This is our eighth year on the Internet. We thought this magazine would be lasting a long time, and it did. Our explanation for this successful run is that the magazine computes well.  So, in fact, do those involved in making this magazine, a rather small number of people. We may have seemed like tyros when we began the zine, but as a matter of fact we were able to handle our presence on the net well enough that you see us today, still here and fit as fiddles.

     SURPRISING evolved and originated with a big bang, much like the Universe, according to some. It is not an original creative work, which is one of the reasons it is comparable to the big bang.  We have quite a few people coming and going, all with their own viewpoints and concepts to express. (Those who would prefer not to see us on the net are coming and going, too, but the difference is, we’ve left them not knowing whether they’re coming or going.) All in all, we think we have quite a worthwhile netzine up.

     Don’t think we’re not glad of our success in this effort.  Only the other day I saw Bobo and Yahres Moulty partying about it, and the two were practically hand in hand, which is unusual for these two, but they were with having the magazine in mind. It seems that lasting all those years, which is outdoing a few, at any rate, of the SF and fantasy prozines that have been proposed over the years, is enough of an achievement that we may well be celebratory about it. It matches up well with the internet, too, which is a good thing, seeing that the internet is smart enough to have “celebratory” in its spell-check vocabulary.  I’m thinking now about how much of an effort it must have been to program that, and about how it must have been for the people who took on this task. I hope if any of them are still around, that they are as favorable to us as we are to them, that is, if they notice the magazine as such. (The Spell-check must not approve of Newspeak very well, as it vetoes leaving the hyphen out of its name, but I didn’t get any red line under “Newspeak”, so apparently it’s familiar with Orwell.)

     I think it’s been noticed by now that the editorial usually has a sort of progress report in the form of a cartoon at the top, showing us in comparison to the teams and crews and gangs found in televised or movieland sf and fantasy movies and series.  What’s happening there is that we have rather run out of these collections of people, unless we want to do the Quantum Leaper and his sidekick or the fellow on Farscape and the people he gets together with.  Oh, there’s new ones coming out, but I’m wondering how well we’d compare with Zoe and Tamara, the Graystones and the brothers Sam and Joseph and the rival, or how much we really have in common with Rush and Young, Chloe and Eli and the rest.  They’re going somewhere, but they keep “bitching” and arguing about it and getting sidetracked in a big way.  They learn a lot as they go, but they’re also apt to have a memory wipe or something and forget about it.  Well, but they do remember all the essentials.  Only the last time I looked at the show, Eli and some other old regulars were trapped in a cave full of spiders while the ship jumped light-years away. Oh, they’ll go back after them after Rush gets certain equations solved that will tell him how to do it. He’s worked out a number that may be the key number as it’s the number of chromosomes in human DNA.  But Young is all over his self examination about abandoning Rush on an unknown planet and he’s not going to want to do that again, so we’ll see more of Eli than his sooty present-time self.

     Anyway, we’re taking a break from comparing ourselves to these space adventurers.

     Well, here’s another issue, and we hope you appreciate it. I know you’re out there, I can hear you exsanguinating. If you have a pleasant trip, keep tuning in here. It’s our pleasure to remain in contact with such a large audience.