I Need You To Do This For Me

It feels like the forces of darkness are forever encroaching.

I need you to do this for me.

I know you just got home from work and you've had a horrible day, but I need you to tell someone how much they mean to you. Or get up and exercise a little. Or write a letter to your Senator about an issue that's been bothering you. Or plant something. Or educate yourself on something that's important to you. Or take care of that little chore you've been putting off for days or weeks.

Make something. Play with the kids, even if they're adults. Start that project. Call that person. Make a list of ten things that would improve your job. Share this post. Find a quiet place and for five minutes, imagine what your life would be like if you faced that fear. Figure out one way to make that dish you love just a tiny bit healthier.

What if you improved your life by one one-hundredth of a percent every day? What if everyone else did too?

The only way we're going to conquer the forces of darkness is if each one of us makes just a little bit of light. Maybe history isn't only made by individuals. Maybe our fate isn't solely in the hands of governments and corporations. Maybe if each of us becomes something more than we were yesterday, we'll start to move things.

I already know you're too tired today and you promise you'll do it tomorrow. You told me that yesterday.

44!

Forty-four years old today. My birthdays are similar to funerals in that they remind me that time is short. The deadline for the goal this blog was meant to document is drawing nearer and I've got stuff to do. So do you! Go do your stuff. Once this life is done, there will be no make-ups!

I've still got 860 stories to write! That's INSANE!

The Metrozone

As I stated on Twitter, when I was a kid, I wanted to be James Bond. Decades later, I want to be Samuil Petrovitch. And I think it goes without saying that I'm still a kid. I talked about the first Petrovitch book here: http://theonethousand.blogspot.com/2011/10/equations-of-life.html So you might want to read that.

I won't go into detail about the second and third books here, but I will say that I think they're even better than the first. The action, the stakes, the hero, the writing, they all make me excited to read. How often are you excited while reading? It almost never happens to me.

I read the second a few months ago and just finished the third. I like to take a little breather between books in a series, although it's possible I'll jump into the fourth book soon. You can find info on all of them here at the author's website: http://www.simonmorden.com/books/

Start reading already!

100 Artists

I think this is a fantastic idea if you're feeling stuck or frustrated as an artist. I've often thought about taking on other personas in order to go places artistically that I wouldn't otherwise go. It's similar to how people's behavior can change when they put on a mask, or even a radically different outfit. Become someone else, why don't you? See where it takes you.

Do It On Nights And Weekends

This Onion article made me laugh as it kicked me in the balls. Go read and enjoy and come back:

Find The Thing You're Most Passionate About, Then Do It On Nights And Weekends For The Rest Of Your Life

This is my life in this article, folks. It might even be your life. It's certainly the life of millions.That life made for my financial cesspit and broke up my family, among other, lesser miseries. And if you're like me, you couldn't have stopped before it all went wrong and you can't stop now. Such is the creative life. It's like a gambling addiction.

The alternative, the way to give your passion more than minutes a day, is to quit your job and live in your car, if you're lucky enough to have a car. Otherwise, it's the street for you. I'm too much of a coward to do that, so I deserve what I've got.

But I make things. You might make things too. Millions like us do. I makes stories and a podcast and I made a novel and other little things. I think even the lowliest maker of things is a better human being than Alexander the Great or Napoleon, or any of the thousands of other military marvels or world leaders, because they all destroyed lives, they destroyed people.

We make things.

We make things for ten goddamned minutes a night sometimes, but we make things. We do it because we don't have any other choice and we'll squeeze it in where we can, rather than abandon it.

And most of all, because it's all we've fucking got.

Rush Of Fame!

If you're a Rush fan, you've been griping for the last fourteen years of their eligibility, "Why the hell hasn't Rush been inducted into The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame?" Well, gripe no more! They're in, as of a couple of days ago. Here are some videos of the goings-on. The audio's not great, the video's a bit better, but hey, I'll take it in lieu of stills and reports any day. Thanks to clg2112 for posting these.

Foo Fighters as Rush, circa 1976, doing 2112's Overture:

Rush's induction speech from Dave Grohl and Taylor Hawkins of the Foo Fighters:

The guys' acceptance speeches:

I just wanna hug these guys. Congrats!

Climb Onto The Sofa

The new episode of StarShipSofa is just sitting there waiting for you! Go listen!

StarShipSofa No 285 Brad Torgersen

Coming up …

Fact:Hugo Reviews A Deepness in the Sky by Andy Thomaswick 01:50

Main Fiction: “The Exchange Officers” by Brad Torgersen

Promo: Amy H. Sturgis The Dystopian Tradition

Narrator: Jim Phillips

I'm There

Stay In And Hang Out With Three Science Fiction Giants

Hey, folks! This Sunday, StarShipSofa is hosting an online shindig with three masters of science fiction: Larry Niven, Jerry Pournelle, and Gregory Benford. Personally, I loved The Mote in God's Eye, Fallen Angels, Ringworld, Lucifer's Hammer and Timescape. You may have loved entirely different novels by them; Between the three of them, they've written absolute piles of them. They could share stories for the hour and a half that's scheduled, or they could go even longer. Tony from the Sofa will have a pot of coffee handy just in case.

Past Sofa events have included questions and answers, so have a mic ready, in case, and you can ask Larry what the Puppeteer was hiding behind its back on page 172 of that book you keep under your pillow. If the scheduled time doesn't work for you, you can sign up anyway and you'll get the audio and the slideshow links by email about a week later. Click on the picture below to get more info and sign up!

Do this thing!

140

Taking a little break from writing Mangoes for May, I decided to edit a story I threw down a couple of months ago and send it out. It's called Life and Times, number 140 of The One-Thousand, not to be confused with Lives and Times, number 1 of The One-Thousand. It's flash, only about 1,100 words long, but it always feels great to finish something.

The Maniacal Ivy And Bean Dispose Of Another Victim

ICFAdventures

Happy Easter, to those of you who are into that sort of thing!

I'd never been to a conference or convention or anything else before last week. It's usually a money thing, sometimes a scheduling thing, but the International Conference for the Fantastic in the Arts is a Florida thing, and I'm a Florida thing, so I can drive there and not sweat the hotel, so that helps. I'm going to be name-dropping like a muhfuh here, so get used to it.

I swung up to Orlando for the pre-conference party the Tuesday night before last and met some cool people there including Kathleen Ann Goonan. I felt a bit like a dope because I knew I'd read something by her, but couldn't remember what. I met quite a few Scandinavian writers and academics and a couple from Australia. I felt dumb after asking Peter Halasz if he was Adam-Troy Castro. But Castro lives in Florida, I figured he might be there, and I've only ever seen tiny little pictures of him on Facebook. I spoke to Guest Scholar Constance Penley who teaches about the intersection of feminism, porn and related matters at UC Santa Barbara. I saw others whom I knew by seeing their photos online (after the Peter Halasz incident, I should probably say I "thought" I knew them) but I didn't see a non-intrusive way to say hello. I had some great conversation with Diane and Lee Weinstein, who have been involved with science fiction for, I think, thirty-five years. Diane answered lots of questions that I had about her years of slush reading for Weird Tales and told me the story about how she was hired by George Scithers.

Mango Feed Is Fixed

My boss, who is a newly converted fan of Beware the Hairy Mango, told me he wasn't able to access the first forty-nine episodes of the show. I realized that I had to adjust the thingie on the site that handles such things and have done so. All the episodes should be available now. I'm seeing them on my iPod, anyway. If you're still not seeing the first episodes, wait a few days, check again, and if there's a problem, let me know at upwithgravity@gmail.com.

As I told the boss, it took me maybe twenty episodes or more to really figure out what the show was, so there are some shows that don't feel as Mangoey today because the stories are just weird, rather than weird and funny. So, bear with it. You shouldn't necessarily start at the beginning with the show and I always, always, ALWAYS warn folks not to listen to them all in a row, because I am best taken in small doses. You'll burn out, people. Of course, listeners regularly ignore that advice. Proceed at your own risk.

Updated Works

I updated the list of my stuff that you can read and listen to. You can see that here, over at http://bewarethehairymango.com/about-2/. I added links to three or four stories, updated a couple of other links and sadly removed quite a few other links to sites that are no longer in working order. Some of those stories were ones I actually removed from this blog when they were published at another side. I'll have to add them back when I get the time and remember. Perhaps I can post the others here as well. I should have another Fiction Crawler to add to the list in a few days.