ISSUE #38 This Here... “...not as bad as last year...” (J T Major)

john and a minder) that there wasn’t going to be a tip. EGOTORIAL Checking the back of the cab as they’re on their toes, I spot a phone on the back seat and yell at the brass who receives it MISCELLANY (AND FOUR FACES OF JENNIFER) back gratefully before presumably getting team-tagged. Regular readers may have a larf at me saying that there isn’t Bloke is walking into the lobby as I get back to the cab and anything fully coherent about this here ‘Egotorial’ (cries of remarks “Well, that was nice of you”. “Yeah”, sez I, and I got “is there ever?” resound through the land), but naturally nothing for it, but some of us do things right”. I go on to what I actually mean is that there isn’t an overarching topic, stage at the Tropicana, and (another) couple of hours later more like a not atypical bunch of bits, really. that same bloke (as I soon realized) comes out, and as he’s I’m going to start with a rather charming (if not lucrative) passing the cab stand, stops and hands me a dollar “for what taxi tale from you did this last week. earlier”. Like I Midweek in said, hardly the Meadows lucrative but a is, as I am nice wont to affirmation. remark, deader I’ve got a than a can of birthday Spam, and it’s coming up and just pure will be the fuckin’ dumb hardly luck whether memorable age you can get of 63 (yes, any number of really, who’d’a rides countable given odds on by requiring my survival the fingers of this long ey?) more than one and given that hand, and the usual that’s working a 9 or 10 hour shift. I thought I’d change Indian food feast will be missing (at least for the typical things up a bit this week, starting at the Cosmopolitan rather ravenous hordes that would be expected to come round than Bally’s as I usually do, but still waiting over an hour to here) and the takeaway suggested by Jennifer is more than I get a ride despite there being only two other cabs ahead of want to spend, probably coming out about $50 for just me, me. After getting that one done, I had a look over at Bally’s although that would last a couple of meals at least, she’s only to find four cabs there already(that’s too many) so I going to fix up the usual home-made with a jar sauce and went across the street to the Flamingo which I guessed might packet side & rice, a naan bread and pickles for my move a little better (not). After about 2 1/2 hours I got an $8 delectation, but I’ll also be hosting a Zoom piss-up for any ride to the Motel 6 on Tropicana, correctly deducing from the and all who feel like raising a glass to my continued quality of the customers (hooker and two johns, or possibly a existence. Tentatively I’ll start this off at noon our time on

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Friday the 29th, going until, I suppose, I fall off my chair for https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pkhtH3Q6238 the final time that day or we’ve all had enough. I’ll email out Now after clocking that thumping slice I inevitably went the link to everybody, and assuming I’m together enough, looking for other stuff, and discovered a mad-rocking trio it’ll also be in thish’s ‘Indulge Me’ as well as on FBF, no with perceived influences including perhaps Metallica, doubt. although their list of self-named influences includes System The last Zoom extended play I did went twelve hours, but of a Down rather than Hetfield’s outfit, which may be more with the ins and outs of competing time zones, we didn’t apposite. In any case, this 2013 slice, ‘Fuero a Mas need any breakout rooms, yet I’m not going to rule them out Alla’ (“Went Beyond”) shows massive power, including but if particular topics are de jour for gobbing off about. We shall not limited to the impressive chops of drummer Gabriel see. Pedernera. We want to thank you all for both private and public concern and well wishes for Jennifer after her accident last month. Because Murica! the fix will of course run to $$, some of which we do have, and we’ve been in two minds about whether to do what seems to be the usual actual healthcare system substitute of a GoFundMe, but the fact is that we’ll come up short. We haven’t punted this “publicly” (for values of “publicly” meaning “not on FBF yet”) but we thought we’d float what I guess what you could call a trial balloon of sorts, as somewhat uncomfortable as it is to make such an ask, although it’s undoubtedly true that every sixpence helps us not only get this sorted, but also to alleviate the issue of all the other fuckin’ bills like rent and utilities that aren’t taking a break. We’re undoubtedly in a better position than some, and not about to be on the streets in the immediate future, but it seems like we’re never that https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V4kjNe1ToOw far away... The plague has affected the band’s ability to either perform https://www.gofundme.com/f/help-jen-replace-her-front- or create new material (DoBFO) but recently there’s been teeth some new releases with a startling change of style to a It’s all (mostly) good. quieter one, a reinvention if you will, which I’m also enjoying very much, for a fine example this title slice from January 22nd/23rd 2020 their new set, ‘Creo’ (“I believe”). RADIO WINSTON https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e-yI0dIwkTM My command of Spanish is rudimentary at best, of course ERUCA SATIVA (“poquito”), most of it having been picked up on various Some people mention that they like recommendations of building sites and thus largely unrepeatable in polite music they might not have previously been aware of, so I’d company, and so all I can generally admire is the obvious like to talk briefly about a band who’ve been around since passion and musicianship on display, which is considerable. 2007 that I reckon most of you won’t have heard of, and in Check ‘em out... fact nor had I until a couple of years ago. http://erucasativa.com/ One of my personal odd obsessions is seeking out cover https://www.facebook.com/erucasativa versions of a favorite song, in this case ‘Gimme Shelter’, which led me to the version (one of my absolute favorites) FAANWANK IN BRIEF by an all-female Argentinian “supergroup” formed by ES NAG & ERRATA guitarist Lula Bertoldi and bassist Brenda Martin, for this slice including Utopians vocalist Barbara Recanati and Nag : You should all have received the FAAn Award ballot Silvana Cologiavanni, drummer for Jimmy Rip & the Trip. listzine The Incompleat Register, so have at it... For the linguistically challenged (not Gary Mattingly or Errata : Pointed out severally by all those involved, Sarah Mooring) the opening banner reads “Meanwhile at Tightbeam is currently edited by George Phillies and Jon D. the Vorterix Theater”, a fairly legendary Buenos Aires Swartz, not Bob Jennings... location.

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may be a Focal Point Zine to somebody who harbors serious HOCUS POCUS interests in becoming a professional writer. There are endless sub categories, perzines, sercon zines, book review Comments on the “focal point fanzine” discussion, collected zines, zines devoted to new movies, zines devoted to the from the loccol so that those actually interested in it can have history of old stf movies, zine devoted to fantasy gaming, a wallow, while others whose garden of fucks is, yea, verily zines devoted to computer games, and on and on. barren can safely enter the ‘Loco Citato’ waters. Rather than interspersing my own remarks I’m going to chuck them in at I suggest again that the determining factor in the Big Picture the end... is how many people interact and react with a publication. A zine that only reaches fifty or sixty people and receives only Mike Glyer : “Frankly, I think the entire notion of a ‘focal a handful of responses from the cadre of longtime point fanzine’ is tincture of pure bollocks...” supporters is lower on the ladder of fan status than one It might be, however, you really needed to come down on whose circulation has grown and expanded and whose the other side of the argument. True, you did get a segment pages are commented on by many diverse readers. of your fanzine out of this opinion. But you could have Yes, it’s a case of raw numbers (however obliquely gotten endless segments by checking the box “Yes, but..” and recorded): plebian quantity verses Patrician Quality that is starting to arbitrate all your friends’ adamant beliefs about the determining factor, but, that’s the reality of the situation what’s required to become the acknowledged FP fanzine. and that is also the way things work in the Real World as This being fandom, you can probably still get away with well. doing that starting next issue. We’ll just assume you were Will any of that mind-set follow thru with the FAAn blowing the false modesty out of your pipes before giving Awards? We’ll soon find out. the idea your full-throated approval. Steve Jeffery : Ok, so there are focal point fanzines and focal Leigh Edmonds : That was an interesting little discussion point fanzines depending on their readership and context, about ‘focal point’ fanzines. I wonder which part of our but I suspect we are not talking about ones which exist balkanized fandom do you think knows what that term even inside a more or less closed club (in which case the BSFA means. I imagine that there are many other parts of Zine would count - and before that Matrix) but to a wider contemporary fandom that hardly knows what a fanzine is, fanzine readership. Although you could equally argue (and let alone what a focal point fanzine might be This may not some have) that fanzine fandom as we understand it is also mean that you are entitled to call This Here ... a focal point something of a closed club, albeit one with the door left open fanzine, but it is a popular one among the fans who count! and faded and barely legible “Welcome” sign (that we keep Bob Jennings : I dunno, your zine certainly seems like a meaning to spruce up, but never do) hanging outside. This Focal Point to me, but of course, it’s all in the mind of the Here... certainly seems to qualify on frequency, readership individual fan. A Focal Point Zine is one that always attracts and reader interaction, but while these might be necessary I that person’s interest, including a quick read as soon as it don’t think they are sufficient, and that a focal point accretes arrives, sometimes resulting in a genuine LOC shortly after (and possibly as you say, only in hindsight) around a that immediate reading. particular title at a particular point in time (possibly the last The more people who engage in the immediate read and the one I could point to with any confidence might be Attitude). immediate response, the higher up the scale of fannish And I’m no longer sure that set of conditions is even relevance the title goes. By those admittedly loose standards possible. you seem to be doing pretty well. Lots of people read and Lloyd Penney : A focal point fanzine has to be the centre of enjoy your efforts, and lots of those who read it actually send what we’re all doing, and there are few themes we can all in LOCs. Whether the contents of the LOCs happen to be participate in. There may have been focal point zines back brickbats or compliments is not relevant. In distant days I then the fandom was a lot smaller, but today, there are so knew a few Focal Point Zines that everybody felt they had to many interests, and I doubt a single publication would cover read and comment on, but at the same time most people everything fanzinish. Many years ago, I tried to revive the didn’t like the editor or disagreed with almost every opinion idea of a Canadian news zine, along the lines of New he expressed to the point that they felt it was a personal Canadian Fandom or The Maple Leaf Rag, but the screaming obligation to send along their own opinions and complaints that came from the remaining clubs across the country to try and straighten him out. convinced me that its time was past, and I didn’t want to You are certainly correct that the whole fan world in this step on some ancient toes. new century is composed of dozens, possibly hundreds of William Breiding : It’s in the air — I’m not the only one to individual floating islands of splinter interests. A clubzine whom it has occurred that This Here... has developed into a may be a Focal Point Zine to members who regard the club focal point [see my deleted comments from loc in 35]. Your as the center of their interest in the hobby, or a fictionzine efforts to negate this perception just sound like whining, as

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they did when you wrote to tell me you chose to edit them the last two issues had a considerable WAHF listing is out of my loc. Now you take up the gauntlet and whip it indicative. You just need to transfer those laggards on good. But... you can rail against fanzine elitism and facebook over to the Real Live Feed of This Here... (perhaps, purveyors of taste and what is acceptably good, but the fact for a focal point, renamed This Hear). Oh, and one more thing of the matter is, too many fans produce boring-ass junk, and —stop breaking down and just do what you do. Yeah? some of it you appreciate and even interact with and I most Nic Farey : What I’ve now realized (memo from DoBFO, certainly don’t. How this relates to the focal pointillist perhaps?) is that correspondents on this topic consistently appearance of This Here... is that you have an appreciable use the phrasing “a focal point fanzine”, in which the interactive mailing list from a group of fans that could be indefinite article is doing all the fuckin’ work! This considered elitist in the eyes of those who view the FAAns essentially confirms my earlier analysis that just about any and Corflu as corrupt and bankrupt. (As you say, this in fanzine is effectively a focal point to a greater or lesser reality isn’t true, and you are so defensive about it, degree, and that, to me anyway, also confirms the misconstrue any comments that might be even vaguely less fundamental uselessness of the term itself. than complimentary.) But the fact is there has always been a “core” group of fanzine fans, working kind of like the circles Now of course our thoughtful readers are perhaps most created by a rock thrown into a pool (the first analogy that likely to be using that heavy-lifting “a” in an historically came to mind was “like the circles of hell”), getting wider contextual manner to suggest that there may be, in their and less distinct as it reaches further out. At the core there is analysis, some kind of succession at play in which a given an intensity that creates a focal point. Focal points are by title of a given era succeeds in becoming “the centre of what their nature limited. To my knowledge I’ve never been we’re all doing” (Lloyd Penney) for its fifteen minutes before involved with what was considered a focal point fanzine, passing the torch. This may have been the case in some now either at the time it was happening, or later viewed in very distant past, but I’d also contend that it’s quite arguable historical perspective, yet I consider myself integral to that the “all” of which Lloyd speaks never actually existed in fanzine fandom. This likely happened because 1) I wasn’t on any meaningful way, and I might point to the early enclaves that fanzine’s mailing list, or 2) I was on the mailing list but I of British and American fandom, always culturally separate, was unresponsive, and thus given the boot. The buzz of as evidence that the “all” is nothing but a charming myth. If activity is created by the personality (sometimes plural) of the concept of that “all” did ever exist it may fall to some the editor, and the editor’s choice of topics and the editor’s intrepid fanhistorian to determine the point at which it (often breezy) interaction with the mailing list. And, of ceased to do so. course, the mailing list has to have a propensity to be want a Attitude was mentioned by Steve Jeffery as the most recent gab-fest, because that’s all a focal point fanzine is—a bunch possible example for the “focal point” designation, further of fans talking fast, loose and furious about topics of interest, opining “I’m no longer sure that set of conditions is even usually initiated by the editor. Your queazy stomach about possible” for such a rough beast to be gestated nowadays. maybe being a focal point is because you are viewing them Attitude may well be a perceived last hurrah of the “focal as arbiters of taste, and maybe viewing past editors of “focal point” concept, a position with which I’m prepared to agree, point fanzines” as, how shall we put this politely, er, how but it’s also observable that it was both largely regional to about obnoxious fucktwits? But the actual reality of the the UK and a self-defined time-limited project (culminating situation is that they were just serving up to their mailing list in an eponymous convention) which in itself served to create what they wanted - news focus, and succeeded in and views on topics of doing so. the fan world. And right Despite Mike Glyer’s now you have created a somewhat expected yet buzz with This Here... that apposite snark, I’m still has turned it very much much more inclined to into nearly a letter-zine, Leigh Edmonds’ one that is compulsively observation that This readable and entertaining Here... can simply and and - an important perhaps more accurately component - opinionated, considered to be currently which creates further “popular”, and leave it at buzz, and maybe a few that. whines. (A. Hooper, William Breiding takes welcome to the real me to task in several world!) Also: the fact that ways, however, and

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having noted that his contribution to the debate is as aside that semi-scholarly analysis of Erle Stanley Gardner’s welcome as always, and I agree with his analysis perhaps oeuvre is reserved for BEAM. m more than he might have expected. Now W does express If there’s a “philosophy” of any kind, particularly on the some contradictions, including the contention that “Focal fannish end, it’s to encourage open comment and discussion points are by their nature limited” rather than others’ on topics of interest to me, and I’ve honestly felt that this has implied concept of something erroneously termed “all been lacking elsewhere, largely because bubbles. I’m highly fandom” - that’s certainly one point of agreement we share. gratified that people have been willing to engage with this in I’ll also acknowledge the sadly prevalent view that there’s a good spirit, and as I’m sure has been observed, I’m quite self-appointed Corflu/FAAn award “elite” which has capable of changing my mind, or at least altering my frequently been derided, past and present, and with reason. perceptions on the basis of robust and persuasive argument, m W might be trying to suggest that This Here... is geared because it’s almost never been “my way or the highway”, toward that so-called “elite” but that’s a conclusion that I although I am feeling the tremors of a massive eye-roll from reject entirely - the worst possible interpretation is that I’m the environs of Kent, WA for that statement which does have somehow pandering to that nebulous group, whereas I’ll - er - an exception or two to its credit. Yes, I’m still an suggest that the breadth of correspondents belies the other opinionated old fucker, as are many of the people I know, but obvious facts of engagement and interest - while there are, that’s all good, innit?... yes, many welcome and familiar names in the loccol, there are perhaps an equal number of those who might been seen as more rara avis, and I’ll point to Liam Proven’s missive FOOTY thish as well as a previous loc from Cuddles for two. Now, admittedly, those two are both also mates of long-standing, BY DAVID HODSON which allows them to punt shared memories (as Liam does A day before I was going to start compiling my references for below) - timebinding, if you will - within their remarks. this column, Nic sent me a link to a new page on Football365 I also reject Wm’s statement that I somehow subscribe to the in case I hadn’t seen it. I would have caught up with it idea that correspondents are “arbiters of taste”. No, if they’re eventually, but F365 has degenerated to such a degree that “arbiters” of any stripe at all, it’s of the metric that This it’s hardly an essential resource anymore. That’s the problem Here..., again as Leigh Edmonds so succinctly observed, is with selling your soul to bookies and Sky Sports. F365 is just merely “popular”. Certainly as any relevance to the FAAn another cog in the media machine that feeds the Liverpool/ awards is concerned, there are another pair of loccers in here, Manchester United publicity monster. Wm himself and Fred Lerner, both of whom have expressed, For a change, and like it used to do back a decade or so ago, while not exactly contempt for the awards, questions about F365 was addressing a real issue in the game of association their relevance relating to their own lack of interest in them. football. I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve written this Let me restate (even though it’s perhaps old news to many) column and hardly mentioned football itself; you know: the the reasons for this title having been resurrected for a third game, the players, the ball being kicked, players kicking each series, and go into a bit of its philosophy, if I can be rather other even. Every time it’s been the same: the games since grandly suggested to even have one: the Covid lockdowns began have been tedious and this is what F365 were finally saying with “The Premier League We’ll lay some blame at the feet of Graham Charnock for paradox: a thrilling season built from drab games”. ending the admirable run of Vibrator, which with its monthly schedule also had significant engagement from the https://www.football365.com/news/premier-league-title- readership there. The cessation of that title left, as ‘Mad Men’ race-thrilling-drab-games-liverpool-manchester-united types might observe, a gap in the market. Also, and more The leader in the Premier League has changed so many times significantly, I wanted very much to publicly comment on – Spurs, Liverpool, Leicester City, Everton, Manchester Michael Dobson’s version of the FAAn awards, having not United, and other less likely candidates – that it really is a done so (deliberately) while they were in process out of what topsy-turvy season and no single pundit has the courage to might be seen as excessive courtesy. call it definitively, although a consensus is coalescing around Since then, as the format has “settled down” (ahem, falls off Manchester City, who are on a very strong run of results. The chair) I’ve continued to comment on fannish topics of bottom line as I see it, and as F365 agrees, is the players are interest (TAFF, Corflu, more bloody FAAn award bollocks knackered; they’ve finished one season, had about a month ect) as well as indulging interests in music and footy at most to relax and recover from that before starting the (inevitable pops to David Hodson) which is nothing but a next one, had no real time to recover from minor knocks and very personal mix of my various obsessions, noting as an grazes, and are now paying the price. Spurs came into the new season seriously “under-cooked” and lost an awful first

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game against Everton before gaining match fitness over the currently at Newcastle United, but has managed Hull City, course of the next two or three weeks with three, and Wigan Athletic (twice), Birmingham City, Huddersfield sometimes four, games a week as the Europa League Town, Crystal Palace, Sunderland, and both Sheffield clubs qualifiers and the League Cup kicked in. Now they’re (Wednesday and United), plus others that I can’t be bothered starting to suffer as the numbers of games in quick trying to remember or look up. The appointment of Bruce as succession take their toll. It’s the same for other sides and manager of the club you support should be a clear sign that this season is going to come down to who gets their second you’ll never know the pleasure of winning a trophy. I know and maybe third wind the quickest and with least injuries Nic wakes in a cold sweat at the prospect that Bruce may carried forward. And the football has been shite! someday rock up at Vicarage Road. As I’ve said before, I don’t believe the previous season Having denigrated Bruce’s football management abilities should have been restarted and I don’t believe this season and career, it has to be said that he’s a prime example of the should have ever started either. The continuation of the old fashioned, no nonsense, uncomplicated, salt of the earth leagues has been seized upon by the more mentally bloke next door that would help you secure your shed if it challenged and emotionally crippled as evidence that the was threatening to blow away in a hurricane. He’d always situation with Covid19 isn’t as bad as the media makes out. stand his round in the pub and would probably get his We in the U.K., just as in the U.S., have demonstrators round in first just in case anything disturbed the evening outside hospitals protesting that Covid is a hoax and that because he’d hate to be thought of as tight or unfriendly. In corridors and wards in hospitals are actually empty, and the early January, Bruce came out and said what many think: things that trigger these morons don’t have to be as high “It’s morally wrong to keep playing football.” profile as the greater orange-skinned shitgibbon that has Bruce is one of several managers who have had health pretended to be President of The United States of America problems in the past and is probably quite vulnerable. “Big” for the last four years. The triggers can be quite mundane Sam Allardyce, a brick of a man, but also 66 years old and like, for example, football matches being played. You know with previous health worries has recently been appointed what? I’ve complained about this stuff so much over the last manager of West Bromwich Albion. Then there’s the year I’ve started boring myself. Thank God for Steve Bruce… example of Roy Hodgson at Crystal Palace, who’s a mere 73 years old. Add these obese in some cases, elderly in others, but all vulnerable to some extent gentlemen into a mix with a bunch of largely brainless, hedonistic youngsters and I can see why they might be concerned on just a personal level let alone a societal level. I wish I could say it was only players from clubs like Manchester City that broke social distancing rules over Christmas, with Kyle Walker being widely accused of organising more sex parties with a few mates and hordes of working girls in London, but, unfortunately, the Tottenham trio of Eric Lamela, Sergio Reguilon, and Giovanni Lo Celso, along with West Ham’s Manuel Lanzini, and families, all shared festive celebrations together and were stupid enough to put it on twitter. Of course none of the thousands of fans who follow their various twitter accounts were going to notice, were they? Did it not occur to these guys that there’s a reason the clubs themselves maintain twitter accounts and follow all their players accounts? Are they really so stupid and thoughtless? It appears so… The Football Association and the Premier League made some fairly toothless statements about punishing players for breaking rules and compounded their previous errors by warning players about how they celebrated scoring goals on the pitch, which is probably one of the safest areas for them to be in given that all Premier League players are tested several times a week. All of which brings us pretty much up to date, except that the major clubs in Europe, stripped of Steve Bruce is a spectacularly untalented manager who large swathes of their income, still keep banging on about a always seems to end up being employed by someone. He’s

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European Super League to the extent that, on January 21st, organisers are now considering playing the whole F.I.F.A., the World governing body, and the six continental tournament at Wembley because England has started confederations; U.E.F.A (Europe), AFC (Asia), CAF (Africa), vaccinations so much earlier than the rest of Europe and Concacaf (North and Central America and the Caribbean), should, therefore, be a safer venue to hold the tournament Conmebol (South America), and OFC (Oceania), all warned than much of the rest of the continent. Again, this seems that Players who compete in a European Super League will optimistic given that the Eavis family announced the be barred from international competitions. cancelation of this year’s Glastonbury Festival on January st https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/55749730 21 . For Steve Bruce to mention morality and football in the same https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-55746293 sentence is incongruous in the extreme. So many of these Even if the tournament does take place, given the fatigue, columns have largely been about the greed of modern wear, and tear the players will be suffering at that point, and football, which is a microcosm of the greed of sport in with no fans in attendance, it’s likely to be a bit of a damp general. On January 19th, Sir Keith Mills, the former chief squib. executive of the London 2012 Olympic Games said it is As much as I want to be optimistic and believe that at some “unlikely” that the Tokyo Olympic games, already point in the late summer I’ll be supping a beer or six in the postponed from last summer, will take place this summer sunshine with a bunch of mates, I can’t see that happening due to the Covid-19 pandemic and that organisers should and that means that 2021 will pretty much be a complete now be "making plans for a cancellation". repeat of 2020. It’s unlikely that we’ll see the benefits of mass https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-55722542 vaccination and herd immunity before the Spring of 2022, On the same day, the games organisers were saying the after a squeaky bum winter watching for another severe Tokyo Olympics will definitely take place this summer , even outbreak amongst the various coughs and sneezes of the without vaccinations of competitors or spectators, in season, just in time for scientists to start developing the response to the comments of International Olympic vaccine for the next strain of Covid that will undoubtedly Committee member Dick Pound on January 7th that there emerge over the southern hemisphere winter of 2022. The could be no guarantees of the postponed 2020 Games going only question in my mind is will they combine the annual ahead from 23 July. Covid jab with the annual flu jab? At some point the organisers of all these tournaments will have to realise https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/olympics/55722310 they’ve unfortunately missed their chance to board the https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/olympics/55575450 gravy train and cancel. Sticking to the old adage to never let a good crisis go to waste; Tory twit Lord Sebastian Coe, the genius who thought that athletics could fill an 80,000 seat stadium in Stratford despite rarely seeing the Crystal Palace National Sports Centre fill even its lower 15,500 capacity, saw an opportunity to up his media profile in time to be considered for a television pundit’s position by declaring his confidence that the games would go ahead. https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/av/olympics/55768183 At the end of the day, the suspicion has to be that the fate of the games this summer will be determined by the Olympians themselves and especially the Paralympians, some of whom are likely to have severe vulnerabilities to the Covid virus. Common sense is more likely to prevail amongst the competitors after witnessing the testing and quarantine problems encountered by the early in the year Australian Open Tennis Tournament than amongst the organisers. It also has to be remembered that the delayed 2020 European Football Championships is due to be held this summer as well. Originally the plan was to hold the tournament split around various major European cities, with the semi-finals and final held at Wembley in London during June, but

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From: [email protected] LOCO CITATO December 26 [[“A lovely thing about Christmas is that it’s compulsory, Mike Glyer writes: like a thunderstorm, and we all go through it [...] together.” (Garrison Keillor)...]] Shifting to Bob Jennings’ five ideas about why fans write few LoCs today, all of them had merit except the suggestion From: [email protected] that fans might be distracted by the vast amount of sf/f December 26 entertainment available today. Science fiction fans are the last people you’d expect to pay any attention to sf. What was Joseph Major writes: Bob thinking? You would think that with all this time indoors, and being [[I still contend that something more relevant to the lack of able to get books without moving away from my desk, I old-school loccing is the immediacy of social media, as would be reviewing like mad. ephemeral as that is. I’d certainly make a comparison with And yet I am too tired to write, often; and when I do have any given loccol and a File770 comment thread, for example, the energy (usually about one in the morning; my sleep the latter of which is however both time-sensitive and schedule is another thing that has gone off the path) I can’t typically timely, if quickly forgotten except on rare find anything interesting to write about. occasions involving the phrase “Fuck Scalzi”...]] As I said to Lloyd Penney, it isn’t that we’ve gafiated from ✻ ✻ ✻ science fiction; science fiction has gafiated from us. Those who write and sell and publish it now have different From: [email protected] priorities and interests. December 26 [[I’m not sure that’s entirely true as a bald statement. Leigh Edmonds writes: Certainly SF by its very nature is a fluid genre, and the This Here ... 37 arrived in my in-box not long before the concerns of its writers (certainly in terms of underlying beginning of the second day of play in the Boxing Day Test subject matter) will change over time...]] Match between Australia and India. So, being test cricket, Getting back to health issues, you were right to get that which moves along at a leisurely pace most of the time, I cellulitis looked at. I had a bad attack of it about a year and read this issue while listening to the ABC broadcast. Pat a half ago, with some symptoms I really don’t think you Cummins bowled Gill right at the beginning of page two as would like to hear about. The climax was when a doctor you were reminiscing about your youthful childhood, the told me that he thought I should be glad that varicose veins score being India 2 for 61 (or 61 for 2 if you insist). Things weren’t involved, as he would have to operate and he didn’t got exciting only a little later just as I got to Radio Winston think I would survive the operation. That’s certainly with another Cummins wicket, 3 for 64. You don’t think I reassuring. was going to stop to listen to any of your links to music with Getting back to moving away, you've noticed the same thing the game in such an interesting state do you? However the with the existing fan awards. The Best Fanzine Hugo goes to Indians dug in and it was time for Lunch just as I got to my a webpage, the Best Fan Writer is someone on the net (and letter of comment on page 9 where I didn’t embarrass myself often getting paid for this, whatever are they doing?), and unduly, India 3 for 90. Play started again just when Jerry the Best Fan Artist is someone who only appears in art Kaufman was expounding on ‘Beyond the Pale’ on page 17 shows. It's not as bad as last year (well 2019) when two first- and progressed fairly sedately - actually a well balanced rate additions to the history and understanding of the field contest - until Claire Brialey was telling the joke about lost the Best Related Work Hugo to a website of fan fiction. ‘never saying “fuck” to Granny again’ and Lyons knocked over another Indian, 4 for 116. By the time I got to [[To even say that I pay little attention to the Hugos is a wondering if Debbie Harry has given up eating on page 27 generous overstatement, although I will glance at whoever the score was India 4 for 122. the current fan award winners might be to confirm that I know of few if any of them. I hope you’ll decide to promote [[And amazingly, India went on to win the series, a first on the FAAn awards in the pages of Alexiad as a more Australian soil, I think, causing some England players to meaningful (and actual fanzine-centric) alternative...]] make confident predictions about regaining the Ashes...]] [...] I did read all of the Footy column. I always do but, as I think I said, my eyes glaze over and my brain stops working when ✻ ✻ ✻ David Hodson writes about hardcore football. So, I must have read all the stuff about footy in this column but my

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brain only snapped back to attention when he started Xmas as a James Bond film, Morecambe & Wise, and of writing about how the game doesn’t grip him as I imagine it course the Queen’s holiday message at 3pm. The great Simon once did. I can understand why he would rather spend £100 Hoggart once recalled a tale, noting that there are members to spend a day sitting in the sun watching cricket rather than of the aristocracy who consider HM to be their social £60 sitting in the wind and rain for a couple of hours to inferior, mentioning some Lord or other, asleep in his comfy watch footy. I was rather startled to read that it cost £100 to chair after the substantial intake of Xmas lunch, being take in a one day match so I consulted Dr Google and I see gently addressed by the butler with the reminder “The that I could buy a seat in the MCG today for between A$100 Queen, sir”, only for His Lordship to grumpily mumble and A$10 depending on where I want to sit, and the “Who invited her?”...]] difference between the £ and the A$ is considerable so that On the business of swearing, which seems to have become a seems an extraordinary difference. When I went to a footy thing, there seem to be a couple of purposes for it. One is game last year (2019) it cost me A$27 for a general admission exclamations, as in when I jam my finger in the door and ticket which meant I could sit almost everywhere I liked in exhaust my pitifully small vocabulary of swear words very the vast MCG. As always, I can only thank my lucky stars quickly and loudly. The other is to be offensive in public that my ancestors decided to migrate here from Britain in but, after taking is some recent American television shows, earlier times, I would be going to neither the footy or the I’m rapidly coming to the view that we’ve exhausted all the cricket if I lived in Britain. swear words that were once so shocking. Perry [[The last footy game I went to was Mexico v Iceland (first Middlemiss’s letter about ‘fucking spiders’ reminds me of teams an’all) here at Sam Boyd stadium, and tickets were that other kind of swearing which is, or should be, $25...]] entertaining as well as shocking. Some of the best swearing While on the topic of cricket, I see that Steve Jeffery I’ve ever heard has come from farmers and is made up of a questions my use of the word ‘umpire’ rather than ‘referee’. combination of words that imply something usually sexual Those officiating officials are called ‘umpires’ in cricket so, of as well as offensive, and comedic. I’ve wondered if farmers course, they should also be called ‘umpires’ in real football are so good at this kind of swearing because they spend long too. I think I’ve heard that they are called ‘referees’ in the hours on the tractor driving around in circles in vast Rugby playing states to the north which is, of course, wrong. paddocks so they spend their time dreaming up these curses for want of anything else to think about. Perhaps they are It is now several years since Valma and I have ventured up like the best punsters who save up their best creations until country to spend Christmas with my family. Partly because they find just the right spot in a conversation to drop them in my parents are now dead and partly because some of the for greatest effect. It has always struck me that Perry would extended family are difficult to converse with. Since Robin be very good at this kind of swearing but he probably hasn’t Johnson moved to Ballarat (another Indian knocked over, 5 spent enough time driving tractors in vast paddocks to be for 173!!) We’ve started sharing Christmas lunch which has able to perfect the art. I also heard some exceptional become less ambitious as the swearing from a bunch of bus years have passed. This year I drivers one time on a picket heated up something I had in the line, which makes me think that freezer and then we had some driving a bus must be pretty Christmas Pud that Robin had much the same as driving a bought at the supermarket. tractor. Then we sat back and watched one of those Christmas romcoms [[Australians are clearly at the that was far more amusing than more creative end of agriculture. we expected. After that we My farmer uncle Ben Walker started watching another movie was one of the most taciturn on Netflix, The Midnight Sky, people I ever knew, having which looked promising but had probably only heard him utter the pace of a sedated snail - I less than a few dozen words in wouldn’t recommend it to total...]] anyone. Before long all three of I’m afraid that my vocabulary in us were asleep, and that was our the swearing direction is rather exciting Christmas. limited and unsophisticated, the [[The post-prandial snooze was result of having been brought as much a part of a British up in a good Methodist family. It’s not that I haven’t been known to utter some of the words

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recently printed in your fanzine, on rare occasions, it’s just From: fabfi[email protected] that they don’t seem to inhabit the ready room of my brain. I December 26 may call a politician a ‘dickhead’ but that is just because it takes less time than ‘fat fascist fool’ or ‘bloated capitalist Bob Jennings writes: bastard’. I received three fanzines today, one physically printed issue [...] delivered by snail-mail, and two pixel versions dropped into the e-box. It happens that this being the Saturday after I also sometimes wonder if ‘editor’ is the right word to use Christmas, I was able to hit the Post Office when they for a person in charge of a fanzine. I take ‘editor’ to mean opened, do a few hours work in the warehouse, and have somebody who fixes my manuscripts to make them readable time left over for fanac. I was able to undertake some but in most cases it strikes me that faneds are more like necessary restacking and organizing work at the warehouse compilers who stick together a collection of material within due to a “seasonal warm spell” of 36 degrees (yeah, yeah, the covers of a fanzine, or like the compare of a variety show, dance around in glee and crow as you bask in the warm link separate performances. I’ve noticed that even the Nevada sunlight, but to slightly rewrite words to a once esteemed Bruce Gillespie has simply lifted the text of an popular ditty, “Massachusetts is a far cry from Las Vegas”. email letter of comment I’ve sent him, not edited it to make it 36 degrees really does pass for warm around here during the the sparkling piece of writing I had hoped it could be. As for winter). I was naturally going to LOC the print zine first, but my patented typos, even Bruce has been known not to edit while downloading yours I started to skim over it and then them all out. read most of it, so, I’m writing to you instead of someone [[I do edit, mostly for typos but also occasionally for sense, (possibly) more deserving. and I will usually cut salutations and/or excessive gush, but It’s an ever changing world out there. I tend to have a lighter touch than my BEAM co-editor in this respect...]] [...] Jennifer hadn’t told you that she had a bridge? I’m not On other fronts, My condolences. I was shocked to read surprised, it’s not the kind of thing that you admit to others. about your ongoing medical problems and Jennifer’s I wouldn’t mention that I’ve got one either except that I’m accident that resulted in her dislocated dental bridge. Do curious that bridges can be attached to teeth. There must be you folks happen to have one of those tiny soapstone some nifty dental engineering goes on there. Mine is statuettes of some bizarre yet exotic fantasy creature located attached to three implants that are screwed into my jaw. I’d somewhere in your home? I can’t think of any other reason like to think that having my bridge bolted to my jaw would why the Gods of Fate seem to be continually picking on you make it impervious to getting broken by falling during guys other than a supernatural bad luck magnet. It might be gardening, but I will take the hint and try never to give in to worth checking on, just to be sure. the temptation to do any gardening again. [[Time once again to remind readers of John Nielsen Hall’s Our Christmas watching this year is Father Brown. Don’t description of the course of my life, one he really wishes I smirk at out lower class tastes. We’d probably watch wouldn’t keep mentioning, as a “slow motion train Battlestar Galactica like Claire and Mark, or the even better wreck”...]] (to us at least) Star Gate SG:1, but we’ve watched them so I hope the dental problem can be resolved without your many times already that they are seared into our brains. having to resort to a GoFundMe effort. There are zillions of There are other shows too like All Creatures Great and Small those running these days and I note that 97% of them do not and Pie in the Sky, but we’ve overwatched them too, so we meet their target goal. had to get something that we didn’t know so well and I’m also sorry to hear that your enforced holiday vacation wasn’t one of those things that doesn’t make sense until time may be extended beyond your expectations. I read in you’ve watched the entire series. We might be old fashioned the news that your city continues to be one of the hardest hit but we still like to get a complete story in an episode. economically by The Plague. It would be wonderful if our Alright, so Battlestar Galactica wasn’t entirely like that, picky, elected politicians would get off their rumps and deliver picky. another stimulus legislation that included some direct I can’t blame you for thinking that a band from New Jersey is payouts to individual citizens, but this debate has been going from Canada. They’re neighbors aren’t they? They look like on for months, and months, and months, and nothing has it from this distance anyhow. happened yet. You would have thot that politicos who were PS The score is now 5 for too many. It looks like this match is up for reelection this year would have exerted maximum lost, and it's only Day Two. effort to creating a bill that would pump some money into the collapsing economy, but no, nothing but hot air from the DC Ciceros. Maybe in January… ✻ ✻ ✻

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Taral Wayne’s and your comments about apazines are both suspect it’s as a backstop against the increasing backwards appropriate. Apazines tend to be interactive among a group encroachment of Xmas goods and frippery in the shops of fans who know each other reasonably well, if only thru before Halloween is even over. At some point I predict all print, and the interaction there is automatic among members; these seasonal holidays will merge together, at least on the indeed that is generally the whole purpose behind an apa. shelves of Sainsbury’s, and we shall end up celebrate the Outsiders are usually welcomed into any ongoing baby Jesus by draping the manger in cobwebs and eating discussion, but the fact that the subjects being talked about hollow chocolate eggs while wearing a tall pointy hat. On are intertwining among various fanzines the outsider your side of pond of course, it would also involve a flaming probably has never read leaves those who are not members brandy soaked pumpkin pie with a sprig of holly. mostly having to write comments about articles or editorials [[Fuckin’ waste of brandy, that...]] or whatever material is there that sort of stands alone, stuff that might have been otherwise offered up in a genzine. As (mardy old) gits of a certain age (I note you are a mere stripling as I was 20 in 1976), Christmas and New Year seem Fred Lerner’s zine is an apazine in name only. Yes, it gets less and less relevant as time goes on, except as a reminder of distributed thru FAPA, but you will note that in all other a new range of aches and pains and unexpected bodily respects it is a general circulation perzine with no mailing failures in the coming year. Even before this year’s Covid comments of any kind, and the only way anybody reading lockdown, Christmas is no longer the full family gathering it the thing outside of FAPA would know that it was an used to be, especially now all my nephews and nieces have apazine would be by reading grown up and now have the fine print at the top of page partners, children and plans of one. their own. [[See my response to Fred’s I borrowed your meme of loc...]] selecting seasonal songs but There are some engaging excluding any of those that were hybrids, such as Bill Plott’s constantly on the radio every SFPAzine Sporadic which is a Xmas for my family FB page, perzine filled with his kicking off with Joni Mitchell's experiences, opinions, travel ‘River’ (and then heard it and book reviews, to which played several times on both there are also pages of mailing BBC Radio 6 and Radio 4 the comments added at the end. I following week) and Thea sincerely doubt that any true Gilmore’s ‘Sol Invictus’, but apazine would ever be able to slightly disappointed no one sport much of a letter column else took up the challenge. I still or would ever rate very high in have to inflict the Albion Band’s a hobby wide popularity poll ‘Wassail Song’ on them. such as the FAAn Awards. [[I will if you won’t... https:// Another oddity of the stfandom experience: people talking www.youtube.com/watch?v=wrpZMNOTdVY ]] about the nature and specifics of the fanzines in the hobby Of course nothing says Christmas more than a bit of rather than the primary focus of the hobby or the people in programming, so I’ve spent the week off before Christmas it. Right up there with discussions about cat farts and dog coding a MIDI sequencer for the Yamaha DGX and can now farts. No wonder the mundanes give us such a wide berth. do a fair impression of Tangerine Dream in their heyday [[You forgot the crucial topic of egg & chips...]] (‘Ricochet’ and ‘Rubicon’) - at least before it crashes with an ✻ ✻ ✻ out of stack space error. I may have to recode this in C#. [[Falls off chair...]]

From: [email protected] [...] December 28 Leigh Edmonds writes “the problem I think I have with big fat fanzines like SF Commentary and Portable Storage, they are Steve Jeffery writes: so huge that it is impossible to respond to them fully in a I still maintain that Christmas officially starts at 3pm on simple letter”. Indeed, and once solution is not even to Christmas Eve and the start of the Nine Lessons and Carols attempt this all in one go. In fact, for me, it’s pretty much from Kings College, Cambridge. I don't know why I seem to impossible to even attempt this given the flakiness of AOL have adopted this as a marker over the last few tears, and and the distinct possibility of several pages of carefully

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crafted comment (coff) disappearing into electronic limbo fall back on. There are some advantages to being an old git. mid-loc. Instead, I tend to pepper their poor editors with a (“Mummy, what's a Beatle?”) series of smaller locs as I work though the contents, Re. “Mr. Finger has put his bollocks on it.” I’m absolutely not sometimes over several weeks, in the hope that, being surprised. There's almost no obligation to respond if you editors, they can daisy chain these together into something come across something randomly browsing in efanzines vaguely coherent and drop out the bits where I’m obviously (because the editor will never know) whereas a mailing list, just wittering on to no purpose (or just to the purpose that I even an electronic one with a pdf attached) implies you are regard loccing in part as writing a letter to a friend and will part of a community, and prompts a response of some kind, sometimes wander completely off topic.) even if it’s just to fire off a minimal thank you line once in a I cannot even imagine working through 500 pages of while to acknowledge receipt or interest. (Though I suspect, ANZAPA. My current apa commitment is a more measured based on comments I’ve seen from other editors, sometimes minac of 4-6 pages every other month shared with half a you don’t even get that.) dozen other contributors and there are still times I struggle And in deference to what to come up with the goods. said above, with another 10 And I really shouldn’t leave pages of TH... still to go, I'd it to the last few days before probably better hit Send the mailing deadline. before AOL plays silly Perhaps that should be this buggers. year's resolution (to be duly broken come the 29th of (Oh god the Beastie Boys January). seem to be sampling Led Zeppelin on the radio. my [[A fine way to celebrate my brain keeps wanting to fill birthday, then (also that of in the missing bar of Jimmy Harry Bell and M Page’s riff) Strummer)...]] Claire Brialey’s remark And as for Taral's comment “We really need to decide “loccers tend to like talking tonight whether our about themselves, and if Christmas rewatching binge given the opportunity they this year is going to be The may do so at considerable Bridge or Battlestar Galactica. length!”. Guilty as charged. Although all this thinking I also suspect some of this is about government makes a reaction to lockdown and me think we need to go a large part of my social back over Borgen sometime interaction now being too” made we wonder for a online. But see my comment moment whether our locs earlier about editors. had got mixed up during Neither do I see anything the editing process since wrong or dismissive about Vikki and I have just faneds or their contributors finished The Bridge and are writing about books they’ve now halfway through The read or films they’ve seen. I’m still enough of a reader to Valhalla Murders (which only confirms just how good the The enjoy reading a good or intriguing review that will prompt Bridge is, both in terms of characterisation and having a me to add something new to my wishlist (and in this SF complete and satisfying story arc across all four seasons) and Commentary has largely taken the place of Locus as the BSFA’s are still approaching the end of Season 2 of Galactica. (We Vector seems to go off in a direction I barely recognise from missed a couple of episodes when the recorder had a bit of a when I was reviews editor). strop but luckily could fill them in from the box set.) Bonnie Raitt: and some astonishing good slide guitar. We watched a couple of seasons of Borgen when it was last Music didn’t stop when U2 and Bono got above themselves broadcast, but then switched back to The Killing, which (or before that G’n’R), just my interest in them. There’s started the whole Scandi-noir ball rolling (and a minor always something new and unexpected that glitters among obsession with Swedish knitwear in the UK), but are now the general dross of autotuned soundalikes. And if not, I looking forward to the next season of Spiral, largely because, always have 50 years of back catalogue on vinyl and CD to as Ben Jeapes observed, the two French cops at the centre of

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this are just as venal and corrupt as the villains they are In conclusion, origin uncertain. Though I do like the Bond trying (often woefully incompetently) to hunt down, and reference. much the same goes for half of the prosecutor’s office. Les [[As do I, and as, I suspect, will fellow Bond aficionado flics indeed. Joseph Major...]] [[I haven’t watched any “Scandi-noir” but I suspect I’d be ✻ ✻ ✻ quite into it if I did. See ‘Indulge Me’ for a bit of current watching, and also non-watching...]] From: [email protected] Now I know where I’ve been going wrong on the curry. I haven’t been using a shovel for roasting the coriander. But December 30 that’s a curry? (or currey)? The traditional* Jeffery/France Jerry Kaufman writes: version of a curry requires that we use every spice on the This month I don’t find myself with much in the way of shelf (cumin, cardamon, pepper, mustard seeds, fennel, fresh, bright commentary for you. I will just wish you and chillies, ginger, cinnamon and clove and then beef up the Jen a Happy New Year, Possibly you will join in the 24 hour sauce with a slab of dark chocolate for shine (admittedly Party People Zoom that Alison Scott, Mike Ward, and Karen more Mexican mole than Balti). Works for us though, even if Shaeffer are hosting? If yes, then Suzle and I might just see the kitchen does becomes inhabitable for half an hour you “there.” between roasting and grinding the spice mix. [[As you now know I didn’t make it. I worked half of those (*in that we use the same set of ingredients and it never 24 hours and slept through the rest...]] comes out the same way twice) You say, in response to something or other I said, “if you ✻ ✻ ✻ have a fault...”. I do have a fault, or maybe two. I sometimes leap in when I think someone has been misread or From: [email protected] misunderstood, and explain what (I think) they really meant. December 30 I try too hard to be funny, whether by taking as literal Perry Middlemiss writes: something said in a metaphorical sense. I try to avoid cliches, but when one seems unavoidable I try to use it a fresh way I seemed to have mixed up my blonde Australian actresses in (sometimes literalizing it or extending it further). I also avoid my last eLoC. The phrase “we’re not here to fuck spiders” controversy, or if discussing such, I bend over backward to was actually explained on the Graham Norton show by be “diplomatic.” Margot Robbie in early 2020. Here's hoping that the venerable Cate won’t decide to sue. I suspect she’s probably Emailing zines direct to readers doesn’t always increase used the term once or twice herself. Maybe you can change response, I’ll admit. There are some I know of that go direct your footnote to “stuffed up by Perry Middlemiss.” Much as well as appear at efanzines, but still only get locs from closer to the actual truth. Lloyd Penney, that hero of letterhacking. If it weren’t for Lloyd, there are zines that would get no egoboo whatsoever. The Australian lexicon does have its amusing turns of phrase, to the extent that we have our own dictionary, ‘The I think that shot of Debbie Harry has been airbrushed - or Macquarie’, which keeps track of such things. So, being the Harry herself has been. She looks more properly aged in inquisitive bloke that I am, I decided I’d better follow up on other photos. Robbie’s phrase to ensure I had some background. And, yes, [[Wm Breiding said much the same thing in a pre-loc remark, the phrase does appear in the dictionary, but it may not be and much more caustically than you!...]] Australian at all. A correspondent on the dictionary’s ✻ ✻ ✻ webpage gave the following explanation: In Ian Fleming’s first James Bond novel, ‘Casino From: [email protected] Royale’ (1953), Bond says to a barman in French: “Mais December 30 n’enculons pas des mouches.” This can be translated as Lloyd Penney writes: “But let’s not fuck flies”. Bond used it to mean ‘let’s not waste time splitting hairs over the type of vodka used in Yeah, you said I could wait to respond to This Here… 37 this martini’. Whether it’s an authentic French saying, or because you probably wouldn’t be getting to it until late something Fleming made up or translated from British January. Yeah, I said I’d wait… Well, so much for that slang, I don’t know. promise. Here’s your loc, and I think this will probably be my last loc of the year. Probably… Neither do I. Other correspondents noted that it was heard in the late 1990s in Brisbane, not a city that is as obsessed with You’re putting them out fast and furious, and the rest of us its arachnids as Sydney. can barely keep up. I know parties are probably verboten per the COVID Police in Las Vegas, but after Jennifer’s bad luck,

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she probably just wants a party for two anyway. Hope she is probably isn’t coming. You might know who Carl is by this fast-healing, and can smile for us soon. time... If we can recover from snake wolves and volcanoes, Adulthood? It's unpleasant but necessary, and helps pay for we could move SF into the non-fiction section of the local the good times more associated with childhood. I have a library. large magnet on the fridge that says “Growing old is [[It was nice to see you at the Notorious RGC gabfest also - mandatory. Growing up is optional.” Big thumbs down on I tend to nip in for an hour or so once or twice a month, the growing up. My own Christmas memories are half and depending on how knackered I am from work. It’ll be less half positive and negative, but these days, as you say, they likely for me to make it at all if we, at some point, get back are all good, with Yvonne. Still, those bad memories crop up on our normal 12-hour shift schedule, but I’ve been enjoying from time to time, and that’s when I prefer that if you’re them in the meantime, having discovered a new mission in going to play any Christmas music, start with ‘Fairytale of life which is to make Moss Whelan fall off his chair as much New York’, by the Pogues and Kristy McColl, and get as possible. And I still have no idea who “Carl” is...]] happier from there. And there’s the loc you might not have wanted now, but you Alice Lawson’s birthday was on December 19th? So was got it. A braw Hogmanay to ye both!, and see you both in Yvonne’s! I made sure she had a good party, especially so that SFnal year of 2021. Where’s my flying car? close to Christmas. I learned early that December birthdays ✻ ✻ ✻ were special; my late mother’s birthday was on Boxing Day. From: [email protected] [...] December 31 The Bizarro cartoon, with the Grinch and the many William Breiding writes: Hanukkah candles he stole... he can chop them up into tealights, and sell them to IKEA. He will make a fortune. [...] Leigh Edmonds, thank you for a late Christmas present. I About fanartists - send me those 25 names, examples, and actually do find fanzines interesting, and I comment on them their contact info, my friend. With the exception of a few I’m with what I can think of, but I also do put in some personal finding that our remaining stalwarts have become decidedly journalism, plus I relay other ideas that caught my eye, or non-communicative. I don’t know whether I’ve done questions I have thought of. It doesn’t mean I didn't like the something offensive, in which case tell me, or if its aging and fanzine’s contents, or couldn't think of more things to say. I the times we are living through, but silence has become a include all. Fellow journalist Harry Warner has been my frustrating trend among our fanartists. inspiration, and Mike Glicksohn was my mentor in early [[They’re listed in TIR, which you’ve been sent, and for the days. I certainly hadn’t meant to ignore Taral’s zines, I most part are readily contactable...]] apologize, it’s been crazy time for me during this pandemic, and I wouldn’t have it any other way. I promise to respond I could go on, but my specs have ended up in the puke. more to Taralzines in the new year. ✻ ✻ ✻ Why don’t fans write many LoCs these days? Damned if From: [email protected] know, I’m too busy writing LoCs. Lately, I have caught flak December 31 from some twits who complain that my letter might be the Fred Lerner writes: only one in the zine’s locol. How is that my fault? You want me to stop? Sure, no problem. I have other things to do, and Thanks, as always, for This Here.... You and your contributors other zines to respond to. [...] manage to make subjects like footy and rock music hold my interest, even though they normally don’t matter to me at all. British grocery shops in Toronto. Indeed. A short drive away from me is A Bit of Home, which sells British and Irish foods, As you seem unsure what to make of my quarterly zine I plus footy souvenirs, Doctor Who goods, etc. Sweet Thrills is should perhaps clarify matters. At last count Lofgeornost had a British candy store, and The British Grocer is a chain of a circulation of 89 print copies, 15 in PDF, and the 16 British food stores in the Hamilton area, near the west end of members of the Fantasy Amateur Press Association (FAPA) , Lake Ontario. Also in that area is The Wandering Scot British for a total of 120. As you can see, calling Lofgeornost an Shop, and up in northern Mississauga is The Scottish Bakery, apazine, while strictly correct, isn’t entirely accurate. But the where I could get sausage rolls, meat pies and Melton FAPA is an important part of Lofgeornost. Not only do I like Mowbrays, plus all the Club bars I might want. It really is an the continuity with the earliest days of fanzine activity that industry here to cater to homesick expats. my membership in the FAPA represents, but the discipline imposed by its quarterly mailing deadlines ensures that I My letter... Good to see you in the BCSFA Zoom the other don’t get lazy about my writing and editing. night. I have heard of a plan to have a New Year’s Zoom event locally, but I have yet to receive an invitation, which

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[[That’s pretty much all along been my conception of taught me how. I am still trying to train my better half Jana Lofgeornost, as more accurately a perzine rather than a to do it but she hasn’t got it yet. Nobody eats a lot of rice dedicated APAzine - and it’s notable that the lines are here except the Vietnamese -- 2nd biggest ethnic minority getting blurrier overall with a number of APAzines also here to visitors’ surprise, taking the econo-social roles of appearing up at efanzines, some even in edited form in that Indian/Pakistani/Bangladeshi and Afro-Carribbean folk in venue to exclude APA mailing comments. I’m very pleased to Britain. (Apparently during the war, the communist have been added to your circulation some while ago, I enjoy Czechoslovakian government reached out like the Four Tops yer ish very much indeed...]] to the communist Vietnamese proto-government and offered The FAPA’s minuscule membership is a far cry from a half sanctuary to the Boat People, since, I suppose, they weren't century ago, when I first got involved with fanzines. The going to make it here in a boat.) membership roster of 65 was full, and there was a long Corner shops, late night takeaways, all Asian restaurants of waitlist for the next available slot. The internet has displaced any hue, and (at least some of) the shitty jobs Czechs don’t much of print amateur journalism, but I still find print a want. Although the Czechs are harder-working than the better medium for what I like to do. I hope there are enough bloody British. people like me to keep the FAPA going, and perhaps to Makes a fella proud to be Irish so it does. renew it. Anyway. Membership dues are low ($10 per year), and activity requirements are minimal (8 pages of original content per Jumbo came in and lifted the lid on the pan saying it must be year). I would encourage anyone who would like to help time to give it a stir, and you and I both leapt out of our seats preserve an institution that has contributed so much to the shouting “LEAVE IT ALONE!” in reedy threnody. Poor lad history of Fandom to consider joining the FAPA. nearly shat himself -- the bravado is all an act of course -- and querulously asked why. I let you explain in your gentle, [[I was a member meself for a very short while...]] dulcet, even understated way. ✻ ✻ ✻ I said afterwards you and did rice the same way and you From: [email protected] murmured sotto voce, as is your wont, and a long felt one too January 17 I have no doubt, “because that is the RIGHT way to do it, o’course!” Only perhaps with an added epithet for rhetorical Liam Proven writes: impact. It’s an even-numbered week. Must be time to ‘ear from old It is, too. scroteface again. [[I went back to my 2008 one-shot trip(s) report Tits, You don’t ‘arf keep knocking 'em Sausages and Ballet Shoes out. Gives me something to pass (available via efanzines, of course) the time on the loo though. to see if that got mentioned, which I was amused in the last one -- of course it did : “I have been meaning [the last one] that I’ve detailed to cook the rice, which of read ‘cos another arrived, course is Oirishly slightly foxed by prompting me to finish and write... a certain person lifting the lid on that some American correspondent the pan...” (p12). I also noted your was baffled by the DoBFO. I name in the dedications upfront - wondered how the Murricans I’m rather guessing that this would managed to understand you. Now I have been the last time we were know. physically adjacent?...]] They don’t. Saying that I just bought a rice The cookery bit about doing cooker off a Taiwanese lass here in something unspeakable to a piece Prague. Her roomie went home and of an innocent pig with garlic left her with a pile of stuff. struck me ‘cos one of my favourite I only took a proper look at it when memories of you was at Jumbo and I got home. Of course it’s entirely Simoné’s old place in Croydon, labelled in bloody Chinese, isn’t it? where for some reason, you were I could only read a few dozen preparing rice. I was struck ‘cos words at my peak and that was 25y you did it the same way I do it, ago. I googled and found its although I can’t remember who manual. Score!

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It’s in Chinese too. Of course. As is the website. And Google bit.ly/trabhov Translate can translate a website but not a downloadable From memory but I bet it works. (I wrote a book, me!) booklet. Because the book’s called ‘The Register - A Brief History Of A brainwave struck: I opened Google Translate, tapped the Virtualisation’. Take the initials, TRABHOV, and bosh, camera button & pointed my phone at it. If you have fast memorable, pronounceable URL. I don’t need anyone else to enough internet it streams video to Google’s servers, reads, remember it but I don’t know my bloody Amazon part translates, matches the fonts it can see as best it can, and number or whatever, but I can remember the title. overlays translated text on the video. My other is bit.ly/trgtws2012 It’s literally like magic. Erratic, unpredictable, doesn’t do what you want but sometimes saves your bum from the fire. It makes ‘em much easier to type. All I need is select and go. It has options for cook, steam, or [[I’m up against deadline for thish, so if I don’t get to this porridge. Well “cook” seemed a safe bet. right away, it’s definitely something I want to have a look at in the (near?) future. Ta!...]] I overfilled it first time and nearly caused a kitchen disaster but I’ll work it out. I am told is.gd does the same thing if you want. Both are free but it’ll remember your links for you if you make an account Amazing things, rice cookers. How they work is brilliantly and log in. simple. Bung any links you put in the zine through that first and it’ll https://twitter.com/krishashok/status/ make life easier for all concerned. 1346471495883624448 Share and enjoy! Go stick your head in a pig! (It's short, and you don't need an account.) [[I’ve had one for ages (Black & Decker brand), but these ✻ ✻ ✻ days it only gets used when I fix up several cwt of Indian food for my birthday bash, which won’t be occurring this WAHF year because plague. Jennifer gets the little microwaveable Claire Brialey ; Bill Burns ; David Hodson : “I’m starting to packets of Jasmine rice to meet the needs of the Indian food think you should rename the column ‘The David Hodson she does for me (she doesn’t partake). As much as I have to column that sometimes mentions football. More people look up the rice cooker instructions every year, I suspect I’d might read it!” ; Rob Jackson (mostly on Corflu business); also have to do the same for that original proper cooking Tiki Leibowitz ; Ulrika O’Brien, having a clear-out up the method, at least to get the rice/water proportions correct. Grate Norfwest, sends several shot glasses for my collection, Oirish interference remains the only time of failure...]] including one described as the “Bobbitt special” which does Anyway. Yes. Food and music. Things that I associate with actually look like a severed knob, made all the more - er - Nicness. interesting by the fact that the bellend is the unstable base of the glass itself ; George Phillies ; Andrew Porter sends a Obvs beer and shouting as well but that is, to be fair, several scan of what’s apparently the first ever mention of a fanzine of my favourite people in fandom. in the press, from the Battle Creek (Michigan) Enquirer, About music and specifically internet and youtube and that, dated October 5 1941 and referencing the ‘Galactic Roamers’ I had a suggestion for you. club. Sadly, Andy’s best efforts at enhancing the image to I read TH... and BEAM on a tablet so in principle I could just make it more readable aren’t quite enough to reproduce the follow the links, but I don’t sit on the can listening to music image here, although you can get the gist on screen. If much. I have some limits. anyone’s interested I’ll be happy to forward it ; John Purcell sends Askance 50 ; Paul Skelton sends All New or Reprint 6, But I know some folk read it on paper. I used to ‘til I had to following up on its mention lastish. I had received ANoR 7, stop going to the office ‘cos of the DETHLURGI. Long links but not this one, well appreciated. ; Jon D Swartz ; Moss are hard to remember, or type, or transcribe. Something that Whelan : “Absorbing.” might help you: There are loads of URL shorteners around. Things like tiny.url and stuff. You go there, paste in the URL you want, INDULGE ME and it gives you a really short one that you use instead. It ✘! GREAT NAME FOR A ROCK BAND : Just started just sends them to wherever you wanted, but in 10 letters not Vol 8 of the Chuck Connor-supplied 80s music collection, 40 or 50. and of possible applicability to John Nielsen Hall, the outfit But there’s one I like particularly. Not for the shortness of its “Rude Buddha”, although I wouldn’t recommend actually URL or anything, but because you can pick the letters. So here’s listening to them... one I prepared earlier:

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✘! TAFFNICITY : It occurs to me to wonder, now that “If This Here loccol is a zine - I have not heard of it before...” the 2021 Corflu has been rescheduled for November, the and going on to punt the N3F’s zine distribution service. weekend before Novacon, whether Mike Lowrey might Eagle-eyed readers may have noticed the occasional presence want to take his trip then to take in two of the Faniverse’s of George Phillies in the This Here... loccol, as well as his great get-togethers... inevitable appearance in just about every fuckin’ WAHF! Has he in fact been replaced by a simulacrum? I think we should ✘ SQUIRREL NEWS : Seriously, congratulations if be told... you had “Giant Multicolored Squirrels Roam the Forests of https://www.facebook.com/groups/467954116579566 Southern India” on your apocalypse bingo card. Reported by http://file770.com/efanzines-drops-n3f-zines-after-groups- John “Wag” Waggott on FBF, which prompted Rob president-seeks-to-promote-it-on-parler-and-gab/ Newman to observe that they’re almost Crystal Palace FC colors... Perhaps also worth noting that if George had simply mentioned “social media” generically rather than naming https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/yes-giant- names, none of this would have happened... technicolor-squirrels-actually-roam-forests-southern- india-180971886/ ✘ TV GUIDE : I’ve lost interest in the new version of The Stand, which basically just isn’t very good at all. For a bit of nightly watching I found a 2015 TNT show, Agent X, which is quite good, appealing as it does to my liking of spy stuff, action and a political setting. The premise is that there’s a secret clause in the “true” original Constitution giving the Vice President the power and control of an extra-judicial operative who may be called upon to do all sorts of action- spy stuff beyond the remit of the usual agencies. Jeff Hephner (whohe?) plays the titular agent with workmanlike efficiency. Sharon Stone (who also executive produced) is the VP, and other well-known participants include James Earl Jones in cameos as the Chief Justice (who is in on it) and Jamey Sheridan as the head of the FBI. It’s mildly amusing that, in having ditched The Stand, I’m watching a show which features one of the original series’ major actors. ✘! RIPPED FROM THE HEADLINES : Commenting Typically, however, as with a lot of stuff I end up liking, the on the Jeffrey Toobin incident on FBF, Linda Bushyager, who show was cancelled after a single 10-episode season... really should know better, uses the construction ✘ “accidentally masturbated”. [falls off chair]... MOVIE NIGHT : Moving on to the big screen, albeit getting viewed on our small screen, I finally got around to ✘! MENTAL HEALTH : “eFanzines Drops N3F Zines watching WW84 before it slinks off HBO in disgrace. There’s After Group’s President Seeks to Promote It on Parler and enough to admire in bits of the individual performances Gab”, runs Mike Glyer’s slightly sensationalized headline in (except for the fuckin’ atrocious Maxwell Lord), but overall File770. I don’t want to recap the entire sorry saga, but the the movie is a disgraceful and incoherent mess. I do rather links to both the F770 piece and the original source (a thread expect better from Geoff Johns... on an FBF group) are below. Apart from a general sense that, ✘ in the kindest interpretation, George Phillies (N3F Prez) is 3FB : If you thought that might be another fannish being spectacularly naive - a less charitable yet excusing abbreviation, well noooo (unless you count being a comix view might be “has lost his fuckin’ mind”, I had a particular fan), I’m of course referring to the Fabulous Furry Freak couple of [falls off chair] moments reading the threads. The Brothers, who, as I’ve been meaning to mention for a minute, first was George saying “both those places [Parler and Gab] now have a brand new animated series which can be found are also full of people who are primarily SF fans who could on the YoobToob (honestly there’s enough fuckin’ links in be lured into joining us”, which was quite eye-glazing, thish already, ey?). The basic premise is that the lads have knowing that the notorious “Vox Day” actually quit Gab been asleep for 51 years after smoking what was obviously since he was being continually trolled by Nazis - or should some really killer weed. The voice cast is what’ll get you in, I that be even Nazier Nazis? The other was a LOL as much as reckon: Pete Davidson as Phineas, Woody Harrelson as a [falls off chair]. In the FBF thread, S&ra Bond wrote (in Freewheelin’ Franklin, John Goodman as Fat Freddy and, part) “...this is the last time I’m gonna rein in my sarc about blissfully, Tiffany Haddish voicing Fat Freddy’s Cat... the N3F in the This Here... loccol”, to which George replied

THIS HERE... 17 THIS HERE... #38

✘ I LIKE TRAINS, ME : The Grate Aitch, Harry Bell, ✘ AGELESS BEAUTY : Kim Cattrall... posted the above photo of classic railway poster art by Tom Purvis. Love it!...

✘ THAT BIRTHDAY ZOOM : Here’s the info. You’ll need the passcode. I’ll email this out separately also... Time: Jan 29, 2021 11:30 AM Pacific Time (US and Canada) Join Zoom Meeting https://us02web.zoom.us/j/86896760649? pwd=U1l6aHFkRVlVeS9HcVk3OThEMUR6QT09 Meeting ID: 868 9676 0649 Passcode: 109757 One tap mobile +12532158782,,86896760649#,,,,*109757# US (Tacoma) +13462487799,,86896760649#,,,,*109757# US (Houston) Dial by your location +1 253 215 8782 US (Tacoma) +1 346 248 7799 US (Houston) +1 669 900 6833 US (San Jose) +1 301 715 8592 US (Washington DC) +1 312 626 6799 US (Chicago) +1 929 205 6099 US (New York) Meeting ID: 868 9676 0649 Passcode: 109757 Find your local number: https://us02web.zoom.us/u/ kdRIzWxg10

MIRANDA THIS HERE... is (mostly) written, edited and produced by: Nic Farey, published on efanzines.com by the Grace of Burns. Locs & that to: 2657 Rungsted Street, Las Vegas NV 89142, or Email [email protected] “‘Cause one’s got a weasel and the other’s got a flag, One’s on the pole, shove the other in a bag.” Art credits: Alan White (pp9, 11, 12, 15)

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