Category: science fiction

Back from the Bay Area…

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At work, trying to get things done. There’s an interesting concept.

Anyway, let’s begin with a picture:

I am absolutely sure that isn’t what they meant, but I got a pretty good chuckle out of it.

So, I went to the Bay Area. Things I did:

  • Went to the Office of Letters and Light (the folks who run NaNoWriMo) to sign my ML form for the coming year. I may be the only ML who will do it that way.

  • Drove to ‘s place; got smothered in kisses by Zoe, who is my second most favorite dog in the world after my own. Also, forgot to take the greenies wrapper out of my pocket after I opened them to give to doggies, which led Zoe to keep sniffing my pocket hopefully that there would be a second treat. Also, saw chickens and got a slice of awesome bread that made.
  • Got back on the freeway, drove back to 680 and made the loop around into the South Bay, as 880’s traffic can get really bad. Stopped in Milpitas to kill time; found disgusting bathrooms and that picture in the Borders there.
  • Went to the BASFA meeting because (a) I’ve been wanting to go and (b) the UK TAFF delegate was supposed to be there. Alas, ran afoul of the air travel gods and failed to get out of Seattle until 5:30, which meant that he was too exhausted when he got here to make the trip down to the meeting. So sad! But other than that, I had a good time, even if the meeting went way longer than I expected.
  • Got back in the car, and drove home mostly without incident, although I got slightly lost in Concord/Walnut Creek/Pleasant Hill looking for caffeinated goodness, which probably cost me a half hour. Paid my bridge toll in dollar coins, which I think weirded out the attendant a little. (Why did I have dollar coins? Well, see, I give TAFF delegates shiny gold coins.)
  • Got home at 1:30 AM; got back up and went to work this morning

I think that’s about it. I don’t know when the next time I’ll make a trip over — finances are kinda tight. Folks are trying to talk me into showing up at Silicon, but I don’t think that’s going to happen. I’m hoping for a Big Game trip, myself, but again, money’s tight, and getting a ticket to Big Game at Stanford’s breadbox is difficult.

That’s about it. Guess it’s time to go back to work, now that I figured out why I was critfailing my HTML roll.

the news from Montreal

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So another Worldcon winds down. If all goes well, I should be at the next one, but at the moment I’m not expecting it to go well. However, unless things go absolutely pear-shaped, I’ll be at the one in 2011, since, y’know, it’s just over the hill from Sactown.

But that’s not the point of this post. The point is to prod at the news from Montreal. And here’s my thoughts. Note: these are just my thoughts.

First off, Reno wins the 2011 Worldcon and Raleigh takes the 2010 NASFiC. Neither of these are the unexpected results, as both were unopposed, but now we know where we’ll be hanging out. As I said, Reno’s just over the hill from Sactown, and as soon as I can scrape up the money, I’ll be buying my attending membership. I encourage all my friends to buy supporting memberships; if nothing else, you’ll get to vote for the Hugos. If you want to go all out and get an attending membership, that’s even better. Come party in Reno with me. ;)

Also, I’m fairly impressed at how well the Reno team has gotten on the ball in regards to social networking. Since Saturday, I’ve received invitations to both the LJ community and the Twitter account, and I suspect, if I were more active on Facebook than I am, I’d have an invitation there too. Well done.

Next, this year’s Hugo trophy is a work of art. Well done. I think that’s my favorite trophy of the last three years.

As for the awards themselves, the first thing that pops out is what might amount to the end of an era. Somebody other than Locus takes the Semipro award, and the category was saved from elimination at the business meeting, both of which I think are good things. I’m all about diversity in winners in the Hugo categories — in both the senses of different people winning them, and in the sense of diverse in the larger context, although I freely admit, the latter is harder. Anyway, the point is, epic moment.

Best fan writer went to Cheryl Morgan. Cheryl’s an awesome choice; I love her writing. Also, I know that she has wanted to defeat Dave Langford in honorable combat, and she’s gone and done that in dramatic fashion. As I said, Cheryl’s awesome and I’m glad for her victory in the category. (Also, that red dress is exquisite.)

On the other hand, there’s best fanzine. Electric Velocipede was the winner. This, in my opinion, doesn’t feel right. Don’t get me wrong, John Klima is also doing excellent work, and the fanzine rules as written don’t exclude him from the category, as he’s rightly pointed out. However, I’m the sort that finds the idea of paying for something that’s in the fanzine category just a little odd, as the ethics of fanzines, as I have been taught them, seem to imply that charging (or paying) anything other than the fannish usual (that is, a copy of the fanzine for a contribution, LoC, or as speculation) is just not kosher. See, I know EV is a labor of love for John, just as fanzines are for their editors, but I’m not sure Best Fanzine is the best place for what he’s doing. But the will of the voters has overruled me, and it is a diverse result, so I’m not sure if I can complain too much. Besides, it’s entirely possible I’ve been hanging out with the old fogies of fandom for too long. ;)

A quick shot of the rest of the categories: I’m sad Taral Wayne didn’t win Best Fan Artist. Frank Wu is a good guy, and a great artist, but I was rooting for Taral in this catagory. Don’t really know much about editors or the short form nominees, so can’t say much there; same with most of the fiction categories. (I failed to read most of them this year; this is something I will rectify for next year’s ballot.) Wall-E won long form, which was not unexpected. The Foglios got a Hugo for Girl Genius in the first year of Best Graphic Novel; I couldn’t think of a better choice. John Scalzi gets another Hugo, for Best Related Book this year — now he just needs to win Best Novel one of these years to complete the trifecta. And, Best Novel went to The Graveyard Book, by Neil Gaiman. I believe that makes Neil the first author to win both the Newberry and the Hugo for the same book.

Chris Garcia not only beat out No Award, but a couple actual living breathing human beings in both his categories. There’s hope for a Hugo for the fanzine lounge yet. At the same time, I’m sad that one of the living breathing human beings was Steven Silver, a person whom I’ve gotten to know through eAPA, and whose work I anticipate every month in that august distribution.

My goal for next year is to receive five nominations and thus show up on the nominations list. That would be awesome. I doubt it’ll happen, though, as I’ve not really done much to warrant the honor.

I like the new logo for the Hugo Award. It’s simple, but elegant. I like that clean style; it’s very Art Deco (I think that’s the right term) and a nice nod to the origins of fandom in those long ago decades. Well done, again.

And I think that’s most all the news from Montreal. I’ll sign off now.

Saturday morning sleepiness

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I’m typing the following on my BlackBerry in the hotel lobby. I’m not entirely awake yet, but I’m not exactly happy to discover that my gopher shift is not nine to noon, but ten to one. The more astute of you will notice that this cuts into broadcasting hours at Baycon. So to make up for it, I’ll be going from as soon after one as I can get to the fanzine lounge. Ohd course, there still are caveats, as I haven’t actually broadcast from hotel space yet.
Other than that minor annoyance, things are going well. More when I’m actually at my computer and can type easier.

Wow, it’s been a day.

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Current ribbon count: 31, plus gopher ribbon, plus three I haven’t attached to the badge yet, for a total of 35.

Current fun being had: Loads.

Permission for live broadcasting from the Fanzine Lounge: Authorized.

Picture taken of me: Possibly for the newsletter, need to get somebody to snap me with my own camera, probably in my natural habitat (in front of a door).

Things that are crucial: Make up signs for the unofficial Sactown BOF in the consuite tomorrow.

Things that have made me feel really awesome: Getting a nice note from the lady who cleaned our room since we left her a tip. Getting mentioned at ribbon panel as having one of the possibly hot ribbons of the con.

And that’s about it.

More later, or you can always check my twitter feed as I can get to that on my phone and may be inclined to update it more frequently. Or not. I mean, as it is, I’ve made more posts this week than I have in weeks…

Here in Santa Clara…

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Made the hotel last night, got a decent amount of sleep — although stupid me forgot to close the windowshades, which made my roommate get less sleep than anticipated.

I’m about to go downstairs and wander through convention space, although the convention hasn’t technically started yet. My plans for the day involve going to find Chris Garcia, attending a panel, and maybe a couple other things. No plans for broadcasting today, but that might change. Watch Tuckerverse for details and sudden updates.

Also, if you’re at Baycon, and want ribbons, come find me and ask nicely.

(Also, rumor has it that I might have installed Skype, and might even be listed under the username ‘retstak’, but you know you shouldn’t count on unsubstantiated rumors.)

Look what came in the mail today!

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Yeah, my plaque for Best New Fanzine Fan showed up in the mail today, and that’s me proudly holding it. And yes, that’s a shirt from the Denver Worldcon I’m wearing. For those who want a closer view, here’s a picture of the plaque I took.

Anyway, gotta get back to writing. The end of the month fast approaches…

Reason #5628 why it would be nice to win the lottery

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Because I would love to get my hands on this collection.

Alas, I am still not yet a multi-millionare, so I’ll have to keep dreaming.

My gast is well and truly flabbed.

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So, not two weeks ago, I wrote here joking about winning a Hugo in 2014. Would I like that? Oh, sure. Who wouldn’t? But that’s a huge dream and one I suspect might not happen at all.

But that’s not why I found my gast well and truly flabbed yesterday. It had started with my pal Ei dropping me off at my grandmother’s so I could hook up with my folks and my ride back to Sactown. While she was there, I made mention of a possible Baycon ribbon I was thinking about, and then had to explain to my grandmother what ribbons were and why I wanted to make them for something called Baycon, which led to me explaining in general terms about science fiction conventions, specifically Baycon and Worldcon. (Also, there was a digression on how con-commuting is a bit painful and the turn-around times and I were pulling in Denver last year.)

The conversation drifted, as conversations are wont to do, and at a lull I pulled out my phone and glanced at my email. There, I found an email from Peter Sullivan (). Now the two of us are friends and fellow eAPAeans, but generally we don’t exchange email. But it wasn’t the fact I got an email from him that had me staring at my phone in shock. No, it was his subject line: “Congratulations on your FAAn award win!”

Now, a bit of a digression here. The FAAn awards stand for “Fanzine Activity Achievement Awards”, and they are voted on by whomever in fandom chooses to participate, although in practice, it works out to being mostly fanzine fans. There’s several categories: best fanzine, best fanzine writer, best fanzine artist, best letterhack (person who writes letters of comment to fanzines), best online fanac site, and best new fan. They’re given out at Corflu every year, and this last weekend was Corflu Zed up Seattle way, simulcast on ustream so that us fans who couldn’t make the trip could hang out and watch the proceedings. Unfortunately, it was also the weekend of my grandmother’s seventieth birthday party, so I couldn’t spend as much time as I would have liked hanging out in the chat and watching the feed.

Which leads me back around to the email informing me I’d tied for first on best new fan with Jean Martin of SF/SF. Now see, I’d fully expected that if I was going to win it at all, it would have been next year, since I was planning to become more visible in the fanzine fandom this year instead of mainly writing my APAzines. So to find out I’d won this year — yeah, it completely came out of the blue.

Hopping on Twitter, I’d found that Peter had announced it there too, and then there was a followup from Chris Garcia, the man who runs the most excellent Baycon fanzine lounge as well as being a whirling dervish of fandom, saying much the same thing. So I guess this had actually happened, and I wasn’t dreaming. And after getting back into Sactown, I hopped back on the virtual con and had a couple people congratulate me there, too, which just went to make it all that more concrete.

So yeah. It may not be a rocket, but it’s a truly wonderful surprise nonetheless. I’m pleased as heck that the folks who voted for me in the awards thought highly enough of me to do so.

Yes. My gast is well and truly flabbed, even now on Monday morning.

Fandom in 2014?

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So I participate in a couple APAs. One of them is not relevant to this story. The other is.

You see, the next issue of eAPA will be its sixtieth. Since it’s a once a month APA, the sixtieth edition means that it has been going for five years. In celebration of this milestone, we’ve been asked to project what fandom might look like five years down the road. It’s an interesting question at the moment, as people I follow have been nattering about the future of Worldcon, among other things.

So here’s the question. Aside from me accepting my first Hugo at the possibly-European Worldcon of 2014, what do you think fandom will look like in five years?

(Okay, so I’m kidding on the Hugo thing, but ever since I got into science fiction enough to understand just what a Hugo was, I’ve always wanted one of them rocket thingys. Although 2014 might be a bit soon…)

Anyway, I’d really like the comments to be on my blog, so I’m funneling LJ comments over here. Also, feel free to pass this URL onto anybody who might care to comment, as this is the sort of thought I’d like to get from anybody who’s got an opinion on the matter. While this is mainly concerned with science fiction fandom (and all its various components), I’d love to hear from folks who are into anime or comics or media or games, because I suspect those fields tie into the general fandom.

Also, since Chuck, our esteemed editor, would kill me if I failed to mention this, eAPA is always looking for new members. It’s all digital, as we do it in PDF. If you’d like to hang out and wait for the open issue next month, that’s cool, but if you want to get involved in this, Chuck’s address is on the eAPA page at efanzines, which I’ve linked to above.

books! Wonderful books!

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The collection of Worldcon books
The collection of Worldcon books

I finally got around to unpacking the 38 lb duffle and decided to take this picture. This is the collection of books I had signed at Worldcon (or otherwise was collected around that period). Technically, I got my copy of Plague War before Worldcon, but my original plans were to get it and have Jeff Carlson sign it at Worldcon — luckily, Jeff was doing a signing at the Roseville Barnes and Noble the Saturday before Worldcon. Also, the Feghoot book was a lovely parting gift for attempting to compete at Win Tom Whitmore’s Books, and is not signed, although it comes from this worldcon. There are also two unpictured books as they were not in the bag in question, but I’ve listed them below.

No, I did not have an ounce of fun in Denver. I resent the implication that I might have had fun. ;)

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Back to life, back to reality…

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From a rift in the space-time continuum somewhere near the Hyatt Santa Clara, katster emerges from the pocket dimension she has been inhabiting for the last three days.

Tim Powers, our Writer Guest of Honor, was the one that coined the “pocket dimension” idea as he summed up his thoughts on the weekends at closing ceremonies. It’s wonderful, I love it, and I’m going to steal it.

The short of it: Baycon was a blast. I ended up with 64 ribbons, a gopher/gofer ribbon, a Reno Worldcon sticker, a Seattle Worldcon button, and a copy of Orange Soda, the 2008 Baycon fanzine in an hour, which I hope will appear on efanzines.com real soon now. I also have some swag from the dealer’s room, and a silver dollar from 1978 that was given to me in change, and an entire run of the whole official newsletter along with one of the two fake newsletters distributed during con.

I managed to hit all four guests of honor with my “Press Button. Receive Baycon.” ribbon, a feat I was particularly proud of. The gofers went on strike, sorta. (Okay, not really, but I got to make a protest sign that read “Doors Don’t Just Watch Themselves” and I think I’m going to print “Gofer Local #42” ribbons next year.) I went through all five hundred of the ribbons I printed and ran out at about 2 PM on Sunday. (Okay, I still had some of the Top Sekret Ribbon I printed with and in mind, but I wasn’t giving that one to just anybody.)

The hotel staff had a competition to see which employee could collect the most ribbons.

I managed to lose something during con, too. This year’s particular case of the concrud seems to have found its way directly to my vocal cords, which means, I have next to no voice. Good thing I don’t talk much at work.

I’d say more, but I promised Chris Garcia I’d write up my thoughts (or the crimes of Belgium) for his fanzine, and I have to produce AuGH #8 before Sunday, and I have to work.

But I’ve already bought my membership to Baycon 2009, and am counting the days until we’re at it again.

history is dead.

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From a review of the new Indy movie, Annalee Newitz of io9.com has the following observation:

The only edge to the film is a clumsy, knee-jerk liberal subplot about how the evil U.S. government suspects everyone of being part of the Red Menace — even Indy! Sounds just like the evil, suspicious U.S. government today! Wow, thanks for the commentary, but honestly if there had just been cooler aliens or a weirder plot I would have been a lot happier.

The movie is set in the 1950s. Now you can see why I just sighed to myself and muttered, “History is dead…”

Look, McCarthyism and the whole paranoia over the Red Menace was real, and it destroyed lives. If you’re seeing parallels to today’s US government in it, then maybe y’ought to be more scared, y’know?

ribbon madness redux.

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I finally decided on a ribbon.

It will say:

 

Met katster.
(still not king)

 

I’m amused, anyway. :)

Ribbon mania…

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Baycon’s coming in less than two weeks! I’m pretty stoked. Baycon was fun last year, and this year I’m actually staying at the hotel instead of commuting from far away. I’m also showing a friend around her first science fiction convention.

(It was pretty easy to convince her to go. All I had to say was, “Hey, guess what? People run around in costume there and nobody thinks they’re weird!”)

Anyway, this year, I’m going to be handing out badge ribbons. (For the confused, that’s why I posted my Baycon badge from last year. The trail of ribbons extending off of it is an example of what I’m talking about.) I haven’t exactly totally decided what they’re all going to say, but besides the already done top sekret ribbon for , I’ve pretty much decided that I’m going to get one that says “Help! I’m trapped in a ribbon factory!”

I’m still trying to figure out some way of saying ‘I said hi to katster’ in a cool fashion, though.

Also, unrelated, the muttering you may have heard coming from Sacramento was katster studying the preliminary Baycon schedules and wondering *why* Iron Poet and Fanzine in an Hour got put in the same timeslot. ;)

Is this the real life? Is it just fantasy?

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So, last Friday night I went out to an event hosted by the Roseville Library called “A Night of Science Fiction”. Three SF authors were showing up to talk about their books and the genre. I admit, the thing that had me raring to go was that one of the three authors was Kim Stanley Robinson, who most of you know as the guy that wrote the Mars Trilogy (Red/Green/Blue Mars).

Neither of the other two names rung a bell at first, until I found myself in the Roseville Library looking at the in-library ad. They had helpfully reprinted cover photos, and I recognized one of the covers from John Scalzi’s blog series “The Big Idea”. The book in question would be Jeff Carlson’s Plague Year .

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