Dayton's Blog: A pimple on the ass of the Internet.

...both here on LJ as well as Facebook:

David Mack (infinitydog, bestselling author, Jack Daniel spokesperson, aspiring curmudgeon and all around good guy) wants you to friend him on Facebook. Why? Well, aside from his normal, insatiable need to be validated in the eyes of complete strangers, he's also posted clips from The Shore Leave Roast of Keith R.A. DeCandido, which was conducted at the Shore Leave convention back in July. The clips feature all of the roasters doing their thing. It's one thing to hear me say "Fuck," but it's another thing entirely when roastmaster Bob Greenberger employs the juicy F-word.

[GeorgeTakei]

"Oh, myyyyyyyyyyy."

[/GeorgeTakei]

Keith was a good sport about the whole thing, and managed several zingers in his own defense once he took the podium to deliver his final remarks. Despite the verbal beating he took that evening, I hope he knows we wouldn't have gone to all that trouble if we didn't love him like the annoying little brother we may or may not have.

To learn more about Dave's shameless attempts to attract more friends, and how to view the roast clips, click on this linky-type thing right here.

My online friends over at Geek Girls Network are getting set to unleash "Zombie Week(s)." Scheduled to run from October 19th to the 31st, the GGN will be offering up a smorgasbord of links, blogs, comics, prizes, and other zombie goodness.

Among the cool prizes being offered as part of the festivities is a copy of Pride and Prejudice With Zombies, autographed by author Seth Grahame-Smith. Rumors that the book also will be signed by the undead, flesh-eating corpse of Jane Austen herself remain unconfirmed.


GeekGirlsNetwork: Zombie Week(s)!




As a prelude to the madness, GGN also will offer up a "live battle" between the Girls and the Zombies, as waged on Twitter starting tonight at 8pm Eastern. Follow @geekgirls and @the_zombie to see all the action. You may even be called upon to bring forth reinforcements! Follow the "#BattleZ" hashtag for more info.

Let's get it on!

No, not from me. What, are you kidding? Have we met?

Friend and fellow writer Kevin Killiany (kvaadk) has recently started writing a series of columns for Novel Spaces, a blog maintained by a group of writers who enjoy sharing their experiences and passion both for the craft and the business of writing. To date, he's written four columns for them, and they are but four of a whole mess of other good tasty bits you'll find there.

Rather than steal too much thunder from Kevin, I'll just point you to his LJ, where he then will direct you to the pieces he's contributed.

Go forth, and read.

I'm already drafting contract language for all my future books, outlining how stuff like this will be included in any and all marketing efforts.


Photo credit: Christine Rideout, aka @Starfleetmom

The lovely model is Mary Czerwinski, aka "@televixen" on Twitter and co-host of DVD Geeks, a weekly radio show, TV show, and podcast that brings you the latest and greatest DVD reviews. This picture was taken at the recent monster Star Trek convention in Las Vegas. Mary is dressed as Seven of Nine from the WWII holodeck simulation in the Star Trek: Voyager episode "The Killing Game."

Sweeeeeeeeeeeeeeet.

Thanks to Mary and Christine for the pic!

And be sure to check out DVD Geeks. You know you want to.

Best of birthday wishes to trillsie, who could use a fun day, by golly. So, you all go over and tell her to have one of those.

Doug Drexler has posted some awesome pics and ruminations about working on the "Captain Proton" sets for various episodes of Star Trek: Voyager. Among the pics are shots of Proton's ship from various angles, which are worth the price of admission all by themselves:

The Drex Files: Captain Proton!

I may not be the biggest Voyager fan out there, but I absolutely love anything to do with Captain Proton. Raise your hands if you read the Proton piece(s) I did for Star Trek Magazine earlier in the year. Man, that was more fun than should be allowed by law.

Anyway, hang out at Doug's site for a while, and be sure to get a good loook around. The stuff he's posting there will make your little fanboy (or fangirl) mouth water.

My e-Mail backlog tells me I've picked up a few friends during the past few days. I'm not sure what's attracting folks to me (Hey, I showered!), but to all o' youz, I say: "Welcome!"

If you're so inclined, drop a comment and tell me what brought you to my corner of Internet Idiocy. For those of you who've been around a bit and lurk in the shadows, consider yourself invited to give up a little 411, too.

bensouttatown gets things rollin' in fine fashion, with pics of Open Secrets in various locales during his recent trip from Toronto to Saskatoon. Check it out:

Ben's Blatherings: Book sightings for Mr. Ward

My favorites are those taken with the Where the Wild Things Are mural. Thanks, Ben!

We're just starting to rock the summer, so let's have some more pix! Check out the details (and links to other people's photos) RIGHT HERE.

Doug Drexler has offered a wonderful celebration of his relationship with the late Bob Justman, one of the "Big 3" who worked to bring the original Star Trek to television. Mr. Justman passed away one year ago this past May 28th.

DrexFiles: Celebrating Bob Justman.

You'll smile. You'll laugh. You may even wipe away a tear.





Related:
Robert Justman, RIP - June 1st, 2008

I've gotten a few responses to my post earlier in the week, challenging folks to send in fun pics of my/Kevin's and my book(s) in odd locales. For those who may have missed it, here's the relevant text from that earlier entry:

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It's getting ready to be summer vacation season. If you're reading this and plan to take one of my/our books with you to read, let's have some pictures! Give it to Mickey Mouse to hold up for a photo op. Lean it up against that sandcastle your kid's building on the beach in Panama City. See if the guard outside Buckingham Palace will let you prop it up against his boot for a shot. Hand it to a booth babe at Comic-con. Make kradical pose with it at Shore Leave. If you live near something unique or unusual, let's see a shot with that. Go nuts. Extra points awarded for originality as well as sheer lunacy. I've already had one friend threaten to take a book to a strip club, while one promises to hook me up with a cool photo on the evening of July 4th (Yikes!).

If I get some fun responses, I'll set up a dedicated LJ entry for the pics. We'll hold a poll to pick the best/favorite pic, and the owner will get some kind of prize.

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My sister had already sent a picture to me, of my niece reading a copy of In the Name of Honor while in the bathroom (no worries: no private bits are visible, but you can see the hardware behind her, letting you know the location). While that's a good start, we're looking for something bold! Example: from friend bensouttatown comes this bit:

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So, I used to work at a kid's amusement park that had a great little chairlift ride. I've decided at some point this summer, I wanted to read a book entirely on the chairlift, and just ride it for as long as it takes me to read the book. I was already considering Open Secrets as the book I'd use, (own it, but haven't read it yet.) but this cinched it for me. I will read Open Secrets from first page to last while riding an amusement park ride, and see if I can get some pics for you.
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The other couple of responses I got were just promises/threats, advising me that rounds were coming down range. Got an idea? Let's see whatchoo got!

You know, the internet is an interesting animal, to say the least. Just trying to figure out the sheer number of ways it's allowed people to connect and communicate with one another is enough to blow one of my brain fuses.

Consider the e-Mail I got earlier this evening, from a reader who contacted me to tell me how much she enjoyed In the Name of Honor, the first Star Trek novel and indeed the first novel I wrote going on nine years ago. Even more interesting was how she came across the book: She found it laying on a vacant seat on the bus she rode home from work one day. This in turn reminded me of a website I hadn't thought of in quite some time: BookCrossing.com, a fun site which is devoted to tracking the movements of books around the world, with the help of eager army of volunteers who catalog individual books on the site, and then "release" the books into the wild, leaving them wherever they might be found by an appreciative reader. The idea is that the finder then goes to the website, makes a note on the book's page to indicate where it was found, reads it, then releases it again for someone else to find. Looking over the site, I was happy to see 76 different copies of my/Kevin's and my books floating around out there, traveling in this manner.

So, I had an idea. Actually, I'm borrowing it from Wil Wheaton, since he's the coolest person on the Web.

It's getting ready to be summer vacation season. If you're reading this and plan to take one of my/our books with you to read, let's have some pictures! Give it to Mickey Mouse to hold up for a photo op. Lean it up against that sandcastle your kid's building on the beach in Panama City. See if the guard outside Buckingham Palace will let you prop it up against his boot for a shot. Hand it to a booth babe at Comic-con. Make kradical pose with it at Shore Leave. If you live near something unique or unusual, let's see a shot with that. Go nuts. Extra points awarded for originality as well as sheer lunacy. I've already had one friend threaten to take a book to a strip club, while one promises to hook me up with a cool photo on the evening of July 4th (Yikes!).

If I get some fun responses, I'll set up a dedicated LJ entry for the pics. We'll hold a poll to pick the best/favorite pic, and the owner will get some kind of prize.

I can already hear my sister laughing as she begins to plot and scheme....

Aloha!

It's been rather quiet around here the past several days (not counting the nightly infodump courtesy of Twitter), and I know I've got some catching up to do. I'm reading through the backlog of e-Mails, trying to scan through the LJ f-list to see what I've missed, shaking my head at the various weirdness unfolding on different message boards, and so on. If you've posted something while I was gone that you think I should be reading, feel free to link it via the comments. I'll do my best to check it out in short order.

A full report of this year's Starfest con is still in the offing, but it ain't gonna happen tonight. For now, suffice it to say Kevin and I enjoyed ourselves as we do every year, and we're already looking forward to returning next year. For those wondering, Space Grunts is now a real, honest-to-golly book, and several copies found new homes during the weekend thanks to the indie book seller doing its thing at the con. Author contributor copies are en route, I'm told.

So...what's up with all y'all?

I seem to have picked up some new followers in recent weeks, particularly in the last few days. To all of you newcomers who've added me to the endless streams of self-absorbed, unimportant blabbering you take in while surfing the 'net, I say "Howdy!"

For the newer peeps, please take a moment to post a comment and tell me what brings you to my corner of the internet.

Looking through my archives, I see I'm due for my twice-yearly "Ask Dayton a Question" post. So: Ask me anything, if you're so inclined, and I'll do my best to provide a thoughtful answer. Lacking that, count on a wise-assed retort customized just for you! Though I reserve the right not to answer anything I deem too personal or inappropriate for this particular venue, I've yet to actually have that be a problem, so fire away!

The very best of Birthday wishes to berkanna. Hope it's a great day!

Happy Birthday to the one and only popfiend! Long may he continue to post on LJ, because God knows if and when he decides to stop, the whole damned site is just going to collapse in on itself, being but a shell of what it once was under his benevolent rule.

Um, or something like that, anyway.

Enjoy your day, dude!

Happy Birthday to trekkieturtle!

The very best of birthday wishes to torenheksje! Hope it's a good one!

I almost let it slip past, but I did want to wish the very happiest of birthdays to dewline! Hope it was a good one!

Birthday wishes to drewshi and duskrider3740. Hope it was a good one!

A check of LJ alerts and whatnot tells me that several folks have added me to their friend-lists in recent days and weeks, so I bid thee welcome!

So, grab your preferred beverage from the fridge, pull up a beanbag chair, and sit a spell. If you're so inclined, drop a comment and tell me what brought you to my little corner of internet inanity and insanity.