Wednesday Pay the Bills Day and also the last one before Christmas; the last one of the old year, in fact. I don’t get paid again until the new year, which is kind of final, isn’t it? The sands in the 2022 hourglass are running out even as I type these words; its chilly again this morning in the Lost Apartment and the week-long slide into the holiday weekend is almost completed. I just have to go into the office today and tomorrow and then a glorious four-day weekend follows, which will be quite marvelous and lovely. I am a bit more sluggish this morning than I have been recently when I arise, but who knows? It might be the weather–it’s below fifty again this morning–it could be any number of things. Hopefully the coffee will clear my head and help me get ready for the day.
One can hope, at any rate.
Well, I did pay the bills and have a surprising amount of cash left on hand; the way paychecks are falling this December/January means I get paid again the first week of January so all those early month bills will be due for that paycheck rather than this one. Obviously, I am going to hoard this surprising windfall (due to biweekly paychecks) to use against the next set of bills. I’m also expecting to get paid for some other work I’ve done between now and the next paycheck–and this is the end of a royalty period, so those will be just over the horizon as well, which is absolutely lovely. It’ll be nice going into 2023 not having financial concerns in the back of my mind. (I ordered myself some presents this morning after paying the bills, too.)
I did manage some work on the book last night, not nearly enough as per usual, but progress is being made. I remain hopeful that I can get so much done this four-day weekend that is looming that it should get me caught up on everything. I also have a short story that is due relatively soon, and another one I am supposed to be writing–I’ll have to look for the deadline in my saved emails–so I can get a better sense of where I am with everything I have to do. I also started writing another blatant self-promotional post for A Streetcar Named Murder, which I should be doing a lot more of, frankly. I did a load of laundry last night, put away a load of dishes, and soaked another sinkload overnight, so I can load the dishwasher when I get home tonight. I think there’s another load of laundry to do, if I am not mistaken. This cold weather certainly has been increasing the laundry–extra clothes being worn to help keep warm, I guess. Friday I’ll get up early, have a cappuccino as a treat, and then start working. I’ll pick up the mail that day and probably swing by Fresh Market to pick up incidentals, too; some other things I’ll need over the weekend. I think I will make pulled turkey on Christmas; I am planning on taking that day off from working and worrying about getting things done and/or cleaning, and I will probably go ahead and make shrimp Creole one other day of the weekend, probably Friday.
The great refrigerator shopping is going to go on hold until after the new year, methinks.
Sorry to be so brief today, but like I said, the coffee took a while to clear the muddle in my head and now it’s time to head into the spice mines already. Stay warm wherever you are, Constant Reader, and I’ll check in with you again tomorrow morning.
I’ve actually never watched the Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer television special–when I was a kid I hated that kind of animation, so I was uninterested in any animated special that used that kind and never watched–but it’s so ubiquitous in our culture that I know enough about it to continue being uninterested in watching it. So, no, young Greg was never a big fan of Rankin-Bass shows. Sue me. And I’ve heard enough about them that it’s like I watched them loyally and religiously every year. A Charlie Brown Christmas always used to be my favorite that I watched every year–maybe I should watch it again this year on Christmas Eve, for old times’ sake and auld lang syne and all that kind of stuff.
It’s not as cold this morning as it was yesterday, but it’s nice to be inside a nice warm house. I slept well again last night, which was lovely and nice, and I feel relatively well rested this morning. I worked on the book quite a bit yesterday, which felt great, and I ran some errands on my way home. It started raining when I left the office yesterday and was terribly windy; the wind was that biting damp cold that’s just miserable. WE also had a thunderstorm last night that Paul had to walk home in, poor darling, sweeping into the Lost Apartment with his umbrella and the winds like an orphan of the storm. Once he was home we finished off Wednesday, which was delightful and we greatly enjoyed. The entire season was actually a mystery, which I wasn’t expecting and was a clever way to do the show, actually. I hope it’s renewed.
Because it was raining and cold, I did think to check the mailbox here at the house–which I never do, but when I got home I remembered our neighbor in the front was out of town so I needed to bring his mail in so it wouldn’t get wet–which turned out to be a good thing; I’d gotten one of those notorious camera tickets, which ironically I had just been talking about recently with a friend, and I said “I haven’t gotten one in quite some time”–well, I guess I spoke it into being and it manifested. Sigh. So I had to pay that, of course–I am a good citizen, after all–but I hate that they send those things to my home address and not my mailing address; I never think to look in the mailbox here precisely because we have a mailing service. I never get mail here at the apartment–except from the Department of Motor Vehicles or from the state.
But Thursday night is when we’re supposed to have the big temperature drop of thirty to forty degrees. Much as I hate the thought, I could get up Friday morning, Christmas Eve Eve, and go make groceries rather than trying to do it on the way home Friday, but I am leaning toward the old “it’s smarter to get it over with” mentality. I guess it will also depend on how tired I am when I get off work that day. I think when I get home tonight, after I work on the book for awhile I am going to curl up in my chair and read for a while. I’ve not been reading a lot lately because my mind hasn’t been there, really, but I had wanted to get this finished so I could read Donna Andrews’ Christmas mystery for the year on the actual holiday. Wouldn’t that be a great way to spend actual Christmas? Bundled up with my blanket in my easy chair with my coffee and a Donna Andrews mystery? I don’t think there would be any better way to spend the day, actually.
I am really looking forward to this weekend, if for no other reason than being able to have four straight days off from work. Sure, I usually don’t go in on Fridays and work remotely, but I don’t even have to do that this weekend!
And on that totally boring note, I am heading into the spice mines. Have a lovely Tuesday, and I’ll be here again tomorrow morning.
Oh, seriously, sometimes I wonder how I manage to still have a career. I did a list of great New Orleans crime novels–a place to get started, because there are a lot of them–for Crime Reads; you can click here to read it. It wasn’t easy narrowing it down to the few I selected, but I also wanted to be certain that the ones I chose were ones I absolutely, positively loved. (The one exception is Dinner at Antoine’s; I read that one as a teenager when I went through a Frances Parkinson Keyes phase–I the King is my absolute favorite) and of course, I didn’t mention James Lee Burke because really, does anyone really need to mention him when it comes to New Orleans and Louisiana crime novels? He’s the uncrowned king of Louisiana crime fiction, plus not picking him relieved me of the duty to figure out which book to choose. (Although I would have undoubtedly gone with The Tin Roof Blowdown, his post Katrina novel, which made me cry several times.)
After making groceries yesterday morning–yes, it’s always smart to go to the Rouses in the CBD on a Saints home-game day, seriously–I came home and relaxed a bit before digging back into the book. I didn’t get nearly as much done as I would have preferred; yesterday was one of those pulling hen’s teeth days. But the Saints managed to hang on to sweep Atlanta for the season, which is the highlight of their terrible season thus far (but we never lost to the Falcons this season), and then we finished watching Smiley (which is absolutely delightful) and then started Wednesday, which I’d been nervous about starting. I watched the original television version of The Addams Family, and Addams Family Values is one of my top three comedy movies of all time. I am still annoyed that Christina Ricci wasn’t nominated for an Oscar for either film; I’ve been a fan ever since and Wednesday, who didn’t really have much of a role on the original show, became my favorite character. I’d been putting it off, despite the great reviews, because I was worried I’d be disappointed. Constant Reader, I was not. Wednesday is terrific, and Jenna Ortega really nails the part. Catherine Zeta-Jones is fine as Morticia, but it’s hard to replace Anjelica Huston, who was sublime. We wound up bingeing almost the entire first season. Absolutely loving it.
It’s hard to believe this is it, the final countdown to Christmas. It’s this coming weekend, and while we still don’t have a refrigerator–out Christmas gift to ourselves this year–maybe we can get a great deal on one after Christmas. The ones with the freezer on the bottom are apparently all about an inch or two too tall to fit into the cubby where ours goes; it’s the damned unusable cabinets about it that are the problem. I don’t know if the cabinet needs to be torn out or if it can be raised a few inches and remounted on the wall; probably the easiest thing to do is just get the freezer-on-top size that fits and be done with it. It certainly would be the easiest thing to do, really. I just had my heart set on one with the freezer on the bottom–another disappointment I’ll need to learn to live with, apparently.
It’s cold again this morning, still sub-fifty degrees. The new heating system in the Lost Apartment works incredibly well–the only reason I even had the slightest clue that the it was cold outside was how cold the downstairs floor is beneath my socks. It’s supposed to freeze this weekend with a slight potential of snow–SNOW IN NEW ORLEANS (which I really need to write about sometime; the way the city reacts to snow always amuses me in a mean sort of way. Most people down here have no idea how to drive in snow or deal with it in any way, and why would they? It doesn’t snow enough for them to ever get used to driving in it. I don’t think it’s snowed here since before 2010? I don’t remember the last time it snowed here, but I remember the only really big snow we ever had; I just don’t remember what year it was. 2007? 2008? Something like that. But my goal for the holiday weekend is to get everything done that I need to get done on the way home from work on Thursday, so I don’t have to go outside for another four days in the cold. I’ll probably spend a lot of time working feverishly on finishing the book, of course, but will take Christmas day as a holiday from everything.
And on that note I am heading into the spice mines. Y’all have a great Monday, okay? I’ll be back in the dark tomorrow morning.
Ah, Sunday. Sundae would be better, of course–who doesn’t love a sundae?
It’s below fifty this morning in New Orleans, so the predictions of colder weather coming our way in the forecast were clearly correct. It’s so nice having a heater that actually works. We didn’t turn it on upstairs, so when I got out of bed I felt a bit cold, but then I came downstairs where it is nice and comfortable. Maybe I can handle the cold weather with a working heater in the house. Who knew?
I worked a lot on the book yesterday and made a lot of progress with chores and things around the house. I’m hoping to get a big push today as well, and the only other thing I have to really do is go make groceries–I am debating as to whether or not that can wait until tomorrow on the way home from work but I am leaning towards going today and getting it over with. I also did some more refrigerator research–trying to find what I want in the price range we want that will also fit into the refrigerator space in the kitchen is proving to be more of a challenge than one would have expected. I think I found one that will barely fit into the space–it’s a matter of fractions of an inch–but we are also wondering if we can simply have the cabinet above the refrigerator removed to allow more room. Decisions, decisions–but there’s no rush, I suppose, other than my obsession now that we’ve decided to make the plunge and get a new one.
We started watching Smiley on Netflix last night, another Spanish language show with queer characters–it’s kind of a romantic comedy; there’s a gay couple, a lesbian couple, and a straight couple, all loosely connected (the pretty young gay bartender works with one of the lesbian couple at her bar; the older gay guy works with the straight guy at an architectural firm) and kind of charming. The premise is that both Alex (the bartender) and Bruno are single and about ready to give up on romance and love. Alex has a string of one night stands with guys who ghost him; Bruno has no luck with dating apps–getting some really nasty responses when he reaches out. For some reason, Alex decides to use the bar phone to call his last ghosting date, all furious and hurt and angry–but misdials and leaves the message on Bruno’s phone instead. Bruno finally decides to call back–just to let Alex know the person he meant the message for never got it–and they start talking and decide to meet. It doesn’t go well, and they end up arguing–and end up back at Alex’s having the best sex either of them have ever had, but misunderstandings continue to get in the way. The lesbians are also at a crossroads in their relationship, and decide to work through the issues rather than breaking up, and the straight couple is also having some trouble. It’s cute, it’s funny, and the actors are all pretty appealing–and of course, it’s nice seeing an “opposites-attract” gay rom-com happening on my television screen. And the young man who plays Alex is really pretty. He was also in Merli, another Spanish show we started watching but gave up on; his name is Carlos Cuevas. The guy who plays Bruno is also far too handsome to be the troll we’re supposed to believe these gay boys think he is–he’s handsome, he’s successful, he’s intelligent–Miki Esparbé; or maybe it’s because he’s older, I don’t know. But I’m interested to see how this plays out.
Christmas is next weekend, which doesn’t seem quite real to me yet. Part of this is because I am so focused on trying to get the book finished as well as trying to stay on top of everything else I am doing that days seems to slip through my fingers and the next thing you know, Christmas is next weekend. This whole year has been like this, frankly–the last few, if I am being completely honest, and in that same spirit, really everything from March 2020 on has been a confusing blur and I don’t remember when or where things happened. It’s also hard for me to grasp that 2010 was almost thirteen years ago, and trying to remember that entire decade isn’t easy. I guess this is what happens when you get older? Ah, well, it’s something I may never get used to but simply have to accept as reality, you know?
This week at work should also be interesting–the week before Christmas, and the week between Christmas and New Year’s is always a weird time around the office. We never have a lot of appointments, and we also have a lot of no-shows, which can be a pain. Paul and I haven’t watched anything even remotely Christmassy; although the Ted Lasso Christmas Special might be a fun thing to revisit.
It’s also weird as the year comes to a close as I start reflecting back on the year, and what is different going into this new year as opposed to going into the last new year. The fact that I have trouble remembering what happened throughout the year is also not any help to me at all, frankly, and neither is the fact that I always have to stop and think was that 2020 or 2021? There are also a lot of draft posts accumulated here; things I wanted to write about when I was more awake and not caffeine-deprived, so that I didn’t misspeak or say something that out of proper context could be problematic. I never talked about my reread of Interview with the Vampire or my thoughts about the new show, which I greatly enjoyed and thought was very well done, for example. (And Mayfair Witches will be debuting in the new year, which I am really looking forward to watching.)
The blog has always been my way of waking up and warming up my brain and my writing muscles, which is why it is always so scattershot and all over the place. I’m not exactly sure when it went from a daily writing exercise to a “daily writing exercise while I wake up in the morning”, but that happened at some point in the last eighteen years; my livejournal began in December of 2004, and I’ve been plugging away either there or here ever since. How much has changed since then? It snowed that December, I remember that, and we were living in the carriage house with Skittle. I know we’d put up a tree, and we were kind of looking forward to 2005 being an easier year after everything that happened in 2004. Little did I realize the evangelical Christians of Virginia were waiting in the wings, as well as a little hurricane that would be named Katrina. I had only published four novels, and only two short stories that weren’t erotica. (I just remembered that when we lived in the carriage house I had to do the laundry at a laundromat–I don’t miss that at all, even if it did get it all over with much more quickly than here at home.)
But the blog was also supposed to be a place where I could write personal essays about subjects that matter a lot to me; things I want to write about but no one will pay me to write about, you know? I started getting more cautious about writing about touchy subjects around 2008, when I went full-time at NO/AIDS (I no longer work for NO/AIDS either; as much as I appreciate the way HIV/AIDS treatment and so forth has changed, I do kind of miss the days when we were a struggling queer health non-profit), despite being reassured by NO/AIDS management that I didn’t need to worry about anything I did or said as long as I wasn’t on the clock–I still didn’t want to do or say anything here that some hater could latch onto and make trouble for the agency with. So, I started censoring myself a little bit, and the more I became involved with other non-profit volunteer work the less I felt comfortable writing about sensitive or touchy subjects, especially as the country became more and more polarized. I’m very careful never to talk about my volunteer work or my day job on here as anything other than my volunteer work or my day job. I’ve compartmentalized my life–the way I always have, back to when I was closeted to one large segment of my life and not to a much smaller part–so much so, in fact, that I’m not certain that I can stop doing it. I think one of my goals for 2023 will be to not compartmentalize as much, and to maybe spend more time finishing those personal essays that I’ve started here and never finished.
But of course, there’s also a time issue. Isn’t there always?
And on that note I am going to head into the spice mines and try to get going on everything I need to get done today. Have a lovely and comfortable Sunday wherever you are, Constant Reader. I will chat with you again soon, promise.
Today’s title is meant to be ironic, of course; I despise snow. It’s pretty to look at, sure, but everything else? Snow can fuck all the way off. I hate almost everything about it. Sure, while the novelty is entertaining at first, I tire of it very quickly. I turned on the heat this morning when I got up–I slept well again last night, which was lovely–because it’s in the fifties this morning. I saw a long-range forecast for the weather on Christmas weekend–next weekend, actually–and it may get down into the twenties next weekend here. AIEEEE!!! That cold means it could actually snow here for Christmas, which is interesting.
I really need to write a book for Scotty where it snows here. The way New Orleans reacts to snow is kind of entertaining and a little annoying; everyone is terrified of it, and given how badly everyone drive here when it rains–you get the picture. The entire city basically shuts down because people are afraid to drive in snow. I know it’s unkind to not be more sensitive on that score–the majority of people here rarely, if ever, have driven in snow, while I grew up with it and learned how to drive in it because I didn’t have a choice; Kansas didn’t shut down when it snowed and the roads were covered in ice, and of course I lived in Minneapolis for a winter. If Minnesota shut down because of snow, everyone would be housebound for five to six months a year.
It’s been a long and awful week; let’s face it, December has sucked almost from day one. Seriously. I mean, I thought November was bad, but Christ. Last night I was exhausted–we watched the two new episodes of Three Pines, but I kept dozing off–not because of the show, but because I was tired. We found a perfect refrigerator–everything we want, at a price we can afford, but of course it’s two inches too tall to fit under our fucking cabinets, so the search goes on. But it was also a brand I didn’t recognize, so maybe we can find one that will fit from that brand somewhere else? One can hope. I really want one with the freezer on the bottom, to be honest, because I hate having to bend down all the time and the older I get the more difficult that gets. I imagine that’s going to also continue to be the case going forward; it’s not going to get easier to bend down the older I get. Here’s hoping, you know? Paul thinks we might be able to have that particular section of the cabinets taken down–it’s not like we can use them for anything because I need a ladder to be able to reach them–but I don’t know if that’s possible, or what kind of mess that would leave behind. Heavy sigh. But we’re on the road to getting it replaced, which is a start. Yay! It’s never really been the same since that hurricane evacuation in 2008, whichever one that was during the Republican National Convention. So, about fourteen years? I mean it still functions, but the door doesn’t always seal closed when I shut it–you have to make sure–and now we’re getting condensation all over the roof of the refrigerator compartment; it’s been doing that since Ike last year once the power was restored. I’ve tried everything to make it stop, but nothing ever seems to work, which totally sucks.
But it’s Saturday, and while it is kind of grayish outside, I am looking forward to a highly productive and effective weekend of work. I’m still concerned about the book, of course–when am I not worried about a book I’ve written or am writing–but it seems to be shaping up nicely. Naturally, this is always a concern for me particularly with a book in progress; you never know how it’s going to turn out or if it’s going to turn out the way you’d hoped or planned. I think part of the issue I am having this time around is that i am dealing with a subject that could be sensitive if handled badly–meaning that I’m afraid of it in some ways and that could explain why this book is turning out to be so hard for me to write. But I don’t ever want to write anything that’s easy; I want to be challenged by my work and if my work challenges me, then it is pushing me as writer to delve deeply into subjects that make me uncomfortable–and this book is definitely making me uncomfortable. So, that’s a very good thing.
I also feel rested this morning, which is kind of nice. The length of my to-do list isn’t as daunting or defeating as it usually is when I look at it in the morning, so here’s hoping that I can tear my way through that to-do list or at least as much of it as possible today and tomorrow.
And on that note, my messy kitchen is calling me, so I am heading off to the spice mines. Hope you have a lovely weekend wherever you are, Constant Reader.
I was bored briefly yesterday between clients (it’s rarely more than five to ten minutes, and at the time I didn’t feel like answering emails or even looking at social media–after all, I am already taking medication for my blood pressure) so I thought, maybe you should look up the books you read and wrote about here to make a Best Reads of the Year list, but as I started going through the blog I remembered that I only write about the books I feel very strongly about, which would mean trying to narrow the ones I loved down to ten, and I don’t really want to do that. I may just do a list of the books I reviewed here…there were so many damned good ones that I read all year, and of course there were a lot of rereads over the year as well. I also watched a lot of television and film this past year, and almost everything was terrific–we stop watching if we aren’t enjoying it very much–so again, choosing favorites or a top ten list would be incredibly difficult and mentally taxing. But I have no problem saying that the television program I watched that I enjoyed the most was Heartstopper. It was just so charming and pure, precisely the sort of thing I would normally turn my nose up at and dismiss as old-fashioned or overly sentimental, but it took me completely by surprise. I wasn’t expecting the sweetness or the charm, and of course the incredibly charismatic, age-appropriate cast had a lot to do with that, too–although I then read the graphic novels and loved them just as much.
I actually feel good this morning, oddly enough. I slept deeply and well, waking only once, and I was able to go back to the Dreaming (Neil Gaiman/The Sandman reference). My arm is much better, though sometimes it still feels like I have a Charley horse in the biceps. It got colder overnight as well, so that probably helped me sleep somewhat. It feels chilly in the apartment this morning: a quick glance at the weather shows that it’s in the mid-fifties, which feels about right. I have a lot to do this weekend, and of course, forty-eight hours isn’t enough time. But the book is going very well, if not quickly enough, and a strong push this weekend should stand me in good stead. Cleaning up the mess that the first ten chapters is taking me a while, no lie, but it’s getting better and I am starting to have fun with it again. Which is always nice.
It’s been quite a week, and I have to say, December has been a bit of a trying month so far. Keeping all the plates spinning is much harder and I am barely making it to some right as they are about to fall off. I’ve been battling exhaustion a lot lately. I’m not sure if it’s the sleep issues I’ve been having for the last ten years, but it seems to be more of a problem these last few years, which could simply be age-related. I know my body has changed a lot in the last few years–blood sugar drops, for example, were never anything I ever had to worry about before, but it makes a significant difference now. Which tends to happen quite a bit, too–because if I don’t eat when I get hungry, the hunger will eventually go away and I’ll end up not eating at all–which results in a drop in my blood sugar. The fact that it’s noticeable is concerning–another thing to ask my doctor about next month, I need to make a list–so who knows? I hate our health care system. Health care should never be a for-profit enterprise, because that puts profit ahead of patients, and the fact that there is anyone who can’t see that “profit before patients” is immoral really concerns me about the future. But I also have faith in today’s young people. They’re bright, inclusive, and want a better world for everyone. That’s kind of cool, isn’t it?
But it’s been a good year, overall. I just wish I’d been able to enjoy it a bit more. And on that note, here I come for the spice mines. Have a great Friday, everyone.
As I believe I mentioned, we were in a severe weather alert for most of the day, with everyone in the meteorology game saying conditions would seriously deteriorate in the mid-to-late afternoon. We started getting emails from upper management and operations in the mid-morning letting us know they were monitoring the weather as the afternoon drew nearer. (I had not really been aware of the bad storms that had passed by the north of us the day before, either.) The decision was made around three to close the building and send everyone home for their safety. I texted Paul to make sure he left his office (fortunately, he was working at home) and hurried home myself. It started raining by the time I got home, and settled in. Maybe about an hour or so later the warning alert on my phone went off, so I quickly tuned into the local meteorology maven Margaret Orr on WDSU (I love her, it’s going to be such a loss when she finally retires) as the storm was drawing nearer and it looked like it was going to form a tornado on the West Bank, just like that horrible storm back in March that also produced one. The maps they use on television aren’t the greatest, especially when they are pulled back as far, so it looked like my neighborhood was in the direct path for awhile. That was a bit nerve-wracking, especially as they were also giving times of arrival–“this storm will be in the lower Garden District in five minutes”–so we just braced ourselves and waited. But fortunately for us (but not for others) this storm followed almost the exact same path as the one in March–following the river and jumping across at Arabi and the lower 9th ward. But we did have some major rain and wind rattling the house. Fortunately, I had Scooter sleeping in my lap, which is always calming, and then it was past and over.
The Entergy power map seems to indicate the office has power, so operations will resume today, one would assume.
It’a also colder today–right now it’s in the fifties–which could account for me not wanting to get up this morning; it’s always so comfortable and comforting when you’re under a pile of blankets when it’s chilly. I feel like I slept through the night for the most part. I think I woke up once? But I feel more rested this morning than I have all week, which is a good thing. This is my last day in the office this week, with tomorrow being a work-at-home day. I made it through another week, but man, time is flying. I spent most of the evening reading parts of When Women Ruled the World on my Kindle or randomly opening The Prime Time Closet to read bits and pieces. When Women Ruled the World is about the sixteenth century; a period I’ve mentioned before because more women held power that century than any century before or since, and I’ve always wanted to write about those women in a book called The Monstrous Regiment of Women, taking its title from John Knox’ horrifically misogynistic text; but whereas I would want to merely overview the women who have been written about extensively already (Elizabeth I, Mary Queen of Scots, etc.) while paying more attention to the ones not as famous (infamous?) in today’s popular culture, like Margaret of Austria, Mary of Hungary, Marie de Guise, Catherine de Medici, Queen Margot, etc. (It was also the same century that produced Elizabeth Bathory…) I should have read more of Algren’s A Walk on the Wild Side, but after the adrenaline rush and emotional distress about being in the potential path of a tornado, my mind was too fried to focus on fiction. I did work on the book some, but my mind was just not in the right place for that sort of work. Hopefully, tonight and tomorrow progress will be made and I can get this under control.
And of course, Christmas is next weekend. Next weekend? Yikes!
Something awful happened to me yesterday on social media that I am still processing, so I am not really quite ready to talk about it here. It ties into a blog entry I’ve been toying with for quite some time now; but it’s not really something I can write when I am waking up and swilling coffee; it’s too personal and too complex to trust to a tired brain that isn’t as awake as it should be to tackle such a subject. I mean, it’s bad enough when you see people you know being openly homophobic or transphobic on social media, it’s even worse when it’s directed specifically at you. By someone you’ve known for years, and maybe didn’t quite consider a friend, but was definitely an acquaintance with whom you were friendly. Well, that ship has sailed–and it’s really interesting to me to see how many people who claim to be allies draw the line when it comes to my transgender siblings. But make no mistake about it: you come for the T you’re coming for me as well. When the right wing comes for the trans community and/or drag queens (which are often not the same thing), make no mistake about it, they are coming for all of us. Just as they used to vilify gay men and lesbians until most decent human beings saw how repugnant it was, they think drag queens and transpeople are an easier way to get to legalize the discrimination against all of us that they want. The language they are using is the same as the ones Anita Bryant used in the 1970’s, and the bigots who have come along in her wake have picked up the banner and use the same coded language she did. “Protect the children!” has always been their battlecry, but who are they to decide how parents should raise their children? What children should be exposed to? Your complaints about “the children” stop at your own. You do not have the right to tell other parents how to raise their children or what they can or cannot be exposed to; and the entire concept of “exposing young children to drag queens is sexualizing them!” is complete fucking bullshit on its face–and you fucking straight people have nerve saying that to queer people while keeping your fucking mouths about toddler beauty pageants. Where are the fucking Proud Boys with their AK-47’s at those events, where they paints the faces of children and dress them provocatively to the point most of them look like incredibly cheap streetwalkers? And don’t you fucking dare ever tell me that Drag Queen Story Hours are inappropriate for children because basically you are fucking saying no queer people should be around children.
Go straight to fucking hell, do not pass Go, do not collect $200.
I think the thing I love the most about the cover of A Streetcar Named Murder is that the cat looking back over his shoulder with the bitch please look on his face was modeled on Scooter.
I’ve been putting my cat into books for a while now. Our Skittle was Paige’s cat, and I know I gave Taylor a cat in the Scotty books, but I don’t remember if it was Skittle or Scooter (and I need to find that out).
I never thought of myself as a cat person, to be honest. I think this was primarily because I never spent time with cats when I was a kid; I had a dog growing up and most people I knew also had dogs. If they had cats, well, the cats were aloof and uninterested for the most part, but every once in a while I’d be at a friend’s place who had a cat and their cat just fell in love with me for some reason–I’ve always attracted people’s pets, which is cool because by and large I do love animals–but it never occurred to me to get a cat. Paul also had dogs growing up, so he always kind of wanted us to get a dog. Much as I love dogs and much as they love me, though, I don’t have the time or the patience to have one, so I always nixed the idea of a pet. But that first winter we lived in the carriage house we had a mouse–and of course wanted to be rid of it. “It’s an old house in an old neighborhood,” our neighbors and landlady advised, “and the best way to get rid of a mouse is to get a cat.”
A cat?
But the mouse was freaking out Paul–I wasn’t thrilled to have one, but could manage a cold-war of tolerance with one if need be–and so we decided to go ahead and get a cat. It was Christmas Eve, I remember that, and we headed down to the SPCA in the Bywater. We looked at one, who seemed interesting–orange and big–but when the girl opened his cage he hissed at us all and clawed her hand. (I know now that he was probably terrified, hence the reaction, but what did I know about cats? All I saw was a mean one, and if it would claw the hand of a caretaker, I didn’t know how well he’d adapt to our house and our lives…) But there was a kitten in a nearby cage who kept sticking his paws out and chirping at Paul to get his attention, and once Paul started paying attention to him, he was purring and rubbing against the bars trying to get to us. The girl took him out of the cage and he started purring even louder. He was purring so loudly they couldn’t hear his heartbeat. We decided to take him, named him Nicky, paid the small fee and brought him home. I walked over to Walgreens to buy litter, food, a litter box, and a carrier, and thus we had our first cat. We never called him Nicky–the only person who ever did was our landlady–but he was amazing. Very loving, but at the same time a good hunter who could jump really high to take a bug out of the air, and of course he was beautiful, just beautiful. During the evacuation for Katrina Paul and the cat stayed at his mom’s–and his mom was the one who started calling him Skittle, because he “skittered around playing chasing things.) We had Skittle for almost seven years when he got the cancer, and it spread very quickly. The day we had to put him to rest was one of the hardest days of our lives–Paul was so depressed he barely got out of bed the entire weekend–and the apartment felt empty and lonely without our cat. The illness and the decision had been so hard on both of us to make that I kind of didn’t want to get another pet because I never wanted to go through that pain again, and Paul felt the same.
We lasted less than a week.
I went to the Cat Practice to pick up Skittle’s ashes on a Thursday after work. While I was waiting–I always have to wait whenever I am there–I always go around and look at the cats they have looking for forever homes (while I always hate having to leave without bringing them all home, it’s also kind of sad if there aren’t any there). In a cage behind the front desk was an orange boy, and according to the label on his cage his name was Texas and he was two years old. I walked over, and he was so friendly and loving–purring and rubbing against my hand–that I seriously thought I should bring you home with me, sweet boy,
That evening, we were watching something on television that wasn’t terribly involving–I was scrolling through the iPad and Paul dozed off on the couch. Suddenly Paul sat up with a gasp and said,”Oh my God!” and insisted he’d woken up and seen a mouse sitting on the lip of our garbage can. I saw nothing–and I’d looked over when Paul sat up, but not specifically at the can, so I could have missed it–but I also didn’t hear anything. (I will also confess to not hearing well–I’ve always been hard of hearing, and now that I am getting older it’s getting worse, so me not hearing anything isn’t as conclusive as it might be coming from someone else.) I just assumed he dreamed it, but he was insistent, and equally insistent we had to get another cat. I mentioned seeing Texas that afternoon, suggested Paul go see him in the morning on his way to work, and if he wanted him, to go ahead and get him, and I would swing by to pick him up after I got off work.
Needless to say, not only did I go pick him up after work, Paul went with me. We got him home, he immediately hid under the coffee table, so we decided to let him acclimate. It literally took about fifteen minutes before he came out from under the table, climbed up onto Paul’s chest and started purring. His coat was a little rough, but within two days he was soft as silk. Paul loves nothing more than to cuddle with the cat–Skittle tolerated it for a while before escaping–and we picked the absolute right cat: Scooter loves to cuddle and wants nothing more than a warm lap or body to curl up and sleep on. He will literally come and howl at me while I am working on my computer because he wants me to morph into a cat bed in my chair.
So, of course I gave Valerie a cat, named it Scooter, and made him a sweet orange boy, like ours. When they were designing the cover, I did tell them the cat was actually MY cat, and they asked me for a photo to give to the artist!
I am delighted that Scooter will live forever on the cover of my book.
It’s always amused me that Santa is an anagram for Satan.
They may even be the only anagrams possible for each word, too.
We’re in a severe weather alert, but mostly the fear is flooding and torrential rain–the massive area under tornado watch is north of here–and it’s dark outside this morning as I sip my coffee and write this. My sleep was spotty again last night–waking up occasionally before falling back asleep again–but I do feel rested, and that’s the most important thing. Progress was made on the book yesterday, which is terrific and ever-so-pleasing to me. I did my errands yesterday after work without issue, but of course once I was home and had worked on the book for awhile, was terribly tired. I cannot allow that to happen when I get home this evening, as there are dishes to be put away and another load to be put into the washer. I’d like to spend some more time with A Walk on the Wild Side this evening as well; I need to finish it if I want to read the new Donna Andrews on Christmas day.
It’s hard to believe that Christmas is next weekend already. It doesn’t seem like it, but what would be really lovely–if it’s not a downpour when I get home from work tonight–would be to take a walk around the neighborhood and through the Garden District documenting decorations. I should make a point of this every year during Christmas and Carnival, frankly. I’ve never seen a city before that loved to decorate as much as New Orleans does–or does it even remotely as well.
But the coffee is good this morning and it’s getting light outside–grayish, really–and hopefully I won’t get rained on while driving to work. (Note to self: if it isn’t raining, bring umbrella inside from the car in case it’s raining when I leave.) I think we’re going to buy our new refrigerator this weekend, which is good since the one we currently have is absolutely on its last legs. I wanted to gt one with the freezer on the bottom, but for some reason those are a lot more expensive–by an absurd amount. So, it looks like we’ll probably get the normal kind with the freezer on the top–or maybe we can spring for a bit more and get one with side by side doors, which would be almost as effective (it’s the bending down that’s starting to get to me), but we’ll see. I think we’re just going to go to Costco and see what they have.
Yesterday a friend posted a list of all the things she accomplished in 2022–which she compiled after feeling like she really hadn’t done much during the year, and was pleasantly surprised to see how much she had, in fact, managed to do. I was thinking about this myself the other night–not that I hadn’t done much throughout the year, but rather that I’d had a rather bad year, but once I sat down and started thinking about it, it’s actually been a good year for me; actually a very good year indeed when all is said and done. Oddly enough, when I sit and look back emotionally, without going into much more depth, it was a year in which my primary memories are tired and miserable. And yet…productivity wise it may not have been my strongest year, but it was still a good year. Bury Me in Shadows was nominated for two Anthony Awards at Bouchercon this year; it’s not the first time one person was nominated multiple times in the same year (hell, S. A. Cosby was nominated for three awards, and I think Tracy Clark was also up for two this year alone) but it’s a select group to be sure and one to which I am proud to belong. I have no way of verifying it either, but I am pretty certain it was the first time the same book was nominated in two different categories. Those were also my third and fourth Anthony nominations, which I think may also make me the most nominated queer author? It’s hard to say because they don’t have full lists of the finalists from every year anywhere, so you can’t really look it up and verify anything, so I hate to make claims that may not be true. But I think they’re true, and even if they aren’t, I am certainly one of the most nominated queer authors. The positive reception Bury Me in Shadows got on its release continued into the early part of this year as well, just as #shedeservedit came out. That one didn’t get near the attention as its predecessor, but it’s a book I am really proud of and am happy to have not only finished but published. I also finished writing A Streetcar Named Murder earlier this year, and I couldn’t be more pleased with its reception, either. I worked on other things throughout the year–short stories, some novellas, and two other novels (Chlorine and Muscles, to be precise)–and while I didn’t get a lot of stories out there and sold this year, I did sell a couple of which I am proud–one I can’t mention as it isn’t public yet, and the other being “Solace in a Dying Hour,” which I sold to an Austalian anthology and it’s a pretty damned good story. I also sold “The Rosary of Broken Promises” to an Anne Rice tribute anthology, and I still have one out on submission. “This Thing of Darkness” was in Cupid Shot Me, an anthology that was released on Valentine’s Day last year–so yeah, that’s at least four stories, and there’s another anthology that’s supposed to come out sometime this month which has my story “A Whisper from the Graveyard” in it.
I also edited the Bouchercon anthology, which took up a lot of my time between January and June. Land of 10000 Thrills is a great anthology, with some absolutely amazing contributors and great stories, and the contributors themselves were not only amazing talents but delights to work with. The anthology caused me a lot more stress than editing an anthology used to–primarily because there were so many demands on my time this past year, which I think is part of the reason I felt miserable for most of the year; my massive to-do list never seemed to get finished and always seemed to keep growing. It satisfies my OCD and need for completion to finish to-do lists, and it also subconsciously makes me think I’ve accomplished things. When tasks don’t get done because I simply don’t have the time or the energy to get to them, that makes me feel like I am failing. I also have to adjust my expectations downward, because I am older and don’t have the energy I used to have–and I really don’t want or need to start taking any kind of stimulant. I probably should cut back on the coffee, frankly.
And on that note, I am going to head into the spice mines. Have a lovely day, Constant Reader, and I’ll check in with you again tomorrow.
The insomnia came back last night for some reason, but I don’t feel exhausted this morning or tired, just like I could have gladly stayed in bed for another week or so. But it is what it is. Yesterday was a pretty good day, all around. I managed to get some more work done on the book again, and was able to do some relaxing last evening. I was tired by the time I had done a load of dishes, so I simply repaired to my easy chair for the evening, doom scrolling on social media with my iPad or reading some history of queer rep on television in The Prime Time Closet, which I think I’ve already read before, years ago–but it’s interesting to look at how we’ve been portrayed on television over the years, especially when televisions stations or religious bigots protested our inclusion.
It really is amazing how much progress we’ve made during my lifetime, even if we are still under constant attack from bigots.
I doubt homophobia and its evil twin transphobia will go away before I die, alas.
I hate being so busy and single-minded during Christmas, which makes it kind of hard to enjoy the holidays. Paul and I have decided to get a new refrigerator as a gift to ourselves–ours is on its last legs. I kind of want one with the freezer on the bottom, since bending down is getting to be an issue for me, but they are ridiculously expensive; even the ones that have side-by-side freezer/refrigerator compartments. But it will be nice to have one that works properly and seals properly when you shut the door, so I am going to take that as a win. The most important thing is having one that works, not getting the specific kind that I want. (I’d love to have one like my mom’s, but Jesus, those are expensive.)
I’m not going to have the time to do cards this year, either, which is unfortunate. Well, maybe. I don’t know. We’re going to Costco this weekend, so maybe I can get some cards there and take care of them over the weekend (again, no college football; I need to do a lot of writing this weekend). Hopefully I can get a lot done this weekend. It’s amazing what a difference no college football on Saturdays can make to my time availability. Anyway, I hope that I’ll be able to find some time to take, at the very least, a walk around my neighborhood to take pictures of the decorations for everyone to enjoy; New Orleans really does Christmas right. One of the reasons I set Royal Street Reveillon during the holidays was precisely because I wanted to write about Christmas in New Orleans–it may not be white, but it’s definitely Christmas down here once Thanksgiving has passed. The weather has remained oddly all right–lows in the 60’s, which is why I think my sinuses have been so out of control lately; the damp and mist and fog wreak havoc on them. I am also not sure what we’re going to do for Christmas day itself. I may drive out to Metairie to get a pizza from That’s Amore (the best deep dish pizza in the New Orleans metropolitan area); I don’t know. I could also order a turkey dinner from either the Fresh Market or Rouses, too. Decisions, decisions.
Apparently, we’re in a severe weather alert with the possibility of flooding through tomorrow night. That should make running my errands after work today rather interesting, don’t you think? New Orleans weather is so much a part of the city that not writing about the weather would be absurd. (That Elmore Leonard advice about not writing the weather, or opening with the weather? I break it all the time. Sorry, Mr. Leonard, but you cannot write about New Orleans and not write about the weather because it impacts everything here.) Imagine writing about New Orleans and not mentioning the heat and humidity, or talking about the torrential, street flooding thunderstorms that make you think you live in a tropical rain forest? Ah, well, I can just pay attention to the weather and in a worst case scenario, can run the errands tomorrow. I just have to mail something as well as pick up the mail, so there’s really not much of a rush for either, frankly. I am not expecting anything in the mail and Paul hasn’t said anything about any packages coming for him, so if it’s nasty today, I can skip it. I also have to wonder how the weather will affect the no-show rate with my clients. AH, well, it’s not like I don’t have plenty of work to do if we do have a high no-show rate today.
And on that note, I am heading into the spice mines. May your Tuesday be happy and joyous and fabulous, Constant Reader.
Queer and Loathing in America 