So I’m Behind on This Blog–Hey, How Are You?–And I May Be Hypomanic–Except My Therapist Says It’s ADHD, Who Knew?–But Also, Any Requests? Oh, SQUIRREL!

I just went through pages of comments to make sure everything was going well, and of course it was because it’s all of you. I don’t even need to post, you can just do this blog on your own, which I love. So go, Argh People, you are excellent.

I disappeared because I shut down in the winter, just curl into the fetal position and fall asleep because of SAD. Except I have a book to write, my part of which is not going well because I can’t get the heroine. (Her name is Rose, and she has an eighteen-year-old daughter named Poppy. That much I know.) Meanwhile Bob is ripping right along with Max’s story, doing a great job, so I have to get my ass in gear. I went to my doc and said, “SAD,” and he said, “Wellbutrin,” and I got a bottle of the stuff and I’ve been on it for a month. Here’s a fun fact about me: anti-depressants and other mood-altering drugs make me insane. The worst when I was on a book tour taking a new prescription and became convinced that room service was coming to kill me. Fortunately, I recognized that was nuts and flushed the rest of the pills before I attacked a waiter with my nail file.

This time I’m all over the place. Ridiculously happy and babbling one minute, sound asleep in the fetal position the next, then trying to talk to somebody and staring off into space, then working for eight hours straight, then . . . you get the idea. What haven’t I been doing? Maintaining this blog, for which I apologize. I’ve apologized to Bob, too, because I’ve been manic–hypomanic, actually–so he’s had to put up with me pinballing from Day of the Dead and steampunk and magic (the non-supernatural rabbit-in-a-hat kind) and lasagna while Bob does great work killing people (he’s so relieved; Vince didn’t kill anybody in the trilogy and I think it hurt him deeply) so I think he’s ready to strangle me, but he leaves it at “Are you okay?” (Yes, I’m FINE, isn’t it a WONDERFUL DAY??????? Did I tell you this thing I learned about magic? Ooooh, a bunch of doll parts just arrived from eBay for Rose’s outsider art, I need to find a good lasagna recipe since Rose is bragging about hers, excuse me I have to sleep now.” Clunk.)

All of which is to say, it’s probably going to be another couple of weeks before these meds level off, but it is working and I can still write, so I’m staying on it until spring at least. Once the sun comes back up again in April, I should be fine again. Well as fine as I ever was.

But I need direction and opinion, and if there’s one thing this blog’s commenters aren’t short on, it’s opinions. So what do you want on here besides Wednesday, Thursday, and Sunday, which really aren’t posts, they’re just pages for you to romp in the comments. I figure you’re tired of State of the Collaboration, and nobody’s had a Questionable, and I don’t have enough focus for Twelve Days of anything, haven’t watched TV or seen a movie in months so no media criticism . . . any requests?

And now back to my research. My heroine works in a secondhand shop and just found a very old bottle of paregoric. Do you know what was in paregoric until the FDA got a grip and outlawed it somewhere around 1970? Opium, honey, and alcohol, plus just a hint of morphine. There’s a reason that stuff was popular.

I have to go, my sealing wax just arrived from Amazon. What is Rose going to do with sealing wax? I don’t know, but I got a great bee stamp, too, so I’m pretty sure bees are going to be a motif. Along with all these doll body parts. Never search eBay for “doll body parts,” it’s like surveying many massacres. I need food.

Where was I?