Only three short stories made it past the 5% vote threshold to be nominated for this year's Hugo Awards and all three authors have been previously nominated in this category. While it makes choosing easy, I think it's a shame there's no new blood.

(3) “Mantis Wives” by Kij Johnson - A well-written horror sketch with, as the title suggests, insects ( Read more... )

Many of you will be able to relate to the trauma of having some of your precious books stored elsewhere due to lack of room. In my case, Wingnut's best mate agreed to store some of my books while we went to Paris for "a year or two". He's an SF fan too, so it was nice to think that the books would have some love while I was gone ( Read more... )

Not only should sleepless babies beware of cradles tumbling out of trees, but Napoleon himself might come to get them too!

Baby, baby, naughty baby ( Read more... )

The summer recess meant a short election campaign though the results are not short of shocks ( Read more... )

After being involved with live blogging the Discworld Convention a few times, this year it's my turn to follow the action from afar.[1] The comms team have started up a tumblr at dwcon.tumblr.com to which anyone with an e-mail address can submit content for consideration. It's a nice idea to try tumblr and I look forward to seeing what turns up ( Read more... )

That's not a reference to clubbing or anything, I'm just excited about the fact that, after six weeks in the Netherlands, I've seen my first squirrel! Not one of the big greys which are overrunning London, but a little red one that shot out in front of my bike and then up a tree ( Read more... )

Instead of immersing myself in the Dutch language like I should, I've spent the last few weeks swimming about in the Hugo Voter Packet. The results of my dive were better than last year: again, one or two discoveries I'll be excited to hear more from, but less outright bad stuff ( Read more... )

With the assistance of Wingnut's dad, we'd hoped to be able to move straight from London to Leiden but had reckoned without real estate agents. Sigh. Fortunately, a family member in The Hague is providing us with a roof over our heads while we look for some place to live. So it feels like I'm rather on holiday here, rather than being properly moved ( Read more... )

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The chorus just kills me.

Ballad of Bethnal Green (A song from 1959 by Paddy Roberts)

Click to view

As usual, found while looking for something else. Now I'm looking for my lost half hour.