Sitting in the front room on a cool, cloudy July afternoon listening to Jackson Browne’s Late for the Sky – my album love affair of the moment, I think, though I am somewhat taken by that Richard & Linda Thompson cd I got the other day – and thumbing through the latest issue of The Word which arrived in the mail today. Apart from what is either arthritis or RSI in my left thumb, and an aching suspicion that I’m ignoring something on my ‘to do’ list, all seems reasonably well with the world.

I’m reading, which is cool. Jeff VanderMeer’s The Third Bear arrived from bookdepository.co.uk yesterday and has an original story in it, so there’s some extra reading coming. I actually loved the title story and am happy to see his story from Eidolon 1 reprinted, so I’m looking forward to this one. I’m also in the early pages of Hannu Rajaniemi’s The Quantum Thief which I’m quite excited about. Of course, I just heard that ARCs are out in the world (somewhere, not here) for Terry Pratchett’s I Shall Wear Midnight so I’m seriously jonesing about that.

Other than that, I’m toying with ideas for anthologies (nothing concrete yet – all I can see are the ideas that won’t work), avoiding writing reviews, playing with podcasts and keeping busy.  WorldCon is coming up like a freight train.  For the first time in several years I don’t think it looks like I’ll be on programming, though I did volunteer. I’m actually reasonably cool with that – having the family at the convention will keep me pretty busy, so it might be a good thing. I also feel like I’m coming down to the pointy end of having to make a decision about World Fantasy.  It’s not until October, but I should talk to Liza and see what she thinks about it. I’m still torn. Too far to go this year? Maybe.

Look what showed up when I got home today. Yes, the advance reader’s copies of Life on Mars! I’m delighted with them. Many, many thanks to the fabulous Sharyn November, and to Stephan again for that cover!

I’m delighted to hear that Karen Joy Fowler’s wonderful story “The Pelican Bar” has won the Shirley Jackson Award for Best Short Story. It was one of the highlights of Eclipse Three, and a real joy to publish.

Other winners included Victor LaValle, Nick Antosca, Stephen King, Robert Shearman, Kevin Wilson, and Ellen Datlow. Sincere congratulations to them all.

A little bit late, for which all apologies, a second instalment in the “Books I’m Looking Forward to” series of podcasts.  I look at July and discuss:

• Lou Ander’s anthology Masked;
• Amelia Beamer’s debut novel The Loving Dead;
• Ted Chiang’s novella The Lifecycle of Software Objects;
• Terry Dowling’s new story collection Amberjack: Tales of Fear and Wonder;
• Ken Macleod’s latest novel The Restoration Game;
• Ian McDonald’s The Dervish House; and
• Charles Stross’s The Fuller Memorandum.

Had a good party last night. The eight of us – my mother, brother, sister, her partner, Marianne, the girls and I – all headed to my mother’s place for a farewell dinner for my sister Barbara and her partner Bec, who are moving to Melbourne tomorrow. As I said yesterday, we’re a small group, so it’ll make a huge difference, but we ate and drank and enjoyed each other’s company one last time for a while.  It was a good thing to do, and for some reason the cold, rainy evening held at bay outside made the perfect backdrop.

I meant to read when I got home, but we were in late and it took a while to get the girls into bed, so I goofed around on the web a little, then slept, if a little fitfully. It’s a rainy morning here now and I’m sitting in my front room and listening to a little more of the Neko Case. I have some things to do and some things I’d like to do today, so I’m not sure what will get done. Sophie’s got a playdate at 1pm, which sort of sits bang in the middle of  lunch and such, but I’d like to get down to Mt Lawley if I can, maybe stop in to Planet or something like that, grab a coffee – who knows?

There is a podcast to do, and I’m waiting to hear from Gary on that. There might be a special guest – Gary’s at Readercon and I told him to surprise me – so we’ll see how that goes.  That’s the only solid commitment. Still the day awaits. I’m going to approach it slowly.