Galaxy Class Issue: 1) Meteorites are on their way! And b) Goings on Chez BA

June 24, 2023

Special Issue #3 June 23, 2023

<tl;dr> Space rocks are whizzing their way toward you, but in a good way: through the mail. Also, a more detailed look at what’s been happening around here the past few months that’s caused so much chaos. Spoiler alert: Y’all are heroes, and things are getting better, but big changes are afoot. </tl;dr>

Hey there Galaxy Class subbies! It’s been a minute, as the kids say these days.

Some good news: The meteorites are (finally) on their way to all y’all! For US folks they’re sent in a small black padded envelope (see pic below), so keep your eyes open for that. I had an extensive discussion with someone at my local post office and she assured me that there shouldn’t be any issues sending them this way. I’ve already from some folks saying they got theirs, too. If you don’t get it in, say, 10 business days, let me know. You can email me at [email protected].

If you live in another country (including Canada) I had to send them in a slightly bigger manila envelope and it may take a little longer to get to you. Because of the extra paperwork they got sent a couple of days after the domestic ones, so I please ask for your patience for a little while longer. But they are sent!

I hope you like them. The market for meteorites is getting tight, and finding decent ones tougher. These are not huge chunks, but hey — they’re from outer space. I hope you like ‘em.

As to why it’s taken so dang long to send them, well, that’s a story. And I’ll tell it to you now! I’ll be sending out a public issue on this as well, but you folks get the early sneak peek.

So, onto Part II of this email…

After SYFY Wire let me go in September things around here basically fell apart. My income went from very comfortable to basically nothing, and stayed that way for a few months. I knew it would take me a while to get my legs under me again, which is why I opened up the new Galaxy Class subscription level — and again, holy yowza, you folks came through. And I needed it…

I live in rural Colorado in a house with my wife. Her folks and a nephew also lived here with us. My in-laws are retired and on a fixed income, and when I lost my job we all realized the living situation had to change. They wanted to live somewhere warm all year (so, not Colorado), so they decided to move to South Carolina. Our nephew moved to Oregon to be with other relatives.

And that left Marcella and me to sell our house and move away. We put it on the market and it took months, but we finally got a buyer. In the meantime we decided that as much as we love Colorado, it’s not meeting our needs as much as it used to. Marcella is an avid gardener, and trying to grow things here is a lot like trying to grow on the Moon, just with slightly more air.

We both grew up and went to school in Virginia, so we looked there. We recently found a place we liked in a rural area (we’re accustomed to that lifestyle now, and really like it) so we’re heading that way. We’re leaving Colorado in early July and, due to the vagaries of selling and buying a house, take residence in Virginia in September. We’re staying with friends and relatives across the country until then. I don’t know how the itinerant lifestyle will affect my writing, but I don’t expect to see a break in the newsletters.

As for the future, the good news is that Scientific American wants me to write even more for them, and that means a more reliable income. Yay! But I’ll tell you, those months after leaving SYFY Wire had been troublesome, so once again let me say that having the cushion provided by all you people who signed up at the GC level saved my tuchus*. I had a bad patch there but you got me through it, and I appreciate it more than I can say.

I hope this gives you some understanding of why things have taken so long to get under control (plus, oh yeah, I had a book come out during all that too). I think by the end of the year life will be much more normal, for whatever definition that adheres to, and more stable. I do like the occasional excitement, but less like what just happened and more like oh hey there’s a new supernova. That’s way more fun.

So stay tuned. I’ll be posting stuff from the road here and on my various social media (like Instagram and Blue Sky and Mastodon and Spoutible) with the usual nonsense and puns I enjoy foisting on an audience.

Thanks again! And, as always, keep looking up!

P.S. I’m working on getting all the links you sent to me to collate into a community marketplace kinda page, and that should be up before I head out of state.

* I love Yiddish! It’s so expressive, but it doesn’t transliterate well to English letters.