Jay Lake: Writer

[personal|cool] Mysterious lights were seen in the sky, flashing

Yesterday was by design a pretty slow day. the_child was heading off for snowboarding at Mt. Hood, and I had planned only two things. One, to spend some time working on Their Currents Turn Awry; and two, to spend some time visiting lizzyshannon, who continues in the throes of post-operative recovery. After an almost too-solid night’s sleep, I made it so.

Plus as a bonus round, between writing time and Lizzy time, I threw in a quick trip to Powell’s Books. I wanted to pick up a birthday gift for tillyjane (a/k/a my mom), and the_child had asked me to score some Brent Weeks books for her. I signed stock while I was there, picked up a copy of the first volume of the A Game of Thrones graphic novelization [ Powells | BN ], and some brag copies of the April issue of Portland Monthly, wherein I penned a review of Mary Robinette Kowal‘s new novel, Glamour in Glass [ Powells | BN ] (first line thereof optional).

I left Lizzy’s place late yesterday afternoon feeling pretty tired. I just wanted to go home and go to bed early. (This happens sometimes after I’ve overslept significantly the night before.) I’d done everything I’d planned that day, the_child was away with friends, and, hey, it as Saturday. But I kept thinking about the Lyrid meteor shower due last night. And how clear and beautiful the sky was as I’d cruised around all day in the Genre Car with the top down. And how I wasn’t a sick man right now, and didn’t have to protect my sleep quite so ferociously. And how there would be meteor showers that night.

So I ate, shopped for groceries, then went home and brooded in my easy chair for a while about how tired I was. I then rattled up mlerules to see if she was free. We headed out to the Portland Women’s Forum State Scenic Viewpoint, overlooking the western end of the Columbia Gorge, to watch the skies for a while from the comfort of the Genre Car’s fully reclined seats with the top still down.

We were there perhaps an hour. Clouds were moving in and out from the east, which was annoying, as that horizon had been clear at sunset. The sky stayed mostly clear, with stars down to fourth or fifth magnitude easily visible, and perhaps a bit beyond that at a squint, so there must have been some haze at altitude. Still, we saw a ton of satellites, including one Iridium flare. mlerules spotted a meteor trail that I happened to be looking in the wrong direction to see. A bit later, we both spotted a long, bright meteor that trailed across the sky in two pulses. For the win!

Finally, my case of the tireds overtook me. We were there too early for the Lyrids’ peak, but we saw cool stuff. Well worth the extra couple of hours of awake time. And hey, who doesn’t like mysterious lights seen in the sky, flashing?

Tags: Books, Child, Cool, Currents, friends, Personal, Portland, Science, Writing

Posted: 6:44 am Sun April 22 2012 | Comments(0) |

[food] The Black Molly at Killer Burger

Ate me a Black Molly at Killer Burger in SE Portland for lunch yesterday. To quote their menu…

1/3rd pound Beef Patty, Smokey House Sauce, Grilled Onion, Philly Steak, Provolone, House-Brined Roasted Green Chiles, Mayo, Bacon

This was one of the tastiest burgers I have ever eaten. One of the best.

mlerules and I had dined there a month or two ago, when this location first opened. At the time she had the Peanut Butter-Pickle-Bacon burger, and I had the Jose Mendoza. Good, crisp fries came with, and they were quite satisfactory burgers, for only a couple of bucks more than fast food prices. I liked it to the point where I made a note to come back.

But the Black Molly… Basically this is the bastard child of a sloppy bacon cheeseburger and a Philly cheesesteak. (No whiz, I’m sad to say.) If you’re an unreconstructed carnivore, the sheer, overwhelming savory meatiness of this burger is a major win. I like my food with a zing, so the chiles worked well with the combination, and what’s not to love about provolone and mayonnaise? And the base of the burger, the patty itself, is almost perfectly constructed and grilled. We are talking an earthquake in the mouth.

My only complaint is that the juiciness of that combination of ingredients rather overwhelmed the bottom of the bun. I wonder if the Black Molly would profit from being on a stiffer, thicker roll of some kind. But from a mouth feel and taste point of view, this thing is made of 100% USDA Grade A win. One of my top five favorite hamburgers ever.

Highly recommended (unless you have a heart condition, are vegetarian, or lactose/gluten intolerant).

Tags: Food, Portland, reviews

Posted: 5:28 am Fri April 20 2012 | Comments(0) |

[conventions|repost] Announcing JayCon XII

This is a repost, which I will roll forward about once a month through the spring

In celebration of my natal anniversary, JayCon XII, my 12th annual 37th birthday party, is Saturday, June 9th, 2012 from 2 to 5 pm at the Flying Pie in SE Portland. We’re partying because I was born, and because I have beat cancer again and again.

If you can read this, you’re invited. Prior JayCon experience not required.

Note that I am announcing this early because people always tell me, “You should have told me sooner!” Except for the people who tell me, “It’s too soon, remind me later.” (Sometimes these are the same people.)

Flying Pie Pizzeria
7804 SE Stark Street
Portland, 97215
(503) 254-2016

http://www.flying-pie.com/

[ Google Maps ]

As is traditional for JayCon, Paul M. Carpentier is specifically not invited.

Tags: Cancer, Conventions, health, JayCon, Personal, Portland, Repost

Posted: 5:34 am Thu April 19 2012 | Comments(1) |

[personal|child] Hitting the Oregonian News Network Meetup

Yesterday afternoon, amid a frenzy of drafting Their Currents Turn Awry and packing for Norwescon, the_child and I hied on down to the Lucky Lab on SE Hawthorne for an @ORNewsNetwork meetup.

@ORNewsNetwork is the Oregonian News Network, a blog syndication portal sponsored by Oregon’s major daily newspaper. (Disclaimer: To state the obvious, this blog is part of that syndication portal. Hence me being at the meetup.) I’d worked with editors @georgerede and @corneliusrex online, but never in person. It was fun to meet them. Also met some cool bloggers, including @TheBugChicks, a pair of young, hip, funny entomologists, along with folks covering topics as diverse as urban foraging, consumerist issues and documentary filmmaking.

the_child is a veteran of many conventions, conferences and other large-scale social venues, but this was her first meetup style event. She had a few nerves going in, but that was quickly dispelled. She did a lot of talking and listening, and I hope learned a few things. Amusingly, we also ran into a family from the_child‘s school while at the Lucky Lab.

As I said to the kiddo in the car on the way there, I’m doing my best to bring her as much experience of the world as possible while I still can, just in case I’m not here for too much longer. The meetup was fun for me, educational for her, and a good way to spend an hour or two on a Portland Wednesday afternoon.

Tags: blog, Books, Child, Conventions, Culture, Currents, Personal, Portland, Writing

Posted: 5:11 am Thu April 05 2012 | Comments(0) |

[travel|writing] Fly away, little bird

I am in the Omaha airport, getting ready to head home to Portland. Much distracted by putting a wrap on Calamity of So Long a Life today, including the edits oh so helpfully provided by the lovely and talented lizzyshannon. Also a little tight for time, so this here is all the bloggery you’re getting today.

This weekend: busy with some Time Off, as well as Doing Taxes. Sunday or Monday I’ll start in on Their Currents Turn Awry, Sunspin volume two, of which I already have about 60,000 words written.

Meanwhile, the airways beckon. Y’all play nice.

Tags: Books, Calamity, Currents, Omaha, Portland, Sunspin, Travel, Writing

Posted: 3:10 am Fri March 30 2012 | Comments(2) |

[conventions|repost] Announcing JayCon XII

This is a repost, which I will roll forward about once a month through the spring

In celebration of my natal anniversary, JayCon XII, my 12th annual 37th birthday party, is Saturday, June 9th, 2012 from 2 to 5 pm at the Flying Pie in SE Portland. We’re partying because I was born, and because I have beat cancer again and again.

If you can read this, you’re invited. Prior JayCon experience not required.

Note that I am announcing this early because people always tell me, “You should have told me sooner!” Except for the people who tell me, “It’s too soon, remind me later.” (Sometimes these are the same people.)

Flying Pie Pizzeria
7804 SE Stark Street
Portland, 97215
(503) 254-2016

http://www.flying-pie.com/

[ Google Maps ]

As is traditional for JayCon, Paul M. Carpentier is specifically not invited.

Tags: Cancer, Conventions, health, JayCon, Personal, Portland, Repost

Posted: 4:20 am Thu March 29 2012 | Comments(0) |

[travel|child] Heading west again

Today I’m bound from Austin back to Portland. I cut my trip short by a day in order be home to see the_child give her formal presentation of her eighth grade project. This has been the design and construction of a marionette, under the mentorship of the delightful and generous Mary Robinette Kowal.

This speech has been a very big deal to her. She’s worked diligently, and practiced it until she’s bored with it. (I consider this a good sign.) I’m very proud of her work on this, and that she brought the project to a successful conclusion.

I can’t wait to see her live and in person tonight.

Photo © 2012, Joseph E. Lake, Jr.

This work by Joseph E. Lake, Jr. is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License.

Tags: Child, Photos, Portland, Travel

Posted: 2:55 am Wed March 21 2012 | Comments(2) |

[personal|process] The day that was

You’d be hard pressed to tell that yesterday wasn’t a vacation day. I did manage a full shift at the Day Jobbe, but I also taught at the_child‘s eighth grade class, put in 90 minutes on Going to Extremes, and squeezed in an entertaining if unsuccessful aurora hunt last night with the_child and mlerules.

So about that day…

Yesterday on my lunch hour, I went to the_child‘s class yesterday and talked about creative writing for publication. That makes me sound so organized, doesn’t it?

Going in, I did have a stack of my books for show-and-tell, and an outline of what I was going to speak to. The first round of questions largely derailed the outline, but that was fine. They were smart kids asking smart questions. And me, I’m pretty quick on my feet. I still managed to cover everything I had originally planned to. It was joy to talk to them. Ghu, I love Waldorf education.

I’ve left the kids with a homework assignment. We developed a character in a setting with a problem as a writing prompt, and they’re to give me flash fiction stories next week based on that. Third session with them, I’ll walk through the stories as if I were editing an anthology, talk about what I see, how I’d select them and order the table of contents, and so on.

Smart kids make me feel smart. And I managed not to embarrass my daughter, at least insofar as she’s been willing to confide in me about the experience. I think it was maybe a little strange to be receiving homework from her dad, though.

Then yesterday evening we got a wild hair to head out to the Columbia Gorge and look for the aurora borealis. The sky had been pretty clear throughout the daylight hours, and this had been the warmest day of the year so far. In other words, we weren’t going to be wet and miserable. I was already tired by the time it got dark, but what the heck. I’m trying to have fun here, people.

We knew the odds of seeing the aurora were pretty low at this latitude, but we thought the trip would be fun in its own right. So the_child and I hied ourselves in the Genre car to pick up mlerules and we drove out to the Columbia Gorge. Once we got off I-84 onto the old scenic highway, we dropped the top and cranked the tunes, and enjoyed the drive up to the Portland Women’s Forum park and Vista House. Those are both on top of the southern flank of the Gorge, with good views of the northern sky.

First, we had to stop and look at the dragon.

That’s the (nearly) full moon in the trees behind.

When we got up to the Women’s Forum park, we realized the northern horizon was occluded by clouds. We pooted around a while to see if they were moving on, and enjoyed the full moon some more.

Oddly, the mountain was hiding. (It does that sometimes.) We did meet a fellow in the parking lot when we arrived who said he’d seen a few colored flashes in the north, but we never managed that. The light from the moon was amazing, and the Gorge at night is incredible to look at. Unfortunately, our camera isn’t good at night time photography. the_child did get a neat shot of I-84 running through the Gorge.

After a while we headed down to Vista House, but the wind was sharper and colder there, and the northern horizon no less occluded, so we punted and headed home.

Though I stayed up too late, it was a lot of fun. Maybe some other time for the aurorae.

Photos © 2012, B. Lake

This work by B. Lake is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License.

Tags: Child, friends, Photos, Portland, Process, Writing

Posted: 6:48 am Fri March 09 2012 | Comments(0) |

[conventions|repost] Announcing JayCon XII

This is a repost, which I will roll forward about once a month through the spring

In celebration of my natal anniversary, JayCon XII, my 12th annual 37th birthday party, is Saturday, June 9th, 2012 from 2 to 5 pm at the Flying Pie in SE Portland. We’re partying because I was born, and because I have beat cancer again and again.

If you can read this, you’re invited. Prior JayCon experience not required.

Note that I am announcing this early because people always tell me, “You should have told me sooner!” Except for the people who tell me, “It’s too soon, remind me later.” (Sometimes these are the same people.)

Flying Pie Pizzeria
7804 SE Stark Street
Portland, 97215
(503) 254-2016

http://www.flying-pie.com/

[ Google Maps ]

As is traditional for JayCon, Paul M. Carpentier is specifically not invited.

Tags: Cancer, Conventions, health, JayCon, Personal, Portland, Repost

Posted: 6:37 am Mon March 05 2012 | Comments(0) |

[links] Link salad phones it in from Denver

Steinbeck vs. Kerouac

Bound, naked in a Subaru: Valentine’s Day role-playing ends badly — Ah, Portland. (Via Scrivener’s Error, whose mother probably doesn’t know he reads these kind of stories.)

Whitney Houston iTunes price hike was a ‘mistake’, Sony says — Ya think so? Ghouls.

Mooresville’s Shining Example (It’s Not Just About the Laptops) — Digital schooling. (Via my Dad.)

Interactive visualization shows the number of CT and MRI scans performed around the world during a 24-hour period — I’m in there somewhere.

The rock record got a bad rap. Fossil diversity accurately reflects history — Interesting. Warning: facts not valid for the willfully ignorant.

Pentagon working with FAA to open U.S. airspace to combat drones — What could possibly go wrong?

America’s Darwin Problem — This. And thank you GOP for stirring this pot while cynically trolling for votes.

A look behind the curtain of the Heartland Institute’s climate change spin — Hard evidence of what we already knew: that climate change denialism is deliberate intellectual fraud for ideological purposes.

Before Karen Met Rick — The GOP contender’s hard-core pro-life wife once dated an abortion provider. Nancy Hass on their time together. Uh huh. Every little thing Hillary Clinton ever did in her life was scrutinized by the media, but did you ever hear about the man Laura Bush killed? Or this story? (Via shsilver.)

What, Newt Worry? Gingrich Isn’t Going Anywhere — Gawd, I hope not. Newt’s the best act since the circus lion at the clowns.

?otd: What do you do in Denver when you’re dead?

2/15/2012
Writing time yesterday: 3.0 hours (new short fiction, some minor revision work)
Body movement: 30 minute stationary bike ride
Hours slept: 6.5 (solid)
Weight: n/a
Currently reading: 1491 by Charles C. Mann

Tags: Books, climate, Culture, healthcare, Links, music, Personal, Politics, Portland, Religion, Science, Tech

Posted: 6:06 am Wed February 15 2012 | Comments(0) |