By Robert Bly
No one grumbles among the oyster clans,
And lobsters play their bone guitars all summer.
Only we, with our opposable thumbs, want
Heaven to be, and God to come, again.
There is no end to our grumbling; we want
Comfortable earth and sumptuous Heaven.
But the heron standing on one leg in the bog
Drinks his dark rum all day, and is content.
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The kids celebrated their first day out of school by sleeping late, eating blueberry bagels for breakfast, playing video games and going to the pool for several hours. In and around getting stuff for them, driving them, feeding them, etc., I wrote a review of "A Matter of Perspective" and returned a bunch of phone calls (my medical tests from last week were all fine, knock wood!).
The Friday Five: Money
1. Did you get an allowance as a kid, and if so, how much was it? I did, and I had to do chores for it, but I don't remember how much it was. Not a lot.
2. How old were you when you had your first job, and what was it? My very first paying job was as an actor/puppeteer at Adventure Theatre, a company that performs for children on the indoor stage at Glen Echo Park.
3. Which do you do better: save money or spend money? Spend. Much better.
4. Are people more likely to borrow money from you, or are you more likely to borrow from them? I frequently forget that I have no money with me because I gave it to someone else in my family, so then if I can't use a credit card, I either end up buying for everyone or borrowing to cover my own expenses. Hopefully it works out in the end.
5. What's the most expensive thing you've ever bought? My home. Well, the mortgage on it.
Fannish 5: What are the five most outrageous misuses of science in science fiction? I am never going to remember all the things that made me scream and tear my hair out, and I don't actually know yet whether Cylons having babies with humans on BSG is completely outrageous or whether in fact all the humans are really Cylons so it's perfectly plausible. So I'll go with the classics, the ones everyone else rips off anyway:
1. Warp Drive - to our current understanding, that kind of faster-than-light travel is impossible.
2. Inertial Dampers - and even if it was possible, everyone on the ship should be smushed dead the nanosecond that they go offline, as they do so often and make people...fall out of their seats.
3. Replicators - the amount of power necessary to transfigure matter would require more matter/energy than the ship could possibly transport.
4. Transporters - similar problem, the amount of energy required to turn a person to energy and then back into matter would be monumental.
5. The Holodeck - the principle is sound, but once the characters can program themselves, we're in William Gibson la-la land.
Have some Brookside butterflies and people:
In the evening Dementor Delta picked me up with a pro writer friend of hers for dinner with a bunch of fannish friends and Vertigo, who drove me home. Then we went to Disco Duck at con.txt where I got to hang out with Ann Tara for the first time since the heyday of Voyager fandom, and many other awesome people whom I won't even try to name here because I'll certainly forget someone and be sad later. It was lots of fun and I met lots of cool people. Then I came home and watched Battlestar Galactica, about which I can say only: Moore,Ron this is so very you and your legacy. Earlier I read an interview summarized at TrekToday with you bragging about how Gene Roddenberry was a great idealist while you are a great writer, and I would just like to note that I will take Roddenberry over you every single time.
Tim Russert: Much too young.
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