Velcome to my lair--er, livejournal.

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I use LoudTwitter to summarize random things, good things, and cool links into one daily post. If you're a LoudTwitter hater and you run Firefox, you can use this greasemonkey script to remove LoudTwitter posts from your friends page, or run this script in your code.

Could I get a ride from somebody else going to birdfigment's shower?

Tamarind-Teriyaki Stir-Fry Sauce
Make with vegetable and protein sources of your choice, but this is a good sauce.

2 c. tamarind drink (we used off-brand tamarind kool-aid)
1/2 c. garlic teriyaki sauce
3 dried red chilies, minced
4 cloves garlic, minced
4 cubes bouillon (I used chicken, but it depends on what your protein source is)

In Progress, Writing

They thought they could come and conquer our world easily. - Kept in Coral

With great reverence, Leander committed the greatest blasphemy of his life. - Tree of Life

In Progress, Editing

When Albin's nursemaid woke him in the dead of night, he knew something even worse than the death of his father had happened. - The Unkindness of Ravens

Clara ought to be home by now, an' my daughter. - And the Dog Died

"Just go, Will," Isabel said, turning her head to look out the window as if he were already gone. - Writ in Snowflakes and Sunshine

Having the king of Achromia's confidence was a heady sensation, but Bertrand had only to think of some of the tasks he'd been assigned to feel his feet become firmly grounded once more. - Pneumatic Knights

The old woman found the naked boy curled up in a semi-truck tire on the beach. - The Old Woman By The Sea

"What a huge, marvelous fish!" John's wife exclaimed. - Out of Focus

Night mist swirled around Valinda's boots as she walked through the empty street. - Vicesteed

07/08/2009 - Wednesday, spent morning waiting for repairperson, then watching repairperson, then to work where there was lots of downtime that I mostly used catching up on blogs of interest.
* Posted writing log.
* Read FundsforWriters, FFWSmallMarkets, 3 Publisher's Lunch, Writer's Digest, Duotrope, Critters, OWW, WritersWeekly newsletters.
* Article on the 1,000 True Fans marketing model, with useful resources: http://www.kk.org/thetechnium/archives/2008/03/1000_true_fans.php/
* Low-potential penthius freewriting inspired by this rather awesome photo: http://sciencenews.org/view/download/id/45316/title/jar_stingray.jpg
* Finished remarking Vicesteed ch. 18. Began making editing changes to ch. 18.
* Posted Pt 3 of my (still not completed!) panel notes from the 4th Street Fantasy conference.

So, before CONvergence, I attended the 4th Street Fantasy Convention, which has more intensive panels, and I'm still writing up my notes from that. These are my notes about what I found useful and interesting and what thoughts and ideas I had that were sparked from these panels:
Fantasy and the Family
Embracing Exposition
What is Fan-Fic?
Food, Fashion, and Fornication

( Read more... )

Special thanks for this report go to work for providing me with downtime (and thank goodness for that--I couldn't have come in early if there had been work, as I was busy watching the dishwasher repairperson being reduced to a gibbering wreck by our ancient [and malevolent] dishwasher).

Also, geez, I seem to have come away with a lot more panel notes than last year.

07/07/2009 - Tuesday, went to work early, only a little downtime
* Updated the market list from LJ.

07/06/2009 - Monday
* Read Duotrope, WritersWeekly newsletters.
* Updated markets from the above.
* Processed Shroud's form letter “please do not consider this a 'rejection' of your work” rejection of "Good Help is Hard to Find." Am amused.
* Processed Critters crit of Vicesteed, ch. 28.
* Prepped Vicesteed chs. 31-32 for uploading to Minnspec, only to realize while writing summaries that a whole hell of a lot happens in the complete chapter 30, and I should really send that in instead. Prepped chapter 30 for crit, uploaded it, and processed.
* Posted writing log.
* Day of the dead penthius freewriting.

Feeling younger than usual: hair in braids, band-aids on elbows, and ice cream before lunch. There was even parade-watching.

07/05/2009 - Sunday, after getting home from CONvergence.
* Penthius freewriting about a different kind of Walk of Stars.

07/02/2009-07/05/2009 - Thursday-Sunday
At CONvergence, which I think counts as more than enough for those days!

07/02/2009 - Thursday, before CONvergence
* Read Publisher's Lunch.

07/01/2009 - Wednesday, spent most of the morning prepping photos for mailing.
* Read Writing-World, WritersDigest newsletters.
* Recommended writing books - I can vouch for The Writers Guide to Life in the Wild West and On Writing: http://bookstove.com/non-fiction/five-good-books-about-genre-writing-by-actual-authors/

06/30/2009 - Tuesday, no downtime, spent the morning mostly dealing with the repair guy and needing to get into work.
* Posted writing log.
* Created a "To Do Once Pro Writer" file. It felt strange to do that--kind of presumptuous. On the other hand, it really only makes sense to keep a place to record ideas and tactics and useful resources for that level of writing. Things like joining this writing group and that writers organization and using the other service if x happens.
* Loaded Vicesteed ch. 29 up into Critters for critique.
* Processed MNLit's non-win notification. (One is never rejected from contests; one simply didn't win.)
* Processed donation received for Aswiebe's Market List (2 months later. Oy. Seemed late enough I thought a thank-you would be more awkward than otherwise.)
* Processed Alternative Coordinates' personal, "we hope you will submit again" rejection of "These Things Take Time." "While the subject matter is of interest to our readers and the story is well written, the story itself does not fit in well with our current releases." Hrm. I am flattered that I got a mostly positive personal rejection, yet somewhat baffled. My intangibles did not fit in.
* Sent Vicesteed chapters 19-22 to MinnSpecer who volunteered to crit more. Yay!
* Updated "Salvaging Scottwell"'s status to reflect it being passed up the line after edits were completed. Am still more than a little gobsmacked that Eric Flint is going to be reading *my* story.

My parents are sorting through their belongings in preparation for their next big move--back to India to teach at a private boarding school. She sent an email to remind me of this:

...you ran away from Lincoln School in second grade. You left a note decorated with hearts:

Dear Mary,

I'v ran away don't wory im alwes arawnd here, I think i'm independent!

Your's Dearly,
Abra

all Be Home for super!

I'm heading off to CONvergence now! I hope to see/talk to/hang out with many of you--say hi if you're there!

I am not sure what it says about me that I
1. took photographs of my gross, bloody biking injuries, but
2. deleted them because I thought they didn't have a high enough artistic value.

06/29/2009 - Monday, no downtime
* Posted writing log.
* Low-potential penthius freewriting about a strangely climated person.
* Updated my "agents of interest" spreadsheet with some new possibles and other details.
* Added new market list subscribers and cleared out the spam from that email account.
* Riffled through freewritings, trying to find something to revise and submit to Thaumatrope's new punk-themed tweet edition.
* Revised/wrote "Bankers Hours" (based on "Businessmen with Stopwatch Hearts") and submitted (though not by name) to Thaumatrope. Logged in all the usual places.
* Read FundsforWriters, 4 Publisher's Lunch, Writer's Market, FFWSmallMarkets newsletters.

• 11:29 After the winnowing, I still have 426 photos, which is too many. Um. Good problem to have?

.

I guess I didn't need to worry about not having enough good photos after all! Of course, I need to get this down to about 250 good photos and 100 great photos. While still making sure there's a good photo of every important person still in there.

06/26/2009 - Friday. Parents visiting from out-of-town before they leave for India! No time for writing.
* Read through and answered suggested edits for "Salvaging Scottwell" (Which is now bumped up to the final level! Final answer in a matter of weeks! But seriously--the final editing process means this story's going to be a lot stronger no matter which way it goes.)
* Read Publisher's Lunch newsletter.

06/24/2009 - Wednesday
* Got "The Old Woman By The Sea" set up for editing and duly recorded in my manuscript tracking spreadsheet.
* Cleared out "to edit" folder and tossed old editing notes that were already implemented.
* Processed MinnSpec crits of Vicesteed chs. 29-30(partial).
* Processed Critters crits of Vicesteed ch. 28.
* Read and updated market list from Duotrope, 2 Publishers Lunch, WritersDigest, WritersWeekly, Critters newsletters. (I read fast, and I'm pretty good at getting through writing newsletters, and I find them useful, but I rather boggled today when I discovered I have 24 unread ones in my inbox.)
* Perceiving the foundation of storytelling: http://www.storyispromise.com/wfound.htm (via There Are No Rules' best tweets post at http://blog.writersdigest.com/norules/).
* Posted part 2 of my 4th Street Fantasy Convention notes.

06/23/2009 - Tuesday, no downtime, dr's apt in the a.m. and then I wasted the rest of it.
* Answered Critter volunteering for RFDR.
* Wrote Pt. 1 of my panel notes from 4th Street Fantasy Convention.

06/22/2009 - Monday
* Thanked natrlobsessions for letting me use leave some of her brain-property in the reclaimed-from-defunct-shared-world story and added info to the notes file for "The Old Woman By The Sea" so that I can let her know when it gets published somewhere.
* Posted writing log.
* Posted about Vicesteed being up for critique at Critters, and emailed those who've been kind enough to express interest in critting chapters in the past.

Yes, we are having our annual 4th of July party! It will begin a bit before two and run until everybody is gone. Guests are encouraged to bring something to throw on the grill and something to share, but there is usually plenty of food and drink for everyone.

And yes, it's at the same time as CONvergence--me, I leave CONvergence for the party. Speaking of which, are there any con attendees who are coming to the 4th of July party that I could hitch a ride from?

Asparagus, parsnip, carrot, and radish from the CSA.

Many years ago, before I was born, my mother found out that her sister-in-law was going to have a baby. She was very excited by this news. So she announced to everybody, "My sister-in-law's going to have a baby! I'm going to be an aunt! ...Or an uncle, depending on what gender the baby is!"