C.E. Murphy's Blog, page 42

artist’s figurines

So I had a great and terrible desire for these artist’s models and although I don’t really draw enough to justify them, it so happened that my great and terrible desire aligned with the Irish date for Mother’s Day, so Ted got ’em for me as a mother’s day gift.

They arrived yesterday (just in time for American Mother’s Day!) and I just spent an hour or more fiddling with them.

Conceptually they’re pretty damn terrific. The articulation is as good as it looks. They have nifty little boxes for...

a smol exercise

I went to the gym for my Consultation today. That sounds very impressive, doesn’t it, a Consultation? Very impressive.

I was not looking forward to it at all. I have never been Consulted at a gym before. It turned out to be fine. My strong opinions were not swept away by Somebody Who Knows Better, so, y’know. It was fine. (“Okay, cardio,” the guy says. “What kind of cardio are you interested in?”

“I will not run for you,” I said flatly. “I’ll swim, cycle, row, whatever, but I will not run.”

H...

Recent Reads: HOUSE OF CARDS

So this is the book I had to rip 2/3rds of out & rewrite and revise what was left in 6 weeks.

It turns out I’d forgotten a LOT of what happens in it. I actually got seriously invested in finding out what happens! That was weird! :)

Like, I had no idea Margrit got involved with the selkies so fast in it. Not that I could tell you when I *thought* she had, but…definitely not that fast. And although in the actual descriptions, Kaimana is meant to be shorter and bulkier than most of the other Old...

gym membership

We found a gym we can get to on the bus, and in a moment of daring, got memberships.

The guy helping us was from Miami. He was fit and slim and gorgeous like he’s always been 190lbs. Says he was 240, 2 years ago.

(This commentary paused while Ted and I have an argument about how much the dude weighed. THE POINT IS HE LOST FIFTY POUNDS AND DOESN’T LOOK LIKE HE WAS EVER OVERWEIGHT.)

Anyway, the paperwork we filled out had a number of questions that Ted and I perhaps didn’t take quite seriously...

Cover Reveal: BEWITCHING BENEDICT

I am ALMOST DONE with revisions on BEWITCHING BENEDICT, my little Regency that’s the first of the Lovelorn Lads romance series. It’s a charming, funny little comedy of manners that I genuinely believe anybody who likes my stuff will really enjoy, even though it (*looks furitive, whispers*) hasn’t got any fantasy aspects to it.

The Lovelorn Lads are something of a cross between Seven Brides for Seven Brothers and PG Wodehouse conceptually, in that there are seven Lads who are close friends, an...

Recent Reads: HEART OF STONE

I’m re-reading the Negotiator Trilogy, which I haven’t done since (before) they were published. I’m doing this so I can write KISS OF ANGELS, which is set (at least partially) after the trilogy, and in some ways I have only a vague idea of what the books are about. I mean, obviously I know what they’re about, but…

Some of you may know that the reason I haven’t written more book-length Old Races stories is that writing the Negotiator Trilogy was…awful. Just awful. Like, I had a small nervous b...

easter holidays

Indy’s on Easter holidays, which is 2 weeks off, and I’ve basically been convinced it’s the weekend since the 8th of April.

Strangely enough, it has not been the weekend since the 8th of April, which has led to some deep confusion on my part. I suppose I’ll get back in the swing of things when school starts up again, but this bodes ill for my brain over summer vacation.

We went down to Fota Island for a day, and I took some pictures.

Indy was thrilled beyond comprehension to see REAL! CHEETAH...

a night with the girls

I did not mean for that last post about the big break to be the last post for two weeks, but I temporarily forgot my password and couldn’t log in. Heh. :)

I defied my cold (and probably common sense) and went out to dinner with friends last night. I managed to be late because I stopped to do my makeup and missed the train, so I was pretty annoyed with myself. OTOH, it did provide the pretty amusing moments where, as I approached the table, one of the two women facing me looked straight at me...

the big break

All right, this is it, the big break.

Livejournal has updated its user terms and conditions with an expectation of complying with Russian (I almost typed Soviet, oi) law, including their anti-LGBTQ and freedom of speech laws, which is more than the camel can bear. It’s not like LJ’s had a lot of activity the past, uh, well, several, years, but many of us who have been holding out…no longer are.

I’ll be here on mizkit.com, of course, but I’ll be crossposting this journal to mizkit.dreamwidth.o...

Let me tell you about growing up in Alaska.

I grew up in a small town in Alaska. It was on the road system, which meant we could and did drive to Anchorage once a year, maybe twice, but my town didn’t have, say, a McDonald’s, when I was a kid. I remember when the Dairy Queen opened, and the Arby’s, which was less of a big deal because it opened after DQ, but the first time I went to McDonald’s I was around 11 and I froze. I had no idea what to order. I hardly had any idea *how* to order, even though I’d gone to DQ and Arby’s. But that...