December News, 2001

michaeljasper.net

"Another Wrecked Web Site"

Dec. 19, 2001

Where'd that week go?

Now Playing:

"Just Say Noel," various artists

Today's Quote:

Outside the City of All-Worlds, winter started early and overstayed its visit, like a cold foreigner so jealous of all that a new land has to offer that he won't leave.

Update from later:

Well, this is nice -- actually did some writing! Wow. What a feeling. I have some two and a half pages on a new story set in Subaridon, in the eastern ghetto of Riverrun Alley, outside the City of All-Worlds. My main character is Toggle, a three-mouthed being from another world, and... well, I don't want to say more. Once I get my outline put together, I should have close to 1,000 words for the day. Woo-hoo! Let's see if I can keep this up for 2 days in a row!

Now we're off to Middle-Earth. Later!

From earlier:

For some reason, December has not been a very productive month so far. Sheesh. Haven't felt like doing much of anything, just reading Lord of the Rings and scraping by at work, looking forward to my week off next week. Seems like everything and everyone is shut down for the rest of the year, including editors -- I haven't heard much in the past few weeks on my various submissions out at different magazines. Sigh. I guess no news is better than bad news, right? Somethin' like that...

The good news is that we're going to see "Fellowship of the Ring" tonight at the Raleigh Grande, after pizza at Lilly's next door. I've been waiting so long to see this flick that I'm having trouble believing it's actually here. Part of me feels like a goofy little kid again, but the other part is holding back, afraid of getting burned again as I did with the Star Wars prequel... As long as it has most of the cool aspects of the novel, I'll be happy.

Speaking of, I finished the last book of LotR last night! Read about 150 pages in a day! The Return of the King really kicks butt as far as action and tying up all the plotlines. I still feel like the "Scouring of the Shire" section feels tacked on (see my review), but it does make sense, in that it makes the hobbits' return more important, and the recovery of the Shire more meaningful. And I loved the scene with Sam replanting trees using the elven dust, and planting the elven tree in place of Frodo's lost tree where his birthday party was held.

Ah, but I digress... I think I'm gonna read up on some stories and magazines that I've fallen behind with, including the Legends antho by Bob Silverberg (I call him Bob, y'know), along with Black Gate #2, and the past fews Asimov's and F&SFs and the four single-author collections I have -- Dozois, Andy Duncan, Jim Kelly, and James Blaylock. That oughta keep me busy for a while.

I'm checking out stories again because I want to write some more stories to go into circulation. I have a Surprise story I'm hoping to write tomorrow, then a horror story for an antho whose deadline is the end of the year, and then... either some new stories or maybe finishing the novel I started last month.

Man, I'm listening to this twisted xmas collection, "Just Say Noel," and the current song is by Sonic Youth: "Santa Doesn't Cop Out on Dope!" It's like Adam Sandler meets Alice Cooper. Too funny. Lots of cool stuff on the CD, including a duet by Aimee Mann and her hubby Michael Penn, XTC, Beck's "The Little Drum Machine Boy," and a sad (lots of sad songs, actually, which says something, I guess) Wild Colonials song, "Christmas is Quiet." Beats the heck out The Carpenters or Barbra Streisand's millionth rendition of "Home for Christmas."

It's hard to believe it's gonna be xmas here in less than a week -- the temps are in the high 60s again today, and the whole month has been incredibly mild. Not that I miss the piles of snow, the minus-twenty windchills, and the bitter gray skies of Iowa and Nebraska, but I would like to see some cold weather for the holidays!

On that note, I need to get something done on my Secret Project. I want to read over all I have so far for Ghetto Dwellers and see if there's a short story or two in there. Wish me luck!
mjj

Dec. 12, 2001

Geekin' out!

Now Playing:

"O Brother Where Art Thou" soundtrack

Now Reading:

The Lord of the Rings (Two Towers, Book IV),
JRR Tolkien

Today's Quote:

"Come, boy," Master Bartamus said, motioning to Peet. "You are my memory know. Join us for my last adventure, the last ride of the Ghetto Dwellers."

Got 'em -- got the tickets to the Show. Eight seats to see "The Fellowship of the Ring" on opening day. And instead of the 3-hour line I (like a fool) waited in to see the crappy "Star Wars" prequel 2 years ago, I had to wait behind 3 people. Crazy.

I've been doing my best to not get my hopes up for this one, but it's hard. These books are what led me down this dark and exotic path of being a writer. I realize the movies will never compare to what's already in my head from reading all four books about 4 times, but it'll be cool to see how close Peter Jackson and his crew get! And of course I'm dying to see what Gollum looks like (hopefully not like Jar Jar Binks!) or witness Boromir turn bad, or what I'm expecting to be the highpoint of the film, the journey into Moria. Even Bilbo's eleventy-first birthday part should be swell. I'm pumped.

Now we just have to make sure everyone can come -- I have tickets for everyone, plus one extra. I felt a little bad, buying 8 tickets all at once, but oh well. What's $60? I actually felt a little sad for the guy behind me -- I was talking to the girl taking tickets about the line for Star Wars, and he said he'd been in that line too. After I got my tickets, he stepped up and bought just one ticket to the first show of the day. I can't think of anything more sad than going to a show like this alone, and I can vouch for that -- when I first moved here, I went to a matinee of "Forrest Gump" all by my lonesome, and it felt... weird.

In other news, Lizzie's just about done with her fall classes! I'm just looking over her last paper before she emails it off. Then she's free! I'm so insanely jealous. She deserves some time off though. She's been working like crazy since the semester started. She'll be busy refinishing and covering our kitchen chairs, and taking it easy. I have the last full week of December off myself, so it'll be fun. We BOTH need it.

Got a couple nice rejections today for stories, including a fairly quick reject from Weird Tales, who like playing the "alas" game, but had good comments on the story (beats a form letter any day!). I may take some of their advice and try and shorten up the story. I also did some tweaking to the draft of "Ghetto Dwellers" to see if I can't use some of the concepts there for a short story or novella. I hate to see all that work go to waste, or sit unused until I have the time and energy to tackle a novel again. We'll see how it goes. But first I wanna give "Black Angels" one more once-over, then send it out again!

Congrats to Greg for winning the non-prize for recognizing the Van Halen song lyrics as "Hot for Teacher." Thanks also for the news about Eddie's hip replacement (cringe). So much info available on the net, isn't there?

Oh, and did I tell you I got tickets to see "Lord of the Rings"??? Woo-hoo! See ya.
mjj

Dec. 11, 2001

"I heard you missed me -- I'm back! I brought my pencil... gimme somethin' to write on, man!"
(name that Van Halen song!)

Now Playing:

"Charlotte, NC, Live," Pearl Jam

Now Reading:

The Lord of the Rings (Two Towers, Book IV),
JRR Tolkien

Today's Quote:

The lords of the lands, and even the King, would never admit to their knowledge of the outriders and their vigilante methods, yet all looked to the outriders for assistance when legal methods had become fruitless. Always a dozen men strong, the outriders were made up of the once-criminal, the now-lost, the always-angry, and the recently-reborn, yet their own histories remained by necessity locked in secrecy. The outriders had their Code, and that was enough.

Good morning. It really is a good morning, evening if I did stay up too late last night (and slept in this a.m. as a result!). I deserved it, 'cause I actually sat down and did an hour of quality writing last night! Finally. I'm hoping my brief hiatus is over, after almost a month, really, of doing nothing but wool-gathering (not really sure what that means, but that's what I feel like I was doing!).

I started off last evening by finishing of the third book of the trilogy, so I get to go to Mordor with Sam and Frodo next. I'm really noticing the attention to detail Tolkien has put into his book in this go-round -- it truly does read like a travelogue of another land in many points. Even the detail he goes into, describing a mountain pass or a forest, which many writers (including me) would've just glossed over, all seem to matter somehow, as if he had truly been there and was sharing his observations with you. Plus he's got a great adventure going on at the same time.

So I read Tolkien for a bit, then read over my single-spaced printout of "An Outrider's Tale." If you ever get stuck on a story, I recommend trying that -- changing the appearance a bit and printing it out. Usually I double-space all my stories in progress, so this time I single-spaced it, which made it look more like a story in an anthology (and saved paper at the same time). Always good to get a fresh perspective on something.

Anyhoo, I sat down and reread the story and marked it up, and was quite happy with what I'd written. I wrote a bunch of stories this summer all at once, it seems like, and I don't remember them all that clearly, so it was good to take some time with this one. I took out some ham-handed attempts at foreshadowing and tidied up this and that. Now I just need to hear back from Realms of Fantasy, who has had the story since early August.

I also did some quick fixups to "Video Nasties" and emailed that one off to a horror contest. I like this one much better after fixing it up and cutting it mercilessly. I took almost a thousand words out, getting rid of the first person sections with the critters of the title. It's pretty close to being a kick-ass story. I may need to go over it one more time, but it's pretty close. I feel much better about it now.

So now I've got my side-stories out of the way, and I've started thinking more about "The Disillusionist." I have one ending in mind, along with some other ideas about what the title character does for his "art," and I think I can make it all work.

It's nice being interested and motivated again about writing! I guess I just needed some time off, eh? I'm off to go sit by my mailbox and wait for some overdue responses for my fiction. Later.
mjj

Dec. 5, 2001

281 words and then some!

Now Reading:

The Lord of the Rings (Two Towers),
JRR Tolkien

Changing the ol' schedule around again, which is always a challenge. Instead of getting up at 5 a.m. to write on weekdays, I'm now getting up at about the same time to go work out with Elizabeth at the YMCA. I finally got around to doing that today, and it was great, even if I'm still recovering (I did a kick-boxing class, then played 2 games of 2-on-2 basketball that just about killed me, tho we won both games! I even got a new nickname...).

After the Y it was on to work, where my company has installed some major antivirus/anti-surfing tracking software that severely limits my surfing time at work. Oh well. It had to happen sooner or later, right? Then I came home, had dinner with Lizzie, and implemented the next phase in the new schedule, writing for an hour or so, from about 6:30 to 8.

As you can see, I tend to be pretty regimented with my time -- but it's the only way I'll get things done. It also gives me something to look forward to -- for the past few weeks I've been bummed because I don't have anything to look forward to in the morning, since I wouldn't be writing.

This schedule seems to be working pretty good so far. I sat down tonight with the laptop while Lizzie finished up one of her last few papers for the semester, and started a New Story!!!

It's one for an anthology, one of the two stories I'd like to write this month. The other is an SF piece, while this one is more horror. It's called "The Disillusionist," and it's an idea I've had for a while but never knew what to do with it. I still don't, which explains why I only wrote 281 words on it so far, but at least it's started! I like the tone o the story so far, a bit old-fashioned, and I'm thinking it takes place about 100 or more years ago, in a small frontier town. I'll let you know how it's going. Damn, but it's good to be back in the saddle again. Later.
mjj

Dec. 4, 2001

Getting some wind in the ol' sails...

Now Reading:

The Lord of the Rings,
JRR Tolkien

Now Playing:

"Catie Curtis," Catie Curtis

Well, I started out this day in a pretty grumpy mood, I have to admit. I've been getting up at 5:30 with Elizabeth most weekday mornings to go work out at the local Y, but both today and yesterday I've been slack and slept in while she was exercising. My energy levels have been really low -- I kept falling asleep last night while I was trying to read in my chair. Must've been that bourbon-laced eggnog. Darn that stuff!

Anyhoo, as the day progressed, I started feeling more human and less Grinch-like ("you have termites in your smile!"). I compiled a list of anthologies to which I can submit some stories, and I have 5 stories ready to be mailed off. Some of these anthologies, like the "Low Port" antho about the "scrapin-by folks" of the future, and the road stories antho, are really cool, and of course I'm convinced the stories I sent them will fit perfectly. I also have a couple story ideas that may work for some other anthos. I always work best on a deadline, and some of these are due by the end of December. I'm seriously thinking of writing the "creeping wall terraforming story." Should be fun.

I'm also thinking of working some more on the Wannoshay novel. The main reason I'm thinking about this is because of Strange Horizons - they put together a store featuring art by Frank Wu for one of the stories that ran in the magazine a while back, and I was thinking how cool it would be to have a coffee mug and mouse pad with Nonami the Wannoshay on it. It would definitely make for interesting conversation when I go get some java at work...

But I do like those aliens, and I'd like to expand on them and figure out how they tick. So that could be something to consider for the new year, or even for one of the anthologies out there. (Or maybe I'll combine all these ideas into one kick-ass story...). Later.
mjj

Dec. 3, 2001

Limping into a new month...

Now Reading:

The Lord of the Rings,
JRR Tolkien

Now Playing:

"Sister Sweetly," Big Head Todd and the Monsters

I like to keep this journal focused mostly on writing, and not get into too many non-writing tangents. Plus I like writing in here after I've done some real writing, as a sort of reward. But today is one of those days, which I've been having a lot lately, when I don't have much energy for writing, but want to get started on something new. I guess I'm still in recharge mode, so bear with me. End of disclaimer.

So here's the deal: I haven't been writing lately. What's more, I haven't really even been thinking about writing. And, although I'm afraid to admit this, I've been really, really enjoying it!

I've been doing lots of reading, getting caught up on the stacks of books sitting in my bookcase, waiting for me to pull them out. I had an idea or two while plowing through Middle-Earth, but no other ideas have really hit me. It's weird, not working like this. I feel guilty almost, like I'm wasting my time or being slack. Like I need to write fiction constantly to be a complete human being and not a waste of space.

I'm getting over that though. Not sure if it's a bad thing or not... Actually, it's a good thing. It's no good being a writer if that's ALL I do. We all need to enjoy life and not work so much. That's why I'm writing this at work instead of getting started on my software manual. :)

I did find some listings for anthologies from Ralan.com that will get me thinking about stories, either new or existing, that I can send out to various publishers. I think I'll try some of them, see if I can't write a new story or two this month. I found a couple anthos for which I already have a story that may fit their requirements. So maybe I'll do that and see where it leads me.

How was that for a meandering, mostly-pointless entry??? Later.

News

mjj

	michaeljasper.net *"Another Wrecked Web Site"*
Dec. 19, 2001 Where'd that week go? Now Playing: "Just Say Noel," various artists Today's Quote: Outside the City of All-Worlds, winter started early and overstayed its visit, like a cold foreigner so jealous of all that a new land has to offer that he won't leave.	Update from later: Well, this is nice -- actually did some writing! Wow. What a feeling. I have some two and a half pages on a new story set in Subaridon, in the eastern ghetto of Riverrun Alley, outside the City of All-Worlds. My main character is Toggle, a three-mouthed being from another world, and... well, I don't want to say more. Once I get my outline put together, I should have close to 1,000 words for the day. Woo-hoo! Let's see if I can keep this up for 2 days in a row! Now we're off to Middle-Earth. Later! From earlier: For some reason, December has not been a very productive month so far. Sheesh. Haven't felt like doing much of anything, just reading Lord of the Rings and scraping by at work, looking forward to my week off next week. Seems like everything and everyone is shut down for the rest of the year, including editors -- I haven't heard much in the past few weeks on my various submissions out at different magazines. Sigh. I guess no news is better than bad news, right? Somethin' like that... The good news is that we're going to see "Fellowship of the Ring" tonight at the Raleigh Grande, after pizza at Lilly's next door. I've been waiting so long to see this flick that I'm having trouble believing it's actually here. Part of me feels like a goofy little kid again, but the other part is holding back, afraid of getting burned again as I did with the Star Wars prequel... As long as it has most of the cool aspects of the novel, I'll be happy. Speaking of, I finished the last book of LotR last night! Read about 150 pages in a day! The Return of the King really kicks butt as far as action and tying up all the plotlines. I still feel like the "Scouring of the Shire" section feels tacked on (see my review), but it does make sense, in that it makes the hobbits' return more important, and the recovery of the Shire more meaningful. And I loved the scene with Sam replanting trees using the elven dust, and planting the elven tree in place of Frodo's lost tree where his birthday party was held. Ah, but I digress... I think I'm gonna read up on some stories and magazines that I've fallen behind with, including the Legends antho by Bob Silverberg (I call him Bob, y'know), along with Black Gate #2, and the past fews Asimov's and F&SFs and the four single-author collections I have -- Dozois, Andy Duncan, Jim Kelly, and James Blaylock. That oughta keep me busy for a while. I'm checking out stories again because I want to write some more stories to go into circulation. I have a Surprise story I'm hoping to write tomorrow, then a horror story for an antho whose deadline is the end of the year, and then... either some new stories or maybe finishing the novel I started last month. Man, I'm listening to this twisted xmas collection, "Just Say Noel," and the current song is by Sonic Youth: "Santa Doesn't Cop Out on Dope!" It's like Adam Sandler meets Alice Cooper. Too funny. Lots of cool stuff on the CD, including a duet by Aimee Mann and her hubby Michael Penn, XTC, Beck's "The Little Drum Machine Boy," and a sad (lots of sad songs, actually, which says something, I guess) Wild Colonials song, "Christmas is Quiet." Beats the heck out The Carpenters or Barbra Streisand's millionth rendition of "Home for Christmas." It's hard to believe it's gonna be xmas here in less than a week -- the temps are in the high 60s again today, and the whole month has been incredibly mild. Not that I miss the piles of snow, the minus-twenty windchills, and the bitter gray skies of Iowa and Nebraska, but I would like to see some cold weather for the holidays! On that note, I need to get something done on my Secret Project. I want to read over all I have so far for Ghetto Dwellers and see if there's a short story or two in there. Wish me luck! mjj
Dec. 12, 2001 Geekin' out! Now Playing: "O Brother Where Art Thou" soundtrack Now Reading: The Lord of the Rings (Two Towers, Book IV), JRR Tolkien Today's Quote: "Come, boy," Master Bartamus said, motioning to Peet. "You are my memory know. Join us for my last adventure, the last ride of the Ghetto Dwellers."	Got 'em -- got the tickets to the Show. Eight seats to see "The Fellowship of the Ring" on opening day. And instead of the 3-hour line I (like a fool) waited in to see the crappy "Star Wars" prequel 2 years ago, I had to wait behind 3 people. Crazy. I've been doing my best to not get my hopes up for this one, but it's hard. These books are what led me down this dark and exotic path of being a writer. I realize the movies will never compare to what's already in my head from reading all four books about 4 times, but it'll be cool to see how close Peter Jackson and his crew get! And of course I'm dying to see what Gollum looks like (hopefully not like Jar Jar Binks!) or witness Boromir turn bad, or what I'm expecting to be the highpoint of the film, the journey into Moria. Even Bilbo's eleventy-first birthday part should be swell. I'm pumped. Now we just have to make sure everyone can come -- I have tickets for everyone, plus one extra. I felt a little bad, buying 8 tickets all at once, but oh well. What's $60? I actually felt a little sad for the guy behind me -- I was talking to the girl taking tickets about the line for Star Wars, and he said he'd been in that line too. After I got my tickets, he stepped up and bought just one ticket to the first show of the day. I can't think of anything more sad than going to a show like this alone, and I can vouch for that -- when I first moved here, I went to a matinee of "Forrest Gump" all by my lonesome, and it felt... weird. In other news, Lizzie's just about done with her fall classes! I'm just looking over her last paper before she emails it off. Then she's free! I'm so insanely jealous. She deserves some time off though. She's been working like crazy since the semester started. She'll be busy refinishing and covering our kitchen chairs, and taking it easy. I have the last full week of December off myself, so it'll be fun. We BOTH need it. Got a couple nice rejections today for stories, including a fairly quick reject from Weird Tales, who like playing the "alas" game, but had good comments on the story (beats a form letter any day!). I may take some of their advice and try and shorten up the story. I also did some tweaking to the draft of "Ghetto Dwellers" to see if I can't use some of the concepts there for a short story or novella. I hate to see all that work go to waste, or sit unused until I have the time and energy to tackle a novel again. We'll see how it goes. But first I wanna give "Black Angels" one more once-over, then send it out again! Congrats to Greg for winning the non-prize for recognizing the Van Halen song lyrics as "Hot for Teacher." Thanks also for the news about Eddie's hip replacement (cringe). So much info available on the net, isn't there? Oh, and did I tell you I got tickets to see "Lord of the Rings"??? Woo-hoo! See ya. mjj
Dec. 11, 2001 "I heard you missed me -- I'm back! I brought my pencil... gimme somethin' to write on, man!" (name that Van Halen song!) Now Playing: "Charlotte, NC, Live," Pearl Jam Now Reading: The Lord of the Rings (Two Towers, Book IV), JRR Tolkien Today's Quote: The lords of the lands, and even the King, would never admit to their knowledge of the outriders and their vigilante methods, yet all looked to the outriders for assistance when legal methods had become fruitless. Always a dozen men strong, the outriders were made up of the once-criminal, the now-lost, the always-angry, and the recently-reborn, yet their own histories remained by necessity locked in secrecy. The outriders had their Code, and that was enough.	Good morning. It really is a good morning, evening if I did stay up too late last night (and slept in this a.m. as a result!). I deserved it, 'cause I actually sat down and did an hour of quality writing last night! Finally. I'm hoping my brief hiatus is over, after almost a month, really, of doing nothing but wool-gathering (not really sure what that means, but that's what I feel like I was doing!). I started off last evening by finishing of the third book of the trilogy, so I get to go to Mordor with Sam and Frodo next. I'm really noticing the attention to detail Tolkien has put into his book in this go-round -- it truly does read like a travelogue of another land in many points. Even the detail he goes into, describing a mountain pass or a forest, which many writers (including me) would've just glossed over, all seem to matter somehow, as if he had truly been there and was sharing his observations with you. Plus he's got a great adventure going on at the same time. So I read Tolkien for a bit, then read over my single-spaced printout of "An Outrider's Tale." If you ever get stuck on a story, I recommend trying that -- changing the appearance a bit and printing it out. Usually I double-space all my stories in progress, so this time I single-spaced it, which made it look more like a story in an anthology (and saved paper at the same time). Always good to get a fresh perspective on something. Anyhoo, I sat down and reread the story and marked it up, and was quite happy with what I'd written. I wrote a bunch of stories this summer all at once, it seems like, and I don't remember them all that clearly, so it was good to take some time with this one. I took out some ham-handed attempts at foreshadowing and tidied up this and that. Now I just need to hear back from Realms of Fantasy, who has had the story since early August. I also did some quick fixups to "Video Nasties" and emailed that one off to a horror contest. I like this one much better after fixing it up and cutting it mercilessly. I took almost a thousand words out, getting rid of the first person sections with the critters of the title. It's pretty close to being a kick-ass story. I may need to go over it one more time, but it's pretty close. I feel much better about it now. So now I've got my side-stories out of the way, and I've started thinking more about "The Disillusionist." I have one ending in mind, along with some other ideas about what the title character does for his "art," and I think I can make it all work. It's nice being interested and motivated again about writing! I guess I just needed some time off, eh? I'm off to go sit by my mailbox and wait for some overdue responses for my fiction. Later. mjj
Dec. 5, 2001 281 words and then some! Now Reading: The Lord of the Rings (Two Towers), JRR Tolkien	Changing the ol' schedule around again, which is always a challenge. Instead of getting up at 5 a.m. to write on weekdays, I'm now getting up at about the same time to go work out with Elizabeth at the YMCA. I finally got around to doing that today, and it was great, even if I'm still recovering (I did a kick-boxing class, then played 2 games of 2-on-2 basketball that just about killed me, tho we won both games! I even got a new nickname...). After the Y it was on to work, where my company has installed some major antivirus/anti-surfing tracking software that severely limits my surfing time at work. Oh well. It had to happen sooner or later, right? Then I came home, had dinner with Lizzie, and implemented the next phase in the new schedule, writing for an hour or so, from about 6:30 to 8. As you can see, I tend to be pretty regimented with my time -- but it's the only way I'll get things done. It also gives me something to look forward to -- for the past few weeks I've been bummed because I don't have anything to look forward to in the morning, since I wouldn't be writing. This schedule seems to be working pretty good so far. I sat down tonight with the laptop while Lizzie finished up one of her last few papers for the semester, and started a New Story!!! It's one for an anthology, one of the two stories I'd like to write this month. The other is an SF piece, while this one is more horror. It's called "The Disillusionist," and it's an idea I've had for a while but never knew what to do with it. I still don't, which explains why I only wrote 281 words on it so far, but at least it's started! I like the tone o the story so far, a bit old-fashioned, and I'm thinking it takes place about 100 or more years ago, in a small frontier town. I'll let you know how it's going. Damn, but it's good to be back in the saddle again. Later. mjj
Dec. 4, 2001 Getting some wind in the ol' sails... Now Reading: The Lord of the Rings, JRR Tolkien Now Playing: "Catie Curtis," Catie Curtis	Well, I started out this day in a pretty grumpy mood, I have to admit. I've been getting up at 5:30 with Elizabeth most weekday mornings to go work out at the local Y, but both today and yesterday I've been slack and slept in while she was exercising. My energy levels have been really low -- I kept falling asleep last night while I was trying to read in my chair. Must've been that bourbon-laced eggnog. Darn that stuff! Anyhoo, as the day progressed, I started feeling more human and less Grinch-like ("you have termites in your smile!"). I compiled a list of anthologies to which I can submit some stories, and I have 5 stories ready to be mailed off. Some of these anthologies, like the "Low Port" antho about the "scrapin-by folks" of the future, and the road stories antho, are really cool, and of course I'm convinced the stories I sent them will fit perfectly. I also have a couple story ideas that may work for some other anthos. I always work best on a deadline, and some of these are due by the end of December. I'm seriously thinking of writing the "creeping wall terraforming story." Should be fun. I'm also thinking of working some more on the Wannoshay novel. The main reason I'm thinking about this is because of Strange Horizons - they put together a store featuring art by Frank Wu for one of the stories that ran in the magazine a while back, and I was thinking how cool it would be to have a coffee mug and mouse pad with Nonami the Wannoshay on it. It would definitely make for interesting conversation when I go get some java at work... But I do like those aliens, and I'd like to expand on them and figure out how they tick. So that could be something to consider for the new year, or even for one of the anthologies out there. (Or maybe I'll combine all these ideas into one kick-ass story...). Later. mjj
Dec. 3, 2001 Limping into a new month... Now Reading: The Lord of the Rings, JRR Tolkien Now Playing: "Sister Sweetly," Big Head Todd and the Monsters	I like to keep this journal focused mostly on writing, and not get into too many non-writing tangents. Plus I like writing in here after I've done some real writing, as a sort of reward. But today is one of those days, which I've been having a lot lately, when I don't have much energy for writing, but want to get started on something new. I guess I'm still in recharge mode, so bear with me. End of disclaimer. So here's the deal: I haven't been writing lately. What's more, I haven't really even been thinking about writing. And, although I'm afraid to admit this, I've been really, really enjoying it! I've been doing lots of reading, getting caught up on the stacks of books sitting in my bookcase, waiting for me to pull them out. I had an idea or two while plowing through Middle-Earth, but no other ideas have really hit me. It's weird, not working like this. I feel guilty almost, like I'm wasting my time or being slack. Like I need to write fiction constantly to be a complete human being and not a waste of space. I'm getting over that though. Not sure if it's a bad thing or not... Actually, it's a good thing. It's no good being a writer if that's ALL I do. We all need to enjoy life and not work so much. That's why I'm writing this at work instead of getting started on my software manual. :) I did find some listings for anthologies from Ralan.com that will get me thinking about stories, either new or existing, that I can send out to various publishers. I think I'll try some of them, see if I can't write a new story or two this month. I found a couple anthos for which I already have a story that may fit their requirements. So maybe I'll do that and see where it leads me. How was that for a meandering, mostly-pointless entry??? Later.
News	mjj