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It's a good time to think about New Years resolutions, even though I rarely make them and indeed, in some ways they sound like good ways to disappoint oneself and beat oneself up when they fail, but whatever. That's why I'm not coming up with ...
Posted by LadyLitBlitzin at 01:33 AM
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This is where is gets a little less cheery.During the week leading up to Christmas, I found out something worrisome. I'm not going to go into any details, but I'll say that this ...
Posted by Summer at 04:44 PM
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We were all tired by the time we got home after the Christmas Eve party. Dorian was in that magical toddler state known as "overtired", which ironically produces not a deep sleep, but a ...
Posted by Summer at 09:19 PM
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The week between Christmas and New Years is so weird. You have this vague feeling the holidays are still going on; even though I was at work, we were operating with a bit of a skeleton crew although my "fan" email was pouring in. (Readers can write ...
Posted by LadyLitBlitzin at 04:01 AM
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When Christmas -- a holiday that normal people cram into one pajama-clad morning -- lasts three or more days, it's not going to be easy to fit it into one blog entry. Therefore I'm not even going to ...
Posted by Summer at 10:05 PM
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I knew we were in for it when Vince started muttering "Christmas overload" on Thursday night.That's right, Thursday. The day BEFORE Christmas Eve.That was when he ...
Posted by Summer at 05:09 PM
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Another bit of Christmas booty was a hardback edition of Dracula, illustrated by Edward Gorey. Cool! I never met an Edward Gorey illustration I didn't like. The edition also has some good aside information, including the short story, Dracula's ...
Posted by LadyLitBlitzin at 09:22 PM
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Amongst my most interesting presents this year was one from my cousin, The Little Book of Venom, which is a book of historical insults from historical figures. (I'm not exactly sure what she's trying to say, hahaha.) Interestingly, while the book ...
Posted by LadyLitBlitzin at 12:17 AM
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I know I've said in the past that Novel & Short Story Writer's Market is a great resource but man, I feel like they issue it every year without being very careful about updating their entries. I have definitely run across a few magazines that ...
Posted by LadyLitBlitzin at 10:12 PM
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It's the day before Christmas Eve and I've still got last-minute stuff to do. I took today off to do this last-minute stuff, but right now I can hear the sound of cars driving through the rain... great. That'll make my mall excursion even more ...
Posted by LadyLitBlitzin at 03:40 PM
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I'm up early this morning. Vince and Dorian are still asleep, and since it's very dark and sputtering rain, if they follow their normal pattern they'll sleep for at least another hour. My baby ...
Posted by Summer at 02:13 PM
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Ok. Done wrapping boxes of chocolates. I've got two half-gallon bottles of vodka -- one with clementines, cloves and cinnamon, one with cinnamon, cardamom, red and black pepper -- steeping on my ...
Posted by Summer at 11:00 PM
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Or maybe a little bit longer. There's an entry in me somewhere, just waiting to be typed out, but it's going to have to wait until after I go ...
Posted by Summer at 07:43 PM
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So, Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince is set to arrive in stores on July 16, 2005. Pre-orders started today. What do you guys think? Will it be as much of a success as it was in the past? I have to admit, I've read all the books and I'm ...
Posted by LadyLitBlitzin at 12:29 AM
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I am - gettin' so cold - I wanna put more clothes on!(Yes, that's the way my mind ...
Posted by Summer at 03:23 PM
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You know, you'd think that the holiday season would be a great one for writers, what with all this card writing nonsense (one of the few realms left where snail mail rules), but man. I get more and more tired of doing Christmas cards every year. My ...
Posted by LadyLitBlitzin at 06:12 PM
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Not an hour after I posted yesterday's entry -- the one in which I detailed the so funny story of my grandfather's funeral -- my father called me. This in itself is a somewhat unusual event. He was ...
Posted by Summer at 04:15 PM
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Carpal tunnel syndrome. Actually, it's not just today that I fear it. Every once in a while the idea will freak me out. Judging by the fact that my entire career -- day job writing, and part-time fiction writing, careers -- rely on me being able to ...
Posted by LadyLitBlitzin at 04:53 PM
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I'm still not quite sure about the etiquette of trackback. I mean, here Julie is, stuck in a house without ...
Posted by Summer at 03:23 PM
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Well, actually, not so scary. Or maybe it is. Dunno. I have had my one horror story (the one that's currently being marketed) accepted by TheHarrow, and it will be published in the January issue. Yay! The downside (not that it's a downside) is that ...
Posted by LadyLitBlitzin at 04:25 AM
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Sorry to have taken a little break here, a friend of mine has been in town after a 3-year absence, due to the downward spiral of substance abuse. (His, not mine. I've already said in the past I've ditched my chemical demons long ago, though maybe not ...
Posted by LadyLitBlitzin at 01:53 AM
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Here's one for the baby book: Age 23 months -- Dorian sneaks a girl up to his bedroom for the first time. We had playgroup here this morning -- 9 babies and ...
Posted by Summer at 08:03 PM
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that time of year, when tiresome "Best Of" lists and endless recaps of events and famous deaths are as obiquitous as "The DaVinci Code".
Posted by brian at 08:00 PM
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I'm getting deeper into Dhalgren, but thought I'd broach the subject of names for characters in short stories (for those of you who write them). How do you choose them? I have to admit, I sometimes use a baby name book -- I have a few of these ...
Posted by LadyLitBlitzin at 07:20 AM
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Today is the day I will get my Christmas tree up. Really. It's not as if it's a big production; it's just a 4' tall fake tree that sits on top of a table. It still has the lights on it from last ...
Posted by Summer at 04:32 PM
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I have finished McSweeney's Enchanted Chamber of Astonishing Stories, and while I think it was good (and sure, worth the $13.95 it cost), it wasn't all that astonishing in the long run. When I read Stephen King's Lisey and the Madman, I got this ...
Posted by LadyLitBlitzin at 11:27 PM
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Okay, my mountain trip was canceled due to inclement weather. So, here I am on the computer. So I was wondering, do you guys fold the corners down on your books to save your place? I would never do that on a book that's a loan or from the library, ...
Posted by LadyLitBlitzin at 03:21 PM
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Thank you to everyone who entered the Summertime Generic Gift Contest. Need some ideas for holiday gifts? I've got them right here. (These are the entries I received, as I received them, in no particular order.)<...
Posted by Summer at 01:33 AM
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My guess is that he is fairly proud of his cardboard characters, mishmashed facts and page turning puzzles
Posted by brian at 01:57 PM
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So it seems no one read The Fig Eater. Or perhaps, everybody's disgusted with me for my admission that I just didn't get the end of that damn book. ;) It is definitely time to crash and burn tonight, I refuse to be up till 1am which is the usual ...
Posted by LadyLitBlitzin at 04:51 AM
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I was so excited to see that a number of you have already entered the Summertime Generic Gift Contest. (Keep sending in those entries! You've got until 8pm on Friday!) But surprisingly, none of ...
Posted by Summer at 07:48 PM
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Okay, so I'm rehashing something I read quite some time ago. Because I was in my roommate's room bitching about something earlier tonight and I happened to see her copy on her bookshelf, and it jogged my memory over one of my more frustrating reads ...
Posted by LadyLitBlitzin at 05:31 AM
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Here's a good link for us writers. Story? What Corporate America Can't Build: A Sentence. I'm sure some of us have encountered this sort of thing in the workforce, and I've even encountered some writers and editors who couldn't write and edit, ...
Posted by LadyLitBlitzin at 12:31 AM
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I went to see the Pixies last night, and I guess I jinxed it with my last blog post, because they did not play "Into the White," which I had hoped for. Oh well... It was a great show, although I must say there were certain surreal elements, like the ...
Posted by LadyLitBlitzin at 10:53 PM
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Dude! It's the first ever Summertime contest!It's December, which means that most of us still have to do our holiday shopping, and I suspect that everyone has
Posted by Summer at 02:50 PM
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My chickens, I am so sorry to have left you for so long, but you see, my time has been swallowed up by Fabulous! Parties! Perhaps I exaggerate a little, but actually my weekend was chock-full of ...
Posted by Summer at 04:09 PM
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I am going down south to Richmond today, to see some friends and go with them to see the Pixies (as well as see their lovely little girl -- who is 3 and not going to the concert, although they did take her to see Fugazi once, with earplugs). I feel ...
Posted by LadyLitBlitzin at 02:58 PM
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Grandpa died here, and he was mean. His ghost is still around here!
Posted by brian at 01:17 PM
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So, one of my rejected stories was rejected, in part, because of the presence of a fortune teller in the opening pages. I was told that several other submissions to the magazine featured fortune tellers, and the editor was leery about having ...
Posted by LadyLitBlitzin at 05:25 AM
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Hebdomeros had mentioned Oyster Boy Review so I went and checked it out yesterday. I enjoyed it very much right off the bat, having read The Everything-Goes Garage Sale of My Love, by A.C. Koch, and The Power of the Universe is in the Mind, by ...
Posted by LadyLitBlitzin at 04:05 PM
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Speaking of online zines, if you get a chance, check out JMWW, Jen's quarterly journal -- the winter issue is live!!! There's some great stuff there! Hope you're all having great weekends, LLB
Posted by LadyLitBlitzin at 05:29 AM
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I've started in on McSweeney's Enchanted Chamber of Astonishing Stories. I'm about 125+ pages in and it's starting to scare me. So, I'm not sure "astonishing" is the right adjective for the title. For the most part, the stories have been good so ...
Posted by LadyLitBlitzin at 04:48 PM
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Okay, so back to Vamped, by David Sosnowski. I do really recommend it, for being a fun read and a quick read, too. Sosnowski did such a great job of creating a world where vampires are the majority, unlike the usual fare, where vampires are edge ...
Posted by LadyLitBlitzin at 06:43 AM
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Things that have recently broken or been destroyed in my home:<...
Posted by Summer at 04:00 PM
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I ran across an interesting factoid yesterday while I was surfing for research at work. According to a survey conducted by the Online Publishers Association, in September, persons 18 to 34 years old were more likely to log onto the Internet (46%) ...
Posted by LadyLitBlitzin at 10:30 PM
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`though the "Da Vinci Code" was such a hacked together assemblage that I'm sure he will have a long and prosperous career churning out similar movilizations.
Posted by brian at 11:44 AM
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Okay, I have finished Vamped and my thought for the evening is, get vamped. It's such a fun read, really clever, even for those of you who might not generally be too excited about a vampire novel. (And we all have heard of those supposed editors who ...
Posted by LadyLitBlitzin at 05:23 AM
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In the last month, Dorian has developed a huge appetite for books, and he's suddenly become very good with his letters. Everywhere we go, he's pointing out and naming the letters he sees... on ...
Posted by Summer at 01:09 AM
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Computers as novelists? Check out this post on the WritersWrite blog. I like to joke sometimes that I'm a machine, but geez. LLB
Posted by LadyLitBlitzin at 02:16 AM
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So, it's the last day of November and I didn't make the deadline for NaNoWriMo, capping out at about 32,000 words. Oh well! ;) I want to thank everybody for their support though -- you guys were so helpful, reminding me of things like, even not ...