Jo Walton ([info]papersky) wrote,
@ 2009-03-19 15:33:00
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Like a panda, touched for the very first time. Like a paaaanda...
There's still lots of snow on the ground, but the temperature is going above freezing some days. On those days, if the sun is shining and the wind is blowing, I put washing on the line. I hate using the dryer, it's the worst thing about winter. I'd line dry even if it cost money, but as it is, it's cheaper, it's more ecological, it's nicer, it's just a win all around. Also, I get to see lovely clean things blowing on the line in colour-coded glory. This morning as I was taking the warm wash out of the machine I decided to split it into two baskets, black (and other colours) and white (including blue). The first thing I pulled out was Z's panda rug. I just stood there for a moment looking from one basket to the other and giggling at it.

On Saturday May 2nd, I'm going to be appearing on a panel at the Ottawa Writers' Festival. I was only mildly interested in this until I looked at the schedule and saw that right after my panel on "Fantastic Fiction" with Mike Carey and Kelley Armstrong, there's an interview with Ursula Le Guin. I'm now wildly excited. I also expect that this means the probability of the rest of the family coming with me has increased dramatically.

Recent posts on Tor.com: Piper's Fuzzy books, Tim Powers's The Anubis Gates, Paolo Bacigalupi's Pump Six, Simak's Way Station, Daniel Abraham's Long Price Quartet, Delany's Empire Star.

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[info]melopoeia
2009-03-19 07:37 pm UTC (link)
You of course post this *after* I have already bought a nonrefundable plane ticket to see my parents in NC that weekend.

*cries*

Then again, I'm not sure how I would have gotten to Ottawa.

Bring back a LeGuin story! Even just an "oh my god I met her and it was cool!"

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[info]zingerella
2009-03-19 07:39 pm UTC (link)
One of the saddest things about my new place is that there's really no way to hang laundry outside (we live beside a laneway, with a parking lot beside it, and our landlord's office and personal car-park on top of what would be the back yard, if he hadn't built an office and decided to park a car there.

Pandas confound your simple binary!

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[info]gtrout
2009-03-19 08:41 pm UTC (link)
I have had that damned Madonna song in my head for over an hour now, and I only now just figured out why. This was unkind of you.

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[info]papersky
2009-03-19 10:57 pm UTC (link)
Sorry! It's much better with a panda.

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the panda dilemma
[info]pir_anha
2009-03-19 10:12 pm UTC (link)
*cracks up*.

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[info]kateelliott
2009-03-19 11:21 pm UTC (link)
Oh, that reminds me, because I was hoping to remind myself to ask you if you could put up your Tor.com post reminders in lj, because I read lj every day in that easy-to-read-all-the-blogs-I-subscribe-to way which is the Friends List. And then you did!

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[info]auriaephiala
2009-03-20 05:54 am UTC (link)
I haven't started the line-drying yet because our back yard is a mixture of snow & wet mud, and I'm not willing to risk the towels out there quite yet!

But as soon as the snow/mud goes, and until it gets so cold that it takes more than a day to dry a towel, I put out all my laundry on the line and shift the laundry to days when it's not raining.

It makes me feel better about energy use, and the clothes feel better.

At the moment, I hang most clothes up indoors, except for sheets and towels, which are too big and have to go in the dryer (which thusly runs very infrequently).

We just got a TED energy meter, which hooks directly into your electrical panel and shows you your instantaneous electrical use. It's certainly an encouragement to turn off lights! (Interestingly, the dishwasher only takes 300W, less than I expected.) I haven't dared to measure the dryer,

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[info]auriaephiala
2009-03-20 05:56 am UTC (link)
I first heard of Ms. LeGuin's talk, but when I checked the schedule and realized you would be there a few hours before, it was a double incentive to go! Will you be signing? Will you be talking about Half a Crown at all, or just about the topic of the panel?

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[info]papersky
2009-03-20 02:14 pm UTC (link)
It's a literary festival, and it looks as if they grabbed what relatively local genre writers they could find and put them on a generic panel. I have no idea what they want us to talk about with "Fantastic Fiction". They haven't asked me to sign, or talk about Half a Crown or anything else, but I'd be happy to if they wanted me to. Or we could just hang out beforehand?

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[info]zeborahnz
2009-03-20 06:21 am UTC (link)
I wish I had a dryer in winter. Winter in New Zealand, especially in Christchurch, is wet. We don't get much freeze, we just get rain. Even if it's not raining, the air is wet. The ground is wet. Christchurch was built on a swamp and in winter my backyard reverts to swampdom. I'd have to put on my gumboots to get to the washingline, and even if it's a fine day and I get up early enough to make the most of all the daylight (far from guaranteed on cold damp Saturday mornings), the washing just can't dry when it's in the way of the water that's evaporating from the ground.

Plus, it's smoggy outside in winter, and it's not nice to have clothes that smell of smog.

So in winter I dry my clothes on an A-frame rack inside, next to a dehumidifier. A dryer would probably be more energy-efficient than that, but there's no room in the laundry.

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[info]henrytroup
2009-03-23 12:29 am UTC (link)
May 2nd is now triple-scheduled. Agony!

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