OmniPoddery: At least it's not a 30% failure rate this month!

I was looking forward to blogging about how I'd gone through an ENTIRE BOX OF PODS without having one of them fail... and then the last one in the box failed this morning.

It wouldn't have been so bad, but the one I was wearing had come unstuck this morning, so I went to change it out with my backup at work. At 10am. And it was my backup that failed.

After the last hellish experience I had nursing myself through a day at work when my pod failed at noon, I decided to trek it home and get it replaced.

Note that this is the post-diabetes, post-layoff, post-Chicago Kameron talking. The default part of me wanted to stick it out. It's embarrassing asking your boss if you can either take a half day or work from home. I have a ridiculous amount of "You show up and do your job" work pride, and I warred with myself over it for about 20 minutes before I gave in.

Why did I give in? Because I remembered how fucking awful I felt last time I nursed a failure with shots-every-hour insulin, and how it took another day and a half just to get back to my old self afterward. If I don't have to force myself through that... why would I do that?

There's tough - knowing that yes, if I have to, I can do that - and then there's just willfully stupid... doing it for the principle of the thing.

So I asked my boss if I could work from home, since busing it home and then busing it back meant I wouldn't get back to the office until after 1pm anyway. He was OK with that (there are advantages to being a writer - you can write anywhere), so I'm working from home today; I only have a couple of small projects.

When I called to report the pod failure, I was actually pretty OK with it. I honestly don't mind a 1 in 10 or 1 in 15 failure rate. That's OK with me. It was very civil. It's that 30% failure rate that starts to fucking grind on you.

I really hope this rate keeps up, because my sugar over the last month has been totally stellar.

I like being healthy. I like being sane. There are too many awesome people in my life right now to screw it all up over bruised pride.

Sometimes you should actually take advantage of offers - like working from home - that will save you and your loved ones a lot of pain and discomfort later.

That's what it's there for.

That's what I keep telling myself.

One for the Road

"I find that the harder I work, the more luck I seem to have."

- Thomas Jefferson

Dear Book Three:

Please stop trying to write yourself in FIRST PERSON.

Save that for Twitter.

Thank you.

The Euphemism Generator

You know you want it!

Today's Readings

It's all wars and assassinations. Nothing to see here. Move along.

One For the Road

My life closed twice before its close -
It yet remains to see
If Immortality unveil
A third event to me

So huge, so hopeless to conceive
As these that twice befell.
Parting is all we know of heaven,
And all we need of hell.

-Emily Dickinson

My Latest Addiction

E.S. Posthumus radio!

Because you can never have enough good stuff to write by.

Busy

So, this is life without WoW.

Holy crap, it is busy and full of things, yo. When you get your ass back to work, you start to wonder what the fuck you were doing the last two months.

I really do like this life a lot better than the one I've been screwing around with the last two months.

Fuck, I have a lot of work to do.

On the upside, I have a feeling that the downtime helped me recharge my batteries.

One For the Road

Because one can never have enough husky puppies.

Writerly Gooderly

Doing some stuff tonight that's a lot like writing... like, uh, I'm a writer or something.

For some reason, I don't feel that writing copy for an insurance website all day really counts. But oh boy, my brain does. My brain is tired of insurance writing, and resume writing, and now book writing, oh my.

I hate to tell my brain that in order to continue to find some measure of financial security - and in order to get a car (let alone all the other stuff that comes after that) - I'm going to need to pick up some freelance jobs here real quick, too.

Oh, man, my brain hurt just typing that.

The writing life isn't terribly romantic. Mainly, it means non-stop work in your chosen profession.

It just so happens you actually like your profession.

Speaking of fighting...

I don't know what gets me more - that the ax is half her size or that she runs out the door after the guy.

And people think I write fantasy.

(thanks, Tyim!!)

Prop 8: Here's Why

Living in blue states and having blue friends, sometimes, I think, shelters a lot of lefties. You start thinking, "Holy fuck, what the fuck could these people possibly be thinking when they go around willy-nilly nullifying other people's marriages? What the hell?"

What you don't realize is that all that rhetoric and scare-mongering? The "gay agenda" stuff? People really do believe that. They really do believe that "those gays" will take away their rights. Because hey, after all, it's what they're trying to do. Pre-emptive strike.

No, really.

I was on my way to our weekly workout with my work workout group, and the two guys in the group are talking about some creepy guy at the YMCA who grabbed at their arms and said, "Ah, you guys are really working out hard, huh?" wink wink nudge nudge (I would be equally creeped out if any stranger grabbed at any part of my body in any way).

Our trainer said, "You know, we had a trainer where I used to work who had a guy ask him out to lunch."

"So he didn't drop that convenient, `my girlfriend' line?" I said. Because, you know, when you get hit on, name-dropping an SO is the most convenient way to say you aren't interested, no matter the person's sex.

"Too many people play both sides," said our programmer.

"I guess," I said, "but guys should get used to the `my girlfriend' line. You're just not used to getting hit on."

"No," said our DB guy, "that's really what gay people think. They just think that if everybody tried to be gay, they'd be gay."

"What the hell are you talking about?" I said.

"I have this gay friend -" (oh god, yes, he really said this. Anytime anyone prefaces a statement like this, you know you're in for it) "and he says that all gay people really think that everyone is gay. And if they can just get you to try it that you'll be converted."

"Once you go gay, you never go away??" our trainer said.

"That is the biggest load of bullshit," I said. "Your `friend' does not speak for all gay people. That's crap."

"That's what he said!!"

Our DB guy was really sincere about this. Maybe he didn't wholeheartedly believe it, but you could see that there was this small, terrified part of him that was mortified to think that it might be true, and that all the gay men at the Y wanted to seduce him.

And this is not an isolated thing. People who have no experience hanging out with people who are different than them, who have bottled up desires themselves, who refuse to engage or think about or acknowledge difference because it's scary... they really do think this stuff.

Yes, things are changing. Prop 8 passed by a very narrow margin. The reason it was so narrow is because there are more people today who stand up and say, "You're full of crap," or "Dude, I'm gay, and that's totally retarded. That's like saying all straight guys are rapists." And for those in really red, red, red closeted states, there are more positive portrayals of gay and lesbian characters on television (yeah, it's still mostly shitty, but like tough female characters, it's getting better, just not really fast). There's a much higher awareness and acceptance of those feelings among the younger generation, and shit, gay people can even get married overseas and in select parts of the US and the world hasn't exploded.

It's not going to happen all at once. These fears don't go away all at once. They are chipped away at slowly. It takes time. And hard fighting. Don't forget the hard fighting - nothing worth winning ever came without a fight. Civil rights, the women's movement... it's taken us this long just to get this far (and sweet god, look how far we fucking have to go), and gay civil rights has a shorter organized history in this country.

Give it time. Keep fighting for it. Educate people. Call them on their bullshit. Don't let people wallow in fear and ignorance. At the end of the day, everybody will make up their own mind, but for fuck's sake, make sure they're not making decisions based on fear and ignorance.

Because, trust me, my blue state friends, there's a lot of fear and ignorance out there. We fear what we don't understand. And we try to destroy what we fear.

Let's chip away at the fear.

I Got This

This was the first thing I thought of this morning when I opened up my email and saw the headline.

Such a Great Day to Live in Ohio

I love me some swing-statin'.

That is, when it swings the way you hope.

I still don't believe it, tho.

You Know You Want To: Nyx on Twitter

Nyx is on Twitter! Now chronicling the wild, roaring 20s of her early career prior to God's War...

Check out: Nyxnissa.

Ah, Budgetry

I was nearly $300 over budget last month. A lot of this is just crap stuff. Tons of dinners out, a couple of bus rides to Cincinnati, and if we count the new phone I had to get because I dropped my old one in a cup of diet Coke, well, we're pushing $500 over budget.

Yeah, that means I had to use the credit card this month, which I fucking hate. I've had to pull it out several times over the last 3 months to cover a lot of crap: new clothes for work, a handful of dates I hadn't properly budgeted for, a pumpkin dinner party I also didn't budget for, two lunches out with Steph that I knew at the time I really shouldn't agree to even if I was ordering water, and a trip to Sam's club that I make every three months that I should really start budgeting for (it's about $150 every time, so $50 a month will cover it).

All told, this isn't horrible - it just means that I pay less toward my CC payment every month. Progress is being made... sort of. Just not... in an ideal way.

I also approached my boss today about continuing classes at Sinclair toward my Marketing Management degree. Student loans have come due, and I prefer to stuff money toward my CC debt before my student loan debt. So, it's back to school in a couple of days and back to paying the full $750 a month toward the CC instead of the $250, $450 or $500 I've been managing the last 3 months.

I've had a really wild, wonderful summer, but it's November now, and time to stop bleeding money. If I want a car next year and a house after that, it's gonna take some self-restraint on my part.

Man, I hate self-restraint.

On the upside, I found out today that my old insurance company is finally starting to pay an old $800 medical bill of mine (it's been over a year). They paid $188 of it, and I'm resubmitting the rest now as per the CSR's suggestion.

How any other company that pays a bill two years after being billed for it stays in business is beyond me.

Mmmmm health care in Amurika.

Oh, Fuck Yeah

The not-Boyfriend texted me tonight and said he couldn't find himself registered on the Montgomery Co site, which makes sense, of course, him being from Middletown and all... so he checked in Butler county and hey, yo, there he was....

This gave me a Sudden Idea.

I'm on the border between two counties here in Ohio.

If one of them doesn't have me then maybe....

Why yes, yes, fuckin' a MY ACTUAL county DOES oh SNAP!

I AM VOTING FOR OBAMA TOMORROW BABY!!!!!

I fucking KNEW I had fucking registered.

Swing state, here I come!!!

To Do

Black Desert line edits (20 pages)
Black Desert actual rewrite based on edits
Black Desert peeps sendoff
Babylon writing schedule
Babylon Chapter 1 (come hell, high water, first person narration...)
Send requested story subs
CB script for GW
Finish Jax short story

Get library card
Get Babylon research mats
Budget update w/receipt calc
Sign up for classes at Sinclair
Gym swim (in addition to regular workout - I'm missing my Thurs workout this week)
Mail in phone rebate
Call old insurance about old bill

Yeah, there's been a little too much boyfriend, not enough rollerderby.

But man, it's been too much boyfriend in such a good way.

Well, shit.

I registered to vote when I got my Ohio license at the BMV back in, what, May? July?

I specifically remember being asked if I wanted to register to vote. I remember filling out the forms. I remember hearing that it was taken care of.

I have not, however, received notice of my polling station. So I logged in online today to look it up.

And lo and behold, my friends: according to Ohio, I am not registered to vote.

It occurs to me that I should have checked this 30 days ago, but why, when I'd registered at the BMV?

There's a reason this is a swing state. Should I not have said out loud I was an independent?

This will be the first election I can't vote in since I turned 18. I can't even vote in Illinois. I can't vote, period.

I could get terribly upset about this, but it's my own fault. I knew things in swing states were wacky. It was the first time I'd registered in this state. I should have double checked my status 30 days ago when folks were posting about checking your status 30 days out.

Mmmmmm swing states.

I'm going to feel like shit if Ohio goes to McCain.

One for the Road

Yeah, I'm Alive

Just wicked busy.

And about to get busier.

One for the Road

kameronhurley.com

Yes, I finally bought it (yes, current content is a placeholder only).

The totally awesome Tyim Courts is currently hip deep in site design. Things will be moving over there slowly but surely (in about two weeks!).

You will all be jealous when you see it!!

Girls for Obama

The best part, I think, is just seeing pictures of girls engaged in... well, being full, active, passionate people.

It makes me happy.

Just because you can vote and wear pants...

The day a woman candidate runs and nobody talks about what she's probably like in bed will be awesome. Can you think of any other candidate who was sexualized (or desexualized) the same way our two big female candidates have been?

The goal is to mock Palin’s intelligence not by engaging with her foolish beliefs and ignorant rhetoric, but by pointing and saying “look, boobs!” or “I’d sure like to hit that!” And making her non-threatening isn’t only dangerous politically when Palin is in fact in a position to potentially do a lot of harm; attempting to make her non-threatening in this way is dangerous to all women who hold power, who want to be taken seriously, and who dream of being able to be proud of their sexuality and brains all at the same time. An acknowledgment of female sexuality shouldn’t be seen as mocking — these portrayals of Palin only reinforce the idea that it is.

And:

We still live in a world where sexuality itself is seen as degrading to women.

As somebody who feels like I can't talk about sex and my enjoyment of it for just that reason - because doing so will somehow devalue me as a human being - I really fucking resent this crap. Is it just that it's even more alarming and teeth-gnashing when they do it to powerful women?

It reminds you that you just can't escape it. You have to face it. And kick it's ass. It's not going away just because we can vote and wear pants.

"You need to be brilliant."

"The truth is that most of what comes in is perfectly competent. Stories with an interesting protagonist with a clear motivation, on a journey with a definite beginning, middle and end. The problem isn't that it's full of problems. The problem is that it's competent, okay, decent, moderately well-executed, perfectly servicable... You get the idea.

To stand out from this sea of submissions, you need to sparkle. You need to be un-put-downable. As jaded as editors are, you need the manuscript that makes you want to grab the phone immediately to call your spouse, boy/girlfriend, best friend because you can't wait to talk about it, the manuscript that has you leaping out of your chair because you've got to do something to disperse the energy that's rushing off the pages and into your heart. You need to be brilliant."

Writerly Bookery

I expected to be asked for my website address and author photo from my publisher at some point... I did not expect that that would be this week.

Crap. It's almost November already, isn't it?

Well, I'll just send them the new URL when I have it. But the author photo really should be done this week. I have no excuses.

It's funny that the request comes on the tail end of my day job's annual franchise convention, where our vendors and franchisees (who've worked with our much larger competitors), asked my boss what marketing agency he'd used to produce all the videos, welcome books, binders, handouts, signage, etc. for the convention. When they found out our little 3-person on staff team put together the whole thing, they were just about floored.

I play a writer in real life, now, too.

And that fiction writing life?

That's going to get really real really quickly here too.

Life is kind of surreal. At some point, after years of slogging away, it feels like you've gotten on a train, and everything is just going really fast.

Workadoo

We should also hopefully have some workadoo projects up on YouTube shortly, and you'll be able to see what all the bloggerly-silence has been about... well, that and rampant socializing.

I discovered Cincinnati this weekend, and learned that it's not ALL of Ohio that sucks... just Dayton. Dayton is the jewel of suckage.

But Columbus and Cincinnati... not so bad!

Because it just isn't Halloween....

... without Jesus Christ Vampire Hunter (??) and Some Chick in a Hat.

I do think it's sad that the one year I can't afford a costume is the year I get invited to a Halloween party one weekend *and* a work party this Friday.

Oh well. It's a Very Nice Hat (a few more pics here).

Pumpkin Pancake Recipe

You'll thank me later...

And yes, these are diabetic friendly.

1/2 cup whole wheat flour
1/2 cup almond meal
3-4 heaping tbs Splenda
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1 tsp pumpkin spice
3/4 cup milk
1/2 cup canned pumpkin (mmmmm PUMPKIN!!!)
1 egg
1 tbs vegetable oil
1 tsp white vinegar

You will need a big bowl and a medium bowl.

In the medium bowl, combine the pumpkin, egg, oil, and vinegar. Stir until they are combined nicely.

In the big bowl, mix up everything else. Then add the pumpkin mixture from the medium bowl into the big bowl. Stir it all up together in the big bowl until it is juicy and awesome. If the batter still seems too thick, add a little more milk. I don't know why you have to combine the ingredients separately and then put them together, but that's what the googles say to do, and mmmm does it turn out fine!

Cook them up and enjoy the pumpkin-y goodness!!!

I Need to Go Back to School

All of my deferred loans are coming due. They're doable and all - it just means paying less toward the CC debt, and that just bugs me.

Sitting down and hammering on my budget again. The last two months have not been kind to me.

Pumpkin Fest `08

Guess which one's mine?


Shenanigans in full swing at Hacienda Hurley.


Stephanie, Queen pumpkin.


This is serious business, yo.

View the Whole Event Here!

They Came For...

"They came for the Communists, and I

didn't object - For I wasn't

a Communist;

They came for the Socialists, and I

didn't object - For I wasn't a Socialist;

They came for the labor leaders, and I

didn't object - For I wasn't a labor leader;

They came for the Jews, and I didn't

object - For I wasn't a Jew;

Then they came for me -

And there was no one left to object."

Martin Niemoller, German Protestant Pastor,

1892-1984

Does it Bug Anyone Else...

... that all the women they've cast in GI Joe look exactly the same?

And where the hell is Lady Jane, srsly? Jinx? They kept Scarlett and Baronness, both of whom are used as "love interests" for either side (after all, somebody has to be "the girl!"), and "Cover Girl" a "Super model turned Joe"???? She was a limited release in the 80s because no one liked her. Note that she's only allowed to run a tank cause she's "hot," and therefore "not REALLY scary."

I fucking hate Hollywood.

Why Hand-holding, Flower-loving Matriarchies Never Rang True to Me

Oh look, matriarchies can be violent (just like any other human social setup)!

I admit, I write a lot of violent matriarchies. Mainly because I believe that any social setup that represses another group within it is going to be violent. The most egalitarian fantasy group I have are a bunch of polyamorous, socialist, gender-fucking hippies called Drakes (in, fittingly, The Dragon's War), and they've managed to keep their society that way mainly based on environmental isolation.

But, my matriarchies?

Violent as all get-out.

Money

Boy does it suck.

Workadooooo

I am so tired.

Autumn

Oh She of the Pink Hair

I called my hair salon today to make my new cut and color appointment.

They have, apparently, fired my old stylist, oh she of the "your pink hair will totally wash out in a couple of days" fame.

I suppose that at some point, all that Rockstar pink hair will catch up with you...

But, you know, despite the pink hair, I did ask for her again. I guess that when folks are paying $140 for a cut and color (including tip), they are less amused by folks who remind me of my sister and give them 2 weeks worth of pink hair.

Some workplaces are far less forgiving than mine.

In any case, new stylist this time around. Should be entertaining to see how it comes out. Hopefully entertaining in a not sucky way, since I have, in fact, been very pleased with all of my ridiculous cut and color appointments at this place, despite the pink.

After spending three weeks and $120 trying to fix a botched haircut at the local Great Clips, paying an assload to get it right the first time suddenly seemed like a great investment.

One For the Road

Training Daze

Now that the pool at the gym is back in order, I meant to get back to the gym tonight on the regular triathlon schedule (as opposed to last week's jogging day, 2 weight training days, and 2 biking days), but I haven't been feeling all that great. A combination of some very late (though awfully enjoyable) nights, wonky sugar, and work stress have really got me down. Healthwise, I haven't been so hot, either, which is related to the wonky sugar, which is related to the work stress. I can't wait until next Thursday when the work stress plummets.

The lousy thing about being me these days is that I'm a lot less flexible than I used to be. Schedules work great, but get me out of the schedule, and things fall down pretty quickly. Or, rather, I exhaust myself pretty quickly.

Sometimes I need to remember that, yeah... I'm just not as super-wow as I used to be, you know... stay up all night drinking vodka and cranberry juice in a cabin in the woods, then hop up the next day, drink more beer, and cram for a history final while navigating tricky group dynamics. Yeah, no more of that. Not that I miss any of that, really...

I just hate things I see as weakness, sometimes, especially when it's coming from me.

Where are my superpowers??

I think tonight is home, reading, bed. No shenanigans.

Being a Female Bodyguard

"What I hate is when you get a member of the royal family. It's the same thing every year: you have to be vetted by a guy from the Saudi embassy saying, "Oh, my God, you are a woman!" At which point you have to throw one of his blokes on the floor and stamp on his windpipe to prove you can do the job."

And if you want to know what Black Desert is about, it's basically this:

"I'm nearly 50 and I am shocked that I'm still alive. I was shocked at 30 and I was shocked at 40. I keep saying it's time to wind down, but I miss doing my job too much. I need the adrenalin."

(Thanks, David!)

V for Vendetta

I love this movie more every time I watch it.

Which might say something terrifying about the state of the world. Or a lot about me. Or both.

I Should Know Better

Workadoo

South Park: All Free, All the Time

All episodes of South Park are now available to view, for free, online.

Wow.

A Woman's Place

And etc.

Back to the Trenches

Just about done with the first pass on Black Desert line edits. Not actually typing them in, mind, just bleeding over the manuscript, which is a mess (yes, that sounds messy, doesn't it?). There's this very obvious chunk of the book where I'm just dithering away until I can come up with the ending (ie get Nyx back in the picture), and I cut out a whole chapter last night to help get over that long, boring pre-ending. I was feeling pretty pessimistic about the whole bloody thing until I pushed past that lull. Then Nyx shows back up, and the book starts again. I'm really going to need to work on that. The secondary characters should be strong enough to carry the book for four chapters, and right now, they aren't. Things which must be fixt....

In other news, I'm thinking about writing some short fiction again. I think some of my struggle is just that I've been spending so long working in one world, in one medium. I love writing novels, and I love this world, but I've been working on bel dame novels, in one way or another, since 2003.

How time flies.

Why is it...

... that writing actually gets *harder* the happier I become?

I think it's just a matter of getting back into constant practice. Giving myself a long break as a reward may not be the best way to manage my new writing all day/writing books all night lifestyle.

Because socializing and gym time have to come in there sometime. Also, cookery, modding, and WoWing... and movies. And French. And... reading. And...

I need a more structured activity schedule.

Yes, I Am Busy...

... but in a good way!

Celebrating Banned Books

I think this is an uber-kewl and terribly creative idea.



(thanks, Tyim!)

"Your Dirty Sex Makes God Send Hurricanes!"

Oh man... can't. stop. laughing...

Shit that Keeps Me in Dayton

Every once in a while, I'll get tired and frustrated with the idea of living in Dayton, and start searching through job ads.

I do this because it reminds me of the hard truth:

If you add in health benefits, I make as much (and, in some places, more - again, if you count the health insurance, which easily covers 5k a year in expenses for me for $10 a month) in this little town doing what I do than I'd make in a big city doing the same thing.

It appears that the swing over will happen once I have 2-5 years of experience instead of 1-2. There's a pretty significant wage jump between the 1-2 years experience copywriting jobs and the 2-5 years of experience copywriting jobs. Once I have the two years of experience, maybe other options will look more appealing?

But so long as this place pays me what they do and offers the health insurance program that they do, I just can't justify *not* living in this blasted heath of a red town.

Man, I love my job. I just wish it was in, like, Columbus or something. You see? At this point, I could totally be OK with the idea of living in Columbus!

And More It's a Small World Afterall

So, the other night, my date brought over a movie called The Gamers. It's a little D&D cult classic, basically a bunch of college guys with a couple of cameras, who document their D&D game in the basement of their school (which you can watch - in all its cheesy, low budget glory - on YouTube)

So I'm sitting there watching the opening where the guys are heading down the hall to start the game, and I'm thinking, man, that dude just to the right of camera looks really familiar.

And then they all sit down around the gaming table again, and yeah, seriously, that DM looks really familiar. I started paying attention to the opening credits, and, lo and behold, there it was:

"Matt Cameron" was playing the DM.

I actually had to pause the movie and burst into uncontrollable laughter.

Matt Cameron and I went to elementary school together. We were best friends for a couple of years from third-firth grade. He introduced me to all of the SF books in the library. When I was 16, I saw him again when he came to a production of Macbeth at my highschool where I played Banquo. The last time I saw him, I was dropping him off at his house after taking him out to dinner with the theater crew.

Appparently, Matt got into theater hijinks of his own in college... I totally should have known. He always did have a love for text-based computer games. It was only a matter of time before he found D&D.

According to Wikipedia, he's now a lawyer in Boston, which is much closer to what I figured he'd be doing with his life. Matt was one of those prodigies who skips grades and attends Gifted classes. I loved hanging out with him, and I was sad when we started to grow apart in the fifth grade. He was a really neat friend. And, honestly, I missed all of the book recommendations.

So then today, I'm randomly clicking Stumbleupon links and I get this page on the Scientific American website, and just before I go to click through again I'm thinking, "Man, that guy looks really familiar."

Pause.

"No, really, that guy looks really familiar." I checked the name, and there it was: Chen-Bo. Chen-Bo was one of Jenn's classmates at Northwestern. He came over a couple of times, as I recall, and was in attendance at several social gatherings Jenn let me tag along on. He was pretty awesome.

It's kind of weird to realize that all of the adults out in the world now are, you know, your contemporaries? Because that means that, uh, you must be an adult now, too, with your book deal and corp writing job?

Um?

"Maybe in Ohio, But Not in America!"

Man, I'm not looking forward to voting in Ohio.

Bookery: It's a Small World

Was browsing the bookstore with my date last night and saw a copy of David Schwartz's Superpowers. I had been picking up and talking about books and authors for sometime as we browsed the shelves, but when I picked this one up, the date said, "I think I've heard of this."

He works at a comic book store, so this didn't surprise me.

I babbled about Dave Schwartz for a bit and my date said, "You know what, I think I heard him on NPR. He seemed like a really nice guy."

Man, bookery gets around. "Actually, yeah, you probably did," I said. "He had a spot on there, I remember. He's a total sweetheart of a guy. It's about kids in Madison with superpowers. I think you'll get a kick out of it."

My date bought the book. Note that it generally takes 3-4 brain taps about a book before you buy it, which was why it was interesting to watch the power of media and personal recommendations play out right there. He'd heard of the book on NPR and also listed somewhere online, and then I pimped it. Third time's the charm.

This made me terribly happy, because there are far too many people I know who write books that aren't up my alley, and then I never read them. And then I feel like a Bad Writer.

But hey, I've learned that just because it may not be my kind of book doesn't mean I can't pimp it. And, knowing my date, I think he'll really dig this book, the little comic-book nerd, Terry Pratchett-reading, Dresdan loving little goof that he is.

Sweet beans.

Quote of the Day

"We turned at a dozen paces, for love is a duel, and looked up at each other for the last time."

—Jack Kerouac

Back at the Gym

Yup, that would be the gym.

I'm glad I waited until I could breath again to go, cause jogging last night wasn't the most pleasant thing in the world anyway. Good news is, I made my best time yet.

Now it's off to do the workday training routine at the Y.

Quote of the Day

"Destroying intellectual freedom is always evil, but only religion makes doing evil feel quite so good."
- Phillip Pullman

Man, Why Do I Feel Like a Crazy Bitch?

Hum do hum do ho dee hum

I think I'll check my blood sugar...

Boo bop wooo

56.

Yup, that would be why I feel like an angry, snarling bitch.

And that would be why I don't act on feelings that feel totally rational anymore (at least until after I check my blood sugar).

Welcome to living with crazy land.

And yet...

The sugar cookies need work.

I subbed half the flour with almond flour, the other half is whole wheat, and of course, I used Splenda. I'm thinking they need some kind of additional topping, though the texture came out really nice - very chewy and good.

It's the almond meal, I think, that gives it the "off" taste. Still, I could eat five cookies without poisoning myself, so really, that's gotta be a win.

Full recipe to follow when I finally get it right.

Thoughts on Impending Economic Collapse

I have survived two death threats, a chronic illness (which, let's face it, threatens to kill me every day), South Africa, depression, chronic-illness-induced Crazy, the mental breakdowns of loved ones, a job layoff, my parents' concurrent layoffs when I was still financially dependent on them, several big city and land mass moves, and much more.

I still owe just under 10K in credit cards, I have 19K in student loans, about $600 in savings and $200-odd in the bank at any one time.

This is the best place I've been in, financially, in the last two years.

I've lived through some tough shit. I'm prepared for things to be worse.

I know that, in time, things get better. `Til then, I've got good friends and good food, and when the food runs out, friends and family band together to weather it out.

But no, it won't be good times. Good stories, maybe. But not good times. I'm as prepared for that as I'm going to get.

Tonight, I baked diabetic-friendly sugar cookies.

They weren't bad.

The Cult of Loving Kindness

The third book in Paul Park's Starbridge Chronicles arrived today. I am continally in awe of writers who write so well that they make this shit look easy.
What stunned me even more is when I discovered this was actually his first series. Dammit, man.

Heroes and Monsters

A TED talk by Philip Zimbardo, most famously known for the 1971 Stanford Prison Experiment, about power and corruption. And power and redemption. Includes an overview of the Millgram experiment, for those unfamiliar with it. That one still terrifies the crap out of me.

This is about the power of institutions and how they affect behavior, and it has just as many implications about your behavior in the workplace, on the street, as it would if you were running the trains or overseeing the prisoners.

There are two bigs points in this one - it's not the people you have to change: it's the system and the basis of power. Power heirarchies encourage evil by allowing its perpetrators to either be anonymous or shift responsibility to someone in authority. If you're looking for the root of evil, don't look at the individual: look at the institution and what it allows and encourages the individual to do.

The second point, and most important because it's the solution: is how the promotion of heroism is the antidote to the abuses of power. Heroes are deviants: they are always going against the herd. They act when others are passive. Heros question authority, heirarchy, power. They aren't afraid to say, "This is wrong."

And those are the sorts of people we need to celebrate and encourage; not abusers of power.

This is why it's important to write good heroes. This is why people get so pissed off about misogyny in the comic book world in particular. If our fantasy heroes preach conformity and misogyny, what hope is there for real heroes?

Standing passively by while people commit abuses just makes you another member of the Millgram experiment. And if that's true, how much of a step to the right is it, really, to turn you into a torturer at Abu Ghraib?

I think about this stuff all the time. It's why I confronted the guys harrassing the girl at the bus stop in South Africa. It's why I was the first one to get up when the guy on the train in Chicago went into a seizure, and it's why I was the first one to notice the girl passing out on the train not long afterward. It's why I confronted one of the guys at my last job about a sexist slap about the unfortunateness of having a girl, and it's why I spoke up at my current job about an incident I observed as being an abuse of power.

Somebody has to be the first one to move. Somebody has to shake it up. And yeah, it's really hard to do. But watching this stuff over and over again?

I'm reminded of why I do it.

Babylon

I started writing the opening to Babylon today in first person. I don't think that's going to work.

But I did finally find the right soundtrack for the novel, which is a big accomplishment in itself.

Writing begins in earnest on October 7th, when my month-of-WoW reward for finishing book 2 runs out.

Here we go again.

Tonight's Adventures in Cookery

Chicken Spaghetti, courtesy of The Pioneer Woman cooks.



No, this is not my photo - I've totally stolen hers. But mine actually almost looked like this! Only in a wok! (I really need to get a proper digital camera).

I swapped out the spaghetti with spaghetti squash to make it diabetic friendly and added about twice the amount of red pepper and seasoning salt that she has in her recipe. I also just cooked up four chicken breasts in a cup of chicken broth instead of boiling it off the bone because, srsly, I just don't have the kitchen hardware to do that (read: big ass pot).

This actually turned out really well. I knew this was the recipe for me when she's like, "Now add 2 cups of cheese! OK, now top the whole thing with another cup of cheese!"

Dinner was tasty. It's all boxed up in the fridge for lunches and dinners this week.

Cutting costs, cutting costs... oh, the glamorous writing life.

Bug Sculptures!

Bugs!

Wild at Heart

I think I may have actually liked this Lynch movie. In the way you find it interesting to, say, examine some particularly strange yet somehow appealing malformation.

Laura Dern still annoys me, and I still have no idea what Lynch sees in Isabella Rossillini. As ever, the main female character is brutalized and overly sexualized. I'm starting to think that this isn't even a critique you can make of a Lynch film - it's, like, the definition of a Lynch film. Which makes me wonder where he gets this obsession, or if it's just lazy misogyny. I'd like to think it's not, since so much else you see in Lynch film's isn't lazy - but I won't rule it out. Sometimes there are just gaping holes in our assumptions where our reasoning should be.

Basic premise is: girl and guy love each other and have mad sex. The girl's mother is jealous of this cause she wants to screw the guy. So she puts out a hit on the guy. Guy and girl run away and go on a road trip through the south. At one point, Willem Dafoe blows off his own head with a shotgun, Laura Palmer plays the Good Fairy, and misc. Twin Peaks actors get cameos. It's the sheer out and out weirdness that makes this movie watchable.

I did like the weird integration of elements from The Wizard of Oz, the red shoes, the crystal ball (the wicked witch mother thing was kind of lazy,but she's a reaaal creepy character), and I think it failed on one level because it's not, in the end, Lulu's (Dorothy's) story - it's her boyfriend's story (and, really, the Good Fairy talks to *him* in the end, so is he supposed to be Dorothy? That might be worse). It's Lulu's job to just love him and endure. He's the one with all the action. It's his actions that are the driving force of the story (unlike Wizard of Oz, which puts Dorothy in a more active role).

So that does kind of lean toward lazy misogyny, doesn't it?

Kind of disappointing, but the film has the same weird Lynchian obsessions with red things, wacky characters, character actors, and family secrets. This is probably the closest thing Lynch has got out there to a a love story that I've seen. A wacky, head-blowed-off, manslaughtering, brutalized woman, fucked up guy love story.

And, ok, now that I've written all that, I'm not sure why I said I liked the movie. Maybe it's more accurate to say I found it... interesting? Just like mangled bodies at the scene of a wreck - so freakin' weird and messed up that you can't help looking.

My Crazy Book Bugs Are REAL SCIENCE!

Escherichia coli (E. coli) can give you a severe case of food poisoning or, with a little genetic engineering, a useful plastic. Scientists at San Diego–based Genomatica, Inc., have announced success in manipulating the bacteria to directly produce butanediol (BDO), a chemical compound used to make everything from spandex to car bumpers, thereby providing a more energy-efficient way of making it without oil or natural gas.

So when do I get to be labeled a hard SF writer? heh heh

Quote of the Day

So

Apparently Washington Mutual failed yesterday.

I've never experienced a Great Depression. I'm not stoked about it.

Most things are a lot more fun to read about in history books that to live through.

Friday yet?

This has not exactly been the best week. I want a do over...

"The Most Important Reading You Will Ever Do"

How books have changed your life.

Training Daze: Off Week

Due to pool closure, allergies severe enough to keep me home from work on Monday (I'm just now feeling about 80% human), pump failures inducing sugar woes (yesterday was *awful*), and the fact that it's fit test assessments at work (which means no regular work workouts this week), I've decided to take the week off from my training schedule.

I'm dedicated and all, but not stupid. Things like breathing and steady sugar numbers (my god it's a fucking miracle to have on a pod that works after three straight failures) = good times. I also have a date on Friday that I'd like to be cognizant for. This will require things like breathing and steady sugar numbers.

The plan is to pick the training schedule back up where I left off come Monday morning.

Also, as a consolation prize for my shitty week, I finally bought this t-shirt:


Because I'm awesome.

One for the Road

More Reasons I Won't Be Reading the Twilight Series

This neatly sums up everything I intuited about the books.

They just stank too much of that Anne Bishop "I'm writing a feminist romance ha ha ha just kidding there are cock rings and child rape and incest but really I had feminist intentions because so many women just can't get over how hottt guys are which makes them weak and prone to rape and incest and falling in love with their rapists because rapists are hottt" thing.

Rapists, vampires, werewolves... whatever. You know, hottt dudes that you should "save yourself" for.

Yeah.

Omnipoddery: OmniPod Suckage

So last night I pull out one of the 5 new replacement pods I received from the Omnipod Insulet Corporation.

I went to activate one.

And the first one out of the box FAILED.

FAILED.

A REPLACEMENT FOR A FAILED POD FAILED.

I called them up, reported the failure. They are sending me another one.

I put on a new pod. Activated fine. But today I tested at 345 at lunchtime.

WHAT THE FUCK SRSLY?????????

The pods generally do this right before they fail (rising blood sugar followed by occlusion error beep, followed by flat line beep). I injected myself with my vial and syringe. I just didn't trust the fucking pod anymore. I expect I'll get a beep any time. If my sugar is still off when I get home, I'll have to change it out again and call them.

I finally wrote Insulet corporation a complaint letter. EDIT: I have now also called them and made a formal complaint. I think my 300+ sugar number is leading to increased amounts of ire, bitchiness, and distraction.

I've fucking had it.

I wouldn't trust a fucking form of birth control with a 20% fucking failure rate. Yet here I am, entrusting my fucking life - and limbs, and vision, and kidneys, and etc. - to a medical device that FAILS 20% of the time.

Back in Februrary, an Omnipod marketing manager had this to say about the "rumor" of a 20% failure rate:

“People on the product have some problems sometimes, of course, but the incidence is very low. That 20% figure is just ridiculous!”

Ha ha. Yeah, a 20% failure rate IS pretty ridiculous!

It's not just me, either. That's the kicker. I knew there was a 5-10% failure rate. I could have - maybe - lived with that.

20% is too much.

I haven't seen this many 300+ numbers since I left the fucking hospital.

Fit Test

Well, it's that time of year again - time for our quarterly fit test at work.

My blood pressure is about the same - still in the good range.

Pushups and situps remained the same - about 50 each.

My only real accomplishment was shaving off those 4 lbs that I'd gained just before the last fit test. I'm not manic about losing weight, but I'm committed to *maintaining* my weight, so I was happy to see that I'd shaved off those plus one, which keeps me at my base line.

I'm telling you - too much WoW and too many flourless peanut butter cookies was enough to tip me over the edge. I like maintaining my weight, if for no other reason than that clothes are expensive.

My measurements may be slightly better as well, but they sounded about the same to me as she read them off. Again: maintenance is good. I'll be able to compare them when they hand out our assessments next week.

Tired.

Now I am tired again. Man, I hate being sick.

I need to be at work tomorrow; I'm thinking tonight will be better than last night cause of the drugs and the fact that I'll be back on the pod in half an hour, but man. I hate being worn down.

I deal enough with sugar wackiness that when I have further wackiness, it's just.. just... really tiring.

Tomorrow will be better!

Breathing is Highly Underrated

I love it when the drugs start to kick in.

In other news, the new Omnipods arrived today as well, so I can get back off the shots. You don't realize just how annoying all those shots are until you don't have to take them anymore.

Being back on shots, even for a day, wasn't any fun at all.

Drugs

Apparently, my supreme sinus/throat discomfort is due to mere allergies, not uber-contagions, as I first suspected (whenever my throat feels like this, I'm afraid I have strep throat). This should excite me, since it's not actual sickness!

But it does mean I have to go back to work tomorrow, because it's not like I'm going to get anyone sick with my allergies (after last year's one-in-every-three people at work getting the flu episode, they gave us three sick days. Good call).

Fucking allergies.

At least I have drugs. And a heating pad. Which does make my whole head feel a little better.

I'm sure I will post about something interesting and useful at some point. Just not right now. Now I'm just going to go lie down again.

OmniPod Goddammit

Had the last pod in my box fail tonight while I was changing out my expired pod.

I have five pods in the mail to replace the 5 that have already failed. According to the woman on the phone (I was stunned that Insulet has 24/7 support. That part is nice, at least), those are due to me tomorrow. I've been calling to try and get new pods for two weeks. I realize they are trying to be helpful and keep me from paying out of pocket for them, but by not shipping me pods when I said I needed them - by making me wait for the Oct. 7th magical date that's in their computer - it means they leave you no room for their 20% pod failure rate. They give you no wiggle room.

So it's back to shots for a day until those fuckers show up. I just took my 15u of Lantus. It also means leaving work early tomorrow so I can pick them up before the the apartment office closes (I had them change the delivery address to my work address to avoid this problem in future). When I'd assumed I'd be sent pods well in advance of running out, I figured having them sent to me at home would be no big deal. I'd have a week or more to pick them up from the apartment office.

But it doesn't work like that. In order to get replacements I don't have to pay for out of pocket ($35 a pop) before the magical Oct. 7th date, I have to call them every time a pod fails and have them ship me a replacement.

Goddammit. 6 pods in 30 have failed.

That's a 20% failure rate.

I realize it's a new technology, but these guys have seriously got to get their shit together.

Friends in the Garden

This small male mantid showed up yesterday among my morning glories:



This morning, when I pulled out my bike to go biking, I found an enormous female. Seriously, this thing is as long as my hand.



I generally find small bugs pretty cool, but after South Africa, the big bugs give me the shivers, initially, even if I know they're perfectly harmless. It's only after I talk myself down that the "Hey, cool!" factor kicks in.

Only Slightly Belated Pic in Honor of Talk Like a Pirate Day

My nephew Christopher, my mom, and my new niece, Kaylee.

Early to Bed and Early to Rise

I have a lot of crap to do tomorrow.

Til then!

Good Signs

I find it a good sign that my date for Saturday sent me an email this morning full of pirate-y goodness.

If nothing else, should be a swell time.

Mmmm rum.

Well, shit

The pool at the gym is out "until further notice."

When I inquired at the front desk if the pool was having repairs done or something, he said, "Oh, I have no idea what's going on with the pool."

Way to go Urban Active customer service!

You know the one thing gyms could TOTALLY improve on? Their fucking customer service. It never occurred to me before because I've never really had to inquire after anything, but today it really hit home.

These people don't care if you show up. Most of the time they appear to be sneering down at you instead of, you know, being happy and encouraging. Going to the gym should be a fun, invigorating experience. You should feel better afterward. And, generally, I do, provided I don't interact with the front house staff behind having them barcode me in.

That's really the trouble. Gyms are always hard sell to get you in the door, but they figure that once they've got you locked into a contract, they don't really have to offer anything anymore. After all, you signed the contract!

Thing is, they don't realize that people who are locked into contracts at gyms they hate will go rant to all their friends (and all across the internet) about how crappy their gym is, which means you may have one person for a year, but you just lost 5-50 possible memberships (depending on just how much and how irate their rant was).

Come on, people, is it so hard to let your front house staff know why the pool is closed?

Seriously.

And now I'll be getting really behind on training scheduled - and on my weakest event! Which kind of irritates me a lot, actually.

And...

We have internet!

Civilization has officially returned.

The Calvary

I seem to be one of The Few, The Proud, The Brave who had power restored yesterday. It came on about 6pm. It was beautiful.

This morning, I saw three power trucks on the road, and though there were still quite a few street lights out on my route in, and several blocks still without power, there was... progress. Which, you know, really, was all I was hoping for. Some kind of indication that we weren't stuck in the second half of The Stand.

They're using the fairgrounds downtown as the staging area for the power and debris trucks, and I passed them on the way in. It was pretty awesome to see 50 second shift trucks and crews get geared up for another day. I very nearly took a picture. It filled me with love!

On the one hand, I don't want to blame Dayton for being incompetent - most of the crews were in Texas, and it took them that extra day to get up here. But you know, it also doesn't surprise me that this get noticeably better once you get in the folks from out of state who know what the fuck they're doing.

It doesn't help that Dayton Power & Light just goes out of its way to look incompetent:

Other major utilities in the region, including Duke Energy and American Electric Power which serves the Columbus area and southeast Ohio, offer the public specific projections, by telephone or Web site, about when customers in given areas can expect to have their service restored.

DP&L lacks the technology to do that, Tatham said.

Often, residents have been able to determine where power has been restored by "driving around," Tatham said.

Yeah. It's an incredibly organized strategy we employ.

Montgomery County Sheriff Phil Plummer said he has been in contact with DP&L about the repair schedule, but needs to know more about when each area is to be reconnected. That would help the sheriff's office deploy patrol officers accordingly to deter criminals who might try to loot in areas still without electric service, Plummer said Tuesday.

DP&L relies on information that local governments relay about reconnect priorities, Tatham said.

"As far as identifying priorities down to a neighborhood, that would be difficult to do," Tatham said.

Right. Because... making a priority list in the event of a disaster isn't something that... people do. Shit, if FEMA doesn't do it, why should DP&L?

Retards.

In any case, there are still lots of folks without power this morning, but at least there's progress.

Then everybody will head back to Texas.

Tonight's Training

Tonight it's 20 minutes swimming and 25 minutes running.

These are the times at which I start to get a little nervous. I'll do fine and all, but you start giving me 30 min of an exercise (my first 30 min swim is next week) and 20-30 of something else, and... whew. It's the anticipation that will cripple you.

So, um, I'm just not thinking about it?

Or thinking about the last 8 weeks?

I may have some hiccups with insulin adjustments next week when the times get longer. I'm just forgiving myself for those now, cause I know that leveling is going to be really frustrating.

Onward and tra la and all that.

How Did I Miss This One?

Ellen and Portia got married.

This makes me terribly happy.

Quote of the Day

"Vision without execution is a hallucination."
- Thomas Edison

More Reasons Not to Live in the Midwest

No power yet.

Every single place I passed on my route today that didn't have power yesterday?

Still didn't have power today.

I have not seen one power company truck in the last two days. Not one.

If I had a fireplace, this wouldn't be so annoying. But no fireplace means I can't cook tea or soup. Steph and the Old Man graciously invited me over to their place for dinner last night, since the entirety of my refrigerator is shot.

The only places that have power are:

1) People who never lost power in the first place
2) Hospitals
3) Oakwood, where the rich people live

The good news is!

At least the out of town cavalry is finally here.

There may be two whole stop lights working tomorrow.

Oh, For Goodness Sake

Seriously??

Conversations With My Coworkers

Graphic designer: Wow, you look nice today. Did you iron that shirt and everything?

I love my coworkers.

(P.S. I did, in fact, buy 3 no-wrinkle shirts this weekend, for just this reason. I've begun looking a lot like Raggedy Ann again.)

Oh, the Wilderness!

I've lived in Alaska.

I've lived in South Africa.

I've lived in rural Washington.

The longest I've ever gone without power was while living 5 miles outside of downtown Dayton, OH.

Seriously, people.

Went off about 1pm yesterday, and still isn't back on as of this morning. The only real annoyance was lack of any time keeping device, once the cell phone died. The upshot? My insulin pump PDM does, in fact, keep time. Which is why I arrived at work on time.

Power was on at The Greene all night (there's nothing more frustrating than seeing the lights on right across the parking lot while you're in the dark. I suspect they had generators), so that's where I had dinner, but the food in the fridge is pretty much a wash. Which is a bitch and a half when you have an actual food budget.

It was a pretty awesome windstorm, tho.

And contemplating electricity in the dark last night, I realized why there's no electricity in the bel dame books.

So it wasn't a totally useless exercise.

Death By Pizza

Insulin pumps are really awesome when they work.

They aren't so cool when they don't work.

Since getting the new pump, I've been able to eat more than 2 pieces of pizza at a go, which is pretty awesome. Longtime readers may remember that pizza has pretty much been my death food since I got sick. Eating more than two pieces means testing every two hours, correcting, highs, lows, and subsequent weird highs and lows afterwards (think of eating a really high carb meal as throwing a stone into a pond. It's the ripple effect. Everytime you go really high, you tend to have to deal with the ripples for a few days after ward. Getting yourself back on track after a bad high is torture).

But with this new pump, I can avoid wacky highs. I set my bolus to give me 35% of the insulin now and the rest over the next 4 and a half hours. This means that as the bulk of the carbs are absorbed over time, the pump is giving me the insulin to cover it at about the same rate. This means no dramatic highs or lows.

Cool beans.

Last night, my pod expired just before dinner (you have to change them every 3 days), so I changed it out and then ordered in some pizza because hey, it's Friday, and I had two lows that day because of my new workout routine (working to cover for this), and all I had in the fridge was hummus, cucumbers, and low carb tortillas, and you can only live on this stuff for so long before you need to mix it up.

So I dosed as usual for pizza, ate 6 pieces of thin crust pizza and a couple of breadsticks, played some WoW, and tested before bed.

I was at 209 before bed, which was a little more elevated than I expected (I can generally stay under 200, even with pizza). So I corrected for it and went to bed.

My 1:30am alarm woke me up. I tested, already knowing when I woke that I was high. I was wicked thirsty, and had to go to the bathroom. My legs were feeling prickly and my eyes hurt.

I test at 440.

Sweet jesus.

When you test that high, you know something's not working.

But I wasn't getting any pod alarms.

So I dosed myself with a few units manually with one of my pens and took the other half of the correction via the pump. Then I drank some of the most delicious tasting water on the planet. Nothing tastes better than water to a dying diabetic, let me tell you.

Set my alarm for an hour later.

In an hour, I'd gone down under 400, which wasn't great, but meant I was getting some insulin (the kind from my pump is absorbed faster than when I give myself a manual injection in the thigh) so I set an alarm for a couple hours later. I then chugged the most delicious tasting diet soda on the planet.

At 5:30am, I tested at 360, which is still absolutely insane.

I corrected.

That was when my pump alarm finally went off.

Occlusion error, according to my PDM display.

Well, no shit.

So I changed out the pump.

But by then, the damage to my Saturday had been done. I was thirsty, exhausted, my legs were needles and pins bothering me, my whole head was muzzy. It was like viewing the world through a gray gauze.

I finally rolled out of bed at 11:30am, trying to get some rest after my rocky night, tested at a finally respectable 138, and walked around like a woman recovering from a hangover.

I resolved - as I have every time after getting sick after eating pizza - never to eat pizza again, even if the actual fault in this case did not rest entirely on the pizza. Eating the pizza just made the pump malfunction that much more shitty.

I love my pump. When it works, it's absolutely awesome.

But when it doesn't work, dying is a really fast and immediate possibility.

I wouldn't trust a form of birth control with a 10% failure rate, and yet here I am, relying on a life or death medical device with a 10% failure rate. If it didn't keep my numbers so damn good the other 90% of the time...

And maybe that's the bullshit part of it.

With t1 diabetes, having good-to-great numbers 90% of the time is... amazing. It is life changing. It is so grand.

Having bad numbers - life altering, perhaps even long-term life-ending - numbers the other 10% of the time?

Well, hey, that's not so bad!

It's like hey, extra blood and pain once a month with an IUD, or 365 days a year of chronic depression and weight gain on a hormonal form of birth control?

Yeah, I'll take the extra blood and cramps 3 days a month, please.

And that's what having an insulin pump is like.

Shitty 10% of the time, great 90% of the time.

The alternative being shitty number 40% of the times with pens and more complications (read: feet getting chopped off) in the future, but fewer chances for abrupt death.

Not having a pancreas really, really fucking sucks.

P.S. Yes, this means very little will be getting done today. I'll have to double up today's workout with tomorrow's. Also, line edits are probably out as well. I want to sleep, and not much else.

On Writing

"Fail, fail again, fail better."
- Samuel Beckett

Alaska.

I've been thinking about it more and more lately. I usually do, around this time of year.

Here's why I still think of it so fondly (this post originally appeared here):

Drunk & Unpublished at the Edge of the World

My first year of undergrad work in Alaska, I met a girl named Lou who drank a half gallon of Black Velvet whiskey every week, rolled her own cigarettes, wore steel-toed boots, and took home a different guy every weekend.

In Fairbanks, even more than other university towns, there’s not much to do during the winter but drink and have sex. When it’s 20 below and it’s been dark for the last twenty hours, you’re really not up for much else.

So Lou would coax me up to her room with promises of cheap whiskey and diet coke, and once I was sufficiently sloshed, she’d bring out her stories.

Lou was an English major from Oregon. She’d spent a year in the Philippines when she was sixteen, and most of her stories were about that year. They were beautiful, emotional pieces that took me to a hot, humid place, to beaches and palm trees and rice at every meal. They were potent escapes from a dark, cold, November night.

After the readings, we’d go down to the front porch of the dorm and roll cigarettes with numb fingers and smoke until we were frozen, then go back in and drink some more. I would drink until I realized that if I drank any more, I wasn’t going to be able to make it downstairs to my own bed without passing out in the stairwell. Lou said she wouldn’t have minded me not returning to my own bed, but Lou wasn’t really my type, and I was still holding out for somebody else at the time.

Lou was a good writer, something I was surprised to learn once she started reading. I’d had any number of people come up to me and claim to be a writer when they heard it was something I did. Most of them were of the, “I have this great idea, and if you write it, we can split the profits 50/50,” type or the “As soon as I have the time, I’m going to write a novel,” kind.

But Lou definitely had talent. She told good stories on paper and in person, and told me about the time one of her girlfriends shot off her boyfriend’s toe after he threatened to kill her and locked her in a basement for three hours.

These were the sorts of people Lou was friends with.

But Lou’s writing had one fault:

She never finished anything.

The impression I got from the bits and pieces she read about her experience in the Philippines was that something not all-together empowering had happened there, something that, after coming back to the States, she dealt with primarily by drinking a lot of whiskey and putting on a lot of weight. She liked to talk about how thin and desirable she’d been in the Philippines, how much men liked her blue eyes. She would say, “135 pounds” with the wistful nostalgia of a far older woman for a much younger self, though she wasn’t even twenty-two.

Lou and I hung out with the same group of stoner guys - the beer drinking, motorcycle riding, marijuana smoking, guitar playing types who were easy to get into bed. And while I mostly was stuck on one of them, she went to bed with all of them, and some of the drama and English majors to boot. I wanted to admire that kind of sexual freedom, but I soon learned that Lou wasn’t particularly happy with her conquests. Mostly, she was angry and bitter that a one night stand was just a one-night-stand. I suggested that maybe getting to know a guy and having a relationship with him before she had sex with him might lead to more long-term interest.

She rejected that out of hand.

“Men don’t want to be in relationships with fat girls,” she said, and she scribbled something into her notebook.

What always fascinated me about Lou was that when I looked at us, I often saw the same person. Or, rather, who I could have been. She was angry and bitter and pissed off at the hand she’d been dealt. She’s had one really bad experience, and it broke her, and she believed everyone was out to betray her and piss her off and nobody would stick by her. And believing that, she created the world just as she imagined it to be.

Most of our drinking and reading sessions involved discussions about how she would get back at the latest lover who had jilted her: not returned her calls, not been up for another midnight session, told her she was just a passing fuck.

When rumors began to circulate on her dorm floor that she and I were lovers, she wanted to stage a glorious public breakup in the dining hall, perhaps to draw further male sexual interest from the woodwork.

She had a flair for the dramatic. It made her a good storyteller, but a rather undisciplined one. Her life was in such a disarray, so full of drama and angst and drunken nights, that finishing most any bit of writing at all would have been a blessed miracle.

She was living. The recording could come later.

Some of the best advice I was ever given about writing came from Geoff Ryman, and it wasn’t advice about writing at all. It was advice about life. He sat me down for my one-on-one at Clarion West after a rather stunning critique of a story of mine in which he asserted that the he found the story “personally offensive” and believed it suffered from “a failure of the imagination.” Coming from a writer like Ryman, when I was twenty years old, the youngest in the class, was like a cold slap in the face.

He said I needed to travel and read outside the genre. He said I had far too much talent to be writing sordid slash-n’hack (I still write slash n’ hack. But it’s a better sort of slash n’ hack).

When I went back to Alaska after that summer in Seattle, Lou was gone. She had had a wild “breakup” with the group of guys we hung with, told one guy’s girlfriend she’d slept with him, told that girlfriend I was a loser slut who’d slept with her boyfriend, too, and was fleeing an abusive boyfriend who’d threatened to kill me (not exactly common knowledge at the time), and tried to get the motorcycle riders to ditch me, too. It worked pretty well. Everybody got pissed off.

Lou always did have a flair for the dramatic.

I’d spent a great deal of my life, about ten years of it, working very hard at “being a writer.” Whatever the hell that was supposed to be. I believed you just had to work really hard. You had to write every day. You had to finish everything. You had to read the books in your field (unfortunately, to the exclusion of all others). You had to go to writing classes and workshops (I’d been going to one sort of workshop or another since I was 14). You had to write, to the exclusion of all else. You had to cut yourself off from other people, because only the writing was important.

Lou didn’t really do any of that. But damn, she had good stories.

I’d like to say that not a lot of my writing got done in Alaska, with all that drama, all those dark nights, all that whiskey. But I sold my first pro-rate-paying story while I was there, something I popped off in a couple hours on a dreary October night while downloading porn and music from the networked computers in my dorm.

When it’s cold and dark and you don’t have a real job, you can say yes to every opportunity that comes your way and write about it, too.

Well, you can say yes to almost everything.

I think Lou may have said yes to too much. There’s a fine line between living out loud and driving yourself into the ground.

Stories don’t come from nowhere.

I remember spending one chilly May night at a ramshackle cabin in the hills just outside Fairbanks. The floor sloped precipitously, there was no running water, and the couple who lived there were growing marijuana upstairs in the loft. We ate wild rabbit cooked up with rice, and before the beer really got flowing, me and one of the other girls took turns shooting a rifle at makeshift targets made out of the remains of a sled dog kennel.

I drank eight beers followed by a fifth of vodka and promptly heaved out a stream of projectile vomit over the porch railing. The guy from New York was playing the guitar, and the couple were dragging themselves drunkenly to bed, and I retreated out to the bonfire just off the porch (fueled, as well, by the remains of old dog kennels) with the kid from Evanston. We huddled together for warmth, and I bled out a bunch of perceived ills and moaned about how unlovable I was, and how Lou had gotten laid more than me, and about the couple heading upstairs, and how I felt I didn’t have any friends, and I didn’t fit anywhere. I always felt too smart around them. Too big, defective.

“You realize you’re a lot better than us, don’t you?” he said. “I’m not really sure why you’ve spent this long hanging out with us.”

I suppose I couldn’t help it. They had good stories.

When the guy from New York hauled me out onto the porch later and berated me for crushing on the coupled guy for the last year, I burst into tears, and he hugged me and said, “Listen, us, this group of losers, you’re not going to see us again. We’re just gonna be some guys you knew in college. This really isn’t important. It’s a chapter in your life. There’s a bigger picture. You deserve way better than that guy, and way better than us.”

Ah, my drunken Alaskan boys.

A month later, I went to Clarion. By September, the group broke apart, Lou’s forked tongue helped severe me from the crowd, and I didn’t see any of them again.

In some small, secret way, I suppose I loved them, and Lou, for being everything I wasn’t. Their expectations of the future were closer, more attainable, less risky. They wanted a good partner and a good motorcycle and good weed and a roof over their heads. They wanted enough money to live. They did not want to be known. They didn’t want to be heard. The stories they told were more private, secret histories, often far more interesting than mine, that they had no interest in broadcasting to the world. Why bother? What did they have to do with the world? That’s why they’d come to Alaska.

And it’s why I left. I wanted more in the way that the perpetually unfulfilled will always want more. I had more people to meet, more places to go, more stories to write.

Like Lou, I never wanted to get stuck in one story. I didn’t want to endlessly catalogue the mistakes of my youth. I wanted to finish what I started.

When I sent off my Clarion applications, I did so without the money to go, and without any real expectation that I would get in. I made the waiting list. I got in a month or so later by sheer virtue of the fact that somebody else didn’t want to go.

That seemed somehow appropriate.

Your writing life isn’t over once you get out of bootcamp any more than your life is over after getting married, or divorced, or having kids. Those are just mileposts on a very long marathon route, pit-stops for food and refreshment, and they usually turn out to be the places where you meet the most interesting people, and collect the best sorts of stories.

Sometimes, I can even finish some of them.

It took me a long time to realize that writing wasn’t about cutting yourself off from people and huddling in a dark room for hours and hours and hours every weekend (well, not every weekend). It was about going out into the world with big boots on and learning how to roll your own cigarettes. It was about riding motorcycles and drinking home-brewed beer and taking trains across New Zealand. It wasn’t just looking out at the world, it was about being a part of it, and living to tell the tale: yours or somebody else’s, somebody who couldn’t finish theirs.

You want to open up your hands and say to somebody, “Here, this, this is your life, what it was, what it is, what it could be. How do you want it to end?”

And I wonder if that’s why Lou never could finish a story. I wonder if she was afraid of getting stuck with the wrong ending, afraid it ended with her reading half-finished stories in a little dorm room at the edge of the world, drinking whiskey by herself on a cold, dark night, trapped by her own adolescent self and the roads she walked before the world became too much, before it reared up to get her, before she got lost to anger and fear.

I dream that she went out and made a better ending.

I know she can.

Wiki Fame: I Keep Wondering...

... when someone is going to do this up properly.

Maybe I have to be srsly famous first?

At least I have an entry!