I have a head cold, which I am blaming for the following weirdness.

mirrorthaw put in Peter Gabriel's greatest hits album, Hit, this evening, and as I always do when I hear it, I thought, "Man, 'Solsbury Hill' so has a story in it." But this time, the other songs ganged up and gave me one.* It's a YA sf semi-dystopian thriller/romance/bildungsroman (reluctant psychics! teenage soldiers! true love!), and my question to you is:

Poll #1476892 Blame the head cold
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 251

Should the romance be:

Of course, I reserve the right to ignore the poll results completely, but I'm curious.

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*For the record, the playlist is:

"Jeux sans frontiers"
"Shock the Monkey"
"More than This"
"Solsbury Hill"
"Burn You Up, Burn You Down"
"Digging in the Dirt"
"Growing Up"
"Don't Give Up"
"Sledgehammer"
"More than This" (reprise)

I'm rereading The Reluctant Widow and am wondering: does anyone have a good photo-reference for Bouncer? I know roughly what a Mastiff looks like, and by lurcher, I imagine Heyer most probably means a Greyhound-Collie cross, but I'm having a rather difficult time imagining how the three would go together. Aside from the part where Bouncer is clearly a Very Large Dog.

Since it seems unlikely that anyone out there actually has a Greyhound/Collie/Mastiff cross and has put pictures of same on the internet (although this is the internet and one never knows), speculation is also welcome!

jeffsoesbe suggested a poll about which short story I should finish first. On the understanding that this commits me to absolutely nothing whatsoever, I provide one.

Poll #1286972 Survey says ...
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 118

Which story should win the lottery?

If making the decision nearly killed you, here's a space for the runner-up:

For those of you in the (perhaps vanishingly small) overlap in the Venn diagram between Due South watchers and Peter Straub readers, would Callum Keith Rennie not make the perfect Conor Linklater?

I will be at Geek.Kon this weekend. I do not, however, know what my schedule is. Geek.Kon is a free con, and the program book is online, so check it out. I will totally pimp for my friend David Salo, who's giving a talk on Sindarin at eight on Saturday. (ETA: That's eight o'clock post meridian.) You should all go.

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And now, a poll:

Poll #1267482 It's like Choose Your Own Adventure!
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 218

What novel should I write next?

fill your bedroom with fire once and

And?

My Storytellers Unplugged entry for October is up. It's either flash fiction or a prose poem and I've never been quite sure which. Anyway, happy Halloween!

So, what would the plot of To Sir, From Russia, With Love look like?