Ye Gods, why am I awake this early? A six AM alarm is enough of a hate crime, but one at five should be prohibited by the Geneva Protocols. And yes, I know people get up this early every day for work, if not earlier–but I am not one of those people. I was talking about this with a co-worker yesterday–how that even on the days when I don’t have to come in so early now I wake up at six, and if I don’t stay in bed and just get up, I am not as tired as I am on the mornings when the alarm goes off at six (and on those mornings when I have to come in early, I actually start waking up around five. I stay in bed until the alarm goes off). I think it’s Pavlovian response, in all honesty, and has more to do with the alarm more than the getting up.
I really do miss the days when the earliest I had to be at work was eleven.
The trip was actually uneventful, honestly (I have since arrived; I didn’t have time to finish this before it was time to head to the airport this morning); I couldn’t have asked for a smoother trip. Getting to the airport was easy, I parked, got to the terminal, checked my bag, and then made it to Security without any issue or hassle or aggravation. The flight was on time, and was smooth and incredibly pleasant–I also got one of those exit row seats without a seat in front of it so I could stree-e-e-e-e-etch my legs all the way out. I got my bag without any incident, and then a friend picked me up and whisked me off to the Yacht Club for lunch, which was also lovely (yet I also can’t help but feel that yachts are incredible waste of money. I guess it’s a status thing for the ridiculously rich who, you know, don’t want to feed the hungry or educate the poor or heal the sick or anything). I also used technology to my advantage; I checked in early yesterday on the Hilton Honors app, my room was ready by one, and I can use my phone as my key, which is incredibly cool (although it will definitely increase my stress about making sure my phone is charged all the time). I’m going to head down in a moment to check into the conference (woo-hoo, Sleuthfest!) and get a Coke before coming back up here, finishing this, and rehearsing for my reading before tonight.
All right, I am all registered. I am starting to get cooled off here in my room–it’s quite lovely–and at some point I am going to have to rehearse for tonight’s Noir at the Bar reading (a rather impressive line-up of talent; not sure what I am doing in there but in these situations I have found that it is often best to never ask questions and just roll with it–I will no doubt geek out at some point about being in a reading with Jeffrey Deaver–closeted gay teenager in Kansas with big dreams has come a long way, has he not, from the little ranch house in a small town with a population of less than a thousand? It still trips me out from time to time when it kind of hits me.
I have decided to read tonight from the first chapter of Chlorine. Yes, just another example of how bad I am at this–I should read from Bury Me in Shadows or #shedeservedit, since I should be trying to sell more copies of them, but why should I start doing the smart thing twenty years into my career? And why not test run something new that I am working on?
I should write a piece called “Flop Sweat” to use for readings.
All right, I am going to lie down for a moment before it’s time to get ready. Have a lovely evening, Constant Reader, and I will check in with you again tomorrow.
I didn’t get as much done as I would have liked this past weekend, which is really not much of a surprise; I always go into weekends thinking I have lots of time to do things and so forth and wind up getting caught up in other things and well, then I don’t get things done that I need to get done and now I am all panicking because I leave for Florida really early Thursday morning and I then get worked up into a state and then…well, I find myself on Tuesday morning without as much done as I needed to get done and trying to keep the panic under control.
I did, however, to read the first chapter of Chlorine at Noir at the Bar Thursday night, so that’s one thing checked off the list. It’ll be nice, I think. It’s uploaded on the iPad and thus ready to go. I have so much to do…I am being interviewed for a podcast when I get home from work tonight, so I hope my client is on time so I can get home in time for it at five.
I slept very well last night–we’re still watching Condor on Epix, and are enjoying it; not sure why it hasn’t gotten more attention; but probably has to do with the plot and timing of the show’s release–hard for a show about the potential weaponizing of a lethal disease during a pandemic to really get a lot of attention or viewers; I would imagine this isn’t the kind of plot your average thriller-viewer would be interested in watching about during an actual global pandemic which had all kinds of horrific conspiracy theories swirling around it during the first few panicky weeks and months after it all started. It’s also kind of interesting how everything about it has just disappeared from the news almost completely, like it’s all over and no one is catching it anymore and the hospitals are doing fine now. No one seems to care about mask mandates or proof of vaccination anymore, either. I didn’t hear a lot of fireworks last night–although at one point I did wryly joke to Paul after a series of them went off, “Fireworks or gunshots?”
Always a valid question in New Orleans.
I did do some writing yesterday–not a lot, a small bit; a revision of a story I had already written several drafts of and yesterday I changed it from present to past tense, and the main character from a young college girl to a young college gay; I think it does work better in this form. I am going to submit it to a an anthology about the South; I doubt they will take it, but hey–it’s the first place I’ve come across where I could actually send it in to try for publication. I wasn’t super high energy at all over the long weekend; I’m not sure what that was about, but it’s definitely a fact–and of course, the trip this weekend is going to exhaust me completely. I have several things to do over the course of the weekend–panels and so forth–and I absolutely must read my essay in How to Write a Mystery again before my panel about it. I really need to make a thorough and exact to-do list so I can start working my way through it. Heavy heaving sigh. I guess I wouldn’t know what to do with myself, on the other hand, were I not always behind on everything.
I have decided to only take two books with me on the trip, since I have to read a friend’s in-progress manuscript while I am there. It’s also on my iPad, but since I have to read off the iPad Thursday night, I need to be careful to make sure it’s charged, so I don’t know if I should read the manuscript while traveling on Thursday or wait and read while resting in my room. Decisions, decisions.
I think after my podcast tonight I will probably go ahead and pack for the trip and get it out of the way. I have to get up at five (!!!) on Thursday for the flight, and I have errands to run and things to do on the way home tomorrow, and then I will get stressed about trying to get ready and GAH. It just makes more sense to get it done tonight.
And on that note, I am heading into the spice mines. Have a lovely post 4th Tuesday, Constant Reader!
Saturday morning and I slept late, and it was indeed marvelous. I have to make groceries and gas up the car (will probably need a bank loan for that), but my primary focus today is going to be reading and writing. I will also probably start going over the edits for one of the two manuscripts sitting in my inbox right now, but that’s also going to depend pretty heavily on how nasty it is outside. It rained off and on most of yesterday–I do love the New Orleans rain, especially if I don’t have to go out into it, of course–but it’s very bright and sunny outside my windows this morning. My morning coffee feels marvelous and tastes even better, and as I glance around the workspace and the rest of the kitchen I see some odds and ends that need straightening and putting away. There’s also some dirty dishes in the sink that need being taken care of at some point. The rugs needs to be straightened, and the entire downstairs needs vacuuming. I would also like to get a box of books down from the attic and start cleaning that out a little bit this weekend as well. An ambitious program to be sure, but one that isn’t impossible…if i stay focused.
Which is always the big if, isn’t it?
We did get caught up on The Boys last night–this third season is the best so far, and there was a great twist in last night’s episode, which doesn’t bode well for the future but I also can’t wait to see how it plays out (although that will probably come in season four). I wasn’t tired when I got home from the office yesterday the way I usually and ordinarily am, but there were things to do, and I immediately set out to get them done once I had reached the safety and respite of the Lost Apartment. But it all got done for the most part, and Scooter got his lap for a goodly portion of the evening while I doom-scrolled social media waiting for Paul to get finished with his work (he worked at home yesterday) so we could watch The Boys. I even fell asleep in my chair a few times while waiting–Scooter’s super-power is the ability to get both of us to fall asleep when he cuddles with us. I did spend a lot of the evening thinking about writing and things I want to write–there’s never enough time for me to write as much as I want to, really, even though I have to force myself to do it.
I also realized last night that I need to get ready for Sleuthfest. I am doing a reading on THursday night and haven’t picked out something to actually, um, you know, read, let alone rehearse. It’s my first-ever Noir at the Bar, and will be in the hotel bar. I’ve published so much stuff that I’ve never gotten the chance to read from, you know? Should I read from one of my recent books? Should I read a short story? Should I perhaps read something in progress–Chlorine, for example? I also am on a panel about MWA’s How to Write a Mystery, in which the other panelists and I are going to talk about our essays…and I really don’t remember much about mine other than it’s about dialogue, so perhaps I should go ahead and reread it at some point before the panel so I don’t sound like an utter blithering idiot.
Then again, maybe people enjoy me being a blithering idiot. I don’t know.
I can’t help but think that is not the case, though. I prefer to believe audiences laugh with me and not at me, but one can never be entirely sure.
Ah, well, there’s plenty of time to get petrified with fear about standing up in front of an audience. But I do have to decide what I am going to read on Thursday. Heavy heaving sigh. I was thinking “Moist Money,” from the Down Yonder anthology–mainly because it’s shorter, but it’s also one of the nastier things I’ve ever written; my short stories tend to be nastier than my actual books (by “nastier” I mean darker, not pornographic, FYI) but there are so many choices…and I need to make up my mind because I am going to need to rehearse before I get there…I can’t just get up and read the way I used to, completely unprepared and stumbling over words and…heavy sigh. There I go again, working myself up into a lather of anxiety about something happening in five days, which will end up being fine in the long run.
And on that note, I am going to make another cup of coffee and head to my easy chair to read some more of The Savage Kind, which I hope to finish today. Have a lovely Saturday, Constant Reader, and I will check in with you again tomorrow.
Well, here we are on Saturday after a rage-infested Friday during which my anger burned with the white hot heat of a dozen burning suns. I somehow managed to get things done–the world keeps turning, no matter how shitty whatever is going on that day might be–and yet succumbed to the need to rage-tweet and retweet; Twitter is such a horrible place and it just feeds on itself.
The other day I was talking about #shedeservedit and why I wasn’t entirely comfortable promoting the book–but the abomination of the ‘supreme court’ and its rulings of this past week have completely changed my position about that entirely. I am very glad that I wrote that book, because part of its story also addresses the need for legal abortion. YES I AM PRO-CHOICE AND I ALWAYS HAVE BEEN, even when I was a child. I remember when the Roe decision originally came down; I was twelve years old, and everyone was talking about it. My sister wrote an anti-abortion piece for our high school newspaper, so I knew where she came down on the issue; my parents never really talked about it but I felt pretty safe in assuming, based on their upbringing and their faith, where they came down on the issue. It seemed kind of wrong to me, but the more I read about it and the more I understood the position of those who argued in favor of it, the more I came around to the pro-choice side. No one should have to carry a child to term against their will, period. I don’t know why that is so difficult for so many men to understand or grasp; if men could get pregnant Planned Parenthood would have drive-thru service. And the right to privacy these judicial activists just struck down? The ripples of government intervention into personal life choices that are none of the government’s or anybody else’s decisions is the epitome of government intervention and overreach that conservatives are always screaming about. The abominable sexual predator Clarence Thomas* even specifically named other decisions regarding privacy and government overreach he felt were ‘wrongly decided.’ Hey, if I was married to one of the biggest traitors in American history this side of Benedict Arnold I’d probably have all the seats and keep my mouth shut, but you do you, predator.
Sigh. I’ll probably never stop being angry about this.
I did manage to get some things done yesterday. I did my day job duties. I also took a short break to go wash and vacuum out my car (I finally found a do-it-yourself car wash that is easy to get to); I also got my brake tag renewed, which was marvelous. (It expired during the shutdown of 2020, and there were no places open to have it done. Naturally, I forgot all about it until a conversation at the office the other day.) I don’t have to worry about that again until 2024. I also picked up the mail and came back home to do more work. After my work duties were finished, I made three binders for working projects–yes, this is something that I do. I print out every draft, three hole punch it, and put into a three-ring binder used specifically for that purpose. I had recently emptied out the binder for A Streetcar Named Murder, and so I am reusing that one of Mississippi River Mischief. I also made a new one for Chlorine, one for “Never Kiss a Stranger ” (and the other novellas), and one for another project I am slowly but surely working on for some reason that doesn’t really make sense to me; someone has shown an interest in it and so I am writing it when I can’t make any progress on what I am currently focused on working on. Today I have an eye appointment in Metairie at noon; I’m debating as to whether to donate books to the library today to get the boxes out of the living room before heading out there. I am probably going to treat myself to Atomic Burger on the way home–I was thinking Sonic, but I’ve not had Atomic Burger since pre-pandemic times so that sounds like more of a treat for me than going to Sonic. (it’s also been a hot minute since I’ve had Five Guys…)
We watched this week’s episode of The Boys last night (thoroughly enjoyed the season finale of Obi-wan Kenobi the night before) before catching another episode of Loot (seriously, Maya Rudolph is killing it on this show; one of the best female comedy performances since Veep–she and Jean Smart will be definitely fighting it out for the Emmy this year, and the entire cast is actually quite good. Very sharp comedic writing, as well, and then once we were caught with that we moved on to First Kill, which we are still enjoying, weird as it is. I also want to spend some time today with The Savage Kind by John Copenhaver–it’s quite wonderful–before I head out to the burbs. (I also laundered the bed linens and got caught up on the dishes as well.) I do want to finish reading it this weekend, so I can find out where it’s going and enjoy every page as well as to move on to my next read before Pride Month runs out. I have all these marvelous books just collecting dust here in the Lost Apartment, and just begging to be read.
On that note, I am going to make myself another cup of coffee and head over to the easy chair with my book before I have to start getting ready to head out to the eye appointment. Have a great Saturday, and remember–channel your rage into action. To quote Game of Thrones, “there is no justice in this world unless we make it.” I intend to spend the rest of my life, as I have spent so much of it already, fighting for justice. I’d kind of hoped that I wouldn’t have to anymore, but letting your guard down just gives the Fascists an opportunity to regroup.
“Henceforth I shall only refer to him in this manner, just as Kavanaugh will always be “the rapist Brett Kavanaugh.”
Tuesday and it’s back into the office with me today. Huzzah.
Yesterday I entered data until my eyes crossed, but I got everything caught up. I also, once I was finished with my work for the day, walked over to Office Depot and got some more organizational items to try to make the kitchen workspace–and the kitchen overall–better organized and pulled together. It’s better now–looking around at the space this morning it certainly looks better than the hot mess it’s been for quite some time–so that’s something, I think. I slept fairly well last night, so as I am slowly waking up this morning over my coffee I am thinking this looks pretty good around here this morning. I also decided that since it’s still Pride Month my reading should continue to be queer books, at least for this month, so I plucked John Copenhaver’s The Savage Kind out of the TBR pile (it did win the Lambda Award for Best Mystery this past weekend after all) and hope to start reading it this evening when I get home from work. I made a binder for “Never Kiss a Stranger” as well as ones for Chlorine and Mississippi River Mischief–which definitely helped getting loose piles of paper and file folders off the counter tops, and at the same time felt strangely like I actually was making some kind of progress, which is always enormously helpful with feeling like you’ve gotten some place, accomplished something.
I just feel like I’m not getting anywhere with anything these days, but my mind has really worked strangely over the past few years. My concept of time is completely altered–not that it was ever really strong to begin with, honestly–and I struggle with memory lapses; my memory doesn’t really work the way it used to, which is incredibly concerning, or used to be; it seems like everyone is having the same kind of problems, and it probably is pandemic/interesting times causing it for everyone that seems to be affected (of course, if this was a suspense thriller, some mad genius would have done something to trigger this in people around the world for their own nefarious purposes–you can tell I watched a James Bond film last night), but it still is distressing to say the least.
I am also glad I took the weekend off. I feel like it was absolutely necessary, and there’s a three day weekend coming up this weekend, which is really nice as well. I don’t think I’ll be able to take the entire weekend off again this weekend–certainly not all three days–but it’s a very pleasant thought, I must say, and I am looking forward to getting through the rest of this week so I can rest up this weekend.
Whine, whine, whine.
And yes, we did watch the final Daniel Craig as James Bond thriller No Time to Die last night. It was gorgeously shot, and Craig is much closer to the Bond Ian Fleming wrote about in the books so many decades ago (I was very young when Fleming died), and while watching last night I thought about the original thirteen Bond books that Fleming wrote all those years ago and how badly those stories have aged–and how little the movies based on them resemble the books. The book Live and Let Die was horrifically racist (I read it again a few years ago, since it’s been decades since I read them) and then watched the movie again, which is also bad in that respect. Live and Let Die was also the first Bond movie I saw in the theater–and parts of it were filmed/set in and around New Orleans, so that part of it has always been sentimental for me in some ways…but yikes. The stereotypes! And the Bond books themselves celebrated imperialistic colonialism–many of the books are set in Jamaica or other possessions of the British empire, and that oh-so-British sense of superiority is very present in the books. But No Time to Die was a perfectly adequate Bond thriller film; Daniel Craig is a commanding presence on the screen, even if the villain, played by Oscar winner Rami Malek (which prompted me to say, “Freddie Mercury would have made a great Bond villain”) wasn’t really developed enough to really hit hard as the bad guy.
Then again, are any of the Bond villains ever really developed?
But watching a James Bond movie, coupled with me reading The Great Betrayal about the 4th Crusade, has me in mind of writing a Colin thriller again–I could of course set it at any time, so it doesn’t necessarily have to be current; the lovely thing about a Colin series is I could literally go back and set them in and around Scotty books, which would/could be very fun to do–but I am just not so great about writing action, I suppose–and thrillers are a lot of action, from beginning to end. I also don’t know enough about guns, really–how can I write about a gunfight or being shot at, or shooting back–but it could be fun….I already know the opening scene (set in 1204, as the city is on the brink of falling; the Patriarch of the Eastern Orthodox Church calls in a couple of warrior priests to smuggle something to safety, and that something is the MacGuffin the entire story turns on: the Pope/Rome wants whatever it is, and the Patriarch would rather burn in hell than let what he considers the Roman heretics have it) and I also know what the first chapter would be–Colin rescuing a politician’s daughter from the terrorists who kidnapped her–and then we would get into the MacGuffin/treasure hunt, with of course the Vatican being the bad guys (seriously, only Nazis make better bad guys than the Vatican) and all kinds of fun stuff.
Someday, perhaps.
And on that note, tis time for me to get back into the spice mines. Have a lovely Tuesday, Constant Reader.
And now it’s Sunday in the Lost Apartment, and I didn’t even go outside yesterday. Seriously, and it was lovely. I spent yesterday morning doing some organizing and planning and chores, and then dove into my edits. I emerged from the edits, bleary-eyed and more than a little bit tired, about five or six hours later and adjourned to my easy chair for some “be Scooter’s nap lap for a while” time and watched some videos on European royalty and some who were royalty-adjacent (Ivan VI of Russia, Diane de Poitiers, Elisabeth-Charlotte d’Orleans, duchess of Lorraine, and so forth) until Paul came home, and we streamed for the rest of the evening, which was nice and relaxing. Today I am going to finish the edits so it can be polished tomorrow before turning it in once and for all–huzzah!–and then the rest of the week I will undoubtedly have the “just finished a book for good” hangover and won’t get much else done. But I am already starting to feel that release of having a book finished; and my stress/anxiety levels have gone down significantly. I slept very well last night, which was also very nice and lovely, and I hope to do so again tonight–it’s been really nice getting all this sleep lately.
We watched Fire Island last night on Hulu, and I wasn’t horribly disappointed by it. I’ve seen few gay films–written, directed, produced and starring gay men– that weren’t disappointments; even the ones that come from traditional Hollywood inevitably I don’t care for very much. I never made it through Call Me by Your Name, for one example, and do not get me started on Philadelphia, In and Out, and To Wong Foo. But I enjoyed Fire Island, despite thinking I wouldn’t. I’ve actually never been to Fire Island–although I was invited to go for my birthday one year; their big Morning Party was actually on my birthday–but I was timid and shy and didn’t know how to get there from Tampa, because it involved trains and ferries and things, and I was also always broke in those days, and so I ended up not going. I’ve regretted it ever since…especially when I was writing Wicked Frat Boy Ways, which had a segment actually set on Fire Island. Anyway, I am digressing. I went into Fire Island kind of expecting it to be the same old gay story about Fire Island–I’ve read enough gay literary fiction either written or set in the 1970’s to have formed a strong impression about Fire Island–but the movie wasn’t what I was expecting. I was kind of expecting…I don’t know, another movie about beautiful and rich gay men with ripped bodies that didn’t go very deep, even if it was billed as a rom-com (I mean, a rom-com set on Fire Island?). But it was a lot more than what I was expecting; the characters the movie followed (a group of friends who all bonded and became kind of a family when they all worked at a horrible restaurant in Manhattan with “bottomless Mimosas”–that flashback scene might only be hilarious to former waiters, but it made both Paul and I laugh knowingly) were not rich for sure; the only reason they can afford to be there is they have a friend–a lesbian who won a lawsuit and got a shit ton of money and bought a house on the island, played by Margaret Cho–and there’s definitely some class issues played out in the movie, as well as issues of race. It was also nice to see some frankness about gay male sexuality. I won’t spoil the movie, but it wound up being deeply satisfying, had some really funny moments, and Bowen Yang is the emotional center of the movie–and he kills it. Fire Island may not be for everyone, but Paul and I really enjoyed it a lot more than we thought we would, and the island itself looks beautiful. I am far too old now to “do” Fire Island…but you can’t always do everything you want.
My, how philosophical I am after one cup of coffee this morning.
We also started watching a Spanish language show called Merli: Sapere Audi (Dare to Know), which is a sequel to a show called Merli about a philosophy teacher and ran for three seasons. This show focuses on one of the teacher’s best students, Pol, who is now studying at the University of Barcelona and is played by a really beautiful young actor named Carlos Cuervas, Pol is still in a relationship with Bruno, the son of his old teacher, and is still struggling to come to terms with his bisexuality (or homosexuality; I am not sure which it is), while developing a new relationship with his philosophy professor, who is played by Maria Pujalte, whom we have seen in numerous other shows; she is always great. It’s entertaining enough, and we’ll probably go ahead and finish it tonight. (I laughed because the opening shot of the show has Pol in the shower, with that shot being a close-up of his lovely ass. “Spain understands the gay market,” I laughed as we watched.) I’m not sure what we’ll watch when we finish this, but there are five more episodes so that will be a question for later this week, no doubt…I think the new, New Orleans based and filmed Queer as Folk will be dropping soon on HBO MAX, and we’ll probably watch that and Obi-wan Kenobi on Disney.
And we still haven’t watched all those Marvel shows, either.
I’ve been thinking–always a dangerous thing–lately about trying my hand at writing a gay romance. I’ve always avoided the genre because of it’s commitment to heteronormativity (which actually came up during Fire Island, which was kind of a knowing wink at the audience), but even before watching Heartstopper (I actually think Patrick/Ivan on Elité was when I first started thinking about it.). I even (of course) have a title for it, and was thinking it might be kind of fun to bring Jake from Bury Me in Shadows back and toss him a romance sequel. (I think my next Alabama may focus on his boyfriend Beau from Bury Me in Shadows….if I write another Alabama book. One never really knows.) But writing another book about Jake, or one about Beau would be kind of lazy since I already created them….but I also couldn’t write another book set in Corinth County and not acknowledge Beau…who was a cousin of the main character from Dark Tide, which did get mentioned. I don’t know. But as I put the finishing edits on my cozy mystery, I am thinking it might be fun and interesting to try something–a romance novel–that is completely outside of my wheelhouse. Sure I have to write Mississippi River Mischief, Chlorine and another project first; there’s all those novellas I have to finish as well as all those short stories; and of course, the essays.
Christ.
No wonder I am so tired all the time…
My goal has been to write a first draft of Chlorine in May, and then a first draft of another project (Muscles) in June, spend July writing the short stories and novellas, and then move on to Mississippi River Mischief in August. I’m now thinking–inspired by these edits–that what I really need to do is spend the rest of this month working on the short stories and novellas as well as getting MRM started; it would be great to have a first draft of MRM completed by August 1, and then spend the next two months writing first drafts of the other projects before returning to MRM to finish by December 1. I think that’s not only workable but doable, but I also have to stay focused on the goal and not allow myself to either get lazy or distracted. I really also want to get back down to 200 pounds before Bouchercon; that may not be entirely realistic, but I can at least change the way the weight is distributed on my body somewhat by then–although back in the day, I generally started working on my Decadence body (ah, the days when it mattered so much to me to be in shape for certain weekends of the year!) around June…but my body has aged and changed since those days, and the metabolism has completely slowed down. But my body also craves exercise and stretching–I may do some stretching when I finish writing this, and before I start putting stuff away and cleaning prior to diving into the edits–and it certainly cannot hurt for me to start trying to make it to the gym three times per week again.
And on that note, I am heading into the spice mines. Have a lovely day, Constant Reader, and I will check in with you again tomorrow morning.
Sunday morning and I slept really well again. I woke up, as always, at just before seven, but stayed in bed lazily until nearly eight–when nature’s call became too much to be ignored for longer. But I have a nice fresh hot cup of coffee, a long Sunday with a lot to do and/or get done today (I also need to run to the grocery store this morning, which is always so exhausting) but I suspect that i can get everything I need to get done, done. Yesterday morning I spent some time with the Carol Goodman novel (which is really and truly spectacularly well done), went to do my self-care (which was lovely) and then picked up the mail and headed home to spend some time doing things. I did the bed linens, emptied the dishwasher and did another load (that needs to be emptied this morning) and also got some things organized for my next writing project. I did the Spirit of Ink interview at 2, as scheduled, and then when I was finished with that I was drained, as I knew I would be, so I did some more file organizing before retiring to my easy chair with my journal to make notes for Mississippi River Mischief, which I am also starting to get excited about writing (which is a lovely change from the usual, where I dread writing any and every thing).
So, overall, I was quite pleased with my Friday. Since we’d finished or gotten caught up on everything else we had started watching, we decided to binge through season two of The Hardy Boys on Hulu, which I am enjoying. Is it the Hardy Boys of my childhood? No, but neither was the 1970’s show with Parker Stevenson and Shaun Cassidy. I belong to several kids’ series groups on Facebook (they are very interesting people; I’ve always wanted to write a book about kids’ series fandom) and they were, of course, quite unhappy with this adaptation (but not NEARLY as up-in-arms as they were about the Nancy Drew television series, in which Nancy actually has sex with Ned–who’s Black in the show–in the very first episode). Maybe it’s because I’m a writer, but I don’t expect adaptations to match us precisely to the source material, and whether people in their fifties and sixties want to admit to it or not, both series in their original forms are horribly dated today. I did enjoy the show’s nods to the canon series throughout–one of the villains was named McFarlane (Leslie McFarlane ghost-wrote many of the original books) and the bad company is Stratemeyer Global (the Stratemeyer Syndicate created and owned both series, among many others), and there was also a single throwaway line at one point about “what happened at midnight” (which is one of the titles of the original canonical series); so that was all a bit fun for me. Even as I watched, I kept remembering all the dog-whistles of the fan group–disguised as “dedication to the original canon” of course–but when you use words like woke and so forth, your bigotry and personal biases are kind of put right out there on display.
And I can only imagine how upset they are that Aunt Gertrude (Trudy on the show) is a lesbian…which actually makes canonical sense, to be honest.
But it was a very pleasant way to waste the rest of the day, frankly, and I felt pretty marvelous when I went to bed last evening. I am really enjoying my sleep lately, which is marvelous, and lately I am feeling very–I don’t know, optimistic?–about my career and my future as a writer, which is always a plus. I am still waiting for my edits on A Streetcar Named Murder, and to hear back about my short story, but I am feeling pretty good about myself this morning (let’s see how long that lasts, shall we?) and tomorrow evening i am going to make a semi-triumphant return to the gym. This morning I am going to spend some time with The Lake of Dead Languages, and then I am going to head out to the grocery store, probably around elevenish, so I can come home and do some more writing and organizing and so forth. I am going to try to bang out a draft of a new manuscript by mid-June, and then I want to spend until August 1 finishing a first draft of Chlorine, at which point I will most likely have to start really working on Mississippi River Mischief. That’s a pretty good schedule, if I can stick to it–and then of course there are any number of short stories I want to get written in the meantime. There are two submission calls I saw recently (with very tight deadlines) I’d like to get something submitted to–but then it always comes down to time and motivation–both of which I am good at failing at–so it’s all going to depend, I suppose. But I am going to get organized here in my office space before retiring to read for the rest of the morning, which hopefully will mean productivity. We also need something new to watch, since we’ve binged our way through everything already–but there are any number of shows that dropped since the beginning of the year that we’d like to see that we never got around to, and more are coming out all the time.
I also want to rewatch Heartstopper at some point, so I can finish my post about it at some point. I really need to get those old unfinished posts finished and posted at some point, don’t I? I also have a bad review of Hemingway’s To Have and Have Not to finish as well as a review of Marco Carocari’s marvelous Blackout, as well as some ruminations about the resurgence of anti-queer political homophobia which hs reared its ugly head again.
And on that note, I am heading back into the spice mines. Have a lovely Sunday, Constant Reader!
Saturday morning and I have errands to run today and chores to do; writing to get done and emails to write. I also want to spend some time today reading as well. I was a lolly-gag this morning, leisurely remaining in bed far longer than is my norm. It felt lovely, frankly, and I think it was exactly what I needed to get my body and my mind back in the order it needs to be in for me to function properly.
In other words, I think I have finally recovered from my trip to Left Coast Crime, which is marvelous.
Last evening I finished reading Catriona McPherson’s A Gingerbread House (more on that later), I actually wrote for a bit (more on that later) and then once Paul got home we binged through the rest of season 2 of Bridgerton, which I think I enjoyed much more than the first (despite the absence of gorgeous charismatic Regé-Jean Page, whom I stopped missing once the story really began going). I think I actually preferred the plot of season two more than the one for season one, and it was absolutely lovely seeing an openly gay actor (Jonathan Bailey) so brilliant and convincing in a traditional male romantic leading role. Is that homophobic of me, or a commentary on show business’ homophobia and fear of casting openly gay male actors in those types of roles? I am not sure.
So last evening was quite an accomplished one, and I was most pleased to see that going into work on Friday was actually helpful. I did manage to get a lot done in the office yesterday as well, which was lovely, and that carried over into my evening here at the Lost Apartment. Today, as I mentioned, I have errands to run (prescriptions, mail, groceries) and chores to do (dishes, floors, organizing) and I would love nothing more than to get some writing and reading done today as well. One can dream, can’t one? I want to get through the first draft of my story this afternoon, and I’d like to work some more on something else I started working on yesterday; nothing of import, really, simply a novel idea I’ve had for a very long time that, for some reason yesterday I couldn’t get out of my head, so I just went ahead, found the existing files, and started writing my way through the first chapter. It actually flowed pretty well, and before I knew it–and it was time to call it quits for the evening–I’d written well over a thousand words, which was marvelous, and had also done no less than a thousand or so on my story. This was pleasing, as Constant Reader is no doubt aware of how I always worry that the ability to write is a skill that I might lose at some point in my life, and it always, always, terrifies me.
I am absolutely delighted to let you know that my story “The Silky Veils of Ardor”, originally published in The Beat of Black Wings, edited by the incomparable Josh Pachter, has been selected as this week’s “Barb Goffman Presents” by Wildside Press in this week’s Black Cat Weekly. I am not the most secure short story writer in the world (many thanks to both Josh and Barb for their keen editorial eye that helped improve the story dramatically from the terrible first draft I wrote years ago), so these little victories help a lot with my Imposter Syndrome issues–which inevitably raise their ugly Cerberus-like heads all the time but especially when I am in the malaise period after finishing a novel manuscript, and especially if I am trying to work on something else and it simply isn’t coming. I am confident now that I will not only finish an initial draft of my story this weekend but perhaps even finish that first chapter I started writing last night and maybe even an outline/synopsis of said book project, which has been languishing in my head for at least a dozen years now, if not more. I mean, it’s not Chlorine, obviously; but that book is becoming even more complicated for me the more I research it–not a bad thing, but indicative of how much work the book is going to be. I was paging through William J. Mann’s Behind the Screen the other night, and I once again was amazed at how tunnel-like my vision was in my initial conception of the book and who the characters needed to be; but I also think the more research I do and the more fears I have of writing it making it all the more necessary for me to actually go ahead and do so.
I really need to work on my focus. I don’t know what it’s actually like to be able to simply write a book and block everything else out of my life in order to solely focus on the writing; my ADHD certainly makes it more difficult and I am inevitably always juggling a million things at once. What must it be like to be able to laser focus all of my attention and energy on a book? It will be interesting to see how retirement, should I ever reach that place, will change and/or make a difference in my writing, won’t it?
I imagine I won’t know what to do with all the extra time. I’ve gotten so used to being scattered in my approach to everything I write that I don’t know what being singularly focused that way would be like, or if it’s even possible for me.
On that somber note, I am heading into the spice mines. Have a lovely day, Constant Reader!
It feels very weird this morning to be getting up so early after having a work-at-home day yesterday. I slept really well last night–I did have a martini with a friend late afternoon yesterday, which was absolutely marvelous. Paul got home late last night–another grant, as always–and so after I got home after my martini (which are really quite marvelous drinks, frankly) I collapsed into my easy chair and started watching Young Justice again, after getting caught up on Last Week Tonight with John Oliver, which has replaced The Daily Show as my source of news served up with a touch of humor. His piece on the buying and selling of our online data was superb–scary, yet superb.
But I entered data yesterday and made condom packs while watching some gay cultural history videos on Youtube, which I am enjoying. I’ve also been thinking a lot about writing and what I need to get done–thinking about it counts as writing, by the way, and if you don’t think so, don’t make me come for you BECAUSE OH FUCKING HELL YES IT DOES. I need to get to work on that story when I have time this week–it has to be finished before Edgar Week, which is coming up pretty quickly in the sideview mirror–and I want to start writing a first draft of a manuscript. I think I am going to push Chlorine back another month–sorry, Nikki–and try to get the first draft of another gay noir thriller written; whether or not I will remains to be seen, but I’d really like to get a first draft of the three books done over the next three months. Is it potentially overly ambitious? Of course it is, we’re talking writing, at minimum, at least one hundred and twenty thousand words in three months, but it’s also eminently do-able, as long as I stay focused and don’t allow other things to interfere or distract me; which is always an issue for me. (Look! a squirrel!) But I am starting to feel rested again… which is really nice. I have to go into the office again tomorrow–four days a week now–but at least I don’t have to get up at six to go in tomorrow. Yay? And I do think I am going to stay at home Monday of next week–decisions, decisions; which is the best day of the week for me to work from home, Monday or Friday? Heavy heaving sigh.
I hope to finish Catriona McPherson’s A Gingerbread House this evening; so I can be prepared to move on to the next one. Please don’t think I’m not enjoying this book–I am–simply because I’ve not finished it yet. It’s quite good, and you really should be reading Catriona’s work if you aren’t already, Constant Reader, and if you ever get the opportunity to listen to her speak, jump at it. She’s quite amusing, and her Scots accent is something I could listen to all day. Her Guest of Honor speech at the Lefty Awards banquet was quite epic and enjoyable; and she’s also a very talented (and hard working) writer. I’ve certainly enjoyed everything of hers that I’ve read….the good news is also that she’s incredibly prolific; at least two books a year. I hope I live long enough to retire because I hope that once I do, I can get caught up on all of the books I am so far behind on reading.
Oh my GOD, that TBR stack is terrifying.
I’m trying to decide what time to come into the office for my final in-the-office day of the week, There is something to be said for getting up early, coming in and getting it over with–as well as beating traffic on the way home, and coming in early means it’s easier to find a place to park, always a plus, you know. (There are few things I despise more than trying to find a place to park.) I am really looking forward to this weekend, to be honest; I keep finding more chores around the house and there’s also this strange mentality I have that I will actually write this weekend around everything else I have to do. Is it possible? Anything is possible, really. Is it likely? That remains to be seen.
It rained last night–heavily; we had some massive thunderstorms sometime during the night after I went to bed,. The thunder woke me up very briefly, and then I just went back to sleep. I don’t think there were any tornadoes or anything–my phone’s warning system certainly didn’t go off, or I slept through it, one or the other. But I am not seeing any doom-and-gloom on local news websites this morning, so I guess we dodged another one last night. It was humid AF yesterday–it’s amazing to me how every year, like clockwork, the humidity returns and every single time it catches me off guard. (To be fair, the real humidity doesn’t really clock in until late May, but the heat starts much sooner, and it’s already getting there.) I am not looking forward to the higher power bills of the dog days of summer (and why are they called that? Dog days? I mean, I know three dog night is an old Aussie saying for nights so cold you need three dogs in the bed to keep you warm, but where did ‘dog days of summer’ come from?) and the steaming humidity, but there are, indeed worse things. And I think our new system kept the bills down pretty well last summer, which was quite nice indeed. So, here’s to a sort of bearable summer if I don’t spend much time outside? Huzzah?
And on that note, it is off to the spice mines for me. Have a lovely Thursday, Constant Reader, and I will check in with you again tomorrow.
This is Todd Sanfield, former fitness model who now has his own underwear/swimwear business! Check it out at https://www.toddsanfield.com/–he’s also the model for his website.
Wednesday morning and today is my work-at-home day. I have data to enter and condom packs to stuff; and of course, household chores to do when I need to back away from the computer for a moment or two. I’ve sort of gotten caught up on my chores around the house–it’s also Pay-the-Bills Day, hurray–but there’s always something that needs to be done around here. There are dishes in the dishwasher that need putting away, and laundry as well, the bed linens didn’t get their weekly laundering on Friday because I was out of town, and so forth. I slept deeply and well last night and feel incredibly well rested this morning–for the first time since leaving, really; yesterday was merely an improvement on Monday because this is supposed to be how I feel when I get up. I’m a bit groggy, but the coffee will undoubtedly help with that, and I’ve already done Wordle–I am finding that to be very helpful in kicking my mind back into gear again in the mornings–and now I just have to finish writing this entry. I also have entries to do on Mia Manansala’s Arsenic and Adobe and Wanda Morris’ All Her Little Secrets, and I am getting close to finishing Catriona McPherson’s A Gingerbread House, which I am really enjoying.
I came straight home from work yesterday and did some chores when I got home, which included putting away the stuff in the dishwasher and folding clothes, before settling in to read some more of Catriona’s book. Scooter climbed into my lap and turned into his usual contented purr-ball self (we think we have a new outdoor kitty; Guzman has also come back and isn’t skittish anymore; and Tiger has resurfaced as well), and when my mind finally became too fatigued to go on reading, I started watching some videos on Youtube (I started watching another one about the inbred Spanish Hapsburgs, but turned it off when it failed to note that Charles V had also married a first cousin on his mother’s side, adding to the inbreeding coefficient dramatically; the Iberian royal houses of Castile, Aragon and Portugal had already been inbreeding for centuries) and then Paul got home. I’ve also discovered a new wonderful channel on Youtube about music, “Todd in the Shadows,” and I really enjoy his lengthy looks at one-hit wonders (last night I watched his videos about “Mickey,” “I Touch Myself,” “Missing,” and “What is Love”–I’ve watched quite a few of these in the past and while I don’t always agree with his opinion about the song itself, it’s interesting to hear the backstories of the artists and the songs themselves, as well as what they tried to do to follow up the success of their one hit wonder. And of course, when Paul came back downstairs, we binged the rest of the fifth season of Elite, which we both greatly enjoyed and might be one of the best seasons thus far; certainly it was stronger than season 4. I think this deserves its own entry, frankly; so I think I am going to go ahead and do one at some point. And then it was off to bed and I fell asleep almost immediately, which was lovely, and slept deeply and well through the night, which was also pretty amazing.
Huzzah!
And hopefully, once I am done with my work-at-home duties, I can work on finishing that short story. I really need to get it finished and turned in before I leave for the Edgars in two weeks. Woo-hoo! (Although yes, I am terribly worried about sleep once I am in New York, too. Fortunately I will have at least one night to get used to sleeping in a new bed before the banquet.
It looks kind of cloudy outside this morning, and the crepe myrtles–which are getting more full since the butchery last year–are swaying in the winds. I should probably check the weather to make sure this isn’t going to be another one of those “potential tornado” days–we’re all a little jumpy after that one a few weeks ago–and it looks like it could be another one of those days. Heavy heaving sigh. I also need to make a to-do list; the one I am working off is from before the trip to Left Coast Crime (so much fun!) and is, therefore, dated.
Sigh.
I also need to get some other stuff done–the Bouchercon anthology needs more organizing, I need to start planning Mississippi River Mischief, and I also got, ordered on-line, another copy of William J. Mann’s Behind the Screen: How Gays and Lesbians Helped Shape Hollywood, which I already have a copy of somewhere but it was simply easier to order a new copy than go through every fucking box in storage to find it, and is going to be important research for Chlorine. I was planning on writing a draft of Chlorine in May, but I may push that back a month and do another first draft of something that has drawn some interest from another potential publisher; it’s something I’ve also been wanting to write for some time but have never gotten around to, so we shall see. The day job is changing a bit, so that’s also going to have some impact on my writing schedules and so forth. Heavy heavy deep heaving sigh.
It’s always something.
And on that note, I am going to make another cup of coffee, pay the bills, and get started on my day. Have a lovely Wednesday, Constant Reader, and I will talk to you tomorrow.
Queer and Loathing in America 