An Important announcement

Posted on by Sarah A. Hoyt

Most of you know that Dave Freer won the Prometheus Award with his excellent Cloud-Castles. (If you haven’t bought it, do. And as always you give this blog a tiny tip when you click through. It doesn’t cost you any more.)

What you might not know, is that Yours Truly is presenting the award, which is your not to be passed up chance to hear the accent that ate the universe. (No, I won’t say Moose and Squirrel. It’s not seemingly. It’s a serious ceremony.)

Since it’s via zoom, I promise I’ll try to get out of my pajamas. If I find my makeup I might even apply some in honor of the occasion.

On the serious side, it’s a richly deserved award and I’m honored and teary that I get to present it. Most of the reason this week has been crazy is my trying to write a speech. (I promise I’ll send it in ahead of time, guys! Even if it’s tonight.) Instead of doing my normal ad lib and forgetting half of what I want to say.

Anyway, the blog post explaining it is here:

Here’s the Zoom link to the 43rd Prometheus Awards ceremony Aug. 19, with past winner Sarah Hoyt to present Best Novel to Dave Freer and Heinlein Society/Trust leaders celebrating Heinlein’s legacy
AND here is the direct Zoom link anyone can use to watch the 43rd annual Prometheus Awards ceremony on Saturday Aug. 19 at 2 p.m. Eastern US time zone) – the same as 11 a.m. Pacific US time zone), 12 noon Mountain time, 1 p.m. Central time and 7 p.m. (England’s time zone):
 
https://agoric.zoom.us/j/88270762290?pwd=MlpoY0NuazNVZjMxMGN6TWFheVdIUT09

Look, there might never be another Prometheus ceremony with dueling accents. Maybe, but you can’t count on it. So, you want to see it, right?

Also seeing me make a fool of myself is worth the price of admittance. And with luck, you might catch a glimpse of Indy hogging the camera, or hear Havey scream for pets. Yes, I could lock them out of the office, but then you’ll just hear them screaming and knocking so loudly you won’t hear me. So, in the name of Heinlein, you’ll deal with my cats. And like it. (Most of you actually will. Because you’re as weird as I am.)

Anyway, be (Virtually) there, or forever have to lie about being there.

48 thoughts on “An Important announcement”

    2. Yes, a real author would find a way to work it into the speech and sound natural.

      :P

      Congrats on the opportunity to present. You’ve definitely earned it.

      Liked by 1 person

  2. Congratulations to Dave Freer (bought the ebook when first released).

    Congratulations to Sarah Hoyt on presenting the award to her friend.

    Oh. I second the “say Moose and Squirrel” poke. You know you want to.

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    1. yeah, but say one of them in the first paragraph of your speech, and the other in the last paragraph.

      MooseSquirrel RockyBullwinkle BorisNatasha^6

      Is it Boy’s Day around here? I see all these flying carp …

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      1. Bonus points for references to Mr. Peabody, his pet boy Sherman, Boris, Natasha, or their Fearless Leader.

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  4. No one could be a fitter presenter.
    When I say “moose and squirrel” now I imagine Barrayarans saying it. Ever since I read about Miles’s assumed “flat Betan accent” (which I imagine as like the stereotypical “yankee” accent of 19th-century British literature) and wondered how he sounded the rest of the time . . .
    Thank you for the announcements, both here and on Instapundit. We hope for a big audience.

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  6. Yeah! I’ll have to see if I can persuade my lunch crowd to move to brunch, or go later.

    Congrats! Whee! tosses confetti, chases same

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  8. Congratulations to both you and Mr. Freer. I’ll have to set an alarm, so I remember.

    About ‘moose and squirrel’. It is a truth rarely acknowledged that to the American ear, a Portuguese accent sounds very similar to a Russian accent. Why this would be I have no idea. I have never investigated. I first noticed it many years ago in a quaint set of shops where I overheard a conversation among other shoppers. I prided myself on my ability to imitate foreign accents (at least as I heard them on TV), and I took it to be Russian that they were speaking, but later found out it was Portuguese. Your fans/friends have made me realize it isn’t only me.

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    1. Back when I still had a day job, one of my clients in Spain spoke Castillian, and I always thought his accent sounded Russian. I have no conscious experience focusing on a Portuguese accent to look for similarities with Russian (thanx for the opportunity, Sarah, but I won’t know definitively until I hear you say Moose and Squirrel.)

      Liked by 1 person

  10. Congrats to both of you!

    Whish I could attend, but will be in the field doing ham radio communications support for a local parade.

    Any chance it will be recorded and available online?

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  11. Oh dang. I can’t be there on account of Sabbath observance. I second RandyGC’s inquiry about a recording.
    And “Moose and Squirrel” is NOT unseemly. Really. You will be honoring a colleague’s achievement with an allusion to a truly great American original creation. (Timeless comedy is arguably a more difficult challenge than tragedy, which gets most of the attention. I’d sooner attend Twelfth Night than Romeo and Juliet, thank you very much.) Rant over, and congratulations to the winner and the presenter!

    Liked by 1 person

      1. The concept of a “shabbos goy” is widely misunderstood. One literally cannot outright ask anyone to break the Sabbath on one’s behalf. If a sudden problem comes up, e.g. a pilot light blows out on a gas appliance, you can tell a neighbor “My pilot light blew out,” but you can’t actually request that he relight it. In the days before cheap electric timers, a community would have a shabbos goy, who would make the rounds of the synagogue and neighborhood looking for problems to fix (a dark house needs a light, an open flame needs banking, etc.), but that’s largely obsolete. There’s no way to get someone to come into my apartment, turn on my computer, access my email for the link, and get me onto Zoom without violating Shabbat to the point where I might as well do it myself. And That Would Be Wrong. But it’d be fun. Especially if you threw in a “Moose and Squirrel”!

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          1. No kidding? Conversos? Your family knows its history all the way back to that little misunderstanding in 1492 or so? That is SO COOL. Hey, any time you wanna come back … but now is definitely NOT a good time. Check back after the Third Temple arrives. ;-)

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            1. Not that far. Dad’s was like the 18th century. Mom’s is a little earlier than that, but it’s also complicated. :D
              Portugal is weird. And not so much the history as family stories. And the names. ;)
              Um…. For a while there I thought older son was going to. He decided not to. Younger son who very much looks like a MOT never had interest.
              Mom tried to send me to the orange harvest in Israel when I was in my teens, because she wanted me to marry a nice Jewish boy. Even though she never considered going back.
              Again, family is WEIRD.
              :)

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              1. Indeed! Curiouser and curiouser.
                Anyway, it’s almost time to shut off all the devices. A good Friday night to everyone!

                Liked by 3 people

            2. My wife traced her Danish heritage to a great-great grandmother named Levinson. I think we all know what that means, and it was a direct matrilineal descent.

              Liked by 1 person

        2. Actually, there might be: your computer wasn’t bris‘d, was he? Auto-Goy! Just join the chat on mute-ish and set it up to start recording at whatever time the shindig kicks off. I think that’s supposed to work, unless your machine is set to restart or something…

          Liked by 1 person

  12. Hrm. Sarah, you are as good about telling me of important events as my resident family. No, ma’am, that is not a compliment.

    However, I shall attempt to be there. I can get the shopping done by noon, but I’m thinking that Hilary is now going to accelerate to give us early thunderstorms – and I will undoubtedly have to run out to rescue the steaks right at the critical moment.

    Liked by 1 person

    2. Well, I done tried… Updated my Zoom app, clicked the join button – tells me its waiting for the host to start the meeting. Okay, happens with that fool thing quite frequently.

      Washed the first load of dishes, still waiting. Cleaned the pool and robovacuum filters, still waiting. 12:35 (MST)… still waiting. Apparently my internet went down at some point after I clicked the button, and the app never told me.

      Sigh… I shall hope that there is a recording posted somewhere, sometime.

      So, congrats to Dave. I was all ready to give out a cheer.

      Liked by 1 person

  17. I’d like to be there, but I have yet to fiddle with Zoom and i recall being put off by it. Not as much as other things, admittedly. But the big issue is… it’s in the middle of my sleep-time. Will anyone be recording this?

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  18. I was tickled and honored when Dave contacted me to help with beta and copy edits for Cloud Castles. Thoroughly enjoyed working with the boy. All on him, I just offered a few comments and pointed out the occasional typo.
    My suspicion is that one particularly sneaky shirttail relative of mine put him on to me. So to whomever that was, thanks for letting me become involved in a very small way with a truly great piece of work.

    Liked by 1 person

  22. Dave Freer’s speech transcript is on on the lfs site (see Old Trainer’s comment at 2:59 pm). Looks like they’ll have video (not sure if it will include the introduction) sooner or later. I’ve got their site bookmarked and will look for the video, since I’m zoom-deficient.

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  23. I connected to the meeting using my browser and got the video just fine, but could not get the sound. (Message was something like “Your mic is not connected” – my computer doesn’t HAVE a microphone.)

    I have no idea what I was doing wrong, but unfortunately I cannot lip read. sigh Sarah, you looked good, whatever you were saying. But without being able to hear it, I just left after 15 minutes. I will read the transcript later. ;-)

    Liked by 1 person

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