Joe Haldeman's Blog, page 38
July 18, 2012
post-VA treat
After the VA tests I treated myself to lunch at Chopstix, a pan-Eastern place that looks out over a small lake or a big pond. An appetizer of frog legs fried in garlic, a "swamp roll" of alligator sushi, and hot and sour soup, a little too hot; gave me hiccups.
Overall an excellent meal – who needs mammals and birds when you can eat reptiles and amphibians. Whilst listening to Frank Sinatra, who goes well with reptiles . . .
Joe
Bend over and count to one
July 17, 2012
home again
It's very strange and gorgeous. A huge loft in a converted warehouse, home to a European couple who want to go back to Milan for the same period we'll be teaching at MIT. He's a painter, and his canvases are all over the big place. Two desks and a drawing table under a ceiling that must be fifteen feet high. Double bed on a platform about five feet high.
It's the Fort Point area, which I've visited a couple of times during "artists' open house" weekends. There's a neat wine bar just across the street, the Ooh La La or something, and it's just a ten-minute walk from South Station.
The big picture windows look out over water, a barge canal, to the Institute of Contemporary Art – and the Barking Crab, one of my favorite places to eat in the whole world. It has an outdoor annex under a tent for when the weather's good, picnic tables and paper plates, with fish and chips to die for. (So don't inhale the bones.)
We hung around the almost-deserted hotel until the next morning, after going out to a good steak dinner with Ellen Klages and a couple of her friends.
Very exciting limo ride through late rush-hour traffic to Logan airport. Fixed-price $65 spin; thrills and chills for free.
(For reading on the flight I indulged my love of chemistry with The Disappearing Spoon, which I picked up in the Dealers' Room – an anecdotal history of chemical elements. [The title refers to gallium, which has a melting point just above human body temperature – you mold a spoon out of gallium and watch someone's face as they dip it in a cup of tea.])
Joe
July 13, 2012
travelin'
Where are all my trees and birds? Where did all these people come from?
It was a productive twelve days, but difficult to quantify. Last year I wrote one whole story ("For Emily," which will be in F&SF soon) there, but this year was carving up a novel and reconfiguring it. The grim labor of taking out some of the best writing in the book, because I had to face the fact that it was only there because it was good writing. The novel had four distinct narrative threads, and one had to go. I'll turn it into its own novella later.
The net result, though, was a manuscript about fifteen pages shorter than the one I started out with. But people will be able to read it without a program.
Gay met me at the hotel, a little less travel-weary than me. Our MIT pals Jag and Antony came out for dinner, which was, for me, typically Marriott – beautiful presentation but mediocre food. I got sole, presented on a plank but too-fashionably undercooked. Hey, if I wanted sushi I would have ordered sushi. But it was great to touch bases with Antony and Jag, and get caught up on all the MIT gossip.
Here's a remarkably well edited bit of foolery – the BeeJees' "Stayin' Alive" matched with a hundred or so little clips of dancing from various old musicals.
Visual puns galore.
youtube.com/watch_popup?v=mz3CPzdCDws
(Thanks to Stuart Schiff via Sherry Gottleib's blog.)
Joe
July 11, 2012
iridium flare
(Sorry if this is posted twice -- a little internet problem)
I saw an Iridium flare last night at 23:21 . . . funny thing is, they'd come up in conversation an hour or so before, sitting around the campfire, and I said I didn't think they were visible more than a few hours after sundown (or before). But I came back to my place and sat in the dark for awhile, and then took the binoculars out and, as I do every night, scanned the clear dark sky for awhile. I took the binoculars away from my eyes for a few seconds and made the lucky sighting. There's nothing else in the sky that bright and sudden, like an old-fashioned flashbulb.
And then a very bright meteor (zero magnitude) a couple of minutes later. My lucky night.
Other good fortune earlier in the night was an impromtu campfire party with makeshift s'mores – we'd toast a marshmallow and then put it on top of a chocolate square sitting on a graham cracker, and complete the sandwich with another graham cracker. We never made them in Boy Scouts, but Gay learned the sticky art in Girl Scouts and later passed it on to me.
satellites and marshmallows
I saw an Iridium flare last night at 23:21 . . . funny thing is, they'd come up in conversation an hour or so before, sitting around the campfire, and I said I didn't think they were visible more than a few hours after sundown (or before). But I came back to my place and sat in the dark for awhile, and then took the binoculars out and, as I do every night, scanned the clear dark sky for awhile. I took the binoculars away from my eyes for a few seconds and made the lucky sighting. There's nothing else in the sky that bright and sudden, like an old-fashioned flashbulb.
And then a very bright meteor (zero magnitude) a couple of minutes later. My lucky night.
Other good fortune earlier in the night was an impromtu campfire party with makeshift s'mores – we'd toast a marshmallow and then put it on top of a chocolate square sitting on a graham cracker, and complete the sandwich with another graham cracker. We never made them in Boy Scouts, but Gay learned the sticky art in Girl Scouts and later passed it on to me.
Joe
July 9, 2012
round rainbows
When I was a soldier in the Central Highlands of Vietnam, I saw a circular rainbow for a few seconds near the top of a mountain, just as the sun began to rise. The atmosphere was in a strange condition of supersaturation, the air suddenly full of mist . . . I looked up (in the direction of my shadow) and the rainbow appeared and then faded out quickly.
Joe
Island walk
A little drama this morning . . . I came down to the main building a little after six and went to make the coffee for everybody – and there was no water! A moderately serious condition on an island.
Being somewhat prudent, I had a gallon jug of drinking water in my cabin, but almost nobody else does.
So I slogged down to the pump, which is in a swampy (of course) corner of the island, hoping that there would be a circuit breaker, but no. Just a switch, and flicking it on and off had no effect.
But even as I type, Rob is churning across the water from his home on the mainland. (a bit later . . . ) He came charging up in the little Mule and is off doing mechanic's magic. A couple of residents got a big bucket, which they filled with seawater down at the dock,, to allow people to flush the toilet. That's not actually critical, since we do have an outhouse. I brought my own gallon of drinking water down to the kitchen, so people could at least have coffee.
That will be gone soon. But I do have ten or twelve Heinekins to help me weather the storm. (Curious to have a working refrigerator but no water.)
(Later) Rob traced the problem to a hose clamp, which failed during the night. So the pump cheerfully pumped out all of the water in the cistern onto the ground, and (I guess) then turned itself off. So he's off to get a replacement hose clamp, and then we'll have water again, in a couple of hours. The pump will have to run for about eight hours to draw enough water for showers, but we'll have drinking water.
It's not something anybody planned for, but it's covered by a sort of meta-rule: if you live on an island, it's only a matter of time before something crucial breaks. Fortunately, there are two boats, and a pretty good little hardware store on the mainland.
Yesterday we had a fun expedition. All of us went on a walk through the woods looking at various plants and fungi. Some of those with northern blood in their veins went swimming. Having lived in Florida for most of forty years, I don't even put a toe in water that's under 75 degrees. I continued on around the island with another guy who isn't into recreational hypothermia, a nice two-and-a-half-hour walk, about half on rocks and half through the thick woods. There's a trail marked with old buoys that have washed up, but some of them have weathered into invisibility, which gives the activity a nice hide-and-seek flavor.
After dinner I gave a reading from Work Done for Hire, the novel I hope I'll finish this month. It was well-received. As I may have mentioned here, I started the book on Norton Island six years ago, but interrupted it to write Marsbound . . . which grew into a trilogy.
Slept well last night and woke up only a little ache-y from the clambering. Now that the water situation is stable, I'll get back to work.
Joe
July 7, 2012
Chili night
The new crew came in yesterday, so now we have ten writers and two artists. I have a list of names but, if the past is any guide, I probably won't connect the names with faces for more than half. If I were running the place I'd pass out nametags at dinner. But that would be anathema to the free-spirited chaotic enthusiasm that inhabits the place. (i.e. "too much like school")
I made a huge pot of chili and a big salad, which were vacuumed up by the weary travelers. I volunteered to cook chili and, providentially, that's what the cook had planned anyhow. So she got to put her feet up some. She did make a couple of pans of Bisquik biscuits, a welcome addition.
Much talk of writing and art around the bonfire. Seems like a good bunch.
Joe
July 3, 2012
on the island
Unsurprisingly, Norton Island is much as I left it a year ago. Quiet, charming. Some small inconveniences. But I just had a nice hot shower up in the main building, and it will be about a 10-12 minute walk to the only WiFi point, near Steve Dunn's porch – Steve owns the island and runs the Eastern Frontier Foundation, which sponsors this lovely retreat.
Next week there will be twelve writers and artists taking advantage of the quiet isolation and occasional camaraderie – people fix their own breakfast and lunch in the main building but get together for dinner, prepared by a professional chef. I'm here a week early, and tomorrow I'll be joined by a couple of other old veterans of the island. Steve opened the island early for us old-timers.
My home for the next ten days will be a 10X10 log cabin with outlets for a desk lamp and a computer. No heat, but there is a stack of blankets. (This might be the only place in the lower 48 where it's cold enough this July to need a couple of blankets.)
I slept like a rock in the cool fresh air and birdy quiet.
We had a lobster boil last night, down at Steve's place. Excellent! Lobster being the perfect vehicle for melted butter.
The drive up was pleasant, just a couple of hours, with a stop at a country diner for fried fish.
I'm back in the cabin I used last time, the second-most distant from the main building. Still only about 250 steps. (It will seem longer in the rain, but none forecast for a couple of days.) Gay will be here a few days, staying in the actual bedroom in the main building.
Down to the WiFi point and then point my nose back to the old grindstone.
Joe
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