July 2004 1 #143 2 File 770:143 I’ve grown a beard! Fair Warning: Just thought you ought to know. I left my electric shaver behind in the hotel room on one of my business trips. The 143 hotel returned it to me in only three days, just long enough for Diana File 770:143 is edited by Mike Glyer to talk me into experi- at 705 Valley View Ave., Monrovia menting with a beard. CA 91016. File 770 is available for She still likes it — so news, artwork, arranged trades, or it’s staying! by subscription: $8 for 5 issues, $15 for 10 issues, air mail rate is $2.50. Telephone: (626) 305-1004 book proposal, Freemasonry for Dummies . I cross inside – plus a stem that extends along a E-Mail: [email protected] was there to work on the Offshore Voluntary side street. The lobby of the main entrance is Compliance Initiative – whether that was also covered with ornamental marble, as is the “for dummies” depends on how you feel about hallway outside the Commissioner’s office people who use credit cards in a way that lets upstairs. All the other miles of corridors are Mike Glyer’s Editorial Notes the IRS trace their unreported income in Car- surprisingly plain, rather like a high school, ibbean bank accounts…. endless yellow walls punctuated by lots of “Watch out! All those pictures of the baby is That 2002 meeting was in the Service’s cheap wooden doors. Instead of name plaques, an early warning sign! Just before the end, New Carrollton, MD office (across town from employees are identified by laser printed signs Brian Earl Brown filled his fanzines with pic- where they used to hold Disclave, right?) Two taped to the doors. It all looks so temporary I tures of the newly adopted child. Shortly after years later I finally got to go to a meeting actu- might have wondered whether the people in- that, he was never heard from again!” – Taral ally in Washington D.C. Now I know that isn’t side would be gone if I came back tomorrow. Wayne impressive to you. It doesn’t impress me, ei- Our January 2004 meeting was chaired by a Baby Talk: I understand your fear, Taral. ther. Of course it doesn’t. I guess that’s why Texan who’d come to D.C. without an over- Maybe File 770 doesn’t do its best work as an I’m not even mentioning it in this editorial. coat. The happy result was that he trimmed a annual, and every once in awhile I’m tempted I wondered what kind of place Headquar- day off the schedule to let us fly home before a to slap “5-star-final, goodbye!” on whatever is ters would be. At the beginning of my career I coming snowstorm. The first day some of finished and write “30” to this avatar of my worked with Jim Heneghan, a Boston Irish- decided to stay in for lunch. The cafeteria fanac. But instead, I muddle along because man with twinkling eyes and a rapier tongue seemed surprisingly undersized for this big most of the time I like working on the zine, who liked to refer to the IRS National Office federal building, but I could see why it was not networking with contributors, writing things I as “the temple of 1,000 sleeping GS-14’s.” in demand. It is located on the seventh floor in hope people will get a smile from -- or find Should I ever see Jim again, I’ll tell him that if the center of the building: a worker in an of- provocative. If things are getting done more they’re not sleeping they sure are working fice on the outer ring of the building can get slowly than we’d like, just know that as I go darned quietly. out to the street and into a restaurant faster along, Sierra, Diana, and even my new job IRS headquarters fills a big city block be- than she can get upstairs to the cafeteria. (boo!) have a priority on my time. tween Pennsylvania and Constitution Ave- These people are pretty well-paid, so there’s Tax Talk: I like my day job, too, as an nues, not very far from Ford’s Theater. The every reason to go out. industry specialist for IRS Appeals. The actual building has the same shape as a window Travel aside, the work I’m doing now fas- work, that is, not the travel. If I could change drawn by a toddler, a simple rectangle with a cinates to me. These are the most creative one thing, I’d never have to go to another out- of-town meeting. Does anyone like that feel- ing of being surgically implanted in a minia- CH-CH-CH-CHANGES! ture airplane seat for hours at a time? Having Daddy away so often is a distraction for Si- My new e-mail address is [email protected] erra, too. Besides, is there any point to business E-Mail Change of Address: [email protected] is the only good address for travel unless it generates fanzine material? me now. The CS indeed stands for Compuserve. I’ve been using them as my How often will I luck into anything like the ISP for years. Somewhere in the middle AOL bought them out, but they still following story? I was in Washington D.C.’s maintain the illusion that Compuserve has a separate existence. To upgrade National Airport on the Friday that Capclave 2002 was supposed to start, when I saw Don- to their web-based e-mail I had to enter an arrangement where the old ac- ald Eastlake III. He wasn’t on his way to the count continues to exist (for some reason) but no e-mail is forwarded and I convention, either. We two fakefans were get to pay extra if I log onto it now. So the old account is still there, it does- leaving for home on afternoon flights. Don n’t bounce mail, but my upgraded software won’t access it and presumably said he had met a publisher in D.C. to pitch his the mailbox hit its limit full of spam two days after I stopped emptying it -- 21st century inconvenience at 22nd century prices! July 2004 3 assignments I’ve had in my career, in one of the Service’s most active areas. But no matter how you slice it, it’s still tax, so I will spare you the details. Just let me say my work is 90% writing – guidelines, training material, zillions of e-mails – and my tank of “writing juice” gets drained by the end of a lot of workdays. When I used to be a front-line Appeals Officer, my accounting, writing, and negotiating skills would be emphasized at different points in the cycle of working a case, so there used to be heavy writing only every couple of weeks. The new job is affect- ing how much fanac I’m inclined to do in what free time I have while raising a 2-year old. We’ll see if I get acclimated to it in the long run. Meanwhile…. The Winter of My Discontent: Having just celebrated the Fourth of July I realize News of Fandom we’re as far from winter as you can get. But in memory it’s yet… cold. It was in the mid- dle of a night last December I decided there Wedding Report at first few knew why I was there, but by the was an urgent need to create The Corbomite end I had done my duty, in the vast expanse Award for Household Product Engineering, to By John Hertz of interstellar space, galaxies, suns, the plan- reward the manufacturer of the quilt that cov- [Reprinted from Vanamonde] On October ets in their courses, and this earth our home. ers our bed. On winter nights I fall asleep at 18, 2003 Dave Trowbridge was married to The rector, Rev. Keith Johnson, was a night with one end of the quilt tucked around Deborah Ross (published both as D. Ross thoughtful witty man. There was a Shield of my chin and the other end covering my feet. and D. Wheeler) at St. Andrew’s Episcopal David cake in seven flavors. To Chris Finnie Yet at 3 a.m., I’m unpleasantly awakened by Church, Ben Lomond, California, population was credited “Beating Down Murphy Under drafts of chilly air across my legs and feet. 3,050. Our Feet.” Where has the quilt gone? Wrapped around Sherwood Smith, who long knew I had a gorgeous drive from the airport Diana? Nope -- what an unjust accusation! Trowbridge and wrote Exordium novels with into the forest under autumn light, then back There it is, on the floor. Gravity has done its him, was Best Person. I taught Regency in the dark having dined well. I last saw the sinister work again. dancing at the reception, with James Lang- Hilton at ConJose, the 2002 Worldcon. My In obedience to the Newtonian laws, once dell in the band. room was on the same side, and, after a little the bottom edge of our quilt drapes over the Ross and Trowbridge brought me on Fri- sleep, there was the dawn. ++ John Hertz end of the bed, the quilt’s own weight gradu- day for a rehearsal and dinner, giving me a ally pulls the rest in the same direction – it room at the Ben Lomond Econolodge next to won’t stay put because the smooth lining is Howden Castle in an enchanted forest, and almost frictionless.