The Drink Tank

This coming month is packed. The things for WorldCon are ramping up (I’VE GOT SO MUCH TO DO!!!!!) and there’s Westercon. I’ve been putting up Westerconversation with folks who have been to them before and I’ve been workign on getting the Lounge ready (though really, it pretty much sets itself up) and it’s going to be a good ol’ time. Westercon is a favorite con of mine, and I know it’s in decline, but having a mid-summer gathering is something I enjoy. Fourth of July Weekend is a good time to gather with a bunch of con-folk and just party. I had an amazing time at the 2007 Westercon at the Escher Marriott in San Mateo. While I know there were all sorts of problems, but it was such fun, was the birthplace of the Fanzine Lounge as we out here now know it and one of the most fun conventions I’ve ever been to. The 2008 Westercon in Vegas had a lot of problems, was ultra-small, but at the same time I had an absolute blast doing it. It also featured a personal top moment of Bill Mills playing Rocket Man for an audience of two in the Rotunda and I was one of the two. It was also the time that Linda gave blood, was in sight of the open door of the Fanzine Lounge and I almost passed out. I didn’t do the 2009 Westercon in Phoenix, nor the 2010 in LA, but I heard that folks had a good time. Of couse, a San Jose Westercon is a good thing and the location couldn’t be better as far as I’m concerned. I did the Dining Guide, which was a hard-ish task because there are so many places for folks to dine. For my money, Tandoori Oven right across the street with worth multiple trips, and I plan on at least two. There’s OJ’s, Original Joe’s, which is a place I’ve loved since I was a kid. There’s a new Pho place a couple of blocks up that is so new I didn’t get to add it ot the Guide. It’s pretty tasty and the cost is good. I’ll be driving in almost every day because I’ve gotta save money for WorldCon. And I’m psyched for WorldCon. I got my program schedule and I’m on some interesting panels. There’s one about Online Fandom and Fans Loving to Hate It. I’m not sure I agree with that statement, but I’m sure it’ll be well-attended because it’s got Teresa Neilsen Hayden and John Scalzi on it. That always makes for a good turnout. The second panel is one that I’m sure will be at least a little controversial. It’s about the Best SemiProzine and Fanzine Hugos. It’s Steven Segal of Weird Tales, Neil Clarke of Clarkesworld and Dave Hartwell of being Dave Hartwell. fame. We need another faned on that panel. There’s a panel on Casino Gambling that has Connie Willis on it. I’ve got a couple of Fanzine panels, a big Match Game, which happens after the Hugo ceremonies. If a miracle happens and I win one, it’ll be the most entertaining edition ever because i”ll be an emotional wreck the entire time! The final one is about the Hugo for Best Re- lated Work. It’s got Michael Swanwick on it, which is good as he’s won at least one of them in the past, and so has Farah Mendelsohn.. Steven Segal, Amy Thomson and Claire are all also on the panel. TO me, this that’s an all-star panel that I just happen to be hanging around on! So, this issue’s got some Taral Wayne and a look at a great Czech film from the 1950s! THere’s LoCs and, as has become habit... A Mo Starkey cov- er! Let’s go! Fan Noir – Blog 3 1 June 2011, words People who complain about wind farms make me angry. To listen to them bitch, you’d think a windmill was a rusting, creaky contraption that chopped up birds and bats, leaving bloody, mangled remains strewn on the ground like so many meat-acorns around the trunk of a sacrificial oak. If that wasn’t enough, they claim that windmills spread a mysterious influence over the country like the wail of damned souls – withering crops, engen- dering unexplained maladies in livestock, souring toothpaste in the tube and causing schoolchildren to fail their ABCs. The fact is, wind farms have been running successfully in many parts of the world for decades – one enor- mous example, that I was astonished to see for myself, lies along the highway east of San Francisco. It astonished me because I saw it way back in the 1990s. There marched mile after mile of giant turbines, turning silently in the desert wastes, and I knew this to be the look of the future. Another case in point is the North Sea. Many of the countries that share the coastline of that windy body of salt water have built offshore wind farms, including Great Britain, Germany, Denmark and The Netherlands. Clearly wind farms work. Nor are they prohibitively expensive. Yet, after more than 20 years of proven use, this free resource is nowhere nearly as exploited as you might expect. Canada in particular seems to be dragging its heels. But, then, that’s hardly surprising. Since the replacement of a Liberal government with a Conservative one, some years ago, Canada has dragged its heels over many things, reverting from a progressive voice in global affairs to a mugwump nation, determined to bury its head in the tarsands and pursue oil-business as usual. It is singularly ironic that, of all provinces in Canada, Alberta seems to be most interested in wind power, since it is Alberta that is most dedicated to keeping oil the mainspring of the nation’s economy – at the expense of industry, transport, and exports. Meanwhile, the province that would most benefit by a lower-cost energy- regime is Ontario, but the province seems barely conscious of the advantages of wind power. Ontario does produce about a Gigawatt of green energy from a half-dozen wind farms, but that’s only a drop in the bucket compared to Ontario’s thirty-Terrawatt needs. The provincial government perennially promises more Green Power, but nothing happens. More studies are needed. Another target date is set, comfortably far in the future. Why? I figure that part of the blame can be apportioned to those people who complain – the NIMBYs. They come in various colours. One hue of NIMBY are the naturalists, who object to the number of birds that would die when they fly into moving blades. I’m not insensitive to this issue, but at the same time I’m callous enough to feel that the death of a few extra crows and starlings is a small price to pay for a working air condi- tioner when it’s 92 in my apartment, and I can’t get up for a glass of water without breaking out in sweat. Yes, all things have a right to live, but sparrows don’t write Shakespeare or build the Chrysler Building. Also, there are an awful lot of sparrows in the world, for every one of us. It’s not as if there were no solution to the problem either. I’ve read that sound makers can be built into the blades that would warn birds and bats of danger ahead, best to go around. LED’s along the blade edge might do the job just as well, and consume about as much power as a single Christmas tree. If neither of these ideas prove to be 100% effective, then there are legions of little old ladies who enjoy taking in small, injured creatures to look after... It lets them to feel superior to other people. There is an “experimental” wind turbine not too far from where I live, on the Canadian National Exhibi- tion grounds. To tell the truth, I’ve never seen dead or injured birds at the base of it. The other main objection to wind farming is that the moving blades create a sound that only some people seem to be able to hear. They claim that these infra-sounds are below the threshold of conscious awareness, and cause them headaches or other illnesses. As well, these sounds also appear to lie below any level that can be detected by sensitive scientific instruments – so far as I know, none have ever been recorded. This in spite of our ability to capture the radio crepitations of a Voyager spacecraft, billions of miles away, sending a signal weaker than your cell phone’s. In fact, even if such infra-sounds are being produced, it begs the question of how anyone living a half-mile away could possibly hear them. Isn’t the wind produc- ing exactly the same sort of infra-sounds while blowing through every tree, every wire fence and every power line between turbine and ear? I doubt very much that anyone living more than a few hundred yards from a wind farm would hear anything, even if each windmill were running a metal lathe and engraving old water heaters with David Suzuki’s personal phone number. At best, it’s a case where a quarter-mile distance should be kept between wind farms and where people live.

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