Category Archives: Blog

The Prozac has utterly curtailed the dizzy/woozy Effexor withdrawal effects, which is fantastic. Although I’m still feeling a wee bit short tempered. Still, even that is improving. I didn’t have the burning desire this morning to strangle the Barnes & Nobles information desk employee when he kept pointing me to the Poetry section (where I’d just spent 45-minutes fruitlessly looking for the book I wanted) and telling me that everything was organized by author (duh). Nor did I feel the need to get out my stabby pen when he said he couldn’t help me after I explained that I didn’t know the name of the author (editor actually). And I didn’t even feel murderous when he informed me that their computers could only do searches by title and author name, although I know that any book searching software worth two copper plugs can do a subject search. However, I will admit to feelings of exasperation when I had to ask him twice to do a simple subject search. Nevertheless, it was fleeting exasperation that dissipated once he found what I was looking for upon conducting the requested subject search, as I knew he would. It’s not like I pulled out an uzi and started mowing down hapless bookstore patrons.

Y’know, I simply like bookstores (and libraries). I spent several hours just wandering up and down the aisles, browsing. I think I spent a whole half an hour poking around in the reference section alone. Yep, I’m a bibliophile.

I do find it distressing that I didn’t see a single SF/F magazine in their newsstand section–not an Asimov’s, Analog, F&SF, or Realms of Fantasy anywhere. I’m telling myself it’s because they sold out and are due for the next issues, not because they’ve decided to simply stop carrying any.

I like denial.

Writing Stuff

I also got a note from my Aberrant Dreams editor, Ernie Saylor, letting me know that I’m in today’s Slip of the Pen (their webcomic). I’ve never been immortalized by a comic strip before. Hee!

Published:
– My appreciation of “Hell Notes” by M.K. Hobson (bricoleur) (published 2/9/2005 in SCI FICTION) as part of David Schwartz’s (snurri) ED SF project.

Received:
– Confirmation from Futurismic (after I queried them) that they’re still considering a story of mine they’ve had since mid-October. I’m very relieved that the Internet beasties didn’t eat my submission and knocking on wood that the tale passes final muster.

LiveJournal once again seems to not be emailing me comments. Well, snartleblast! If I’m not responding to your comments, it’s because I haven’t @#$! seen them. At least Comcast has worked out whatever was bringing our Internet connection down so consistently recently. (Have I just jinxed us?) We’ve had fairly stable connectivity for the last couple days. fosteronfilm and I started talking about switching to DSL over the weekend. Maybe Comcast bugged our modem and overheard us? While it’s true that if Comcast can maintain a semblance of reliability, I’m less inclined to switch and contend with all that assorted hassle, but considering how aggravating their perpetual “we’re up, we’re down” service has been, we’ll see . . .

We spent Sunday afternoon with sruna and pleroma festively hanging out, nibbling upon holiday delicacies, and drinking mead and the best hot chocolate evah! Well, fosteronfilm had the mead. I had three sips from his glass, which is probably about all I can safely down. It was very yummy. But sruna absolutely makes the most fabulous hot chocolate. It’s sublime.

I think the Prozac may be helping with the Effexor withdrawal icks, although I’m not sure yet. Then again, it could be that I’m crested over the worst of the symptoms anyway. Still getting dizzy bouts, but they’re fewer, further apart, and less intense. Regardless, I’m staying on the Prozac, at least until next week, just to be safe.

Writing Stuff

Published:
– “Only Springtime When She’s Gone” (reprint) in issue #7 of Neometropolis
– “Spring Arrives on a Hob’s Tail” in Story Station.

Hmm. A Spring theme for December?

These are both online and free, so hop on over for a read! The former is a SF, cyberpunkish re-telling of the Hades & Persephone Greek myth that was originally published in jinzi‘s anaisdotmfk.com, and the latter is a fairy tale inspired by Hobkin and his tail.

Looking over my logs, it seems that I’m now awaiting payment on no fewer than five recently published stories:
– “The Bunny of Vengeance and the Bear of Death” in Fantasy Magazine. The check on this one’s rather outstanding now. I may need to do a bit of polite nudging.
– “Oranges, Lemons, and Thou Beside Me” in Apex Digest.
– “My Friend is a Lesbian Zombie” in Here & Now.
– “When the Lights Go Out” in Ennea (9).
and now
– “Spring Arrives on a Hob’s Tail” in Story Station.

I wonder if I’ll get these before the new year or if I should go ahead and start furrowing my brow at getting all my 2005 bookkeeping in order? I do quite a bit of end-of-year accounting for my writing stuff and the sooner I can get started on it, the better.

New Words: -400 and several editing passes on the rewrite of “Cyberevenge Inc.” Sent it back to the folks at TQR. I hope they buy it. It’s a vicious little tale that I was inspired to write in 2002 after a run-in with a nasty cyberstalker. It was a very cathartic piece to write. The first place I sold it to was an anthology project that crumbled before it could see publication, but I’m actually rather pleased about that as it gave me the opportunity to go in and do some tweaking and tuning before I sent it out again. It’s a much stronger story than it was. And because of the subject matter, I think I’d rather have it be published in an ezine. Normally I prefer the feel of hard copy publication over electronic, but the ironic appropriateness for this in an Internet venue is just too chock-full of pointy goodness.

Club 100 For Writers
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500/day
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The Effexor withdrawal paired with the extra spiky Monday-on-Adderall-after-the-weekend-holiday effects is nearly psychedelic. I’m getting dizzy waves that border on bona-fide visuals. I’d say “whee!” except it’s really not all that enjoyable. My days of finding vertigo recreational appear to have passed.

t_rex mentioned that some folks use Prozac to help wean off Effexor as it often diminishes the side effects–which makes total sense on a pharmacological level–and it’s much easier to get off Prozac. Since I’m becoming less functional rather than more, and I’ve got leftover Prozac, I’m putting myself on a 20mg/day dose for a week and seeing how that works out. It’s either that or going on an every other day taper with the Effexor, and I want to avoid taking any more of that stuff ever, ever again. *wobble* Sheesh.

Writing Stuff

Received:
– Payment from Stephen Eley of Escape Pod for “My Friend is a Lesbian Zombie.” I’m delighted to get paid from Stephen so very promptly but also a bit anxious that I haven’t received payment from Here & Now yet. Well, everything with H&N seems delayed, so I shouldn’t be surprised.
– Rewrite request from TQR for “Cyberevenge Inc.”

New Words: Maybe 2? Did a couple editing passes on “Arachne’s Gift” from Critters feedback, and I’m pretty happy with it. After some agonizing and dithering, I decided that I’m going to go ahead and send it to Cricket this week, as I had originally intended. The Purple Crayon said that some of the editorial staff might be staying on for a while in a freelance capacity after the move, and honestly, I can’t hope for a better reception than to send it to the editor I already know and love, even with all this pending upheaval.

Club 100 For Writers
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While my p-doc said I could just stop taking the Effexor and it wouldn’t be a problem, he was obviously mistaken. I’m getting these periodic bouts of lightheaded dizziness, like falling. At first I thought it was the Adderall giving me a particularly hard kick for some reason, but since I’m on my weekend “holiday,” it obviously can’t be. It’s not a bad sensation, but it’s distracting, especially since it seems to be happening with greater frequency rather than less. I remember a similar effect when I first started taking the stuff, and it passed in a few days. I expect it’ll get better soon, but until then, it makes both stairs and driving chancy enterprises.

fosteronfilm and I saw Narnia with yukinooruoni yesterday. yukinooruoni and I were absolutely charmed by it. fosteronfilm was less so. I was delighted from the opening scene to the closing one (during the credits–so don’t rush to leave the theater). They did an excellent job with casting. All the actors were superb and believable–both children and adults (the White Witch was perfect, absolutely perfect). The movie was very faithful to the book, to splendid effect, and the FX were spectacular. I wish they would have shown more of the good guys–talking animals and all–but the majority of the FX scenes seemed to focus on the White Witch’s army over Aslan’s. Matthew didn’t like the children at all, and can’t get past the Christian propaganda elements of the original story and the resulting (literal) deus ex machina, the grump. The Chronicles of Narnia were a cherished and beloved favorite of mine when I was little (and too young to grasp either the Christian symbolism or any of the other problematic elements of C.S. Lewis’s writing). Now I have the urge to re-read The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, and perhaps the whole series.

Had a follow-up appointment with my p-doc today. And . . .*drum roll please*. . . he agreed to let me stop taking the Effexor. I am now officially off any anti-depressants, which makes me happy! (Yes, the irony of that sentence is pretty gooey, isn’t it?) I explained to him that I hadn’t upped the dose past the 37.5mg starting amount since I was having such a good month in November, and that I’m sure the improvement is all due to the Adderall–since my weekend “holidays” are pretty sluggish. He suggested I up the Effexor and wean off the Adderall, but when I brought up that it seems likely that Effexor would be harder to get off of than a measly little amphetamine dependency, plus the shiny speed makes me happy, regulates my sleep, and gives me energy, whereas there’s no reason to believe the Effexor would do any of that. He agreed. So I’m staying with the Adderall . . . at least until my HMO adds Provigil to their list of spiffy drugs.

Writing Stuff

Received:
65-day form no from Glimmer Train.
65-day personal no from the From the Trenches anthology after making it to the short list.
157-day no-with-obligatory-comments from Leading Edge.

Ow, ouch. Not a good day, rejection-wise. Ooo, my ego is smarting. I need a band-aid.

New Words: 500 on “Vain and Vie.”

3,321 / 20,000 (16.6%)

Club 100 For Writers
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500/day
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