Assorted Nonsense

Here’s an interview I did with John Scalzi at the world science fiction convention in Toronto back in 2003. Back before any of his novels came out. At this time he was just kind of getting into the whole science fiction convention thing.

I remember we had quite a pleasant chat, and I came away thinking what a nice fellow. I figured his book would come out, quietly disappear, and I’d never hear about him again (I did not think this mean-spiritedly; just, with so many books published each year, what were the odds of success?) Since then, of course, Scalzi has become quite the science fiction phenomenon (and I couldn’t be happier for him, especially considering he appears to be every bit the same well-grounded, pleasant fellow I met in ’03).

I remember thinking exactly the same thing about a fellow by the name of Rob Sawyer about twenty years ago when we worked on a CBC Ideas radio show together (on SF, of course), and he told me he had a book coming out… so much for my powers of prognostication.

The common denominator appears to be having met me shortly before publication of their first novels — clearly I am some sort of good luck charm.

Either that or they’re just talented workhorses… nah…

The interview runs nine minutes, twenty-six seconds.

An interesting footnote to this interview… John talks a little about how he came to publish his first novel Old Man’s War. In the last Worldcon in Montreal, I attended a panel on publishing that included writer Mike Resnick. The subject of how Scalzi had published his first novel came up, and Resnick remarked that Scalzi had done emerging writers a great disservice by setting such an example. My response to Resnick would be perhaps, but ultimately we are all responsible for our own actions, and in any case it certainly worked out well for Scalzi.

Yes, it’s time I collected some new tape. Actually, I still have tons I haven’t edited or posted. I’ll see if I can’t get to that shortly after the kids are grown.

In the meantime, plenty of old tape to repost…

Things are back up and running. And it’s inspired me to get the most out of this blog. I’ve enabled my audio plugin (which I actually didn’t even realize was disabled… that’s how lax I’ve been lately). So I’ll try to post some audio clips over the next little while. Like this one, featuring my good buddy Matt Watts, whom I haven’t seen in a dog’s age:

That’s Holly Lewis in there as well. The clip is from Steve the Second, one of my favourite drama productions from my previous life as a radio drama guy. Ah, the good old days.

Incidentally, the last time I saw Holly Lewis she said to me, “Still sulking, eh?”

That’s because they were doing Canadia 2056 at the time and I had been reassigned to work on Q instead of producing Canadia. Holly was right, I was still sulking at the time, but I’m smiling these days, as things have turned out pretty well. I actually enjoyed story editing Canadia, and I didn’t have all the pressure of producing it. And I have to admit it turned out pretty well with Greg DeClute at the helm. And in retrospect my time on Q was pretty interesting. Got to meet people like this, for example:

And of course it all led directly to my present gig, which has been one heck of a positive educational experience.

Well that’s enough of a trip down memory lane. Why don’t we close with this clip, just for fun. And at this point I have no idea what clip I’m actually going to post… so it’ll be a surprise for all of us:

Yeah, that works.

Monday night my blog disappeared; just got it back today.  Something to do with being on a shared server and using too much resources.  So my provider kicked me off.

Anyway, back on today, hopefully for good.

The timing was unfortunate; Canada Reads had just done a short profile on me that I had been looking forward to mentioning in the blog.  Oddly, the Canada Reads blog appears to be suffering a few problems too.   Hope it’s not me!

A question you’re pretty much forced to ask yourself at an event like a World Science Fiction Convention is:

Just how much of a geek am I?

Not “am I a geek?” because if you’re at a science fiction convention, if you’ve actually paid for a membership, if you’re staying at a hotel in a city you don’t live in because you’re attending a science fiction convention, you ARE a geek, even if you’re a professional.

I’m not saying that’s a bad thing.  I readily admit that I am a geek.  I have a classic Star Trek poster in my office, for crying out loud.

But… just how much of a geek am I?

Because, you see, there are different stratums of geekdom.

There are people who, let’s face it, kind of look like geeks.  Blasphemy!  But it’s true.

For instance, one day at the World Science Fiction Convention I walked into a panel moderated by someone who, on the surface at least, seemed pretty geeky.  There was clearly a different standard at play in terms of physical appearance.  I’m not looking down my nose at the guy; heck,  his credentials beat mine all to hell.  But on the appearance front I would humbly suggest that this gentleman was a hair geekier than me.

I could be completely deluded.  It’s entirely possible that I look geekish.  Certainly when I was in high school I looked like a geek, which is to say bad haircut, so skinny I had to run around in the shower to get wet, terrible glasses and a wisp of a moustache.  I like to think that I have learned how to look after myself since then, or at least, have allowed the women in my life to correct at least the most obvious of my fashion deficiencies.

So anyway, that’s two levels of geekdom right there: geeks who don’t give a whit about their physical appearance (Corey Doctorow calls them the “Underwear on the Head” types) and those who are more “stealth” geeks, at least in terms of physical appearance.

Who cares if someone looks geeky, you say?  Good point.  It’s really how you feel about yourself that matters, not the opinions of others, right?   (As long as you’re not running around hurting others with your over-inflated self-esteem).   However, it’s probably undeniable that the appearance of some science fiction enthusiasts contributes to the image problem of science fiction itself.  I’m just sayin’.

So anyway, you go to one of these cons and there are a fair amount of these underwear on the head types, and right away you find yourself asking yourself, my God, do I belong here?  Am I one of these people?

I was walking to my hotel one night with a bunch of other con-goers (some in costume, Klingon and whatnot) and a car-full of young male Montrealers hooted and jeered at us.  And right away I thought, my God, do I belong here, being mocked with these… these geeks?

The answer was a resounding YES, of course.  I may have been cleaned up a bit by various pitying womenfolk in my life, the moustache is gone, the hair cut more or less properly, the glasses replaced with contacts, the jeans fit a hair better…

…but the underwear on the head is still there, I’m afraid.  You just have to look a bit harder (I think…)

Never was a story of more woe
Than this of Juliet, and her Fish.

Which work of Shakespeare was the original quote from?

Get your own quotes:

(Thanks to Sherry D. Ramsey for pointing this one out…)

On our last full day at Bon Echo.

We couldn’t get in at the Provincial campground, so I booked us a spot at a nearby campground called Bon Echo Family campground.  It’s only a hop, skip and a jump from the Provincial park, so that’s worked out well… every second day we get a day pass and spend it at the provincial park canoing, swimming, hiking, exploring.  And there’s canoing available where we’re staying, along with a beach that’s even better than at the provincial park, so we have the best of both worlds in many respects.

And the weather has been fantastic, especially considering it looked quite dodgy the day we got here, cold and rainy.  But every day since then has been better and better.

And that’s all the time I will spend blogging today, as this is not supposed to be an electronic vacation.  In fact, I just hooked up to the campground wireless to see if Mr. Schmidt had read my submission to Analog yet… but no such luck.

No news is good news, I guess.

And tomorrow it’s back to Whitby, and the following Monday back to real life.

Not thinking about that, though.  This afternoon is all about swimming, canoing, and ice cream.

… I been posting often enough lately?

Going camping tomorrow, though, so probably no new posts til next weekend.

Unless the campground has wireless…

Here’s something that I don’t really get, and that I find kind of sad.

I just finished reading a memoir by Larry McMurtry called “Books.”  Although McMurtry is an Academy Award winning screenwriter (Brokeback Mountain, with Diana Ossana), the author of 28 novels, including Terms of Endearment and Lonesome Dove, he is also the owner and operator of a used bookstore, and has been for about thirty years.  “Books” is about this alternative career.

That’s not what I find sad.

What I find sad is McMurtry’s admission that he never wrote a “great” novel.  Here’s what he has to say about his novels:

Most were good, three or four were indifferent to bad, and two or three were really good.  None, to my regret, were great, although my long Western Lonesome Dove was very popular… popularity, of course, is not the same as greatness.

Lonesome Dove is one of my favourite novels.  Maybe McMurtry is right… it’s not great.  It’s awesome!  If my novel were even one thousandth as good as Lonesome Dove I would be ecstatic.

I don’t think that McMurtry is being modest.  He’s been surrounded by books for so long that he has too many to compare his to.  He’s comparing his books to the likes of Sir Isaac Newton’s Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica.  It’s apples and oranges.  Newton’s is great for one reason, and Lonesome Dove is great for another.

It may be that the quality of your work is inversely proportional to how good you think it is.

I think my novel is coming along quite well.

Oh.

Damn.

George RR Martin, that is.

I think it was the Saturday night at Anticipation. Fergus and I passed this party room, I can’t remember what the sign said exactly, but it was something to do with George R.R. Martin, the author of A Song of Ice and Fire, one of the more terrific fantasy sagas to come out over the last few years, head and shoulders over Jordan’s Wheel of Time stuff (the problematic A Feast for Crows notwithstanding).

A young woman was womaning the entrance to the room. “Come on in,” she said. “This is the celebrate all things George room.” Or something to that effect.

“You mean the tell him to get off his ass and finish the next damn novel room?” I quipped, rather lamely in retrospect. And not out of any disrespect, just because I do really want to read the next one, and yes I know I am a fine one to talk.

A hush fell over the entire hotel.

“He’s in there,” the young woman informed me, with considerably less hostility than I deserved. “Do not say that ever again within several hundred miles of the man or you. Will. Be. Pissed upon and put to death.”

“Oh. Heh heh. Sorry.”

“Idiot,” Fergus said, slapping me upside the head.

(He did neither, actually, though I deserved both.)

We entered the room, and sure enough there was George, surrounded by hordes of fans. We drank some of George’s beer. We left.

Later, I met George in the hall. I shook his hand.

“Love your work,” I told him.

He accepted the compliment graciously and, like every other writer I met at the con, left me with a good impression.

I said nothing about his next book and have not, as a result, been either pissed upon or put to death.

But I sure do wish he would finish it…

A shot of Fergus Heywood, myself, and Karl Johansen, editor of Neo-opsis Magazine, at Anticipation.

In the back to the right you can see a blonde woman in profile… she’s Elizabeth Westbrook, whom I met shortly after this picture was taken, and with whom Fergus and I had a lively conversation, mostly about what Fergus does for a living, if I recall. I don’t know what it is about what Fergus does for a living but I must have heard his explanation for it about three times that night. (He’s an amazing internet content guy… you wouldn’t believe what he’s capable of.) Anyway, Elizabeth is Hayden Trenholm’s wife. Hayden graciously offered to appear in our reading of The Cold Equations, which happened on the Saturday night.

But more about that in another post.