Author Archives: Eugie Foster

Sheesh, where did the weekend go? Monday again, yuck. Watched Blade II yesterday on DVD (cheers, NetFlix). I’ve been in a shiny-but-vacuous movie sort of mood, of late. But hey, they’re all fitting for the season. This last bunch has all suffered from a huge dearth in decent scripts. Is all the money going into the flashy EFX so the production companies have to cut corners on the screenplay? Apparently.

Writing Stuff:
Got my sales fix today! Sold my short story “Perfidious Beauty” to the Embark to Madness anthology. Rah!

And, because the universe wants to keep me humble, also received an 11-day “There’s nice writing here, but–” from JJA of F&SF, a 3-day reject from Lenox Ave, and a spinal injury-inducing 1-day “doesn’t meet our present needs” from Surreal. *wince*

Writing Stuff:
ARGH! Received the October SFWA Forum in the mail today. I’m not listed in it as having been upgraded to “Active” membership. Let’s see, tallying up the SFWA-approved pro sales I’ve made: one to Cicada, one to Phobos Books, six to Cricket, two to Realms of Fantasy, and one to The Third Alternative. That’s almost four times the requisite three required for Active membership. What’s the hold up?

Normally, I wouldn’t be upset, but I’ve been burned by SFWA red tape before. This is bringing back nightmares from a couple years ago:

I sent in my initial application May 2002. No reply for two months.

July: Queried the Executive Director of the SFWA about my status. Still no reply.

September: Queried again, this time carboning the SFWA president (upon the advice of other SFWAers). Heard that the Exec Dir. was “working on my application” and if it was okay to telephone me to verify something. I immediately fired a note off to her to tell her to call anytime. One month later, no call, still no membership.

October: The Eastern Director was kind enough to get involved with helping me get this processed. Another round of queries. Still nothing.

November/December: By that time I needed to know what was up because I was getting my taxes ready and I needed to know if my dues check got cashed and therefore whether or not I could write it off. I fire another note off to the Exec Dir. explaining the whole check cashed/tax issue. I get an email from her telling me to expect my membership packet in the mail. It arrived a couple days after. Wahoo.

BUT I still have yet to appear in the SFWA member directory or any of the Forum updates, despite several emails AND the fact that several other writers I know who applied AFTER me both got their membership before me and are in it.

And now this. It’s enough to make me start pulling out my hair!

With much determination, I embarked upon a regime of aggressive, preventative medication this morning: Sudafed, Aleve, caffeine, and sugar. Results: a qualified success. No headache, hurray! But I did a lot of restless twitching at my desk, and the muscle tic under my left eye has returned. Time for the magnesium supplements.

Writing Stuff:
Decided to re-read Ursula K. LeGuin’s Earthsea trilogy, prompted by all the shiny trailers of the mini-series coming up in December on the SciFi channel.

Managed 1000 new words on the fantasy. Rah! And I’m percolating an idea for another story. So far I’ve got a good setting, characters, and beginning, but I’m not sure where to go with it. Not sure if I should go ahead and start it on the hope that something will get jostled loose, or wait until a plot and theme coalesces. Ponder ponder. Also beginning to dwell on the science fiction story I set aside. Multi-tasking is me.

Did a Critters critique, which seems to be my default activity when I feel like I should be writing, but can’t seem to focus on putting words on the page anymore.

And finally received a response to my query to LCRW, over a month later. Quite frustrating and a trifle perplexing: “Sorry, I think this one was rejected. It’s not in our submission pile, so it must have gone back to you already.” They’re not sure they got it, but “think” they rejected it. That does not fill me with neon flashes of “oh boy, that was postage well spent!” Oh well, back out it goes.

Despite the faint pinging in my skull this morning, I ventured back to work today, armed with Sudafed and many OTC analgesics. Made it through most of the day feeling pretty chipper, but toward the mid-afternoon, my head began throbbing and pounding again. Ugh. The last hour was torturous.

While lounging insensate on the couch yesterday, there was a lot of passive entertainment pandering. We watched Haunted, a properly Halloweeny ghost story starring Kate Beckinsale. It was a mite bit predictable, but there was gratuitous Kate Beckinsale nudity, which makes everything good.

Also watched The Wicker Man, the 1973 movie starring Christopher Lee and Edward Woodward. It’s incorrectly labeled “horror” on IMDB. It’s more of a dark comedy, IMO. I guess it’s also possible both Matthew and I have really twisted senses of humor, but I giggled a lot. It’s also more appropriate for May Day than Halloween.

Wrapped up the day with The Peacekeeper Wars. Man, the Sci-Fi channel is really overplaying that thing–wringing every single on-screen minute out of it they can. I remain terrifically amused at the Henson muppets, especially Rigel. A muppet swimming (nice CGI effects there), throwing up, and being chained to a wall. Now that’s wicked funny. I think more SF shows should use muppets. There were a lot of “this is here solely to further the plot and makes no sense otherwise” moments, but I was willing to give it to them. There were enough good sections, and I bow to their effort to wrap everything up in a two-part miniseries.

There’s always a “my brain feels liquefied” after that much boob tubing. I have the urge to read something obtuse and deep now. Or maybe something shiny . . . once my brain ceases its efforts to bound out of my skull.

Got a flu shot after work. Itty bitty line, hardly any waiting, but they did want to make sure I was at “high-risk.” The receptionist, when I told her I had Lupus (which I typically just say because it’s more universally understood, versus MCTD which gets blank stares), she proclaimed “perfect!” and shooed me into the to-be-injected line. First time anyone’s responded that way. So yay, I’ve been inoculated. But owie, why is it those damn shots hurt so much? I’d rather give a bucket of blood than get a few CCs of flu vaccine in the arm. Ow.

Writing Stuff:
Finally finished my review of this week’s Sci-Fiction for Tangent and emailed it to my editor.

Saw on the TTA Press message board that “Running on Two Legs” is going to be illustrated by Kelly Dyson. I’m getting good and excited about seeing it in print. I’m so very fond of this particular story.

In less good news, new wordage achieved was so pathetic it’s barely worth reporting. Maybe 100? Crappola. Usually October is one of my most productive months. My muse has forsaken me, the strumpet!