for writers

Jeff brought home a portable scanner for me yesterday (Visioneer PaperPort Strobe) and I've been having fun with it. Apparently it also does some OCR, faxing, and photocopying. The scanning quality isn't the best, but it's not bad for something so small. I scanned a bunch of pics for the ConCerto report. Site of the Day: The Astounding B Monster (thanks to Randy Hoffman for the suggestion).
Hey, Inkspot/Inklings got mentioned in the most recent issue of Netsurfer Digest:

FOR WRITERS

Inkspot is a cool Web site if you're a writer. This frequently updated
resource offers market information and other key writer stuff in its
biweekly newsletter, "Inklings". You can subscribe (it's free) at the
site, search through an archive of back issues, and read articles
about topics such as self-publishing and manuscript submission.
Bookmark it if you want to be the next Hemingway.
<http://www.inkspot.com/>

pre-toronto trek

Looking forward to Toronto Trek! We'll be there Saturday through Sunday. Organized a writer's chat with children's author Karleen Bradford last night which went pretty well in spite of the technical glitches (poor Karleen kept getting disconnected). The scanner's pretty neat; I'm still learning how to use it properly. And it gives me the chance to post silly things here like this collector's item I found while cleaning my office.
Today's Site: Music Festival Finder.

guest blatherer: rand

Fun practice last night...went over some of our repertoire for Toronto Trek including our new Babylon Five song. Lazarus (Allison's tamagochi) is thriving! She is a much better mother than I ever was, even though she hardly ever feeds it icecream.

[6:09:56 PM] Rand is here! He is going to be my Guest Blatherer today. Take it away, radboy.... the human ear is comprised of 27 parts, each of which is trained from birth to fight off wax. i'm over here enjoying a rainy day off in toronto. what about you? this blathering thing takes effort. don't let anyone fool you. and some people do it everyday. did you all know that english was joseph conrad's second language? and he wrote arguably the best novella in the english language. imagine that. i'm going to stop now and enjoy a nice, tall glass of ice-9 before driving home.

toronto trek prep

Quick blather before I finish packing for Toronto Trek. Packing becomes more and more difficult each con as I accumulate more and more hand percussion instruments. I find I can longer take them all with me and it becomes a painful task to have to choose which to leave behind. I'm starting to learn how to play the bongo drums, but part of me wonders if it's worth it...how am I going to carry it??? Allison has a good point, though...hopefully I can beg and borrow instruments like that at conventions. Anyway, hope to see some of you at TT. Today's Site: Toonagram (email a cartoon to a friend!)

toronto trek report

Had fun at TT. Highlights include: watching Allison take care of her tamagochi Lazarus all weekend (she had him hanging from a cord around her neck so she would be able to hear him when he beeped), Saturday night filk, Allison being offered gum by B5 GoH Claudia Christian in the hotel elevator (Claudia Christian, incidentally, has just been fired from B5), the Xena panel (I've never watched the show, but it was interesting to see how intense the discussion got sometimes), seeing Lyanne Quirt (and she showed me pictures of her rat!), getting our CDs/tapes (yay!) from Dodeka. Jeff got home from his canoe trip with "the guys" yesterday, very hairy (i.e. didn't shave the entire trip). He reports that one of the guys came home with over 120 mosquito bites! Anyone having trouble connecting to this site (or my email address) last week might be interested in seeing this article about the "week from hell on the internet".
Today's website is courtesy Allison: Dinokun Page (the life and times of a pocket dinosaur). Lots of info about Allison's tamagochi...and it looks like her little guy doesn't have much longer to live! :(

[6:23:58 PM ] Check out Buffalo Online's review of Ookla The Mok's new album, Less Than Art!