Bloggin'

I'm kind of blogging over on Patreon now. The blog posts are free. The fiction you gotta pay a buck to see.

Neglecting my Blog

I'm sorry I haven't posted in awhile. It was pretty much all downhill for me after Galley, and I'm only starting to climb up again. More reviews should be coming soon (knock on wood). Until then... um...

Who Am I?

Eric, who wrote about the Newbery Awards in the most recent post on this blog, has been urging me to start blogging again.

A note on blogging

I sometimes use the scheduling function in Blogger to schedule my posts. This has come in handy a variety of times. For instance, I didn't want to dump all my Hugo reviews on people at once, so whenever I finished one ahead of time I would schedule it out a day or two. In this week's case, I scheduled pretty much all week on Saturday, which was good, since I've been sick the beginning of this week.

So to the person who was wondering if I really get up at five a.m. and write my review and post it... no. I generally have it done the night before or earlier and schedule it so there will be something on the blog every day.

I also tend to schedule posts when I'm going out of town or to a convention. It makes it easier to make sure there is something for people to read. But hey, blogging about blogging is a sin, so I'm just going to leave it at that.

Edited to add: If I had been blogging live earlier this week, I think I would have bored you with lots of stuff from San Diego. Instead, those will have to wait until I have some time to look through and find stuff I really want to share. Here, here's something I found clever:

We've rediscovered Pluto, apparently.

The Week in Review

Last Friday my workday ended with me taking photos at the SHS girls softball game, then I headed home to be with my sweet husband and obnoxious cat for the evening. We ended up watching Gotham, The Flash and Arrow all in a row to catch up on the week's viewing, since the hubby was headed to the Seattle area for a couple of events over the weekend. He left early Saturday morning, leaving me with Inkwell the cat, who didn't actually notice "daddy" was gone until "mommy" was late feeding him, then the cat searched the house for hubby-Eric and came back and meowled at me.

For my part, I took it totally easy on Saturday, finally catching up on long lost sleep and doing absolutely nothing that I didn't need to. Heck, I probably even ignored some stuff that I technically needed to get done. The neighbors behind our house had a big fiesta, complete with the Mexican polka music that kept Inkwell yowling along... but I napped and played Doctor Who: Legacy and read and generally just relaxed. When it came time for Inkwell's evening meal, he sat staring at the front door, waiting for Eric to come and feed him. I decided to get up and feed him, but he seemed really confused by the lack of Eric.

Inkwell decided Sunday morning that 5 a.m. is a good time to be fed, and since Eric was nowhere to be seen, he had to wake me up. I was partially awake for his first attempt at 5. At 5:10 he tried again, this time getting me to roll over and cover my head with the blankets. A few minutes later he walked the length of my body with his claws out, trying to get a reaction. I turned over again, and he stood on my left boob and yowled at my face (prompting me to write a haiku). This woke me up, but I growled at him and turned over. It became a battle of willpowers, with me determined to sleep until his normal feeding time and Inkwell just as determined to get me up early. About normal feeding time I finally relented and fed him, then went back to bed and shut the door. He then scratched at the door and yowled because I'd locked him out, but I slept through some of it.

Once I was up and moving I discovered I was suffering from mild vertigo. I decided to rest, but still worked through some chores. I didn't want to be a complete slob two days in a row. Ok, yeah, I did want to be a slob, but I felt a little guilty about it. The vertigo seriously cramped my style, but I still got laundry and dishes done. Eric got home a bit after 6 p.m., totally exhausted from his weekend. Inkwell was pleased at the return of his other servant.

Monday... ah Monday. I thought I had everything under control. But did I? No, I completely forgot an assignment. It was a stupid move, one of those that you say, "How could I have done that?" and kick yourself for. I'm still kicking myself. The short answer to my question is that I never put the assignment in my on-line to-do list, which is how I remind myself of unusual assignments. The result was a total failure on my part. Note to self: List ALL assignments in to-do list, darn it. The editor recognized how angry I was at myself and lightened up a little, I think. As it was, he didn't need the story to fill space, so I got the story done for Tuesday. That worked. Still kicking myself.

Monday afternoon, after I'd finished lunch at home and was headed back to the office, I said "bye" to Inkwell and he tackled me. Full-on body slam against my leg. Every once in awhile he makes it clear that he's not ready for me to go back to work. Monday was one such day. I detangled him, explained that I was going to work to earn money to get him kibble, and managed to get out the door without him scratching me. When I got home later in the afternoon he glared at me, stung by my rejection. Monday night he gave me his full meowsage and purr therapy treatment. I think he's been a little unwell and needing attention.

One strange sight in my neighborhood when I arrived home one afternoon was two "yippy" dogs in my yard, probably Chihuahuas or Chihuahua-mixes. That's not so strange. What was strange is that one of the dogs was wearing a dress. You don't see that every day... certainly not on a dog wandering outside.

I woke up Tuesday morning from a fantastic dream that, once I was back in reality and started to think about it, fell apart rapidly. I was with some kids at a lab where they were launching some kind of devices to the moon. The devices were measuring something, like the distance and speed of some object in relation to the moon. What was cool about the dream is that I understood, just enough, the technology being used and was able to explain it to the kids after the scientists explained it and the kids didn't understand. One of the scientists said I should be a teacher, and I felt a swell of pride. Then everyone, including the scientists, had chocolate cake. Then I woke up and realized that the tech they were using was impossible *and* outdated, the rockets would not have been launched from indoors... nor would they have launched five different rockets, the trip would have been longer than the hour or so we waited for the rockets to reach the moon, and the cake was just too darn good to be real. But I did wake up in a fairly good mood. Craving chocolate cake.

My mood improved when I got to work and I learned I had missed the city council meeting in which the council finally, once and for all, decided to ban recreational marijuana in the city. Well, not really once and for all, since I suspect the subject will be revisited all too many times in the next few years... but I didn't have to be at that meeting, which made me happy. As a citizen, I'm happy the council made a decision instead of kicking it down the road. I'm also happy as a citizen that they decided not to waste city money running an advisory vote on the issue (which would have cost the city, thus the citizens, up to $10,000). Yay. As for the actual issue itself, I don't care one way or another. They are fighting against the tide of history and will eventually lose. But at least they made a freaking decision.

Even the editorial meeting in which the reporters were informed that we are going to an earlier deadline didn't serve to ruin my mood. The new schedule will be slightly difficult to adjust to, but hopefully will otherwise work out for us. More on that as it happens.

Tuesday afternoon was uneventful. Inkwell was still needy when I went home to lunch, which I suspect means he's sick. It's very hard to tell with cats. He tackled me again Wednesday morning when I left for work. Tuesday evening I had a meeting at one of the absolute calmest groups we cover. I enjoyed it, and it was fairly short as such meetings go. I reset my alarm clock Tuesday night for 15 minutes earlier to start the process of getting ready for the earlier deadline... unfortunately, Inkwell keys off the sound of the alarm to figure out when he should get fed his breakfast. He was not at all pleased to hear the alarm but not get fed for another 15 minutes. He'll just have to adjust, too.

I dragged all day Wednesday possibly due to the morning adjustment, but felt better on Thursday. On Wednesday I noticed a ton of mushrooms in the back yard and decided to get some photos of them so I could identify them. Then I ended up taking some more stylized shots of them with my real camera for the paper. I also spotted another weird plant in the yard which turned out to be Virginia Creeper, not poison ivy or weed. Hey, you never know in this area!

Thursday was tame, but involved a late meeting. The school board, for some insane reason, meets at 7:30 pm, which is at least an hour later than any other group. The meeting was longer than two hours, but much of it was taken up with awards and recognition for students and staff. Including the presentation of a giant talking cigarette to the board.

Friday morning was one of those mornings I hope to never have again. The vertigo was back, but I didn't have any choice but to grit my teeth and work through it. As soon as I had my stories done and everything settled, I went home and just slept through the afternoon. It was difficult to get back up.

And now it's Saturday. I've just gotten back from Cinco de Mayo festivities, and I'm exhausted. I think I'll go rest.

The Week In Review

Last Friday I spent an hour or so taking sports photos. Both games were at the local Christian high school and started at the same time. I started at the boys baseball game because I had this notion in my head that they've been doing poorly this year, so it might be a quick game. I got my shot within an inning or so, then headed to the other side of the school to watch the girls softball game. This one was much harder to get a good shot at, but I stuck with it, and eventually got a decent photo to go with. Not my best, but it worked. Amusingly, I was still there when the local team got up by 10 runs and the ref called the game.

I also managed to convince a person to be a "neighbor", which is a filler piece we use to pad out the paper when news runs a little short. Basically, the victim neighbor fills out a form with a bunch of silly questions, I take the person's photo and they show up in the pages when we need more content.

In addition to taking pictures of people painting houses, I attended the first annual Asparagus Festival last Saturday, which was apparently a success. It tied in with one of my assignments, so I was able to complete some work while there. I also bought some asparagus which I steamed for dinner.

On Sunday I went out to the farm for the Meet Your Farmer event, and that was also pretty cool. I got to sample fry bread with a variety of toppings... the toppings being the thing being sold. There was some apple butter from The Campbell Farm that tasted very close to the great stuff my mom canned that we used all through my childhood. I really wanted to get some, but didn't have cash. I'll probably have to find their farm store and visit to get it.

I was also given a sample jar of raw honey... ohmanohmanohman... I need more. I love honey but rarely get it because it's so expensive anymore for the real stuff. This honey is really really good. Not the stuff you buy in supermarkets. I'm told there's a store in my town that sells it: I'm going to have to go and check out the prices. I'm bracing myself.

I then went to a concert, which was also fun. The announcer started by telling everyone the score of the Mariners game (which they later won in a wild battle, 11-10). The violinist started the concert with the absolute worst rendition of "Mary Had A Little Lamb" that I have ever heard, and I've heard some awful first-year stuff. He had a wicked grin on his face as he did it. Then he got down to some serious fiddling with a Mexican guitar for accompaniment. It was excellent, and I kind of wish I had stayed for the whole thing.

While I sat in the darkness of the auditorium, on the steps, I heard something behind me. A woman was being helped down the stairs, but she couldn't see a thing. I stood up and moved over into an empty row so she wouldn't step on me, but she couldn't see the stair, and started to fall. Between the guy guiding her on the other side and myself, we managed to stop her from falling and help her down into a seat. She did bruise my arm a little as she fell before I reached out to help.

Monday deadline was a nightmare, but at least it was a nightmare I knew and recognized this week. I got to work at 6:30am, about an hour before usual, and pounded out copy for fours hours until the 10:30 deadline. I got my last assignment turned in right before deadline, but it wasn't corrected and returned to me until just at deadline. The editor made a point of reminding us about deadline, as our deadline may soon get a little harder. More on that as it happens, if it happens.

After deadline, the boss sent me out to check on a potential story about downtown work. I got the story from city hall and the photo within about a half hour, then got back to the office and wrote up the majority of it before lunch. After lunch, I had two stories to finish writing and a promo to polish up, and then I was done. The editor let me leave to save some hours, since I worked the weekend. I met up with hubby-Eric and we got haircuts, then went home and watched the DVRed Boston Marathon. It was actually a moderately relaxing night.

Tuesday was ok, since I finished my work the day before and only had to worry about the police logs in the morning. We published my new museum president story along with the Meet a Farmer story on Tuesday. Hubby-Eric wasn't working, so we went out to lunch at the Salvadoran place. The pupusas were excellent and it's always nice to get some extra hubby time.

Tuesday afternoon I got to go to softball and baseball games again. The first was the Christian School girls, and I'm really happy with my photo from the game. I actually didn't know I got such an interesting shot until the photo processing guy handed it to me Wednesday morning. I had picked a different photo of a girl catching a foul ball as the most likely shot. But this one is much better. The timing couldn't have been more perfect if I'd planned it.

After hanging around in the heat for an hour, no real shade on that softball field, I headed over to the high school's baseball diamond to get shots of the boys team in action. I was not getting decent shots and I was overheating. I ended up buying an ice cream cone at the concessions in an attempt to cool down, since water alone wasn't cutting it. That helped, but I also clung to whatever shade I could find while taking pictures, which cramped my style a little. While hiding in the shadow of the visitors' dugout, there was a run-down between second and third base. I snapped away, and that's the shot we used. I honestly didn't think any of the other pictures I took were worth keeping. Of course, we put a bunch of the other photos we get on the blue dot, and some of the other shots I took at that game got picked... they just aren't as good.

Wednesday morning I had sports to write up, which can be incredibly easy or incredibly difficult, depending on the coach. The absolute best coaches write up an email with detailed stats and a few comments on the game, their athletes or the event. Great coaches call or email with useful information. Good coaches call or email with the basic stats and few comments. The annoying coaches don't call or email, you have to call them and pray they aren't in class or asleep when you try to reach them, if you can reach them. Wednesday I had an absolute best coach and a great coach. Unfortunately, my great coach counted wrong and I had to call him during class to clarify before I could finish my story. D'oh! We all make mistakes sometimes.

I've stopped putting my name on most of my sports stories because I feel like I'm still learning the art of sportswriting, which is a different animal than newswriting. I feel like a byline is taking too much credit for what is often the coach's or my editor's work. That said, this story I wrote feels, to me, like it was more written by my absolute best coach. Add in the fantastic photos by the photo processing guy (he's a pro in more ways than I'll ever be) and it turned out to be a pretty good story.

After deadline on Wednesday I started work on my Thursday stories when the editor told me to grab my camera and head over to a little park by the museum. One of the city's bronze statues that is a frequent target for idiot vandals was finally getting repaired. I hustled over and took a few dozen photos of the artisan working on the statue, which is of a cattleman branding a calf. The branding iron has been torn off twice, and the original artisan who cast the statue had to return to fix it. This was the second time, but the statue actually has been missing the branding iron for several years before it got fixed this time.

While out at the park, between moments I could take pictures of the work being done, I tried to use my long lens as a macro lens. To my immense surprise, I got some decent photos of bees, and one very nice shot of a butterfly. As we've printed a bee photo recently, I submitted the butterfly to the editor as a filler photo.

Bees are easy to photograph, since they sit still for awhile.

By the time I returned to the office, it was time for lunch. After lunch I started to pound away at Thursday's stories again when a couple of high school girls came to my office. One of them is being mentored in her senior project by my co-worker and cubicle mate, so we sat and chatted about writing and making mistakes and photography. It was fun, and the girls seemed interested... but my work suffered a little from my distraction.

Thursday morning was another sportswriting morning, along with major corrections on my other stories. Again, not really exciting. Except for getting back my track story with only one correction, which I don't think has ever happened.

I managed to get home for lunch to enjoy the Doctor Who: Legacy Adipose Twitch stream, which was nice. I even got there on time, despite it being a half-hour earlier than usual. And I got a thank you note from somebody I wrote a story about, which is also nice. Sometimes I cling to those rare thank you notes like a drowning person. I have most of the ones I've received taped up around my desk to look at when I'm feeling pressure.

With the editor gone on Friday, it meant getting as much as possible done ahead of time to lighten the load on the substitute editor. With the exception of my column, most of my stuff was easy cut&paste or simple promos. I did end up with one of the editor's usual sports stories for Friday morning, but it was just that and the police logs in the morning. Not too much to worry about. Of course, then we got word that the U.S. Representative would be in town and hey, could we maybe send a reporter? *sigh* They usually give us a couple of days notice on events like this, but Friday it was only a few hours. Fortunately, one of the reporters was able to break free some time, with difficulty, so she went.

The afternoon was silent. Not much of anything happened at all. I eventually went out to a softball game for the local high school, the first time I've taken pictures at the high school's softball field this season. There was a complaint about the girls facilities being so much worse than the boys, which was true. So this year, the facility, which will only be used this season, was upgraded considerably. It is much nicer than last year, including dugouts with real roofs instead of plastic sheeting, toilet facilities, fenced bullpens, and an outfield fence. Unfortunately, due to the many fences, I had some trouble finding a good spot to take photos from, but eventually I went out past the homerun line and found that my long lens could get some good batting action. I believe I got a couple of good shots, but that will be up to the photo processing guy on Monday.

Today is a day of absolute do-nothing. I am writing this blog, but this is the most effort you'll see from me today. I'm going to take it easy since it's technically my first day off in almost two weeks.

The Week in Review

This was the week of killer meetings. There's a group we report on that has a predictable and annoying trait. They will receive a presentation during which it is clearly stated, often more than once, that doing X will lead to result Y. After the presentation, the first question is always "What happens if we do X?" Always. Every single freaking time. And usually, the next question is "If we do X, what will be the result?" Yes, the exact same freaking question, stated slightly differently. It happens so often with that particular group that I have a "game" of predicting which member will say it first and how they will phrase it. Fortunately, I don't have to report on that group every time they have a meeting. This week I did. This week it happened. I texted my husband: "killmenow."

Going back to the start of the week, I was off-kilter all day on Monday while still recovering from my cold. I made the mistake of thinking I didn't have much to do Monday morning, only to rapidly realize once I reached my desk in the morning that I had more stories to finish than I had counted on, including two sports stories, extra briefs the editor had assigned to me after I left on Friday, and the medical supplier story from Friday. Add in some unfortunately interesting police reports, and it got tense. I didn't finish until right before deadline itself, 10:30 am. Ouch.

Usually on Mondays I'm getting ready to go to the city council meeting in the evening, but a co-worker traded with me so I went to another town's city council meeting on Tuesday instead. The other town's meetings are usually much shorter, so it was presumed I got the better of the deal. Sadly, that didn't turn out to be the case.

The big problem I faced this week was that I didn't have a subject for Thursday's photo page, and so I asked a co-worker for advice. She suggested I get photos of the workers cutting asparagus in local fields. I liked the idea... it tied in with today's asparagus festival. So I penciled in an early morning trip to a local asparagus field that's actually within walking distance of my house. I drove since I had to go to work after.

Early Tuesday, just after 7 a.m., I headed out to the field. I'm just going to say right now that the workers I saw are much stronger folks than I am. They are also really impressive in how easy they make it look. A long knife that looks like a very thin spatula is used to cut the asparagus shoot about an inch or so below ground level. The cutters pick sprouts that are a certain height, never touching the ones that are too short. The field, from the road, looks really barren... only close up do you realize what's growing there. Talking with one of the workers, she said they cut from about 7 a.m. to 1 p.m. each day.

I asked for permission to take photos before going into the field, then I tried, really hard, to get photos of one older woman who cackled gently at how I had to scramble to keep up with her. She was really good at the job, cutting so rapidly I was afraid the camera wouldn't be able to get a non-blurry shot of her. In my research, I read that asparagus cutting skills are extremely valuable to farmers and take a long time to perfect. Just out in the cold dusty field taking pictures I found myself impressed by the people I met.

I got three or four good shots, but I really needed at least a couple more to make the photo page work, so I decided to drive up later in the afternoon to the processing facility and see if I could get permission to get a couple of photos there. So, after deadline, which wasn't nearly as unpleasant as Monday's, I drove around the "factory" area of town until I spotted the distinctive orange crates I'd seen workers putting asparagus into earlier that morning.

I found the facility's office and went in and asked permission. To my slight surprise, I was granted a quick tour (complete with hair net!). I saw the freshly cut asparagus come into the building and get cut to a uniform height. Then workers deftly sorted them by diameter, checking for damage as they went. After sorting, the asparagus go to a packing table where they are bundled with a rubber band, weighed, and then packed into crates. The crates are loaded up and shipped that same day to markets all over the state (and further).

Overall, it was a truly humbling experience. The amount of work that goes into getting asparagus from the fields to the stores is labor-intensive and impressive.

Tuesday night I headed to the city council meeting in another town. There were three items on the agenda, none of which looked to be serious, so I was expecting a short meeting. In this town, the council meets in a workshop for an hour before the regular meeting starts, so I headed down to make sure I attended the workshop. I also decided to have dinner in town, since I don't usually make it down there. I realized after ordering my bacon cheeseburger that I wanted onion rings instead of fries and a chocolate shake instead of a 7Up, but I didn't change my order because I'm a wimp and they were really busy. Hopefully I'll remember for next time.

I got to city hall with only minutes to spare before the meeting. The council was already all present, and a couple of other people I knew and didn't know were in attendance. One of them, a security specialist, was there to give a presentation on lateral vascular neck restraint, a method of subduing people that looks like a chokehold but isn't, because it's cutting off blood to the brain and not air to the lungs. He said the presentation would take about a half hour, but he had technical difficulties and it actually went a full hour... right up to the start of the regular meeting. Regardless of what you think about police techniques, the presentation was fairly interesting. But with the regular meeting starting and most of the items on the workshop agenda still to go, I realized I was in for a long meeting.

Sure enough, the remainder of the meeting took two and a half hours. My co-worker on Monday had two meetings that totaled about the same amount of time. *sigh*

Wednesday was the parks and recreation meeting in which the lack of organized sports events put on by the city was discussed. It was depressing because a good man is considering quitting the group because progress is so slow.

Thursday I had the groundwater meeting. A group of people who basically despise each other, some for very good reasons, trying to solve a massive problem with the drinking water in the valley. Always a difficult meeting to sit through. This one wasn't nearly as bad as usual. Which is not to say it was fun... it's the one meeting that every reporter groans when they get it... it just wasn't as bad at my city council meeting this week.

Friday we had a bombshell dropped on us at work, figuratively. It's not certain if or how it's going to happen, so I can't explain... but if it does happen my job has the potential to change quite a bit. It's harrowing to go through. When you like what you do, change is feared. But life is change, so I can't really complain.

I'm working all weekend. I started Friday afternoon with baseball and softball pictures, then this morning I went out to a couple of houses that are being cleaned up and painted thanks to a local initiative. The volunteers make for good photos, especially the very little children carefully painting. Tomorrow I go to a "Meet your farmer" event that includes a pig roast, although I may not make it to the roast thanks to having to head to a concert and get a photo before the first event is over.

In other news, I finished posting my cosplay photos from Emerald City Comicon. If you'd like to look, here's a list of all the posts:

• Cosplay
• More Cosplay
• Cosplay continued...
• More great Cosplayers
• Still More Cosplay
• Further Cosplay
• Yet More Cosplay
• Even Still More Cosplay
• Let's Continue the Cosplay
• Neverending Cosplay
• Back to Cosplay
• Yet Further Cosplay
• Continuing Cosplay
• Even More Cosplay
• Nearly Done With Cosplay Photos...
• This is the last ECCC 2015 Cosplay Photo post!

The week in review

I really like having a new laptop... it means I can visit websites quickly, which gives me surprisingly more time to get stuff done, which means I have more effective computing time. I was actually clicking on a link, going off and playing with the cat, eating, doing household chores or playing on the iPad Mini, and hoping by the time I got back, the website had loaded enough for me to copy the link for my blog. It was just taking way too long, so I pretty much stopped blogging. And the iPad is just no fun for visiting websites to blog them. So having a fast computer again is nice.

Anyway, I've been sick the past week with a nasty cold, probably the con crud from Emerald City Comicon. I've been able to post many of my Cosplayer photos over the last week, which has saved me from having to think about blogging while I was sick. I still have about 80 photos to post... just of cosplayers. Here's links to the posts so far:

• Cosplay
• More Cosplay
• Cosplay continued...
• More great Cosplayers
• Still More Cosplay
• Further Cosplay
• Yet More Cosplay
• Even Still More Cosplay
• Let's Continue the Cosplay
• Neverending Cosplay
• Back to Cosplay
• Yet Further Cosplay

I also wrote about the con for work: My escape from reality... and then I wrote about being sick: Cold season hitting me hard this year. Aside: I just want to say, it took moments to load my work articles on this new computer. My old computer had reached the point where it would not open the newspaper's website at all.

Work has been busy, and it is always way more difficult when you are sick. I had a brief moment of difficulty on Monday when my desire to go home and get chicken soup conflicted with the editor changing something last minute that needed my approval. I was... upset is too light a word, but that's what I'm going with. It was not handled well by me. After that incident, I was a little more careful and forced myself to rest even when I wanted badly to get up and do something. I ran out of breath even just sitting on the floor playing with the cat.

One of my assignments last weekend was to cover two Easter events in the Lower Valley. I was at Grandview's annual Easter egg hunt and got two temporary tattoos, one on the back of each hand. The one on my right hand didn't last the day, probably because the kid applying it didn't wait long enough, but the one on my left hand stayed until yesterday. I think I need to hit the dollar store and see if they have any temporary tattoo designs I like. I kind of enjoyed having it for the week.

I also got to see the Reptile Man again this past Tuesday. I was still feeling sick, but I got some good photos. After that, I still had to get baseball photos, and although I felt horrible, I still managed well enough that I got compliments on what I took from the boss, which is always nice.

On Tuesday my story about the new local frame shop also ran in the paper. Imagine my delight when I saw on Facebook that the owner had framed the article.

I've been framed!

Some time ago I was asked by the author of a book I reviewed a long time ago to read his new book and provide a cover blurb. I was honored to do it, and found the book (in a PDF galley) to be as excellent as the first. I wrote what I hoped was an appropriate blurb and e-mailed it off to him. I wasn't sure if I expected to ever get a response besides his thank you. Well, a woman came in with a review copy for the newspaper and it ended up on my desk this week. I was happy to see my name on the back:

My bit is the middle paragraph there... wow. I've been blurbed...

The book is available at Amazon if you want a copy.
It's a pretty good read, a mix of poetry and prose.

You can get a copy of Migrant Earth on Amazon, and his first book of poetry is available through Village Books if you want to support an independent bookstore. I'd like to get a copy of Migrant Earth for myself. For the moment I'll settle for reading the newspaper's copy. I have to write a review of it for next month, which shouldn't be too hard. I've already read it once...

In other work news, I had three assignments yesterday to tackle. I managed the one at the assisted living facility without too much trouble, although I did set off the alarm when I tried to leave... oops. I had a baseball game next and enjoyed that. It was at Sunnyside Christian High School, and they played a solid first inning... enough for me to get plenty of good shots before I left. The tough job was leaving my nice comfortable house again and going to a soccer game in the evening. I stayed for the first half. The light was horrible for photos, so I don't know if anything I took came out. I was shooting into the setting sun for the first 20 minutes, and then under stadium lights for the rest of the half. I actually enjoyed what I saw of the game. The SHS team is really good, and when they play you can see the beauty of soccer when it's played well and passionately. Being practically out on the field also helps a little in my enjoyment of the game. I can hear the players shouting instructions to each other. I nearly got hit by the ball twice, but managed to step aside.

The temperature dropped rapidly last night once the sun was gone, so by the end of the first half I felt like I was being beaten up by the cold and by the bedraggled remains of my illness. I got home and just crashed, physically and emotionally. I think I slept almost 12 hours. I had bizarre dreams that refused to make sense. I've been up a few hours. Hubby-Eric and I got both the cars washed at a charity car wash, had lunch at the charity car wash, and now I'm resting and blogging like I haven't blogged in years.

Cosplay photos will return on Monday. It should take me four more posts to finish with the cosplay photos. I hope you all enjoy them. If you like me blogging, let me know. I'll try to get back into the habit.

Blogging from the iPad

I thought I would give it a shot, since my poor computer is nearly dead. Strange thing, Google hasn't updated its blogging app for years...

Anyway, here's a blog. Whee.

These, if the photo comes through, are cheese zombies. A school lunch favorite around this area. A co-worker was selling them to raise money for the swim team her son is on. We bought some because it's fun to tell people we're eating zombies for dinner.

Ok, let's see if this posts.

Er, hello...

Sorry I haven't been posting. In fact, I'm pretty annoyed at myself for the utter lack of posts. But I guess as a writer, I have trouble writing when I don't have to be writing for work.

I'll try to get back to posting some daily, or at least weekly, content soon. There's so many cool things in the world, this is my spot to spout off about it all.

What to post... what to post...

With the attempt to get back to blogging daily comes a certain sort of pressure, mostly imposed by myself since my 20 or so readers aren't going to pressure me at all. So I'm sitting here trying to come up with a topic and finding my brain is pretty empty after a full day of work.

Back in the day I'd have plenty of links because I'd have spent a few hours earlier in the day browsing the web. Now I don't do much more than the minimum of browsing, which is all I usually have time for. I've stopped reading most of my RSS feeds, and I haven't been able to keep up with my favorite blogs. This is not a bad thing, entirely, because it means I'm working enough to keep me busy.

Anyway, I wanted to post something fun tonight, but I haven't got a lot going upstairs. So I think I'll just post these thoughts and hope to get something more for my next blog tomorrow. Maybe I can find a video or something.

Mobile Blogging

I have Blogger on my Android phone now, so I can attempt to blog from where ever I happen to be. If this works, a picture of some of the archives at work should be attached to this post.

Comments

I've started to shut down commenting on posts older than a year, and maybe even just stuff older than a month. It's going to be a piecemeal process because Blogger doesn't seem to have a universal way of updating all the 5,000+ posts on this blog by date, so I can't just reset them all to disallow new comments at once. And with over 5,000 posts... well, I don't like going through and updating one by one, but that seems to be what I'll have to do.

Maybe that will stop the avalanche of spam I get, maybe it won't. A lot of it is posted on older posts. They still won't get through my moderation, but whenever someone attempts to post spam on an older post I'll update that post to reject new comments.

I'm hoping that after almost a year at my "new" job, I can start to re-balance my life and get back to a little light blogging, a little light Aquaman fan stuff and maybe some other stuff that fell by the wayside while I learned how to be a reporter.

Happy Blogiversary to Me!

October 22, 2002 --- October 22, 2003 --- October 22, 2004 --- October 22, 2005
October 22, 2006 --- October 22, 2007 --- October 22, 2008 --- October 22, 2009
October 22, 2010
Nine years of this blog's existence... It accomplished what I set out to do. I wanted to write for an audience, and I wanted to write regularly. It was a lot of practice, and it helped me considerably to prepare for my current job. Writing every day meant that I was ready when I got hit with jobs that required daily writing.

Speaking of writing, my second Word Nerd column is up. Now I need to come up with another one.

I do have some blogs in the works. I got a new Kindle and plan on doing a review of it soon, comparing it to my first gen Kindle. I also intend to write my reviews of the last few Doctor Who episodes and the last season of Sarah Jane Adventures. And I'm slowly catching up with my comic book reading, although I'm about a month behind still. I haven't yet read Aquaman #1! That's what happens when you get a freakin' cool job that swallows 90% of your time.

I've been at my current job for two months and a week. And I still love it.

Blogging About Blogging...

In case you were unaware, Blogger went down for about 20 hours, and then it took some time before the last couple of days of posts were restored. Everything appears to be back to normal again, but if something should vanish again it is probably Blogger's fault, not mine. I hope.

Comments

I will not pass through anonymous comments that are clearly from spammers. You gotta be more creative than that. And if you don't sign a name to an anonymous comment (or at least an online handle) then it's not happening, sorry.

But it has been entertaining reading some of the garbage that spammers think I'll fall for...

Holy Flaming Cows! Eight Years of Bloggity?

October 22nd 2002 --- October 22nd, 2003 --- October 22, 2004 --- October 22, 2005
October 22, 2006 --- October 22, 2007 --- October 22, 2008 --- October 22, 2009
I haven't been as faithful about writing every day for the last couple of years, but I have updated regularly. I don't have any idea how many readers I have since I removed all tracking bugs long ago, and I don't think I would want to know even if I could. I know the most important people in my world have the ability to keep up on me if they so choose, and that's what's important.

So, here's to the next year! Let's hope it's the best one ever!

Current Spam Attack

I've been getting a lot of comments that have a very generic "I liked this post" type of comment, followed by a long series of periods ......... which are actually links to a spam site. Anyone else getting these right now? I've had to delete them from a bunch of my blogs.

What to Blog About?

I keep hearing bits of news that are reported elsewhere and I think, "I should blog that!" and then I promptly forget. For instance, do my Doctor Who fan friends know that Katy Manning will be appearing on the Sarah Jane Adventures? Are my comic book fan friends aware that there is going to be a Young Justice animated series that includes a strange version of Aqualad? But when I get to the point I want to blog about these little tidbits, I always forget. I guess I'm moving into another phase of blogging... the old forgetful blogger.

HA!

Go look at Elayne's Blog and let me know if you see any errors there. I just finished downgrading her classic template to a layout format. And it only took... well, all day yesterday and most of the day today. Good thing I'm between contracts.

Next up: The Aquaman Page, which has an embedded blog.