I’m very pleased to announce that I’ve signed the contract for my second sale to Analog Science Fiction & Fact. My story, “The Song of Uullioll,” should appear, I think, in the first half of 2012.
It was surreal when my first Analog story was published this past year. It’s even more surreal that I have stories slated for publication next year in the two biggest science fiction magazines, Analog and Asimov’s Science Fiction.
This is a nice dream I’m living.
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Fifteen years ago today — November 7, 1996 — the Mars Global Surveyor launched from Cape Canaveral atop a Delta-II rocket.
(Mars Global Surveyor. NASA image.)
The first U.S. mission to arrive successfully at Mars in 20 years — since the Viking missions — Mars Global Surveyor entered Martian orbit in September 1997. Its planned aerobraking routine had to be radically altered when one of its solar panels did not lock into position; as a result, it did not enter its final “mapping orbit” until February 1999.
Even though its primary mission was only intended to last one Martian year — 687 Earth days — MGS actually examined the red planet for seven years. Its array of instruments “collected data on the surface morphology, topography, composition, gravity, atmospheric dynamics, and magnetic field” in order to “investigate the surface processes, geology, distribution of material, internal properties, evolution of the magnetic field, and the weather and climate of Mars.” NASA lost contact with the spacecraft in November 2006, just five days shy of its ten-year launch anniversary.
by Ballad, that is … “Monster Hunter Ballad.”
Today Alethea Kontis posted on her blog a video shot during her “traveling sideshow” at Dragon*Con, which includes me doing a rough-but-passable rendition of my song, “The Monster Hunter Ballad.” Appropriately, I’m sporting one of the Monster Hunter International hats that were given out during the con.
My song starts at around the 7 minute mark. Before my song, Leanna Renee Hieber did an evocative reading (I was particularly taken with the imagery), and after my song, Danielle Friedman performed a wonderful “poi” routine … unfortunately, without fire. You will also hear some “zombie haiku,” which have become something of a staple at Alethea’s readings.
Thanks again, Alethea, for letting me play along!
P.S. For anyone who may not have seen it, the first video of the “Monster Hunter Ballad” is still available for viewing.
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FULL DISCLOSURE: The Monster Hunter International books by Larry Correia, which inspired the aforementioned ballad, are published by Baen Books. I work for Baen as a contributing editor.
by First things first: my story “Sensitive, Compartmented” is tentatively slated for the April/May 2012 issue of Asimov’s Science Fiction. I’m very happy about that, so it gets top billing on the blog.
For today’s space history tidbit: 40 years ago today — October 28, 1971 — Great Britain became the sixth nation to launch a satellite on its own rocket when a Black Arrow launch vehicle lifted the Prospero satellite out of the Woomera Test Range in Australia.
And speaking of Australia: the Australia party last night at World Fantasy Con seemed to go very well — a good crowd, and everyone seemed to enjoy themselves.
And so it goes!
by Fifty years ago today — October 27, 1961 — Saturn-I launched from Cape Canaveral. This launch was, as the title stated, the first test flight of the Saturn family of rockets that were intended to propel the Apollo astronauts to the Moon.
(Saturn SA-1 launch. NASA image.)
Also known as SA-1, the upper stages of the Saturn-I were filled with water ballast. The vehicle reached 84.8 miles altitude and flew 214.7 miles downrange into the Atlantic Ocean, achieving its mission objective of “verifying the aerodynamical and structural design of the Saturn 1 booster.”
Oh, to have been a part of that program! But at least I have a small collection of Saturn-related relics I salvaged during my time at the Rocket Lab.
by I haven’t had a lot of space history posts recently. I try to limit myself to anniversaries in multiples of 5 years, to keep from repeating things, and to keep the pace from getting overwhelming. I also try not to include “routine” events like the launch of the Nth in a series of satellites … not that anything about space operations has become truly routine, of course. But here’s one for the record:
Five years ago today — October 26, 2006 — a Delta 2 rocket out of Cape Canaveral placed two solar observatories in orbit.
(STEREO spacecraft. NASA image.)
The Solar Terrestrial Relations Observatory consisted of two identical spacecraft, STEREO-A and STEREO-B. Once in space, the two satellites were allowed to drift into different heliocentric orbits: STEREO-B ahead of the Earth (leading), and STEREO-A behind the Earth (lagging). From those vantage points, their observations could be combined to image the Sun “stereographically” and predict whether a coronal mass ejection was heading toward the Earth.
On February 6th of this year, STEREO A and B reached 180 degrees of separation, which “enabled, for the first time, the simultaneous observation of the entire Sun.”
In other news, I’m heading to the World Fantasy Convention today. Folks have been urging me to go to WFC for years; it’s a small convention, primarily of SF&F professionals. It seems a little odd to think of myself as an SF&F professional in my own right, but my 3rd and 4th professional sales are forthcoming: more on those later, when the contracts are signed (or when the editors give me the okay).
by (Cross-posted from the Industrial Extension Service blog. Originally entitled, “For NC Manufacturing, 4th Place May Be Better Than 3rd.” Emphasis in original.)
A few days ago I had the chance to look into some statistics about manufacturing in North Carolina, and I found that manufacturing is doing pretty well here. Yes, we’ve seen some downturn and some of our companies are struggling, but overall the state has been doing well and is poised to do even better.
(Yes, there is a community in North Carolina called “Whynot.” Image: Whynot ? by Donald Lee Pardue, on Flickr, under Creative Commons.)
Amid the statistics on manufacturing output, contribution to Gross Domestic Product, exports, and so forth, I found that North Carolina rates highly compared with other states. For example, NC is 4th in the nation in terms of total manufacturing output, with California, Texas, and Illinois making up the top 3 (though Illinois is not too far ahead of us).
On another measure, NC is 3rd in the nation, but whether that’s good or bad depends on your point of view. As reported in a 07/18/11 Charlotte Business Journal article, NC is 3rd in terms of our dependence on manufacturing; i.e., in the share of total state GDP generated by manufacturing. By this measure, Indiana is 1st in the nation and Oregon is 2nd; in contrast, both states are behind North Carolina in total manufacturing: Indiana is 6th and Oregon is 16th.
I submit that it’s better for North Carolina to be in 4th place nationally in total manufacturing than it is to be in 3rd place in dependence on it. After all, what does dependence on manufacturing mean for the overall economy?
What would it mean if dependence on manufacturing changes? If that statistic rises, and we grow more dependent on manufacturing, it may be because factory output has improved, or other sectors of the economy have suffered, or a little of both. Likewise, if that statistic falls, and NC becomes less dependent on manufacturing, it simply means that comparatively more economic output is coming from other sectors — which isn’t necessarily bad.
For now, at least, NC is the 3rd most manufacturing-dependent state. Whether that’s good or bad depends on whether manufacturing begins to falter, taking the rest of the economy with it, or whether manufacturing holds its own or improves and so buoys the rest of the economy. Are you an optimist or a pessimist? That kind of statistic works for both types of people, but ultimately it really doesn’t mean much.
Think about it this way: Oregon’s manufacturing output in 2010 was less than half of ours, yet their state is actually more dependent on manufacturing for total GDP than the Old North State. Based on that statistic, problems with manufacturing output are likely to have much worse general economic consequences for Oregonians than for North Carolinians.
So I say it’s far better for North Carolina to take pride in being the 4th most productive manufacturing state in the nation. Maybe we should set our sights on knocking off Illinois and taking 3rd place in that statistic.
by In case you haven’t heard, there’s another Rapture predicted for tomorrow. Word now is that the world as we know it will “probably” end tomorrow.
(Praise belongs to the King by kelsey_lovefusionphoto, from Flickr under Creative Commons.)
So make the most of today! (But you should do that anyway.)
by Imagine my surprise at learning that I now have a page of my own in the Internet Speculative Fiction Database.
(Image from the Internet Speculative Fiction Database.)
The page lists all of my published stories to date, which is pretty cool.
The database is maintained by a rather large community of volunteers, so I have no idea who entered my information. As a result, I can only offer general (but genuine!) thanks to the kind person(s) responsible, and wish them — and you — only the very best.
Thanks!
by Seventy years ago today — October 6, 1941 — the U.S. Army activated the Redstone Arsenal in Huntsville, Alabama.
(Redstone Arsenal building 7101, with Redstone missile in front. U.S. Army image from Wikimedia Commons.)
Redstone Arsenal was originally built to produce chemical ammunition for use in World War II, which it did very well. Then, in the postwar years, that experience with handling dangerous chemicals made Redstone a natural place to experiment with rockets and rocket propellants and eventually to be the home for the Army’s Aviation and Missile Research, Development, and Engineering Center; Army Space and Missile Defense Command; and NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center.
Of course, I can’t mention Redstone Arsenal without mentioning the online magazine Redstone Science Fiction, the third issue of which included my story “Memorial at Copernicus.”
Also on this date, 30 years ago in 1981, the Solar Mesosphere Explorer launched from Vandenberg AFB, California, on a Delta rocket. SME was built to “investigate the processes that create and destroy ozone in the Earth’s mesosphere and upper stratosphere,” and operated until December 1988. The small experimental UoSAT (Oscar 9) satellite, built by the University of Surrey, launched as a dual payload on the same Delta rocket.
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