Dispatches since 2005
The journal
Announcements, new editions, travel, diving, cooking and the working life of a novelist — 3,176 entries, all of them here in full.
April 30, 2007 · 222 words
Portales
For the last three days I’ve been in Portales, NM, for the 31st Jack Williamson Lecture. This is the first lecture since Jack’s death last year at the age of 98, but there was no decline in the number of professionals who came to honor Jack and to participate in the luncheon and other activities. […]
Read entry →April 24, 2007 · 361 words
Khorasan
The other night Kathy and I drove to Socorro, the Athens of the Southwest, for a concert by Niyaz. (Considering the music, Socorro became for one night more like the Khorasan of the Southwest.) Niyaz is sort of a world music supergroup, assembled out of performers who have had successful careers on their own and [&hell
Read entry →April 21, 2007 · 850 words
The Story Editor Inside Me
Somerset Maugham wrote something to the effect that people read less fiction as they grow older, because the stories in fiction can only take certain predictable shapes, whereas real life (as represented in Maugham’s example by history or biography) is essentially without limit. I find that this is true in my case. I r
Read entry →April 18, 2007 · 1,760 words
Robins Hood
BBC America has been running the latest version of Robin Hood, and I— a sucker for dramas in which characters wear tights and bash each other with heavy lengths of iron— have been watching. The Brits seem to do a new Robin Hood every decade or so, I suppose because the Merrie Men, though diligent […]
Read entry →April 18, 2007 · 239 words
Eat Like an Edwardian
I read with fascination this article from the Times, in which the author and his wife enjoyed a typical Edwardian diet of 5000 calories per day. Here’s the menu for the first day.DAY 1Breakfast: Porridge, sardines, curried eggs, grilled cutlets, coffee, hot chocolate, bread, butter, honey. Lunch: Sauté of kidneys on to
Read entry →April 11, 2007 · 669 words
I Hab’ a Co’de
Or some other damn kind of virus. Sore throat, splitting headache, constant cough, sleepless nights, general misery. And this just after I’d given the tax stuff to the accountant and was ready for some fun. Instead I’m housebound watching videos, because my head hurts too much when I try to read. Here’s what I’ve seen.
Read entry →April 5, 2007 · 1,621 words
The Sarge and Me
For the last ten days or so I’ve been indulging in that annual American rite of spring, the preparation of the income tax. It is my custom, while slowly going blind staring at faded receipts marked with cryptic notes that doubtless seemed perfectly understandable at the time, to avoid encroaching madness by renting and
Read entry →April 2, 2007 · 88 words
Sky Glow
Why New Mexico? Here are four colorful reasons. We had a storm pass through the other night, darkening the sky to near-black. Then the setting sun broke through the cloud cover to the West and set the whole Eastern horizon ablaze. Here are some rather inadequate pictures. Today, Palm Sunday, we passed a group of [&hell
Read entry →March 30, 2007 · 995 words
A Place to Stand
Last night I caught two episodes of the Travel Channel’s latest, 1000 Places to Go Before You Die, based on the best-selling book of the same name. (A copy of which my 2005 Clarion students kindly gave me as a parting gift. Or maybe not so kindly. Maybe they were suggesting I go to Borneo […]
Read entry →March 24, 2007 · 167 words
Who Knew?
So I have now discovered a previously unknown demographic: that strange and heretofore occult overlap between the fans of science fiction and professional ice hockey.Yes, my signing at the New Mexico Scorpions game was a success! (Or at least, a success in the category: previous signings with me in them, not taking pla
Read entry →March 23, 2007 · 358 words
The Virtues of Repression
This topic has been inspired by mention of Samuel R Delany in an earlier topic, Tour de Force, below.I am moved to ask the following question: Is repression good for you? Or, if not for you exactly, for art?Take Delany as an example. In his early career, it was forbidden, particularly within our commercial genre, [&hel
Read entry →March 17, 2007 · 647 words
Tour de Force
I just reread Roger Zelazny’s Creatures of Light and Darkness for the first time in maybe thirty years. I’m not sure how I missed it during that time, since I regularly reread Roger’s work. Perhaps I failed to go back to the book because my personal copy seems to have gone missing, so when I […]
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