I got a significant surprise the other day when checking out the enrollment in my various classes. (Actually, I got a few, but one especially big one.) For certain core classes in my department, the class limit is 30-ish, but for a number of content-course electives the class limit is 80 students. (My impression is that this isn’t actually a limit, so much as a split point — 85, 105, or even 125 students technically can enroll, but above 80, the class can be split in half, at the professor’s discretion. Unfortunately, this means the class will be split and …
Month: February 2008
Why Writing is a Solitary Activity
Kind of reminds me of editing projects, communal course design discussions, and other collaborative work I’ve done in the past. And yes, this is why writing is a solitary activity so much of the time. And, I suspect, why the book is usually better than the film. This is why crit groups are useful, too. Because crit groups are almost always full of other writers, meaning, people who are both readers, but also know something about writing. But it always becomes a solitary activity again, in the end. Because crit groups all too often bombard you with dozens of great …
Books & Mags Read Recently
It’s been a while since I’ve updated this, so while I’m in a procrastinating mood, I figured now’s a good time to get to it. Here are the books and magazines I’ve read in the first nine weeks of 2008:
Movies Of Late…
As per comments that my reviews of things run long when I clump videos and movies along with TV and music, I’m going to only do movies and TV here. I’ve got another post on books in the works. These will be quick-capsule reviews, for the most part. Martian ChildSaw this in Seoul with Lime. She found it a little too “normal,” as in, the supporting characters were just a little too predictable for her tastes. I haven’t read the original story, though I have read other things by David Gerrold, but I found the movie entertaining in how it …
Where I’m From Is Not Flat
Um, or at least you shouldn’t say it aloud. Ha! (LJers, pop over for a funny video about how to survive in Saskatchewan, and what not to do when you’re there.) Hilarious, though totally silly. We know it’s flat. We like it that way. Well, except the winter wind…
Watch the Skies
Watch the Skies is the name of the website where Tor invites you to join their e-newsletter mailing list… …and get free books. So, like, what are you waiting for? (Via Pat’s Fantasy Hotlist) UPDATE: Simon Owens emailed to let me know that much more is in store for us at Tor. More here.
Sold: Dhuluma No More…
I’m very pleased to say that my tale of climatech, climaterrorism, the global south, and journalism in the mid-21st century, “Dhuluma No More,” has been accepted for publication in Asimov’s SF! That’s my second official pro sale of 2008, and the year’s still very young! It’s also my second sale to Asimov’s! I owe a big thanks to my friends from Clarion West who helped me out with a much earlier draft titled “Ogallalla”… especially Shawn Scarber… from whom I learned a lot when he discussed the original (and triple the current length) draft of this story. Since I can’t …
Warning off
For those who read my earlier post about how the RSS feed might have to change for this site, please disregard that warning. Because of the nature of the plugin I’ve installed to allow privacy control of my more sensitive posts, changes to the feed will be unnecessary. Yay! However, it would still be a good idea to visit my Contact/RSS subpage and make sure you’re subscribed to my original feeds. (That is, copy-and-paste those feeds, rather than following the link and subscribing to the Feedburner feed that you’re forwarded to. That way, if I ever so stop using Feedburner …
Love Detector Phone Test and Voight-Kampff Job Interviews
So there’s a new service available in Korea through cell phone operator KTF that will supposedly analyze voice patterns to see whether a lover is honest, attentive, passionate, or whatever. The first response most people have is one I share: yeah, right. As in, I doubt we’re quite at the point where such an analysis can reasonably be made from a single cell phone call. But that’s not such an interesting observation. I mean, someday we doubtless will be at that point. We’ll be able to analyze voice prints (and other peripheral sound, like breathing patterns, for example) and compare …
Bananagirl Wins the Prize
Back in the days when I still played with Dabang Band, we used to joke about hiring telephone girls to dance for one of our shows. You know, the girls in vinyl skirts who get hired to dnace when new phone shops or hardware outlets open. (See here or here for examples. There’s girls with a dancing soju bottle here, too.) I never took the idea seriously, but seeing the video below, I now think Dabang should have permanently hired on a troupe of such young ladies, contracting them always to wear blonde wigs and zebra-print hot pants. (And a …