14 April 2001

Yesterday we went up Hoover Tower at Stanford. Cold and windy, but a nice view. Palo Alto is such a pleasant town to wander around in. I like the alien murals on the sides of the buildings. We also went to eat at a couple of my favorite places yesterday. Grandpa was still not feeling good, so Aunt Doris dosed him with hot lime juice and honey. She was sure this would make him feel better. He was sure it would not. I'll just leave you to guess which one was right. The answer seemed obvious to me.

I haven't been answering a lot of my e-mail -- I'll get to what I neglect after the folks go back to Omaha on Tuesday -- but Jed, in his list of short story collections he loved, pointed out an obvious lack in mine: Spider Robinson. (Most of the short story collections he listed were not ones I had read yet. That's what the library is for, I believe.) The problem is, which? By Any Other Name just came out, a reprint combination of Antinomy and Melancholy Elephants. That may be It. But I'm wondering whether to count the Callahan books. I counted one of de Lint's Newford books, but that had an interlinking cast of characters, not the same characters, and not much of a plot arc over the course of the stories. The Callahan books seem more like The Martian Chronicles to me, and that's not a short story collection and not a novel either. It's just something else. I don't know what. But I'm thinking Spider belongs on my collection list somewhere, as well as on my novel list.

I sold an article yesterday, to Phantastes. It was the submission that had been out for the longest time -- I sent it to them last June. But, you know, at least after all this time it was a yes. I'll put the link up when the article goes up. It's a different kind of world-building article. The subtitle is "Building a Better World Through Creative Swearing." Not a topic I've seen addressed many times....

I'm going to bake muffins for tomorrow's breakfast and then get a little work done before we leave for the A's game. I doubt that I'll have the time to post tomorrow, so if I don't, have a happy Easter. For whatever reasons you like.