Eagles Over the Kennebec

Monday. Sunny and already warm. All the windows are open and the cats are lounging in the breeze from the sliders in Steve's office.

The first load of towels needs to be taken out of the dryer and the second load put in.

The area rugs and runners are outside and over the rails, taking the sun. My deck chair and table are set up and ready for use.

Regarding the deck chair. When I got it out of the closet where it overwintered, there were five springs taking shelter beneath its skirts. FIVE.

For book club, I'm reading A Gentleman in Moscow, which I'm enjoying. It strikes me that this may have been what Theo of Golden was striving for, and, err, didn't achieve.

Since I just recently read Balance of Trade, I started Trade Secret last night, wherein I note that the Young Gentleman reveals to us The Plan. I believe that Jen Sin reviled the Young Gentleman's clan in Salvage Right, and also said something about The Plan, which I will need to check.

Honest to ghu, this universe is tight. The authors must've have a million databases. *cough*.

I have a couple titles that will fit in the small blank stars on the front of the Starry Shirt, so I'm getting those ready to be embroidered.

And! I have not yet heard from D2D customer service, which is not surprising, and I really don't expect to hear from them this week.

I believe I need to step out for a few minutes to hit the TJMaxx in-town, and also the Hannaford. P'rhaps I'll get the car washed. I have a pass, after all.

How's everybody doing this fine Monday morning?

And, I've hit a snag in the republication project.

Draft2Digital has produced Content Guidelines, to wit:
What are the requirements for self-certifying erotica content?
You must accurately declare the presence of specific erotic themes during the publishing process. You are required to disclose if your work contains any of the following:
Incest or Pseudo-Incest: Sexual relations between family members, whether biologically or non-biologically related (including step-relatives).
Bestiality: Sexual relations between humans and real-world animals. (Note: Fantasy creatures such as shape-shifters or aliens are not classified as bestiality).
Rape for Titillation: Content where the dominant theme is non-consensual sexual relations intended to titillate the reader.
Age Play: Consenting adult characters role-playing or pretending to be babies or children.
Dubious Consent (Dubcon): Scenes exploring the gray area between consent and non-consent where the receiver’s willingness is unclear.
Non-Consensual Sexual Slavery: Erotic depictions of kidnapping, imprisonment, or trafficking. This is distinct from BDSM, which relies on informed consent and safe words.
We do not accept content with pornographic images or content that glorifies taboo subjects such as sexual exploitation of children or rape.

. . . Given the squeamishness of the audiobook company that backed out of its contract because Chapter Whatever-It-Was, I'm guessing that D2Digital will find The Fey Duology to be in violation of its terms of use.

This? Is disappointing. To say the least.

The other, somewhat disturbing thing about this new policy is that books that certify "erotic" content will not be offered to libraries. I'd like to know if the libraries know that they're being "protected" in this manner. And, I do have right here a review from Library Journal stating that Duainfey is "for most libraries."
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Sigh. This has been a good day for Stress Eating. At least it was strawberries. Mind you, strawberries and whipped cream, but it could've been worse.

So, the Plan. I'll continue getting the book together while I'm waiting for D2D to answer me (surprise! They warn of higher-than-normal customer contacts. Gee, I wonder why.), and based on their answer, I'll ... figure something out.

You'd think the people who are trying to suppress "erotica" would understand that hiding things in the corner, or forbidding certain things that people want, like, oh, I dunno? Abortion? Oh! Alcohol! Only drives it underground, where it warps and becomes deadly.

Yes, well. Back to work.

This day has not been as productive as I had envisioned.

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Despite the best efforts of the universe, I did get some useful stuff done today. I include washing the dishes and vacuuming the dining room, living room, and bedroom in that.

Tomorrow, I need to research how/how much it will cost to register the copyright for The Fey Duology (we had always assigned and noted an ISBN, and published the copyright notice, which, until the late shenanigans with the AIs, provided protection as it showed Intent. The Anthropic Settlement teaches us that there's no protection without you spend money for it. Well. Lesson learned.), fill out the necessary forms, and maybe even finish formatting the book.

After which, it can languish until I get some Answers from D2D.

. . .I keep catching myself saying, to myself, or to the cats, or, yanno, to all of us, "Why is everything taking so long?" And, aside the universe being bored, the answer is -- today? Today, if I was focused on getting the book formatted, Steve would have vacuumed, done the dishes, and cooked dinner, too. If he'd drawn the book, then I'd've picked up the chores, and the book would have been ready for formatting (except we'd probably still be talking about if we're paying the copyright fee, and wondering to each other WTF D2D has got into its head) right about, oh -- now.

I'm never going to get used to this, am I?

Well.

Onward.

Everybody have a good evening. Stay safe. I'll check in tomorrow.

Here, have some daffodils:

Friday. Sunny and cool.

Finished yesterday with a phone call from the Investigator from the finance company, who only wanted to tell me what I've been told eight times before, that they did not submit the check twice and the error was on the bank's side. I told her to call the bank, but no, investigators can't call banks to find out WTF. Nor can banks call investigators. I was a moderate wreck by the time we finished up, and spent the evening reading until I stopped shaking. I finished When the Wolves are Silent around 11 pm.

I did have a pleasant dream where I was grocery shopping with Steve, so there was that.

Woke up this morning, called the bank and went through five levels of experts until the fifth said, "Jeez, I don't know why we pulled -- oh, wait. Yanno? I bet we weren't sure that said thousand." So, we verified that the needed funds were in the account (yes). I called the finance company, explained that the bank had acted out of an Over-abundance of Caution, verified the amount due, which I carefully BLOCK PRINTED on the check, and God, may She be willing, this is the end of that.

(And, yes, I am aware that we have reached the land of Everybody Make Something Up Until we Hit on Something that Sounds Plausible and Doesn't Lose Anybody Their Job.)

What else?

Ah. Indeed, Ray cannot install my dishwasher-arriving-on-May-6 for me, so I need to cast about for someone else.

And? There's actually more, but I'll reserve the rest for later, before this becomes too long.

How's Friday treating y'all?
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* I believe it was Val Con who said that being a Scout was one-quarter being terrified and three-quarters mucking about in the mud? The same can be said of being a writer.
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Oh, hey, here's more:

Back when I first met Steve, I operated on the principle that people -- all people -- were out to get me, and that I could trust no one. Which makes the entry of Steve into my life even more extraordinary, but -- that aside.

I hate that we -- or at least I -- have returned to a place where I must suspect everything of being a scam.

This takes a toll on your soul, and I hate it. I especially hate it because for much of my life, after Steve convinced me that sometimes, people will actually be kind and helpful because there are kind and helpful people in the world, I very much benefited from the kindness of strangers.

And now? Everyone has to be Scrutinized and Weighed and the walls must be fortified. Not just the normal stuff of "You're Old and Now You're Prey" that's always been out there, but the unrelenting barrage of people trying to steal from you, frighten you, and trick you is approaching lethal. And now, there are AIs added to the arsenal of the scammers.

In this brave new world...

Sunday. Grey and damp, but not snowing yet.

This morning while taking my shower, I learned that Joan Jett had covered "Dirty Deeds," which, had I taken a Moment's Thought, I would have said, "Of course she did," but there we are.

I am, let it be known, Very Fond of "Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap," AC/DC, and here we find the fundamental problem with humankind. It's a song about a hitman soliciting business, and assuring customer satisfaction through a variety of means. It is, in a word, a terrible song. And yet, yes -- I do love it. Why do I love it?

Well. Beyond the fact that it is of course always a pleasure to hear someone who is happy in their work (I'm especially fond of the list at the very end of AC/DC's version: "Concrete Shoes. Cyanide. Neckties. Contracts. High Mountains!"); it's manic; and, so I choose to believe, meant to be a parody. Also, because it may remind me of home -- gently raised as I was in a blue collar family in a violent, ugly, port city.

I also learned that I need to find a source for the particular fuzzy little balls that Rookie dotes on and then hides so effectively I can't find any to throw for him, leading to Sadness of the Tiny, Abused Coon Cat variety.

And! I've also learned that my tea has brewed, and Firefly is waiting for me on the comfy chair.

What's one of your favorite songs -- and why?
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Had a lovely chat with Sean Hazlett for the Baen Free Radio Hour. We talked about Liaden Universe Constellation Six, Duainfey and Longeye, The Wire, and had a fine time.

Rook and Tali joined me for moral support, and even Google chimed in at one point, thinking, apparently, that I had asked it a question.

For the curious, it has not snowed, but the skies have opened several times to let St. Peter dump out his washtub.

I'm off for the rest of the day, I think.

Everybody stay safe.

Look at these guys; are they pros or what? 

Today's blog post title from, of course, AC/DC, "Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap"

Friday. Cloudy, damp, temps forecast to rise into the mid-60sF.

A thunderstorm rolled into town at bedtime last night. I got up from the couch, moved to the comfy chair in my office, opened the curtains, cracked one of the windows, and watched the storm for an hour. We don't get nearly enough thunderstorms at this location, so we need to celebrate those we do get.

House has been picked up and Sarah's due in at 9ish. I'm about to retreat to Steve's office and start working on getting the Fey Duology ready for prime time.

What're you doing today?

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Out to the post office and back. Lunch prepared and et. I have done some research and it may be -- that is may be -- possible to offer a softcover edition of the Fey Duology through Draft2Digital that does not involve Amazon's marketing arm. I've always found D2D ... kinder than Amazon. I will continue exploring.

Perusing the reviews for Duainfey and Longeye (I'm looking for a -- one -- glowingish professional pull quote, and it's being tough going -- I'm again struck by things like the reviewer complaining about made-up words, and I've gotten the distinct feeling that some had decided what the books were going to be about, and then were thrown off by them being, err, different.

There are also the odd reviewers who remark -- back to back -- on the fact that the two books have different voices (yes?  this would be why there were two books), and complaining that they were forced to buy two books when a "rigorous editing" could have pared the entire tale into one book. 

And then there are the reviewers who found Our Heroine Useless and Too Stupid to Live because she managed to survive a completely alien situation, learn the workings of said alien situation, make her way through trauma and fear back to love and morality -- a lengthy road that I believe rightly passes through Anger. Those folks remind me of the people who found it Unbelievable that a woman as brilliant as Aelliana Caylon was "supposed to be" would have allowed herself to be abused.

That said, I've been sitting for some time with the problem of how I'm going to survive, going forward, especially as a writer, because I can't simply just bear down and do everything that both of us did (ref Useless and Too Stupid to Live, above) without becoming a Rolanni-sized ember. Sarah's visit this morning illuminated my situation. When I needed help cleaning the house, I hired somebody to help me. When it became clear that I couldn't cope with the website that Steve had maintained, I hired somebody to help me.

So, it will be no shame to hire somebody to help me with PR, and possibly other administrative tasks, so I can write, meet my deadlines, interact with my readers, and Have A Life. You wouldn't have thought that coming to this realizaton would have taken this long, but here we are.

It's a pretty day outside. I have all the windows that will open, opened, and now it's time to go back to Steve's office and format me some more manuscript.
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So! I'm a third of the way through the Easy Part of the job. Tomorrow I may not be so speedy, as I do fully intend to spend at least an hour in The! Studio! with my glasswork.

Fans of Rookie will be interested to know that he conned me out of a tidbit of hardboiled egg at lunchtime and snabbled it right down.

Tali, offered her own bit of egg was -- confused.

Everybody have a good evening. Stay safe. I'll check in tomorrow.

Proof of spring:

Thursday?

. . . let's go with Thursday. Damp and cool, but by no means cold.

Breakfast was rice crackers, cream cheese, and grapes. Lunch will probably be fried potatoes and onions and a protein to be named later. The to-do list is everything I didn't do yesterday.

I am three-quarters of the way through Longeye and There. Is. Not. ONE. THING. Wrong. with these books. I'm actually quite angry with the people who made me ashamed of my own work and very nearly caused me to abandon my art. And while Steve said all the right things -- one of Steve's many talents lying in the direction of selling sno cones to penguins. At a profit. -- I doubt he would have given up writing, and I'm not sure the partnership would have survived my withdrawal.

Side story: We had friends who were musicians, a duo, who played gigs in the neighborhood. One day, one of the duo called and asked to meet us for a drink; she had something she wanted to talk out. So, we met her, and it turned out that she had met another musician whose art ignited her own in a way that playing with the other half of the current duo, also her partner, did not. She really wanted to play with this other person, and expand her art. I can still hear the raw anguish in her voice when she said, "And the problem is, I never made a distinction between being with [partner], and playing with [partner]."

Sometime after that, the original duo vanished from the local scene, and we heard, eventually, that they had split and she had left the area.
The moral of this story being that the partnership Steve and I shared was fluid, and informed everything we did. I lost track of how many times we were asked: "You're married? And you write together? How does that even work?" It worked because we were together.

*deep breath*

Going back to the Fey Duology -- I will, indeed, be reissuing these books. Proudly reissuing these books.  Under our names.

And now? I b'lieve it's time to go to work.

How's everybody doing?

Today's blog post title comes courtesy of The Black Crowes, "She talks to angels"

What went before: Well. I finished Crystal Dragon last night. When it comes time, I'll be talking about Soldier and Dragon as one work, which they are (much as The Queen of Attolia and The King of Attolia are one book, IMHO). I do remember thinking that we ought to have included "The Hound of Heaven" (Francis Thompson) previous to the text. Steve argued that it would confuse more than illuminate, though, in my head at least, Dragon has its (very deep and complex) root system there. He was probably right, though. Nobody reads the classics anymore.

In any case.

Saturday! Sunny; rained overnight, looks like. Not going to be nearly so warm as yesterday. I've got The! Studio! warming up, and will today remember to turn OFF the heaters before I turn ON the grinder.

My first cup of tea has just finished brewing and Firefly is stamping her tiny slippered foot -- ahem. Her large, furry foot, wanting me to get into the chair so we can have our morning chat.

Later.
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End of Saturday report.

The day was partially taken up with This Old House stuff -- circuit breakers that wouldn't unbreak, toilet that wouldn't behave. I fixed all of it, eventually, and spent a little time with my glass project, cut out pattern stars for another project, and shared some lying-on-the-bed time with Rook (who took over my stomach) and Tali (who found a corner of folded-over blanket (Tali prefers blanket, God She knows what we'll do when summer finally arrives). Since the reason I was lying down in the bed was to do my PT exercises, this was, as you might imagine, Vastly Convenient. But very comforting. Apparently, I'm on the lists as needing comfort.

I'm having some doubts about stained glass as an art that I'll want to be pursuing, it taking more dedication than I'm free to give it, given the press of my primary art. Also, I'm having some serious trouble (1) scoring a line and (2) making it straight. I'll visit The! Studio! again tomorrow and do some more grinding; there's no rush, after all.

I started reading Duainfey at lunch (taking a break from the Liaden re-read; it strikes me that Crystal Dragon is a good place to pause), since I'm looking to republish it and Longeye.

Is there any interest in me discussing those books after I read them?

Other than that, I am not bouncing back as quickly as I feel that I should from having finished the book. OTOH, the absence of Steve was acute after I turned in the manuscript, and then the news of eluki's passing.

Oh, and genocidal maniacs who have access to the means to make their threats good. That, too.

Rough month, all of a sudden, and it's only the 11th.

Well.

I hope everyone's doing as well as possible. Stiff upper lip, and a stiff drink, too, if it will help.

Stay safe. I'll check in tomorrow.

Today's blog post title taken, in fact, from "The Hound of Heaven," by Francis Thompson, which includes a very specific flight along shifting ley lines.

It is, by the way, snowing here in Central Maine.

Important Stuff First:  I saw Firefly's tail at Full Upward Extension last night.  This morning, she's preferring half-mast, which may mean it's hurting her still.  I can give her the pain meds at noon, and will be doing so.  She did come to snuggle with me when I thought I was going to get up this morning, so we stayed in bed a little longer, talking about how scary That Whole Thing was and how was she feeling now, and articles I'd read about dogs who'd broken their tails and had to get them amputated before there was Serious Damage gone to their spines, and how I'd been really, really scared that she'd gotten cancer wrapped around her spine like her Aunt Sprite, and -- well.  We promised each other not to do this again.

A little later, she joined me for our sitting-in-the-sunlight session.

Yesterday afternoon, I made an appointment to walk an alpaca at Northern Solstice Farm in a couple weeks. There will be a meet 'n greet with the alpaca who agreed to walk with me that day, who will already have donned halter and lead, then an approximately 30 minute stroll either around the farm, or, if conditions aren't too squishy, on a trail through the woods.  Now I remember why I have hiking boots.  I'm really looking forward to this, and glad I didn't let myself talk myself out of it.

Other than that, and actually related to the alpaca walk, I'm trying to unfold myself -- which is to say, to find the way back out of my head after the Intense Concentration required to finish Kin Right on time and correctly.  Steve would have had us out and about, walking up and down the world, breathing the air, taking photographs, eating out, and striking up conversations with strangers chance-met on beaches, in train stations, or in stores.  

I . . . am not that ambitious, left to myself, and the timing's a little unfortunate, as I find it's Easter weekend (how did that happen?).  So, unfolding will take the shape of puttering around, straightening up, making hummus, blowing the dust off of my poor, abandoned glass project, maybe finding another movie/tv show to lightly binge, and planning a ride for next Wednesday or Thursday, when the weather is expected to be warmer and sunny.

The secret of writing is that you can't write all the time.  So -- aside an infodump, and blog posts, no Writing here at the Confusion Factory for the next bit.

Reading, though . . . I've finished reading Balance of Trade, and also Theo of Golden.  I'm about half-way through Seeking Persephone, and after that?  Crystal Soldier.  Speaking of literary whiplash.

And I think that catches us up.

Here's a picture of Firefly, from this morning's sunshine session:

Today's blog post title brought to you by Dire Straits, "Skateaway"