Wind Tunnel Dreams
Is an experiment in cyberfunded creativity; in 2008, it will occasionally be in the form of a short story in seven parts posted daily over the first week of the month, and occasionally be short-short stories based on your prompts. Several of you expressed an interest in doing art based on them; I'd love to see it, and will put it up on the site. :) (Add Wind Tunnel Dreams as an LJ interest, read the stories, and join windtunneldream!)

Shayara
Is an urban fantasy illuminated manuscript (as it's not 100% illustrated, I don't know that you can call it a webcomic). It is in process, and will resume posting when I have a decent backlog. Stay tuned! Look for a bunch of goodies scattered around the site as the story progresses. (Add Shayara as an LJ interest, read Shayara posts, and join shayara!)

Offline Writing
Places You Haunt is my Las Vegas Tam Lin - read the early version at placesyouhaunt!
Seizure Lass is a book about anti-seizure medications, a medical memoir.


Collaborations
Minicomic with charitylarrison - Fall/Winter 2008!
Story-and-jewelry collaborations with kythryne (Wyrding Studios) (this happened September 2008) and sihaya09!
Shayara jewelry with upstart_crow and azhure!
Shayara soundtrack with s00j and lrstrobel!

If you want to contribute art to any project, or have an idea for a collaboration, e-mail me at shadesong AT gmail.com!

Upcoming in Dead-Tree or Pixel Format
* "Wool and Silk and Wood" in Electric Velocipede #16 (World Fantasy issue), November 2008
* "The Angel of Fremont Street" in ChiZine, January 2009
* "Twelve" in Cabinet Des Fees, March 2009

Question for Bostonians:

Restaurant in Central Square, can seat 10-15 in a separate or separate-ish room. Ideas?

EDIT: Also, if you want to do dinner with me in Central Square tonight, ping me!

Medical
Cautiously optimistic. Yesterday was mostly sedentary, with a few nice walks at the end of it.

Post About Islam
Has had a thread frozen. This is the first time I've ever had to freeze a thread, I think. Note to readers: if the lies you're spouting read like Nazi propaganda if you replace "Islam" with "Judaism", maybe you have a problem.

Twilight
Elayna's heard so much on both sides about Twilight that she felt she had to read the book and decide for herself. So far, she declares that Edward has multiple personalities and Bella has no personality at all. I'll ask her for a fuller review when she's done. (We need to get our family review site up and running! I owe a couple of people reviews.)

Meeeep...
I have a maddeningly busy few days coming up. I may be out of the house *all day* today, from 9 to 9. Will have to haul my computer with me, so I can get stuff done between getting stuff done. Tomorrow's less crazy, with only one out-of-the-house thing, but tomorrow I have to pack. And Friday-Sunday, of course, is my trip.

Leavin' on a Jet Plane
Can anyone give me & Miss Kid a ride to the airport? Friday, 'round 11 AM?

Florida Friends!
The sole opening in my schedule is Friday evening.

Daily Science
Cracking the secrets of the atmosphere of Titan, Saturn’s mysterious moon, and how planetary atmospheres evolve, have come a step closer after evaluation of data from a successful fly-by of its surface by the Cassini spacecraft.

Researchers and engineers on the Cassini project, which includes teams from UCL Space and Climate Physics and UCL Mullard Space Science Laboratory (MSSL), were also given a glimpse of how Titan, which has no magnetic field of its own, holds onto remnants of Saturn’s magnetic field as it caught the big moon on one of its excursions outside Saturn's magnetosphere.

Daily BPAL
( Baby Lilith scents )

Plans
Graeme Base reading/signing at Porter Square Books, Interstitial Arts Foundation: Boston Chapter inaugural planning meeting, BARCC Survivor Speakers Bureau meeting. These are all spread out a few hours apart from each other, so I'll be wandering the city and finding places to sit and read or write between things. Also have to pick up my meds. Am not sanguine about the fact that I won't get to see my kid this afternoon, but it just doesn't make sense to train-and-bus back here to spend an hour or two and then bus back to Central Square. :(

So yes. Re-reading Bones of the Moon, hearing the first chapter of The Ghost in Love, and listening to Jonathan Carroll talk about writing -

- the man is a genius, by the way, and I cannot understand why they are not teaching his novels in writing courses and why so few people know him when you all read his fans and imitators voraciously, so go read him now, I'll wait -

- basically just blew parts of my mind wide open. And I came to some realizations about what I'm doing that doesn't work for me and how to fix it, and - I know how Places You Haunt ends.

I have known this entire second shot at it that it doesn't end the way it originally was meant to. Because I'm not the person that started this book. And I am writing it for different reasons. It is no longer my eulogy, my penance. My recent trip to Vegas threw all of that into sharp relief - I understand now. Who I was, what I wanted and needed. And I understand that I am not that girl anymore, because I have grown; I have become someone else, built on the bones of that girl.

And I am at peace with that city now. And I'm not torn by those knives of survivor's guilt anymore.

And I know how it ends now. I know what Sara does and why it works and what becomes of it, of the spirits, of Doodle and Kaylin and Sara herself.

So yeah. Oh hey. Epiphany. Hi.

Whee!

On a day I've been feeling kind of lonely (I'm XNFX, I swing from overcrowded to lonely, it's at least as annoying to me as it is to you)...

* Decants from bookandbroom/habiliments - the Baby Lilith circle celebrating the spawning of kebechet and puddin666.

* A matchbox by heart-sister artfulruin, the almost-twin of the one she donated to Blogathon - I get to keep this one! (Grey, I love it!)

* My sihaya09's-friend switch-witch giftie from bifemmefatale - soap and tea and a rollerball for BPAL and ginger candies and! lovely earrings by sihaya09 and a Stormwinds pendant by kythryne/Wyrding Studios! All beautifully packaged in a lovely paper box that's just the right size to hold my elaborate Wyrding Studios necklaces for travel.

So I feel so very hugged right now. :) My day has been touched by many wonderful people.

One of the huge talking points this wacky election season has been "Barack Obama is a Muslim!"/"No, he isn't!"

And he isn't; he's Christian. And making assumptions about someone's religion based on their name is daft.

But.

The people who accuse and the people who protest so much are treating Islam as A Bad Thing. Saying "Muslim" as if that equals "terrorist".

And yeah, we've had some Muslim extremists these past dozen years. Absolutely. But they are a minority. And tarring and feathering a whole religion based on the actions of its radical fringe -

Well, if you want to do that, come talk to me about the Holocaust. And the Crusades, for that matter.

Obama's not Muslim... not that there's anything wrong with that. And I know. I know. That y'all are not so stupid as to believe that all Muslims are terrorists. Or that being a Muslim is in any way bad, or that Muslims are worse people than the people of your chosen religion.

But every time you react with that indignance and outrage, that "how dare they call him that", it sends a message to people who maybe don't know any Muslims that being Muslim is a Bad Thing.

And it's just not.

Administration
Happy birthday to jenstclair!

Hello to new readers larichev and oberonia!

Medical
'k, I got through Saturday's Walk and Sunday's tabling, but yesterday's closet-cleaning and box-hauling tipped me over the brink. I spent a few hours so wiped out that my brain was basically not operational, just waiting for it to be late enough to go to bed. And I'm having a hard time kicking into gear today. Plus all of the dust we kicked up yesterday has left me coughing. :(

Daily Science
New images from NASA's Cassini spacecraft reveal a giant cyclone at Saturn's north pole, and show that a similarly monstrous cyclone churning at Saturn's south pole is powered by Earth-like storm patterns.

Plans
Going to a Jonathan Carroll reading tonight at the Harvard Bookstore. Besides that? Trying to wake myself up, seeing if I can tackle a few things on the To-Do List of D00m.

Reading's at 7, so I may stop by Diesel first. Any of you Boston folks want to come with?

....via jetshade, and this is all copy/pasted from her:


------------------
Businesses and organizations that YOU might support are spending tens of thousands of dollars in CA to ammend the state constitution and keep the California gay community from being able to marry - never mind that thousands of them are already married and all this will do is damage and destroy families. Read the list, don't support these people and SPREAD THE TRUTH

Here is the list of people spending money to take away our right to marry

http://www.californiansagainsthate.com/dishonorRoll.html

The group providing it is called Californians against Hate.

Mission Statement

As thousands of gay and lesbian couples marry throughout California, an extremely well-funded campaign has placed an initiative constitutional amendment on the November 4th ballot. Proposition 8 would define marriage as only between a man and a woman. Supporters of Proposition 8 spent millions to qualify this amendment, and have vowed to raise in excess of $20 million to remove marriage equality in California.

Much of the money to qualify this constitutional amendment came from San Diego County. We feel that if these individuals, businesses, and organizations so adamantly desire to take away our right to marry, then the LGBT community, our families and our friends should fight back against these purveyors of hate.

Therefore, we will wage a campaign to disseminate the truth about who funded the qualification of the initiative and who is funding the campaign itself. We propose to take action against the businesses of those who fund the effort to harm us. We will identify these individuals and companies on our web site: www.CaliforniansAgainstHate.com as soon as their names become available to us, and broadcast these names all over the United States utilizing old and new media. We will make sure that our millions of friends and allies throughout the country know the exact identity of those who have contributed vast sums of money to oppose our freedom to marry.

Californians Against Hate is organized as a California nonprofit public benefit corporation, exempt from taxation under section 501(c)(4) of the Internal Revenue Code. It is completely independent and not affiliated with Equality for All, which is the official campaign committee opposing Proposition 8 in November. Our funding will come from a few individuals who believe that the truth should be known about those funding the campaign of hate.

Finally watched Spider-Man 3...

It's not as awful as I'd been told. There are moments of stupid, yes. But you know what this would've worked as? A full season of a Spidey TV show. There are some great moments, and some great themes, and I see what Raimi was going for... but he did not have the time to make it work, and what would've been a great dozen episodes is a movie that feels too long, too full, and packed with jarring transitions.

So I will try to keep it in my mind as the season it should've been, and forgive it for not working as a movie. *nod*

Just spent hours going through the old comics. Pulled... I'm seeing five crates, and enough spillover to fill at least two more. These will hopefully give us monies or store credit at our comic shop. Either way, this has freed up a bunch of closet space for Adam. (I have to deal with the same 12 boxes in my closet. Foo.)

Now I go hit the muscle relaxants. Because comic boxes are heavy.

My loved ones like to poke at me for Doing Too Much. And they're right. I do tend to overload myself. But I've been figuring out which of my timesucks are energizing and rewarding (like BARCC) and which are crazymaking (like Arisia staff-person-ing), so I can cut the ones that leave me frustrated and exhausted.

I think I've been doing a mostly-decent job at recognizing what not to take on, though. Example: I have not joined the SCA, despite cajoling by SCAdian friends. Because I know that would be crazymaking. Other example: running BPAL decant circles. It would be a great way to be able to try everything. But. Crazymaking and majorly time-consuming.

And I'm actively engaged in trying to make existing timesucks a positive thing. I was very seriously considering giving Wind Tunnel Dreams up, because it was running me ragged - but I found a way to make it something creative and fun again (thanks, Kyth!).

It's all just a continuing process of figuring stuff out. And I'm steadily making progress. *nod*

Yes, this is early to think about it, but people are buying plane tickets, so! Early shot across the bow!

Airport
We are picking people up at the airport on Sunday 11/23 and Wednesday 11/26 (evening); we are dropping people off on 12/1. If you're planning on flying in and can coordinate with this schedule, that makes things easier and awesomer.

Crashspace
Claimed: Couch (Gwyn) and loveseat (rafaela). There is ample room for airbeds (and we have one queen and two twins); further crashspace is claimed by slipjig, lbitw, and harkalark. If you will require crashspace, please let me know. Also, let me know if you have an airbed to loan; I always worry that we'll come up short.

Allergies/Sensitivities
Please let us know if you have any. We have EpiPens handy, but would rather not have to use them.

Food
If you are bringing food, please post a post-it note on it telling us how long it needs to be in the oven and at what temperature. Part of last year's agita was unlabeled stuff not getting cooked because we didn't know it was there, and people ducking into the kitchen to try to put their food into the already-full oven. This year, we'll have a staging area. We want to fit your food into our schedule, but we *do* have a schedule. Help us make this run smoothly!

Kitchen Access
During the last few hectic hours of cooking, you will not be allowed into the kitchen if your name is not Adam or 'song. No one got stabbed last year, accidentally or otherwise. We want to keep it that way. (Related: If you have "caution" tape to loan, that would be awesome.)

Tradition
We watch The Princess Bride. Please do not kvetch that we are watching a movie. It is Tradition.

Cats
There are three. Please medicate accordingly. I'm amenable to running the Roomba and keeping the cats upstairs during the festivities, but the house really can't be made 100% allergen-free.

How You Can Help
I love doing the cooking. I hate doing the cleaning. And past experience has shown that I have special difficulty with the dishes - my tendonitis tends to flare thanks to a day of peeling and chopping, and I just cannot lift the pots and pans without pain by the end of the day. So that's one way you can help.

Phew. Yes. Hi.

jimhines says:"If the bidding breaks $100, I'll start to throw in some extra prizes to the winner. How many prizes depends on just how high that closing price goes. I've never done this before, so I have no idea what to expect. Scalzi raised over $2000 with a similar auction ... but then, he's John Scalzi. I figure any donation to NCADV is a good one.

And on that note, if you don't want to bid but still feel like donating, the NCADV donations page is at http://www.ncadv.org/donate.php."

Medical
I did some physically-demanding things this weekend, but I watched myself like a hawk and applied appropriate levels of painkillers, muscle relaxants, and sleep. So I'm doing pretty okay today. Except for allergies that are hitting *one eye* and my nose.

Street Fairs and Shopping
I still love street fairs, but I don't hit the shopping tables anymore. This is less a function of not having the money, and more a function of thinking "Kyth could do that better. And that? sihaya09 could do that better. And I'm not going to buy scarves when I can just get them from my knitter friends." Because a) my crafty friends genuinely do do awesome work, and b) many of them take barter. Note to crafty friends launching websites: I do proofreading/editing for store credit!

Argh-y Monday
Argh-y because the whole family's home, and I wanted to write today; instead, my day will be spent hounding the child to do her homework and practice her flute. And I'm flying to Florida Friday, so this means I only have three working days this week.

Happy Monday
Happy because I do love my family, and also because we'll get to do our Halloween decorations when kid finishes what she needs to do.

Shirts I Want
* Snorg Tees
* Busted Tees
* Jinx Tees

Link Soup
* "Thoughts on the Firefly Seventh-Season Premiere".
* I want this library.
* Also, I want these bedrooms.
* Strange knitty things.

Daily Science
Desai has spent the past year and a half developing a robot that can perform biopsies and destroy tumor cells all in one session, making the diagnosis and treatment of breast cancer less time-consuming and more accurate than ever before.

Plans
lynxreign and emilytheslayer are coming by later to deliver some bookshelves. Other than that, we have an unstructured day; we should clean the hall closet so we can get to the Halloween decorations and stash the window A/C units, and I should get caught up on e-mailish tasks as well. And maybe I can write Large Fandom Collider and New Gods with people around - who knows?

* The walk today went very well, financially and physically. I managed just fine as long as I kept moving; body revolted as soon as I stood still, though, and I napped for several hours. Glad I did it, though.

* Come to Harvard Square Oktoberfest tomorrow! I'll be tabling for BARCC from 2:30-5, and I'd love to see some friendly faces. :)

We're watching Wargames with Elayna.

And explaining things like dialup modems, primitive hacking, computer discs, dot-matrix printers...

This is where the generation gap is, right here. Explaining early-'80s computing to a kid with an iPod and a laptop.

Someday, felisdemens and I are going to start a line of T-shirts advertising the businesses we come up with.

You will want them. Oh, yes.

(I remind you for Rancho Chocha and Pet Spoilers.)

Now bed, for I must get up early for the Out of the Darkness Walk!

Iiii have been vetting program items for Arisia all. day.

While David and I watched a movie, too, as I don't require much mental energy to proofread and toggle things. But still.This never ends. *falls over*

Administration
Hello to new reader dakabn!

Medical
Still achy from yesterday's burst of activity. Still headachey from Wednesday.

Out of the Darkness Walk to benefit the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention
Pasting from earlier this week: Okay, you know that you can win fabulous prizes for sponsoring me or any other member of Team Monkey Hugs.

But also! You'll get my Large Fandom Collider storybit and my alternate take on New Gods from September's Wind Tunnel Dreams. And! You'll also get these for spreading the word about the walk. Just post about the walk and send me the link, and you'll get the storybits. (You won't get entered in the raffle at Emily's journal; that's for sponsors only. But. Storybits. *nod*)

WTD Wind-down
I always have a bit of a comedown when I stop doing WTD for the month. Not dipping my toes into new worlds every day. *sigh*

Shayara Musing
Elayna's addiction to Cirque du Soleil DVDs (no,we've never seen them live, alas) has me thinking about the arts in Shayara. We've established that there's a symphony orchestra. It follows that there'd be a city ballet. And circus-type performers... we have a Carnival District, after all! And the acrobats would have the memory of dozens or hundreds of lives of honed skills... what do you get from a dancer who's been dancing in life after life for centuries?

Daily Science
The first ecosystem ever found having only a single biological species has been discovered 2.8 kilometers (1.74 miles) beneath the surface of the earth in the Mponeng gold mine near Johannesburg, South Africa. There the rod-shaped bacterium Desulforudis audaxviator exists in complete isolation, total darkness, a lack of oxygen, and 60-degree-Celsius heat (140 degrees Fahrenheit).

Daily BPAL
( John Barleycorn & The Hessian of the Hollow )

Friday Memage!
Wearing: White nightie with purple flowers. Boring! :)

Reading: The Creative Habit by Twyla Tharp (hoping to kick-start a habit for myself!); Charles Fort: The Man who Invented the Supernatural by Jim Steinmeyer.

Writing: Hopefully I can get into the proper headspace for Ondine today. The problem with Ondine and with the Telenias's story is that they both have very distinct Voices that I don't slip into naturally. Ondine is easier, especially the way I'm bending it. The Telenias just has an alien thought process, but he does have internal logic (and how!).

Planning:
Today: David arrives in late morning. Afternoon/evening plans with felisdemens and feste_sylvain are possible.
Tomorrow: Out of the Darkness Walk!
Sunday: I'm manning BARCC's table at Harvard Square's Oktoberfest from 2:30-5 - but the 'fest sounds like loads of fun, so I'll likely show up early and wander around. You should come!
Monday: No active plans of yet, but Adam & Elayna are off for Columbus Day, so any offers of plans ought to keep that (and them!) in mind. Anyone up for apple-picking, or the gathering of any other sort of fruit or vegetables? Pumpkins? Something?

You?