At least I think he has. He left for the airport yesterday and then called me.

“My flight’s been delayed. To Wednesday.”

I uttered an impolite questioning phrase.

“No warning, no notice. Just a new itinerary.”

Anyway, they got him on a flight for this morning, in theory. Because he was flying out of Newark, he decided to stay in the hotel out there. I think he’s on his way home now.

Steve was going to come visit for Mom’s birthday, but when my folks had to cancel their trip we also rescheduled my brother’s. It looked like this would be a more convenient time.

However, when we bought the tickets, we didn’t realize that I would be in tech week for a show (which seems constant now), finishing production on one magazine, two books and recording an audio book. All of which is somehow due on Monday, the day Steve leaves.

Forgive me if I don’t really write much this weekend.

I just got the final art for Charles Stross’s book, Toast, coming out from Wyrm. I’d already done a preliminary layout using the rough draft of the art, so it was easy to drop the final art in place, make a few tweaks and send it over to Neil.

The art is by the talented and very easy to work with Steve Montiglio. I have no understanding of how he works as fast as he does with as much intricate detail. He just delivered the final art weeks before his due date. It makes a girl very happy.

Besides– Giant octopus ships in space! What more could you ask for?

That’s right, we don’t yet have internet at the apartment. We get it next Friday, you know, while I’m away at Readercon. Until then, postings will be somewhat sporadic I’m afraid.

We spent yesterday cleaning and unpacking. The bedroom is assembled and has no boxes. Yay! Rob has disassembled the stove and is deep cleaning it. It’s a nice old Welbilt, which has thirty plus years of grease buildup on it. We shudder.

The living room is starting to emerge from the chaos of boxes, but it will take awhile.

I have to give a huuuuuuge thank you to Emily, Jodi and my brother, Steve, for their help moving us in.

Here are some photos from moving day.

Arrival in NYC

Today is my little brother’s birthday.

Although we had serious sibling rivalry growing up, he’s a swell guy. He just got accepted to Vanderbilt where he will finish his doctorate. I’m not looking forward to calling him Dr. Harrison, but I’m still proud of him. Oh– and he’s driving up to NYC to help us move in.

The Table of Contents for the Best of Apex 2006 anthology is out.

The list is final. The decision has been made. We are publishing the following stories in this year’s Best of Apex 2006 collection.

Blood Baby - Jennifer Pelland
The Queen of Stars - Bryn Sparks
That Old Sandlands Fever - Douglas F. Warrick
Cerbo en Vitro ujo - Mary Robinette Kowal
Genesis Six - Shane Jiraiya Cummings
Starfish - Steve Parker
Indigestion - Robby Sparks
How to Raise a Human - Deb Taber

I just found out that the Doctor Who anthology I’m in has been officially announced on the Big Finnish website. Doctor Who: Destination Prague is available for pre-orders and will come out in March, 2007. The cover image isn’t up yet, but Steven Savile, editor, says that it should be out any day now. I’ll post it when it is.

I just saw the news that Lazytown won the BAFTA in the International Children’s category. Woot!

INTERNATIONAL

FAIRLY ODD PARENTS - Butch Hartman, Gary Conrad (Frederator Studios for Nickelodeon/Nickelodeon UK)

HARRY AND HIS BUCKET FULL OF DINOSAURS - Kristine Klohk/Helen Cohen/Graham Ralph (Collingwood O’Hare Entertainment/Silver Fox Films Ltd/CCI Entertainment/Five)

LAZY TOWN - Magnús Scheving, Raymond P Le Gué, Jonathan Judge (Lazy Town Productions for Nick Jr UK/Nick Jr UK)

SPONGEBOB SQUAREPANTS - Paul Tibbitt, Steve Hillenberg (United Plankton Pictures Inc for Nickelodeon/Nickelodeon UK)

Today is Steven Savile’s birthday. To celebrate, I am reading his novel Inheritance. So far, it is grim and horrific. Those aren’t normally compliments but are completely appropriate for a vampire novel. He also has managed to get humor in there too, which is astounding in a book with the undead rising all around. I’m looking forward to seeing how this one ends, although, I’ll have to give up my habit of reading at meals with this one.

Steve, next time we’re in the same place, I’ll buy you a pint.

I was ordering a subscription to the Clarkesworld Magazine chapbooks (which look gorgeous) and the order form asks “Who is your favorite author?” This stopped me dead in my tracks. Favorite. I was just having this conversation with my husband last night about The Sparrow. It is the book that I always recommend when people ask me to recommend a book. But it’s not my favorite book. My favorite book is probably Lavender and Old Lace by Myrtle Reed.

This is favorite defined as “a person or thing regarded with special favor or preference” because it’s certainly not the best book I’ve ever read, but it makes me cry everytime and I love it. She wrote in 1902 and it’s a straight ahead romance, with mild fantasy elements, and yes there is purple prose. But the characters are very real and the descriptions are evocative. I mean look at this line, “The faded green shutters blended harmoniously with the greyish white background, and the piazza, which was evidently an unhappy afterthought of the architect, had two or three new shingles on is roof.”

So, favorite author? Orson Scott Card, Mary Doria Russell, Guy Gavriel Kay, Steven Brust, Neil Gaiman, C.S. Lewis…? Lordy. I should just put down Myrtle Reed and confuse the living daylights out of them. I regard all of them with special favor.

I think I’ll go with Steven Brust though, because of three things: I won a interpretive reading competition in college with an excerpt from Brokedown Palace; I had my first fan girl squee! over him; I read The Sun, The Moon, and the Stars whenever I’m creatively constipated and that always gets me over it. I have a special regard for him for that.

So who’s your favorite author?

While I wish that Rob and I could be home to celebrate with you, I trust that Mom and Steve will be able to help you with your birthday present.

We climbed part way up Esja today. On the way back down, Steve saw a side path and said, “Why don’t we go back down that way?”

“Okay. But you know it’ll hit a point where it goes straight down,” I said.

Steve got a wicked grin and said, “Great.”

So down we went. At a certain point, Steve was ahead of me and stopped. The path, in fact, the ground in front of him had disappeared. “Hey, Mary. Guess what?”

“What?”

“It goes straight down.” And then my brother vanished over the edge.

I followed him, leaning back on my heels and trying to stay on the vegetation instead of the sheer gravel slide that the path had become. The thing is that I’d always thought of Steve as a sporty sort of guy, but not as particularly outdoorsy. I’m wrong. Who knew?

We had to cut the hike short because Tóti from work came over for dinner. I made ratatouile with goat cheese and pesto vinaigrette and served that with greens and the leftover potato salad. We had daim ice cream for dessert.

Just a quick update to let you know that my brother has arrived safely.

Rob’s parents arrived in Reykjavík today. They were scheduled to come in this evening, but caught an earlier flight. This is wonderful because I’m going to London today and thought I was going to miss them. So we’re off to have lunch, then they’ll drive me to the airport and go play with Rob. I’ll be back on Sunday and we can have more adventures then.

I’m going to London because Steve Savile and Alethea Kontis will be there with their anthology, Elemental.

Today is my brother’s birthday. Hurrah! He’s old!