arkessian

I've given my website at www.arkessian.com a minor makeover (and a behind-the-scenes technology update). I'd be grateful if people could go visit and confirm that it's working for them...

Imagine my amusement when a genealogy blog that I follow pointed me to a post on another blog by a dear friend (in her professional capacity) who also regularly blogs here at dreamwidth. I do hope she's ready for the hordes of family historians who will be beating a path to her institution's door!

The garden has been disastrous this summer: very poor tomato, pepper, aubergine and even courgette crops. I shan't bother with aubergines and peppers next year -- I think the micro-climate is too marginal here for them to be reliable -- and I'll pick my tomato varieties more carefully. The courgettes clearly need to be grown on the more sheltered side of the patio, so I'll try something else on the windy side... I don't know what, yet.

In compensation, a neighbour has had a bumper crop of cooking apples, so I've spent the last few weeks making: apple pies, apple cakes and apple chutney. I just cored, peeled and sliced 3 lbs (6 kilos) to put in the freezer for future use and there's another 2lbs still to deal with. Luckily, I like apples.

... it doesn't mean that I want to take over the world.

But lately, people (plural and in two different contexts) have assumed that -- because I'm willing to help with a particular task or organisation -- I'll be willing to take over carrying out or running the whole thing.

Wrong.

I already have more than enough on my plate, and am not doing things I would really like to do. Why would I want to increase my workload of things I don't enjoy, or don't care for as much as other things? I'm willing (in both cases) to take on a little more, but not the whole thing.

Have I really not done one of these this year?

( Ratio of female to male authors: 15 to 6 (by author) or 29 to 6 (by book, counting a female joint author as wholly female) )

The astute among you will recognise that I had fun reading/re-reading some generation starship books. Also, owning an ereader has increased the rate at which I'm reading.

FarthingParty was great fun, and Montreal is a comfortable city -- sensible public transport and a plenitude of restaurants, and my aged O-level French allowed me to at least show willing...

( Bolded if I read it, underlined if I read part of it: )

By which I conclude that (a) I'm reasonably widely read in the field (68 out of 100) but not exhaustively so; and (b) my tastes differ widely from the other people who voted. No LeGuin? No Cherryh? to mention two glaring names missing off this list...

I've backed the world sf travel fund — I think it's a great idea.

I appear to be an SF Mistress! There's a very generous review at SF Mistressworks (which originally came from Performative Utterance).

And Jo Walton has nice things to say for the second time at www.tor.com.

Odd, to be getting more reviews now than when the book first came out...

And another poor performance -- I was really not paying attention in the 90s.  Usual rules for women writers who got their start in 1993...  (Meme originated by james_nicoll )

( Read more... )

Usual rules for women writers who got their start in 1992... Again a poor performance away from all my previous sources.


( Read more... )

Women writers who got their start in 1991, alphabetical by first name. Otherwise, usual rules apply: Italicize the authors you've heard of before reading this list of authors, bold the ones you've read at least one work by, underline the ones of whose work you own at least one example of. Come up with improvements to flavour your versions.

Another poor performance from out in the sticks before the 'net...

( Read more... )

From james_nicoll again... Specifically women writers who got a start in 1990. It's alphabetical by first name. Otherwise, usual rules apply: Italicize the authors you've heard of before reading this list of authors, bold the ones you've read at least one work by, underline the ones of whose work you own at least one example of. Come up with improvements to flavour your versions.

What this highlights is how I left London, specialist SF bookstores and oursin 's book lending range about now... Also, I suspect, that I'm not a short story reader as a rule.

( Read more... )

I am all in favour of packing books well when they go in the post, especially if they are travelling over an ocean (I have experience -- too much experience -- of things getting lost without trace on their way from the US to me).

I am not in favour of receing books in packaging tht I am personally physically unable to open. I do not own an industrial quality staple-remover, not the sort of scissors that can cut through really thick cardboard.

I'd be tempted to send the damned thing back except I really want the book inside....

Grrrrrrrrrrr.

I finally got the last veg plants off the kitchen windowsill and into a planter outside -- albeit later than I intended because of the chest infection and then vertigo.

So this year I have planted: 4 cordon tomatoes (1 plum, 1 black russian, 1 striped and 1 I can't remember); 2 bush cherry tomatoes; 2 aubergine; 2 peppers; 2 chillis; 2 courgettes; a planter full of pak choi; 2 rows of cut-and-come-again salad leaves; coriander; parsley; sage; tarragon; basil; and several bay plants All this in addition to the rosemary, chives, thyme, purple sage and mint that are year long residents.

The oregano didn't survive the cold winter, nor did the previous bay plants. I have however acquired a couple of volunteer fennel plants in the flower border, survivors from when I grew fennel there some seven years ago...

The over-wintered onions and shallots weren't worth the effort and I shan't be repeating them; ditto for potatoes this year. I still need to find somewhere to sow some spinach and some stir-fry leaves (perhaps on the kitchen window sill).

From James Nicoll again, authors who got their start in the 1980s:

Italicize the authors you've heard of before reading this list of authors, bold the ones you've read at least one work by, underline the ones of whose work you own at least one example of. Come up with improvements to flavour your versions.
( Women authors who got their start in the 80s )

I think I may be a little over-committed. I don't know why I imagined this would not be a problem when I retired, given:

• my track history when employed
• my inability to allow myself to do anything less well than the best anyone can (there is no adequate)
• my inability to suffer things done badly by others
• my demonstrated ability over hmmph years to attempt All The Things

Hence this attempt at a list of All The Things... Perhaps it will convince me I need to strike some things off the list (surely not); perhaps it will enable me to cross things off as I do them (hollow laugh). At least it will fulfil my self-imposed quota for a blog-post this week.

( All the Things )

* And if we don't, at least we'll know which far-flung corners have been left to their own devices.

From James Nicoll

Italicize the authors you've heard of before reading this list of authors, bold the ones you've read at least one work by, underline the ones of whose work you own at least one example of.

Lynn Abbey
Eleanor Arnason
Octavia Butler
Moyra Caldecott
Jaygee Carr,
Joy Chant
Suzy McKee Charnas
C. J. Cherryh
Jo Clayton
Candas Jane Dorsey
Diane Duane
Phyllis Eisenstein
Cynthia Felice
Sheila Finch
Sally Gearhart
Mary Gentle,
Dian Girard
Eileen Gunn
Monica Hughes
Diana Wynne Jones
Gwyneth Jones
Leigh Kennedy
Lee Killough
Nancy Kress
Katherine Kurtz
Tanith Lee
Megan Lindholm (AKA Robin Hobb)
Elizabeth A. Lynn
Phillipa Maddern
Ardath Mayhar
Vonda McIntyre
Patricia A. McKillip
Janet Morris
Pat Murphy
Sam Nicholson (AKA Shirley Nikolaisen)
Rachel Pollack
Marta Randall
Anne Rice
Jessica Amanda Salmonson
Pamela Sargent
Sydney J. Van Scyoc
Susan Shwartz
Nancy Springer
Lisa Tuttle
Joan Vinge
Élisabeth Vonarburg
Cherry Wilder
Connie Willis

Not doing badly on this one!

High spots so far? Wiscon, and a week shortly after in Southwold (Seaside!)

Latest low spot? Combined ear infection, sinusitis and chest infection.  [This is penned from my bed of pain...]

2011? Any time now, you can start behaving yourself.

2011 can only get better -- she says fervently. The tally so far is:

• the lodger's heart attack
• the death of my beloved brother-in-law
• the probable emergence at my brother-in-law's funeral next week of the black sheep of the family, who will (as palpably demonstrated at other family funerals) make it All About Them and need smacking down sharply. I expect to be designated smacker, to spare the less resilient members of the family, especially my oldest sister who has all she can deal with right now.

I will be at Wiscon come hell or high water!