Archive for 10 months, 2 weeks ago, in the early afternoon

gimme a ticket for an aeroplane

10 months, 2 weeks ago, in the early afternoon

Tomorrow morning, I’ll be leaving for Penguicon in Detroit, so today is eaten up with (a). finishing up day-job work, if possible, (b). charging all phones, cameras, iPods, and mini-laptops, (c). trying to plot a wardrobe, and (d). preparing the household for my absence.*

In a few minutes, this whirlwind of activity will be interrupted by Psynde, who will be joining me for lunch. This is probably a good thing, because it will distract me from my imminent freak out over here. I like to travel, but I live in permanent fear of forgetting something important, which is probably why I tend to be the most ludicrously over-prepared person in any given group of out-of-towners. But hey, when the zombie apocalypse comes, some of us will have all the Benedryl, band-aids, Advil, Maalox, notebooks, lotion, pens, tissue, cough drops, eye drops, hand sanitizer, and tiny flashlights … and some of us will have NOTHING.

I make no apologies.

Anyway. You may reasonably expect me to be all but absent for the next few days, though I’ll make a point to stay (more or less) current over on Twitter — on account of I can post to that site by phone, from the road. So follow me there, if you’d like. Otherwise, I’ll see you all when the party is over.



* Changed kitty litter, cleaned the fish tank, etcetera.

April 27, 2009

10 months, 2 weeks ago, in the early evening

Yes yes, I’ve been absent a lot lately. I’ve spent the last few weeks trying to clean up an enormous, tragically torqued file for my day-job … and also trying to juggle two creative projects which alternately demand appalling portions of my attention. At the moment, I’m trying to give priority to the day-job deadline, because I really want to have this file fixed in its entirety before Penguicon — for which I’ll be flying out on Thursday.

But Dreadnought progress is the only thing I can satisfactorily quantify with a word-meter, so that’s what you get today. [Aside: Speaking of that word meter, I’ve gotten a handful of emails and comments lately, wanting to know where I got it. It comes from Writertopia’s Toolbox. Consider yourselves duly briefed on this matter.]

So here’s recent progress on the battlefield adventure about a widowed nurse from a Confederate hospital aboard a west-bound train pulled by a Union war engine — now with military intrigue, steampunk Texas rangers, undead political separatists, murderous plots, bushwackers, bandits, sabotage, and epic scenes of mayhem:

Project: Dreadnought
New Words: 3135 (pretty good, though some was written yesterday)
Present Total Word Count: 17,733 words
Goal: 100,000 words



Things Accomplished in Real Life: Still plugging away at the day-job, as well as the Project Which Must Not Be Named (but which is due to start eating my life in earnest any day now); did not actually beat any of the electricians to death, even though they woke me up early (for no good reason, as it turned out), and even though they spent all day trying to burrow up through my floor with industrial-grade power tools while I was trying to work (technically they’re tearing up my downstairs neighbor’s ceiling, but it SOUNDS like it’s my floor); created filing system with spiffy new crate and hanging folders for secret project of doom; went to the bank and got some cash for the coming weekend.

Reason for Stopping: Suppertime. Will probably return after suppertime to either get more writing done, or get more day-job work done. This depends on how badly I feel the need for a glass of wine. I won’t do day-job work while imbibing; but I will totally write about dirigibles and steampunk nurses while imbibing. I’m not sure what precisely this says about my work ethic, but oh well. There you go.

April 23, 2009

10 months, 2 weeks ago, in the evening

Here’s recent progress on the battlefield adventure about a widowed nurse from a Confederate hospital aboard a west-bound train pulled by a Union war engine — now with military intrigue, steampunk Texas rangers, undead political separatists, murderous plots, bushwackers, bandits, sabotage, and epic scenes of mayhem:

Project: Dreadnought
New Words: 1515 (not great — that’s a 2-day total)
Present Total Word Count: 14,598 words
Goal: 100,000 words



Observations: Jesus, but planning a cross-country trip in the 19th century must have been an epic freaking undertaking. I get to invent my own rail lines and dirigible transport routes, and it’s still a logistical nightmare … never mind the war zone that gets in the way of much of it.

Things Accomplished in Real Life: Did much day job work; was thrown offline most of the day while Qwest got its act together and (eventually, late this afternoon) got our connection up and stable; therefore was incapable of doing much of the research/poking around required for more information. Oh well.

Reason for Stopping: Time for noms.

Links and Info Round-Up

10 months, 3 weeks ago, in the early evening

  • It’s the end of genre fiction as we know it (and I feel fine). Barnes & Noble’s new Blog, operated by Paul Goat Allen (of forum moderator fame). And no, I’m not just linking it because he mentions me. Well, that’s not the only reason. I swear.

  • Wild Cards consortium news. Straight from George’s mouth. My final and formal statement on the matter is this: SQUEEE OMG !11!!!ELEVENTY!!! *cough cough* I mean, I am very proud and excited to be included in such fine company, and I can’t wait to get started on any future Wild Cards projects that might land on the collective plate.

  • DREADNOUGHT notes, for your perusal. Sort of. I ran into a stumbling block from a travel-planning perspective, so I spent half the afternoon researching old railways and deciding which lines I could re-draw and which ones I could pretend never existed in 1880. So yes, I know that almost everything under that link is incorrect. But at least I know why it’s incorrect, and it will be consistently incorrect, in accordance with my nefarious purposes.

  • Strange Horizons review. That fine online publication offers a fairly in-depth review of Fathom that’s free of overly significant spoilers. I love Strange Horizon reviews. They’re always thoughtful, and they always pull something unexpected out to show and entice potential readers.

  • Early Bioshock 2 goodies. For all its (well-documented, but IMO largely irrelevant) faults, I truly loved the original Bioshock — and I just can’t wait to see what the franchise creators come up with next. I particularly enjoyed the video featurette beneath the link, wherein I learned many things and had my appetite duly whetted.


Grab-Bag Assortment

10 months, 3 weeks ago, in the evening

  • Once more, with feeling. I know I just redid my main page the other day, but I wasn’t “feeling it.” So I’ve given it a new look — something glossy, pretty, and a little weird. It pleases me. I think I’ll keep this one for awhile.

  • Blood of the Muse really liked Fathom. This guy’s reviews are always fun and spoiler-free, and I’m not just saying that because he’s said very nice things about my books.

  • Boneshaker preorders. Over the weekend, I received half a dozen emails asking if it was all right to pre-order Boneshaker from Amazon.com. Let me be the first to reassure you: it’s absolutely okay! I know the listing is naked, but that is the listing. The book’s release date is a long ways off, but if you’re one of those folks who loves the suspense, well, don’t let me stop you …

  • 40-Foot Steampunk Spider. The husband sent me this link, earlier this afternoon. “Although the Expo Y150 festivities are not scheduled to officially begin until the end of April, the enormous steampunk spiders could be seen prowling the Yokohama waterfront this weekend.”

In other news … here’s recent progress on the battlefield adventure about a widowed nurse from a Confederate hospital aboard a west-bound train pulled by a Union war engine — now with military intrigue, steampunk Texas rangers, undead political separatists, murderous plots, bushwackers, bandits, sabotage, and epic scenes of mayhem:

Project: Dreadnought
New Words: 1728 (not great — that’s a weekend total)
Present Total Word Count: 13,083 words
Goal: 100,000 words



Observations: I’m relieved to be writing Mercy away from the hospital. Two chapters of Civil War ER was just about all I could take; too much more, and even the most casual readers might start slitting their wrists from all the gruesome woe.

Things Accomplished in Real Life: Made some healthy progress on the day job project; spent a couple hours on the phone with an editor regarding a project about which I’m not yet allowed to squee; that’s about it, really.

Reason for Stopping: I’m completely exhausted. Allergies are keeping me up all night with BreathingFail, and I’ve sucked down enough pills to choke a pony … which helps … some … but leaves me wiped out and stoned. I fervently hope that the aforementioned editor didn’t think I was completely lit. But three Benedryls, two Zyrtecs, and two heavy-duty decongestants will make a girl a little spacey.*



* But at least they let her BREATHE.

nothing hurts like your mouth

10 months, 3 weeks ago, late at night

I am sick to death of thinking about my teeth, and now I don’t have to for another four months.* I am officially, thoroughly, obnoxiously all caught up with my ten-years-lapsed dental work … and to that I say “Praise Steve, and pass the Doritos.”

Well, actually I’m more inclined to say, “…and pass the pudding.” They shot me up again, and this time it was the right side of my face that felt like a slab of somebody else’s liver. But now that the Novocaine is all worn off and I can resume making kissy faces at the cat, my mouth aches like a mofo. I can still taste blood. My jaw is either sprained from the stress, or just plain pulled. My gums ache all the way back to my ears.

But I’ve been given a clean bill of oral health, at least for now. I have to go back in a few months to make sure my gums aren’t going to burst into flames or anything; but assuming it all checks out, I can move on to a 6-month schedule like normal people.

I’m a little ambivalent about that. On the one hand, it means that I can quit having those nightmares about my teeth turning into wee wads of gum before falling out of my face. On the other hand, I went ten years without bothering to take a trip to the magical reclining chair, and I did just fine thank you very much. Why the hell should I go every six months?

Yes, I know. This is madness. And I’m sure that once my mouth once again feels like a normal mouth, and not like a mouth that’s been participating in a How Many Rocks Can I Fit in Here competition, I’ll have a healthier take on the situation. But for now, I could wait another ten years and be all the happier for it.

Because this sucks. And it will not stop sucking for at least another glass of wine. Or two. I suppose I’ll have to crack open another bottle FOR SCIENCE.



* Yes, I still intend to brush them between now and then. I’m negligent, not a hermit.

cat self-liberates from bag

10 months, 4 weeks ago, in the evening

I was going to keep this loosely under my hat — which is to say, it’d been leaked, and it’d appeared elsewhere on the ‘net, but I wasn’t going to make a show of it over here until there was a final product and/or official word. But then I said to myself, “Self, why should I keep mum while everyone else gets to show off the preliminary cover of Boneshaker?”

Because that’s totally what the “it” in question refers to. And furthermore, that link will totally take you to a preorder page at Amazon. I didn’t even know such a page existed, though sadly, it’s merely a shell — not even a wee little gif or jpeg.

So what will this novel look like, once it’s in your hot little hands? Well, I’ll show you.
But you’ll have to click the link below:

(more…)

April 15, 2009

10 months, 4 weeks ago, in the late afternoon

I haven’t made a huge amount of progress on DREADNOUGHT today, due to the critical need for groceries that ate up two hours in the middle of my work time. But such is life. And now I have food, so I shall not starve.

So here’s today’s progress on the battlefield adventure about a widowed nurse from a Confederate hospital aboard a west-bound train pulled by a Union war engine — now with military intrigue, steampunk Texas rangers, undead political separatists, murderous plots, bushwackers, bandits, sabotage, and epic scenes of mayhem:

Project: Dreadnought
New Words: 1087 (not great)
Present Total Word Count: 11,355 words
Goal: 100,000 words



Observations: Writing a telegram is peculiarly difficult. At least, writing a fictional telegram that is both brief and informative sure as heck is. I spent longer composing that bad-boy than the rest of the text put together. Oh well. It’s important, and it needs to be right.

Things Accomplished in Real Life: Did copious day job work; went grocery shopping; cleaned kitchen; prepared for laundry (which I’ll begin in a minute).

Reason for Stopping: I’m a smidge pressed for time re: the other creative project upon which I am presently noodling — and I feel the need to wrap up my revised proposal for it sooner, rather than later. So I’m going to try to take the rest of the afternoon (working around the laundry) to wrap it up.

Steve Smiles upon the Internet

10 months, 4 weeks ago, in the evening

But the great Intergalactic Fruitbat does his smiling upside-down, so don’t be confused and think he’s giving you the ol’ stink-eye. This exceedingly fine bit of iconography was created by Shanna. And Steve looked upon it, and saw that it was good.



April 14, 2009

10 months, 4 weeks ago, in the late afternoon

This morning was devoted to day-job work, and then after lunchtime I took a break to noodle around with my website’s new look. Feel free to visit. Click around. Tell me if you notice anything that isn’t working, or that looks bad.*

And here’s today’s progress on the battlefield adventure about a widowed nurse from a Confederate hospital aboard a west-bound train pulled by a Union war engine — now with military intrigue, steampunk Texas rangers, undead political separatists, murderous plots, bushwackers, bandits, sabotage, and epic scenes of mayhem:

Project: Dreadnought
New Words: 3146 (very nice)
Present Total Word Count: 10,268 words
Goal: 100,000 words



Observations: I’m having really good writing days lately. Maybe I do better with the day-job, which makes me parcel out my time better. I’ve heard a lot of people say that they write the most when they have the least free time — and I know I used to be one of those people (Lord knows I started/wrote much of Four and Twenty Blackbirds while working 3 jobs and in graduate school). I guess there’s still a vestige of the old habit there to be harnessed.

Things Accomplished in Real Life: Did copious day job work; washed all the towels in the apartment, for they were all dirty; wrote half a dozen checks to pay half a dozen bills; mailed off the aforementioned bills; changed the litterbox; resisted the impulse to take a nap.

Reason for Stopping: Must take a few minutes to do dishes/clean the kitchen before suppertime; then I need to get back to that other creative project/proposal upon which I continue to noodle.



* In my perfect world, I’d have oodles of money to pay a good designer to make me a kick-ass personalized steampunk page; but this is the real world, where that ain’t the case — and I must stick to themes that I, personally, can tweak into submission.

April 13, 2009

11 months ago, in the evening

Here’s today’s progress on the battlefield adventure about a widowed nurse from a Confederate hospital aboard a west-bound train pulled by a Union war engine — now with military intrigue, steampunk Texas rangers, undead political separatists, murderous plots, bushwackers, bandits, sabotage, and epic scenes of mayhem:

Project: Dreadnought
New Words: 2115 (not bad)
Present Total Word Count: 7122 words
Goal: 100,000 words



Things Accomplished in Fiction: Cut short the mourning period in favor of a fresh batch of wounded soldiers; treated some gruesome injuries; triaged like a mofo; ordered a new nurse around as a matter of necessity.

Things Accomplished in Real Life: Did quite a lot of dayjob work; had a chat via phone with the boss-man; took lunch with Caitlin; created and emailed off a 2600 word proposal; did leftover Easter dishes; re-read part of my very-helpful source material for info regarding Civil War era hospitals.

Reason for Stopping: All this talk of festering wounds is making me hungry.

Very Good Dogs

11 months ago, in the evening

As many of you know first hand, a guide or helper dog can be a life-changing kind of companion — and the institutions that train these fine canines (and subsequently pair them off with the people who need them) are doing truly exceptional work. One in particular is the Fidelco Guide Dog Foundation.


In fact, in December of 2007 one of my long-time readers was partnered with a new guide dog from this very school. Cyndy and “Yara” got along quite smashingly and all was well, until Yara began mysteriously losing weight. It turned out that Yara was suffering from exocrine pancreatic insufficiency — a genetic disorder that prevents the poor pooch from producing the proper enzymes required to digest food.

On the upshot, this is a very easily treated condition. On the downshot, it was very expensive. But on the upshot again, Fidelco agreed to pay for the medication (a dietary supplement that’s worth its weight in platinum) for the rest of Yara’s life — at no cost to Cyndy. Huzzah!

So now Cyndy wants to help return the favor via the Walk for Fidelco, a fundraising event held at the Manchester Community College campus in Manchester, Connecticut. It is her goal to match the money that Fidelco is pouring into Yara’s medication — $2500 (this year alone) — in order to thank them for their generosity.

If this sounds like a good cause to you, and you’d like to sponsor Cyndy or read more about her statement on the matter, just click here to visit her FirstGiving page. It’s a great cause benefiting a damn fine organization, and every little bit helps.

April 10, 2009

11 months ago, in the early evening

Here’s today’s progress on the battlefield adventure about a widowed nurse from a Confederate hospital aboard a west-bound train pulled by a Union war engine — now with military intrigue, steampunk Texas rangers, undead political separatists, murderous plots, bushwackers, bandits, sabotage, and epic scenes of mayhem:

Project: Dreadnought
New Words: 2701 (pretty good)
Present Total Word Count: 5007 words
Goal: 100,000 words



Observations: How bad would it suck if your job was to go around telling people they were widows and orphans? What a goddamn thankless job. Anyway, I was concerned that maybe my first chapter/introduction/whatnot was going to run too short; I shouldn’t have worried. I’m 5000 words deep, and I haven’t even gotten to the telegram yet. Thank heaven for Western Union, eh? Bloody well up and running (and transcontinental!) long before 1880.

Things Accomplished in Fiction: Delivered some very bad news; showed the daily typical workings of the hospital; established Captain Sally and introduced the Clara Barton cameo.

Things Accomplished in Real Life: Did so much dayjob reading that I nearly went cross-eyed; went to lunch with Psynde and then hit up Petco for cat/fish supplies; cleaned house; wrote 2700 words in about 2 hours, go me!

Reason for Stopping: Time to work on that other creative project now.

the monster at the end of this post

11 months ago, in the late afternoon

Yesterday I looked out the window and saw this, on the street below.

sinkhole 004

Okay. To be completely honest, what I saw was this same scene with two electricians staring into the hole like they’d just put in a quarter and were waiting for the show to start. When I went downstairs to ask about it, they shrugged and said that they’d reported the situation to the city. So I shrugged too.

Then one of them asked, “Is that your salt?” And I was like, “No.” So we all shrugged again and we went our separate ways, none the wiser for the encounter.

sinkhole 003

Last night, a WDOT truck actually came out to investigate. By which I mean, “Two dudes in orange vests hung around poking at the box of salt with a stick, acting like they thought it might be stuffed with used hypodermic needles or something … and then they tried to fill up the hole with water.”

After about twenty minutes they gave up, turned off the water, rolled the hose back up, closed up the truck, and left. I don’t know what that was supposed to accomplish; but I guess the hole looks a little cleaner now. Maybe. So if their job was to “clean out that hole or at least make it bigger” then they did a decent job. I give them an “E” for “Effort.”

sinkhole 002

Started out in church and finished with Angelica

11 months ago, mid-afternoon

And so it begins. Here’s today’s progress on the battlefield adventure about a widowed nurse from a Confederate hospital aboard a west-bound train pulled by a Union war engine — now with military intrigue, steampunk Texas rangers, undead political separatists, murderous plots, bushwackers, bandits, sabotage, and epic scenes of mayhem:

Project: Dreadnought
New Words: 2306 (it’s a start!)
Present Total Word Count: 2306 words
Goal: 100,000 words



Observations: I’d be astonished if this comes in under 120,000 words, but I may as well keep the goals modest for now. Though I have much of this story sketched out, I’m still not sure what the scope is going to look like — which may sound lame, but there you go. Let me try it this way: I know the shape of the story, I just don’t know what color it is, what size bra it wears, who does its hair, or where it buys its shoes. Okay. Yeah. That’s not very helpful either.

Ludicrously long and temporary first sentence: “Down in the laundry room with the bloody-wet floors and the ceiling-high stacks of sheets, wraps, beddings and blankets, Vinita Lynch was elbows-deep in a vat full of dirty pillowcases because she’d promised — she’d sworn, and on her mother’s life — that she’d find a certain pocket watch belonging to Private Hugh Morton’s father before the wind-up device was plunged into the tubs of simmering, soapy water and surely destroyed for good.”

Resolutions: Must average at least 10,000 words a week on this. MUST.

Things Accomplished in Real Life: Chugged through dayjob editorial duties which are a bit of a bear right now (stupid screwed up digital file with loads of stupid errors); straightened house; investigated sinkhole outside my kitchen window and took pictures; ran to Walgreens for yet more allergy medication; printed out some forms that I need to mail; did not take a four-hour nap again.

Reason for Stopping: I have another potentially-important-creative-project on my plate right now too, and I need to change gears for an hour or two.

Wait. What?

11 months ago, in the evening

Around lunchtime, I ran back over to the movie set briefly to drop off some promised items — then I came home because there Much Work To Do. But then I sat down on the couch, leaned my head back, and closed my eyes for a couple of minutes. And suddenly it was 5:00.

I have no idea how that happened. I wish it had not happened, despite the fact that the odds are high I needed it badly; thanks to my allergies I’ve been sleeping like hell for several days, and the long weekend was a fun riot, but it wore me out.

So a four-hour nap? Not the world’s hugest surprise or anything. But now there’s even more Work To Do, since that sort of thing doesn’t magically vaporize while one drools all over the throw pillows and dreams of a ghost man with absurdly long legs who lives in my ceiling.

Oh well. These things happen, I suppose.
*sigh*

I said this world is full of endless abstractions

11 months, 1 week ago, in the late evening

It’s positively exhausting, standing around preparing for things to happen. For much of the day, I felt like I was in a church, waiting for a wedding to start — hanging around the outskirts of a room, waiting to be sent for and told where to stand while lots of people were doing very complicated things with cameras.

But it wasn’t a wedding. It was a short independent film, and I was an extra.

Caitlin, Aric, and I met up at a lovely old historic mansion on the backside of Capitol Hill, where we lounged about being tidily dressed and idly chatty while the cameras rolled. Mostly, the cameras rolled on Wil as Ed did the directing* — ably managing a whole room full of folks in a borrowed, pristine, expensive home without breaking a single thing.

Right now, those of you who know me in person are sitting there slack-jawed and gaping, assuming that Ed must be some kind of goddamned magician to have kept me from face-planting into the china cabinet or carving up a Persian rug with my high heels. You’d be right. He’s pretty amazing.

Wil was pretty amazing too, even though I didn’t see most of what he was doing. I was an extra. It was my job not to look at the pro, and to pretend to be deeply engrossed in exchanging quasi-intimate dialogue with a (perfectly pleasant) stranger. It’s downright baffling, really. I can talk all day long, at length, quite happily, to just about anybody; but you put me in front of a camera and tell me to chat at the guy who’s been placed in my personal space and I totally draw a blank.

Mostly, we ended up talking about grievous injuries, strange concerts we’d attended, Ed’s “alternative” (and utterly fictional) independent film career (say no more!), and speculating on the pollen count. We also had to hold a pair of brandy glasses perfectly still for several minutes, waiting for the shot to be perfect, so that we could clink them in front of the lens and step apart. That was way harder than it sounded, trust me.

But it was a lot of fun, especially once I’d been at it long enough to forget that I was being filmed. I highly recommend the experience — and not just because we all got fed some truly nomulent pizza, and we met a lot of neat new people

No, I’m not going to tell you too much about the film itself.

Ed says I’m welcome to blog about it, but there are a handful of elements that should really remain on the down-low; and anyway, by the time it’s all edited together and released, perhaps you’ll have forgotten about this post — and it will come as a nice surprise.

I’m not sure precisely how the final product will appear, but it’ll almost certainly be available on the internet, and it will likely end up screened at the odd festival or two here and there. Believe me, when it goes public, I’ll point you to it every which-a-way. The script is really great — ominous and funny — and I can tell you already that the production values are superb.

I can’t thank Ed enough for inviting us to be part of this.
It was a total hoot :)



* He also wrote the script.

Everybody’s workin’ for the weekend

11 months, 1 week ago, mid-afternoon

Mine has been most excellent, excepting the hideous allergies (conSARS?) which afflict me this afternoon. Ah, spring in Seattle. Doesn’t feel like spring. Only kind of looks like spring. But unleashes all the spring allergens like gangbusters.

Anyway. My weekend began on Friday, as you no doubt noticed from the picture I posted with my previous entry. Long story short, that afternoon I got together with Wil, Joanne, and Joanne’s S.O. Marc for my upteenth visit to the Seattle Underground Tour. Why upteenth? Because I totally love it, and it’s usually the first thing to which I subject all out-of-towners. I’m all about supporting the local history guys, and the tour is typically a lot of fun for anyone who (a). is interested in truly bizarre historical happenings, or (b). likes to poke around in condemned, deserted, filthy, disused buildings.

My companions were exceedingly good sports about the whole thing, especially Wil — who is a consummate tourist. It’s one of my favorite things about him: He’s genuinely interested in a whole lot of stuff, and he wants to participate in everything, everywhere he goes. He is precisely my kind of travel companion — willing to try anything once, go anywhere once, and listen to anything (for at least awhile).

And yes, Seattle is very, very proud of its toilets. You would be too, if once upon a time you could only flush them during certain quasi-mysterious times of day or else you’d be blown off your crapper by a geyser of raw sewage.* But don’t worry! It’s all fixed now.

Following a light supper at the Elliot Bay Bookstore cafe, we went our separate directions for the night; and all of us (plus a whole bunch of other people) turned back up yesterday at the Emerald City Comic Con. Alas, poor Wil was trapped in his booth most of the day; but Caitlin and I bumped into Joanne and Marc from time to time, and a wonderful afternoon of crowd-wrangling and tee shirt shopping did ensue.

Well, okay. Truth to tell, Cait and I spent more time sitting in lines than doing actual shopping, but that was fine. We were taking it leisurely.

We started out in the line to have a chat with Hellboy creator Mike Mignola, who had been very kind and personable to us both via the wondrous internets. He’d told us to swing by, and we’d promised to swing by, so we swung by, and it was totally awesome even though I totally forgot to bring anything for him to sign.

We also swung by and said hello to Ed and Matt; but I don’t know Matt very well (though he seemed quite pleasant) and we’re going to see Ed tomorrow so we didn’t hog too much of his time either — especially considering that there was a long line of pissed-off looking guys dressed as Captain America behind us, each one waiting for his turn to have a Very Sternly Worded Conversation, I’m sure.

Once we’d worn ourselves out stamping around on the hard concrete floor, we called it a day and went home … only to get a call from Mike about after-convention refreshments. Much to our collective delight, he invited us out for drinks and snacks,** and he told us stories about scouting for film locations in ominous eastern European factories where scar-faced workers with wrenches the size of German Shepherds leer, stomp, and make friendly threats that would’ve prompted me to require a change of shorts. Not to put too fine a point on it, but he was very, very, very, very cool — and I highly recommend him as a storyteller and a human being.

But now? Ah, now I’m back home and trying to get some work done. I’ll be gone much of the day tomorrow, so I wanted to get a headstart on the week’s dayjob requirements; and now I’m going to settle in for a long afternoon of note-taking, reading, and researching. I’m feeling particularly inspired given last night’s conversation, and I might even be able to write the first few lines of Dreadnought today — but we’ll see. I definitely need to start it this week, and those first words are always the toughest. For me. Not necessarily for everybody. Your mileage may vary, and all that.

So have a good one, all.
I’ll be around.



* Because that’s what you get when you build your city on a tidal mudflat, and you can’t be bothered to install a sewage system first. Merely running a wooden pipe from the top of the hill to the edge of the water does not (as they say) “cut it” when high tide rolls around.
** At which point we were joined by Richelle, whose picture I pilfered with her permission.

Flush with Joy

11 months, 1 week ago, in the evening

Courtesy of the exceptional BarbieHead.
(That’s her, lower right.)

Not dead yet.

11 months, 1 week ago, in the late evening

I woke up this morning to an email from my former boss and all-around great guy, who shall henceforth be referred to as “Bluemeister P.” He knows why. Anyway, this email informs me that I am dead, and ain’t that a lark? It also suggested that I call him so he could offer more personal condolences on my very sad state of vitality (or lack thereof).

I agreed to this, even though I was well aware that any given phone call with Bluemeister P. was far more likely to be peppered with profanity, fart jokes, and at least one mention of poo and/or somebody’s wang — which would be the case even if I really had died, so there was no reason to get my sentimental hopes up.*

So we played phone tag a little, and finally caught one another around lunchtime. After the obligatory exchange of lower-bodily-fixated humor and friendly gossip, I learned that Chattanooga, Tennessee, seems to think I died several years ago. This is due to the sprouting of an urban legend that confuses me with something that happened to someone else about four years ago; and although I did, in fact, have a passing involvement with the event, I did not, in fact, die as a result of it.

To clarify in brief: In May of 2005 I indulged one of my better-known vices and let myself inside an abandoned turn-of-the-century power plant, wherein I took a whole bunch of pictures and (as you might guess) I posted them on the internet. Two weeks later, a teenage boy tried to do likewise. He fell through an old hoist shaft and broke his back, landing him in a coma and the building’s owner in hot legal water.

The kid came out of the coma, at which point he was asked why he’d broken into the building. He insisted that he hadn’t broken into anything — that it’d been hanging wide open, and he’d just walked inside. It was the classic defense (and one I’ve used myself once or twice): “I didn’t break-and-enter. I just entered.

But it was tough to prove … until a google-savvy family member turned up a set of photographs taken not two weeks before, including this image, which looked a lot like an exonerating smoking gun.

Enter the lawyers.
Cue a bunch of stuff I’m not supposed to talk about.

But somehow, in the short span of four years, the kid who fell down the hole underwent a series of changes in the urban lore. Most notably: (a). he morphed into me, and (b). he died.

Regarding (a). — He’s not me.
Regarding (b). — He’s not dead.

But this didn’t stop some folks from a call-in talk radio show from lamenting loudly and at length about how the building’s owner still won’t sell the property for development (apparently this is in the news again) … and what a shame it is that the city can’t just tear it down, especially since that poor girl died there three or four years ago.

The original events in this case took place while I was working for Bluemeister P., who knew all about the matter at the time — and who nearly drove off the road when he heard of my passing. He turned up the volume and listened intently as another half dozen callers likewise phoned in to lament the loss of that poor, dear girl who was in there taking pictures — you know, she posted those pictures on the internet, you can still find them** — and how sad it was that she’d died there. Wasn’t she a writer or something?

Upon reaching my former workplace, my former boss took the liberty of checking my webpage, looking up my email, and sending me that message informing me of my untimely demise, some time ago.

I’m glad I caught him on the phone. It was good to talk to him.

It was also amusing to watch the way a rumor works, or the way an urban legend congeals around a rickety scaffolding of facts. At the time of the actual case, I did some blogging about it — very, very careful blogging — because the injured kid’s case made headlines, and even back then I had enough readers that people made the connection between my pictures and the impending lawsuit in an internet minute.

Maybe it wasn’t enough that a teenage boy was left paralyzed; maybe the building required blood, and a “girl” (I was nearly thirty) was more tragic, toppling to her death after frittering away her youth snapping photos of empty places. Maybe the story needed a ghost, someone to roam the cavernous, still-empty floors of the old power plant tower … snapping photos and tripping elaborately, swirling and falling those four endless, forty-foot stories with my skirts billowing like an unhappy heroine in a Tim Burton flick. If it’d gone down like that, you can bet I’d stick around for a good haunting. The narrative would seem to demand it.

But. Anyway.

I’m not dead. No girl ever died inside that building — or if any unfortunate soul ever did meet her maker there, you can safely assume it wasn’t me; and the boy who was so badly injured did survive, and now I believe he’s a filmmaker. I hope he’s doing well. I hope the tower has no ghosts, and no more victims.



* Best. Boss. EVAR. Seriously. Were circumstances different, I’d go back to work for him in a heartbeat.
** Mind you, I’m not sure how I died in there, then managed to post my pictures to the internet; perhaps someone posted them posthumously?