Smale Christmas 2011

It's the holiday season again, so soon? Wow. I suppose it's time for the Christmas Letter, then. Even if we're in denial.

The Chromatics are still going strong after over a decade and a half(!). In May we were the weekend guests at the North Carolina Museum of Natural Science, performing several shows for their Astronomy Days. This year we also performed at an awards banquet for the International Microwave Symposium, were the main event for the International Association of Fire Safety Scientists, and entertained at the Goddard Space Flight Center, Art & Glassworks in Lancaster PA, the Garden of Lights in Brookside and, oh, lots of other places.

Due to extensive work commitments we didn't start traveling until July, but after that we barely stopped. In July we toured New Mexico, visiting Santa Fe and Taos, exploring the mind-expanding ruins at Chaco Canyon, and hitting the heights and the depths in quick succession during a balloon ride into the Rio Grande Gorge. Karen then flew to Tucson to see her parents, and Alan spent two weeks as one of thirteen students at Taos Toolbox, a master class in writing science fiction and fantasy taught by Walter Jon Williams and Nancy Kress. In addition to learning a lot, writing 12+ hours a day, and drinking and singing into the night, he may just have made some new friends for life (go Dieselbears!). Within days of his return to the DC area Alan boarded another plane to recross the country for a work meeting at Caltech. In August he went to Worldcon, the World Science Fiction Convention in Reno, NV (of which more later), crossing most of the country again at the same time Karen was returning from a NASA IT Summit in San Francisco. In September we went to Spain with Alan's parents to spend ten days touring Granada, Cordoba, Seville, and other roads less traveled in Andalusia. Alan headed to Paris in November for a "work" (and fine dining) trip, after which we represented the Chromatics at the Sojam a cappella festival in Durham, NC... and one of us would really, really like to stay home for a while now.

Writing-wise, Alan had a rather startling year. After eighteen months of hard work he finished a good draft of a novel called "Eagle and Thunderbird" and was surprised to find it was 210,000 words, twice the length of a sane first novel. (It's now off being critiqued by seventeen valiant beta-readers.) In August he was shocked to make the cover of "Realms of Fantasy" with his sixth story for them, appropriately called "Leap of Faith". In the fall he was commissioned to write two non-fiction science articles for "Lightspeed" online magazine: a piece about terraforming called "Planetary Alchemy" to accompany a story by one of his Taos Toolbox friends, and another about earth-killing asteroids called "Armageddon Rock" to accompany a new story by... Arthur C. Clarke. And if that wasn't enough, at Worldcon he was absolutely flabbergasted to win the Sidewise Award for Alternate History, for his story "A Clash of Eagles" (which forms the first part of "Eagle and Thunderbird").

Karen's work schedule has slowed down a little bit this year, following a major website delivery in May. Since then her project has had a staffing reduction of 75% and Karen has taken over managing the future development. Things are a little less stressful now, leaving time for actual weekends and vacations. Karen's college friend Terry and her husband visited this March, and high-school friend Michelle and her husband visited in August. In between we had a minor drought, requiring us to water those 25 arborvitae we planted last November. They are surviving and even thriving. In a few years we'll have another solid wall of green along the road. A 70-foot oak near the house was dying, so we had that one removed, piece by agonizing piece. We wish we could get a discount on our home insurance for being proactive! This November has provided beautiful weather and inspired Karen to get on her bike for the first time in many months. Unfortunately rain and cold has set in again and it will likely be next spring before we can get much more biking in. Karen attended a National Geographic Travel Photography seminar in DC in December where she learned a lot and is inspired to take beautiful photos. Must get out and practice!! Fortunately, she'll be reducing her work schedule to 4 days per week starting in January, so there's hope for biking and photography in the New Year.

In addition to all that we refinanced our house, enjoyed a local earthquake and hurricane, were trapped at home for a couple of days when our road flooded, painted our dining room, and Alan acquired a new car (you'll be shocked to learn that it's black).

Okay... I guess a lot did happen this year. Perhaps we're ready for the festive season after all!