Sense of Adventure

So I had the German Bomber Channel on for electronic wallpaper a little while ago, and they were showing their Engineering an Empire show on Rome. And I was struck by a wonderful vision. (Thud.)

The scene: a couple years in the future. I’m enrolled in a course at Syracuse University. And the tall, lean, distinguished-looking professor points to some projection or exhibit and in his characteristic deep, slightly nasal, slightly metallic voice asks, “Can anyone tell me what this is?”

And I’ll pipe up in my best Professor Hikita accent, “It’s your hand, Buckaroo!”

Enough whimsy. Okay; like that’s gonna happen.

Yesterday was a good day. Got a lot written. Annja’s current exploit’s really picking up steam, and The Dinosaur Lords are going great guns. Plus I did a lot of necessary world-building on DinoLords, which helped the writing a great deal.

The key there was that I actually wrote story, not just typed notes and drew maps, both of which I also did. I know way too well what kind of a trap that note-making thing can be: a whole novel, The War for America, wandered off into the swamps and bogged down because, in large part, I devoted so much time to writing reams of notes. That and not having an actual synopsis, but rather an idea in my head where I wanted to go. Not so good an idea. It turns out that, while I have a great gift of improvisation, I need a certain amount of structure both to activate it and to direct it usefully. Who’da thunk it? Anyway that’s why I’ve got upwards of 700 pages of novel and am not half done - and have, I judge, upwards of a million words of notes. Seriously.

(Someday I’ll go back and finish that. If events don’t overtake it first. Which is a major possibility.)

(more…)

I have a black dog. This is very important to me..

It wasn’t when I got her initially. I just wanted a dog. It’d been a year and a half since I lost Bear, whom the wonderful Pat Rogers so aptly called “the little golden dog” - who acquired a large and active fan following who continued to query me for months after her death as to where she was. Enough time had passed for an emotional reset. And to prepare myself I’d read the amazing and useful The Other End of the Leash by ethologist Patricia McConnell. So when I happened by the animal-adoption fair being held at the nearby PetSmart, my main concerns were a nice dog who’d get along with me and the cats and not eat too many house guests or neighbor kids - after one or two, people start to talk.

But more of that tale later. It’s just that the dog I’ve grown to know and love and rely upon to defend the redoubtable Milán Pack and territory against the wicked (lately, mostly young moms strolling past with prams and little dogs on leashes - as every schoolchild knows, among the leading perpetrators of home invasions!) is black. A very deep, glossy black, except for a white blaze on her chest that’s seldom visible.

So why, oh my, when I open the back door, is what I get back a khaki dog?

This just happened. Again. It’s about 1:30 PM Friday. I’m trying to get some writing done and maybe at last plant the honeysuckle I’ve nurtured in a pot on the kitchen counter all these months in the backyard, before heading out to dinner with some Wild Cards Mafia types - including Denver’s own Carrie Vaughn, of Kitty and the Silver Bullet fame - and then to ASFS to hear Ian Tregillis read from the first novel of his upcoming Milkweed Triptych trilogy. I love that name, by the way. Anyway, I read the ending (I mean, silently, to myself. Without even moving my lips much) as part of the Critical Mass authors’ group, and it completely rocks, and Melinda says Ian’s a great reader, so I’m much looking forward to it. Anyway.

(more…)

Been a busy day. Got a lot of writing done, and also made good progress in the yard. I’m finally about ready to plant the honeysuckle clipping I’ve been nurturing in a pot on the kitchen counter for the last year and a half. Soon after that I’ll be planting native grasses front and back. Yay!

Also, I finally got the necessary preparations made to learn at last whether I’ve indeed achieved compost. However I was too beat tonight to filter the stuff and find out. Tomorrow…

Poor Emma has somehow got a slice in one of her pads. Poor tyke. I gave her a quarter aspirin to relieve the pain. She’ll have to heal a few days before I take her out walking again.

Click here to read the reason behind the season - what makes Cinco de Mayo so damned special. I was going to watch the largely unknown 1970 Clint Eastwood/Shirley MacLaine (!) oater Two Mules for Sister Sara (the only movie I know of set during the Franco-Mexican War) in honor of the great day. But I’m too racked-up for that too. Maybe tomorrow for that as well.