In some ways, I am remarkably like my cats: anything that comes into the house, I do rather tend to think it's mine. For keepsies. I had houseguests, but apparently I'm not allowed to keep them? They went away! pennski and bookzombie were here, and now they're not. We are desolate, the boys and I. We eat leftovers, and watch long movies about poor leadership, futile gestures and...

With my usual distorted sense of priorities, I have prepared for houseguests by shopping and cooking all day. At 1600hrs, I remembered that they might just be arriving at 1700hrs. Eek. So Mac and I made up their bed (he did all the useful stuff, the pouncing and rolling around on clean sheets, while I faffed about in the background), and then I got out the Evil Machine of Suckage, and proceeded to...

Last Saturday morning Chris and I went out for a run and a walk together. With the aid of a piece of string and google maps I found out we covered 4.25 miles in 55 minutes. We did the same route again today and only took 50 minutes. I'm so proud of us both! I'm trying to keep up with the running and I'd like to run twice a week with Chris, once a week with Scott and once more either by myself or possibly...

We thought it was all over for Andy Murray in the third set - when look what happened! I still can't believe he won. Yes, for the next week, bookzombie and I will be tennis bores.

I have just finished reading the fabulous "Diana Wynne Jones: Children's Literature and the Fantastic Tradition" by Farah Mendlesohn. ISBN 0-415-97023-7. What follows is partly a brief account of that book - go buy! go read! tell me what you think! - but also a record of the effect it has had. Not only did this book explore different types of fantasy and how they are exploited and subverted by DWJ...

I asked bookzombie to get me Farah's book on DWJ for my birthday (ISBN 0-415-97023-7) and he spotted that we were both in the acknowledgements! This is a first for me and I'm very pleased. It's the second time for bookzombie (thanks Mr Meaney!). And then I turned to the index and found bookzombie again - he has a note! Huzzah! My best beloved has a note in an academic work...

include (i.e. I ran into a lot of people, and I have a terrible memory. If I do not mention you as being in a particular place or on a particular panel, I apologize -- there was just too much stuff and not enough rest this weekend to keep it all in my head. ;)) Pre-Con And Thursday I have learned a couple of things.   First: Try and get your con duties done as far ahead of the con as possible...

Nifty! p.s. Talking to yourself is a sign of impending mental collapse! Total comments: 1967 1 badgerbag 386 2 wild_irises 104 3 vito_excalibur 69 4 eriktrips 58 5 pantryslut 57 6 cynthia1960 46 7 pennski 41 8 bibliofile 40 9 Anonymous 38 10 ...

In late February , pennski proposed bringing a typical British cake to Eastercon to explore the hypothesis that British cakes, while dry, are redeemed by being consumed with tea. It seemed only fair that I bring a cake too, one representative of American cakes. Thus it was that we, along with bookzombie , settled down with cups of tea (camomile in my case), improvised plates, and...

Was brilliant! The 2 panels I was on both went well and I was touched to have Tanith Lee telling me to write fiction and fjm telling me to write more reviews instead (seconded by a voice from the back of the hall). bookzombie was also on 2 panels - with lively debate in the first. Sadly I missed the second which sounds like it was a hoot! China Mieville's guest of honour speech...