By John Hertz: It’s not that I have nothing to do (sing rickety-tickety-tin). But I thought you might like these. Our Gracious Host once said I had the heart of a poet – yes, I know the Bob Bloch joke.
* * *
The clouds floating by,
Slowly, it seems, remind me
They are big, but far.
* * *
For Bjo Trimble’s birthday
Birthing new ideas,
Juno to many of us;
Old and young she sparks.
* * *
Dance, so much with time,
Rhythm its flowing blood, yet
Independently
Nourished, nourishing, opens
All it touches to depths, heights.
The first two are in unrhymed 5-7-5-syllable lines, somewhat like Japanese haiku. The third is in unrhymed 5-7-5-7-7-syllable lines, somewhat like Japanese tanka. The last two are acrostic (read down the first letters of each line). The third is a birthday present for a woman I know through another hobby.
Bjo’s name is properly spelled with a circumflex over the “j”, an Esperantism indicating pronunciation “bee-joe”, but OGH’s software won’t allow it.
…The Martian Chronicles is not a child’s book, but it is an excellent book to give to a child—or to give to the right child, which I flatter myself that I was—because it is a book that is full of awakening. Which means, simply, that when you read it, you can feel parts of your brain clicking on, becoming sensitized to the fact that something is happening here, in this book, with these words, even if you can’t actually communicate to anyone outside of your own head just what that something is. I certainly couldn’t have, in the sixth grade—I simply didn’t have the words. As I recall, I didn’t much try: I just sat there staring down at the final line of the book, with the Martians staring back at me, simply trying to process what I had just read.
The fifth episode of my podcast Bradbury 100 drops today. The theme of the episode is biographies, as my interview guest is Jonathan R. Eller, author of three biographical volumes on Ray: Becoming Ray Bradbury, Ray Bradbury Unbound, and Bradbury Beyond Apollo.
Jon is also the Director of the Center for Ray Bradbury Studies, and has done more than anyone to explore Bradbury’s thinking and authorship.
… Bradbury’s poetic, metaphor-filled prose was not easy to adapt to the screen, which is perhaps why there have been far fewer screen versions of his work than that of, say, Stephen King. But there were still a number of significant adaptations of Bradbury’s work for both the small and big screen, including some that he was directly involved in as a screenwriter….
01 – It Came from Outer Space (1953)
With the exception of a handful of short stories adapted for various early 1950s anthology TV shows, this was the first relatively major film based on Bradbury’s work and still remains one of the finest. Oddly, it wasn’t adapted from a published story but an original screen treatment he developed for director Jack Arnold (Creature from the Black Lagoon).
In the film (the first sci-fi movie to use a 3D filming process), an alien ship crashes on Earth and its crew makes copies of the local townspeople to gather what they need to effect repairs. The aliens are not hostile, but merely want to fix their ship and leave peacefully. This was an unusual idea for the time — the extraterrestrials in most films from the era were decidedly dangerous — and sets It Came from Outer Space apart as a thoughtful yet still suspenseful piece.
…Bradbury, intoning gravely over shots of the artefacts: People ask, Where do you get your ideas? Well, right here. As the camera pans, Bradbury says, Somewhere in this room is an African veldt. Beyond that, the small Illinois town where I grew up. He sits at a typewriter and the keys clatter. One night, watching these credits, my grandmother said to me, “You know, he’s from here.” She meant, of course, from Waukegan, “that small Illinois town” where he grew up and where we sat now in her neighborhood of tiny homes called The Gardens. But I, at age seven, thought she meant here, here in the house we sat in, that he had grown up in the house, perhaps even still lived in the basement which resembled, in its murk and books and clutter, the same office Bradbury sat down to write in during the opening credits of his tv show.
It wouldn’t be a bad premise for a Bradbury story: a young girl, bookish and morbid, discovers an author living in her grandmother’s musty basement. And in a way, he was there. My father’s old room was part of that basement, still set up the way it had been when he lived there, commuting to college and working part-time at a bookstore. One room was floor to ceiling bookshelves and by the time I was in junior high school, I would go down there regularly and pick something out to read. Most of the books were yellowed and falling apart, their covers marked with their original prices: fifteen cents. Among these were a few volumes of Bradbury’s short stories. I would pick one, often The Illustrated Man, and take it back upstairs to the velour armchair and settle in.
The latest video from First Fandom Experience brings to life a three-page screed by a young Ray Bradbury addressing the issue of the incongruous and annoying ads in pulp magazines.
The piece appeared in the Spring 1940 issue of Sweetness and Light, an edgy, satirical fanzine from a faction of the Los Angeles Science Fantasy Society. A full reading of the piece is presented along with historical context and a selection of the offending advertisements. Enjoy!
(4) PIXEL BUDS. Plainly, it’s our duty here to signal boost the review of a product by this name: “Thoughts on Pixel Buds 2: The Buddening” by John Scalzi at Whatever.
1. To begin, they look pretty cool. Like the first generation, they come in their own little charging case, and when they’re nestled in there and the top is flipped open (which is a solidly satisfying tactile experience, by the way), it looks for all the world like a cute little robot with bug eyes (at least in the orange variant).
According to the complaint, filed with the Los Angeles Superior Court on Wednesday, Mike The Pike Productions was granted an option to the film rights of Martin’s novella in 2009. The company subsequently assigned the option to Blackstone Manor, LLC., the named defendants.
Described as a “werewolf noir,” “The Skin Trade” was originally published in 1988 as part of “Night Visions 5,” a horror anthology that also included stories by Stephen King and Dan Simmons. The story follows Randi Wade, a private investigator who is looking into a series of brutal killings in her small town, which eventually leads to her learning about werewolves and other demons. The story won a World Fantasy Award in 1989.
According to the complaint, Blackstone exercised the option on Sept. 2, 2014, and, per the 2009 agreement, it had five years to start principal photography before the rights reverted to Martin.
The complaint alleges that Blackstone “hastily assembl[ed] a barebones cast and crew” a day before the 2019 deadline “to shoot a handful of scenes” for no other reason than to maintain the appearance that it was making the progress necessary to retain the rights. Martin says the “token” production was “insufficient,” comparing the move to a contractor hurriedly building a gazebo in lieu of the agreed-upon skyscraper when faced with a deadline…
(6) WW84. DC dropped a new trailer for WonderWoman 1984 at the DC Fandome event.
Fast forward to the 1980s as Wonder Woman’s next big screen adventure finds her facing two all-new foes: Max Lord and The Cheetah. With director Patty Jenkins back at the helm and Gal Gadot returning in the title role, “Wonder Woman 1984” is Warner Bros. Pictures’ follow up to the DC Super Hero’s first outing, 2017’s record-breaking “Wonder Woman,” which took in $822 million at the worldwide box office. The film also stars Chris Pine as Steve Trevor, Kristen Wiig as The Cheetah, Pedro Pascal as Max Lord, Robin Wright as Antiope, and Connie Nielsen as Hippolyta.
(7) LEFT IN THE SILO. Nicholas Whyte, CoNZealand’s Deputy Hugo Administrator, in “The 1945 Retros that weren’t”, runs the numbers to show why various categories did not make the final ballot.
We didn’t publish the full stats for the 1945 Retro Hugo categories that weren’t put to the final ballot this year, mainly because voting ended only seven days before the Retro ceremony and we had to prioritise fairly ruthlessly.
But after internal discussion, we are publishing them here….
What are the numbers again? This time we received over 600 works from hopeful contributors. At a guess, over 2 million words of fiction.
The majority of those writers really tried to send us something they thought we could use. For instance, we’re not a horror magazine. People knew that and sent very little horror. We didn’t get much in the way of apocalyptic dystopia either. Sex and swearing were at a minimum, yet people also recognized we’re not a children’s magazine nor specifically aimed at the young adult market.
By and large, the stories contained hopeful themes, big ideas and presented worlds filled with diversity, empathy, heroism, and hope.
I don’t have the exact numbers, but we read a lot of good stories. Let’s say 25% were “good to excellent.” It could be more. Conservatively, that would be over half a million words.
At $0.06/word, that’s over $30,000 (if we were able to buy all those good stories). While we do a good job of making DreamForge look big-time, that’s more than our annual budget for everything related to the magazine. And if we could somehow invest in all those stories, they would fill our pages for the next 3-4 years.
… Second, creating an issue of a magazine is not just about selecting great stories. It’s about creating a reading experience. Think of it as a variety show. If all the stories are literary, philosophical, message pieces with troubled characters navigating complex plots, our readers aren’t going to make it through the whole issue.
Some stories are challenging, and they require a clear head and concentration before delivering a payoff in emotion or thoughtful meaning. And honestly, I don’t want to read those at 11:30 pm after a long day when I open a magazine for a few minutes of relaxation. I check the Table of Contents for a short story that looks light and easy to get through…
(9) ANGUS BUCHANAN OBITUARY. Industrial archaeologist and biographer Angus Buchanan died June 17. He is profiled in The Guardian. There’s a kind of steampunk sensibility to the topic.
Engineers shape economies, landscapes and how people work and live in them. Yet in the past their achievements were little celebrated. Angus Buchanan, who has died aged 90, did much to increase awareness of their endeavours and breakthroughs.
The appearance of his book Industrial Archaeology in Britain as a Pelican Original in 1972 marked a significant step forward for an emerging discipline. It supplied the crucial link between the development of industrial archaeology at regional and national levels in Britain, leading to the conservation, restoration and reuse of buildings, sites and engineering that might otherwise have been lost.
…The culmination of Buchanan’s research came with Brunel: The Life and Times of Isambard Kingdom Brunel (2002). In building the Great Western Railway and important bridges, tunnels and dockyards, the great Victorian engineer changed the face of the British landscape. Innovations at sea included the SS Great Britain, the first screw-driven iron transatlantic steamship, and his designs revolutionised modern engineering.
The biography provided the first fully documented and objective account, placing Brunel’s significance in a historical context. The desire to avoid concentrating on familiar incidents and the legends surrounding them led Buchanan to a thematic approach rather than a chronology, covering Brunel’s overseas projects and professional practices, and the politics and society within which he functioned, as well as familiar subjects, among them his other major ship, the SS Great Eastern.
The [Bristol Industrial Archeology Society] BIAS had a major influence on the preservation of Bristol’s city docks, thwarting traffic planners who wished to build a major road complex across them. In 1970 the Great Britain was returned from the Falklands to the dry dock where it had been built in 1843, and it is now a popular tourist attraction; nearby is another of Brunel’s masterpieces, the Clifton suspension bridge.
(10) MEDIA BIRTHDAY.
August 22, 1957 — X Minus One’s “Drop Dead” first aired. Based off of Clifford D. Simak‘s story of that name which was first published in Galaxy Science Fiction in July of 1956, it’s a superb tale about a planet with a very obliging inhabitant called The Critter and how it serves the astronauts who land there. The radio script was by Ernest Kinoy with the cast being Lawson Zerbe, Ralph Camargo and Joseph Bell. You can listen to it here.
(11) TODAY’S BIRTHDAYS.
[Compiled by Cat Eldridge and John Hertz.]
Born August 22, 1880 – George Herriman. Wrote the immortal and so far unique comic strip Krazy Kat; also illustrated Don Marquis’ poetical tales of Archy and Mehitabel a cockroach and another cat. Krazy sometimes seems male, sometimes female, which hardly matters; is endlessly the target of bricks thrown by Ignatz Mouse, taking them as a sign of affection; is the subject of protection by Officer Pupp, to whom they are merely illegal. Other characters, equally unlikely, are also animals (including birds), whom anthropomorphic is equally inadequate for. Nor does dialectal justly describe the language, nor surreal the landscape. Here is the theme. Here is a variation. Here is an elaboration. (Died 1944) [JH]
Born August 22, 1919 — Douglas W F Mayer. A British fan who was editor for three issues of Amateur Science Stories published by the Science Fiction Association of Leeds, England. He was thereby the publisher of Arthur C. Clarke’s very first short story, “Travel by Wire”, which appeared in the second issue in December 1937. He would later edit the Tomorrow fanzine which would be nominated for the 1939 Best Fanzine Retro Hugo. (Died 1976.) (CE)
Born August 22, 1920 — Ray Bradbury. So what’s your favorite work by him? I have three. Something Wicked This Way Comes is the one I reread quite a bit with The Illustrated Man and The Martian Chronicles being my other go to regularly works by him. (Died 2012.) (CE)
Born August 22, 1925 — Honor Blackman. Best known for the roles of Cathy Gale in The Avengers, Bond girl Pussy Galore in Goldfinger and Hera in Jason and the Argonauts. She was also Professor Lasky in “Terror of the Vervoids” in the Sixth Doctor’s “The Trial of a Time Lord”. Genre adjacent, she was in the film of Agatha Christie’s The Secret Adversary as Rita Vandemeyer. (Died 2020.) (CE)
Born August 22, 1945 — David Chase, 75. He’s here today mainly because he wrote nine episodes including the “Kolchak: Demon and the Mummy” telefilm of Kolchak: The Night Stalker. He also wrote the screenplay for The Grave of The Vampire, and one for Alfred Hitchcock Presents, “Enough Rope fur Two”, which he also directed. (CE)
Born August 22, 1946 – Rafi Zabor, 74. Seldom does work from outside our field wholly engage with our spirit. But The Bear Comes Home is superb. Naturally we ignore it. It does have explicit sexual activity, not gratuitous. In a year when Earthquake Weather could not reach the ballot, of course The Bear could not muster even 5% of the nominations. Don’t let that stop you now. [JH]
Born August 22, 1948 – Susan Wood. Her we do recognize. Met Mike Glicksohn at Boskone 4, 1969; Energumen together to 1973, Hugo as Best Fanzine its last year; both Fan Guests of Honour at Aussiecon (in retrospect Aussiecon One) the 33rd Worldcon though marriage gone. Three Hugos for SW as Best Fanwriter; Best of SW (J. Kaufman ed.) 1982. Taught at U. British Columbia; Vancouver editor, Pac. NW Rev. Books. Atheling Award, Aurora Award for Lifetime Achievement, Canadian SF Hall of Fame. One Ditmar. (Died 1980) [JH]
Born August 22, 1954 – Gavin Claypool, 66. Los Angeles area actifan. LASFS (L.A. Science Fantasy Society) Librarian. Won LASFS Evans-Freehafer service award twice; only five people have ever done so. Reliably helpful to others e.g. at SF cons. [JH]
Born August 22, 1955 — Will Shetterly, 65. Of his novels, I recommend his two Borderland novels, Elsewhere and Nevernever, which were both nominees for the Mythopoeic Fantasy Award for Children’s Literature, and his sort of biographical Dogland. Married to Emma Bull, they did a trailer for her War for The Oaks novel which is worth seeing as you’ll spot Minnesota fans in it. And Emma as the Elf Queen is definitely something to behold! (CE)
Born August 22, 1963 — Tori Amos, 57. One of Gaiman’s favorite musicians, so it’s appropriate that she penned two essays, the afterword to “Death” in Sandman: Book of Dreams, and the Introduction to “Death” in The High Cost of Living. Although created before they ever met, Delirium from The Sandman series is based on her. (CE)
Born August 22, 1964 – Diane Setterfield, Ph.D., 56. Three novels. The Thirteenth Tale sold three million copies (NY Times Best Seller), televised on BBC2. “A reader first, a writer second…. The practice of weekly translation from my undergraduate years [her Ph.D., from U. Bristol, was on André Gide] has become an everyday working tool for me: when a sentence doesn’t run the way I want it to, I habitually translate it into French and retranslate it back into English. It’s like switching a light on in a dim room: suddenly I can see what’s not working and why.” [JH]
(13) SUICIDE SQUAD ROLL CALL. Adam B. Vary, in the Variety story “‘The Suicide Squad’ First Look, Full Cast Revealed by Director James Gunn at DC FanDome” says that director James Gunn revealed at DC Fandome that the cast of The Suicide Squad, coming out in April 2021, includes Margot Robbie and Viola Davis from the 2016 film Suicide Squad but also Nathan Fillion, John Cena, and Peter Capaldi as “The Thinker,” a DC villain from the 1940s. Principal photography was completed before the pandemic hit and the film is completed and ready to go.
… Among the new cast, Gunn said that he reached deep into the DC Comics canon to find a motley crew of villains to populate the movie, and it appears he brought some invention of his own to the project as well.
Distant cosmic objects such as planets, galaxies, and nebulae are sometimes referred to by the scientific community with unofficial nicknames. As the scientific community works to identify and address systemic discrimination and inequality in all aspects of the field, it has become clear that certain cosmic nicknames are not only insensitive, but can be actively harmful. NASA is examining its use of unofficial terminology for cosmic objects as part of its commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion.
As an initial step, NASA will no longer refer to planetary nebula NGC 2392, the glowing remains of a Sun-like star that is blowing off its outer layers at the end of its life, as the “Eskimo Nebula.” “Eskimo” is widely viewed as a colonial term with a racist history, imposed on the indigenous people of Arctic regions. Most official documents have moved away from its use. NASA will also no longer use the term “Siamese Twins Galaxy” to refer to NGC 4567 and NGC 4568, a pair of spiral galaxies found in the Virgo Galaxy Cluster. Moving forward, NASA will use only the official, International Astronomical Union designations in cases where nicknames are inappropriate.
…Nicknames are often more approachable and public-friendly than official names for cosmic objects, such as Barnard 33, whose nickname “the Horsehead Nebula” invokes its appearance. But often seemingly innocuous nicknames can be harmful and detract from the science.
The Agency will be working with diversity, inclusion, and equity experts in the astronomical and physical sciences to provide guidance and recommendations for other nicknames and terms for review….
(16) HONEST GAME TRAILERS.[Item by Martin Morse Wooster.] Fandom Games asks in this Honest Game Trailer, “Destroy All Humans”, since alien invasion is “the only box left on the 2020 bingo card” why not enjoy this 2005 game where you’re an alien mowing down humans and giving bad Jack Nicholson impressions?
[Thanks to Mike Kennedy, John Hertz, Cat Eldridge, JJ, Martin Morse Wooster, Michael Toman, Andrew Porter, and John King Tarpinian for some of these stories. Title credit goes to File 770 contributing editor of the day Kip W.]
By John King Tarpinian: I am lucky enough to be able to visit Ray on his birthdays, always leaving him a gift or two. The cake had to be quickly removed because there were ants that appeared to be interested in the cake. And no, I did not eat the cake but gave it to the mortuary staff as a thank you for taking care of Ray.
I left a Clark bar (Ray’s favorite), brass horse (representing his first book, Dark Carnival), & the polished coprolite (dinosaur poop) in honor of The Sound of Thunder. Oh yes, I used a box of Dark Carnival matches to light the candles.
After visiting Ray I always go over to pay my respects to others who had influences in Ray’s life. Truman Capote, who was partly responsible for Ray getting his first story published in a mainstream publication, the October 1946 issue of Colliers Magazine, “The Homecoming.”
Also going over to Hugh Hefner, who as a young publisher, serialized Fahrenheit 451 in March/April/May 1954, in Playboy.
Of course, I also visit someone who I tease as being Ray’s chauffeur, Robert Bloch.
It is a pilgrimage I both enjoy making but wish I’d rather be going to Comic-Con or simply having lunch with Ray.
The 2020 Seiun Award winners were announced August 22 by the Japan Science Fiction Convention “F-con”. The presentation ceremony will be held at the convention, now postponed to March 13-14, 2021 because of COVID-19.
The award has nine categories. The English titles and names come from a press release sent on behalf of the Chairperson of “F-con” and are noted as “subject to correction/revision.”
BEST JAPANESE LONG STORY
“Signpost to the Stars”, by ISSUI OGAWA (HAYAKAWA PUBLISHING,INC.)
BEST JAPANESE SHORT STORY
“Mizu No Tsuki (Invisible moon)”, by Hiroe Suga (HAYAKAWA PUBLISHING,INC.)
BEST TRANSLATED LONG STORY
“The Three-Body Problem”, by Liu Cixin translated by Nozomi Ohmori, Toya Tachihara, Sakura Mitsuyoshi and Wan Zai (HAYAKAWA PUBLISHING,INC.)
BEST TRANLATED SHORT STORY
“Uncanny Valley”, by Greg Egan translated by Makoto Yamagishi (HAYAKAWA PUBLISHING,INC.)
BEST MEDIA (TV, CINEMA, VIDEO GAME, ENTERTAINMENT)
“ASTRA LOST IN SPACE”, directed by Masaomi Ando created by Lerche Original comic by Kenta Shinohara
BEST COMIC
[TIE]
“How many light-years to Babylon?”, by Dowman Sayman (AKITA PUBLISHING CO.,LTD.)
“BATMAN NINJA” by Masato Hisa Characters&Supervision DC COMICS (HERO’S INC.)
BEST ARTIST
Yuko Shiraishi
BEST NON-FICTION (RELATED WORK)
“NHK’s Hyappun De Meicho (“100 minutes on a famous book”): Sakyo Komatsu Special “Mythology in the Age of Godlessness””, by Tetsuya Miyazaki (NHK Publishing, Inc.)
NON CATEGORY (EVERYTHING THAT FEELS SENSE OF WONDER)
The first-ever image of a black hole, by EHT (Event Horizon Telescope) collaboration
[Thanks to Hirohide (Jack R.) Hirai, International Liaison, Science Fiction Fangroup’s Association of Nippon (SFFAN), for the story.]
Today during the Virtual Columbus NASFiC, the Association of Science Fiction & Fantasy Artists (ASFA) unveiled the finalists for the 2020 Chesley Awards.
The Chesley is named for astronomical artist Chesley Bonestell. The winners will be voted by ASFA members.
2020 Chesley Nominations List
Best Cover: Hardback Book
Tommy Arnold — Gideon the Ninth by Tamsyn Muir (Tor / September 2019)
Tran Nguyen — The Storm Crow by Kalyn Josephson (Source Books Fire / July 2019)
Karla Ortiz – Rage of Dragons by Evan Winter (Orbit / July 2019)
Feifei Ruan — The Descendant of the Crane by Joan He (Albert Whitman / April 2019)
Michael Whelan — Empire of Grass by Tad Williams (DAW Books / May 2019)
Eric Wilkerson — Tristan Strong Punches a Hole in the Sky by Kwame Mbalia (Rick Riordan Presents / October 2019)
Best Cover: Paperback or Ebook
David Curtis — Silver in the Wood by Emily Tesh (Tor/Forge Tor.com / June 2019)
Jamie Jones — The Warrior Moon by K Arsenault Rivera (Tor / September 2019)
Amanda Makepeace — The Long List Anthology Volume 5 by David Steffen (Diabolical Books / December 2019)
David Palumbo — Wildcards IX: The Jokertown Shuffle edited by George R.R. Martin (Tor / April 2019)
Dan Dos Santos — The Cunning Man by D.J. Butler and Aaron Michael Ritchey (Baen / November 2019)
Jeremy Wilson — Seven Blades in Black by Sam Sykes (Orbit / April 2019)
Best Magazine Illustration
Yoshitaka Amano — Blood Borne #12 / June 2019
Evan Cagle — Buffy the Vampire Slayer: The Chosen Ones #1 / August 2019
Matt Dixon — Clarkesworld #152 / May 2019
Tiffany England — Into the Wild Blue Yonder, Cricket Magazine / October 2019
Tithi Luadthong — Lightspeed #109 / June 2019
Reiko Murakami — Lightspeed #104 / January 2019
Best Interior Illustration
Francois Baranger — The Call of Cthulhu Design (Studio Press / November 2019)
Audrey Benjaminsen — Time Variance of Snow by E. Lily Yu (Tor.com / December 2019)
Amanda Makepeace — “Fanfare for Rose” (Amazing Stories, Spring 2019, Vol 76)
John Picacio — Ninth House by Leigh Bardugo (Flatiron Books/Macmillan / September 2019)
Armando Veve — Knowledgeable Creatures (Tor.com / March 2019)
Allen Williams — Pan’s Labyrinth by Guillermo del Toro and Cornelia Funke (Katherine Tegen Books / July 2019)
Best Gaming Related Illustration
Wylie Beckert — Rosethorn Acolyte: Throne of Eldraine Magic Card (WotC / October 2019)
Iris Compiet — Brazen Borrower: Throne of Eldraine Magic Card (WotC / October 2019)
Melissa Gay — Summer Dandelion: Olde Fae Card Game (Changeling Artist Collective / June 2019)
Winona Nelson — Lonesome Unicorn: Throne of Eldraine Magic Card (WotC / October 2019)
Omar Rayyan — Flaxen Intruder: Throne of Eldraine Magic Card (WotC / October 2019)
Charles Urbach – King By His Own Hand Official VIG (Very Important Gamer) Attendee Badge and Art Print for GameHole Con Gaming Convention (October 2019)
Best Product Illustration
Oliver Barrett — Full Metal Jacket (Mondo Poster / June 2019)
Tehani Farr — The Sky Mage and The God Eye Poster art (Pawahtun Festival / January 2019)
Emily Hare — Dragons 2020 Calendar (Kickstarter / November 2019)
Kez Laczin — Cover art for the song Stronger by TheFatRat (Monstercat / June 2019)
John Picacio — La Cantarita (Loteria Grande Card published by Lone Boy / December 2019)
Debbie Hughes — The Raven, The Wolf and the Maiden (Oil on panel)
Elizabeth Leggett — The Devil / The City (Digital)
David Seidman — The Divine Migration (Digital)
Lauren Raye — Snow Anima Sola I (Digital)
Best Monochrome Work- Unpublished
Ken Cunnningham — Both Their Coats Were Heavy (Graphite powder on dura-lar)
Jeff Echevarria — Doctor, My Eyes (Charcoal, graphite and gouache)
Tehani Farr — Gyhan akaii dannan Deli Iatt ”She who sits at the end of the world upon a mountain of bones dreaming” (Mixed Media, watercolor, graphite pencil)
Melissa Sue — Stanley The Tootsie Monster (Graphite)
Allen Williams — The Hidden Light (Powdered graphite pencil, oil on board)
Best Three Dimensional
Daria Aksenova — The Crane Wife (Pen, Ink & Goldleaf on hand cut, suspended, layered)
Sara Felix — The Cosmic Egg (Mixed Media)
Kristine Poole — The Spinner of Dreams (Bronze)
Forest Rogers — Selene (Mixed media)
Vincent Villafranca — Unbridled and Unfettered (Bronze)
By David Dyer-Bennet: I’ve committed art. Documentary art, in the form of a book and a website (plus I will be offering prints of some of the photos for sale).
I got caught by the fascinating things people were writing and painting on the panels put up to protect windows here in Minneapolis, when things kind of came apart after George Floyd was killed. And by the layering and juxtapositions, and the broad range of views being expressed.
The website and book are live, you can see what I’ve done at Words Over Windows. (The book is an Amazon print-on-demand production, but the proofs look quite good. There’s also an ebook, which would look great on a good tablet.)
The specific Uncle Hugo’s photos are here, here, and here.
By Steve Vertlieb: As I remember what would have been his 100th birthday on August 22nd, my memories drift back to a time not that long ago when I was proud to think of one of the greatest writers of the twentieth century as my treasured pal.
Here is my affectionate tribute to cherished friend Ray Bradbury, whose loving presence occupied my world and my heart for nearly four decades. Ray was one of the most distinguished writers of the twentieth century and, with H.G. Wells, perhaps …the most influential, legendary science fiction writer of the past one hundred years.
More importantly, however, Ray was a gentle little boy whose love of imagination, fantasy, and stories of other worlds influenced thousands of writers and millions of admirers all over the world. His monumental presence upon this planet warmed and inspired all who knew him, and I was honored to call him my friend for thirty-eight years.
Here, once more, you’re invited to read my loving remembrance of the life and world of Ray Bradbury, “I SING BRADBURY ELECTRIC” at the American Music Preservation site.
Our historic first meeting with the immortal Ray Bradbury in his West Los Angeles living room during the joyous Summer of 1974.
Steve and Erwin Vertlieb with Ray Bradbury in 1974.
When I was preparing for major open heart surgery in March, 2010, I received an e-mail from Ray’s daughter, Alexandra (Zee). She wrote “My Dad told me to tell you that “you’re not allowed to die.”
I took Mr. Bradbury at his word, and didn’t. Who was I, after all, to argue with Ray Bradbury?
Sharing a few special moments with cherished pal Ray Bradbury at Forry Ackerman’s spectacular 1993 “Famous Monsters” reunion celebration in Crystal City, Virginia.
A cheery note from pal Ray Bradbury concerning my appearance in the Conor Timmis documentary, Kreating Karloff, wishing “you guys and mummies” an enthusiastic “Bravo.”
2014 Retro Hugo base, designed by Marina Gélineau.
[Editor’s Introduction: Dave Wallace left a thoughtful comment today about what he sees as the problems with the Retro-Hugos periodically given by Worldcons, and offered several proposals for change. He gave permission to republish the text as a post, which should allow even more people to read and engage with his ideas.]
By Dave Wallace: I’ve been thinking about problems with the Retro-Hugos and what to do about them since the Dublin Worldcon. I was hoping I would get a chance to finish writing up the proposal I’ve been working on so that I could circulate it as a whole for comments rather than putting it out piecemeal. But since we’re discussing the topic now, let me share some excerpts from the notes I have on how we could better honor past work if we were to decide to discontinue the Retro-Hugos in their current form.
Issues with the Current Retro-Hugos
This list of issues with the current Retro-Hugos is a combination of thoughts that I’ve had and some of the comments I’ve heard from others:
1) They involve a lot of time and expense for the Worldcon putting them on, especially for the Hugo Administrators. 2) They are an all-or-nothing thing for a given year: either a Worldcon decides to host all the Retro-Hugo categories for a given year, or they won’t be revisited at all for another 25 years. 3) Lots of Worldcon members don’t participate, compared with the regular Hugos. 4) It’s a fair amount of effort or expense for many voters to track down all the finalists in a given category. 5) They are tied to a specific anniversary year in a 25 year cycle. 6) People vote for the one thing that is familiar, rather than thoroughly comparing finalists. 7) It’s hard to track down reproduction rights to form a Hugo Packet. 8) At 75 years, it’s hard to find representatives for whom the trophy is meaningful – lots of past Retro trophies are sitting in warehouses. 9) Modern categories may not fit historical SFF consumption well. 10) Retro-Hugos don’t have the same prestige as regular Hugos.
What Would We Need in a Different System to Honor Past Work?
Suppose we were to pass and ratify a constitutional amendment discontinuing the current form of the Retro-Hugos at the 2021 and 2022 Worldcons. Would that be the end of attempts to honor unrecognized work from past years?
It need not be. But I think that any replacement system must reckon with the central failure of the current Retro-Hugos, which is that they attempt to do too much in a single year. Trying to deal with a full second set of Hugo categories in addition to all the current year Hugo categories is a burden for voters and administrators alike, and means that few are able to devote the time to properly understand these works in their historical context. Thus the two key ideas that I would propose are to decouple historical awards from a specific anniversary year, and to host no more than one historical award category per year.
These two ideas are related. Doing only a single historical category per year reduces the extra workload on voters and administrators dramatically. Breaking the link to a specific anniversary eliminates the current pressure on Worldcons to either host a full set of retro-Hugos for a given year or accept that no works from that year can be honored for another twenty five years at the earliest, when they will be even further away from the people to whom those works were most meaningful. Instead, the focus can shift to asking what historical categories, if any, are most ready and appropriate to be honored now.
Outline of Proposal
I’m still working out details and looking for feedback, but the basic outline of the proposal I originally hoped to submit to the 2020 Business Meeting involved three constitutional changes:
1) We officially decide to stop holding the Retro-Hugos in their current form after 2020 (or maybe after 2022, if Chicago really wants to host them).
2) Instead, we add a provision that would allow each Worldcon to optionally add a special Hugo category for works from a specified past year to the regular Hugos, similar to the current provision for trial categories in section 3.3.19 of the WSFS Constitution. If they elected to add such a category, it would be a special category in the regular Hugos, such as “Best Short Story of 1948” – no need for a separate ceremony or the expense of a separate base design. This would also address concern #10 above.
3) Finally, we establish a new standing committee to propose and vet proposals for past year categories, so that future Worldcons will have a list of ripe proposals to choose from if they want to add a past year category. Two important criteria for them to consider in evaluating possible year/category combinations (suggested, not absolutely mandatory): (a): Can the Worldcon obtain the rights to distribute likely finalists in the Hugo Voter Packet, or otherwise make them available in an easily obtainable form, and (b): Is there a living person connected with the work who would appreciate having the trophy (and ideally, would show up to accept it)?
These two criteria are related: the existence of such a person can aid in getting the rights for the packet. If the original artist is no longer alive, it could be a family representative, literary executor, or publisher. Having most/all finalists available in the Voter Packet would make it more likely that voters would read and compare all the works on their merits, instead of just voting for the one name they recognize.
(I recently shared the above proposal outline in a twitter discussion with Hugo finalist Siobhan Carroll, who had her own similar proposals about the Retro-Hugos – twitter discussion here and here.)
I wish I’d had time to write this up more fully, but maybe the unfinished version makes it easier to incorporate feedback. What do others think?
(1) COLUMBUS NASFIC OPENING CEREMONIES. [Item by David Doering.] Watching the Opening Ceremonies of the Columbus NASFiC, I noted the number of apologies for lack of the in-person meetings.
However, I also think we should celebrate that we are LIVING an SF novel. If we had written this 20 years ago, it would have been SF–real-time linkups with AV from around the globe!! Is that KEWL or what??
We did NOT have to cancel. We still have a great slate of programming. AND we still can get together to honor Mike Resnick.
I should add that we also don’t have worry about scaring each other with pathogens if we were in person. Thus potentially setting off a “War of the Worlds” scenario with all of us “aliens” descending on a single city only to be doomed by GERMS.
(2) ROGUE NASFIC. Chris Garcia is the virtual Columbus NASFiC’s Editor Guest of Honor. The con newsletter made everyone aware he’s also got some real-life concerns right now:
Please share your positive thoughts, hopes, prayers – as appropriate – and spare a moment of contemplation for Christopher J. Garcia (GOH), his wonderful family Vanessa, John Paul and Ben, as they await news of their home, and neighbourhood, evacuated as they are from Boulder Creek in the Santa Cruz County CZU August Lightning Complex Fire. Certainly, we all wish them well. (submitted by James Bacon)
In better Chris Garcia news, check out his Rogue NASFiC YouTube channel of extra programming. As Chris explained on Facebook:
This is what happens when I’m given the power of Guest of Honor without oversight!
This YouTube Channel has some great videos of interviews and more! I’ll be adding as the Weekend (and beyond!) goes on!
Coming soon will be our Podcast channel!
I wanna thank the entire team of the NASFiC for letting me have a little fun!!!
Here’s one example:
(3) NINA ALLAN FIRES A CANON. [Item by PhilRM.] Here’s another very interesting piece by Nina Allan, discussing, among other things**, the notion of an SFF canon: “Weird Wednesdays #11: the question of lineage”. There’s a well-known quote by Borges, from his essay on Kafka: “The fact is that every writer creates his own precursors. His work modifies our conception of the past, as it will modify the future.” Nina’s take (which I completely agree with) is that every writer creates their own canon; I’d extend this to say that every reader creates their own canon also.
**Her piece also convinced me that I really need to read William Golding’s The Inheritors and The Spire, which sound like fascinating books.
…I have explored and will continue to explore some of the ‘canonical’ works from science fiction’s so-called Golden Age – not because I feel I should but because I am interested. I enjoy thinking about these things, I enjoy writing criticism, and I happen to believe that the more widely you read around a subject, the more fiercely you can argue your corner, the more enjoyment you can derive. And having said that, I saw an interesting comment somewhere at some point during the post-Hugo furore with words to the effect that it is actually the middle generation of science fiction writers – Le Guin, Butler, Russ, Delany, Disch, Haldeman, Pohl – who are the true pioneers of the American tradition, who not only wrote better then but speak better now to the generation of writers currently winning Hugos. That definitely rings true for me, though it might not for you. But that’s the beauty of such contentions: they are there to be discussed.
In celebration of Bradbury, the AWM will also air in August on its newly launched podcast four conversations with contemporary science fiction and fantasy writers. Each weekly episode of the podcast features one of the AWM’s past live programs and covers a range of topics including process, writing influences, and the life of a writer. J. Michael Straczynski, author of Becoming Superman headlines the August 10 episode. On the August 17 episode, Annalee Newitz, author of The Future of Another Timeline, is joined by journalist Dan Sinker. Hugo-Award winner John Scalzi, author of The Consuming Fire, is featured on the August 24 episode. Isabel Ibanez, author of Woven in Moonlight, closes out the month on the August 31 episode.
If there is one lesson to be learned from Hamilton’s Broadway success, it’s that a surprising diverse number of themes can be successfully turned into musicals. After all, who would have believed Ontario’s steel town—just a second—I have just been informed that the musical Hamilton is not in fact about Hamilton, Ontario, but rather about a significant figure in the American Revolution. I see.
Nevertheless, my point stands: almost everything can be turned into a musical, given sufficient talent. Even science fiction epics. Which brings me to the exciting topic of What Science Fiction Works I Would Like to See as Musicals.
Ray Harryhausen original sculpture, #10 in the limited edition of 12 created in the early 1990s, and then cast in 2010, the last work of fine art by the cinematic trailblazer before his passing. Entitled ”Giving Life to Fantasy”, this self-portrait sculpture depicts Harryhausen as he wanted to be remembered, filming the animated creatures of his imagination: the Cyclops and Dragon in their climactic battle in ”The 7th Voyage of Sinbad”. Other personal touches in this detailed sculpture include Harryhausen’s Giant Octopus from ”It Came from Beneath the Sea” in a box on the floor (along with his inspiration, the gorilla from ”King Kong”), and his Brontosaurus from ”The Animal World” on the side table. Signed and numbered by Harryhausen on the corner of the table, ”Ray Harryhausen 10/12”. Sculpture stands on a green marble and wooden base, with entire presentation measuring 19” x 11.5” x approximately 11” tall, and weighing nearly 50 lbs. Some light patina to bronze, overall near fine condition.
(7) HUNGER GAMES IN EVERYDAY LIFE. [Item by Martin Morse Wooster, Designated Reader, Financial Times.] This is the lede of an article by John Reed in the August 20 Financial Times about protests against the Thai government.
“It is a morning ritual at every Thai school, steeped in tradition and nationalist decorum: children stand still and sing the national anthem as the kingdom’s blue, white, and red flag is raised.
But this week, amid a growing ‘Free People’ youth protest movement, children across Thailand raised their hands during the ceremony to make the protesters’ trademark, defiant three-fingered salute.
The gesture originated in The Hunger Games, the dystopian young adult franchise of books and films, but has been adopted as an emblem of a movement that has spread from university campuses to secondary schools…
…”it has become a peacefully powerful symbol of anti-authoritarianism,’ said Viengrat Nethipo, assistant professor of political science at Bangkok’s Chulalongkorn University. ‘Recently it’s been described among youth as symbolic of the French Revolution’s values of liberty, equality, and fraternity, so it’s easily adopted as a symbol.'”
(8) STATUE READY FOR PRIME TIME. [Item by rcade.] Medusa, a 2008 statue by the Argentine-Italian sculptor Luciano Garbati, is getting a seven-foot tall bronze version in New York City across from the New York Criminal Courthouse where Harvey Weinstein was put on trial. NSFW image in a tweet here.
Garbati’s statue is a response to Benvenuto Cellini’s famous Perseus with the Head of Medusa statue and the idea that Medusa is the villain of the story.
The original Greek myth of Medusa offers plenty to be angry about. The monstrous being with snakes for hair starts out as a human woman, who Poseidon rapes in Athena’s temple. The goddess then punishes Medusa by turning her into a Gorgon and exiling her. Perseus is later sent on an errand to bring Medusa’s head to King Polydectes. Equipped with a mirrored shield, winged sandals, and a special sack for her head, Perseus creeps up on Medusa while she lies sleeping, cuts off her head, and then uses it as a weapon for turning enemies into stone.”
Garbati says, “The representations of Perseus, he’s always showing the fact that he won, showing the head…if you look at my Medusa…she is determined, she had to do what she did because she was defending herself. It’s quite a tragic moment.”
…With Steven Universe and She-Ra both having ended this year, PAPER invited showrunners Rebecca Sugar and Noelle Stevenson to sit down with one another and reflect on the legacies of their respective series, getting their start in comics, the state of representation in the animated field and where things go from here.
PAPER: Since you’re both wrapping up your respective series’, looking back at what each of you have accomplished, in those series what are you proud of, what do you wish you could have improved on or pushed further?
Rebecca Sugar: Okay, well looking back on everything, I’m really proud of what we were able to do with the characters of Garnet and Ruby and Sapphire. It really goes all the way back to the time I spent on Adventure Time and when I got a chance to do some of the earlier episodes with Marceline and Bubblegum. This was 2010 so Don’t Ask Don’t Tell was still a national policy. It would be half a decade before same-sex marriage was legal in The United States and I wanted to do something with the characters of Marceline and Bubblegum but figure out how to get it on TV. The strategy at the time that I pitched was that because they’re both centuries-old, millenniums-old, had a relationship sometime in the past and they’re unpacking that in a way that would be apparent. That was the only way to be able to do something with these characters and their relationship on screen.
As I was entering my show, I really wanted to find a way to be able to show characters actively in a relationship happening in real-time. We strategized the concept of fusion to be able to explore relationships and include queer relationships. Central to that, one of the things we were excited about was to have the character of Garnet have a ton of screen time and be a main character. There were a lot of things I wanted to explore with an active relationship to parallel my own relationship. I was inventing these characters with my co-executive producer Ian Jones-Quartey, who is also my partner. We wanted to explore an active, queer relationship that would parallel a lot of our experiences with bigotry as an interracial couple.
(10) N.K. [Item by rcade.] While discussing a project called Women’s Prize for Fiction Reclaim Her Name that asked to publish one of her stories for free, then asked to publish one of her novels for free, Nora Jemisin explains how she came to write novels under the initials N.K. Thread starts here.
“(And for those wondering, I’ve said this in multiple interviews, but I did it bc at the time I was an academic starting to publish papers, and thought the initials would separate my fiction writing from my academic writing. [Yeah, this was before natural language processing.])”
Read the whole thread for how she handles a question about what the K stands for.
(11) MEDIA ANNIVERSARY.
August 1998 — Blade premiered. With Wesley Snipes as Blade, this film, the first of a trilogy, was directed by Stephen Norrington and written by David S. Goyer as based on the Marvel character developed by writer Marv Wolfman and penciller Gene Colan. It was produced by Snipes along with Peter Frankfurt and Robert Engelman. Stephen Dorff, Kris Kristofferson, N’Bushe Wright and Donal Logue were the other principal cast. Marvel, along with Amen Ra Films and Imaginary Forces, were the producing film companies. It was generally well-received by critics though several thought it was way too violent. Box office-wise, it did fantastic but Marvel earned just a flat fee of $25,000. Audience reviewers at Rotten Tomatoes currently only give it a 55% rating.
(12) TODAY’S BIRTHDAYS.
[Compiled by Cat Eldridge and John Hertz.]
Born August 21, 1872 — Aubrey Beardsley. Best remembered for his often highly erotic art, ISFDB lists him as having a genre novel, The Story of Venus and Tannhäuser, which bears one of the longest subtitles I’ve encountered (“The story of Venus and Tannhäuser in which is set forth an exact account of the manner of State held by Madam Venus, Goddess and Meretrix under the famous Hörselberg, and containing the Adventures of Tannhäuser in that Place, his Repentance, his Journeying to Rome, and Return to the Loving Mountain”). He has two genre novellas as well, “Catullus: Carmen Cl.“ and “ Under the Hill”. And yes, he was just twenty-five when he died of tuberculosis. (Died 1898.) (CE)
Born August 21, 1888 — Miriam Allen deFord. Although it is said that she started writing SF when Boucher became editor of The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, she only published five of her eighteen late Forties through Fifties works there. One published there, “Mary Celestial“, was written with Boucher. And one, “A Death in the Family”, was adapted in Night Gallery‘s second season. Best remembered as a mystery writer. I see no indication that she’s in print in any manner these days for her SF (but three of her mysteries are available from the usual suspects) though she had two SF collections, Elsewhere, Elsewhen, Elsehow and Xenogenesis. (Died 1975.) (CE)
Born August 21, 1911 – Anthony Boucher. Co-founded The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction with Francis McComas, co-edited with him 1949-1954, alone through ’58; two Hugos for Best Professional Magazine. Eight Best of F&SF anthologies 1952-1959 (’52-’54 with FM). A Treasury of SF ’59, one of our best. Six dozen short stories. Translated into Dutch, French, German, Hungarian, Italian, Japanese, Russian. Opera lover. First translator of Borges into English, hello Evelyn Leeper. Also detective fiction (a star there too), radio drama, poker. (Died 1968) [JH]
Born August 21, 1927 – Arthur Thomson. Fanartist. Thirty covers, a hundred forty interiors. Signature often read as “ATom”, some insist it’s just “Atom”. Resident illustrator of Hyphen. Back covers for Nebula. Here is the Nov 64 Riverside Quarterly. Here is Banana Wings 49 (repr. from An ATom Sketchbook). TAFF (Trans-Atlantic Fan Fund) delegate, published ATom Abroad. Official Artist of Boskone 15. Two Novas. Rotsler Award. (Died 1990) [JH]
Born August 21, 1943 – Ron Walotsky. A hundred eighty covers, fifty interiors. Gallery in Locus 500. Interview in SF Chronicle 214. Magic: the Gathering cards. Ancient Warriors of Lost Civilizations series based on horseshoe-crab shells found near his Florida home. Here is the May 67 F&SF. Here is Lord of Light. Here is Earth Ship and Star Song. Here is The Shores Beneath. Here is Houston, Houston, Do You Read? (Souls cover bound with it is by Dieter Rottermund.) Here is the Nov 97 Analog. Here is Jimi Hendrix. Artbook, Inner Visions. (Died 2002) [JH]
Born August 21, 1943 — Lucius Shepard. Damn, I didn’t know he’d passed on. Life During Wartime which won him the Astounding Award for a Best New Writer is one seriously weird novel. And his World Fantasy Award winning The Jaguar Hunter is freaking amazing as are all his short collections. I don’t remember reading “ Barnacle Bill the Spacer” which won a Best Novella Hugo at ConFrancisco. (Died 2014.) (CE)
Born August 21, 1956 — Kim Cattrall, 64. Gracie Law in John Carpenter’s amazing Big Trouble in Little China. She also played Justine de Winter in The Return of the Musketeers, Paige Katz in Wild Palms, Lieutenant Valeris in Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country and Linday Isley in Good v. Evil. Series wise, she was one offs in Tales of the Gold Monkey, Logan’s Run, The Incredible Hulk and The Outer Limits. (CE);
Born August 21, 1957 – John Howe, 63. A hundred sixty covers, two hundred fifty interiors. The Maps of Middle-Earth, There and Back Again with Brian Sibley; A Middle-Earth Traveler. Here is Rip van Winkle. Here is The Lord of the Rings (presumably not meaning to imply Gandalf is he, aiee). Here is The Once and Future King. Here is Fool’s Errand. Here is Créatures. Artbooks Myth & Magic, Sur les terres de Tolkien, John Howe Fantasy Art Workshop, Forging Dragons, Lost Worlds, Coloring Dragons. Website here. [JH]
Born August 21, 1965 – Darynda Jones, 55. Sixteen novels, three shorter stories. Summa cum laude from U. New Mexico. Sign-language interpreter. RITA Award. Admits to almost finishing a post-Apocalypse story while in a corner booth at a Tastee Freez, kindly has never shown the manuscript. Lives in New Mexico with husband and two sons the Mighty Mighty Jones Boys. Third Grave Dead Ahead a NY Times Best Seller. [JH]
Born August 21, 1968 — Carrie-Anne Moss, 52. I first saw her as Tara McDonald in the Dark Justice series. Not genre, just her first video I think. Due later played Monica Howard in the “Feeding the Beast” episode of Forever Knight as her first genre role. Oddly enough her next role was as Liz Teel in the Canadian series called Matrix which has nothing to do with the Matrix film franchise where she’s Trinity. Her latest genre role was playing Jeryn Hogarth in the now defunct Netflix based Marvel Universe. (CE)
Born August 21, 1972 – Socorro Vegas, 48. Premio Nacional de Poesía y Cuento «Benemérito de América», Premio Nacional de Novela Ópera Prima «Carlos Fuentes» (Mexico). Five book-length works (Todos las islas is short stories). We may claim “The Giant in the Moon”, see it in English here. Other translations in Compressed, Concho River Review, The Listening Eye, Literal, The Modern Review. [JH]
Born August 21, 1975 — Alicia Witt, 45. Her first role was at age eight as Alia Atreides in David Lynch’s Dune. Next, genre wise at least, voices Caitlin Fairchild In the animated Gen¹³ film. She has series one-offs in Twilight Zone, Person of Interest, Elementary, Walking Dead, Supernatural and The Librarians. She showed up in an episode of the original Twin Peaks and reprised that role nearly thirty years later in Twin Peaks: A Limited Event Series. (CE)
(13) DC FANDOME. In addition to everything else happening this busy weekend is the DC Fandome. It’s free and signing up is easy — here. The 24-hour event starts at 10 a.m. Pacific.
(14) GRATITUDES. In “i am grateful”, Wil Wheaton admits it’s hard for him to fall asleep because when he’s trying, that’s when anxiety works on him most aggressively. He shares a practice that has made it easier.
…But I started doing something that’s been incredibly helpful, and I thought I’d share it.
Every night as I’m getting ready for bed, I focus on a list of things for which I am grateful. I call it “doing my gratitudes”. I just start somewhere, like “I am grateful that I am going to sleep in a warm, safe bed. I am grateful that I get to share this bed with Anne. I am grateful I have enough food.” Stuff like that. I remind myself that there is so much that is good in my life, and by thinking about those things, recognizing those things, and making space to feel grateful for them, I do not give my anxiety an opportunity to grab hold of anything and go to work on me.
… Those bright lights are so important right now, whether they are stadium lights turning night into day, or pinpricks that barely allow candlelight through black velvet. Spending time in gratitude makes it easier for me to find the light, and remember that it is there, even when I can’t see it.
Did the iconic theme song for The X-Files need fan-written lyrics? If it got the cast of the sci-fi series to reunite for a musical Zoom call, then, perhaps — like the massive government archives secreting away the supernatural — it’s worth it for the greater good.
…Now how many government secrets are hidden in this song? The new lyrics — courtesy of contest winners Jennifer Large and Rebecca MacDonald — give composer Mark Snow’s classic eerie theme a twist, especially when sung by a wide-ranging collection of cast members and crew.
…Explanations abound for the game’s sudden explosion in popularity, but I have noticed a particularly common camaraderie among fellow writers. What is it about this game, with so many other open-concept games already in existence, that draws writers to it with such gusto? The timing of release and the sweetness of the game in such dark times are no doubt factors, but I believe it goes deeper than that, down to the very core of our creative hearts.
…From that moment on, I unconsciously spun the narrative of my experience. From the clothes I wore to where I placed the coin-operated tourist binoculars I’d shot out of a balloon with a slingshot, I was crafting a story within this story-less game. This is the garden where I breed pink roses. Here is my carnival for when I need a bit of a thrill, outfitted with a popcorn machine and a teacup ride. There is the playground and community pool where I’ll meet my friends on the weekend, lined with color-coded tables for playing chess. Every piece of wallpaper, every color, every pair of jelly sandals I place on my chibi feet are dishing out tone and theme and mood.
And then there are the villagers. They are a delight to witness as they flit about the island, munching on popsicles, singing, or sprinting Naruto-style on the beach. I’ve dedicated far too many hours to crafting and designing spaces on my island that my residents might enjoy, despite many of the items being stationary and non-interactive. My imagination does all the work the game does not.
Alexander Muscat tweets, “In Microsoft Flight Simulator a bizarrely eldritch, impossibly narrow skyscraper pierces the skies of Melbourne’s North like a suburban Australian version of Half-Life 2’s Citadel, and I am -all for it-.”
In Microsoft Flight Simulator a bizarrely eldritch, impossibly narrow skyscraper pierces the skies of Melbourne's North like a suburban Australian version of Half-Life 2's Citadel, and I am -all for it- pic.twitter.com/6AH4xgIAWg
— Alexander Muscat linktr.ee/alexandermuscat (@alexandermuscat) August 19, 2020
In Japan, if you want to disappear from your life, you can just pick up the phone and a ‘night moving company’ will turn you into one of the country’s ‘johatsu,’ or literally ‘evaporated people.’ You can cease to exist. Meet the people who choose to disappear and the people who are left behind.
After a cliff collapsed in Grand Canyon National Park, a boulder with fossilized tracks was revealed, park officials said in a Thursday news release. The fossil footprints are about 313 million years old, according to researchers.
“These are by far the oldest vertebrate tracks in Grand Canyon, which is known for its abundant fossil tracks” Stephen Rowland, a paleontologist at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, said in the news release. “More significantly, they are among the oldest tracks on Earth of shelled-egg-laying animals, such as reptiles, and the earliest evidence of vertebrate animals walking in sand dunes.”
Pumpkin spice came early this year — too early, according to majorities of consumers.
Dunkin’ Donuts’ pumpkin-flavored coffee and other fall treats returned to the menu earlier than ever this year, the company said, arriving at participating locations Wednesday. Starbucks Corp. has yet to confirm the return date for its much-loved pumpkin spice latte, but one location reportedly said the product would launch on Aug. 28.
While some social media users are eager for the early return of fall products — a silver lining in an otherwise difficult year — new polling from Morning Consult shows that many consumers would prefer to see products promoted closer to the seasons or holidays with which they’re associated….
(21) VIDEO OF THE DAY. Metal Monsterette is a fun family film made in 1957 with kids and cousins by Ed Emshwiller. His daughter Eve is the heroine and daughter Susan is the mad scientist Dr. Majenius.
[Thanks to Cat Eldridge, Mike Kennedy, John King Tarpinian, John Hertz, Michael Toman, JJ, rcade, Martin Morse Wooster, and Andrew Porter for some of these stories. Title credit goes to File 770 contributing editor of the day Kip W.]
