Assorted Linky-Lynx

Linky-lynx! First: It has come to my attention that Schlock Mercenary is one of 22 webcomics that some columnists over at the Washington Post are letting you vote on (voting closes Wednesday.) The winner gets riches and fame, plus the admiration of the entire world as the Washington Post sponsors a ticker-tape parade in honor of the best webcomic of the decade. I guess that falls under "fame," too. Also, "wishful thinking." As you well know there can be no ticker-tape for webcomic heroes because ticker-tape is from the era of print, and webcomics mean Print is Dead. (See what I did there? HUMOROUS IRONY. See also "Trolling for Ted Rall.") Anyway, there are comics there you probably want to vote for. Pick only one. The stakes here are incredibly low, so we can all expect the competition to be legendarily cutthroat, complete with ballot-stuffing, name-calling, and DDoS attacks on the Post. But me expecting that behavior and me encouraging it are two different animals. Play nice. There's a third animal here -- my pit-bull*. He has rabies, H1N1, and no leash. Second, and completely unrelated! There's a new episode of Writing Excuses up, and in this one I talk about why I don't listen to anything you say. Admittedly, me announcing that is not a great way to entice you to listen to the podcast. More especially, it's a horrible way for me to invite you to post comments, but it's also the Truth, or at least one flavor of Truth depending on the day. Third: unrelated to The Washington Post, but very related to Writing Excuses: In just under three weeks I'll be at Life, The Universe, and Everything 28, the Brigham Young University symposium on Science Fiction and Fantasy. This event kicks off convention season for me, and also happens to be where all of my local SF&F industry friends hang out each year. Admission is free. The schedule is here. No, I don't know what Bob and I will discuss yet, but "The Bob and Howard" show sounds too interesting to pass up. Just prior to the event I'll publish the schedule excerpts that apply specifically to me for you to print out and stick in your wallets. Finally: Unrelated to all of this, but still lynxish: If you've been following the Howard Tayler Twitter Feed you know that I spent the first couple of weeks of this month being incapacitatingly sick. You also got to read funny things I wrote, and you got linked to a couple of things I found clever, amusing, or awful. Maybe I'll put the Twitter feed on the front of the site someday, but today is not someday. (Okay, it IS someday, but it's somebody else's someday. Why they were longing for this day, I have no idea. Today was SILLY.) (*Note: I considered using a lynx instead of a pit-bull, but the lynx is very skittish and not especially threatening -- even when rabid. )