Sarah A. Hoyt's Blog, page 277

Fill In Blog Post – by Havelock Vetinari Hoyt

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Hi, my name is Havelock Vetinari, though I’m usually called Havey — I think they mean heavy — and sometimes Captain Floof McFuzzy Pants.

As you can see from my picture, above, I’m QUITE the most handsome of the Hoyt cats, far cuter than Greebo who is all black except for some little white patches, and whom mommy calls her little bulldog.  I’m certainly not a bulldog, though daddy sometimes calls me his puppy, since I come when he calls me.

I’m not sure why I shouldn’t come when called, for y...

Fraught

 

I will admit right now that I’m a very bad libertarian.  I AM a libertarian and think that in any dispute we should come down on the side of individual liberty.

You can get me to swoon by saying “taxation is theft” in just the right voice (ask my husband.  He knows.) I’ve mumbled about financing services with lotteries.

But I do think there is a place for both the army and the police in our society.  Seriously, now.  To believe there isn’t, or that we can do without is the equivalent of bel...

HRC: The End (or is it?) – by Amanda S. Green

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HRC: The End (or is it?) – by Amanda S. Green

This is the final post on HRC’s book, What Happened. I almost wrote “HRC’s novel”. Why? Because in a lot of ways this has been the best fiction writing I’ve seen in some time. I swear she isn’t recounting the same election season I remember. But it is over, or it will be as soon as I finish this post. What isn’t over is HRC’s belief that she is still relevant and has a role to play in the U.S. political landscape.

I’ll admit up front that I skimm...

Breaking the Gears

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When I was little, I liked tinkering with mechanisms.  Depending on the age, this sometimes meant I took a perfectly good wind-up toy and did things that made it act weirdly.  Take the crawling baby doll I opened up and then had some inconvenient pieces left over, and when she crawled again, she’d crawl three steps and lift her leg.  Three steps and lift her leg.  I was young enough I had no clue why the adults thought this was hilarious, btw.

One thing you learn pretty quickly with mechanis...

The Things that Stay

Every year, around this time of year, the newspaper my dad took, the now defunct Primeiro de Janeiro, printed a supplement called “O calendario dos….”  And now I’m at a loss as to the “the” what.  I vaguely remember something like does Matutinhos, but the google search only brings up matosinhos which is a town by the sea, and at any rate, I have no clue what Matutinhos means except it might have some connection to Matitudinal, ie. of the morning or awake.  (Yep, that’s right, I was woke befor...

Go Back To Where You Once Belonged

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I have no clue where Mary’s word for the week is.  I know she said she sent it, and Mary is an honorable woman.  But my email appears to have done a disappearing act on it, so we’ll make do without.

Fifty words, the word is: root.

Speaking of roots I’m not swearing this will happen, but I’m going to try to find as many of the Argonauta collection books as I can and go back to my sf/f roots in order, to figure out, now as an adult and a professional, what about these books enthralled me and d...

Health, Wealth, Love

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When I was little, our unsophisticated New Year’s toasts “Health” or for reasons unknown to me “Chinchin” were raised to another level by visiting relatives.  I assume they were from Venezuela, because we did them in Spanish forever more.

And you’ll forgive me because I can’t write in Spanish, and it’s be so long I might not remember the right words, but I think it was “Salud, Dinero y amor.”

Health, wealth and love.

I used to think older people were strange and stodgy because when you asked...

The Pursuit of Goodness

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I suspect there have always been unwritten laws in society.  Do this, don’t do that, that’s not the way to greet someone. In every society really.

But I think we’re living in a time of unique lack of codification.  Which isn’t of course.  There are rules, but they change suddenly and no one tells you.

No, I’m serious.  As great (eh.  Good at least) apes, we have and develop social scripts, and signals.  This is normal.

But the great flowering of the crazy of the romantics — back to the nat...

Freedom

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The first time I tried to run away from home, I was ten.  I took the essentials: my books, in a shoulder bag, and the family’s Siamese cat under one arm.  I think I made it halfway to the train stop down the street before mom caught up with me.

I no longer remember WHY I’d decided to run away from home, but it probably had something to do with either shoes (I liked work boots, mom didn’t) or the fact mom disapproved of how much I read.

Anyway, in retrospect it’s a good thing I didn’t manage...

HRC: The Russians Did It – Amanda S. Green

[image error] HRC: The Russians Did It – Amanda S. Green

As we near the end of HRC’s book, we finally get to see what she thinks about the Russians and the 2016 election. I could sum it all up with “Bad Putin, Worse Trump” but that wouldn’t make for a very interesting post. Besides, there is sooo much more there. Starting with the fact that, within four paragraphs, she blames our lack of faith in institutions like the media and academia, the Mercer family, the Koch brothers, Trump and Vladimir Putin for h...