C James

Thank you Jan!! It's great to hear that said! I'd put it in my siggy, but the quote from you that I currently use as a siggy is almost identical.

I'm late announcing the title of Chapter 28! It's a nice, relaxing little chapter. It's called Blood and Time. CJ

The main awards post will be in the Lounge tomorrow morning, so we'll see then. However, I will verify that Graeme and Shadowgod are the member's choice for King of Cliffhangers. Long may they reign over their malevolent precipices! It's going to be a very, very good year.

The rest of the awards will be posted tomorrow (they are still being made) but I simply could not wait to post about the truly wonderful results in one category. As you might guess, I've just been dying to reveal this. We had a tie. There are two winners for a GA Member's Choice 2008 King of Cliffhangers! Without further ado, here they are; :worship: :worship: :worship: This is true recognition for their mastery of the Cliffhanger. May they long reign, Sovereigns of the Malevolent Precipices! Congratulations to Graeme And Shadowgod!

Thanks Edward! By sheer coincidence, I will be traveling via cruise ship. Besides, unless I can get another look at Eric's diary and the General's diary, where would the new chapters come from? Cliff climbing goats? Well, umm, goats don't like cliffs. We learn quite a bit more about Felecia soon. All I can say is, there are reasons for many things. Aww, but goat-buddy, misunderstandings happen, and they had one. BTW, Kudos to AFriendlyFace for figuring out what was going on. In the Ch 26 thread, Kevin wrote, Spot-on! This also gives me an opportunity to thank him for his influence. His Story Buy me a Drink (BMad) also features an exotic dancer, who uses "cover" relationships to avoid getting hit on. He also hates the term "stripper" and prefers "exotic dancer". I've been trying to figure out (including talking to Kevin) just how much plagerisim I've done here. Even I don't know. I think, but am not certain, that I envisioned Jansen and Keith's "cover" before I read Bmad. I don't remember and I'm far from sure. The "exotic dancers" part, well, that did enter the story long after I read Bmad, and thus is IMHO most likely subconsciously stolen by me. BTW, I highly recommend reading BMad, it's a great read!! Thank you Kevin!!!

Hi Rush, They can't come after you for the debts of others; the worst they can do is take the property. I'd strongly suggest looking into this, PROVIDED it's not a scam. If there is really property, then it may be very valuable; land in the Canary islands is much sought after by Europeans, mainly for the climate. Anyway, that's just my two cent's worth, though I'm very concerned that they came looking for you; that seems to indicate a scam IMHO, but one never knows. Good luck!! CJ I'm unlikly to climb Cumbre Vieja; you can drive to its long, shallow summit. I do plan on doing that, though. . Nope, it's a couple of other volcanos I plan on climbing, much steeper ones, with no other way up. Agreed abotu the New Madrid quake.. a repeat of that would be a disaster. You didn't think I was making the story up, did ya?

Best eFiction Story by a New Author In Due Time by J. Ross Best Story by a New Anthology Author If No One Notices by AFriendlyFace Best Poem Black Light by Corvus Best Antagonist/Villain (From any 2008 GA story) Travis from In The Fish Bowl by DomLuka Best Protagonist/Hero (From any 2008 GA story) Taylor from Hello Stupid by Dom Luka I would like to add a sincere round of thanks to Sat8997 (Sharon) and Kurt, who did a great deal of work to make these awards possible, and to all the members of the WST who participated in the discussion threads. As a nominee, I had to keep out of the process, so they did all the work. Thanks!!!!!

The 2008 Gay Authors Readers' Choice Awards First, I'd like to introduce two very special awards, for those who help make all this possible; the unsung heroes of GA, all of our Editors and Beta Readers! The Best Editors! The Best Beta Readers! Best Hosted Story How The Light Gets In by Duncan Ryder Best Shared/Promising Story Buy Me A Drink by A Friendly Face Best eFiction Story It Started With Brian by Dan Kincaid, Co-authored by Adam Phillips Best Anthology Story Street Life by Graeme Best Non-GA Story The Price of Friendship by Graeme

Cody, I'm afraid, is indeed out of the picture. He couldn't be in it for a lot of reasons, but one is that the timelines for the story have diverged. In DnCW, a week or so has passed. In Changing Lanes, we're now almost a year since the San Francisco kiss. Now, as for the volcanoe; why does it worry you so? It's not venting much. In fact, it says this; Deep beneath Cumbre Vieja, magma was on the move, forcing open fissures deep underground as it pried open its ancient rift system, which ran north to south along fracture zones. Along the way it encountered ground water, heating it to thousands of degrees, generating enormous pressures that could not yet find relief. It's not venting, the pressure is just building up instead. See? Nothing to worry about. I liked that too. Keith had the right idea IMHO. Thank you Tim!!! Definitely no cliffhangers in this chapter (like all my chapters, actually). Picking on poor, innocent me. Shame on you! The boat plan, a tender ride from the beach using a cruise ship's tenders (carried along with the lifeboats and hoisted in and out of the water on davits, like the lifeboats) isn't risky; I've done it quite a few times. For a beach landing, the tenders deploy powered Zodiacs to get through the surf. That can be interesting in high surf, but I've only been swamped once doing that. Hrmmm, make that twice, come to think of it... one capsized, and that got kind of exciting, due to being strapped in. Lol, okay so maybe its a little risky. The only problem with the C-130 idea is the ash that's closed the airport; it shuts down aircraft engines fast. Now a question for everyone: How old is the General, and how old is Felecia? From back in chapter four, when we first meet Felecia, Wilhelm, and Horst, we have the following;

Our favorite volcanic character in "Changing Lanes" has a special cameo appearance in a Popular Mechanics article today! (I've linked to the page, but it's a couple of paragraphs from the top, in the section about the 80 foot high tsunami heading for the East Coast) The article's name is "5 natural disasters heading for the United States". Read the bit about Cumbre Vieja, it's very informative. Edit to add: A note to MikeL: Your Amphibiousness, please note that if this did occur, a lot of land would get wet, and frogs like it wet, right? See? Nothing to worry about.

Hrmmm, EMoe.. what is this? Don't you want to take credit for your... ever-so-slightly tense chapter ending? Chapter 27, Drums out of Darkness, will be posted around noon my time on Tuesday.

You halo is broken.

But Dr. Strangelove, IMHO, is probably the best of a fantastic bunch. It's my favorite anyway... but maybe it's just becuase I'm soft-hearted and love a happy ending. :nuke:

I'll be leaving around March 9th. I'll be gone 6 weeks. I expect to be able to check in here from time to time, as I'll have a laptop with me, but there will be streaches when I won't have internet access. I was in Phoenix the other day, but up north, doing some electronics shopping. Phoenix is a four-hour drive each way for me, so I don't go in often. I hope you had fun at Sky Harbor. CJ

Dr. Strangelove, which was also called "How I learned to stop worrying and love The Bomb", is one of my all-time favorite movies. Perhaps my favorite movie ever. Thanks for posting this, Eric!! of that famous scene. It's perfect, right down to the names on the bombs... If anyone hasn't seen the movie, I HIGHLY recommend seeing it. It is, IMHO quite possibly the best movie ever made.

I can't comment on any of the above, but I do want to say, you pegged a subtle issue; Eric is indeed in a position of authority thanks to the business deal. Keith knows that, Jansen might, but Eric does not seem to realize it. Getting in was the easy part. Poor Brian, he wasn't sure it was real. GREAT point! I can't comment on the future, but I can post a quote from chapter 9.

Congratulations, Mark!!!

One thing to keep in mind about Eric... He's never dated. He's had loads of one-night-stands, but he's never dated anyone. Wildone pegged a few things. (Way to go Wildone!) The Scar mentioned in a previous chapter, that he loved the irony of the General unwittingly being the insturment of restoring what the general had taken from him. There was also the fact that The Scar was supplying Iran with magnetic bearings. Those have one principal use; in high-speed centerfuges, and Iran's nuclear program is centerfuge-based (much akin to gasseous diffusion, it takes advantage of the slight weight differential between differing isotopes of uranium, while in a gassious form (Uranium hexaflouride). Changing Lanes is set in the very near future, and the Iranian nuclear program is, according the International Institute for Strategic Studies, expected to have sufficient enriched U-235 to make a bomb, this year. Oh, and I should mention, I've made no secret of the nuclear plotline in Changing Lanes; Every single chapter announcement has had the :nuke: emote in it. I can't comment on most of what has been asked in this thread (It is in coming chapters) but I can say this, Wildone was quite wrong on one thing: when he said there were cliffhangers in this chapter! However, if Jansen's words to Eric, at the very end of the chapter, count as a cliffhanger.. I can only give credit where credit is due, and give full credit to Emoe for that. It was his idea to move that scene to the end of the chapter.

I try to avoid doing this, but I've had to cmake a change to Chapter 20 of Changing lanes. Previously, the number of cut-and-cover bunkers at the Iranian target the General mentions is 47. It has now been changed to 50. The reason for the change? The author can't count! While reviewing satellite photos of the secret Iranian base, I counted again, and discovered that I'd miscounted the first time. Oops! I could dismiss this as one of the pitfalls in using real locations, but in reality it's just my inability to count. Here's the authir's note from the end of chapter 26, if you want to see the bunkers. They are along the winding dirt road to the left, that runs north to south. The bunkers are to the west of the road, sunk into the mountainside.

I just updated the posted chapter to add the bit below at the end: CJ

Hrmmm, the nature of Spam.... It's kind of a canned processed ham, right? Does this mean that you're saying that Echidnas are hams? I thought that was only true of actors, but, you may have a point...

Why, away from the cliff, of course! Frog hunting... Hrmm, this seems like a good idea for a new forum passtime! :ranger: That poor goat does look a little.. uneasy. Hrmmm, maybe the goat in the pic has dined on too many Echidnas? ROFL!! Here's the pic. Canned Echidna, Australia's newest gourmet export.

Just a note on story posting: Assuming I don't have an internet outage or something, "The Scorpion and The Frog" will be posted in about eighteen hours (Aiming for 11am, my time, Tuesday).

Awww, Benji... surely you know that I'd never go anywhere near a cliff of any sort?

Ahhh, but I think the "fix" Benji is suggestion would involve editing out the cliff. After all, the presence of a cliff of any sort proves conclusively that it is not me.