Dispatches since 2005
The journal
Announcements, new editions, travel, diving, cooking and the working life of a novelist — 101 entries, all of them here in full.
September 26, 2006 · 1,166 words
Sounds
The other night I traveled to Albuquerque to attend the Globalquerque! world music festival, which allowed me to sample half a dozen bands during the course of a single day. “World Music” is one of those shifty categories that can mean anything, but a handy rule of thumb is to consider world music “indigenous music [&h
Read entry →September 22, 2006 · 400 words
Re:Work
There is nothing quite like the experience of sitting at a round table of your peers and being told that the last four chapters of your novel don’t work. Enduring an air strike by B-52s might give something of the flavor, but may be not. In a recent post (“Creamy,” August 17), I discoursed on […]
Read entry →September 20, 2006 · 1,726 words
My Life
So far the day has been spent in another lengthy round of trench warfare with my tractor, Beam. Veterans of the late, lamented Genie and dm.net may remember the tragicomic history of my relationship with this machine. When I first moved to the country I acquired Beam, a Murray tractor with a powerful Tecumseh engine. [
Read entry →September 14, 2006 · 2,533 words
Log of the Eclipse (13)
Cool! I’ve found this totally nifty virtual model of Constantinople, circa 1200, before the Crusaders screwed it up. Check it out! It’s got everything but that damned mechanical bird! Now back to our travelogue: 5 April 2006 The Prophet’s Beard The Hotel Divan’s restaurant seemed unprepared for the number of visitors w
Read entry →September 11, 2006 · 298 words
Be In My Book!
The online auction to benefit the Clarion Foundation begins today. Clarion is, of course, the premiere workshop in fantasy and science fiction. The proceeds from the auction will benefit the workshop. Please drop by, spend money, and come home with nifty items. I know I want Howard Waldrop, in his Peter Lorre voice, an
Read entry →September 6, 2006 · 402 words
Coddled
I am in the midst of a rural idyll. A couple weeks ago Sage Walker invited me up to the Bear Paw Ranch near Regina, to loaf about in beautiful scenery, watch the baby elk frolic in the pasture, and to eat her splendid cookery, which included a breakfast of eggs coddled in brie.* I […]
Read entry →September 1, 2006 · 57 words
Me, Glorious Me
We pause for a moment of self-glorification. This news just in: The Praxis is going into its fourth printing. The Sundering is in its third. Conventions of War went into its second printing earlier in the summer. Holmes, I detect a pattern here. It’s time to bite the bullet and admit that the series is […]
Read entry →August 31, 2006 · 3,129 words
Holy Wisdom
4 April 2006 Holy Wisdom Gack. Up early, down to the uninspired breakfast buffet, then onto the bus for the hour-long ride to the airport in Izmir. Once there, security checkpoints separated scenes of vast confusion. No one seemed in charge. Somehow we got out bags checked. Somehow we got through security and onto the
Read entry →August 28, 2006 · 307 words
Possessed by the Devil!!!
Father Gabriele Amorth, who is official “caster-out of demons” to Pope Benedict XVI, has declared that Hitler and Stalin were possessed by the devil. In fact, according to Father Gabriele, the entire Nazi party was possessed! Glad we’ve finally got to the bottom of that mystery. All those books and papers offering one
Read entry →August 28, 2006 · 242 words
Planet Clyde
The Battle of Pluto is over. But not the war, one hopes. The new decision is lame, the sort that can only be reached by a committee. The IAU has declared that Pluto is now something called a “dwarf planet,” along with Ceres and Xena. Charon remains a satellite. I can’t seem to find out […]
Read entry →August 21, 2006 · 45 words
Neolithic
Readers of my Turkish trip report may recall my mention of Çatalhöyük, the Neolithic site in central Turkey that is believed to be the oldest human settlement. Here’s an excellent article by Çatalhöyük’s current excavator, Ian Hodder, detailing recent discoveries and reinterpretations of older finds.
Read entry →August 21, 2006 · 51 words
Too Cheap to Meter
So now we have a company in Dublin that claims to have ” hit upon a way of generating clean, free and constant energy from the interaction of magnetic fields.” Uh-huh. 420 scientists from around the world have signed up to test the system. Read the story here.
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