Tag: Round Up The Usual Peacocks

She Loves Him Still

I absolutely adore the Meg Langslow series by Donna Andrews.

When I was taping Susan Larson’s radio show the other day (oooh, how fabulous do I sound?), one of the things she asked me about was, simply, what exactly is a cozy mystery? I don’t remember what I said–something about how the primary point of them was to make the reader feel comfortable, and escape the worries of the every day, or something equally moronic–and of course, as always, later on I came up with the perfect example of how to define a cozy. Cozies are about communities, pleasant and warm communities where neighbors take care of neighbors and everyone watches out for each other and primarily is operating from a good place. The main character has to be someone the reader can not only identify with but has to like; and whenever there’s a new volume in the series it feels like we as readers are getting another lovey vacation to visit with dear old friends we only get to see once or maybe twice a year (fortunately, Andrews is on a two-book per year schedule; her Christmas crime caper for this year just landed at the Lost Apartment this week).

This is precisely the feeling i get when I read one of the Meg Langslow novels; like I’ve taken a lovely little vacation to my favorite little city in Virginia, Caerphilly (which I always pronounce “carefully”), and see Meg and her friends and family. It’s a place where everyone is neighborly or nice–and those who aren’t, everyone tries to steer clear of or just accepts that they just aren’t as nice as everyone else (they inevitably end up dead, anyway). Caerphilly College, where Meg’s husband is chair of the Drama Department, has served up any number of choice murder victims over the years–there was that horrible English department for awhile, and of course everyone loathes the Business Department; which is the source for the mystery in this exceptionally fun and funny mystery.

“We need more peacocks!”

I glanced up from my notebook-that-tells-me-when-to-breathe, as I call my combination to-do list and calendar. Dad was standing just inside the back door. He wore elbow-length white leather gauntlets and a pith helmet with heavy netting thrown back to reveal his face. His beekeeping outfit.

“If you’re looking for peacocks in the beehives, that’s probably why you’re not finding any,” I said. “The pair you gave us for Christmas tend to hang out at the far end of Rose Noir’s herb field.”

“I know,” Dad said. “I was tending the hives when I noticed them. They’ve lost all their feathers.”

“It’s called molting,” I said. “I hear they do it every year.”

“Well, I know that.” He knocked some mud off his garden boots and clomped over to sit across the kitchen table from me. “I’ve already called Clarence Rutledge.”

I looked down at my notebook. I was up earlier than I liked and had a busy day ahead of me–busier than usual, thanks to all the things Mother had asked me to take care of in preparation for my brother Rob’s upcoming wedding to Delaney, his fiancée, now only a few days away. Then I glanced up at the clock. Already eight o’clock. Which said everything about how I expected my day to fo. Most mornings I’d have said “only eight o’clock.” But if there was something wrong with our peacocks…

The series comes full circle with this volume; the first in the series was Murder with Peacocks, and our first introduction to Meg came with her heavily involved in the planning on not just one, but three weddings, including her mother’s and her brother Rob’s; Rob’s fiancée is the one with the bright idea for peacocks as wedding decor (I remember thinking as I read this, that woman has no knowledge whatsoever about peacocks) and here we are again, with Meg heavily involved in planning another wedding for her brother Rob…and once again, peacocks are involved (there’s one hilarious scene in which Meg has to take a truck to “borrow” peacocks for the wedding since hers are molting, and she gets trapped in the truck when the peafowl launch an attack).

But as Meg goes about her day to day life with all the added burdens of the wedding planning, her nephew Kevin asks her for help. He and a friend have been doing a podcast about cold cases in Virginia, and someone tried to run his partner over with a car the previous weekend. Could this be connected with one of their cold cases? Meg, mainly to get out of wedding duties, agrees to look into the cold cases–which include a cheating scandal at the business school and a suicide, as well as the disappearance of an exceptionally talented coffee house singer from Charlottesville–which leads her to a lot of questionable antics (such as breaking into the business department to look at donor records) that are not only hilarious and improbable but Andrews always makes it completely realistic and completely believable, which is one of the many reasons I love this series so much: each volume is hilarious, completely unexpected, and absolutely marvelous, with Meg managing to never be caught off-guard or nonplused by anything that happens or comes up.

I absolutely love this series, and it’s always a delight when there’s a new one to read–and I do have the new one to read already! Huzzah!

Straight Back

G’morning, Saturday! How you doing? I slept well, woke up sans alarm, and feel kind of rested and good this morning. The sun is ridiculously bright this morning–it was yesterday as well–but that’s fine. Today is a long day of college football, and I have one errand to run this morning later on. Yesterday was a fairly good day; I got my work done during the day and ran the errands that needed running. I made Swedish meatballs (my version of them, any way) for dinner last night, and we settled in to watch the finale of Bad Sisters and of course, Halloween Ends, which was remarkably different than what I was expecting and despite a slow start, turned out rather interestingly after all.

I did think about the book last night while I was waiting for Paul to be ready for television viewing (and while I was doing some chores and making dinner), so I think I may have some success working on it this morning. I am going to try to get this done, put the dishes away and do some other chores before taking a shower and getting cleaned up to work on the book before I have to run the errands. And while I am of course hoping that Alabama cleans Tennessee’s clock today, the LSU game isn’t until this evening so I have the day pretty much all free heading into that, so there’s no reason I can’t get some writing done today and tomorrow (note to self: check the time of the Saints game today so you can plan accordingly). I don’t need to make another grocery run this weekend–or even order anything for pick-up–so I can pretty much plan on having the time to get things done around here. I have to work Monday morning in the clinic (covering for someone) but I also don’t have to be there until eight-thirty, either. Huzzah!

I also want to start rereading ‘salem’s Lot today; but I also have some other things I want to read as well. There never is enough time for everything, seriously. I have a couple of short stories written by friends that I need to look over (I promised feedback months ago) and I also have that Shirley Jackson Edgar-winning story I want to read, too. At some point I want to drive around the city and take pictures of Halloween decorations too–maybe I can take a walk with my phone tomorrow morning around the neighborhood and the Garden District–because I feel like I don’t document life in New Orleans as much as I should.

But then this blog has never really had a theme other than really just being a kind of diary for me, more than anything else, one where I don’t really talk about personal things as much perhaps as I would in a diary but just a way of situating myself and seeing where and how I am every morning. I have some pending entries that I also need to finish–entries talking about other books I’ve written, other books I’ve read and yet not done an entry for yet–and of course that takes time out of my day every day as well as time away from my other writing. But I do have a rather funny one about Nancy Drew and New Orleans I really should finish sometime–I have a weird love/hate thing with Nancy Drew; my OCD required me to collect and read the entire series, yet she was never really a favorite of mine; there were other juvenile series I vastly preferred to both Nancy and The Hardy Boys–but I had wanted to pay homage to Nancy’s adventures in New Orleans in the new Scotty book, so I reread the two books where Nancy came to New Orleans (The Ghost of Blackwood Hall and The Haunted Showboat) and whoo-boy, were they dated, wrong on almost every level, and horrifyingly racist. (Sidebar: I’ve always wanted to write my own juvenile series, similar to Nancy Drew and the Hardy Boys, and at the same time I’ve always wanted to write a murder mystery set at a fan convention for one of these series–because I belong to some fan-pages on Facebook and let me tell you, those folks are interesting)

I also have my entry about Donna Andrews’ marvelous Round Up the Usual Peacocks to finish, and I also have a rather lengthy entry about Interview with the Vampire I think I’ll wait to finish until I am done with watching the show.

I am not going to lie, I was curious about Halloween Ends primarily because I absolutely hated the second film in this sequel/reboot series, or whatever the hell it is considered. I was impressed by the creative decisions made on how to handle this absolutely, finally the last chapter (the end definitively ends it, trust me); but I am not entirely sure how I felt about the focus being moved off Laurie and Michael Myers. I guess I was a little disappointed–I was hoping to see, I guess, a balls-to-the-wall Laurie v. Michael battle, which we did kind of get, but it also wasn’t the primary focus of the film? I appreciated the new story as well as the new cast members like Rohan Campbell (who plays Frank on Hulu’s The Hardy Boys reboot), but I came away a little disappointed, but that was due to my own expectations, not any failure of the film itself. (I was also really amused to no end that Kyle Richards of The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills, who played one of the kids Laurie babysits in the very original Halloween, was brought back to reprise the role in the new trilogy. After listening to her talk about “filming” all season, and “having to focus on learning her lines” while dealing with RHOBH drama…only to watch the actual film to see she has exactly two scenes and at most five lines made me laugh out loud–and of course, Paul shadily said “I find it really hard to believe a bartender in Haddonfield could afford all that plastic surgery” which sent me into gales of laughter. I did enjoy the movie, though, and appreciated the different direction it took. If you’re a fan of Halloween, I think you’ll enjoy it, too–but understand it’s different going in.

All right, on that note I am going to head into the spice mines. Have a lovely Saturday, Constant Reader, and GEAUX TIGERS!

What Makes You Think You’re The One

And now it’s Saturday.

LSU is playing New Mexico this evening (GEAUX TIGERS!) in Tiger Stadium–it should be an easy win but when it’s LSU you can never take anything for granted–and I have a lot I want to try to get done today before the games get started. I have errands to run, Costco to order for delivery; it just never ends for one Gregalicious, does it? It would appear that way.

I did feel a little tired most of the day yesterday; not sure what that was about, to be honest, but there you have it and there it is. But I also got this lovely review in Publisher’s Weekly; another industry journal I’ve not been reviewed in for quite some time now. I am getting more excited AND nervous as time ticks down to the official release date…but it’s really lovely getting all this pre-publication love from industry journals, early readers, and bloggers. I’m quite sure I don’t know how to act anymore! I’m very happy that everyone seems to be embracing the book, which I thought may be a big departure from what I usually do, but maybe it’s not? I don’t know, I’m not the best judge of my own work. It really never occurred to me that my Scotty series was technically a cozy series–despite the weed, swearing, violence and sex–but Scotty, despite being licensed, never actually had a client (the guy up on the fourth floor in Vieux Carré Voodoo does actually hire him before he is murdered) but usually, he’s just going about his day to day existence when he stumbles over a body or some kind of criminal conspiracy. But when I got home from work yesterday I puzzled over that bad bad chapter, and so this morning I am going to try to get it fixed up once and for all before diving headfirst into Chapter Four. I have some errands that must be run today–and I am going to order a Costco delivery–and I also have some cleaning around here that simply must be done; but I am hoping to avoid the allure and pull of college football as much as I can today to try to get as much done as I can on the Scotty today.

I also did the laundry once I was home, and finished clearing the dishes piled up in the sink–which even now are awaiting me to unload them from the dishwasher and put them away once and for all–and once Paul was home we settled in for Dahmer, which continues to be disturbing and hard-to-watch and almost documentary-like in style, tone, look, and story. Evan Peters and Niecy Nash should each take home Emmys for their work here; Niecy is absolutely stealing every scene she is in, and Peters looks so much like Dahmer…it’s also disturbing to watch as a gay man who went home with a lot of people he had just met for the first time. It really is a wonder there aren’t more serial killers in the gay community, and they certainly wouldn’t have much difficulty in finding potential victims thanks to the casual hook-up culture always so prevalent in gay male communities (which has always been something I want to write about; either in essay or fiction form); a sort of Looking for Mr. Goodbar sort of thing only with gay men. (I should reread that book; I haven’t in years–not since it was a thing anyway. I was thinking lately I should reread all the “thing” books from the 1970’s–Jonathan Livingston Seagull, Coma, Looking for Mr. Goodbar, Jaws, Love Story, etc.–to see how they hold up and what, if anything, they have to say or can be said about the culture and society of the time and why those books, all so disparate, were so successful and popular at the time.)

I slept wonderfully last night, which is always a delight and a plus, and my coffee is tasting rather marvelous this morning. It is most definitely hitting the spot, that’s for sure. I feel rested and good this morning, which makes it a great day for getting things done. I am also thinking about taking my car to the coin-operated self-wash while I am out and about today (reminder: check projected path for Tropical Storm Ian; the one off the Cape Verde Islands formed first and took the name Hermine), and I also want to do some cleaning around the writing. We should be able to watch the LSU game tonight, even though it is on a lesser ESPN/SEC Network sub-channel, which is annoying–but I get it; LSU-New Mexico is a “who cares?” game outside of Louisiana.

I also spent some time last night with Every Frat Boy Wants It, my first erotic novel under the name Todd Gregory, and it’s not that bad. I realized that the three “fratboy” books I wrote are of a type, really, and rereading that long-ago written story (I would swear to God it’s been almost since I bought the new car, which was 2017, so it’s been about five years or more since I wrote it in the first place) made me realize that the concordance I want to put together for Scotty needs to be a part of an even larger concordance of all my work; all the different Louisianas I’ve written about and fictionalized over the years, which is even more important now that this Scotty is going to be driven so much by action outside of New Orleans.

I also need to revisit My Cousin Rachel at some point today before tomorrow morning’s podcast taping; I don’t want to rely on my ever-decreasing memory and should at least be somewhat refreshed in my recollections of what is one of my favorite Daphne du Maurier novels, possibly even more favorite than Rebecca. Big words, I know; but while I am certainly more familiar with the text of Rebecca, having read it so many times, I’ve only read My Cousin Rachel once–and came to it within the last decade or so, on the recommendation of Megan Abbott. I’ve seen neither film adaptation, tempting as the original (starring Olivia de Havilland and marking the screen debut of a young Richard Burton) may be; simply because while I know both films are very well-regarded, it’s hard to imagine a du Maurier adaptation finer than either the Hitchcock Rebecca or Nicholas Roeg’s adaptation of Don’t Look Now; with the bar set so high on du Maurier adaptations, how could either version of My Cousin Rachel stand up to them? I recently read a new-to-me du Maurier long story or short novella called “A Border-line Case,” and like all things du Maurier, it is rather marvelously well-written and twists the knife with something obvious that was there in front of you all the time but du Maurier pulls her usual authorial sleight-of-hand that makes the reveal startling and shocking despite being right there in front of the reader the entire time.

I also had wanted to spend some time with my Donna Andrews novel Round Up the Usual Peacocks, but not sure that I’ll have the time necessary. Ah, well. And on that note, I am going to head into the spice mines. I need to brew a second cup of coffee, and there are odds and ends around here that need attention. Have a lovely Saturday, Constant Reader, and I will check in with you again either later today or tomorrow morning.

Over & Over

Monday morning and I slept really well again. I feel rested this morning; but then a weekend of pain killers and muscle relaxers will do that for you. But I do feel better than I have since getting home from Minneapolis this morning, so that’s a start. My back still hurts but it’s bearable–this morning it feels like I simply slept on it wrong rather than making my wince and my eyes water every time I move. I also realized yesterday that if I did everything with proper posture, my back didn’t hurt…you know, doing things the way you’re supposed to–i.e. not bending at the waist to pick something up but rather using my legs, keeping my head erect instead of leaning forward, sitting back in chairs etc. I also did, in addition to the drugs, the alternating heat/cold thing with it, and so I think as long as I don’t do anything particularly stupid in the meantime it’ll keep getting better.

And I should always use good posture and do things properly anyway. Lesson learned.

I did manage to get all the dishes done and put away yesterday, which is lovely. I have a couple of errands to run today–mail, minor groceries, a prescription–but I think the right plan is to do my data entry while doing my heat/cold with my back, and at some point try to do some stretching. I believe my hips and quadriceps have been taking pressure off my back when I walk and do things, which is why they’ve been exhausted for the last few days as well. I don’t know how to avoid this happening again when I travel, but I think it does have more to do with all the standing and laughing–a laughing injury!–than anything else, as I didn’t have the same issues other times I’ve traveled. We did watch the Saints lose yesterday, and then, in my drug-addled state I rewatched the LSU game when it was rebroadcast on SEC Network yesterday, before we watched American Gigolo, House of the Dragon and The Serpent Queen. I wasn’t sure about American Gigolo, because no matter how much I love John Bernthal I just couldn’t see him taking over from Richard Gere, but he did a great job and the second episode really takes the show off–the first is merely set-up and back story, which is why you should always give a show two episodes before deciding to stop watching unless the first episode is so incredibly bad you can’t put yourself through a second (although I will confess to being wrong about Outer Banks, which I found out thanks to the Holmses). Of the three, I believe The Serpent Queen is the best (because you really can’t go wrong with Catherine de Medici; her story alone is dramatic enough for a series), even though they aren’t capturing Diane de Poitiers correctly (Diane was a lot smarter then they are making her out to be, and she was never Catherine’s enemy for the simple reason she preferred Henri to be married to someone he could tolerate but was no threat to her); but I believe the audience wouldn’t get the nuance and sophistication of the game Diane played in reality.

I did start reading Donna Andrews’ Round Up the Usual Peacocks yesterday before I had to start taking meds for my back, and it’s as charming as her books always are. I didn’t get as far as I would have liked because my back’s need for attention by the time the Saints game started could no longer be ignored; and I started reading Daphne du Maurier’s novella “A Border-Line Case” during my brief lucid moments (because it was shorter). It’s an interesting story and one that I will most likely have to start over again in order to get a real reading of it accomplished, but du Maurier is such a genius with mood and her language usage that reading her is akin to getting drunk on the words.

Reading du Maurier is, of course, one of those things that make me wonder why I bother, or what I am trying to do with my work–and she used a typewriter. I can never get past that with writers of the past–that they wrote either first in long-hand or all along on the typewriter–but regardless, it always had to be typed. (Even using Word I make typos on a regular basis and they are far easier to correct on a computer document than they are on onion-skin or bond paper….which makes me think about how Misery couldn’t work today, because Paul would have to be a crank who still used a typewriter instead of a laptop and…you get the picture.)

So, today I hope to start digging out from under. I had never really caught up on everything after Bouchercon (primarily because I’ve been in so much pain since I got home) and so now today I must assess the damage and try to figure out how to get back on the horse I’ve fallen from. I didn’t intend to lose two weeks to Bouchercon but here we are, almost to the end of September and another month of 2022 gone before I knew it and a deadline taking aim at the bull’s eye squarely affixed to the center of my forehead. The house is a mess (as always) and I have a lot of data entry to get done today before venturing out to run the afore-mentioned errands; I also don’t know where I am at financially and need to figure out what bills are left to be paid and so forth. I also need to get this messy house under some sort of control, and I only have so much time every day to deal with these things. Once my back is better, I’m going to start easing back into the gym as well–what better way to get in shape for conferences than being in better physical condition and perhaps dropping some of this extra weight? My blood sugar was surprisingly high the last time I fasted for blood work, which isn’t great–so perhaps the exercise and shift in diet I’ve been avoiding for quite some time has finally reached the point where it’s unavoidable anymore. My natural inclination to laziness doesn’t help matters much in this regard either, but I just have to remember how much I enjoy how I feel after I’ve worked out to help motivate me to get started again. This back shit is a motivator too; if I can keep my back stretched and strengthen my core, I’ll never lose a week to back pain again.

And so, that is the state of the Gregalicious this morning: hopeful, rested, and hoping the sheer amount of work I am behind on won’t send me into a corner whimpering. I am heading into the spice mines, and I shall see you on the other side, Constant Reader.

And as always, thanks for stopping by.

Storms

So this morning my back still hurts, but it’s more of an ache than an agonizing pain the way it has been for since this whole mess started the other day. I am resisting the urge and need and desires to actually go ahead and operate today like normal–I should keep resting it, alternating heat and cold, for at least another day–and also have to remember that yesterday morning it felt better, too–but by noon I was taking muscle relaxers and pain pills and camped out in the easy chair, my brain too wasted by the meds to do much of anything other than watch television all day. No reading, no writing, no nothing.

On the other hand, at least it was College Football Saturday, so I had some good entertainment to watch on it. LSU played Mississippi State last night at the very odd starting time of five pm, and I can see that the Saints and LSU are both back to normal–making you think they’re going to lose the game badly until the second half, and even at that sometimes not until the fourth quarter. LSU trailed 13-0 at one point last night before putting together a beautiful drive in the waning minutes of the first half to pull within 6 points at 13-7 before ultimately dominating the fourth quarter impressively to win 31-16. It was Coach Kelly’s first SEC game, and obviously, his first conference win. Mississippi State usually gives LSU some trouble whenever they play, except for the years when LSU is having A Really Great Year and blows them out; LSU has also lost some incredibly disappointing games to the Bulldogs over the years. (It always seems like other teams in the SEC West always rise up to play their best against us; not sure why that is, but it’s a fact) It was also a very weird day all over the country in sports–with Florida, Arkansas, and Notre Dame squeaking out wins over opponents that should have been overmatched; Texas A&M struggled to beat Miami–yes, it is going to be an interesting year in college football.

Maybe not as interesting and fun as 2007–an EPIC year for college football, and not just saying that because LSU won a national title that year–but still fun and interesting.

I just applied store brand Ben-Gay to my back and the heat feels nice. I do think I should probably spend yet another day in the chair. I think once I post this and do some minor picking up around here I may retire to my easy chair with Donna Andrews’ marvelous Round Up the Usual Peacocks. I also am not sure when the Saints game is today, either. Ah, noon. That should give me a few hours to read before the game comes on. I may even try to use the laptop during the game to do some writing, but it’s going to depend on how much my back stiffens up today as I continue to try to function.

And yes, I am well aware I am obsessing about my back and the pain, but seriously, back pain is one of those things you cannot escape; your back is essential for movement and so forth, and while I am not consciously trying to find out what movements hurt and which don’t…I am slowly figuring it out. Someone suggested to me the other day that this could actually be a laughter injury, and I do think that’s entirely possible, as I can remember laughing so hard my abs and ribs began hurting, and I would bend over sometimes laughing so hard….and that is the most painful position for me to assume since the injury made itself known.

A laughing injury. Only a Gregalicious could injure and incapacitate himself by laughing too hard.

What can I say? I am out of shape for laughing like that any more. THANKS PANDEMIC.

I also have to sometime write up Back to the Garden and The Devil Takes You Home, two of this year’s best novels that I’ve read thus far.

I also need to reread My Cousin Rachel before next weekend’s podcast ZOOM call. Yikes! I also cannot get over how messy and sloppy the apartment has become since my injury made itself known–which is really the thing that is driving me the most crazy of everything here, you know. I had hoped to be able to spend this weekend getting the apartment cleaned up and getting caught up on everything but instead I’ve had to nurse my back and get even more behind on everything.

And on that note, I am going to take Donna and my coffee and retire to my chair for a few hours. Have a lovely Sunday, Constant Reader, and I will check in with you again tomorrow…hopefully with the news that my back is better.

The Chain

And today it is back to the grind of the every day. I think I have CPR training this morning, so I won’t be seeing any clients until the afternoon schedule, but who knows? I feel like I haven’t been to the office in about a thousand years. My back is achy and sore, and our Internet is being wonky, which is aggravating (I’ve already had to reboot the modem twice since we got home) and I hope I am not going to have to deal with Cox (is there any company more aggravating to deal with than Cox Cable?). I am woefully behind on so many things it’s not even funny, and I dread even trying to get through all of my emails. I think I have CPR training this morning–which, given the aches in my back, is going to be absolutely delightful to get through–and I am feeling still very tired this morning. My batteries have not completely recharged yet, but as I drink my coffee and eat my morning peanut butter toast I can’t help but hope that they will give me some energy to help me get through this day.

It’s always a bit of a crushing disappointment to return to reality. I was able to push it off for a day by having a work-at-home day yesterday, but nope–today I will be back in the office, and if that’s not a reality slap in the face, I don’t know what is.

I did finish reading Back to the Garden last evening, which was superb; highly recommended, and more on that to come later. I need to get back into the swing of writing again–Scotty isn’t going to write himself, although you’d think by now he would be able to do that, wouldn’t you?–and I don’t even want to think about what all is in my inbox. The entire time I was gone I basically just tried to keep up with deleting junk mail, but even so there’s a remarkable number of emails that I have to read and at least respond to some. I was already behind before I left on the trip, and I sometimes wonder if I will ever catch up enough to at least tread water with the damned emails. I also have to organize my receipts from the trip–always a joy–and get them turned in for reimbursement, and there’s some other post-Bouchercon clean-up on the anthology that needs to be done, too. Heavy heaving sigh. I need a vacation so I can recover from my vacation; but then again, my vacation wasn’t really a vacation, was it? I had a marvelous time, but it far exceeded my limitations on social engagement. What happens when someone who tends to introversion is forced to be an extrovert for four days? An exhausted Gregalicious who is feeling every minute of his age at this point.

My back is killing me this morning. I may have to go buy some ibuprofen. And it looks like the heating pad tonight while getting caught up on our shows may be in order (yay for the debut of The Serpent Queen!). I am apparently getting too old to travel, and this is not, by any sense or measure of anything, a good development in my life.

So, I think tonight in my easy chair, as my heating pad loosens this horrible tightness or whatever it is in my back that is going on, I may have to simply go back and reread everything I am in the process of writing because I literally do not remember anything that is going on in any of my projects. And since I did finish reading my current book, it might be in my best interests to reread my own before moving on to Donna Andrews’ Round Up the Usual Peacocks (I literally cannot wait to read this; Meg Langslow is one of my favorite series characters of all time).

Tonight on the way home from work I am going to stop and make groceries (I was literally too tired to face doing this yesterday) and then come home to search for my travel mug, which has apparently disappeared. It’s not in the dishwasher nor is it in its usual place in the cupboards. I don’t think I left it at work; and I think I did a load of dishes last week before we left? I don’t know, but it isn’t anywhere it’s supposed to be this morning and I am finding this to be highly irritating.

Well, maybe not highly. More like a popcorn kernel shell stuck between your teeth and gums.

And on that note, I am heading into the spice mines. Have a lovely day, Constant Reader, and I will see you tomorrow.

Warm Ways

Saturday morning in the Lost Apartment and all is well in the world. Southern Decadence is raging in the French Quarter–if someone would have told me as recently as ten years ago I would have ever reached the point where I didn’t care about going down there and diving into the sea of mostly undressed gay men from all over the country I would have laughed at the absurdity, but one gets older and things and priorities change. Do I have fond memories of years of going and having an amazing time? Absolutely. Do I miss those times? Somewhat, but I am also aware that I am older and that kind of wild-ass partying is too much for my old body to handle anymore.

I slept really well last night, which was a delightful and pleasant surprise. When I got home from the office yesterday–running errands on the way home–I was tired, of course, but still managed to do all the bed linens, get the rest of the laundry done, and did two loads of dishes in the dishwasher. There are still some odds and ends around here that need to be taken care of, but other than that, the Lost Apartment is sort of under control. For now, at any rate.

College football is also back this weekend (GEAUX TIGERS!) with LSU playing tomorrow night in the Super Dome. Monday of course is Labor Day, Tuesday I have to go into the office, and then Wednesday it’s off to Minneapolis. Huzzah! As such I will probably get no writing done at all while I am gone–I’ll be too busy running around everywhere–so it would be nice to make some good progress on everything I am working on this weekend. Of course, the temptation to be lazy and simply spend the weekend relaxing is, of course, always going to be there–will probably win out more often than not–but that’s okay. I am done beating myself up for not working every minute of every day every week of every month of every year. Everyone needs down time, and it’s absurd to think otherwise.

My reading is all picked out for the flights/airport time: Laurie R. King’s Back to the Garden, Donna Andrews’ Round Up The Usual Peacocks, and Gabino Iglesias’ The Devil Takes You Home, if I don’t finish it this weekend, with Nelson Algren’s A Walk on the Wild Side on deck. I’ll probably get some books while I’m at Bouchercon, too–the book room is always too big of a temptation for me to avoid completely–and I am pretty overall excited about the trip, and neither flight requires getting up at the break of dawn, either, which is lovely. We also got caught up on Bad Sisters last night, a fun show on Apple Plus–but the one I am really looking forward to is The Serpent Queen, as I love me some Catherine de Medici, and I have long wondered why this fascinating, complex and extremely intelligent woman has never been deemed worthy of a film or a television series (it would have been a great role for Bette Davis back in the 1940s; she would have chewed the scenery like nobody’s business and gotten another Oscar nomination).

This morning’s coffee, by the way, is da bomb. Delicious and hitting the spot, which tells me yet again that I slept incredibly well.

I am feeling particularly good this morning, which is also nice. It’s always nice when you feel rested. Oh! I’ve also been invited to speak on a podcast about Daphne du Maurier’s My Cousin Rachel, which gives me an excellent excuse to reread it!

Alert Constant Readers will have noticed by now that I’ve been making posts about my stand alone novels over the last month or so (maybe just the last couple of weeks? I am not sure of anything anymore and I certainly don’t trust my memories); I am currently working on Timothy and The Orion Mask, after which I will most likely move on to some of the pseudonymous work I’ve done–the Todd Gregory novels, for example–but I should also, in honor of Southern Decadence, talk about Bourbon Street Blues this weekend; but I’ve already done plenty of writing and talking about Scotty and how he came to be, and how I came to write the book and where the idea for it came from, so I’m not entirely sure there’s anything left to say about Scotty and Bourbon Street Blues that I haven’t already said; I’m sure I just don’t remember everything I’ve written on my blog about that book. But it won’t hurt to revisit the book; I know there are some things about the books I’ve never talked about before. but we shall have to see.

And then should I do the short stories? The novellas? Why not? It is my blog, after all, and I can do whatever I please with it, can’t I?

And on that note, I am going to make another cup of coffee before heading into the spice mines. Have a lovely Saturday, Constant Reader, and I will check in again later.

Landslide

Friday and a three-day weekend looms. Huzzah? Huzzah! There’s football games to watch this weekend (GEAUX TIGERS!) as well as a lot of work I need to get done before I leave for Bouchercon next Wednesday. Which is fine, of course. I just have to buckle down and get my head back in the game, is all. I’ve been tired this week after work–part of that is getting up at six in the mornings, certainly–but it’s irksome to not be able to get as much writing (and good writing, not the horrible shit I’ve actually been writing) and reading in every night as I would like before I turn my brain to relax mode. Ideally, I will be able to get some things taken care of this weekend; writing and reading and cleaning and getting ready for the trip. We have a two o’clock flight out in the afternoon, and we have two hours (!) at Midway Airport–but there’s also a Home Run Inn pizza place at that airport (I noticed it when I had to change planes there last spring when I flew to Kentucky–a mistake I shall never made again) and so perhaps we could have some wonderful Chicago-style pizza for dinner on our way to Minneapolis. I think by the time we get to the hotel and check-in and all settled it might be too late in the evening to do much of anything other than unpack; I also have a very early panel on Thursday morning which means I will have to get up around seven.

I hope there’s lots and lots of coffee to be had in the hotel, else it won’t be pretty.

Yesterday was a tired day for sure. I didn’t sleep deeply Wednesday night–not restless per se, but I was in a shallow sleep for most of the evening, if that makes sense? Not that horrible if I open my eyes I will be awake but that half-sleep where you know you’re asleep but you’re also aware of everything? I hate that. So by lunchtime I was already running out of steam and trying to just hang on until I got off work. I was going to run errands on my way home but was too tired and just came straight home (I can stop by the mail and the Fresh Market tonight or go tomorrow). Once again I was too brain-dead to either read or write, but I did make progress on some chores before collapsing into my easy chair to be a Scooter pillow. I watched Venus and Serena play doubles–Paul was out having dinner with a friend–and then we watched Five Days at Memorial and Archer, and finally were able to watch last week’s episode of American Horror Stories–Hulu kept fucking up when we tried before; we’d get halfway into the episode than it would reboot back to the beginning; finally last night it worked–the weird Judith Light gets a facelift episode–and really, it wasn’t worth all that trouble. These stand-alone horror stories are really hit-and-miss, just as they were in the first season; sometimes they are interesting and clever, other times as satisfying as eating something with no flavor. And then it was bedtime.

I slept fairly decently last night and feel a bit of a sleep hangover this morning, which is fine–I’m assuming the coffee will wipe the dust off everything and remove the cobwebs from the corners of my brain–but today is a short day in the office, which is always nice before a three day weekend–and of course, I intend to run those errands tonight (so I don’t have to tomorrow) and I also need to start making a list of the things I need to pack. I know I am going to take Gabino’s book with me to read on the trip, along with the new Donna Andrews (Round Up The Usual Peacocks) and Laurie R. King (Back to the Garden) to read when I have time or at the airport and on the planes; I imagine I’ll finish Gabino on the way up and get started on the Andrews; which I’ll finish in Minneapolis in order to read the King on the flight home. I also have a copy of Nelson Algren’s A Walk on the Wild Side–a friend had posted on social media that they were going to watch the campy film adaptation with Jane Fonda and Barbara Stanwyck, and I thought wasn’t that a book first? It was, and since it’s a New Orleans novel–set in the French Quarter in the 1930’s–I thought perhaps I should read this? So I ordered a copy, and it’s rather well written–I’ve glanced through it a couple of times, always finding some sentence that makes me think wow this is either really amazing or incredibly overwrought and overwritten–which is a very fine line to walk. It’ll be interesting to see whether or not I think it’s amazing when I read it.

I had promised myself I wasn’t going to go down any Internet wormholes again for a while, the other day one of the New Orleans and/or Louisiana history pages posted about the murder of a Storyville madam (which I’ve always thought could be an interesting basis for a book) by her long-time live-in lover to whom she’s always been rather abusive, and it mentioned that her killer, although a common-law spouse, was only able to inherit a very small portion of her estate due to “Louisiana’s concubinage law” and well, how could I not go looking that up? Louisiana has some very bizarre laws, particularly when it comes to inheritance; but you also have to understand that up until the Civil War ended, Louisiana had some very bizarre customs. The “concubinage law” was actually passed to protect the dead person’s “legal” family as well as his “extra-legal” family from each other if there was no will, or even if the will cut out one family to the benefit of the other. It’s from plaçage, of course; that dreadful custom where a wealthy white man had a white wife and children, but also had a Black mistress and children with her.

The “concubinage law”, for the record, was on the books until it was repealed in 1987.

1987.

Jesus.

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

Love Changes

And we’ve made it to Wednesday and Pay-the-Bills day. Hurray? But, as I do like to continually remind myself, at least you CAN pay the bills and still buy groceries and other things, which is a dramatic improvement over the way life used to be. I think back to the days when I worked for the airline and cannot believe the way I used to live; always broke, scrounging for change in the car to buy cigarettes (why didn’t I just quit?), never sure how I was going to get something to eat that day…sometimes not eating at all. Since this was also the period where I tried to get in shape and lose weight–not eating wasn’t as big an issue for me then as it is now. Then again, I’ve always had issues with food, body image, and body dysmorphia (which I still have, I just don’t pay as much attention to it as I used to back in the day when I cared more).

If there’s any kind of neurosis, it seems to be very welcome in my brain.

I was absolutely correct about the insomnia effects yesterday, I might add. Sure enough, all morning long I was a bit cloudy in the head and by the afternoon I was very tired; but I did get some emails answered that needed to be answered and some progress on things that needed to have progress made on them. By the time I got off work, I wasn’t even sure that I’d be able to go pick up the groceries I ordered but Constant Reader, I persisted. I was fucking exhausted after I got them into the house and put away, but I did it. I also swung by and picked up the mail on the way home as well. There were a couple of things that I forgot to put on the list that I considered stopping to pick up as I headed home, but decided they could wait for another evening (tonight, in fact; I can stop by the grocery store in the CBD on my way home, which is not only convenient but easy as well). Yay for me, I think. Today I have to get through that damned to-do list if it kills me–which it might–and so I can start seeing daylight again, or at least get to the surface where I can start treading water again.

I did finish proofing the Bouchercon anthology last evening–I suppose I could start calling it what it actually is, Land of 10000 Thrills, rather than the Bouchercon anthology–and it’s quite the good collection of stories. And an interesting variety of voices, stories, and crimes, at that. I think you will all enjoy it, Constant Reader, when it comes out, and I will be sharing the preorder links and the cover design as soon as they drop into my inbox. This is my third Bouchercon anthology; I did the first New Orleans one (won an Anthony for it, as well) and the St. Petersburg one (my story in that one was nominated for an Anthony Award) and now I’ve done this third one–and I am nominated for two Anthony Awards this year (as Paul says, “two chances to be a loser!”)–and this is it, the last one. I said that after Florida Happens, of course, but I kind of don’t ever want to do any more anthologies of any kind, to be completely honest. I think I am good at putting them together, but there’s not really any money in them anymore–and especially the ones like this, that don’t pay anything at all and are simply a donation of my time and energy, both of which I no longer have in great quantities any longer. I need to save my creative strengths and energies (such as they are) for novels, short stories, and essays. I shouldn’t have agreed to do this one, frankly–something I’ve reminded myself of over and over most of this year–but here we are. To be honest, I don’t remember agreeing to do this one, but I am betting it happened on that horrible drunken afternoon at St. Petersburg Bouchercon when bad influences got me to drink that Low ‘n’ Slow stuff.

Yes, that’s probably when it happened.

I did not, in fact, get trained on the monkeypox vaccine yesterday after all. Our program’s nurse had an emergency and couldn’t make it in, so we had to reschedule it. I’m right now blanking on when that was moved to, but I’ll certainly find out tomorrow morning when I get to the office (I only bring the laptop home on the weekends, because Monday is my work-at-home day). I also slept really well last night–my sinuses kicked in at some point overnight, so I’m a bit phlegmy this morning (ugh) but I am also fairly certain a Claritin will do the trick on that. I have one more thing to get done today before I am finally free and clear to work specifically on Mississippi River Mischief, and I hope to get that story edited today. I also read some more of Curtis Ippolito’s Burying the Newspaper Man, which I am enjoying–the book certainly gets off to a big start–and we watched some episodes o Control Z last night–we’re on Season Three, but don’t really remember much of the plot or the story from previous seasons, although they are doing something rather interesting with a queer storyline that I’m not very certain how I feel about. But it makes me think, which is always a good thing–good art, whether it’s a book, film or TV show, should always make the viewer/reader think a little bit; that’s what art is supposed to do, challenge and inspire.

I also picked up copies of new releases yesterday: Donna Andrews’ Round Up The Usual Peacocks, Gabino Iglesias’ The Devil Takes You Home, and Amina Akhtar’s Kismet. Definitely some good reading in my future; I’ll probably move the Iglesias up the TBR Pile to next position after I finish the Ippolito.

And on that note, Constant Reader, I am going to head into the spice mines. You have a lovely day now, you hear? And I will check in with you again tomorrow. Happy Wednesday to all!