Day in the Life of an Idiot

 I'm going to have to keep this fairly short as I need to head out early to pick-up Mason from his job because 1) he texted to say they might be let out five or ten minutes early and 2) we're out of canned cat food AGAIN.

I swear now that we're down to three cats (two of which are elderly--technically, "geriatric,") we go through more food than ever.  

There was an interesting discussion on someone's FB feel about 'true' morning larks, vs. whatever you call the people for whom the 9 to 5 world is designed to accommodate.  This person noted that night owls like to complain that the world is built around larks, but it really isn't. I mean, yes, me much more than them, if only because being to work at 9 am isn't a hardship for me.  BUT, I naturally wake up around 6 am (our alarm is set for 5:30 am, though, because of Mason's early start time of 7:20 am.)  Waiting for stores to open feels like half of what I do as a lark.  Science fiction conventions are even worse for me, because most of the "action" starts well-after I'm ready to head to bed. People always say to me, "Well, just stay up late and sleep in!" Thing about being a lark? Sleeping in, for me, is 7 am. I often _can't_ go back to sleep, no matter how late I was out the night before.  

Still, I wouldn't trade. Mornings are still my favorite time to sit and write and get things done. It's when I have the most energy and feel most creative.

My family just sits in bleary-eyed silence while I yammer on about everything on our morning drive into school. This, it should be noted, is me BEFORE I've had coffee.

Anyway, you may have noticed that I'm not reporting my spell-of-the day progress. I may start up again, but I just hit a wall with Llewellyn when I got to the "Youthful Appearance" spell for the new moon. Y'all _know_ what the new moon is, right? It's a night with basically no moonlight.  The moon is virtually invisible to the unaided eye.  This spell wanted me to go outside with a mirror to "catch the new moon's light." You know, okay, for an anti-aging spell, I suppose I could catch some "anti-"light, but then the author wanted me to also imagine my face "being flooded with moonlight."

THERE ISN'T ANY MOONLIGHT ON NEW MOON. NONE. ZERO. NADA.

Yes, yes, the moon is still there, but the point of the dark moon is that it's dark! Invisible! 

So, I just set the book aside and haven't much felt like going back to it yet. I think I will, if only because having a project like this amuses me, but seriously.... wtf, Llewellyn?

At first I thought I must be mad to have agreed to host a sleepover while Shawn was out of town on a business trip. Now, I'm sitting in the computer room wondering what the heck I'm going to do with myself all night.

To be fair, this isn't a huge sleepover with countless screaming argonauts. It's just one other boy, someone we've had over before, no less. I've fed them... a lot, actually -- a dinner of corned beef and fixings, desert of fresh raspberry pie and icecream, and now they're munching on popcorn in front of "Ice Age." They're other big plan is to have a pillow fight. Last time, a lamp actually got broken (I know! It was like something out of a sitcom!) but we moved all the breakables into the hallway this time, and everything seems to be going well so far, knock on wood.

Like I said, I think the hardest part so far has been knowing what to do with myself. I was reading for a while downstairs while they were having the first of many pillow fights, and now I'm surfing the interwebs and talking to you.

The book I'm currently reading is GRACLING. It's a fantasy YA about a girl who has been "graced" with the ability to be an a$$-kicking assassin. I'm not wickedly impressed so far, but I can see why it was recommended to me as a follow-up to HUNGER GAMES. Kat is very similar to Katniss, and not just in name, but also in tone. She's very non-emotional, distant, and cold. I suspect that's going to change now that the love interest has made his appearance. We shall see.

Meanwhile, I'm waiting for some graphic novels to show up so I can review them for my new gig. Seems my whole life is about waiting for something to come in the mail... rejection letters, royality checks, books to review... :-)

Speaking of all that I was saddened to hear about Realms of Fantasy and Dreams of Decadence folding (again.) My very first short story sale was to Dreams of Decadence, and I never managed to crack Realms. (I'm such and AWFUL short story writer, really. It's sad.) Still, like a lot of people I entertained the idea of buying them from Warren Lapine for a buck. Seems like kind of a deal, unless you consider there's probably accumulated debt, etc. Oh, yeah, and the fact that I know absolutely NOTHING about running a magazine.

And WisCON actually disinvited Elizabeth Moon, eh? Wow. I know there's talk out on the interwebs about WHAT IT ALL MEANS in terms of setting a precident, but I don't see how they could do otherwise. I guess the SF3 membership voted to disinvite her, and, frankly, I'm not sure she's a good WisCON fit because the thing that's struck me about all this is that she's offered no apology, explanation, or any kind of attempt to engage people in a discussion about her post. In fact, she deleted other people's comments. I'm sure that was an attempt/hope to make it all go away, but that REALLY doesn't jibe with WisCON's sense of discourse, you know what I mean? (And it's not really very realistic about the way fandom works in the Internet age, either.)

Looking back on this (but more its predecessors), I hope that if I ever find myself in the center of any kind of fail storm that I have the sense to shut up, listen, learn, and apologize. I don't think that it's wise for us, as writers, to walk on eggshells on matters of race, class, religion, politics, or any other hot button issue. Science fiction is one of the few genres where we push boundries -- sometimes into uncomfortable maybe even sharp edges, and I think that one of the fallouts is that we f*ck up sometimes, even when we have the best intentions.

Of course, if you say stupid things and stick by them, there are consequences. I'm not sure I can avoid the stupid, so my best bet is to try not to be hateful, and, for god(dess's) sake if I come off that way, apologize.