Tag: Saints and Sinners

Holiday

Don’t I wish? Paul and I periodically talk about taking an actual vacation that is a vacation for both of us (he sometimes comes to crime conferences with me as a vacation for him), but the problem is always time. I have to use my vacation time from work to go to these conferences, not to mention visit my family since they live over seven hundred miles away, which makes saving some time for an actual, I don’t know, vacation at a beach resort or something hard for me to do. I think the last actual vacation-for-both-of-us that we took was Italy all those years ago. And after this weekend I am thinking that in the future I am going to have to take time off from work for Saints & Sinners the way I used to, so that I can enjoy it a lot more, the way I used to be able to do. We must have had someone feed Skittle for us back in the day? And Scooter? Or did we board them? I honestly don’t remember. Boarding Scooter would probably be the easiest because then I wouldn’t have to commute at all; the easiest of course would be to park the car at the hotel but I am NOT paying for Hotel Monteleone parking, which is INSANELY expensive. It would cost over a hundred dollars to park at the hotel, at least.

And yeah, I don’t want to pay that when I’d only use the car sporadically anyway.

Sigh. The trials and tribulations of living in New Orleans when there’s a literary event going on in the city.

I was very tired and dragging yesterday; I was definitely operating on Accessory and not recharging. I somehow made it through my work day (I was amazed, what can I say?) and got my work done, cleaned out my email inbox, etc. etc. etc. It’s always so humdrum and sad when you go back to your regular life after getting to be an AUTHOR for the entire weekend, you know? Paul was home, so we actually got to spend the evening together for the first time in I don’t know how long; we watched Ted Lasso and The Mandalorian, which was nice. I just love Ted Lasso, and who would have thought way back in season one that Jamie Tartt would become one of the more likable characters on the show? I hate that it’s the last season, but at the same time I love that they aren’t deviating from the original plan for the show’s story arc despite it’s success, and sometimes it’s best to walk away when you’re on top. There was a wonderful scene for Brett Goldstein in episode 2 that also kind of reflected that mentality; where he ponders whether his decision, when he realized that he was getting older and starting to slow down, to leave Chelsea before he just became an old geezer and was dropped; leaving on his own terms rather than being asked–which is kind of what Ted Lasso as a show is doing.

As I was so tired and dragging when I got home last night, I didn’t get any work on the book done. I intend to make up for that tonight. I slept great last night–I feel rested which is lovely–and feel like I can get back on track today after yesterday’s transitional day. There’s always a bit of decompression after a weekend of being an author, and this year was a bit interesting. I’ve become a bit more reflective, and since turning sixty, as you well know, I’ve started looking back over my life. Paul said last night that since it was the twentieth Saints and Sinners, he’d been doing it for a third of his life–which made me realize I’ve been an author for a third of mine. When you look at it in those kinds of terms its a bit more staggering, isn’t it? My first book came out twenty-one years ago; my first published fiction came out twenty-three years ago. I’ve been doing this for a very long time, haven’t I? I guess it’s about time that I stopped being self-deprecating and started appreciating what I’ve accomplished? (Author friends have been trying to get me to change that about myself for years now; it’s still very hard for me to do what I consider ‘bragging’, because as a child it was hammered into my head that you only praised other people and it was up to other people to praise you; but I am also beginning to realize that isn’t very emotionally healthy, and it’s incredibly self-defeating, which is the last thing I need more of in my life.)

It’s also raining again this morning; while it would have been a pain in the ass for it to have rained over the weekend I kind of wish it had–that would have taken care of the humidity, so I wouldn’t have been a disgusting sweat rag most of the time. The rain of course makes me want to curl back up under a blanket with a book and let Scooter sleep in my lap, but alas, I must go into the office and do my job so I can get paid so I can continue to be a functioning member of American society. Tonight on the way home from work I have to swing uptown to get the mail and make groceries–I didn’t get around the refrigerator last night, so I’ll have to do that tonight–and then I want to work on my book for a while and then do some more catch-up cleaning. I need to make a new to-do list, and I also need to work on the living room, which has been out of control for quite some time now, and the books are a complete and utter disaster. I also want to get started reading Scorched Grace tonight, too. I also have to sort of get used to the idea of having Paul home in the evenings again–it’s not like he won’t be upstairs working on his computer, but it’ll be nice having him around and maybe Scooter will stop feeling so forlorn and abandoned. (The amount of guilt a cat can make you feel is really amazing.)

And on that note, I am going to grab my umbrella and head out into the spice mines. Have a lovely Tuesday, Constant Reader, and I’ll check in with you again later.

Burning Up

Back to life, and back to reality.

Sigh.

I am tired this morning and really wishing I had taken the day off so I can sleep in and get my act together today; the apartment is a mess and there are errands that I should run not to mention chores that built up while I was Festing this weekend. I am also a bit drained, like my batteries need recharging. I slept decently last night (Scooter kept waking me up throughout the night) but I easily felt like I could sleep more. Ah, well, no choice but to buckle up and dive headfirst into the week and just go to bed early every night so I can get somewhat recharged. I think the weekend went very well; I just wish I could divide myself up (or have clones) so I can see and hang out with everyone I want to; the problem is there is so little time to see and do everything and it kind of slips through my fingers. I also should have taken more time off from work–today, for example–to make it easier on me both physically and intellectually, so that I can commute from home to take care of Scooter while still seeing people and getting to do a lot more. I had to leave last night after dinner and walked home (it was rather hot and humid all weekend, which is unusual for March so I was sweating a lot, which is also unpleasant because even after it dries you feel sticky still), and of course was soaked and tired when I got home. (I walked home twice from the Quarter this weekend, which is more walking than I’ve done since probably Carnival, 2018.) Probably not the best thing to do, but no streetcar ever passed me on the walk home either night, but once I started walking I just kept walking and after I walk past Poydras I’m like kind of dumb to catch a cab or call a Lyft now so wind up walking on. It’s usually once I’ve walked under the highway that I think yeah walking wasn’t the best decision here.

The panel I moderated went well, I thought; my panelists (Marco Carocari, John Copenhaver, Kelly J. Ford) were spectacular, witty, smart and presented themselves extremely well and made me look intelligent and like a good moderator, so thanks, y’all. We had a nice turnout and some good questions from the audience. My reading went well on Saturday (I was also glad to get a chance to read “This Town”, which I’ve not had a chance to do before), and of course, I had some lovely meals with friends during the course of the weekend. Everyone seemed to be having a good time over the course of the weekend (one of the best things, for me, about Saints and Sinners is how it’s so incredibly upbeat; everyone is in a collegial mood, if not a good one. I generally come away from S&S inspired and ready to get back to the keyboard–and I do feel that way this morning, or would if I didn’t feel so tired. (I really should have taken a Lyft home last night; it was a bad decision to walk…but the exercise was something I needed and I need to do more of, and just because I’m out of shape and not used to walking distances anymore should serve as a wake-up call to start getting back in shape.) But my coffee is doing the trick this morning, and I am waking up mentally. Physically everything is tired–my toe is sore, another reason I shouldn’t have walked home twice–but mentally I’m okay, and I bet my shower will wake me up this morning. I probably should have taken one before I went to bed.

And now it’s reality time again, and back to the ritual of sleep, work, write, cuddle with the cat while watching television. The apartment somehow is a mess–I don’t know how that happened when neither one of us was home for most of the weekend, but it’s the case. I have laundry to do and dishes to put away and I need to go through the refrigerator and clean out stuff that spoiled over the weekend (always a joy!) and rearrange the rugs and the floors need cleaning and…sigh. It really never ends, does it? And I need to get back to work on the book. I was going to bring it with me to the Monteleone so I could work on it over the weekend, but as I was packing I said to myself you always do this and then you never even THINK about it and my interior voice was 100% correct. I am going to probably take the first half of the revision to my easy chair tonight at some point and start doing a line edit on it. I don’t think my brain is functioning well enough today for me to be able to work on revising tonight, but a line edit to check for sentence structure and rhythm and overuse of the same words? That I can do with a purring kitty asleep in my life…and I may just go to bed early, too.

Gosh, so many options! But I definitely need to get gas soon. I’d forgotten that I didn’t get gas Friday morning, which was on my errands-list before heading to the Quarter. But what a lovely weekend it was, from beginning to end. I had drinks with friends–lots and lots of drinks–and some lovely meals (Palace Cafe, Mr. B’s Bistro–one can never go wrong with a Brennan restaurant), and lots of laughter and hilarity and good times. I love being around writers.

And now I can look ahead to my trip to Bethesda for Malice Domestic, which will be the next time I will be around writers for an entire weekend, which is marvelous. (After that, it won’t be until Bouchercon in San Diego, which is far too long.)

And I think I am definitely reading Scorched Grace next. I heard Margot Douaihy read from it this weekend, and after listening to her on panels… yeah, I need to read about the lesbian amateur private eye nun with a gold tooth sooner rather than later.

And on that note, I am going to drag my butt to the office and get this week going. Have a lovely Monday, Constant Reader.

We Found Love

Friday and Saints and Sinners starts today! In fact, the box office is probably already open and people are picking up their badges and bags and programs as I type this. I’ll be heading down there later this afternoon–taking a Lyft to the Monteleone–because I do have some things to get done this morning and early afternoon. I’ve taken today off from work because I’ll be losing the weekend to Saints and Sinners, so all the things I usually do on the weekends, I have to do before I head down there today. I’ll be coming back tomorrow night to spend the night with Scooter and make sure he’s okay, and then of course after the closing on Sunday I have to get back home because I have to get up early for work on Monday morning. I will undoubtedly be drained and tired from all the talking and walking and socializing–things I’m generally not used to anymore–so I am glad that I took the time to get ahead of day job work this week so there won’t be a lot of pressure for me to get things done Monday; it’s nice to ease your way back into your reality after a weekend of talking about books and writing.

I didn’t get as much done as I might have hoped for last night, alas. I did get some good work on the book done, which is great, and I did do some things around here. I also spent some time watching this week’s Superman and Lois, which I am still enjoying but the recasting of Jonathan hasn’t really stuck with yet–which makes me feel bad for the replacement actor (I always thought of Al Corley as Stephen on Dynasty, even though his replacement Jack Coleman played the part far longer)–but I like the way the show portrays Superman and I also like the “cozy” aspects of the setting being Smallville. I meant to pick out a book to start reading last night but couldn’t decide which one; I’m thinking The Lost Americans by Christopher Bollen (his A Beautiful Crime is perhaps one of my favorite queer crime novels, for any number of reasons) or Margot Douaihy’s Scorched Grace, which sounds really fantastic. I also have any number of other crime novels on hand, and I’ve also been thinking that I should probably read in another genre for a while to cleanse the palate in a way; that’s kind of why Scorched Grace is appealing; it looks and sounds highly original and deeply clever. I won’t have time to read anything this weekend anyway, if I don’t have time to get started today on my reading. I am almost finished with The Power Broker, too; and I have a lot of thoughts about the book that coincide with other massive books I’ve read about political power and those who have and wield it which I will undoubtedly share with you, Constant Reader, once I’ve finally finished the book.

It’s a bit overcast outside this morning, and I also feel very well rested. I slept very well last night and I allowed myself to sleep later than usual. I woke up at three, five, and again at six, and decided that it was better to sleep in–although I probably should have gotten up early so I can sleep tonight at the hotel. Paul got the same massive suite he had last year, so it’s kind of fun to have that place as an escape from everything. I’ll take pictures and post them once I get down there. I do have to run get the mail, do some laundry and more cleaning as well as writing and editing this morning. I am also resisting the urge to take the manuscript with me down there this weekend; I doubt very seriously that I would ever have the time to actually sit down and work on it. I think I’ll just take the laptop and see if I can keep revising rather than copy-editing the first half just yet.

I stepped away from this for awhile and came back to it, after getting to work on the laundry and the dishes issues (unloading and putting away; washing and starting another load in the dishwasher). I am going to be able to run the errands in a little bit, and then I’m going to straighten up around here and try to get heading down to the Quarter a little earlier than I’d planned. I probably should pick up some things for the room–sodas and so forth–but maybe not. I don’t know. I always end up taking more stuff with me than I need, which I just then have to lug back home with me.

And on that note, I am going to bring this to a close and do more work around the house so I can run the errands and get down to Saints and Sinners. Have a lovely Friday morning, Constant Reader, and I will check in with you again later.

Shut Up and Drive

Thursday morning and all is quiet and still in the Lost Apartment. Again, I didn’t want to get up this morning, but forced myself out–the constant whining from a hungry cat for the assist, seriously; he hasn’t shut up since I got up even though I have fed him–but that’s okay. I am taking tomorrow off because of Saints and Sinners, so being tired today is okay. I’m always tired by Thursday. I wasn’t that tired when I got home from work yesterday, so I was able to get some work done, which felt great–I also realized that after today I will be over halfway finished, with an end to the revisions in sight. It’s coming along very well and I’m quite pleased with it, and very happy I seem to have been able to get back into the groove after a very difficult period. I stopped by the post office to get the mail yesterday–some things I needed and ordered had arrived–and then came home to work for a glorious couple of hours before I started doing chores around here. I also watched the second episode of Ted Lasso, which I am still loving; I’ve seen some dissatisfaction on social media about the new (final) season; I have no quibbles or concerns with it so far. The show’s heart is still there, the character relationships are just as strong if not even more poignant, and I think they are taking us on a wonderful ride this final season. I love this show so much I don’t even wonder what’s going to happen or even speculate about it; I am more than content to simply enjoy the ride for what it is without looking ahead. (I don’t want to look ahead because I don’t want it to end.)

Tonight when I get off work I get to come home, do some more work on the book, and relax. Tomorrow I’ll move into the hotel for the night–I’m going to come home Saturday night to keep Scooter company, and then will commute back on Sunday before coming home in the evening. I also am probably going to try to do some organizing and cleaning before spending some quality time with Scooter in the easy chair. I also need to figure out what I am going to read from at the reading series on Saturday; but I can think about that tomorrow morning after I’ve slept in and feel a bit more rested than I do this morning. I slept pretty well last night; I pretty much slept through the entire night but I do remember waking up around one thirty in the morning before going back to sleep. But my coffee is jumpstarting my brain and body as I type this, and I am sure I shall make it through this day without a problem. I will probably just come straight home from work tonight; I can run errands tomorrow and get things done around the house before I head down to the hotel.

I’m looking forward to this weekend primarily to see people I’ve not seen in a hot minute. Some terrific crime writers are coming in for the weekend–Jean Redmann, Michael Nava, Cheryl Head, John Copenhaver, Marco Carocari, Shawn Cosby, and Kelly J. Ford, to name a few–and so am looking forward to seeing my crime fiction family as well as the other S&S regulars. I didn’t really do much last year because I was revising A Streetcar Named Murder, but this year I’ve managed to not be as far behind as I usually am at this time of year. (Make no mistake, though–I have a lot of catching up to do before May 1, believe you me.) Maybe when I get home tonight, after working, I can start reading something new. I haven’t decided on my next read yet, which is terrible since I finished reading my last book Sunday, and haven’t started anything new. I am almost finished with my years-long reading of Robert Caro’s The Power Broker, which has kind of turned into an Afghan War of sorts around the Lost Apartment; something that’s been going on forever with no end in sight. I think I am going to read something by David McCullough as my next major-length non-fiction read; either the Johnstown Flood or the Panama Canal one; I’ve not been able to decide but I think I have about another hundred pages or so of the Caro to go anyway so there’s plenty of time for me to decide.

I can’t believe March is almost over already, either.

I need to get my taxes done. Next weekend, for sure.

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

Rude Boy

And we’ve made it to Wednesday, Constant Reader! Isn’t it marvelous? Paul is moving into our suite at the Monteleone today; I will be moving (sort of) down there on Friday, but will be going back and forth between the Lost Apartment and the hotel over the weekend. Scooter is going to lonely and needy and definitely not happy, but who knows how their brains work and what their concept of time is? I am going to not head down to the Quarter until later in the afternoon on Friday anyway, and I’ll probably head back home after the reading/anthology launch on Saturday night before heading back on Sunday morning. I also have to do a reading on Saturday afternoon, so I probably should decide what I am going to read sometime before then and maybe practice a little bit?

I did get some work done on the book yesterday (huzzah!) which always feels good, and overall, outside of how cold it was at work (seriously, it felt like we were working in a refrigerator at the office yesterday; my knit cap was on most of the day), was a pretty good day. Yay for good days! I’m starting to feel more like myself than I have in a very long time, which is pleasant. I was beginning to think old Gregalicious was gone for good, another casualty of a pandemic, a crumbling society, and too much change too fast in too short a time. It’s nice to have the old Greg feeling again’; one where I am not stressed and have anxiety non-stop and can actually come home from the office, do some chores and some writing, and then relax in my easy chair with a purring kitty sleeping in my life and actually not feel guilty for not doing anything.

Because you know , sometimes you just have to do nothing. And enjoy it.

I went down another research rabbit hole the other day, too–I really want to write a book set in a foster-care home or an orphanage; crime or horror or some combination of both. One popped up on Facebook the other day on one of my old New Orleans pages; I think ain’t there no more is the page. Anyway, there was a Catholic boys’ orphanage in the area (actually, it was Marrero, so on the West Bank) called Hope Haven, where the boys were emotionally, physically, and sexually abused for years. (Thank God it’s closed now.) But it hits all my sweet spots, especially with the Archdiocese and the Catholic Church as the villains of the piece. And of course it was closed down after the scandals started hitting, about ten years ago.

I slept okay last night–not the greatest; I didn’t want to wake up this morning and I feel sleepy still, which means I’ll be dragging unless coffee comes to my rescue. I suppose I should be grateful that this is the first iffy night’s sleep I’ve had in a while. A lot of it, I think, has to do with Paul packing last night. I had already gone to bed by the time he got home, and he started packing once he was here. I woke up when he came home, and then had some issues falling back asleep but finally did. But here I am, forced out of bed at an ungodly hour, gradually and slowly waking up as I slurp my coffee and hope that time will slow down so I can put off going into the office. It’s really more the getting ready and driving over there that I dread more so than actually getting to the office, being there, and working. I just wish today were Thursday already, so the weekend would be closer. I am taking Friday off, so I don’t have to worry about any working-at-home duties, and can just spend the day at home doing things and getting packed and prepared to head down there before I actually do.

And of course, Paul won’t be coming home tonight or tomorrow, so Scooter is going to be needing lots of attention, so after I get home tonight and do some work–it’ll be over to my easy chair to be a cat bed for the rest of the evening.

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

Only Girl in the World

I saw that John Jakes died yesterday–or they announced he had passed yesterday–which was kind of jolting; primarily because he’d come across my radar again lately. I don’t remember who or how, but I was looking at something or looking up something and a quote from him about reviews and critics and his place in American literature, or he was asked about the literary stars of the day or something (these memory lapses are so aggravating) but I loved what his response was: I don’t remember exactly the comparison, but he compared books to wine: his were an inexpensive wine you could pick up at a grocery store, satisfying but nothing special, while others were the really rare and fine vintages you went down into the cellar to retrieve and had to blow dust off the bottle. (It may have been meats; I can’t remember exactly but the wine analogy seemed more correct and apt, frankly.) I appreciated that, because I spent a lot of my teens and early twenties reading Jakes’ American history novels. They were fun to read but not great, and I wound up reading the entire eight volume Kent Family Chronicles as well as the North and South trilogy (and I think in some weird way the train of thought that led me to the Jakes quote was remembering Kirstie Alley and Patrick Swayze in the mini-series of North and South, because I was also thinking about the Civil War because I was watching Civil War documentaries on Youtube, which led me to abolitionists and a meme I saw reading I don’t argue with people John Brown would have shot and you see how that all goes; the weird and twisted slipperiness of my mind. I hadn’t thought about Jakes in years; and now he’s popped up twice within a couple of weeks. (He was ninety, so had a long and full and vastly successful life. Those books were all bestsellers and the first three of the Kent books were filmed for television; I think the original plan was to film them all but that ended after the third made for television movie.)

I think there were eight books in the Kent Family series; the original plan was to follow the family through American history, but the book series ended in the 1880’s, I think; it ended before the twentieth century–which was smart. How would you cover the world wars and Vietnam? Civil rights? These were very pro-Americana books, too; they were all part of the big Bicentennial Celebration of 1976–which was a very big deal at the time, if you weren’t born yet, and the years leading up to 7/4/76 were a lot of patriotic overkill, frankly. Every business and company had some sort of Bicentennial celebration tie-in, starting in about 1974, I think, so by the time the actual Bicentennial rolled around many of us were already sick and tired of hearing about it. We had just moved to Kansas that summer, and we still only could get one channel–CBS out of Kansas City. (Hard to believe there was a time when you could live somewhere and only get one channel, but it used to be very commonplace, and there were only three networks anyway.) The primary problem, for me, with the Kent series was how plausible is it that every member of this family is a friend or acquaintance of every famous person in our history?

I slept well again last night, which is marvelous. I did laundry and put the dishes away after work, and made a grocery run, picked up a prescription, and got the mail. I was a busy Gregalicious yesterday, and I worked some more on the book as well. I feel a lot better about the book–it’s not nearly as terrible as I had feared; I really do need to work on not hating my work or at least going overboard as far as their condition, frankly. I am looking forward to making some more good progress this weekend as well; now that I am feeling more myself again (I feel good this morning, too) I think I am going to be able to get all of this finished and revised and reworked and handled and improved. This is the part of writing a book that I enjoy; the drudgery is the first draft, and the polishing and improving is the most satisfying, because you see and can feel it taking shape.

I did break down and watch the first episode of the new season of Ted Lasso without Paul last night; it was marvelous, as expected, and just such a delightful show and characters. I decided it was okay to go ahead and watch because I figured I wouldn’t mind a second watch when the Festivals are over. It just might well be my favorite comedy series of all time; definitely up there with Schitt’s Creek and Cheers for sure. Today I also am heading in to see the doctor this afternoon about my toe, which still hurts to bend and twinges when I walk, but I am not limping. Maybe it’s a waste of the doctor’s time, but you never know, and once you’re past sixty you kind of have to take any of these sorts of things that happen seriously. (I have a tendency to ignore it and hope it goes away on its own.) It’s been nearly a month since it all started; I think it was exactly four weeks ago today that it started hurting and initially swelled, but between Carnival and Mom, I didn’t really have a chance to get in, and as soon as I was able to know for sure I could make an appointment and keep it, I did–and this was the first one available. Fingers crossed it isn’t anything more serious than arthritis or (sigh) gout.

It’s amazing what a difference to my overall mood getting back on the writing horse makes, seriously. Now that I am working on the manuscript again, I’m sleeping better and feel more settled and like myself again, which is lovely–I was beginning to wonder. I wasn’t quite as tired yesterday when I left the office, and I have to say, it’s been marvelous feeling rested and being able to work again. Much as I whine and complain about writing–usually, it’s not the writing itself I complain about, but rather deadline stress more than anything else–I do love it, I do love doing it, and it really makes me happy. I recently realized that while my primary identity is author, another identity (and one I’ve held much longer than author) is reader. I have always been, first and foremost, a reader. I love to read, and wish I had more time to do so; hence the not worrying about ever being bored if and when I do get to the point of retirement–there will always be books to read, stories to write, and something to clean around the house. I am only bored if and when I choose to be; and there’s also always some movie I haven’t seen I can stream, too. I’m a homebody, and the older I get the more true that becomes. I am putting off a Costco run until after the Festivals, even though we’re getting low on things and out of others; there’s no point in doing much restocking of the kitchen since Paul will be moving down to the hotel on Wednesday and not coming home until either Sunday or Monday. I need to figure out what I am doing over the weekend myself. I think I have something Saturday morning, a reading that afternoon, and then a panel on Sunday? I don’t know, I’d have to check I suppose, and at some point I should get that all put into my phone calendar.

And on that note, I am heading into the spice mines. Have a lovely Thursday, Constant Reader, and I will check in with you again tomorrow.

Lust to Love

It’s literally amazing how much stuff fell by the wayside over the last couple of weeks, really. I realized yesterday that it was already the 26th and thought how can that be? Mom just died on Valentine’s Day–twlve days ago? But I went to the office the rest of that week and drove over for the funeral last weekend, and then I was on bereavement leave and worked at home–the Fat Tuesday holiday fell in the midst of my leave–and today I am going back into the office, which feels like a step in the right direction towards normalcy, of a sort. Life does goes on, and as I’ve moped around this last week, it also kind of feels like I’ve been in a fog of sorts for quite some time. I should be used to this sort of thing, as it always happens with a paradigm shift–like how the weekend before Katrina we’d gone to Hammond to celebrate my birthday and had a great time…and while we were evacuated, that seemed like was a different life, a different world, and even happened to different people. Murder in the Magic City/Murder on the Menu seems like it was months ago. And hadn’t I just turned in the manuscript that week before I left, with plans to get back on it as soon as I recovered from that trip? Then Mom had her stroke and everything went up into the air, and now I’m trying to find all the balls I dropped somewhere that I had been somehow managing to keep up in the air.

Yesterday was a gorgeous day; it was eighty degrees when I made groceries and gassed up the car. I kept the toe elevated and iced for most of the rest of the day while I read more of Abby Collette’s marvelous Body and Soul Food–which I am really enjoying–and then around five gave up on everything for the rest of the day. I printed out a short story I need to read to see if I can revise it into something that I can turn in for this anthology I’ve committed a story to, and of course I have to dive back into the manuscripts. I have to write something for Paul for Saints and Sinners; and I think I may have agreed to write something else? I need to do thank you cards and I need to mail the books to the winners of the Facebook page takeover giveaway that I did. I need to check in on my dad and sister, and of course at some point this week the fuse for the dryer is going to arrive so I can see if I can get that working again (prayers are appreciated and welcomed; not having a dryer has really sucked). I also ordered some other things I need. I just feel like I don’t have a grasp yet on my own life, and I don’t really like the way it feels. It’s almost like I am swimming through a fog, and things I used to easily remember and keep track of now just go right out of my mind like they were never there in my head in the first place. I don’t like this feeling; I don’t like not being able to trust my memory anymore–but even now as I write this I am wondering hasn’t this been the case for a while? Isn’t that why you started making lists in the first place–because if you didn’t write it down you’d forget?

I can’t even trust my memory about my memory. There’s a Kafka novel in there somewhere.

I’m also more aware of how quickly I tire now, too. I know that’s been going on for a while–since last summer’s horrific bout with Long COVID–but I am hoping that once I get back into the gym I will start building up my endurance again, and I also have to accept that it won’t be quick and my body won’t change at the speed that it used to. For one example, I was overweight when I moved back to New Orleans in August of 2001; I’d lost twenty pounds and tightened up everything by Halloween so I could wear a slutty costume. I’m not going to be able to return to the gym and be able to dress slutty again within eight weeks. (Not that I would dress slutty now–I’m in my sixties, for God’s sake, and I don’t care whether people think I look good or not anymore. It was never the priority of the gym for me in the first place. Yes, I liked looking good and yes, I liked getting flirted with and hit on, but for me that was a nice side effect to having the endurance to dance for hours, or feeling good physically.

God, I used to be so vain! I don’t really miss vanity, though.

One of the things I was working on before Mom had the final stroke was building a website–just something to play around with when I have time (ha ha ha ha ha, sure, Greg, that’s going to happen) and of course, that was the same fucking day I got the text from my sister, so I’ve not done a whole hell of a lot there, you know? I did get the domain registered, and I loaded a picture as well as info on A Streetcar Named Murder, but it’s going to take me some more time to learn how to do all the things I want it to do.

Because I am just swimming in free time.

I’m a bit groggy this morning, mainly because I am out of the habit of waking up to the alarm now–it actually jolted me awake, as opposed to me already being awake when it goes off, which means a retraining of myself yet again as this does not feel natural to me. It feels weird having to go back to the office this morning, as well. My toe’s not quite as painful this morning, either–it still hurts, mind you, but I can walk without limping and it’s not as bad as it has been, which is progress. I am still going to message my doctor today, though. We’ll see how it feels at the end of the day, won’t we? I suppose I can always ice it again once I am home tonight.

And on that note, I am heading into the spice mines. Have the best Monday you can, Constant Reader.

Live With Me

Wednesday and Pay the Bills Day has rolled around yet again. Woo-hoo!

Yesterday I was working on cleaning out my inbox–an ongoing struggle, but it’s suddenly gotten easier lately–and around noonish an email from Left Coast Crime dropped in letting me know that A Streetcar Named Murder had been selected as a finalist for the Lefty Awards! I certainly wasn’t expecting anything like that to ever happen, so thanks to everyone who listed me on their ballot. It’s a tough category–the other nominees are Ellen Byron for Bayou Book Thief, Catriona McPherson for Scot in a Trap, Jennifer Chow for Death by Bubble Tea, and A. J. Devlin for Five Moves of Doom. Such a thrill, really, and to be nominated against authors for whom I have so much respect and admiration for their talents and achievements already? And so many other amazing nominees in the other categories as well–including lots of friends! Kellye Garrett, Alex Segura, James L’Etoile, Karen Odden, Laurie R. King, Gigi Pandian, Rob Osler, Eli Cranor, Wanda Morris, and Catriona again (nominated TWICE!!!!). I’m really sorry I won’t be going to Left Coast this year. I had a marvelous time last year, but it’s also the week before TWFest and Saints & Sinners, and there’s no way I could take that much time off so close together–let alone leave the week before the festivals. I’d come home to find the locks changed, seriously. So many amazing reads this past year on this list, and there I am, right there with some of my favorite people.

It’s always lovely to get recognized, of course. Award nominations are always a lovely pat on the back, and yes, while I often joke about always losing everything I am ever nominated for (I love pretending to be bitter and cynical about losing awards), it is indeed a great honor and a thrill and all those things they’re supposed to make you feel like. Being nominated for mainstream awards, like this and the Anthonys, was never in my thoughts or calculations (to be fair, I never think about awards when I’m writing something)–so yes, for the kid who used to give acceptances speeches to the mirror holding a shampoo bottle as a stand-in for an Oscar, it’s an honor and a thrill and a privilege. I mean, winning isn’t really in my control–anyone who’s ever nominated’s control–so I just look at it as a lovely nice job thumbs-up from the community and add it to my author bio.

I slept really well again last night and this morning I don’t feel tired or sore and my mind is completely alert–yesterday there was some residual fog from my trip still, and leftover exhaustion–but today feels absolutely great. I ran errands after I got off work yesterday–some books and other things came in the mail yesterday, including my Rainbow candles (a client gave me one for Christmas; I loved the smell, and then had to go searching on line to find more of them) and the leather-bound copies of Rebecca and Echoes from the Macabre by Daphne du Maurier as produced by the International Collectors’ Library (about time I got two really nice editions of two of my favorite books). I was terribly tired when I got home from work yesterday so I pretty much melted into my easy chair with Scooter asleep in my lap and just watched videos on Youtube (I went down a Rihanna wormhole for a good while–I’d forgotten how amazing her music was–while also looking up videos from Hadestown, whose score I’ve been listening to every since I got home; I cannot tell you how much I loved this show). I need to pay the bills today and get back to work on the book–I’m behind again and am really going to have to work my ass off to get it done by the end of the month now, no time for goofing off or anything other than a major push; I also have a short story to finish that I’ve promised to a friend for an anthology; that will be a nice creative and intellectual challenge to try to get finished around the book, too.

So, yes, Constant Reader, as you can probably tell I’m in a really good place this morning. My coffee is marvelous, I got a lovely pat on the back from the mystery community yesterday (“they like me! they really like me!”), and I am feeling great about my writing and my future. We’ll see how long this happy feeling and inspiration lasts, won’t we? I also think the cold or sinus thing that’s been going on with me since I flew to New York has finally been given the boot by my immune system, which is really nice. (I always feel terrible when I travel–part of it is the lack of sleep and the dehydration caused by the pressure changes required for flying; one of these days I’ll learn to drink water and replenish electrolytes when I travel instead of just drinking Cokes and coffee and alcohol; you’d think I’d know better by now but I clearly do not) But I feel like me again for the first time in what seems like a really long time, and it’s going to take some getting used to and adjusting again. (This weekend especially is going to feel weird as fuck, to be honest.)

And on that note, I am heading into the spice mines. Have a lovely Wednesday, Constant Reader, and I will chat with you again tomorrow.

Baton Rouge Bingo

Ah, Scotty–the series that will never die.

It never ceases to amaze me the way this series has been embraced by readers, or that twenty years after turning in the first one here I am writing the ninth (or it is the eighth?) volume. It just goes to show that trying to come up with a plan for your writing career (at least in my case) is a fool’s game. Revisiting my work the way I have been recently–in part because I am writing another book in this seemingly endless series–has also reminded me of plans that have gone awry over the years; things I was trying to do with my writing and the series and the stand-alones that somehow got lost in the shuffle of trying to make a living while trying to be a writer at the same time as well as balance volunteer work, editing, and my relationship and my responsibilities around the house; and sometimes wondering if maybe I shouldn’t revisit and/or revive those plans. I’d like to get a lot of projects I’ve been thinking about for years or have in some sort of progress finished at long last before I come up with anything new–the problem, of course, being that there’s always something new poking its way out from the deep dark corners and recesses of my creative mind.

I famously said on a panel at Saints and Sinners, when asked about the potentiality of another book in the Scotty series, that if I could “think of a way to include Mike the Tiger from LSU along with Huey Long and his deduct box, I would” and of course, a few days later it struck me across the face like a bitch slap from Joan Crawford as Mildred Pierce, and so I started making notes as the story started forming in my head.

I’d been wanting to write about Huey Long ever since I’d read the T. Harry Williams oral biography, Huey Long, which won every award on the planet back in the early 1950’s when it was originally published. I’d been trying to sort out fact from fiction when it came to Long for quite some time by the time someone recommended the Williams volume to me; I was very interested to find out what the actual truth about Long was, separated out from all the noise. I knew about the Kingfish from my US History text book, which devoted an entire paragraph to the “most dangerous politician in American history, the demagogue from Louisiana” without getting into much depth about his rise, what he did, and why he was so reviled.

The GPS in our brand new Explorer announced that it was about ninety miles to Baton Rouge from New Orleans when Frank punched in the coordinates into it before pulling away from the curb at the airport.

I stifled a laugh. It might only be ninety miles, but to a New Orleanian it’s like being sucked into a wormhole and winding up in another dimension.

Of course, New Orleanians are horrible snobs about the city’s suburbs, always making snarky jokes about needing shots and a passport to head over to the West Bank or out to Metairie, so it should be no surprise that we also look down our noses at the rest of Louisiana. We act like there’s no intelligent life outside of Orleans Parish; nowhere decent to eat, no art or culture to speak of, and certainly no one we’d want to associate with could possibly live out there. It’s not true, of course—but we like to pretend it is.

As my Louisiana History teacher at Jesuit High School once sniffed contemptuously, “President Jefferson offered Napoleon $10 million dollars for New Orleans, and for an extra five million he threw in the rest of the continent west of the Mississippi.”

Needless to say, this snobbish disdain for the rest of Louisiana was hardly endearing—which quite frequently means New Orleans gets screwed over by the state legislature.

So, when Frank first mentioned this trip to Baton Rouge, I reacted the way any true New Orleanian would. I scrunched up my face like I’d smelled something really awful and said, “Ew. Do we have to?”

He rolled his eyes. “Yes, we do, and we need to buy a new car.”

This was even more horrifying to me than going to Baton Rouge, to be honest. I hate to drive—I always have. I don’t even like riding in cars. Given the way people drive in New Orleans, it’s understandable. Most drivers in New Orleans don’t use their signals, ignore street signs and traffic laws if inconvenient, and no one here knows how to make a left turn properly at an intersection. It always amazes me that there aren’t more traffic fatalities.

As I had mentioned in my entry on Who Dat Whodunnit, I had always liked LSU; how can you not love a team that actually has a LIVE TIGER mascot? But of course I was always Auburn first then Alabama; LSU was my third favorite SEC team, and after we moved here it kept creeping closer and closer until I only rooted against LSU when they were playing Auburn, which then became I’m happy whoever wins but after Katrina? I went all in on LSU. Paul and I went to our first game in 2010, the Mississippi game, and it was incredibly exciting and I became an even bigger fan; there literally is nothing like a Saturday night in Death Valley, and remember–I’d gone to plenty of college games in my life before that experience, and I thought the Auburn-Florida game in 1993 was the biggest and most exciting game day experience I’d ever had…

…and then I went to an LSU rivalry game at night in Tiger Stadium, and no, there’s absolutely nothing like that experience, anywhere, any time. And I love Mike the Tiger. (every time I go to a game I stop by the habitat to see if he’s out in the yard so I can say hello; he’s such a beautiful animal.) Constant Reader is undoubtedly very tired of listen to me about my LSU fandom and how much I love going to games in Tiger Stadium, but there probably wouldn’t be LSU football as we know it if not for Huey Long. Huey Long turned LSU from a small-enrollment C level state university into what is today, or at least got it started. He’s the reason the stadium is shaped the way it is (he wanted to expand the stadium but there was no money in the budget for it–but there was money to build a new dorm…so he built the dormitory into the stadium. The stadium only stopped being a functioning dorm in the 1980’s or 90’s I believe, and I think there’s a plan to refurbish and reopen the dorm…so yes, Tiger Stadium is the only football stadium in the world that can also serve as a dorm…and the football stadium was used as a staging center for the evacuation of New Orleans after the Katrina flood), and he encouraged the students to raise the money to get a live tiger mascot.

When I was puzzling over how to work all of these elements into a modern-day crime novel, there was a bomb threat on the LSU campus which resulted in an evacuation of the campus. The administration made sure Mike the Tiger was secured and evacuated safely before the general evacuation call, and of course, the students who think football is over-emphasized and prioritized over the university’s primary role as an institute of higher learning (they aren’t wrong, for the record) were furious and outraged that the tiger was giving a priority over the students. I don’t blame them in the least for those horrible optics, but I also understood where Admin was coming from; it was all a part of their safety strategy, and I am sorry, when you have a live tiger habitat on your campus, you kind of have to take that into consideration. Would you want to try to evacuate a tiger during the chaos of a general campus evacuation? How many things could go wrong in that situation? (And the question of whether there should be a live tiger habitat on a college campus is certainly one that should be discussed–traditions aren’t always a good thing–but not in the midst of a chaotic situation and a threat to campus safety. And as I understand it, his team of vets and veterinary students moved very quickly and it resulted in perhaps a fifteen minute delay in the general evacuation call? And leaving him on an abandoned campus was just not an option. So I decided to start my book with Scotty and Frank heading to Baton Rouge, getting caught in the evacuation panic traffic, while Mom is currently being arrested for slapping the state Attorney General. Mike gets kidnapped during the evacuation by a rabid animal rights’ movement, and the leader of the group turns out to not only be from New Orleans but also connected to Huey Long–her grandfather worked for him, and was killed in a car accident shortly after Huey was assassinated.

And at the root of everything is the deduct box. the big strongbox of cash Huey always kept on hand to pay for “unexpected expenses” no one wanted a record of–and I even brought back a villain from the past. I also introduced a new character to the family dynamic: Taylor Rutledge, Frank’s nephew from Corinth County, Alabama (see? all of my books are connected), disowned by his religious rural Southern parents after he came out to them and comes to New Orleans to live with them (I had an eye to spinning Taylor off into his own y/a crime series, but it hasn’t happened yet).

And this book has, perhaps, one of my favorite scenes ever in a Scotty book–when he realizes the bad guys have set he and Taylor adrift at sea…and Mike the Tiger is also on the boat with them (hat tip to Life of Pi).

And having now introduced a new character to the family dynamic, I could hardly call it quits on the series after that–so I knew there was going to be yet another.

Because Scotty will never. ever go away.

I Am…I Said

Monday morning and I am working at home today; hurray! Data entry to be done, emails to check and answer, amongst various other things that must be done today. Later on, I am going to go over my manuscript one more time to make sure I caught everything and made every change that needed to be made, and then sending it off to my editor. Whew. I spent most of the weekend working on it, and I am pretty pleased with the work I’ve done. Is any of that work any good? Remains to be seen, but I think I managed to do what was asked of me. At least, I hope so.

I slept really well last night–I am definitely on a “good sleep” roll now–and actually woke up before six this morning, but stayed in bed until seven. I feel rested–this entire past week, once I got over the exhaustion from the trip, has been a miracle of feeling rested and good sleep–which is a lovely change from the norm around here. We watched the latest episode of Gaslit last night–I am not sure what the point of all the “Liddy being insane in prison” was about other than just filler; but the tragedy of Martha Mitchell is hard to watch play out fictionally, since I watched it play out in real life. I was an early teen at the time of Watergate; I turned thirteen in 1974, and even though I was apolitical at the time and paid very little attention to politics, just going along with what my parents believed until I got a little bit older and started paying more attention, Watergate was ubiquitous; it was everywhere. The hearings aired on every network every day, preempting everything I usually watched when I was home from school on vacation; it was on the news, in the was in the newspapers, Mad and Cracked magazines talked about it endlessly…I can only imagine how viral Watergate would be in today’s world, but on the other hand, it would have been a lot uglier in this current political climate.

And whatever else can be said about Nixon, when it was obvious how bad it was going to get for him, he did what was best for the country and stepped down–even if it was really what was best for him.

We also watched another episode of Merlí, but while it was very well done, it’s beginning to drag a little bit. The cast is very appealing, but there’s really no melodrama (or much of it, anyway); it’s really about a bunch of college kids learning about themselves and learning about the world, and there’s not even a lot of relationship drama. We’ll probably finish it off–they are all appealing, after all–but it’s not a must-watch must-finish kind of thing for us. We also started watching the new season of The Boys last night, which is interesting–I am really waiting for the arrival of Jensen Ackles, whose character has been teased since almost the opening of the season–and so we’ll probably stick with that. We also watched the first episode of Obi-wan Kenobi, which was better than I would have thought, and we’ll definitely go on watching that. I’m really in the mood for a good crime show, to be honest, and will probably go digging around on Acorn and Britbox to find something.

I was too burned out from the book yesterday to read anything last night, so The Mother Next Door continues to rest on my side table next to my easy chair. Maybe tonight, maybe tonight.

The kitchen is also in a bit of a mess this morning. I still have things that need to be filed and things that need to be put away–there’s also stuff in the refrigerator that needs to be tossed–but that’s cool. I can take care of that when my eyes get bleary from entering data and I need to take a break away from the computer. And my eyes will definitely get bleary; they always do when I’m doing this kind of work, which is why I am glad I don’t have to do it every day.

I also have to start preparing for my class this Saturday. I do have my notes I was going to use for the Saints and Sinners workshop (that I wound up not bringing with me when I went to the Monteleone to teach it, so had to wing it) but this is also going to be slightly longer than the S&S workshop, so I need to be better prepared, and I definitely don’t want to try to wing it at nine thirty in the morning. So, that’s the next big thing when I get this manuscript sent off later today. As I was also saying the other day, I am thinking it might be smart to go ahead and try to write a first draft of Mississippi River Mischief before trying to do anything else, so it can sit for awhile before I get back to it with fresh eyes–it really does help to divorce yourself from the work for a period of time. I think that really worked well with Royal Street Reveillon, and it’s probably the best and smartest way for me to get going on this new Scotty. I also am thinking I should go back and reread the entire series–not thoroughly, just a skimming–so I can get a handle on his voice again, maybe figure out some things, find some things from his past that might need to be circled around back to again. I’m thinking maybe a villain from the past might need to come back into his life at this time again…and of course, there’s the personal story that was left hanging at the end of RSR…I really need to stop doing that, don’t I?

And on that note, I am going to head into the spice mines. Have a lovely day, Constant Reader, and I will chat at you again tomorrow.