If I count today, I have twenty-two days until Daughter of Hounds is supposed to be on my editor's desk. And I have no idea how I'm going to make that deadline. I have twenty-two days to read the entire typescript, 613 pp. if you exclude the appendices, and make all my revisions, which I already know will be substantial. If I could just cut out sleeping, it might be fairly easy. Thank you, Bullet Girl. And before I can even get started on the novel, I have to spend the rest of today tidying up the Alabaster ms. for subpress; I think they're going to try to have the ARCs out by late February. We'll begin with DoH tonight or, more likely, tomorrow.

Meanwhile, Spooky and I have caught some sort of cold. It's nothing serious, but it is slowing us down. What's more annoying than the symptoms is that it's the first time in over a year — almost seventeen months, actually — that I've caught anything. It's been the longest "well streak" of my entire life.

And Chris Penn is dead.

At least Sirenia Digest #2 is out. Of course, I'm going to have to begin work on #3 almost immediately so as to avoid another late delivery. I may write something about chocolate (as suggested by wishlish) for the first of the three vignettes. I do hope that people are (or already have) enjoyed #2. Feel free to comment. Speaking of comments, yesterday was another very good day for LJ comments. It's nice, having them here to distract me at odd moments and to keep my mind moving. Which is to say, I encourage such behaviour.

We did go for a long walk yesterday. I needed the fresh air, and it was a nice way of thumbing my nose at this bug. It was another suprisingly warm day. Strange things are happening out there. The grass is getting green. The clover's growing. The dogwood trees have buds. A lot of trees are budding. The dandelions are blooming, as is the henbit. We saw a butterfly. It's cold again today, but I don't think it's supposed to last very long.

Spooky and I started Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix night before last. So far, I have to say this is certainly the best written of the Harry Potter books. It's markedly better than the last one. Considering the time Rowling took between the fourth and fifth books, it's not so unexpected. She's handling the recap stuff much more skillfully, much less intrusively, for example. Spooky has a crush on Nymphodora Tonks.

Okay. I gotta get started. But I do want to remind everyone of the letter Z auction, still in progress. It ends sometime of Friday. The leather-bound lettered edition of Frog Toes and Tentacles with a handmade "cozy" (crushed black velvet lined with red silk, a hand-embroidered letter Z, to match the cover of the book). You can sleep with it under your pillow. Your nightmares will thank you.