It's been a busy week! In summary:

Last weekend we did manage to see the snow sculptures and were quite impressed. There's a good article here that summarizes the entries to the competition and also includes a photo. The previous night we'd had freezing rain, so it was rather slippery outdoors, and we drove through a thick fog most of the way to the park.

Over the weekend we watched Gladiator (I've had the DVD sitting around for ages), starring Russell Crowe, and the first disk (four one-hour episodes) of Australians at War. The latter is a series documenting Australian involvement in various wars since the Boer War (South Africa) of the 1800s, through to present-day (up to 2000). In addition to the narration, photos, war footage and present-day location-shoots, the series includes interviews with veterans (most over 100 years old!) and readings from diaries, poems and other writings. It presents a uniquely Australian perspective of each conflict, which is interesting to compare against the primarily UK or US-centric views of many history books and TV documentaries.

As usual, I spent a great deal of time job-hunting this past week. Unfortunately there was nothing much of interest and I'm yet to hear anything back from the jobs I applied for last week. The IT job market is still looking pretty weak.

This week has also been filled with lots of story research and frantic scribbling in my notebook. Among other things, I learned that the central underpinnings of my new story idea make no sense in respect to the history of the time during which it is set, and also that one aspect was scientifically impossible! What initially was going to be a "hidden history" tale morphed into alternate history, and then into a hopeless shambles, all in a matter of days. Now I'm changing tack and going with a near-future scenario, keeping the setting, but throwing away the rest. Not to worry - I'm sure I can salvage scraps of the old idea for future projects :) Meanwhile the deadline gets closer and closer...

In the mail today, I received my copy of Greetings from Lake Wu. This is the first short-story collection from the prolific Jay Lake, and each has an opening illustration by Frank Wu. This can be ordered direct from Wheatland Press. I'm looking forward to reading this one!

And finally, one of our pet fish, Pierre (so-called because of his red Oranda beret), shuffled off this mortal coil early this morning. R.I.P.

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I finally finished reading the December issue of Asimov's today, which means I was able to finalize my "best-of" picks from the magazine for 2003. Before I list those, I'll just mention my favourite stories from this issue: Curator by Charles Stross (another fascinating brain-bending Accelerando tale from Charlie - how does he do it?), and Mortal Engines by Michael Bateman (a haunting tale of loss and discovery, set during a winter snowstorm).

And now for my picks for best of Asimov's Science Fiction for 2003:

Best Novella:
1st - Curator by Charles Stross
2nd - Welcome to Olympus, Mr. Hearst by Kage Baker
3rd - Benjamin The Unbeliever by Allen M. Steele

Best Novelette:
1st - Nightfall by Charles Stross
2nd - Touching Centauri by Stephen Baxter
3rd - The Man From Somewhere by Jack Williamson

Best Short Story:
1st - The Apocalypse According to Olaf by Barth Anderson
2nd - Morlock Chili by Lawrence Person
3rd - Robots Don't Cry by Mike Resnick

Best Poem:
1st - Alternate History by Maureen McHugh
2nd - Still Life, With Frog by Tim Pratt
3rd - Eight Things Not to Do When The Alien Steps Out Of Its Saucer by Bruce Boston

Best Cover Artist:
1st - Fred Gambino, October/November issue
2nd - Jim Burns, April issue
3rd - Mark Garlick, May and July issues

There were some difficult decisions to make, but overall I'm happy with my selections. Voting finishes February 1st and you can vote for your favourite stories here. Since I'm way behind on my Analog and Fantasy & Science Fiction mag reading, my best of 2003 picks for those magazines won't be ready for quite awhile :)

And just when you thought this entry couldn't get any longer, I need to keep track of some stats:

Total submissions:	1
Total acceptances:	0
Total rejections:	1
Waiting for response:	2
Books read:	0
Fiction Mags/Chapbooks read:	3