Fencing Upgrade

My fencing teacher is starting up a Competition class in July: two hours a week plus additional out-of-class bouting, and I'd have to upgrade to electric fencing gear. My classmates in the intermediate class are trying to get me to commit, and (despite my general horridness as a fencer) I'm inclined to do so. My objection to bouting (where the real experience and practice comes in) has always been the cultural one of having to insert myself into a group of people I don't know and say "Hey, me next!" which I am generally (don't laugh) too shy to do. But this class will remove that objection, since I'll be working with people I mostly know, and won't have to feel like I'm forcing myself into the class. The question comes down to: do I want to spend the money, do I want to spend the time, and how much of an appetite for public humiliation in the cause of improvement do I have? I'm thinking the answers are going to be yes, yes, and Oh, what the hell.

Dueling Modems is Reborn

If I knew enough Latin I would use it.

Those who wandered the halls, first of GEnie and then of DM.net, will be pleased to know that the site has been resurrected at duelingmodems.com. It has an interfact that is sort of the bastard child of GEnie and LiveJournal, with a smidgen of Blogger, but conversation is clearly starting up again. Oh, Goodie! One more way to procrastinate and hang out at the electronic water cooler.

Celebration

Today is Ian McKellan's birthday; he is 76, I believe. I saw him in Acting Shakespeare in the mid-80s and fell completely in love (his voice is sublime, and he has beautiful hands, and the sort of rangy male beauty I find very compelling). Then I saw him in A Knight Out and realized that he was not just talented and gorgeous, but very smart and very funny. Since then, of course, he's been a mutant and a wizard and Richard III and many other things. I'm just glad he's alive. I think he's swell. Happy Birthday, Sir Ian.

And the pillow, too

In addition to making the quilt, I also made a pillow (not quite as cool as the quilt, but I had extra fabric left over). The center has, on one side, Wiscon 30, and on the other hand a small picture of Space Babe.

Quilt!

This is the quilt I made to be auctioned off at the Wiscon Tiptree auction: I've got pictures of 35 former Wiscon GOHs, plus Kate Wilhelm and Jane Yolen, this year's GOHs. Hope it raises lots of money. I'm already thinking about a quilt for next year....

Anyone Know...

...if DM.net yet lives? I feel like there's a wake going on and I couldn't get in to pay my respects.

Pipe Dreams

The people who did this have entirely too much time on their hands...in a very cool way.

Question

Why is it that, no matter who does the dishes, no one (but me) ever washes the glasses or salad bowls? Just asking.

Dia de las Madres

We broke the tradition today because YG had a sleepover last night in Orinda (and a "baby shower for the homeless" Scouts event at 11 am today). So I was taken out to a lovely breakfast by Sarcasm Girl and the Spouse, then drove out to Orinda, listening to The Golden Compass, which I have not read; captured the girl, drove her to her Scout event, then came home in time to be whisked off to a movie by the Spouse (MIssion Impossible: 3--probably the best line is when Our Hero tells his new wife about his profession. "I work for an agency called the IMF." "What does that stand for?" "Impossible Mission Force." "No, really." "Really!") Now the family is making dinner (with only minimal input from me) and I am drinking a glass of wine and updating my blog. It's been un-San Francisco-like weather: over 80 degrees, and sunny--which seems like a kindly gesture from the Gods, but more likely a sinister sign of global warming. Tonight I'm going to watch the series finale of The West Wing and dream of alternate universes.

Joyous Mother's Day to all of you who are, or have, mothers. Also aunts, cousins, sisters, and daughters.

Roots

Maybe five or six years ago, writer Laura Resnick had a swell idea: why not establish a listserve for women who wrote science fiction and fantasy? Not exactly a professional organization, but a place where we could exchange ideas, ask for advice, swap gossip a little, announce our triumphs and complain as necessary. I joined the SFF-FW list shortly after it was formed; it now has Idunnamany women on it, and it has been a nice community to be part of. Last year, when Andre Norton was declining, a discussion began about how important she had been to many of the writers on the list; out of the discussion the idea arose of letting her know how important she had been, giving her an award or a gift or something from her peers--women writing science fiction and fantasy. Why stop there, we thought? In the end, SFF-FW gave Betty Ballantine, Madeleine L'Engle, Anne McCaffrey, Ursula K. Le Guin, Kate Wilhelm, Joanna Russ, and Andre Norton the "Roots in Writing" award: a plaque, and a tree or planting of their choice, meant to signify that these women were all, in some way, the roots from which our membership had grown. We all thought this was a one-time thing, and then this year we somehow found ourselves doing this again--but a little more modestly, with one recipient, Jane Yolen.

Elsewhere on the web I've seen a comment to the effect that SFF-FW is a "self-proclaimed and unknown group." Well, yes. Most groups are self-proclaimed, and we have not been much interested in being known beyond our membership. But if anyone out there is wondering who these people are and what the Roots in Writing award is, well, this is it.