Thank you, KnitLJ. I will try the non curse-making method tonight.

In the meantime, I steal an awesome meme from tithenai :

If I were a summonable monster, how would you summon me? (Include items to lure monster-me and method for said fell ritual.)

Judging by the emails I receive, there are a lot of aspiring writers among my readership.

I wanted to make mention of a couple of summer writing programs that might be of interest to you.

First, the legendary Clarion workshop, which began with Damon Knight in Clarion College, Pennsylvania, and is now in scenic San Diego. An intensive six-week writer's boot camp that will make you, break you, maybe change your life. I will be one of the instructors at this year's Clarion, along with Delia Sherman, Dale Bailey, Samuel R. Delany, Jeff Vandermeer, and Anne Vandermeer. For more details, check out

http://clarion.ucsd.edu/

Applications for Clarion are being accepted now, and will close on March 1... so if you've ever wanted to have me read and critique your work, and learn the secret handshake and the diagonal relationship, speak now or hold your peace until the next time I do a workshop (which probably won't be for a few more years).

[[ I do NOT read unpublished manuscripts that are mailed or emailed to me, so don't even think that. I do my teaching and critiquing only with a workshop context. And sorry, no, I won't be your mentor.]]

Clarion has been helping to turn out professional SF and fantasy writers since the 60s. Maybe you're the next one. You'll never know unless you apply. But be warned, only a few are chosen. Admissions are extremely competitive, with only one of five applicants getting in.

For writers who are already published, but are looking to take the next step in their careers, there is the Taos Toolbox, founded and run by my friend Walter Jon Williams and held right here in scenic New Mexico.

http://www.taostoolbox.com

Walter Jon's pitches his Toolbox as more of a "graduate study" program, for writers with a bit more experience. Graduates of Clarion, Clarion West, and Odyssey, neopros with a few sales under their belts, even journeymen looking to improve. I am not connected with the Toolbox, but I did a guest lecture there a few years ago, and it struck me as a great program. This year Nancy Kress will be assisting WJW with the teaching, and Carrie Vaughn (of Kitty and Wild Cards fame) will be giving a guest lecture. And when you're not writing, reading, critiquing, or listening to lectures, hey, you'll be in Taos.

Clarion Workshop and the Taos Toolbox. If you want to write, check 'em out.

Knitting primal scream follows. Non fiber-geeks, move on.

OH MY FUCKING GOD.

Not since I first started knitting and had to take a ferry to the local shop to have someone fix my total cock-up of a stockinette crap scarf have I wanted to throw my needles into the ocean so much.

I'm making these, which are awesome, (chart here) and the user project comments are all: this is sooo easy and fast! Grrrrr.

I got so excited. I have the most gorgeous Blue Heron yarn for them. And I can't even start.

You start with single stitches, one on each of four dpns, in the round. Which is, you know, hard enough, thank you slippery craftdeath. And increase every row or so. But starting that small with dpns I can't even see what order the needles go in, and doing k1, yo is so horribly awkward and it's a MESS and I can't even get past the fourth round. The needles keep falling out and I can't see anything.

And you know, I've gotten pretty good at knitting. There's not a stitch in here I can't do. I'm learning to read a chart for the first time but I'm a clever girl, that's fine. I just can't get this stupid thing started and all the Ravelry girls are like: I finished in an afternoon! Hate, death, perdition.

Some note that it's easier with two circulars, which I confess is not a skill I've acquired. Also I don't have two circulars in the same size. And the knitting stores are a. a 25 minute ferry ride b. a mile walk in the snow afterward and c. arrrrgh.

I really wanted to have these for the shows with s00j at Arisia and ConFusion. They should be easy. No other gloves I've seen are this cute. And yet I am stymied and want to kill, kill, kill.

PS Fuck Vogue and their space-saving patterns with NO guidance whatsoever. Also all your sweaters in the holiday issue were ugly.

Hi, my name is Cat. I knit, and swear a lot. AGGRO KNITTER +2 NEEDLES OF POKEY DOOM.

Project: Captain America consists of a 90 day training regimen to attain Super Soldier status. Well, actually, it's to achieve sufficiently non-couch potato status so that I can advance to Project: Captain America Extreme, and attain Super Soldier status. I've done quite well so far, though I missed one unplanned day. This was a non-issues, as it fell within the one rest day per six workout days plan anyway. And I've stayed almost entirely true to the diet plan, which has paid off already with various results both visible and intangible.

But yesterday, Batroc the Leaper, Captain America's nemesis, struck. In the form that is, of the crazy schedule the French Canadians with whom pyr8queen works, and thus force her into, which then gets passed right on down to me. Sure, sure, I could have stayed up late and worked out, but it's much more fun to blame the French. However indirectly.

Tonight, I must do battle with my own sloth The French again, and do the workout that I missed this morning as a result of waking up late at night after going to bed absurdly early and then being utterly unable to go back to sleep and therefore overslept and didn't have time to do it in the morning and was late anyway after walking the dog. I also blame the French for run-on sentences and incoherence.

In other news, soon this bike will be mine, and I will ride it places.

I just discovered this morning that my cell phone is messed up, and it hasn't been notifying me of new voicemail messages since mid-November.  So if you've called and left a message and wondered why I was such a rude jerk and didn't call you back, it's because I never knew you called. 

This morning I heard my phone ring (I was in the shower) and I was annoyed that the caller didn't leave me a message.  So in a fit of grumpiness I was about to change my outgoing voicemail greeting to say, "Yo jerks, if you don't leave a message, I will never know you called, so I'm not gonna call you back.  Don't be a buttface and rely on me looking into my 'missed calls' list to call yo' princess ass back.  And while we're on the topic of voicemail messages, would it kill you to provide some freakin' content in your message as opposed to just 'Hi, call me back?'  I got a life to lead, Sizzlepants."  And *that's* when I discovered that I had 26 unheard voicemail messages from before Thanksgiving.  WHAT IN DEE HELLZ? 

You know, voicemail messages from clients who wanted classes that I totally missed.  (Sure could have used the money...)
And voicemail messages from my (good) client in Austin trying to coordinate lunch plans when I was in their next building.  (Which now finally explains a confused conversation I had with them a few hours later.)
And voicemails from friends who were in town for like a half-day and I missed seeing them because I didn't know they called. (I totally blew off rrspike, and I am mega-bummed about that.)
And cute voicemails from friends wishing me a merry festivus and/or a happy new year... missed those too. 

So, please accept my apology-- I promise, I wasn't trying to be rude or blow you off.
Please also accept my cosmic apology for cursing you out for not leaving me a message YET AGAIN.  :-P  (Because if 9000 people are calling and not leaving messages, the problem must be with 9000 people, and couldn't possibly be on my end, right?  Of cooooouuuuurse!  God, I'm a righteous jerk.)

I'm not sure how to resolve this, other than being more vigilant about calling my voicemail.  I called Verizon and they said, "Oh, yeah, we heard that from some customers with that model phone."  No fix, except paying $4.99 extra per month for Visual Voicemail, a little application that (a) costs money and (b) still doesn't freakin' let me know if I have a new VM just by glancing at my device. 

Yes yes, these are the problems of the first world.  *le sigh*

So please don't interpret my failure acknowledge your call / call you back as a blow off. 

I will try to be better about manually checking my phone's voicemail, but I am willing to bet that I will forget from time to time. 
In the meantime, texting is always preferable if you need me to respond quickly.

I have reached the end of the topics previously selected by audience members, and I'm into ones that I've laid out myself.  February's topic will be "dreams."  After that, I'm open to suggestions. 

What would you like to see as a poetry fishbowl theme?  Post your suggestions in a comment.  I'll gather the suggested themes and post a poll -- probably on Monday or Tuesday -- so folks can vote on favorites.  Then I'll take the top several themes and sort them into my schedule.

Also, I plan to do the same thing I've done before with certain fishbowl polls: Prompters and donors will get extra votes, so that active participants have more influence over the project.  But anyone can still vote; nonparticipants just get one vote apiece.  If you haven't gotten involved yet and you want to, simply use the PayPal button in my Profile to toss me a buck or few (and tag it "general poetry fund"), or sponsor a poem from the latest fishbowl.

Dinner was delicious. I have great respect for Trader Joe's gluten-free Kraft Dinner (macaroni and cheese to you yankees (and yes, when we say "yankee" we mean any American, even Southerners)), as it closely approximates the wheaty standard variety. I did add butter to the cheese sauce, though, as it was a little thin without it.

The italian chicory (aka radicchio) was toothsome and perfectly cooked, though I added too much salt to the vinaigrette by accident which was a little sad. The soup also turned out very well, though my roommate thought it was a little too spicy. I did use a particularly spicy batch of my homemade chicken broth in it, as well as a Madras-style curry spice blend. Next time I may dial one or both down in deference to her whitebread palate.

Seared radicchio

2 heads radicchio (radicchios? radicchiae?)
Olive oil
Roughly 1 cup red wine

If the radicchios are the oval-shaped ones, like bok choy, or if they're small round ones, quarter them. Otherwise, if they're medium or huge round ones, sixth or eighth them.

Add a tablespoon or so of olive oil to a hot pan. When the oil is also hot add the radicchio, cut-side down, and sear for three minutes. Turn the radicchio over to the other cut side. After two minutes, add a splash or two of red wine and a grind of pepper to each slice of radicchio. After a minute more the wine should be cooked off. Put the radicchio on a plate or baking dish and cover tightly, either with tinfoil or the baking dish cover*. Leave it covered for at least five minutes, then dress (see below) and serve.

The idea is to sear the outside to give it a lovely grilled, caramelized flavor, and then let the chicory's own steam cook the insides of the quarters (or eights or whatever). I used a cast iron pan because of how well cast iron sears, though I know I was naughty and used wine (which is acidic) on cast iron which you should avoid if possible.

Mustard-balsamic vinaigrette dressing

1/4 cup olive oil
1/4 cup balsamic vinegar
1 tablespoon brown sugar
1 tablespoon prepared mustard (I used dijon)
1 teaspoon minced garlic
1 teaspoon fresh ground pepper
1/2 teaspoon salt (or more or less to taste)

Whisk all ingredients together in a non-reactive (ie not metal) bowl until emulsified**. Let it sit at room temperature for a few minutes.

Curried chestnut and cauliflower soup

1 medium head cauliflower
1/2 lb roasted chestnut (or so. You can often buy them in small 200 gram jars, which is a little under a 1/2 pound but will do just fine)
1 medium onion
1 teaspoon powdered turmeric
2 teaspoons curry powder (I used a very spicy, chili-intensive Madras curry mix, but you can substitute "regular" curry powder if you want less heat. Alternatively, substitute an equal amount of your favorite ras el hanout)
Olive oil
Chicken broth (or veggie broth if you like, which I don't)

Cut the cauliflower into small florets. Chop the onion. Heat some olive oil in the bottom of the saucepan, then add the onion and the spices and cook for 2-4 minutes until the onion is just tender. Next, add the cauliflower and a couple of pinches of salt and cook for around 5 minutes or until the cauliflower is lightly browned, mixing well to ensure that it's all coated in the spiced oil.

Add enough chicken stock to cover the cauliflower by about an inch, which should be just over a quart. Bring to a boil, cover and cook for about 12 minutes. Meanwhile, grind the chestnuts to a meal (powder) in a blender or food processor. I found that by refrigerating the chestnuts ahead of time and pulsing the nuts*** in short bursts in three separate batches, I got a very nice even texture to the resulting nutmeal.

After 12 minutes of boiling, add the nutmeal to the pot and cook for another 5 minutes or so, still covered. Remove from heat, allow to cool for 5-10 minutes, then puree with an immersion blender (or in batches in a regular blender, if you're sadly stick-blenderless like I am).

Serve.


*If you opted to use a plate, do not cover with a baking dish cover (you idiot).
** The dressing, not the bowl (you idiot).
*** Dirty!

Wide Release January 9 The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus
February 12 The Wolfman (Steampunk meetup?)
March 5 Alice in Wonderland
March 26 Clash of the Titans (sounds like fun, need a group!)
April 16 Kick Ass
May 7 Iron Man 2
June 18 Jonas Hex
July 2 The Last Airbender (I'm a big fan of the cartoon)
December 12 Tron Legacy

I might do a post later on movies on my radar further out, but actually have stuff to do today!

According to the "Manage Tags" feature, the topics most often appearing in this journal are:

Writing -- 809 posts
Networking -- 730
News -- 571
Reading -- 570
Poetry -- 532
Politics -- 483
Cyberfunded creativity -- 476
Science fiction -- 421
Fishbowl -- 350
Economics -- 326

Writing is the first topic to pass 800 posts.  The order of topics has not changed.

Tonight is my night off! I'm going to investigate the nearby aikido dojo. This should be exciting!

Word of the Day
asseverate, v. : to affirm or declare positively or earnestly.

Baby at 28 Months
We have an ancient, ancient digital camera that we no longer use, and loving gadgets as she does the baby inherited it half a year ago so she could fiddle with buttons and such. I put it in her toybox back then and we both forgot about it until a few days ago, when she had the yen to go through the entire box all the way to the bottom.

"Camera!" she exclaimed when she found it. "Take a picture." She put it to her eye and said, "SMILE! Say CHEESE!"

I laughed and waved at her. "Yes, take a picture."

And this being the digital age, she looked at the camera's LCD after clicking the button, expecting to see the picture there. "Uh?"

"It's broken," I said, apologetic.

"Needs batteries," she agreed and ran off to do something else while I gaped after her.

...

Turns out months ago, her father told her why the camera wasn't working, and she remembered. She sure surprised Mommy, though...!

Current Plans
The Three Kings Sale is over! I'll be responding to the stragglers tonight and ordering the books either today or tomorrow. I'm moving a little slowly because elusivetiger just put Windows 7 on my machine and I'm re-installing/re-organizing/restoring a lot of stuff. My biggest issue at this point is color calibration. That's a pain in the neck and I'm going to have to re-do the whole shebang, I think, because even though I copied the profiles from my old computer they don't seem to be working/looking right. I'll reinstall my color calibration software and hardware and go at it again.

Elsewhere
...
Wow, I copied everything and the kitchen sink over from my old hard drive... except, apparently, my Bookmarks. *rueful* Um, more Elsewhere when I have links. -_-


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