Rosemary Kirstein

Ha. Exactly as I wanted, we have power in our town, but the DayJob is in one of the many areas with no power.

Of course, it would have been nice to know before I drove all the way there.

I tried to get to the Funky Monkey to do some serious writing there, but alas, that town is blacked out too. I also swung by the town with the Tibetan imports, but they too had no power at all.

So I’m home, making Miso soup. And reading and writing. Sooo nice.

My sympathies, of course, to all the people who are suffering seriously because of the power outages. But I gotta grab the happy where I can.

I told you that I had a set of Wind Horse flags somewhere at home, and that I was going to put them up in symbolic acknowledgement of the difficulty of the task before me and declaration of my determination to persevere. However:

Worst. Wind Horse. Ever.

I do know that the idea is to leave the flags up until they become weathered and tattered and faded with age. However. It’s cheating to have them start out that way.

I know it looks like they’re printed on taffeta (already a bad idea), but no self-respecting taffeta looks like this!

They are obviously printed on the sort of material called “interfacing“, which garment makers use to stiffen up cloth in clothing. And particularly cheap interfacing at that. I remember in the dim and dusty days of my youth when I actually went through a phase of making my own clothing as a way of saving money. At the fabric store, there were several levels of quality available for your interfacing. In those days, not understanding the concept of “You get what you pay for”, I’d sometimes opt for bottom of the line. Which was so badly woven that as soon as you ran it through the sewing machine, it would immediately unweave itself around the stitches, and simply flop to the ground, possibly in an attempt to escape.

And clearly, the factory workers responsible for these flags had the same problem, as they’ve done multiple fold-overs, and run some of the flags through their machine several times in an attempt to get the so-called cloth to stay attached to the string.

c. unacceptable

Hmpf, say I.

I shall acquire a better-quality set of Wind Horse flags in my copious spare time. I think I know where to get some locally…

(Daily scarf still to come. It’s too early. Note bed-head above.)

Mysterious and lovely.

I don’t know if Darlene has names for her creations, but that’s what I call this one.

I love this moon.

It reminds me of when I was a kid, and I’d wait until everyone was asleep, and then sneak out of the house, across the fields, and into a nearby woody area.

Note the raised edges of the leaves

There, I’d hang out in this one open field edge with an old crumbling stone wall, surrounded by trees on all sides, with one big bare tree in the center. I’d think moody, mysterious thoughts. Often there was a full moon.

I think my plan to inspire myself is working…

Don't mess with me, when I'm wearing the moon.

This is one of the newest to me, even though it was done in 2008. I think I might have got it at Boskone this year, when I went on a bit of a spree…

photos just don't capture the colors

This one isn’t batiked like yesterday’s — the background colors are dyed, but the stars are hand-painted.

Stars and nebulae... a wearable universe

Of course, I had to dress in black to make it work — NOT THAT I MIND.

That's it. I'm ready.

(Darlene’s website)

I am still in overtime, forget-about-the-rest-of-your-life mode at the dayjob. Upside: I’m continuing to have discussions with my boss about whether or not this state is permanent, and he does sympathize. Downside: We have no answer yet. Until it’s sorted out one way or the other, I’m still working too many hours.

I generally try to keep my writing life and my DayJob as separate as possible. People around here don’t read much, and it’s more trouble than it’s worth to teach people who already aren’t interested in books that there’s more to SF and Fantasy than UFO’s and vampires. So I tend to just clam up, do the job, get the paycheck and health insurance.

I even dress differently, and there are certain items that wear at conventions and in my personal life, things I haven’t worn at the job because to my mind they are specific signifiers of my Writer persona.

Chief among these being: my collection of gorgeous silk scarves hand-made by Darlene Coltrain:

The center, here seen as the top

I first started buying them in, I think, 1998. They’re filled with images that remind me of the things I love best: stars, skies, water, the natural world, anything both clearly seen and mysterious.

further down

This is one of my favorites, and one of the ones I’ve had the longest…

moving downward

And yes, I am wearing it at the DayJob. Looking at it reminds me of what’s important, what I love, and makes me feel strong.

Thing are really hard right now, and it’s been going on too long. And I realized that instead of leaving my writer self outside, I need to keep her right here, right up front and center. This so that can I stay focused on fixing things on the job so that I can HAVE TIME TO WRITE AGAIN.

Therefore, for as long as this is going on, I’ll have the same conversation with my boss every Monday, asking what the plan is to fix this — and I shall wear one or another of my beloved scarves to work every single day.

As a reminder to myself — and to everyone around me.

as much as I could fit in the picture.

Yah, situation has not much changed yet. Still in overtime, and now taking antibiotics for the whatevertheheck that has me coughing.

Cool thing seen recently: How your brain processes time! I’m absolutely fascinated by how the brain works, how the brain generates the mind, how consciousness operates. (Useful information in creating believeable aliens.)

David Eagleman is an excellent speaker and a cutie patootie really seems to know his stuff. Also the author of Incognito which is currently lurking on my Kindle, waiting for me to have some time to give it a reasonable portion of my attention.

Instead, I’ve been doing some serious comfort reading, by which I mean things I’m pretty sure ahead of time that I’ll like. For instance: Terry Pratchett’s latest — Snuff! If I had the time, I’d post an actual review, but I’ll just say that I was not disappointed, and that I believe I’ve come to like the Sam Vines thread of Discworld the best.

Also finished listening to the audiobook version of Scott Westerfeld’s Goliath, the final volume of his steampunk YA trilogy that began with Leviathan and Behemoth. Damn, I wish there had been books like these around when I was of the YA target age! Still, fortunately, I’m perfectly capable of getting swept away by a good YA, and Westerfeld is a favorite of mine.

Ack! I’m still at the office, and I’d better get to that #$##@#@# stack of work…

Not posting lately, but just to let you know I’m still here… a series of events at the DayJob has resulted in all my time being completely devoured.

For, like, a month or so now.

Steps toward resolution will be taken quite soon. But in the meantime, I might be a bit quiet for a while.

Other news: spent the weekend serving as phlegm-factory, dosed out on Nyquil and Dayquil in alternation. A fact not unrelated to the situation mentioned above.

Other other news: there is no other news.

Next up: random photos from my wonderful Labor Day weekend that I had no time to tell you about….

Kayaking -- love it.

Wild grapes!

They'd make a great table decoration, if only they lasted....

More later…

I mentioned this on Facebook, but completely forgot to put it here —

I wanted to remind people that Ellen Kushner (famous author, and wife of other famous author and Genrette Delia Sherman) wrote a radio program called “The Door is Opened,” which I heard many years ago, before I actually met her.

It’s about Yom Kuppur and Rosh Hashana, and as a non-Jewish person I knew next to nothing about those holidays. People tend to assume I’m Jewish because of the last name, but nope.

(If you’re curious: I’m an atheist. But as a writer and student of human nature, I’m interested in what makes people tick. The cultural content and context of the Jewish traditions interest me much more than any religious aspects.)

The show was gorgeous, deep, and moving. It totally swept me away. It really is worth hearing, and I urge you to do so because (ta-da!) it’s available to listen to online for free. And while you’re there, you can peruse the other episodes of Sound and Spirit. They’re all excellent, and they’re all hosted by and written by Ellen Kushner.

Meanwhile, Delia Sherman‘s Young Adult novel The Freedom Maze is coming out soon, and you can read the first chapters online for free.

Also cool: My pal Ann Tonsor Zeddies has a story appearing in a YA anthology called Speaking Out: LGBTQ Youth Stand Up. I haven’t read the story yet, but shall be laying my money down for a copy of the book real soon.

Other news: I have not fallen off the face of the earth, contrary to appearances. But ever since Labor Day I’ve had not a minute to spare from an avalanche of overtime at the DayJob. Or rather, what minutes I do have to spare are spent either a) writing, b) going to the gym so my body doesn’t disintegrate from the overtime, or c) complaining. These are my main pastimes lately. Hoping for things to ease up soon.

Latest audiobook I’m working out to: Scott Westerfeld‘s Goliath, the third volume of his YA steampunk trilogy. I love Westerfeld, and I love this trilogy, which I’ve “read” completely in audiobook form. There’s nothing like a good YA when you’re feeling blue.