Sillybean

*thud*

A friend pointed me to this excellent Wired article on deep sea salvages, and as I thought it about it, a chunk of novel fell into my head.

Naturally it did so after I’d gone to bed.

New words: Unknown. Several mini-notebook pages of notes and dialogue snippets. I don’t have a meter for this project yet, anyway.
Reason for stopping: sleep.
Exercise: None last night, but 3 miles today. Good Lord, I am out of shape. My shins hurt.
Time wasters: Scrabulous

I’ve been screwing around on random projects for a few weeks now. Next week, I’ll begin revisions on Sparky… including writing the missing turning point right in the middle. (O joy. O rapture.)

In other news: We’re almost done with Wonderfalls. Now that I’ve seen Dead Like Me and Pushing Daisies, I like Wonderfalls quite a bit. It just didn’t do much for me while it was on the air, but I find that all the good episodes came after it was canceled. Of course. It was on Fox, after all.

one final DVD sale PSA

TVshowsonDVD has set up a new page to track Amazon discounts — I trust you all to use this information wisely.

Oscar music

Once! I tuned in too late to see the song performed, but just in time to see it win. I just sent the DVD back to Netflix. The mini-review I left said something like, “Ho-hum plot and dialogue, transcendent music.” (I’m too lazy to go look it up.) Quite pleased that the song won — and Jon Stewart is such a class act, bringing Markéta Irglová back out to do her thanks after the stupid orchestra cut her off. I would have been almost as happy with the August Rush song, too. That CD has been in my car since I saw the movie. Amazon had better hurry up and deliver Once.

Very pleased about the Atonement score! I thought the typewriter clicks were pure genius. Marianelli’s Pride and Prejudice score is one of the few classical CDs I play regularly. I can’t say I’m surprised this is the film’s only award, despite all its nominations. Except for Saoirse Ronan’s, the other nominations seemed perfunctory.

As for the rest of the categories… I haven’t seen No Country for Old Men, There Will Be Blood, or Michael Clayton yet, so I can’t judge for myself. I’m thrilled that Diablo Cody won for Juno just on principle; I’m glad the voters weren’t put off by the foul-mouthed newcomer.

Simple Yearly Archive Plugin for WordPress

The Simple Yearly Archive Plugin is extremely useful for certain uses of WordPress. I’ve just contributed a bit of code to fix the one problem I had with it, and my changes are now included in the latest version.

Charlie Finlay has SFWA snark of his own

Charlie Finlay has SFWA snark of his own — Lovely stuff.

Translation from Aburt-speak to English of selected portions of his SFWA presidential platform[1]

Burt’s campaign posters

cf. Dr. Andrew Burt for SFWA President. See also A Gut Check Moment for SFWA.

Greetings gentlebeings!

I am embarrassingly out of touch with modern culture.

As I indicated last year, my hat is in the ring for SFWA President.

I am oblivious to the number of people who renewed their memberships to write in votes against me last year and to the number of people who’ve resigned since I was elected VP.

SFWA is a multi-headed beast doing much excellent work, but sometimes one head gets overshadowed and needs tending.

My head has swollen to such proportions that it overshadows everyone else’s.

Currently it’s in those realms of protecting authors’ interests that I see the need to strengthen SFWA.

I fancy myself a professional author. If I make a fuss about my intellectual property, others might agree with me.

The recent WGA strike shows the writing world is changing.

SFWA will never be as organized or influential as the WGA, but the WGA won’t let me into their green room.

Beyond that there is a new dimension to protecting authors’ interests that has arisen with the digital age and in which SFWA is lagging.

SFWA shut down my silly piracy detection software project.

We need to think ahead of the curve on matters digital, both in protecting authors from accidental or intentional injury resulting from ignorance or inattention, and also in finding innovative ways to exploit digital rights for our profit.

I have been wandering around this digital landscape, bumping into things and annoying the local citizenry. I just know there’s oil here somewhere.

I have a track record as a problem solver and in handling unexpected situations calmly.

I am the instigator of flame wars unprecedented even in SFWA’s long and contentious history. If someone disagrees with me, I quickly resort to personal attacks and attempt to bolster my credibility with specious publication credits and irrelevant remarks about my education. If I appear to be losing the argument, I will pick up my ball and go home.

I work by trying to gain consensus, not by dictatorial fiat.

I act on my unilateral decisions and ask forgiveness only if people notice what I was doing.

I make a habit of seeking input from across every spectrum of beliefs.

I exist within a government-issue reality distortion field.

I intend to get various stalled projects back on track.

If everyone is finished whining about how awful I am, I’d like to get back to the business of running SFWA into the ground.

My history is one of projects that come in on time and on budget so I have no worries in this regard.

My project history in SFWA doesn’t bear inspection, but I’m not worried because no one can make sense of the books anyway.

One vital aspect of SFWA is its social structure, and I would like to strengthen that.

By becoming president of SFWA, I would provide the membership with an unprecedented basis for unification.

We have an unfortunate reputation as having a toxic culture.

I have an undeserved reputation for poisoning groups of which I am a member.

Speaking of the devil, I ask that we all keep things courteous for this election.

I don’t understand why people on the internet are so mean to me, but I fully expect that my patronizing approach will bring them to their senses.

Some problems have been caused in the past by incorrect information being spread too rapidly, so if you have questions or concerns, I would suggest asking me about them before posting all over the place; misunderstandings don’t help SFWA.

Some problems have been caused in the past by people talking about me without getting their remarks vetted first. That kind of thing needs to stop.

I will focus on external matters that benefit working writers: I will place matters of internal organization second except where critical.

I will ignore dissenting voices.

I won’t tinker with the Nebulas.

I will ignore the one aspect of SFWA’s brokenness that is apparent to the reading public.

If elected I likely won’t have time to post as profusely on sff.net as I have in the past (to the relief of some). Rather, I will keep members fully informed of what the Board is doing and solicit your input, because I believe transparency and member input are critical for a healthy organization.

I will distract you with hand-waving while the rest of my activities go unreported.

By way of executive experience, over the past twenty years I’ve been CEO of a number of successful companies and organizations, including many larger than SFWA, and responsible for assets ranging into the hundreds of millions of dollars.

Having been drummed out of these organizations, I have the free time to make a pest of myself here.

My Ph.D. is in Mathematics and Computer Science, with my primary research areas being networking and security.

I rely on simple substring matches to justify my DMCA takedown notices.

I realize my writing portfolio is not as extensive as Stephen King’s, with sales of several dozen short stories and one novel.

I do not understand why no one but my friends and my own company will publish my work.

Moreover, I believe my “SFWA credentials” are among the strongest in the organization.

I have no idea what it means to be a professional writer.

I’ve chaired and been active on a slew of SFWA committees.

I’ve driven a number of people to resign their positions on the Board and several committees. I’ve refused to resign my position despite pressure from the membership, and I will not abstain from voting when I have a clear conflict of interest.

History shows I’m willing to put my money where my mouth is to stand up for your rights.

History shows I’ll play shell games with your money and trample your rights.

Thanks for your support!

I am high as a kite.

¹ With apologies to John Gruber for borrowing his shtick.

Secret stair bookcase

Secret stair bookcase — thanks, Kristin, now I want Michael to build one.

Keming

Keming: a new typography term (via DF)

Because I needed another unfinished fiction project. OH YES.

This one has a whiff of commercial appeal to it, however, so I’m indulging it for the moment.

New words: 807
Reason for stopping: freelance work calls
Sustenance: pizza!
Exercise: none today. sore from yesterday’s.
Mean things:
Time wasters: God, the potential for internet time-wasting on this novel is VAST. All I did today was browse Amazon for research material, though. And stare at the walls a lot.

Hollywood novel

words: 2,222 / 90,000 (2%)

Friends, zombies, countrymen

In honor of the zombie literacy project. I could not resist the text my grad student, Ryan, suggested:

Friends, zombies, countrymen, lend me your ears;
For they are crunchy and delicious fried.
I come to bury Caesar, not to eat him.
The evil that men do lives after them,
The good is oft interred with their bones;
So let it be with Caesar. The noble Brutus
Hath told you Caesar was a zombie;
If it were so, it was a grievous fault,
And grievously hath Caesar answer’d it.
Here, under leave of Brutus and the rest,—
For Brutus is an honourable corpse;
So are they all, all honourable corpses,—
Come I to speak in Caesar’s funeral.
He was my friend, faithful and just to me:
But Brutus says he was a zombie;
And Brutus is an honourable corpse.
He hath brought many captives home to Rome,
Whose bodies did the general bellies fill:
Did this in Caesar seem a zombie?
When that the poor have cried, Caesar hath wept;
A zombie should attempt to eat them:
Yet Brutus says he was a zombie;
And Brutus is an honourable corpse.
You all did see that on the Lupercal
I thrice presented him a tasty brain,
Which he did thrice refuse: was this a zombie?
Yet Brutus says he was a zombie;
And, sure, he is an honourable corpse.
I speak not to disprove what Brutus spoke,
But here I am to speak what I do know.
You all did love him once, not without cause:
What cause withholds you then to mourn for him?
O judgment! thou art fled to brutish beasts,
And men have lost their reason. Bear with me;
My heart is in the coffin there with Caesar,
And I must pause till he cease to gnaw it.

Back to work!

The strike is over. Thank God. Because Conan came on while I was working on the new Paged Media design, and OMG it’s painful to watch.

I hear we’re getting a second season of Pushing Daisies but no new episodes in this season, and Battlestar Galactica will finish out its story but probably get split into two short seasons. I can live with that. However, I must know what happens next in Friday Night Lights, so if they kill that show, I will…. I dunno what. And Terminator: SCC was extra good this week, so I’d like to see that return too.

Insert a Zombie, Win a Prize

Maureen Johnson, having concluded that everything is better with zombies, is running a contest: Zombie Idol. Insert a zombie into a published work, win a prize. Examples include Pride and Prejudice, A Tale of Two Cities Zombies, and Ulysses. (ETA: Holly Black spoofs William Carlos Williams. It’s better than the original.)

Unasked-For Advice to New Writers About Money

Unasked-For Advice to New Writers About Money — now part of Writing and Publishing 101

Firefly Season 2 campaign

Firefly Season 2 campaign — looks to be run by some fans without a plan to actually make it happen, but it’s interesting nonetheless.

Looking for open source CMS and portal software options

Roger Johanssen is looking for open source CMS and portal software options. I’d been composing a rant about Joomla to be posted here, but I decided to let it be part of the discussion there instead.