Well, I’m pretty much all packed, my laptop is charging, Jeremiah Tolbert’s holding the fort at Futurismic, and I’ve managed to clear pretty much all my responsibilities and obligations. In other words, I’m ready to go away for the week.

The Masterclass is going to be a lot of fun, I think, though I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t slightly apprehensive. After all, my last involvement with formal education in literary matter was my GCSEs, way back in 1992. I’m sincerely hoping there aren’t too many moments when someone says something like “well, of course, if viewed from a poststructuralist angle …” and I have to say something like “er, poststructuralism, if you could just remind me of the basic ideas there, please?”

Ah, I’m sure I’ll be OK. If I’m worried about anything, I should be worrying about the damned reading list!

As I mentioned before, I have no idea how often I’ll be able to get online, if at all. I’m going to schedule a few things to run while I’m away, and hopefully at the very least I’ll manage to send some photos or brief missives from my cameraphone. But essentially I’m on holiday (even if my brain will be extremely busy), so it’ll be short shrift here at VCTB until I return from the distant North next weekend.

In the meantime, I hope you all have a good week!

Well, I’ve not actively been a part of the science fiction community for very long, but I’ve been around long enough to know that there’s usually a huge uproar of controversy and bitching after the winner of the Arthur C. Clarke Award is announced.

This year? Nothing. Nada. Silencio.

Does this mean everyone’s happy with the choice of M. John Harrison’s Nova Swing?* Or are the discontented just holding fire until they have some really ripe and fermented blog bile to launch?

[* You'll hear no complaints from me, that's for sure.]