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!