Well, there were very good arguments put forth, so I peeked! Very excited!!! Socktopus yarn! In River Styx colourway. So pretty! And nautical themes for the two choices of sock pattern – one of which is called turbulence. Am I over fluid dynamics enough to go for that option ?
So. The timeline has expired. I have not completed my Cookie A socks and look what came in the mail today.
Yup. That there is package number 2 of the sock club.
The question is – will I open it and peek inside to see what the next one is or will I make myself wait til I’ve finished the first pair?
The 2012 NAFF race is on. In fact it closes in just 11 days, on April 22. What is NAFF? I hear you ask?
All Australian fans are eligible to vote. Voting costs just $5 and goes towards the fundraising for NAFF. You can even vote to hold over the funds or for neither candidate – all votes however cast help to raise money for the coffers.
But, this post is to tell you not only that you should vote but that you should vote for Sean. Here’s Sean’s candidacy pitch:
Sean Broughton-Wright
A fan reviewer and commenter writing at Adventures of a Bookonaut, Sean promotes Australian speculative fiction authors, publishers and community news. In 2011 he ran an interview series on ‘Authors & Social Media’, featuring the likes of Marianne de Pierres and Margo Lanagan. He submits audio interviews to the fan produced Galactic Chat podcast; Claire Corbett being his most recent. His cunning plan at Continuum is to record audio interviews; file a daily report and tweet selected panels. He will gladly participate in panels or con activities that match his expertise.
Nominated by: Alisa Krasnostein (WA), Tansy Rayner Roberts (Tas) and Alexandra Pierce (Vic)
And as you can see, the members of Galactic Suburbia are his nominators. That’s because we think Sean is awesome. But let me introduce him to you a bit more to show you why he would be a great NAFF candidate.
Sean lives in South Australia. He is not the other Sean who lives in South Australia. He’s never been to a Natcon before – and so he doesn’t yet know what he is truly missing. Though he is starting to suspect – check out his Tweet stream over Swancon weekend. In fact, if you’re on Twitter you’ve probably chatted with him, had your signal boosted by him or gotten the breaking news from him. He’s a great supporter of Australian SF/F even though he’s fairly new to the scene. Sean blogs at http://bookonaut.blogspot.com/ where he promotes Australian SF/F fiction. If you write, produce, edit, publish or perform Aussie specfic, he’s more than likely tooted your horn for you.
Sean came on board our sister podcast Galactic Chat last year and has conducted some suburb interview for the podcast. They’re really worth listening to. His recent interviewees include Helen Lowe, Claire Corbett and Ian Irvine.
And maybe you’ve seen him around the traps fighting the Feminist 101 fight like the strong feminist ally that he is, so that some of us can take a wee break from the front.
I believe Sean is the kind of candidate that NAFF is intended for – an Australian fan who has never been to a Natcon before, wouldn’t otherwise be able to make it to this one and already participates so enthusiastically in fandom. Let’s bring him out to Melbourne, show him what a Continum con looks like and introduce him round!
Sean is running against WA fan Sarah and John Parker. They are strong and worthy candidates. No matter who you vote for, voting makes the fundraising easier. So get voting. Here’s all the information on how to vote:
Votes are being collected by: Sue Ann Barber (VIC) and the candidates. For more information please contact Sue Ann at activeim@hotmail.com. Voting opens Tuesday 3rd April 2012 and concludes on Sunday 22nd April 2012.
Please make all cheques payable to NAFF or National Australian Fan Fund. Email Sue Ann if you would like to pay via direct deposit or PayPal. Cash, in person, is welcome, but not through the mail! Postal address:
NAFF
PO Box 249
Pascoe Vale South VIC 3044
As I said, still not with the sitting still and doing one thing. I am *supposed* to be finishing my first lot of socks for the Cookie A sock club. Here is how much I have done of the first sock. Nearly the cuff. And I know that the second round has been posted to me so I am knitting against the clock here. I chose the pattern that is going to knit up like fortune cookies but that lace repeat is starting to get to me. Any second now, I get to turn the heel. And yet.
And yet, even with the deadline, I mostly knit on the kimono jacket.
And that has its own story. When I was cataloguing my WIPs, I pulled it out. I guess it was about half done and not touched for a good five years. I realised what was stopping me from finishing was that I had no idea where I was up to on the pattern. I know realise it would have been only a matter of measuring the sleeves and continuing on. However, actually when I measured it, I decided I was knitting it one size too small for me. So I unravelled the whole thing and started from scratch with one size up. But. Either the wool had sat for so long under a window in the sun and perished a little, or a moth or two had gotten to it. Or my knitting was not all that flash hot. Because the yarn is frayed to broken in some places. In more than a few places. So this has been a process of joining broken yarn and so on all along the way.
At first this was really hard and I realised that it was because I want this piece to be perfect. And I also want it to look exactly like the picture in the pattern. Except for two things. 1. Its not the same yarn as in the picture so it’s not going to look like that (why I didn’t buy that yarn when I purchased the it is a mystery for the ages because I no longer remember) and 2. This is the first sweater, and in fact non accessory sized adult garment, I’ve ever knit. Its probably not going to be perfect. And I’ve realised I need to give that up and get over myself and knit the damn jumper. It’s just a jumper. So I am nearly back knitted up to where I started when I unravelled it. And miraculously, most of that knitting happened this weekend. It was only just maybe 10 or 20 rows in when I took it to Swancon on Friday. And now I’m halfway through through the sleeves. I’m not sure if it’s going to be long enough but I’ll see.
The exciting bit about this project is that it involves a dropstitch when you get to the end. Yup, you purposely drop a bunch of stitches across it – and that, I reckon probably will make it might lighter and longer. So I’ve been waiting for that moment for about 5 years. I’m all about the delayed satisfaction.
So what with all this excitement and deadlines. Yeah I totally spent yesterday on something completely else. Remember my panic about moving over to knitting and not quilting? Well I’ve been listening to a bunch of podcasts on my drives all last week – both on knitting and on quilting – and following the lead on one of the quilting podcasts led me to a New York Beauty quiltalong. I only first came across the New York Beauty blocks last year but I fell in love with them and I fell hard. I love the art deco feel you can get with them and I love the sharp contrasts of points and circles and I love the amazing effects piecing them can bring. But I’m scared of them cause I’ve never done circular sewing before.
But I stared at this quiltalong all the rest of last week. And even though I’m not going to join and even though I’m *knitting to deadline*, I printed out one or two templates. And then today I went rifling through my stash. I kinda wanted to use the Paris cats fabric for it but I don’t know how much of that is still committed. And then I remembered/found this gorgeous set of fat quarters called something or other Noir. And I had bought it for liking it but with nothing in particular in mind. And it has Eiffel Tower fabric in it and …. and I started another project! Oops!
It feels terrible to be so utterly unfocussed right now. But it also feels fantastic to just follow creative whim. And this turned out so much better than I thought it would. It’s not a great semicircle (it has a bit of lineaity in it) – but first try! And I love how the points came out. I’m so suckered into the New York beauty! There are nine different blocks in this quiltalong.
I think I’m in!
Yesterday was a huuuuge day! We woke up to a twitter stream informing us that the Hugo ballot was out and Galactic Suburbia was on it! We’ve made it onto the first ever Fancast category ballot and it’s absolutely amazing, hard to take in and just totally floored me. Thank you to every one who nominated us!! We’re so glad you think what we’re doing is Hugo worthy. This category is absolutely awesome, if you don’t listen to the other podcasts, you’re missing out!
Best Fancast
As you know, at Galactic Suburbia, we LOVE awards season and we’re major fans of the Hugos. To be a part of it is too too cool. I’d already decided that this year I’d follow Alex’s suit and work me way through the entire Hugo packet and I can hardly wait til the 2012 one is out!
If you want to play along and if you want to cast a Hugo vote! you can do so by buying a supporting membership here.
And if that wasn’t enough for one day, I was so pleased to hear that Nightsiders by Sue Isle won the Tin Duck for Best WA Long Fiction Best WA Professional Production. I’m so very proud of this book. I’m so very glad that others are enjoying it and getting as much out of what she has done in this collection as I did.
I’ve been sitting here all day with the intention of writing up a bunch of posts I want to make. There are a few on a bunch of topics, so many in fact I thought, well, I could queue up for the week so as not to deluge the blog. I have though in fact started only this one. Mostly because I couldn’t decide where to start. And that’s been pretty much most of the day and in fact my week. And it’s not even been too much to do, no idea where to start. I have a list, comprehensive lists, breaking things down into bite sized tasks. Any task to suit any mood. Alas my mood has been to flit with no desire to sink my teeth into anything or indeed to sit still long enough to sink at all.
Take today, I’ve half cleaned the kitchen, half started the laundry, cleaned a bit of my desk, folded some laundry, and sorted a bit of my in tray. But I’ve completed nothing, really. And instead I’ve been sort of consumed by my knitting and the internet. And I still don’t feel much like doing anything even though I have TONS to do. I just don’t seem in a settling into anything type of mood.
I made it into Swancon on Friday and Sunday – Friday was unexpected as we found 
ourselves with 6 hours to kill between Easter breakfast with C’s parents and Seder night with mine. And I wanted to pop in and see Marianne and drop her in some books. I settled into her interview panel with the beginning of my knitting (above) and thought I’d just stay for that. Zoe interviewed Marianne and I believe it was recorded so perhaps available for listening at some point in time. And it was a really great interview, which I thoroughly enjoyed. I mean, yeah, really lovely things were said about Glitter Rose, and Kendra asked a fantastic question about the book (always so freaking awesome when readers get what you were trying to and/or really think about the work – Marianne described Kendra as a “thoughtful reader” and I instantly decided that’s what I want to be when I grow up and also how lucky I am to have thoughtful readers of the work I publish) but it was just really energising to hear Marianne speak. It’s kinda rare now that I think about it to sit in a big room, for it to be really well packed and for just one woman to speak about her experiences as a writer. An she had so much of interest to say.
After that, I ended up kind of conning – I believe it’s called? I just sort of floated around, got into conversations with people and had not a care in the world. It was great. And C had headed off to the gaming room when we got there and I got a text asking if I was ok and if it was all good to stay and I was happy, he was happy and it was good. I had a brief chat and debrief with Marianne just before we had to head off to dinner and that was that.
Sunday we headed back in – I had two panels on and C played in the magic tournament thingie. I managed to persuade Jonathan to come and join me on my first panel with Helen and Satima on what to do once you’ve finished your manuscript. And then we headed off to lunch with Kathryn and Terri. And after mooching about, I had a second panel which I don’t think went very well and then I headed back to the dealers room where I managed to successfully win the fan art pictured with my knitting above! It’s by Susan Margaret who also painted the Glitter Rose glasses from last year. I think I might love her work 
I’m looking forward to drinking lots of cups of tea whilst knitting and reading in a winter with this cheery set. It was part of a beautiful installation which I would have bought more of but I had no more money on me.
And then I could dodge it no longer. Marianne sat me down and gave me the hard questions to “check I was still on the straight and narrow.” How lucky am I to have such awesome mentors? Something that’s a real struggle is finding publishing mentors in Australia – there’s lots of avenues for how to learn your craft as a writer or editor, all manner of courses and workshops and societies. But so much less, to almost nothing, on how to grow an independent press. I think it would be fair to say in the SF/F scene, most small presses stick around 5 to 10 years. And very few make the leap from small to medium. I’ve been lucky to be introduced to a bunch of people who have been willing to help by answering my questions and to offer guidance. But I’ve been luckier still to have good friends who throw ideas at me and let me bounce off my crazy. Marianne, though, is the one to whom I confess *everything* and who has been keeping me honest and on track so I don’t get too crazy. Or that I at least keep the crazy on the back burner for now. She knows a lot about the business and anyone who had the chance to hear her talk or to talk with her this weekend knows just what an honour that was. I for one am glad I had nothing hidden I had to confess to her face!! I would not have enjoyed that! And it was instead great to talk through with her my plan with the upcoming novels and everything that goes along with trying to make this a real thing.
I’m a big fan of Locus, of what they do and also of preserving history and historical artifacts. Here’s a really good chance to chuck a buck or two in the pot and make sure that a bunch of the genre scene doesn’t get lost or misplaced and that the ephemera Charles Brown spent his lifetime collecting can be accessed, used and enjoyed. You never know when you might want to research something.
Locus Photo and Ephemera Archive Project
I’m going to go contribute now.
If you’re just joining us, and want to try out Galactic Suburbia for the first time, here are the top episodes that we think represent the best of 2011.
Episode 36: Spoilerific Book Club: Joanna Russ Featuring: “How To Suppress Women’s Writing,” by Joanna Russ; “The Female Man,” by Joanna Russ and “When it Changed,” by Joanna Russ
Episode 47: 24 November 2011 In which we bid farewell to the queen of dragons, squee about 48 years of Doctor Who, dissect the negative associations with “girly” fandoms such as Twilight, and find some new favourites in our reading pile.
Or if you’re feeling adventurous, you can check out our entire 2011 catalogue of episodes! Thanks to our silent producer for gathering those links.
I needed to post about my Nana before I could post anything else here, it didn’t feel right. I hope also it’s understandable that I will be a bit unreliable on things whilst I take a bit more time out of commitments and also that I may not make it to Swancon.
Also this week, in the midst of everything else, I gave notice at work and resigned on Tuesday. An old boss had come looking for me some time ago to work for her on something that would be the kind of job I would write for myself if I were to write one for me in public service. It also comes with a promotion, more money and less commute – in fact it’s ridiculously close to the train line. So that’s a 15 hour return of time to my week as I can read, slush, reply to email etc whilst commuting. It’s a pretty good opportunity.
The problem was, I didn’t look for it and I was enjoying where I was when she came and found me. I like my boss and my team. And I’m still learning how to do the job. And I knew how badly they needed extra hands for the work load and by leaving, I will be leaving more work to less people. For which I feel pretty awful about. So I had been dreading resigning, in fact I almost didn’t even consider the offer in the first place because of this. I am so lucky to have such good work friends – one of whom smacked me around for a bit for not even considering it. Especially as it has the opportunity to apply for permanency which I am yet to have ever been offered (the opportunity to apply for) in the 7 years working where I am. And I was the worst feminist ever, being so apologetic for taking a better offer, I apologised like 5 times as I left the room after resigning. Seems I’ve at least moved to a point where I will take what’s right or better for me but I don’t quite own or feel proud of doing so.
I’m sad too to be leaving my agency and moving on. But the job feels the right fit for me. I’m a little scared by how badly they are needing and wanting the skills I have. I think maybe the job is going to be really hard and I won’t have much supervision to guide some of what I will be doing (not overly different to where I was in my last job but I do know how that then feels). I raised some of the issues that I thought there would be in my taking the job and they have already offered some solutions and I’ve thought of a few ways to deal with things too. So … I guess … I’m actually doing this. I start April 30.
This was a pretty highly emotional week. My grandmother has been ailing for some time now and her health had taken a rapid decline in the last 6 months or so. My family had to make some difficult decisions about her living situation and so on but then last week, she really took gravely ill. On Tuesday I headed up to visit and sit with her after work and she was very distressed. It was very upsetting to sit and the only thing you could do was hold her hand and whisper comforting things to her which you hoped she could hear or sense as she was pretty out of it by then. I didn’t head up Wednesday. Thursday I waited til I was in Bunbury and had sat at my desk for an hour before texting my mum for an update who told me to head up straight away. I did so and that was one really long 2.5hour drive. Thanks to The Writer and the Critic for keeping me company and something to focus on. After that, we sat with Nana pretty much that whole day, she was much more peaceful. As I left at about 8/8.15pm, I kissed her and told her I loved her and I knew that would be the last time I saw her. We got the phonecall at 4am (though actually 6am cause I’d put the damn thing on silent) and then I headed back up to be with my family.
I’ve posted before how much I appreciate the Jewish death rituals. They are so clear about what to do and how to comfort mourners and they offer mourners themselves a very direct course towards and through grief. We bury our dead as soon as possible. Since Shabbat (the Sabbath) is on Friday night, funerals need to happen before 3pm on Fridays. So my family were organising the funeral by the time I arrived at my Nana’s house where everyone was gathered. We sat and drank tea and talked about what the eulogy should say. And we just sort of existed in that limbo stage of shock where the reality hasn’t really set in. I’m amazed by how much of the rest of the mundane world just melts away when you’re so focused on intense emotions and moments in life. The complete loss of the sense of time.
I’d headed up to my sister’s to drop off food as she’d made her place the gathering for Shabbat dinner. And we had taken over some lunch for everyone. You can’t think about eating at all and then you eat something and realise how starving you were. After everything was organised, I headed back to my sister’s to finish a grant application that was due Friday night and I’d intended to work on on Thursday night and Friday afternoon. That’s one interesting way to write a grant application – you couldn’t be more removed from the words emotionally even if you tried.
We headed to the funeral – it’s amazing how many people showed up without much warning. And that’s when the reality hit home – we were burying my Nana. 
My uncle gave the eulogy and it was a very beautiful one. It’s so important to me that women have decent eulogies. So often, and especially with women my grandmother’s age, the eulogy consists of “she was born in blah blah, met her husband, got married, had x number of children and loved to cook and clean for them. It made her happy. And she will be missed”. And these give you no sense of the person she was or what life she lived outside of cleaner and housekeeper. It always makes me kinda mad.
But this wasn’t that kind of a eulogy. And I do think he gave a good sense of who Nana was and what was important to her – family, Jewish community, the wider community, philanthropy and so on. And that she was someone who gave good advice, never pulled punches but also was someone who thought it was better to not say anything at all, if it wasn’t nice. She lived to be 96 and as my uncle said, she had a long life, well lived. She travelled to far and exotic places. She saw the most amazing changes in her lifetime. She was someone who learned how to record her shows off the Foxtel – she wasn’t afraid to embrace new technology or new thoughts for new times. She never judged me for the choices I made in life or for who I was and she loved me unconditionally. I enjoyed hearing her stories and she had lots to tell. She showed me that nothing much had changed in 100 years – I wasn’t doing or thinking anything new at all
She will be greatly missed.
After the funeral, we headed back to my Nana’s where most of the family was milling about, drinking tea, eating eggs (I think it’s because it’s the symbol for life and rebirth) and talking. It’s very comforting to come from such a sad and confronting event to a house full of people. I think it eases you back into reality in a way that would be so much harder to do it you went home to an empty house. (At the funeral, it is considered a great deed (mitzvah) to help bury the person so every one lines up to shovel three shovels of sand in. It’s a very upsetting thing to do but it also forces you to accept what is happening and pushes you forward into grieving.) Now, you remember that you have life and family and that you will and can go on.
We sat with the mourners – my dad, uncle and aunt – for a bit before heading back to my sisters where I finally finished the grant and submitted it. Her sister in law and mother in law had kindly cooked most of dinner and were fussing around setting things up. My cousin’s fiance had flown over for the funeral and was napping. And there was this sense of family, love and comfort in the house. And then everyone (half of the family) came over for Shabbat dinner and the house was filled with people and we were just together as family. I find that very comforting. Though I was actually unwell and couldn’t eat.
After the day of the funeral, we hold evening prayers for the dead. And that is where we are at the moment in the phase of all this. Still very much in that post shock place and still very immersed in family.
Tomorrow, back to work and life goes on.
I’m going to disable comments to this post as whilst I appreciate words of condolence, I didn’t post this for those. Thank you for your thoughts at this time, I do appreciate them.
Photos taken by my cousin of photos in my Nana’s photo album.
I’ve been doing research for the Craft Ebook line that I’m working on. I forgot research was fun! I also forgot research is vital, but never mind that now, I got there in the end. Anyway, one of the things I’ve been doing is going back and listening to old episodes of Cast On podcast. I stopped listening for about a year, I suspect some time in the last bit of my relationship with the ex. Brenda took about a year off and so once she was back podcasting and I rediscovered her, I wanted to go back and listen to the episodes I’d missed. And then I was enjoying listening to her so much on my long drives that I started working my way back through older episodes.
The old format of the podcast aimed to sound like how a magazine read so it included news, and announcements, a regular feature called Today’s Sweater, other features and then an essay. The essays started as Brenda’s and then were sometimes were written by listeners and read by guest readers.
A couple of weeks ago now, I was listening to one such essay that made me cry and made me really think about what knitting means to me. A woman wrote about a scarf she’d made. She’d picked it for a long road trip, something complicated enough that she wouldn’t finish it in the first hour or two, but simple enough to not need to pay too much attention. And then she talked about how she’d knitted it on the journey, about the scenic backdrop of the trip and how happy they were and what a great time she’d had. She didn’t finish the scarf on the trip. However, not long after the trip, she fell down the stairs in her house and broke her neck. So immediately after this trip, she’d gone through the worst time in her life. It was a very dark time, she was lucky enough to be able to be operated on and regain her mobility but her recovery was very slow and painful. And she talked about all the days filled with pain and not being able to sit for very long. And how she then thought that knitting her scarf might be something she could do. At first she could only knit one or two stitches at a time and that she couldn’t sit for very long as well. Eventually she gained more strength and the pain lessened and she worked at the scarf and was able to wear it, finished, by the time she was well enough to go on a gentle camping trip again. She wrote about what that scarf, and knitting, meant to her. That project had been with her at the best of times and then kept her company in the worst of times, giving her something to focus on, to mark her recovery and to immerse herself in.
After I finished wiping away tears from the happy story, I thought a lot about the last time I had really thrown myself into knitting and what knitting means to me. My grandmother taught me to knit. I don’t know when. One of my earliest memories is dragging an old round plastic bag, that had contained a small ottoman, around my grandparents’ house, filled with white acrylic yarn and lots of knitting needles. I was about three and I would pretend, though think, I was knitting like my grandmother. I couldn’t have been that much older when she finally taught. I feel like I’ve always known how to knit. I don’t remember not knowing how to. I love to knit and I love doing something that my grandmother taught me. Now that she’s gone, I love that I continue to do something that she taught me and that she loved to do. I love the bringing a part of her with me into the future. My other grandmother taught me how to crochet and I feel the same way about that. And I guess there is something very nurturing and comforting in it.
Some time around when my relationship with my ex (I really need to find some geological reference word to refer to that period of my life. Answers on a postcard) started to head south, I took up knitting in a big way. Like A BIG WAY. I got really engrossed in the online knitting world which was starting to take off. All these personal blogs with gorgeous photos of works in progress and hand dyed yarn, and groovy modern patterns. And etsy. And paypal. And sock yarn clubs. And podcasts. It was a heady, frenetic time. I was in my first serious grown up day job. The ex would spend exorbitant amounts of money on ridiculous things (like private golf club memberships, boating and my favourite, oops I wanted a brand new car. Again) and I figured, why not do the same (on so much smaller an order of magnitude)? I fell into a new fandom, of sorts. I stashed like hand dyed yarn was going out of fashion. I joined sock yarn clubs. I ebayed. I ogled and leered and drank in colour and fibre. And I knitted so much. I would literally stay home on a Saturday night, in preference, to knit. (Sure the choice was usually to go and sit in a cold damp stadium and watch really poor basketball played poorly.) I knitted. A. Lot. I knitted so many babies booties, I’m still gifting them in large piles to every baby that has been born since. And I still have a huge drawer full. I tried my hand at an etsy store, to little success. I even tried stalls at craft fairs. I was in this obsession waist deep. I had knitting on sets of needles all over the place and I was always starting new thing. I was immersed. I must have knit about 30 pairs of adult socks. And scarves. A few shawls. And those gorgeous hot water bottles (that yarn I used was just divine).
It got obsessive. And looking back on it now, I think maybe I understand why. I didn’t really knit like that once I moved out into my own place. A lot of the projects I’m cataloguing now, I started before I moved out and then never really picked back up again. I packed away most of my stash and didn’t look at it til I moved last year. I picked up a new craft – the patchworking – and got into that, but in a much less obsessive way.
It occurs to me now that the knitting was a way of finding love – of surrounding myself with something I associate with someone who always comforted me. Getting involved, no matter how much from the (consumer) sidelines, in the online knitting world was a way of coming home, of being understood, of being wrapped up in a nostalgic love. Because I wasn’t even being overly creative with my knitting. I knit a lot of plain socks and straight scarves, with fabulously colourful yarn. Teaching myself to knit socks was possibly the most adventurous thing I did during that time. And I never got sick of knitting stockinette. I just knit and knit and knit. Like my life depended on it. And maybe it did.
And last night I wandered into the TV room and looked at my bag with my sock yarn club yarn in it, all balled up and ready to go, and I felt that feeling again – of coming home. Of warmth and fondness. Of belonging again. And I guess that’s different to how I feel about patchworking – which is filled with creativity and invention and experimentation. And I actually mentally checked myself when I felt that way – like to be cautious that I don’t fall into that big knitting hole again. Almost a don’t enjoy this too much, kind of thought process. Don’t get consumed. Why not? I wondered? Am I scared of the obsession? Should I not feel at home with my online knitting peeps? Is that so wrong? I realize now, after writing this, that that won’t happen – it can’t happen – because I am in a very different mental space. That it will be ok even if I do enjoy it too much. Because this time, I’m doing it because I love to knit and not because I’m trying to kit over (or out of) a hole.
That said, I still am a *little* bit scared of the siren that is knitting online.
Thanks to those who left feedback on my craft post of anguish. I am terribly behind at answering comments. I took all your advice and packed up and put away the Charm Quilt project. I packed up all the pieces that I had laid out and put them in a ziplock back and made a box just for this project. And that alone made me feel so much better. I’ve got a few pieces of that project still out on my sewing table – a few of the hexagons all pinned and ready to go – and some of the scraps. I’m mostly just mildly contemplating them from a distance. I feel like I could finish them off so they’re still out. But I am also very aware that I might feel completely better if I just packed them all up and put them away for now. Of course as soon as I did this, another little batch of fat eighths I’d ordered from a Jinny Beyer sale as a reward for something I finished came in. I took a photo of them and then popped them in the box as well. I’ll figure out what I’m doing with all that another day.
Tansy says I always have this panic and I always move in cycles. I dunno though – this quilting thing is pretty new. I only really started collecting fabrics just as my relationship with my ex was breaking up. So – oh. What’s that? 5 years ago now. Hmm maybe it’s not that new after all. Maybe I should just chill out about this and let 
go and let the cycles happen on their own. This forcing business only makes me feel bad anyway. It’s just that I have so many beautiful projects that I want to get to and I also want to actually finish the ones I have started. Anyway. This is not the point of this post. In any case, this time round, I really want to hope to believe that I can somehow be immersed in two crafts at once. Just like you can be immersed in two books at once. Oh. Nevermind.
I took up some very excellent advice from Sim in the comments to my last post. She suggested that I audit my projects. I’ve only partly started this. I’m hoping to have finished it by the end of the week. However, this exercise was very interesting because I found where all my sets of DPNs (double pointed needles, come in sets of 4) were. Yes, they were in various stages of different pairs of socks.
I decided that what I really want to focus on is starting and finishing the socks from the Cookie A’s sock club before the next skein of yarn comes in. So I went in search of the right needles. I found them in a sock project I had stashed in C’s glove box for those times I’m with him and we’re driving somewhere (we live 45 mins to an hour from stuff). I was maybe 25% away from finishing the pair. I’d started them on a couple of days field trip in the last job, oooh what? Last June? Last October?
Yes, well. I pulled out the project and assessed it. It was close to being finished but very quickly, I also discovered that the second sock was a little bit shorter than the first – I’d put the heel in too soon. So I ripped back the half of the gusset and the heel and started over. I was a bit annoyed at that, creating more work etc, but the stripes, they didn’t match and I’d made a point of casting on the second sock exactly at the right point so that they would. And it would only annoy me every time I wore them if I didn’t fix them now. What’s an extra day of work compared to be annoyed every time I wear them? These socks wear really well – they are a commercial self striping sock yarn and about 15% nylon so they machine wash and wear great. The first pair I made with them, something like 8 years ago, still look fantastic.
So in summary, I ripped back the sock to almost halfway, reknit it and finished these off over the weekend. A weekend in which I was out for most of Saturday and did various work things as well. A couple of hours and a new pair of socks. Makes me eye off the other socks in various stages on the needles. How long would it take me to have all new socks before winter? I suspect some of this has come about because I am so used to knitting for other people. I’m not sure why I am like that for knitting but a vast majority of what I have knit I have gifted away. And that sort of taints how you feel about it, I think. I mean, I love knitting and it might be that I am more process than product focused. Thus as long as I am knitting, I am happy. And how many of any one craft thing does one person need? Etc. But at some point, if you never enjoy the spoils of your labour, you must lose enthusiasm. So, whilst I do have a list of projects I want to gift this year, I think I really need (and I think I already had done so?) to set aside this year and craft primarily for myself. You know, til I have too many hats, scarves and socks etc.
Oh look, here’s another topic I have been struggling to pull into a coherent piece. We’re getting married. And I’m over the moon that I am going to marry C. I’m really excited about our wedding day and the life we are planning together. But I have to admit that the planning of the wedding, for me, is an internal struggle between two parts. And as we get deeper into this, it gets more uncomfortable and as such I am getting less and less decisive on things. Which means, I am embarrassed to admit, C is doing much more of the coordination of details than me.
Here’s the thing. There is 12 year old me aka the Hollywood stereotype thinker and there’s 36 year old me – independent woman, feminist, etc. They actually agree far less often than you might think.
12 year old me has always dreamed of the white dress, the veil, being walked down the aisle. The whole kit and caboodle. And in some ways, this would be the really easy option. Open up the Hollywood recipe of how to plan a wedding, follow steps A through W and bazinga you have yourself the white wedding we all dreamed of.
The thing is … I’m 36. And I’m not the wide-eyed innocent swapping her parents’ home for her husband’s, to be wife and mother. I’m really struggling with a lot of the symbology of weddings. And I think it would be really easy to just not think about them and I spose a lot of people don’t. But I started to think about what things mean, as people ask do I want this or that, and I don’t want to be an automaton. I don’t want to do things just because that’s what is expected or because everyone else does. But as soon as you start to think about deeper meanings and symbolism of rituals, it really starts to hurt your brain. So for example, I’m not something “to be given away” – I’m not property and noone owns me and more than that, I already left home some time ago and earn my own keep. I’m not really comfortable with a veil – what’s that about, hiding the bride’s face and all that? And then there’s the dress itself. Can I really, with a straight face, saunter down the aisle in a big white meringue and not look completely over the top? Except, some little part of me still says, in a very tiny voice, but I want to wear the dress! And .. it’s not often you have an occasion to wear a ball gown, so why not? And … but veils are so pretty! And this is a one time chance to wear one. Picking wedding colours, styles and a theme feels so defined, such a statement of “this is who I am/who we are” when really it might just be one aspect of who we are. On the other hand, we’re planning a wedding here and decisions need to be made and things booked and deposits paid. It’s all rather overwhelming.
I blogged before about this: I want our wedding to be meaningful to us and represent who we are and what kind of life we plan to make together. It very much needs to be a blend of the two of us. And for my part, throwing out a lot of the traditions feels right and wrong at the same time – I am a person who loves ritual but at the same time, cannot go along with things that have always been just because they have always been so when they let women down. Which means we have the chance to start from the foundations and build upwards. But I have no idea what that means or what that will eventually look like. Or where to start thinking about that.
That all makes it sound so much more tortured than it is! We had a lot of fun going wedding cake tasting which I might confess I took inspiration from the Gilmore Girls. Oddly though, I got over cake much quicker than I thought I would. We didn’t even eat all the cakes here in this wedding cake taster box! And in the end, it only took a morning of doing the wedding cake circuit to find the cake I wanted and lock it in. Though I maintain I will find an event to plan so I can order and serve the light green cake with Japanese orange blossoms
PS. After I wrote this post, I realised that I want to change the theme of our wedding. C just rolled his eyes. Though it has meant that I spent the weekend creating picture boards of my ideas for the theme and I’m much more excited and feel much more focused and clear on what I think I want.
Monday morning got you down? Check out the latest episode of Galactic Suburbia
In which Alex falls by the wayside and Alisa & Tansy soldier on to talk about awards, Connie Willis, Tina Fey and Chicks Digging Comics. And more comics.
News The Galactic Suburbia Award has landed.
Manfire: the latest exploration of genderbending comics protest through artwork
Ditmar nominations open (wiki with things eligible; how to nominate)
Cool comment about understanding Aussie fiction awards from outside our country.
Aurealis Awards nominees: press release
Brit Mandelo new Strange Horizons fiction editor
Pinterest for Galactic Suburbia! Thanks, Celia
Swancon Program is out – Perth SF convention this Easter.
Tansy’s Creature Court books (Power and Majesty, The Shattered City and Reign of Beasts) are now available on the Kindle internationally! Should be available on other platforms too – iBookstore etc. If you see them for sale somewhere in your country please let us know. Fly, my pretties, fly!
What Culture Have we Consumed? Alisa: All About Emily, Connie Willis; Bossypants, Tina Fey; Hunger Games Movie Tansy: Astonishing X-Men, Joss Whedon & John Cassaday; Saucer Country by Paul Cornell, Chicks Dig Comics, edited by Lynne M Thomas & Sigrid Ellis.
We’ll be giving away a copy of Beyond Binary, edited by Brit Mandelo (and featuring a Tansy story). Tweet us with the name of your favourite queer/genderqueer/QLTBG character in SF or fantasy to be in the draw!
Please send feedback to us at galacticsuburbia@gmail.com, follow us on Twitter at @galacticsuburbs, check out Galactic Suburbia Podcast on Facebook and don’t forget to leave a review on iTunes if you love us!
WARNING: Spoilers for the books and the movies herein.
Last night, after recording the latest Galactic Suburbia podcast, C and I rushed off to the movies to see The Hunger Games. The darling man that he is, knew I had been looking forward to this movie in particular and had bought Gold Class tickets as a surprise a couple of weeks ago. (really, the marrying him is such a no-brainer). I’d not been to Gold Class down here and was a bit unsure what to expect. It’s a little more expensive but you get a free soft drink and popcorn. As we entered the glass doors for the Lounge, I realised that we were not the only ones seeing a 9pm movie. And in fact, the Gold Glass at Rockingham has a lot more seats. It also has a regular movie goers section in front of the partitioned Gold Class. It was not … as exclusive, shall I say? Also there were a lot of people, which made it noisy. And we got sat next to some *younger* people. I know I am “older” now when I no longer react to over-hyped teenaged/early 20s young men who are laughing and jeering and making fun of people to a) draw attention whilst b) trying to cover their insecurities. I just mostly don’t care about what they think and I want them to be quiet. And get off my lawn.
So you can see I kinda was unimpressed and a little annoyed when the movie started. I don’t know if that impacted on how I experienced the movie. Everybody was given a bowl of popcorn as the movie started and I did like that. Also, Katniss Everdeen is pretty darn impressive – so much so that even those jeering boys were quiet as the tension mounted and I could feel they thought she was quiet the awesome.
The movie. This a review, after all. Normally, I am really forgiving of movie adaptations from books. I don’t expect the movie to be true to the story. I understand a 2 hour movie has much less scope for subplots or large casts of supporting characters. And I don’t mind if chunks of the book get left out. It’s not *all* crucial and it doesn’t *all* need to be included. A movie is not a book. However, I can’t tell if I just loved these books more than most or if my reaction is fair one. But I felt disappointed for much of the movie. I felt disconnected and a little bit robbed of my emotional journey. And I’ve spent the day thinking this through carefully. I didn’t really like or enjoy the movie.
I didn’t mind the production of this film. I imagined people in the districts to be poorer I guess we might see more of this if the second and third books get adapted. After all, we mostly see District 12 in their Sunday best for the Reaping Day. I did feel though that the whole movie felt less glossy and shiny than a Harry Potter. I’m still not sure if maybe it *should* be, given it’s post apocalypse. And I have to also say that about 5 -10 minutes in, I felt very uncomfortable because the opening Reaping Day scenes are a little bit triggering for me (all a bit too close to rounding people up for things and you know how I am with such imagery). C leaned over and reminded me I picked this film and then said we could leave whenever I wanted to. Actually, maybe that’s what I mean about it not being shiny? These scenes of the District Square and so on had a very 1940s feel to them.
But there were a lot of things I liked about this movie. The capital is very exciting and futuristic, and the stark contrast to District 12 with colour and fashion and design was really well done. Haymmich is played brilliantly by Woody Harrelson. I think he was an excellent choice of casting. The entry scene into the arena on chariots was done well as was the Girl on Fire schtick. And that whole prep prior to the game was also well captured. I found the TV hosts a little grating because they weren’t charismatic enough but at the same time you could see they served as the narrator at points (to explain stuff for info dump, not done particularly savvy) and also were a little bit of a window into the All is Not Well in the Capital foreshadowing.
But really, ultimately, I was disappointed with the storytelling from the time they entered the arena onwards. Too much was cut from this part of the story or did not translate into movie. We see very little of Peeta from when Katniss takes off once the game starts and it means that we lose the paranoid elements of the experience of being in the game – we lose Katniss’s flipping back and forwards with deciding whether he is genuine and loves her or whether he is playing her. And because this is lost, all we get is him shaking his head at her when they are on the dais waiting for the countdown, him as part of that first group of the Careers hunting her down and the trackerjacks and then her going to find him once the rules changed.
There is no motivation or explanation given for why Katniss decides to go find Peeta at this point. Why would she want to save him? We really didn’t get the sense in the movie that she didn’t want to have to kill him, that was dropped much earlier on. And so her last interaction with him is the group coming to hunt her and her setting the wasps on him. More happens between them in the book so that its obvious she would drop everything to find him. And from memory, there was something more in the book between them after the wasps and before the rule change that makes it clear that if nothing else, they are on the same side and would make a natural team. Also that she knows he is injured. In the book there are more opportunities for them to interact in the game so as to start laying down the beginning of a love story for the Hunger Games audience to engage with and make her more of an asset for the producers of the show to keep her and them in. And to in fact change the rules as a response to that. Whereas in the movie, she just ups and somehow knows where to find him and then is all kissy kissy. I was left in the cinema not buying it.
I felt ultimately that the complexity of the relationship between Peeta and Katniss is sacrificed in the movie and so it was a very bland and unsatisfying watch. Katniss’s feelings were far more complex and they make the ending more poignant (and moreish). So too, I don’t feel we got a good sense of Peeta, though possibly because them being a team inside the arena was much shorter screen time than it is in the book. You really felt at the end of the book sympathy for both Katniss because she was playing up the story to survive, yet also really values Peeta as at least a friend, her feelings on him still budding and so hurt that she had hurt him, and also for Peeta who so completely loves her and actually wanted to be picked in order to help her survive, at his own expense, and also knows that his love is helpless.
That said. And I will go back and reread the books now because I felt cheated on the ride. I did still really enjoy a lot of aspects of what makes The Hunger Games awesome. I was struck by how lovely it was to see a heroine dressed up in hero garb – in this case the unitard of the training gear – and still *look* like a woman. She’s tough, there’s no doubt, and there were some great scenes of her fighting guys, and the climatic scene on top of the cornucopia where Peeta gives her a hoist up and then she turns round and pulls him up after her. She clearly was strong and equal physically, which is refreshing to see on the movie screen. She doesn’t just fight the girls and she doesn’t only accept help from the boys. But they never took away from her her womanness. If I can say that. Whether in hunting gear or the ball gown, she was still always feminine. And one of her strongest traits, and I think assets, was her maternal instincts. So used to mothering Prim, she mothers Rue – which is heartbreaking. Oh Rue!! And in turn, Rue is a very strong and important ally. And she cares for Peeta when he was hurt. And then even in the final moment, when she shoots the final dude, I forget his name? and he falls off to the wolves below, her “humanity” is to put him down, with that last final arrow. She is tough and a hunter and survivor, but she is still loving and full of compassion and care. I liked the way they were portrayed.
So, in all. I dunno. It felt like a let down. Am I too much of a fan of The Hunger Games? Did it get in the way of my watching? C had not read the books and said he felt it hung together quite well. He felt less disappointed than me.
I’m going to spend the weekend immersed in the books again. Send tissues and chocolate.
EDIT TO ADD: I realised I hadn’t touched on the depiction of violence in the movie and I wanted to mention it. There are dead bodies of kids. There is some you know, killing of kids. A lot of it is offscreen, as it is in the book. And a lot of the rest of it is filmed in such a way that you can’t really see what’s happening – shaky and unfocussed cam etc. That said, there is no escaping Rue’s death. And its horrible and poignant. And I cried lots.
Trigger warning: I talk about food issues herein.
Well it’s week 6 of this 12 week program I’m on – almost half way through. Already? It’s hard to believe actually. I thought it would be so much harder – to give up some of my much loved habits and I thought it would be harder to drag myself up off the couch. Which is not to say that there haven’t been skipped workout sessions or off program meals but they have been the exception rather than the norm. I’ve never stayed on a program this long before. I am the queen of the two week flunk out, to be truthful.
It’s weird to know that I really can go 6 weeks without a packet of lollies and not only not die but not even really miss them. Sure I get the odd craving but it turns out cravings are fleeting. Huh. There are a few things that I have downshifted calories and servings sizes so as to not have to give them up completely. I might really think the world without chocolate is not worthwhile so I’ve shifted to a sugar free dark chocolate which, to be honest, is really not that bad. And we’re also allowed a brand of low fat ice-creams so I’ve not really gone ice-cream-free either.
That said, there have been two main reasons for stopping myself from throwing it out the window and diving into the mini fun size choccie bars flopped seductively in their charity box just 10 steps down from my office cubicle. The first is that I really have worked hard to get to here, both physically and mentally, and I don’t want to undo that and that leads into the second, which is, I suspect that if I had one taste, just one, I wouldn’t be able to stop again. I’d be back into those foods having a hold over me and I’d be back where I started. If I could have just one chocolate bar and stop. And then not have another for a while, I’d be ok. And the goal is to get to that place. I just think it’s a little while off from here still.
So, where am I at? Cause as it turns out, it isn’t just about losing weight.
I’ve lost 5 kg in 5 weeks, which I’m quite happy with. My 12 week goal was to lose half a kilo a week (6kg) and I almost completed that in the first third of the program. I have had to review my goals (which is apparently what you are supposed to do and not just me shifting the goalposts) and now am aiming to lose 12 kg by the end.
We’re eating a lot more healthily and consistently than we were before. We clean out the fridge at the end of every week because we need to make room for the new week’s food plan. I noticed this weekend that we threw out a lot less moldy fruit and veggies and that we had almost no leftovers from cooked meals in the fridge at all. And what went in were almost all fresh, unprocessed groceries. And lots and lots of colour.
On top of this, I’ve started taking a nighttime multivitamin which is supposed to promote rest and repair for your body. I’m really really crap at remembering to take multivitamins in the morning but a nighttime one suits me perfectly and I’ve been really consistent about this.
So the sum of all these things is that I am sleeping better than I have done in years. In YEARS! Yes I also gave up espresso coffee. And I’m exercising a lot more than I was before. And OMG sleeeeep. I know that’s the thing people with children tease you about but I have never ever been a good sleeper so being able to sleep through the whole night without waking up 6 times? Divine! And new for me. And you know what else? I wake up feel rested. RESTED! It’s like a whole new body. Every day. And therefore, unsurprisingly, my Crohn’s is really settling down. I’ve found the nutrition plan has a lot more gluten in it than I would ordinarily eat. We’ve sort of tried the food as is to get a feel for it but this week I am switching things out to replace, especially bread, with gluten free options. I’ll be interested to see how this plays out.
And exercise. OMG exercise. I have a love/hate relationship with it. It’s always been this way for me – putting on the clothes (to be fair, more so when it was those thick ballet stockings with the seam you had to have perfectly straight) is always the hardest part for me and sometimes can be the stumbling block I cannot climb. I am enjoying seeing myself get fitter and stronger. I’m enjoying being able to do more and recover faster. Today I ran all the way down to the sports complex and back and I can’t believe how comfortably I did that (in 3 min/2mn run/walk blocks). I’m getting the endorphin rush that makes it all worthwhile. And I’m also really aware of all the studies that show how exercise can alleviate depression and Crohn’s symptoms.
I’m also *moving* around and strengthening core muscles! I’m suddenly aware of how many friends of mine suffer from RSI and it occurred to me that whilst I am not a writer, I still spend a lot of time at a desk and then further hours hunched over a laptop. It might be prudent for me to be proactive about preventing injuries. I’ve noticed since about the first week of this program that my headaches have gone – I used to pretty much have constant headaches and now I know, because I *remember* them, that I have had only 3 in the past 6 weeks. Not only that but my neck issues seem to have eased up as well. And you know, physios and doctors tell you that exercise will help but you kinda look at them and think something FREE will fix this? Come on! Yeah it turns out getting off your arse and moving around a bit is good for you. Who knew?
I’m only 6 weeks in. I have to make it another 6 weeks and then beyond. And I don’t know how I will go yet. But I have started to get really (more) cynical about a bunch of things in modern life. All these things that are supposed to be convenient and help you save time but really make you fat and lazy and cost you money and then you have to pay more money to get thin and moving and so on. You really have to wonder what kinds of mugs we are, just lapping up all the cola and fries we can get whilst flicking the channels on the remote.
Apologies for this and the next couple of posts I’m going to make. They’re a bit of a whinge and a self kicking but I feel like I need to get them down here before I can move beyond them. Not talking or writing about it is becoming a block and not helping with the working to move past it.
It’s not surprising given how I feel – frustrated and drowning – that I’m not getting much done on my craft projects. And that frustrates me even more – craft is my outlet. But not being able to face crafting? Makes me even sadder. I noticed that what I have been able to do is more of the scrap quilt. And worse, I noticed I was doing it with almost an obsessive quality. And … well … this is not a project that is going to have a quick end date which means there is no quick payoff or enjoyment to dedicating myself to it. I’m not even really getting scraps tidied up and reduced because there are just *so many* of them. And it’s an example of how I so easily get sidetracked and how I do it as an avoidance technique.
Once I identified this, I realised it was because I was stuck pairing the above triangles for my 
charm quilt project. So I spread them all out on the table, as you can see, to just, face up to it and start making hexagons. Mm.. I have a lot of charm pieces. And they don’t match. I managed to pull maybe 8 hexagons (6 triangles in each) out of these stacks last weekend. And then I just got kinda depressed with the damn project. I can’t make those damn pieces match. And … *deep breath* I kinda hate how the project is turning out. Here is just a small part of the pieced quilt top so far. I just. It’s not really doing anything for me. It’s not really going where I wanted it to go. And I can’t tell if this is just deep-into-project-fatigue or my general ennui or if it totally sucks. And none of these are really helping with the getting on with working on, and enjoying making, the quilt.
So that’s not really going very well. And neither is the rest of it. I was really inspired and loving the craft projects I had on the go. And the point of having the spare bed in the craft room was to have it as a working space to piece quilt tops and get them to the finished stage this year. This is how the bed looks at the moment – and this is after I cleared all the clean laundry off it and put that away. I can see 6 separate projects there in various levels of disarray and there is at least one more to the right of that box. Nothing about this inspires creativity.
AND. Course of course there is an And. I’ve been researching for the craft ebook project and listening to a lot of back episodes of Cast On podcast (more about the VJJ project later). And I am starting to miss my knitting. I have this terror of switching crafts – I’m sure I felt it when knitting about moving into quilting and now that I am here, ensconced in quilting, I don’t want to get absorbed back into knitting and abandon all these projects. But as much as I am kinda feeling I’d like to get back into knitting, or figuring out how to knit and sew at the same points in my time-space continuum, I think I’d like to try a sweater. I’ve never knit a jumper before. Which is not really 100% true – I have a kimono jacket which has been on the needles, possibly since the ex and I split. And this not finished. I’ve never embarked on a large knitted project and I’m kinda tempted. But at the same time, I feel like I need to finish the many many WIPs I have on needles about the place. And what’s stopping me? Not knowing where I was up to on most of them.
Can you say it with me now? AAAAAARRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHH!!!
Am I driving myself crazy right now?
Yes.
I am so struggling to keep a daily blog. I can’t even express how frustrating I find this one thing. I’ve been blogging for longer than any of the other things that I do. I started my first blog, back in the days of Diaryland (yes, I am *that* old), to make sure that there was some point in my day, every day, that I sat down and wrote something. So it’s really sad for me to turn around at the end of another week and see that I didn’t get time to sit down and write something.
And it’s also frustrating to me that I am still grappling with what does and does not feel appropriate to post about. It used to be that everything in my life was fair game. And I posted in a no holds barred way. And maybe that became a bit of a train wreck at some points. I made and lost friends over some of the posts. But it felt a lot less restrictive. These days, even though they aren’t really directly linked, I am still the public face for my press and that’s deeply important to me.
Actually, I do have a few things I want to sit down and write about and I hope I will start to get on top of things so that I can sit down and … write again. Because that’s the other thing giving me great frustrating these days – time. And my lack of it. I’m desperately frustrated at the moment – drowning and drowning in my frustration about the drowning. And I guess more than a little frustrated at my current lack of being able to do something about it. There are a few things going on in the background but none of them are guaranteed at the moment. And so I am left with constantly feeling like no matter how hard I work, I have barely taken a chunk out of the to do pile. I worked solidly yesterday all day, even waking up a bit early for me for a Sunday, and still barely scraped the surface. It’s a very very upsetting thing to see where it is you want to go, and the path you need to take but a lack in the funds and time to actually do it. And if that is why I ultimately fail, I will be heartbroken about it, I think.
I hope this malaise is really just the dark before the dawn. I do have things in motion to deal with some of these things. I’ve had to admit that I really am going to have to delegate if I want to get as much as I want done. There is really only so much work that one person can do in a week. I’ve been so lucky to have Terri come on board to pick up Publicity and Promotions for me. It’s such a crucial aspect and yet so easy to not be on top of as you grapple to meet print deadlines and editing and so on. We had a really productive 3 hour(!) meeting a couple of weeks ago now and have so many ideas and tasks to develop. I’m also hoping t oset up some new interns who are coming on board. We really do have some cool projects under development, and I can’t wait to start making progress on them.
Thanks everyone for your responses to yesterday’s vox pop. I’m going to tally all the responses later because I think there were some interesting things in it.
Meanwhile. Today the Aurealis Award shortlist came out and I’m delighted to see the Twelve Planets series get a few nods. Namely, Bad Power by Deborah Biancotti, Nightsiders by Sue Isle and Love and Romanpunk by Tansy Rayner Roberts are all shortlisted for Best Collection. I’m so very proud of these three books. Additional nods came in the Young Adult category where both “Nation of the Night” (Nightsiders) and “The Patrician” (Love and Romanpunk) also got shortlisted.
Huge congratulations to all the other shortlisters. The full list is over at Tehani’s blog if you’re interested.
I have so much to update here but here is something really interesting I just came across on the interwebs:
The real reason it’s so hard to get your Australian novel published
which I came to via, Who’s afraid of Australian novels?
Which pauses me to ask you, when was the last time you bought an Australian novel? Answers in the comments box, just as a fun exercise. I mean, I’m in the process of buying Australian novels to publish but it’s an interesting question. As I looked round to see what I have just recently bought and when I last bought an Aussie novel, I guess we bought Tansy’s Reign of Beasts last month in February. And before that, maybe The Courier’s New Bicycle? at Xmas/New Year? Not too bad really. But if I was to go back before that … probably the last time I was at Crow’s Books and it was raining that day and I still worked at my old job.
So, how about you? (Bearing in mind you’re probably doing the AWW 2012 challenge, right? :P)
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