Announcements

“O What Freedom” to appear in Analog

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I am extremely pleased to announce that I will once again be gracing the page of Analog magazine, with my story “O What Freedom, This Great Steel Cage”.

(Ten points if anybody besides my brother recognizes where that gif is from) (I’m looking at you, Casey)

This is a story about how technology plays a role in disability, anxiety, and addiction, which is a lot to pack into a very, very short story. I originally wrote this piece for the Art & Words show. It was inspired by “The Wheel” by Stephen Daly.

(Also: story may contain robots).

The Best Christmas Pageant Ever

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Shazam! Come check out Evelyn as troublemaker Gladys Herdman at Provision Theater, playing November 28 – December 20!

Based on the book by Barbara Robinson

When the Herdmans (the nastiest kids in the neighborhood) decide they want to be in this year’s Christmas pageant, everyone is sure it will be a disaster. But when the curtain finally goes up, a miracle happens—making it the best ever! This hilarious and heartwarming comedy, filled with singing and music, makes a firm statement about the transformative power of the holiday season—not to mention the transformative power of theatre.

Performances are Saturdays at 3pm & 7pm and Sundays at 3pm; special matinee performances will be on 12/2, 12/9, and 12/16 at 10am.

Tickets are cheap and the show is hilarious (and family friendly!). Evelyn is having a great time and I promise you will too.

I got a new job

/ Shane / 1 Comment

After 9 years at my current job, today is officially my last day. End of an era.

I got a new job
One that won’t make me sick
One that won’t make me crash my car
Or make me feel three feet thick

There are lots of things I’m excited about at the new job, but none more so than the commute. My new job is downtown, so I’ll be taking the train. In addition to saving myself 2 hours* of stressful Chicago driving every day, I can actually turn that time into something productive. Read a book, write, do some knitting. Anything other than stare at the bumper of the car in front of me.

*2 hours assuming nothing unusual, like construction, an accident, any kind of weather, a large event going on in town, it being Friday…because those would make it take a lot longer. Luckily, none of THAT stuff ever happens.

I got a new job
One that won’t hurt my head
One that won’t make my mouth too dry
Or make my eyes too red

Certainly it is a bit nerve wracking to give up what you know for a new opportunity. I mean, I think it’s for the better. I hope it’s for the better! But you never really know, right? Change is scary. What if they won’t let me sit at their lunch table? What if they go out of business next month? What if they’re all secretly lizard people who run the world and they think I’m a lizard person and that’s why they hired me and when they find out I’m not a lizard person they put me in a dungeon so I can’t reveal the secret lizard person plot to the media?

On the other hand, no risk, no reward (e.g. ruling the world at the head of a secret lizard-person cabal). And after 9 years, I think it’s just time to move on. They certainly seem like a fun group of lizards people. They like legos. The conference rooms are named after planets from Star Wars. I said I write science fiction in my cover letter, and they actually considered that a plus.

One that won’t make me nervous
Wondering what to do
One that makes me feel like I feel when I’m with you
When I’m alone with you

I’m nervous, but excited. I’m pretty sure it’s going to be awesome. At the very least, it will be different.

The way I figure it, worst case scenario, at least I have a whole new group of people who haven’t heard any of my stories. Time to start over at the beginning…

On the sorry state of First Friday Foods

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So, you may or may not have noticed that there has been a severe lack of First Friday Food recipes lately.

Part of it is that those posts take significantly more work than the average blog post, but the more major issue is that I just ran out of recipes! In the past 4 years, I’ve published over 60 recipes. Since I mostly use this feature as a handy reference to recipes we make a lot, I guess at some point I had just kind of posted all the recipes I needed to post.

Fear not! Now that summer has come around, it turns out I’ve got a few more recipes up my sleeve after all. However, in the future, look for First Friday Foods to become a little more sparse.

-The Management

Lullabies for a Clockwork Child

/ Shane / 1 Comment

Just over a year ago, I sold a story to Pseudopod, the weekly horror podcast. And now, it’s finally up!

I want to stress that this is a horror story, in a horror podcast. As the host, Alasdair, is fond of saying: horror fiction is specifically designed to make you feel uncomfortable. If you don’t like that feeling, perhaps skip listening to this one and wait until my next sale comes around.

If you would prefer to listen to only my story (and honestly, my story is not that frightening; only 4 or 5 people killed, max! I promise!) you can skip to around the 22 minute mark. But I warn you, the story immediately after mine will make you squirm in absolutely every sense of that word.

So, warnings out of the way, sit back and enjoy a story about how love can make you blind, how you always want the best for your children, and why you should never, never wind that mainspring.