 |
Wednesday, April 09, 2003
posted 8:14 AM
I CAN"T BELIEVE I FORGOT TO THANK CHRIS STEIN
I hate putting together the "thanks" page at the back of a novel. I hate it because I know I'll forget to thank someone who provided something absolutely essential. I know I'll forget because I have to put that page together when I'm still reeling from having completed the manuscript, and am in full and quite headless flight from the very process of writing.
Well, I did it again. I did it bigtime, this time. Came to me in the middle of the night, last night, when I happened to wake and find myself thinking about that thread about the Russian "military archaeology" site that Searchstring Sensei recently Googled the stills from. How people were wondering whether Damien's Dig, in PR, has any basis in reality. "Silly people," I thought, sleepily, "What do they think I thanked Chris Stein for?"
Eyes shooting open in horror. *Did* I thank Chris Stein. Toss. Turn.
And, of course, I didn't. That's Chris Stein of Blondie, or so he's best known. Also Chris Stein the Japanese model-building otaku, ultra-specialist Japanese magazine afficionado and custom knife maven. Very high otaku-DNA factor, Chris has.
About the time I was starting what would become PR, Chris sent me an email describing, pretty much as you've come to know it, Damien's dig. The scene with the pilot of the excavated plane is imaginary, but the rest of it is worked up quite directly from Chris's brilliant description of this scene he'd discovered. A friend of his had been there, and seen it, and Chris was corresponding with him. Chris mentioned to me, in passing, how cool it would be to go there and shoot documentary video. His email made my ears ring, though in my non-linear way it took months to occur to me that the film I had absented Damien for was in fact Chris Stein's documentary.
Now I can only groan, and apologize. But this is *exactly* why I hate having to do the "thanks" page. Not only will I manage to leave someone out, but I'll manage to leave out the person whose passion, enthusiasm and descriptive powers managed in a single email to affect the entire course and meaning of the book!
Dang.
Though it makes me appreciate yet another advantage of having this website, as I can instantly go public with my apology and this citation.
Ladies and gentlemen, Mr. Chris Stein: Aside from all that great music, he's given us...The Dig!
As to how I can manage to do these things... Remember that long early thread about drugs and creativity? Well, I really do write in an altered state. It's an altered state called "writing a book", and, let me tell you, it's seriously *chronic*.
THE UBER-JETTA
Wish I knew how to do an umlaut.
I saw the Uber-Jetta in Barcelona, this past December, when I walked past a Volkswagen showroom. It's called the Phaeton, and they build it in the Glass Factory.
The Glass Factory is a purpose-built Phaeton-factory with glass walls, in a German city, the entire assembly-line visible constantly to passers-by. The Phaeton itself, retailing in Canada for about three times the list on my Jetta, struck me as looking like a Jetta on steroids. I would have expected it to look more like a Passat (but more so, somehow). But it doesn't have that Passat roofline thing going on.
The ultimate in a German stealth car: I've probably seen a few in traffic, even here, but have read them as Jetta's. Like it's a Jetta, but it must be *closer* than I think it is, because it's somehow a little too *big*.
I PROMISE TO LIGHTEN UP ON THIS SARS STUFF
But, meanwhile, The Agonist has this remarkable indie material from the epicenter of the outbreak. I recommend this particularly for anyone prone to imagine that SARS is the result some sort of biotech. My best guess, as a sci-fi guy, is that SARS is the result of millions of people living in all too cosy proximity with a whole petting zoo of billions of farm critters, *in a tropical climate*. Epidemiology teaches that no more than that classic recipe is required to produce outbreaks of even the most fearsomely novel diseases.
http://www.agonist.org/archives/001212.html#001212
CONSPIRACY THEORIES DON'T DO IT FOR ME, USUALLY
But still...
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/cms.dll/html/uncomp/articleshow?msid=42881408
EXTREME ATHELETE
Thanks to Kevin Kelly for pointing this one out.
http://www.bikesportmichigan.com/editorials/0000023.shtml
AND IF YOU'RE WONDERING WHY...
That reminded you so strongly of the general vibe of STARSHIP TROOPERS...
http://www.insidetri.com/news/fea/1465.0.html
|
|
