An author's collection of thoughts and stories
Tie-dyed cotton sateen (orange sorbet and plum blossom), with my own machine embroidery design, satin ribbon, and rhinestones.
I know that I mention every now and then that I like sewing. For me, that often means taking plain white fabric and turning it into a colorful garment with various embellishments.
However, I do not identify as a “sewist”, because I am not a follower of “sewism.”
I just play with chemicals, computer programs, thread, and fabric to make stuff.
Our house likes to eat dishwashers.
The last one died on Mother’s Day. After which, we discovered that the small business we had bought it from — for that personal touch and guaranteed warranty — had gone out of business because of … you guessed it! Queries proved that it was going to be difficult to find an authorized repairman.
So I bought a bottle of soap just for the new scent, and am now using the dishwasher as a horrendously overpriced drying rack. Because the only thing that works reliably is me.
Especially now that I haven’t had a single migraine since I started taking low dose aspirin. Ha. Ha.
The funny part is, I’m actually better at keeping up with the dishes when I’m handwashing them. I can easily slip into autopilot and scrub away while thinking about other things (usually my writing), and I don’t have to sort through what can go through the dishwasher and what can’t, or make sure that I’m loading everything in correctly, or blah blah blah. I just hate washing dishes. ‘Cause, you know, it’s the dishes.
So the other day I had a pan of cream cheese brownies baking in the oven, the baby was busy throwing cat food all across the kitchen floor, and I was scrubbing away at the sink with a particularly deep train of thought, when it hit me that since I’m writing a story with lots of different branches, I can easily invoke the multiverse and have the branches bleed into each other. Which one is canon? They all are!
Be still, my heart!
I know, I get excited over some pretty weird things.
BTW, the brownies were amazing.
Lately I’ve been wondering how much blogging matters.
You see, I’m old enough to remember Neopets, Gaia Online, and LiveJournal, and the internet sure as heck ain’t what it used to be.
I’m pretty convinced that certain monoliths suppress literally everyone, then select which individuals they want to become popular, and there’s nothing organic about any of it for anyone.
‘N stuff.
But don’t worry, this isn’t my “farewell forever” post. If my calculations are correct, I’ve got about 11 real live actual people who come here to read, and I’m not going to up and abandon you just because of something as silly as stats.
Actually, I’m getting tired of trying to be structured.
And if I get the impulse to post a random pun at 10:43pm, I might as well do it without explaining anything.
I’m also tired of pretending like I’m not as cynical as I am. After a certain amount of bullying and ostracism throughout my childhood, I made the conscious choice that fictional friends were considerably better than real ones — 90% of everyone will go out of their way to hurt you purely because they can.
Hell, five years ago I tried to get out and be more social with the assumption that adulthood changes how people interact with each other, and it ended up mentally fucking me up pretty badly. Conclusion: adulthood has made the bullying even worse.
And let’s face it, modern fashion trends are purely an experiment in how far people are willing to debase and humiliate themselves for the sake of fitting in. Yes I said it. If you don’t look at yourself in the morning and immediately feel good about yourself, then you should trust me when I say that *you* aren’t the problem, it’s your fucking ugly clothes. Change your style. Just do it already.
Aaaaaanyway.
I’m gonna do what I want for awhile.
An on-going playful debate between my husband and me is whether to spell it gray or grey. I like the ‘a’ and he prefers the ‘e’.
My reason is that ‘a’ looks more solid, decisive, and strong, while the ‘e’ is more timid and weak. Mind you, ‘e’ is actually my favorite vowel, I just don’t think it works in this particular case. My husband’s argument in favor of the ‘e’ is that he has no aesthetic sense in regards to letters or spelling (ha ha, just kidding. I love you).
In my mind, this is gray:
And this is grey:
I prefer the former.
And yes, I know, we’re pretty weird.
“Are you always this nice?” Carol asked.
Lambert laughed. “Not usually. Most of the time my job requires me to be a toughass.”
The Scion Suit VN edition
ROFL XD
The Rules:
Thank you Kat, from The Lily Cafe for the nomination!
The story:
I’m currently in writing binge mode, which (true to the stereotype) is making me ditzy about everything else. So, forgive me for the weird things that I’m inevitably going to say.
I created my blog during the summer of 2012, while my husband and I were living off-grid with our first newborn. I was in an alternate world back then — talking to trees to predict the future sort of stuff — so I can’t for the life of me remember why I did it; I just know that “Autumn Rain” was intended to be highly symbolic and infused with magic for my lifelong desire to be a writer. I sure wish I knew what was going through my mind, but I trust that I set myself up with the right thing.
Ultimately, I traded psychic ability for a laundry machine, because my body couldn’t keep up with the amount of physical labor that was required with the resources that were available. Consequently, I now eat too much junk food, exercise too little, and rarely have a clue what the breeze is trying to say. I’m always telling myself that I know better.
I didn’t post at all until 2017. By that point I had three babies, and I realized that the planets were never going to align and give me space to focus on writing — I had to carve some out for myself. So I started Light Eternal, and published occasional posts to my blog. In 2019, I decided that it was time to become serious about it all, and started updating regularly. It’s amazing how many superfluous activities I was able to cut out of my day in order to find the time, and now I’ve got a good routine going.
Hey, I told you it was going to be weird.
My advice:
Life is never going to be perfect, and the work is never going to be done, but don’t ever let that stop you.
2. Blog about what you love, because you love it.
The goal shouldn’t be monetization, because then you’re setting yourself up for burnout. This is something that I say about fiction writing as well: you are your most important audience, and your main focus should be on keeping yourself entertained. Basically, have fun.
I’m going to skip out on nominating anyone. I have a neurotic character named Carol who needs to have some adventures in a mechanical Suit from outer space, and quiet time only lasts for so long.
Normally I don’t blog about super personal information, but I’m in the mood so why not.
This last week I developed a blood clot in my leg. It’s a superficial one and responding quite well to basic home treatments, so I’m not very likely to die (though it is still painful). Honestly, I’ve known for my entire life that I inherited poor circulation in my lower extremities, but I kind of assumed it would never amount to anything worse than chronically cold feet. At least while I’m still in my 30s, you know? But blood clots does explain why I would periodically get fingerprint-sized bruises in random spots on my legs.
The event managed to hit me right in the emotions.
Unfortunately, a few days prior to this happening, my husband commented that I’ve been getting a lot of migraines lately, and I had an “Oh shit” moment. A number of things that I had attributed to a combination of stress and sleep deprivation could actually be signs of mini strokes, so I’m pretty freaked out. If I’ve been getting blood clots in my legs, then there’s a chance of getting them in my brain. I do not want to have a stroke and turn into a vegetable. I like being the way I am, and using my mind as much as I do. Everything I want in life revolves around being a functional person.
Angst angst angst.
At the very least, I did let a few of my usual habits slip over the winter, so hopefully getting off my butt and back into daily exercise in will help improve my health, with a strong imperative of “DON’T BE LAZY AGAIN.”
I am not remotely thrilled at being prone to this sort of problem.
I often think to myself that I ought to treat writing more like a part-time job than a hobby, and make some adjustments to our routine so I can write in the mornings when my mind is sharper. The benefit is that I’ll be able to work much faster than I currently do.
I’ve given myself the goal of publishing a new novel every year, which is a perfectly respectable pace all told, and in that regard I think that I’m doing just fine. But I’m also interested in exploring creative writing in different formats, and that’s going to take up more time. A lot more.
Which means that I need to manage my time more efficiently.
Which is a bit of a trick with a 10-month-old crawling all over me. >.<
So, in addition to writing novels, I’ve decided that I want to turn The Scion Suit into a text-based game.
i dunno why im such a nerd.
That means writing a multi-pronged script, and learning basic programming (which has my husband tickled). You’d think that I have enough going on, but writing the script for a video game is one of my bucket-list items, and there’s no time like the present.
We’re probably not going to be spending every weekend at the pool this summer anyway.
Besides, as long as I stick to the adage that “Progress is progress,” even just an hour a week will eventually add up. I’m pretty certain I do everything in 10-20 minute increments.
So I plan on starting off with a “choose your own adventure” format, but I want to get stats worked in as well.
I’m also looking forward to when the New Pokemon Snap comes out at the end of the month, so I’m probably going to have to quit watching movies and youtube. Frank James will just have to continue on without me. XD
