True Blood – Ep 1

OMG, how is it I didn’t know Anna Paquin was playing Sookie? Hah! Also, I don’t recall Sookie being quite so innocent (and dumb)… Sex and swearing and all – fun! :O

Lovely day!

I had the nicest day today. My dad is over from QLD painting the house and, of course, spending time with his grandies. Today we had a Natcon50/Swancon36 meeting in Perth (with tour of prospective venue, which was marvellous) and then   and I went on a bit of a shopping journey that somehow ended up at Planet Books and me over $200 poorer (but v. happy!), and then went on to her place for the afternoon – it was just wonderful. What made it so good? I didn’t have any kids with me!!! Well, except the one I’m carrying about at the moment, but with nausea gone and second trimester goodness kicked in, that one’s not making it’s presence overtly known atm, so I just had a lovely, peaceful, grown up time. Heh, except when Benji was being the kid 🙂

So my dad rocks. He rocks awesome when I look at my house and don’t hate it anymore, just because he’s painted it! In fact, I’m hosting next but one meeting again, because I want people to visit! 

Day at home tomorrow, with visit from uncle (and possibly aunt), with lots needing to get done, as haven’t really been home all that much in recent weeks. Looking forward to it, despite knowing there’s SO much stuff I need to do… Really must do some of those jobs…

Good day

Had a meeting with the Principal this morning, regarding replacing me while I’m on maternity leave (she’s approved half pay, AND coming back part time! Among other things…) Have had some very positive validation from this principal over the last week, so feeling pretty good about that. I love my job, and that shows I think 🙂

The rest of the day was super busy, as we had the celebratory day for our college namesake, which involved lots of student wrangling, but a day outdoors (somehow we jagged a lovely day!) and culminated in reffing a game of volleyball (staff vs students) which I thoroughly enjoyed (and which made me realise how much I miss playing!).

Also had phone calls and emails from the insurance company – looks like we’ll be getting some replacement floor coverings which is wonderful – RAC rocks!

Came home to painted ceilings in the living areas, and a new front fence and a clean (expensively!) pool. Washed up, did washing, made dinner with dad, wrangled v. tired Miss Three and am now pretty stuffed – but in a good way!

Might go have a warm bath and read a book for a little while. And early night for me methinks.

What a weekend!

Once again, we’ve done three trips to Perth in three days! Friday it was to Midland, to pick up our friends who were visiting from QLD (for cancer treatment), and drop them back to Aunt and Uncle’s where they’ve been staying, and spend some time with them – Aunt has just (in the past couple of weeks) found out she has bowel cancer, with secondary cancer in liver, and (a bit of a shock), lungs as well. She’s very positive, but is in for a long journey.

Then on Saturday, after a big morning of cleaning and a quick shopping trip, went up to the airport to pick up "the painter", my dad, who has come over from QLD to paint our house. We were calling him "the painter" to avoid the kids figuring out who was coming, and the look on their faces when he walked out of the gates was well worth it! Master Six just stared in shock and said, "Pop Pop?!" in this high little voice (I’m clearly pregnant, cos that reaction brought tears to my eyes!). He told us later that "I said it but my mind was saying it couldn’t be Pop Pop!" How cute is that! Miss Three squealed and got all excitable naturally. Very sweet. At the Aunt & Uncle’s again for the afternoon (Uncle is Dad’s brother), which was nice too. Had to drag Dad away, which I felt bad about, but he’ll spend more time with them next weekend and the week following.

Today we did the big trip to Bunnings for painting supplies (which worked out fairly reasonably), then home to start the work (my job was scraping bloody glow in the dark constellations off the roof of Miss Three’s room, many of which had already been painted over once in the distant past!). At 1ish I headed off up to Greenmount to the Katharine Susannah Prichard Writers Centre for the Speculative Fiction Competition Awards this afternoon. I was invited to judge the competition some months ago, but it was a secret! I really enjoyed the judging process and the stories I got to read, and look forward to one day coming across some of the best ones in print! Ooh, just realised my judge’s report is already online! So you can read what I thought 🙂 Was a very pleasant afternoon.

Came home to make dinner with Dad and enjoy the newly arranged patio out the back with hubby and Dad. Came in to serve up tea and discovered water on the tiles. What the?! Absolutely shocked to find the bath overflowing and the hallway (carpet) drenched, Master Six’s (cork floored) room flooded, the living area tiles awash, Miss Three’s bedroom (carpet) half soaked, and water creeping into our bedroom. Argh!! The three of us raced about with towels, turned on fans, opened doors, and (when I remembered it!) the VAX super sucker for about an hour, drying the floors. The hall carpet is still fairly damp, but the rest has dried up fairly well with the help of the VAX, but I don’t think the carpets are going to survive the event too well. Have no idea how a thorough soaking of water affects a cork floor though. Anyone?

Yeah, so that was fun. But am looking forward to seeing some paint go on the walls this week! Yay! So, we’re at the end of another busy weekend. Oooh, a weekend in which I might have just planned a big roadtrip for next year, which will take us across the bottom of Aus, to Tassie, up to Worldcon in Melbourne, to Sydney, the family in QLD, and then across the middle(ish) home again! Big plans (with three kids!), but could be a lot of fun, which lots of great catchups. And snow! And Worldcon! Woot!

Oh, and we have a contract on our house in QLD – fingers crossed all goes well!

Hmm, yeah, busy week. 🙂

Hugo Winners!

By way of Tor.com:

9:43pm: And lastly, the Best Novel category:

* Anathem by Neal Stephenson (Morrow; Atlantic UK)
* The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman (HarperCollins; Bloomsbury UK) (Winner)
* Little Brother by Cory Doctorow (Tor Teen; HarperVoyager UK)
* Saturn’s Children by Charles Stross (Ace; Orbit UK)
* Zoe’s Tale by John Scalzi (Tor)

9:40pm: Best Novella:

* “The Erdmann Nexus” by Nancy Kress (Asimov’s Oct/Nov 2008) (Winner)
* “The Political Prisoner” by Charles Coleman Finlay (F&SF Aug 2008)
* “The Tear” by Ian McDonald (Galactic Empires)
* “True Names” by Benjamin Rosenbaum & Cory Doctorow (Fast Forward 2)
* “Truth” by Robert Reed (Asimov’s Oct/Nov 2008)

9:37pm: Best Novelette:

* “Alastair Baffle’s Emporium of Wonders” by Mike Resnick (Asimov’s Jan 2008)
* “The Gambler” by Paolo Bacigalupi (Fast Forward 2)
* “Pride and Prometheus” by John Kessel (F&SF Jan 2008)
* “The Ray-Gun: A Love Story” by James Alan Gardner (Asimov’s Feb 2008)
* “Shoggoths in Bloom” by Elizabeth Bear (Asimov’s Mar 2008) (Winner)

9:36pm: Best Short Story:

* “26 Monkeys, Also the Abyss” by Kij Johnson (Asimov’s Jul 2008)
* “Article of Faith” by Mike Resnick (Baen’s Universe Oct 2008)
* “Evil Robot Monkey” by Mary Robinette Kowal (The Solaris Book of New Science Fiction, Volume Two)
* “Exhalation” by Ted Chiang (Eclipse Two) (Winner)
* “From Babel’s Fall’n Glory We Fled” by Michael Swanwick (Asimov’s Feb 2008)

9:33pm: Best Professional Artist:

* Daniel Dos Santos
* Bob Eggleton
* Donato Giancola (Winner)
* John Picacio
* Shaun Tan

9:30pm: Best Graphic Story:

* The Dresden Files: Welcome to the Jungle Written by Jim Butcher, art by Ardian Syaf (Del Rey/Dabel Brothers Publishing)
* Girl Genius, Volume 8: Agatha Heterodyne and the Chapel of Bones Written by Kaja & Phil Foglio, art by Phil Foglio, colors by Cheyenne Wright (Airship Entertainment) (Winner)
* Fables: War and Pieces Written by Bill Willingham, pencilled by Mark Buckingham, art by Steve Leialoha and Andrew Pepoy, color by Lee Loughridge, letters by Todd Klein (DC/Vertigo Comics)
* Schlock Mercenary: The Body Politic Story and art by Howard Tayler (The Tayler Corporation)
* Serenity: Better Days Written by Joss Whedon & Brett Matthews, art by Will Conrad, color by Michelle Madsen, cover by Jo Chen (Dark Horse Comics)
* Y: The Last Man, Volume 10: Whys and Wherefores Written/created by Brian K. Vaughan, penciled/created by Pia Guerra, inked by Jose Marzan, Jr. (DC/Vertigo Comics)

9:26pm: Best Editor, Short Form:

* Ellen Datlow (Winner)
* Stanley Schmidt
* Jonathan Strahan
* Gordon Van Gelder
* Sheila Williams

9:24pm: Best Editor, Long Form

* Lou Anders
* Ginjer Buchanan
* David G. Hartwell (Winner)
* Beth Meacham
* Patrick Nielsen Hayden

9:21pm: Best Dramatic Presentation, Short Form:

* “The Constant” (Lost) Carlton Cuse & Damon Lindelof, writers; Jack Bender, director (Bad Robot, ABC studios)
* Doctor Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog Joss Whedon, & Zack Whedon, & Jed Whedon & Maurissa Tancharoen, writers; Joss Whedon, director (Mutant Enemy) (Winner)
* “Revelations” (Battlestar Galactica) Bradley Thompson & David Weddle, writers; Michael Rymer, director (NBC Universal)
* “Silence in the Library/Forest of the Dead” (Doctor Who) Steven Moffat, writer; Euros Lyn, director (BBC Wales)
* “Turn Left” (Doctor Who) Russell T. Davies, writer; Graeme Harper, director (BBC Wales)

9:12pm: Best Dramatic Presentation, Long Form:

* The Dark Knight Christopher Nolan & David S. Goyer, story; Jonathan Nolan and Christopher Nolan, screenplay; based on characters created by Bob Kane; Christopher Nolan, director (Warner Brothers)
* Hellboy II: The Golden Army Guillermo del Toro & Mike Mignola, story; Guillermo del Toro, screenplay; based on the comic by Mike Mignola; Guillermo del Toro, director (Dark Horse, Universal)
* Iron Man Mark Fergus & Hawk Ostby and Art Marcum & Matt Holloway, screenplay; based on characters created by Stan Lee & Don Heck & Larry Lieber & Jack Kirby; Jon Favreau, director (Paramount, Marvel Studios)
* METAtropolis by John Scalzi, ed. Written by: Elizabeth Bear, Jay Lake, Tobias Buckell and Karl Schroeder (Audible Inc)
* WALL-E Andrew Stanton & Pete Docter, story; Andrew Stanton & Jim Reardon, screenplay; Andrew Stanton, director (Pixar/Walt Disney) (Winner)

9:02pm: Best Related Book:

* Rhetorics of Fantasy by Farah Mendlesohn (Wesleyan University Press)
* Spectrum 15: The Best in Contemporary Fantastic Art by Cathy & Arnie Fenner, eds. (Underwood Books)
* The Vorkosigan Companion: The Universe of Lois McMaster Bujold by Lillian Stewart Carl & John Helfers, eds. (Baen)
* What It Is We Do When We Read Science Fiction by Paul Kincaid (Beccon Publications)
* Your Hate Mail Will be Graded: A Decade of Whatever, 1998-2008 by John Scalzi (Subterranean Press) (Winner)

8:57pm: Best Semiprozine:

* Clarkesworld Magazine edited by Neil Clarke, Nick Mamatas & Sean Wallace
* Interzone edited by Andy Cox
* Locus edited by Charles N. Brown, Kirsten Gong-Wong, & Liza Groen Trombi
* The New York Review of Science Fiction edited by Kathryn Cramer, Kris Dikeman, David G. Hartwell, & Kevin J. Maroney
* Weird Tales edited by Ann VanderMeer & Stephen H. Segal (Winner)

8:53pm: Best Fanzine:

* Argentus edited by Steven H Silver
* Banana Wings edited by Claire Brialey and Mark Plummer
* Challenger edited by Guy H. Lillian III
* The Drink Tank edited by Chris Garcia
* Electric Velocipede edited by John Klima (Winner)
* File 770 edited by Mike Glyer

8:50pm: Best Fan Artist:

* Alan F. Beck
* Brad W. Foster
* Sue Mason
* Taral Wayne
* Frank Wu (Winner)

8:44pm: Best Fan Writer:

* Chris Garcia
* John Hertz
* Dave Langford
* Cheryl Morgan (Winner)
* Steven H Silver

8:37pm: The John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer:

* Aliette de Bodard
* David Anthony Durham (Winner)
* Felix Gilman
* Tony Pi
* Gord Sellar
 

Commiserations to Jonathan Strahan (although YAY for "Exhalation"!), but congratulations to all the winners!