Below are the most recent 25 friends' journal entries.

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Saturday, May 25th, 2013
steepholm	9:31a	Are Student Loans Really a Tax? I've been doing a few back-of-envelope calculations, and they don't make pretty reading. As maths and I have an uneasy relationship, I'm happy to have my figures and assumptions corrected - I only hope they're wrong. Student fees at most English universities are £9,000 per annum. For a three-year degree, that adds up to £27,000. For students starting now, the interest rate is 3.5% plus RPI. RPI varies a good deal, but if we look at it over the long term I think it's reasonable to take 3% as an average figure. So, for back-of-envelope purposes, the loan is charged at 6.5% compound interest. Of course, the interest begins to accrue from the moment the first loan is taken out at the beginning of the first year of college, so by the time the three-year degree is finished, we can expect almost £2,000 worth of interest to be added to the loans themselves, making a total of £29,000. This is a best case scenario, in which the student's living and accommodation costs are fully-funded by parents, bar work, etc. In reality, all but a very few students will need to supplement the fees loans with other loans to cover these costs. For most students, these extra loans will amount to many thousands of pounds, but to make the maths simpler let's say that our student has waalthy, generous parents and a fearsome taste for part-time work, and gets away with borrowing just £1,000. Total debt at the time of leaving uni with that precious 2.1? £30,000. People who defend this system often justify it by pointing out that the money doesn't have to be paid back at once, but only when a graduate's income exceeds a certain amount (currently £21,000). After that, you pay 9% of your income over that sum. They don't often mention that interest will be mounting up throughout that period. In the current climate I think it's reasonable to expect our student to take a couple of years to find a job that pays over £21,000. By that time the interest on the £30,000 will have bumped the amount up to £34,000. In other words, there will be around £2,000 per year (and rising) to pay in interest alone. How much more than £21,000 will our graduate need to earn just to service the interest - i.e. to stop the amount they owe from rising? Well, £2000 is 9% of (about) £22,220. So, that's the amount above the threshold they will need to earn to keep up with the interest on their loan: requiring an actual salary of £43,220p.a. But of course, they won't earn that much immediately (quite possibly they'll never earn that much - the average salary in the UK is well under £30,000). To keep it optimistic, let's stay that our whizz-kid takes just another two years to get to this break-even point. By this time of course it is no longer the break-even point because meanwhile the loan has climbed to £38,000 and they'll actually need to be earning more like £46,000 to start paying it off. Never mind, let's be implausibly generous and give them a salary of £46,000 in their mid-twenties. So, within four years of uni our lucky graduate is earning £46,000 (it took me till my late forties to earn that much) and is ready to start paying off the loan rather than just servicing the interest payments. Let's give them a successful career. Promotions follow, and soon they're earning £56,000. On that salary, they will be paying over £3,000 per year towards their loan, though only £900 of that will go towards paying off the capital (at least at first - the portion going on interest will of course decrease over time). At that rate, the loan would be paid off in another 23 years - around half a working lifetime. That, of course, is pretty much the best conceivable case - a case in which virtually no loans for accommodation or living expenses are incurred during college, and in which a secure, very well paid job is obtained within a short time after graduation. For the vast majority of students, neither circumstance will apply. As far as I can see, anyone who is not in the top 10% of earners (i.e. more than £50,000p.a.) has effectively no chance of ever paying off their loan, at least through the government's preferred method of taking it out of earnings. They've very little chance of even servicing the interest on the debt. For them, the graduate loan scheme is actually a lifetime extra 9% income tax. It's not actually a graduate tax, of course, because graduates like me (and the ones who introduced the scheme) don't have to pay it. It's really a punitive tax on the young. (5 Comments |Comment on this)
Friday, May 24th, 2013
leahbobet	11:03p	Thud: On Roadstead Farm May 24, 2013 Progress Notes: On Roadstead Farm Words today: 1000. 1100 Words total: 71,000. 71,100 Reason for stopping: P. is home from work, and we are going to eat dinner and play board games like old folks do. Darling du Jour: "He was swallowed up," Lieutenant Jackson said, and looked at his callused hands; an old horror on his weathered face. "John Balsam slew the Wicked God, and his last act was to take up his prophet, Asphodel Jones, and devour him whole." Mean Things: Missing home very badly; death, death, and death; being attacked by something you can't see is pretty much ultra-no fun; being eaten up by your own deity like it's Cthulhu Time yum yum nom. Research Roundup: Rigor mortis; mapwork again, giving me the fun of having a character grow up on the wilderness conservation area they used to take us to on school trips when I was a kid.  It's where I learned what scat was! Books in progress: matociquala, Range of Ghosts. All this and I just realized I don't have any (original, pre-war that kills your dads) single-parent families in this book.  Well, fixed that. Today in YE OLDE TALE OF PEOPLE GETTING INTO EACH OTHER'S BUSINESS (ALSO MONSTERS): Back over Chapter 13 again, and through it to the end, and now we're into Chapter 14 and a lot of splainin' that needs doing by some people right now.  There is a strain of Lovecraftian horror in this thing that just keeps getting stronger the farther we go on. Sometimes the word I want in a sentence is not a word in English.  There is nothing in this language that has the full richness of broigus.  I am going to defect to artsy literary fiction so I can write sentences which have all the words I want, and then people will just have to look it up. Maybe more after dinner.  I dunno.  We'll see. (ETA: Got 100 more. Not much, but hey.) Current Mood: tired (Comment on this)
handful_ofdust	9:35p	NOS4A2 A lot of my time over the last two days has been taken up with Joe Hill's wonderful new novel, NOS4A2. This book is literally so fun that I finished it, then started it over again, and found myself staring hard at it as though I could somehow conjure more content with my mind. I just liked it SO MUCH. Everything about it. Basically, the story starts with a guy named Charles Talent Manx the Third who, back in the 1930s, bought a Rolls-Royce Phantom limo which somehow allowed him to travel to and create a place called "Christmasland", a creepy little theme-park pocket dimension (or "inscape") he then began to ferry selected children to, sucking out all their youth and personality and leaving them with nothing but a kind of evil innocence, the sort that makes you think playing games with names like "scissors-for-the-drifter" and "bite-the-smallest" is just the best thing ever. The first inhabitants of Christmasland were his own daughters, Lorrie and Millie, but over the years he's stolen away over seventy more, with the help of various Renfields; when we first meet Manx, in 1995, he's over 113 years old and looks roughly forty, a bald, hickish, sharp-toothed beanpole in a limo driver's uniform who says things like "Good gravy!" or "That is a repugnant image," and always sounds super-cheerful, even when he's threatening to let his kids eat you alive. (The vanity plates on his ride, BTW, are a joke--a reference to the fact that he took his first wife to Nosferatu on their first date. "That's how long ago it was, ha ha!" She later called him a vampire, accusing him of sucking their kids dry, but he "turned his frown upside-down" by rebranding himself with the NOS4A2 label. And killing her, one assumes, though he never quite cops to that. He also claims he's been married at least one other time since then.) 1995 is also the year Charlie runs into Vic McQueen, who has a totem item of her own--a covered bridge called "the Shorter Way" which no longer exists in real life, but which materializes in front of her whenever she's travelling at high speed (say on her favourite bike) and needs to find something. She then passes through the bridge and teleports to wherever this lost or needed thing can be found. One time, it's her mother's bracelet, which she thinks finding will stave off her parents' divorce; another time, it's a girl with a similar talent, because what she needs is someone to explain this whole "inscape" thing to her and convince her she isn't crazy. And one time, when she's in a really desperate mood and wants to do something heroic...it's the "Sleigh House", one of Charlie's real-world hideouts. One way or the other, colliding with each other ruins both Charlie Manx and Vic McQueen's lives. Charlie ends up in a supermax prison, quickly aging back to actual 113-ness once he's been parted from his limo and banned from further entry into Christmasland, and lapsing into a progeriatric coma. Vic, OTOH, ends up living with sweet, fat Lou Carmody, the geeky dude who picked her up after she fled Charlie's house of horrors--they have a kid together, Wayne, and things might go okay, except for the fact that the Christmasland kids keep phoning her up to ask when Daddy's coming home. This makes her drink too much, take too many drugs, get tattooed all over, start maniacally pumping out a very successful series of children's books to stave off the calls, etc. Eventually, she puts all their phones in the stove, burns down their house and ends up in a mental hospital, then rehab. She removes herself from Wayne and Lou's lives because she doesn't want to destroy them, starts taking her meds, and tries to forget. Then...Charlie's long-resold car suddenly wakes up, and drives over to his last Renfield's house. Charlie wakes up, seems to die, then walks out of the morgue and into the Rolls. And all three of them start coming for Vic, bent on taking Wayne to Christmasland. But Vic, putative craziness aside, is one slippery, badass lady, and she isn't about to let that happen without a fight... This precis doesn't actually give everything away, believe it or not, because a lot of the pleasure of the book comes from the various characters' interactions, and the twists keep on coming. One way or the other, it reminded me strongly of Locke & Key, which is my favourite thing by Hill so far, and I found myself both thrilled and consistently amused, in an utterly black way. (For example, as Charlie gets younger again, he starts sort of shipping himself with Vic, comparing her favourably to his prickly first wife, a woman "like a bad case of poison ivy! I scratched 'til I bled, and then I came back and scratched some more!" "Do you think she is inclined to look favourably on older men?" he asks Wayne, who's sort of boggled by the idea. "She says I'm her boyfriend now," he replies. Charlie: "Oh, all mothers say the same!") Anyhow, yeah: if you like a fast, mean ride on a cool machine, NOS4A2 is tops. It made me contact-high, in ways I really hope can translate to giving me a second wind on all my own projects. This entry was originally posted at http://handful-ofdust.dreamwidth.org/493946.html. Please comment either here or there using OpenID. (2 Comments |Comment on this)
batwrangler	9:49p	I have the best dogs Dog school went really well today with Fezzik and Puccini (keep in mind he is an 11-yo Maltese who was most likely not carefully bred) only had two teeth extracted during his dental apt yesterday. This brings Puccini's total number of extracted teeth to six*, which considering I know of a 6-yo min-pin who had fourteen teeth out in a single apt, is really not bad. OTOH I finally ordered a Squiggle-It brand tug toy because Fezzik likes the ones at school and they sent me a pink one -- you can't select colors -- I am so not a pink girl. Maybe I can stain it with some blue drink mix.... *And most of the other teeth came out at his first dental apt right after we got him. You can also read this entry on Dreamwidth ( comments) (Comment on this)
flemmings	9:35p	Unseasonableness Wore my winter coat and neck warmer today, and only felt hot when in direct sun. This is my idea of heaven. The lilacs are preserved for the glorious 25th, after the past week's best attempts to get rid of them: sultry mid 20s/ mid 70s every day, torrential rain and gales every night (or afternoon, if Tues and Weds.) In a week it will be 28C, so I make the most of this. Doors Open this weekend; not sure if I'll go anywhere much. The down side of everything blooming still is that I can wear my contact a maximum three hours a day and then it itches uncontrollably. Being one-eyed is a pain. Tuesday was out at East General seeing a specialist (plastic surgeon!) about this annoying bump on my finger. There's a name for annoying bump, that I forget, and they'll remove it for free on June 6; but a) I have to stay off anti-inflammatories (and chocolate! and ginger!) for a week beforehand and b) finger must stay bandaged and dry for a week after. Am not looking forward to the week before, since my knees hate me even with prescription meds. But the week after-- perforce a holiday, because one can't not wash hands in my profession-- will be happy indeed. (2 Comments |Comment on this)
jinian	8:23p	swap went well Lots of clothes came in, lots of clothes moved out, someone took them to charity for me afterward, and I made my friend speechless with my new dress. :) [ETA: Note temporary SPACE BABE TATTOO on forearm.] This entry was originally posted at http://jinian.dreamwidth.org/570017.html. Respond wherever you like. (1 Comment |Comment on this)
kate_nepveu	7:40p	obligatory I'm-here post Made it to WisCon, about three hours behind schedule, which during the uncertainty and running around gave me lots of existential angst about whether it's really worth it to travel on Memorial Day weekend, especially when I can't leave on Thursday, but dinner helped. Now putting my feet up before my 9:00 panel and the parties. Come buy a Con or Bust T-shirt at the Aqueduct table in the dealer's room tomorrow! comment(s) | add comment (how-to) | link
kateelliott	12:54p	Daggerspell (Katharine Kerr) re-read at A Dribble of Ink. Join us! This will start May 29 at A Dribble of Ink. Welcome to the Daggerspell Reread and Review Series, with Aidan Moher (your humble editor/blogger) and Kate Elliott (author of lots and lots of cool novels)! We thought it would be fun to bring two different perspectives (someone who’s read the series, someone who hasn’t), and explore Daggerspell together, comparing notes and reflecting on a series and world that are held dearly by many readers. We’re also hoping that, if you’re not familiar with Kerr, you might discover a new favourite author. If you are so inclined, read along with us. I’m very excited about this. Again, the introductory post about what we are doing and the schedule find here. Mirrored from I Make Up Worlds. (1 Comment |Comment on this)
bookelfe	2:48p	So there was a period of time last month when I was capable of doing not much of anything except wheezing on my sickbed and reading library e-copies of historical romance novels on my Kindle. Over those two days or so, I read: 1. The entirety of the Brothers Sinister series by Courtney Milan as published so far, which currently consists of ( two novellas and a novelCollapse ) 2. What Happens in London, by Julia Quinn, which is probably ( the most hilariously plotless romance novel everCollapse ) 3. His at Night, by Sherry Thomas, which ( did not have as many hijinks as I wantedCollapse ) As a sidenote, I am sure this is something that the romance novel-reading community has come to terms with well before I did, but it never fails to be hilarious to me how little the titles of romance novels have to do with their actual content. What Happens in London is my new favorite, though, because, as I have explained, NOTHING HAPPENS IN LONDON. NOTHING. This entry is cross-posted at Livejournal from http://skygiants.dreamwidth.org/332280.html. Please feel free to comment here or there! There are currently comments on Dreamwidth. (1 Comment |Comment on this)
rachelmanija	11:38a	The Rifter, by Ginn Hale: foreshadowing Spoilery for the entire series - seriously. And you really don't want to get spoiled for this if there's any chance whatsoever that you might read it. I remembered something about book six (The Broken Fortress) and re-read it, and... ...how the hell did Hale do that? I don't think I've ever come across this particular use of foreshadowing before, or at least not the way she did it. ( Read more...Collapse ) Crossposted to http://rachelmanija.dreamwidth.org/1109459.html. Comment here or there. (1 Comment |Comment on this)
sovay	2:21p	I'll always burn a light for you I slept enough to dream last night! I have no idea why I dreamed about wandering around an aquarium with an Omni theater and a library in the basement with derspatchel except that my brain evidently thinks I've been too housebound lately. The Omni theater looked half like the old Hall of Ocean Life in the American Museum of Natural History, full of dioramas and blue light. Rob had some kind of proposal to talk over with someone in the upper seats of the theater, I was doing research. Even in the dream, it struck me that putting a library in the basement of an aquarium is a terrible idea. I was reading a short experimental novel from the '30's, translated from the Czech, about a girl on the moment of death, moving through her memories as if through the streets and squares of the city where she had been born; it was a political allegory, but I didn't know enough about the politics of the time. The library's walls were full glass windows and the waters of the harbor were visible beyond them, faintly gold-sparking with afternoon. It is true that the New England Aquarium is within walking distance of the Fort Point Channel, but not quite the way the dream seemed to think. (9 Comments |Comment on this)
athenais	11:19a	What the wind did My yard is practically denuded of roses. Many branches were broken, many buds snapped off or withered, all the big blooms had their petals torn off and whirled away in the space of two weeks. Luckily, all my roses are repeat bloomers. Queen of Sweden has already pushed new blooms open. Excitingly, Glamis Castle is finally budding and I hope to see a rose or three over the weekend. That is, of course, if we don't get more wind. May 6th: May 23rd: (2 Comments |Comment on this)
greygirlbeast	12:56p	"Child, they're seeking weakness tonight." Cloudy here today. Cloudy and rainy and currently only 64˚F. The only upside is that Memorial Day weekend has been ruined for the tourists flooding into South County. --- Yesterday, I wrote 1,636 words and finished Alabaster: Boxcar Tales #13. Which finishes Alabaster: Boxcar Tales. Spooky and I both got weepy, reading back over the last script. Last week I spoke with my editor at Dark Horse and told him that it was time for me to step back from both Dancy and comics for the foreseeable future. That, after almost two years of pretty heavy involvement on this project, it was time to refocus my attention on my prose work. It felt a lot like I was tendering my resignation, like quitting a job, though it doesn't truly amount to quite that. It just means that, for the time being, I'm choosing to concentrate on other projects. In a lot of ways, working in comics is far more stressful than prose publishing, and, right now, I've got to decrease the stress in my life. That said, working with Dark Horse has been a marvelous experience, and I thank everyone I've worked with – Rachel, Jemiah, Daniel, Shantel, Mike, Steve, Greg, Rachelle, Augie, and Spencer – for making Alabaster: Wolves and Alabaster: Boxcar Tales happen. I'm not an easy person to work with, and you've all shown admirable patience. I especially thank the many readers and reviewers who've believed in the books. Thank you. And if you are a fan, don't be sad. There will be additional Dancy material from Dark Horse, but I'm not yet at liberty to announce what it will be or when it will be released. I'll make those announcements when I'm told that I can. Into the Light of the Dark Black Night. Aunt Beast Current Mood: tired (9 Comments |Comment on this)
oracne	11:11a	I'm at the con! Hooray! So, I am at WisCon, and have already had a delightful couple of meals with friends whom I have not seen in far too long. Also, it was delightful to be able to eat things. This morning, I even risked a latte, with no unfortunate effects (my first coffee since last Thursday). I shall spare you further talk of my innards.... If you're a Twitter user, here are the hashtags for the panels I'm on: #ModSquad #ImaginaryBookClub #XenogenesisPanel #TheDoctorIsAJerk #Moderating201 - the con itself is #WisCon without the 37 attached. I find myself at loose ends until The Gathering, which starts at one; I actually brought a few items for the clothing exchange this year, including a happy banana yellow pullover, bought on clearance years ago, which has always looked terrible on me but is cashmere so I suspect someone will want it. My first panel isn't until 4:00 pm. This is a very happy state of affairs. Tomorrow is the Farmers' Market, then my first panel at 10:00 am, another at 1:00 pm, and another immediately following at 2:30 pm, luckily one which I will not be moderating and about which I can talk with little mental effort (Dr. Who). My last panel, in which I will moderately moderate a panel about moderating, is Sunday at 2:30 pm. Had that discussion again yesterday in which we try to figure out who people are and can only do so by their usernames - so please feel free to tell me who you are if I do not appear to know who you are despite following you on LJ or whatever for the past decade or more. I will attempt to do the same. (1 Comment |Comment on this)
telophase	9:18a	Hrm Sitting in the waiting room at the doctor's office (nothing major, just a follow up on something previously), and OH GOD WHY DO WE HAVE TO HAVE A TELEVISION ON? It's playing some sort if special medical-office channel giving tips about health BUT WHAT IS WRONG WITH SILENCE? Sent from my Apple ][e You can comment here or at the Dreamwidth crosspost. comments at Dreamwidth. (5 Comments |Comment on this)
asakiyume	9:07a	At the food van Actually, it's not a free-standing van, it's a trailer, towed behind another vehicle, and it has a generator at the front to power the grill, the refrigerator, the water in the sink, etc. Paris let me take photos of it all. Here she is at the window, talking on her cell to a customer. And here is the same view from inside! It's a whole little world in there, a tiny, efficient kitchen. Here's the menu, in case you're wondering what a person might be ordering. ( more peeks insideCollapse ) Thank you, Paris! And here's hoping for a brisk business all summer! (17 Comments |Comment on this)
kate_nepveu	9:00a	here we go Flights all pushed back and kids all up ridiculously early, but off to airport now. Supposed to get in around 4:00 local. Honestly I have a bad feeling about this but I'm trying not to stress, there's nothing to be done, and even my 9:00 panel tonight would survive without me because I'm not moderating. If only I can grab a catnap on a plane I'll be okay, I think. comment(s) | add comment (how-to) | link
tithenai	8:00a	Wiscon Schedule! No time to tidy things or do anything and also super awesomely I am sick now. So great. So helpful. My Wiscon schedule! More later! As Schedule Location British Women SF Writers (scheduled) moderator Fri, 4:00–5:15 pm Conference 4 Moderator: Amal El-Mohtar. Ever since Mary Shelley, there have been British women writing science fiction, as well as a long history of women writing in gothic and fantastical modes. Can we talk about any actual tradition, or are there factors militating against this? Writing in speculative mode has been perhaps more accepted as part of high literary tradition in the UK, which has perhaps tended to discourage intragenre dialogue or indeed, the development of a specific sense of genre. (Can we contrast the crime novel and the significance of women writers in the development of the British mystery?) Who are the writers who might be included? What are their influences? Women's Speculative Poetry Now (scheduled) participant Fri, 9:00–10:15 pm Conference 4 Moderator: Lesley Wheeler. Ursula K. Le Guin publishes Finding My Elegy: New and Selected Poems; Tracy K. Smith's science fiction-y collection Life on Mars wins a Pulitzer; Aqueduct issues The Moment of Change, an anthology of feminist speculative verse. If you were standing at the intersection of poetry and speculative fiction, 2012 was an interesting year. In this roundtable, poets, critics, and editors take turns briefly addressing several interlocking questions: What are the most interesting developments in 21st century speculative poetry by women? Where's the action—what magazines, presses, and virtual / physical communities are fostering those trends? What are the audiences—how are these poets reaching readers and listeners? We'll devote much of the allotted time to an exploratory conversation involving the roundtable audience. Queers Dig Time Lords (scheduled) participant Sat, 10:00–11:15 am Senate B Moderator: Sigrid Ellis. We do! Dig Time Lords! Join some of the contributors to Mad Norwegian Press's anthology, Queers Dig Time Lords, as they discuss their love of, joy in, and frustrations with the complicated world of Doctor Who. Queers Dig Time Lords (scheduled) participant Sat, 1:00–2:15 pm Michelangelos Contributors to Mad Norwegian Press's Queers Dig Time Lords read from their work. Open Secrets: a Speculative Poetry Reading (scheduled) participant Sat, 2:30–3:45 pm Senate B Members of the Secret Poetry Cabal (a speculative poetry group) will read their work. Playing with the Shiny Muse (scheduled) participant Sat, 4:00–5:15 pm Room 634 Moderator: Elise Matthesen. Elise Matthesen was nominated for a World Fantasy Award in 2009 "for setting out to inspire and for serving as inspiration for works of poetry, fantasy, and SF over the last decade through her jewelry-making and her 'artist's challenges.'" Jo Walton has gotten necklaces for several of her novels and written poetry inspired by new work posted online by Elise. Others have written short stories, poetry, and songs. Every WisCon, ten to twenty percent of the membership writes haiku for earrings. What's useful and interesting about playing with the shiny muse? How does that work? Contemporary Fantasy and Science Fiction from the Muslim World (scheduled) moderator Sun, 2:30–3:45 pm Capitol A Moderator: Amal El-Mohtar. A lot has happened since One Thousand and One Nights. Come and hear panelists discuss contemporary fantasy and science fiction from the Muslim world! We'll talk about works by Muslim authors from different countries, both those available in English and those still awaiting translation. We welcome audience participation, so come with questions; we'll bring our reading experience and boundless enthusiasm. A dystopian Cairo, a water planet and a magic library await you! (6 Comments |Comment on this)
shewhomust	1:00p	An introduction to the Pushkin sonnet ...from Andy Croft, of course. And since nothing in the video tells you this, the book is 1948, published by Five Leaves. (Comment on this)
Thursday, May 23rd, 2013
leahbobet	11:33p	Thud: On Roadstead Farm May 23, 2013 Progress Notes: On Roadstead Farm Words today: 1500. Words total: 70,000. Reason for stopping: P. is home with Vietnamese.  We're going to make a mango salad to go with it, because I has a recipe. Darling du Jour: "I need you, Thom," she said again, and her pockets were empty of river stones. Her hand stilled on the last three; they fell, and ran through her fingertips. The stars glowed, gap-toothed, silent, and my breath held, wishing for magic. Wishing for a miracle. The minutes stretched. The word-spell bowed under their weight and shattered. (Alternately: "Marthe had lived on Roadstead Farm long enough to know this wasn't a place prayers were answered." I have two today.) Mean Things: Hiding someone with the junk and broken things, and fully realizing that as a metaphor; magic, when it does not work; raw, unfiltered grief; making me cry; excellent grossness; an impromptu stoning, and not the drug-related kind. Research Roundup: Mapwork, as figuring out what towns survived the apocalypse and which didn't is a continuing challenge; the colour of unoxygenated blood. Books in progress: matociquala, Range of Ghosts. Dreams about snakes last night.  I do not like snakes. Today in YE OLDE TALE OF PEOPLE GETTING INTO EACH OTHER'S BUSINESS (ALSO MONSTERS): A quick fix-it pass on Chapter 12, and most of Chapter 13 knocked down, as well as a bit of general forward through this little arc.  We have officially broken the 70,000-word threshold.  I don't imagine I'll keep that, though; there's a lot in this file that's stale-dated, debris of directions this book isn't going anymore.  Things are going to come out; a bunch of things came out today, in fact.  I have no idea what the actual functional wordcount is right now, or what of the bits forward are going to be kept. I made myself cry.  That...felt good, to do that again. Further: It's interesting how I forget that this is functionally and structurally epic fantasy, as well as Sinclair Lewis/Margaret Laurence Canadian literary fiction.  The amount of details, maps, characters, distances to keep in my head just balloons more every day.  The notes file has doubled in the last week or so.  It gives me ideas for a front-piece map, which would in and of itself be a wonderfully genre-subversive thing to do, given that this is a story where, largely, the protagonist does not leave home. Dinner.  I'll finish this chapter and take on the next tomorrow. Current Mood: melancholy (5 Comments |Comment on this)
nineweaving	10:01p	Little eyases, last battles Isn't this a lovely theatrical pairing?  A double-bill of players' boys:  "This summer we will publish a chapbook by Greer Gilman, Cry Murder! in a Small Voice, and, although we have more planned, we have just one Big Mouth House title: Peter Dickinson’s The Seventh Raven, a thriller set in a rehearsal for a North London kid’s opera." O my.  A little-known and poignant history.  In 1913, the boys of Shakespeare's grammar school in Stratford performed Henry V, with a lost-and-found score by Vaughn Williams.  Most fought in France afterward.  Seven died, including two sets of brothers. "We see yonder the beginning of the day, but I think we shall never see the end of it." Leaving at dawn.  I don't want to be late for Ragnarok. Nine (18 Comments |Comment on this)
gerisullivan	10:05p	45 years ago today... ...my father turned 45 years old. I don't remember him ever commenting on his age before that birthday, and he didn't for decades after, either. But 45? For weeks before, as the day grew closer and closer, Daddy kept repeating "45? I'll be 45? That's half of 90!" Thirteen-going-on-14-year-old me made a birthday card for him. On the cover: ~"You're 45?"~ On the inside, ~"That's half of 90!"~ and, after another fold, ~"That's a quarter of 180!"~ and, with one more fold to open, ~"That's an eighth of 360! Age...it's all a matter of perspective."~ Followed by happy birthday wishes and my love. It's a happy memory for today. Daddy didn't make 90; he was confounded he made 80, let alone 85...86...87...and 88. He savored the joy in each of the days he was here, and always loved seeing a sparkle in my eyes and a smile on my face. That's what he told each of his kids he wanted for his birthday most every year. His birthday, Father's Day, and Christmas, too. He's not here to see them on Susie's and my faces today, but the sparkle and smiles are there. The sparkle, the smiles, and the joy of the day. (4 Comments |Comment on this)
kate_nepveu	8:47p	tweetle beetles! I just read about tweetle beetles for the poetree community. If you remember Fox in Socks fondly, you should too, it's fun and takes literally only a minute or two! You don't need the book either, jjhunter has the excerpt. (Actually the formative Seuss tongue-twister book of my childhood is the other one, Oh Say Can You Say?, the one with the bread/bed spreader and the shinbone pins, but SteelyKid loved Fox in Socks for a while and the tweetle beetles were my favorite part, so I could not resist. And now, WisCon packing.) comment(s) | add comment (how-to) | link
oyceter	5:23p	( Spoilers for all of S1!Collapse ) Comment | Read Comments () | Link
desperance	4:23p	BayCon schedule This morning over coffee, Julie said "So what's your Baycon schedule, then, Chaz? Interested parties want to know..." - and I did have to confess that I didn't know. I knew I had it somewhere; hell, I'd even read it... It was pointed out to me - quite forcefully, in fact - that this was small use to anyone else, or indeed to myself if I couldn't remember it. Other people, I was reminded, post theirs in public fora, to make the information accessible to others, with the possible notion of attracting a small, y'know, audience. So okay, then. Here is my BayCon schedule: 1. Themed Reading: Urban Fantasy on Friday at 9:00 PM in Central (with Kyle Aisteach, Pat MacEwen, Kevin Andrew Murphy, Jaymi Elford) Authors read from their urban fantasy works. 2. Location, Location, Location -- Setting Your Story in an SF World on Saturday at 9:00 AM in San Tomas (with Juliette Wade, Paul Carlson, Todd McCaffrey (M), Aaron Mason) Your character has to live somewhere, and that somewhere needs to support the story. It's embarrassing to have a great scene all written involving bikini- or Speedo-dressed people, when they all live in the first permanent settlement on the Moon, and only landed yesterday.... 3. How to Tell one Dragon from another on Sunday at 11:00 AM in San Tomas (with Audrey Kiehtreiber (M), Irene Radford, Pat MacEwen) Not all dragons are alike. Simple mistakes in taxonomy can be dangerous to your plot line or your health. In this panel we present dragons in history, myth, and folklore from Asia to New Age. 4. Themed Reading: Fantasy on Sunday at 9:00 PM in Alameda (with Jenna M. Pitman, Pat MacEwen, David Friedman) Come listen to authors read from their fantasy works. ...Apparently I have two separate readings, Friday and Sunday. I shall read two separate things. Y'all should definitely come to both. A panel is only a panel, but a good piece of work is a Smoke. (4 Comments |Comment on this)

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