The Final Countdown

Still here. According to my surgeon, 7 days = 7 days. No room for negotiation. She's strict, and rightly so. Tomorrow I can go. Okay. I'm almost there.

Listening to The Empress of Mars by Kage Baker.

Reading The Twelve by Justin Cronin.

Writing a story about a post apocalyptic hospital. Hmmmm.

Reese W has been rather naughty, hasn't she?

Tomorrow...

Still Doing Time

I thought I'd be out by now, honest I did, Guv, what with time off for good behaviour and being such a bouncy (relatively speaking) patient who was back on her feet and doing laps up and down the hospital corridors the day after last week's operation (I've devised my own track around the bank of lifts and a circuit that involves some pretty fancy configurations. Unfortunately, I frequently surprise or frighten the staff as I come "whizzing" around a corner, my purple dressing gown-cape flying), but alas, here I am a week later still in the medical slammer because of hardware-software interface issues. Basically, I can't leave until a tiny piece of tubing has been yanked out and it HAS to stay in for seven days. Hopefully, they'll jump the gun a little and it'll come out tomorrow. Cross fingers.

But I haven't wasted my time. After a quick, high-priority, post op system check to make sure my brain was still working the way it should (thinking up stories) I've squeezed in some writing in between the countless check ups, taking drugs and all the medical messing around. I've also listened to audio books as I've walked my 3 x 20 minute carpeted laps (what a disciplined athlete I am), have read books, chatted with visitors, nurses and ancillary staff, and, of course, have caught up with really important matters that I was seriously behind on like Kim K's drama-filled pregnancy, Kanye's caddishness, Kate's bump, Justin B's love life, Miley's postponed wedding, Chaz B's weight problems, and Jessica S's topsy-turvy whatever. I'm not entirely sure about Jen's situation. In one magazine she is happy and possibly pregnant, while in another she is apparently hiding some secret that the media feel honour-bound to uncover so they can splash it across a double page feature sometime in the near future. I can hardly wait for the reveal. No, wait, maybe I can. Yes, definitely and officially, I don't care. I can tell it's been zonks since I've seriously read these picture-filled mags rather than just flicked through them at checkouts, because I had to do a bit of research on the ubiquitous terms babydaddy and babymama so as to understand the subtle cues about marital status that I correctly suspected they incorporated.

They're fun enough to read, and enlightening in a social studies kind of way, but after a few such fascinating articles, I usually seize Scientific American or the like to rev up my brain again. Everything in moderation.

Anyway, the hospital is winding down for the night and all good patients are heading for their beds. I shall do so with a book.

Reading in bed - what a luxury.

Usually.

But I'd much rather be doing it at home.

Don't Know When I'll Be Back Again

My iPod is loaded with stacks of audio books,
The cats are crated and giving me filthy looks...

*sigh*

I'm off to my sister's place to settle the moggies and overnight, after which I'll head for the hospital where I shall once more be sliced and diced. Shouldn't be too long this time. Crossing fingers and toes.

Zombie Brainwashing

Warm Bodies is an insidious movie. Do not see it. Do not let your loved ones see it either, but by all means recommend it to your worst enemies. Gentle, amusing, and all warm and fuzzy about the walking dead, this feel good movie full of misinformation, probably propagated by some secret organisation of card-carrying zombie lovers for their own dark reasons, might well bring about the extinction of our species.

Imagine it. The Zombie Apocalypse has arrived. Civilization has collapsed, but you, of course, being a sterling member of the human race, have survived. Cat-like, you're slinking through the debris-strewn streets, all lethal and commando-style in your camo gear. You're good to go with long, pointy knives adorning all parts of your person and the trusty, fully automatic, military assault weapon of your choice at the ready, when you spot a lumbering shape. You peer through the telescopic targeting thingie, your trigger finger a' twitching. You are so ready to blow the decaying head off the decrepit abomination before you.

But inexplicably, you pause. Stirrings of an old movie get in the way of your animal instincts. Scenes from Romeo and Juliet flit through your mind. You take a moment to think. You think things like Maybe there's a really nice person trapped inside that festering corpse fighting to get out and party or perhaps I wonder if this decomposing cadaver has a vinyl version of that Blue Öyster Cult album I've been trying to find for so long. What with the apocalypse having drastically reduced the pool of suitable dating partners, you might even perversely entertain musings such as Apart from all the rips, rot and pus, he/she actually looks quite hot in that murky light. Most dangerously of all, with memories of Warm Bodies flooding your synapses, you might indulge in the lost cause romanticism of Maybe my one, true, long lost love lies embedded beneath all that flaking flesh.

And that's it. The End. You're a goner. With your survival instincts slowed by this entertaining but highly dangerous movie that promulgates the notion that deep down, zombies are people just like us, you'll be pounced upon and felled as you dreamily plan the wedding, and disembowelled and devoured by rancid hordes before you get to your imaginary honeymoon.

So I cannot stress this enough - do not see this amusing piece of zombie propaganda. Your survival, our survival, depends upon it.

The Book Game

To make popping into op shops and the like a little more exciting, I like to set a couple of concurrently running challenges for myself. No rush, no sweat, just a goal that allows random fate to reward one with a little, but cheap, hurrah! every now and then. At the moment, one of my self-imposed contests is to collect hardback versions of The Masters of Rome series by Colleen McCullough. I found The First Man in Rome ($10) at Clunes Booktown last year, and The Grass Crown (down from $8 to $3 - what a bargain) at the R.S.P.C.A. shop in Bendigo.  An op shop I often pop into whilst walking of a morning from the train station to the the Arvo Job when I have early starts has yielded two volumes - Anthony and Cleopatra ($5) and...

... today, The October Horse ($5). I'm especially pleased about this hefty acquisition because there was a softback copy in the same shop about five months ago, which I almost buckled and bought. But no! Rule number two is that they must all be hardbacks! So I waited. And so I triumphed. Caesar himself would have been proud of my will power and patience.

Ah, the little things. Enjoy them.

Just Being Still

Except for a short walk and shop, I stayed home today and very consciously enjoyed my peace and quiet and privacy with nary a nurse or medical student in sight, not to mention by ability to run, jump, climb trees (not that I did - but I could if I wanted to!), lift stuff and stay awake because next week...

Nah, I'm not going there yet, not before I have to.

I also derived much pleasure from writing for a couple of hours today, well aware my brain will very soon turn to porridge of the thick and gluggy sort. Now is not the time for tackling any of the big, serious SF themes I've got on the boil. No, to counter the greyness of mood brought on by my impending blahness, I'm sticking to writing lighter stories that cheer me up, and am well pleased that I finished the first draft of my hopefully amusing SF quest story featuring a human-alien, Sherlock-Watsonishy team with a dash of Sir Richard Burton (not the actor! Richard Francis Burton). I hope to use the pair again in more fun short stories. Of course, if this tale isn't snapped up, there'll be no more spacey adventures for my two galactic travellers. Cross fingers that somewhere out in the universe, they raise an editorial giggle.
   

Supanova, Sci-Fi and Supasoup

It's been a busy weekend. I'll admit up front that no writing whatsoever got done. Yesterday it was off to Supanova for the day. The crowds were huge, as usual, and the stalls overflowing with every geekish thing your heart could possibly desire (Dalek keyring/plush toy/t-shirt/alarm clock anyone?  Darth Vader keyring/plush toy/t-shirt/alarm clock anyone? Enterprise pizza cutter? A knitted Jayne hat? Or perhaps a blow-up Baloonicorn for the lounge room?) With The Hoff as a guest star, there was plenty of KITT action (little and big boys never seem to tire of standing around staring at glossy, black cars with blinky lights), and with Alec Baldwin*** on the premises there were Serenity lovers a' plenty. Throw Barbara Eden into the mix, you're practically guaranteed lots of pink-clad Jeannies running around, crossing their arms and blinking.

It was very crowded, but fun. The place was chock full of monsters, super heroes, steampunk aviators, manga characters, and medieval warriors buckled into big, furry coats. And most scarily, Weeping Angels walked amongst us (don't blink!).

 Outdoors, the Australian Quidditch Association put on a game for our viewing pleasure, and afterwards, they had a recruitment drive for new players. It looked like they were having a ball, and for a few seconds, I considered signing up, but unfortunately for them, I'm seriously leaning towards joining the local roller derby team to realise my Whip It fantasy, so I'll have to give Quidditch a miss for now ;)

Today it was time for some more sci-fi with a quick pop into town for the movie Oblivion, and then lots of running around here at home getting ready for my upcoming medical crap. What a time waster. It's all the bother of preparing for holidays (find and wash presentable jammies and socks, organise cleaning, bills, house minding etc) but without the prospect of lazing about on the golden sands of a tropical island to compensate for the hassle. Ah well. I'm doing a lot of cooking so as to make life easier on my return. My freezer is now full of a particularly potent super-soup which is guaranteed to hasten my healing and make me feel warm and glowy. It's just like chicken soup, but with lentils.

***D'oh. Amendment. Serious cred malfunction. Too much recent viewing of 30 Rock + late night blogging + not checking = wrong Baldwin. Adam Baldwin, of course. My embarrassed apologies. At least I got the other brother who also starts with an 'A'.

Readings and Writings

I'm just back from listening to readings by local YA authors Kirsten Krauth and Ellie Marney, as well as Simone Howell spruiking her latest novel, the very funny(at least from the chapters we heard)  Girl Defective,  at the local writers' centre. It was good to spend time in the company of other scribes, even if most of them are hard core litfic types who pause, try to politely hide their embarrassment (and sometimes terror?) and then awkwardly flounder for something suitably nice to say if one happens to mention that one writes *gasp* science fiction with the occasional side trip into horror and fantasy. That's all right. They're good people. They're just not comfortable with some forms of writing.

In fact last year, I was playing with the idea of using the centre's resources to put out feelers to find out whether there there were any local writers interested in setting up a purely SF&F writing group, but then I was felled by illness, so I put it off until this year. However, since this year looks to be something of a repeat of last year, maybe I'll give it a shot in 2014. It'd be nice to have a band of like-minded people to just chat with at these get-togethers, and not feel that one has to constantly defend a whole genre.

I almost didn't go at all because, in between the obligatory Wednesday reading and napping sessions, I was writing up a wonderful storm here at home. My brain has gone into overdrive these past two weeks, possibly because of the recent, inspiring sales of unusual tales that I wasn't sure would ever see print, possibly because it's anticipating the fast-approaching hospital crap on my horizon and wants to get in as much work as it can before pain-killers kick in and switch off my creative synapses again. Whatever. Go for it, brain, I say, and by golly it's obliging me. So I almost finished a hopefully hilarious story today (it just needs a short linking scene, which shouldn't cause any real writerly angst) that stalled about six months ago when I couldn't for the life of me figure out an earnest but silly central quest for my two characters. Today the solution was as obvious as the keyboard beneath my fingers, and as easy as eating ice cream to write. Sometimes you just have to let stuff sit until it's ready to co-operate.

Getting Into The Spirit Of Things

This is turning out to be quite a week. I've just sold another SF story, namely The Stars Their Hesitation, which stars Spirit, as in the plucky, little Martian rover that could, and other assorted space probes, to Bards and Sages Quarterly.

 I've always felt a bit sad about the probes hurtling through space all alone, and the rovers switched off and left on their lonesome on the windswept plains of the Red Planet after doing such a sterling job for us, and, well, this story is partly my way of thanking them all for their efforts and making things right, and partly about other things...

It'll be out in October.

No, No, No, No, No! Say It Isn't So!

There will only be one more Iain Banks book ever:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2013/apr/03/iain-banks-cancer-statement-full

http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2013/apr/03/iain-banks-gall-bladder-cancer

 

I love my Iain M. Banks books, I do. And now there'll be no more Culture novels? Ever. This will take time to absorb.

 

And to lose the amazing man himself so soon, way too soon, is beyond sad.
 

I'm Baaaaaaack.

Okay, I probably could have posted this yesterday, but it still felt a bit tenuous then. However, after a bit of correspondence today, I now feel confident enough to announce that my SF pony story will appear in Andromeda Spaceways Inflight Magazine later this year.

So I finally did it! After countless (well, if you want the exact number...) hold requests for stories that then weren't picked up (as I've often lamented in posts), four and a bit years after my debut amongst its pages, I'll be making an encore appearance in ASIM.

Yay!

Ponies Rule!

Yay! It looks like my SF pony story has found a good, loving , wholesome home. I'm so glad. I like this story a lot, but suspected it might be a hard sell, what with there being ponies in it and its voice being a bit unusual, but it looks like the right editor has come along at the right time, and Bob's your uncle. So it goes in this game.

More details when it's all professionally acceptable to announce the buyer.

Yay!

Hooray for Easterwood!

So that's Easter over and done with - back to the Arvo Job tomorrow. In between running around (while I still can), writing (got much done today and yesterday, though I do keep painting myself into a corner with the dragon story. It's the prophecies, you see - they're a bugger to work with, especially if you're actually wanting to mess with the whole idea of prophecies) and reading Jeanette Winterson's The Daylight Gate, I caught up with a few movies I've been wanting to see for a while or just randomly picked because they looked like fun, watching them either here at home, or on Good Friday along with hot cross buns loaded with melting butter at my brother's home cinema in his Victorian-Viking-Steampunk (Vicvikpunk?) pile a few towns over.

The was The Master ( there are some people so damaged that not even cults can reel them in), Anonymous ( which I enjoyed, although if I were feeling sensitive about all the conspiracy theories surrounding poor Will S, I'd say some rather elitist people have a problem acknowledging that genius doesn't always have to spring from noble loins) and Robot and Frank (aaah, so bittersweet, and it had twists). Robot and Frank pushes all our we-desperately-want-to-love-our-automaton-pal buttons, and yet it does not cheat and make Robot anything but a robot.

In the foreign language department, there was the German post-apocalyptic (evil solar flares cruelly toast our poor planet) movie Hell (which means brightness in German, but very fittingly doubles as a place of eternal damnation in English.) This movie shows what you can do with hungry-looking actors, a burnt forest as a setting, filters on your camera lenses and just a handful of Euros. It's good but grim. Like with The Road, you wonder if you would have what it takes to bother slogging day after day through such misery and meanness. Finally, Luc Besson's The Extraordinary Adventures of Adele Blanc-Sec is a very Gallic and cartoonish 103 minutes of fun a la Raiders of the Lost Ark with a feisty, very French, Victorian-era heroine on a mission to save her sister no matter what it takes. There are cool, talking mummies, there's a pterodactyl, there's a guillotine scene - say no more.

It was a nice mix of movies. Aaah, holidays are good.