Hippie Cereal (photo)

Trader Joe's, Seattle, WA

You can't necessarily tell from this photo, but yes, those twigs are actually green.

Blackboard from Night Kitchen (photo)

Night Kitchen Bathroom, Seattle, WA

This blackboard used to be in the Night Kitchen, in the bathroom.  Now the Night Kitchen is no more, but this photo lives on.

Where Have All the Batteries Gone (Song)

Where Have All the Batteries Gone
to the tune of "Where Have All the Flowers Gone"
by Luna Lindsey

Where have all the batt'ries gone, long time passing?
Where have all the batt'ries gone, long time ago?
Where have all the batt'ries gone? Gone to robots every one.
When will they ever learn?
When will they ever learn?

Where have all the robots gone, long time passing?
Where have all the robots gone, long time ago?
Where have all the robots gone?  Gone to mine ast'roids, every one.
When will they ever learn?
When will they ever learn?

Where have all the ast'roids gone, long time passing?
Where have all the ast'roids gone, long time ago?
Where have all the ast'roids gone?  Mined to lith'ium, every one.
When will they ever learn?
When will they ever learn?

Where has all the lith'ium gone, long time passing?
Where has all the lith'ium gone, long time ago?
Where has all the lith'ium gone?  Gone to batt'ries, every one...
When will they ever learn?
When will they ever learn?

Blog Tour - June 11th to July 9th

Starting next week, on June 11th, I start a month-long blog tour.  My schedule is pretty packed.  This list may change.

This blog tour was made possible by Bewitching Book Tours.  Roxanne has made everything easy, and I am pleased at how many doors she was able to open for me.

What is a blog tour?  During the month, Emerald City Dreamer will be featured on many different book blogs, in the form of reviews, author interviews, and guest posts.  It's a great way for readers to see what book bloggers think of my novel and to learn more about me.  I hope you will check out some of these great blogs, as they are a way for you to learn more about other books.

As these dates pass, I will update the links to point directly to my post.  For now, they point to the blog.


June 13 

ReaWrite – Promo

June 15 

Rabid Reads - Five Reasons to Be Afraid of Faeries – Guest post
Rabid Reads Contest Winner

I Just Wanna Sit Here and Read – Spotlight

A Dream Within A Dream – Promo and Review

June 18

Fang-tastic Books - Six Things to Take Along on a Faerie Hunt – Guest post

Books, Books, and More Books – Review

June 21

Roxanne’s Realm – Promo
It's Raining Books – Giveaway

June 22

The Creatively Green Write at Home Mom - Where Do Ideas Come From – Guest Post 

June 23

JeanzBookReadNReview – Author Spotlight and Promotional Spotlight

June 25

The Full Fang – Interview

June 27

The Speculative Salon – Interview

June 29 - 8pm
Debut Live Author Reading at Wayward Coffeehouse
Babbling About Books - Part of This Complete Breakfast - Guest Post

July 3 

Manga Maniac Cafe – Interview

Everything to Do With Books – Review

Coffee Addicted Writer – Review

July 5 

Book Reviews, Fiction Reflections, N' More – Interview and Review

Fiction Fascination - Four Faeries That Should Keep You Awake At Night – Guest Post

July 9 

Bornean Bookworm Reads - Musing About Muses and Music – Guest Post

The Wormhole – Interview

Simply Infatuated – Interview and Giveaway

Scarcity Mentality vs. The Abundance of Ideas

Writers get asked all the time, "Where do you get your ideas?"

To most active writers, ideas are easy. They flow faster than we have time to write them. Anyone can get ideas. 

Some people seem to have a zero-sum notion of ideas, that there is a set number, and once those run out, they're all gone. This leads to lots of idea-stifling behaviors. It is a notion that proves itself. Imagine if we had a scarcity notion about muscles, that each of us has a top limit on the number of motions we can make, or pounds we can lift. We'd all sit around because we think it's healthy; meanwhile our muscles atrophy, and sure enough, after walking a few paces, we'd collapse, having "run out" of muscles.

Ridiculous, yet it is something most people believe about a muscle we call the "brain".

Like any other muscle, the Ideaceps Major gets stronger the more you flex it. The brain only likes to do work that it thinks you find useful. All ideas need are a little attention, a little appreciation. Don't judge your ideas, don't stuff them away. Just jot them down, or reflect on them for a moment and thank them for being so brilliant. Your brain will kicks in and give you more. It's that simple.

Let's look at some idea-stifling behaviors that come from zero-sum thinking:

The Unworthy

Some think good ideas only come to those magically blessed to receive them. They believe themselves unworthy for inspiration. When an idea pops into An Unworthy's head, she thinks, What a stupid idea! After such abuse, her brain naturally assumes that thinking of ideas is a useless skill, so it resorts to thinking up ideas rarely, and only on accident.

The Hoarder

Hoarders get ideas that they think are good. In fact, they think they're such good ideas, they grow paranoid, afraid someone will steal them. So they keep them secret.

This comes from the mistaken belief that ideas are unique. Once an idea is given to one person, it is reserved forever, as if the idea gets patented right then and there, restricted from anyone else's use. No one else could possibly think of such a good idea simultaneously.

I used to be a hoarder. I've had dozens of million-dollar ideas I kept to myself. A year or two later I would see my product idea on the store shelf, or my story idea in someone else's book. eCigs? Yeah, I thought of those. I didn't know a thing about atomizers, but I imagined a delivery system of flavored nicotine that looked cool without the smoke, that would come in all colors. I even thought of the LED to simulate the ember.

Ideas are out there for the picking. Just because I think something up doesn't mean it's mine. Someone else will think of it, too.

The Perfectionist

Some hoarders keep their ideas in reserve for "someday". I'm not talking about those who have so many ideas they have to pick and choose which ones to work on – I'm talking about people who have one or two great ideas, but wait for the day when they can get it perfect. The idea gets put away, never to be seen again.

This also stems from the zero-sum notion. This is my one perfect idea. This is my Ringworld or Snowcrash or Foundation, and it will make me rich and famous.

An idea is just a small piece of the craft. There's prose, pacing, setting, characters, plot, editing, grammar, and voice. When the idea is so perfect, the other ingredients may feel unworthy. It is tempting to put a good idea on the shelf until the perfect time, when the stars align.

Sometimes as I write, I am tempted to reject an idea for a character, or setting, or twist that otherwise fits. Why? Because it seems too perfect, to "big" for the story at hand. I may be tempted to save that idea for later. Oh, I think, That twist is far too cool to throw away on a simple scene in this novel. I should save it for a story all of its own!

But I know better. I fight this temptation. If this story inspired that idea, it belongs here. That idea has some magic to it, some energy. If I set it on the backburner for the day when I can supposedly do it justice, it will grow stale, and possibly die completely. My current project will want for lack of that energy.

Abundance

Trust. Trust that ideas will always be available. Those ideas are here for me today, and new ideas will be there for me tomorrow. As I reward my brain by giving its ideas life, so it will reward me.

There is no upper limit on the number of ideas I will have in my lifetime. Time is the real limitation, an actual zero-sum. I flex my Ideaceps Major all the time and my brain has given me notebooks full of seeds. There is no end to material I can work on, as long as I keep working. That's the hard part. That's the limited resource. Time and work.

Ideas don't make success. Success comes from the implementation and marketing of those ideas. That is much more difficult. There's a reason why eCig-makers in China are raking in the dough for my idea. Let them. I don't care. Lots of people think up the same ideas at the same time, and he who acts on it wins. That guy in China put in all the work, and I can buy an eCig and puff away. I get to use their inventions or read their stories and not have to invent or write it myself.

I've got plenty of other ideas I can act on.

Slippery (photo)

Rest Area near Cle Elum, WA

Yes, that's how it's supposed to work, actually.

Silly Autocorrect (photo)

Back when I had an iPhone.

Yes, very helpful, Autocorrect.  These things always happen after a long string of compounding errors.  In this case, my phone kept sending messages before I was done writing them, and then it went and wouldn't let me write the word "Nevermind".  I think I retyped it three times.

Wayward Reading - June 29th

Two exciting announcements this week!

Reading at Wayward Coffeehouse

I am booked for my first debut live author reading at Wayward Coffeehouse in Seattle with my friend, horror author Michael Montoure!

Michael has a long background of doing readings at Seattle venues and at cons in various places.  His short story collection, Slices, is awesome, and available at Amazon in Kindle and print.

I have performed an author reading once before, but on video.  This will be my first live performance.

I will be reading three pieces:

• Let the Bugs Work Themselves Out,  a sci-fi short story about ants and hackers.
• The Metro Gnome, a story set in my Dreams by Streetlight world, about a gnome on the 358 bus.
• An excerpt from Emerald City Dreamer.

Details: Wayward Coffeehouse in north Seattle.  June 29th, 8pm-10pm. Directions

The other announcement is my book blog tour, starting next week.

RIP Ray Bradbury

I was greatly inspired by Bradbury as a child.  I remember taking an SAT test in 1992, and recognizing a passage from Dandelion Wine they'd used.

Our family had tapes with the Bradbury 13 dramatizations done by BYU in 1984.  Just last month I wanted to share them with the kids, found them, and listened to some of them on vacation.

Some of these stories had huge impacts on me, especially a "Sound of Thunder", about time travel and the effects even small changes could have.  "The Wind" terrified me, and kept me up late, listening to the wind in Eastern Washington, afraid it might get in.

On Twitter today, someone pointed me at these audio productions done in the 1950s, and clearly inspired the later Bradbury 13.

I never got around to reading the Martian Chronicles, but I saw the poorly-made movies.  And obviously Fahrenheit 451, one of the greatest dystopian novels of all time.

He is one of the three greatest classic SF authors, those who founded and popularized science fiction.  They taught literary snoots that sci-fi had something important to say; that as a genre, it could rise above the pulp rubbish.  Of these three -- Asimov, Clarke, and Bradbury -- Bradbury was the last alive.

Now they are all gone, and it is up to the generations of new guards to try to fill their shoes; to try to grasp, here in the shadow of a possible mind-boggling singularity, what the future may hold.  To intuit what dangers there may be, that we might warn of them.  To cast about for hope that we may promise it.  It is a tall order, when much of what they foretold has come true.

If you're a writer, or just want to know more about Bradbury's life and creative mind, "Zen in the Art of Writing" is short and very good.

Nothing is more inspiring and mystic to me than reading biographies and seeing documentaries on the lives of old sci-fi writers.  Zen falls into that category.  It is easy to imagine him sitting at a typewriter in 1953.  It is hard to imagine him predicting a future where technology might make it possible for there to be no books.

Thank you Ray, for being on my dad's shelf as I grew up.  If only I could write half as well as you.  You changed the world; you changed my world.  Your words will outlive us all.

Video Store Art (photos)

Every year, Roland and I take a weekend trip to Leavenworth, WA for our anniversary from the time we met.  This weekend will be our fourth trip.

Here are some photos I took on our first year.  There's a little independent video store off the main drag, obviously intended for the locals.  Also obviously, it was run by geeks, since an action figure of some kind guarded each aisle.  I believe they also had a video game console and a couch at the back of the room, but my memory is hazy.  We rented a pile of movies, including United 93 and the original version of Let the Right One In, which the clerk highly recommended.

Most notable about this store was the ceiling.  It was obvious from the different art styles, that they would lend a ceiling tile out to whoever wanted to add something.  I captured some of my favorites.

Gender Politics on Game Night: "Apples to Apples" vs "Blokus"

I love games.  I love games of every type: LARP, PC, console, board, card, RPG, strategy, and puzzle games.  I like games that are difficult, that make me think.  And I love games where I can sit back and relax and do something mindless for hours.  I love meaningless social games where everyone wins.  And hardcore competitive games where the loud shout of "Headshot!" booms bass from my speakers in a crowded room of a LAN party.

I'm really good at many games, and pretty good at most games.  I used to avoid games I totally suck at, but lately I can play them without caring too much about winning.

For many years, off and on, I've hosted game nights where random friends show up bearing games and snacks.  A card or board game is selected by democratic process, and fun is had by all.

A few years ago, I attended a large game night with twenty or thirty attendees in a large house.  Some of the people I knew pretty well, and others were new to me.  We had enough people for two or three simultaneous games.  At some point, Apples to Apples was starting up in the living room, and Blokus was coming out the dining room.

In case you're not familiar, let me describe these games.  Apples to Apples is a party game that large groups can play.  The rules and strategy are very simple.

A very girly card played during a very girly game.

The judge draws a card.  In this example, he reads, "Touchy-Feely! Affectionate; Tactile, Huggy!"  Players then select from their hands cards they think the judge will find most touchy-feely...  They throw them into the pile upside down, and the judge reads off all the red cards in a dramatic or amusing fashion, explaining the rejects before settling on the winner.  In my case, here I would choose "spiders", because I freaking love adorable cuddly spiders.

In this example, "Risky", I'd choose "Cocaine"... because when I use a wood chipper, I know exactly who I'm putting in there and why.

Blokus is a very different game.  There are a fixed number of players, up to four, and four works best.  You are given a pile of brightly colored geometric shapes and a series of specific rules on how to place them on the board.  Your goal is to lay down as many of the pieces as possible while blocking your opponents' ability to do the same.  It is a highly competitive game requiring feats of logic.

The only 8-bit board game.

These two games could not be any more different from each other.  And I love both equally.  Depending on who I'm playing with, I'm usually more likely to win Blokus than Apples to Apples... and as I said, everyone wins Apples to Apples.

So we're at this party, where an Apples to Apples game is forming.  I'm standing in the dining room with two other guys, and we're trying to talk another guy into being the fourth player in Blokus.  One of the guys, someone I've not met before, says something like, "It's better than that girl-game they've got going in there."

Errrrt.  Time to bust out my newly-formed infant inner-feminist.

There was a time when I'd let this comment slide.  After all, who wants to be the rude angry bra-burner, when he's perfectly innocent just ignorant and we're all just trying to have a little fun?  The fear bubbles up -- how am I going to put this complicated concept into words he'll understand?

I turned on him and opened my mouth in spite of my fears.  I said, "What?"

He repeats what he'd said, then makes some excuse.  "You know, it's a girl-game.  What's wrong with that?"

"And I suppose Blokus is a boy's game?"

He nods, a little sheepishly, but only a little.  "It's no big deal," he says.  "You know what I mean."

"It is a big deal," I say.  Then I explain to him, exactly and persuasively, what I mean.  I ask him, "Do you work in the IT field?"  Most guys at these Seattle game nights are.  He nods.

At this point in my life, I had worked in IT for ten years.  Ask any woman who has worked in IT for long.  I had experienced what most of us have:

• A former boss spent most of our conversations staring at my breasts.
• I'd been denied promotions, only to have outside male-hires fill those positions.
• When answering the tech line on the phone, I'd heard the words, "I'm sorry, I was trying to reach tech support... can you transfer me?" more than once.
• I'd had persuasive arguments for decisions ignored until my male underlings said the same things to the same people, and then the decisions were made.
• I was repeatedly honored for being an awesome "webmistress", then a "guru", then a "rockstar", yet continually made 40% of the market average for my position. 
• If you had any kind of computer problem, I could solve it, but had a hard time convincing a lot of men that my opinions were worth anything.
• I went years thinking I was the only women this ever happened to.

I also had won almost every Blokus game I'd played up to that point.

So I say to him, "Most likely you are or will be in a position to hire."

He nods.

"And you think that women are good at social word-association touchy-feeling games, and uninterested in logic games.  Which means you may generally think women are bad at logic."

At this point he says something about thinking not all women were bad at logic.  Obviously some women are good at logic.

"That's a problem," I said.  "Because the IT field requires logic as a primary skill.  Someday, you will interview two applicants of equal experience and skills.  One will be a woman, and the other a man.  And the woman will have to somehow prove to you that she logical enough to get the job.  The man won't.  That is why it's a big deal."

He looked abashed.  He looked convinced.  We went on to play Blokus, and I won.  I pwned three guys in a competitive game of logic and strategy, and I hope at least one will someday interview a woman and remember that night.  And that she will get the job.  And that she will be treated well at that job, and that her opinion will matter, and that she will have equal opportunities for advancement.

This personal story is important on this week when a sexual harassment lawsuit is beginning in Silicon Valley.  Liberal geeks on the West Coast, in the IT field, consider themselves open minded, advanced, pushing the envelope not just in the tech fields, but in culture and social interaction as well.  The geek men in Seattle have long hair and wear kilts and T-Shirts with swear words and they are sex-positive and tolerant and they're well-read on advanced concepts of political theory and history and .. well, they're aware, and they're smart.

Geeks should know better.  Yet according to employment statistics, they don't.  According to that one guy, at that one game night, they don't.  Women are less likely to enter the computer field, less likely to climb the ladder to management and executive levels, less likely to make as much as men in the same positions, and more likely to leave the computer field for a new career.  (I did.)

There are a lot of reasons for these stats, and I'm willing to acknowledge there are many factors, including pregnancy, women's difficulty with knowing how to negotiate, and women's tendency to try to be "nice".

Yet I cannot overstate how men's attitudes towards women play a direct role in keeping women discouraged.  I was strongly motivated in my career, not only to make more money, but to influence my company.  No matter where I worked, I always wanted to help my company succeed.  I wanted to make operations more efficient, I wanted to make our systems run as smoothly as possible.  I wanted our products to be better.  And I invested a lot of thought and energy at each company towards these goals.  I didn't see myself as any different than my male co-workers.  But they did.

Being shot down repeatedly is demoralizing enough.  To know that at least some of those times I was dismissed because of my gender is intolerable.  At one company, early in my career, I'd been shot down so many times, I remember finally giving in and giving up.  (Especially when they kept hiring men for the IT Manager role that I was basically doing, without the title or pay.)  I decided to stop rocking the boat and just settle into the shoes they wanted me to fill... just fix the computers and make everything run, without a budget or the authority to make decisions that no one was making.  I literally kept the network together with duct tape.

What they needed:  A smart, driven person to make decisions and keep the network running.
What they had:  A smart, driven person to make decisions and keep the network running who happened to be female.

The Silicon Valley lawsuit story combines with another new story.  Global labor statistics reveal the jobs most difficult to fill.  Even with unemployment at 8.2%, STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Math) jobs continue to go unfilled at crippling rates, especially in hard-logic roles like Infosec and Network Architecture (two fields which were options on my career path).  Of the top five hardest positions to fill, STEM fields make up four of them, including IT jobs.  49% of companies in the US have difficulty filling jobs.

These numbers will have a huge impact on our country's role as a technology innovator.  It will have a huge impact on our GDP.

Is it just a coincidence that fewer women are entering these fields during the same period that these fields are starving for employees?  Women make up half of our population -- shouldn't we be represented 50/50 in STEM jobs at IT firms?  And shouldn't women help run these companies?  I worked for five tech companies in my career, and with one exception where a small consulting firm was started and owned by a woman, the only women in C-level positions were in HR and Marketing.

Gender stereotypes might be funny to joke about at parties.  They might not seem like a "big deal".  It's all good.  It's just game night.  But real women are being hired and fired based on that stereotype.  Women who could contribute.  Women who might help your bottom line.  Women who probably would take your company to the next level against your competitors, if only you'd listen to them, if only you'd give them credit, and if only you'd pay them what they're worth.  Women who could help keep this economy afloat if society would only stop barring and discouraging them from positions that are desperately needed.

One thing I can say for sure.  This woman will gladly challenge you to a game of Blokus, because there's a strong chance I'll win.

Elephant Stall (photo)

Somewhere in a public bathroom in Seattle, WA

For hanging your trunks.