Category: Uncategorized

Don’t Let it Show

Sunday morning and I slept in. I also slept well, and no, didn’t want to get up out of bed this morning either–hence me sleeping in later than I’d intended. I was very low energy yesterday, physically and mentally, which I think had everything to do with the crash and relief after the surgery. As I said, since the medication switch (which I seem to never stop talking about) I don’t have the mental anxiety anymore, but my body still reacts to it. I could physically feel the relief once we got home Friday from the surgery, so I shouldn’t be terribly surprised that I am exhausted this weekend. This is yet still another reminder that I need to be kinder to myself about not getting things done, because it inevitably is beyond my control in the first place.

Paul is doing swimmingly. There’s pain, but it’s nothing he can’t handle with some medications, which is to be expected. But he can walk without the walker, and climb/descend the stairs without difficulty. This is an enormous relief, as I have to return to office on Monday and leave him in the capable hands (paws?) of Nurse Sparky, who uses his kitty healing powers on him as much as possible. It’s weird how cats always sense it, isn’t it? Sparky has been glued to Paul for the most part since he got home, although now he’s down here playing while Paul sleeps.

Because of everything we pretty much did very little yesterday. Paul got up earlier than I expected, so I turned the French Open on for him to watch while I tried to do some things. I made some progress on the apartment, but for the most part I wound up in my easy chair watching with him. WE switched over to a rewatch of Celebrity Traitors UK, which is one of my favorites (I told you I was obsessed with the show), before moving on to a new movie on HBO, Miss You Love You, starring Allison Janney and Andrew Rannells, which we really enjoyed, and then started Half Man, which is incredible, and I am still digesting it. It’s the new show from Richard Gadd, of Baby Reindeer fame, and will have more to say about it once I finish the show today and think about it a few days. It’s incredibly done, the writing is exceptional, and the acting is top notch. We binged five episodes last night before calling it an evening.

Today I cannot blow off; I need to do some things today around here and I need to have some things delivered this afternoon. As much as I would love to just sit in my chair and read my book with Sparky in my lap, alas, I have to get some cleaning done and some other stuff as well, and hope to have some time to do some writing and reading around watching television and hanging out with my little family here today while letting my batteries get charged up to capacity again today before I go back to work tomorrow. I also don’t know how long Paul is going to sleep in this morning, either. So I am going to try to do some things and get cleaned up before he wakes; I also need to run the dishwasher again. I did do a load of dishes and caught up on the laundry, so I wasn’t totally idle yesterday.

Not that there’s anything wrong with being idle. Christ, Greg, you don’t have to be doing something every second of every fucking day. Vestiges of the coping mechanisms developed for my anxiety, I suppose.

Okay, I am going to get another cup of coffee and make some toast before I get cleaned up and get some things done around here before taking a reading break. So, have a lovely Sunday, Constant Reader, and I’ll be back tomorrrow morning, okay?

She’s Single Again

Tuesday morning and my slice of coffee cake is now crumbs. My coffee is hot and tasty as I sit here, bleary-eyed and not quite awake and alert yet. I do feel rested this morning and physically good, so that’s always a nice start to the day. I did get some chores done after I got home last night, and the kitchen looks kind of nice this morning. Overall, the apartment looks tidier, which is all one can hope for, isn’t it? Sparky curled around my shoulders last night while I was doing the dishes, and then convinced me I needed to provide a lap for him (claiming it was for a moment) and then going into a sound, deep puddle sleep, dead to the world, while I binged some more of The Traitors Canada. Such the life, don’t you think? I am debating whether or not to stop on the way home to make some groceries, but at the same time…well, it can’t hurt, can it? I am ordering lunch today as a treat for myself–I have to bring some extra stuff in this morning to the office, so don’t have a free hand to carry my lunch–and I want to do some chores tonight when I get home as well. If I can just get the dishes out of the way…

I also finished my newsletter on Phyllis A. Whitney’s Listen for the Whisperer, which I really enjoyed rereading. It did remind me of one of my biggest quibbles with her work, and that of her contemporary, Victoria Holt; the heroines don’t really solve the mystery or capture the murderer. They usually find out it’s someone they trusted and only when that person kind of loses it and either captures, or tries to kill her, or both, do they realize the answer to the mysteries swirling around the spectral and spooky manse where the heroine has come to stay and/or live. (Remember, Dark Shadows began with a beautiful young woman taking a train through the foggy Maine night to arrive at a spooky mansion full of secrets.) I think I may revisit my first Victoria Holt (The Secret Woman) or Mary Stewart (The Ivy Tree) next; it’s fun revisiting these classic, if dated, Gothic romantic suspense novels. That newsletter is scheduled to go out tomorrow morning!

In other surprising news, I got money from a class action suit involving Blue Cross/Blue Shield, which was completely unexpected. I get these notices every once in a while about these kinds of legal actions, and usually it results, if I register, in a check of less than two dollars. I usually don’t, because registering takes time and even if it’s just a minute or two, it hardly seems worth it for that small of an amount. So, seeing a payment to my Paypal account for almost two hundred dollars this morning makes me think that maybe, just maybe, I should register for more of these things. I mean, that’ll pay my Entergy bill this month. Not too shabby for found money, was it?

Last night, as I watched Season 3 of The Traitors Canada (season three is the best so far), I was fondly remembering how much I enjoyed dinner and the conversation last Friday night with my friend, and that maybe, just maybe, I should start thinking about extricating myself from this healing cocoon I’ve spun around myself since Mom died–it’s really been kind of non-stop since then–and then just kind of shook my head. Maybe not yet? I’m kind of enjoying focusing on myself and Paul, and just kicking back and enjoying the lack of drama in my life that isn’t coming from the television. Physically, I felt well yesterday, but a little still fried mentally. I started revising a short story yesterday–it didn’t go well–which was enormously frustrating, but it was a rather insincere try and I did kind of give up easily when the words weren’t flowing. It’s a muscle in my brain that I’ve allowed to get slack and flabby from lack of use (kind of like the ones in my body–MUST TAKE WALK THIS WEEKEND); and so it’s naturally not going to rebound immediately, just as the ones in my body don’t anymore. It doesn’t mean I am done with writing for good, it just means I need to get the muscle strong, flexible, and healthy again. The creativity is going very well; I am just having trouble stringing the words and sentences together on the page.

I am also having trouble focusing. Par for the course, really.

And not really very surprising, given that the world is burning to the ground as I type.

I feel pretty decent today–alert and awake–so we’ll see how this day turns out.

And on that note, yep, off to the spice mines with me. See you tomorrow!

Such a pretty young man–and a very nicely shaped ass, too, per the mirror behind him.

If I Die Young

It pleases me enormously that the “schedule post” function of the newsletter worked swimmingly and it went out yesterday at 12:30, just as I wanted it to. Sorry, you’ll have to forgive my cynicism about technology working the way it is supposed to, as I frequently find that to not be the case. But there it was, in my inbox, as planned, and yes, I felt very accomplished and smug and on top of things. It was something I started writing while in Alabama on the trip, after visiting cemeteries all day. You can read it by clicking here. (There are helpful subscribe buttons there, too, so you can make sure you never miss one.)

I was tired when I got home from work last night, running errands on the way home, and thus made a lap bed for Sparky for a few hours until Paul got home. I did watch another episode of The Traitors Canada, which I am enjoying watching so am doling them out one episode at a time. I am a bit tired this morning–great night’s sleep last night, just saying–but that’s to be expected after a busy day at the office yesterday and it is Thursday, after all; I’m always a bit tired as my days in the office for the week come to an end. I’m going to be driving all over the place tomorrow for doctors’ appointments, but am hoping to get some good rest this weekend and even maybe do some writing. Stop that crazy talk, right? But the apartment definitely needs to be cleaned and organized and made better for the aftermath of Paul’s knee replacement, which is coming up in two weeks. I have no idea what all that will entail–his recovery, that is–but I know he’ll be doing rehab for a while after. He’s going to have the other done later this summer, too. So, I will have quite a bit on my plate for a good while this summer, and having to be Paul’s nurse around everything else going on. Heavy heaving sigh.

The two Black women activists who launched the recall of Governor Janky have also launched a recall effort on our hideously evil Attorney General, Liz Murrill. GOOD, and as always, it’s the Black women who step up. Liz is currently threatening the Mayor and the city council with being “removed from office” because they are trying to appoint someone to the Clerk of Criminal Court position that the state removed after a wrongfully convicted Black man who served time for something he did NOT do and became a jailhouse attorney was elected. Well, the bigots in Baton Rouge weren’t about to have that voter-directed rebuke of the horrible system here in Louisiana or let it stand, so the fucks (all of whom hate New Orleans, a vital piece of the state economy) eliminated the position.

But yes, they are the true Patriots who looooove the Constitution. (Sarcasm implied.)

And the Christian hell isn’t horrible enough for these uneducated ass-wipes to spend eternity in. People here are pissed as fuck; I don’t think I’ve ever seen the electorate this enraged and activated here before. The recalls may not work–the racism runs deep with the mediocre here–but I am enjoying watching all of this unfold. I have signed both petitions, and you can bet your ass I am going to vote this Saturday, and I will cast each vote against whatever Janky Jeff wants–so you can kiss those constitutional amendments goodbye, shit-for-brains. He’s literally making Bobby Jindal look better–which I didn’t think was possible…actually, what I hoped was impossible. But we live in interesting times, don’t we?

Rex Reed died earlier this week, and is another one of those celebrities who frequently came to the Williams Festival. He never remembered who I was (we must have been introduced a dozen or more times), but he was always friendly and polite when we would inevitably be introduced again. He was a great panelist, and his stories about filming Myra Breckenridge were hilarious, once he got going. He loved nothing more than an audience, and always played it to the hilt. I read his collection of celebrity profiles Do You Sleep in the Nude? when I was a teenager, and everything else aside, he was a brilliant writer. His subjects often loathed the pieces he wrote on them, and him as well–but he had a reputation for showing them as humans, warts and all, not as gods from Olympus–and he could be quite bitchy. Despite not really understanding what it meant, I tagged him as a child as different–the same way I did Gore Vidal and Paul Lynde and Charles Nelson Reilly and Jim Nabors and Rock Hudson and Tony Randall and Joel Grey, which has always made me think like recognizes like as the real explanation of “gaydar” (and it doesn’t always work)–and I always enjoyed his bitchiness, even if sometimes it seemed like more of an effect than anything; this is what people expect from me so I have to give them what they want. He also had a great story about meeting Bette Davis in Baton Rouge as a teenager, too. He actually spent a lot of time in Louisiana growing up, and graduated from LSU. He aged really well, too. I felt a bit of a pang when I heard the news. I’d kind of like to read more of his work…I wonder if any of it is still in print or ebooks?

I am having dinner with a friend tonight, which I am also looking forward to very much…and that’s the note I shall close this entry on before heading into the spice mines. I will of course be back in the morning, so have a great day and I will talk at you then.

I used to buy candles here, a few blocks from my old office. I don’t know if it’s still there or not, but I loved this store. It always had such an interesting herbal smell.

Belle Fleur

How is it pay the bills Wednesday again? Yesterday was a decent day, and I was worn out and fell asleep in my easy chair around nine while Paul packed. He’s moving into the Monteleone today for the Festivals, so I have been left alone to deal with a lonely kitty with abandonment issues. I ran my errands after work–my next dose of medication for my next injection arrived–and did another load of dishes and picked up a bit. I also watched a few episodes of The Traitors New Zealand–but it’s too early in the season to really decide anything about it yet. I was impressed they voted a traitor off at their first banishment, but I suspect it will be a while before they get their next one.

I wrote my newsletter essay about Mississippi Blue 42, which you can read here. I really enjoyed the book, and it made me think a lot, not just about college football, but writing about sports authentically. There are just so many hokey tropes and clichés in sports that are easy to fall into–the plucky kid who never plays but wins the big game; the poor kid using sports as a way out of poverty and to get an education; the big game that comes down to the final play; the big comeback; and on and on and on. But that’s the thing about sports, though–you can see a trope play out in a game on your television every weekend. Eli Cranor addresses some of these in the book, but handles it in a way that makes it not feel tired or overused, but rather inspired and fresh and new. That’s a skill, y’all–Eli Cranor is a real one. Add him to your reading list–and if you’re not a football fan, the writing alone is good enough to appeal to everyone.

Since Paul won’t be home tonight, when I get home from work I have to get used to Paul not being here. His work schedule is incredibly intense and erratic in the months leading up to the festivals, so spending the evenings alone with Sparky isn’t new; what’s new is I’ll wake up in the mornings and he won’t be here. Tonight will depend on how I feel after work, I think. Tomorrow night will be my usua; Thursday night exhausted not do anything night, and then of course I have to do the whole prepare for panels and a reading thing over the weekend, taking Lyfts to and from the Quarter. I took Monday off as a recovery day, and then it’s back to work with a vengeance. It never ends, does it? Ah, well. Today I am going to look through my to-do list notebook (I’m trying this “running list” thing I’ve lifted from Donna Andrews’ marvelous series) and figure out what I need to get done first, and what is plausible and/or possible. I need to start writing fiction again, but the last few attempts were so futile that I’ve not really wanted to try again. It’s silly; nothing’s changed, and this is simply a mental block that I’ve created, but I keep thinking, with the country and world burning to the ground does any of this matter? Which is dumb; in my newsletter essay about being a DEI author I know that, small as it may be, my authorial voice is an act of protest every time I write about queer people. I had started writing a story for that American Gestapo anthology, and it was an excellent idea–but it really took me into a dark headspace I didn’t want to be in, so I put it aside.

I also filled my tank–a Honda CR-V, for the record–and it cost over forty dollars. I don’t think I’ve ever filled my car for that much since I bought it in 2017. Nice job, MAGA. But hey, so what if you self-owned as long as you owned the libs, right? No sympathy for any of you, really–especially you three-time MAGA voters. I am amused that the media blamed “economic anxiety” for the 2016 and 2024 elections…how did those votes work out for you? Looks like the Midwest is about to get destroyed again with the cost of fertilizer, and you have no workers this year, either, so what was the point of the farmer welfare money?

And make no mistake about it, Midwest red voting farmers–you’re on the fucking dole; why don’t you pull yourself up by your bootstraps? Why should my tax money bail your racist asses out?

And on that note, I am heading into the spice mines. Have a lovely pay=the-bills Wednesday, Constant Reader, and I will check in with you again tomorrow after my first night alone.

The pier at Panama City Beach, Florida

Thriller

Congratulations to everyone!!!

2026 ITW THRILLER AWARD NOMINEES

We’re thrilled to announce the finalists for the
2026 ITW Thriller Awards:

BEST STANDALONE NOVEL

Megan Collins – CROSS MY HEART (Atria)

Ruth Knafo Setton – ZIGZAG GIRL (Black Spring Press)

Gilly Macmillan – THE BURNING LIBRARY (William Morrow)

Sarah Pekkanen – THE LOCKED WARD (St. Martin’s Press)

Olivia Worley – SO HAPPY TOGETHER (Minotaur)

BEST SERIES NOVEL

James Byrne – CHAIN REACTION (Minotaur)

Robert Crais – THE BIG EMPTY (Penguin/Putnam)

John McMahon – HEAD CASES (Minotaur)

Christopher Reich – THE TOURISTS (Thomas & Mercer)

Vincent Zandri – TERMINAL MOONLIGHT (Down & Out Books)

BEST FIRST NOVEL

Chris Chibnall – DEATH AT THE WHITE HART (Pamela Dorman Books)

Kelsey Cox – PARTY OF LIARS (Minotaur)

Sophie Stava – COUNT MY LIES (Gallery/Scout Press)

Zoe B. Wallbrook – HISTORY LESSONS (Soho Crime)

Liann Zhang – JULIE CHAN IS DEAD (Atria)

BEST AUDIOBOOK

S. A. Cosby – KING OF ASHES (Macmillan)

      Narrated by Adam Lazarre-White

Mark Edwards – THE WASP TRAP (Simon & Schuster)

      Narrated by John Hopkins, Anna Burnett

Marisa Kashino – BEST OFFER WINS (Macmillan)

      Narrated by Cia Court

Xan Kaur – WHEN DEVILS SING (Macmillan)

      Narrated by Michael Crouch, Anjali Kunapaneni,  Jennifer Pickens, Landon Woodson

CN Mabry, N’Dia Rae – THE CHEATER’S WIFE (Simon Maverick)

      Narrated by Ruffin Prentiss, Machelle Williams

Michael Robotham – THE WHITE CROW (Simon & Schuster)

      Narrated by Katy Sobey

BEST YOUNG ADULT NOVEL

Liz Lawson – MURDER BETWEEN FRIENDS (Delacorte Press)

Margot McGovern – THIS STAYS BETWEEN US (Penguin Young Readers)

Clay McLeod Chapman – SHINY HAPPY PEOPLE (Delacorte Press)

Diana Rodriguez Wallach – THE SILENCED (Delacorte Press)

Julie Soto – THE THRASHERS (Wednesday Books)

BEST SHORT STORY

Katrina Carrasco – LEVEL UP (Bywater Books)

Scott William Carter – THE SEDUCTION OF DR. DIMENSION (Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine)

Lee Child – ELEVEN NUMBERS (Amazon Original Stories)

David Lagercrantz – FALSE NOTE (Amazon Original Stories)

Jessica Van Dessel – THE VIOLENT SEASON (Alfred Hitchcock Mystery Magazine)

ITW will announce the winners at ThrillerFest XXI on Saturday, May 9, 2026 at the New York Hilton Midtown, New York City.

Congratulations to all the finalists!

Tosca Lee
ITW Board of Directors, Vice President, Awards

The Winner Takes It All

Congratulations, everyone!

Lefty Nominees for Best Humorous Mystery Novel
  ° Ellen Byron, Solid Gold Murder (Kensington)
  ° Jennifer J. Chow, Star-Crossed Egg Tarts (St. Martin’s Paperbacks)
  ° Elizabeth Crowens, Bye Bye Blackbird (Level Best Books)
  ° Catriona McPherson, Scot’s Eggs (Severn House)
  ° Cindy Sample, All’s Faire in Love and Murder (Cindy Sample Books)
Lefty Nominees for Best Historical Mystery Novel
(Bill Gotttfried Memorial) for books covering events before 1970
  ° Cara Black, Huguette (Soho Crime)
  ° Mariah Fredericks, The Girl in the Green Dress (Minotaur Books)
  ° Dianne Freeman, A Daughter’s Guide to Mothers and Murder (Kensington)
  ° Claire M. Johnson, City Lights (Level Best Books)
  ° Laurie R. King, Knave of Diamonds (Bantam)
  ° Rob Osler, The Case of the Missing Maid (Kensington)
Lefty Nominees for Best Debut Mystery Novel
  ° Adrian Andover, Whiskey Business (Chestnut Avenue Press)
  ° Kristen L. Berry, We Don’t Talk About Carol (Bantam)
  ° Laurie L. Dove, Mask of the Deer Woman (Berkley)
  ° Sue Hincenbergs, The Retirement Plan (William Morrow)
  ° Marisa Kashino, Best Offer Wins (Celadon Books)
  ° Diane Schaffer, Mortal Zin (Sibylline Press)
Lefty Nominees for Best Mystery Novel
  ° Lou Berney, Crooks (William Morrow)
  ° Claire Booth, Throwing Shadows (Severn House)
  ° Tracy Clark, Edge (Thomas & Mercer)
  ° Leslie Karst, Waters of Destruction (Severn House)
  ° James L’Etoile, River of Lies (Oceanview Publishing)
  ° Gigi Pandian, The Library Game (Minotaur Books)

Guitars, Cadillacs

Merry Christmas Eve Eve! I just have to get through the day and then it’s holiday vacation time! I got a lot done at work yesterday, but was very low-energy. I wasn’t tired, or fatigued, or even sleepy (the three stages of tired for me), but just a little bit off. More of an “odd energy” day than anything else, I suppose. But I wasn’t in the mood to stop and make groceries on the way home as I had planned–and didn’t realize until just now how stupid it is to go to the grocery store the night before Christmas Eve…heavy heaving sigh, but it’ll have to do. I’ll just go uptown and get the mail when I leave the office today, swing by the store, and get gas. No worries, no problems, and no big deal. There was hardly any traffic yesterday morning when I drove to work, and not really much on the way home, either. Here’s hoping that will last through today, right? Sparky was needy when I got home last night, too, so I didn’t get much of anything done last night, either–which is perfectly fine. I did think some things through during the day and evening, so it counts.

It’s the malaise, I suppose. My mind is also unfocused right now, so my creativity energy is bouncing all over the place and so many different works that are in progress right now racing through my brain…it’s actually fun, if annoying. I think I will actually spend Christmas Eve and Christmas not doing much of anything other than mildly picking up and straightening the house, and reading. Then I have three full days to get things done before I return to the office on Monday for a mere three day work week before my next day off, then work at home Friday, and another weekend. I am getting terribly, terribly spoiled.

Hilariously, someone had put up a voodoo doll dressed up as an ICE agent and stuck full of pins here in New Orleans, and that (of all things) went viral over the weekend. The result? MORE of them popped up all over New Orleans, especially after our Attorney General Liz Murrill (aka Pam Bondi Lite) reacted publicly by threatening people with criminal charges for putting up–wait for it–voodoo dolls1. Apparently a significant portion of them have been calling in sick since the first one went up. Thoughts and prayers, guys, thoughts and prayers.

One thing you have to say about Heated Rivalry–it’s enormously popular and driving a lot of conversations. As always, the discourse on who can write who, who can make money writing about whom, and who gets their work adapted for the screen popped up again, as it inevitably does; and it is a conversation that does need to be had…but without hurt feelings, nastiness, and homophobia. As I always say, writers can write about whatever they want and for whatever reason they might have, whether writers should is a different and highly nuanced conversation that cannot be had on social media, for the record.

Let me say this, though: whatever anyone wants to say about them, at least m/m writers don’t write tragedy/trauma porn, and they don’t kill off their gay characters, which put them miles head of most straight authors, who choose to write gay characters as sad, tragic losers destined for unhappiness, misery, and early death.

The noble, tragic gay trope is very, very tired.

And I love that the show is opening eyes, hearts, and minds. What more could anyone ask for? (I do love seeing older straight white women explaining to Gen Z queers how hard it used to be to come out; isn’t it still?) It still burns my ass that Netflix canceled Boots like the craven cowards they are, but they have a history of this; see Dead Boy Detectives (but I think that was canceled because of Neil Gaiman predator blowback, other than having a gay main character). But there is already a second series of Heated Rivalry greenlighted; not sure how that will precisely work.

And on that cheery note, I am heading into the spice mines. Have a lovely pre-Christmas Eve, and I will be back on the morrow for more holiday cheer!

Ah, the things I would do to Mario Lopez…
  1. And I love that ICE is afraid of voodoo in New Orleans. Shouldn’t have come, Gestapo man, shouldn’t have come. And the curses laid upon you here will follow you for the rest of your life… ↩︎

I Take a Lot of Pride in What I Am

So, this is another Monday in one of the last weeks of 2025. I slept well, and only hit snooze twice, which was unusual. I feel rested and good this morning, which is absolutely delightful. I didn’t get all my chores done over the weekend, so I’ll have to put away dishes and so forth when I get home from work this evening. I also have some dishes to wash and put through the dishwasher, too. Yesterday was a nice, lovely, relaxing day. I finished watching The American Revolution and New Orleans Soul of a City (the last one was about the Saints and the Superdome–so the series was food, music, Carnival, and the Saints; pretty much the soul of New Orleans). The college football play-off seedings were released, to the anger of several fan bases, and LSU is going to the Texas Bowl to play Houston in Houston. We also watched The Roses, which was interesting. I also spent a lot of time scanning journal pages into my computer so I can get all my notes over the years on Chlorine easily accessible and in one place. It’s chilly this morning, but the rest of the week (I think) will have highs in the 1970s.

ICE is here, sweeping the city with a goal of five thousand “criminals” to deport from the New Orleans area–and they are doing it so far with all the skill, efficiency, and Constitutional adherence they’ve shown everywhere else they’ve invaded with their Gestapo tactics. The reports so far seem to have netted only thirty-eight arrests, a third of whom had criminal records (odds they’ll be here through Carnival?), and they seem to have primarily focused on the immigrant community in Kenner, the suburb with the airport and the last one before you hit swamp heading west on I-10. A friendly reminder, that always needs to be mentioned, that immigrants rebuilt the city after Katrina. That’s why New Orleans was a sanctuary city: gratitude, which always seems to be in such short supply in the American psyche. I’ve been blocking the racist trash from the outer parishes and “metro area” who always claim to be from New Orleans but never are, who show up with their hateful bullshit on social media. I drove one bitch all the way off Threads recently, who pulled the I live in New Orleans which then became I’m from New Orleans to I was born in New Orleans but a quick search of her social media (wide open, I might add) showed she actually lives in ALABAMA, like the lying piece of racist trash she was, and that her husband worked for a government contractor. When I asked her how her husband’s employer would react to her being a racist lying piece of shit on-line, POOF. She was gone.

Keep New Orleans out of your disgusting, filthy, lying racist-ass mouths–and if you’re going to be such a troll on-line, don’t use your real name and leave all of your social media open. They’re rarely smart, you know?

And for the record, racist skanks in the burbs, New Orleans has always had crime; it’s a port fucking city. The history of this city is drenched in blood spilled by violence. Y’all fled the city after integration. Fuck ALL the way off.

Nothing makes my blood boil more than non-New Orleanians complaining about New Orleans. Begone! You have no power here!

But as always, going through the journals to scan my notes from Chlorine (I actually found the very first time I wrote the idea down, which was kind of cool) was revelatory; I really need to go through my journals more regularly to remind myself what is in there. There are some terrific ideas for short stories and essays in there, as well as notes on multiple projects that are still unfinished. As I was saying yesterday, my journals are far more informative about my writing process than anything in the files, so I think one of my projects for the rest of December is to ditch a lot of my files and get everything compressed into the filing cabinet. I also need to prune the books some more, and start clearing out the storage attic, and take everything off the tops of the kitchen cabinets (I literally have boxes of books everywhere).

And then there’s that moment when Carl Hiaasen shares your newsletter post reviewing hid book Fever Beach–yes, I still fanboy all the time. Eeee! (And it’s getting lots of likes and shares, which is really cool and was never the point of the review!)

And so, without anymore delays, I am heading into the spice mines this morning. Have yourself a merry little Monday, Constant Reader, and I’ll be back on Tuesday morning!

The river parishes light bonfires on the levees to direct Papa Noel, an incredibly cool Louisiana tradition. They feature prominently in Ellen Byron’s mystery A Cajun Country Christmas.

Baby Girl

Pay-the-Bills Wednesday has rolled around again somehow, and somehow it’s already December. How did that happen? Going away for nearly a week has messed with my head a little bit, hasn’t it? But this morning I feel good and rested–odd for the midweek, don’t you agree?–but I also slept well. I had to turn the heat on last night when I got home from work with the groceries, and it’s snug and cozy in here this morning. (I am starting to like the cold weather, which is wild, isn’t it? I always exaggerated how much I didn’t like cold weather, but it seriously doesn’t bother me anymore.) We were busy in the clinic yesterday, and I think I will be again this morning, too. I was a bit tired when I got off work and headed to the store to make groceries. I didn’t get as much done when I got home as I’d hoped–the apartment was very cold, and I huddled under a blanket in my chair with Sparky while catching up on the news–my, what a shit-show we as a nation have turned into–before actually taking a short nap in my easy chair before getting up to do some things before going to bed. It’s forty-one outside this morning (!!!) but I am not minding that at all. Go figure. My theory is that the snow earlier this year snapped me out of a lifelong hatred of cold weather. Stranger things have happened, after all.

The professional bull-shitters, aka ESPN’s line-up of talking heads and morons who blather on endlessly without providing any real information but like you to believe their opinions are based in something, have continued to drag Lane Kiffin for going to LSU. I hate to break it to y’all, but all you’re doing is endearing him even more to Louisiana and Tiger Nation. I watched his initial press conference on Youtube last night (I couldn’t watch it live as I was at work Monday) and I have to say, he kind of won me over. Will he bail on LSU the same way he did to Tennessee and Mississippi? Possibly, sure. But welcome to college football in the twenty-first century, and it’s not like the players can’t leave the way they used to not be able to when their coach went somewhere else. And really, the timelines on how things are set up aren’t conducive to not screwing schools and teams over in this manner. I get the bitterness and disappointment for Mississippi and their fans; I’d be pissed if that happened at LSU, and they–and the Tennessee fans still mad about him leaving in the dead of night for USC all those years ago–have every right to be bitter and angry. But getting the dragging he is getting nationally only makes LSU fans feel more dug in; they do not mind being considered the villain in the least, and neither does the new coach. Hell, they live for having a chip on their shoulder.

It’s kind of reminiscent of the Steve Spurrier days at Florida, frankly–which should be very scary for everyone else.

I did look at LSU’s schedule for next year, and they have to play Alabama, Auburn, Texas, Texas A&M, and they get to play at Mississippi and Tennessee–Coach Kiffin’s greatest hits. It shows we play at Mississippi again next year, which seems wrong; we played in Oxford this past season so should have to go there two years in a row, but okay. We also play Mississippi State, Arkansas, and Kentucky. It’s going to be weird not playing Florida every year.

I also started gathering all my notes on Chlorine last night, to organize and get started on it (again), which will entail revising the first three chapters all over again. It’s fine; it originally started with the cops coming to his front door, before I switched it over to a studio fixer. I may leave the studio fixer intact, but it will need to be somewhat changed because the plot demands it. I also have my page proofs for Hurricane Season Hustle, another editing job, and I went over the edits for a short story that an anthology is taking, which is very cool.

As for the Pete Hegseth murder/war crimes story, is anyone surprised at the lengths this administration will attempt to distract from the Epstein files? I’m not, and frankly, Hegseth belongs in front of a firing squad.

I’m also having some thoughts about the next Scotty, too, which is kind of fun.

And on that, off to the spice mines with me! Have a lovely day, Constant Reader!