Hey, Mom! The Explanation.

Here's the permanent dedicated link to my first Hey, Mom! post and the explanation of the feature it contains.

Monday, September 30, 2019

A Sense of Doubt blog post #1686 - Frozen Passages and other soundscapes

A Sense of Doubt blog post #1686 - Frozen Passages and other soundscapes

Just Frozen in time and space right now. This music may help get us unstuck in time.



A year following my last release, Moments in Golden Light, I present a collection of soundscapes embodying quite a different vision. Frozen Passages is an imagined journey into the far north of the continent, through boreal forest, across vast, barren landscape, through the iciest storm, and eventually finding warm refuge as the night brings a welcome calm to the tundra. Though you will meet no fellow traveler on this trek, it is not a solitary journey. Your companions in this story are the birds of the air in all of their diverse colors and forms. Small songbirds flit overhead from tree to tree in the taiga, curious and watchful of your presence. In open country, the silhouette of a lone raptor moves gracefully beneath the sky's sparse clouds, held aloft by unseen currents of wind, seemingly aloof, yet ever aware of you and every moving thing in its scope. These wondrous fauna, my favorites in the animal kingdom, are represented in many of these soundscapes as flourishes of woodwinds and distant flutes, sounds intended to evoke the calls of these beautiful winged creatures. Few things in nature stir my heart more than the sight of a hawk or an eagle in flight, or inspire in me a feeling of affinity more than the smallest of avians. And so I hope you will find in Frozen Passages a balance of snowy, frost-covered dreamscapes, inspired by the beauty of nature, and tempered with the warmth of human emotion.

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Thank you for listening ♥

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Our next release sees the return of Ben Rath, who released ‘This Body Is Not Me’ under his other alias Slow Heart Music back in 2017. The record was well received by many circles and featured in A Closer Listen’s top ten Ambient releases that year. Between this and a project under his own name, Manchester, UK based Rath has released on labels such as Eilean, Unknown Tone and Cathedral Transmissions.

Slow Heart Music focuses on Ben’s acoustic guitar playing whilst work under his own name is typically more Experimental and drone based. In ‘Any Given Moment’ we have an album that shows glimpses of plaintive guitar combined with Ambient drones to represent fleeting moments, memories and nostalgia. The combination is both restful and tinged with warmth, perfect for the Spring and the Summer months ahead.

The music on this album focuses on experimenting with the guitar as a sound source, both for processed and treated instrumental compositions and free improvisations. Ben wanted to take some of the more Folk inspired guitar instrumentals he has created as Slow Heart Music and incorporate them into more ambient soundscapes. He also had in mind a lighter, more uplifting sound after the darker, more meloncholy themes of Black Heart Music which was released on Eilean Recs. We’re informed that Ben is bringing this phase of musical creation which began in 2014 to an end, so this record acts as his penultimate full album release, with the final part due to be released this year if all goes to plan.

Any Given Moment is presented in a limited edition run of 100 copies, including artwork provided by David Gonzalez Fuster, which is a set of vintage and Polaroid photos. The faded images that represent untold memories are placed against a bright orange credits panel, which brings a warmth and splash of colour as these stories are brought to life.
 

credits

released April 27, 2019

Written and produced by Ben Rath
Mastered by Tim Diagram
Artwork by David Gonzalez Fuster
Packaging Design by Harry Towell

license

all rights reserved







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- Bloggery committed by chris tower - 1909.30 - 10:10

- Days ago = 1549 days ago

- New note - On 1807.06, I ceased daily transmission of my Hey Mom feature after three years of daily conversations. I plan to continue Hey Mom posts at least twice per week but will continue to post the days since ("Days Ago") count on my blog each day. The blog entry numbering in the title has changed to reflect total Sense of Doubt posts since I began the blog on 0705.04, which include Hey Mom posts, Daily Bowie posts, and Sense of Doubt posts. Hey Mom posts will still be numbered sequentially. New Hey Mom posts will use the same format as all the other Hey Mom posts; all other posts will feature this format seen here.

Sunday, September 29, 2019

A Sense of Doubt blog post #1685 - EPIC 2015


A Sense of Doubt blog post #1685 - EPIC 2015

For my classes.

Related to Culture Jam.

Stay tuned. I may add some notes here later.














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- Bloggery committed by chris tower - 1909.29 - 10:10

- Days ago = 1548 days ago

- New note - On 1807.06, I ceased daily transmission of my Hey Mom feature after three years of daily conversations. I plan to continue Hey Mom posts at least twice per week but will continue to post the days since ("Days Ago") count on my blog each day. The blog entry numbering in the title has changed to reflect total Sense of Doubt posts since I began the blog on 0705.04, which include Hey Mom posts, Daily Bowie posts, and Sense of Doubt posts. Hey Mom posts will still be numbered sequentially. New Hey Mom posts will use the same format as all the other Hey Mom posts; all other posts will feature this format seen here.

Saturday, September 28, 2019

A Sense of Doubt blog post #1684 - Three Things About Baseball - game length, playoff rank, and Goodbye

https://www.espn.com/mlb/insider/story/_/id/26658623/how-baseball-changed-150-years

A Sense of Doubt blog post #1684 - Three Things About Baseball - game length, playoff rank, and Goodbye

Goodbye to the regular season of Baseball for 2019. As of tomorrow, when the last games of the regular season are played, one of my constant companions, one of my good friends, Baseball games for the Detroit Tigers and the Chicago Cubs will adjourn until next spring.

I am sad. I didn't expect much of the Tigers this year, though I hoped that they would get 50 wins, which they are not going to do. But not only did I think the Cubs would make the post-season, but I believed that they would win the Central division.

And then, they failed.

I will watch post-season games, but I will miss my Cubs.

ADDED (1909.29): I just found out that because of rained out games, the Tigers will only play 161 games this season. I am being CHEATED out of a game?? I could have one more game?

Seems wrong, though the Tigers and White Sox records and standings have no effect on anything except another bittersweet struggle for greater mediocrity.

As for the post-season, here's the teams in the order I care about seeing winners win.

HOUSTON ASTROS
OAKLAND ATHLETICS
TAMPA BAY RAYS
ATLANTA BRAVES
LOS ANGELES DODGERS
MILWAUKEE BREWERS
WASHINGTON NATIONALS
ST. LOUIS CARDINALS
NEW YORK YANKEES

I most want to see the last two teams in the list lose.

I know I have three AL teams at the top before any NL teams, but I care more about seeing any of those win.

I would love to see a match of teams that no one expects to see.

Normally, I do not cheer for any Texas teams to win anything, but I like this Astros team a lot and I LOVE JUSTIN VERLANDER.

At least the Cubs are a spoiler right now, exacting revenge with their B squad in beating the Cardinals last night and again today (even though the blog post's official time is 10 hours before the final score of the Saturday game).

GAMES ARE TOO LONG

I hear this a lot when people complain about Baseball.

Linda Cohn just said it on Sportscenter last night, which is what prompted this content.

Also, people say that the game of Baseball is "boring."

I often suggest that Baseball is a thinking person's game.

But why does everything have to be fast and fast-paced?

Where's the appreciation for the slow things?

I don't think games need to be shorter; I think games should be longer.

I would love to enjoy a five hour Baseball game. I would love to spend LITERALLY ALL DAY at the ball park.

I always wonder if the people who claim that Baseball games are long, slow, and boring have actually watched a whole game, have talked about its rules, its history, its nuances. Or are they just repeating what other people say as if they were a bunch of parrots.

Why does fast equal good?

Supposed "fast" food (which is often not delivered all that fast) is pretty terrible. It's NOT good.

Sure, other sports are "faster" and games are shorter. But is soccer really any more exciting or any more intense when the score is close?

I say, make the games LONGER.

And so, here's two links that were hanging around, waiting to be shared.

I also say elect Bonds and Schilling. I suppose Roger Clemens, too, even though I cannot stand the guy.

This whole "cheating" BS is stupid.

BONDS, SCHILLING, CLEMENS IN THE HALL

https://sports.yahoo.com/barry-bonds-roger-clemens-curt-schilling-will-probably-get-hall-fame-just-not-year-235034332.html?src=rss

And I  LOVED Bill Freehan. Sad to hear of his passing.

BILL FREEHAN - The greatest Tigers catcher
https://www.freep.com/story/sports/mlb/tigers/2018/10/28/detroit-tigers-history-star-catchers/1781150002/?src=rs

Goodbye Baseball's regular season.

See you in March of 2020.


oh yeah, and this stuff from the next day.

https://www.espn.com/mlb/story/_/id/27731818/ex-cub-david-ross-interest-succeeding-joe-maddon-manager



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- Bloggery committed by chris tower - 1909.28 - 10:10

- Days ago = 1547 days ago

- New note - On 1807.06, I ceased daily transmission of my Hey Mom feature after three years of daily conversations. I plan to continue Hey Mom posts at least twice per week but will continue to post the days since ("Days Ago") count on my blog each day. The blog entry numbering in the title has changed to reflect total Sense of Doubt posts since I began the blog on 0705.04, which include Hey Mom posts, Daily Bowie posts, and Sense of Doubt posts. Hey Mom posts will still be numbered sequentially. New Hey Mom posts will use the same format as all the other Hey Mom posts; all other posts will feature this format seen here.

Friday, September 27, 2019

A Sense of Doubt blog post #1683 - xkcd - DRONE FISHING



A Sense of Doubt blog post #1683 - xkcd - DRONE FISHING

Just an xkcd today.

I was going to hit the random button, but this one, the most recent, was so perfect that I chose it.


Permanent link to this comic: https://xkcd.com/2208/
Image URL (for hotlinking/embedding): https://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/drone_fishing.png




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- Bloggery committed by chris tower - 1909.27 - 10:10

- Days ago = 1546 days ago

- New note - On 1807.06, I ceased daily transmission of my Hey Mom feature after three years of daily conversations. I plan to continue Hey Mom posts at least twice per week but will continue to post the days since ("Days Ago") count on my blog each day. The blog entry numbering in the title has changed to reflect total Sense of Doubt posts since I began the blog on 0705.04, which include Hey Mom posts, Daily Bowie posts, and Sense of Doubt posts. Hey Mom posts will still be numbered sequentially. New Hey Mom posts will use the same format as all the other Hey Mom posts; all other posts will feature this format seen here.

Thursday, September 26, 2019

A Sense of Doubt blog post #1682 - Alienist Manifesto


A Sense of Doubt blog post #1682 - Alienist Manifesto

Right now, blog entries need to be easy. I am just posting the most interesting content that has come to my attention recently or far in the past -- stay tuned for a dip into the archives -- as I need to not only get caught up but get ahead and have ready-made posts complete and queued to go if I am not ready with any of the original content, and also, the readiness to make time to create the original content.

So, today, this. WOW. FREE DOWNLOADABLE PDF!!!!!!!!!!!!!

This exists??? How comes I am just hearing of it now?

I love the Internet. It is my soma. Huxley and McLuhan knew.





https://alienistmanifesto.wordpress.com/




CATEGORY RESPONSE / ALIENISM & POETRY / TRANSFUTURISM / PICK A FUTURE / METAZOA / APRÈS LE FUTUR / ALIEN RHYTHMS / ZOMBIES, CYBORGS & CHIMERAS / VALEDICTION FOR A WHITEBOI / NEW ADVENTURES OF THE HUMAN MACHINE / THE EXTINCTION CABARET / MOTHERFUCKER / GENERATIVE CELLS OF ABYSSAL HEIFER / WÖRTERFLUCHT / CONCUSSION PROTOCOLS / FROM AN OCCASIONAL ISLAND / [UNDISCLOSED LUMINARIES OFFER YOU TO THE WORLD] / GUNK 7 / THE PROCESSES / ROBOTOCRACY / THIS IS NOT GOING TO END WELL…
INTERIOR MINISTRY / DIFFRACTIONS COLLECTIVE / LOUIS ARMAND / MS MEKIBES / PETER BOUSCHELJONG / VÍT VAN CAMP / GENE EDITED / GERMÁN SIERRA / JO BLIN / ATEFEH AHMADI / RICHARD MAKIN / MK UNDEFINED / D. HARLAN WILSON / AMY IRELAND / VANESSA PLACE / STELARC / PETRA RÖSLEROVÁ / MIKE CORRAO / KAREN ELIOT / MICHAEL ROWLAND / RACHEL HAYWIRE / UXXGEUZ / METAZOA.ORG / BARBORA TRNKOVÁ / TOMÁŠ JAVUREK / DAVID VICHNAR / ANA PAULA RUMUALDO / BLAIRXBLACK3 / FEMEN


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- Bloggery committed by chris tower - 1909.26 - 10:10

- Days ago = 1545 days ago

- New note - On 1807.06, I ceased daily transmission of my Hey Mom feature after three years of daily conversations. I plan to continue Hey Mom posts at least twice per week but will continue to post the days since ("Days Ago") count on my blog each day. The blog entry numbering in the title has changed to reflect total Sense of Doubt posts since I began the blog on 0705.04, which include Hey Mom posts, Daily Bowie posts, and Sense of Doubt posts. Hey Mom posts will still be numbered sequentially. New Hey Mom posts will use the same format as all the other Hey Mom posts; all other posts will feature this format seen here.

Wednesday, September 25, 2019

A Sense of Doubt blog post #1681 - There will be joy again



A Sense of Doubt blog post #1681 - There will be joy again

I am still buried with work and struggling to keep up. I pray for reprieve and time to devote to some wholly original content as I have so many things in the works. For now, just this, as I loved it, love it, cherish it.


FROM:
Road To Nowhen - Orbital Operations 22 September 2019

Yeah, well.  We're all having fun here in the End Times.  There's nothing worse than American friends messaging me with "oh my god I am so sorry about your country." 
Hold on tight. Something will happen to make you smile. It's never rained forever. Llke the man said: There has been joy.  There will be joy again. See you next week.


THE DEMOLISHED MAN by Alfred Bester is one of my favourite books and one of the first SF books that I really adored with all of my heart.

Surely, Ellis loves Bester, too, and quoted from him at the end of his 1909.22 newsletter (quoted above).

Here's the article he linked.

https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/books/features/book-of-a-lifetime-the-demolished-man-by-alfred-bester-2343714.html

Book Of A Lifetime: The Demolished Man, By Alfred Bester

In 1985 I bought a 30p second-hand paperback because I liked the title: 'The Demolished Man', by Alfred Bester. This fits into a rare category of novel - short science-fiction - and I read it during my first two days as a student. University promised friends, drinks, adventures, but I preferred life on Mars. On the third day, I read it again.
Since then, for me, 'The Demolished Man' has become a comfort book. All writers should have them. Instead of reading for research, or reading to steal, there are books that recalibrate the original, childish joy of reading to escape. This in turn reignites the urge to write and, for me, 'The Demolished Man' is one of those books. Geoffrey Household's 'Rogue Male' (1939) is another.
Both these short novels are full of vigorous action. 'The Demolished Man' (winner of the inaugural Hugo award on publication in 1953) is an American cop novel set in the future, a genre combination later exploited by Philip K Dick and William Gibson. For Bester, familiar police procedures are given an original edge because the investigating cop, Lincoln Powell, PH.D 1, is a first grade ESPER.
"Esper for Extra Sensory Perception ... for Telepaths, Mind Readers, Brain Peepers." He knows and the reader knows right from the start whodunit. It was Ben Reich, evil industrialist (an ever-contemporary touch) who lives by the flawed motto, "Be audacious, be brave, be confident and you will not fail".

Powell's challenge is to trick the murderer into revealing his method and motives, because not everybody in the future can read minds. Reich himself, for example, attempts to outwit Powell by filling his head with a popular song and acting before he thinks. In this way the ripping pace of the book becomes part of what it's about.

Each time I re-read the novel I'm impressed by the formal daring. Bester experiments with fonts and layouts to convey different types of unspoken thought, and his prescient characters include Sam @tkins, Jo ¼maine and the very sexy Miss Duffy Wyg&.
Not all his future projections have worn so well. Reich's motives are stiffly dependent on Freudian theory, but most glaringly Bester fails to predict any type of feminism. The words girl and pretty always come as a pair.
My edition is the 1966 Penguin with the ugly Halloween cover and a glut of hard-boiled typos, and I doubt it will survive many more readings. If anything, the story itself gets younger. I'm now older than the characters, who in their late thirties once seemed impossibly experienced in the ways of the future world. And however many times I re-read 'The Demolished Man', I never tire of the ending: "There has been joy. There will be joy again." Yes, I think. That must be so. It is 1985 and time to go out.
Richard Beard's new novel, 'Lazarus is Dead', is published by Harvill Secker

If you're just joining me and have forgotten why you subscribed: I'm Warren Ellis, author, comics writer, public speaker, screenwriter, producer, Doctor of the University of Essex, Patron to Humanists UK and writer & Executive Producer of CASTLEVANIA on Netflix.
Please add 
to your address book so I don't keep getting marked as sp7m just for sending you an email with four fucking links in it.
If you enjoy this newsletter, perhaps you'd like to infect your friends with it, by driving them to http://orbitaloperations.com and forcing them to give me their email address.  Forward them your copy of this newsletter to see if they like it.
I post during the week at LTD.
Tweet Button     Facebook Like Button

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- Bloggery committed by chris tower - 1909.25 - 10:10

- Days ago = 1544 days ago

- New note - On 1807.06, I ceased daily transmission of my Hey Mom feature after three years of daily conversations. I plan to continue Hey Mom posts at least twice per week but will continue to post the days since ("Days Ago") count on my blog each day. The blog entry numbering in the title has changed to reflect total Sense of Doubt posts since I began the blog on 0705.04, which include Hey Mom posts, Daily Bowie posts, and Sense of Doubt posts. Hey Mom posts will still be numbered sequentially. New Hey Mom posts will use the same format as all the other Hey Mom posts; all other posts will feature this format seen here.

Tuesday, September 24, 2019

A Sense of Doubt blog post #1680 - "Shoot Me Now."


A Sense of Doubt blog post #1680 - "Shoot Me Now."

This is classic humor stuff. I am going to start class with this clip later this week.

I used the Calvin and Hobbes strips in class along with the classic bit from Looney Tunes, who are returning via the great work of their longtime home, Warner Brothers.

Sometimes giant corporations do things that benefit humanity, like more Looney Tunes.














 








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- Bloggery committed by chris tower - 1909.24 - 10:10

- Days ago = 1543 days ago

- New note - On 1807.06, I ceased daily transmission of my Hey Mom feature after three years of daily conversations. I plan to continue Hey Mom posts at least twice per week but will continue to post the days since ("Days Ago") count on my blog each day. The blog entry numbering in the title has changed to reflect total Sense of Doubt posts since I began the blog on 0705.04, which include Hey Mom posts, Daily Bowie posts, and Sense of Doubt posts. Hey Mom posts will still be numbered sequentially. New Hey Mom posts will use the same format as all the other Hey Mom posts; all other posts will feature this format seen here.

Monday, September 23, 2019

A Sense of Doubt blog post #1679 - Under Frustration - Musical Monday for 1909.23


A Sense of Doubt blog post #1679 - Under Frustration - Musical Monday for 1909.23

I can't even begin to explain how overwhelmed I am. But I keep on keeping on. One thing at a time.

So, just music today.

Thanks you Warren Ellis for this music.





  • Record/Vinyl + Digital Album

    Simple LP including all the tracks of the compilation.

    Includes unlimited streaming of Under Frustration Vol.2 via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
    ships out within 7 days

      €20 EUR or more 

     


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about

The “Under Frustration” project takes stock of the contemporary Arab electronic scene, and highlights its astonishing diversity, by deconstructing Western clichés that are still fantasizing about a culturally homogenous Arab world. In a context of post-revolutionary disillusion, this ambitious trilogy sets itself as a manifesto of a new, futuristic, underground wave that aims to uplift the Arab voice, once again.

With this new release, Arabstazy allows the listener to walk among Shiite, Shaabi or Stambali lands - revealing new mystical sounds, reserved for trance ceremonies and ancestral rituals; all vivid in the eyes of the collective members, musicians, producers, videographers and photographers, nowadays, scattered between the United States, Tunisie, Germany, France, Sweden, Irak, Liban and Poland.

Curated by Arabstazy
Produced by Shouka
Published by InFiné

credits

released September 13, 2019

license

all rights reserved
OTHER GOOD STUFF:

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- Bloggery committed by chris tower - 1909.23 - 10:10

- Days ago = 1542 days ago

- New note - On 1807.06, I ceased daily transmission of my Hey Mom feature after three years of daily conversations. I plan to continue Hey Mom posts at least twice per week but will continue to post the days since ("Days Ago") count on my blog each day. The blog entry numbering in the title has changed to reflect total Sense of Doubt posts since I began the blog on 0705.04, which include Hey Mom posts, Daily Bowie posts, and Sense of Doubt posts. Hey Mom posts will still be numbered sequentially. New Hey Mom posts will use the same format as all the other Hey Mom posts; all other posts will feature this format seen here.

Sunday, September 22, 2019

A Sense of Doubt blog post #1678 - Scorpion Swamp


A Sense of Doubt blog post #1678 - Scorpion Swamp

I weary of being behind schedule.

I have postponed a post about Piper and Adam's wedding about six times. Not that you know that. It was planned again for today, but it requires some work, which I am not able to devote to it today. Next week sometime, now, if I can execute my plan.

Standing in for that content is this tidbit shared by Kieron Gillen in a recent newsletter.

And when I make this post, I will be current, which is a good feeling.

from Kieron Gillen's newsletter #125

I’ve had a few requests for “What’s the Scorpion Swamp thing?” I mentioned in passing at World Con, so I’m going to share a nerdy tale of eldritch horror and/or mishearing.
The Fighting Fantasy books were created by Steve Jackson and Ian Livingstone (who also founded Games Workshop, etc). There’s a little confusion that there’s also a completely different American Steve Jackson, who made games like GURPS, Car Wars, Illuminati, Munchkin and so on. I’m a big fan of both, but it was the American one who was a guest of honour at World Con.
I’m in the queue for his spotlight with my friend, Daniel Nye Griffiths, and we’re chatting about this. Specifically, there’s something which makes the Steve Jacksons even more confusing.
American Steve Jackson also wrote some of the Fighting Fantasy books.
Now, I somehow recalled something else. Namely, that there was a third Steve Jackson, who only also did one of the Fighting Fantasy books – specifically, the unusual Scorpion Swamp,. We frowned, not thinking it likely, and ended up turning to google to look up the facts. We were disappointed to find that, no, I’d got confused, and it was US Steve Jackson who did Scorpion Swamp. The concept of a third Steve Jackson who only ever did one game book was too good to be true.
Scorpion Swamp is one of the weirder of the series. Not tonally like the genuinely chilling House of Hell – but because it took a very different structure. It attempted to model an actual “dungeon” and move between it as if it was a real space, in a way more like a simulation than the more branching narrative of the Fighting Fantasy games. It’s one of the books which reviews terribly and understandably, just as it’s a completely different beast to the rest. As a kid, it was always one of my favourite for exactly that reason – and while the simulationist approach is very American Steve Jackson, I’d somehow transferred its unusual nature to be the work of someone who absolutely slipped from the pages of history. It would make sense it was done by someone who did no other work, because it was its own thing.
But I was wrong.
So we go into the panel, which is a delight. Eventually it hits the Q&A and someone asks a question about the Sorcery gamebooks. You can hear the wince from the crowd, as they’re written by the British Steve Jackson. American Steve Jackson takes it in his stride, and talks about them, then notes they’re not by him. It then segues to the Fighting Fantasy books he did write.
The host says he did three, yes?
Steve says yes.
The host strains his memory and lists three game books.
Steve says Yup.
Dan and I look at each other, in glee.
Scorpion Swamp wasn’t in the list.
Now, it’s possible we misheard. It’s possible that Steve misheard. It’s possible that Steve heard right and was too polite to correct the host.
But it’s also possible that all the geek history is wrong and there’s actually a third Steve Jackson.
“The Third Steve Jackson” is clearly the name of my forthcoming eldritch cosmic horror novella.
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- Bloggery committed by chris tower - 1909.22 - 10:10

- Days ago = 1541 days ago

- New note - On 1807.06, I ceased daily transmission of my Hey Mom feature after three years of daily conversations. I plan to continue Hey Mom posts at least twice per week but will continue to post the days since ("Days Ago") count on my blog each day. The blog entry numbering in the title has changed to reflect total Sense of Doubt posts since I began the blog on 0705.04, which include Hey Mom posts, Daily Bowie posts, and Sense of Doubt posts. Hey Mom posts will still be numbered sequentially. New Hey Mom posts will use the same format as all the other Hey Mom posts; all other posts will feature this format seen here.