I received my AnLab award, with an accompanying check, in the mail today. It's a spiffy-looking certificate, attractively matted and ready for framing. Now what do I do with it?

Like the previous AnLab I won a few years back, it will go somewhere for safekeeping, but not on display. I don't have a lot of wall space, and I've never been one to build a shrine to myself. The Writers Of The Future award, my academic awards, certificates, medals, and a few athletic trophies -- all of them are packed up somewhere. Even all the contributor's copies of all of my stories are squirreled away in a cabinet, not arranged conspicuously to show off my successes.

It's not that I don't appreciate my successes, but I don't revel in them either. I don't push my kid's baby pictures on the unsuspecting, nor bore them with recordings from my old music career. I don't badger people to read my stories, nor do very much to promote my web page or blog.

Perhaps I'm too modest to properly self-promote my stuff, but I'm mostly of the opinion that the work ought to speak for itself. It's naive of me, I know, but I think a writer ought to spend most of his effort writing. Oh, I'm not above a bit of flag-waving and horn-tooting, but I've always thought that if you have to twist arms to get people to consider your achievements, then you probably didn't achieve very much.

I'm quite a poor salesman, aren't I?