Category: Writing

working on another homily

This one’s called the Persistence of Saints. I have no idea when it will be done.

Yesterday I practiced on 4 instruments, did my shoulder exercises, walked in Oakalla, did a load of laundry, emptied the dishwasher and ate a candy bar two hours before bedtime. It was a bad idea. I sure enjoyed it at the time, but I crashed pretty hard and then got insomnia.

The insomnia was ably assisted by all them f-ckers in the alley setting off fireworks.

I was still awake at one this morning. My eyes feel like they were dragged across the desert behind a camel. Also, this morning, early, I communed with the commode & I found out what that much chia seed (I’ve been eating a fair amount) does to my digestion; while I won’t provide details I’m sure your imagination can cope.

Dietary changes are not easy. Cutting out white flour, sugar, rice, potatoes? not easy.

They walk side by side:

now the work really begins

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I spent a lot of yesterday afternoon with my face hanging out in front of the tube, but I was also looking at the three books in the UPSUN trilogy. It’s really not a work to everyone’s taste, but it doesn’t have to be. The things I’m best at when I am writing are:

  1. handwaving regarding the plot BUT IN THIS CASE I HAVE STRONG CULTURAL REASONS FOR NOT WANTING TO CHOP PLOT TOO FINE
  2. snarky social commentary – Fun in Hi-Skule John Brunner, kinda
  3. snarky dialogue between people who actually love each other but are behaving badly
  4. pretty much anything to with Sixers, my current and forever fave alien
  5. snarky dialogue by people who don’t have anything to do with the action but are seriously pissed off at the moment (people in crowds yelling rude things a specialty)
  6. godawful family dynamics (nothing drives action like shitty families) (It’s a trope) (but I enjoy my own family) (however much they enjoy, or don’t, me)
  7. RESEARCH like the time I wasted a day inventing what the city elders rename all the Vancouver bridges to and did you know that psychologically we won’t actually understand how many fucking bridges there are in this town until access is cut to them? Bridges are extremely important to Vancouver, we won’t function well if they fall, are blocked, are damaged ….
  8. saying things are just so AFTER I DO ALL THAT RESEARCH
  9. inventing things like the ‘sproing’ which I think is one of the best things I ever came up with
  10. writing an entire side project – BOOK LENGTH – which is an internal fanfic for two of the characters, whom I’ve since decided do not belong together anyway, and it sure gave me some insight into why destiel is so annoying to some fans
  11. yes kids I wrote a 55000 word, elaborately researched and fabulously queer /non-conforming/whore-positive book and will never publish it because it isn’t canon in my own universe AS A THOUGHT EXERCISE about how to run a brothel in Vancouver after landback
  12. gamifying a revolution is not a new concept in sf but tricking an entire generation of mostly white, Chinese and Desi Vancouver gamers into mapping the city so that the Indigenous infrastructure techies can get a tree-by-bush overview of what food is growing here, that was irrestistable

Sooooon

Shortly I will formally retain the services of a high-powered and thoroughly qualified person to perform the cultural competence reading of the UPSUN trilogy.

I’m not lying when I say that if this is successful (there’s no guarantee that this person will enjoy doing the work enough to want to get paid for doing more than one) this is likely going to re-energize me. And if it isn’t successful, I’ll continue to look for someone who can assist.

The manuscript’s printed out. I just need to put together a one page contract and get this puppy in the mail.

yesterday

voted … NDP majority is now in

Man, the BC Liberals sure are a bunch of feckless dweebs

Walked down at New West Quay with Paul, who’s supposed to be in quarantine. Honestly, I don’t know what to say. I’m certainly not going near him without masking up. Purchased excellent chocolate and Jeff and I consumed every scrap of three high end artisanal chocolate bars over the afternoon.

Paid for yet another ad to get a cultural competence reader to look at UPSUN.

Someone bought UPSUN!!!

Skipped letter writing.

Wrote a letter to Mary this am, haven’t mailed it yet.

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gee mOm

Had an absolutely hilarious email convo with my mOm this morning, and I can’t even repeat it, but I will say it had something to do with my own mother forgetting when my birthday is. THIS IS WHAT HAPPENS WHEN YOU LOOK INTO NEXT MONTH AND DON’T PUT THE CALENDAR BACK TO THIS MONTH, mOm.

I made vegan pizza. I can’t tell the difference, so yay soy mozzarella.

Supernatural was meh.

Jeff and I are going to take a walk to various errand-y things in the neighbourhood. (later… it was fucking SNOWING when we went out so car was taken… got my flu shot, Jeff provided a Buster poop for the vet to perform augurious duties over)

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went for a walk with Paul

 

scraping up my confetti

Sorry, the post title is a reference only my mOm will get.

I am so angry and sad I don’t have much place for it. Tom’s situation is not good. He’s very ill, and he’s being treated, and Peggy is being calm and realistic, which means shit’s very hard indeed. More I cannot say; I am communicating privately with the people we’re close to who are also close to Tom at Peggy’s behest, and it’s not jolly.

The Lekki Gate massacre in Nigeria…. it’s terrible. But protesting police violence has a price the world over…. that shouldn’t be death and disfigurement.

Flu shot at pharmacy and televisit with doc today.

Later – I’m feeling like maybe I do not wish to leave the house. Nope, no flu shot.

The go pro arrived, but Buster is boycotting training because we locked the cat door because Jeff needs to collect cat poop for the vet. HE IS LITERALLY ON STRIKE.

I made brown buns to go with the chili.

letters mailed

there’s one for Jan and Jim as well.

I have a lot of phone calls to make today

 

made one already, now I have to go to the website because they’re making it as mucky as possible to do it by phone

 

later – I HAVE SUCCESSFULLY APPLIED TO PHARMACARE can I just not do anything else today? but NO more work awaits! la la la and only a 600 dollar deductible.

and Buster’s going to the vet today so the morning shop’s been shifted to later in the day

News from Nova Scotia and elsewhere

I can easily believe the RCMP did nothing about a mob of whites almost killing a bunch of Indigenous fishers. But the people who are PROUD of that are  SCUM.

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THIS WILL BE THE LAST HALLOWEEN YOU’LL BE ALLOWED TO BUY FIREWORKS IN VANCOUVER

I am thrilled past words.

Now I know why Buster did a running&leaping paw clap this morning! He was celebrating. (He LOATHES fireworks.)

Phil Shailer of Hollywood wrote this as part of a letter to the editor in 2016

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white disabled people from soapbox: thing
Black disabled people noticing: thing has context, Black people don’t experience it that way
white disabled people to Black disabled people: if you were less whiny you’d experience ableism correctly
Black disabled people: flames dot gif
the above is in response to a simply VILE twitter exchange between a relatively wealthy blind white woman and a relatively brokeass Black disabled woman
Palate cleanser:
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from @theyankeeartist on twitter, Gomez tossing Morticia in the air
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The unexpected postcard

I haven’t had enough
Can’t ask me to say when
Can’t ask me to resist
Won’t come my way again

It’s not that I am helpless
Nor that I am compelled
But that I have no words for
A way I’ve never felt

a long guitar and harmonica talking instrumental break

When you feel like you’re past hope
Past any chance for redemption
Perhaps some satisfaction
That life would get my vote
Then love comes into view
Like an unexpected postcard
Saying everything is beautiful
And soon you will be home.

fiddle on the last four lines, harmonica drops out

yes this is a destiel filk, tune exceeding dangerously sappy C&W, and it’s going along with the fic I’m working on. I am so cheesed with myself; I don’t want to leave the house, and there’s been a letter to pOp sitting there on the kitchen table for the last day. Also I’m supposed to make like lady bountiful to Paul, holed up in his motel. Tea, and beans, and whatnot.

Ratrunners

A ratrunner is someone who drives around too fast late at night. Because of the orientation of my bedroom window – faces west – I’m listening to the ratrunners on Kingsway. Sometimes it’s a Kawasaki or similar, blasting down the hill at what sounds, from the wound up noise, like they’re doing about a ton and a bit. There are lots of crosswalks and the roadway isn’t straight, and it’s just a terrible idea.

Anyway, they were out last night, and they are usually worse on weekends.

Despite it all, I practiced good sleep hygiene. Instead of playing on my computer or brO’s phone, I did my evening routine and then slept. Woke up at 3 on the nose, so that’s 7 hours of sleep, and I only woke up to roll over and curse the ratrunners.

@see_starling on twitter made this over four years:

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Looks like a sixer’s favourite blankee!

Another fic came into my mind almost as soon as the last one was done. This one will be about the quarantine, and snow.

And, from Cory Doctorow, and who knows where besides, Kate Bush as a bat in 1978:

and isn’t the costume the sweetest hoot I looked for 20 minutes on the internet for a photo credit and gave up, fuck you uncaring universe, I try to give credit but the internet has eaten the attribution just as surely as names wear off headstones

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excellent morning so far

finished the fanfic, just shy of 19K words, then went downstairs and completely reworked Standard of the Crow (Thorfinn’s song) for octave mandolin, since Otto yelled at me that he would do a much better job than Smokey. He was definitely right about that.

It amazes me how different the percussion guitar song Gelis and Nicholas sounds when it’s capo 4 and when it’s standard …. anyway, lots of writing, and a good practice, and now I have to force myself to eat something that isn’t tea or carbs, and I don wanna.

40 hits on the fanfic so far; final word count 20K

Spoke to Dave D and Tom L, and these days what a relief to actually interact with someone….

Destiel fannage

Added later, watched the Supernatural from last night, it was adorable, there was just so much squee with the boys.

Mailed a letter to mOm and another to Barry. Yes I said I mailed it already. No I didn’t actually until now. Mild chest pain (completely normal at this point) on the way up the hill; the problem is that if I stop I fall down or want to, and it’s been raining, so no work in the garden. I think I’m going to have to get one of those stool canes. I had rocks to sit on in Mt. Seymour but they’re thin on the ground in urban settings. Best part of the walk was no mask.

I should walk some more later, perhaps I’ll be able to talk Jeff into coming. Maybe not so much hillage with the walkage

terrifying podcast about what canada should do in case of political instability before/during/after the election and during the transition period, if any.

 

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This is absolutely terrible but it made me laugh.

Welp, I’m awake. Guess I’m having a cup of tea and some breakfast.

Had a nice long talk yesterday with my mOm about my medical woes. I’ll be fine, I’ll be fine; but my body fell apart after that infection in March, and there’s one symptom in particular that makes me think it’s post COVID, but I guess I’ll never know and should get right with not knowing, while I’m working on improving things.

Here’s Jan M. as a retail worker in 2020

She’s been posting costumes every day on her ‘gram, and some of them have been awesome, why she even did a Castiel the other day. AND I DEAD NOW

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