Danger: Hazardous Books

Cheryl passes on to me a story about a man with so many books his apartment was condemned. Like her, I hope local officials here where I live never make such an inspection or determination. Not sure we have 3,000 books in this place, though.

Westercon Report

The first part of my report on Westercon 60: Gnomeward Bound, concentrating on the history, background, and some of the politics leading up to it, has been published in issue 135 of The Drink Tank.

I wrote all of that material as a prelude to actually writing about my personal experiences at the convention, and then other things with more urgent deadlines got in the way, and continue to do so. I'm in a bit of a time bind to write the second part.

Change of Plans

(Yes, I know that Champ Car isn't F1, but that's the only racing-related icon I had in stock.)

I was originally considering going to Saturday of Con-X-Treme, but I have heard way too much discouraging information about how it's being run, and moreover, there's almost nothing in the program to interest me, other than hanging around with some friends and going to the BASFA party. And I have a pile of other fannish work that still needs doing.

So this evening, dave_gallaher called to offer me a ticket (standing room, which may be a tad difficult, but I'll survive, I guess) to this Sunday's San Jose Grand Prix, as well as to drive us both down there, as he's got a place he can park.

I decided to let Con-X-Treme pass, spend tomorrow trying to get the fannish work done, and take in the Champ Car race in San Jose. I've never been to a serious motor race before. Now, where did I put those earplugs?

Better Than Expected

Ganked from frankwu

This coming August 27, the day I fly to Japan for Worldcon, I will turn 42 years old by the calendar. According to this Real Age Calculator, my "Real Age" is 36 1/2 years old; it predicts that statistically, I'll live until about 80 years old. The bad things (diabetes, overweight) are more than offset by the good ones (never smoke or drink, exercise regularly, extremely low cholesterol, and others, including, interestingly enough, having good friends).

I labeled this "Better Than Expected," but in fact I found myself thinking just recently, "I don't feel like I'm 42 years old. I feel younger than that." Despite having had some real problems keeping my blood sugar in the green zone these past ten days or so, and despite hobbling around on this injured left foot, I'm still feeling pretty good overall.

Wish I'd Gone to That One

I had been considering going to tonight's Giants game against the Marlins, partially due to the planned post-game fireworks and partially due to the Bonds homer chase. Well, now I really wish I had gone, because there were plenty of fireworks on the field as well as those post-game. Bonds hit home run #754, so he's only one shy of the record, and the game went back and forth, with the Giants eventually winning 12-10 (including letting Florida get the tying run to the plate in the top of the 9th, so it was impossible to relax).