Harry Connolly's Blog, page 184
June 18, 2010
In which I reveal my ignorance, part one
I will shamelessly reveal my ignorance here, because everyone is ignorant about different things, yes? First, I want to link to Oil spill crisis as opportunity, a rather detailed post that covers a lot of ground, including a much friendlier analysis of Obama's "War on the Oil Spill" speech than my own, a clip of Rahm Emmanuel that I can't watch, and a really awesome graph (I mean REALLY AWESOME) that shows what our energy sources are and what they go to.
But I want to comment on this:
...
June 17, 2010
Randomness for 6/17
I sure am posting a lot of these lately.
2) How to clean oil off a pelican.
3) How to tell a completely believable story.
4) How to make crappy Hollywood movies.
5) How to plot a novel, Glenn Beck style
6) How to unveil a secret place in the middle of a city.
This doesn't work
This is one of those complaining posts, because sometimes shit just doesn't work out. There will be one positive note included at the end, just so you don't think everything in my life is petty annoyance. People who hate to read griping should skip to the end.
First: My modem at home has died. I emailed a link to myself from work at 5pm. When I got home at six, the email was there, but I couldn't connect with the web. After more than an hour with tech support, they decided that I just...
June 16, 2010
Quote of the day
Five Thousand Gulf Oil Spills. That's the rate that people are releasing carbon to the atmosphere from fossil fuel combustion and deforestation today. I know, it's apples and oranges; carbon in the form of oil is more immediately toxic to the environment than it is as CO2 (although CO2 may be more damaging on geologic time scales). But think of it — five thousand spills like in the Gulf of Mexico, all going at once, each releasing 40,000 barrels a day, every day for decades and centuries on...
Randomness for 6/16
1) Mary Jane Watson, master of the obvious. Now THIS is writing!
2) Thomas Kinkade, if Thomas Kinkade was cool.
3) I know I'm behind the times linking to this, but damn! This is cool.
4) Look upon the face of evil.
5) Night Of The Killer Lamp: 23 Ridiculous Horror-Movie Adversaries
6) The Stockholm Library. It's a rare library that gives me vertigo. There's this one and the main downtown library in Seattle. Brrrr.
7) Star Wars, now with more pants.
June 15, 2010
Randomness for 6/15
1) Tee hee.
2) All fame is fleeting. Best-selling books of decades past.
3) Somehow, I don't think Syfy is taking their movie originals very seriously.
4) How to keep someone with you forever.
5) A friend made a documentary called THUNDER SOUL about a famous high school funk band from the 70's
and their reunion tour. Listen to the band here.
6) Quote from article: "The findings do not directly link playing video games to reckless driving. They only show an association. Researchers say the...
OOOOoooooo!
I just noticed, as I signed the contracts for the French language rights to Child of Fire and Game of Cages, that Bibliotheque Interdite is planning to publish them in hardcover!
Whoa! Also: Awesome!
How not to be lonely.
No, this isn't actually a plan for avoiding loneliness.
As I mentioned before, my wife and son are in upstate NY for the rest of the month, dealing with the death of my m-i-l. That means I'm home alone for that time.
Normally, I'm a complete ass when it comes to productively using private time, especially when I have a lot of it. For these two-plus weeks, I have to be better. Therefore! I have made these resolutions:
1) No fancy cooking. I can't be spending hours and hours prepping foods ...
Sample chapter of Game of Cages
Del Rey included a teaser for Game of Cages in the back of Child of Fire, but it was just a few pages, not the whole first chapter. Behind the cut, for those who are interested, is the full deal: the complete chapter one of my upcoming novel.
CHAPTER ONE
It was three days before Christmas, and I was not in prison. I couldn't understand why I was free. I hadn't hidden my face during the job in Hammer Bay. I hadn't used a fake name. I honestly hadn't expected to survive.
I had, though. The list o...
Three semi-revealing things about me
1) While descending toward JFK airport, the plane I was riding hit the worst turbulence I've ever experienced. I was seriously thinking I might never see my family again. I also wondered if I could find a way to fold down a couple corners of a page of the book I was reading so that it would highlight a special message to my family, just in case the book made it through the crash but I didn't. It seemed like a nice idea, but unworkable, so I didn't try it.
2) It was only after spending 12 ...
