(1) San Diego Rocket Race 2015 happens October 17. Entry fee is $40 per team (of two to four). The theme is —
The Rocket Race is an urban adventure competition where teams of up to four will be using their brains to solve science fiction themed clues that lead them by car and on foot all around the San Diego area. The theme for the 2015 race is Post-Apocalypse Now!
…The San Diego Rocket Race is a day-long adventure race for teams of two to four players, made up of two components:
In the first half of the race, teams will solve a clue that will lead them somewhere around San Diego, where they will pick up their next clue. When that clue is solved, it will lead to a new location, and the next clue will be given to the team, leading them to the next location, and eventually they will reach the midpoint of the race and a mandatory lunch break.
In the second half of the race, the game changes to a photo scavenger hunt. Teams will receive a checklist of clues and will have until the end of the race day to find as many places in the photo scavenger hunt checklist as possible and reach the finish line before the race deadline.
(2) Find out about “The Most Advanced Human Brain-to-Brain Interface Ever Made” at Motherboard.
Scientists at the University of Washington have successfully completed what is believed to be the most complex human brain-to-brain communication experiment ever. It allowed two people located a mile apart to play a game of “20 Questions” using only their brainwaves, a nearly imperceptible flash of light, and an internet connection to communicate.
Brain-to-brain interfaces have gotten much more complex over the last several years. Miguel Nicolelis, a researcher at Duke University, has even created “organic computers” by connecting the brains of several rats and chimps together.
But in humans, the technology remains pretty basic, primarily because the most advanced brain-to-brain interfaces require direct access to the brain. We’re not exactly willing to saw open a person’s skull in the name of performing some rudimentary tasks for science.
Using two well-known technologies, electroencephalography EEG and transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS), Andrea Stocco and Chantel Prat were able to increase the complexity of a human brain to brain interface.
(3) I’ve fallen behind in my coverage of the George R.R. Martin Deluxe Talking Plush toy. You can now listen to an audio sample from Factory Entertainment, and buy a copy for $29.99.
Dressed in his trademark fisherman’s cap and suspenders, our Deluxe Talking Plush features 10 exclusively recorded audio quotes delivered directly by Mr. Martin himself!
(4) I spent a random minute watching the opening sequence from The Prisoner on YouTube because I wanted to hear the music.
As any Prisoner fan knows after watching the opening a thousand times, the license plate on McGoohan’s Lotus is KAR 120C. And if you Google the plate number you get lots of Prisoner-related hits.
When the black limo that’s following him pulls up to the curb outside his home, there is also a good view of its license plate — TLH 658. I Googled that number, but what I mainly got were hits on The Lutheran Hymnal where TLH 658 is “Onward Christian Soldiers.” Make of that what you will.
(5) Speaking of conspiracies, a couple of weeks ago I fearlessly investigated the never-before-asked question: What determines who pops up as the “featured member” in the SFWA Blog sidebar?
I wanted to know because Lou Antonelli popped up when I logged on that day.
I asked the President of SFWA, “Is this based on paid advertising? Some algorithim that detects I just read about Antonelli on FB? Something else?”
Cat Rambo replied —
The sfnal answer would be that SFWA’s orbital mind control lasers determined made you look at it right then.
Unfortunately, though, it’s random.
(6) Leading up to the 40th anniversary theatrical re-release of Monty Python and the Holy Grail, co-director Terry Jones introduces lost footage and outtakes from the movie.
(7) Steve Davidson is up to “1941 Retro Hugo Awards (Part 6: Fanzines)”. It’s one of the more heavily populated categories, and Davidson warns —
This is, of course, an incomplete list. Even in 1939/1940, those attempting to index the fanzines published up till then despaired of ever being able to compile a complete list. And, of course, getting a hold of even a tiny fraction of what is listed here is nigh on impossible these days, making the selection of nominees for Best Fanzine of 1940 a particularly problematic task.
(8) In 1941 LASFS was still meeting at Clifton’s Cafeteria, which is about to experience an architectural rebirth of its glory days. The Thrillist has some great photos previewing the restored (and in some spots, remodeled) interior.
First off — and this alone would probably set Clifton’s apart from every other restaurant in LA — the space now features a three-story atrium that’s stacked around a massive redwood tree in the middle of the restaurant. But wait, there’s more.
(9) Shockingly, an award given by a convention that has only twice thrice been held in a non-English-speaking country has in every case been voted to fiction published in the English language. Lynn E. O’Connacht has exposed the numbers in “Hugo Award Nominations by Country”.
So, initially, when the Hugos were announced I was thrilled along with everyone else. I am still thrilled because it is a great thing worthy of celebration. Diversity creates strength and fosters innovation. But something in the back of my mind was niggling at me. There was something about the celebration that felt off to me. Something about translated works and English-language awards and voting. Something that, as far as I can tell, no one has mentioned in any of their articles. Something that I expect most people wouldn’t even think to check. Either because they’re too thrilled that ‘one of their own’ won a prestigious foreign award or because they just don’t see that there might be something to look at.
It’s fairly common knowledge that, despite claims to the contrary, the Hugo Awards are a predominantly American award. But is it? After all, despite the slate voting this year saw a lot of diversity and it still won the awards. That’s what was niggling me: how completely different that focus is from my experience. Were the Hugos more nationally diverse than my gut was telling me? Was I wrong in thinking about the Hugos as an American award? Was I wrong to think of it as an award only native speakers of English stood a chance at winning?
(10) Wouldn’t people be more willing to see Victor Frankenstein if the actors traded the leading roles? Find out when the movie reaches theaters on November 25.
James McAvoy and Daniel Radcliffe star in a dynamic and thrilling twist on a legendary tale. Radical scientist Victor Frankenstein (McAvoy) and his equally brilliant protégé Igor Strausman (Radcliffe) share a noble vision of aiding humanity through their groundbreaking research into immortality. But Victor’s experiments go too far, and his obsession has horrifying consequences. Only Igor can bring his friend back from the brink of madness and save him from his monstrous creation.
[Thanks to Arnie Fenner, JJ, and John King Tarpinian for some of these stories. Title credit belongs to File 770 contributing editor of the day Fin Fahey.]
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NelC on September 24, 2015 at 7:26 pm said:
When I went I had good results by picking someone who had plenty of time (a bookseller in a nearly empty bookstore, for instance) and explaining in my fractured Dutch that I was trying to learn Dutch and having some request that had to do with the situation (looking for an easy children’s book, buying flowers, whatever.)
On the other hand I noticed that anyone who was in a hurry would immediately switch to English if I hesitated, and it seemed to me kinder not to waste their time with my Dutch.
And in yet other situations, children of the family would be encouraged to speak English with me (I assume as a golden chance to talk to a native speaker for certain values of “native” that aren’t very stringent; I’m not sure a Briton would have survived the stampede but an American was acceptable if no Briton was available,) so I spoke English with them.
And how would it be practical for the voters to judge works in a non-English language? If the Worldcon membership ever grew large enough to have large numbers of voters whose first language was not English, it would tend to become a contest between blocks of voters along lingusitic lines. It would mean nothing to most readers if Best Novel was won by “Heersta Horg Bazoom Shmalor” or the Best Film was “Gzeesc sz Mygonciy” and would inevitably bring up the question of why have such an award at all.
@Taral Wayne: Yeah. I was thinking about that too. The one all-world, all-languages literary award I know of that sort of works is the Nobel Prize for Literature. Which is a) juried, and b) essentially a lifetime achievement award. So, small pool of “voters” and a very long time frame. And still people bitch about who does and doesn’t win.
The idea that one could viably hand out an annual award for something like “best science-fiction novelette in any language anywhere in the world” seems naive.
Many thanks for the heads up on the Streets of London; I am now mildly embittered because Amazon has sent it to my iPad, as requested, but not my Kindle. Usually it works, but not this time.
I am departing for Albania, Croatia, Greece and Italy; hence wanting them on multiple platforms in case there is actually some sunshine there!
Also, I am not rich beyond the dreams of avarice, though it may look that way when gazing at my travels this year; there are weird legal things called ‘Rights to Light’, and building Crossrail will deprive me of some of them, for which I’m paid, and I’m spending it while I can.
Carpe Diem!
On the latest at John C Wrights – An excerpt from an essay by Leo Grin, of which he approves, with my comments –
“Soiling the building blocks and well-known tropes of our treasured modern myths is no different than other artists taking a crucifix and dipping it in urine, covering it in ants, or smearing it with feces.”
This is the sort of thing I most object to in Wrights line of thinking. This statement as it is borders on the really, truly blasphemous. The “modern myths” Grin speaks of are PULP FICTION. They were written for money and read for fun. This stuff is not in anyones religion, and if it is they are pitiable. In my day no Bishop would have permitted the works of Howard in the Catholic schools, because they are lurid. To say that messing with them is on par with deliberate desecration of a crucifix is the blasphemy. Too many people take this literature much too seriously, on all sides, and get lost.
“In the end, it’s just another small, pathetic chapter in the decades-long slide of Western civilization into suicidal self-loathing.”
On the other hand, this is precisely correct. Its just attached to the wrong thing.
Wright, and Grin, strain at gnats. I’m not saying they are swallowing mountains, but, eh, whatever. Its a lack of perspective.
Michael Flanders said:
Ray Bradbury – The Piper
RAH as Lyle Monroe – Heil!
Those 2 were in a Sam Moskowitz-edited anthology called “Futures To Infinity” which collected obscure stories by famous writers. I had a copy many years ago. Funny to see the titles pop up together like that.
And up here, this weekend is the outdoors book fair “The Word on the Street” in both Kitchener and Toronto. People listed on the Toronto one with SF/Fantasy connections include R.J. (Rebecca) Anderson, Johnathan Auxier, Kate Blair, Leah Bobet, Erin Bow, Megan Crewe, Natale Ghent, Sarah Henstra, David Nickle, Emily Pohl-Weary, and Eve Silver.
Don’t see James Alan Gardner on the list, but of course he’s local to the Kitchener one. (He used to show up at the Toronto one regularly until the Kitchener one started.)
Endless.horse is also a good way to pass an indefinite amount of time. Or it’s a way to pass it, at least.
I just now realized Bee Duffel was in two iconic movies, Fahrenheit 451 AND Monty Python and the Holly Grail. In one she burns herself alive and the other she is the old crone.
UltraGotha
That’s wonderful! I don’t suppose his surname was Jarndyce, by any chance?
Stevie – Wot!?? You’ve never heard of Flanders and Swann?
Good Lord, girl. Go buy them RIGHT NOW.
Twas beauty that killed bad.horse
The obvious SFF connection to Flanders and Swann is that Donald Swann wrote the music for The Road Goes Ever On, a song cycle for Lord of the Rings published back in 1967.
The Kitchener WOTS is seen as hostile to local specfic authors by the local specfic authors I know. Last year I helped set up an evening of readings but being FASS Vice is consuming all my spoons this year.
Someone commended on my LJ that there are more cooking demos than readings at Kitchener’s WOTS this year.
Jack Lint –
And the First and Second Laws of Thermodynamics
http://www.iankitching.me.uk/humour/hippo/entropy.html
Almost all Flanders and Swann stuff is wonderful. I highly recommend acquiring it.
I have a rather lovely bound copy of the sheet music for this. Swann’s setting of “Je Suis Le Tenebreux” is also SF-linked, as Julian May made the original poem the theme for Marc Remillard in the Saga Of The Exiles:
Added a record for the English translation of The City of Woven Streets to Goodreads if any Goodreads users want to add it to their to-read shelf.
@Anthony
BT’s name servers were doing something to my lookups, probably part of their filtering stuff even though I opted out. Using Google’s dns made things a bit clearer. Helps I’m not actually supposed to be working…
Too much ICMP traffic may be getting filtered, I was still able to get the whole thing using tracepath instead which uses UDP packets (and doesn’t need root)
@Jack Lint
No it wasn’t. It was splatting into the ground like that.
OB books: Just finished Broken Monsters by Lauren Beukes. That was ruddy good, one bit in the climatic scenes managed to make me blurt “Jesus Wept” on the train home. That got me some funny looks.
I’ll have to try Shining Girls soon if that’s the level she is writing at.
Holy cow! I didn’t realize the LotR music was written by that Swann. Wish I still had my copy of the songbook …
My first exposure to Flanders and Swann, though I didn’t know it at the time, was Tony Randall doing, “Have Some Madeira, M’dear” on The Carol Burnett Show. (Which I suspect you could no longer do on prime time TV.)
Has anyone heard “Vendor Librorum Floreat (Let the Bookseller Flourish)?” It was a single they did for the ABA which wasn’t on the CD set I have.
Time has given me a very different perspective on “Have Some Madeira M’dear.” As in it always made me uncomfortable but I didn’t know why and now I do. For this knowledge I tip my hat to the conversations about consent over the last few years.
Note that I generally quite like most of the Flanders and Swann I’ve heard, but that one is creepy. And much less funny when you realize what is going on.
I feel a certain glow and warm buzz at the fact that fans and nerds are at the point where a prominent science fiction author needs to disclaim his interest for an open public office, and there’s a draft campaign, all within a few hours of the announcement.
I will likely have different feelings after seeing what fresh conspiracy theories will come bubbling out of the MGC and Vox at this news.
Now you know where the Puppies lifted it from 🙂 #lucky10K
There was a walmart.horse. It was just a picture of a horse in front of a walmart, but that didn’t stop walmart from releasing the lawyers.
In-fucking-deed. A friend of mine is very fond of it, having heard it back then when he was young and innocent (he knows better now, but some things you still remain attached to). He tried to share the love, and I went eeeeeek.
@Cat
I was having a similar conversation yesterday. I was reading a modern short story that was attempting to work in 1860s England, and the casual prejudice was very much on display. I realized that, while historically accurate, it came across as wholly unnecessary to the work, bothering me enough that I put it down. At the same time, reading work with the same language from the period doesn’t bother me as much or at all.
I love the old versions of “Have Some Madeira M’dear” and if you haven’t seen the utterly unctuous version done by the Limeliters on youtube, you’re missing out. But if a modern cover came out of it, I can’t imagine I’d be able to treat it favourably in the slightest. The patina of age I think matters a lot in how we approach things.
@James Davis Nicoll:
That’s… unfortunate. I’d noticed the Kitchener WotS site had a fairly small Participant list (and no Exhibitor list at all) but hadn’t realized it was that bad. Living in Toronto these days (and not owning a car) means I don’t get out to Kitchener-Waterloo all that often, and I’ve never actually been to the Kitchener WotS. (It started well after I moved to Toronto.)
FASS Vice, hmm? Wonder how close this site gets to Critical FASS. (Granted, you and I both mentioned it, so I guess we’ve already hit it in a sense.) Especially since I also mentioned James Alan Gardner, who dedicated Expendable to FASS.
(By the way, while I use this pseudonym for most of my commenting online, you might remember me as the person who broke your record for most terms on the WatSFiC executive. I see you’re still ending up as club exec…)
I do love Flanders and Swann, but the (ahem) attitudes behind “Have Some Madeira, M’Dear” and “Philological Waltz”… no. Just… no.
Jenora Feuer, JAG is my ride to weekly gaming…
I did take 15 years off FASS…
Living in a different city does make not getting involved any more easier.
Then again, the 1990 work term I had in Ottawa, a group of us rented a mini-van and drove down to Kitchener-Waterloo to attend FASS, and I seem to recall the group included one of the writers of the show that year, who did kind of have to be in attendance for at least part of it.
(The van blew a tire outside of Kingston on the way back, and we discovered there wasn’t a spare in the back. In 1990, before any of us had cell phones. At least the rental company just paid for it when I handed over the broken tire and the bill.)
For some time now, I’ve been toying with the idea of doing a cover version of Every Breath You Take (that quintessential stalker song) in which every aspect of the arrangement has something subtly wrong with it. Like, one string of the lead guitar is an eighth of a note flat, etc etc. The effect I’d be trying for, ideally, would be that when you hear this cover of the song, your skin crawls—and you can’t tell why.
I can think of two things it would mean:
1. Worldcon was on Venus that year, and we finally had a pan-Solar System electorate.
2. The evil cabal was still in control of all things. Puppies like books with bazoom larjor, not shmalor!
I’m not sure what to make of Gzeesc sz Mygonciy winning for Long Form, though. I would think, by then, that gzeesc would have learned that cosplay doesn’t mean consent…
Sting is still quietly horrified at couples who tell him that’s “their” song. “I Will follow you, written much earlier with romantic intent, gives me similar creeps.
I was just at a bilingual wedding right outside Montreal. The husband is a mostly monolingual Anglophone (he’s working on learning French, and doing well enough) and the wife is a bilingual Francophone. So the speeches and the DJ were in both languages, However, where the French speakers translated their speeches as a matter of course, the English speakers didn’t — or, more honestly, couldn’t. It was however, stated fairly confidently that nobody at this particular wedding couldn’t understand, though some Francophones might struggle with speaking it. (which I get, as I understand a lot more French, spoken and written, than I dare speak. Though the father of the bride was disproportionatelly pleased that I tried.)
That specific language division is pretty much typical for southern* Canada, really, except in Quebec outside Montreal (which has a strong Anglo presence these days) and Gatineau (aka Hull, which is effectively part of the nation’s capital).
*Northern Canada has a fair number of small communities whose first language is, or tries to be, that of the local First Nations.
> “I’ll have to try Shining Girls soon if that’s the level she is writing at.”
I liked The Shining Girls better than Broken Monsters, in fact.
@Lenora Rose: In Montreal, in my experience, if you’re an anglophone and speak French only other anglophones will speak it back to you. Past Quebec or thereabouts you start to find genuinely unilingual francophones.
On Dutch speakers: it isn’t just that their English is so good it is when you learn that it is their third language* that the sense of linguistic inadequacy really creeps up on you.
[*or fourth if they are Belgian – having already learnt French and German they feel they need to learn English just for symmetry]
Every Breath You Take is the song for my mother’s time in the hospital with my eldest sister, original meaning notwithstanding. It came out around the same time or shortly after and for my mother, it reflected both how she felt at the time (watching every breath) and the hopes for the future (that my sister would live to do the other things in the song).
A while ago I got a copy of The Road Goes Ever On with a CD of the happily-named William Elvin singing the songs included. Unfortunately Elvin’s name was the only appropriate thing about him. He basically can-beltos* his way through, making all the songs sound the same.
*Old singers’ joke: the opposite of “bel canto” is “can belto.”
A friend lived in the Netherlands for a while. She now speaks passable Dutch, but has convinced herself that she is dyslexic, which is a bit of a surprise as none of her friends can really see how she completed two degrees without ever noticing her condition.
It came upon her while she looked at signs and newspapers and thought “those aren’t words, those are just a jumble of letters”. Most people just things “well, that’s Dutch for you.” Now had she been living in the Czech Republic…
Dutch people generally don’t actually speak German (except in the border areas). They simple pronounce Dutch as if it were German, with the occasional German word thrown in as a courtesy.
In Toronto, The Word on the Street coincides with the Victoria College Book Sale, which runs from Thursday through Sunday. Usually there’s a fair amount of SF.
It’s not quite as good as the Trinity one in about a month, though.
@ Meredith, I’ve always thought of it as a parent/child song
nickpheas wrote:
I was the most atrocious speller for a while; I wasn’t expecting to see those double a’s or double k’s or oe’s or eeuw’s so I didn’t. It was like they were camouflaged or something and I had to stop and peer really hard to see them. And sometimes seeing them as a single a or a single k makes a difference. It doesn’t just come out as a misspelled word it comes out as an entirely different word. Which made it very hard to look things up.
I’m getting better at it. But I can sympathize with your friend–Dutch spelling accords quite closely with how it sounds (once you know the general pronunciation rules*) but until you train your eye to the combinations it’s a lot like what I imagine dyslexia to be.
*Dutch people will occasionally complain about the difficulty they had as children learning which words should be spelled with ei and which with ij (they make the same sound in most parts of the Netherlands) and I just laugh really hard.
Cubist on September 25, 2015 at 12:20 pm said:
For some time now, I’ve been toying with the idea of doing a cover version of Every Breath You Take (that quintessential stalker song) in which every aspect of the arrangement has something subtly wrong with it. Like, one string of the lead guitar is an eighth of a note flat, etc etc. The effect I’d be trying for, ideally, would be that when you hear this cover of the song, your skin crawls—and you can’t tell why.
I keep hearing this one featured at family weddings, played utterly straight.
But then, these were the relatives doing White Weddings with All the Trimmings, so they tended to be creepy anyway.
(“We could have 200 children to glorify the Lord! Because no contraception here!” and other horrors.)
I will Follow Him, though, was a song I sang for the obsessively attached kitty who made it difficult for me to walk away from the house because he would, in fact, follow me, yodeling every step of the way.
Nothing would keep him away.
But charming, if weird, in a cat doesn’t really work for people.
@cat @nickpheas My favourite Amsterdam brewery: Brouerei T’ij.
(Which has a whole egg thing going on for reasons)
Ha! I suspected as much – they are actually TRYING to make me feel linguistically inadequate!
So next in the TBR pile I’ve got:
Descent, Ken MacLeod
Ocean at the End of the Lane, Gaiman
Station Eleven, Emily St James Mandel
The Bone Clocks, David Mitchell
The Quarry, Iain Banks (do want to read this but not sure I’m emotionally ready)
Children of the Sky, Vernor Vinge
Exiles Gate, CJ Cherryh (been trying to get a copy for some time)
Terminal World, Al Reynolds
Any nudges towards one appreciated…
“He basically can-beltos* his way through, making all the songs sound the same.”
This, exactly. I never bought the album, nor even listened all the way through, because it all sounded painfully–and uninterestingly–similar. 🙁
I forget who recommended The Watchmaker of Filigree Street, but yum.
(V rfcrpvnyyl yvxr vgf fhogyr nibvqnapr bs ohapurf bs pyvpurf – fgbel qvq abg tb jurer ubuhz cerqvpgnoyl vg zvtug unir.)
It and Daughter of Mystery are my current You Must Read This books.
If the kids were not on the opposite side of the world, I would just hand them copies, but getting them into my Kindle library will do for now.
In other news, I was a good person and took my mixed hard plastic into the full-service recycling place, and came away from their Reuse Station with Carol Berg’s Transformation trilogy.
Virtue is its own reward, I know, but books are nice too.
It looks as if there are further works in the same universe, but they’ll have to wait for October money to come in.
For now, I will finish The Traitor Baru Cormorant (2015 reading) then a tasty completed trilogy to follow.
I am set for the weekend.