A seething mass of turgid drama.

Project Reorganize status: ongoing. Progress is progressing.
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Or, What Happens When I Am Thrown Off My Routine.

I woke up ~ 4AM with a headache. Fortunately, no nausea; probably smoke-related rather than migraine. So I got up, took a pill, and then because I was fully awake went to pet the cat in his heated bed. He proceeded to lead me to the Designated Pick-Me-Up spot, so I did. He groomed me for ten minutes and then sodded off back to bed. I was unable to get back to sleep, but at least the headache diminished.

I kept tossing and turning as I waited for my 5 AM alarm. Finally I heard the newspapers hit the front door. They're supposed to be delivered by 5:30 but today was closer to 5:45. Oops - yesterday when I turned off my alarm, I apparently turned off my alarm. Oh well.

So, quick shower, get dressed, make coffee. I'm working my way through a batch of chicken congee for breakfast and because we don't have a microwave, I'm eating it at work. So not eating breakfast before leaving helped out today. But I still had to rush a bit.

When I got to BART, I realized my bag felt light. Oops: I forgot to put my book back into the bag. Oh well; I can play games on my tablet during the bus ride home today. Except... yup, left the tablet at home too.

Accomplishments, in no particular order:

Did some light reading

Made bread (which exploded far beyond my expectations - good, but weird)

Started 4 lbs of pork loin in a brine for lonza

Played a bit on the computer

Made fabulous strawberry ice cream

Did some exchequery things that needed doing

Vegged out with the wife and cat

Had a wonderful summer dinner of grilled beef bavette, grilled corn, aforementioned fresh bread, and grilled padron peppers, followed by leftover strawberries and whipped cream

Saw the pre-Raphaelite exhibit at the Legion (well worth seeing)

"(author x) is not your Bitch" is the go-to response to any complaint that a book hasn't been released. And I understand why Neil Gaiman wrote that. From the author's perspective, it's totally true - readers do not have a claim on authors.

But. Brent Weeks, a mid-B-lister author, wrote something a few years back that stuck with me. He pointed out that A-listers are generally going to have their audience regardless of when they write. If GRRM were to ever write another Game of Thrones book - which I personally doubt, but I've been wrong before - it'd be a bestseller. Perhaps less so since the TV series, but still. Gaiman can sell as many books as he can write, and it doesn't matter how long it is between releases.

Weeks was apologizing for reworking the third book in a trilogy (which ended up as, so far, a five-parter) and delaying publication. His fear is that B-listers like himself don't have that guaranteed audience. If they don't maintain their fanbase and mindshare, the readers will simply go someplace else to read what is being published. And maybe they don't come back.

That's what I've done with GRRM, actually. I devoured the first two books, instantly bought the third and fourth when they came out, and eagerly awaited the next. And then less so. And now... I might get it from the library but I really don't care anymore. I'm no longer invested. That never would have happened had the books come out on some vague schedule.

I'm not arguing that authors should constantly pump out dreck solely to publish, Piers Anthony-style. I am saying that the reader's side also matters.

I went to SF in SF for the first time in quite a while last night. They often run them on Sunday evenings, so I tend not to go unless there's an author I want to hear/get books signed. In this case it was two - one local, one formerly local now in Oregon. I've quite enjoyed both their books, which are quite different but maybe share a sense of humor. I haven't quite enjoyed them enough to buy them; my bar for buying books has gotten pretty high the last five years.

Megan O'Keefe has written a steampunkish fantasy trilogy centering around two con artists. I like well-done heist novels, and the characters are fun. (Plus the interactions are Wodehouse-esque.) Curtis Chen has written a couple sci-fi novels about a spy with a superpower (he can open a "pocket" to an empty parallel universe, which is handy for storing stuff). But the spy is hardly James Bond; he's a total amateur.

Both authors read from a couple of their works and took questions. I enjoyed it. The only downside was suffering a major calf cramp as I jogged across a busy intersection. I couldn't exactly do anything about it, and limping the 3 blocks to where I parked didn't help matters. It's better today although still bugging me.

As I get time (ha!) and effort (ha ha!) to sum up...
Omnivore Books had an event for Stephen Grasse, the founder of Sailor Jerry rum (which I have not had) and Hendricks Gin (which I have and liked). He's got a new book out: Colonial Spirits, about the US history with founders and booze. Short version: if it could be made into booze, they did. Jefferson "made shitty wine"; Washington was smarter and distilled whiskey, which they have re-opened on Mount Vernon.

Grasse is an interesting guy. He's apparently a bit of a rock star in the booze consulting world. He knows it and certainly has some diva qualities. On the other hand, he's got lots of good stories and knows how to play to an audience be it large (the bookstore was pretty full) or small (six of us went out to dinner with him afterwards). It was a fun time and I may try some of the adapted colonial booze recipes from his book. Some of the punches look good; they made a sample at the event that I quite enjoyed.

Zinziber's publication date was pushed back. Again. It was originally due October 2015, I think? Prospect Books not getting it done is the most likely culprit but aryanhwy, you should hit up your colleague for an explanation. Says the self-entitled impatient purchaser.

So, Charles Stross.
He did a reading and signing earlier in the day, which I was unable to attend. I might not have gone in any case; while I have enjoyed a number of his books (love the Laundry Files, quite liked the first Merchant Princes book but got bored as it got increasingly ranty, meh on most of the space opera) I do not own any of them. However, Borderlands occasionally offers sponsors extras. In this case, spending a couple hours with Charlie and his wife at a bar afterwards. I put in my name and was one of the ten drawn from the hat.

It was fun. Charlie felt no need to restrain his feelings, and indulged his rantyness. Sometimes this was hilarious, other times entertaining and interesting, occasionally an internal eye-roll on my part. (He's a Scottish socialist; I'm neither.) One example of a long-winded, hilarious diatribe was his story about going from drug-running [as a licensed pharmacist] to becoming a computer scientist, thus becoming the "only actual qualified cyberpunk."

Also good chattage with other Borderlands sponsors, because we're similar book geeks. I bailed a bit after 9 PM, because Sunday night. People were still going strong. I made sure to thank Jude from Borderlands for the opportunity.

I just finished a collection of Anthony Boucher's short SF stories (thanks, NESFA!). In general they were good. Boucher was primarily an editor, although he also reviewed mysteries for the San Francisco Chronicle and taught at Cal. There's a long-running mystery convention named after him.
Many of the stories were somewhat dated - they were written during WWII, after all. One of the last ones went the opposite way I thought it would, and I think it would be far more interesting the way I envisioned. So, as a way of getting it out of my head:

The editor of a small-town newspaper is granted one wish. He wishes that the newspaper should always publish the truth (it's the masthead slogan). He gradually realizes that everything he publishes comes true - at least within the circulation area. When he headlines "War Ends!" the town acts as if there were no longer a draft, ration coupons, etc; but the federal government eventually sends an agent to investigate why they've stopped complying. Eventually he realizes that he's abusing the power and publishes a retraction of the ability.

How I thought the story would go: The other way 'round. Instead of everything he publishes coming true, he only has the ability to publish what is true. Hilarious problems with advertisers! Even more so with politicians! How do you make stories interesting when you are limited to exact descriptions? Or constant usage of "This reporter thinks that..." Basically, it's a more nuanced problem.

I just finished Sausage: A Global History by Gary Allen. It's a decent little book in a series dedicated to food and drink - a good overview, some modern recipes, a fair number of photos and historic advertisements. There's nothing really that I didn't know, but it's a much deeper dive into the history than any other charcuterie book I've read.

The second chapter (the title still makes me snerk - "Some Historical Sausages and the Links Between Them") starts with a couple allusions from The Iliad and goes forward. Apicius, check. Both the 10th and the 13th c. Middle Eastern cookery books, that's unusual. Form of Curye, Menagier, Guter Spise, check. Rumpolt, that's less common. Manuel de Mujeres? Ouverture de Cuisine? Dude did some serious research.

Eventually I get to the acknowledgements, here put in the back.

"I have to first thank Ken Albala, historian of all things culinary, who practises what he preaches."

Ah, that makes sense!

"He put me in touch with Jeremy Fletcher, who has collected and translated a vast number of medieval and Renaissance sausage recipes."

...
I'm glad the Charcuterie doc was useful. I did not translate much of it, of course, and the doc has full attribution to those who did. But, um. Is it bragging to say that I know his pre-1600 research is accurate?