Mur Lafferty's Blog, page 88
September 22, 2009
News From Poughkeepsie – Day 112
The New Adventures of…Muhammad Ali
Leroy wanted to be the greatest. So he bought The Greatest™.
"It's more than just a personal body upgrade," the doctor had said. "It's a personality upgrade, a consciousness upgrade. You'll see the world in a whole new way."
Leroy had concerns, which he tried to voice. But the doctor had easily brushed them aside.
"If you were really concerned about your organic personality, I would not suggest going through this procedure. That said, if are you really happy...
September 21, 2009
One of the hardest things about working from home – for me…
Is figuring out how to feel "accomplished."
Today I got up early for a doc appt. On my way out of the doc's (or maybe the way in; I have no idea), I dropped my credit card in the parking lot. A Good Samaritan found it, but I wasn't called till I got home (25 min drive). Already pissed at spilling coffee on myself, I read some email to calm down, then did my drive back to Raleigh to retrieve it. I got home in a very foul mood, and did some more online admin stuff, ate lunch, and suddenly it...
News From Poughkeepsie – Day 111
No Sunday edition yesterday, because no one wrote anything. Clearly, the idea of hard working astronauts had no appeal to anyone but me. Ah, well. Let's see what happens this week.
Even Hitler had a sister in law. Bridget Dowling was married to Adolf's half-brother Alois and claimed that the famous dictator moved to Liverpool to live with her and her husband from November 1912 to April 1913. While there is nothing to back this claim up–no records show of Adolf ever visiting Liverpool–it has...
September 19, 2009
WANTED- ISBW Assistant
Hi all! I have been realizing in the past few weeks that I need some help with ISBW. With the new(ish) format, the show is longer now, and so with the time to record, and then the hours it takes to edit, I often find myself wanting to upload the show without QA and detailed show notes. Which is unfair to my interviewees and people running promos – not to mention you listeners! But the show is longer and I am working on more projects than ever.
So I need someone who can listen to the new...
September 18, 2009
News From Poughkeepsie – Day 110
Lower Decks
"It is not a usual thing to begin a chronicle thus, but the final mission of the Emma Goldman
was not a usual one. It is not an easy thing to describe. Nevertheless , as the official biographer of the Emma Goldman, I will attempt to document the strange and unusual adventure that was her last journey.
What follows is an entirely unbiased and, quite frankly, modest description of how I saved the crew of the Emma Goldman–and, from what I understand, the universe–from complete and...
September 17, 2009
News From Poughkeepsie – Day 109
Lower Decks
When the Narsureema attacked, our fleet was not prepared. We were expecting missiles, energy weapons, combat. But the Narsureema were far craftier than we expected, and knew to cripple the very machines we depended on. One by one, our computer systems failed us. And one by one, so did our ships.
All but the Fredrick Douglas. For aboard the Fredrick Douglas was IT Specialist, First Class Myra Williams. And if there was one thing Myra knew, it was how to bring a computer back to...
September 16, 2009
News From Poughkeepsie – Day 108
Lower Decks
When the crew of the Kurasawa began falling ill, a virus was suspected. But as their condition worsened, it became more and more clear that something far more unusual and dangerous. Then the medical staff succumbed. In deep space, with a mission that desperately needed completion, Captain Ruban called on the only person she knew could help.
And that was the start of how the Kurasawa 's Health Inspector Zia revolutionized long-distance space travel…
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September 15, 2009
News From Poughkeepsie – Day 107
Lower Decks
When Alfredo turned in his resignation, his superiors were shocked. This had been his dream, they said. No one ran a galactic cruiser kitchen the way he did, they said. He was the best chef they ever had, they said. He couldn't possibly leave, they said.
Alfredo listened. And when they were through, he very calmly stated that once again he had no desire to continue cooking on the Celestial Pegasus, or any other space cruiser ever again.
"Let me tell you what I saw in that kitchen," A...
September 14, 2009
News From Poughkeepsie – Day 106
The last few weeks have been kind of heavy on the supernatural, so this week is pure space opera. One of my favorite STAR TREK: THE NEXT GENERATION episodes (and don't be like that; we all have a favorite ST:TNG episode) is "Lower Decks," where instead of following a main cast, we instead follow a handful of junior officers who are around the periphery of what would be a fairly straightforward episode. This sort of thing also happened in the ANGEL episode "Harm's Way," the entirety of
