Author Archives: Eugie Foster

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For all Georgians: Vote Yes for Amendment 6 tomorrow!

Action alert from the Humane Association of Georgia:

VOTE YES ON AMENDMENT 6 for the Dog & Cat License Plate that will help save lives!

AMENDMENT 6 would establish a program that would control dog and cat overpopulation and thereby reduce the number of animals housed and killed in animal shelters. The program will be funded by the voluntary purchase of special license plates.

WHY DOES GEORGIA NEED A DOG & CAT LICENSE PLATE?

Dog and cat overpopulation is a tragic problem in all areas of Georgia. Every year, thousands of healthy, friendly cats and dogs are killed in Georgia shelters because people have allowed their pets and strays to breed, and there are not enough homes for them all. IN addition, many Georgians cannot afford to sterilize their pets. Sterilization (spaying/neutering) is the humane solution to dog and cat overpopulation. It reduces:

*The number of stray cats and dogs
*Dogs and cats housed and killed in shelters
*City/county tax burden for animal control
*Destruction to property and livestock
*Health risks and bad behavior
*Car accidents
*Wildlife and habitat destruction
*Spread of diseases like rabies
*Injuries to people and other animals

Purchase of the license plate would be voluntary. It is an easy way to fund this important program, and the great-looking license plate will show others that you care about dogs and cats.

HOW WILL THE DOG & CAT STERILIZATION PROGRAM WORK?

As with other “specialty” license plates, county tag offices will collect additional funds with the usual tag fee for each license plate purchased. The money generated by sales of the plate will:

*Help pay for sterilization procedures
*Provide educational materials about the importance of sterilization
*Promote sales of the plate

The Georgia Department of Agriculture will use an existing accounting system to pay licensed veterinarians in Georgia to perform spay or neuter procedures for dogs and cats.

FOR MORE INFORMATION, PLEASE CONTACT:

Humane Association of Georgia (HAGA)
1317 Hearst Drive
Atlanta, GA 30319
(404) 827-0603
(478) 745-4099
http://www.humaneassociationofgeorgia.org

PLEASE VOTE YES ON AMENDMENT 6 ON NOVEMBER 5TH!

Hot damn! Cricket sent me a rewrite requet for my kitsune folktale! Not as good as a sale, but much better than a kick in the teeth!

This will require some dwelling upon . . .

Haven’t had a chance to update my LJ in days and days and days what with having company and all. Paul and Nick are here. Hurray! Right now, the boys are asleep and Hobkin is having a snack, so I’m taking this moment to scribble down a quick “catch up” entry.

October is perfect hot tub weather. Just perfect. Matthew thought we were all going to overflow the tub, but somehow, we managed not to.

We went to see the Spooky Puppets Halloween Show II at the Center for Puppetry Arts last night. Wasn’t sure what to expect, but there was beer, wine, and baked goods, adult-themed puppets, and really cute lasses dressed in a red she-devil unitard and black vinyl bat girl ensemble, respectively. Alcohol and puppets and babes! Much fun was had by all. And there was even a short little haunted house walkthru beforehand. Thanks, glenn5 for letting me know about this.

But we forgot to tape Firefly last night. For the folks who saw it, was it any good?

The boys put on their XY geek hats and opened up the computer too. They installed a slave 80 GB hard drive and 128 MB of RAM. Our system is faster, bigger, and they didn’t kill it! Hurray! And the price for computer upgrades has really gone down . . .

We also went to see Lilo and Stitch at the local second run theater. My God it’s funny, and poignant, and sweet. I loved it! And so did the boys so it’s not just me being a girlie-girl. Hobkin’s Godmother has a young skunk that she got at about the same time we got Hobkin. She named hers “Stitch.” A more appropriate name doesn’t exist. If anyone wonders what having a pet skunk is like, think Stitch from Lilo and Stitch. Coming home after the movie, I couldn’t help but check Hobkin’s sides for extra arms.

We have a lot of Halloween candy left over. We only had something like twenty kids come by. Where were they all? Oh well, more candy for us. I’ve been swinging on a sugar buzz for days. *twitch*

Matthew liked my bunny costume. Although every time I sat down, I ended up on my tail. There must be a trick to wearing round little bunny tails.

Happy (belated) Halloween, y’all!

Watched Saint Sinner last night with Matthew and Paul, the Clive Barker made-for-TV movie on the Sci-Fi channel. I think Clive Barker would be fun to hang with at a party. Or maybe he’d be kinda scary.

Having seen some of his other stuff, and read his horror short fiction, Saint Sinner came across as his attempt at horror comedy. He doesn’t elicit the same sorts of laughs that, oh, say Joss Whedon does with his brand of horror wit, but there was certainly a humorous irony that speckled the movie. It’s the kind of funny that makes you pull your lips back from your teeth and chuckle, rather than a delighted belly laugh.

And I don’t think Clive thinks people are very bright in general.

Overall, it was fun. Nothing monumental, but fun. And there was a LOT of gratuitous clothing. In a story about succubi, one would assume there would be nekkidness. And yet. Many strategically placed sheets, though.

I wish Clive owned the rights to Nightbreed so he could finish up the sequel. Now that was good Clive Barker.

A topic has come up several times in chats between my husband and I, and now Paul. It’s about Internet anonymity. Our consensus appears to be that it’s too much responsibility for some people.

Sure, it’s nice to be able to say what you want behind a wall of facelessness. But it allows cowardly assholes to be as abusive and spiteful as they want, without fear of the normal retributions of such hateful behavior–such as a fist in the nose, or people knowing what sort of person you are.

Okay, I’m fanatical about keeping records when I write.

Continue reading →

I had Matthew do first reader duties on my catharsis story the other day. Everything I write goes through him first before it gets sent through my critique groups gamut. He’s got a better eye for pacing and tone than anyone I know and my stories don’t graduate from zero draft to first draft status until after he’s had a go at them.

But, get this, my horrific little tale made him go squick. Hee! Matthew watches movies like Hellraiser and Poltergeist that send me cowering under the covers (yes, I’m a timid girlie-girl, shut up) and I wrote something that gave him the willies!

Rah!

Well, I believe the nail has gone into the coffin of the Halloween story. At the Shakespeare Tavern on Saturday, I had an idea for a light little SF tale, a bit of Picture of Dorian Gray meets Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. I jotted it down in my idea file with the intention of back burnering it until after I’d finished up the other stuff I was working on. Well, the “catharsis” story is done and waiting for critique, but I still couldn’t get back into my Halloween tale. However, I’m 1500 words into my humorous SF ditty.

Sigh.

Ah well. The important thing is that the words flow. It’s irritating that they don’t always flow where I want them to, but at least they’re not bottlenecked behind some logjam.

I also wrote a 1000-word essay for the hell of it. Non-fiction is so much easier to write. I should start looking into more non-fiction markets, I suppose. They pay better and there’s a bigger demand for it. It’s just not where my interests lay. But it’s really so much easier. Argh.

In other news, Paul is coming down to visit next week for the traditional Foster Halloween fête. Hurray! And next week Nick will join him. And I still don’t have a costume. I think this weekend we need to make a trip out to Party City for some Halloweeny goodness.

Finished up my “catharsis” story and then went back in to cull. Managed to lop off around 1000 words, leaving it a nice, manageable 6500. Yay!

I’ve queued it up at Critters. I debated using an MPC, but I think I’d rather try to finish the Halloween story this week rather than mull over the critiques coming in.

According to my logs, this is the first story I’ve completed since early August–calculations based upon completion of zero draft, not finished product. Glah. That’s too much time. Way too much time.

But, looking at the big picture, I’m well within my goal of twelve short stories a year. This one makes my eleventh for 2002. Rah. Sort of.