Month: November 2018

What About Your Friends

This four day weekend was precisely what the doctor ordered.

I feel relaxed and rested already, which is quite lovely, if I do say so myself. Although yesterday…I didn’t realize precisely how worn out and tired I was. I wound up doing some chores around the house in the morning, only to find myself very tired and unable to face my computer screen. So, instead, I retired to my easy chair and finished reading Slouching Towards Bethlehem, which I enjoyed, and then dove back into Empire of Sin. I also dozed off once or twice in my easy chair, with Scooter curled up in our lap; Paul and I always joke that’s his primary super-power: putting people to sleep. If he comes and cuddles and falls asleep on you, you will also eventually doze off. It’s very interesting and strange at the same time. Go figure.

We are also watching a rather well-done suspense series on Netflix called Bodyguard, which stars Richard Madden, aka Robb Stark (which probably means there won’t be another season of Medici Masters of Florence, damn it), and it’s quite interesting; well written, with twists and turns and some very interesting points and all kinds of Machiavellian machinations. We are enjoying it, which is great.

One of the many things I put on my goals for 2018 was a renewed focus on self-care; I’ve kind of let that fall by the wayside as the year has progressed (although it’s one of the reasons I am not beating myself up for not getting anything done yesterday; I was extremely tired). I have returned to the gym in fits-and-starts–getting a new groove going for a few weeks only to fall off the wagon and then having to come up with the motivation to start over again. Despite these enormous disappointments with working out, 2018 is one of the better years I’ve had lately, fitness wise; at the beginning of the year I weighed in at a terrifying 225 pounds; last week I weighed myself and discovered, to my great delight, that not only had I finally broken through the plateau of 215 (I never seemed to be able to get my weight lower than that, no matter how hard I tried), but I blew it up; last week I only weighed 208. I haven’t weighed that since 2011 or 2012; one of the two, and it’s just continued to climb since then. It would be great and amazing and awesome to roll into 2019 with 200 firmly in my sights; I doubt I will ever be able to get back down to 180. but if I can get down to 200…who knows what I can accomplish? Needless to say, this is very exciting for me.

I had some hopes and thoughts about possibly going to the gym today later; I may still do so. But I have some errands to run, some bills to pay, and some writing to do; the house is also kind of a slovenly mess. I also have the next two days off; big games for both LSU and the Saints on tap for the weekend–it’s easy going to be a great weekend for us here in Louisiana, or one of the worst football weekends ever. You never know, really.

We also get an extra hour of sleep this weekend, which is amazingly lovely.

All right, ’tis back to the spice mines with me. These bills aren’t going to pay themselves, nor are the groceries going to do themselves, either.

Have a lovely Friday, one and all.

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Thought I’d Died and Gone to Heaven

Thursday, and the first day of a four-day weekend that just kind of dropped into my lap. The office move and so forth has had some complications; I’d planned on taking today off anyway, and then it occurred to me yesterday that I should just go ahead and take Friday as well; what was, after all, the point in taking Thursday off, working on Friday, and then having the weekend off? I’ve been very tired lately, badly in need of recharging the batteries, and the two-day weekends just haven’t been cutting it; so why not take a mini-vacation?

So, here I sit at my desk, looking outside at a gray day. Shadow is watching birds atop the stone fence outside my windows, there’s no sign of the sun anywhere, and it rained pretty heavily at some point in the early morning as everything is wet and shiny and dripping out there. I have a load of dishes and a load of laundry to put away; another load is running in the dishwasher, and the kitchen/office is completely out of control. Yes, indeed, there are plenty of things for me to do today, when the spirit so moves me.

We finished packing up the office Tuesday, and the movers came yesterday. I worked at the main office yesterday; a long ten hour day mostly doing paperwork, making condom packs, and then doing testing last night.  Apparently we’re waiting for some final clearances from the city before the new office building is up and operational. It was a little poignant saying good night and good luck to the office on Frenchmen Street when I left Tuesday night, and there were a couple of times  during that day when I felt a wave of sadness coming…but I made it. Yay, me.

Also Tuesday morning, the ebook of Bourbon Street Blues, aka Scotty I, went up for sale at long last. I’m very excited about this; it’s been unavailable for far, far too long, and people have been asking about it for years. But it’s finally a thing, and eventually a print version will also be available. If  you’re interested in getting the first Scotty ebook, you can get it right here. This makes me really happy; you’ve got no idea, Constant Reader. Especially since I am in such a Scotty state of mind with my writing these days.

Hopefully, Jackson Square Jazz (aka Scotty II) will be up by the end of the year as well, and all Scotty books will thus be available for anyone who wants to buy and read them.

I also finished writing Royal Street Reveillon  (aka Scotty VIII) Monday night. I am going to go ahead and get that turned in this week. I just need to add the chapter headings, which is always a fun part of the wrap-up process. I also have to do the afterward, but that’s going to have to be short–the book is clocked in at 101,000 (and some change) words. This is the longest book I’ve written in years. I guess I am writing longer these days. Not sure what that’s about, but there you have it. I feel relatively confident I can get these finishing touches on the book done today.

The rest of this week I am going to focus on replacing “Don’t Look Down” with two other stories for the collection Survivor’s Guilt and Other Stories. I’ll probably start working on Bury Me in Satin, my Nanowrimo project, on November 1 and hopefully will have a healthy first draft finished by the end of the month, after which I will spend December revising it and tearing apart/restructuring the WIP, which is what I plan on doing in the first two months of the new year; I’ll then have to spend another month or so writing a new ending for it, and then another month or so revising and polishing. Hopefully, come April, it’ll be in good enough shape to try to lure in an agent. One can hope, at any rate. And then I want to spend the summer writing Muscles, and then I am going to spend the fall trying to write something historical about New Orleans; I am just not quite sure yet what that project will be.

I didn’t sleep well Sunday night, so Monday I was tired all day. Monday night I slept deeply, but had to get up earlier than I wanted to; I felt rested but still slightly sleepy. Sleepy is better than tired; there’s a difference, and that distinction is important–kind of like the difference, from working out, between sore and tired. Since this is the week of the office move, my work schedule was disrupted; I had to get up early every day until today, which made me cranky and tired every night. I’m not really sure what my schedule is going to be next week. Alas, uncertainty is not one of my stronger suits. But I did sleep very well last night, getting up just around nine this morning and I feel rested and alert. This is a very good sign for the rest of the day, and the potential for productivity.

I also started gathering my essays over the last couple of evenings, which was interesting and fun, yet weird at the same time. There were essays I’d published that I’d forgotten about writing and publishing–seriously, who else forgets work they’ve done and been paid for? This mook, that’s who. (MOOK? This is what comes from following David Simon on Twitter.) So yes, that is definitely going to take a while to get in order. It’s always interesting–at least to me–to come across old things I’ve written, whether I remember them or not. If I do remember writing them or what they’re about, I almost always discover my memory is wrong when I start rereading them. I don’t mind it; it’s just odd. That’s kind of where The Fictions of My Life comes from; my memories aren’t correct so frequently because of the interpretive personal filter I view everything through that I often suspect my memories differ so much from the reality that they are closer to lies than truth.

And on that note, I think I shall head back into the spice mines.

Have a lovely day, everyone.

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