Yesterday, I finally got around to reading High Windows by Lavie Tidhar. It was published in Strange Horizons several weeeks ago, but I missed it at the time.

I really liked it, despite the inclusion of several sex scenes of a fairly uncomfortable-to-read variety. (Sex scenes per se are fine by me, but, straight, narrow and boring person that I am, gay male prostitution and high-tech S&M push my comfort zone.) Anyway, it combined the features that I liked most in Tidhar's recent Flytrap and Clarkesworld stories.

I thought the Clarkesworld story (edgy alternate history) was conceptually interesting, but the setting just didn't feel concretized to me. The Fytrap story (futuristic warfare in a vaguely culturally Asian setting) had lovely mood and imagery but was practically nothing *but* mood and imagery. This one had settings that felt real to me, *and* a conceptually interesting story with some plot substance to it. And yes, despite being a fairly short story and having some thoroughly un-traditional elements, it had some of that sense of narrative sweep of the good old-fashioned space opera variety.

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This month's "open slot" story at Clarkesworld, The Other Amazon by Jenny Davidson, was fun in a completely different way...and, hey, it was downright wholesome by contrast to the last couple of open slot stories Mamatas has published. A bit lacking in plot in the most traditional sense, but I was tickled enough by the premise to like it anyway. And I very much hope that Robin McKinley reads the story and is inspired to actually write the "Sunshine" prequel Davidson has her write in the future.

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Apropos nothing, I had Comedy Central on in the other room the other night (so I didn't catch who the comedian was) when I caught the following line, which I liked enough to pass on, paraphrased from memory:

"Some of these young married couples I know, they pretend to agree about the strangest things. I have conversations with them that are like, 'hey, did you see that movie?' 'Oh yes, *we* saw it.' 'Um, what did you think?' 'Well, *we* thought the script was good, but the backlighting in some of the scenes could have been done differently...' Now, I don't believe that even a married couple of lighting directors would really have exactly the same opinion about that..."

Which had me practically rolling on the floor laughing, since it sounded so much like some conversations that I've actually had. The "we" thing in those sorts of contexts comes off as very, very creepy.