Category: Miscellaneous
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Tis The Season
. . . for the NORAD Santa Tracker once again! The countdown clock is running, and NORAD personnel are already giving deadpan media interviews about this year's operation.
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The Harmonic Convergence of Geekery
There are science fiction geeks. Hi, my name is Jim and I'm a science fiction geek. ("Hi, Jim!" says everyone gathered in the church basement.) There are typography geeks. I'm not a typography geek, though I am a fan. (I lack the knowledge to be an actual typography geek.) ("What a poser!" thinks everyone gathered…
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Philcon 2014
This coming weekend I'll be at Philcon, the venerable Philadelphia science fiction convention. Like a lot of venerable Northeastern science fiction conventions, it's no longer held in the city where it began, but off in a suburb where the hotels are affordable. (The only exception to that rule I know of is Boskone, which is…
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What I’ve Been Up To
It's been a while since my last posting, due to a combination of being busy and being sick (and not getting well as fast as I'd like because of the busy component). Fortunately, I can make other people do the work for me. This podcast explains some of where I've been for the past month.…
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Please FORWARD This IMPORTANT WARNING!
I've been following the news about the upcoming vote on whether or not Scotland should leave the United Kingdom. Interesting stuff. But then I had a shocking realization: there is a Sinister Plan underlying the whole scheme, and I'm sounding the alarm to make sure everyone is aware of what's going on. Follow the timeline:…
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Diversity and DragonCon
In recent years the cozy cameraderie of the science fiction world has been disrupted by controversies over diversity and tolerance. We've been told that SF is too white, too male, and too straight, and that we need to Do Something to change that. I'm not going to grapple with the question of whether the demographics…
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Here Be Dragons: Dragon-Con 2014
My talented wife Diane Kelly was invited to participate in this year's Dragon-Con in Atlanta as a science panelist. I tagged along, for several reasons. My first priority was to work in a little book promotion for A Darkling Sea and the upcoming Corsair. To that end I volunteered to help man the SFWA table…
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Congratulations Hugo Winners
Congratulations to the winners of the 2014 Hugo awards, and to all the nominees. The winners: Best Novel: Ancillary Justice by Ann Leckie Best Novella: "Equoid" by Charles Stross Best Novelette: "The Lady Astronaut of Mars" by Mary Kowal Best Short Story: "The Water That Falls on You From Nowhere" by John Chu Best Related Work: We Have Always…
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Armadillocon, Featuring ME!!
This coming weekend I will be a guest at Armadillocon 36, in charming Austin, Texas. If you happen to be deep in the heart of Texas this weekend, come by. Here's what I'll be doing. Friday, July 25 4-5 p.m.: Cool Locations Which Haven't Been Used — A panel discussion; the title pretty much says it…
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On the Verge of Great Events
Most of us remember history as a series of Big Events: wars, revolutions, inventions, disasters, and so forth. (Historians in recent decades have done an immense amount of really amazing work studying day-to-day life in the past, but nobody seems to pay much attention to them aside from other historians.) The trouble with Big Events…
The Cambias Digression 