John Holbo digresses. In the middle of a Crooked Timber post about academic journals, a parenthetical excursion into the Higher Wisdom:

(Hey, did you read that nutty stuff over at Powerline today? And every day? Here’s my advice. When you find yourself reading something by Hindrocket, some rant about how irrational and traitorous the left is, or the MSM; just sort of pretend you are reading a Spider-Man comic, and Hindrocket is J. Jonah Jameson yelling at Betty Brant, or Robbie. Or Peter. About Spider-Man. Because why does he hate on Spidey so? Spidey is so obviously not a menace. He’s good. It’s too bad we all know who Atrios is now. Otherwise we could imagine: what if Atrios is really, like, Hindrocket’s secretary? I realize it is really a quite serious matter than the right-wingers have gone around the bend and apparently aren’t coming back. Still, you’ve got to find a way to read their stuff with a sunny heart.)

[12:27 PM : 15 comments]

Your New York City nightlife guide. See below. Tomorrow night—that’s Thursday, February 17, at 7 PM—Whisperado, the three-piece band in which I play guitar and (increasingly frequently) sing, will do a one-hour gig at the C-Note, 157 Avenue C (at 10th St), New York City. No cover charge. Thrill to the spontaneity of live music! On the setlist: new material, old material, and me covering Dave Alvin’s “4th of July,” a Whisperado-type song if I ever heard one.

At both of our last two rehearsals, we took out some songs we haven’t done in six months or a year, and nailed them as if we’d been sweating over them every day for a month. As our drummer remarked, we should put stuff on the shelf more often. Of course, good rehearsals are a mixed omen for successful live performance, but we do promise to be loud.

UPDATE: Our drummer sprained his ankle and can’t play, so enough with the “break a leg” comments already. The set will be a two-piece with an abruptly rearranged song list. That’s Show Biz.

[04:39 PM : 53 comments]

Uncharacteristic SF industry post. I’ve agreed to be one of the five judges for this year’s World Fantasy Awards. The other four are Kate Elliott, Jeffrey Ford, Tim Lebbon, and Jessica Amanda Salmonson. Obviously, I’ll be looking at as much English-language fantasy writing published in 2004 as I can get my hands on. If there’s anything you think we should see, our ship-to addresses are here, and we’ll need to receive it by June 1.

In other genre news, I was happy to see two Tor books among the finalists for this year’s Nebula Award: Gene Wolfe’s outstanding re-envisioning of epic fantasy, The Knight, and Cory Doctorow’s breathlessly inventive debut novel Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom. This year’s Nebulas will be given out over the weekend of April 28 - May 1 in Chicago, and I’ll actually be there this time, unlike the last couple of years.

[10:21 AM : 35 comments]

“It’s the self-delusion.” The Corpuscle (which all of you should be reading) pierces to the heart of the “Gannon”/Guckert affair.

[10:55 AM : 18 comments]

Did I miss the memo? “Publishers usually ask that their writers keep their advances a secret,” writes Cory Doctorow on BoingBoing. Is this true? Speaking as an acquiring editor, I don’t recall ever asking a writer to keep money details secret. As far as I’m concerned, it’s incumbent on me not to blab my writers’ personal financial details all over SF fandom or the internet, but if the writers themselves want to talk about it, that’s fine.

I have no doubt that some publishers and editors have indeed made demands like this, but I keep hearing it asserted that it’s the usual practice, and as far as I can tell that’s just not true.

[11:45 AM : 67 comments]

Open thread 11. Because it’s been, like, two months since the last one.

[06:55 PM : 139 comments]

Just in case you were contemplating a pickup game. Evidently, Republicans have special rules for baseball, too:

“I can play hardball as well as anybody. That’s what I did, cut people’s hearts out.” —Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-TN).

Via Political Wire.

[10:49 AM : 74 comments]