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.