For the past week, I've had a really bad head-chest cold that has kept me from doing much of anything requiring thought.

Posted by: JohnL at 09:26 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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What a fascinating modern age we live in! Restaurants are guarding their fryer grease. And Peru is once again...guarding its guano!

Posted by: Fred Kiesche at 09:28 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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We've landed a probe on the northern polar region of Mars and it is beaming some great pictures back to Earth. A spacecraft in orbit snapped a photograph of a spacecraft landing on Mars. We're about to launch a shuttle to deliver a huge laboratory to the ISS. So what was the coverage on the news I saw today and what subject dominated the NASA pre-launch press briefing.

The toilet on the ISS is malfunctioning.

Sigh.

Posted by: Fred Kiesche at 09:02 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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A while back I came across a list of movies, books and other entertainment items on the International Space Station. I forwarded that list to Baen Books, as I noticed that a good chunk of the titles involved were from that publisher.

Somewhat jokingly I suggested that, in the spirit of their programs to give free books to members of the military and free books to disabled readers, they ought to give free books to the crew of the ISS.

Gee...maybe I should have suggested they give me a book contract. Because it appears they listened to me!

(I can't complain. They get free books, and I got a free Baen Books apron and a bunch of bookmarks and a sheet of autographed bookplates!)

Posted by: Fred Kiesche at 07:47 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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Just how hard can it be to post one sentence a day?

Posted by: JohnL at 08:43 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Rumors of War (200

The list can now be found here.

Posted by: Fred Kiesche at 09:10 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Another Fine Myth; Robert Asprin (part of Myth Adventures, Volume One) (Meisha Merlin; 2006; ISBN 1-59222-111-4; cover by Phil Foglio).

Just about the same time that I learned the sad news that Robert Asprin had passed away, I was finishing up this book. Meisha Merlin had put out two omnibus editions (this one is made up of Another Fine Myth, Myth Conceptions, Myth Directions, Hit or Myth, Myth-ing Persons and Little Myth Marker); shortly afterwards, Meisha Merlin went under. What is it with small publishers and this series? It's a curse, I tell you...

The first volume is the tale of Skeeve, an apprentice magician and Aahz, a demon. Skeeve's teacher summons Aahz to impress Skeeve, but not only ends up dead but has a hand in Aahz losing his powers. Toss in a baby dragon, a demon hunter, a beautiful assassin, various sidekicks, a war unicorn, dimensional travel...and another magician who is trying to take things over. Lots of puns, lots of verbal jokes in names, each chapter is headed by a quote allegedly made by folks ranging from Hamlet to Bruce Lee to Laurel and Hardy and others.

Due to various unfortunate events (failing publishers, books going out of print, troubles with the IRS), this series never gained the widespread reputation that it should have. Sure we have Rowling. We have Pratchett. But the name of Asprin should have been as widely known. The books are a hoot 'n' a holler. They're fun. They're a riot. Seek them out.

Posted by: Fred Kiesche at 07:55 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Fragile Things; Neil Gaiman (Harper Perennial; 2007; ISBN 978-0-06-125202-0; cover by Gregg Kulick).

Smoke and Mirrors; Neil Gaiman (Harper Perennial; 2001; ISBN 0-06-093470-0; cover by J.K. Potter).

The review can now be found here.

Posted by: Fred Kiesche at 07:42 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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They've gone and planted a flag on another planet. Again!

Seriously folks, take a look at this image. The Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter took a shot of Phoenix as it was landing!!!

Posted by: Fred Kiesche at 06:58 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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...Did anybody feel the need to remake The Andromeda Strain? I'll watch it from end to end later, but the ten or so minutes I saw were...uninspiring...

Posted by: Fred Kiesche at 07:13 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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The day started with me spending about an hour swatting spam comments on Ye Olde Blog (frakking bustards), then boiling rice and chopped meat (not for personal consumption; it seems that New Dog had come with, and now has passed to Old Dog, um, "digestive issues"!). Now, I've cleaned the fish tank, I am ready to get cleaned up, finish one military history, maybe start another.

In the meantime, I put on a pot of beans.

The recipe comes from The El Paso Chili Company's Texas Border Cookbook (W. Park Kerr and Norma Kerr). This is one of those cookbooks that I will probably wear out, it has a number of dishes that I make again and again. Their pot beans (Frijoles de Olla) is a favorite that leads to other dishes such as Well-Fried Beans (Frijoles Refritos) as well as being put into various pots of chili.

The author's point out that this is comfort food on several levels. The cooking process is long, but relaxes you. It's nice to know you've got a pot simmering, or waiting for you in the refrigerator. And it is nice to make a batch of frijoles refritos, put them into tortillas with some cheese and maybe some meat, freeze them, and bring them to work for several months afterwards.

Good eats!

I'd love to visit this restaurant. Several times. The cookbook, as I said, is excellent. The only problem I've found is that living in the nether regions, I often have to send away for ingredients or substitute. Things are getting easier, but you still occasionally run across something that causes you to scratch your head. more...

Posted by: Fred Kiesche at 08:36 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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The first pictures are coming in from the Mars Phoenix Lander (only on television nothing on the web yet). From the looks of things, Phoenix managed to miss any rocks and the area that we've seen (so far) actually looks very flat. Can't tell if the surface is ice and dirt mixed, ice covered by dirt, dirt-colored ice or what. One picture being displayed is of a landing pad, it does not appear to have sunk into the ground much (if at all).

UPDATE: Raw image, taken directly from television, now available.

Posted by: Fred Kiesche at 08:07 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Ernst Stuhlinger, one of the last members of Werner von Braun's original rocket team has passed away.

Stuhlinger was a key inventor of ion propulsion, a system that has been used successfully on several missions to the Moon, the asteroids and one comet. Probably more of the public know him than they realize, thanks to his work in the 1950's Walt Disney television shows which featured realistic depictions of voyages to the Moon and Mars.

Posted by: Fred Kiesche at 06:46 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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The Mars Phoenix Lander has successfully landed in the northern polar region of Mars. Waiting on the first pictures.

Posted by: Fred Kiesche at 06:29 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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I have recently discovered (and highly recommend) Liquid Tension Experiment.

Posted by: JohnL at 08:40 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Did the universe move for you? For you see, not only was John Scalzi in a coffee shop, but he was in a Starbucks and even (apparently) had some coffee!!!

See thousands of Scalzi fans rending their copies of You're Not Fooling Anybody When You Take Your Laptop to a Coffee Shop into so much pulp! See the stock price of $tarbucks climb as those thousands of fans embrace coffee again!

The paradigm, she has shifted.

Posted by: Fred Kiesche at 09:31 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Ever since William Gibson's Pattern Recognition came out, it has been impossible to purchase a Curat calculator. Now you can play with one to your heart's content, in a virtual fashion (all sorts of good stuff on the gadget can be found here).

Posted by: Fred Kiesche at 08:30 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Related to the previous posting, I'd love to get this for my house.

Back Off I'm Doing Science.

Posted by: Fred Kiesche at 08:11 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Some nifty t-shirts for those who live in the the future (depicted in the past).

Posted by: Fred Kiesche at 08:06 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Via Bill Fawcett...

Robert Asprin (1946-200

On May 22, 2008, Bob passed away quietly in his home in New Orleans, LA. He had been in good spirits and working on several new projects, and was set to be the Guest of Honor at a major science fiction convention that very weekend. He is survived by his mother, his sister, his daughter and his son, and his cat, Princess, not to mention countless friends and fans and numerous legendary fictional characters. He will be greatly missed.

Asprin should have been the "American Pratchett". He wrote great humorous science fiction and fantasy. His career was impacted by the Internal Revenue Service, which took his income from solo works for a long period. With the Thieves' World series, he helped to start the shared-world anthologies that so many publishers fell in love with. The MythAdventure series and the Phule series were both great examples of humorous genre fiction.

Posted by: Fred Kiesche at 07:53 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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