My Michael Swanwick chapbooks have arrived.
And they’re both great.
Chapbooks
Patrick
Superbeast
I discovered on the track today that this song (“Superbeast”, by Rob Zombie) perfectly matches my running* pace.
It’s extra funny when you consider that, as I was leaving the house this morning, my wife said, “Enjoy running… for your life!”
* Fine, jogging pace.
Blue Moon 2018
I shot this photo from my deck, on a chilly night at the end of March 2018. Then I went inside and ordered Michael Swanwick’s chapbook/objet d’art Blue Moon, helping to ensure it would sell out instead of being burned.
Local radio
Current status: sitting in the Double Decker listening to “Talk Dirty to Me”. I haven’t heard that in years. I’m not convinced I missed it, either.
Sabotage (Memories of JJ, #8)
Dad loved cop shows from the ’70s and ’80s. He wasn’t a big fan of ’80s and ’90s music, though. So imagine my surprise, one day, when, home for a weekend, I heard the dulcet tones of the Beastie Boys coming from the TV that he was watching. It was such an odd occurrence, in fact, that it took me a moment to recognize what I was hearing.
Then it clicked: it was the breakdown in “Sabotage”.
I came out of my room just in time for the lyrics to start up again, and Dad, realizing he’d been tricked, switched the channel.
I get it, though. It sure does look like an ’80s cop show.
How to keep FB from exploding
Apparently I set my birthday to private on Facebook last year, which meant that this year, I didn’t have a million Happy Birthday! posts from friends and family. I’m OK with that.
A markèd improvement
I had laser eye surgery performed on the weekend. Today was my second follow-up appointment with the ophthalmologist.
My vision is now sitting at 20/16 with both eyes, which is apparently a step better than 20/20 or “perfect” vision. I gather that the 20/16 means that I can see at 20 feet what a normal person can see at 16 feet.
I had a look at the documents the doctor provided. Before the surgery, my good eye was at 20/400. My bad eye, well, they didn’t even bother with a 20/number, just marked OF 2ft (I assume “out of focus at two feet”).
Now all I need to do is get used to a life without glasses.
(That’s not my eyeball. Photo by Vanessa Bumbeers on Unsplash)
Collège Louis Riel at Jazz Fest 2018
I posted these to Facebook but not everyone’s on Facebook. (Hi, Mom!) So here are a few photos I got of my oldest nephew playing in the Collège Louis Riel band at the 2018 Brandon Jazz Festival.
An evening out with the stars
With some of the money I inherited from my dad, last year, I bought an 11–16mm f/2.8 lens for my camera. In plain English, it’s a nice fast lens with a nice wide field of view, which means that it’s great for astrophotography.
Tonight, the stars aligned for me, as it were. There was almost a 50/50 chance of some aurora sightings, per SpaceWeather. The temperature was a balmy ‑1°C, which was a pleasant change from the ‑25°C and ‑35°C nights we’ve had for the last couple weeks.
Long story short, there was a faint haze to the north. Editing with Gimp brings out quite a bit more than the naked eye could see.
As my camera clicked away, I leaned back against the car. At one point I thought of Kurt Vonnegut’s quote: If this isn’t nice, I don’t know what is.
Pine boughs
On my way back to work after lunch, a City of Brandon truck passed by on the street, carrying a load of freshly-cut evergreen boughs. Just for a second I smelled sawn pine, faintly, and I felt a momentary touch of nostalgia, because pine was the wood of choice for Dad, whether he was in the shed at home or teaching shop class. It was common wood: soft, inexpensive, and ubiquitous.
I grew up smelling cut pine.
Then it passed and all I could smell was winter in the city again.