Ironically, I sometimes don’t realize how much stress I’m internalizing about what we’re doing to this planet until something like this comes along:

Solar-Power Breakthrough

Researchers have made a major advance in inorganic chemistry that could lead to a cheap way to store energy from the sun. In so doing, they have solved one of the key problems in making solar energy a dominant source of electricity.

Daniel Nocera, a professor of chemistry at MIT, has developed a catalyst that can generate oxygen from a glass of water by splitting water molecules. The reaction frees hydrogen ions to make hydrogen gas. The catalyst, which is easy and cheap to make, could be used to generate vast amounts of hydrogen using sunlight to power the reactions. The hydrogen can then be burned or run through a fuel cell to generate electricity whenever it’s needed, including when the sun isn’t shining.

For your viewing pleasure, I give you Al Gore’s Energy Crisis speech and challenge to the United States. You can find out more at www.wecansolveit.org.

If anyone has ever wondered what Stockholm looks like, well I have just the thing. I humbly submit to you the pictures I took (no captions, sorry) via this web album.

The time is approaching for the IGMS anthology, which includes my story, "In the Eyes of the Empress’s Cat," to be released. I found out something interesting while I was in Sweden recently. Kathleen Bellamy, Orson Scott Card’s assistant, called to ask how to say my last name. Apparently they’re coming out with an audio version of the anthology as well. Professionally read and produced and all. I’m totally stoked about this. I’m really curious to hear how someone else will read the story. Probably better than I could if they have any chops at all. (Not that I have no chops when it comes to reading. I’m just not, you know, stellar at it.) I’m not yet sure if it’s going to be a download or CD-only. I imagine it’ll be downloadable somewhere, but I’ll post more details when I have them.

Oh, and by the way, my last name? You pronounce it BOWL-yer. You can’t look at the name when you say it. Just gotta think Bowl Yer Ass Off, without the Ass Off.

Wow. The June issue of Realms has a review already from The Fix Online, and it’s very complimentary of my story:

“Lest our Passage be Forgotten” is full of surprise twists, courtly intrigue, and more. Beaulieu displays a skill at delving deep into the psyches of his characters to reveal the human condition and weaves a tale full of love, lies, and danger.

Mood: Content and pleased. Conpleased, if you will.

My friend and fellow specfic author, Anton Strout, just launched his first little baby, er, book. It’s called Dead to Me, and in the words of Anton, if you like Joss Whedon, Douglas Adams, or Jim Butcher then you’ll love Dead to Me. If you’d like to find out more about the book, read my interview with Anton that I posted recently as part of the Writers Symposium, associated with the GenCon game fair.

My story, "Lest Our Passage be Forgotten," has been pushed back one issue. It should now (hopefully) appear in the June issue of Realms, which should hit the newsstands in early April. I’ll definitely post again once I get confirmation. Word has it that the story has some killer artwork. Realms employs some of the best artists in the biz, so I can’t wait to see what they’ve come up with.

My wife, Joanne, has started up a kickin’ new Etsy store to sell her jewelry. It’s called Relly Rose Designs. Take a look, and remember, Valentines is just around the corner. Here are a few pics of her earrings, all original designs:

I’ve been trying to keep track of both my LJ and my own blog comments for some time, and it has really become cumbersome. So, though I don’t like forcing people to my blog, I’m turning off the LJ comments. I hope this doesn’t keep all my friends from hopping on over to chat…

Which is interesting since I just went there last night for a Swell Season concert. I like Chicago - the night life, museums, theater - but I don’t think I would ever live there.

What city are you?

Your Score: CHICAGO!

You scored 54% Style, 24% Climate, and 64% Culture!

You are Chicago, Illinois. Chicago is the largest city in Illinois and the seat of Cook County. It stretches for 22 mi along the southwest shore of Lake Michigan in the northeast part of the state. The name Chicago is thought to come from an Algonquian word meaning ?onion? or ?skunk.? Today, Chicago is a major Great Lakes port and the commercial, financial, industrial, and cultural center of the Midwest. The manufacturing industries dominate the wholesale and retail trade, and trade in agricultural commodities is important to the economy. The Chicago Board of Trade is the largest agricultural futures market in the world. Among Chicago’s many attractions are the Art Institute of Chicago, the Field Museum of Natural History, the Jane Addams?Hull House Museum, Navy Pier, and numerous architectural landmarks such as the Sears Tower and Frank Lloyd Wright’s Robie House.

Yeah, that’s right…it says ‘onion’ or ’skunk’, but you are definitely neither (and neither is your city). In fact, you are a very stylish person and cultured as well. You probably find that above information interesting because you like to learn things about your surroundings. And what surroundings they are- fast-paced, non-stop, always awake, and full of interesting people. You prefer city-life, and all the stores, restaurants, and arts it has to offer. And you certainly won’t let the cold or rain keep you down. You’re going to do what you want, when you want, and dammit, you’re going to have some fun, too!

I have officially launched a cooking blog. This is something I’ve been pondering for a while, and finally decided to go ahead and bite the bullet. The site is pretty close to what its final incarnation is going to look like, so I wanted to spread the news a bit, have everyone look at it, and give me some feedback. If you have a few spare moments, hop over to cooksense.net and take a look. If possible, please reply via the top entry in the blog. It’s an open query for feedback, and I’d like to exercise the commenting features.

Also, if you know of any links/sites that might apply to cooksense, please send them to me via the “Recommend” page on the site. I’m looking to exercise that as well, and (**Bonus points**) I might use your link on the blog. I know, fame and fortune awaits, right?

One last thing, if you have even a few more moments, please shoot me an email using the Contact page. Same rationale as above…

Thanks so much, and if you know of any foodies out there, please feel free to pass the site along to them.

What would I do if I became ruler of the world… Hmm. I guess I’d start with banning plastic bags and incandescent light bulbs and go from there.

What supervillain are you?

Your results:
You are Lex Luthor

Click here to take the Supervillain Personality Quiz

No, not really. In my novel. Man do I feel like an ass hole. It reminds me of the Michael Vick stuff this summer. Lots of attention paid to it, but there was a fair bit of recoil from people that noted that it got a lot more attention because of his celebrity and because it involved dogs (or just animals in general, I suppose). I wonder if there would have been more outrage if he had been a murderer. You know, of people. I’m thinking no. It brings to light how numb we all are to the death of human beings around us, where animal deaths are simply not as, what?, publicized? I heard this notion that if you really want readers to hate a character, have them kill, not another character, but a dog. I think it’s true. This guy’s way, way more mean than I thought he was about ten pages ago. I feel bad about killing cute little Berza. She was such a good dog. But, well, circumstances demanded a serious statement, and that’s about as serious as it gets.

Yay! I just got tickets to The Swell Season in Chicago! If you haven’t already seen it, I would highly recommend seeing the movie Once, which stars Glen Hansard of the Irish band, The Frames, and Marketa Irglova. The movie is a simple, slice of life film about a struggling musician in Ireland. He comes across a muse in Marketa Irglova’s character, and it spurs him to do things that in his heart he didn’t think he would ever be able to do. It is a love story, though not in the traditional sense. It is also a musical, but again it breaks from convention; it is instead a thoroughly refreshing take on the form.

See it. You’ll be happy you did.

Ah, but back to my story. Glen Hansard and the Frames have been around for quite some time–small news in the US but they’ve been cherished by the Irish for years. I don’t know much about the history of how the movie got started, but Glen and Marketa teamed up and recorded songs as the Swell Season, most of which appear in the movie. Their sound is light at times, serious at others, but always enchanting, so much so that I tried like hell to see them when they toured the states during the summer, but they were playing in a very small venue in Chicago at the time and so tickets were extremely hard to come by. I stumbled across their new tour dates and snapped up a few tickets for myself and Joanne.

Yay! I can’t wait!

So I’m looking to host an event in Second Life. I’m new to SL, and very new to hosting an event there (read: I haven’t organized one before), but I understand that you need to have a location to do so. I’ve been poking around to see if there’s a public place that I can host it, but it occurred to me that some of you might own land in SL or know of someone who does that would be willing to allow me to use it for a specfic reading. Which is a not-so-subtle way of saying: do you?

My story, “How Peacefully the Desert Sleeps”, is now up at IGMS. Your assignment? Go read. Now. Go on… And report back here once you have…