Forteana and Jim From the Future

The Helm trade paper back is actually coming out on the 25th of this month, as opposed to the 8th of next month as was previously reported.

Anyway, I was putting a preview copy of The Helm TPB in the mail today to send off to the Fortean Times and I decided to ride the office Segway instead of walking.

For any of you who don't already subscribe, the Fortean Times is an awesome, monthly magazine about strange phenomena and experiences that continues the work of Charles Fort--the premier investigator of oddities and the man who coined the term teleportation. You can check them out at http://www.forteantimes.com/

I thought that the Fortean Times might be the most appropriate place to run a review of The Helm.

And now the Segway. First, you can't ride a Segway without feeling like some imperiously arrogant visitor from the future--perhapse a being named Orlon 5 or Commander GreeGnxx--just visiting this planet to mock the backward apes that still get around using their own legs.

As you hover along the streets, a foot or so taller than everyone else, drawing stares and shocked looks, you can't help but feel the odd mix of smug superiority and awkward stupidity that is the signature of the Segway experience. If you haven't ridden one, I'd suggest you try it.

We own a Segway because my business partner, David, won it as a door prize at the TED convention one year. Mostly it sits in the corner, quietly gathering dust, but about once each spring I get tempted to take it out for a spin. Since the post office is nearly a fifteen minute walk from the office, today provided a great opportunity to blow the dust off our chariot from the future.