Much of today has been spent on the edge of falling asleep. That might be at least in part due to the large quantities of spring sunshine streaming through my windows, but I still feel sleepy now. As you’ll see from today’s other entries, I have managed to get some things done. Not a lot though. And I’m OK with that.
Besides, tomorrow I have to be up, awake and presentable by 10:00am, which is about an hour earlier than I have managed all this week. I blame these lovely people.
zzzzzzzzzzzz…
Thursday means Lockdown Reading day. Today we have a new story from Juliet McKenna. Fire in the Night takes place after the events of Southern Fire, the first book in the Aldabreshin Compass series. There are two more short stories that follow on from this one. We’ll put them both out if Lockdown lasts that long. Juliet talks about the genesis of the stories here.
I am reminded that Southern Fire came out in 2003. It featured a black lead character, and is set in a majority-black society, long before such things happened. Tor, who did the US edition, even put the hero, Daish Kheda, on the cover, which of course meant that the book sank without trace. Thankfully things are better these days.
A day late, but this week’s show finally got on the air. This is one of the problems with not being able to go into the studios: tech-fail happens. Huge thanks to Miranda, our station manager, for sorting it all out.
I spent the first hour of today’s show talking to my good friend Paulette North. Paulette was the person who recuited me to Ujima, and Women’s Outlook was her show before it was mine. We talked about a whole range of subjects, including how she is coping with Lockdown, how Gloucester Road in Bristol is a great little community, and how the government is coping with the crisis. Paulette has never been one to hide her political opinions, so this one is well worth a listen.
Next up I spoke to Daryn Carter of Bristol Pride. He’s had a fairly nasty case of C-19 and is now in recovery. He talked to me about what it was like to go through the illness, and how recovery is a very lengthy process.
Finally I spoke to Aled Osborne from Brigstowe about how people who are living with HIV face additional problems in these unprecedented times, and how you can help Bristowe to help them. As I’ve said before, I think that the lessons learned by the queer community in surviving the AIDS epidemic will be of great value to the world as we begin to recover from C-19.
Because the show was broadcast on the wrong day, it won’t appear in the usual category on the Listen Again service, but you can find it under today’s 12:00-14:00 slot, which is here.
The playlist for today’s show was as follows:
Today was a cooking day. It was a cheap one too. I had some fresh veg that needed eating, so I went for a classic Southern dish that Kevin taught me: red beans and rice. It is also vegetarian and nicely spicy. That will do me for a few more days as well.
Out in the so-called “real” world, journalists at the Financial Times are claiming that the true death toll in the UK from the virus is over 41,000, rather than the 17,000 that the government is reporting. It is quite bizarre to live in a world in which the FT is the main opposition paper to a Conservative government, but here we are.
And talking of the government, Parliament was back in action again today, albeit with minimal physical attendance in Westminister. The government took the opportunity to set out some of its priorities for the coming months, which it turns out will include starting on the roll-back of trans rights in the UK. It looks like trans kids will bear the initial brunt of their planned cruelty, but it won’t stop there.
Online conventions are all the rage right now. Here’s another one. QuaranCon will take place on April 24-26. It will stream live on YouTube. The full programme is here.
The UK’s National Space Centre will be screening a documentary film called We Are Stars free on YouTube this coming Friday (April 24th). Narrated by Andy Serkis, it promises to allow you to, “Discover what are we made of and where did it all come from. Explore the secrets of our cosmic chemistry, and our explosive origins.” It is aimed at families so it should be ideal if you have space-mad kids.
Screening starts at 18:00 UK time, which is 10:00 in California so it should work for folks in North America as well. Further details here.
Probably the most annoying thing about Lockdown is that, while I am coping well with the psychological side of things, every so often I have a day when my body says “enough”. Today was another one of those days. I woke up with a low-grade headache that has never quite gone away. So although I did get some work done, I didn’t do nearly as much as I’d hoped.
Oh well, thankfully there’s little screamingly urgent left needing doing.
I have a radio show tomorrow. One of the interviews is with my friend Daryn Carter who has had a pretty nasty case of C-19. It it he talks a bit about the rollercoaster recovery process. Relapses are common. I certainly feel a bit like that today.
But relapses affect countries too. The news media were apparently crowing this morning that the UK had turned a corner and beaten the virus, because we’d had two consecutive days when the death toll fell. It doesn’t work like that. Today we are back over 800 again. I was speaking yesterday with a friend who works at a hospital, and they were looking at May for peak load.
Meanwhile people are getting exciting over the Office of National Statistics data on deaths. The ONS has information on the total number of people who die each day, which they can compare with averages going back many years. We are significantly above average. The actual numbers of people dying are much higher than annual average plus offical government virus death toll. This has led to people claiming that the C-19 death toll is 41% higher than the government says, and to government supporters yelling “fake news”.
The first thing to note is that the numbers are not fake. All of those people have died. The official government death toll, currently at 17,337, refers only to people who died in hospital and who tested positive for C-19. That means that thousands more unexpected deaths have occured that cannot be directly linked to the virus.
Those people will have died for a variety of reasons. They may have had C-19 but were not tested. They may have died of other things because they had been weakened by a case of C-19. They may have died from something entirely different that might not have been fatal if the heath service hadn’t been massively overloaded at the time. 16 women apparently died in domestic violence incidents, which is more than twice as many as would be expected in that time period.
So you don’t have to have had a case of C-19 for your death to be linked to it in some way.
Today I have: finished editing this week’s radio show; attended an online meeting (Diversity Trust work); finished writing an essay about a book on trans people in the Classical world; and done a batch of laundry. Pretty much a normal day of working from home.
Out in the supposed “real” world I have seen stuff on social media suggesting that government propagandists, or a marketing company employed by them, set up 128 fake Twitter accounts, purporting to be NHS staff for the purpose of trying to show that doctors and nurses support the “herd immunity” policy favoured by Cabinet hawks. Sadly I am unsurprised, neither by the dishonesty of it, nor by the incompetence with which the subtefuge was implemented.
Elsewhere the price of oil on US markets has gone negative.
Over at Newcon Press, Ian Whates has put together an amazing charity anthology to raise money for the NHS. It contains 53 stories from a range of top flight British authors including Mike Carey, Peter Hamilton, Frances Hardinge, Paul Cornell, Tade Thompson, Juliet McKenna, Adrian Tchaikovsky and Stephen Baxter. It is available only as an ebook, and you can get it for the ridiculously low price of £5.99. Go ye forth and buy.
Much excitement in the UK media today. With the Labour Party pretty much dead in the water thanks to its own internal squabbles, the Tories feel safe to fight amongst themselves. Thus we had the remarkable sight of The Times launching a full-scale attack on Boris Johnson.
For the benefit of foreign readers, a little explanation is in order. The Times, owned by Rupert Murdoch, has always backed Michael Gove for Prime Minister. However, the Tory right, which is very traditionalist, prefers the Telegraph, for whom Bozo is a columnist. Having The Times attack Bozo is therefore possibly a signal that Gove thinks he can make a bid for power while the PM is still indisposed from his bout of virus.
There are other things to bear in mind, though. Gove probably doesn’t have the support of either the party or the country for a coup. What he can do is fire a warning shot across the bows of Acting Prime Minister, Dominic Raab, to let him know that he has to do what Murdoch wants while Bozo is not around. What Murdoch wants, of course, is the end of Lockdown, and a return to the “herd immunity” strategy, because that is seen as being good for the economy (well, good for billionaires).
The coming week will be an interesting time in Westminister.
Not that us ordinary citizens can do much to influence things. We’ll just have to sit tight and hope that a modicum of common sense prevails.
In the meantime I have been working on next week’s radio show, and I have started on a project I promised myself when this all started. I am planning to watch all of the Studio Ghibli movies on Netflix. Today I watched Howl’s Moving Castle. I am now very much hoping that Lockdown lasts long enough for me to watch all of the others.
So, birthday under Lockdown turns out to be much the same as any other birthday, but with a lot more (virtual) company.
I began the day by doing a trans history talk for a local LGBT+ group (adults this time), which was fun.
I have a fair amount of work of various sorts to do, but I decided to goof off for the day and do some baking. I don’t have a usable oven, so for Christmas I bought myself one of these (cheap in a Clark’s Village outlet store). I’ve been so busy that I haven’t had a chance to use it before today.
I decided to make scones (for cream tea) as they are fairly easy. They turned out suprisingly well for a first attempt. They were a little over-done, but machines like this are very precise and now I know to reduce the heat setting next time.
I had sport! Formula E has launched a sim series with most of the actual drivers taking part, plus a side race for other folks. It was actually the side race that interested me most as it had a combination of amateurs, profesional esports players, and young drivers hoping to break in to the big time. Charlie Martin has a seat in the Techeetah team. Sadly she didn’t do very well, but everyone is learning right now so I hope she’ll perform better in later races.
And of course there was WiFi SciFi 2. Only one panel this time, and it devolved into discussion of the writing business which is less of interest to me, but probably more what the punters want.
Next up: dinner, wine, cheese, TV or movie.
World, what world?
I might have overdone things a bit yesterday as I woke up feeling sore and stiff, as if I’d spent yesterday in the gym. My philisophy these days is that if my body says “no” then I listen to it, so today has been fairly lightweight.
I did record a couple of great interviews for next week’s radio show. One is with my friend Daryn Carter from Bristol Pride who has had a pretty nasty case of C-19 and is now starting on the long road to recovery.
The other is with Aled from Brigstowe, a charity that provides support for people who are living with HIV. While we were talking it occured to me that there are a lot of similarities between these two virus-borne illnesses. They are not identical, obviously. They attack different parts of the body, and HIV needs to be communicated through bodily fluids while C-19 is ferociously infectious. But with both there will be questions as to when people are phsyically and medically safe to return to work. Post-viral fatigue is likely to be an issue in recovery in both cases. People are already starting to talk about possible new laws that would require us to be able to prove that we were C-19 free before being let back into ordinary society. And inevitably there will be a social stigma against those who have had the disease, because those who haven’t will be afraid (however irrationally) of getting infected.
The upshot of this is that the lessons that the Queer community has learned over the years in supporting people who are living with HIV to integrate back into society may prove to be invaluable in helping rebuild after the pandemic has been contained.
I’m not the first person to think of his. I understand (thanks Roz) that Dr. Fauci, the US virologist, gained his reputation through working on the HIV epidemic. Also my friend Jonathan Cooper has written this article talking about how the victims of the C-19 pandemic will need to band together and speak out against a government that appears to assume that only people who deserved to die will have suffered.
Quite how one holds a government to account when it has an 80 seat majority and has most of the national news media in its pocket is another matter. But hold it to account we must, because if we don’t they will continue their project of selling off the NHS and dismantling all of our social safety nets.
Mike Carey has a new science fiction trilogy underway, and book 1 was officially published yesterday. Normally I would be jumping at this and reviewing it immediately, but I can’t because, as Mike mentioned in the launch event last night, I had a small hand in creating the book. There are a couple of trans people in it, and I helped out with a few details of their characterisation and story arcs. Advising other people about trans issues is, after all, something that I do professionally.
Of course there’s a lot more to the book than just those characters. Indeed, of all the reviews I have seen so far, only one has even mentioned their existence. And in my humble opinion the rest of the book is amazing. Koli’s voice does take a little getting used to, but once you are into the rhythm of it reading becomes very easy. The whole thing about murderous trees is fabulous. The weird place names will probably mean more if you are British and have a vague idea of what the original names were, but if you are not they will just sound like fantasy names.
For those of you who love maps, Mythen Rood is the small town of Mytholmroyd in the Calder Valley, not far from Hebden Bridge. English places names are remarkably bizarre at times.
Of course with us all stuck in isolation and animals starting to wander the streets of our cities, the whole setting of the books takes on a new significance. The books are set a couple of hundred years into the future, so sufficiently far for the current crisis to be merely a small part of what has happened to the world. Nevertheless, the books are set in a world that nature has reclaimed. Asked for a playlist for the book last night, Mike mentioned my favourite Talking Heads song. I think you will see why.
I needed to cook again today. I made a batch of curry that will do me for a few days, though some of it will go on hold over the weekend due to there being venison steaks in the fridge.
I’ve also put out a new free short story (see below), started on the next radio show, and done some Women’s Equality Party work. I’m mostly keeping up with the email, but I’m sure there’s stuff I need to answer.
This evening I attended Mike Carey’s virtual book launch for The Book of Koli, which is an absolutely wonderful read. I’m afraid I can’t review it, for reasons that Mike explained in the interview, but all of the reviews I have seen thus far have been very positive.
If there is an outside world, I’ve been too busy to notice.
It is Thursday, so that means another release in the Wizard’s Tower Lockdown Reading series. This one is by Roz Clarke, whom most of you will know as one of the editors of the Airship Shape & Bristol Fashion series, but she’s a great writer as well Answering Back is quite short, but I found it very amusing. Here’s what I wrote about it for the bookstore:
A short story by Roz Clarke in which the greatest mind of his generation (possibly of all time) discovers that in the real world people don’t always follow the scripts you have written for them. Feminist and funny (unless you are the sort of person who thinks that Victor von Doom is a great role model).
It also has what has become one of my favourite lines in fiction, but I can’t tell you what it is as there’s enough spoilery stuff for a very short story already.
You can download a free copy of the story via the Wizard’s Tower bookstore. And please consider buying a copy of Colinthology, which Roz helped edit and has a story in, because all proceeds from the sale of that one go to support hospitals in Bristol.
You can find the full list of Lockdown Reading titles here.
That’s another week’s radio show broadcast. I have also finished a presentation for an online academic conference next week. There’s no let-up in the work that needs doing.
Both main political parties in England are now talking about an “exit strategy”. As far as Labour is concerned, this may simply be a means of embarrassing the government. As far as the government is concerned, it is crazy talk because they have no intention of putting a testing regime in place, and without testing and a track-and-trace policy there’s no way that a loosening of restraints will result in anything other than a fresh surge of infections. Clearly they don’t think that enough of us have died yet.
Of course track-and-trace brings with it a whole set of new problems. Fortunately there are internet law experts thinking about these things, in addition to the tech guys who will be only too keen to be asked to build shiny new mass surveillance tools.
Still, no point in worrying about things that you can’t fix. I think I will go and read some books. I do have plenty of them.
Today’s show mainly features small businesses talking about how they are coping with Lockdown.
I started with Tara from Talk to the Rainbow, a new psychotherapy service catering to members of marginalised communities. Understandably, they are in a lot of demand right now, but are having to learn to do therapy remotely.
Next up were Graham and Esmerelda from My Burrito, who seem to be doing OK on remote ordering, but are having a lot of trouble with Deliveroo. If you can order your food via a different delivery service then they, and many other restaurants, will be very grateful.
Finally I talked to Dan from Storysmith Books, who are finding that people’s interest in reading has not waned, and may even be increasing.
For the final segment of the show I had a chat with Kevin about this year’s Hugo finalists. We didn’t manage to cover all of the categories, but hopefully we will have generated some interest in the Awards. Plus it was a chance for me to point out how female-dominated they Hugos are these days.
You can find the show on the Ujima Listen Again service.
The playlist for today’s show was:
It being two weeks since I last shopped, and with a birthday coming up, I knew I needed to brave Tesco again this week. I had originally planned to go tomorrow because I figured that the first day back after a long weekend might be a bit mad. However, I have two deliveries scheduled to arrive tomorrow, and two phone calls booked on Thursday, so today it had to be.
The car started, which was a relief. She likes the sunshine. It is only in winter that I have to run her every week or the battery goes flat.
As I expected, the store was quite a bit busier than last time I went, but the line moved very quickly. I think I was only queuing for around 15 minutes.
Most food is back in stock. There was pasta and rice. I even found a packet of disposable gloves. But there’s still no flour. Home baking FTW, I guess.
Most people were not wearing masks. I think I only saw 4 all the time I was there. Of course they are difficult to buy here, but it is in stark contrast to what I’m hearing from other countries. However, everyone was very well behaved.
There was a mountain of chocolate. Top end Easter eggs that were selling for £10 or more were on fire sale for £1 or £2 each. I may have bought several. I also have venison steak. Tomorrow I shall order more cheese from Fine Cheese Company.
The big news story here is that the government’s figures for virus deaths may be massively understated. It turns out that other European countries are including deaths in care homes in their fatality figures. The UK figures are for hospital deaths only. In France deaths in care homes make up around a third of the total deaths. So while the official government figures say that we have had around 12,000 deaths, the actual figure may be around 18,000.
Of course this is all speculation, and while the government refuses to embrace testing it is impossible to prove, but deaths in care homes are certainly happening. Also data from the Office of National Statistics is starting to become available, and we are seeing a sharp rise in deaths not attributed to the virus.
Latest data from ONS 30 mins ago https://t.co/tCLkBgMQEF Just drawn this extraordinary, and shocking, graph. Why the massive rise in non-covid deaths? How much is judgement of registering doctor? How much is collateral damage of lockdown??? pic.twitter.com/OXyvGr07GF
— David Spiegelhalter (@d_spiegel) April 14, 2020
The other big story to break today is that Westminister is ordering suppliers of much needed personal protection equipment (PPE) to supply it to customers in England only, and not to accept orders from Scotland or Wales.
So much for the “United Kingdom”, eh?
We won’t forget.
What day is it today again? Oh yes, it is a Monday, but it is still Easter so most people here are not at work. I am, of course. Still plenty to do.
Not much to add to that really. There isn’t even any interesting virus-related news on social media because everyone is too busy talking about the disaster that is the Labour Party. It’s no wonder that a recent poll showed 46% of Brits willing to vote Tory again even though the government is deliberately letting thousands of people die. Is it too much to ask to have an opposition party that doesn’t devote most of its energy to in-fighting?
The results of this year’s Otherwise (formery Tiptree) Award have been announced. The winner is Freshwater by Akwaeke Emezi. The Honor List is as follows:
I’m not familiar with Emezi’s work at all, but clearly I should be. Nor do I know much about the short fiction (the Hurley and Motoya are both collections). I have reviewed The Calculating Stars and The Deep. I reviewed Fire Logic and Earth Logic back in Emerald City and loved them both. Both books won the Gaylactic Spectrum Award. Now that all four books are out I have been meaning to re-read the entire series, but of course I have no time. Meg Elison won the Philip K Dick Award with The Book of the Unnamed Midwife, the first volume in the trilogy that The Book of Flora concludes. I have The Book of Flora on my TBR pile, and it has just got a boost up towards the top.
I am, of course, delighted to see so many works with trans themes on the list.