Christmas

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Earthrise: Fifty years and counting (Don’t count on it)

“To really think about ourselves as citizens of Earth is something that I think we’re still working toward,” Jacob Haqq-Misra, a research scientist at Blue Marble Space Institute of Science, told Space.com. “[Seeing this image] may be enjoyable and fun and awe-inspiring, and you might think about it later that day, but I don’t think most people have a perception of ‘I’m a citizen of Earth’ when they’re driving to work.”

He’s curious how potential future space developments — establishing a human presence on Mars, or discovering extraterrestrial intelligence, for example — might make that Earthling perspective easier to grasp by creating a group to contrast it against.

That’s us: the forever simian, defining ourselves in contrast to what we aren’t as opposed to what we could be.

So what would happen if some of us became Martians, Venusians, or Jovians? Hmmm…

www.space.com/42842-earthrise-apollo-8-photograph-50-years-later.html

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Adam’s Stepsons awarded Pinnacle Best SF

A late Christmas surprise!

img_9584Adam’s Stepsons won Best Science Fiction in the Fall 2017 NABE (National Association of Book Entrepreneurs) Pinnacle Book Achievement Award contest.

It’s gratifying to see my novella appreciated, but it would be even better to hear from individual readers.

If you have read Adam’s Stepsons, please don’t hesitate to write what you think about it – even if it’s just a single sentence – on Amazon, Goodreads, your own blog, Twitter feed, or Facebook page, anywhere!

 

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Christmas in Japan

It’s been a long fall. Lots of work the past two months, with intermittent bouts of family sickness, but somehow we managed to pull through in time for the holidays.

Of course Christmas is not a national holiday where I live (central Japan). It’s mostly treated as an excuse for couples to enjoy a romantic evening at an overpriced restaurant. Except for us, where it’s an excuse for moms and dads to have their kids wreck the house while the parents have a few drinks.

Fortunately. the food is good. Very good. No Christmas turkey or ham here (the main fare is typically KFC actually, since some KFC chief in a brilliant PR stroke managed to convince the entire country that Americans eat fried chicken at Christmas). But there are plenty of parents nearby who are really good at cooking.

And of course there’s always cake:

 So Merry Christmas, Happy Chanukah, Happy Kwanzaa, Happy Holidays, and other non-denominational festivities to you and your kin!

And no, I don’t want to talk about the 2015 World Series. I’m too busy using the NL Champions shot glass set to be depressed…