¡Rábanos Radiactivos! # 2246

Written by Fred Patten, and intended for Apa L, 2246^th Distribution, LASFS Meeting No. 3694, May 29, 2008.
Golden State Colonial Convalescent Hospital, 10830 Oxnard Street, North Hollywood, California 91606-5098.
Telephone: hospital(818) 763-8247; personal (818) 506-3159 * eMail:fredpatten@earthlink.net

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Last Thursday my sister Sherrill took me to the LASFS meeting. Marc Schirmeister showed me a new book with a chapter about the LASFS and my name in it; American Nerd, by Benjamin Nugent. It was an unflattering but reasonably accurate description of the club as an example of science fiction fans, based on attending one meeting apparently around January 2005. Nugent dwelled on how old and gray most of the members were, but friendly and lively and welcoming to guests. I think that Jerry Pournelle and I were the only members mentioned by full names; others were named only by their nicknames like Scratch, or described like the gray-haired man in the mad scientist's white coat. The meeting was Dan Alderson's patron saint week; Nugent reported the club's devotion to its own history. Schirm announced the book and that he was donating it to the club library. The book is a survey of different kinds of American nerds; Schirm said that the LASFS was very favorably depicted in comparison with the SCA. I would think that Nugent would have gotten a better example of s-f fandom by attending a s-f convention. The meeting almost disproved our devotion to our history when the week's patron saint, DeeDee Lavender, was announced; nobody could remember her except that she was married to Roy. An unconfirmed rumor was announced that Robert Asprin had died. (Locus confirmed it the next day.) The program by Tom Safer was animated cartoons about pirates; as usual, I had to leave just as it was starting.

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ˇZANAHORIAS ELECTRóNICAS!

-- Comments on Last Week's Distribution:

Cover - (DeChancie) Hooray! I got top billing of an excellent cast!

Vanamonde #782 - (Hertz) Whether The Bear Comes Home, by Rafi Zabor, is science fiction or fantasy is irrelevant. It is a fine novel, and that is what counts. ## I don't think I have ever had Wensleydale cheese. Hopefully Warren Johnson will bring some samples to the LASFS.

De Jueves #1584 - (Moffatts) Yes, that was Brick Bradford. You don't need a title to recognize him. ## Does Los Angeles still have any steel mills at all? ## One of the nice things about Florence Ambrose being a bioengineered wolf is that she mixes human intelligence with some lupine traits such as a better sense of smell than humans have. I wish that Stanley would publish a collection of the Freefall strips. It shows four types of intelligence; human, alien (Sam Starfall), mechanical (Helix), and bioengineered (Florence). ## I could not sit all day in a courtroom in my wheelchair. I am under doctor's orders to spend as much time as possible lying down rather than sitting up to avoid sores. ## I do not think that I could handle a three-ring notebook. Could you staple Dian's story like Apa L?

Why Did the Wind Blow Away the Heat? - (Cantor) No, Furry fandom recognizes any s-f with animallike aliens. The Hokas are fine examples, as are Piper's Zarathustran Fuzzies, Cherryh's felinoid hani, McCaffrey's Hrrubans, and many others. Human intelligence in otherwise unanthropomorphized animals also is included, as Koontz's Watchers or Cartmill's short story "Number Nine". Furry fiction is defined on the Ursa Major Award website as "must include a non-human being given human attributes (anthropomorphic), which can be mental and/or physical (for example the intelligent rabbits in Watership Down for the former, and Bugs Bunny for the latter.) Simply including an animal character is not sufficient to qualify." Your determination to not recognize Furry fiction as a subset of s-f is not followed by others in s-f fandom, except those who insist that Furry fandom is limited to Fursuiters only. Also, stories like Smith's The Age of the Tail and Orwell's 1945 Animal Farm are certainly Furry fiction just as the s-f of Jules Verne and H. G. Wells is recognized by almost everyone as science fiction even though it predated s-f fandom. ## I think that all Post Offices have to have at least some quantity of all denominations of stamps, so if 50¢ stamps are no longer available in one Post Office, they must be discontinued in all.

Fish Out of Water #276 - (Helgesen) Didn't Isaac Asimov also predict an environmental holocaust by the end of the 20^th century if humans continued polluting at their current rate?

Godzilla Verses #192 - (DeChancie) You make a good case for adventure fiction needing drama but not necessarily action. ## I recognized the Griffith Park Observatory in movies and TV shows long before I recognized the L.A. City Hall. In fact, I was not sure if it was the City Hall or the Tokyo Diet building which I saw pictures of first and looks very similar. ## I want to see the Bollywood remake of Superman that shows a 5-year-old Clark Kent as Superbaby doing a breakdancing marathon.

I Waterproof Nightingales - (Gold) Yes, I have read The Age of the Tail. I consider it fantasy since no explanation is given as to why babies start to be born with non-simian tails. I wondered why it was called a humorous essay rather than a novel just because it was written as a pseudo-history without any characters, when Karel Capek's War With the Newts, which is written the same way, is considered a novel and not a satirical essay. ## Thanks for trying to link to my Anthro reviews. The LASFS Library might consider getting some of the books I review favorably.