It's been forever...


 


I haven't posted much of anything for a long, long time. Sorry about that, life is in... flux, I guess. We're all fine - in fact, I'm going to be in Chicago next Monday/Tuesday (Sept 24/25) at Twilight Tales and assorted other related events. The following Tuesday/Wednesday the three of us will be in the Iowa City area (in a little town called Mount Vernon, actually) to do another college visit thing, this time for TWO DAYS. This is the school that The Kid REALLY wants to attend so it's a huge big deal. She's getting interviewed, we're meeting with staff, financial aid, and the registration folks... We're hoping that her grade slump while the kidlets were here won't ruin her chances. We probably won't know anything for certain till January or February, but the 2-day visit is apparently a major step in the process.

I'm home the following weekend, then I'm out of town again for a quilt retreat thing, then home a weekend, then off again to World Fantasy. For someone who hates traveling, I sure do a lot of it in the autumn. After World Fantasy, I am HOME. There's nothing on the schedule at all. Ever.

Which is of course subject to change without notice.

So, anyway, we're all fine. Uncle Rick's moved back in, and that's helping us recover from KidFest '07. Slowly. I spent most of this afternoon at Child Support Recovery getting it turned off - which I tried to do back in early August. But, apparently, they sent me some form that I never got - or I returned said form which they lost - and it needed to be notarized (or so they said) to cancel the Child Support that we never got. What an insane fiasco. Took about two hours to untangle the mess and the only thing they had me do - other than explain over and over and OVER that I'm the aunt and no, none of the kids are mine, and no I don't have them anymore - was to fill out a form with my name and address, list the kidlets' names and check that they were now with their mother.

And for this I drove clear across the county and sat around for two hours. Didn't even need the notary that they'd insisted was required and for the life of me I can't see why my numerous telephone yellingconversations wouldn't suffice. It just really peeved me that I had to get a whole stack of forms notarized to cancel something I never got, then they mail me saying I needed MORE forms filed and notarized.

Nothing changed, nothing. All the hard work, frustration, and aggravation was for nothing. The child welfare system here is extremely messed up and I hope that I never have to endure the constant vat of BS again.

Deep breath.

I've started sewing again, a little anyway (Amy will be pleased to read that, I'm sure) and I've re-joined the quilt guild I was in years and years ago. So far so good there. They, too, have a block of the month, but it's a block lottery. Each quilter with a block puts their name in a hat and name drawn gets all the blocks. Maybe I'll win someday.

Mostly, we're struggling to get back on track after the kidlets trashed our finances. We've 'gone frugal' and so far so good there. Just need to work at paying off some credit cards - three small children are expensive, especially when they came into our lives with nothing at all - and the scrimping, saving, and trying to get resources to stretch is taking a lot of my attention lately.

In other completely unrelated news, I'm finally, for the first time in memory, SLEEPING at night. It's made a huge difference to my mood and overall outlook. It's amazing.

I am not writing, and that's okay. I have too much crap on my plate as it is right now without having to worry about words and deadlines too. I do feel bad, though, that Friday Snippets have stopped, because they were pretty fun.

But I have an idea. Maybe.

Way back when, while my agent was shopping Ghosts, I wrote a book. It was called The Stone Spies and it started immediately after Ghosts in the Snow ended. The original version of Ghosts, before cutting it in half into two books, then removing the back 3/4 of the first book and all the second... Before. Please remember, it was all 'Before'. I wrote it in the winter/spring of 2003, and a lot of it was made completely defunct by major changes to Ghosts (let alone events in Threads and Valley). But it's here, on my hard drive, and I'm considering putting it up for free, maybe as snippets, maybe as a self contained PDF.

If anyone would be interested in seeing The Stone Spies, in whatever form, please let me know. Just remember that it was written before editorial changes to Ghosts necessitated a completely different direction for the Dubric Books. Some things remain the same - the main characters, for example - but other things are completely different - like the magic, the mirror, and assorted events. Some bits have been salvaged and sprinkled into Threads and Valley. But I still think it's a fun little book all its own.

Anyway, let me know.

Posted: Monday - September 17, 2007 at 06:43 PM         |

©