Michael Flynn's Blog, page 45

THE GANDERSAUCE SOCIETY

On the lookout for special pleading and double standards everywhere.
Our motto: What's sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander.  

Our entry for the day:

Pity the first lady. Every time she pulls a frock from her closet, changes her hairstyle or raises a well-groomed eyebrow, someone somewhere not only parses her decision and weighs its symbolism but also attempts to give it a whiff of scandal, back-room tumult, or something equally unseemly."--Robin Givhan, TheDailyBeast.com, Feb. 2
"Style can be used to break down barriers. It can show stature and authority and also exude commonality.  But when it is too perfect, too formal, too stiff, it sets one apart. In Mrs. Gingrich's case, style implies a social hierarchy that, far from exuding empathy, reflects the haughty airs of noblesse oblige."--Robin Givhan, TheDailyBeast.com, Dec. 12

h/t to WSJ Best of the Web

This is Kool

h/t Mark Shea

The Journeyman: On the Short-Grass Prairie

I am pleased to announce that my story "The Journeyman: On the Short-Grass Prairie" has been accepted for publication at Analog Science Fiction/Science Fact. 

The story describes an adventure undertaken by Teodorq sunna Nagarajan, whom my perceptive reader will recognize as a player in the novel Up Jim River.  This story takes place on his home world, called World, well before he finds his way to the Spiral Arm and the company of the harper and the scarred man.  

As teaser, the story opens thusly:

Read More

A Blast From the Past

What Happens When a Pair of Irishmen
Visit France in the early 800s? 

The Monk of St. Gall (probably Notker the Stammerer) tells us:

Now it happened, when [the illustrious Charles] had begun to reign alone in the western parts of the world, and the pursuit of learning had been almost forgotten throughout all his realm, and the worship of the true Godhead was faint and weak, that two Scots came from Ireland to the coast of Gaul along with certain traders of Britain. These Scotchmen were unrivaled for their skill in sacred and secular learning: and day by day, when the crowd gathered round them for traffic, they exhibited no wares for sale, but cried out and said, "Ho, everyone that desires wisdom, let him draw near and take it at our hands; for it is wisdom that we have for sale."

and so on

Adventures in Statistics

The following graph was prepared by NOAA and presented on the National Public Radio website. The gist of the accompanying article was OMG!! WE'RE ALL GONNA DIE!!! Or something like that. In particular, weather ("which is not climate") has suddenly become climate again.

at least until the last line of the article:

Tell me more...

After the Spring Comes the Fall

Egyptian elections.

Kindle ebook

Into the New Millennium

Analog's first e-anthology:

A Few Odds and Ends With No Apparent Connection

While cleaning out a folder of various snips and such, I ran across several items that seemed to concatenate and thought I'd try to stitch them together.

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[image error]The first, by movie critic John Bowman, regards the connection between Charlie Sheen and Moammar Ghadaffi.  Both, he says, rely on the persistence in legend of a long gone bogey-man.  In Ghadaffi's case (as for many others), it was long-vanished Italian (French, British,...) colonialism.  But there is a Genesis narrative supporting Mr. Sheen, as well.

Both [Mr. Sheen and Mr.Ghadaffi] were based upon a founding narrative of the culture that each man shared with his less addlepated fellow countrymen. ... For the founding narrative of today’s popular culture also involves a noble rebellion of the oppressed. Without the success of the free,egalitarian, life-affirming unofficial culture of yesteryear against the "uptight" and "repressive" official culture, Charlie Sheen would beunimaginable, and he depends as much on the pretense of this long-defunct cultural regime’s continued existence as Colonel Gaddafi does. It’s what makes him an interesting, rebellious, "transgressive" pop culture hero and not just a poor, self-destructive, strung-out nutbag. In this sense, his claim to be a "total rock star from Mars" with "tiger blood" had a certain truth to it, since rock stars who come from nearer to home and whose blood is anthropoid have been waving the same bloody shirt for almost half a century, ever since the official culture pronounced its dying benediction upon the noble cause of removing the stigma of hypocrisy from youthful self-indulgence and quietly gave up the ghost.

The screed continues at The TOF Spot. 

Head Lines

The Answer is No
"Have You Hugged a Port-a-Potty Lately?"--headline, San Antonio Express-News website, Dec. 1 

Hmm.  Well, It's Not the Beard...
"Why Egypt's Salafis Are Not the Amish"--headline, Council on Foreign Relations website, Dec. 1

This is Pretty Much the Definition of a Night Club, Isn't It?
"Cops: Drunk Man Annoys Women at Cambridge Nightclub"--headline, Cambridge (Mass.) Chronicle, Nov. 30

Blast from the past

Firestar, redux Fresh New Second Edition!

A box full of author's copies arrived today.
The first book of the Firestar series is back in print.  There is no change from the first edition, which means it is now mostly alternate history.  Back then, 1999, 2000, 2001 etc. were all in the future!  One of the problems with near-future SF, I fear.  I suppose we could have bumped everything up a couple of years; but really, why pretend that this is an effort to predict the future, rather than the stories of a potpourri of characters?  The science and technology of SSTO is still there; but it's interesting to see what this future omitted or overlooked.

Anyhow, for people who missed it the first time around -- and judging by sales, many of you did -- now have a chance to make up for that lack. Buy early and often!

It is my understanding that Tor intends to bring back the entire series: Firestar, Rogue Star, Lodestar, and Falling Stars.  I wonder if there will be a boxed set? Woo-hoo.