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today i went to both dentists. the implant guy removed the caps from the implant posts, inserted the abutments, took an x-ray, and sent me straight downtown to my regular guy, who took a number of impressions and then put white plastic caps over the abutments. my new teeth will be ready in two weeks.

the new teeth are $1,800 each. this doesn't even count the implants, which are twice that per tooth.

my most expensive jewelry is in my mouth and no one can see it. also, i am broke.

Hey LJers,

I just wanted to let you all know that we are going to be performing some mogilefs maintenance over the next few days. We will be upgrading our current version to latest stable as well as changing some db config information to better handle the amount of files we are currently hosting. This shouldn't cause a big impact on site stability, but you may see some minor delays with userpic / scrapbook images appearing or other requests associated with our mogilefs. We would love to not have that happen, but unfortunately with some of the steps we need to take we have to cause a delay with images. I figured this was a better solution than taking down all of LiveJournal because well lets face it, we all need our daily LJ fix ;)

Thanks,

I love this cold weather. And it's starting to look like there will be some form of wintry precipitation on Friday, with highs in the 30s. oooh, that's really cold! And wouldn't that be rich that thirdworld doesn't come to Austin this weekend for SMOFcon and this one gets snow.

There are questions about whether or not there will be enough wintry precipitation to affect the opening of the university of Friday. I suspect some graduate students are wondering the same thing. Well, kids, it's been very slow here, traffic-wise. Way too slow, actually. As in, folks are starting to talk about how slow it is. This is not a good sign. It shouldn't be this slow, and I wonder what this means for Thursday and Friday (because I have no doubt whatsoever we will be open on Friday).

Friday, esp, since I am supposed to go downtown after work for SMOFcon. Still haven't figured out my driving details, and I'm still hoping I'll find street parking near the hotel, because I don't want to have to pay tons of $$ for parking down there.

Meanwhile, I finally took a look at the SMOFcon website to see when things are happening. I'll miss all the Friday programming, but I should be able to get to the hotel in time for the icebreaker, maybe if I can figure out my transportation. Programming doesn't start until 10am Saturday, so that should give time maybe to have breakfast with reudaly and nimrodjcs. Maybe Elsi's, which isn't terribly close to downtown, but easy enough to get to, if we leave early(ish)?

Then I looked at the program, and there's some good stuff there. And I saw that R. will be there (and on a good program item I'd be interested in attending) and I got all ooh shit, he's going to be there (I wasn't expecting SMOFcon to be something he'd be interested in), it's not that big, I might actually have to see him. At least I discovered this now, and not say Saturday afternoon. This way I can mentally prepare (and have a drink or two before hand).

Meanwhile, where are the freaking students??

Pyr's energetic editor, Lou Anders, has a unique way of demonstrating how a reader decides to buy--or not to buy--a book. Lou is a dashing, colorful sort of man with a big personality. He tends to jump up from his chair and dramatize his points. My own new book happened to be the one he used to illustrate the process.

Lou walked along the front of the panel table, telling us that a reader will start at one end of the alphabet and go down the stacks, looking. He picked up my novel--The Singers of Nevya, since you ask--and looked briefly at the cover, then lingered over the back cover copy. That happens to be all blurbs, which he says do matter to readers (see previous post, and another to come). Then he opened the book and turned to the first page.

According to Lou, many readers do this. They read one paragraph to see if they like the writer's style, to see if there's something there that intrigues them. He read my first paragraph aloud--making me squirm and wish I could rewrite it on the spot--and talked about what was interesting in it (he wanted to know what a quiru is, and thought he might buy the book because of that curiosity.) When he set the book down--despite my protests!--he said each book gets about twenty or thirty seconds of a browser's time, and that first paragraph can make all the difference.

A good exercise is to turn to books we love, and read that first paragraph. Some examples from my own library:

"I heard a noise," Mrs. Davenport said, "and then I was moving through this tunnel." --Passage, Connie Willis; this intrigues me because I love anything to do with near-death experiences and the paranormal.

On a certain day in June, 19--, a young man was making his way on foot northward from the great City to a town or place called Edgewood, that he had been told of but had never visited. His name was Smoky Barnable, and he was going to Edgewood to get married; the fact that he walked and didn't ride was one of the conditions placed on his coming there at all. --Little, Big,John Crowley; don't you just have to know what that's about? And this paragraph gives you a sense of Crowley's writing style,slightly Victorian, formal, polished.

In the evening Clarence sprawled on the ragged hook rug, facing the cathedral front of the burnished wood Edison, a pillow tucked beneath his chin, a blanket wrapped around his shoulders, and his useless legs encased in casts, sticking behind him. Eyes shut, he listened to KLZ, the Reynolds Radio Company, and slowly rotated the dial through the other Denver stations. . . He'd listen as hard as he could so that he wouldn't hear his own breathing, so he wouldn't even think about his breathing. Did that breath hurt? What about the next one? Did the muscles in his chest tighten up just a little that time?--The Radio Magician and Other Stories, James Van Pelt; combined with the intriguing title of the book, this first paragraph (I shortened it a bit) draws me in right away, connects me instantly with the point-of-view character.

Of course, different readers will have different reactions. If some of these paragraphs would make you buy a book, why? If you would put the book down instead, why? It's worth examining.

I'm going to go read aloud the first paragraph of my work-in-progress right now!

So instead of pithy thoughts, bold words, or sweet nostalgia I give you...cute surprised kitten.

Now, don't you feel better?
Anon

I just got a call from Dr. Braun a little while ago, and she got the results of my ultrasound from St. David's. She thinks that the lump is probably benign, but since the radiologist recommended another recheck in 6 months and this would be the 2nd recheck, she wants me to come in and be examined by her. As her nurse said, it's more of a precaution than anything else, and she doesn't think I'll need surgery or even a biopsy, but it's better to be more cautious now than a year from now someone say hmmm, this may actually be cancer.

So, I have an appointment to go in next Thursday morning for more medical manipulation of my booby. Yay.

I blame the cold weather. I love this weather: it's cold, gray and wet. Which puts me into the mood for snugglies. I've made my home as snuggly-friendly as I can: I put the flannel sheets on the bed, it's even cold enough for a blanket. The cats love both. Last night I used my fireplace for the first time this season, and if I forgot to open the flue, well, it's been a long time since I used the fireplace. Imagine standing in the kitchen nuking some leftovers in the microwave, wondering where the smell of smoke is coming from (and it's not coming from the microwave). Luckily I remembered in short order to open the flue, and the fire was happy after that, and I did not set off my smoke detectors.

This weather, unfortunately, also puts me into another kind of snuggly mood, and it makes me long for snuggles with, well, someone inappropriate. I am of course referring to the Irish Bastard, who for all his issues, all our issues, is very snuggly. I wish I could say I don't miss him at all, but that would be a lie. There are many things about him I do miss. There are many more things I don't miss, and those are the more egregious things, so I try to keep reminding myself of those things as needed, because some things I will not forgive at this time. But he's been in my thoughts lately, and it's distracting, because I've got work to do. As in work work.

It's deadline week - Friday is the deadline for anyone graduating this semester to turn in their theses/reports/dissertations, and this means they have to be in the door by 5PM Friday or they graduate in the spring. The traffic has been steady since last Wednesday, although surprisingly slow today. Too slow. This means end of the week will be shitty with traffic. And anyone who makes it in the door by 5pm, we have to stay and see. Which I don't care about, but it does mean I'm not sure when I'll be able to make it to SMOFcon on Friday evening. I should be done here by dinner time, so if anyone is in town for SMOFcon and wants to have dinner with me, I'm up for that. I'm trying to figure out details: do I drive in and try to find some free parking somewhere around campus? Do I drive in and suck it up and pay for parking in a garage and then drive downtown (only to face the possibility of having to pay again for parking?)? I'm kind of hoping that I can find street parking down there. Shoot, I'm not even sure what hotel SMOFcon is in (I just bought my membership yesterday, so I'm a little behind the curve), I suppose I ought to look that up. See, I have too damned many distractions and I need to be a little more practical right now.

Meanwhile, we're looking at some cold nights ahead, which I love. Now if I could get the distractions out of my mind, that would be super swell. Well, maybe not get the distractions out of my mind, but rather have different distractions. The idea of snuggles is a perfectly fine one, a worthy pursuit. For now I have to be satisfied with Ginger and Charlie, who for such small beings actually generate a lot of heat, so they do have some extrinsic value (in addition to their intrinsic value).

And then I can start my countdown to vacation (which for me starts in 16 days).

Word count: 11740 | Since last entry: 2849

Finished the first draft of... um, this thing I'm working on. Which definitely isn't a short story, at almost 12,000 words, but I don't think really deserves to be a novelette... it's not a novelette-sized plot. I think it must have a lot of stuff that can be removed. But it isn't really meant to be an independent story anyway, it's meant to be a chapter of a novel, or to be more accurate a story in a book that's a collection of stories about the same characters. (This is all new to me and I'm still figuring it out.) It's probably too long for a chapter anyway. I'll see what I can do about editing it today.

I don't think this is the first story/chapter in the book, either. Nor do I have even a vague idea what I'm going to write next. Whee!

Also: celebrated the Endeavour Award win by buying myself a new MacBook Pro. Shiny! I now have an iBook G4, in great shape, for sale at a reasonable price.

In other news...

• Applications open today for next summer's Taos Toolbox workshop, a two-week master class for SF/F writers taught by Walter Jon Williams, Nancy Kress, and Carrie Vaughn.
• Applications are already open for next summer's Clarion West workshop, an intensive six-week workshop for SF/F writers taught by Michael Bishop, Maureen McHugh, Nnedi Okorafor, Graham Joyce, Ellen Datlow, and Ian McDonald.
• The current Wild Cards trilogy wraps up with Suicide Kings, the concluding volume of the Committee Triad, which will be released on December 22. To celebrate, Pat's Fantasy Hotlist is having a contest to win copies of the first two volumes. (I'm not in this trilogy, but Wild Cards is too cool not to blog about.)

backpacking
Want to embrace your wanderlust on the cheap? If you're high on adventurous spirit, but low on funds, this community can help you plan a trip to anywhere. Offering plentiful tips on how to travel light, you can post about inexpensive hotels and youth hostels if you're into urban exploration or discuss camping gear and mosquito netting for the great outdoors. Hitch your backpack, pitch your tent, and carpe diem!

Sometimes old favorites need to be revisited.  I won’t tell you how long ago I first read Siddhartha, but it was published in 1922, which is before I was published.

At any rate, I chose to listen to it on my way down to Orycon (the drive is from Seattle to Portland, or 3 hours and change) and back.  I think partly out of yearning for something beloved and familiar, even though I haven’t read or heard it in a decade and maybe for two.

I’m pretty sure this is my third time through this book, and that each time it has seemed even more relevant to my life than the time before.  This time, the insight is that Siddhartha chose so many different paths to walk, with nearly complete re-inventions all along the way.  It seems to me that we do that in modern life.  I have been three or four different careers by now, and have spent long years celibate and long years not, and chosen different teachers at different times in my life.

It reminds me how classic fiction resonates as true to the human condition and transcends time.

Mirrored from Brenda Cooper.

The December issue of Clarkesworld Magazine is now live. If you enjoy this issue, please consider participating in our citizenship drive by making a a donation, book purchase, or just spread the word.

FICTION Night, in Dark Perfection by Richard Parks Night, in Dark Perfection (AUDIO VERSION) by Richard Parks, read by Kate Baker The Grandmother-Granddaughter Conspiracy by Marissa Lingen NONFICTION If It Scares You, Write It: A Conversation with Nnedi Okorafor by Jeremy L. C. Jones Bartitsu: The Martial Art for the Steampunk Set by Nick Mamatas COVER ART The Remains Which Live by Keisuke Asaba

I'd like to say this was done on purpose, but instead it was a happy surprise. Writer Keffy Kehrli pointed this out to me a while back. He has the last story in the last issue of Talebones Magazine. The last two lines of the story read: "All tales have ends. The bone dice were thrown once more."

We have a winner!

Nate Williams from Lawrence, Kansas, who chose a copy of James Van Pelt's The Last of the O-Forms.

Details about the giveaway were posted here:

Orycon was excellent, one of the best in recent memory. I car pooled down with dbara The new hotel is an improvement. This was the first year I had a table in the dealer room there. For years I've simply thrown books on Lady Jayne's table (and thank you, thank you, Jane, for all the times you've done that for me!) It was a slow first day (although I only did biz from about 2:30 pm to 6:30 pm. Then to the Endeavor Awards, where Ken Scholes' collection Long Walks, Last Flights was a finalist. The winner was David Levine for Space Magic. Congrats, David!

A better day in the Orycon dealer room on Saturday. Not just in sales, but due to some exciting possibilities. Might tell y'all about it sometime. :) Sunday, the biz in the delaer room was rocking. It's kind of cemented my decision to deal there again next year.

I closed up the table a half hour early and zipped over with davebara to Powell's Books in Beaverton for a mass SF signing. I was thinking of just driving home, but saw that Barb & JC Hendee were among the 20 writers there, so off I went to surprise them. (Although Barb said she predicted I'd be there.)

We went to eat afterward and throughout dinner I started to droop. It's amazing how fast it hit, but in the parking lot afterward, heading to my car, I got a bad case of chills. My head and throat were already hurting. Dave and I made the 2 1/2 hour trek home, and by then I was full blown sick.

So I'm home from work and in bed today. Just crawled out of bed a while ago to do a few things. We'll see how it goes.

I had a post ready for yesterday. I wrote it up before I started working on the novel. But I just didn't actually feel like posting it. So I'm doing this today instead.

On Sunday I got together with a couple of people and we had a marbling party -- where we marbled paper. I've done this for the last few years, made marbled paper over Thanksgiving weekend, to use with holiday cards to send to people.

One of the first things you have to do is stir the colors. If you marble right after you stir you have something like what you see in my icon (also known as a get gel pattern.)

After you stir the colors, you rake a comb across it. That's the nonpariel pattern, and the simplest of them all.

After you make the nonpariel pattern, you start to get fancy with swirls, curls, fans, etc. You have to be careful and not overwork the pattern. You also have to lay down the paper to collect the colors sooner rather than later, or they'll start to fade and drift.

( Warning! Lots of pictures! )

At Orycon I used the Bump iPhone app to exchange contact information and photos with people. It is an excellent app and I recommend that every iPhone user install it (it's free, and also available for Android and iPod Touch) because the more people who have it the more useful it is for everyone. It is a semi-replacement for the ability to "beam" information from one Palm PDA to another via infrared, which the iPhone lacks, and it's fun! To exchange info, you both run the Bump app on your phones and then you just bump your phones together.

The way it works behind the scenes is that when you are running the Bump app, whenever the phone's accelerometer detects a bump (a sudden change in acceleration) it timestamps the event and sends it to the Bump server. If two phones both send in bump events at the same time, the server notifies each one that the other is ready to send data. If both users confirm, the data is transmitted over the Internet via the Bump server.

brendacooper and I, being geeks, played with this and discovered that you don't actually have to bump the phones together for it to work. As long as you are able to coordinate it -- for example, down the length of a table at dinner -- if you bump your phones on the table at the same time the bump will still work. But because the Bump server uses the phones' location information to determine proximity, it might not work if you are too far apart.

bookfails
Planning to do your part to help boost the declining publishing industry this holiday? Better check here first. Sure, there are plenty of folks who post glowing reviews of their favorite books. But what about the epic fails? Compose and/or discuss snarky, incisive critiques on the books you despise most.

foundphotos
Ever stumble across a frayed photo in your grandmother's attic? How about a faded picture tucked in the sleeve of an old novel at a used book sale? This is the place to post them. An amazing, eclectic collection of photographs sure to delight anyone with a penchant for history or nostalgic memorabilia.