I got into Best American Sportswriting 2007

I woke up this morning to an email from the series editor informing me that “Bugs Bunny, Greatest Banned Player Ever” had been selected to go into the 2007 book (covering 2006 writing) and would I please get them contact information, all that good stuff.

It stunned me for a while. For one, I’ve read the anthologies, and while I don’t write like most sportswriters, I’ve been doing baseball stuff for almost ten years, and I’ve written some pretty good stuff but never thought any of it would have a chance. I figured Bugs, though wildly popular for an internet moment (I got linked on woot.com! w00t!) wouldn’t be able to get noticed, much less be selected, in the vast pool of applicants.

I still think that. Print outlets, people who make money at this, ESPN and Slate writers, they often have editorial backing their submissions, and to my knowledge, no blogger has ever been included in an annual and, though I’m even less sure about this, I believe that it not only makes U.S.S. Mariner the first blog to get something in one of the BASWs, it makes us the only what I’d call “non-mainstream” outlet.

It seems like this should have much wider implications, though obviously I’m a little biased – it’s a first, but I feel like it recognizes something that people who read baseball blogs have known for a while – you can get just as good baseball analysis from David Pinto or the other top-shelf sites as you can from national outlet, or writing that’s as insightful, or funny, or well-researched, and as bonus you can get whatever you want that you’re not getting now.

I’m so happy that something I worked that hard on, and that people responded to, made it through the gauntlet, and I hope in some way this helps baseball blogging in general.

Why aren’t rebate programs illegal?

How can the way rebate systems are run be legal?

If a company offers a rebate and punts customer service, it’s in their interest to pay out as few as possible without being sued. It doesn’t matter why they deny your rebate, you have no recourse. There’s really no place to go to complain that they ripped you off.

For instance. When I bought my beloved Mac laptop months ago, I was eligible for a ton of rebates, and I applied for them all, what with being unemployed. So I sent in all the stuff, and I was super extra-careful because I was leaving for my vacation and wouldn’t be around to answer mail for a while. One of them was denied for failure to enclose some random piece of information – which I did. So I called Apple up.

Me: Hey, I just got this denial notice that said I didn’t include the receipt, but I did, and I sent all that stuff in.
Them: Well, we don’t have it, so you need to send in a new one.
Me: I don’t want to be a pain, but this really is someone’s fault on your end, and it’s a ways for me to my nearest Apple Store to get a duplicate receipt… is there any way you can just check my submission? You got the other two things I know were in there…
Them: Nope, the only thing you can do is get another receipt.
Me: Ooookay.

Annoying, but whatever. So then I got a shredder with some rinky-dink rebate at Staples that I totally, entirely qualified for, this time thinking “Okay, 50% chance I get denied on the rebate, it’s still a decent price”. Denied, for essentially no reason: I looked it up and it said “invalid rebate parameters” or something.

Then I got to fight with their people, where I had to point out
1) It was within the date range for the rebate
2) It was submitted within x days of the purchase
…
4) You need to give me my money

I understand why companies give out rebates: if x% of the purchasers don’t remember to redeem it, they make a huge profit. But my experience with these things is that they’re pushing the boundaries to the point where it’s
1) Offer rebate
2) x% of people eligible apply = profit
3) Deny rebate to applicants
4) y% of x% fight the blanket denial = much more profit

It’s fraud, really, on a massive scale, and I’ll spare everyone the rant about law enforcement priorities, but it boggles my mind that Staples and all these other companies you can google to find thousands of complaints about their rebate policies can keep at this. It’s depressing.

The upside to unemployment

When I blew my iPod, I swore for a while. But I don’t have the money to spend on replacing it, especially with no money coming in the door. So I cracked it open and fixed it. It’s actually not that tough if you’re careful and willing to tinker – I searched for other people who’d replaced the hard drive, found some good instructions, and viola, I’m back listening to music a few days later.

Woo-hoo for cheapness.

Strange connections

Book research takes me back to looking through Robert Anton Wilson’s stuff, leads to RU Sirius #78: Robert Anton Wilson Lives!. RU Sirius then leads to number #84: Hal Robins aka Dr. Hal joins us to talk about Secrets of the Subgenii; underground comix, and his latest book, Dinosaur Alphabet…

I recognize Hal Robins’ voice immediately, think “there’s no way” then decide to go look it up. And yup, Hal Robins is Harry S. Robins, and did the voice for Dr. Isaac Kleiner in the Half-Life games, so it turns that without knowing it, I was familiar with his work:
– as a voice actor in some of my favorite computer games
– as a fiction writer and
– with the SubGenius
and knew him, vaguely, from the comic stuff, without ever putting any of these aspects together.

It felt weirdly satisfying, like putting the last piece into a jigsaw puzzle I hadn’t known I was working on.

Everything iPod iTouch is destroyed

I’ve always scoffed at Apple’s assertions that iPods are reliable, since they’re not. Anyway, I killed another one today. How? I was sitting in my office chair, listening to it. No drop, no trauma, just sad ipod icon. And what with being unemployed… yup.

So, to sum up:
Apple’s claimed iPod failure rate: 0%! Possibly less than zero.
Macintouch’s survey: ~14% (link)
My experience: 100% in a sample of four, not including a dead replacement iPod shipped to me.

woooowheee.

First resume in six months, not for Expedia

Short version: If I don’t manage to sell the next book proposal or some stories quick, I’d probably go back to Expedia, but they’re slashing headcount and it doesn’t look like there are program manager jobs. So I’ve been keeping an eye out for other jobs.

Today, I came across one – I described it to a friend as “this listing looks like 50% ‘exactly what I describe the job I’d be willing to return to working regular hours for’ and 50% ‘I’m not sure if I have the accounting/cost experience, or if what they’re describing is really what I’m reading…'”

So I hemmed, hawed, and finally dropped them a line. I figure there are a couple possible outcomes:
1. They toss it in the round file as a poor fit
or
2. They’re intrigued enough by the 50% perfect fit that we talk, and
2a. decide the gap’s too far
2b. decide to talk some more, in which case
3. After talking some more, we decide
3a. there’s no fit
3b. maybe something could be worked out, in which case
4. we discuss what that might look like, and
4a. no agreement’s possible
4b. we reach an agreement and I go back to work

I don’t know how I feel about this, having done it, except that the chance the job is actually an amazing opportunity made it worth it. We’ll see. In the meantime, this establishes that as conflicted as I might be about wanting to get back into IT, I’m at least vulnerable to pitches.

New story: Archipelago

 

Archipelago is my latest science fiction story. I love it, I’m working on re-writing it to make it better, but I won’t spoil the story by discussing what I’m re-writing for until we’re done.

 

Across the table, over Assistant Chief Burton kept on about some ridiculous staffing issue that somehow tied the police union together with some obscure new OSHA workplace guidelines. Seattle Police Department Chief Scott couldn’t bring himself to pay attention. He’d been on the clock bomb chasing for over two days. Every day, all through the city, these things would turn up. Budweiser cans painted red, with a battery-powered alarm clock. Bowling balls with a fuse. Replicas of Big Boy, Little Boy, with tiny action figures riding. Tile reproductions of video game icons.

Continue reading →

New digs

This is the new, rapidly-improving home of HLWT. I’ll be back in a minute.

This look is “Benevolence” and is, with a couple twakes, a theme that I desperately wanted to use for USSM. It was up on USSM for a little while on a weekend while I was tinkering and people flipped out with happiness.  It is a little hard-to-read, though. Anyway.

I look forward to being able to play around with WordPress plugins I can’t date tinker with on a much higher-profile site like USSM.