No further news on the Discon/Worldcon situation, except that the Hugo Award nominations will be out on April 13. But I know of two other midsummer events that won't be held in 2021. A science-fiction convention in Pittsburgh, Confluence, has been canceled, and the Lithuanian folk dance festival that was originally supposed to be held in July 2020 ( Read more... )

The first few days of the new year haven't been too bad. I started watching The Crown and The Right Stuff and had various pleasant online interactions with friends. I always get a little wistful when taking the Christmas decorations down and putting them away, but that happens every year.

On Saturday I had a "wild encounter" with actual friends -- a ( Read more... )

The past couple of days have seen me take steps toward greater productivity.

I have been wondering whether a second computer monitor would help me when I'm doing a Zoom interview or simply writing up my articles. I wanted to get one secondhand, but the cheapest place I know to get one, the Terrapin Trader surplus-goods shop at the University of ( Read more... )

Today makes 38 years since my father died, and eight years since my friend Andrea's father died. (Andrea's parents hosted me for a few days when I visited England in 1989. They were kind to me.)

My friend Janina just marked the four-month anniversary of her husband's passing on the 27th, and yesterday would have been their 44th wedding anniversary.

( Read more... )

Yesterday I felt tired and restless. And unfocused. I have focus issues anyway, but it was really bad yesterday. I dozed off in my "office" chair. I wanted to poke around with the couple of computer games that I play instead of actually doing, y'know, work.

This feeling lasted well into the night, until I checked Facebook just before 11 p.m. ( Read more... )

Yesterday was April Fool's Day, but so many people on Facebook were warning that any attempt at pulling online pranks would result in immediate blocking and unfriending, I hesitated to post anything funny. Several friends were celebrating birthdays and wedding anniversaries, though. So that was OK ( Read more... )

On Saturday the boy toy and I cut each other's hair. As I explained in the previous entry, I've been cutting his hair for a while now, but this was the first time he trimmed mine. He ended up taking off about two and a half inches. My hair feels SO much better without all those split ends. It gets much less snarly ( Read more... )

This morning I thought of going outside, after I was finally dressed, to try to project an image of the transit of Mercury through my binoculars. (Hey, it worked for the partial solar eclipse a couple of years ago.) But then Tall Dancer phoned (to keep himself awake on a long-distance drive), and I hadn't talked to him in months, and by the time we ( Read more... )

I, like the rest of the metro area, was high with happiness after Game 2 of the World Series. I mean, FiveThirtyEight.com gave the Nationals an 81 percent probability of winning it all! But now that the Series is tied 2-2, that website gives the Astros a better than 50 percent chance again. *sigh ( Read more... )

Apparently it was 1 year ago today that the Red Sox advanced to the World Series. The Washington Nationals did that just a few nights ago. So, both of my favorite baseball teams in the Series in two successive years! How 'bout THAT ( Read more... )