Author Archives: Eugie Foster

Had britzkrieg and her fiancé over last night to watch Sixth Sense which neither of them had seen before, and they’d also somehow managed not to have the ending spoiled for them. I really enjoy that movie, although I think this was the only time I’ve seen it that I wasn’t unnerved by it. Then again, it took me three viewings of it to watch the whole thing through without hiding my eyes through parts of it. I’m such a wuss.

We also did our taxes yesterday. Quite pleased with the results. Going to use the refund to buy a new computer! Shiny.

Had a follow-up with my Rheumatologist. He’s referring me to a pulmonary specialist as he still can’t figure out why I’m having such problems breathing. Also he put me on a prescription NSAID (diclofenac) and is switching me off Methotrexate and onto Imuran. So, more pills. And I’ve got to have a slew of blood tests done to make sure I can tolerate the Imuran. Pin cushion me. Sigh.

I was in so much pain on Thursday it made me furious. So I decided to try to meditate some of it away. I’ve been out of practice with my yoga, but I still remember the techniques, dammit. And hey, it worked! After half an hour of meditation and relaxation focus, I could breathe easier, and I hurt so much less. And I was in a better mood. I think I’m going to try to get back into the meditation groove. If nothing else, it’s self-hypnosis with a goal of relaxation pain management/stress diffusion.

And finally, heard from a couple fellow past Phobos winners that the results of the 2003 contest are beginning to go out. They know this because they got an email from the CEO that they’re winners.

I haven’t gotten any such email.

I suspect that means “Tried as an Adult” can be clumped into the non-winner category. Waiting for the final word, but in my (albeit limited) experience, the good news goes out in one batch, and the other news goes out later, in a more leisurely fashion.

Damn.

I’m prepping myself for a great deal of disappointment over this. Whereas it’s possible I might be a winner still and the email was delayed, I think it’s more likely that I should gear up for a good mope fest. In preparation for this probable eventuality, Matthew bought home cake. He’s a sweetie.

But still . . . wah!

Going to try not to think about it today and instead focus on shopping for a new, shiny computer.

Okay, I’ve made precious little progress on my fiction writing these last bunch of days, but I’ve been having a lot of fun doing other writing stuffs.

Polished up the Tangent review of “Script-Doctoring for the Apocalypse” by Chris Nakashima-Brown in Infinite Matrix, then did a couple synopses for Scrybe Press.

Wish there was a way to make a living doing this sort of thing . . .

Okay, the writing news I had to hold off on announcing, I can announce, now that I’ve actually delivered the goods. I was asked by one of my writing group buddies who is an editor for Tangent if I would like to be a reviewer for them. Since Tangent is widely read (nominated 4-times for a Hugo) by editors, publishers, and, of course, writers, I jumped at the chance. Name recognition good.

My review for the Winter 2003 issue of Oceans of the Mind just went up, and I’ll be doing a review of Infinite Matrix soon as well. Tangent is a subscription ‘zine (at $5 a year, it’s a steal!), but all reviews are opened to the public two to three weeks after they’re posted.

Very pleased to add another feather to my writing cap.

Sent the letter off to the editor of Cricket today, giving my a-ok on her edits.

So far, twenty-eight critiques of my story currently up at Critters. A bit of inconsistency of the feedback I’m getting is driving me nuts. I’ve received “your message is too sledgehammery” as well as “I don’t get it” comments in about equal measure. It’s a social commentary on homeless people, dammit! If my theme is delivered too heavy-handedly, how come so many people aren’t getting it? Wah!

Also, got a note from the Editor/Publisher of Scrybe Press proposing a paying barter writing gig. He’s asked me to try my hand at writing book jacket synopses with the proposed trade of a signed book (I assume the book I synopsize) for every synopsis I write. Sounds shiny to me!

The edits for my folktales “When Shakko Did Not Lie” and “The Snow Woman’s Daughter” (renamed from “Winter’s Daughter”–no problem with that, at a quarter a word, if they wanted to rename it “Bob” I’d be fine with it!) arrived in the mail today from Cricket. Additionally, the editor, in her letter, told me to look for the edits of “Razi and the Sunbird” soon.

Y’know, having a top rate editor can really make a huge difference in one’s writing. Debby Vetter has a knack for really making my prose sing. I noticed when she edited “Manny” for Cicada, I actually learned how to write tighter and clearer from going over her changes. Now that’s damn fine editing, that is. I agree with all of her modifications, a situation I have not always been fortunate enough to be in with other editors. On whole, I’m of the philosophy that it’s the editor’s prerogative to tweak my story to fit their house style and vision so I’ve never made a stink about fixes and changes. But with Cricket/Cicada I wholeheartedly approve of their revisions.

Also, she wants to include an author’s note at the end of “Shakko” from one of my correspondences with her that explains a little of the kitsune mythology. That swells my total word count by another 159 words . . . adding another forty dollars to my paycheck. Wow. The author’s note bonus alone is more money than I’ve received for some of my sales.

I don’t think I can gush more about the Carus publishing group without drooling, so I’ll stop now. But I’m utterly delighted to be appearing in their magazines again. They’re a real class act.

After a terrible week at work (technical difficulties are cropping up for everyone of late. What’s up with that?), had a nice, relaxing evening last night. glenn5, after a bit of geographical location awkwardness, swung by with key lime pie. Matthew cooked up his broccoli pasta a la Matt, and we watched the DVD of Robin Hood–the Errol Flynn one. When debating our entertainment selection, there was discussion of something noir-ish, but somehow we ended up with Robin Hood. Go fig.

And there was pie. Mmm. Hobkin kept trying to get at my slice of pie. The fuzzwit likes key lime and whipped cream. Well, who doesn’t?

Also, via one of my writers groups, I got presented with a writing opportunity that I accepted. It’s not a huge deal like a novel contract or even a sale. Heck, I’m not getting paid for it, but it has some perks, not the least of which is more name recognition in the SF writing world. I’m quite pleased. But I can’t say what it is yet.

I can say something else, though. I think I actually missed announcing this when it cropped up, so I’ll do it now: I sold “Cyberevenge Inc.” to the Dreams and Shadows 2 anthology, edited by Richard Lee! Rah! Richard is also an editor for the new horror ‘zine, Sinisteria.

A little contextual background on this story: I wrote this as a catharsis when I was being plagued by a nasty little wart of a cyberstalker. I’m pleased that something worthwhile came from that ugliness. Me ripping a page out of Harlan Ellison’s book–when someone pisses you off, write a vicious, horrific little story and get it published so everyone can ride along with you on the vicarious-disgust-and-fury train. Whee!

I get a visual effect sometimes with caffeine. I think it happens when I hit some sort of critical mass in my bloodstream. I start seeing things clearer and brighter. That might just be because I was peering at the world with half-squinted eyes, bleary and groggy, before, and the caffeine stimulates my foggy brain to sit up straight and pay attention. But I had a very pronounced effect this morning.

I’m still off the Clonazepam. Trying to wean myself off one burgeoning chemical dependency at a time. Didn’t sleep well last night. Wanted to bash my alarm clock for having the temerity to wake me up when it went off. Refrained from committing violence upon an innocent electronic device and dragged myself out of bed. Stumbled in to work with the rain pouring down, an apt counterpoint to how I was feeling–gray, blurry, and cold–chugged a cup of java, and suddenly it seemed like a film had lifted from my eyes. Weird. But welcome.

I like coffee. I think I shall have a torrid love affair with it, then spurn it most callously when I realize the relationship has become abusive and dysfunctional, and then punctuate my years with brief but passionate reconciliations with it. Yes.

Writing stuff:

1000 words on novel2. Although some of that is the mythos I cut and pasted into dialogue. Is that cheating? Having the characters read the mythos to each other? Argh. Well, it’s better than trying to fit passages at the beginning of each chapter, I suppose.

Good lord. I got zero critiques on the story I have up at Critters yesterday, but this morning when I opened up my email, I had eight. Still trying to absorb the deluge of comments. Also, one Critter suggested I write novels, a suggestion I have received before (most notably from Norm, a favorite regular Critter of mine–I think we’d be great friends if he didn’t live across the country somewhere). But it’s most aggravating right now as I am feeling rather frightened by the magnitude of novel2. I guess that’s what NaNoWriMo is about, just getting the words on the page so you can get over the hurdle of writing a full novel-length work. Eep. Maybe more coffee . . .

Okay, I eschewed the Clonazepam last night ’cause I didn’t think it was doing squat for my pain. So, yes, I’m hurting a lot today. I’m still undecided on whether the stuff actually dulls the pain or not, but it really does affect how deeply I sleep. I half-woke several times last night, and I had a bunch of really intense, really vivid dreams. And they were all of the disturbing variety. Can’t remember much of them now, but they had a recurring theme of solitary abandonment. Pffft.

I’ve quasi-trained myself to escape my dreams when they get too unpleasant. Either I wake myself up, or I have my dream self fly away. There was a lot of arm flapping and sky-cruising last night. Yuck.

Despite the absence of a depressant in my system, I still needed beaucoup caffeine to function. I am mightily displeased with the workings of my physiology right now.

britzkrieg, my last attempt at email communication with you has once again bounced back to me with the same error. Just FYI.

On an amusing note, ‘though Hobkin has a wee brain, it’s filled up with sense. I decided his nails were getting too long so decided to clip them. I got him all settled beside me on his side with his paws conveniently displayed and had Matthew fetch the clippers. I thought Hobkin was asleep, but no. His little eyes opened; he saw the clippers, and he promptly rolled onto his tummy, protecting his paws from assault. He then proceeded to eye me warily. It was adorable. Frustrating as all get out, but adorable.

Writing stuff:

200 anti-words on the Novel2 & 600 new ones to replace the overwritten crap I pulled. Not me at my most shiningly productive. Suck.

I have this rebellious urge to write another vampire story. For a while there, I was forcing myself to suppress these periodic urges as they popped up as I was finding it well nigh impossible to sell vampiricly subject-mattered fiction.

Then I sold “Inspirations End” to the Tales of the Paranormal anthology, “Ascendancy of Blood” to Scrybe Press, and “The Few, the Proud, the Leech Corps” to Dreams of Decadence. Suddenly, my inventory of vampire fiction is getting pretty low.

This could also be a “bit off more than I can chaw” reaction to my novel2 efforts. I did some mulling and realized that what I’m wanting to write, in a nutshell, is a coming-of-age political ascension tale set in a high fantasy world which explores themes of gender identity/roles/stereotypes, sexual preferences, and religion. With a healthy dash of daring adventure and magic duels, oh, and a great destiny which must be fulfilled to save the world. Meep.

So yah, I have the urge to write a vampire story. Nothing concrete yet, but silky shadows, razor-edged fangs, hot blood, and eternal youth calls to me. I. Must. Resist. Or maybe not.

Flibbertigibbet fanged muse.

I’ve been taking my Clonazepam like a good girl; shouldn’t the pain be going away now? What’s the point of courting a dual addiction to Clonazepam and Caffeine if I’m still hurting? I can hurt with a clean system just as well as I can with a chemically jonesing one, dammit.

This morning I did something I thought I would never have to do again. I scraped ice off my car windows. I’m just glad we still have a scraper. The odds were high that we’d left all such devices back in the Midwest when we made our Southern exodus. But fortunately I found a (broken) specimen in my trunk that had enough of a blade to scritch away the thin layer of frozen condensation. Tonight I am putting my car in the garage come hell or high water.

Writing Stuff:

Got the urban fantasy that was obliquely rejected from the Creative Loafing fiction contest bubbling to the top of the Critters queue this week. I’m curious to see what people’s opinions will be as it’s a bit more mainstream that a lot of the fantasy I toss up.

Currently reading Shatterday by Harlan Ellison. It’s a deeper river of a collection. Deathbird Stories was like rapids or even a waterfall. The emotions were vivid, obvious, and visceral in those stories. The tales in Shatterday are more subtle, requiring some reflection to get the kick-in-the-teeth emotional effect that is the Ellison trademark. I haven’t been moved to tears or nausea once, but I leave each story feeling rather wistful and sad–sometimes thoughtful, sometimes melancholy. I wish I could evoke emotions in my fiction with even a fraction of the finesse and skill of Ellison.

I hope I’ll be able to interview him at Dragon*Con. If I do get the opportunity, I wonder what the chances are of me making remotely sensible noises instead of twittering and stammering like a fool fangirl. *snort*

New word count: 1000 on Novel2. And I’m calling the section I wrote yesterday “Prologue.” So I guess I’m now on Chapter 1. Still uncertain how to work the mythology into the thing. Later. Later.

dude_the‘s flight was cancelled last night. He phoned to let us know and came back via MARTA after rescheduling his flight to this afternoon. Then he got bumped from that flight. He’s sticking around the airport to try to get on the late night flight. If he can’t, he’ll call us and come back here to crash for the night. Sheesh. Bugger AirTran, I sez. The bastards.

glenn5 called on my cell as we were heading out the door on the way to Hartsfield-Jackson. I think I probably sounded pretty abrupt or harried. I’m not used to getting calls on my cell, and we were rushing around trying to get dude_the squared away. As it turns out, of course, we needn’t have hurried. Must remember to get glenn5 our landline number. I only use my cell for emergencies and conventions.

Building up a huge tolerance to caffeine again. Dammit. That seems to be par with the Clonazepam. Can’t function without my java while I’m taking my meds, can’t function without the meds to take the edge off the pain. Not good.

Also got an email bounced I tried to send to britzkrieg. I tried to resend, B! Hope it made it to you re: Future Sixth Sense viewing.

And something happened to our garage door opener yesterday. As we were pulling in after dropping off dude_the (an altogether poorly fated endeavor), the door, while opening, suddenly slammed down on the hood of my car. I thought it was hard enough to dent it, but it seems that modern garage doors are pretty light. Doesn’t appear to have even scratched the paint, fortunately. But now the opener thing won’t work. When the button is pressed the motor makes motor noises, but the door doesn’t budge. Have no idea what the deal is. We weren’t far enough into the garage to have hit any of the sensors, and when Matthew got on the ladder to peer at it, he couldn’t see anything egregiously or obviously wrong. Probably going to have to call a garage door opener mechanic sort. Sigh.

As far as auspicious beginnings to weeks go, this wasn’t.

Writing stats:

1000-words on the novel inspired by The Lion in Winter. (To be abbreviated “Novel2” from here on in.) Have the mythology written up (1100 words of it), which is a first for me. There’s been a lot more world building on this project than I’m accustomed to doing. I’m not big with the world creation (unlike britzkrieg who actually has a world map created!), so this is a big deal for me. Normally the ‘verse takes shape as I write, and if I run into inconsistencies along the way, I go back and smooth them out in my rewrites. I’m pondering now if I should make the mythology write-up a sort of prologue. Except the 1000-words I wrote today is closer to being a prologue. But I’d like the mythos divulged in there somewhere. Hmm. Maybe as italicized quotes at the beginning of chapters? Urg, there’s gotta be a better way . . .*ponder ponder ponder* Actually no, worry about that later. Write story now.

75-day BFoD from RoF. Out that story goes again. I will get past Carina . . . one day.

It was a good game, even if the Panthers didn’t win. Aw heck, it’s tradition. We always root for the losing team. But there was much drunken shouting at the television, complete with swearing and cries of jubilation. Much fun had by all. Hobkin occasionally hopped off my lap in disgust during some particularly boisterous exclamations, but he’d always come back when things quieted down again. Overall, he seemed utterly unperturbed by all the excitement going on around him. He did chase Kristin up and down the hall a few times, to the mutual delight of both of them (Hobkin likes Kristin!). And he also got to nibble on a few pretzel ends (with the salt rubbed off) and got an extra large dinner (so he wouldn’t go after our pizza). So on the skunk scale of things, I suspect it was a good night for him.

Re: the game. I was thoroughly confused often. Again, that’s par. But all the yellow flags and what they meant required me to query dude_the often. Were there more flaggy things this year than usual? It seemed so. dude_the‘s explanations got less coherent as the game wore on and he got more and more booze into him. Mmmf. But I’m pretty much clear on the whole End Zone and Downs concept, which are really the salient bits.

The half-time show was . . . interesting. The musical entertainment was terribly lackluster, downright uninspiring. But Janet Jackson’s boob as revealed by Justin Timberlake was a nice bit of titillation (pun, sorry). Kristin’s sister has a TiVo, so after the flash, she called her so we could get a slow-mo/close-up description of the event. Silver pasties. Pffft.

Waking up this morning did not top my list of fun things to do, though. I wasn’t hung over, because I didn’t drink all that much, but I was quite groggy. The whole going to bed late paired with the Clonazepam conspired to making the morning a rather fuzzy-headed blur. So I took a few hours off work this afternoon.

But now the fun weekend is drawing to a close. dude_the is flying back to the Midwest this evening. Pook.

Writing stats:

If Max hadn’t called about his theatre project, I would have accomplished nothing this weekend. So I’m waving around “Icarus Exult” as my badge of productivity.

This week, back to the grind, dammit!