Club 100 for Writers
27/100
500/day
15
Feeling better today, although still nasally challenged. Went into work clutching my magical bag of pharmaceuticals. All hail the Sudafed gods. Fortunately, it was a fairly quiet day in the office as people are winding down for the holidays. I sat in a snoggy haze, dazedly plucking at my computer and drinking tea, without too much interference.
Received an adorable Harry & David holiday moose jar stuffed with two bags of moose munch nibblings from teflaime yesterday. *waves* Thanks, sweetie! During one of my less phlegmy episodes, Matthew and I wolfed down a bowl of moose munch while watching Christmas in Connecticut with our new moose friend.
Also watched the SciFi channel’s adaptation of Ursula K. LeGuin’s Earthsea novels. Well, they certainly took an interesting approach to the classic trilogy. I guess it made sense to merge all the storylines so as to diminish the elapsed time that happens across the novels. Also to introduce a love interest, mutate the religion of Atuan and all of Earthsea, totally change the personalities of major characters, and . . . no, wait. It didn’t really make sense. Actually, it pretty much sucked. I hear Phobos acquired the screen rights to The Left Hand of Darkness. I hope they can do a better job of adapting it than the SciFi channel did with Earthsea.
Word count: 500 on the SF WIP. Hard to get back into the swing of things after being a couch slug for several days. But this story is getting very close to the “done” state.
Club 100 for Writers
26/100
500/day
14
Still feeling somewhat crappy today, so decided to take another day off. *sneeze* I don’t think the frigid icy snap we’re having, courtesy Canada, is doing me any good. The incredible dryness reminiscent of Midwestern winters is certainly not.
In better news, cpolk did the Santa hat meme with my Hobkin icon. Isn’t it adorable? I have hereby swiped it for the holidays.
Went to see A Christmas Carol at the Shakespeare Tavern on Saturday. It was, by far, the best production–play, movie, whatever–of that Charles Dickens classic that I have ever experienced. I’ve been feeling pretty saturated on the CC front for several years now, and I was actually not all that enthusiastic about Saturday’s theater outing as I was beginning to come down with some phlegmy cold symptoms, but we had the tickets so out I went. They started with several, lovely madrigalish carols and I was laughing out loud within the first five minutes of the first scene, a state of mirth I generally maintained for the whole play. Not that there weren’t poignant bits; but, like with all productions at the Shakespeare Tavern, the director knows that humor is the best stage device there is. I’m still blown away by their amazing sense of pacing. Never a dull moment. It got us properly into the festive, holiday spirit. I highly recommend the Tavern’s Christmas Carol to any and all in the Atlanta area. Go see it before the run ends!
Did a lot of prezzie shopping over the weekend. Continue reading
Ugh, feeling very behind on Christmas shopping efforts. I suspect this weekend will be jam packed full of shopping adventure. I imagine Hobkin will be verily displeased.
Got a note back from Carina. She can’t get me the full critique as she’s going out of town for the weekend, but she said she really liked my story! Okay, I’m sending it off to market now.
Received word from Andrew that my princess fantasy has been bumped up the queue and will go up next week. Good timing that.
Word count: 600 on the SF WIP. Entering the climax. And suddenly I’m in the homestretch. A couple more days and I might actually finish this one.
Club 100 for Writers
25/100 – one quarter of my goal. And now even when I don’t feel like writing, I’m loathe not to make an effort at it because I don’t want to start all over again at “1.” Plus I find that if I force myself to at least try, I can get 100 words no problem, and 500 with just a bit of muse-coaxing. Neato.
500/day
13
I’m feeling in a less-than-communicative mood today, so instead of writing, here’s some pictures of our festive, Christmas décor, plus a couple of Hobkin, because he’s just that cute.
Hobkin is such a good boy! The flu-like symptoms I was having, well, seems they were a pretty low-grade flu . . . which I’ve subsequently conferred upon the poor fuzzwit. After dinner, he was cuddled up with me on the couch, and suddenly he jumped up and went scampering away. Now that isn’t an uncommon occurrence, so I didn’t think anything of it until the unmistakable sounds of a skunk being sick to his stomach started coming from the kitchen. I sprang up to check on him, and found him sicking up with his head in his litter pan. Poor lil guy.
Hobkin’s very good about running to his area to be sick (which has a nice, linoleum floor, making it much easier to clean than carpet), but this was the first time he was considerate enough to do so right in his litter box! I praised him effusively and gave him a mint sandwich (Pepto Bismol on bread) to ease his tummy.
Hobkin is such a good boy. And he seems much better today.
Word count: 500 on the SF WIP.
Club 100 for Writers
23/100
500/day
11
More Christmas shopping, check. No more flu-like symptoms, hurray! Could it be that my flu shot nipped it in the bud? It’s more likely I ate something that didn’t like being eaten yesterday . . .
Heard that the current managing editor of Tangent is stepping down in January. There’s some uncertainty whether the publication will continue after that happens. I guess they’re looking for a replacement managing editor, unless Dave Truesdale agrees to resume the helm he relinquished a year ago. I hope they find someone. I really have enjoyed writing reviews for them.
Word count: 500. Launching back into the SF story.
Club 100 for Writers
22/100
500/day
10
Accomplished some Christmas shopping over the weekend. There’s still much to do. I need another week in December to prep for the holidays! And I think I might be coming down with something flu-like, despite having received one of the rare and exclusive flu shots. Ugh.
Finished, at long last, my review for Tangent of this week’s Sci-Fiction story and emailed it off to ye olde editor.
Received a 33-day “clever but not for us” from On Spec. I think I need to really mull over whether it’s worth my while spending the oversea postage on the handful of foreign markets that don’t take electronic submissions.
Word count: 150 + (-)500.
Had an excellent brainstorming session with Matthew on the SF piece. Hacked off one of the sub-plot aspects of the story in order to give it better focus. Much happier with this approach. My hubby is quite clever. I think I’ll keep him.
Club 100 for Writers
21/100
500/day
9
Watched The Santa Claus 2 and Love Actually yesterday, both charming and utterly fitting movies for the season. During Santa Claus 2, high-pitched squeaks began at roughly one minute intervals. Sounded like a robot mouse was being systematically tortured. At first, we thought it was the DVD, but rewinding and fast forwarding didn’t duplicate the chirps. Then we thought it was the fiber optic tree over the mantle as it has a revolving part which causes the colors to change. We turned that off, but the electric mouse continued its intermittent shrieks. Spent the next half hour standing by the security motion detector, the glass break alarm, and finally the smoke detectors before determining that it was one of the upstairs smoke detectors. And it continued squawking after we disconnected it and removed the battery. I’m totally baffled at what powers the things now. But it quit its complaints after we put in a new battery.
There are a lot of devices in our home whose workings baffle me.
Saw on The Third Alternative‘s message board that issue #40 with my novelette “Running on Two Legs” in it is now at the printers and the editor hopes to begin mailing it out by next weekend or sooner. Squee! Also it looks like my story will be in the venerable position of last! I’m so excited. I really love this story.
