Email List and Submission Dates

[Paul SB]

Good to know. The more the merrier. I was a teacher for many years and had no time to read, so now I want to absorb as much as I can get. What I’ve read of yours has been fun, so just keep writing, just keep writing, writing writing …

[Silk she/her]

10 minutes ago, Paul SB said:

Good to know. The more the merrier. I was a teacher for many years and had no time to read, so now I want to absorb as much as I can get. What I’ve read of yours has been fun, so just keep writing, just keep writing, writing writing …

Yeah, I had a similar experience after working in an office that does pandemic planning in 2020. Definitely trying to get way more reading/writing/music done now, though it's a challenge being so wrapped up in collective bargaining... 

Haha, this story will be quite different than anything I have in print so far. It is easily the most bizarre thing I've yet written. But hopefully still fun. 

Revising, revising, revising...

[Paul SB]

Normal is boring. Bizarre is good. Well, sometimes it's good.  

Good to know. Most of the time I've been here only one person has been critiquing me, and I was really hoping for more feedback. Different people see different things.

[Silk she/her]

On 2/17/2026 at 6:40 PM, Paul SB said:

Different people see different things.

Agreed. We have a lot fewer people coming through here than we used to, unfortunately. Suspect people are moving to more real-time formats like Discord--I've even heard that's happening for the 17s forum overall, that there's more activity on Discord than the forum now. (I don't do massive Discord servers, so can't confirm myself!) 

Also

I FINALLY FINISHED THE DANG DRAFT

Edited February 22 by Silk

[Paul SB]

I've never tried Discord -- it sounds discordant to me. Glad you finally finished the draft. Are you going to post it? 

I've had a bad flu, so I'm a little off. I'm going with the assumption that since I'm the only one posting here it would be okay to today.

[Silk she/her]

10 hours ago, Paul SB said:

I'm going with the assumption that since I'm the only one posting here it would be okay to today.

All good. 

Discord works well as an app--though they've made a few dumb decisions lately that are likely to see a mass exodus if they follow them through. I actually use it all the time, just mostly for small groups. Servers with hundreds or thousands of people in them become noise to me pretty quickly. 

10 hours ago, Paul SB said:

Are you going to post it? 

Hopefully next week. I didn't post it this week just because I'm still catching up on some other things and unlikely to be able to jump back into critiquing quite yet. 

[Paul SB]

Looking forward to it. I've liked all the stories I've read of yours so far.

Hopefully the discord people will migrate back here.

[Appol PhD they/he]

I'll take a slot for tomorrow, please! 

[Paul SB]

Once more into the breach ... did I use this one already?

[Silk she/her]

1 hour ago, Appol PhD said:

I'll take a slot for tomorrow, please! 

 

51 minutes ago, Paul SB said:

Once more into the breach ... did I use this one already?

Both good to go! 

I could claim a slot for myself, I suppose, but between a union event and a band event (on a Thursday, of all days) it's unlikely I'll be able to do any critiquing before the weekend...

[Paul SB]

Bummer, dude! I've been looking forward to it for quite some time. This place is a tango when it should be a conga line.

[Appol PhD they/he]

Update: I found out today that postdocs at my university don't have access to microsoft word (which I would mostly be using to write grants that bring them money, so I guess they don't actually want me doing that), and since I don't feel like doing my edits on google docs I'm going to hold off until that hopefully gets resolved. 

[Paul SB]

No fun. What field are you in?

[Appol PhD they/he]

Plant science! My PhD work was on the microbiomes of apple fruits. 

[Paul SB]

Cool beans, dude! Any good gut bacteria in the genus Malus?

[Silk she/her]

23 hours ago, Paul SB said:

Bummer, dude! I've been looking forward to it for quite some time. This place is a tango when it should be a conga line.

I'd go for a rueda circle instead of a conga line, but that's just me

7 hours ago, Appol PhD said:

Update: I found out today that postdocs at my university don't have access to microsoft word (which I would mostly be using to write grants that bring them money, so I guess they don't actually want me doing that), and since I don't feel like doing my edits on google docs I'm going to hold off until that hopefully gets resolved. 

as a lapsed academic and current university administrator, I am shocked, absolutely shocked, that something like this could happen at an institution of higher learning.

[Appol PhD they/he]

6 hours ago, Paul SB said:

Cool beans, dude! Any good gut bacteria in the genus Malus?

Interestingly enough other scientists reviewing our grant proposals hate it when we try to connect the apple fruit bacteria to the gut. Partially because a lot of them get washed off anyways and partially because most of the ones that don't get washed off just die in stomach acid. 

So instead we focus on ones that stop mold from growing on the apple, of which there are a few. But it's hard to tell what they're actually doing when there are so many different types. 

[Paul SB]

Makes sense. Most people underestimate the power of soap and water to neutralize bacterial infection. They want to hear the word "kill" and are clueless that they are causing the little buggers to evolve immunity. Then there's the stomach acid. 

My son is big into mycology, though his focus is on bioremediation -- using fungi to eat up contamination in soils and water. Biology is pretty amazing stuff, and it can be great inspiration for writing science fiction, too. I get more ideas for stories from the science I read than from anyone else's fiction.

[Paul SB]

Someone is liking my posts again and I have no idea who. Glad somebody likes my babble, though.

[Appol PhD they/he]

That was me lol. Mostly just means that I saw it and think it's cool since I didn't acknowledge it by responding directly 

[Paul SB]

Okay. No offense intended, but I would have been happier if it was someone else, just because there are so few people who get involved here. Thanks, though.

[Paul SB]

Another week has come and gone. Are we good for sub 13? I hope we will see some more up here.

 

PS -- I started listening to The World of Juno, though I haven't gotten too far. It's an interesting premise, and it reminds me a bit of African folklore, or maybe Mike Resnik's Kirinyaga.

[Silk she/her]

8 hours ago, Paul SB said:

Another week has come and gone. Are we good for sub 13? I hope we will see some more up here.

Please do! 

I suppose I might as well throw mine in the ring, though it'll probably be later in the week before I get to critiquing.

9 hours ago, Paul SB said:

PS -- I started listening to The World of Juno, though I haven't gotten too far. It's an interesting premise, and it reminds me a bit of African folklore, or maybe Mike Resnik's Kirinyaga.

Have fun with Juno! I think of my story in there as my favourite story that I didn't expect to write, lol. 

I haven't read the Resnick title, I'll have to check it out. 

[Paul SB]

I hope to see it soon, though it's always a stretch for me to read anything that isn't an audiobook I can listen to in the car. The weirder the better. I read Kirinyaga ages ago. It's a collection of a short story about an asteroid colony made up entirely of people who are trying to recreate their mythical past golden age, and of course it doesn't exactly work out as planned. It has this bizarre ending where the old wise man climbs to the top of Mt. Kilimanjaro with a reconstructed Tyrannosaurus Rex.

[Silk she/her]

3 hours ago, Paul SB said:

It has this bizarre ending where the old wise man climbs to the top of Mt. Kilimanjaro with a reconstructed Tyrannosaurus Rex.

That does sound fun! I'm always down for bizarre stories. 

Speaking of which, I've gone ahead and submitted mine. I'll get to some critiquing later in the week. 

Edited March 9 by Silk