Tag: Chlorine

Stomp!

Friday, Friday, got to get down it’s Friday!

Another lovely night’s sleep was enjoyed by one Gregalicious, and my mood is pleasant as a result. It really is insane how much better I feel when I’m getting regular sleep that is good; hopefully today I’ll be able to get a lot accomplished–despite the horror of knowing that we are in an excessive heat warning, with the heat index potentially climbing up to 115 this afternoon and staying there for most of the rest of the day. Yikes! I do have to go to the gym today–which would be on foot, which will send me out into the madness of the heat–but I shall survive. New Orleans and heat kind of go hand-in-hand, after all, and while this summer seems a bit more extreme than past ones, at least we have a working a/c system in the house now (which has also made a remarkably marked difference from the last two summers around here).

I need to make a to-do list, and I have a shit ton of emails to answer. Heavy sigh. It never ends.

I also need to type up my notes from my meeting with my editor yesterday, so that I am prepared to fix what’s wrong with #shedeservedit, so I can get it finished by the end of the month, which is when it’s due. I also have to finish going over the edits for Bury Me in Shadows, so I can get that finished as well–just to ensure that everything with it that she did (this is the line/copy edit) I’m okay with; fortunately I trust her but there are a few things she wants me to check. And while I do hate putting Chlorine aside for a little while, if I can get the Bury Me in Shadows things finished on time I can go back to working on it for Sunday. I don’t know, we’ll see how the weekend goes, I suppose.

Gregalicious plans, and the gods laugh.

But this morning my coffee is wonderful, and I am basking in the glow of feeling good about a lot of things. I’ve not felt good for a while; my memory is such a joke these days that it seems as though I haven’t felt good in a while about myself and my life and my writing in general for a long time. Not sure how true that is, or if it’s really just another side effect of a nasty pandemic (on-going!); but I definitely am hopeful this lasts for a while.

I watched the Olympics yet again last night; it was terrific to see Sunisa Lee become the first Asian-American all around gymnastics gold medalist, and I think possibly the first Olympic medalist of any kind of Hmong descent. The Hmongs are an ethnic minority of southeastern Asia, spread out over Vietnam, Cambodia and China; and they were recruited and used by the American military during the Vietnam War to fight the illegal war in Laos–and then of course, once we pulled out, we pretty much left them out to dry (see also: Iraqi Kurds after the First Gulf War. Sensing a theme?), and they were finally welcomed and recognized as political refugees and allowed entry to the US (big of us, right?) in the early 1980’s. I first became aware of the Hmong people and culture when I lived in Fresno–a large number of them settled there–and my parents also lived next door to a Hmong family in Houston (my mother became rather fond of the family matriarch over their years of being neighbors). I’m not sure if there are any Hmong-Americans in New Orleans; I do know there’s a large Vietnamese community here in the East (that French colonial tie between New Orleans and Vietnam–banh mih is like the Vietnamese version of a po’boy, although I think banh mih might have, probably, existed first).

Then again, there are a lot of other cultures in New Orleans that rarely get written about–Greeks, Vietnamese, the Isleños from the Canary Islands, the Haitians and Dominicans–which is yet another indication of how I could be writing about the city for the rest of my life and never scratch the surface of all the different cultures and ethnicities and influences here.

I also watched 54: The Director’s Cut again–I rented it a few years ago on Prime, I think–and while I remembered it as a much better movie than the theatrical release (which was really sappy and terrible and borderline homophobic), I’d forgotten how completely queer the director’s cut is. I was actually thinking last night about writing an essay about Studio 54-despite never having been there–but knowing that it existed was one of the first times in my young gay life that I became aware that it was possible for people like me to live differently than what I had been raised to believe was my life path and what was the cultural norm (“Looking for Studio 54” is the title I jotted down in my journal), and watching this (much better) version of the film while I made my condom packs yesterday was interesting (I also thought about doing a compare/contrast between the two different versions of the film, “A Tale of Two Studio 54’s”, but I can probably write that into my “Looking for Studio 54” essay); I think the first time I watched the director’s cut I was still completely in the headspace that Shane, the main character (a dazzlingly beautiful Ryan Philippe in all of his youthful glory) was straight but willing to do what he needed to do to get ahead; on second watch, it’s even more clear that Shane’s sexuality is incredibly fluid and while it was possible that he might be gay and just coming to realize it, it’s also not impossible that he could be bisexual. This film is a lot more sexual than the theatrical release, and has no problem exploring the gory details of the hedonism–the drugs and sex–that were the hallmark of that period and of the club itself. There are also some parallels between this movie and Saturday Night Fever–the good looking kid going nowhere who loses himself in the joys of a disco, the only really joy in his life–and there’s also the sense of Shane, rejected by his father for being a disappointment (how many gay men can relate to that experience?) and finding and making his own family; while Shane’s sexuality definitely is fluid in the film, and it never really answers the questions it raises, so much of Shane’s journey parallels the journey of so many young men in the 1970’s drawn to the glittering lights of New York away from their drab lives wherever they were originally from…yes, there’s definitely an essay there, and one that requires watching the film again and probably the theatrical release as well.

And on that note–hello spice mines! Good to see you–and Constant Reader, I will see you tomorrow.

Rock With You

Thursday and we have reached the “work-at-home” portion of my week. Yay! I don’t have to leave my house! (crowd goes wild)

I am feeling good this morning, partly because I overslept (this is becoming a thing with me; how lovely to go from chronic insomnia to oversleeping in a just a month) but regardless of whatever the reason was–the switch from cappuccinos to regular coffee, perhaps–but nevertheless, this morning Gregalicious slept late, and it felt marvelous.

I worked a little bit on Chlorine last night, but it stalled out a bit; not so much from a lack of desire to write or not knowing what to write, but primarily distractions around the Lost Apartment, which were annoying and also unavoidable, alas.

And speaking of anomalies in Gregalicious land, I didn’t finish this entry this morning before it was time for me to start working–which hasn’t happen in so long I cannot remember the last time it happened; usually I’m able to push right through the entry before leaving the house. I didn’t have to leave the house this morning, but I did oversleep, after all–definitely a problem. And now I have spent a lovely day making condom packs while catching up on Real Housewives of New York and watching some history videos on Youtube; I also had a lovely call with my editor about both Bury Me in Shadows but also a highly productive conversation about what I need to do on #shedeservedit to get it ready for publication–edits, sloppy transitions, bad bad Greg writer stuff, really–and some serious tweaks that may actually be easier than I think they’ll be; we’ll just have to see, won’t we? (And now I understand the Chlorine inertia this week; I knew I had this call scheduled and I knew I was going to probably have to put it aside for a while…breaking the chain, as it were. I think I will go ahead and finish Chapter Three and maybe Chapter Four before I dive back into my edits.)

I also had some other interesting developments occur this week, career-wise, but nothing that can be reported just yet; sorry to be so vague, but we’ll just have to wait and see how it all plays out. I am feeling better about everything these days–sleep really makes so an extraordinary difference in my life, it really is amazing–and while I am not in Greg can conquer the world mode again just yet, I have a feeling that it’s just around the corner. I am starting to feel energetic again, creative and ambitious, and more like the old Gregalicious than I have in years. Not sure what caused it, to be honest–pandemic, perhaps? I don’t know but I also don’t remember when I last felt this good about myself and everything in my life, to be honest, and it’s a lovely feeling. Now I need to get better organized; I think that is what this weekend is going to be about; me getting my shit together and getting back on top of everything again. I am going to finish reading Razorblade Tears and pick out my next read; I am going to get those chapters written and some short story edits done, and this fucking apartment and my fucking life are going to be organized and ready for the future.

And on THAT note, it’s time to get to work on everything.

Enjoy the rest of your Thursday, Constant Reader! I’m going to make mine count.

Who Do You Think You Are

Wednesday and hump day; it’s the Wednesday between bi-weekly Pay the Bills Days and all the bills are paid and thus all is right in a Gregalicious world. Huzzah? HUZZAH!

I didn’t want to get up this morning–definitely didn’t want to get out of bed–which is a lovely contrast to a few weeks ago when I was getting up earlier than usual because I couldn’t sleep. The caffeine experiment also seems to continue to work–I wasn’t tired from less caffeine yesterday, didn’t crash from caffeine drop in the middle of the afternoon, and felt fine when I got home from work (other than exhaustion from being out in a heat advisory, which convinced me to skip the gym last night and try again tonight). I worked on Chlorine a little before being sucked into the Olympic vortex last night, but tonight I am going to try to get more work on Chlorine done and maybe do some editing etc. rather than staring at the television for most of the evening. I am really enjoying working on Chlorine–it hit me yesterday that I am having a lot of fun with the character voice, and another key to his character, who he is, came to me last night–more than anything, he’s a survivor, a queer man in a horribly homophobic society doing what he has to do in order to survive and work and keep going without being destroyed in the process–and as such, he has to make some moral compromises…but he truly sees those compromises as endemic to Hollywood and the system; everyone has to make compromises in Hollywood.

I am really, really liking the character, and really really liking writing it. I mean, yesterday I got to write the line “I’ve never cared much about dames.” That inordinately pleased me to no end, and is emblematic of the voice and the tone I am striving for in this book. And I’m actually believing this will be a really good one–which is a feeling I rarely get when I am in the midst of writing something, if ever.

So, I am just kind of basking in the glow of writing something I am enjoying and am proud of at the same time, since it’s such a unique experience for me.

I’m also speaking to my editor tomorrow about #shedeservedit, which she apparently thinks, in her own words, is “amazing”, which nevertheless means I’ll be taking a break from other writing relatively soon in order to do the revisions and edits on it for its January release. At long last, “the Kansas book” will be out there for people to read. I’ve kind of worked on this book, in one form or another, since 1977, really; it’s been a long time a-bornin’, as they used to say in the olden days in the rural midwest. There are some other Kansas book ideas in my head, but unless something really jumps out and grabs me by the throat, this may very well be my last Kansas book. Alabama, on the other hand…one of the things I need to do (which I forgot to add to the to-do list I created yesterday) is go through the Alabama stuff I’ve already written and clear up discrepancies and so forth, as well as make a list of who’s who in the county and the county’s history and so forth. I will be revisiting Corinth County again–for some reason, I’m thinking that one of the supporting characters from Bury Me in Shadows (namely, Beau Hackworth) may even get his own book at some point, and there are numerous other Corinth County stories I want to tell. I may even do some more California books, for that matter…and there’s definitely a book with a Houston tie-in I want to write eventually.

I guess we’ll see how it all turns out.

But I am pretty jazzed I’ve somehow made it to Wednesday relatively unscathed.

This bodes well for the future, methinks. And in a few more weeks I get a four day weekend; they are closing the agency on the 13th and the 16th as a thank you to the staff for working through the pandemic (which isn’t over yet, but I appreciate the long weekend) and we also all got a raise for the year, which was also rather nice. Bouchercon in New Orleans is also happening in a few weeks–at least, so far it is still happening–and while it’s going to involve social distancing and masking, I am still looking forward to seeing my friends whom I’ve not seen in years now. Years.

But if Louisiana’s numbers keep worsening…sigh.

And on that note, I am going to get my day started. Have a lovely Wednesday, Constant Reader!

I’m Your Baby Tonight

Tuesday morning and the week is passing gradually; not that I want things to hurry up by any means (God forbid, this final countdown to sixty is horrible), but I do kind of wish it were the weekend again. What can I say? I loves me a weekend.

Yesterday’s caffeine experiment went pretty well. I wasn’t wired all morning, true, but at the same time I felt fine and I also didn’t have the usual caffeine crash that usually happened around three o’clock; in fact, I felt fine when I got off work rather than tired. Had last night been a gym night, I would have gone. Instead, I cleaned the kitchen and did some things around the house and watched the Olympics. Sure, I could have spent some time writing last night, and probably should have, but it was also kind of nice to just have a relaxed evening where I wasn’t completely exhausted and was able to just kind of chill out and relax. It was also nice not to have to deal with cappuccino mess when I got home from work last night, and it’s kind of nice to relegate them from necessities to occasional treat from now on–most likely for days when I have to get up and be somewhere early–or when I am just completely groggy, and one is more than enough.

Yesterday was also kind of a good day. I managed to get quite a bit done, despite a serious lack of motivation or desire to do so, and kind of just relished a Monday where I wasn’t tired and felt pretty good overall. Even this morning, I feel rested and alert and alive rather than dragging my ass as usual–the absence of insomnia has been quite marvelous, really–and I am not dreading my day, which is usually the case on Tuesday mornings. Tonight after work is a gym night–which usually means an abbreviated workout because the gym will be crowded–but I am going to try to do my best to get in as good a workout as the one I had on Sunday, which felt wonderful. I am undoubtedly going to have to get a new computer by the end of the year–we’ll see how the chips fall for me financially–because this one just isn’t fast anymore and doesn’t function that great with more than two programs open; or that great with even just two. And if I have any social media open on my browser–well, kiss that all goodbye for sure…and now that I have my laptop working at top speed…I am trying to train myself to work in my easy chair.

Why not? Why not indeed?

Might as well be comfortable while I write and work on-line, right?

Makes sense to me, at any rate.

So, here I am on a Tuesday morning feeling relatively awake, alive, and fairly decently, if I do say so myself. I just need to now get my energies focused; the goal for today is to make a thorough to-do list; get as caught up on emails as I conceivably can; go to the gym tonight; and possibly start writing Chapter Three of Chlorine–I will probably end up cleaning up the first two chapters to remind myself of my character’s voice…I do like the voice I am creating; I like the character even though he’s kind of unlikable and does things that are perhaps morally questionable. But I’m having fun with him, and that’s the most important thing, methinks.

I am really happy I’m enjoying writing again. I am not really certain that saying that is completely fair–and probably a journey through past blog entries when I was writing something would probably quickly prove that to be a lie; I think I’ve probably always enjoyed the act of creation and writing. That isn’t to say that some of it isn’t drudgery–trust me, copy edits and line edits are nearly as tedious as watching paint dry–and editing becomes problematic because I become so familiar with the story and so tired of it at the same time that I am not entirely sure I can trust myself to edit–and God knows I am never the fairest judge of my own work! I am often much too hard on myself with this kind of stuff, and I probably need–despite the rare possibility of change at my advanced age–to work on getting past that. But I think the primary difference I am experiencing with writing Chlorine–as well as the things I’ve written lately–is I feel a confidence in my writing that I’ve not felt in a long time, and I have really enjoyed creating these things.

Of course, I have lots of editing to do on short stories and novellas, but hey–it’s all a part of the process.

And on that note, I am heading into the spice mines. Day Two of less caffeination; will report back tomorrow.

Blow

Good morning, Sunday, how are YOU doing?

I overslept (for me) again this morning; which felt nice; I’ll take oversleeping over insomnia any day of the week, frankly, and this morning I am going to swill coffee, read some more of S. A. Cosby marvelous Razorblade Tears, and then will write for a while before going to the gym later on in the early afternoon. I still haven’t gotten phô yet–maybe next weekend I can make to the Lilly Cafe and finally get some.

Yesterday saw me relaxing and organizing and cleaning for most of the day, at an incredibly casual pace–so casual, of course, that I didn’t get everything finished that I wanted to get finished (natch); but progress was made and I will always take some progress over not making any. I finished writing Chapter 2 of Chlorine yesterday, also setting up Chapter 3 to be written for today (after some reviewing of Chapters 1 and 2 before getting started on that today). I like that I am starting to feel connected to this manuscript; it’s finally taken root in my head and all the other considerations about it no longer matter to me other than the two most important: that I finish writing it, and that i write the best book I possibly can.

The whole Chlorine thing is remarkably improbable about how it came to be in the first place. I’ve always wanted to write about 1950’s Hollywood and the gay closet/underground that existed there; it was an incredibly turbulent time, with television stealing film audiences, HUAC investigating Communists, and J. Edgar Hoover at the FBI going after gay men and lesbians. It was also during this time that the biggest closeted movie star perhaps in Hollywood history, Rock Hudson, came to success–and there were plenty of other closet cases on the headlining pictures with their names above the title: Montgomery Clift and Tab Hunter–and plenty who may have been bisexual but definitely had experiences with men, like Marlon Brando, Anthony Perkins, James Dean, and so on. I idly wrote about this notion I had for a noir set during that time, with the main character a hustler with no talent but a lot of good looks and charm, that opens with another closeted actor’s nude, dead body being found in the morning on Santa Monica beach–only the drowning victim also had chlorine in his lungs, so he clearly drowned in a swimming pool and his body was moved. I riffed on this concept here on the blog for a little bit, and then thought nothing of it.

Yet Chlorine landed with my peers in the crime writing community for some reason–I got a lot of tweets and DM’s about what a great idea it was, and that I needed to write it. Some people continued pestering me about it, enough time and enough people, for me to go ahead and slot it into my writing schedule….but even then I kept putting it off and not taking it or myself seriously; was I the right person to write such a book? Is this interest in such a book even something that could turn into sales or whatever? You know, the usual self-doubt that plagues me on a daily basis. I sat down and wrote a very rough first chapter several years ago, just to see if I could get the tone right, and the voice properly done; I was rather pleasantly surprised with how it turned out, and so I put aside any thought of imposter syndrome and figured, okay, I CAN do this.

But the syndrome came again when the calendar time to write the book rolled around; I spent the last month or so writing anything but this manuscript…and finally sat down to revise and reshape that first chapter so that it set up the second even better, and I also had an idea of how to do the second as I worked on the first. It took me a few days, but I now have a very nice 3700 word second chapter written; and today I am going to work on writing the third. I wanted to wait until August and spend that entire month writing it, but finally decided that I was being decidedly un-confident, so while I still want to have the first draft finished by the end of August, I decided to go ahead and get started on it in the meantime. I still want to work on Scotty for the rest of the year, from September on, but there’s also a lot of other things I need to get done, so I need to stop being lazy and get my ass into my chair and writing.

We watched the Olympics some yesterday–I am amazed at the sports I couldn’t care less about most of the time but will watch avidly during an Olympics–but it again seems weird that there’s no audience or crowd…and this whole weird vibe these Olympics are giving off–no you smoked weed so you’re banned; you’re a serial sexual assaulter so we’ll make accommodations for you–has kind of tarnished the whole thing for me in some ways. There has always been cheating and stupidity at the Olympics (another example of how media has brainwashed us all into the mythology of the Olympics), but for some reason this year it seems more intolerable than usual. But I love watching the US swimmers–it’s weird without Michael Phelps in the pool–and I will undoubtedly watch more, especially the gymnastics.

But…..still.

I also figured out last night how to change a story I started writing at some point during the last decade and make it actually work–“The Brady Kid”–and while the new idea I have for it may not work after all, it’s an interesting idea for a story and something I definitely want to try writing.

And on that note, Razorblade Tears is calling me, and so it’s off to the spice mines for a bit to read, swill coffee, and prepare to start writing.

My My My

Thursday and just got home from the hideous experience of having bloodwork done. I am not exactly sure when precisely I turned into such a delicate goddamned flower, but every time now I have blood drawn I get a gnarly-looking bruise on the spot where the needle went into my arm. Back in the day when my veins used to roll and they had to dig to get the needle in (always a most unpleasant experience) it made sense that afterwards I looked like I’d been hooked up to a dialysis machine. Now the needle goes straight in, without any pain, and yet I still develop a particularly nasty bruise.

Sigh. The bruise from last week’s blood draw just finally went away, and now I am going to have a new one. Heavy heaving sigh.

Ah, well, and so it goes.

But at least NOW I can have coffee. I had to fast for this, especially since my quarterly bloodwork (for my PrEP prescription) had shown high glucose levels (I always have them done after I’ve had lunch as fasting is not required SURPRISE–blood glucose is high after I eat. IMAGINE THAT) so I definitely need to have a diabetes test run (better safe than sorry, right)… and I have to confess rather shame-facedly that the last time I had fasting bloodwork done I had coffee before having it done. Yes, Bad Greg, bad Greg, bad Greg indeed.

Today is yet another exciting day of condom packing and doing some quality assurance reviews of paperwork from work. I will naturally get caught up on Superman and Lois today as well as the two franchises of Real Housewives I am still watching (New York and Beverly Hills, although it’s more of a habit to watch these than anything else, really) and maybe–just maybe–there will be time for a movie as well. Not sure what that might be, but there are so many options anymore! I am also hopeful that there will be time for me to work on Chlorine and get some time in with Razorblade Tears. Paul is going to bring home dinner with him tonight–anniversary meal, from Hoshun (I’ve been wanting lo mein lately)–and then I guess we’ll either figure out what we’re going to watch next (note to self: find out if he wants to keep watching Loki, because if not, I can watch it alone) or he’ll do some work. I also need to bag up some more beads to drop off for ARC (honestly, we literally have beads every fucking where) and I’d like to get some more books culled so I can take them to the library sale on Saturday.

I wrote about 1500 words on Chapter Two of Chlorine yesterday; it wasn’t easy and rather like pulling teeth, actually, so I kind of would like to revisit (not reread; I can just page through it at random to get a feel for tone and voice) James M. Cain’s Double Indemnity, which is one of my favorite books of all time; I feel like in this chapter I am being too wordy, which is always a problem for me with my writing–I over-explain, I tend to have long long sentences connected by and, I often fuck up the rhythm of the words, which greatly affects and impacts the voice and tone of the story. The problem with Chlorine is there’s a lot of backstory–and since it’s Hollywood during the dying days of the studio system–what is artifice? What is real? What is rumor? I also have the ability to mention actual stars of the period–even if they aren’t in the book itself, but can be mentioned in passing, which is a lot of fun–I wrote something yesterday about a female star claiming she was “up there with Hepburn, Crawford, Davis, Garbo; you can say Karla and everyone knows who you mean.” (And yes, I just realized that the Garbo-based character in The Love Machine by Jacqueline Susann was also named Karla; although it did not even subconsciously affect my naming of this character–Karla Weiss the half-American, half-German Jewish actress who emigrated to the US to become a star immediately was someone I created way back in 1996, inspired entirely by a black-and-white photograph of a friend; I looked at the picture and invented Karla Weiss and her backstory and it’s been in the back of my mind for the last twenty-five years; she fits in here–and while I originally had her winding up in New Orleans and becoming a recluse for a Chanse or Scotty story, it could still work, I suppose; but she would be WAY too old unless I went back and set that case years ago in the past, which could also work….see how these wormholes form for me?)

Then again, who knows? I could open up the document and next thing you know words are flowing from my fingers like water from a spigot.

This, by the way, is why writers drink.

That said, I did pick up some mixers at the grocery store on the way home–grapefruit juice and margarita mix, as well as a salt thing for the rim of the glass–and am really looking forward to getting some Patrón on the next Costco run. Don’t get me wrong, I am going to continue trying to perfect the dirty vodka martini–but the last one turned out so terribly that I am quite literally afraid to try again. Perhaps I should get some gin as well? Hmmmm. Oh, Costco and your inexpensive liquor.

And on that note, it’s about time for me to head into the spice mines. Have a lovely Thursday, Constant Reader, and I’ll chat with you again tomorrow!

a

Working My Way Back to You

Wednesday! Pay the Bills Day! Huzzah? HUZZAH!

I know, right? Pay Day is generally depressing, as I pay the bills and slowly but surely watch the balance in my checking account gradually deplete, and then try to figure out how to stretch what is left for another two weeks. While this is rarely–if ever–fun, there’s something weirdly satisfying about doing it, though; part of the slight OCD problem I’ve suffered from most of my life. Tomorrow morning I also have to get up early–I have to have blood work done, which means fasting, so I basically scheduled it at eight in the morning so I can literally roll out of bed, wash my face and brush my teeth, throw on some clothes and go out the door. (I will, of course, take some coffee with me which I will immediately start guzzling as soon as the blood draw is finished and I can head home to condom packing and lab form quality/assurance–a very big Thursday at the Lost Apartment for one Gregalicious.)

I started working on Chapter Two of Chlorine last night, and I really think I have the voice right–we’ll see as it goes along–but I am in a groove with the book at the moment and I am going to ride this wave as long as I can. I hope to get Chapter Two finished tonight and Chapter Three started; then I am going to work on revising one of the short stories this weekend–probably not a novella (that will require more than a few hours work, I fear)–but I’d like to end July with some stories being submitted, decent progress made on Chlorine, and then to spend August finishing the first draft of Chlorine and possibly revising some the novellas. I’d like to spend October thru December writing another Scotty book, so this time between now and October 1 is going to have to be highly productive if I want to stay on my schedule. I also did some minor tweaking on Chapter 1; I always find that (tweaking/editing an earlier chapter) helpful in finding my way back into my main character’s voice. (I guess that can go under Helpful Writing Hints, can’t it?)

It can, of course, be horribly overwhelming when I sit and think about the projects I currently have in progress; as I got organized over the weekend I did find myself a little taken aback to see that I have nine projects in progress (short story collection, essay collection, three novellas, three novels, an anthology) and that is most definitely going to require some serious focusing in order to get everything finished. I will, of course, continue to have other ideas come along while I am working on all of these things–the more my creativity seems to flourish, the more ideas and thoughts I have ; which is why “Wash Away Sins” popped into my head over the last weekend. But as long as I can stay focused and don’t allow myself too many distractions, I should be able to get everything finished and somehow stay on top of everything.

Stranger things, of course, have happened.

Last night we finished watching Young Royals, which was exceptionally good. It’s a Swedish show, which kicks off when the Queen of Sweden’s second son, Willhelm, gets involved in a viral video while partying at a bar and getting in a fight, so the royal family packs him off to an elite boarding school where he won’t get in trouble. Ha ha ha, famous last words, right? Wille soon becomes attracted to a talented young local kid, Simon, who is also attending the school–and it goes from there. Simon also has an autistic sister with ADHD, Sarah, who is also kind of adopted by the richer, more socially prominent students–which was actually a lovely break with tradition; I assumed they’d bully her mercilessly–and while there are other story-lines, the Wille-Simon romance is the primary driving story of the show, and it’s so beautifully handled and done. (Watching this made me realize how deeply sanitized American queer y/a is; I mean, for generations the primary driver of young adult storylines in books and movies and television shows is “will they have sex? Will they lose their virginity?” And while my experience with the majority of queer y/a is limited to a few things written by straight people that I absolutely detested–the whole “losing one’s virginity” seems to never come up. I guess queer teenaged sexuality is the third rail? There’s an essay in this, methinks) Anyway, it’s a great show and it handles the gay young love storyline really well–tenderly and beautifully and sweetly–and it also doesn’t hurt that the young actors in the leads are very appealing. There are, for example, many sweet scenes where they just sit next to each and cuddle a bit–which I realized was far more intimate than the actual “take off our clothes and get to it” scenes. Highly recommended! I do hope there’s a second season, as the first was quite marvelous.

And now of course we have to find something new to watch. Outer Banks‘ second season, which looks INSANE, doesn’t come out until the end of the month, so we might have to give Gossip Girl on HBO MAX a look-see (we never watched the original).

And now I am boring myself, so I will bring this to a close. Happy Wednesday, Constant Reader!

Into the Groove

Tuesday and the second day of this new (newish?) week, and so far so good.

Yesterday wasn’t bad–God only knows there have certainly been worse Mondays logged in by one Gregalicious–but it also wasn’t a great day either by any means. I wasn’t tired, for one thing, which automatically made it seem like a much better day to begin with, and I managed to get things done as well, which was even nicer. My emails are never ever going to be completely finished being answered… I guess accepting that it’s a Sisyphean task is a sign of positive mental growth. I also managed to do no writing last night, either. I did write a couple of sentences of the second chapter of Chlorine, which I guess counts as progress. I also didn’t read when i got home last evening…I wasn’t tired, really, but was more emotionally drained from the day–and that IS a thing, isn’t it? Instead, I settled in to watch some videos on Youtube and when Paul got home from the gym, we watched another episode of Young Royals, which we are rather enjoying on Netflix.

I also made a financial decision yesterday; it was a big one, but I feel like it was necessary, and was a first step toward getting out of debt–which has been really unpleasant and an endless cycle ever since I bought the car. I’ve essentially been treading water for the last four and a half years as my debt has slowly and gradually increased; figuring that nothing could really be done about it until the car was paid off and that huge chunk of cash that had to go out every month could be resolved. I decided yesterday to pull some funds out of my retirement account–yes, I know, it was a decision that could come back to bite me in the ass at some point in the very near future–and pay off, not only the car but some other debt that’s been hanging over me for quite some time. This was primarily triggered by trying to figure out how to finance the work on my mouth that needs to be done; realistically there was no way I could possibly take on that much more debt without relieving some that already exists, and so I figured removing some money from my retirement–which realistically isn’t that far in the future–was the proper way to go. It is conceivable that I may regret this in the future at some point, but I did think about it over the weekend and finally decide it was the right thing for me to do.

I think that might have also had something to do with my emotional exhaustion last night, as well. I absolutely hate making life decisions, but this stress has been really wearing me down, and relieving it–even if it is simply a temporary fix–is going to make a huge difference for me going forward.

And really–can anything that relieves stress be a bad thing?

Today is our anniversary; twenty-six years ago today Paul and I became a couple. (It’s easy for me to remember because it’s exactly one month before my birthday.) It’s seem hard to believe sometimes–other times it’s hard to remember that I actually had a life without him–but it’s been a lovely twenty-six years, and I cherish even the hard times, because we were able to get through them together (it’s true, hard times are much easier to bear when you have someone to share them and commiserate with).

I really am one lucky Gregalicious.

So, tonight after work I am going to the gym, and will discuss with Paul what we would like to do special this weekend. The actual day isn’t as important to either of us.

And on that note, tis off to the spice mines.

The Right Stuff

And Monday has rolled around again in this rollercoaster we call life; the question is whether this week will be a slow climb, or the rapid and insane downhill race leading into a loop-de-loop or a circular spin, both at ridiculous speeds.

The good news is that it was definitely a lovely weekend here at the Lost Apartment. I went to the gym yesterday and had a great workout and I worked on Chlorine. Not a lot, mind you–some revisions and corrections to the first chapter, before getting started on the second; i got about 1200 words down on it–but enough for me to be happy about it, you know? While allowing my creativity ADHD to have full run over my brain throughout most of June and July thus far was a good idea–man, I produced a lot of work–I worried a bit seeing how much was now in progress. I posted a picture of all the works currently in progress, gathered and separated by binder clips, only to realize those five WIP’s weren’t in fact, all of them; I was missing at least four more and possibly five, bringing the grand total to ten.

And even I can admit readily that ten WIP’s is too fucking much for anyone to sanely work on at the same time.

And that’s not even taking into consideration the short stories, of which there are many–and that particular list continues to grow and grow and grow and grow (although I did realize that “Vivit Dominus” is actually the perfect start for a story already in progress called “Gossip,” which is probably the right title for the story). I mean, I just started another one called “Wash Away Sins” over the course of the weekend, and had the for another essay at some point this weekend as well…because, of course, there are never too many things I can be writing on at the same time.

This, of course, is partly why I am never completely mentally stable.

Being so scattered creatively can often be a problem, and often is–which is why I try not to give my creativity free rein and control over what I am doing most of the time. I am very fortunate in that most of the time I can reign it in and keep it under control–pushing aside pesky new thoughts regularly, or taking a brief break to scribble something down in a journal–and now I am wondering if Spelllcaster needs to be expanded into a novel or not….it’s nearly 40k already; and yes, adding another 20-35 k might not be all that hard to do (as I mentioned yesterday, I do have an idea about how to continue the story, rather than simply padding out what I already have in place) but when, precisely, am I going to do this? This is the real problem with trying to reel it all in now–there are already so many things in progress that trying to schedule finishing them all becomes problematic, especially now that I am able to zero in on Chlorine.

Heavy heaving sigh.

But I do feel well rested this morning, and almost like I might be able to get things done and get back on track–the brief bit of organizing I did over the weekend (of the writing stuff, along with the filing) certainly helped tremendously’; now I need to get the filing a bit more under control. (I have four file boxes shoved under my desk, which is claustrophobic; they need to go elsewhere but I am not really sure where to put them in the meantime; if I put them in the attic they’re gone forever–let’s be honest–but I suppose I could put them on top of the kitchen cabinets–so accessible if not easily accessible.) But alphabetizing and cleaning out files I no longer need to have around isn’t a bad idea, and might help clear things out. (I also need to clean out the attic and donate a shit ton more books, don’t I? And maybe the Christmas stuff which we never use? I don’t know about that. Scooter isn’t going to live forever, and maybe our next cat won’t try to topple the tree all the time)

I also need to carve out some time this week to read Razorblade Tears, which I am enjoying.

And on that note, the spice mines are calling and I must follow their siren song. Have a lovely Monday, Constant Reader.

Love in the First Degree

THURSDAY!

It’s lovely to be working at home this morning–I do have my bi-annual physical with my brand new primary care doctor today (which means prescription refills, HUZZAH), but other than that, I am planning on being ensconced in my easy chair making condom packs for most of today, while I get caught up on shows I am watching (Real Housewives, Superman and Lois) and then possibly moving on to a 1970’s movie–either a return to the Cynical 70’s Film Festival, or the 80’s Teen Film Festival (which inevitably is disappointing, as the movies tend to not age particularly well…I am still reeling from rewatching Class, with Rob Lowe and Andrew McCarthy; although it would make for a good essay about how society has changed since those films were made…).

Because I don’t already have enough to write.

I slept incredibly well last night, and even slept in a bit. I’m a bit groggy this morning (Groggy GreggOly) as a result, but my coffee is quite marvelous and it seems to be doing the trick. The Lost Apartment is the disaster area it always seems to be on Thursday mornings–heavy sigh–and so after i get my condom packing done, I’ll have to do some cleaning around here while I am doing my writing tonight. We finished Happy Endings last night–the final six or so episodes of the final season really weren’t very good, alas–and will probably focus on finishing HIgh Seas before moving on to something new–Young Royals, perhaps, or an Italian show Paul was interested in (I need to see if he wants to finish watching Loki, because if he doesn’t I know what I’ll be bingeing while condom packing tomorrow–we’ve also not watched any of the Marvel shows on Disney Plus, and we probably should give them a whirl; although some borderline homophobic comments by one of the leads in Falcon and The Winter Soldier kind of killed off any interest I may have had in that show)–and of course, some of our favorites (Ted Lasso, Outer Banks) are also coming back soon.

I also want to read S. A. Cosby’s Razorblade Tears this weekend, so I can move on to the next book on the list, The Other Black Girl by Zakiya Dalila Harris–my reading has fallen off so dramatically, I really need to get back on that horse and start riding again.

But I also have to get organized, which is apparently an on-going struggle, my own personal Vietnam, as it were. One would think by now I’d have kinda-sorta gotten used to the 6 o’clock alarm when it rings three mornings per week, and kinda-sorta adjusted my life around that, but really haven’t. Sometime next month my schedule is going to change again–which is going to require readjusting from what I’ve never adjusted to something new; it will also mean having to get up relatively early still to go to the gym so I can keep my workout routine going–Ill be going in later on Tuesdays–10 instead of 7:30–but I won’t be getting off work until 7 pm, which is too late to go to the gym Tuesday nights after. Heavy sigh.

And I need to get going on Chapter Two of Chlorine. I think I need to make a list of things I need to do for the weekend and start, as always, checking things off. In another note, I was cleaning out my spiral notebook yesterday and discovered that, as I tore the two to-do lists out of it, that I had done almost everything on both of them (even though I never crossed them off). Progress, of a sort, I guess. (Note to self: you need to get a new notebook too).

I also am at that time where I can upgrade my phone; a trip to the AT&T store is no doubt in order. It did, however, occur to me yesterday that iPhones probably can no longer accommodate plug in head-phones, which will make a difference for me. I sure as hell don’t want to pay $300 for ear buds I will lose rather quickly… but on the other hand, I have also managed to have iPhones now for twelve years without breaking or losing one, so maybe I am mature enough (ha ha ha ha) to have those ear bud things without the possibility of losing them and having to replace them for a ridiculous amount of money. I don’t know. We shall see what they say when I stop into the store. Fortunately, there’s one a few blocks away, and I can go there on my way to Office Max to get a new spiral notebook.

The excitement around here truly never stops, does it?