Choose Your Own Apocalypse

The Warrior Muse is hosting the Choose Your Own Apocalypse Blogfest today. I admit I forgot--signed up days ago, but neglected to actually write a post--until now. I give you my version of Apocalypse :)

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There was a time when our Friday evening gatherings on the porch extended deep into the night, even to the hour when skies began to lighten above us, when, as the last friend or two left, we'd turn off the light over the front door because the bright blue of Curaçao dawn made it irrelevant.

I'm in print!

A nice milestone to close my first whole year of being a writer: I get to see my words on an actual, physical, print publication. 

A novel-length book published by Pure Slush, GORGE, a novel in stories, contains a piece of mine (Dessert), and is available as of today for purchase via Lulu.

I ordered three. Cannot wait for delivery :D

50 Best Literary Insults (Thank you, ShortList)

You have favorite lines from Shakespeare, don't you? Roald Dahl, Margaret Atwood, James Joyce? Lines so poignant, so rife with truth that they dropped like smooth riverstones into the still pond of your mind, that you felt the ripples to the tips of your fingers?

Of course you do.

My Next Big Thing

I was invited to participate in the NEXT BIG THING blog hop by the awesome Vanessa Wu of Intense Sensations (read her awesome Big Thing post here; awesome short story collection of lesbian erotica)--thank you, Vanessa! 

Ten questions about the current / new WIP: check. 

1) What is the working title of your current/next book?

Okay... I'll go with Novel #1, A MANTRA FOR CATS AND OTHER RUNAWAYS. I've been working on revisions for over a year, so that definitely makes it "current" :D

The Do-Over 'Fest: Progress

Originally posted on April 18 this year, for the A to Z Challenge: Progress. Brought to you via the Deja Vu Blogfest, courtesy of DL Hammons at Cruising Altitude 2.0. Thanks, DL!

Tarahumaran women in the
Chihuahua mountains.

Up in the Mexican Sierra that scars the country from North to South (same tectonic origin as the Rockies), there are a few communities left that live the way they have for hundreds of years, maybe thousands. No electricity, no plastics, no pop culture.

Once in a while, medical missions make their way up the craggy paths and provide basic care--vaccines for children, prenatal controls, setting bones, treating infections. But most of these communities have, at best, minimal involvement with the modern world.

Those poor bots, man

Last week, for the first time ever, a spam comment made its way past the Blogger filters. First time in eighteen months. Like everyone, I get email notifications when someone comments, so I deleted it immediately... But it started me thinking.

These bots that troll the blogosphere, leaving comments with links to such trust-inspiring sites as cheap cigarettes online UK, or speed up computer--I know they're bots, I know there's no actual person typing these comments over and over. Or maybe there is; I'm sadly (perhaps happily) un-versed in how spam works. Still, even if they're bots, I feel kind of sorry for them. Trolling, trolling, trolling... All that effort going to waste, because Blogger's spam filter catches them more often than not.

Makes me want to cry.

Post-NaNo Blues

On Friday I skidded past the NaNo winning line at 50,022 words and felt all good and self-satisfied with myself. I decided to take the weekend off from writing--from the computer as a whole, period. I deserved it, right? I worked hard all month, neglected all sorts of stuff to get this NaNo thing (and the editing thing) done.

And now, five days later, I can't seem to garner enough enthusiasm to get up from the couch, let alone write.