Author Archives: Eugie Foster

Dragon*Con 2nd all-staff meeting and Celexa

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The 2nd Dragon*Con all-staff meeting was yesterday whereupon I picked up a new reporter for the Daily Dragon, gabbed with a returning one, and socialized at length with fabu folks such as dire_epiphany, astralfire, sara1221, bevlovesbooks (and her eensy-bebe, Eleanor, who has teeny-tiny toes), and Dean-of-the-camera-but-no-LJ.

A huge hurray goes out to fingerman! Chairman Pat bequeathed upon him the coveted and shiny 15-year anniversary volunteer plaque. *flings confetti* A well earned and well deserved commendation.

Yesterday was a good day. I keep saying this, but I also keep forgetting, so apparently it merits repetition. I need to get out of the house more often. Working from home and flinging hamsters willy-nilly, I forget how much time I spend sequestered in the library, staring at my laptop. Getting out lets me unwind–flagrant introversion notwithstanding–and it also stokes my muse with fresh faces, real settings, and new experiences. I’m more productive after a few hours out and about than if I spent those hours nose-to-the-keyboard. And most importantly, I’m happier.

So yeah, on the heels of that not-so-brilliant insight, and after feeling nauseous, light-headed, groggy-unto-death (I ended up having to take a nap yesterday as well as crashing after dinner), and tremor-ridden–after only a single day on the stuff–I’ve decided on the out-the-window option for the Celexa. Odds are the side effects would pass in a couple weeks, but I need these couple weeks. It will stress me out far more to be laid out by the sleepies or the queasies right now than any possible 6-8 weeks-down-the-road benefit. Scary-nurse-lady teetered my confidence, but I know I’ve got enough of a handle on my moods and emotions to determine when and if I need to be on psychotropics. And I don’t; I may again at some point down the road, but I can deal a-ok right now.

   


Writing Stuff

*Squee!* I’m on the short list for the Southeastern Science Fiction Award (SESFA) in the Best Short Story of 2005 category! Mega thanks to Jason Sizemore for having the brilliant acumen and stunning good taste to publish “Oranges, Lemons, and Thou Beside Me” in Apex Digest!

But err, I still don’t know what to blog about for my Writer’s Vanity guest blogger spot on Wednesday. Gleep.

Received:
– Contract from Paradox for “The Archer of the Sun and the Lady of the Moon.” Of course, as soon as I start fretting, it shows up. At least that’s one hamster nicely in orbit.

Writing update

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Apex Digest editor Jason Sizemore dropped me a line letting me know my featured writer interview and story got “blinked” by Locus Online. To my knowledge, it’s my first blink. Locus deems me blink-worthy!

Received:
10-day form nyet from Farthing.

Not Received:
The contract from Paradox for “The Archer of the Sun and the Lady of the Moon.” Huh. I thought the editor was going to send it out last week. Meep?

You get what you pay for at the Pdoc’s

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Went to see the pdoc nurse practitioner to get my Adderall refilled yesterday. When you go in for a meds checkup with the nurse, they have you fill out this checklisty form in the waiting room where they try to concise a DSM diagnosis into one-word categories–“mood,” “sleep,” “appetite,” “interest,” “anxiety,” etc.–with 1 to 10 (bad to good) rankings.

I’m thinking, okay, this is subjective, and surely she’ll ask me questions and we can discuss it if she has concerns. Because, y’know, that’s what a doctor would do. So I fill it out based on how I’ve been sleeping and stressing this last week, giving “sleep” a “3” since my circadian cycles have been wonky, and mood a “3” as well because I’ve been juggling too many hamsters. And I also put down a “4” for appetite because, well, I’m taking an amphetamine, and it’s an appetite-suppressant. (Which, by the way, is an excellent way to lose weight.)

When I go in, she informs me that “I’m not doing good,” which I thought was a wee bit presumptuous since she’s exchanged all of two, maybe three sentences with me. And she pushes hard for me to get back on an antidepressant. I ask her what she’s basing her assessment on, and she says the 3 I gave “mood.”

Okay, so nurse lady doesn’t subscribe to my “it’s subjective” interpretation and doesn’t realize that that 3 is a 3 for me across the board, and that my board has never been profoundly depressed or psychotic. I try to explain this to her and that I didn’t think “mood” was an effective descriptor for everything that encompasses a person’s mental state, and I’m not suicidal or homicidal, and I’m really not all that depressed either; I’m mostly cranky and stressed.

Her response? “You keep going like this and you’ll end up in the hospital.”

WTF? First of all, I was diagnosed with mild depression–not a hospitalization caliber ailment–and I feel tons better now than I did when I was diagnosed years ago. Second, how can she find it in the least bit appropriate to tell anyone, especially someone who may be feeling emotionally frail, that if they “keep going like this you’ll end up in the hospital” based solely upon a 1 to 10 scale of a one-word descriptor? This woman hasn’t spent fifteen minutes talking to me in the three months she’s been aware of my existence!

I tell her, “No, I really won’t.” And explain to her how hard it was to get off the Effexor and that I would rather not go back on an antidepressant.

She continues to push and suggests I try Celexa which is a “more pure” SSRI than Prozac and isn’t an SNRI.

I try to point out that it wouldn’t take effect for six or so weeks in any case (by which time I fully expect to have selected the hamsters I want to keep in the air, and to have volleyed the rest of them over the fence), and she interrupts me and says “two weeks.”

Huh. Okay, my grad. school Psychopharmacology class was a loooong time ago. Maybe they’ve made strides in the antidepressant field. Might be worth trying.

As I make speculative noises, she rattles on how I should “take this at night before bed.” Since I took the Prozac in the AM, and I don’t want to take something that will make me tired because that’s the whole reason I’m on the Adderall–fighting the fatigue and all–I ask her “so this will make me sleepy?” And she says “no, you just take it before bedtime and when you wake up you’ll feel better.”

Do you get that she was talking to and treating me like a refugee from the short school bus?

Yeah. By this time I’m annoyed, upset, indignant, and doubting myself. Maybe I should go back on an antidepressant. After all, I was dwelling upon it before, and I’m going through a lot right now. But mainly, I just want to get my stupid Adderall refill and leave. So I give her the go ahead on the Celexa.

She enters prescriptions for both meds into the computer and off I go to the pharmacy. But Adderall is a controlled med and requires a hard-copy script, which nurse-lady should have known. I’m forced to go back and wait 45 minutes to get a stupid piece of paper, ensuring that I get caught in rush hour traffic, making an already upset-Eugie extremely unhappy.

After languishing for over an hour in Atlanta’s lovely traffic, I got home and looked up Celexa online. Length of time until effective: 6-8 weeks. May cause drowsiness.

In addition to bullying and coercing me, she lied to me.

I’m obviously sympathetic to the mental health profession, having that MA in Psychology and all, but I’m feeling pretty mistreated by it right now. And I have to wonder, how exactly is the sort of conduct she displayed going to be of benefit to anyone’s mental state?

Because I have indeed been stressed to my eyeballs, I took the Celexa last night. When I woke up this morning, I was groggy and light-headed. And I feel a headache coming on. Oh yeah, so helpful.

Now I’m debating whether it’s worth staying on it, because I was, after all, contemplating going back on an antidepressant, or if I should just pitch the stupid pills out the window.

I’m trying to base my decision not on my experience in getting them, but my overall mental state.

Right now, the window’s looking pretty enticing.

Feh. And she wants to see me back in six weeks. I’d say “no way in hell” except my alternative is to follow-up with a doctor to get my Adderall refilled, which has a co-pay. Seeing her, at least, is free.

Juggling too many hamsters

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Hamsters hamsters everywhere!

Between canadiansuzanne‘s son’s hamster, snarkydork_jodi‘s hamster, wicked_wish‘s posting of this adorable hamster-cupcake video, and my offhand comment likening writing fiction to washing dishes while juggling hamsters, I think the cosmos is trying to convey a hamster-illustrated message upon me. (I guess birds was too subtle.) And this metaphysical hamster-dispatch, I believe, is that I’ve got too many hamsters in the air.

Guess now would be a good time to revisit the whole “reinvention” thing. I’ve had friends who’ve “reinvented” themselves. Some have done it multiple times and afterwards they seem pretty much the same to me–maybe with a new wardrobe or new job or some-such, but fundamentally still them.

I’ve never properly understood the underlying motivation that prompts these episodes of self-overhaul. Even after major life changes–like our relocation to Georgia and the loss of my old day job–I didn’t feel like I was reinventing anything. It was the same old me, but in a new place doing different things.

I still don’t get it with regard to the nature of people and personalities, but I think I do understand the mindset and mood that drives it. Sort of. It’s a profound sense of discontent with the grounded and fundamental beliefs or assumptions about yourself, a dissatisfaction with deep underpinnings that require more than a few tweaks or a change in venue.

I’ve been feeling that way about my writing of late. With my frustration about obtaining the “next level,” and my desperation at ever breaking into the Big 3, I’m left with an overwhelming feeling of dissatisfaction–and dropped hamsters. Add onto that the glaring inability to make anything remotely like a decent living on short stories (who can survive on $.05/word??), and my failure at maintaining progress on my novels, and I’m left floundering in a big ole morass of reproachful hamsters at my feet.

After wrestling with that for a bit, I think I’ve come up with a solution: I need to put down some hamsters.

What does this mean on a non-abstract, “am I putting down this Siberian hamster or that Roborovskii hamster” level? I dunno, I’m still working on that. But I do know I’m feeling pretty fragmented and way over-stressed these days.

I want to make a living doing what I love, which is writing. That hasn’t changed, nor will it. But what I write, what I focus on, and where I concentrate my efforts, I think that needs a realign. I need to reorganize my priorities or I’m going to burn out. And if I burn out on writing, well, I may as well burn out on life.
   


Writing Stuff

New Words/Editing:
– 1600 on a freelance project. Several editing passes, polished, and sent off to the client. Payment received in less than 24 hours.
– 100 on the Swan Lake story. I shouldn’t have put it down the other day. I was on the verge of hitting flow, and now I seem to have lost my place. And there’s another hamster on the rug, dammit.

Published:
– basletum‘s interview of me for his “Give it Meaning” column.

Received:
– 9-day no grabbie from JJA at F&SF.

I think that might’ve been a dwarf hamster. Tossed him too high and now he’s quivering on top of a bookshelf.

Club 100 For Writers
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500/day
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Fairy portals sprouting in Michigan

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dean13 sent along this link from NPR on wee fairy doors popping up in Ann Arbor, MI. I want one! Although I’m inclined to think there’s already one under Hobkin’s hutch . . .

[Edit: dean13 found the artist’s website: urban-fairies.com (*squee!*)]

   


Writing Stuff

New Words/Editing:
– 1000 on the middle-grade novel –> Picture book effort. Only halfway into the story and my word count limit’s just about up. Urp. Must cut and tighten. Daunted has become intimidated.

Received:
– Payment for my “When the Guidelines Say for Children 7 to 12” article. The editor said it’ll probably be published in June.
– Acceptance and contract for my “10 Myths About Writing for Kids” article from Writing-World.com.

And now I’m thinking I need to start seriously considering doing lots more nonfiction. Dwelling on trying my hand at writing nonfiction for kids. I think I’d be decent at it. And this whole query/pitch->green light->pay thing, where I know I’ll get paid before I write something, there’s definite appeal there.

Club 100 For Writers
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500/day
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Empathizing with Sisyphus

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My wingstubs ache, my to-do list scares me when I look at it, and my circadian rhythms seem to have fallen into a bizarre pattern: I fall sleep for three hours after dinner, wake and work through the wee hours of the night, tip over at around 4-5AM, wake again a few hours later, and then go upstairs and work until dinner.

This has been going on for the last several days. It’s productive, but also disorienting. And there’s a surreal, Sisyphus-ian feel to everything. I’m whipping things off my plate as fast as I can, but more keeps piling up. And now stuff is starting to overflow. (yukinooruoni, I know I owe you a very overdue email). Urf. I need another plate.

   


Writing Stuff

Saw that a sneak peak of the June cover of Spider with “The Tax Collector’s Cow” in it is up on the “Coming Attractions” page of the Cricket Magazine Group website. The theme looks to be “cows.” Hee! Moo.

Got a note from Jason Sizemore that there’s going to be an Apex celebration/signing/promo event at Destinations Booksellers in New Albany, Indiana this summer. He asked if there was any chance I could make it. Sigh. There are decided disadvantages to living the glamorous (*snort*) life of a freelance writer. Being poor is one of them. I don’t see how there’s any way I can pull it off, but I hope they’ll raise a glass to me in absentia.

Also saw the cover art for Aegri Somnia. Quelle disturbing:

New Words/Editing:
– Started outlining the salient plot points of my middle-grade novel as prep for my rewrite. Finding myself rather daunted by this undertaking. Meep. Meep a lot. I was, however, reminded of how much I love this story.
– 200 words on the Swan Lake tale, interrupted when I got wind of another freelance gig, at which point I lost my momentum and switched gears.
– 1600-words on the second article for Writing-World.com. Revised, polished, and sent off.

Club 100 For Writers
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500/day
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Busy busy busy

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I was going to pen this rambling, meditative post on “reinventing oneself” but as it turns out, I’m too busy to give the topic the attention it needs. In a nutshell, I’ve been lurching and flailing through some fairly meaningless self-indulgent introspection and dwelling on what to do about it. Maybe I can go more in-depth into the subject tomorrow.

Anyone who knows me personally, it’s nothing to fret or freak about. No major life changes or anything, and mostly to do with my writing. And undoubtedly nothing major there either. Just your everyday angst and agitation.

   


Writing Stuff

Received:
– 8-hours to a SALE of my nonfiction article “When the guidelines say ‘for children 7 to 12’: An overview of children’s developmental reading stages from a writerly perspective” to Writing-World.com.

This was the article I queried, pitched, and subsequently wrote over the weekend. Plus the editor wants to see the other article I pitched to her, and she pays on acceptance! So yeah-for-sure the contract’s going out in the mail tomorrow. After all the research I did for that mongo freelance gig a few weeks back, I was pretty primed to write this. Using my Psych. degree makes for a happy Eugie. A huge thanks go out to basletum for bringing this publication to my attention!

– Email from the editor of GrendelSong that “The Goddess Queen’s Battlefield” is going to be in issue #2 not #3. Sooner publication, rah.

– 175-days YFOP from RoF, alas.

– At long last, the notes from the editor asking me to turn my middle-grade novel into a picture book. *gulp* Much sleeve rolling up to commence.

New Words/Editing:
– 500 on “When the guidelines say ‘for children 7 to 12′” and several editing passes and reference checks. Obviously, the fork’s stuck quivering up to the hilt in this one.

Club 100 For Writers
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500/day
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Pride & Prejudice: Keira Knightly

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Less hard of a crash yesterday than I expected. After a day of working in the library, I came down at the reasonable hour of 5PM, baked chocolate chip cookies and had dinner with fosteronfilm. Then we watched the Keira Knightly Pride & Prejudice, which I think pretty much wraps up my Jane Austen kick, and I flopped over with a skunk at the respectable bedtime of 10ish. And now I’m back to regular working hours. Well, almost regular working hours. I woke up this morning at 6ish, but that’s only a little early for me.

Pride & Prejudice was enjoyable, mostly because of Keira Knightly. The other actors, while adequate, didn’t particularly stand out, except for perhaps Judi Dench, who did a nice coldly intimidating and controlling Lady Catherine de Bourg. I was underwhelmed by Matthew Macfadyen as Mr. Darcy; Colin Firth he ain’t. While Firth’s Mr. Darcy pulled off sexy with aplomb, building his appeal from the character’s arrogance and pride, I couldn’t bring myself to go ga-ga over Macfadyen’s portrayal. His Mr. Darcy just came off as unlikable and awkward, which pretty much kills the romance aspect.

Still, Keira Knightly is adorable.

   


Writing Stuff

Published:
– The May Apex Online is now live with my featured writer interview and “Only Springtime When She’s Gone” for reading perusal/pleasure.

New Words/Editing:
– Did a final editing pass on the freelance project and sent it off.
– 1000 on a nonfiction article I pitched to an editor. I’m querying and pitching. Big, grown-up freelance writer me.

Received:
– Payment for my last freelance gig. Huzzah! That was nicely speedy.

Club 100 For Writers
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500/day
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Not the sharpest screwdriver in the toolshed

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Was feeling logy yesterday so took an additional 10mg of Adderall at around 2PM on top of my normal early-morning 20mg. Yep, that was an exceptionally ill-advised thing to do. Proceeded to stay up until 5AM in an enforced state of fervid wakefulness. But at least it was a productive insomnia. Got much work done including an overdue update on my Children’s Market Listing. But then, after I fell asleep, a small, fuzzy beastie woke me at 7:30 demanding breakfast.

So yeah, I’m not taking any Adderall today, and I expect there will be a hard crash later this afternoon.

   


Writing Stuff

I committed a major writerly blunder yesterday–possibly due to the Adderall-induced wired brainstate I was in. I accidentally submitted a story to a market that had previously rejected it. Doh!

I do keep meticulous records, and this is the first (and I hope last) time I’ve ever done this. It was a question of not scrolling quite high enough on my spreadsheet before deciding on the next market. Fortunately, I caught the error before the editor did, and it was an electronic submission, so once I realized my boo-boo, I fired off a contrite “oops, sorrysorry, please ignore my submission” email and have since received editorial confirmation. But I still feel quite the dimmy.

New Words:
– 600 on freelance work. Finished up my current gig pending a final editing pass.

Received:
– Invite from Jason Sizemore to be a guest blogger on Apex Digest‘s “A Writer’s Vanity” Wednesday the 17th. Don’t know what to blog about yet, and I’ll be following in the footsteps of wicked_wish who’s doing a guest stint this Wednesday–ye verily a daunting act to follow. Ponder ponder ponder.
– 84-day pass from On Spec. Damn you Canadians with your beady eyes and flapping heads! *ducks and runs from wistling and canadiansuzanne*
– Sneak peek of the artwork done by Aaron Siddall for “A Patch of Jewels in the Sky” forthcoming in June’s Dragonfly Spirit:

Isn’t it shiny? This is another one for my library office wall.

Club 100 For Writers
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500/day
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Tristan & Isolde

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Watched Tristan & Isolde last night, which I was surprised to find myself liking. I’m actually not a huge fan of the Arthurian legends. I like the era–knights in armor, damsels in distress, chivalry and sword fights etc.–but the foundation stories don’t excite me; they’re too downer-heavy. I guess I’ve got a pretty limited appetite for tragic and unrequited love. Also, the base “Tristan and Isolde” story is way disjointed–two, maybe three Isoldes, a love potion, Tristan perpetually being poisoned, and I think there’s a dragon or something in there to boot–but Hollywood did a good job pulling it together, paring off all the superfluous characters and side intrigues.

I’ve been a fan of Rufus Sewell since I first saw him in Dangerous Beauty, one of my all-time favorite movies (Veronica Franco is my hero), and then Dark City. I thought he was perfect in the role of Lord Marke, plus he’s way hawt, which ramped up my sympathy for the character and made the love triangle that much more tragic. I was less impressed with the actor who played Tristan. I think the role was too much for him; he didn’t have the range to pull off tormented, and so mostly came across as sullen and petulant. However, to make up for that shortcoming, Thomas Sangster, the child actor who played Young Tristan, was fantastic (he also appeared in Love Actually as Sam, Liam Neeson’s son). That kid’s got excellent screen presence, not to mention with his gymnastics background, he was pretty damn impressive in the fight scene he did. If the world is fair, he’s got a solid career in front of him. He looks way younger than he is, though. IMDB says he was born in 1990, and I would never have pegged him as 14/15 in T&I.

And I haven’t even touched upon how lushly beautiful the movie was. Shot on location in Ireland and the Czech Republic, the sets and cinematography were breathtaking.

A surprisingly satisfying movie-watching experience, all-in-all.

   


Writing Stuff

New Words:
– 100 on the Swan Lake tale. Wah! The story’s there, but the words aren’t coming. Bludgeoning of muse scheduled for later.
– 900 on freelance work. Ho hum.

Received:
– 10-day pleasant pass from Aeon: “a clever tale, and a well-written one . . . Still . . .” with a “We look forward to seeing another from you soon” consolation prize.

Club 100 For Writers
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500/day
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