Caution Do Not Cross

October 11

I am briefly the saddest boy in town because Agent Ink is breaking up, but I have good memories of their good music, and their two CDs, and I'm sure I'll hear Evan and Rob singing in other combinations on other CDs, someday. Those boys gave me years of good rock. Their gestalt will be missed.

In further Rock News, Erin in a roundabout way got a band she's friends with to temporarily name themselves Robot Pony in honor of Heather and I, and that's just so damn cool. What I love is, is how our little journals change people's lives for the better.

I've written 1500 words so far on a new Marla story about vengeance, and responsibility, and people with all their bones broken, and wings, and eyes, and venom. Whee! Also have a solid idea for a new Mr. Li story, which I'll do next.

Once again, I'm too lame to do NaNoWriMo. I'd like to, but I just finished Rangergirl a few weeks ago, and I don't want to work on anything bigger than novelette length for a bit. Maybe next year.

I was rejected by Zoetrope, and they didn't even send me a bookmark; there was nothing in the envelope but the first page of my story. It'd be enough to hurt a less rejection-hardened writer's feelings, I think...

Yesterday, after leaving the gym (where I foolishly attempted to do a biking class on an empty stomach; I had to quit halfway through when black spots swam in my vision and I felt like I was going to vomit. I know, it was stupid to even attempt, but I didn't think it would be *that* hard), I had a Paranoid American moment. I saw a scuffed black briefcase lying on its side underneath a post office drop-box. I looked around, but there was nobody nearby except one of the usual panhandlers, who seemed an unlikely candidate for briefcase ownership. The first thing that popped into my head was "It's ransom money dropped off for the kidnappers to pick up!", but the second thing was "Suitcase bomb." So I walked on, and a couple of blocks farther there were a couple of cops standing around talking. I approached them and said "I'm probably being paranoid, but I thought I'd tell you, there's a briefcase shoved underneath some mailboxes down on the corner of Whatever and Whichever street." And they said "Okay, we'll check it out." So I went to the café, and read for about half an hour, and sweet Heather joined me, and we left... and on the way to the BART station, we saw the corner all cordoned off with yellow police tape, and cop cars pulled up to the curb, and so forth. If it was a suitcase bomb, go me. If it was just some guy's case shoved for some unfathomable reason under a mailbox... er. Sorry.

Hmm. I'm almost certain I had more things to write about, but I didn't make notes, and now they're all lost, turned to brain-vapor. Which is just as well; I'm not feeling terrifically eloquent this afternoon. So, the usual things: I'm reading Wizard of the Pigeons, and liking it very much. It's far weirder than I'd expected. We're going to parties this weekend, and we have to do laundry, and grocery shop, and we'll generally be insanely busy. Though I'm not writing reviews for the December issue of A Certain Magazine, so I'm less busy than I would be otherwise. There are too many other reviews already in the hopper, and since I'm the lowest of the low men on the totem pole, I'm the one who gets cut. It's fair enough, I suppose; I'm honestly kind of pleased to not have the stress. Now the only thing I really have to worry about is Star*Line (we are having production difficulties)... the November issue of A Certain Magazine will have 2 reviews by me, though, and a Worldcon report, and probably some of my haiku! So I can't complain overmuch.

Words written since February 1, 2002: 174,400

Words written since last entry:
1,500

Send me songs about French clowns.

Tim Pratt
P.O. Box 13222
Berkeley, CA 94712-4222

Karmically speaking, it's a real bargain.