My editor is reading my revised manuscript and will have questions for me "shortly". I am on pins and needles -- how much of my time will I be able to spend on illustrations, and how much will be gobbled up by having to respond to her questions and possibly do some rewrites or (gasp) new material? Meanwhile, I don't yet have a contract for the book ( Read more... )

So now that the word is out that baby Dougalikander is to be a girl, my niece (age 7) and nephew (age 4) have suggested the following names:

Niece: Renee, Jasmine, Blossom
Nephew: Flower Swab, Blossom, Fruit Fly

Votes, anyone?

I work just a few blocks from Cambridge City Hall, where folks were showing up all day to get hitched. I saw lots of film crews, a few fundamentalist carpet-baggers from out of state making a lame protest, and a small but steady stream of happy couples. And guess what? Hell didn't freeze over, the sky didn't fall, the sun did not become the color ( Read more... )

Our road trip to Worcester MA started with a visit to the Miss Worcester Diner, which we had seen on a web site. It's in downtown Worcester, near the railroad yard, an area that looks like one of those grim-n-gritty model railroad layouts where everything has a lovingly applied patina of rust and dust. You may or may not know that Alikander and I ( Read more... )

Went back to my mom's house yesterday and helped her box up some of her books. My reward was a cache of old photos, including some pictures of me playing D&D around 1979, pageboy haircut and all. Some photos showed sweet old Mr. B, the family cat from 1977-1990. Also brought back my beloved Peter Rabbit's Race Game, which is described on the box as ( Read more... )

"It was July in the lands of men, the month of sun, and rightly so, for the sun shone brightly over the fields and scattered villages where Man dwelt, and over the vast, dark forests where no Man dared to dwell, where the sun was not welcome. She turned the farmers' bare back to bronze, and made sweet milk sour. The people of the villages did not ( Read more... )

Yesterday Ali and I drove up to have lunch at Pickety Place in Mason NH, about a 90 minute drive ( Read more... )

Recovered from my mom's basement ( Read more... )

Yesterday was Good Friday -- no school! I spent the day working on the Northern Crown manuscript and playing Star Wars: Galactic Battlegrounds, which has great music from the films that you can groove to while the Empire is taking out your pathetic little rebel base. Took a nap with Pickles, and then noticed he was limping. Off to the vet, two ( Read more... )

I was going to keep this under my hat at least til WisCon, but someone who recently visited our apartment has threatened to let the cat out of the bag, so here goes ( Read more... )