…JANUARY 4, 2009Public Memorial Service for the Late “First Lady of Star Trek” Majel Barrett Roddenberry
Cast Members and Fans Come Out to Celebrate and Remember Roddenberry’s Life
WHO:
Eugene “Rod” Roddenberry, son of Gene & Majel Roddenberry and CEO of Roddenberry Productions, will host cast members, family, friends and fans to celebrate the life of his late mother. Fans are invited to come and pay their respects with the family and share their fondest memories of the late Trek icon.WHAT:
Eugene “Rod” Roddenberry will hold a public memorial service for his late mother. Family, cast members, friends and fans will have an opportunity to remember the legendary “First Lady of Star Trek.”
Month: December 2008
Daryl Gregory
Hey, it seems that a buddy of mine is going to have an interview in January’s Locus Magazine.
We attended Clarion together, lo some 20 years ago, and Daryl was one of the ones I thought would catapult to the top of the field. He has the gift, the ability to rivet the reader, and get under your skin. I highly recommend his first novel, Pandemonium —first-rate stuff, keeps you thinking. Damned impressive first novel.
Daryl took many years off to raise his kids, but a few years ago I noticed his short stories appearing here and there. Now the novel. …
Koan
A note I jotted to myself sometime in the past. I don’t recall the circumstances, but the question posed feels universal.
…The spiritualists cringe and argue against any description of self-conscious life as mechanism, that any mere machine is necessarily only an accumulation of parts and processes that can never rise above its own origins. They offer in its place a description that makes of us a vessel to contain an essential self that is gifted from without, a near complete something that a priori transcends the mechanistic. From where? Choose your own myth of origin. But they all presume a Maker.Â
Chapter the Next
Yesterday, I stayed home from work again. Nothing to do. In a way, I like this. I’d go on contract with the company if I could, go in only when there was actually something to do. But it’s not that much money, so it’s a quandary.
On the other hand, I finished a chapter in a book that’s been teasing me for a couple of years. I’d walked away form it to write something else, and I’ve been finding it difficult to go back. I have a lot written—almost a third of it, at least—and I’m loathe to just give up on it, but with one thing or another I just haven’t been able to get any forward momentum.…
Procrastination
The end of 2008 approaches. 2009 is going to be…
Not more of the same, I sincerely hope. Mea culpa, I am procrastinating. I watch myself do it. I’m doing it now. I’m writing this instead of hammering out the classic fiction of the future.
I have tio admit, since the beginning of December I have been more and more depressed, which is a horrible, downward spiral, the likes of which I haven’t felt since I broke up with a woman I thought was going to be my wife, a long long time ago. I was a mere 24 then, contemplated ending it all, took a lot of long walks, and came out the other end determined to do better. …
Seekers and Sowhats
I don’t keep abreast of new television very well. I’ve drifted into a mental space wherein I’m dimly aware of new things. I hear about them on the radio or from friends or occasionally I see a notice on a website. But I’ve long since lost the habit of keeping track.
So when I started hearing about this new fantasy show, Legend of the Seeker, it seems that it was already airing and I’d heard nothing about it beforehand. I didn’t get much in the way detail from anyone, other than short recommendations (“Oh, you should see it, it’s good!”)…
Changes For Another Year
Like everything else, publishing seems to be melting down. Harcourt announced a buying freeze, but they aren’t the only one, just the only one that has bothered to make it public. In other companies, salaries are frozen, lay-offs are rampant, and a general constriction is beginning. The economy is in the tank and no one is getting out unscathed.
So what does this mean for me?
2008 is coming to a close and, like 2007 and 2006 before that, I do not have a book contract. I haven’t sold a short story, either, but to be fair I haven’t been writing any. …
Quotes
The desire for social equality is not unmixed with a certain eagerness to be rid of the bother of pity.                              Jean Rostand
Intelligence would seem to exist primarily as a way to outrun natural selection     Samuel R. Delany, 1995
Romance and poetry, ivy, lichens, and wall-flowers need ruin to make them grow. Â Nathaniel Hawthorne, The Marble Faun
…Action is consolatory. It is the enemy of thought and the friend of flattering illusions.Â
Poetry For Sale
Last January, Missouri was granted its first official Poet Laureate. At the inaugural celebration, Walter Bargen read a new poem for the occasion, a poem which spoke to Missouri and dreamers and possibilities, called Moonwalk Missouri.
The Missouri Center for the Book has produced a fine letterpress broadsheet. It is now available. Go to
http://www.columbiabooksonline.com/
and click on the Walter Bargen link on the left side. There you will see at the top two versions.
The money will go to support the Poet Laureate program, which MCB hosts, and will ensure its continuity. It’s a little late in the season, perhaps, but these would make good gifts. …