Whew! We have returned, sunburned and happy and everything we own covered in sand. A really fun weekend playing in sand and water and sun at the Great Sand Dunes Nat'l Park. It was a yearly family vacation for forever, put aside for a couple years, now recovered. I got married there! One of the most beautiful spots in the world. My world, anyway.

So today I will be going back and forth between writing and knocking sand off of crap in the garage. The end of the novel is close - maybe the end of the week.

Great baseball game last night. The Mets earned a split with the Dodgers and proved they CAN play with the big boys. Meanwhile, Sara's Braves have won 5 straight and are moving up in the NL East.

Congrats on finishing the Tara saga, Scott.

Coffee and a cookie without so much sand in it, please.

Carl! I love Kid Creole! Even saw them in concert in NYC back in the day. Good tune. Thanks Fuzzy.

Another gray overcast day, though it’s pretty warm out. Packing for a mini-trip out to Sand Dune Natl Park with Talia and my daughter and her beau. It was a yearly family trip for a very long time.

Also looking to break 105k words today. And STILL won’t make it to the end. 110k length (for this draft) is looking likely. Cut 20k in the next draft - that won’t be hard, the characters wander around aimlessly for like 100 pages.

Coffee and cookies Would be swell!

Cool moment in the game last night (Elizabeth will appreciate this) - Mets pitcher was pitching to the Nat's Juan Soto, 2-2 count, and had him struck out, but the ump called it a ball, and on the next pitch he walked. Soto shook his head "no" to the pitcher, like "you thought you had me, but you lost me" and beamed this big smile, and the the Mets pitcher responded with a giant grin. It was very cool, that shared smile.

Small moment, but made the game for me.

Writing calls. A coffee and a cookie please!

Cool and overcast here. No Talia Thursday. The cats and my car keys are both gone - I think they stole my car and are hanging out at a cat cafe somewhere, drinking cat coffee.

A got a story coming out today that I am very close to, and I hope I am not being untoward by putting the link here. https://books2read.com/amt-into-the-briny-deep At he time, I thought this was the best thing I'd ever written. I will let you judge for yourself.

Thanks for the coffee, Ape, and the cookies, Sara.

I love to begin the day with a thunderstorm, Carl. Sadly it's sunny and warm here.

Ventured out with my daughter last night for the meteor shower. It was pretty good, I think we saw around 30 between us. Hung out and talked in the dark and watched the sky.

Today I'm taking the dangerous step of stopping work on the novel for a few days, to write a story for an anthology I REALLY want to enter.

Thanks for the coffee Ape, and the cookies Sara.

Onward!

Quote by Mendalla

So as I bring this saga to a close, I find myself realizing how little I thought through the world beyond how sorcery works (and even that kind of got built ad hoc). Tech-wise, we have a blacksmith as a character so presumably sometime in the Iron Age or later in Earth terms. But then again, there must have been smiths making bronze items in the Bronze Age. However, I think Iron Age is about right. The society is fairly decentralized. Tana and her friends live in villages in a river valley. There's mention of a larger community upstream but it never comes into play. There's no sign of governors or other officials, just a reference or two to Lond the smith being a village "headman", which could just mean an elder member of the community who takes leadership when needed. An alliance defeated The Night Lord but who were the allies is unmentioned.

So it is all pretty vague and what I do introduce is purely in the service of the story. For instance, we know there was some kind of ancient history that produced Pras Tola in The Healer's Power but that's about all there is as far as history.

If I was to expand this into a novel or more, then I would have to spend some time to develop these ideas more. But this is likely staying as is (three short stories that I might eventually combine into a novella) so I am not inclined to spend more time on this world for now. But there is a revelation at the end of the final story that could turn into a hook for a sequel (you'll know it when you read it) so who knows?

Interesting stuff.

As a practical matter, I'm finding my world building contradictory in several places, and I'm not even trying to true it now. I'm going to write it down AFTER the first draft, so I have canon to follow for the second draft.

Quote by Mendalla

For others who may be wondering about the meteor storm/shower:

https://starwalk.space/en/news/meteor-storms

Apparently though, it is not a sure thing. It depends on some suppositions about a how a comet broke up in 1995.

Yep. It looks to be all or nothing. If the pieces of comet exited faster than 60 mph, things might get crazy. Otherwise, nada. But it's early, at 11 pm MST, so easy to catch. I read somewhere that between 11:00 and 11:22 the Earth will pass through three separate streams of dust.

I saw one back in 2001 and it was spectacular. A spiritual experience.

Enjoy the weekend, word-heads! Off to do lawn work.

An iced coffee please. And a cookie!

Thanks for the coffee and cookies Sara. Long and rowdy parties are fun!

Red, my back is hurting from dragging broken tree limbs out of the back yard. You have my sympathies.

I'll break 100,000 words today. Kind of an arbitrary accomplishment, in that I'm not done. Still, it feels good.

The weekend is all lawn, all the time. I'll grill salmon and steak on Monday. And remember - Monday night could bring a HUGE meteor shower. Maybe a meteor storm! Go out! Look up!

A coffee and a meteor-shaped cookie please.

Quote by Mendalla
Though the fact that ours was a clear hate crime, more like the Buffalo shootings in that way, kind of ups the ante (the family were Muslims from Pakistan, the driver was a white supremacist piece of ****).

They're all hate crimes. It's all hate.

I'm at 98.5k words, so that is my focus. I gotta do therapy and hit the drugstore, so it will be tight, but I'm so close to typing "The End" I can smell it.

I am trying to nurture hope for American Democracy these days. It ain't easy.

Coffee and a cookie please.

Sad day in Texas.

I'll just sit here and try to write the horror away.

Peace everyone.

Nice to see you writing rather than deleting Scott. And adding to an existing world must be fun.

Happy birthday, Bob Dylan. 81. Jeez.

I blew off physical therapy. Pure laziness. Energy level is low, but I will carry on. Do my thousand words, meet the tree guy to get at the one tree I can't trim. If only there were multiple tins of cookies sitting around I could steal from to generate the necessary sugar high to get my energy levels up. Hmmm.

Hey, I have a thought!

A coffee and ALL THE COOKIES please.

Good Lord, Sara, thanks for the coffee and all the cookies. I will have fifteen snickerdoodles. I will space them out, one every hour, until bedtime.

Cool airplane, Anna May. I like the little toy airfield.

Cleaning up broken limbs today. What a mess. Gonna have to call a tree guy for one of them - wet snow busted off the top of a tree. I'd post a picture if I weren't so lazy.

Other than than, a slight warming trend, 1000 words to write, and short story critique night, so I have to critique 2 stories. Better get to it.

Appreciate the coffee and cookies!

We got a FOOT of snow last night. Several trees in the back yard cracked. We'll have to wait for a thaw to see if any of them were damaged.

And...the Mets are in Denver, and last night got snowed out, so today they are playing A DOUBLE HEADER IN THE SNOW. Should be entertaining at least.

Novel critique got canceled today too. So it's just me and Talia and the cats and the snow. I'm sure we can find something fun to do.

A coffee and a...*OMG A BANDIT JUST CAME AND TOOK ALL THE COOKIES!!!*

Hey Sara, we're physical therapy buddies! I've got another 4 weeks. Yeah, that really sucks about Scherzer. Our pitchers can't stay healthy.

Cold and rainy now, and a frikkin SNOWSTORM on the way (sorry Sara) so I've gotta prepare the garden and shut off the sprinklers. Snow? Isn't in May? checks watch

It a good day to hunker down and write, though, when chores are done.

A coffee and cookie please!

Good morning everyone!

It's No Talia Thursday. The cats seem surprisingly calm. Little do they know (evil laugh). Should hit 94K words today. Like climbing a mountain. Also physical therapy today, also actual therapy today. I like both therapy sessions, luckily.

Mets won last night, and they are playing now, but I'm saving the game for tonight. The evil Yankees are soaring - best team in baseball. Grrr.

A cookie and a coffee please. Time to make the donuts.

Gamera walks into a bar.

“You’re a shell of your former self,” said the bartender.

I’ll be here all week. Top your waitress! Sorry, that’s not very funny, but I am not fully awake yet.

Different day, same stuff on the table: write, walk, eat, baseball. You’d think I’d get bored. I’ve got 10k-ish words to go, I am in high gear. Even the cats have noticed (not really).

Coffee and a cookie please!

I am REwatching True Detective, the HBO show from several years back. It is SO good. Dark dark stuff, with a hint of cosmic horror. What really makes it works is that perfect balance between McConauhey (sp?) and Woody Harrelson. McConauhey is OUT THERE, weird and intense, and without Harrelson grounding it with his regular guy humor, it really would be too much. As is, it’s perfect.

And Alexandra Daddario is celebrity crush-worthy. Hubba Hubba.

It holds up really well.

Warm day, double header, a long stretch of time to write in: ready to begin the day.

My brain is still waking up, though, so not much to say. blink, blink

Maybe a coffee and a cookie will get my neurons stirring.

Quote by Mendalla

"In dead R'lyeh, Cthulhu waits dreaming"

If you are stuck sleeping off the eons in a tomb under the Pacific Ocean, what better way to wake up and destroy humanity than with some strong black Costa Rican coffee? Or a few cups of English Breakfast tea? Now being served here in Inspirations.

Hides strange book bound in human skin under the counter and walks away whistling

🤣 (interpret that as mad cackling rather than ROTFL)

R'lyeh lies dreaming at 48° 52′ 36″S 123° 23′ 36″W. It's where we are going to drop the space station after we quit using it. Can you say conspiracy theory? I set a story on another site there (Beneath).

I'm prolly gonna try Culbard's graphic novel "The King in Yellow."

Anyway. Long relaxing weekend, but it's time to write. The eclipse last night was mostly too cloudy to see, but caught some clear sky right after totality here.

Coffee and cookies please!

Quote by Mendalla

I read Robert Chambers' original stories about The King in Yellow decades ago, long before True Detective referenced it. Actually, the best King in Yellow story I have read is "River of Night's Dreaming" (1981) by the late Karl Edward Wagner. Brilliantly disturbing piece of horror. It first appeared in Whispers 3 edited by Stuart David Schiff, but has been reprinted a few times since. If you like King in Yellow, it is worth hunting it down. Apparently, it was also adapted for the TV series "The Hunger".

Glad to hear you had a good time at StokerCon. I have never been to one of the big cons but should do it someday.

I’m open to any suggestions you have on other books dealing with the mythos - I didn’t know much about it. I was looking around at graphic novels about it tonight - I may go that route. I’m a little scared I will find the 1890s prose a little impenetrable (like I do Lovecraft).

Stokercon was indeed cool - I recommend it. It’ll stoke (heh) up your enthusiasm to write for sure.

Quote by DenimAngel

Good morning folks

First one in ....

Putting on the tea kettle and making coffee

Yay coffee is on the way. There is red rose and Earl Grey tea in the cute tea pots on the counter .. Red Rose is in the tea pot with pink roses and Earl Grey is in the tea pot with blue roses

sits the tea chest and hot chocolate storage chest on the counter .. sits out marshmallows (nibbles a couple) yep still Fresh

peeks in the cookie jars hmm no cookie bandits yet

Woke up early ...noisy neighbors grrr. But it's LIBRARY DAY so it's a good day

Molly the monkey is hanging out and wonders who needs a monkey hug

giving the adorable critters fresh water and morning treats

climbing up in my favorite overstuffed chair with the morning paper and a cup of coffe and a couple of cookies

Stay safe everyone

I will always take a monkey hug from that little scamp. :)

Nice to see you hanging out here, lil coffee.

Back from StokerCon, and feeling refreshed and reinvigorated. So many good ideas, so many talented writers, and everyone just wants to help! Everyone there has their own skill set, and it was so nice to share what little I know, and shamelessly borrow from folks with more experience and talent. Biggest obsession, post-con, is The King in Yellow, which is a crazy strange set of four stories that sort of invented cosmic horror. That HBO show True Detective often referred to it, several years ago. Very creepy stuff. Binged a bunch of TD last night. And I’ve seen it before! Looking forward to reading the stories.

Just raked, laid down new grass seed, and watered. Frikkin tired. Way to late for coffee, but something iced and decaf would be nice. And a cookie!

Congrats to your son, Red. And again to yours Scott.

I also have reason to celebrate - I sold a story to the NoSleep podcast, and it's finally out! Season 17, episode 16, I'm about 1:12 in. It actually came out in March, but they never told me! I finally saw the payment.

Off to StokerCon this weekend, to workshops and networking (shudder). It'll be fun, if a little out of my comfort zone - my first Con (except for a Star Trek one in high school).

Yeah, our bullpen is stating to falter, Sara. I liked Reid-Foley - former Brave isn't he?

A coffee and a cookie please.

Congrats on your son's job, Scott.

Boring day today, just the way I like 'em! I broke 90k yesterday. Should come in just under 92k today. I've got an Excel chart of my progress I'm tempted to post, but I'm not sure anyone cares.

My decade old Nintendo Wii baseball came yesterday. Unsurprisingly, I hurt my shoulder pitching right away, trying to get a few more MPH on my fastball. My physical therapist will not be pleased.

Okay. Time to get to work. Coffee and a cookie would be great!

Those trilliums are beautiful, Scott. Cool flower, cool name (sounds a little science-fiction-y).

Not fully rested up, but doing better. It kicked my butt to get a thousand words down yesterday, but I did. Just broke 90k. I feel like I'm running a marathon.

Nice day today. Gotta get a haircut for StokerCon this weekend! I'll probably squeeze a walk in too.

Thanks for the coffee and cookies!

Thanks for the donuts, Carl, and the coffee, Scott.

I didn't sleep well so I'm a little irritable. It's a regular writing day, with physical therapy in the middle. This is the kind of day where I don't think I'm going to write well, because my brain isn't working, and I used to just take the day off writing. But I'm at 87k, I'm chomping (champing?) at the bit to finish. So I'll clean up the bad writing in the rewrite.

A LOT of coffee, and a Sara cookie too!

Hey, Gabby! Welcome!

Quote by Mendalla
Dreamt there was this big robot bug in my house and when I tried to smash it with a hammer, it regenerated itself. 😨

Robot bugs! What a wonderful way to begin the day! Ever see Runaway? It's pretty good.

Same ol, same ol today. I'm building raised flower bed boxes this weekend, and then sealing them - we'll set them up in a couple weekends (I'm going to StokerCon next weekend!). Also going to a play Saturday.

I hope you guys don't get sick of me droning on about baseball, but...the Mets had a 7-run ninth inning comeback last night that was thrilling. Biggest comeback win in 25 years. This may be be the year. They scored 7 runs in a 29 pitch span to take the lead. Yikes.

I really wish I could take naps - I just can't, my body won't fall asleep. I often have nights where I don't sleep well, so I want to take them. It just doesn't work.

Time to get to it.

Coffee and cookie please, thanks to Ape and Sara for making them.

Where's Ping? SOMEONE FIND PING!!!

Quote by Mendalla

Um, getting the sprinkler system up after shoulder surgery? 😒

Nice weather here. Since Verbs got the coffee going, I'll just make a pot of hot Red Rose and a pitcher of iced for the non-coffee crowd.

Typed too fast. Shoulder physical therapy. Which I'm doing to avoid surgery.

250 words to go. Sprinkler guy is here. Pedal to the metal.

There are cookies but no coffee? I can do coffee. plugs in percolator from 1964

No Talia Thursday. The cats are trembling in inchoate fear.

Busy day. Write my thousand, shoulder surgery, get the sprinkler system up and going, and try to sneak in a walk. Boring. I like boring.

Sorry about your tummy, Sara. Thanks for the cookies!

Quote by Mendalla

Nice pile of calls for submissions for themed magazine issues and anthologies. Some are weirdly specific (houses that are no longer there), others are quite broad. Genres are all over the place. There's at least one in support of Ukraine. Many are due end of this month so get cracking, literary types.

https://authorspublish.com/46-themed-submission-calls-for-may-2022/

The Kolchak anthology sounds fun!