Monthly Archives: October 2004

Pre-Hiatus Thoughts

As promised and threatened, I am officially starting my hiatus at the end of this entry; between now and December 1 the only thing you’ll see here are links to cool music I’ve found online. The one exception to this will be if/when I get my hardback copies of Old Man’s War and the notice […]

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Odd and Ends 10/29/04

Random thoughts on a Friday: * Question for the other online egomaniacs out there: I may be coming late to this particular party, but have you noticed spam domains in your referrer logs? I’ve never had this before, but suddenly my site is being “visited” by “people” coming from domains like “your-illegal-viagra-pharmacy.com” and such. Really, […]

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The Scalzi Endorsement: John Kerry For President

Yes, I know, this isn’t a huge surprise to anyone. But let’s just make it official, shall we. I’m John Scalzi, and I approve this message: I will vote for John Kerry on November 2, and I think you should, too. Allow me to grant, first off, that this is most importantly a vote against […]

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Book of the Dumb 2 Arrives

Here’s Athena again, modeling this year’s model of Book of the Dumb: Book of the Dumb 2, or as I like to call it: Book of the Dumb 2: The Quickening. It’s 330 pages of quality stupidity, and as a bonus it actually looks quite a bit nicer than the original, thanks to a slightly […]

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Inflicting My Child Upon You, Volume #25,338

Because, by God, it’s my Web site. If you click here, you’ll see Athena sing the informative and emphatic “Planet Song,” with music and lyrics by Athena Scalzi. And if that hasn’t caused you to scurry away screaming, indulge in the gripping narrative tone poem “I Broke My Knee,” another original work, which recounts Athena […]

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James and Ted’s Excellent Literary Adventures

Hey, look at that: James Lileks has got a new book out: Interior Desecrations: Hideous Homes from the Horrible ’70s. It’s a follow-up to his Gallery of Regrettable Food, except this time, instead of mocking 50s food, he’s mocking 70s interior decorating. And rightly so, I’d say. James and I go back a ways, to […]

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Where We’ve Been, What’s Going On Now, What’s Happening Next

I’m back. Over the last few days Krissy and I were in New York City, convincing skeptical friends that Krissy was not actually mythical and does indeed exist (the rumor of the mythical Krissy having sprung up through the fact that I’ve gone to two Worldcons solo and yet spoke of this mysterious offstage wife). […]

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AFK 10/21

First off, I’m appalled that it’s the 21st of October already. That thing they say about time moving faster as you get older is hellaciously true. This is very bad news when you have a book deadline. Second off, I’m going to be AFK, at least as regards the Whatever, through Monday. Places to go, […]

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The Five Year Old Vote

Athena and I just got home from me picking her up from school when the phone rang; Athena picked it up and then handed to me with a puzzled look on her face. It was a recorded political message. I didn’t bother to hear who it was from; I just hung it up. Athena wanted […]

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Wimmie-wipos

Clearly, I’m not a George Bush fan, and I’ll be voting against him come November 2. But I’ve been asked — and not unreasonably so — just how bad would another four years of Bush be for me? The answer: Honestly? Not bad at all. Why? Well, simply put: On paper, at least, I (and […]

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Random Crap 10/19

Bits and pieces going through my head today: * It took two weeks for the comment spammers to figure out that I’d yanked all the previous Whatever entries, and now they’re back to annoy me again. Fortunately, this newer version of Movable Type makes it very simple to yank the comment spam out by the […]

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Doing the Friend Pimp

My pal Joe Rybicki, aka the mastermind behind quality geek-core band Johnny High Ground, has finally gotten his Johnny High Ground Web site in order, and as may be expected, it’s a rockin’ good time, with music downloads and links to the release of the JHG compilation Early Output: 1999-2002, which piles up the music […]

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Makin’ Chili

I got into one of those moods to make something in the kitchen yesterday — a rare mood, for which Krissy is thankful, since when I get in the mood to make something in the kitchen, usually the kitchen explodes toward entropy in fairly short order. But what can I say, I had a hankering […]

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From the “We Knew This, Now We Know It For a Fact” File

Your Sunday reading assignment, ladies and gentlemen: Planning for after the war in Iraq non-existent By WARREN P. STROBEL and JOHN WALCOTT Knight Ridder Newspapers WASHINGTON – In March 2003, days before the start of the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq, American war planners and intelligence officials met at Shaw Air Force Base in South Carolina […]

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Voting Christian

Got an e-mail today, one of those “forward to all your friends!” ones, that asked “How Would Jesus Vote?” and suggested that Jesus would vote for John Kerry. This will no doubt come as a vast surprise to many Bush supporters, who will likely be shocked, offended and personally aggrieved at the idea that Jesus […]

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Takin’ the Quiz

Apparently two bloggers over at the Detroit News Political Blog, John Needham (who is liberal), and Susanna Cornett (who is not), are having a catfight about the Bush Voters v. Voight-Kampff entry here, which has precipitated the Cornett to answer the quiz at length, along with some various snarky commentary about me and that particular […]

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Learning Curve = 0

Steve Schwenk, late of wishing violent death upon the child of a New York Times reporter and then being shocked, shocked when that wish was publicized in the New York Times with his name attached to it, has posted an open letter to Daniel Okrent, the NYT’s public editor, who is the one who outed […]

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Like a Newbie, Fragged For the Very First Time

My new DSL modem has provided me the first true low-ping environment I’ve had since I left the warm confines of the AOL LAN, lo those many years ago. So I cranked up my Unreal Tournament 2004, went looking for some local servers, and jumped into a deathmatch to see if I still had my […]

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Courting Disaster

DSL modem has arrived. Will now attempt to install. Keep your fingers crossed. This will undoubtedly be a bumpy ride. Don’t worry, it won’t keep you from accessing the Whatever; it’ll just keep me from accessing the Whatever. Update: 6:15 pm — Oh. My. GOD. So much speed.

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Ignorance is No Excuse

Sweet Jesus on Pogo Stick, but I do get sick of ignorant people around here. One just popped up in the comment threads for The Election and Kerry’s Shoes and dropped a wide load of ignorance on the proceedings; the item that’s currently exercising my irritation is this little gem: We are the infedels. The […]

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