It’s been quite a run for LSU Athletics since the football team went undefeated and was possibly the greatest college football team of all time. Since then, LSU has won numerous national titles for individuals, as well as in women’s basketball, baseball, and now gymnastics. LSU had made the post-season thirty-three times but had never won the title (only seven teams had accounted for all of them since the NCAA recognized the sport in 1982; LSU is now the eighth), always be referred to as “the only top program to never have a national title.”
That is no longer true.
I don’t remember when Paul and I started following LSU Gymnastics, but it’s been a really long time. It seems like we’ve always watched, but I know that isn’t true; it wasn’t always aired, although collegiate women’s gymnastics seems to be getting more and more popular. It certainly has caught on in Louisiana, where Tiger fans pack the PMAC (Pete Marovich Assembly Center) for every home meet; LSU fans turn out for almost all LSU sports; which is why Omaha loves it when LSU is in the College World Series. The bar that has the shots contest every College World Series tweeted at LSU fans the other day, asking hopefully if LSU would be coming back this year. The College World Series was a lot of fun last year, and an epic story of LSU coming out of nowhere and winning it all.
Last year, LSU’s gymnastics team had a lot of adversity. Several major competitors went out for the season with injuries, but they fought back and through and surprised everyone by making it into the Final Four. They came in fourth, but just making it that far was a huge accomplishment. With some great new freshmen this year and the injured stars back, there was a very good possibility that LSU, ranked number two for most of the season, could win it all–but they would have to hit every routine to have a chance against two-time defending champion Oklahoma, an unbeaten juggernaut that just kept showing up and scoring big. Towards the end of the season, LSU continued scoring consistently over 198–an important benchmark. But then Oklahoma had to count three falls in the semi-finals, while Florida and Utah sailed right past them into the finals. LSU also scored over 198 again in the semis–with a really bad vault rotation for them–vault has been their weakness all season. Yesterday they started on floor, got a huge score, and then went to vault, where they feel behind Utah. A subpar bars rotation–they usually do better–pulled them back ahead again, and then came the balance beam. Sierra Ballard kicked off beam with a 9.95, but then the next competitor fell off the beam!
OH NO!
So, we were on the edge of our seats for the rest of the beam…but everyone else scored over a 9.9. When final competitor Aleah Finnegan mounted the beam, she only needed a 9.75 to clinch it for LSU, and she nailed it with another score over 9.9, and that was it….our Tigers were national champions!
GEAUX TIGERS!
And wonderful Hayleigh Bryant won the all around the night before, which was awesome.
Sunday morning! And LSU Gymnastics won the national championship yesterday! Woo-hoo! That accomplishment is worthy of its own post, so tune in later for that, okay? It was very exciting, I have to say, and the Lost Apartment was filled with excited cheers even as we held our breath as LSU clinched it all with a fantastic final rotation on balance beam. We kind of celebrated this throughout the night by watching replays and highlights before episode two of Sugar, which I am loving. Colin Ferrell, yum.
I was very tired Friday from running all those errands, and so was Paul. I was still fatigued yesterday, the physical and mental kind that I’ve not felt in a while–but sadly more evidence that my stamina is not back and needs to be worked on. The heat is also back; yesterday was pleasant, but Friday was eighty-eight degrees…in April. That doesn’t bode well for the summer, especially for one that’s going to be a more active hurricane season. But while I was so tired yesterday I managed to use what little nervous energy I had to clean and organize, and the apartment actually looks better this morning. It’s still not up to par–I need to do the floors to get there–but it’s nice to walk down to a neater first floor. I do need to run the dishwasher this morning, and finish filing before I read and write for the day. I do feel a little dragged out this morning, but hopefully getting caffeinated and cleaned up will take care of that problem.
I did do some things writing-related yesterday. I found the epigraphs for the next Scotty book, for one, and also wrote the opening of The Crooked Y in my head yesterday as I cleaned and organized. I created some working folders for projects that are forming in my head, and I did write notes down in my journal occasionally. I also did some electronic file cleaning up, which is proving to be an endless, endless process that may never be finished. But as long as I can still search for everything in a finder window, it should be okay. I also thought of how to open The Summer of Lost Boys, too. I’ve been listening to the Billboard Top 100’s for the years I am considering setting the book in, and I think I am settling into 1974, which was when I originally wanted it set in the first place, the summer (in my life) between junior high and high school. It’s kind of fun, if a little painful, to go back to that time and remember it for myself, but I think it’s going to be a really strong book once it’s underway. I also started getting the current book a bit better organized. I feel better about things, if that makes any sense? Hopefully I’ll be able to get a lot of writing done. I want to finish the rewrite of “Passenger to Franklin” and start the revision of “When I Die,” before diving into the book headfirst and trying to get the rest of it plotted.
I think I’ve been a bit overwhelmed lately, in all honesty, and I need to get calmed down and focused again. I need to remember how to harness my brain ADHD-driven creativity and focus on one thing the way I used to be able to do so. I have been very pleased with the (sparse) writing I’ve been doing, but I also think that might be partly due to the stamina issues I’ve been having since the surgery. I am trying to rush to get back to “normal” (or what passes for it around here) and getting ahead of myself, and I need to reign in my impatience and take things slower. It’s okay because it’s temporary, and this too shall pass. Take a breath, remember you had a rough go of things last year, and you have to build everything back to the point it was before the injury.
I’ve also been remiss in not congratulating award winners lately in my field; I am very pleased to report that J. M. Redmann won the Hansen Prize for queer crime fiction for Transitory, which is now also a Lambda finalist AND a two category Goldie finalist. Yay Jean! I’ve known Jean for almost twenty-five years now, she was my boss’s boss for about eighteen years, we’ve co-edited anthologies together, and now I am her book editor. Transitory is a terrific book, and being Jean’s editor is pretty easy, actually. Ivy Pochoda recently won the Los Angeles Times Book Award for Best Crime Novel for Sing Her Down, and Ivy is pretty awesome, too. I am behind on her books (I’m behind on everyone’s books, really) but her Wonder Valley was fan-fucking-tastic. Way to go, Ivy! (That was a loaded category, too–other nominees were S. A. Cosby, Cheryl Head, Jordan Harper, and Lou Berney.)
And on that note, I am going to head into the spice mines, eat something and get cleaned up and ready to go for this glorious morning. Have a lovely Sunday, Constant Reader, and I will chat at you again later.
I am a bit tired this morning. All those errands I ran yesterday? Apparently I have not recovered my stamina yet, because I am feeling it this morning. My legs are very tired, and I did not want to get out of bed this morning…which was also partly because Sparky turned into a purring cuddlebug while trying to get me to get up–lying on me and rolling and purring and head butts and making biscuits. It was actually kind of lovely, really, but now I am up, a load of laundry is started, and I am drinking and loving my coffee. LSU is competing for the national championship in Gymnastics at 3, which is probably going to suck all the oxygen out of the day, so I’ll need to get a lot of things done today before three, won’t I? GEAUX TIGERS!
Yesterday was a rather interesting day, social media-wise. After I posted yesterday morning and as I was getting ready to dive into the day, I shared the post on my social media as I always do, and I had some extreme irritations, all related to my years in Kansas, of all things; like all this writing and thinking about Kansas and ideas for books/stories there manifested some people I went to high school with, as well as some other unpleasantness. For the record, straight white cisgender, this is the sort of thing we’re talking about when we talk about microaggressions and safe spaces. The first thing that popped up at me on Facebook was some tired old bitch of a white woman’s post sharing an interview with Dawn French, in which she not only defended the Chatelaine of Castle TERF, but chastised everyone. After all, as a straight cisgender white woman, it’s our responsibility as queer people to explain it all to HER, and if we’re not willing to do so, their lack of understanding is on US.
Fuck off, Dawn French. Queer people don’t have to explain their humanity to you, you miserable fucking bigoted bitch. “Well, I don’t understand this, so please explain to me why you deserve to be treated like a human being.” That’s it right there. Doesn’t sound so nice when it’s put that way, does it? Is it really too much for you to treat other people with respect and kindness even if you “don’t get it”? And when exactly do I get my fucking paycheck for explaining our HUMANITY to someone with a blackened, dead soul and no empathy for anything outside their own experience? The arrogance!
Anyway, this former Facebook friend shared this and said, “I agree.” Someone else, another former Facebook friend, commented “Yes, absolutely.” I unfriended and blocked both, and then posted in my anger “If you are a defender of the Chatelaine of Castle TERF, just unfriend me now.” Another former Facebook friend then announced his departure. He only unfriended, so I blocked his homophobic ass, too.
As if that wasn’t enough, someone I went to high school posted a funny meme I was going to comment on, when a homophobic piece of trash from high school tried TAGGING me on it because I had unfriended her after getting sick and fucking tired of her MAGA posts and remembered the time I heard my “friend” mocking me with other people in the high school cafeteria for being gay. Again, I don’t owe anyone any explanations for cutting you out of my life because I fucking refuse to explain why I deserve to be treated like a human being and not as the butt of a joke or something to hate and despise because a verse in Leviticus says so.
Jesus, right? It’s so tiring.
And then, in the biggest irony of ironies, another person I went to high school with–who is always posted queer ally stuff, which I’ve always appreciated–did so again yesterday further down on my feed, and of course someone had to come in waving their cross and Bible, but what was truly nice was seeing how many people went after the Bible-thumper, quoting the Bible and the Sermon on the Mount back to her, and it was on that thread I discovered she had a younger sibling that is gay (I wasn’t the only one to graduate from that school, apparently) and then someone else from high school commented “My brother is gay, too”–and the irony of that was almost too delicious to savor. You see, the second “my brother is gay” poster? She and her troglodyte best friend loved called me a fag quite often and quite happily my senior year…and while that was satisfying enough, I then remembered that she and her bitch friend would say it and laugh…in front of her brother….so his situation was worse than mine, and I went from smug to sad. Her brother was also an asshole to me (which I understand; I avoided other kids who got slandered and mocked and called that), but knowing that he was gay and was listening to his sister and that other bitch call me that? How he must have hated himself every time she said it. I wonder how suicidal he was? And truly, how sad was it that we are so socialized to avoid other kids with that same stigma and shame we experience rather than supporting each other? I think that’s also one of the many reasons I have trouble trusting gay men as I do straight people–another kid who was gay-presenting at my high school in the suburbs and was friends with people who treated me like shit….out of curiosity I looked him up and he too is out and proud now. How sad he joined in so his friends wouldn’t think he was a fag, too.
But at the same time, it’s giving me an insight into Kansas that I didn’t have before. The state, which I should have known, isn’t full of homophobic MAGA trash, and neither is the area I lived and suffered through for five years. And that could make for an interesting approach to another book. I had thought Sara, with my out gay character in a rural Kansas high school, was a bit much–I didn’t think kids could be out there–and turns out that while it’s not appreciated, those brave kids are facing it all down and defiantly throwing it back in their tormenters’ faces. I actually even thought for a moment last night that it might be worth it to go back sometime, to just look around and see how different everything is from my old memories.
And on that note, I am going to get cleaned up and going on my day. I may be back later, I really do want to get all of these draft posts finished and out of the drafts file at some point, but I also don’t know how the day will play out so we’ll just have to see, Constant Reader. Have a great Saturday regardless.
Work-at-home Friday! I got up early this morning for some reason, but it was an hour later than usual so I will count it as “sleeping in.” I have a lot of stuff to get done for work duties today, which I want to wrap up so I can get all the errands taken care of. I have prescriptions to pick up, groceries to make, a trip to Costco–I get exhausted just thinking about it. But yesterday was really a good day, wasn’t it? I’m not sure how it was for you, but I was productive and in a really good mood for most of the day. I was a bit tired at times during the day, but I made it through, picked up the mail (a package of new shirts arrived!), and then came home. Sparky was rambunctious and so had to cart him around on my shoulders while I did some things, and then he parked on the desk while I wrote for a while. I also talked to one of my co-workers who drives for Uber/Lyft, because I wanted to be sure I was getting how it all worked right in a short story I am working on and revising, “Passenger to Franklin.” I was also pleased that the story wasn’t the piece of trash I convinced myself it was when I was writing the first draft, and I was pretty happy to see that despite my usual self-deprecation mentality (which I am really working on, I promise) it wasn’t bad at all–and there are some really good images and sentences in it. After all my running around today, if I have time I am going to write some more tonight, and hopefully finish this second draft.
LSU Gymnastics was in the first session of the national championship meet, and they scored over 198 and qualified first overall into the finals Saturday afternoon. I would be excited regardless, but it’s even more exciting this year, because if they hit they could finally win it all this year. I was waiting for Paul to get home and had stopped writing to settle into my easy chair, and remembered, oh, I wonder if we can catch a replay of LSU on ESPN? So I turned on the television and navigated into the ESPN app, and thought, oh, I don’t care about the second session, but I can watch for a while until Paul gets home. So I did just that and turned it on just in time to see Oklahoma’s first vaulter sit down on the landing. Oklahoma was undefeated and ranked number 1; Ragan Smith, one of their stars, has spent a good potion of the year making TikToks claiming LSU’s routines were over-scored, which is not only unsportsmanlike but a total bitch move (I am not a fan of that kind of shit, especially since you’re daring karma,Alabama and hubris is not something the gods like). They sat down two more vaults, and two others weren’t great, pushing them so far down they couldn’t climb back, which was shocking. They had two more falls off the beam, so had to count a fall there. This is NOT what you expect watching Oklahoma, and Paul got home right after that first vault, and the evening session was like a trainwreck you couldn’t stop looking at. It rained Alabama gymnasts around the balance beam–I think four of them came off–and even other teams were having falls they didn’t have to count. When the bloodbath was over, Utah and Florida moved onto the finals to join LSU and California. I am very excited to watch Saturday afternoon!
Last night was also a lovely evening because Paul and I were both relaxed, rested, and in a pretty good mood, so we were laughing and joking and having a great time. It’s been way too long since we’ve had an evening like that, and I was actually reluctant to go to bed and end the evening (I still hate ending a good time, and I don’t think that will change until I am in the crematorium), but it held over until this morning, too, which was unexpected and a delight at the same time. I feel good this morning, despite only sleeping in for an extra hour, and confident and like myself again for the first time in a really long time (I know, I say that all the time, but having fun with Paul has been missing from my Bingo card for far too long), but I don’t really think I’ve been myself for almost ten years or so. Mom had her first stroke and we almost lost her the first time in 2016 around Christmas, and that’s been weighing on my mind subconsciously I think ever since until last year when we finally did lose her. The pandemic, volunteering, getting COVID myself, Mom dying, my surgeries–it’s been quite a ride and while I am not certain I am completely coming out from under it all, I am feeling somewhat better and I hope it lasts.
I also came across another interesting bit of Kansas corruption and crime yesterday, in which a corrupt district attorney (now a federal prosecutor), in tandem with a police chief and a judge, were closing cases by not sharing evidence, forcing people to testify against innocent people by threatening to send them to jail, and on and on it goes. You can read about this vile racist piece of shit here.
Seriously, so much crime in Kansas.
I also typed up some notes for the new Kansas book (it feels weird to be saying that since it was what I called #shedeservedit for years), and I also started bringing together some things for the next Scotty book. See? I am being productive again. Maybe that’s why I am feeling so good? Probably. I always am in a better place when I’m writing, and without any other things weighing me down, I am really loving life lately, you know?
And on that note, I am going to start doing some day-job stuff by heading down into the spice mines. Have a lovely Friday, Constant Reader, and I will check in with you again later (have you noticed I’m posting a lot lately? Trying to clear out those unfinished drafts).
At the risk of sounding crude, this wrestler has an amazing ass, does he not?
Ah, Thursday and my last day in the office for the week. Awesome. Yesterday morning I once again did the old “don’t leave the house until 7:30” again, and once again I wasn’t groggy or tired by the time I left the house. Bizarre how that minor shift in how my days are structured has created such a significant change to everything. I really need to remember to pay attention to routines before they become ruts, so I can change them and avoid said rut.
I did finish the first draft of a short story Tuesday night, and I am most pleased with it. I am writing it for an open call for an anthology, and I am very pleased that I got a first draft done long before the deadline. (I’m still bitter about missing the Chessies anthology deadline, for which I was working on three stories. Note to self: never write three stories for a submissions call because you think it sounds like a great idea. It is not, nor is it ever, a good idea.) Yay, me! I also decided to work on revisions of some other stories in progress; I am still struggling working on this book, but I’ve also decided I need to really immerse myself in it for at least one day so I can get a handle on this plot and figure out where it’s going and what needs to come in and what needs to come in so that I really feel like I have a grasp on the characters and the story. Those stories in progress are the first drafts I never got a chance to revise for the Chessie anthology, and all three will fit snugly into the end of my short story collection…so technically, if I can get the three stories whipped into shape, I can also go ahead and get the collection turned in. Huzzah! All three of the stories are actually ghost stories of a sort; “Passenger to Franklin” needs some serious revision, and so does “When I Die,” which is a terrific concept and really needs some work too. I think I can get one of my oldest and most beloved stories of my own whipped into shape and added into this collection as well, which just goes to show–never discard an idea or throw out a story because you’ll eventually come back to it someday.
I wrote out the opening paragraphs of the next Scotty, which I want to write this fall and hopefully get turned in around November or December. I am pretty pleased with the plot and story of this one, too, but I also need to spend some time brainstorming the plot and how it twists and turns around and turns out. I still haven’t dipped into my Paul Tremblay yet, and I think I may save it for Sunday morning reading over my coffee. Saturday morning I am going to reread/skim Death Drop so I can get a better feel for the current WIP and make sure I have the voice right, which I don’t think I do yet, which is also why I think I am having so much trouble writing it. It’s always a struggle for me to write a book when I don’t hear the voice of the character in my head, so I need to get it there ASAP.
I feel like I am making progress with my writing, even if working on the book is like pulling recalcitrant teeth.
I feel pretty good this morning, a little tired perhaps, which is oddly different that the past few weeks, when I was tired earlier in the week and felt more rested as the week progressed. This of course made no damned sense at all, but that’s okay. Few things in my life have ever made sense, and a lot of it probably is related to the anxiety and medications, as well as this week’s change in schedule. Last night when Paul got home we watched the first episode of The Sympathizer, which was very intense. I loved the book, and the new series is actually quite excellent–but more on that as it develops, obviously. I also managed to fold the laundry and do a load of dishes. I also picked up two new books, the new Scott Carson (aka Michael Koryta) and the new Alyssa Cole. I want to get some serious reading done this weekend as well as some cleaning and writing, and I also need to get my taxes completed this weekend and off to my accountant. An odious chore, to be sure, but a necessary one. I also have a lot of errands to do this weekend–we need to go to Costco, I need to make groceries, and of course there’s a shit ton of cleaning that needs to be done. I will need to work on reorganizing the freezer/refrigerator tonight in order to make sure there’s room for what we pick up this weekend.
And on that note, I am heading into the spice mines. Have a lovely Friday Eve, Constant Reader, and one never knows, I could be back later.
Ah, Wednesday and the midpoint of the week has arrived. It’s been a good week so far; I’ve not been super-tired at all this week and I think the shifting of my arrival at work from 7:30 to 8 was a smart decision. I imagine, though, it’ll eventually start getting difficult for me to get up later as it has getting up earlier, once I am used to the change. In other words, it won’t feel like I am getting to sleep late eventually.
I saw something interesting yesterday on social media that really resonated with me: Your life should not be a museum, and that’s kind of what my mentality has been. I tend to get stuck in ruts so easily, and I like to accumulate things that have meaning to me (have I introduced you to my library yet?), but do I really need to keep these “artifacts” of my past? I never look at these things, rarely have anyone over to see them, so therefore what is the point? Everyone at the day job laughs about how, at a co-worker’s wedding last fall, someone made a joke about how I always wear Crescent Care T-shirts to work and were surprised to see me outside of the office and wearing something else–and since the joke was made, I’ve not worn one. Not once. I had started wearing them every day during the pandemic when I came to work and it was a further simplification of my life: I didn’t have to pick out something to wear to work, But when he made the joke, I wasn’t offended, but it did kind of snap me out of a rut. You have plenty of other clothes you never wear, and they aren’t doing any good hanging in the closet, I realized finally, so I started wearing my clothes instead of the work T-shirt. I generally don’t care about clothes most of the time but I eventually get to the point, periodically, where I’ll get interested in clothes again and will buy some–I had a shoe experience earlier this year, and now have two gorgeous new pairs of shoes to show for it.
So, why not buy some more Polo style shirts in colors I generally don’t wear or don’t have in the closet? Yes, that’s my way of saying that I did order some new shirts for work yesterday.
Yesterday was also the fifty-year anniversary of women being able to get their own credit cards without their husband or any kind of male co-signer. I remember when this happened, by the way, and I also remember when my mother got her very first credit card; it didn’t have her name but rather Mrs. My Dad. I remember thinking, “yeah, but it’s STILL technically his name.” People also don’t remember that about fifty years ago was when women/wives stopped being subsumed into their husband’s identity at the expense of their own: I am constantly amazed by plaques commemorating civic leaders and donors that list women as Mrs. Chanse MacLeod or Mrs. Scotty Bradley. Women had no identity beyond their husband once they were married. They couldn’t get bank loans, and I am not sure about bank accounts, either, for that matter; women were basically chained to their husband for life and if she got a divorce, she was basically screwed. Once women had financial freedom and no longer needed a husband…well, the divorce rate rose significantly, which is why men were so opposed to treating women like equals.
“What, you mean I have to convince her to marry me? Spinsterhood and divorce aren’t unpleasant fates anymore? That’s it–women need to be controlled.“
Sigh.
We also finished The Gentlemen last night, and I was very pleasantly surprised that it did have a most excellent finale. I don’t know if there will be more seasons, or if it was merely a mini-series, but I really enjoyed it and kind of am in the place where I worry about the continuation; so many shows go on long past their expiration date (looking at you, Friends and Thirteen Reasons Why) and lose me in a later season. (I really worried about it with Ted Lasso.) But we’ve got some other shows lined up to watch, I think the national finals for college gymnastics is on this weekend, and I also would like to get some more writing done this weekend. I did write last night on revising a short story, but today I am going to get back to work on the book (and hopefully finish the short story). It’s been a good and productive week thus far, and I really like this “go in later” thing I accidentally stumbled over on Monday morning. I made it through the day yesterday without getting tired, and I felt good when I came home to His Majesty Sparky, who is now addicted to the squeeze treats I bought for him. But I only have one more day in the office this week, and suddenly it’s the weekend again. I also worked on my taxes a bit more yesterday. Sigh.
And on that note, I am heading into the spice mines again. Have a lovely Wednesday, Constant Reader, and I will be back probably a little later.
The Ides of April and Tax Day, huzzah. I’ve filed for an extension for mine because I just couldn’t deal with it before, which is kind of childish and more than a little immature; the key word here is avoidance. But I plan to get it all finished this week, God willing and the creek don’t rise. I am going into the office a little later than I usually do, because I have to swing by the Cat Practice to get Sparky’s food on the way to the office. It’s an Admin Day, so not a big deal for me to not be there as early as usual.
I feel rested and good this morning, which is a very pleasant change and surprise. I did go to bed a little early last night, but I spent most of the day writing in my journal, watching documentaries, and later on in the evening we watched more episodes of The Gentlemen. I also finally looked up the name of the star, Theo James, because it was bothering me that I recognized him and couldn’t place him. I am liking it a lot more than I would have thought, frankly; not being a big fan of producer/showrunner Guy Ritchie, but it’s actually quite fun. I also went down some rabbit holes of research yesterday, which is always a lot of fun for me. I also started reading Paul Tremblay’s The Pallbearer’s Club, which I had a little trouble getting into at first, but I remembered having this issue with A Head Full of Ghosts, too–like the latter, he’s playing with form and style and point of view in the former, which is a bit hard to get used to it, so it’s slow going (for me) at first, but as always, there’s such depth and compassion in his writing it’s easy to see why his career has taken off. I’ll try to read some more of it when I get home from work tonight, after I do the day’s writing. I am definitely planning on writing every day now, even if it’s just a little something. I made lots of notes yesterday in my journal, too, which was very cool.
I decided yesterday, when watching a lengthy documentary of LSU football highlights (I was doing this around chores, listening to the documentary while Sparky and Paul slept on the couch) that one of the problems I’ve been facing with writing lately, something I’ve talked about on here a lot, is how I’ve not really been able to focus all of my creative energies on anything that I am writing, but have any number of things in-progress that my mind keeps attention-deficiting between, skittering around between projects and ideas without really landing effectively on anything for long enough to get very far. Yesterday I decided, as I grabbed the journal and hit play on the documentary that I was going to free-form take notes and scribble out ideas as they came to me, regardless of what they were about or for, even if they were entirely new project notes. I did a lot of scribbling, and most of it focused on one project, which really needs to get done by the end of the year, as well as some others I was a bit surprised still were there and fresh in my mind. I also know now that if I rewrite at least three of these short stories drafts that I have on hand, that collection will be complete.
I also found the voice for a new project idea I’ve had in the front of my mind for a while, primarily because we watched those ‘troubled teen cure’ documentaries at the end of the previous week. I had an idea for one set in Kansas, based on a foster home where the kids went to my high school. I didn’t think much of it when I was in high school–other than how much harder those kids had it than the rest of us–and sometime in the years since high school I thought, I could write a crime novel around that story even though it would entirely be fictional and the real place was simply a starting point for my fictionalization. The title came to me this weekend–The Crooked Y–and so that’s definitely moving up the list of “what to write next.”
As you can tell, writing is becoming more important to me and it feels good for my mind to be creating again, even in this current ADHD way, which is so much better than the dry well experience I’ve been having since…well, since Mom died, really. 2023 was a lot of personal trauma; and relentless from January on, which makes it not surprising, I suppose, that my brain has been fallow for so long.
And on that note, I am going to start getting ready to head into the spice mines for the day. Have a great Monday, Constant Reader, and I may be back later.
Sunday morning blog after an uneventful yet sort of productive day yesterday. Our Internet went out around one yesterday afternoon, and was essentially in and out (mostly out) until about eight o’clock last night. I did finish reading my book, which was superb (more on The Cypress House later) and I did get two more blog post drafts finished, which felt great. I ran my errands, cooked outside last night, and did some cleaning up around here as well. When it came back and we could watch television, we finished Pray Away and moved onto The Gentlemen, which we are really enjoying, on Netflix.
It was actually nice not having Internet, if odd–you never realize how much you depend on it until you don’t have it, seriously–because I was able to relax all day, instead of getting caught up on the news (rage-inducing, as always) or watching old LSU football highlights (always a joy) or finding new documentaries to watch. Pray Away was the final step in our “teenager abuse programs” watching, following The Program and Hell Camp, and what’s truly frightening is the gaslighting involved, for both kid and their parents–and that the troubled teen industry is still chugging along, abusing kids and bilking their parents of money. I’ve never wanted to do a conversion therapy story–I briefly touched on this in Baton Rouge Bingo and again in Royal Street Reveillon; that Taylor’s parents wanted to send him to one in Mississippi. I had also talked about a conversion therapy camp in Mississippi before in other works, some of them my Todd Gregory stuff, and maybe someday that will come to fruition in some way. Watching all these documentaries has put me in mind of how to write about one in a Scotty book or a stand-alone; there’s also another idea for a mystery/crime novel I’ve been thinking about a lot as I watched these horrific documentaries, only set in Kansas. (Oddly enough I find myself thinking about Kansas a lot more and more these days, not sure what that’s all about.)
I also was looking through books yesterday after I finished the Koryta to decide what to read next, and I was having trouble deciding; mainly because I have so many damned fine books to read in the TBR stack. I also ordered two more books yesterday morning–poems by Mary Oliver, recommended by the fabulous Carol Rosenfeld (me trying to learn more about poetry and start appreciating it) and the newest Scott Carson (which is a pseudonym for Michael Koryta). I think I am going to read The Pallbearer’s Club by Paul Tremblay (I’m a huge fan) while also embarking on a reread of Thomas Tryon’s The Other, which was probably one of the most influential books I read when I was a kid. I am still reading Rival Queens as my current non-fiction, and I am thinking that The King’s Assassin, the basis for the incredible new Starz series Mary and George (which you should be watching) and again, a period of history I’ve always been fascinated by, and watching the show has given me an idea about how I could approach another project that’s been in the files for almost two decades.
Today I intend to write and read and clean and organize for most the day, although I am sure once Paul gets up we’ll start streaming The Gentlemen again. I have some blog entries I also want to finish writing, and of course, there’s all kinds of writing that I need to get done today as well. I’ve been really scattered with my writing this year, and part of it has been an inability to focus on just one project with my usual laser-like focus, and that’s why I’ve not been able to get anything much done this year. This morning I feel more awake and focused than I have in a long time, which is great. Once I finish this and my review of The Cypress House I’ll get cleaned up, read for a bit, and pick up around here before focusing in on what I want to get written today. Being organized helps, and if I could simply manage to stay organized rather than just letting things pile up everywhere, I wouldn’t have to do as much cleaning and straightening and organizing as I always do on the weekends.
The Lefty Awards were presented last night in Seattle at Left Coast Crime, and I was very delighted to see the results this morning–Tracy Clark, Best Novel, Hide; Nina Simon, Best Debut, Mother-Daughter Murder Club; Naomi Hirohara, Best Historical, Evergreen; and Best Humorous, Wendall Thomas, Cheap Trills. I don’t know Nina, but the other three winners are friends, which is delightful, and I couldn’t be happier for Naomi, Tracy, and Wendall–who was on that Humor panel I had to step in to moderate at Bouchercon in San Diego last year, and was wonderful. Kudos to all winners and nominees!
And on that note, I am heading into the spice mines. Have a great Sunday, Constant Reader, and I will chat with you again later!
The hunky Alan Ritchson, starring in Prime’s Reacher, did an interview recently calling out evangelicals and Trump supporters, who got all in their feelings and have decided not to watch the show anymore. Sounds like ‘cancel culture’ to me. How woke!
Sunday morning here in the Lost Apartment, and today’s blog title seems particularly apropos; I do feel more rested and relaxed and ready to go this morning, and certainly more so than I have all weekend. Never fear, I can always derail my day at any time, but for right now I feel rested and able to get it going somehow. I did sleep later than I (and Sparky) wanted to, but I am firmly believe your body knows what it needs more than your conscious self. I was tired yesterday. I had to go make groceries to get the things I wasn’t able to get Friday evening, and when I got back home from that, I was tired. I had intended to cook out yesterday, but I also had the time for the NCAA Regional Gymnastics Finals wrong–it was on at five rather than seven, as I believed–so I didn’t have time to assemble our new grill in time. I wound up just having a turkey sandwich and Paul made scrambled eggs.
LSU did win that regional meet and qualified for the national semi-finals, and scored over 198, which is a benchmark. They also didn’t have a great vault rotation, which means they could score even higher if they hit on every event. The delightful Haleigh Bryant got two 10’s–vault and bars–and they pulled away from everyone by the end of the second rotation. We also finished Ripley, which is marvelous, and started watching Sugar on Apple, with Colin Farrell–which is also pretty good with a powerful neo-noir sensibility; Sugar, the main character, also has an affinity for old noir films, so sometimes the show is in black and white and sometimes in color, which gives that old, slick late 40’s noir feel to the viewer. It’s also set in LA, so there’s all that wonderful Chandler feel to it, too.
And the apartment is a bit of a mess today, too. I’ve done some good work this weekend getting it all under control, but it’s still not completely, which I will have to work on today around writing and doing others things. I also started reading Michael Koryta’s The Cypress House, which is really good (everything he writes is gold; if he weren’t so good we’d be burning with jealousy) and reminds me I need to really work a lot harder on my own stuff. I read quite a bit of it yesterday morning with my coffee; I will probably do the same again today. It felt good to be reading again; I was also paging through Grady Hendrix’s Paperbacks from Hell, which is always a fun ride down memory lane–it’s about the horror boom of the 70s and 80s, which definitely had an impact and influence on me as a writer; I always went back and forth between horror and crime when I was unpublished, and while I mostly write about crime now I always enjoy branching out into horror sometimes–I have two more supernatural/horror type stories in draft form that I would love to get revised and put in my short story collection. I was doing a lot of thinking about works in progress yesterday while I watched the crime shows and the gymnastics; it’s been a while since my mind started roaming creatively like that, and I really liked experiencing that again; my mind has been fallow for so long I was beginning to worry (as always) that it was going to be stuck like that at some point.
I am also looking forward to reading more often and regularly now; I should absolutely 100% read for an hour every day when I get home from work and decompress; what better way than to curl up in my chair with Sparky purring in my lap? And reading a good writer before settling in to do my own word count for the day is a pretty good idea–I’ve always held that one of the best ways to write better is to read works by authors you admire, and there are so many authors I admire…I also came up with the idea for the next Scotty as well as its title, which is always a challenge. I’ll probably write that later this summer, after I get everything else I want to get done this year done. I am feeling better and am feeling good again; today I have to go to the gym and get restarted on my therapy on my own, too.
And on that note, I am heading to the easy chair with my book for the next hour or so before I come back here to dig into the day’s writing. You have a marvelous Sunday, Constant Reader, and I may be back later; one never knows. I have several entries that I need to finish, too.
Ah, Saturday morning after another good night’s sleep. I managed to sleep late again–Alarm Sparky hasn’t worked the last two days; he waited until almost eight this morning to demand breakfast and to try eating my Fitbit again; he tries to chew my Fitbit fairly regularly throughout the day. (He has also peeled off my Breath-Rite nose strip both yesterday and this morning–try sleeping through that sometime!) But he’s a sweet boy and I love him. He’s bonded again with Paul over the last couple of weeks and has adjusted to having him around again, which is nice. Settling back into normalcy (or what passes for it) around here now, and trying to get some things done today–preferably this morning, to be honest. I have to get everything done that I need to get done today before seven, which is when the NCAA regional championships for gymnastics airs with LSU trying to make it to national semi-finals. I do have a lot to do today–I really was tired last night when I finished work at home duties, and couldn’t really do much of anything other than finishing the laundry. Paul and I watched more of Ripley, which we are both enjoying and the production values are just so extraordinary; almost every shot is beautiful, and the black-and-white photography is brilliant; I don’t think I’ve seen such stunning visuals in a black-and-white film since Sweet Smell of Success.
I also managed to finish reading Last Summer last night, and there will be more about that later. It’s a very dark and mesmerizing tale; told in a voice that speaks to being a teenager but it gradually becomes very dark. I enjoyed reading it a bit, wondered about its casual homophobia (normal in books when this was punished, yet still startling to encounter; it was so common when I was growing up that I never really noticed the presence of actual queer characters and actual casual homophobia). I did remember the way it ended, and I think I do remember reading the sequel Come Winter. I’ll probably dissect more at some point, and give it a review reflective of the time period in which it was originally published and filmed.
We also watched the first episode of Mary and George, which is so much fun! Julianne Moore is clearly enjoying herself playing Mary, who dragged herself up from the lower classes and has ambitions for not only herself but for her son, the beautiful George, and Lord, is he beautiful. Nicholas Galitzine looks much prettier as a brunette than as a blond; being a blond doesn’t work as well as dark hair. Not sure which is his actually hair color, but those blue eyes certainly pop a lot more with darker hair. It’s way fun, and very very queer; historians are very quick to erase James I’s sexuality and desires for men from the pages of books–you literally need a photo of him buggering someone to convince homophobic historians; history is full of bisexuals, especially among royalty. The seventeenth century has always one of my favorite historical periods, too, and one I’ve always wanted to write about. I guess I should stop being such a coward and try to write something historical since I’ve always wanted to; but Imposter Syndrome always intrudes whenever I start thinking seriously about it. Maybe someday…but the show has the best line about sexuality and gender I’ve ever heard: “A body is just a body.”
Overall, I could easily be upset with myself for not writing last night, but I am not going to do that to myself anymore. I needed the rest, clearly, as I must have been tired. Today I have to run to make groceries, do some writing, and get some other things done. I am going to be cook out today–it’s bright and sunny out there, which is great–and I am hoping to get some cleaning and organizing done around here as well. I do need to empty the dishwasher, and I am a bit hungry this morning. I am going to spend about an hour reading Michael Koryta’s The Cypress House while I drink my coffee and my mind wakes up, and then I have to dig in and get to work for the day.
And on that note, I am heading into the spice mines. Have a lovely day, I may be back later, and hang in there, okay?
Queer and Loathing in America 