Dispatches since 2005
The journal
Announcements, new editions, travel, diving, cooking and the working life of a novelist — 187 entries, all of them here in full.
September 19, 2007 · 276 words
Robert Jordan
I knew Robert Jordan by his given name, Jim Rigney, though I didn’t know him well. His wife, Harriet McDougal, edited my second Tor book, and when they visited New Mexico in the mid-Eighties, Fred Saberhagen threw them a party. (Thus, in memory, do the dead play host to the dead.) I remember Jim told […]
Read entry →September 19, 2007 · 51 words
I Have a Cold
I have a cold. Again.It’s not a bad cold, as colds go, but it’s inconvenient, and it sucks away energy.This is something like the fifth cold I’ve had in the last eighteen months. I conclude that my immune system has gone to hell.Any home remedies I should try?
Read entry →September 15, 2007 · 339 words
Annihilation! Cool Flying Dudes! And other stories from the world of science . . .
Greg Frost has been keeping me up to date this week on the world o’ science, and it’s clear that science is becoming more skiffy than ever. First up— annihilation! A team including David Cassidy— who will be played in the movie by David Cassidy— has succeeded in merging di-positronium with ordinary po
Read entry →September 13, 2007 · 653 words
Truisms
I’ve been reading Imperium, by Robert Harris, a novel about the life of Cicero. It seems to cover the middle part of the great advocate’s career, from the prosecution of Gaius Verres to the conspiracy of Catalina. It leaves out Cicero’s rocky relationship with the First Triumvirate and his tutelage of Octavius, who lat
Read entry →September 9, 2007 · 160 words
Th.J for Fake
“I used to brag that I got the Thomas Jefferson wines,” hesaid. “Now I get to brag that I have the fake Thomas Jeffersonwines.” As a sometime stage magician, I enjoy a good sleight-of-hand. I like a colossal monstrous jape, a clever bit of illusion, and Orson Welles, both for his War of the Worlds […]
Read entry →September 8, 2007 · 124 words
Why Men?
“Today’s human population is descended from twice as many women asmen.“I think this difference is the single most underappreciated fact about gender. To get that kind of difference, you had to have something like, throughout the entire history of the human race, maybe 80% of women but only 40% of men reproduced. “ So h
Read entry →September 8, 2007 · 145 words
Strike in Second Life
IBM employees are going on strike in Second Life. During the talks to renew IBM’s Italian internal collectiveagreement, the works council, supported by the majority of IBM Italy employees, asked for a small salary increase. IBM responded by cancelling their “productive results benefit”, resulting in a loss of €1000 per
Read entry →September 7, 2007 · 61 words
Laboratory Supermen
“The feeble-minded and the man of intelligence should not be equal before the law.”High civilization is besieged by those possessed of inferior genetics! A heroic man of action and a brilliant scientist team up to find the secret of immortality, in order to create a super race!The time was the 1930s. The man of action
Read entry →September 5, 2007 · 108 words
Lucky Camera
According to this press release from the University of Cambridge, Lucky Imaging is now taking astronomical pictures that are clearer than those produced by Hubble, and at 1/50,000th the cost. The system uses ground-based cameras combined with inexpensive software. “These are the sharpest images ever taken either from t
Read entry →September 5, 2007 · 80 words
Rain, Thunder, Hail, Beef!
So here we find our soaked survivors of the Williams Lake hike. First me modeling the latest in plastic tabards. Note the flared shoulders, the tight bodice, the daring use of double vents. Next, we have Me, Pat, and Scott. Scott displays his Manly Stance. Thirdly, Williams Lake without the tourists. Picture the silenc
Read entry →September 4, 2007 · 745 words
Thunder, Lighting, Hail
The holiday weekend was full. On Friday night Kathy and I journeyed to Santa Fe for Carl’s birthday party. Next morning, following breakfast at Melinda’s of Lamy (eggs baked atop spinach, brie, havarti, and cream), we journeyed to Snow Bear at Taos Ski Valley for a weekend with our friends Pat and Scott. We drank [&hel
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