-
I saw the eclipse!
It was significantly cloudy in Dublin at Solar Eclipse time and I had no real hope of seeing it. In fact, it was *raining* lightly, but I was still out and about and keeping an eye on the sky. Suddenly the clouds broke just enough to keep a haze over the sun, allowing me to look directly at the eclipse, which, at 9:23am, was close enough to the 90% totality seen today from Ireland to count.
I am not lying, guys: it was fucking awesome. And that’s from somebody who knows what an eclipse is. It’s no wonder people who didn’t, back in the day, were utterly terrified and confused by them. I was genuinely filled with joy to see it, and enjoyed walking around in the strange light.
-
preposterously awesome
We all know I have a coat problem. Slightly less well-known is my bag problem, which is particularly incomprehensible because I don’t usually carry one.
I would, however, give up all the other rarely used bags in favor of never using this one:
Seriously, I do not know what level of kick-ass one has to conquer in order to deserve one of those, but I have major, major bag lust. But of course, what color would I get it in? The brown seems somehow sexier, but the black, more practical! Insofar as a black leather 4-way hip holster thigh strap steampunk beyond-comprehension-awesome bag is practical at all, I mean.
Also, I would like those abs and hips that go along with the bag, please.
They’re available (the bags, not the abs) here, from this Etsy seller. Dude, they are just SO AWESOME. Costly, but they’re hand-made and for the sheer amount of awesome involved, they seem worth it. Of course, I would expect it to last forever.
Maybe for Christmas? :)
-
awesome & yet self-aggrandizing
Today’s awesome things are all about me (I swear this wasn’t the plan when I started this on Sunday). :)
First, today is the official release day for WALKING DEAD, book four of the Walker Papers! As far as I can tell, everybody I know bought it two weeks ago, but still, today is the official release day!Seattle’s a great place to live…if it weren’t for the undead.
For once, Joanne Walker’s not out to save the world. She’s come to terms with the host of shamanic powers she’s been given, her job as a police detective has been relatively calm, and she’s got a love life for the first time in memory. Not bad for a woman who started out the year mostly dead.
But it’s Halloween, and the undead have just crashed Joanne’s party. Now she has to figure out how to break the spell that lets ghosts, zombies and even the Wild Hunt come back. Unfortunately, there’s no shamanic handbook explaining how to deal with the walking dead.
And if they have anything to say about it–which they do–
No one’s getting out of there alive.
Second, to go along with WALKING DEAD’s release, my web guru, Laura Denson, recently did a recording of “Rabbit Tricks”, the Walker Papers short story that fits chronologically between COYOTE DREAMS and WALKING DEAD.
Third, my longtime friend and writing partner Sarah Palmero did a two-minute voice recording from THE QUEEN’S BASTARD. I think both of these are pretty damned cool (if utterly bizarre, because wow, really weird to hear someone else reading my words!), and would like to thank them both profusely for doing these and letting me post them publicly!
Fourth, I just noticed several of my books have been nominated as contenders for 101 Best Fantasy novels. I have to admit that given some of the company (which ranges from Lloyd Alexander to Diana Wynne Jones with all points between), I feel my presence there is a bit ludicrous, but also quite wonderful and I wouldn’t mind making it onto somebody’s top 100 list, so if you wanted, you could go vote. :) And my thanks to whomever nominated me, how cool of you. :)
Fifth, I’m terribly smug to show off the (tiny–if you want to see it full sized you’ll have to buy the story) cover for “Hot Time in the Old Town Tonight”, which was painted by manga artist Lanny Liu.Along those same lines, “Hot Time” has debuted amongst its patrons today. (I wasn’t thinking, when I changed its due date to September 1st, that that was also the release date for WALKING DEAD. Oh well, everybody got WD early anyway, so “Hot Time” still gets to be a little bit special.) For those who didn’t join the fundable commission the first time through, the novella will be available to purchase in February 2010, after which it’ll go off the market permanently until it finds a traditional publisher.
Also, it is possible I’m just flat-out taking the rest of this week off. I have one million things to do, but I’m not sure I care that much right now. A week of down time is not going to put me any more insurmountably behind than I am already. :)
(I’ll post real awesome things later, honest. :))
-
lovely evening
Somehow the book has nearly caught up to my YTD wordcount again. That’s kind of weird. Anyway, I realized today I may have as few as 4 chapters left, which would be sort of awesome. No, actually, who am I kidding, it would be totally made of awesome. I could have as many as six or seven, but four or five is seeming pretty likely. *fingers crossed*
We had a lovely evening here at the Murphy-Lee household. My uncle and cousin are over visiting, so Ted made an apple & onion stuffed pork roast for dinner and pineapple upside-down cake for dessert, and we sat around and chatted for a few hours. Very nice.
Arright, I’m just going to bed now. (I told you: boring post week.)
ytd wordcount: 72,200
-
comparatively early-morning drive-by update
It’s nice out! It won’t last, and in fact was miserable when we walked to the gym three hours ago, but it’s nice out now! And I am happy! It doesn’t take much. :)
I made the error, perhaps, of posting this on Labor Day, when not many people in the US were around, and so, though I’ve gotten some (excellent) responses, I’ll point people here again: in short, if you want to give me a short story idea, I might write it for you. :)
Ardian sent me the rough draft splash page for the 5th issue. (I love artists. They almost always draw the money shot first. The page in question is page 20 of the issue. Fun stuff first! :)) It’s going to be *gorgeous*.
Speaking of gorgeous, have I shown you Scott Clark’s cover for Chance #1? No, I didn’t think so. Teh pretty, let me show you it:
Now I’m going to go to work. Got 5 pages written on Chance #6 yesterday. Aiming for 10 today. Woo woo!
(Oh oh oh, oh wait, first, I have to point people at Ordinary People Change The World, which is a fundraiser site sponsored by comic book writer & novelist Brad Meltzer. They’re raising money to save Jerry Seigel’s home, the house Superman was created in, and there are some really *cool* things going up for bid. Go check it out, because it is totally made of awesome.)
miles to Isengard: 258
ytd miles swum: 13.3
ytd wordcount: 315,000
