I didn't write an entry yesterday because Sunday was the sort of writing day that hardly bears mentioning. I wrote twenty eight words. No, really. And having done that, I realized that I needed to read back over Chapter Six of The Red Tree before going deeper into Chapter Seven...so I read it aloud to Spooky, who was patient and listened. And there was some invaluable discussion afterwards regarding how the book will be wrapping up, because we've reached the point where I need to understand how that's going to happen. Anyway, despite that progress, at the end of the day I was annoyed and disgusted with myself. Fortunately, I made up for it yesterday, by writing 2,144 words on what will be the next to last chapter of the book. From where I am now, I can see THE END, and it terrifies me. And, too, I find myself more disturbed at the impending fate of my protagonist than is usual for me to feel. This is not a book with a happy ending. Maybe my grimmest ending ever, even more so than in Silk and Low Red Moon and Murder of Angels. At least each of those books leaves the reader (and, importantly, she who wrote it) with a sliver of hope. I hesitate to say so, but in many ways, The Red Tree is a more adult book than anything I've written previously. But, yes, a very fine writing day yesterday.

After I was done for the day, we hastily dressed and went out into the world. It was sunny, so we didn't have to worry about the damned windshield wipers (we're still waiting on the replacement part), sunny but quite chilly. I think we left about 4 p.m., and by then the temp was in the mid 50sF and dropping. We drove south, all the way to Harbor of Refuge at Point Judith. The tide was out, and the moon had risen, one night before the first quarter. The late afternoon sky was so blue, but with a few clouds. The air was so clear we could clearly see south all the way to the northern shore of Block Island, a good ten miles out. We went down to the spot where we usually sit, below the Rabbits' Restroom, in the ruins of Fort Greene. But I was fidgety, and we ended up walking along the granite jetty, farther than we'd ever gone before. We finally stopped at the point where the jetty begins to curve sharply back to the west (about 41°21'35.63"N, 71°29'22.67"W), some 368 yards from the place the jetty begins. I wanted to go farther, but the wind was very cold (the sea was calm), and our ears were starting to ache. So we headed back. There were deep tide pools on the harbor side of the jetty, and where the beach begins, great mats of seaweeds tangled with bits of innumerable mollusk shells and crabs. I found my first Anomia simplex (jingle shell). After leaving the harbor, we drove over to the parking lot beside Point Judith Lighthouse (to 41°21'43.46"N, 71°28'50.51"W), and watched a lone fisherman casting in the shallows. The water was filled with the floaters of lobster pots. Tall sailboats passed the Point as the sun began to set, and their sails were orange in the fading day. We spotted a one-legged Ring-billed gull (Larus delawarensis). Neither of us had identified a Ring-billed gull before, and here this one had only the one leg, though it seemed to be getting along just fine. Quite a bit smaller than most of our local gulls.

We left the shore reluctantly, and drove up to see Spooky's parents in Saunderstown. It was almost dark by the time we arrived at their house. I traded her father an older stack of Science for a newer stack. We headed back towards Providence about 6:30, I guess, and stopped in at Newbury Comics in Warwick on the way. I got a used copy of the director's cut of Neil Marshall's superb The Descent (2005), and Spooky picked up volume two of Angel: After the Fall in hardback.

Back home, there were a few hours of WoW. Mithwen has reached Level 26, and Shaharrazad is at 16. We did have some interesting and experimental attempts at immersive rp the night before, Sunday, with maetrics, an rp acquaintance from my time in Second Life. I can say now that it can be done, rp in WoW, even if just barely, though only if one is willing to worry a lot less about leveling up and such. Also, I'd no idea that night elves were so much larger than humans. Oh, and I bought a guild charter (10 silver), and it will be named the Wrath of Elune, if I ever get eight more signatures.

Oh, while we were driving down to Point Judith, we listened to My Big Hero by 12 Rounds. Spooky had gotten the album from Byron months back, but I'd not heard it. Very nice. Sort of Portishead with a touch of Shirley Manson, perhaps. The vocalist is pleasantly reminiscent of Billie Holiday.

Late last night, we watched The Descent, which was just as terrible and awesome as I recalled. And that was yesterday.

An extremely good writing day yesterday. I did 1,864 words and finished Chapter Six of The Red Tree. Much better than Sunday, when I wrote only 1,010 words and did not finish the chapter. The manuscript is now 68,003 words long. There was no writing on Monday, because it was Mabon, and I had no intention of spending the whole sabbat at a keyboard. And now it is Wednesday, and I see that my last real entry was made on Sunday morning, which leaves me to play catch up again.

First, I want to announce that Frank Woodward's documentary, Lovecraft: Fear of the Unknown (in which I appear), winner of best documentary at this year's San Diego Comic thingy, will be screened at the Chaplin Theatre on Saturday, October 4th, at the absurdly early hour of 1:45 p.m. It's part of this year's Shriekfest, whatever that might be. This will be the film's Los Angeles premiere. Frank tells me it's also been slated for festivals in Buenos Aires and Montreal.

Sunday night we watched Jean-Pierre Jeunet's Le Fabuleux destin d'Amélie Poulain (2001), which I'd only seen the one time in the theatre. I'd forgotten what a truly perfect film it is.

Monday, we got out of the house as soon as we could, which I think was about 2 p.m., and headed south from Providence. First, we visited Game Stop in Warwick, because they had the World of Warcraft "Battle Chest" (Wow plus the "Burning Crusade" expansion) on sale, and we picked up a copy for me and another for Spooky. Yes, it's gone that far. I'll return to the subject of WoW shortly. Anyway, after Warwick, we'd intended to drive down to Moonstone Beach, but changed our minds (we have two of them, most of the time) and instead headed east towards Beavertail. But there was to be yet another change in plans. In Jamestown, we decided that instead of going on to Beavertail, we'd explore the southeastern edge of Conanicut Island, around the ruins of Ft. Wetherill. The first fort built on the coast here was Fort Louis (named for the King of France, yes), erected during the American Revolution. Later, it was Fort Dumpling (named for Dumpling Rock), after being lost to the Brits during the occupation of Newport. In 1900, the fort was renamed in honor of Captain Alexander Wetherill, an infantryman killed in the Battle of San Juan during the Spanish American War.

We parked and spent the afternoon on the rocky beaches, surrounded by high granite cliffs (an unnamed granite formation dating from the Late Proterozoic), searching for bits of beach glass. It was a grand way to spend the first day of Autumn, and I was more in need of actual Nature than Ritual, so it was also a grand way to spend Mabon. I needed that nearness to Panthalassa. So, I lay for hours on the cobble-strewn beach, the clear water of West Cove literally lapping at my feet. It was a grey overcast day, and quite chilly, but no rain. There were ravens and gulls and cormorants. We found lots of glass, including some rare violet and pink bits. The only other people we saw, I think, were two guys who'd been scuba diving in the cove. There were sail boats, and the wind made my ears ache. It was close to a perfect day. There are photos below, behind the cut.

As for World of Whorecrack, and what should have been Level Grind Part Two, let me just say that nothing takes the gung out of your ho (or mine, anyway), like having to endure two hours (!) loading the game software and innumerable patches. My free trial was almost up, so I went ahead and activated a paid account. But, yeah, the software took for fucking ever to load. And load. And load. It was after 9 p.m. before I actually got back to, you know, playing. I'd hoped to get back up to Lvl 15 last night, but having lost all that time loading the game, I only made it to 13. Still, not bad for two nights. Mithwen advances. But. I am beginning to wonder why I bothered switching from the PvP server to an RP server. In two nights, and maybe twelve hours of play over those two nights, except for a few exchanges between me and Spooky, I have yet to see anything resembling rp. I don't mean that I'm seeing bad rp. I'm just not seeing any rp at all. Not even an attempt. I do see lots of annoying ooc behavior and chat. And there's more traffic on the new server, which is sort of irritating, and people keep challenging me to duels (I decline, as it makes no sense in story, and they make no attempt to rp the requests). So...I am left to wonder. Why does Blizzard bother with rp servers, and why do all these people sign in to rp servers, when no one even tries to rp. There's no attempt that I can see at being in character, playing someone who is actually a part of Azeroth. As near as I can tell, it's not that players in WoW can't rp, it's more like the concept is entirely alien to them. I begin to suspect it never even crosses their mind, what "roleplay" actually means. Fortunately, it's a good enough game that I don't really care about the missing rp, and I suppose I could form a group devoted to actual rp. We'll see. But I am annoyed that I switched servers and started over.

Oh, and last night, while I was trying to dump some loot in the bank in Darnassus, some goofball named "Thirstyblood" shoved a guild charter in my face and asked if I would sign it. I did, since it seemed like it would be more trouble to say no. I did not know this would automatically make me a member. Duh. Anyway, shortly thereafter, the guild was activated and the title appeared over my head —— "Unholly Strength." I "whispered" to Thirstyblood and asked if he knew he'd misspelled "unholy." At first, he said no, he'd spelled it that way on purpose. He then admitted "unholy strength" was taken. I asked to leave the group. He wanted to know if I was leaving over the spelling, and I said yes, for starters. At this point, he changed his story again, and said it was just how he wanted to spell "unholy," and made a stink about having a right to spell things as he wished. I said fine, wonderful, just please let me leave. Never mind that we're playing Alliance, so it's a given that we at least probably wouldn't think of ourselves as unholy. Or unholly, for that matter. The guy was getting really...apoplectic...over me not respecting his "right" to spell words as he "chose." But, after five minutes or so of this, he did finally eject me from the guild. I wanted to ask if he called himself "Thirstyblood" because "Bloodthirsty" (which would have been bad enough) was already taken, or if that was a personal choice, too. Jesus fuck, where does all the stupid come from?

Anyway, I have to get to work on Sirenia Digest #34 (subscribe!) and look over the page proofs for the B is for Beginnings chapbook...but yeah...photos behind the cut:

( Fort Wetherill, Mabon 2008 )

Holy fuck, but I'm tired.

After the marathon "leveling crunch" last night (Spooky and I both made it back up to Lvl 10, and it only took seven consecutive hours), I managed a long writing day and finished Chapter Six of The Red Tree this afternoon. But now I am far, far too tired and my head too murksome to make a decent journal entry. But I'll get to it in the morning, promise, complete with photographs from yesterday's trip to Fort Weatherill on Conanicut Island. I edited and uploaded the images this morning.

Spooky promises comfort food for dinner, and then...well...I hope to get to Lvl. 15 tonight. Hello, my name is Caitlín. I'm a godsdamned dork.

Yesterday, I did 1,130 words on Chapter Six of The Red Tree. Afterwards, we read over the pages. Any day that "the rushes" manage to give Spooky the creeps is a day I know I've written well (that is, of course, provided I meant to evoke creepiness that day). Looking at my schedule, deadlines, short stories, Sirenia Digest, and so forth...it's a damned good thing I had those 1,500+ word days, because, otherwise, I'd be unspeakably behind.

As for the remainder of yesterday, I read through a couple of papers in the June Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology —— "A reassessment of some poorly known turtles from the Middle Jurassic of China, with comments on the antiquity of extant turtles" and "A rare Danian (Early Paleocene) Chlamydoselachus (Chondrichthyes: Elasmobranchi) from the Takatika Grit, Chatham Islands, New Zealand." Spooky got Chinese takeaway for dinner, and then there was far, far, far too much World of Warcraft ("elf crack"). By the way, it's not just me, so there's no danger of Spooky becoming a "WoW widow." She also has a night-elf character, a druid named Syllahr. As for Merricat, she reached Level 14 and almost made it to Level 15, but quests seemed to be running short, and so I fear it's away to Darkshore for me. I also attended to some SL business, some notices regarding the Howards End sim. And late, watched (for the umpteenth time) Joseph L. Mankiewicz's adaptation of Tennessee Williams' brilliant and horrifying play, "Suddenly, Last Summer" (which I recently summed up as The Golden Bough meets Lovecraft by way of the Southern Gothic). I am endlessly fascinated by Violet Venable tending dead Sebastian's primordial jungle. Anyway, that was yesterday.

Please have a look at the current eBay auctions, and note that not only is there a copy of The Five of Cups, but there's the first copy of Tales from the Woeful Platypus that we have ever offered for auction. Oh, have I mentioned that subpress will be doing my third "weird erotica" collection, Confessions of a Five-Chambered Heart, next year? I must have...

Also, remember that subpress is now taking pre-orders for my first sf collection, A is for Alien, and that the new mass-market paperback of Daughter of Hounds is now available..

Okay. The words are waiting. But here are a few photographs from our drive down to Harbor of Refuge on Monday evening:

( Harbor of Refuge, September 15th, 2008 )

I haven't made an entry since September 14th, when I made a short and scattered entry. And now I am faced with the unenviable task of trying to play catch up. Except, I know that I can't, so, instead, I'll just touch on the highlights of the past few days. They are a blur of some genuinely impressive mouth pain, and almost no sleep at all. Last night, finally pain free, I slept a remarkable eight hours, and almost feel functional again today.

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Friday night (September 12): After writing all day, we drove to Warwick, because Newbury Comics was having a thirtieth anniversary sale. 30% off lots of stuff, including used DVDs, which was our main interest in going. We picked up Kill Bill (Vols. 1 and 2), Amelie, Slither, and Interview with the Vampire. All of which came to just under $40. Yay sales. However, by the time we left the store, it was dark and rainy, and when Spooky cranked the engine, the windshield wipers wouldn't wipe. The motor that drives them had burned out. So, we called AAA to get the car towed back to Providence, and called Spooky's mom, who came up from Saunderstown and gave us a ride home. Back home, cold and damp, we had night #2 of the Amazing Chicken Soup, watched Slither again (love that movie), and read more of Interview with the Vampire. And it was that night that the mouth pain went from a nagging, minor thing, which it has been since my last dentist appointment in May, to full-blown Hurt. First night of not sleeping.

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Saturday (September 13): All day, stoned off my ass on Oxy and zolpidem and Klonopin, and I managed to get nothing written, no work done. I could hardly concentrate on listening to Spooky read, though that's mostly what we did. I lay on the sofa and bed, my mouth throbbing, and listened to Spooky reading Anne Rice aloud to me. Late, in a fit of desperation, unable to listen to more of the novel (Claudia had just poisoned Lestat, a part of the book that leaves me heartsick for all three characters)...this sentence has clearly lost direction. Let's try again.

Later, in a fit of desperation, needing distraction, I signed up for the free ten-day trial of World of Warcraft and played for five hours straight. It's like....crack. Actually, it's a lot like Morrowind, with better (though more stylized, more like a Final Fantasy game) art and animation. It's actually a very, very playable game, much to my surprise. I don't see a lot of room for rp in WoW, and even though I signed onto a supposedly rp-dedicated client, there were still people with idiotic, inappropriate "names" —— Chickenwing, Imripped, etc. What the hell. Are there really people who can't stop being jackasses long enough to get into the spirit of a game? Or do they not even grasp the concept of character? Also, when I'm anyplace I can pick up chat (Darnassus, for example), the homophobic lolspeak is excruciating. But, other than those three drawbacks, like I said, WoW is quite playable, and I'm having fun with it. I'm now a Level 13 night-elf fighter named Merricat (thank you, Shirley Jackson). Day #3 of the ACS.

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Sunday (September 14): Sick from my second night without sleep, and sick from all the Oxy, and the bloody pain, I stared out the window a lot, unable to even begin to work. I did play some WoW. There was a 5 p.m. meeting of all the folks in the Howards End rp and build-team groups, and I think I managed not to make an ass of myself, despite being asleep and sick. My thanks to everyone who came. Great turn out. There was ooc banter (which will be rare in HE), and many questions were asked, and, afterwards, people wandered about the sim. It gave me some hope this will actually happen. But, as the evening wore on, after dinner and night #4 of the Amazing Chicken Soup, the pain in my mouth became too great a distraction, and I just sort of shut down. I've had a LOT of tooth pain in my life, but Sunday night and Monday morning were truly unforgettable. I think I got to sleep about 5 ayem, and slept fitfully.

---

Monday (yesterday): It was suddenly summer again, hot. Spooky found me a dentist over on College Hill, and I had a 3:30 appointment. I took Oxy and Advil and waited. Oh, I bathed. Rarely, have I so looked forward to a dentist appointment. Anyway, it went as well as such things can. No abscess, which surprised me, but there's no saving the cracked tooth. He removed the filling that was put into it back in February, then packed it with antibiotics and something that tastes of clove oil and made the pain stop. It will buy me some time, though no one can say how long. Then, I'll go back for the extraction.

After the dentist, I needed the sea. I loathe feeling frail, and I felt extremely frail yesterday. So, after we swung back by the house, Spooky drove me down to Point Judith and Harbor of Refuge. The sea does not make me feel less fragile, but it puts my fragility in perspective. Next to Panthalassa, even granite is frail, so who am I to feel dread or disappointment at my own weak flesh? We walked about just a bit, because I was woozy, and watched dragonflies and Monarch butterflies (Danaus plexippus), which were everywhere. I picked up some clam shells (Mercenaria mercenaria), and we headed back to Narragansett. My mouth was still a bit numb, but we stopped at Iggy's, because we were both starving, and I managed a bowl of chowder (Manhattan style) and a couple of doughboys. On the way home, I dialed the iPod to Sigur Rós, and dozed until we were back in the city. That, in synopsis, was the last four days.

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Please have a look at the current eBay auctions. Hopefully, today marks a return to "normal." Oh, the reprise of summer lasted only a day, and it's cool again.

So, as promised earlier today, a dozen photographs (behind the cut) from yesterday evening's visit to Point Judith:

( Point Judith and Harbor of Refuge, 7 September 2008 )

Yesterday, I did 1,552 words on Chapter Five of The Red Tree. At this point, the manuscript is 51,435 words long, or 206 pages. And, as usual, I have no idea how this novel will be received. I do not know how my agent will react, or my editor, and especially not readers. This is probably not the novel with which I will win over Middle America. I expect the Wal-Mart crowd will not gobble this one up. And Oprah will not shower accolades upon it. Ah, but there is sex, and how often has that ever happened in my novels? Actual sex. It's all between two woman, and one of them is in her forties, but still. It is sex. The trick is allowing sex scenes to play out in such a way that the whole novel does not come to a grinding halt because of THE SEX SCENE. Well, that's one of the tricks.

Somehow, I slept seven hours last night, and feel a bit better today.

Spooky has begun a new round of eBay auctions. Please have a look.

Let's see. How about a news item? Well, I'm learning just exactly what a total religious whack-job this Palin woman is, and that's even scarier than Hurricane Ike. Really, people, McCain is 71 years old. Life expectancy for men in America is only 75.4 years, so, you know, there is a better than good chance that the war-mongering old fart could kick the bucket and leave crazy little Miss Alaska the True Believer in charge. Well, leave her camp of extra-loony evangelical Xtians in charge. But whatever.

There's a reason I try to avoid the news.

Anyway...yesterday, after the writing, Spooky and I went down to Point Judith, because we knew that, after Hanna's passage, the surf would be spectular. And spectacular it was. So much so, it was too much for any actual surfers. We climbed the remains of Fort Greene (aka, the Rabbit's Restroom), then picked our way along the cobblestone beach below the hill (to 41°21'42.89"N, 71°29'6.05"W). The tide was out, and there were dead horseshoe crabs (Limulus polyphemus) everywhere, dozens of them. The waves were enormous, and the air was filled with salty mist from the breakers. As the first quarter moon rose over the sea in the south, we turned west again and walked back to the jetty at Harbor of Refuge. Far out, the waves were completely overtopping the jetty, sending up great walls of white water. We ventured a couple of hundred yards out (approximately 41°21'38.78"N, 71°29'18.93"W) and I stood on the ancient granite blocks, getting wet, the wind roaring around me, entirely amazed. Spooky took a lot of photos, and I'll post a few this evening. We stayed until sunset, then had dinner at Iggy's before heading back to Providence.

Later, there was some work on the Howards End sim, and we read more of "Cabal." And that was yesterday. Oh, I do have this screencap from the Howard Ends skybox, grumpy Nareth getting a "time out" with only Sulk Bunny and Captain Spaulding for company.

( Why so green and lonely? )

A hard rain, here in Providence, as Hanna bears down on us. I don't really expect we'll lose power or anything of that sort. But we do have a tropical storm warning, a flash flood advisory, and so forth. Anyway, I thought I'd post some photos from our trip down to Beavertail on Thursday:

( Lions Head, Beavertail, September 4, 2008 )

A bit warm here in Providence. 81F in the apartment right now, and that's with Dr. Muñoz blasting in the middle parlour. It was worse yesterday. But the remnants of Hanna are headed our way, and the promise of rain and cooler weather. Right now, Ike's a scary looking beast, even after dropping to a Category 3.

No writing again, yesterday. Someone made a comment about Clive Barker's "The Hellbound Heart," and I started rereading it, and there went the day. This can't continue. Today, it's back to The Red Tree. Anyway, that's the first time since 1986 or so that I'd read "The Hellbound Heart." It's a far sight better than the film that was made from it (we won't get into the sequels, except to say I have an odd, soft spot for Hellraiser II), but really wasn't as good as I remembered. The sexual elements are too important not to have been handled better. Storywise, the last half wanders about, to and fro, as though it's not quite sure how to wrap everything up. But the Cenobites remain delightfully eerie (and sexy) creations, as does the "Lemarchand configuration." Ironically, in the end, I was left wishing that Barker had written it as a longer work, at least as long as "Cabal." Either that or a much shorter work. Still, it has a spark.

After Spooky picked up our weekly bag of produce at the Dexter Training Grounds (and this week, we got tomatoes, lettuce, kale, two nice eggplants, peaches, and green beans), we headed down to Beavertail. Spooky's taken to watching the tide charts and surf reports, and we knew the waves would be pretty good. We walked back down the green path to the more northerly section of the rocks, far above the lighthouse. We walked until we encountered a large cleft in the rocks at Lionshead (41°27'18.20"N, 71°23'26.98"W), a sort of fissure, roughly 25' across, maybe 20' down to the rising tide. To get around it, we'd have had to follow it west a ways, and night was already coming on, so we stopped there. I allowed myself to pay more attention to the geology than my footing, and stepped on a slick bit of algae and took a fall. I only scraped up my left arm a bit, though I narrowly missed sliding over the edge and into the sloshing water-filled fissure*. I guess I haven't forgotten everything I learned, way back when, when I had to climb rock faces for a living, because I fell well and managed to stop myself from going over. I think it scared the piss out of Spooky, but we were both laughing about it as soon as I'd gotten back up onto stable ground. We spotted an Upland Sandpiper (Bartamia longicauda) in amongst the usual assortment of gulls, cormorants, and plovers. It was dark by the time we made it back to the car, maybe nine thirty before we made it home. I have photos, but don't have the time to get them up this morning. Maybe tonight.

I did a little SL, mostly stuff related to Howards End. We got a couple of sea gulls for the sea cliffs (buying animated scuplty animals in SL always gives me Bladerunner flashbacks), though I think we need about eight more. The terraforming continues. It's taking a little longer than I'd expected. Later, we watched the first half of Tim Burton's Sweeney Todd. I'd taken a Lortab for my damned aching mouth, and it had me woozy and slightly ill, and we went to bed about 2:15 ayem.

Yesterday, I received page proofs to read over for a new Call of Cthulhu gaming supplement that will include the Benefit Street ghouls. Obviously, this is being done with my consent. It's a nerdy sort of flattery, and I never get enough of that.

Please, if you have not already, consider ordering a copy of the NEW mass-market paperback edition of Daughter of Hounds (or picking one up at your local bookshop). Also, subpress is taking pre-orders for my first sf collection, A is for Alien. Thanks.

*Postscript (12:46 p.m.): I just found this news story from July 2007 about a woman falling into the very same fissure. There's a photo.

Great relief over Gustav. This time, Cuba took the blow.

A black day of unfocused and unfocusable anger yesterday, and so a Lost Day. A mostly Lost Day. There was a hint of redemption towards the end.

Day before yesterday, well, that was spent getting Sirenia Digest #33 ready to go out (thank you Gordon, and Vince, and Geoffrey), but I also managed to write another 700 or so words on "Some Notes on an Unfinished Film." I may try to work on it again today, but then it has to be shelved, so I can get to Chapter Five of The Red Tree.

Oh, I actually have some cool news from dreaded Dragon*Con. scarletboi spoke with Ted Naifeh about allowing Ziraxia to do a Dancy Flammarion T-shirt using his artwork, and Ted agreed it was a great idea. The artwork that gets used might be an illustration from Alabaster, and it might be a drawing of Dancy that Ted did for Sissy and Kat back in 2004. Either way, it will be very cool, and I'll keep you posted. I will assume that all subscribers have received #33, but if you haven't, email Spooky.

Yesterday...I'm not exactly sure how the day began, but by one p.m. or so, I could see it was going nowhere good, nowhere healthy, nowhere productive. So, after I'd somehow managed to focus enough to read "Details of a new skull and articulated cervical column of Dinilysia patagonica Woodward, 1901" in the new Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology, we decided to head towards Watch Hill, at the very southwestern corner of Rhode Island, because it's a place we love and we'd not managed to make it down there since we arrived in June. We hoped the Labor Day crowd wouldn't be too bad, but anything would be better than me stalking furiously about the house. Well, no, as it turns out, that was not the case. The sky was an impossible carnivorous shade of blue, not a speck of cloud anywhere, and the sun white as hell, and all of it just making me want to lie down somewhere and dig my fingers deep into the earth and hold on. There is no explaining my "sky anxiety." And to make matters worse, we reached Watch Hill to find it awash and teeming in a foul blanket of tourists. I was heartened to see that "Book and Tackle" is still open, albeit in an inappropriately tidy new building. Also, it was good to see the Aphrodite moored right where I first saw her two years ago.

I told Spooky to just keep driving, to just get me out of all that light and out from under that hideous sky, away from all those people, and we headed back towards her parents' place in Saunderstown. It was shadowy there, under the trees, and I hid upstairs and napped while Spooky sorted through photographs from her childhood. By six p.m., I was calmer, and my head not so full of light, and we headed down to Point Judith, planning to have dinner at Iggy's, hoping the setting sun would have sent most of the tourists scurrying back to their respective points of origin. And mostly, that was true, just not true enough. There were still tourists, and worse still, this year's crop of college students. The line at Iggy's was too long to even consider, and seeing all those faces, my appetite died anyway. We drove down to Harbor of Refuge, where we were able to slip into the underbrush and blessedly away from the throng of fishermen and surfers and college kids. We climbed the steep hill above the Point Judith Fisherman's Memorial. The view from up there was wonderful, the day's first fleck of wonder. The poison ivy is turning red, the air was filled with dragonflies, and the western sky was catching fire. Spooky noted a great deal of rabbit poo, so (thank you, Edward Gorey), we dubbed the hill the Rabbit's Restroom (41°21'43.58"N, 71°29'6.75"W). We watched the surfer's over at the Point, near the lighthouse. There was a marvelous surf, and the largest waves were there, of course.

After a time, we climbed down to the rocky beach (approximately 41°21'42.99"N, 71°29'9.14"W) just east of Harbor of Refuge and sat in the ruins of Fort Greene (WWII, built in 1941). And finally the weight of the sky lifted from me, the weight of all that light. I lost myself in the crash of 10-15 foot waves against the rocks, and the sound of each wave withdrawing to make room for the next. There, the withdrawing water makes the most remarkable sort of noise, and Spooky and I have both struggled to find the right words to describe it. It's bit like hearing popcorn popping, if the kernels were the size of cobblestones. It's a bit like hearing bubbling hot oil, especially if an ice cube is dropped into the oil. We sat there with the gulls and cormorants and Semipalmated plovers while the sun set, astounded at the force of the incoming tide, at the concussions traveling through the stone beneath us. And here is magick, true magick, wild magick. The interface of Panthalassa and Pangea, which one might call mother and father, goddess and god, if one were so crass as to reduce either to merely anthropomorphic abstracts of their true selves. We stayed until dark, and Spooky took a lot of photos. On the way home, we stopped at George's in Galilee for fish (very, very fresh) and chips. First time we'd eaten there since 2004.

There are photos behind the cut:

( Saving Grace, 1 September 2008 )

Postscript (3:07 p.m.): I just read that Don LaFontaine has died. "In a world..."

Yesterday, for the first time, we read aloud through "The Z Word," start to finish. I hadn't heard any of it out loud, which is unusual, as we usually read the days pages aloud right off. Anyway, it holds up. Vince has already begun work on the illustration. The rest of the workday was spent going over the Daughter of Hounds excerpts that will also appear in Sirenia Digest #33, and I wrote an extra-long prolegomena for the issue (or so it felt, at 661 words). I also spoke with Bill Schafer about doing a third erotica collection for subpress next year, and that project now has a green light.

Please note that the copy of To Charles Fort, With Love included in the current eBay auctions appears to be the last copy of the trade hardcover edition that we have for sale. Which came as a surprise to Spooky and me both. So, considering the collection is sold out, and this is likely my last copy for eBay, you might want to have a look. Also, if you missed it yesterday, A is for Alien now has a cover (art by surrealist Jacek Yerka, which just pleases me no end).

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When the work was done yesterday, Spooky said, "Let's go to the beach," so we did. Only, first we stopped in to see her mom and dad in Saunderstown. We talked about apples, Wyoming, rock climbing, Colorado, jellybeans, and the subversiveness of science. Her dad had several back issues of Science for me, all of August, I think (he's a department chair and Professor of Anthropology and Marine Affairs in the Department of Anthropology at the University of Rhode Island). Then we headed south to Moonstone Beach, which we'd not visited since way back on July 28th. This beach has so many moods, and yesterday it was still and quiet. Not much surf, and the air was so clear we could see south all the way to the northern shore of Block Island, about 13 miles away. We waded a bit, and both got a lot wetter than we'd intended. There were tracks of plovers, gulls, and cormorants everywhere. Tiny dinosaur tracks. We saw a flock of almost forty cormorants, when we'd never seen more than three or four together, previously. The last of this year's rose hips have ripened. We saw the pair of swans on Trustom Pond we've been seeing all summer long. A beautiful evening. There are photos below.

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Back in Providence, we got some Chinese takeaway and, being in the mood for something goofy and charming, we watched Jane Fonda and Lee Marvin in Cat Ballou (1965, directed by Elliot Silverstein). Then I did some work on the first go at a set of rules (the "do's and don'ts" sort) for the Howards End players and sent it out. It will need a good deal of expansion and revision before we begin in October, but it's a start. Basically, I'm looking at all that time I've spent in other sims and other rps, at everything that's mucked up rps in which I have taken part, and trying to weed out the problems before they arise. The terraforming is coming along nicely, most notably the warrens and necropolis by the sea, and the old train tunnel under College Hill. Oh, and I got a really oogy new skin for my Ravnos antitribu character (from Corvinus, a different rp), so now we no longer have to pretend she has welts and blisters and seeping open sores due to her horrid photohypersensativity. Now she looks the part. Oh, and Spooky worked on the Bailff avatar, who is looking quite a bit like Sid Haig

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Today has been declared an Official Day Off, my first since Monday the 18th, nine days ago. I was getting kind of ragged. Anyway, here are the photos:

( Moonstone Beach, August 27th, 2008 )

Despite a very slow and spectacularly difficult start, yesterday was a pretty good writing day. I wrote 1,210 words on Chapter Four of The Red Tree, and managed to finish the scene that I've been working on since Wednesday (the second scene of the chapter, or the second entry, since The Red Tree is Sarah Crowe's journal). Huzzah! I knew it was going to be a hard section, but it still surprised me. It is the point in the book where the influence of the Weird becomes undeniable.

Please do have a look at the current eBay auctions, and don't forget to pre-order A is for Alien (from subpress, of course) and the mass-market paperback of Daughter of Hounds. Thank you, and the platypus says I shall be negligent in my duties if I do not also mention subscribing to Sirenia Digest, as there's no time like the present.

After the writing yesterday —— and I don't think I finished until about 5:30 or 6 p.m. —— we headed off to Beavertail on Conanicut Island. The wind had been so brisk all day, we knew it would be a fine, fine evening out on the rocks. Sadly, though it also being near the end of summer, and a Sunday, there was a veritable plague of tourists. We parked way around on the eastern side of the point, as far north as we could, putting as much distance between us and everyone else as possible. We followed a trail through the woods, as the sun was setting, past a clearing and down to the rocks, ending up approximately 1,100 yards northeast of the lighthouse. It's a part of the shore we hadn't visited since 2006. Here, rocks of the Cambro-Ordovician Conanicut Group, specifically interstratified beds of the Fort Burnside Formation and the older Jamestown Formation form great flat tables of phyllite and siltstone, metamorphosed to varying degrees. We were maybe an hour past high tide, but the moon had yet to rise. Far to the south, at the point, the lighthouse winked on and off. We came upon an adult and a number of young Herring gulls (Larus argentatus). We climbed about the rocks as the sea roared around us, and relocated a deep tidal pool. In one of the shallower pools, we found all manner of whelks and periwinkles, tiny crabs (most dead), and Spooky spotted a beautiful little urchin. I lay down and, putting my arm into the chilly water up to my shoulder, managed to fish it out for her. A gorgeous little Purple Sea Urchin (Arbacia punctulata). We stayed almost until complete darkness. I didn't want to leave and go back to the city. I never do, but the reluctance was especially acute yesterday. I just wanted to stay out there with the gulls and the cormorants and the salt spray. I wanted to slip off the boulders, like a seal, and lose myself in the churning bay.

There are a few photos below, though it was darkish, so they aren't the best I've ever posted. As for the Howards End sim, we've reached the point where I have to force myself to sit down and make some sketches, so that Jessica can get the terraforming underway, because we seem to have some very eager builders (our build team has swelled to about seven people, including me and Spooky), but nothing can be built until the land is sculpted, and all the tunnels and basements dug.

( Beavertail, August 17, 2008 )

Yesterday did indeed go entirely off the rails, and it refused to be shoved back on. Nothing was written. There was email with Bill Schafer regarding the cover of A is for Alien and with Anne Sowards regarding the cover of The Red Tree. New contracts arrived (details TBA), and I had to spend some time with them. There was deliberation over artists to be interviewed for Sirenia Digest #33. There was printer drama.

By 3:30 p.m., it was clear there would be no writing, and I suggested to Spooky that we just get the hell out of the house and maybe head for Watch Hill, which we've not visited since our arrival in Rhode Island back in June. She agreed it was a good idea, but then remembered we had to pick up our CSA produce bag at Dexter Training Ground at 5 p.m., and, I noted that a line of thunderstorms was sprouting up across South County. Regardless, we resolved to head for Watch Hill after picking up the CSA bag. I took a bath, and I think we actually got out of here about 5:30. Just south of Providence we hit the rain, and I suggested we give it up and turn back. Spooky was reluctant, because it meant we would run into work traffic. So, we changed our plans. Instead of Watch Hill, we just drove down to Narragansett and got some doughboys at Iggy's. By the time we reached the restaurant, the sky was clearing somewhat. We took our doughboys and headed to Point Judith. The tide was high, and the sea seemed oddly calm. Spooky suggested we check out the beach at Sand Cove ("Roger W. Wheeler State Beach"), over on the western side of Narragansett. I'd never been there, so I said sure. Sadly, it turned out to be 27 acres of the dullest, ugliest, most litter-strewn waterfront I've seen in Rhode Island (or anywhere in New England). We walked about a while, and at least the broad expanse of shallow water created by the breakwaters to the south meant an environment amenable to a number of species of pelecypods (bivalve mollusks) I'd not yet seen on the state's beaches. I picked up shells from large Surf clams (Spisula solidissima), a pretty little Bay scallop (Aequipectecn irradians), and a species of Razor clam (either Enis directus or Solen viridis, but I can't be sure, as the hinge, teeth, and beak were missing). Ratty sea gulls everywhere, and tourist droppings. After maybe twenty minutes, we grew disgusted and headed back to Providence.

Last night, after dinner, we watched P.J. Pesce's Lost Boys: The Tribe (2008), an entirely unsuccessful attempt to produce a sequel to Joel Schumacher's classic The Lost Boys (1987). There's really, honestly, not much good to be said for Pesce's film. I'm glad it wasn't longer, as the 100 minutes felt interminable (this was the "director's cut"). All the charm of the original was absent, all the things that made it work. Sure, there was sex and gore aplenty, and some dubious CGI, which I think were chiefly attempts to hide the absence of a script or direction or much in the way of acting. The camera work was...well...I've seen better stuff in Sci Fi Channel films. The critical soundtrack was dull and mismatched. Only the Aiden cover of "Cry Little Sister" (original by the psuedononymous "Gerard McMann") was worth the trouble, and even that could have been better. And Corey Feldman. Poor, poor (oddly well-preserved) Corey Feldman trapped in this asshat of a movie, trying his best to recapture some of the magic of the first film. Twenty-one years after the release of The Lost Boys, you'd think someone would have gone to the trouble to do this right or leave it the hell alone. And all I have to say about Angus Sutherland is that the father seems to have passed along none of his talent to Kiefer's half-brother. Anyway, I'd say skip this one altogether. Even free, it's a painful waste of time. This mess would have been more accurately titled Grand Theft Auto: The Lost Boys, and now I know why it went direct to DVD.

The Howards End sim was delivered this morning by Linden Labs. Right now, it's just a barren hunk of rock, like something thrust up from Paleozoic seas. But Jessica Ornitz, our terraformer and tunneler, will soon get to work on molding the stone to our purposes. I'm trying not to get too excited about this, at least not until after today's work is done. We have 15,000 prims to make the world come alive (a prim is the fundamental building unit in Second Life). If you want in, we still have slots open (I don't expect to close membership to the "Denizen's of Howards End" group until October, really), what I'll need is your SL name, so we can send you an invitation. Then you'll get all the updates and stuff. For now, the access list to the sim is restricted to the build team. Oh, and if you have not yet created an SL account, please, no silly names or pun-names. Names that you can imagine one might encounter in one of my novels set in New England (I'll likely be playing mostly as Bellatrix Bracken). For those people who already have accounts with unusual names, we'll figure something out, but absolutely no "joke names" will be permitted in sim. One day, I'll post my list of most idiotic, unforgivable SL names. Oh, and no names with numbers in them. I got in one decent bit of rp in Corvinus last night (thank you, Lina).

Please have a look at the current ebay auctions, and if you have not yet done so, it would be very helpful if you'd pre-order the mass-market paperback of Daughter of Hounds. Thanks! Now, here are some rather dull photos from yesterday:

( Narragansett, August 14, 2008 )

So, here's the way I see it, and if I am wrong, someone can tell me so. You guys can either get an online journal wherein I occasionally say what I think on a diverse range of subjects not necessarily related to my writing (recently, and the cause of some strife, that Orson Scott Card is a raving homophobe, that I'll be voting for Barack Obama, and that Robert Jordan and Laurell K. Hamilton write "tripe"). OR, we have this other choice. I can keep my mouth shut, like I mostly used to do, and confine this blog to daily word counts and notices about our ongoing eBay auctions. Because you can't have it both ways. If I express my opinions —— which are often contentious, unpopular, unorthodox, whatever —— it is inevitable that I'll offend someone every few days. This morning I received a rather whiny email from someone claiming I'd hurt his feelings because of what I said about Jordan and Hamilton, and so he probably won't be buying any of my books. Night before last, one reader went ballistic in the journal comments over the fact that, while I condemn OSC's hate speech, I support the presidency of Barack Obama (seeing these two things as somehow inextricably linked). And it's true, I do not need to be alienating readers. But it's also true that when I do not give in to my tendency to be a mouthy bitch, this journal gets rather dull. So, which will it be? You want the somewhat unexpurgated me, or the utterly dull and inoffensive me? You can't say, we want you to be honest, then go off on me when you find something I say offensive. You are certainly entitled be be offended. But...this is my LJ, right? And the opinions expressed here are mine. Maybe I'll post a poll later —— reserved and inoffensive, or honest and often offensive. Let you guys decide. Right now, I'm just annoyed at the whiners who want me to know I've hurt their feelings...because, you know, I care.

I just got the news (thank you Doug Miller), via boingboing.net, that I am one of the thirty-one sf authors who will be discussed this month on the Science Fiction Message Board. Specifically, I have been assigned to August 23rd, or that day's been assigned to me, whichever. I'll post about this again nearer to the date, and here's the link to the announcement by Cory Doctorow. I was frankly amused at the person who complained about my inclusion on the list because I write "Vampire romance novels," when I've only written one vampire novel, sixteen years ago, and it wasn't very romantic.

Yesterday was an odd sort of day. A semi-day off, but at least I answered that mountain of email. Spooky baked some very yummy muffins for Lughnasadh (apple, cinnamon, walnuts, and dates). I loaded Sigur Rós' Með suð í eyrum við spilum endalaust (2008) and Gordon Bok's Seal Djiril's Hymn (1972; my thanks to Sonya for this one) onto the iPod. I took a long, cool bath. That sort of rather aimless, laid-back sort of day. We get too few of those hereabouts. About 5:30, we headed to Beavertail for an informal Lughnasadh ceremony. And here things got a little derailed, and it was likely my fault.

I've always thought that the ruins of Fort Burnside (circa 1942, built to guard the minefield that was placed in Narragansett Bay during WWII) would be a wonderful place for ritual work, especially given that the two circular depressions that each once held a 3-inch gun have an odd and striking resemblance to a megalithic site, as does the old bunker. What I failed to take into account were the nosy people. Why I failed to take this into account is beyond me, as I know well enough that humans are pathologically incapable, in general, of minding their own damn business. As Spooky was beginning to cast the circle, some swamp-yankee goombah with a camera wandered up wanting to know what we were doing. As we worked, we attracted a smallish audience (a child's shrill and repeated scream, "Mommy! What are they doing?!"). And as we were heading back to the car, a woman approached (she was out walking her dog), and she said to Spooky, "I see you two are spiritual people." Spooky stopped to talk to her. I figured she was some harmless New Ager, so I busied myself putting things away. A few minutes later, Spooky shows up, grumbling, and tells me that the woman wanted to know if we'd "...ever thought about Jesus Christ, who created the sea?" It was all Spooky could do to keep me from going after the woman, I think. I was instantly livid. I swear to fuck, I considered making an impromptu human sacrifice to Panthalassa and all the hungry crabs and fishes.

I mean, what if I stood around outside some local Xtian church on Sunday, and when they exited, annoyed the congregation members with questions like, "Have you ever thought about the Morrigan, or Dionysus, or Brighid? What if someone who was Islamic, or Buddhist, or Hindu, or what-the-hell ever did such a rude, thoughtless, arrogant thing? Sure, I know why it's so, as I was raised Catholic and Methodist, but it is truly regrettable that so many Xtians are driven to evangelize, to witness, to annoy the shit out of the rest of us with their religion, when I'd never dare do such a thing. But I don't have to be happy about it. Afterwards, I was so angry I climbed down the cliffs to the sea, to a spot where the incoming tide was especially violent, slamming itself loudly against the rocks, slinging up spray ten or fifteen feet into the air. I sat there and watched the waves and tried not to hate that woman, who seemed to feel that we have so little conviction and so little right to privacy that she could approach us and ask such a goddamn, idiotic question. Spooky was much nicer to her than I'd have been, telling her "Many things made the sea." I'd have probably said, "Yeah, we did the Jesus thing, but, turns out, pagans get better sex. And, by the way, from that sour fucking look on your face, you could probably use some." We stayed with the sea until dark, then headed back to Providence, and got sandwiches from Eastside Market for dinner.

Oh, on the way down to Beavertail, we stopped at Newbury Comics in Warwick. I went in only meaning to get the new director's cut of Alex Proyas' Dark City (1998) and the newly released Doomsday (2008). But it is an evil, seductive place, and so we also picked up the hardback of Joss Whedon's Angel: After the Fall, Vol. 1 and a limited edition book/CD thingy Nick Cave has released to accompany Dig, Lazarus, Dig. Last night, we watched the new cut of Dark City, which runs 111 minutes, versus the theatrical release of 100 minutes. But, those restored eleven minutes make an already brilliant film far less choppy, more subtle, and give it quite a bit more depth. Also, the annoying opening voice-over that was forced on Proyas by the studio has been removed. At the time of the film's original release, I was a friend of a friend of the director's (well, technically, I still am), and knew that he was very displeased with the cut, especially with the voice-over, that gives away the film's fundamental mystery in the first minute. The restored footage concerning the whore's daughter (we don't even see that she has one in the 1998 cut) and Jennifer Connelly's character singing "The Night Has a Thousand Eyes" (vocals performed by Anita Kelsey), were especially welcomed restorations. Anyway, I have always adored this film, and now I adore it even more.

Time to get back in the platypus saddle, back to work, and my thanks to Larry Roberts of Bloodletting Press for giving me a two-week extension on the introduction I agreed to write for S. T. Joshi's forthcoming Arthur Machen collection. Also, my thanks to Ernest Lilley (senior editor at SFRev) for sending me the following photos from my signing at Readercon 19. Spooky's even in most of them:

( Readercon, July 18th, 2008 )

I've long since lost track of the times that some sf reader, usually someone in SL, has told me how much hesheit loves the work of Orson Scott Card, and then I've had to explain that, regardless of whatever talent Card may (or may not) possess as an author, I cannot see past his religion-based bigotry to even try to enjoy his work. And, usually, the hesheit in question has no idea what I'm talking about, despite the fact that Card won't stop shooting his mouth off about the evils of homosexuality, the sanctity of marriage, the holiness of het procreation, and so forth. For example, his article for the July 24th issue of mormontimes.com, in which, among many other dim-witted and hateful things, Card says:

If America becomes a place where our children are taken from us by law and forced to attend schools where they are taught that cohabitation is as good as marriage, that motherhood doesn't require a husband or father, and that homosexuality is as valid a choice as heterosexuality for their future lives, then why in the world should married people continue to accept the authority of such a government?

Superstition aside, much of Card's hysteria seems to center on some sort of imagined threat to the human population's ability to continue to crowd out all other lifeforms on the planet, should gay and lesbian marriages be recognized. It would be funny, if it didn't piss me off so much. Let's look at the world population clock. As of right this very fucking second, there are 6,713,684,976 humans on the face of Earth (most living in horrid poverty). That's 6.7 billion, Mr. Card, already far above the planet's carrying capacity for humanity. So, please, shut up and fuck the hell off. May your poor shriveled Mormon wang desire the anus of another man.

Er...but moving along to things that don't make me want to adorn my face with the tines of rusty forks, how about confirmation that there really are vast hydrocarbon lakes on Titan. One has now been named —— Ontario Lacus —— a 7,800 square mile lake of ethane, methane, nitrogen, and other simple hydrocarbons.

Also, my great thanks to Anita Dalton for sending me this link to her analysis of "Caitlín R. Kiernan’s use of child characters in Daughter of Hounds." Reading the article yesterday, I realized that I'd forgotten how much I love that book, how much I love those characters. Truly, it's by far my best novel-length work of fiction, and, you know, as much as no one wants to admit it, authors need to have their egos stroked every now and then if they are to continue authoring (especially us midlist waifs). So, thanks Anita, from the bottom of my wicked heart, because for every reader like you who "gets it," there are a thousand more I leave wondering why they didn't read some tripe by Larell K. Hamilton or Robert Jordan, instead. I think, Anita, that your article has made me resolve to return to Emmie and Soldier as soon as The Red Tree is done (Emmie will be about 12 or 13). Meanwhile, once again, I remind folks to please preorder the new mmp edition of Daughter of Hounds, so I'll have a chance to write such a novel.

Four and a half hours sleep last night, at best. Insomnia keeps me up, then the face pain (from the seizure-cracked molar) wakes me. And today I have a mountain of tedious work ahead of me, whipping Sirenia Digest #32 into shape before it goes out to subscribers this evening. Jesus fuck, I can't even think in curlicues right now. And yet, somehow, I must cross this day productively. Coffee and Red Bull. Anyway, yesterday I wrote 535 words, and found THE END of "Derma Sutra (1891)." Wow, what an angry, sexy, fuck-you sort of story, all wrapped in Lovecraftiana, steampunk, and the sort of coitus that keeps shitwits like Orson Scott Card awake at night. I am rather proud, I must admit. But, the well of anger is deep, and when i was done with the story, it was unexhausted, so Spooky dragged me away from the keyboard about 6 p.m. (there was genuine dragging involved), away to Beavertail and the calming sea.

Usually, we stick to the northeastern side of the point, above the lighthouse, but south of Lionshead. Yesterday, we took a tartan picnic blanket that blu_muse sent us from a trip to Scotland and spread it out on the boulders on the northwestern side of the point. There are beautiful sheltered coves back there, the water all the shades of beach glass. As the sun set, I lay with my head in her lap, just listening, smelling, tasting, feeling the mist against my skin, letting Panthalassa pull me slowly back from the brink. There were cormorants, gulls, rabbits, ladybugs (ladybug sex, even), ripe red hips on the beach roses, beautiful green-white thickets of Queen Anne's Lace (Daucus carota). The floats from lobster pots bobbed not far offshore. We stayed almost until dark. I didn't want to come back to Providence. I just wanted to lie there by the roaring, sighing bay until the stars came out. I wanted to swim in the cold water. I wanted to be nothing more substantial that the foghorn calling out across the waves. But, that's not the way it goes.

Back home (about 9 p.m.), Spooky made dinner (corn and Annie's "creamy tuna spirals"; we usually avoid processed foods these days, but Annie's is an occasional weakness), and I read more of Fraser's book on the Triassic. Then we read all the way through "Derma Sutra (1891)" (it comes in at 5,254 words total). Later, I managed a few hours of Second Life. Even though the "Kingdom of Sand" sim is turning out to be less wonderful than I'd hoped, it did give me a good scene last night (thank you, Sev, Artemsisia, and Lina). And I finally said good-bye to Toxia once and for fucking all. I dropped in, thinking I might miss the place, but after only five minutes I was so pummeled by lousy rp and utter, mindscathing stupidity that I left and left for good. I'll take away some good memories of that sim, but only a few. There is simply no overcoming the moron factor, and wishing don't make it so. Basically, I desperately aspire to hide out in the Palace in "Kingdom of Sand" as Shahrazad al-Anwar until we can make my own sim a reality. Because I'm tired of hopping from one world to the next, one character to the next, only to be greeted with idiots and stories that'll never be finished. Spooky and I have even chosen a name for the sim (from a rather long list), which will be the Providence of Daughter of Hounds —— "Howard's End" (thank you, E. M. Forster) —— assuming no one takes the name before we can raise the money.

Gods, it's already 11:53. Almost afternoon. Just a few more things. For one, my thanks to Gordon (thingunderthest) for this image. I have no idea what's even being advertised or why anyone would pay $19 for it, but now you can see the horror I wake to every day:



Please have a look at the current ebay auctions. And now, yesterday's six Beavertail photos (behind the cut). Not the best we ever took, but ambient light was low:

( Beavertail, July 30th, 2008 )

I have an email this morning from director Frank Woodward, maker of Lovecraft: Fear of the Unknown. Frank writes. "Just wanted you to know that Lovecraft won Best Documentary Film at Comic-Con. Your section on Deep Time continues to mesmerize. People consistently mention it to me after they see the film." So, that's cool. Very cool. May it win many more awards.

Yesterday, I wrote 1,015 words on "Derma Sutra (1891)," for Sirenia Digest #32. This piece is genuinely "weird erotica." No. Ditch the silly, pc "erotica" tag. This is "weird pornography." If Lovecraft had ever decided to write porno, well, I think, honestly, it would have looked a lot like "Derma Sutra (1891)." Even though there's not a single tentacle or a squamous batrachian fish-person in sight.

I haven't been wanting to write here about my dratted health. The last month I've been struggling with pain from that upper left molar I cracked in the grand mal seizure back in October. My dentist in Birmingham was skeptical of her chances of saving it. And now I'm thinking that she didn't. She sent me off to Providence with a penicillin script and another for Lortab, should the tooth go hot before I find a dentist. I have not yet found a dentist. And I've only taken one of the Lortab, as ibuprofen is controlling the pain, mostly, even though it does a number on my stomach (and me and pain meds have an ugly history I do not want to see replayed). So, if I have seemed out of step or extra curmudgeonly or whatever, it's mostly the pain and worry about the pain and the uncertainty and so forth. The pain wakes me in the mornings. It's become that very first thing of the day, this sensation like someone's socked me in the jaw right proper. But I absolutely can't stop work on The Red Tree and the digest to have a tooth pulled or root canaled or whatever. I cannot risk being sidetracked, not at this point (yes, this is part of the "romantic" life of a freelance writer).

Spooky's added a PC copy of the leather-bound edition of Frog Toes and Tentacles to the new round of eBay auctions, along with another copy of Alabaster Please have a look, and bid, should you be so disposed. Thanks. And I'll remind you that subpress is now taking preorders on A is for Alien.

After the writing yesterday, we escaped the house and headed for Moonstone Beach. I was hoping that the storms on Sunday would have cast up some interesting things. And, in fact, when we reached Moonstone, we discovered wonderful lag deposits of pebbles, which are not normally present there, not in such great numbers. So, as the sun set and Asian families fished for blue crabs in Trustom Pond (using chicken legs on string), we crawled about on the sand and stone, looking for bits of beach glass. Spooky found the best pieces. My eyes are just too lousy these days. We picked up a bag full of plastic garbage. At some point, I just lay down on the wet pebbles and sand, just lay there listening to the surf and the birds. And it occurred to me, This is what I have, and this is why I do the writing, and put up with the pain. This is why I'm hanging on, because I can lie on the beach, with the sea lapping at my feet, and know that this one thing, at least, is real. It's not much, but, then again, it's everything, the seashore, that liminal space where earth and ocean meet. It's what I desire, and what I have earned. Ah, and I found a very nice carapace of a spider crab (Libinia emarginata) and brought it home with me. We left as it was getting dark, and the Asian families were still snagging crabs with chicken legs.

Set me aflame and cast me free.
Away, you wretched world of tethers...

After dinner at Iggy's in Narragansett, we stopped by Spooky parents' on the way back, to get cucumbers and yellow crooked-neck squash and eggs and just visit. The sky is so marvelous over their farm, the stars so brilliant. Heading back into town last night, I think my mind was still lying on the beach. Entering Providence, I had some weird flashback to Southland Tales, and it seemed to me —— and the sensation lingers this afternoon —— Here is the Future, as much as there is ever a "future," and it is bizarre and deadly, ugly and wondrous, and I have no place here. It's an unsettling sort of realization, and yet I can't find any fault with it. I think it was about 10:30 pm when we finally got home again.

Oh, there was a question from a reader, who asks, "I was reading some of your old posts today and it reminded me you sometimes referred to your 'favorite Thai place' in Atlanta. Could you share the name with me or in the blog?" And yes, now that I am here in Providence and no longer have to worry about dinner being interrupted by a well-meaning fan, I can (it actually happened at that restaurant a couple of times, which is why I never named it). Thai Bowl in Decatur, though the old, now-deceased location off Highland was better. Thai Bowl is one of the few things I miss about Atlanta.

And one last thing in this long entry. Yes, to create an avatar in Second Life that looks good, that moves well, etc., you will have to go beyond the default freebie av. And roleplay is far better with good avs and decent animation overrides and so forth. But, here's the thing —— compared to the charges incurred by popular MMORPGs, (which SL is not, not an MMORPG, I mean), such as WoW and The Lord of the Rings Online: Shadows of Angmar, creation of a good av i