It's a Winner! It's a Real Bilbo Bopper!
For your information, the subject line is an unforgivably oblique reference back to the days of vinyl records. Just so you know. Or don't.
Right, I shall be writing this entry in sort-of real time with choosing the winner of a personalised and signed copy of The Fear Institute. Which is to say, I shall be writing a bit, doing something, writing about what I just did, and so on. First thing up is that I shall randomise a number from 1 to (checks Twitter) 425, and then do some very tedious counting to find out who that is. If it's an inadmissible entry -- a group or whatever -- I do it again and keep doing it until I get an individual. I shall not be publishing the number, primarily because I'm likely to miscount and I can do without being pulled up over a failure in accuracy, thank you very much.
I was going to generate a number electronically, but that's boring, so I'm going to do it old school and break out some polyhedral dice. 425 is an awkward number, but that can't be helped. I'll generate a 1 to 5 for the hundred groupings, then roll percentiles. Obviously, if 426 to 500 comes up, I immediately re-roll. That'll give me a flat probability spread over the target numbers.
Dice! (Huh!) What are they good for? (Generating random numbers!) Say it again!
Okay, here we go.
And the winner is...
Arse.
No winner, it's a group, although a thoroughly awesome group and one I'm very pleased to have following me -- Hammer Films. What, you don't have a legendary horror film production company following you? No? Awww.
Awesome, but not an individual. Try again.
And the winner is...
I can't find the damn dice. I had them a second ago. How the blazes have I lost them? Oh, panic over. Okay.
And the winner is...
These dice are taking the piss now. That's three numbers in a row over 425. This isn't going brilliantly, is it? This is why they never let me compère Eurovision.
And the winner is...
W00t! A viable account! Finally.
@eslamprey! Come on down!
Evelyn S. Lamprey, a splendid name that I may use for a character at some point, is a photographer, and lives in a haunted house. I'm not going to have to make up anything at all for the character, really, am I? There's the story right there.
Congratulations to you, Evelyn. I'll scribble in a copy of The Fear Institute and get it off to you before the end of the week. Commiserations to everyone else, especially those who offered "special" favours for me to rig the lottery, favours that I regretfully had to decline for reasons that now elude me. Believe me, you had a narrow escape.
The Fear Institute comes out in about a fortnight from Headline in the UK and, I would guess, Australia. Still no idea when it will be published in the US or Canada. Sorry about that, but I'm completely out of the loop on how that's progressing. If you really cannot wait, I'm told that the Book Depository do a good job, but I don't have personal experience of their service. You can find The Fear Institute here: http://www.bookdepository.co.uk/Johannes-Cabal-Jonathan-Howard/9780755347988
Right, I shall be writing this entry in sort-of real time with choosing the winner of a personalised and signed copy of The Fear Institute. Which is to say, I shall be writing a bit, doing something, writing about what I just did, and so on. First thing up is that I shall randomise a number from 1 to (checks Twitter) 425, and then do some very tedious counting to find out who that is. If it's an inadmissible entry -- a group or whatever -- I do it again and keep doing it until I get an individual. I shall not be publishing the number, primarily because I'm likely to miscount and I can do without being pulled up over a failure in accuracy, thank you very much.
I was going to generate a number electronically, but that's boring, so I'm going to do it old school and break out some polyhedral dice. 425 is an awkward number, but that can't be helped. I'll generate a 1 to 5 for the hundred groupings, then roll percentiles. Obviously, if 426 to 500 comes up, I immediately re-roll. That'll give me a flat probability spread over the target numbers.
Dice! (Huh!) What are they good for? (Generating random numbers!) Say it again!
Okay, here we go.
And the winner is...
Arse.
No winner, it's a group, although a thoroughly awesome group and one I'm very pleased to have following me -- Hammer Films. What, you don't have a legendary horror film production company following you? No? Awww.
Awesome, but not an individual. Try again.
And the winner is...
I can't find the damn dice. I had them a second ago. How the blazes have I lost them? Oh, panic over. Okay.
And the winner is...
These dice are taking the piss now. That's three numbers in a row over 425. This isn't going brilliantly, is it? This is why they never let me compère Eurovision.
And the winner is...
W00t! A viable account! Finally.
@eslamprey! Come on down!
Evelyn S. Lamprey, a splendid name that I may use for a character at some point, is a photographer, and lives in a haunted house. I'm not going to have to make up anything at all for the character, really, am I? There's the story right there.
Congratulations to you, Evelyn. I'll scribble in a copy of The Fear Institute and get it off to you before the end of the week. Commiserations to everyone else, especially those who offered "special" favours for me to rig the lottery, favours that I regretfully had to decline for reasons that now elude me. Believe me, you had a narrow escape.
The Fear Institute comes out in about a fortnight from Headline in the UK and, I would guess, Australia. Still no idea when it will be published in the US or Canada. Sorry about that, but I'm completely out of the loop on how that's progressing. If you really cannot wait, I'm told that the Book Depository do a good job, but I don't have personal experience of their service. You can find The Fear Institute here: http://www.bookdepository.co.uk/Johannes-Cabal-Jonathan-Howard/9780755347988
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