It’s not raining.
Wow.
Just…wow
Today, thank ghod, there are no errands, the bills are paid, and my intention is to get some damn’ writing done. And also start clearing the living room so the painter can get to the walls when she manifests. Finding places to stack things — that’s going to be a challenge.
Progress on Necessity’s Child
63,848/100,000 words OR 63.8% complete
Kezzi sniffed. “Who tells the truth to a gadje?”
I write this morning to bring you news of a philanthropic sheep, a sheep of heart, and of means. Looking at him, (which you may do here) you might not think he’s such a much. You’d be wrong.
From the catalog: This cuddly felted wool sheep will warm up your tree and employ women in Kathmandu.
Mind you, I don’t know what the sheep’s business interests are, in Kathmandu, or what the connection between a warm tree and employing women is, precisely. But it seems worthy work. Worthy work, for which the sheep ought rightly to be commended.
Comma wars apart, do take time to look around the SERRV site. The paper catalog, which arrived at the Cat Farm yesterday, has lots of yummy stuff in it.
Yesterday, Steve had a doctor’s appointment. The doctor’s office being affiliated with the hospital that’s staying in town (as distinct from the hospital that’s leaving town), it has acquired — a television set. That’s right, a television set. And there’s no way to get away from the derned thing. I’m completely baffled by the ubiquity of television sets, especially in doctor’s offices, where people are already feeling unwell or anxious*, but the receptionist said that it was now “policy” that the television had to be both present, and on.
Gah.
Doctor visit done, we to the post office to close SRM’s box and open one for us. There’s a forwarding order on the old box (which is one short hall away from the new box), so anything in the system to SRM or to us at PO Box 707 should arrive just fine. In future, however, our address is:
Sharon Lee and Steve Miller
PO Box 1586
Waterville ME 04903
Splinter Universe mail should also go to the new address.
After that important piece of bidness was taken care of, we were off to Home Despot, and to Maroons, and then home, by way of Arby’s for lunch, and Hannaford, for groceries.
This morning, bread is on the rise. I have some business correspondence to deal with and a trip to town to accomplish an errand that inconveniently could not be dealt with yesterday.
The weatherbeans are calling for rain — and rain has answered their call.
———–
*I was once trapped in a hospital waiting room where the television had been tuned to a “nature” channel. Nothing wrong with that, right?
Ahem.
The segment I was treated to involved interviews with people who had witnessed and/or survived attacks by bears.
You try reading your book, while your back is to the television set, from which are clearly audible the sobs of the groom who had witnessed his bride savaged and consumed.
Haircut today; no purple stripes. I still have some purple from the last time.
Also had to call the insurance company that covered us when I worked at the day-job, to let them know that the claim they denied from June of 2010(!) was from a doctor I’ve never seen, and they should straighten out their records.
In the course of that conversation, it came out that I was still listed as an active member of the plan, though Steve was not.
Which meant that I had to call HR at the late, unlamented day-job, and tell them that they needed to remove me from the pool.
Honestly, folks, do I gotta do everything myself?
In other news, the editorial pass through Necessity’s Child is done. The crowd roared! And the author muttered under her breath, ’bout dern time.
For those playing along at home, the score is:
63,134/100,000 words OR 63% complete
For bonus points, and my thanks — I heard a Jackson Browne song on the radio today, and it was not a Jackson Browne song that I believe I’ve ever heard before. It’s lyrics have to do with paying a debt from a bad bet, and also being two men inside — one looking for love, which the other wants to hide.
Anybody got a clue? A title? A pointer?
As some of you know, “Guaranteed Delivery” was posted to Splinter Universe in September. It’s a story about leadership, and fame, among other things, and generated a comment from od_mind, over in the Splinterverse discussion group, in which he comments that the story reminds him of Walter Jon Williams’ Drake Maijstral novels, which also deal with leadership, and fame.
First, if you haven’t read the Drake Maijstral series, you should do so — most especially you should do so if you’re a fan of Alexei Panshin’s Anthony Villiers’ novels. Walter’s books are just newly available as ebooks from Amazon and BN.
Second, the notion of a society that runs on fame and ratings and an aristocracy that is more or less always on camera. . .isn’t original with Walter, either. (This isn’t a complaint; it’s an observation. It’s not at all uncommon for writers to riff off of each other’s ideas, or for authors to be caught by the same phenomenon, and to write a story about whatever it is. The stories will be different, even very different. It’s only part of what makes the writing gig so much fun.)
Anyhow. Back in the late sixties and early 70s, when I was stuffing my head full of every bit of fiction I could put my eyes on, I read a whole run of older SF stories about what we would now call Reality TV. A young woman — usually it was a young woman — was followed constantly by a camera, her life projected for millions to watch.
Some of the stories questioned the ethics of the show’s producers introducing “plot devices” in order to shore up sagging ratings when life got too placid. Other stories wanted to talk about what happened to a star when she got old, (and of course ugly) and had to be replaced by a younger (prettier) girl, in order for the show to hold audience interest.
Then, of course, there was Isaac Asimov, who posited “dreamies” — movies made by recording the thoughts and sensations of coherent dreamers, which were then mass produced for public consumption.
Moving up in time, now we actually have Reality TV, and Facebook, and Twitter and the rest of the social media, which encourages people to live publicly.
It’s interesting when science fiction is almost right.
I? Am officially cross-eyed. Which is ghod’s way of telling you to knock off for the night.
So, today, I did the in-town errands, some of the in-house errands, and skritched cats many times.
I also spent a big chunk of the day down in the guts of Necessity’s Child. I believed for a brief time that I might need to recast a chapter, but examination proved that all the chapter in hand needed was, y’know, some hints to the reader about why the character was reacting as they were.
It doesn’t count unless it’s written down. You’d think I’d know this by now, wouldn’t you?
I spent more time than I had budgeted for over at Lulu, what with having to report a couple of copyright violations, but I’m pleased to announce that!
Print editions of Barnburner and Gunshy, the Wimsy, Maine and/or Jen Pierce mysteries, may now be purchased from Lulu. This link goes to an ordering page.
And now? I’m going to go fall on my face.
G’night.
1. Errands in town: bank, post office, grocery, Staples, Kmart
2. Chores in house: laundry, cat boxes, dishes, filing
3. Skritch cats
4. Do some work
Yeah, still working deep in the innards. Fixed a Ghods of Plot problem today. Ahhhh. That’s better.
For those writers who read here, and who may not have seen it elsewhere — Publisher Fitzhenry & Whiteside is apparently given to creative interpretation of contract language, and professes to believe that they have the right to refuse to honor contract terms on whim. Doranna Durgin, who is a very nice person, a skilled writer, and who really doesn’t need this sort of nonsense explains all.
Follows a commercial break.
Remember that the Calamity’s Child special October eBook sale is still going on. For one slim payment of ninety-nine cents, you can download two Lee-and-Miller stories to the eReader of your preference.
Also! If you’re thinking about giving somebody a Nook, or a Kindle, or, heck, a tablet computer for the upcoming holidays — why not pre-load it with reading material? I’m thinking specifically Lee and Miller reading material, naturally, but generalizing from the specific also works. Yes, it is a good idea. You’re welcome.
For Lee and Miller eChapbooks, including all of the Adventures in the Liaden Universe® chapbooks #1 through #17; as well as collaborative and singleton stories, and The Tomorrow Log, check out Pinbeam Books, for a list and handy clickable links to Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and Smashwords.
For Lee and Miller, and Lee, eNovels in the format of your choice, you want Baen Webscriptions.
We now return you to your regularly scheduled blog, where Yr Hmbl Hostess is about to push the publish button, get off this infernal machine, and go read a book.
Everybody have a good evening.
Hey!
Tomorrow is Monday.
And I don’t care!
Still not much to see, here: Chores, tinking around in the innards of the novel, a walk in the brisk and breezy day.
I did finish reading the material in the folder marked “Steve’s Klamath” and it’s good stuff. What to do with it, if we want to do anything with it besides admire it, and then refile it, is a discussion for another day.
The delivery count is now: All received except The Shattered Vine, which BN tells me will be a few days delayed, so sorry. However! Since having deliveries is so much fun, I bought some other stuff, like that Abney Park CD I was talking about earlier in the week.
In addition to deliveries, the mail brought us the on-pub check for The Crystal Variation, and a contract! Yep, we had so much fun doing “Intelligent Design” for the Baen website, we’re going to do it again. Nope, no title yet. Our deadline is July 2012. We’ll let you know when we have a pub date.
Let’s see, what else? Oh! One of my colleagues, Saladin Ahmed, was zooming along on his second book — the sequel to Throne of the Crescent Moon, which is coming out in February — when…his computer died the True Death.
This is a terrible, terrible feeling, as I know from experience. Fortunately, when the exact same thing happened to me, ‘way back in the Dark Ages, I still had a typewriter kicking around the place, so I could get on with things. Not so, Saladin. What he has instead of a typewriter? Is very small twins.
Twins, as some of you may know, are Rather An Expensive Undertaking.
So, anyhow, Saladin needs a computer so he can finish writing his book, and in order to fund this expenditure, he’s holding a raffle, with lots of fun stuff on offer, including Tuckerizations and signed ARCs — well, go on over and take a look.
Lastly, everyone’s seen this, right?
Bread’s in the oven for the first rise. Next on the agenda is to start the lentil soup for the meal we eat in the middle of the day, which we call dinner. Lunch is the lighter meal that we eat at the end of the day. Or possibly at the very, very skinniest half-hour of tomorrow.
For those tracking deliveries: Just My Type and the CD set of A Night in the Lonesome October have made it safely to the Cat Farm. Still to arrive is The Sleeping Partner, and The Shattered Vine.
Last night, after I was finished with Necessity’s Child, I started reading the contents of the file marked “Steve’s Klamath,” being a chronicle of the life and times of Corporal Miri Robertson, late of Surebleak.
For those wondering what the devil is keeping the woman from getting new words done on Necessity’s Child — new words are getting done, but they’re getting done in existing chapters as scenes shift, expand or contract. It looks like I should have announced these first 60,495 words A Draft. Who knew?
So, anyhow, not much of interest to see here at the moment.
Cat census: Scrabble sleeps with the heffalumps, and Mozart is still curled up in my spot in the bed, now that I’ve had the good grace to vacate.
That’s all I’ve got.
What’s doing at your house?
So, in addition to ordering in the Large Monitor, I made a Quill order over the weekend — paper, toner, pens — all the things that fuel a writers’ household. Also, I bought books.
On Tuesday, a white-box truck pulled up and off-loaded two cases of paper. An hour later, UPS arrived, schlepping the monitor and a smallish box from Quill. This proved to contain one (1) box of toner.
Yesterday, the rest of the toner arrived, and the pens.
Today, I believe we have nothing scheduled to arrive, but I look forward to tomorrow’s deliveries of The Sleeping Partner and Just My Type, and Saturday’s arrival of the CD set of A Night in the Lonesome October.
Steve and I still need to achieve new winter coats. Ours are from…2004. I bought them with the employee discount, the first year I worked at Bean’s for Christmas. They’ve worked hard, these coats, as anyone who looks at them can instantly perceive.
Some folks down in the discussion thread regarding Found Files have asked about the possibility of continuing the second Shan and Priscilla novel.
The answer to that is — I don’t know. It would very much be a novel to feed existing fans, and such novels go through moments of favor and disfavor, as the winds of publishing do whatever the winds of publishing do. Also, I’ll just mention that there are NO NOTES with the 80 pages, just the pages, and the words, and the unwritten, but clear, “and as obviously follows.”
See? I’m no easier on myself than I am on you guys.
I’m going to sit down with the Klamath partial this afternoon, but I suspect the case is going to be much the same, there. With the additional challenge, if we decided to go forth, of needing to unravel “Misfits” and weave it into the plotline.
Today, the weatherbeans promise us rain. That’s OK; I’m in for the day, working.