A Cold Day in Crisis

My story, "A Cold Day in Crisis," (Number 51 for those of you keeping track) is up at Electric Spec today. Give it a go:

http://www.electricspec.com/issues/volume-5-issue-2-may-31-2010/a-cold-day-in-crisis-by-matthew-sandborn-smith.asp

What It Feels Like

Found this on Neatorama today:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ajPvCQjatW4&feature=player_embedded

Groovin' To The 8-Bit

@steveattwitter turned his followers onto this groovy little 8-bit player today. You need Flash. Sorry iPaddies!
http://8bitboy.popforge.de/

Discovered this great new science fiction market thanks to Duotrope. They need lots of stories. Looks like they'll be e-mailing a story a day out to their subscribers.
http://dailysciencefiction.com/

Sometimes I Try Too Hard

So I'll stop. I liked this: http://su.pr/45PHz4

Second Mission

I always had a second mission in mind for this blog, after the flash-fiction-a-day went away, but I never got to it officially. I like to turn people on to cool stuff. When I'm not talking about my writing here, I'm going to try to link to something that I think is cool and want to share with you. A lot of people I know who have lives and don't spend them here always ask me, "Where do you find this stuff?" Which makes me happy because I know that I'm introducing them to something they wouldn't have already found.

Now you people reading this, you don't have lives and you may already have seen the cool things that I have, but it's unlikely you've seen everything that I have. So you may gain something from this. Between this and writing updates, I hope to post something new every day. We'll see how that goes.

My editor at Chiaroscuro, Gord Zajac, was kind enough to list my teddy bear story as one of his top five at Chizine. Read his post here, and by all means check out those other stories as well:

http://gordzajac.typepad.com/and_in_conclusion_i_hate_/2010/05/my-five-favourite-chizine-stories.html

That wasn't the cool thing. That was just self-serving.

The cool thing is that Gord has a new novel out from ChiZine Publications, called Major Karnage and it sounds like a hell of a lot of fun. You can buy a copy of the limited press run here: http://chizine.com/chizinepub/books/major-karnage.php And, no, the cool thing isn't going to be something you have to buy all the time. I'm not making a penny off of it. But you can enjoy the following, as I have. This is Gord reading from the first four pages of the book. It's a blast:

Fundraiser For Hearts, Hands And Homes

Alana Garner-Jones, a lady I've been friends with for almost thirty years, works for an organization called Hearts, Hands & Homes Community Collaborative For Foster Care & Adoption. They're doing a fundraiser at The California Pizza Kitchen at the Foxwoods Casino in Ledyard, Connecticut. If you're in town on June 8th of 2010, eat a bunch of pizzas there from 11:00 AM to 8:30 PM because 20% of everything you spend will go to Hearts, Hands and Homes.

You need to bring a flyer from Alana in order to be counted and you can reach her through Facebook. Here's the page for the Fundraiser: http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=126800447346232 If you want to help and you're not on Facebook, give me a shout in the comments or drop me an e-mail at upwithgravity@gmail.com and I'll pass it along to her. Do it for the children! Thanks!

125

125 is in the bag and out the door. And over the river and through the woods. That's number 6 for the year.

Story At Everyday Weirdness

My story, One with Everything, which you may have read here years ago, appears at Everyday Weirdness today. Take a peek, it's super short: http://everydayweirdness.com/e/20100505/

124

Just completed 124. 47 left to go this year. 876 in the next nine years.

New Mango is here: http://bewarethehairymango.com/episode-32-finally-a-computer-for-everyone-else/

My first Fiction Crawler in many moons is out on the Sofa this week. Also, the feature story was recommended by me on an earlier Fiction Crawler.



Aural Delights No 132 James Alan Gardner

Fact Article: Science News by J.J. Campanella

Main Fiction: The Ray-Gun: A Love Story by James Alan Gardner

Fact Article: Fiction Crawler 9 by Matthew Sanborn Smith

Art Cover Audio Intro by S.P Wilson

Narrators: Ray Sizemore

Art Cover by S.P. Wilson

The Big Four One

I am now forty-one years old. I have nine years to write eight-hundred and seventy-seven stories.

No sweat.

Phone Conversation At Work Today

ME: Thank you for calling Barnes and Noble. This is Matthew. How can I help you?

GIRL (I'm guessing ten years old): Matthew? Are you single?

ME: Yes, I am. Are you asking me out?

GIRL: How old are you?

ME: I'm going to be forty-one tomorrow.

GIRL: Happy birthday.

ME: Thank you.

GIRL: Um . . . Do you wanna go to, like . . . Outback tomorrow?

ME: I'd love to, but unfortunately I have to work.

GIRL: You have to work on your birthday?

ME: Unfortunately, yes.

GIRL: When are you available?

ME: I don't actually know. (Laughing)

GIRL: Yeah, um . . . That laugh? It's not so good.

ME: Well, we all have our faults.

GIRL: Okay, well, I'll call you.

ME: Okay. Bye.

Fund Raising Auction For Jeanne Robinson

Thanks to Church for this link. Sci-Fi Saturday night is holding an auction on May 8th to raise money for Spider and Jeanne Robinson to help with their expenses during Jeanne's battle with cancer. More details here:

http://www.scifisaturdaynight.com/?p=972#more-972


Forgot to mention this before. Sent out story 123 last week, A City on the Move. 48 to go for the year, 877 to go for the decade.

Youse Guys

As they say in New Jersey, thanks, youse guys! For you foreigners, pronounce it like "use guys." I want to thank everyone who tossed some money in the Mango pot. I'm not totally in the clear yet but your donations (and some of them were more generous than I could have expected) have really helped. I'm currently taking steps to get more control over my financial life. More hustle will be needed on my part, but that's good motivation.

In other news, I participated in the latest Mind Meld over at SF Signal. This go around, we were asked, "What are the coolest robots in science fiction?" You can check out my answers, along with everyone else's here:
http://www.sfsignal.com/archives/2010/04/mind-meld-what-are-the-coolest-robots-in-science-fiction/

Something else that's good: I'm currently working on Fiction Crawler 9 for the Sofa! It's been around seven months since I did number 8! I'll send it Tony's way soon, though I don't when he'll choose to run it. I'll let you know. The six stories I recommend are among the best I've ever recommended. You can't wait!

Speaking of Sofa neglect, I do that too much. Let's see what's going on there this week.

Aural Delights No 131 Gregory Frost

Editorial: Goodbye Steve by Tony C Smith

Fact Article: Observation Lounge by Cheryl Morgan

Promo: The Gamma Quadrant Podcast

Main Fiction: Madonna of the Maquilador by Gregory Frost

Narrators: J.J. Campanella

Help!

I've got no sob story for you. I need some dough and was hoping for a little love for the free content I provide over on that other site:

http://bewarethehairymango.com/wherein-i-am-reduced-to-begging/