Linkee-poo wonders how you manage to make ends meet

Bryan Thomas Schmidt put together a punch list for self-editing from taking Cat Rambo's editing class. I need to reread this when I have more time for it to actually sink in. (Grokked from Cat Rambo)

John Joseph Adams is giving away ARCs of his latest anthology, Armored (of which I posted a link to the story by Tobias Buckell and Dave Klecha yesterday) on Goodreads (where I should be doing more, sigh, in a moment Ishmael, in a moment).

You know that whole less regulation, let's do away with unions, and all that conservative crap, this is what happens in such a world. Employees fired because they all wore orange shirts on the same day so that when they went to happy hour after work, they'd look like a group. I wonder if the lawyers would look at themselves and say, "Hey, we're all wearing dark suits, we must be part of a protest" and fire themselves. Nope, that wouldn't happen because they're the people with big degrees. (Grokked from the Slactivist)

Gene Wolfe, Neil Gaiman, David Hartwell, Michael Swanwick and others ride a merry-go-round. Okay, anybody else thinking of that scene in American Gods? I keep waiting to see their true forms show up in a psychedelic light show.(Grokked from Tor.com)

Patty Jansen on boring beginnings and why you shouldn't do them. Read and learn. (Grokked from Elizabeth)

Catherine Schaff-Stump with some good advice for a writers' workshop. Catherine is wise indeed.

Miranda Suri gives some good reasons why you want to go on writer workshops/retreats/conventions. Miranda is also wise. I'll also point out that, at least for me, after going on these, you start to miss them when you're not on one. It's a hard habit to break.

(This seems to be a VP XIII day, go figure)

Lookie, Santorum gets caught applauding a religious assnard (thanks, John Scalzi, I'm kinda liking that word). While it's roiled into pseudo-religo-speek, that's called "hate" spewing out all over that stage. Expect the MSM and Fox News to endless run this one just like they did with the Rev. Wright sermon. Yeah, that last line cracked me up too. (Grokked from Jay Lake)

"But set aside the role Fox News played in her death and consider the role it played in her life. Watching Fox News made this poor woman miserable. She lived in needless terror, troubled by a constant anxiety that was manufactured and fabricated by political operatives posing as journalists… That’s harmful. It’s wrong. Decent people don’t torment the elderly with imaginary threats." As someone who is dealing with a little bit of this in my own family, yes, this.

One of the things I keep hearing from lots of friends who live in foreign lands, and on the news whenever it's a slow news day and reporters go out and ask people questions, is "Just WTF is going on over there?" The rest of the world is getting ready to go to the Hague and have us all involuntarily committed. (Grokked from Jay Lake)

Alligator Quotient: The benefit of so many alligators stacked up, the ones still at my level can't open their mouths.