Luscious and I attended the Katharine Susannah Prichard Writer's Centre SF/F Awards ceremony on Sunday, in our capacity as this year's judges. We had a great time reading for the comp: 90 entries in the Open section and 20 in the junior. Submissions are blind, which meant that we didn't know the identity of the winners until after we'd chosen them, so it was gratifying to see some good names amongst the crop, some of whom we count amongst our friends. It was also good to see sopme of the authors come to accept their prizes: not many Western Australians copped gongs this year, and I enjoyed listening to those who did attend give their readings.
For the record, yon winners this year were:
OPEN SECTION:
Winner- Happy Now, Peter Frankis
2nd - Here Be Monsters, Susan Wardle
Highly Commended-
- Deadline, Martin Livings
- Ian, Shane Jirayia Cummings
- Rentokil Girl, BJ Thomason
- Hollow, Peter Frankis
- Boomerang, Joh Gooley
- The Scent of Milk, Tansy Rayner Roberts
- The Heartfelt Creature, Dominic Lennard
- Screen Conspiracy, Harold Mally
- Rings And Things, Helen Venn
- Leap Year Man, Jim Murphy
- Crossed Wires, Laurie Steed
- They're Selling Postcards Of The Hanging, Neroli Cochrane (Winner of the highly-unofficial Lee's Vote For Best Title of the Competition award)
Winner- Disenchantments, Briony Davis
2nd- The Feast, Colin Gan
Highly Commended-
- Encephsystem (TM), Ruth Fox
- The Tree, Ben Brooker
- The Clone, Nicola Sanchez
- The Isle, Ruth Fox
- Waiting For Reality, Huxley Baberowski
- A Sword... For The Road, Valerie Coscini
And the winner is...
1 game to go, and the mighty Bayswater Juniors lie in 4th place, with a strong chance of making the finals! A brave 4-0 loss this weekend (to a side that walloped us 9-2 in the reverse fixture) speaks of some good form, so it all rides on the final game of the season.
The last couple of games have been a bit hard on Aiden: with the business end of the season he's getting less game time, which I don't think is fair: junior sport is supposed to be about fun, not about the coach and his friends reliving their inflated glory days through the kids. I ended up having a row with the coach's father on Sunday, who is of the opinion the supporting the kids means shouting abuse at them every time they do (or don't do) something. Ugly parents get under my skin, and had he turned it upon the A-boy things would have become much louder than they did....
Thankfully, Aiden's still up for every game, and still gets involved- he laid a beautiful crunching tackle on a player last weekend. He's a much better player than he was at the start of the season, and I hope he continues next year, and keeps having fun.
And we're already starting to train the next generation. How's this for goalscoring form?
Mia Hamm is yesterday's news!
Lie down and die, Barbie. You can't compete with a Batman mask and an imagination. The jewlerry is a nice touch, don't you think? "I could fight crime, or I could just head out to dinner."
It's not a bike pump, it's a sword! And a trumpet, and a microphone, and a guitar....
The Pink Knight Avenger...
CURRY, METHEGLIN, AND LAUGHTER
Had a great time on Sunday night, when Shane Jirayia Cummings and Angela Challis joined us for dinner after the SF Awards, giving us another excuse to head down to our special little Indian place and grab some takeaway. Dinner started at 7, and it was past midnight when we finally parted, weary from laughter and some of the most enjoyable conversation we've had since, well, since the last time we shared dinner. Shane and Angela are just too much fun for words, and anybody who enjoys metheglin as much as I do is always welcome :) Not to mention the muscat, the cabernet merlot, the classic white.......
Oh, and next time you bump into Shane, ask him to tell you about the vespian legetarians :)
IT'S BACK, BABY!
The Premier League is back!
Here we go, here we go, here we goooooooooooooooooo!!!!!!!!!
SECRET TIJUANA DEATHMATCH...
...has arrived in the mail! How can you not love a game that lets you take failed American businessmen and pit them in masked Mexican wrestler combat to the death? I love Cheapass Games.
And I notice on the side of the box that they have a game called Unexploded Cow. Hmmm.....
UP AT EBAY
Put up our first items for sale yesterday on this fine taking-money-from-Batts-in-return-for-regular-packages-in-the-mail site. If you'd like a massive encyclopedia of motorcycles, an unopened copy of Titus on DVD, an unopened VHS box set of the first 3 Star Wars movies, or a 3-issue The Shadow mini-series, look under Triffbatt and make a bid.
ANOTHER ONE DONE
Finally finished a story and sent it out this morning. It seems so long since I've accomplished this simple task. But the story's a good one, by which I mean it's unremittingly nasty and makes Luscious' skin crawl. Which is a fine thing, because Decimated has gone off to Shadowed Realms.
Tentacles crossed.
BOOOOOOOKKKKKKKSSSSSSSS........
This Saturday, the grand opening of Fantastic Planet Bookstore, 8 Shafto Lane, Perth.
Run by groovies Elaine Kemp and Stephen Dedman, this promises to finally be the decent SF bookstore this city has been waiting for. Elaine and Stephen are committed to showcasing the weird, the unusual, the local, and the hard to get, as well as the usual shel-filling money spinners.
Get your asses down there. Buy something. Support it. Read their weblog. Tell them what you want. This is the best chance we've had since A Touch of Strange turned to poo to have a truly first class Speculative Fiction bookshop.
You'll recognise me on Saturday: I'll be the large hairy guy telling the short gorgeous woman that I can't possibly live without any of the enormous pile of books I'll be carrying. Hope they've got a big Waldrop section...
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