I Cleaned Out My Bathroom Today (Yes, That’s Really What This Post Is About)
Posted on January 25, 2023 Posted by Athena Scalzi 41 Comments
I’ve mentioned on here a few times that I have a bit of a hoarding problem, and I really do mean that genuinely. My life is seriously impacted by it, and every once in a while I get a super strong urge to fix it. That feeling struck today, so, I took a big step and cleaned out my bathroom, which contained years worth of stuff.
Tons of expired skincare in the back of drawers, bobby pins from freshman homecoming, perfumes I hate the smell of, thirteen packs of that floss the dentist gives you at your checkups, and more. So much stuff I thought that maybe one day I’d have a use for. But I realized that this “maybe” mentality is ruining my life.
Maybe I’ll need that extra nail file some day, I think as it sits there for four years, untouched. Maybe I need to keep this product in the box, and keep the original packaging, as it expires two years later and was never even removed from the box. Maybe I’ll use this moisturizer again, even though I bought a new one specifically because I didn’t like this one. Maybe I need this backup comb in case I misplace my three hairbrushes.
It was just… so much. And so tiring. My bathroom looked like a tornado went through it, with tiny tubes of toothpaste scattered around, four different facial cleansers on the counter, a pretty jar for Q-tips that sat empty because I never remembered to fill it with Q-tips.
But, today, I cleaned off every shelf and cleaned out every drawer, and threw away two trash bags worth of stuff. And it hurt me. It genuinely hurt my soul to throw away makeup I wore in college, unopened things I’d gotten in subscription boxes, products I’d received as Christmas gifts I never really touched because I didn’t want to use them up since someone I cared about gave it to me.
My shelves were so dusty, and all the products that sat on those shelves were just as dusty, proving that I never touched them or used them. They had to go. It was time, y’know?
I’m happy I did it, and it honestly only took me a little over an hour. I’m not sure why it took me so long to get around to doing it, but I did. And that progress is honestly substantial for me, because for some reason, there’s a mental toll that comes with throwing it all away.
It was hard in the moment, but I feel so much better now. And I’m actually proud of myself, which is a really, really good feeling.
-AMS
A Mildly Disappointing Snowpocalypse
Posted on January 25, 2023 Posted by John Scalzi 28 Comments
We were told for the last couple of days that today we could expect anywhere from four to eight inches of snow, and that we should probably all just stay in our houses and hunker down while the stuff blanketed the earth (and roads, and electrical wires, etc). So we did — I mean, I would have anyway, I work here and don’t actually leave the house much when I’m not traveling — and prepared for a hefty winter onslaught.
What we got was anticlimactic: an inch or two, and not even enough to completely cover the lawn. The snow we have is slushy and heavy, and a temperature drop later in the day means that slush will turn to ice and make the roads a menace. So I don’t want to completely discount the weather, or how it will mess with getting around (and possibly the electrical, if the ice weighs down the wires). But there’s a difference between being told you might have to dig yourself out, and whatever this is.
I’ll still take it over a snowpocalypse! I don’t actually like being trapped! But, yeah. Mildly disappointing all the same.
— JS
The Great Leveler
Posted on January 24, 2023 Posted by John Scalzi 12 Comments
The house that we bought on the property adjacent to our church is no more; neither is the rubble of that house when it was torn down. What’s left now is dirt, laid over the former basement space of the house by the machinery you see here, and soon to be blanketed in snow thanks to the storm that will hit overnight. But it was good to see the expanse of the property, and get a sense of what we have to work with in the spring, when we decide what to do with it (we already know we want parking in back and a garden in front; I mean the specifics). For one thing, it gets more sun than I thought it would, and it’s winter. That’s useful for planning.
It’s been a good day, folks.
— JS
HBO Max Subtitles Need To Get With the Program
Posted on January 24, 2023 Posted by Athena Scalzi 43 Comments
I, like many others, have been watching The Last of Us on HBO Max. I have also been watching it with subtitles, and I’m shocked at how garbage they are. You would think that such a huge, expensive, and widely-anticipated show would cater better to its subtitle-using audience, but you’d be severely disappointed.
What do I mean by “bad” subtitles, though? How can subtitles be bad, and what would good ones look like? I’m glad you asked! I was frustrated by the subtitles for The Last of Us, because they left out entire words on several occasions, they don’t indicate who is speaking, or in what tone anyone says anything, they don’t include things like sighing, gasping, exclaiming, or include any background conversation. They also include no SFX, which means no “monster screeching”, “zombie clicking”, “guns shooting”, “explosions”! How are you going to leave out the zombie noises entirely, in a zombie show?!
Aside from all this, I’m also upset about the lack of choices when it comes to the subtitles themselves. Unlike Amazon Prime, on HBO Max you can’t choose the size or transparency of the subtitles. Amazon Prime gives you four choices of font size, as well as the choice to make the background of the subtitles opaque or solid. These are important aspects of subtitles! And there’s zero choice of this on HBO Max.
So, I started to wonder if other shows/movies on HBO Max were just as bad, or if it was just their newest, most popular, biggest budget show that had shitty subtitles.
I turned on Teen Titans to see how they compared. For Teen Titans, I was surprised by the fact that the subtitles were all in caps lock. Why would you ever put subtitles in nothing but caps?! It also did not indicate tone, who was speaking, etc.
Next, I tried The Book of Life. This one was actually a little better. It indicated when someone was singing rather than speaking by putting a music note before the line, included background conversation, and showed when a character sighed, grunted, etc. The subtitles on The Book of Life were weirdly delayed though, not by much, but enough that I noticed it.
Following that, I tried South Park. Again, no indication of which character was speaking, or in what tone. How are you going to watch South Park without knowing who is speaking sarcastically?! It’s important stuff!
Finally, I tried HBO Max’s big seller, Game of Thrones. At first, I was happy that it would specify who was speaking, but it was short lived, as it was completely inconsistent. Sometimes it would say who was speaking, then for the next five times someone spoke it wouldn’t. It was occasional at best. Plus, there was a huge mix of caps lock VS not caps lock. It was very strange.
All this is to say, HBO Max needs better options for their subtitles, and better ACTUAL SUBTITLES. STOP LEAVING WORDS OUT ENTIRELY.
The fact that a 100-million-dollar show has fucking garbage ass subtitles says a lot about how much they care about accessibility. People who use subtitles deserve just as good of a viewing experience as non-users, and deserve the same amount of information that non-users get. whether it be background conversation, SFX, or indication of tone.
Do fucking better, HBO.
-AMS
Hey, Wanna Know Who Won This Year’s Robert A. Heinlein Award?
Posted on January 24, 2023 Posted by John Scalzi 72 Comments
And as you might expect, I’m pretty damn happy about it. Not only because it’s an award named for Heinlein, who is an undeniable influence on me (you may recall that the Publishers Weekly review of Old Man’s War said “Though a lot of SF writers are more or less efficiently continuing the tradition of Robert A. Heinlein, Scalzi’s astonishingly proficient first novel reads like an original work by the late grand master”), but because so many of the previous winners are writers whose work I admire and are people I consider friends: Joe Haldeman, Spider Robinson, Connie Willis, David Gerrold, Geoff Landis, Elizabeth Moon and Alan Steele, to name just a few names. This is a hell of a lineage to be placed in, and I am, honestly, a bit flabbergasted about it.
In other news, guess who’s going to Balticon this year? That would also be me! I’ll be there for this award presentation and also to do other stuff at the convention. It’s going to be fun. If you’re anywhere near Maryland on Memorial Day weekend, come be part of the convention and come say hello. I’m really looking forward to it.
— JS
“My Year of Dicks” an Oscar Nominee!!!
Posted on January 24, 2023 Posted by John Scalzi 6 Comments
It had been on the shortlist (i.e., the step before actual nomination), but as of this morning’s Oscar nomination announcements, it’s officially a nominee. Which means Pamela Ribon, my friend who wrote its screenplay, is also an Oscar nominee!
This is genuinely the best news of the day, as far as I’m concerned. It’s not every day that an actual friend and someone whose work you’ve enjoyed and admired for years becomes an Oscar nominee. She’s worked hard for years to get to this moment and deserves every single bit of it. I’m so proud of her I could plotz.
— JS
The Kaiju Preservation Society Out in Paperback Today
Posted on January 24, 2023 Posted by John Scalzi 8 Comments
And what a lovely trade paperback it is, too. It doesn’t look too much different from the hardcover, with a only a few graphic design changes to push a review quote, and to announce the book’s NYT bestseller status (thanks for that, folks, by the way). If you want to pick up this version, it’s available at pretty much any bookstore that sells science fiction.
If you still want the hardcover edition, it’s still available, but you might want to put near the top of your “to do” list, since once the paperback version of a book comes out, the hardcovers stop being printed and become increasingly scarce.
Let me reiterate how happy I am this book has done so well out in the world. It feels very much like the right book at the right time, both for me as a writer, and for quite a lot of readers. I hope people continue to find and enjoy it. And I think the people who find it and love it will probably find a lot to like about Starter Villain when it comes out in September. I’m looking forward to folks catching up with that one.
— JS
Chengdu Worldcon Now Accepting Credit Cards
Posted on January 23, 2023 Posted by John Scalzi 6 Comments
For those folks outside China who wanted to get a membership at this year’s Worldcon in Chengdu, but were stymied because the Worldcon site wasn’t accepting payments from outside China, there’s good news: The site now accepts credit card payments. I tried it myself and the site acknowledged my payment and membership (although, please note, after a half hour, it has yet to email me a receipt).
Please note that this year’s membership set-up is slightly more complicated than usual. If you want to vote for the Hugos this year (and nominate, if you did not have a membership for last year’s Worldcon in Chicago), and vote for future Worldcon site selections, you will specifically have to purchase a WSFS membership. Then, if you want to attend, either online or in person, you will have to purchase that attending membership separately. The WSFS membership is $50; the online attending membership (which I suspect is the one most people not living in China but still wishing to attend will end up getting) is $10. I believe you can get an attending membership without a WSFS membership (i.e., without Hugo voting rights), but I didn’t get the memberships in that sequence, so I can’t be sure.
Note also that if you want to be able to nominate for this year’s Hugos, and did not have a membership to last year’s Worldcon in Chicago, you will need to purchase your WSFS membership by January 31, which is (checks watch) soon.
Here’s the link to the English language site for the Chengdu Worldcon, if you want to get a membership.
(Also, if you have any further questions about memberships, the Chengdu Worldcon or anything else relating to those two subjects, please ask the Worldcon, not me. All that I know I have just shared, and I am not a customer support representative for the Worldcon. Thanks.)
Happy Lunar New Year!
Posted on January 22, 2023 Posted by Athena Scalzi 6 Comments
Hey, everyone! I just wanted to come on here real quick and wish y’all a happy Lunar New Year!
Today, I celebrated with my friends by exchanging red envelopes, making paper lanterns out of construction paper, wrapping spring rolls, and I even tried making Tang Yuan for the first time! Specifically I made these black sesame filled ones.
The spring rolls were really yummy and crispy, and the dessert I made was like super chewy mochi with sweet sesame filling oozing out. I actually didn’t end up making the ginger broth with it because I forgot about it entirely! But that’s okay because I don’t particularly like a strong ginger flavor anyway.
Happy Year of the Rabbit!
-AMS
Absconding With My Wife For the Weekend
Posted on January 19, 2023 Posted by John Scalzi 6 Comments
Guess who is having a weekend off with his spouse? If you guess “Why, it would appear John Scalzi is,” then you are 100% correct. We’re off to see friends and hang about and enjoy each other’s company. Honestly, sounds ideal. I believe Athena will be posting something in the next couple of days, so you will not be entirely bereft of Whatever content, but if she doesn’t, well, try to have an excellent weekend anyway.
— JS
Jam-A-Rama: Part 1
Posted on January 18, 2023 Posted by Athena Scalzi 38 Comments
A food influencer I follow on Instagram and Tik Tok has in fact influenced me. I have been thoroughly influenced into buying Bonne Maman’s Advent Calendar.
If you have never heard of Bonne Maman, it is a jam/jelly brand that’s pretty common in most grocery stores. It’s like a nicer Smucker’s.
When I went to order this back in December, it was actually on back order and said it wouldn’t be arriving until January. This was fine by me since I don’t really mind eating festive things after the festivities have passed. I did think that it should be on sale if that was the case, but it was still the full fifty dollars.
One thing to know about me is that I simply love the idea of advent calendars, and am a huge fan of them in theory. In execution, however, I have been severely disappointed by basically every advent calendar I’ve ever bought (I’m looking at you, Williams Sonoma Baking Advent Calendar).
This one, though, is the epitome of what an advent calendar should be. Twenty-three one-ounce jars of different flavored fruit spreads, and one honey.
Look at that consistency! All jam, no bullshit (and one honey).
It unfolds like a big book into this!
So I started punchin’ the numbers.
Since there are 24 items in the calendar, I decided to just do four at a time. That way the posts aren’t too long.
So here’s days 1-4:
We have Rhubarb-Strawberry:
Orange, Yuzu, and Grapefruit:
Apricot-Peach:
And finally, Mirabelle Plum and Linden Blossom:
I decided to try these on toast. The bread I used is Pepperidge Farm’s Farmhouse Butter Bread, which is just a thick white bread I buy from Kroger. I also like their Honey White and Sweet Hawaiian, though.
I toasted two pieces, then cut both pieces in half and spread each with a different jam. Admittedly, they all look pretty much the same.
Upon trying the Rhubarb-Strawberry, I was shocked to find that it didn’t really taste like much. It was very mild in flavor, and I didn’t feel like I was getting any rhubarb from it. It was more just like a weak strawberry.
Next was the triple citrus one, the Orange-Yuzu-Grapefruit. I was actually excited to see that yuzu was included in this one, since yuzu is a flavor I pretty much only have when I try Japanese snacks. Sadly, though, I wasn’t a huge fan of this one, as I don’t really like grapefruit, and it was definitely grapefruit heavy. It was too bitter for me. Also, this spread in particular was very liquid-y, so much so that I almost switched to a spoon to spread it instead of a butter knife.
Following that was the Apricot-Peach, which I kind of thought would be my favorite, as I love peach jam. However, it ended up tasting a lot more like apricots than peaches. I suppose that’s why they put it first in the name of it, but wow was it apricot-y. I prefer peaches over apricots, so that was a bit disappointing, but it was still good and fairly sweet overall.
Finally, the Mirabelle Plum and Linden Blossom. I’m pretty sure I’ve never had linden blossom before, so I was interested to see what kind of flavor that would bring to the table. The answer, as you might have guessed, is floral. This jam was sweet and floral, and really quite pleasant. I enjoyed it a lot.
After trying all four of them on toast, I thought to myself that there was no way the first one was really that weak. It had to have been the bread dampening the flavor of it. So, I tried all four again with a spoon. Nothing between me and the jam, just pure flavor.
This made a world of difference. Everything tasted better, and things like the rhubarb and peach finally came through where they really didn’t before. However, I feel like trying them plain isn’t really doing anyone any favors, because you’re most likely not going to eat the jam plain. It’s important how it tastes on bread, because you will probably be eating it on bread, or on something else that might dampen the flavor of it compared to just trying it straight out of the jar.
Anyways, there’s the first four! Which looks the best to you? Have you ever been disappointed by an advent calendar? Let me know in the comments, and have a great day!
-AMS
The Big Idea: James L. Cambias
Posted on January 17, 2023 Posted by John Scalzi 4 Comments
One advantage writers get when they work in different fields of writing is more tools for their professional toolbox — but as James L. Cambias points out in this Big Idea for The Scarab Mission, not every skill is directly transferable from one medium to the next, and learning which tools this is true about is part of the trick.
JAMES L. CAMBIAS:
My standard bio identifies me as a “writer and game designer.” Some might wonder why. It’s been nearly seven years since my last major game product came out (Weird War I from Pinnacle Entertainment Group, if you’re a completist), while in that time I’ve published four novels and a couple of short stories. Oh, sure, I have put up a couple of little self-published game products on DriveThru RPG, but when I go to my office or the nearest coffeeshop to “get some writing done,” it’s fiction I’m pretending to work on, not games.
Yet I still “identify” as a game designer for the same reason I also mention that I’m from New Orleans, even though I’ve now lived in Massachusetts longer than in Louisiana. It’s where I came from and part of who I am. My first paid writing work was a Car Wars article for Steve Jackson Games, and from 1991 to 2000 my primary job was cranking out adventures for game company house magazines, and then full-length game supplements for GURPS, HERO Games, Rolemaster, In Nomine, the old Star Wars and Star Trek roleplaying games, and Castle Falkenstein.
For a time I called myself the Destroyer of Game Companies, because every time I got into discussions with a publisher about a major game project, that was almost inevitably followed by the announcement that they were going out of business.
I learned a lot about the craft of writing. When I started, my chief advantage over other fan writers was an ability to research things using my wife’s access to academic libraries (no Wikipedia or Google Books in those days of dial-up Usenet). A side gig as a proofreader also meant my copy was very “clean” and didn’t need a lot of editorial attention. (As a side note, the only result of my attempt to set myself up as a freelance copy-editor for game companies was that one publisher got insulted when I sent him a markup of one of his print advertisements highlighting all the typos and grammatical errors.) Game writing gave me the chance to experiment with narrative voices, sentence structures, and creating imaginary worlds.
However, when I started writing fiction, my game experience wasn’t as big a help as I had thought. I could produce decent prose . . . but everything I knew about storytelling was wrong.
See, in games, the characters generally follow an upward trajectory. They gain resources, abilities, allies, and a better understanding of the game world. They learn to defeat tougher enemies. It’s a pretty decent metaphor for adolescence, which is still the prime age for getting into gaming.
Whereas in fiction, a character who goes from strength to strength is kind of boring. We want to see our heroes endure hardship, make sacrifices, get stripped of their powers and assets and status until they have nothing left but their own wits and courage. I had to learn to do that.
Yet there is still an influence on my fiction from games, and I cannot deny it. In my fantasy novel The Initiate, I deliberately set out to write about a character who does “level up” throughout the story, gaining magical knowledge and power as he battles his way up through a secret hierarchy of evil wizards. The trick is that he is constantly giving up his humanity as he does so, getting more and more like the villains he opposes.
It also doesn’t take a genius to see an influence from games on my latest novel, The Scarab Mission. It’s about an oddball crew of treasure-hunters exploring a ruin full of enemies, deathtraps, and hidden dangers. Sound familiar? All it needs is a map gridded off into ten-foot squares. Sure, it’s a derelict space colony rather than an underground complex, but I know a dungeon crawl when I see one.
But I haven’t forgotten my lessons about storytelling. The characters in The Scarab Mission may acquire loot and defeat traps, but they also need to make sacrifices and hard choices, and by the end are reduced to their personal essentials. My protagonist Solana has to defeat her nemesis without any “magic items” at all, despite living in the Tenth Millennium when magical-seeming technology is more common than dirt.
Game writing helped me make it as a writer, and I’m never going to give it up entirely. I still run a weekly roleplaying campaign. Lessons from gaming are useful in fiction — and some tools of fiction are valuable in gaming. But they are distinct genres, if not entirely different art forms, and must be approached on their own terms.
The Scarab Mission is probably the closest thing I’ve written to a “game novel,” but it’s definitely a novel, not a roleplaying game. I hope you all enjoy it.
The Scarab Mission: Amazon|Barnes & Noble|Indiebound
Read an excerpt. Visit the author’s site.
I Have A Strange Obsession With This Song So I’m Making You Listen To It
Posted on January 16, 2023 Posted by Athena Scalzi 13 Comments
I heard this odd song in an animatic on Tik Tok, and I’ve been listening to it multiple times a day since I first heard it a few months ago.
I have no idea what it’s about or really even from, but here it is:
And here’s the animatic! I had been following this artist’s progression of the animatic for months and this is the final version:
Freaky, right? I’m so curious as to what is going on in it, but I enjoy it even without really understanding it.
Most people I show the song to aren’t as big of a fan of it. My dad says it sounds like community theater singing Bohemian Rhapsody.
What do you think of it? Kind of catchy, no? Strangest song you’ve heard today, perhaps? Let me know in the comments, and have a great day!
-AMS
Family Portrait, WWII Style
Posted on January 15, 2023 Posted by John Scalzi 14 Comments
In this photo you will see, from left, my great uncle Roy, my grandmother Jean, and my grandfather Mike. This would have been taken during World War II so my grandmother and grandfather would have been in their early 20s, which makes this officially the youngest I’ve ever seen them in a photo. The photo was sent to me by a relative who guessed I would appreciate it, and they were right, I do. I especially appreciate the picture of my grandmother, as I have fewer of those than I do of my grandfather, and I have almost none of those. Also, look at the way she’s looking at my grandad. That’s a definite “admirin'” look, there.
One thing this picture confirms for me is how very little of my looks I’ve received from the Stannard/Scalzi side of my genetics. I look nothing like either of my grandfolks, and very little like my father, whereas my mother and I look rather a lot alike, as do Athena and I (she got Krissy’s height, hair and attitude, which, honestly, is a good division). It’s my sister Heather who carries the Stannard/Scalzi look, and her kids sort out about 50/50 on the matter.
What I get from that side of the family is a quick wit and a certain stubbornness, which I admit, has been more useful to me in life than my looks. So thanks, Mike and Jean, for that.
— JS
Close To Home: Boscoe’s Place
Posted on January 14, 2023 Posted by Athena Scalzi 19 Comments
Welcome, everyone, to a new series I’m starting here on the blog! I’m calling this series “Close To Home”, and it’s purpose is to feature small businesses in the area, much like Small Business Saturday. This series differs from Small Business Saturday, though, because it’s going to be only eateries. I’ll be going to these local places, trying out their stuff, and showcasing them to y’all, so you can see these potentially hidden gems in our small rural towns.
Now that you know what you’re diving into, let’s get started with the first restaurant of the series: Boscoe’s Place.
Around where I live, it can feel like there’s not much to do or see, or like there’s not many options to choose from when you want to grab a bite to eat. This makes it especially exciting when new places open up in our small towns. This was certainly the case when Boscoe’s Place opened in Covington, the town neighboring mine. The opening of it had been greatly anticipated, and for the past year it has been a hotspot for locals.
I drive past it almost daily, so I figured it was time I gave it a shot, and show you all this “doggone good food” they have.
I went on a Friday night at dinner time, so it was decently packed. Every table was full, but I only had to wait about twenty minutes for a table. I was glad it was busy. I like to see small businesses get good traffic.
Not only is the menu full of dog-related puns, such as their y’appetizers and ‘lil pups menu, but they even have Yappy Hour!
This is because of their namesake, the late Boscoe. The restaurant name gives tribute to the owners’ companion, so his memory may live on in everyone that visits.
I decided to go ahead and try some of these y’appetizers. First up was Boscoe’s Cheese Snacks:
While normally I don’t order cheese sticks from restaurants because they’re largely unremarkable, Boscoe’s cheese sticks are a little different, as they are wrapped in wonton skins.
After breaking one in half to reveal a rather impressive cheese pull, I dove right in and was met with a hot, crispy, cheesy, delicious bite. It was garlicy, buttery, parmesan-y goodness, made even better with a dip of the zesty marinara.
These were a super strong start to the meal, but I still had another appetizer to get through.
Here we have Boscoe’s BIG Pretzel. The description says it might be the largest pretzel you’ve ever seen, and honestly I think they were right. This thing was massive, and served with a spicy mustard, stone ground mustard, and a hatch chili queso.
The pretzel was soft and fluffy, and pulled apart easily into perfect dipping-sized bites. The spicy mustard was definitely not my cup of tea, as it had the capability of clearing your sinuses without offering much flavor in return. I am a lover of stone ground mustard, though, so I’m glad that was included. As for the queso, I was worried it would be too spicy for me (y’all know I’m a baby about spice), but it had just a small amount of kick, and was really creamy and warm! Overall, another great appetizer.
I figured I’d try a drink to get the full experience of this place, since they do have a whole bar, which they also have seating at.
I got a Lemon Drop, which I had no idea came with edible gold glitter in it:
It was so pretty! I absolutely loved the presentation of this drink. As for taste, I will say it was on the strong side, but at least you get a lot of bang for your buck.
Moving onto the main courses, here is their Caesar salad with grilled chicken:
While this salad is pretty standard, you can’t go wrong with a classic. Crunchy croutons, fresh greens, moist chicken, all in all a solid salad.
Of course, I had to try a burger and fries. Here we have the Bruschetta Burger:
A patty topped with bruschetta, balsamic, onion, lettuce, tomato, and a toasted bun (pickles served on the side).
This burger was seriously delish (though I did take the onions off). The meat was cooked perfectly, the balsamic was present but not overpowering, and the toppings were all fresh. Plus, the toasted bun made a world of difference, adding more texture and better flavor overall. The fries were pretty good. They were crispy on the outside and softer on the inside, but not really seasoned at all.
I noticed that there was no dessert section on the menu, and I asked my waitress if they had any desserts. She said they did, but no one really orders it, and it’s not on the menu. I asked what it was, and she said it was fried dough with powdered sugar and your choice of caramel or chocolate. I asked if it’d be okay to order it, since it was technically off menu, and she assured me I could. I got it with caramel.
I really can’t understand why this isn’t on the menu, because it is so good. It’s warm and crispy, topped with whipped cream and drizzled with caramel, what’s not to love? Plus, it’s easily shareable. I definitely had one too many slices of this thing.
After all that, it came out to about seventy dollars (before tip). I think that’s a pretty decent price, all things considered.
The food was awesome, the service was great, the prices are good, and the drinks are strong. I definitely recommend checking Boscoe’s Place out, and don’t skip on the secret dessert.
What looks the best to you? What drink would you try? Let me know in the comments, and have a great day!
-AMS
Whatever Twenty-Five, Part One: Introduction & Scene Setting
Posted on January 13, 2023 Posted by John Scalzi 31 Comments
September 13, 2023 will mark the 25th anniversary of Whatever, the blog you’re reading right this very second, so I thought it might be fun and interesting, every 13th day of each month of 2023, to write a piece reflecting about the site, my life and anything else regarding the last twenty-five years that might come to mind. I did a similar thing five years ago with the 20th anniversary of the site, some of you may recall, with a series called “20/20,” in which I wrote twenty pieces during the month of September, about life in 1998, when the site started, and life in the then-present of 2018. For “Whatever Twenty-Five” I’m going to try to avoid going over the same ground as I did with those pieces, although there will necessarily be at least a little overlap — it’s the nature of retrospective essays. But aside from anything else, five more years have passed. There’s more to muse on. Roughly 20 percent more, in fact.
I will say that twenty five years ago today, January 13, 1998, I had given no thought at all to writing what would become a nearly-daily chronicle of my life, and one of the longest-running personal sites on the Internet. On January 13 1998, I was still gainfully employed at America Online, at the time the world’s largest online provider, where I was the company’s in-house writer/editor. I was specifically in a group that was in charge of doing special events on the service, and being a “fire-team,” as it were, when something needed to be addressed sooner rather than later. In practice, however, I ended up being a company-wide resource, the person all the groups came to when they needed some writing done.
Which was cool in one sense — it kept me busy — but also meant, as I’ve noted before, that when my group was dissolved, no one wanted to put what was a company-wide resource (me!) on their department budget. I became a layoff of one, which is a kind way of saying I was fired, but nicely so, since AOL kept me on until my next vesting date so that I could cash out some stock options as I walked out the door. Those stock options paid for a house, so, uh, yeah. It was relatively soft punt rather than a hard bounce.
I’ve talked before about how being laid off from AOL affected me emotionally and otherwise at the time (spoiler: really badly), so I’ll skip that part of things this time around, and instead focus on one practical aspect of it: Now that I was laid off, my primary email address, tied in as it was with my AOL employment, was going away. Now, I could have just gotten a different AOL address (and, in fact, I did), but before I had been at AOL I had actually had my own Web site. It made sense to me to have my own web site again — and not just my own web site, but my own domain, so that I would never have to change my email address ever again. Scalzi.com was registered on March 4, 1998, and yes, since then I have never changed my primary email address. So well done, me.
The astute amongst you will note that there are several months between March 4 and September 13. What was on Scalzi.com between those dates? Well, mostly, it was an archive of writing that I had done up to that point. The archive served both as a place for me to easily access my own writing, and also, and more to the point, as a place for people who might hire me for freelance work to access my writing as well. Having been laid off, and feeling deeply burned and raw by the process, I decided to go to work for myself rather than to work for someone else, and then just get laid off again. So here was a site, showing off what I could write.
It worked, sort of. It got occasional visits and I did get some work from it. Mostly, however, I got work from former co-workers, who had left AOL for whatever reason, and when their new company needed a writer or editor for something, remembered that I existed and rang me up. There was an upside to being the only writer a bunch of tech folks knew personally! I would say ultimately eighty to ninety percent of my freelance business came from people who knew me from AOL, or (slightly later) referrals from companies I had done business with. Having the web site didn’t hurt (among other things, it had my contact information), but was probably not the business magnet I had expected it to be.
Around this time, the earliest stirrings of what eventually would be known as “The Blogosphere” were underway; tech people were migrating .plan files onto web sites, journalists, some laid off and some bored, started populating their own places online, and nerds and/or academics who had previously collected themselves on USENET started putting together their own personal outposts. These were not blogs, yet; they were called online journals or online diaries, or just “web sites.”
I started making the rounds of several of these sites, and was particularly taken by the one at lileks.com, run by James Lileks, a syndicated columnist I had read back when I was a columnist myself, and whose style I enjoyed and admired. He was writing on his own site every day, and I was all, oh, hey, I could do that, too. After all, one day I might be a newspaper columnist again; might as well keep in practice.
So, on September 13, 1998, I started writing Whatever. What was the plan? There was no plan! And to my credit I was upfront about it: the site is called “Whatever” not in honor of the dismissive Gen X expression but in honor of “I’m writing what comes into my brain, and what I feel like writing about.” Which, to be sure, is how the site continues today, nearly a quarter of a century later.
There have, mind you, been changes. Over the years the site has gained some regular features, most notably the “Big Idea,” which was created to help other writers promote their latest work. Whatever is also no longer a solo enterprise; my daughter Athena contributes regularly, and covers topics I would never think to cover because — hey, get this! — she’s her own person and has her own interests and life experiences. Also, of course, in the space of 25 years as a writer, I have changed, a subject which I suspect I will come back to more than once as I unfold this series over the course of the year.
I’ve mentioned before and will undoubtedly mention again that writing on and in Whatever has become, unexpectedly, my life’s work; not the work I get paid for, nor the work I am best known for, but the work that has been persistent and ongoing. When I started it I had no children and had written no books and my life was in a very different place, professionally and spatially, than it is now. So much of the literal day-to-day of my life is recorded here, in millions of words across two-and-a-half decades. As (also) mentioned earlier, it wasn’t really planned to be this; it wasn’t planned to be anything. It just is, and was, and probably will be, what I write because I want to, until I can’t do it any more.
Some of you have been reading this almost from the beginning; I’m glad you’ve stuck around. Some of you may have just started coming to the site; I hope you’ll continue to come by. For both these groups and everyone in between: Thanks. 25 years is a long time to do a thing, but it doesn’t feel like it’s been a long time. It just feels like what I’m writing today.
That’s the secret to Whatever, I suppose: I just keep showing up and putting words into it. Let’s see what tomorrow brings.
— JS
Popcorn Palooza: Part 1
Posted on January 13, 2023 Posted by Athena Scalzi 20 Comments
Someone from the internet was in a generous mood for the holidays, and sent my family a box of popcorn! Specifically a variety pack of popcorn from Fireworks Popcorn, which comes with these nine different popcorns:
Here we have High Mountain Midnight, Orchard Blossom, Sunset Fire, Red River Valley, Autumn Blaze, Baby White Rice, Savanna Gold, Harvest Blend, and Wisconsin White Birch.
I’ll be honest, I don’t really know anything about popcorn, and I never considered the possibility that there could be varieties of it. So, after seeing this variety box, I decided to see what exactly the differences were between all these popcorns by taste testing and comparing them.
I have decided to do three at a time, making for a total of three posts since there’s nine varieties. For this post, I tried Autumn Blaze, Red River Valley, and Baby White Rice.
I was excited to try the Red River Valley one, as I’d never seen red popcorn before. The Autumn Blaze was also pretty looking.
Before we dive in to the cooking and taste testing, I just want to say thank you to the person that sent these along! We really appreciate your kindness! ‘
So, I decided to cook all the popcorns in the same type of oil and in the same pan to get consistent results. I used Colavita Extra Virgin Olive Oil, and a small pot with a lid, and followed the instructions on the bottle, which say to add 1/3 cup of popcorn to 1-3 tbsp of oil (I used 2 tbsp). I did not add any salt or butter, I just tried everything plain. This was also my first time ever cooking popcorn on the stove!
For each popcorn, I would say it took about ten minutes before it started popping, and then once it started, it only took about three minutes for it all to pop (give or take a few kernels).
Up first was Autumn Blaze:
I thought it was neat you could clearly see which pieces were which color as a kernel.
I noticed that this popcorn was like, oddly small.
After I tasted it, I thought that it was extremely neutral. I’m not saying that it’s bland just because it’s plain popcorn or something, I really mean it has a very neutral flavor. It tastes like the poster-child for popcorn. I think this would be a good popcorn to turn into kettle corn.
Following that, I whipped up a batch of the Red River Valley popcorn:
Don’t ask me how or why, but somehow there was a lot more of this kind of popcorn! It filled the entire pot, where as the previous variety (and the next variety) only filled the pot halfway with popped corn! I couldn’t even fit it all in the bowl.
For this one, you can really tell that this was the red variety, as all the popcorn is dark in the center, giving it an almost burnt look.
This was the moment of truth for me. Was this popcorn going to taste the exact same as the previous corn? Or was it possible for popcorn to have different flavors?
The answer is, it was actually very different. I couldn’t quite place it at first, but I settled on that this one had a richer taste, and a bolder flavor that made itself much more known to your taste buds.
I actually preferred the more mild flavor of the previous corn, this variety tasted a bit too much on the robust side.
Finally, the Baby White Rice:
This one looked the most normal, with its uniform light brown centers.
I was surprised that this one turned out to be my favorite. It had a mild flavor that was something more than the neutral-ness of the first one, but much less than the robustness of the second one. This one just screamed movie theater to me.
After tasting all three, I wanted to see if the website had descriptions of the popcorns, and if my judgements of them had been in line with their descriptions.
Lo and behold, I found a characteristics page, and a whole comparison chart. I had been right on the money with saying that the Red River Valley one had a particularly rich/deep flavor compared to the other two mild ones.
And the characteristics page even mentioned that their popcorn is so small because large popcorn is less flavorful and has a Styrofoam-like texture!
Anyways, that’s three down, six to go! I think out of the six left, I’m most excited to try the Orchard Blossom popcorn, because it’s pink! Who doesn’t want pink popcorn?
Which one of these three sounded best to you? Are you a fan of kettle corn or caramel corn? Let me know in the comments, and have a great day!
-AMS
The Big Idea: Mary Baader Kaley
Posted on January 13, 2023 Posted by Athena Scalzi 5 Comments
Real life experiences from authors’ lives often inform their fiction. In the case of Mary Baader Kaley, her life experience, and the life experience of someone she loves, lives at the heart of her novel Burrowed. What is that experience? Read on to discover.
MARY BAADER KALEY:
My husband and I belong to an exclusive club we never meant to join. We are the parents of a special-needs child who will be fully dependent on us for the rest of our lives, because our youngest of three children was born with a brain malformation. Based on the parts of the brain involved, doctors surmised something impacted his development around my eighth week of pregnancy when I was very sick and hospitalized. Looking at him, you can’t see the malformation, but you can’t miss his secondary diagnosis: autism.
He’s fifteen now.
The seed of what would become Burrowed began to take root when he was three—after he began to sleep more than a couple of hours at a time and the fog of sleep deprivation began to lift. I wondered what it would look like if everyone had some sort of disability, and an entire world grew from there. Some people in this world must live underground because they’re too sickly and weak to be exposed to the general population. Everyone else is healthy enough to live above ground but suffer from debilitating conditions of their minds. I wanted to explore how people with various disabilities are treated. Is it possible to see a person for his or her strengths rather than isolate them for their defining difference?
And to bring this back to the real world, another question arises—how can non-disabled people make a difference for someone with a disability? The answer couldn’t be simpler. We can have that person’s back.
After our son was born, neurologists were keenly interested in his malformation—not to treat it but rather to diagnose exactly what type of congenital disorder it might be. A Dandy Walker variant? A strange presentation of Chiari IV? Different doctors had different opinions. Frankly, it didn’t matter.
We were sent to geneticists. The specialist summarized all the different panels of DNA analysis they could run, the costs of each, and the types of mutations that could be found. I stopped her, asking, “Will knowing any of these mutations help my son?” I didn’t mean to be rude, but my child had been prodded and poked so many times already. She replied it wouldn’t help him. From that point on, we made sure any further testing or medical appointments for our son would have one goal in mind: to help him with his actual medical issues or his development in reaching his full potential. Period.
We had bigger questions, like would he ever walk? Talk? Ride a bike? Dress himself? Well, yes, he eventually did these things on his own timetable—he can walk, skip, and run. He can ride a bike with training wheels, and he can dress himself (albeit in dial-up internet speed). And after a lot of help from wonderful teachers and therapists, he can speak. No one would mistake him for an effective communicator, but he can get his point across when he wants something (usually his iPad or a snack). And he can recite every word of his favorite shows by memory, in the voices of each character. In truth, he makes us laugh every day.
Social boundaries will always be an issue though. One day when he was about six, we were standing in line at a fast-food counter and the person in front of us just received his tray of food, turned around to find a seat, and my son grabbed a few French fries from this man’s tray faster than I could react. No sooner were the fries in my son’s mouth when he reached for more, and I had to hold onto each of his wrists to stop him. The man’s eyes opened wide with a what-just-happened expression. I apologized profusely, stammering something about autism.
Thankfully, the man was understanding, nodded, asked me not to apologize, and walked off joking, “I shouldn’t have these fries anyway.” Honestly, I fought tears—not from embarrassment but from the fact that this man was so cool about everything. Not everyone was. Other people threw us side-glances as if I couldn’t control my own child. Yet the guy with a few less French fries than he paid for? He had our back.
Hands down, my biggest fear for my son relates to the distant future when both my husband and I are gone—who will have his back then? We’ve made plans for him, drawn up legal documents, etc., but no one can guarantee these things will work out. It’s hopefully a long way off, but this fear is an icy whisper that sneaks up on me every so often.
Even now, though, there are times we’re not with our son to fend for him. He goes to school, he goes out with sitters or with other family members. What happens if he snatches someone’s food and the person isn’t as cool as that guy with the fries? What if someone doesn’t like the behaviors he exhibits as an autistic person? He’s got zero ability to spout off a clever retort or defend himself against the blandest of bullies. In short, if someone wanted to hurt him, they could. And make no mistake: my son absolutely knows when he’s being teased or bullied.
Every flavor of disability exists in this world—and for the most part just like anyone else, these people chug along within their daily routines with their families and friends who look out for them. Sometimes though, they could use a little help. Small kindnesses. Maybe a few fries.
I have to trust that other people will be there for my son when I’m not around—from his underpaid teachers, school aides, and therapists—who we adore. And still, there are unnamed others, people I won’t meet but he will come across who, like French fry guy, decide to have my son’s back.
From the deepest depths of my soul, I thank each and every one of them.
Burrowed: Amazon|Barnes & Noble|Indiebound|Powell’s
Wipeout, Rural Ohio Style
Posted on January 12, 2023 Posted by John Scalzi 37 Comments
Our afternoon today was interrupted by a knock on the door and a young man standing on our porch. He had come to inform us he’d made a bit of a mess of our yard, down by the road. What happened was, it has been raining more or less constantly today, and the young man’s truck hit a patch of water on the road, hydroplaned, and then went into our yard.
Actually, there was more to the story, as the picture at the top of the piece here suggests. At the lip of our yard is a bit of a ditch, put there to channel water during really heavy rains. When he hydroplaned, it appears that his truck slid into the ditch, hit the incline of it pretty substantially, and then flew a truck length or so before it came back down into the yard. And yes, indeed, the young man made rather a mess of the lawn. And, probably, his truck.
Personally, while I appreciated that the first impulse of this young man was to drive up and admit to tearing up our turf, I wasn’t especially worried about the yard. It’s grass and dirt; we can replace and reseed it and put the roller on the lawn tractor to flatten it back down, and it’ll be fine. I was more worried about him and asked him if he was all right. He said he was (he also said he wasn’t sure about the state of his truck, however). That being the case, I told him that in that we were all good. Accidents happen. If the only damage is to a yard and a truck, we’re all ahead of the game, here.
The moral to this story, if there is one, is that honesty really is a good policy, and also, please be careful on rain-slick roads, because they will absolutely mess with you. Slow and steady gets you home, folks.
— JS
Two Pets, One Door
Posted on January 11, 2023 Posted by John Scalzi 5 Comments
And from Sugar’s point of view, this is exactly the way things should be, with her on the inside and the dog on the outside.
Don’t worry, they switched places almost immediately thereafter.
— JS
Whatever Everyone Else is Saying