What’s Coming Up

I’m very nearly done with this whole time off thing. It seems ridiculous to take a month long break from doing something that you like to do. I’ve played Little Big Planet to death, I’ve read a few books, and now, there’s no other way around it, I’m downright bored. I want to be back in karate so much that I get excited like a little kid on Christmas morning, chest fit to burst, when I think about going back. I’m also ready to write again. It was nice, having a quiet week where I kept telling my brain, save it, buddy, I’ll get to it later, but it’s stopped being fun and transgressive, and just started being a bit of a bummer. So I’m going to pick up my current project on Tuesday and try to get the first draft done by the end of December.

I have a hunch you guys will be unsurprised if I tell you that things are going to be changing around here. I’ll be posting less, but I hope I’ll be posting better. I’m going to stick to using Twitter for my mundane, the majority of the links I find and my other quotidian. I’ll be using the blog to talk about writing for the most part. Yes, I’ll still occasionally post regrettable things whilst in the grip of rage (that can’t be helped), or do random posts about… stuff, but for the most part the frequency of my updatery is going to go down, but I hope the value of the content will go up. My plan is to stop using up my limited writing time to write a blog post simply because it’s been twenty-four hours since my last one. I’d much rather post about something I want to tell people about, and that I think folks might want to know. That time that I’m not spending here will probably be spent writing books, which is probably a good thing.

Further plans for this blog include a series of book specials for blog readers. The first event is going to be that one-to-one book giveaway I was talking about before. Ocelott, being a clever soul who has some experience with book events, came up with a solution to my problem of verifying books sold for the one to one book giveaway, hurray! That means I can run that the first week of December. And that means if you’re in Canada and you’re thinking about buying a copy of one of my books, try to wait. If you buy a book the first week of December, I’ll send a copy of the same book in your name to the library of your choice. So hang on to your hard earned bucks so that you can get your book and do a good turn for our underfunded libraries all at the same time.

One last item, and, apropos of nothing posted previously, I mentioned vac pots in a tweet and some of you were wondering what they are. Here you go:

What I Learned on my Autumn Vacation

So, 25 days early, here I am, sitting down at the ole’ compy with a cup of tea and Janis Joplin (Pearl) on the Wi-fi Hi-fi. I’m feeling slightly sheepish about coming back so early, but mostly relieved. I need blogging like I need bad black tea. Not like, I’ll die without it, but I get grumpy and engage in bizarre behavior until life returns to normal.

My time off was a learning experience. It’s the first time I’ve ever taken time off as a writer and the biggest, most important thing I learned is that it’s a useless undertaking. Unless I’m actually not in a place where written communications of any kind can reach me (ie, comatose), I’m still working. This is because other people don’t stop working just because I decided to take time off. And, as it turns out, I need to do a considerable amount of work even though I’m not, technically, working. I even caught myself the other day thinking, “Phew, good thing I’ve got all this extra time to get this writing stuff done”. Thanks, brain. Thanks for feeding my delusion there. Just what I needed.

So here’s what I’ve been doing while I’ve been away:

1. Planning a one-to-one book give away. I need your help for this. I’d like to, for a few days in December, give books away to libraries. It would work like this: You buy a book, and I give a copy of the same book away to a publicly-funded library of your choice, be it a school or municipal library, anywhere in Canada. This sounds great, and I want to do it, but there’s one small problem.

Booksellers, unfortunately, don’t report the number of books sold for some time. Amazon, for example, reports every 90-120 days. That means there’s no way for me to know how many books sold when till, oh, springtime. I thought about getting people to send me the copy of their receipt, but that means renting a post box. Any solutions you guys might have are welcome. The sooner I sort out the logistics, the sooner we can do a big book giveaway.

Gone Fishin

Well, I wanted to leave y’all with something big to chew on while I was away, but this is all you get. Some pictures on flickr will eventually be going up (hooray for batteries!), there will be a few asinine twitters and I will (probably) post occasionally. Regular transmission, however, is about to cease. I know I said November, but it’s the 30th, I almost never do a Saturday post, so this is it.

See you guys in three weeks. Don’t get into too much trouble while I’m away, yeah?

It’s Getting to That Time

Our culture is funny about death. We try not to talk about it, we don’t usually see it. When my gran died just over ten years ago, I only knew because I heard it from my mom. I never saw her corpse or even her casket. I don’t actually know where her ashes were buried, either. Which is, lets face it, downright weird.

Even though we’re in the midst of a pandemic, we’re almost certainly the most divorced from death we’ve ever been. Sitting up with the dead is a long-gone tradition. Dressing and washing the dead are now the province of professionals. Old age and death are thoroughly medical and they happen in places like homes and hospitals, not in public.

Well, now it’s that time of year. The time of year when we acknowledge that, yeah, actually, everybody dies. It’s time for autumn festivals like the Day of the Dead, Samhain and Hallowe’en. It’s funny that these old and old fashioned festivals are still so important to our modern, rational world. I guess it stands to reason they’re still fulfilling a need we have. And, judging from the re-emergence of the old Celtic festival, transmogrified, in the UK, Hallowe’en in particular is filling a need that’s not otherwise being met.

Hallowe’en is a biggie. Particularly for kids. If aging and death happens behind hospital, home or hospice doors, where else are kids going to get to learn about death? (From a goldfish, I guess. If the parents don’t swap it out for a fresh one.)

Anyway, it’s getting to that time of year. Do you have your light and offerings? Are you ready?

*grumbles*

It’s cold, it’s raining. I decided it would be OK if I had a cup of coffee about twenty minutes ago because, heck, gotta stay warm somehow. And it’s not like I’m sleeping anyway. Because I’ve been thinking about Onsen. Onsen. On October 28th, with November three days away.

I hate you, Brain. I hate you.

Snippit

A little wee snippit from Field Guide to Assassins of Muromachi Street. Warning! It contains spoilers! If you read this you’ll know that Jao survives the first book and that’ll ruin everything!

Mount Baker Senior Secondary

This is my old high school. Back then, it looked essentially the same, except the sports team was the Trojans, which, when you’re 17, is just about as funny as it gets. So now it’s not the Mount Baker Trojans, it’s the Mount Baker Wild, but that’s about all that’s changed. Apparently the mercury spill they found the last year I attended is still not cleaned up. Apparently the asbestos is still present. It looks like the roof has got worse, but not by much.

High school, if memory serves, sucked. It sucked in a huge way. It sucked because I was a drama kid, and lots of my friends were gay or played D&D and we all got beat up a lot. It sucked because the school was too small and we were too big. It sucked because the jocks got to be absent from class for tournaments but the drama kids, who did Stagecraft till late were never excused. It sucked because it was riddled with unfairness and arbitrary rules, and the good teachers couldn’t make up for the bad teachers, even though they tried.

High school sucks enough, without, you known, adding asbestos and mercury and too little space or insulation, and a roof that might collapse on the students in winter. It’s crappy enough to be there when you don’t want to, when you don’t fit in, when you know you’re going to get it from the teacher, or the bully or whoever. High school sucks enough without any outside help at all.

So, federal and BC government, could we please shovel some of the money that’s going to the god damned Olympics to fund a school that’s literally collapsing?

Could we reallocate some money to, you know, clean up the mercury spill that’s been there at least from my day? I remember it being an issue ten years ago.

Could we please give the students at MBSS a god damned fighting chance?

That would be great. Thanks.

Tonight

While the husband is at school writing an exam I am:

Doing dishes
Eating the leftover pear and chocolate bread pudding
Drinking coffee (decaf, promise)
Doing interview questions for Lorna Suzuki
Listening to the BBC’s Ramblings program (the most British thing EVER)
Blogging

Nerd ADD? Got it.

Mac and Cheese

2 cups sharp cheddar or
1 cup not particularly sharp cheddar and
2 tbsp scary potted cheese product
4 tbsp cream cheese
1/2 cup milk
1 tsp flour
1/4 onion
Olive oil
Dash of nutmeg

3 cups (dry) macaroni

4 pieces buttered stale bread

Cook the macaroni until it’s soft enough to eat, but tough enough to stick in your teeth. While it’s cooking, in a cast iron pan, fry the onion and olive oil until the onion is clear. Chuck in the various cheeses, and while they’re melting, make a mix of the flour and milk and pour it into the cast iron pan. Mix it well until it’s slop, and all the chunks are melted. Add the nutmeg.

Dump the (strained!) pasta into the cast iron pan and mix it well. Chop the buttered bread and dump that on top of the mac n cheese. Bake in a 300 degree oven till the bread is brown and crunchy.

Serve. Have an apple to clear out the arteries afterward.

Review

From the dark, claustrophobic depths of the sewers to the memory-laden city streets to the oppressive atmosphere of Audel’s sinister golem factory, Tamara Sheehan as created an intriguing world that feels REAL and a plot that keeps you on the edge of your seat.

So why, you wonder, did I only give it three stars? I really, really wanted to give it at least four (it’s a great read), but there are two reasons why I felt I couldn’t

Anne, an Amazon.com reviewer, has posted a very interesting and thoughtful review of Tenth Man here.