Category: New Orleans

Music

Tuesday morning and it looks like we managed to survive Monday somehow. It was ninety-seven degrees yesterday when I left the office–but the humidity hasn’t started getting super bad yet. After getting the mail and making groceries, I was exhausted by the time i finished unloading the car and putting everything away. And it’s only May. It’s funny how we forget the brutality of summer when it’s not summer her, every single year. It’s always a shock how hot it gets here when the summer heat returns in late spring…and how much it saps the energy right out of you. I did manage to get some work done last night after putting everything away, and then I repaired to the easy chair after a ZOOM meeting to be a kitty bed.

We started watching Shrinking last night on Apple TV, and it is really one of the funniest shows I’ve seen. I believe it’s written by Brett Goldstein, aka Roy Kent on Ted Lasso, and stars Jason Segal and Harrison Ford. Once it hits its stride–the pilot episode was a bit uneven–it becomes absolutely hilarious. I can’t believe more people aren’t talking about this (maybe they are, I am notoriously oblivious, after all) but it’s terrific. Funny–and the humor comes from the characters and who they are, rather than situations, which makes it richer and more human, I think. Jason Segal plays a therapist whose wife passed away about a year before the show opens, and he’s questioning everything about his life, including how he practices therapy with his patients, and decides to be more active, proactive even, in his treatment of them. Sometimes this works, sometimes it doesn’t, but it is always quite clever and funny and enjoyable. He also has an estranged relationship with his daughter–his grief was selfish, and he wasn’t there for her when she lost her mom–and their neighbor, Liz, has kind of taken over taking care of Alice the daughter, so he’s trying to rebuild that relationship as well, while navigating his gratitude to Liz for stepping up–complicated by the fact she won’t let go or step back. Like Ted Lasso, it’s about relationships and learning how to navigate grief–in Ted Lasso, it’s the grief of the failed marriage, in Shrinking, it’s grief over a dead spouse…but the primary takeaway from the show so far is something I’ve noticed, and a friend who lost her spouse about six months ago and I have been talking about, is the lack of conversation and discussion about grief, how to grieve, how long one should grieve, the guilt you feel whenever you have a good moment or something nice happens to you (“I shouldn’t be having a good time!”), and so on.

We have a billion dollar industry built around grief–the mortuary business–and yet that’s all about the public display of grief, rather than the intimate experience of it. Ah, capitalism. I’m actually surprised no one has figured out a way to monetize grief, really. Or maybe that’s what the mortuary business is? If so, at least in my case, it’s gone horribly wrong. The service in Alabama at the funeral home was absolutely lovely, don’t get me wrong–but it didn’t provide me with any closure or answers or much of anything other than the ability to share sadness with the rest of the family (and I do pity the relatives who didn’t come or even call or anything; that is something Dad will never forgive. I am a little more understanding, but totally get where he’s coming from and can appreciate and understand it. He worshipped her and he saw that as a slap in her face, right or wrong.), so I don’t know.

I don’t know much about anything, really. Almost every day is a reminder of how little I know and how little I understand. But life really is a learning process; I hope to never stop learning and evolving and growing until the day my heart finally gives out as well.

And on that note, I am heading back into the spice mines. Have a lovely Tuesday, and I will check back in with you again tomorrow.

Drowned World/Substitute for Love

Saturday morning in the Lost Apartment and I finally slept well last night, and I even slept in for an extra two hours this morning. I could have easily (and gladly) stayed in bed for even longer, but I have too much to get done this weekend to allow myself to slovenly lay in bed for the entire morning, so once Scooter’s outrage about not being fed at six a.m. manifested itself into non-stop yowling, I got up and fed him. I feel very rested today, which is lovely. I was tired and dragging all day yesterday, and when I finished work I had things to get done. Paul and I ran out to Costco for a restocking (I hate that sometimes they have stuff and sometimes they don’t; they didn’t have several key things I always get when I go) and then I picked up the mail and a prescription. I need to get gas this weekend as well as make groceries, and the tires need to be aired up as well (the low pressure light came on in Alabama last weekend, but only one tire was low and it wasn’t officially low; it was simply lower than the other three tires), and there’s all kinds of other things I need to get done this weekend. I am editing a manuscript which needs to get finished this weekend; I’d like to do a little more work on my own manuscript; and I would absolutely love to finish reading Lori Roy’s brilliant Let Me Die in His Footsteps this weekend as well. It’s seem rather daunting when it’s put that way, but I am confident that not only can I get all of it completed but without driving myself insane, either.

Always a plus!

We watched The Boston Strangler film on Hulu last night (after an episode of Somebody Somewhere, which I am really growing fond of), and it was quite good. It focused on the two women reporters who figured out there was an actual serial killer and did all the pursuing of the case, all the while tweaking the police who were falling down on the job and forcing them to actually do their work. I wasn’t old enough when the killings were actually happening, but my dad had a copy of Gerold Frank’s The Boston Strangler and I did read that, as well as watched the Tony Curtis film version of the story when it was released to the television networks after its theatrical run. I don’t really remember much of reading the book, other than one landlady who was certain one of her tenants was the Strangler, and the story kept coming back to her and her suspicions. That always stayed with me over the years (what if your tenant/neighbor was a serial killer and you started to suspect? which became my story “The Carriage House”–yes, Virginia, that story gestated in my head for nearly fifty years before I wrote it) and to this day I still remember how chilling that was and how much I worried for the landlady. (It’s also the plot of the ancient Hitchcock film The Lodger, in which the landlady suspected her tenant was Jack the Ripper.)

I was thinking yesterday about the entry I wrote yesterday morning and the way I was/have been feeling for quite some time, and I realized that I’ve been a very passive participant in life; I’ve been kind of letting it happen to me for a while now rather than living my life actively. I don’t know if it’s exhaustion, both physical and emotional, or a reaction to trauma; or maybe, perhaps, even both. The last few years have been rough on everyone; I don’t think we’ll ever know the full extent of the trauma we all experienced as a result of that paradigm shift back in March of 2020; the shutdown, the battles over what was responsible and what was irresponsible; the insanity of the anti-vaxxer movement and everything else that was just plain wrong over the last few years. I suppose for some of us the trauma goes back even further, to the 2016 election. But it’s kind of true. I think I was very active in my own life and the pursuance of goals before 2016, and ever since 2016 I’ve just been kind of coasting along, letting things happen instead of making them. As a general rule I don’t like coasting through life; it was the recognition that was what I was doing in my early thirties that led to the big changes in my life, which was followed by the achieving goals I had always dreamed about, since I was a little boy.

But roadblocks and speed bumps encountered aside, I think had I been able to look ahead twenty-one years when my first book was released to see where I am today, I’d have been pleased and thrilled and more than a little bit smug about what I’d accomplished. A character trait I’ve never wanted to have is arrogance, and I am always afraid of sounding arrogant when talking about myself and my career. I never want to sound arrogant or smug (well, unless I am dealing with haters, in which case I love giving rein to smug condescending arrogance), but over forty novels? Over twenty anthologies? Over fifty short stories? Fifteen Lambda nominations, and seven Anthonys in total? Nominations for the Macavity, the Shirley Jackson, the Lefty, and the Agatha? How could I not be satisfied and proud of myself?

As I was making room for the Costco purchases once we got home, I was putting some things up in the storage attic and needed to move a box, so I looked inside of it to see what it was. Clippings and things from my career, it turned out–once I carried the box down the ladder to the laundry room I could see I’d written Career Memorabilia on it in Sharpie–and inside was all kinds of things. Back issues of Lambda Book Report from the days when I was either its editor or did some writing for them (or when they were reviewing my work), and back issues of Gay and Lesbian Review Worldwide, too, along with Insightoutbook catalogues (what a serious blast from the past). Of course I had to bring that box down and keep it for sorting through and scanning purposes (I am serious about cleaning shit out of the storage attic this year), and hilariously found the September 2000 issue of Lambda Book Report, with Michael Thomas Ford on the cover. (Peering inside, I saw that Paul actually was the one who interviewed him!) Scanning all of this stuff will be a huge undertaking, and I do actually hate the thought of throwing it all out once it’s done; I don’t know if Lambda ever archived the back issues or not, so this may be all that’s left of it out there. Same with Insightoutbooks; it was very important and crucial to queer publishing between 2000 and when it went under sometime around 2009 or 2010 (that may be wrong; I also found an issue of LBR from 2008 or 2009, and I would have sworn under oath that LBR stopped publishing a print edition long before that. (You see why I no longer trust my memory? Mnemosyne no longer comes to my aid anymore these days, which is most unfortunate–and yes, the reason the goddess of memory comes to mind is because of Carol Goodman’s marvelous The Ghost Orchid–more to come on that score.)

But I also did some cleaning up and filing around here while I was making dinner (ravioli) last night, so this morning the office doesn’t look as bad as it usually does on Saturday morning; the sink is filled with dirty dishes and there’s a load in the dishwasher to put away, but more of the things I generally wind up doing Saturday morning are already done, so there’s no excuse for me not to be highly productive today other than malaise and laziness.

And on that note, I am going to get these minor chores handled while I keep drinking coffee and my mind finishes awakenening.

Beautiful Stranger

Wednesday and it’s Pay-the-Bills Day again; how does time pass so goddamned quickly?

We were in a flash flood advisory yesterday evening when I left the office, and on my way home I could see that at some point yesterday some of the streets I traverse every day had flooded at some point in the afternoon. I did get a little work done on the book yesterday, but was ultimately forced to surrender to fatigue and repaired to the chair. I was also still feeling some of the after-effects of the Anthony nominations being released on Monday–was still getting congratulatory posts and emails and messages, which I had to acknowledge; everyone is so kind and lovely. So many people are delighted and happy for me, which always comes as a surprise. I guess you never really outgrow the PTSD from being a queer kid?

But I also got to see this week’s Ted Lasso last night (they drop on Wednesdays, but we always can get it at 8 pm central on Tuesdays on Apple Plus) and it was maybe one of my top five episodes of the entire series. Yes, I’m partisan, and yes, I am prone to love anything well-done with gay themes and yes, I am also very highly critical of gay themes in film and television. Stop reading now if you want to avoid Ted Lasso spoilers. When it was revealed earlier in this final season that Colin was actually a deeply closeted gay player I got a bit excited. I’d wondered if the show would address homophobia in sports, and what’s it feels like to be a closeted gay professional athlete, and it was handled so beautifully. The scene with Trent Crimm and Colin talking about it in front of the Homomonument in Amsterdam was just brilliant, and then last week Colin’s friend Isaac grabbed his phone from him to delete nude photos (long story, but YOU SHOULD BE WATCHING) and of course saw his text conversation with his boyfriend. Isaac just gave him a disgusted look and walked away…and my heart broke a little bit for Colin. I know that feeling all too well–the friend who becomes a former friend once they find out or you come out to them (and yes, coming out is a process that goes on for your entire fucking life)–but it’s Ted Lasso–I knew this wouldn’t turn out badly, and it really didn’t. Yes, I am biased, but this episode is one of my favorites of the entire run of the series; everything was clicking and humming along the way it usually does–this season has felt a little uneven–and everyone was pitch perfect, from Roy to Ted to Keely to Rebecca to Higgins to even Nate, whose redemption arc I am enjoying. Yes, I was disappointed when he turned in Season 2, but I am delighted to see that he’s still the same Nate, still figuring things out but at heart a really good guy. And Roy’s growth and development–courtesy of a swift hard kick in the pants from Rebecca–is epic. The end game of the show is now in sight, and I think we’re all going to be delighted with the direction in which it’s going to go. I hope there’s a bit with Trent Crimm doing a book launch for his book on the season and Richmond and Ted’s philosophy of coaching. I cried a few times during last night’s episode, won’t lie–and I absolutely cannot wait to watch it again when I get home this evening. I have to run some errands on the way home–post office and prescriptions–but I am hoping I’ll get home and be able to have a lovely evening of writing before I wind up turning into a cat bed.

I don’t feel tired today although I had a relatively restless night of sleep–sorta sleep as I call it, where your mind feels sharp the next day but physically you’re tired. I need to start stretching (and yes, I know I’ve been saying this for months) but it does help keep you nimble and loose; the aches and tiredness comes from tight muscles, and the best thing to do with tight muscles is stretch them. Maybe I should put that on the to-do list? I didn’t want to get up this morning–the bed was incredibly comfortable and I felt really relaxed–but I can look forward to not getting up to an alarm on Friday morning.

And on that note, I am heading back into the spice mines. Thanks again, everyone, for all your kindnesses about the Anthony nominations; I still can’t believe it myself, you know? Three? Madness. Have a great Wednesday, Constant Reader, and I’ll check in with you again tomorrow.

Frozen

Yesterday started off really well for me. I woke up, felt a little groggy, brewed a cup of coffee while I washed my face and brushed my teeth (also checking my scalp for sunburn acquired on Sunday) and then sat down at my computer to touch the space bar to wake it up. The first thing I saw was a DM from my friend Kellye, saying, okay double nominee and, as always, replied with “wait what?” She replied, have you not checked your email since last night? so I went to my inbox and there it was: the Anthony Award finalists for San Diego 2023…and I was on it three times. THREE. In all honesty and modesty aside I figured/hoped/thought my best chance to score a nomination was for the 2022 Bouchercon anthology (what kind of monster do you have to be to edit the Bouchercon anthology and NOT get on the short-list for their awards?) but Best Humorous for A Streetcar Named Murder? Best Children’s/Young Adult for #shedeservedit? How absolutely lovely and kind and totally a surprise. It’s kind on unreal. Last year I was nominated twice, which was stunning in and of itself (losing both was no surprise, and seriously there is no shame in losing to Alan Orloff and Jess Lourey; two very talented, funny, and lovely people), but three? I know Shawn A. Cosby was nominated for three I think last year, too? That’s some good company to be in, let me tell you what. I’d be lying if I didn’t say I am thrilled, and how delightful that Streetcar and #shedeservedit are getting some award love. The Anthony nominations announcement sort of derailed my day–but what a nice way to have your day derailed, right?–but I was able to get some things done.

I still can’t believe it. And if I didn’t say thanks or “heart” your congratulations on social media, my apologies. Thanks to everyone, really. It still doesn’t seem real; like always, it never does until I’ve actually not won the night they are presented, but like Paul said, “Three more opportunities to extend your losing streak!”

So, yeah, not much progress was made last night. I wasn’t tired when I got home, but I ran some errands and got home rather quickly–that was a surprise–but did some laundry and a load of dishes, but every time I tried to write anything I’d get more notifications and I am obsessive about thanking people; I never want anyone to think I don’t appreciate their being kind to me. And really, not bad for a queer writer, right? Granted, there’s not much queer about either Streetcar or the anthology, but I am still a queer writer no matter what it is I write, it will come from a queer societal perspective. That’s the thing, you know, about queer writers. Even if we aren’t writing about queer characters and themes, we cannot help but bring an outsider’s perspective towards everything we write, and while perhaps being on the outside colors our viewpoint, it also gives us the opportunity for a different perspective and the ability to sometimes see things a bit more clearly than our straight counterparts, who are all wrapped up in their straightness and their perceived straight world.

Obviously, I am still a bit aglow from the great big hug I just got from my colleagues–and still waiting for the correction email–but today I have to firmly reaffix nose to grindstone. I simply have too much to do to allow myself the ease of indulging in my exhaustion–although it is necessary sometimes for recharging purposes–but time is slipping through my fingers like quicksilver and I’ve got to get all this shit done. I must say, career-wise, this has been a good year so far. But I really am having a good year on the score; it just would be nice if my career wouldn’t only go well during times of trauma so I could enjoy the highs a little bit more? Oy.

But I did have another good night of sleep last night and I do feel rested for the moment–my legs are tired, though; I really need to start stretching daily–so we’ll see how the days goes. I’d like to finish reading my book (Let Me Die in His Footsteps by Lori Roy, which is superb) at some point, and of course there are things to edit and emails to answer and things to write too–and I definitely need to make a to-do list as well as a Costco grocery list as well.

And on that note I am heading into the spice mines. Have a lovely Wednesday Eve, Constant Reader, and I will check in with you again tomorrow.

The Power of Goodbye

I got home last night around eight o’clock. I am very glad I went up there this weekend; it meant a lot to Dad and it was kind of helpful for me as well. I am still kind of in shock that I was able to sleep in the motel room on Saturday night; I actually slept better that night than I did at home on Sunday, but here we are. I am composing an entry about the First Sunday in May; I started writing it last night when I got home but don’t want to finish it while I’m sleepy or foggy from sleep. It needs a clearer head, to be certain. It was hot and humid yesterday, and I have a bit of a sunburn on my scalp from the incredibly bright hot sun as we went from cemetery to cemetery.

I am very tired this morning, but am really glad I went this weekend. I feel like some of the darkness has receded–perhaps not for good, make that most likely–I have long since learned to know that once the constant darkness starts to recede that there are still going to be bad days in the weeks and months to come, but that first wave of grief that I’ve been living with seems to be over. Stay tuned, and keep your seatbelt fastened; there’s still more turbulence to come.

I didn’t finish listening to Carol Goodman’s marvelous The Ghost Orchid in the car, but I can finish listening while doing some chores around the office that always need to be done. It’s really fantastic; with DNA from Dark Shadows, Mary Stewart, and Elizabeth Peters; another one of those books that make you think why do I even bother? But Carol’s one of my favorite writers (and favorite people) so I prefer to enjoy her work than beat myself up over not being able to write books as well–there’s no point in that kind of thinking in the first place.

I do feel like the cathartic feel from this weekend might help me buckle down and get back on top of everything. I am so behind on everything that it’s not even funny. I do have an eye appointment this Saturday–just getting my prescription checked; will order new glasses from Zenni if they are needed (and I suspect they are)–and hopefully I will be able to get deeper into the book this week and maybe–just maybe–get all caught up by the end of this coming weekend. I need to go over my to-do list and come up with a new one; I won’t be able to take books to the library sale because of the eye appointment but I should take a box down from the attic this week to get started on the ultimate purge, and hopefully think ahead and plan as much as I can while this good feeling lasts.

And on that note, I am heading into the spice mines. Have a lovely day, Constant Reader, and I’ll check in with you again later.

Rain

In a little bit I’ll be loading up the car and driving north.

We watched more of The Diplomat last night, and I must say, what a terrific show. Keri Russell is fantastic, the writing and production values are top natch, and the cast? Chef’s kiss, really. I also managed to get some work done on the book last evening, as well as doing some chores around the house on breaks from work-at-home duties. I laundered the bed linens, forgot to pick up my dry cleaning, and noted that the humidity has returned–the Formosan termite swarms won’t be far behind, either. There have already been sightings reported on social media, and yet it’s not yet Mother’s Day, which was usually the demarcation line of swarm season. The work on the house next door also looks like it may be winding down at long last, and while the house looks lovely, I still miss my crepe myrtles.

I slept very well last night, so we’ll see how I feel sleeping in a motel tonight. I don’t have much to do to get ready for the drive; my Carol Goodman audiobook is downloaded to my phone, and I just need to pack my shaving kit and a change of clothes to be ready to go, after showering and shaving. I also need to queue up the directions on my phone, too. It should be, all in all, a lovely drive. Mississippi, despite everything, is quite beautiful to drive through, as is Alabama (the entire South is beautiful, more’s the pity), and of course, I’ll probably be working through plot points in my own book while I listen to Carol’s read beautifully through my speakers.

I am not sure what time I will get back here tomorrow, but I assume it will be late, so I will be tired going into my work week. Maybe I should have taken Monday off? But even if I am tired, I should be able to drag my ass to the office. It’s my get-caught-up-on-things day at the office; and I generally am never there for eight hours. Since I am not client-facing on Mondays I am thinking I could probably manage the day despite being tired…and maybe being tired on Monday will help me sleep the rest of the week. I mean, I can dream, can’t I? And Lord, I am behind on everything. Hopefully getting this weekend out of the way will remove the cloud from my subconscious and I can move on ahead without the depressive lows or out-of-nowhere emotional collapses. Again, I can dream, can’t I?

So, when I get back tomorrow night I need to remember to make a list of everything that needs doing in the meantime–there’s a lot I have to do and get done, so I need to make certain that everything that needs doing is written down so I can remember to get to it. I have an eye appointment next Saturday, and I also need to figure out some things about getting the hearing aids and so forth. Heavy heaving sigh. It also looks kind of gray out there this morning; perhaps I should check the weather between here and there before I leave this morning. A thought, to be sure. Looks like rain both today and tomorrow–all the way there and all the way back, as well as here too. Yay, he typed in sarcasm font. That’ll make the drive ever so much easier.

But I don’t mind these lengthy drives, although I’d prefer to teleport wherever I need to be rather than drive or fly. It’s also unusual for me to be gone two consecutive weekends–although of course, after I went to the library events in Birmingham and Wetumpka I had to go to Kentucky the next weekend, and back to Alabama the next–three weekends in a row with me not home. The discovery of audiobooks for the drives changed everything, really. I also worked on cleaning up the piles of books, but haven’t bothered pruning much because I can’t get to the library sale to drop off books before next weekend at the earliest.

I don’t know if there will be an entry tomorrow morning or if it will have to wait until I get home, or Monday morning, one or the other. (And I just realized of course it’s raining today; it’s Jazzfest and it always rains on one of those weekends.)

And on that note, I am heading into the spice mines. Have a lovely day, Constant Reader–not sure when I’ll be back. SO hang in there, okay? You got this.

Erotica

Work at home Friday, woo-hoo! The excitement really never stops, does it? Ah, well.

Yesterday was a pleasant enough day, despite my complete exhaustion by the time the afternoon rolled around. I was fine in the morning, focused and getting things done, but once I went back to seeing clients after my lunch break, I was physically and mentally fatigued. I also had to pick up the mail on my way home–the traffic wasn’t nearly as terrible as it had been the day before; I do NOT know what that was all about, nor do I want to know, frankly. I came home, did some things, and then collapsed into my easy chair. We started watching that new HBO MAX show about the Watergate burglars starring Woody Harrelson and Justin Theroux (and if you would have told me in 1989 that Woody from Cheers would become one of our best character actors, I wouldn’t have stopped laughing until 1992), but while it’s exceptionally well done, E. Howard Hunt and G. Gordon Liddy aren’t the kind of people I want to know better or see anything about as the lead characters of anything. It was eerie how well they reproduced suburban life in that period (also having Cersei Lannister playing Mrs. Hunt was an interesting twist), but again…I couldn’t get a sense of whether this was parody or striving for accuracy (which shows how insane Hunt and Liddy both are/were), so after one episode we tapped out and switched over to The Diplomat, which is amazing. I fell asleep during the second episode (I’ll rewatch it to get caught up at some point) because I was, simply stated, completely exhausted from a week of working and not sleeping well and emotional upset, I suppose. Last night I slept like a rock–completely dead to the world all night, and even slept for nearly ten hours before rising this morning rested and refreshed. It is quite lovely, frankly, and I feel terrific for the first time all week. Of course tomorrow I have to drive to Alabama (and back again on Sunday) but I have already selected Carol Goodman’s The Ghost Orchid to listen to on the ride to and fro, and I am kind of excited at the chance to listen to yet another brilliant book by one of my current favorite authors.

I’ve not had a chance to pick up Lori Roy’s brilliant Let Me Die in His Footsteps, which I was reading on the way home from Malice last Sunday and loving every word. Despite the fact she has two Edgars and another nomination from her first three books (which is pretty amazing on every level), I think her more recent work is even better than her earlier work. This book is also pretty fantastic, and I can see why it did win the Best Novel Edgar. Roy has a very hypnotic writing style, and is a master of voice; this story is told by two very different and very distinct voices with an alternating dual time-line, which is also something I love, love, love. The pity is that when I finally do finish this book, there will only be one Lori Roy novel left that I’ve not read, When She Comes Home, and I’ll have to hold onto that one until she publishes another book unless I want to (sigh) finish her entire published canon thus far.

I dread the day when I run out of Carol Goodman novels to read, for example.

It’s been a tough week, and I think that its my subconscious dealing with the issues of what this weekend means, really. Over the course of my life I’ve become really good at compartmentalizing my life into different rooms in my brain and shutting and locking the door on things, thinking I can’t deal with that now, I’ll deal with it later but some things are too big to be locked away, and they seep out through the cracks around the door in its frame and drag like a heavy stone at my being and emotions. I hit a major wall when I got home from work on Wednesday; I just got overwhelmed out of nowhere with grief and collapsed into my easy chair for some purring cat therapy. I also find that my moods can easily be shifted with essentially a snap of the fingers this week. I am unused to this kind of grief, and periodically wonder–with a sense of dread and horror–how much worse this will be when I lose Dad, as he is the only parent I have left. I know I am lucky. I had my mom for nearly sixty-two years; most people don’t get that long with one parent, let alone two. How much harder would this have been to deal with when I was younger and more immature?

But that is the kind of thing I always dismiss when it comes to mind–the path of regret is one of futility, wasted time and energy and emotion. You cannot change anything, so what is the point of trying to figure out or thinking about how different things might have been had you chosen A instead of B at this point, or D instead of Y then? The ripple effect of every choice we make reaches people we don’t know in ways we’ll never know, so maybe different choices made by me could have resulted in horrible things happening to other people, and why on earth would I wish bad things for people I don’t even know? That sounds terrible, frankly, and nothing I would ever want.

In some ways, this morning I am kind of looking forward to the drive north. I mean, yes, the destination is grim and sad, but it’s a beautiful drive; I have a great novel to listen to, and I really am looking forward to seeing my father. I want to get a good look at him, you know, and listen to him and see how he is doing. It’s so hard to tell via email or text, you know? Nothing like having eyes on someone for a proper assessment. I’ve decided to go up there this summer for a while, keep him company and spend some more time with him. (And yes, hateful little voice inside my head, I am very aware that I should have been doing this when Mom was alive. No sense in regrets, but I don’t want to feel this way when I lose Dad, so…changes in mentality and thinking are necessary going forward. I do wish it were easier to get up there than it is, though. I don’t think anyone can fault me for thinking that, either.)

Ah well, I have work-at-home duties to take care of as well as chores, so I am going to bring this to a close and head into the spice mines. I’ll check in with you again tomorrow before I leave, Constant Reader, and have a lovely day.

Love Don’t Live Here Anymore

I think I was always aware of the existence of New Orleans; I just don’t know or remember how my impressions before visiting for that first real visit were formed. I know I learned about New Orleans from my love of history; the city was too important to the development and shaping of the country to not be featured extensively in books–particularly the Battle of New Orleans in 1815. The Witching Hour by Anne Rice, I remember, had me wanting to come visit; I discovered Julie Smith’s New Orleans Mourning after visiting for my thirty-third birthday and realizing that I’d found the place where I belonged, needed to be, and my dreams would all come true.

New Orleans has a very deep canon of literature; you name a kind of book, one has been written in that style about the city. And just as there are a lot of subgenres of crime fiction–you can pretty much find a book about the city in any of them. There have been a number of cozy series set here, in every type of cozy style. I’ve always wanted to find a good cozy series set in New Orleans to sink my teeth into–the humorous kind–and while I’ve tried quite a few, none of them really took with me. That’s not to say the books weren’t well-done and written, or unclever; they just didn’t connect with me. I eventually stopped trying to find one, really–but of course, as with anything, just because you didn’t connect with the first two series you tried, doesn’t mean you should stop trying.

Take Ellen Byron’s Vintage Cookbook series, for one good example. I greatly enjoyed the first book in the series, Bayou Book Thief, which went on to win the Lefty for Best Humorous Mystery earlier this year. It was a terrific series launch, and had me really looking forward to the second book in the series, which is when series generally begin to find their legs and hit their stride.

And so, on my travel day to Malice, I read Wined and Died in New Orleans.

Ricki’s heart hammered as she glanced at the ominous black clouds hovering over New Orleans from the front window of her shotgun cottage home. She took a deep breath, then used masking tape to make X’s on the windowpanes of the living room’s large front window. She grunted as she hefted a mattress ontp the top of the room’s couch and positioned it over the taped window. “We’re safe now,” Ricki assured her dogs, a German shepherd mix and a Chihuahua mix, who were watching her with curiosity. “Even if the hurricane sends stuff crashing into the windows, they’ll break but won’t shatter into a million pieces. And the mattress will keep everything from flying inside.”

A violent clap of thunder shook the house. Ricki cried out. Princess and Thor, the shepherd and Chihuahua, barked at it. I choose to feel calm. I choose positive and nurturing thoughts. Ricki repeated the mantra over and over to herself. She’d been saying it a lot lately. Seconds later, rain slammed the cottage roof with an almost deafening force. Ricki’s phone sounded an alert and she grabbed it. She read the message: Hurricane watch canceled.

“Seriously?” Ricki said with a frustrated groan.

Ricki is our erstwhile heroine, who recently relocated to her birth city, New Orleans, after her husband died in a freak accident while trying to create a viral video. Since her return, she’s found a love interest with the handsome celebrity chef who lives across the street; developed a friendship with her landlady; and opened her own vintage cookbook shop at Bon Vee, the mansion of the Charbonnet family–known for owning restaurants and their delicious food. There are some great characters at the Garden District mansion since converted to a culinary museum celebrating the family that Ricki befriends as well; all in all, a lovely little community of friends and support for her.

This book is set during Ricki’s first hurricane season, and yes, Byron gets what that is like absolutely right–the constant warning texts of warnings and watches and their cancellations–as well as the blase attitude of the locals; we never get concerned terribly until we know something for sure and even then, you can’t be certain if you need to evacuate “just in case.” Evacuating for most people isn’t free, and even if the only disruption is a power outage–if it’s long enough you have to throw everything in the refrigerator out.

Thank God we didn’t make our Costco run the week of Ida, which was when we were due to go. It’s also been a hot minute since I dipped into hurricane season in one of my books. (Mississippi River Mischief does have some hurricane content, but it’s one from the previous season) But I digress.

The plot of this story is put into motion when several cases of really old wine–from the nineteenth century–are found on the estate, and because of its age, it’s really valuable. The decision is made to auction the wine off and put the money back into the museum–which doesn’t always break even–but the discovery of the wine brings some distant relations of the Charbonnet family out of the woodwork, all claiming they deserve a share of the wine sale proceeds. Ricki is also dealing with an intern; her crush across the street (with whom she time shares two dogs) has hired an assistant who sees Ricki as the competition and undermines her at every turn; and of course, one of the distant relations turns up dead and Ricki has to clear her friends–all of whom are suspects–of the murder.

There’s also a wonderful New Orleans pothole that plays a crucial role in the story.

I loved this book. I laughed out loud on the plane a couple of times–and smiled at others, when I recognized something from one of mine and Ellen’s boozy get togethers whenever she comes to town, which made the book all that much more fun to read for me. But it’s fun even if you don’t have a personal connection to it, either. Buy this book, love and cherish it!

And you can thank me later.

You’ll See

And somehow, here we are at Thursday again. It is kind of annoying and irritating how quickly time is slipping through my fingers; but then this was a short work week because I was off on Monday. I’ve felt a bit out of sorts and off-balance this week, which I think is because of the Malice come-down plus knowing that I have to go to Alabama this weekend. It’s hard for me to focus and get settled with that journey ahead of me, and while I am not necessarily dreading it, I also know it’s going to be emotionally draining and exhausting so there’s some trepidation, to be sure. It’s also Mother’s Day the next weekend, so that’s going to probably be a bit rough (note to self: text your sister). Yay?

But in cool news, the anthology This Fresh Hell now has a release date of June and can be ordered here: https://improbablepress.com/products/this-fresh-hell

(Apologies, for some reason I can’t substitute text for links anymore. Fucking updates.)

Anyway, this anthology has my story “Solace in a Dying Hour” in it, and this is a story I am really proud of. It’s one where I went to rural Louisiana/bayou country yet again, which also meant navigating stereotypes, tropes, and clichés. I had originally intended to write a story about the grunch (a mythical creature sighted occasionally out in old New Orleans East, but I think his old stomping grounds now are neighborhoods) but in looking up information about that particular Louisiana legend I stumbled over a bunch more that I’d never heard of, and one in particular–le feu follet–really struck my fancy. These are fairy lights seen out in the swamp or along a bayou, kind of like a will-o’-the-wisp. Usually no larger than a candle flame, these lights have been said to be many things, but the definition I went with–the souls of the unshriven dead, come to claim other souls–worked for what I was trying to do, and the more I thought about it, the more the story began to come together in my mind. I think it’s a lovely piece of writing, frankly, and it really must be if I am going to say it publicly. It turned out exactly the way I wanted it to, and I had some expert editorial help from Katya de Becerra and Narrelle M. Harris (who worked with me on my Sherlock story; I really love working with Narrelle) that made it even better than I thought it could be while still remaining what I wanted the story to be; their input was invaluable. Good editors, y’all, are worth their weight in gold. As you can imagine, I am very excited about the story and the anthology.

I slept decently last night; I was again very tired when I got home. It took me an hour because of traffic–I stopped at the Rouses’s in the CBD on the way home, but was only there for fifteen minutes. I left the office at straight-up four thirty and got home after five thirty. It was the worst I’ve seen traffic in the CBD since before the pandemic. Not sure what there was about yesterday that brought horrendous pre-pandemic traffic back to New Orleans, but here we are, right? Heavy sigh. Tonight I am going to swing uptown on my way home to get the mail, so hopefully Claiborne traffic won’t be hellish tonight. And tomorrow is my work-at-homeday, before getting up Saturday and driving north. It was odd; yesterday morning on the way to work the traffic was also heavy. It’s been a hot minute, but I always used to drive here before the pandemic at off times so I never had to deal with traffic very much. I am beginning to think my working in the evenings is a thing of the past I may never see again, doomed to a life of getting up at six a.m. Monday thru Thursday for the rest of my working life. That sounds incredibly tiresome, doesn’t it? But I imagine I’ll be tired all of next week, too, and won’t get caught up on rest until the following weekend. Not loving this, for sure.

But in other weird developments, I discovered that Tuscaloosa–where I will be turning north to head to the home country–has WHATABURGER. It is almost sad how excited finding that out made me; I am definitely scheduling my trip to stop there for lunch on my way up. How cool is that? Usually when I drive north I tend to stop at Hardee’s, since we don’t have them in New Orleans and they’re basically Carl’s Jr, which I loved when I lived in California (and yes, I know the family that owns them is homophobic right-wing trash) so I always see that as a bit of a ‘treat’ for me when I go on long drives. I do love fast food hamburgers, although the old classics (McDonalds, Burger King, and Wendy’s) all are kind of disgusting to me now. Give me Whataburger, Five Guys, or Sonic. (I am starting to not like Hardee’s; the last few times it was just kind of meh)

Fascinating stuff, am I right?

What can I say? I’m a little bleary this morning, so maybe it’s best to head into the spice mines and be done with it. Talk to you tomorrow, Constant Reader!

Human Nature

Wednesday!

I was tired yesterday. I slept okay Monday night, but not deeply and I did keep waking up so it was a restless night at best–and I sure as hell didn’t want to get up when the alarm went off yesterday morning. I was also behind at the day job when I got there, so had to play catch up a bit between clients. It was all good, but still a bit more stressful than I would prefer; I also kept thinking it was Monday all day which drove me a bit insane.

I also discovered that my insurance actually does not cover hearing aids for adults; I must have missed the part about having to be under eighteen when I looked it up. Which kind of sucks that in order to hear I have to pay for it out of my own pocket. The good news is I’ve made it this far without them, so I guess I can start trying to save up to pay for them somehow, or maybe I can get them financed or something. I’m not entirely sure, but it’s irritating. Our health care system has been fucked up since, well, the Reagan administration (quelle surprise; what modern day horror doesn’t date back to that bastard?), but the decline of the airline industry actually can be dated to Carter; he was the one who deregulated the airlines under the guise of increasing competition so fares would be more competitively priced. We see how well that worked out, haven’t we? American, United, Delta, Southwest and Jetblue are all that are left now from the glory days of air travel–Eastern, Pan Am, TWA, Continental, Northwest and many others having either folded or been taken over by another airline. Glad we have all these choices now, right? (Sorry, I was thinking about how the airline industry has declined over the course of my lifetime while at the airport the other day, and clearly it was still in my subconscious. I love Jimmy Carter, but this was a mistake.)

I slept better last night. I still woke up a couple of times but I feel very much more rested this morning than I did yesterday. I was tired when I got home from the office so immediately put the dishes away and started another load before the fatigue overtook me. I got caught upon Vanderpump Rules–more on that later–and when Paul got home from the gym we watched this week’s Ted Lasso, which was lovely and melancholy at the same time. (My God, how I love Jamie Tartt! Phil Dunster is killing it in the role this season, too. What an incredible character arc–and now we are seeing a lovely redemption for Nate, who disappointed me but we get to see our Nate again this season, which is so nice)

I did manage to work a little on the book yesterday, and it took me a little while to get reacclimated to the story and everything. I think I’ll be back on track with it again today and thru the rest of the week before I leave for Alabama on Saturday morning; and while the drive up there and back over the weekend will probably be tiring, I think I can see the end of the book coming. It might take me awhile to get there, but the end game is there and I need to really focus at some point to get it done. I may have to take a long weekend in mid-May to get there. Heavy heaving sigh. It’s always about time management for me, isn’t it, and being tired? How did I used to do this all the time? Oh yes, I was younger and hadn’t had COVID yet. *shakes fist at universe*

I need to stay away from Twitter more. I get so angry whenever I go there, and am always tempted to say something snarky or in kind to a troll–I don’t always succeed in deleting the tweet before hitting send, either–and while I am not worried about going viral or getting cancelled (if it happens, it happens, you know, and if I fuck up, I kind of deserve it), I am trying not to be that person. I don’t want to troll trolls on-line, nor do I want to get into tweet-fights with anyone. It’s all just a waste of time and energy that can be utilized better elsewhere (I do, however, reserve the right to troll anyone trolling a friend), and does no one any good. Twitter is the worst of us, really; originally intended for people to connect and interact with each other, it basically evolved into a place for people to complain. Oh, someone cut you off in traffic? Tweet angrily about it! You watched a show you didn’t enjoy? Tweet about it! And so on and so on. Twitter can be fun; I’ve certainly had fun there with friends and of course there’s always my “Greg meme” face, which can be used for surprise, shock, or horror (I actually have the picture saved on all devices for easy access and use as “the horror”); for some reason that always makes people laugh. It is a funny photo, and I will always be grateful that Josh Fegley snapped that shot so perfectly timed to get that expression on my face when the Evil Mark said, well, something evil while we were at Drag Bingo at Oz. I’ve tried repeating that photo without success; it was something in and of the moment, I guess.

Or I’m just older and my face sags so much I can’t replicate the expression. One or the other is the most likely, or probably both.

Heavy heaving sigh.

And on that note, I am going to head into the spice mines. Have a lovely day, Constant Reader, and I will check in with you again tomorrow.