C.J. Cherryh's Blog, page 213

63123. People ask me how do you write…well, here's an answer.

http://www.cherryh.com/WaveWithoutAShore/?page_id=525

I talk about outlining a book, and it immediately conjures images of Mr. Smith's English 101. Not so. A book outline is 'more like guidelines,' and in response to a question, I actually created an outline for the Great American SF Novel. Sorta. At least you can see the process, if you're interested. I don't even mind if you steal the plot. Just deny you got it from me.

Let's try this again. Mischief managed!

You guys were not in danger, I hope, of picking something up: it was a file on the installation on our server. We used the patch (available on WordPress) and all should be well. If you at any time have a password request involving something called Magic, we can tell you what to do.

having trouble posting

62839. We are within 25 people of having 500 members! You all…

…are a bright spot in my day.

I wish I could say we are 100% ready to go with the e-books. I know Lynn is really trying to make it work. We are most of the way there, but we've all been hit with emergencies of one kind and the other. Just as soon as she announces the site works, we are going to be there with a splash. Jane's busy making covers. I'm busy trying to get the new Bren book finished. And Lynn's trying to understand that program.

Par for the course. Lost my keys…again. Bad as glasses…

But I found them. Had lunch at Peking North and of course, deposited them on the bench seat instead of into my purse. It took me a while to figure this one out—and it was Jane who remembered this restaurant.

We found a reasonable pond store locally. And ended up with a new koi. She's the same size as our average. Her name is Maddy. She's a pearl white with butterfly fins, ie, a long-fin, and very reasonably priced. Baby koi tend to be around five to twenty dollars depending on quality. The adults

61799. We're attacking the lawn…

Hard to believe, but Lowe's doesn't stock fungicide for lawns. It's on their website, but not in stores, and probably half the lawns in Spokane have the problem, after the 5 feet of snow we had this winter.

We duct-taped the front door to try to help Jane's allergies, and today we got some fungicide from a local store, and Jane applied it, sneaky her: I was going to do it, but she beat me to it. It's rainy, so hopefully it will get to work. I'm tired of this stuff.

We also got some pumice rock, fo

61048 words. Rain and cool. Trying to get back to routine.

I'm going back to old habits, trying to gather momentum, and so far so good, as the guy said, walking the plank…

It's too wet to go into the garden this morning. We've kept the path bare earth and this has a certain drawback. We can't afford the gravel or the concrete to do flagstones yet. So it can be a bit of a bog here and there.  I had better go out and toss some fishfood, however, before our spoiled fish go walkabout trying to find some. As if they haven't gotten fat on the worms and algae n

OSG's on the wing, coming home from Montreal Worldcon…

She says she had a wonderful time, but she wants her kittehs and her own bed.

We're going to pick her up at the airport, since OSGuy is at work. We have her house keys.  Heh. But we're out of resources to do the reception number on her house that she did on ours. The fact OSGuy is home just limits our creativity about hanging pirate flags in the living room and skulls in the shower and the basement.

We are, however, retaining that idea for a suitable time.

60,028 words on the manuscript, and finally I've got my focus back.

Writers are delicate creatures. I can't work well when taking antibiotics, when stressed, when on painkillers, etc. And the load of stress is slowly easing. The pond is so much help in this I can't express—just the sound of the water, our funny collection of anime-named fish, the visit of the daily dragonfly, and the wind in the hawthorne leaves—sure, the other side of the fence is a major city arterial, but y'know, you hear what you want to hear, and I'd rather hear the waterfall.

Midsouthcon wr

Jane's posting again.

Thank you, Jane.