Writers’ Bloc at Eastercon 2014

I will be reading my story “Leftovers” as part of the Planet Scotland event this Sunday from 20:00-22:00 in Castle 1.

Hope to see you there.

[more info]

Writers’ Bloc at the Science Festival

Writers’ Bloc returns to the Edinburgh International Science Festival for The Culture Collider, an exploration of weird science and stranger arts. The show starts at 8pm on Sunday the 13th of April in the Red Lecture Theatre, Summerhall.

I will be reading a new story. Hope to see you there.

[more info · tickets · more of my fiction]

Writers’ Bloc at the Book Festival

Writers’ Bloc returns to the Edinburgh International Book Festival for a special event with John Lemke and Poppy Ackroyd. The show starts at 9pm, Wednesday 14th August in the Spiegeltent, Charlotte Square.

[more info]

The Girl in the Video: original interviews with icons of 1980s MTV

Recently I posted a link to Marc T. Nobleman’s “The Girl in the Video” series in which he interviews women who starred in ‘80s music videos. I neglected to note that he is still searching for three of them. Since I know many folks who are either excellent researchers or ‘80s music lovers (or both), I thought I’d help out.

These requests are taken directly from Marc’s site, and are of tweetable length so you can copy and paste them:

• Real research question: if you know the Annie Hubbard who was in 1984 Night Ranger video “Sister Christian,” pls contact @MarcTNobleman
• Real research question: if you know the woman—even just her name—in 1986 Cinderella video “Shake Me,” pls contact @MarcTNobleman
• Real research question: if you know woman—even just her name—in ‘87 Richard Marx video “Should’ve Known Better,” pls contact @MarcTNobleman

My favourite from his series is the essay from Wendy Frazier who starred in ZZ Top’s “Legs” video. That video is seared into my brain. If I could draw, I could storyboard the whole thing from memory.

Cyg Runs for Iain Banks

The summer has been so hectic that I forgot to fundraise (or even mention, really) this Sunday’s 10K race. I am fundraising for Cancer Research UK in memory of Iain Banks.

cygnoir.net on Facebook

cygnoir.net is on Facebook!¹ It’s 2007 all over again! Social media metrics! Buzz marketing! If you “like” this page, you will receive updates from me in your Facebook feed. Well, probably. I’m still not sure how those algorithms work …

If Facebook isn’t your thing, updates are also posted to Bloglovin, Google+, LiveJournal, Tumblr, and Twitter.

^{1. It’s actually been around for a while. I’m mentioning it now because I stopped posting these updates to my personal page. ↩}

PopClip for Mac

PopClip is a neat app that appears when you select text with your mouse, giving you context-specific options like copy, paste, and search. More options are available via free extensions for popular services like Evernote, Instapaper, TaskPaper, and more.

PopClip is on sale for $0.99, but the sale ends today!