Busy

I was very busy yesterday and therefore didn't have a chance to post anything:

1. The spot betting revelations regarding the Clarke Awards have necessitated urgent reevaluation of the Hugo Awards process, particularly with the nominations for this year's Awards being announced this coming weekend.

2. Looks like I'll need to start learning Swedish.

No, Really

Actually, I spent most of yesterday driving back from Fernley. I got away before noon, and it turns out that I was going to need all of that time.

( Sparks fly in Sparks )

After more than an hour delay in Reno futzing with fuses, I finally got out of Reno and into the mountains. Weather was decent, although cold. I ran into some rain on the way down the west side, but no snow. Traffic was a bit heavy, with skiers mixed in with big rigs. At my usual coffee stop in Colfax, congestion was quite high, and I waited about twenty minutes for the queue to subside before getting my own coffee, but that's okay as I was checking mail and messages anyway.

In the end, I didn't get back to Fremont until nearly 9 PM.

I Wish This Was an April Fool Joke

...but it's dated last Monday.

US asserts authority to Stop travel from non-US countries to any North American country

Get this? You can't fly from the UK to, say, Toronto for this year's World Fantasy Convention without the permission of the US government, even though you're never going to set foot on US soil, and even if your flight isn't crossing US airspace. And you won't know if you've been granted that permission until you try to board your flight, and if you're denied boarding, it's your own problem and there's no recourse.

Somehow the US government has managed to make the UK and our neighbors knuckle under to this and effectively said that the US controls all North American airspace. What's next, a declaration of annexation of Canada, Mexico, etc.?

I've complained to my (soon-to-be-ex-) congressman, but what can I do about this? And what are Canada, the Bahamas, the UK, etc. thinking in giving away their sovereignty to the the US this way? Can you imaging how angry the US government would be if (say) the UK declared that it had the right to veto travel of anyone traveling from the USA to anywhere in the EU? The USA would say, "No you don't" and would brush it aside.

If I were the Toronto World Fantasy Convention Committee, I would be getting nervous about how many of their members from outside of the USA and Canada will actually be able to attend or will simply cancel their trips rather than deal with the random possibility of being denied boarding because their name appears on a Secret US List.