Ohmygodyay

We’re back in our place. It looks fan-freakin-tastic if you look past all the empty cardboard boxes that need to go out. So glad we did the reno. Never want to do a reno like that again.

Canadian SF Writer Beaten, Arrested

This comes via Ocelot on Twitter, who posted the link:

Dr Peter Watts, Canadian science fiction writer, beaten and arrested at US border

My friend, the wonderful sf writer Peter Watts was beaten without provocation and arrested by US border guards on Tuesday. I heard about it early Wednesday morning in London and called Cindy Cohn, the legal director of the Electronic Frontier Foundation. She worked her contacts to get in touch with civil rights lawyers in Michigan, and we mobilized with Caitlin Sweet (Peter’s partner) and David Nickle (Peter’s friend) and Peter was arraigned and bailed out later that day.

But now Peter faces a felony rap for "assaulting a federal officer" (Peter and the witness in the car say he didn’t do a thing, and I believe them). Defending this charge will cost a fortune, and an inadequate defense could cost Peter his home, his livelihood and his liberty.

Plus side: There will almost certainly be video surveillance of the scene.
Negative side: Legal defense is expensive.

The entire article is here.
More here.
And here.
Ooh, and here.

If you can, please give. If you can’t, boost the signal.

Previous Post

Oh my holy god it’s gotten cold. It’s minus six, which is really cold for us at this time of year. It’s the right time of year to be hanging out in an overstuffed undersized apartment where there’s nothing to do but sit in the bed and watch TV. And I do mean nothing, because our place is too small to do much in except sit in the bed and watch TV. Which is, let’s face it, the greatest thing ever.

So I’ve been spending my evenings watching Hikaru no Go, which is the most amazing anime because it defies the usual anime conventions (there are no giant mecs, no monsters, there’s not really any magic (all though there is a haunting) and the gratuitous shower scene that one finds at least once in almost any anime is mysteriously absent – woah!) and also because it’s an exciting anime about a game that I find really boring to watch. So it’s kind of magical, actually.

I’m actually getting some writing done too, which is nice. I think I’ve finally learned not to talk about what I’m writing about because every time I do I stop wanting to work on that project. I don’t know if talking about it makes all the magic sort of go away, or if I think too much through the story and consequently become bored of it or what. One way or the other, it’s the kiss of death to talk about what I’m working on while I’m doing it. So, erm, disregard this part of the post, OK?

Ahem. Anyway, this whole 700sq feet of stuff crammed into a 300sq foot space situation feels a lot like staying in a hotel for a convention, except it’s a whole lot less exciting and there’s no room service.

Moving

We’re moving house, and that means I’ll probably be without the internet till Friday. How I’ll survive I have no idea. Hopefully I’ll get to post or twit at you guys some time soon.

Cold, Winnipeg and Keycon

Spent last night at our friend’s place drinking cheap sake and eating Chinese take out food. Home today about as hydrated as a prune forgotten in the back of the pantry. Must. Have. Water. Fun night, though. We watched Coraline and a few Family Guy episodes and two out of four of us complained almost non stop about how stiff karate had made us. We’re practicing up for old age.

Stumbled home full and warm and very very tired while the wind bent frosty trees at dangerous angles and howled through the alley. Woke in the middle of the night because our greenhouse was trying to take flight. The wind is still contorting the leafless trees, and it’s supposed to keep up like this till tomorrow, so if any of you guys are on the coast, make safe your flyaway goods! Worse still, it’s 3 degrees here. Now, I know some of you (Ocelot) are going to be in fits of laughter when I whine about it being 3 degrees. I know. I know. Let me give you the Patented Coastal Response to your derision: “It’s a wet cold. Much colder-feeling than a dry cold.”

This is, in fact, partially true, but it doesn’t mean that we’re as cold in relative terms as Winnipeg right now. Or even in spring. Ah, Winnipeg.

You know, I might have been hard on that town when I posted here, but the fact is, I really like that place (ohmygodUkraniansausagehomnom). I had fun when I was there, caught up with a good friend and made some new ones and really enjoyed Keycon. But… well, looking at my finances, I’m sad to say I don’t think I’m likely to make it to Keycon this year. The cost of flying and then bunking in a hotel is, really, prohibitive.

I’m a bit bummed about this. I really loved Keycon. The organizers did a great job last year, the other guests were great fun, the attendees were the sort of people I wish I could have stuffed into my suitcase to bring back home. I’ll be sorry to miss it.

All that said, if I can get a cheap flight, I’ll go (assuming the organizers don’t say no, of course). So I’m on the hunt. If you guys see any seat sales, know of any wormholes, or have access to a postal van that’s headed east, let me know.

My Brilliant Plans

Oh god. I am so sore.

I’m sore because I had a great class last night. I did at least 30 breakfalls (and I would be unsurprised if the total was somewhat closer to 50). I know this is nothing to those aikidoka out there in the world, but for me? Damn big night. So that hurts a bit the next day, because you never land every fall exactly right (at least, I never do).

And we’re packing up everything we own and moving it fifty feet down the hall while our place gets new paint and new carpet. We’re moving without the fun and excitement of going to a new place. Yes, we did this to ourselves (I was the one who announced I was sick of the carpet and got the whole thing started) and yes, the outcome will be grand, but everything we own is mostly books. They weight a lot. I’m a little bit sore from all the packing and schlepping.

And I started working out again. This is because the jeans I bought in summer time fit rather less well than they did when I bought them. I’m just doing two little half hour workouts twice a week, one cardio and one strength. I’ve never done strength training before. I’m a bit sore from that.

All my brilliant plans are completely sensible. They’re all good for me. Yay, good karate class! Yay working out! Boo moving but it has to be done! But all at once? Not the most masterful execution.

Question for the Ages

Apropos of nothing…

I’m listening to the BBC, and the news programs today have been all about how the people who ran the banks into the ground are going to get enormous bonuses this year. The banks say they need to pay huge bonuses or they’ll lose the top brains and then who will run the ship?

Has no one given this any thought?

Do the people who work in banking in the UK have no sense of duty to their country? No sense of shame? If they’re the kind of people to make a grand hash of an entire nation’s economy and then just run off after a better paying gig, good God, why on earth would you want them?

Good Question

A friend on Livejournal asked this question:

“did you ever have to write any query letters?”

Oh my yes. Yes I did. And do. Every damn time I want to sell something, a query goes out with the manuscript.

Queries are the letter you send to a publisher asking them to buy what you’re selling. They’re fraught. People spend huge amounts of time agonizing over them, but the fact is they’re just letters. They need to do a few things – convey information clearly, demonstrate the author of the letter can manage the language, and give the editor some idea of what to expect from the submission, but really, that’s it. Here’s how I do mine:

Oh my god, it’s almost December. 0.o

 

Final final final

So I got the final final final round of edits for Field Guide (I think. I hope.) and, really I have to give a shout out to Jay Lake, who once, long ago, in the far off mists of time, posted something on his blog about how the only person who has any responsibility for the text in the printed book is the author because when people read a book and find a mistake, they don’t think, gee, the editor/proofer should have caught that, they think, what a dumb author. And they’d be right. Who else should care about your book as much as you?

Anyway, this is a nugget of wisdom that I’ve taken to heart, and today, it may have saved me from having Field Guide come out with an appalling and unintentionally hilarious misprint. Autocorrect, a function that I suspect is the scourge of fantasy writers everywhere and not just the bane of my existence, autocorrected a character’s name from Hyan to Hyman. Erm. No. Not quite what I was going for.