Back in MY Day, We Got One Blog Post a Day, and We Called It THE NEWSPAPER
Posted on June 24, 2010 Posted by John Scalzi 48 Comments
Looked up from what I was doing today and discovered it was 6pm and thought, crap, I totally haven’t updated Whatever since this morning, and then was seized by guilt until I realized, hey, I’m doing this for free, and you get what you get. SO THERE.
No, wait, don’t walk off like that. You know I love you. Here, have a cookie. And a pony. There, we’re all better now.
That said, I’m looking at my schedule for the second half of 2010, and it’s, like, really busy. I become SFWA President a week from now, which is mindboggling, by the way, and so I have to budget time for that. Then aside from that I’ve got the usual writing stuff to do, so that when 2012 rolls around you’re not asking hey, why don’t I have a new Scalzi book? And then I’ve got some not-usual writing stuff to do, which I’m totally not going to tell you about yet, but oh boy, just you wait, and then I also have some travel, including a stint in that place the planet hides under the equator, what’s it called, oh, yeah, Australia. Plus other stuff relating to a life that doesn’t involve work and/or science fiction, because, as it happens, I have one of those.
Which means a couple of things:
1. I’ll probably yet again try to impose some sort of structure on my work day, which you may or may not see reflected here in terms of when/how much I post. More details about this soon.
2. In the reasonably near future I’ll be taking a hiatus here BUT Whatever will keep publishing because I’ve already made arrangements for that. I’m still working on some of the details, so I’ll make a more formal announcement about it at the beginning of July.
All of which is to say I’m actively working to balance work, life and sanity while at the same time keeping the lot of you amused with blogtatsic stylings. YOU BETTER APPRECIATE IT, MAN.
No, no, don’t run off. Here’s another cookie. There, there.
If you’re going to all the trouble of flying across the globe to OZ, you may want to consider giving New Zealand a quick peak. It’s worth the trip :) (emigrated here 2 years ago, still in awe)
Also, a speaking / book signing gig in Wellington would be much appreciated ;)
Is this cookie … pony-shaped?
Blaise:
I did look into it and unfortunately I can’t spare the time at the moment. Which is not to say that I don’t plan on a New Zealand trip at some point.
I visit you site multiple times a day I guess I will structure my visits… two can play that game!!
LOL just kidding here have your cookie back you deserve it more then I.
does the cookie at least have chocolate chips in it?
These are oatmeal cookies. Yuck. And that goddamn pony ate the first one you gave me.
The least you could do is put up some entertaining cat pictures, Mister Self-Centered-Guy-Who-Hates-His-Readers.
If the cookie is pony-shaped, you could line up chocolate chips behind it…playing with your food is actually a GOOD thing.
Wait. Go back a minute. You used to get news … on paper?
BWAHAhahahahahaaa hehehhheeee…
Crazy talk.
(Ooh, oatmeal-raisin-chocolate-anise-lemon-almond-butterscotch animal doodles! Don’t mind if I do.)
News… Paper? You mean that stuff I use to start my grill?
I had a cherry pie over here and now it’s gone. Who let that pony in my pantry?
Hey, no pressure. If we don’t get a new book from you by 2012, it’s not like the world’s gonna end. Or IS it?
*warns pony away from spontaneously-appearing-cake*
Just thought I’d ask; any chance of you being in Sydney at some point when your in Australia? If your not, I’ll have to find the money to get to AussieCon, which I imagine is why you’re going to Australia in the first place…
Don’t put too much structure in your life. It isn’t good for you.
I will gladly forgive a cut in output here if it gets me a sequel to The Android’s Dream by 2012. That is what you have in mind, of course.
*sniff* Is that a snickerdoodle? I mean, you’re not really sorry unless that cookie is a snickerdodle.
Honestly, I wondered how long you could keep your blogging pace going. It’s clear to anyone that you’ve got alot of fun/bill paying work to do, and that takes time away from the internet.
Some of us still have Neil Gaiman’s blog on our RSS feeds. He used to post quite alot of long, entertaining missives daily on the internet, but not so often anymore. Ever so rarely readers see these dispatches that say something like, “Do you know that there are miniature ponies roosting in the trees around the Arecibo Observatory? My fabulously talented girlfriend made an interpretive song about them, and my precocious daughter has shot the video here. The jugglers with the Faberge pony eggs were a nice touch.” The story sounds too absurd to be true, but then he posts a link to a “Save the Roosting Ponies” fund, and there ya go. Then, there’s silence for weeks until we hear from his assistant that he briefly stopped in America to train his dog in the art of practical beekeeping before heading into the Amazonian interior for a reading of the Quechua language edition of his latest book.
Mister Scalzi, you’re a talented, hard working writer who’s highly in demand, and I think you’ll wind up with you own adventures and hobbies which leave you waaaaaay too busy to do anything other than enjoy life. Post a missive to us when you can – we’ll love to hear about how Adam Savage threw up at the first Wootstock ever held on a live feed from NASA’s Vomit Comet. Now give me that snickerdoodle. It makes the tears taste a little less bitter.
Oh Geezzz. I’m getting anxiety thinking about it….
I mean who will be babysitting us? Is it someone cool?
Will they have the nexus of Cake Dimensions in their kitchen?
Will their cats have bacon on them?
What about unicorn Pegasus kittens?
Do they have cookies?
Are they cool or not?
I’ve honestly always been a little surprised at your blogging ethic when you post those “sorry for not posting today” things; as a reader I don’t really expect daily updates, and I think in the age of RSS feeds it’s perhaps not quite as necessary as it once was. At any rate, best of luck on finding a good balance between Whatevering and “real work”, and I hope you enjoy Australia as much as I did. (Remember, you’re the one with the funny accent!)
P.S. I can’t believe you aren’t on the Vanilla or Cherry Coke Zero train yet.
Cookies?
(feeds cookie to pony.)
I’m on a fricken diet. And horses are nothing but maintenance.
(kicks pony)
How about a flying car?
Hey… structure your day the way you want, John. Must as I enjoy my visits to Whatever… given a choice, I would much rather have a new John Scalzi book to read.
Thanks for keeping Whatever going; it keeps me sane in my crazy life.
I agree with Chad. I, at least, would actually really prefer if you just didn’t post when you had nothing to post rather than posting an “I’m not posting” post. No one will think you died or something if you didn’t post for a day or two.
What kind of cookie?
Wait. July. you are having a baby, right? a kitten unicorn baby? with a certain WilW, but not at all in a slashie/explicit sex way? more like something non-sexual, perhaps implanted during an alien abduction?
wow, its late.
Do what you gotta do, although I think I speak for many of us in hoping that that doing of stuff involves more books for us to read. We need something to while away the hours between blog posts.
Well. The pony is in the yard. They eat grass, right? And daughters love ponies. So, I’m gonna say that’s a twofer.
Entertain us as you will, sir. I’ll take what’s given and be happy for it, Judge Smails style.
Is it cool if we act all petulant like just a bit, though? You know, just every now and then ask for you to read our like totally awesome 3rd season of SGU script(s)?
But, you know, just if we’re angling for another cookie?
Nom nom nom…mmm…cookies.
You are the most regular and prolific blogger I follow. While I always miss the Whatever when you are taking a break, I really appreciate the work you put into it. That being said, posting some nice cat pictures before your hiatus will help prevent Chang (who is not Chang)’s wrath :)
In Oz you may earn brownie points by using bikkie instead of cookie. We know and use the cookie word ourselves but bikkie (biscuit) is more authentic Oz. :-)
Miles:
“No one will think you died or something if you didn’t post for a day or two.”
In fact, experience teaches me that if I don’t post the “I’m not posting” posts, within a day I get e-mails expressing mildly frantic concern about my well-being. Which is why I make those posts.
Although you wrote, “and then I also have some travel,” I read, “and then I also have some time travel,” which just seemed unbelievably cool. But Australia would be almost as good.
I am glad that your daughter is OK.
Sure, John. Everyone knows that you put up these “posting will be slow for a while because I’m busy yada yada yada” posts, and then within three days you’ve put up eleven new missives on everything from politics to sunset pictures to the Tao of writing.
It’s all just a reverse-psychology ploy to get us to check the Whatever even more frequently.
We’re on to you, Scalzi.
John@28:”In fact, experience teaches me that if I don’t post the “I’m not posting” posts, within a day I get e-mails expressing mildly frantic concern about my well-being. Which is why I make those posts.”
In other words, no good deed goes unpunished. You set up an expectation among your fans that you’d post daily, and now you’re a slave to it. When are you going to learn to abuse your power? The point of bribing someone isn’t to keep on bribing them, it’s to make them dependent on you so you’ll 1) be able to fleece them and have them smile while you do it, and 2) laugh maniacally at their pitiful mewling.
I’ll bet Bob Heinlein never had this problem.
I’ll bet Bob Heinlein would have killed to live in a world with email, blogs/web, twitter, and pocketable phone/computers.
Best of luck JS, and have a good year. Maybe the cats will pick up the slack.
do you expect the viewer count to drop ? love these kind of stats.
Oh thank Crom. Now maybe I’ll be able to get some work done.
I’m starting to suspect, though, that you’ll arrange for guest posts. Like methadone treatments!
What is this “newspaper” of which you speak? Wait, didn’t they invent the paywall or something?
Look, I STILL haven’t gotten the pony Obama promised us in 2008 (much less the free house and car) so I’m not holding my breath waiting for yours. Not that SF authors aren’t generally WAY more credible, accurate, and realistic than politicians.
Virtual cookies don’t work on me…
Oh man, my fault entirely. I forgot I had set my browser to reject cookies…and ponies.
Ponies?
I kind of had my heart set on a Unicorn Pegasus Kitten.
Is this your way of saying, “We had a thing. But as much as I hate to say it, it’s pretty much over, you and me. Sure, sure, we can be friends. Just don’t call or write, okay? Seriously. Time to grow up. Stop with the stalking. Ha-a-a. Hey, I’m kidding. Yes, of course I’ll be in touch. Really. I promise.”
TBogg gave me a pony AND a puppy and a cookie AND an ice cream cone when he couldn’t stand being around me anymore.
I await your revised offer.
Hey man, we DO appreciate it. You da’ man.
You don’t scare me. You couldn’t stop blogging if you wanted to.
Thank you for everything you do for you fans and I wish you well in structuring your time however you wish to do what’s important to you. I’m pretty sure that is the best thing for all of us who take so much enjoyment from your work!
The cooky IS A LIE!!!!!!
Well at least we could pretend for a while. Think what you would have felt like if he’d offered you cake…
I APPRECIATE YOU! AND YOUR WORK! I APPRECIATE YOU & YOUR WORK SO MUCH I WILL GO THROUGH YOUR BINS (FOR FREE) AND EAT ALL YOUR RECEIPTS SO YOU DON’T SUFFER IDENTITY THEFT!
Just kidding. Still, your random musings are a great distraction on my daily commutes.
Oh hey this reminds me: I need to do my SFWA application finally.
You know, now that you’re going to be its president and all.
Hi. I picked up Android’s Dream, read it, loved it, went to your blog, loved it also. Now, to the bitching part – the editing on Android’s Dream sucked. Can you do anything about it? The errors made me irritated. Ex: in one paragraph, the Fixer’s Akita dog “Chuckie” suddenly became “Charlie”. I had to go back and re-read to make sure I hadn’t misunderstood. I found the mess ups annoying; there’s at least one on every page, and now that I have checked out your blog, I can assume that the errors are NOT from you.
Okay. One is supposed to sandwich negatives with positives. So, here is more positive: I loved the book, your style of writing, and the complexities. I am an OLD appreciator of Keith Laumer’s “Reteif” stories, and of course I knew what the title meant. NOW I can go back and read your other books! I have not been able to read much sci fi in a while, since I get frustrated by issues I call “continueds-on”. Meaning, I get upset if I jump into the middle of a series unknowingly. So, I truly appreciate all you have done that I’ve found so far, and hope that you continue to produce such truly enjoyable writings. If I were capable of fandom, I would be a fan. Instead, I just wanted to say Thank you for giving me a few hours of pure reading pleasure, and I look forward to more as I read the rest of your productions. I have ALL of the old sci fi – complete Heinlien, complete Azimov, etc.- all the way back to H. G. Wells, with Edgar Rice Burroughs tossed in. I’m old, but not dead yet. It’s a joy to read your books. Except for the typos. Grrrr.
Regards, Red