I believe I may have outsmarted the spammers. For the moment. By installing one of those word recognition typing thingies. Sorry for the inconvenience to the living humans who comment.

Things that give me joy, in no order, and inexhaustively:

• The bleeding hearts shady shade plants that were crushed by huge pallet full of deck redoing fake wood last summer and I thought were dead dead dead but which came back this year. Even the one that was puny. Though it’s still puny.
• Coming across books I’ve already read in the 50 books poc journal (such as Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi) and realizing that while my reading pattern is pretty white, it’s not completely white, and that’s before I start intentionally seeking more diverse reading!
• Sunshine.
• My leather jacket (sorry, vegans).
• The way my daughter plays “Ode to Joy” on the piano.
• Empanadas.
• One Password.
• Yes, you’re alive songs: “Leeds United” by Amanda Palmer, “Karma Slave” by Splashdown, “Walk the Walk” by Poe, “Up to the Roof” by Blue Man Group, “Flowers” by They Might Be Giants.
• Newfound stability in poses like Utthita Trikonasana.
• Coloring and drawing with Sophia.
• Local Taizé services.

What gives you joy?

I have too many tabs open. Most of them were things I intended to post here.

On your mark, get set, go!

Videos:
• The trailer for the gorgeous, wonderful “Surreal Guide to Botany”
• The awesome Amanda Palmer, giving us all a Christmas gift: “What’s the Use Of Wond’rin’?“
• Ok, so who am I kidding. There’s no way one Amanda Palmer video is enough, so here’s “Leeds United” aka the Belly Incident Video.
• An insightful interview of Derren Brown conducted by Richard Dawkins (link is to part 1 of 6. They’re all worth watching, though.)
• Hilarious post-election Get Your War On video. Yeah, I know, it’s been a while. But you know what? Still funny. “America’s new flag is just a white flag, but there’s a picture of a burning American flag on it.” and “Dude, he’s Muslim, that’s how we do!”
• Coolest Theremin EVER. I hope I can get my husband to make one of these.
• New Coraline trailer! New Coraline trailer! New Coraline trailer! Man, I totally need to get on the ball if I’m going to read Sophia the book before the movie comes out.

Miscellaneous:
• Interesting word test. Fun to take, though it does require some endurance and even my prodigious attention span flagged a bit about 170 words in or so. I did ok, though I don’t trust the claimed score percentile to IQ correspondence.
• The Graveyard Book won the Newbery! Neil Gaiman didn’t swear! (like he did when he got the Hugo).

Stories I kept planning to recommend in my story recommendation posts and never got around to. But I want a clean slate, so here they are in a glut:
• In the Dreamtime of Lady Resurrection by Caitlín R. Kiernan. This is a gorgeous, wonderful story. It’s everything I love about Kiernan. I can’t quite understand why her King Kong story won year’s best in Clarkesworld’s reader poll instead of this one, which I think is so much better.
• Rampion in the Belltower by Merrie Haskell. Because happy ever after fairytales are better with zombies.
• Watermark by Michael Greenhut. My favorite thing out of Fantasy magazine in ages and ages. I always read, but I’m usually disillusioned. This one works for me.

I believe I am more susceptible to meme transmission from Transylvanian Dutch than from anyone else. Don’t get me wrong, he passes along plenty that I don’t bother with, but so do most people. But sometimes I get snagged and sucked in, and for whatever reason, it’s usually from one of his.

Here’s the meme (as copied from his blog):

The first five people to respond to this post will get something made by me. It will be about or tailored to those five lucky “victims.”

This offer does have some restrictions and limitations:
• I make no guarantees that you will like what I make!
• what I create will be just for you.
• it’ll be done this year
• you have no clue what it’s going to be. It may be a poem or story. I may make something all craft-y like. It could even be a CD. (altering the original to add: or a bathbomb!)
• I reserve the right to do something extremely strange.

The catch? Oh, the catch is that you have to put this on your site as well, if you expect me to do something for you!

Remember, chime in, and be forced to participate in your own playground!

“As for our common defense, we reject as false the choice between our safety and our ideals. Our Founding Fathers, faced with perils we can scarcely imagine, drafted a charter to assure the rule of law and the rights of man, a charter expanded by the blood of generations. Those ideals still light the world, and we will not give them up for expedience’s sake.“

That’s what I’m talking about! It’s about time. Thank you, sir, for saying so. You have my full support.

I’ve always liked the Babylon 5 intro, where Sheridan (I think it’s Sheridan, anyway) says “It was the year of fire… the year of destruction… the year we took back what was ours. It was the year of rebirth… the year of great sadness… the year of pain… and the year of joy. It was a new age. It was the end of history. It was the year everything changed. The year is 2261. The place: Babylon 5.” Pretty epic, no?

Well I’m not really living an epic here, but I’m looking for a brief way to sum up 2008, so I’m going to steal that format, as a reference for what happened, which I’ll be dropping here for the future.

It was the year:

• of Guitar Hero and of the Wii Fit
• of DIY detergent and the new HE washer
• of many pictures (over 2800! here’s the first of the year:
  
  and here’s the last:
  
  )
• of finding a decent King Cake in St. Louis, and of the brawl with Oz
• of the cubbies, built by Kurt for Sophia’s room
• of the eclipse, observed from our front door
• of music for Sophia (she performed a flute duet in church and started piano lessons in late August).
• of Disneyworld, of Sophia’s first time at the beach
• of the new Ford Focus, to replace the sadly defunct Cougar
• of the nonos coming to stay for a while
• of pneumonia
• of Sophia playing a flower in a play based on Alice in Wonderland (though she wanted to be Alice, because, as she said, she had the right hair)
• of pierced ears, and the bike that she still cannot ride, and the Snip-Its glamour party
• of fairy ears, and princess camp
• of learning to eat honeysuckle from the bushes in the backyard
• of Chocolatier:Secret Ingredients, Spore and Battle of Wesnoth
• of driving to Texas for Fourth of July
• of Blue Mountain Camp in the Fall and being Nastia Lukin for Halloween (even though the only Olympic events watched in this household were soccer matches)
• of electrotango and Amanda Palmer
• of joining book club, and of making the 52 book challenge (finally!)
• of the new deck and porch
• of finally giving in and getting on FaceBook
• of bad teeth
• of publication, at long last (x2)
• of two sales, doubling the number from 2007
• of learning to make bath bombs
• of playing assistant in the Montessori classroom
• of gorgeous hair ornaments
• of Christmas for the birds
• of MySims and Lego Star Wars
• of rollerskating for the first time, and getting roller skates for Christmas
• of a New Year’s Eve murder party
• of learning to make soup, and wishing I’d known how years ago

All in all, a pretty good year.

I’m published! Again! I know, crazy, who’d think it could happen twice? I’m also a little behind on giving notice here. I updated my facebook when my piece came out on December 4 and it seemed like enough preening at the time. With Christmas season stuff revving up, I’ve not had time to also update here until now. This week in particular has been insanely busy, with extracurricular stuff every single night so far, and more to come.

At any rate, I’m published in a fabulous market: Escape Pod. A dream market, actually, so I can tick off one on my checklist of places where I wish to see my work appear. You may listen to my flash piece, The Way Before absolutely free of charge, distributed on a creative commons license (because we at “Tempered Thoughts” heart creative commons!). If you’re not familiar with Escape Pod and are interested in Science Fiction audio, allow me to recommend some episodes that are among my favorites:

• Episode 99: Start the Clock by Benjamin Rosenbaum.
• Episode 131: Hesperia and Glory by Ann Leckie.
• Episode 157: A Small Room in Koboldtown by Michael Swanwick.
• Episode 175: Reparations by Merrie Haskell.
• Escape Pod Flash Fiction Contest, 2nd Place winner: Skyscrapers by Rachel Swirsky.

One thing that posting this so late allows me to do is to note how super pleased I am by one of the comments that a poster wrote on the entry for my piece. John posted he had a sudden realization at the end, and his realization is completely right and I now believe what I’ve heard other writers say, which is that whether someone likes what you write or not, when they GET it you feel so gratified. Dude, you got it, and I feel great about that! Mild spoilers in his comment, if a 300 word flash piece can be spoiled, so listen before you read if you intend to listen.

A word of advice to those of you who are personal friends and family of mine. It is ok (no, better than ok, ideal really) to simply say “Congratulations.” You do not have to pretend to like what I write. You do not have to criticize what I’ve published, and be fair or objective about it. The time for fixing the piece’s flaws is long past, so you might forbear pointing them out, since plenty of people are available for that, and they aren’t people I need support from, as you are. You can elect to simply rejoice in victory with me. I encourage that! For the record, if you say you read it, but don’t say you like it, then it’s quite obvious to me how you felt about it. So instead of carefully avoiding praising my work, if you disapprove of it, simply say “Congratulations on getting published”, ok? I promise not to put you in the uncomfortable position of pressing you on your opinion, or even asking if you heard the story. Thanks!

Last but not least, in honored Scalzi tradition, you may use the comment thread of this entry to point out the cool stuff you or your friends are doing all across the web. Links encouraged! Let me start you off by pointing you to my niece performing “Silent Night”. She can seriously sing. Listen to my story, and her passionate singing, and post cool links, as the spirit moves you.

So do you remember about eight or nine years ago, when I was obsessed with bhangra music? Oh, right, that was before I had a blog. Some of you have known me for that long, though, and know what I’m talking about. Anyway, for you newcomers, I went through this phase where I was totally obsessed with bhangra. My daughter’s Sanskrit middle name is a gift of that era. I finagled my way into an Indian wedding reception just to hear the stuff and dance. It was awesome. I still love it, even though I’m not obsessed with it the way I used to be.

Now I’m completely obsessed with electrotango instead. I mean, yeah, this makes a little more sense than my earlier bhangra obsession because tango originates in a place I’ve lived and a quick check at my last.fm tells you I listen to Thievery Corporation more than anything else except TMBG, and I’ve liked Gotan Project for some time as well. But I didn’t know there was more than Gotan Project. I thought Gotan Project was an outlier, a lone band kind of doing its own thing. Turns out there’s a whole genre there! And I LOVE it.

So in the last month, I’ve been listening to tag radio on last.fm. A tag radio is a series of tracks that have all been tagged by users with the same tag. It’s a good way to get a solid mood listen, when you need a certain consistency in what you’re listening to. Or when you’re obsessed with a certain sound.

The tag I’ve been listening to is electrotango. I LOVE this stuff with intense singlemindedness. Tanghetto, Bajofondo, Supervielle, Federico Aubele, Bulevard Tango Club, San Telmo Lounge…I could (and do) listen to it all day. I wish I’d known to look for this stuff when I was in Buenos Aires last year.

The electrotango radio was in heavy rotation during the composition of both “Kenosis” and “Mi Buenos Aires Querido” and I believe they are better stories for having that musical backdrop. “Kenosis” in particular has been liked by almost every critiquer who has read it, and that sort of thing never happens to me. By and large, my stories are not well-liked, and never universally. (Some might wonder why, in light of that, I continue to write them, but that would be a question for another day. This is not the writing angst post. This is the electrotango is fantastic post).

The pinnacle of my obsession is “Perfume” by Supervielle. If you have a Last.fm account you can hear it; it’s one of their free tracks. I love the lyrics, so dramatic and intense. You can rely on “Like water seeks thirst” being a blog title at some point. Listen, do you hear the tango? The sea? It sounds like Buenos Aires, that weird mix of nostalgia and anticipation: the wind and the water and the memories. Say it: “el impulso antiguo y sutil del eco de tu perfume”. Feel it in your mouth. It’s totally lovely and wonderful to say.

Right, I did say I was obsessed?

Ok, a music post deserves a scorekeeping update:

• 2 points Sunjunkie
• 2 points Jerm
• 6 points Lanfaedhe
• 2 points Dave Lartigue

WTG, Lanf, leaving all the other participants in the dust! But it’s not too late for folks to catch up, so keep playing.

If you’re wondering what the scoring is about, I give two points to the first person who comments with the line following on the one I give in my blog post title, when my titles are lyrics (which is often, though sadly, not today). There are unclaimed entries since I started the game back in July, if you’d like to dig through the archives and play along. Some day there will be a prize. I don’t know what and I don’t know when, yet. But it will be fabulous, in the style of the prizes awarded in Dave Lartigue’s leaf bag contest. I promise. (BTW, Dave, you are the first link under a google search of leaf bag contest. You must be so proud!)