M.K. Hobson's Blog, page 3

A couple of recent mentions, which I appreciated

This is a picture of a Mexican restaurant on 82nd Ave. The sky is pretty, that’s the only reason I’m putting it here.

1) In which I am considered underrated, a sentiment with which I will never disagree.

2) In which my characters Emily Edwards & Dreadnought Stanton are counted among the top seven “Steamy” Couples of Steampunk.

Patterns, fabrics & my little sewing cap

So, pictures. Also, my phone takes cruddy pictures. Sorry.

Here are the patterns we are going to be using.

Fabric

Nora cutting out pattern pieces. Standard disclaimer about ignoring the mess in the background.

And here is a picture of me wearing a little cap that Nora sewed for me. It started as a trim experiment. She has decreed that I must wear it whenever we are sewing. I’m not quite sure why. But it is every cute.

Nora and I worked on the underskirt last night, and got it almost finished. Pictures tonight after I get the waistband on, the tapes and ties in, etc. Then I need to make the overskirt, because we can’t do the muslin for the jacket until we can take measurements with all the skirts on.

Time Traveler’s Ball Gown: Weekend Zero

Nora and I are going to be attending the Time Traveler’s Ball in October, and I have agreed to help her sew a new gown. Last week we ordered the patterns from Truly Victorian. We will be making the 1884 French Vest Bodice, the 1885 Four-Gore Underskirt, and the 1884 August Overskirt. Apparently the patterns were delivered Friday but we didn’t pick them up so we’ll have to wait until Monday.

This weekend we ran around gathering materials. The jacket and overskirt will be made from some red and white yardage we got from Goodwill a long time ago. Also in our fabric stash are a couple of yards of bright red poly taffeta. However, we needed some secondary fabric to make the underskirt. We thought stripes would go nice with the floral pattern, so after much searching and agonizing we settled on a very smart striped shirting that we got at Jo-Ann’s with a 50% off coupon. We also picked up some slate gray poly taffeta from the bargain upholstery fabrics shelves. With this palette, we are ready to create!

The first project will be the underskirt and overskirt. We have three weekends to complete this project, so we’d better get cracking.

Time Traveler’s Ball Gown – Weekend Zero

Nora and I are going to be attending the Time Traveler’s Ball in October, and I have agreed to help her sew a new gown. Last week we ordered the patterns from Truly Victorian. We will be making the 1884 French Vest Bodice, the 1885 Four-Gore Underskirt, and the overskirt. Apparently the patterns were delivered Friday but we didn’t pick them up so we’ll have to wait until Monday.

This weekend we ran around gathering materials. The jacket and overskirt will be made from some red and white yardage we got from Goodwill a long time ago. Also in our fabric stash are a couple of yards of bright red poly taffeta. However, we needed some secondary fabric to make the underskirt. We thought stripes would go nice with the floral pattern, so after much searching and agonizing we settled on a very smart striped shirting that we got at Jo-Ann’s with a 50% off coupon. We also picked up some slate gray poly taffeta from the bargain upholstery fabrics shelves. With this palette, we are ready to create!

The first project will be the underskirt and overskirt. We have three weekends to complete this project, so we’d better get cracking.

THE WARLOCK’S CURSE now available on Audible

[image error]If you’ve been waiting for the audiobook version of THE WARLOCK’S CURSE, it’s now available on Audible.com and Audible.co.uk!

And if you’re waiting for news about the next book … well, I was hoping to do a post on Mother’s Day (as that was the one-year anniversary of the completion of the Kickstarter) but in a nutshell: I’ve been writing a lot, and am making excellent progress on both the bonus stories and THE UNSTEADY EARTH. I promise I will get a more detailed post up soon.

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Sale to F&SF!

[image error]I am pleased to announce that I’ve sold a historical fantasy story titled “Baba Makosh” to The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction. Set during the Russian Civil War (1920-ish), it depicts a struggle between the old Slavic Gods and the Communists. It is one of those rara-est of avis-es, a “novelet,” which means that when awards time rolls around again, I’ll be suspending my personal rule against flogging my own work. Because, yanno. Odds.

I have no idea when it’s coming out, only Gordon knows and he isn’t telling. Or at least he hasn’t told me yet. If you’re interested in seeing the reference images I compiled when writing it, have a look at it’s Pinterest board.

My thanks to Gra Linnea, David D. Levine, Sara Mueller and Dave Goldman for their reading & critiques!

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I’m big in Japan

[image error]I am pleased to announce that Hayakawa Publishing in Tokyo has purchased the Japanese rights to The Native Star. Many thanks to my awesomesauce agent Ginger Clark and the Foreign Rights Department of Curtis Brown, Ltd. for putting this deal together.

I have no idea when it will come out or what the cover will look like (though I’m dying to find out) but I do know that they’re putting it out both in paperback and ebook. I will post more when I know more. Meanwhile, since I couldn’t find couldn’t find a picture of Godzilla in a Top Hat, you get this cute little fellow instead.

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Are *you* real?

[image error]So, for whatever reason, lately I have been doing more than my recommended daily allowance of ontological heavy lifting. I’m working my way through “Why Does the World Exist” by Jim Holt, I’ve been watching all of Rick Roderick‘s old philosophy lectures, I’ve been sifting through the Rupert Sheldrake videos on YouTube (I’m not particularly interested in his psychic research, though it does seem nicely constructed) … and just the other day, my dad sent me a link to a series of YouTube videos called “The Holographic Universe” by some guy named Stephen Davis who is apparently riffing off Michael Talbot’s old work (which I read in 1991 and found really nifty.) I’m not overly impressed by the Stephen Davis videos (they are exceptionally repetitive and condescending) but they have pointed me in the direction of a bunch of new research that I wasn’t aware of.

Anyway, all of this had led me to this philosophical question: Is there any way for me, within this information-based universe we seem to inhabit, to design an experiment that would allow me to verify your existence? (By you, of course, I mean you, right there, sitting reading this on your computer or smartphone or whatever.)

At the end of the day, I don’t care if I can prove that my own existence is real. My subjective experience is “real enough”. But I’m afraid the matter of your existence has not been resolved to my satisfaction. If everyone and everything I interact with could possibly be a function of my observing it (thus collapsing the waveform and bringing it into existence) then what does that mean for you? Do you exist when I’m not looking at you? Personally, I don’t think you do. Out of sight, out of mind. But I’m sure you have some strong feelings in the opposite direction. But are those feelings objectively real and located within some objectively real part of you? Or are they my subjective projection of what I assume someone in your position must feel? I know this all gets pretty esoteric pretty fast, so I return to my original question … is there any way for me to ever know, from within my subjective experience, whether anyone or anything else has any objective existence? 

This reminds me of Einstein’s glass-elevator thought experiment, where he deduced that, without an objective frame of reference, he could never determine whether he was hurtling through space at the speed of light or just standing still. So I think the answer must be that no, I can never verify your objective existence, because that would collapse some larger quantum waveform. Determining for once and for all whether you had objective existence or were just an extremely sophisticated NPC in my subjective reality would … I don’t know, either make you more real or more dead. Or maybe kill us both. I’m in no hurry to attempt the experiment, are you?

One other argument for your reality (I’m sure you’re glad to hear this) is that, if you didn’t have some kind of objective reality, then some part of me would already “know” everything you were going to tell me. Thus, you could never surprise me. But, in real life, surprises do happen—and thus, you must have some kind of objective existence independent from mine, QED. But scientific experiments have shown that the human brain subconsciously knows what information is coming at it well in advance of the actual conscious awareness of that information. So while one’s conscious mind may be surprised, one’s unconscious mind seems to be already in on things. Additionally, think about dreams. Haven’t you ever been surprised in a dream? Haven’t you ever had dreams take plot twists that you didn’t expect and were delighted and/or appalled by? So where did that “dream-twist” come from? Your subconscious mind created it then served it up for your conscious mind to gasp at. Couldn’t it be exactly the same with our waking interactions?

The only dim light I see leading me out of this cave comes from the “many universes” theory, in which you inhabit your own independent reality and I inhabit my own. Our realities are totally separate, we’re in two little bubbles. In my reality, you do collapse back into the quantum foam and cease to exist when I’m not interacting with you. And in your universe, I don’t exist when you’re not interacting with me. But why on earth should these bubbles connect at all? Why should they have any features similar enough for the two of us to have any interactions? I mean, in your bubble you also have “trees” and “computers” or else we couldn’t be interacting. So why do “trees” and “computers” transcend both of our bubbles? Where would such commonalities come from?

Maybe I need to lay off the metaphysical everclear. I’m sure it’s not doing my existential liver one bit of good.

Book buying adventures

I am (like many writers) a sucker for books. And like (I imagine) many historical fantasy writers, I am a sucker for OLD books. Over the past couple of days I have picked up a few doozies from the comfort of my own internet shopping terminal. Check these out:

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Midnight Scenes in the Slums of New York

Frederick Bell | 1881

This is a published version of an 1875 lecture given by the Reverend Fred Bell at the DeKalb Avenue Methodist Episcopal Church, under the auspices of the East Brooklyn Young Men’s Christian Association. According to a notice in the Brooklyn Daily Eagle on March 23, 1875, Bell was ”well-known as the reformed drunkard and pugilist,” and the lecture recounted how he had been called by God to labor in the Fourth Ward of New York City, “thickly populated with thieves, pugilists and all kinds of men, women and children who were deeply sunk in poverty and sin.”

“At first he wondered what he could do to reach these people. Finally one afternoon, about a month after his entrance into the field, he dropped into a boarding house in Cherry Street, where he found twelve or fourteen sailors who were “three sheets in the wind,” and having a good time. One of the number was singing a comic song, and after he got through he (Bell) was asked to favor the company with a song, which he agreed to do if good order was maintained. One of the men then raised his fists and exclaimed, “I’ll swell the head of the man who disturbs the stranger,” which had the effect of producing order, and then he sang the song “Scatter Seeds of Kindness,” which was heartily applauded. There were two or three wet eyes in the room when he got through. They encored him, and he was obliged to sing “I’m so glad that Jesus loves me.” Then they asked him if he was a minister, and when he owned up that he was they promised to come to the Mission, and some of them did go and were saved.”

To be honest, I mostly got this one for the beautiful cover. But I think it will be a fun read, as it sounds both lurid and uplifting!

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Behind the Green Lights

Cornelius Willemse | 1931

Speaking of lurid, but perhaps not so uplifting, I picked up an early edition of “Behind the Green Lights” (without a dustjacket; the picture shown is the only one I could find.) It’s the memoir of a Tenderloin beat cop in the early 1900s, in which he recounts his rise from patrolman in the mainly Irish-American NYPD, to acting Captain in the homicide squad. It describes his service in some of the roughest neighborhoods of the city at the time. Wikipedia promises me that I’ll be treated to “candid revelations of the often brutal police methods used at the time, as well as a rare law enforcement perspective on the gangs of New York during the Prohibition and pre-Prohibition era. Willemse also describes his confrontations with major gang members of the early 20th Century, including Kid Dropper, Little Augie Orgen and Tom Flanagan.”

This one I am really, really looking forward to reading.

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My Son’s Manual

Anonymous | 1838

And last, but certainly not least, is this addition to my collection of antique manners and deportment books. This one is quite a bit earlier than the mid- to late-19th century ones I usually buy, but I scooped it up at an obscenely good price on Ebay. I’m quite pleased with this, as someone on Amazon is selling a similar copy for $75. All self-satisfied cackling aside, the book should be an interesting peruse, as it was “meant as a guide to lead the boy into manhood” and includes sections on “Classical Learning, Industry, The Imagination and the Importance of its Proper Regulation, A Good Heart Necessary to Enjoy the Beauties of Nature, Filial Love, Fraternal Love, The Want of Decision of Character, On Buffoonery in Conversation, etc.”

I’ve really been needing a lesson in the importance of properly regulating my imagination, so this book can’t come soon enough for me.

In which my daughter destroys the Universe (and other birthday shenanigans)

[image error]Without a doubt, yesterday was the absolute best birthday I’ve had in years, thanks in no small part to all the lovely birthday wishes via Twitter and Facebook. Thank you all!

So after putting in a morning at the day job, I met up with Nora (who had the day off from school due to MLK day) and we took the streetcar over to NW Portland, to Jovana Salon. I have a bunch of big work meetings this week, so I wanted to get my hair whipped into shape. And my stylist Tammy gives the most incredible shampoo massages, so I also treated myself to one of those.

Afterward, Nora and I walked up 23rd Avenue. I’m not a huge fan of hipster shopping, but with my (now really blonde as Tammy went a bit nuts with the highlights) hair, and Nora all Harajuku-ed up in neon colors, we managed to have a great deal of boisterous fun, representin’ for Oregon City. Sure, it was a little embarrassing when she destroyed the Universe, but all in all … a very good time.

Anyway, about the Universe destroying, here’s the story. I didn’t know there was a Salt and Straw on NW 23rd (I thought it was just a North Portland thing.) For those who don’t know what Salt and Straw is, it’s a super gourmet highbrow specialty shop that makes really good handmade small-batch ice cream in very odd flavors (e.g., “strawberry balsamic with black pepper.”) Because the flavors are so not-mainstream, they encourage sampling. They have these nice little silver spoons, and they’ll let you taste as many flavors as you like. I tried the “Elvis” (banana ice-cream with peanut butter and some kind of fruit swirl, I didn’t much care for it), the vanilla with salted caramel (their most famous flavor, and, I think, their best), the almond brittle with salted ganache (also very good), and something chocolate honeycomb brittle, I don’t remember the exact name. Nora also tried a bunch of flavors, one of which was called “The Universe” (maybe you can see where this is going.) After she’d tried it, she was handing the little silver spoon back to the counter-person (you’re not supposed to do that, they have a little dirty-spoon repository, but she hadn’t seen it) and in the transfer, the spoon dropped slam-bang into the very center of “The Universe.”

Great dismay. Wailing and gnashing of teeth. Rending of garments. The counter-person loudly proclaimed to the people behind us, “We are now out of The Universe!” and then climbed up on the counter to erase it from the flavor-board. Nora and I probably would have been horribly embarrassed, except for the fact that we were having so much fun making jokes about destroying the Universe. “I can’t even take you out for ice cream without having you destroy the Universe!” … that kind of thing.

Anyway, I do sincerely apologize (retroactively) to anyone in line at Salt and Straw yesterday who was hoping for a scoop of The Universe. I will try to keep my daughter’s mighty Universe-destroying powers under better control in the future.

After that, we walked around NW a bit more, picking up an artisan loaf from Ken’s Artisan Bakery, as well as a wedge of manchego cheese and a bottle of Spanish white wine from Trader Joe’s. We later consumed these with the Iberico ham my sister & her partner sent us from their trip to Spain. Oh man was that some good ham. Thank you Rachel & Greg! And then after dinner, of course, there was cake and ice cream and strawberries.

It was a wonderful, wonderful birthday. If this is any indication of what my 44th year of existence is going to be like, I’m wholeheartedly looking forward to it.