Journeyman

To begin with, I went to chess for the first time in a few weeks on Monday and discover the tournament over, and me with only two wins. I usually do much better than this, and one year I came home as Club Champion.... Well, next year looms, I guess. On the other hand, in Monday night play I drew Vaughn and beat Mark one with only a small group on hand. If you're anywhere around Waterville or Central Maine and want to get some Monday night chess in, do let me know...

And yes, I have been a little quieter than usual. Part of that is that stuff goes on behind the scenes -- that's usual, right? -- and part is/was recovering/getting re-oriented after Boskone. Yes I missed getting to a com for all those months and now I miss having one on a schedule for March. I also note that we're hardly scheduled at all for 2008 yet -- hey, tell your con committees that we're nearly wide open next year! So far we're scheduled for WorldCon in 2008....

Meanwhile, part of the busy has been the prep work for this:

Electric Words: Baen ebook and independent podcast authors Sharon Lee and Steve Miller are known around the world for paper editions of their science fiction. The writers will appear at Second Life Library at Noon PST Sunday March 11 to discuss the whys behind their first, second, and third forays into electronic media, and how demand has changed since they started publishing BPLAN Virtuals Disk- Top ebooks in the late 1980s.

If you're a Liaden Universe fan and not familiar with Second Life, here's a reason to visit... and if you do visit and decide to join, please feel free to mention Elan Neruda (my in-world nick) ... because doing so gives us extra stuff in the game.

Other things going on in SL -- we've sold off about half of the original holdings in Clay since much of the need for prims has been reduced now that Chatrez exists and the Friends of Liad and Science Fiction Rangers meet and have places there, as do several other writers and creative types. We may reduce the Clay area bit more since Chatrez is a genuine Friends of Liad based Island and we often go there to visit and rest, but I think SRM Publisher still will maintain the rest of the land so we have a mainland visibility. If you come to visit SL to consider joining Science Fiction Rangers -- Shawna does a great job of letting the Rangers know when sci-fictional events are going on in-world, and she also arranges some for the Rangers...

On this side of the cyber-divide, the final Nebula Ballot is up... and I was a bit disappointed for several reasons to see that SRM Publisher author Mark Tiedemann's Remains did not make the final ballot. Mark has been nominated for a number of awards over the years and it would be good if he'd had a shot at the top this year. If you're not familiar with his work, look for Remains on the bookstore shelf or take advantage of our SRM chapbooks or the three pack we sell on our pages to discover his work for yourself.

Meanwhile, enough avoiding of Fledgling, chapter 7. Catch you soon.