Ring My Bell
May 1
6:39 p.m.
(this is... scattered. non-sequential. sorry)
Already mid-week; this happens to me every time, but where have the days gone? How do I look around and notice that it's already Wednesday? So it goes, the eternal slide and slip of time...
Happy Beltane, all. It's a world of sun and brightness here.
Not much to report about the past few days; perhaps that's why I haven't been writing here. I read The Mermaid that Came between Them by Carol Ann Sima, which I think I'll review, and Strangers and Beggars by James Van Pelt, which I will most certainly review -- it's awesome. Now reading Requiem by Graham Joyce, for fun, and three chapters in, it's my favorite of his books -- the language is far more poetic than his work usually is, but not in a distracting or flowery way.
I've been working on Rangergirl; did another thousand words last night, and soon I get to write a steamy sex scene. I don't know if it'll be any good or not. I'm trying to approach it like poetry, letting the language suit the content, using images, metaphors, apt but not obvious associations... I want it to be good. It's not a gratuitous scene at all, it's very important in shaping the interrelationships of the characters. I hope I can pull it off. I hope I can have fun doing so.
I worked out on Monday night, cardio and stretching and abdominal crunchy things. I've lost 10 pounds in the past couple of months. Whee! Heather says she can see that I've lost weight; I can't see it at all, but I'll take her word for it. After, Heather and I went to Au Coquelet and had a very pleasant time, talking. It was lovely; we don't go to cafés together as often as I'd like, and it's always nice when Heather decides to join me.
Yesterday Heather and Holly both stayed home sick, but Heather, at least, is better now; I don't know about Holly. Last night we watched Buffy, of course, and ate sandwiches and ravioli and had a lovely time. Creature comforts. Mmm. I also bought some of my favorite tea last night, Bengal spice, and I'll soon have a nice steaming cup of that...
Work has been busy, putting together the June issue, and will continue to be busy this week. This is my favorite part of the month, doing layout, making edits, writing... I like my job. And it helps that my boss has been buying me lunch pretty often lately. Free food is our friend.
When I got home from work today I replied to e-mail submissions. I still have a few snail mail subs to answer. I also want to organize my Star*Line stuff a bit better, start figuring out what I want to go into my first issue (which is still a ways off), look at all the poems I've accepted to see if I have too much of one thing and not enough of another (I think I've been buying more long poems than short ones, and more fantasy poems than science fictional ones, but I'm not sure). That will help shape my editorial decisions in the coming months, and I'll be able to put the word out about what sorts of poems I want to see...
There's been a far higher-than-average influx of inappropriate submissions this past week; I'm not sure why. I've received e-mail submissions that were CC:ed to a dozen other magazines; I've received short fiction; I've received political rants; I even received some pretty disturbing anti-Semitic poetry. Strange and offputting. But there've been lots of good submissions, too, of course... just strange for all the outliers to come clustered together like that.
Plans for tonight are vague. We have some DVDs to watch. We'll make dinner. We'll probably get some work done. We'll celebrate Beltane. All will be well.
Words written since February 1, 2002: 57,950
Words written since last entry: 1,000
Flowers, heaps of flowers. Poisonous, carnivorous, reeking strange; send me your flowers.
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