Reading: Zombies of the Gene Pool
Music: Holdstock and MacLeod - Deepwater Shanties
TV/Movie: Spinal Tap
Link o' the Day: Odd Todd

Welcome to Tuesday!

A good, productive sort of day. A good amount of housecleaning got done today. I blew through around 5 or 6 chapters of the Zorro book. A very tedious affair of placing pictures with descriptions, prices, etc. But I got a good amount done today. Also working on the June 08 issue of the medical journal. Just got the first round of changes today and am going to tackle some of it now so I don't have to worry about it later. This weekend is Banjo Camp North and I'm totally psyched.

Gonna be a good weekend. I wonder if it's too late to get Pretty Maggie a banjo so she could join me. Hmmm.

And speaking of music, it's Tuesday, which is session night. So me and the tenor banjo (as opposed to the five-string bluegrass one featured this weekend) and the bodhran are going to head down to Patrick's Pub for the weekly round of Irish music.

So all in all. Good times.

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Weather is nice. Windy, but nice. Now you know.

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So how would you define Space Opera? I ask because it's a topic that's come up recently on one of my mailing lists. Some have said that Space Opera stories should take place exclusively on spaceships. Planet-bound stories are considered Planetary Romances.

My favorite definition of Space Opera is "things blow up." I wish I could remember who said that. A couple of authors I met at Torcon--but I can't remember which ones.

I think Space Opera should include all these things. Spaceships. Exotic worlds. Things blowing up. As someone on the list pointed out, Horse Operas don't take place exclusively on a saddle, do they? But there should be a horse or three there someplace.

I think of this because one of the anthologies I'll be doing will, hopefully, be devoted to Space Operas, and I need to think about parameters.

I've written short stories that included exploding spaceships. I've written stories set on exotic worlds.

But I've not written enough.

Hmm.

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Frequent visitor maggie, aka "electricgrandmother" pointed me to a link called Odd Todd which seems to be devoted to the life of lay-offs--that is, stuff for folks who have been laid off work, like me, to do. It's basically devoted to time-wasting activities. There's a bit of a community there, so it's a support system for some. I'm not sure if it's for me. I have enough to keep me occupied, but I could certainly see visiting it from time to time.

Enjoy!