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Below are the 8 most recent journal entries recorded in
throw another bear in the canoe's InsaneJournal:
| Wednesday, January 18th, 2017 | |
| 5:28 pm | Oh, yeahhhhhhh. Cover reveal for The Stone in the Skull up at Tor.com! Fantastic art by Richard Anderson!  Book drops 10/10/2017. I'm actually working on the copy edits right now. |
| Tuesday, January 17th, 2017 | |
| 9:53 am | how i learned to stop worrying and ignore the internet. You there. New writer. Freshly-published debut author. Get off tumblr, stop worrying about what people think, and go write your next book. Okay look, I'm not saying that one should not consider thoughtful criticism of one's work, or that one should isolate one's self from the community. I'm not saying that criticism has no value. I'm not saying be an inconsiderate asshole. Don't be an inconsiderate asshole. Or try not to: we all fail that one sometimes, too. And not just to our mothers. I'm saying that there are people out there who want to make you write their book for them, and that's impossible, because nobody can write their book except for them. So when they start reading as if they are measuring every single book against the perfect book in their head, well--they will never find it. Because as all writers know, the only way to get that book--the book that speaks with your own voice--is to write it. And then fail, because every book is a failure in some way, even if only its author knows it. They're never quite perfect, our creations, because writing is too hard to do well. Fail better next time. Let those other people write their own books. If you haven't written a book yet, but nobody else is writing the books that say what you want said, well, you have exactly one option. And it's the same place every single published author started out, at one time or another. There are no shortcuts. Use your voice. So stop kicking yourself. Stop catering to someone else's ideal, and set your own. It'll probably still be unattainable, but it will be yours. Stop trying to speak with somebody else's voice because that somebody told you your own voice was inadequate or uncommercial or wrong. Stop telling yourself that your work is garbage. Stop telling yourself that nobody else wants to hear what you have to say. Accept that there are people who will hear you wrong, and that that's not your problem, and you get to have boundaries as an artist. You get to have boundaries, even as an artist on the internet. You have a voice. One voice. It's your voice. Your voice is important. Use it. |
| Monday, January 16th, 2017 | |
| 12:21 pm | the boys want to be her Kitten weigh in! Molly: 7.5 pounds Duncan: 8.7 pounds Gurney: 8 pounds even |
| Friday, January 13th, 2017 | |
| 9:44 am | no matter how far you roam, i will always love you. INT: BEDROOM: 7:40 am Monkey: Mrrph? The Smart One: *patter patter patter DWOP!* Monkey: Oh, hi, Mousie. The Smart One: *runs down monkey's spine* The Smart One: *patter patter patter rattle rattle thump rattle thump slide rattle patter thump* The Smart One: *patter patter patter DWOP!* Monkey: Oh, hi, Mousie. The Smart One: *runs down monkey's spine* The Smart One: *patter patter patter rattle rattle thump rattle thump slide rattle patter thump* The Smart One: *patter patter patter DWOP!* Monkey: Oh, hi, Mousie. The Smart One: *runs down monkey's spine* The Smart One: *patter patter patter rattle rattle thump rattle thump slide rattle patter THUMP.* The Smart One: ... Monkey: ... The Smart One: ... Monkey: ... Action Dork Cat: CUDDLES TIME! Monkey: *cuddles* The Smart One: Cuddles? Action Dork Cat: MOAR CUDDLES TIME! Monkey: *cuddles* The Smart One: This is no good. The Smart One: *jumps to shelf by bed* Action Dork Cat: MOAR CUDDLES TIME!!!!!!!!!!11!1eleventy! The Smart One: *pushes pill bottles around* Monkey: Cat. The Smart One: *pushes pill bottles off shelf* Monkey: You little shit. Monkey: *evicts cat* Monkey: *Well, I guess I'm up anyway." Monkey: *Fetches a flashlight and a stick, and retrieves Mousie from where she has been lost THIS time.* The Smart One: MOUSIE! *scamper patter rattlepounce* SEMI-FERAL NINJA PRINCESS QUEEN EXILED FROM BEYOND THE MIRROR DIMENSION: You guys are weird. *** Mousie has been returned to her family and is resting comfortably:  SEMI-FERAL NINJA PRINCESS QUEEN EXILED FROM BEYOND THE MIRROR DIMENSION is still trying to figure out how to get home:  Cuddles time:  |
| Thursday, January 12th, 2017 | |
| 11:12 am | my girlfriend's cat is smarter than me  (reposted from Patreon) ON ANXIETY Above, a photo of three adolescent kittens. Please ignore the background clutter: it's an actual picture of my actual bedroom 30 seconds ago, unretouched except for a little color correction, complete with the clean sheets I didn't manage to get on the bed yesterday. The goofy tuxedo cleaning his toes is Duncan; the elegant blue blending into my robe is Gurney. They're littermates. I want to talk about the vigilant little tortoiseshell on the footboard. Her name is Molly, and she's a little over a month older than the boys, but two pounds smaller. She came home with them because when she came into rescue, she was housed with them as a near-agemate, and the three of them have bonded like true sibs; there is washing, and chasing, and spatting. The difference is, while the boys somehow wound up in a shelter and from there eventually a rescue, they obviously had good mothering and good human socialization. They know how to play without using their claws; they have a number of vocalizations that they use liberally with humans; their favorite game is fetch. Molly is a semi-feral who was netted on a street in New Jersey and got very, very lucky to find her way into the same crate with her foster brothers and eventually on to my nice warm bed--rather than being euthanized. She's almost always vigilant; her head is on a swivel, and even when she's napping she almost never completely relaxes. She's difficult to approach and will only sometimes tolerate human contact, and she needs to be in control of the interaction. In human terms, she's anxious and on the defensive all the time. Some of this is genetic, of course; she's pretty obviously got at least one feral parent, and she'll never be the sack of comfortable snores her brothers can be. Some of it is the kitty equivalent of PTSD. She's been traumatized, and she knows that everything can vanish under her in seconds, and she might have no control about where she lands. The boys are rambunctious, bold, and while they're both very athletic, one of them--Duncan--has a real tendency toward getting himself into scrapes he needs to be rescued from. He doesn't follow the rules of parkour very well, and he doesn't always know how to get out of what he's gotten himself into. (Gurney generally has a plan. Duncan is like KOWABUNGA IT'LL WORK OUT SOMEHOW.) Molly always has a plan. Molly has three plans. In addition to her plans, Molly has two escape routes, and she's prepared to fight for her life if they don't work out. The boys crash and bang and stampede all over the house. Molly moves on little ghost feet, in doorways and around the edges of rooms. Molly acts like she works in the publishing industry. Specifically, she acts like a writer (or any artist, probably) who's forced to confront the realities of making a living in a field with wildly inconsistent rewards and quite a few punishments, and doing it through the means of stripping out all her fears and vulnerabilities and waving them around for people to be entertained by (or not) and to judge (and quite possibly publicly disdain.) I know so many anxious writers. Hell, I'm an anxious writer. Coming back from a really messy, crippling bout with it right now, actually, and currently have the upper hand, but let's not talk about the latter half of 2015, and almost all of last year. I have so many brilliant friends who are anxious about what they are writing about, or the quality of what they are writing, or showing their writing to other people, or whether the internet will fall on their heads no matter what they do, or even being able to write at all... and it pisses me off, this anxiety (and my anxiety, which manifests in I HAVE NOTHING USEFUL TO SAY AND I AM SAYING IT POORLY SO WHY BOTHER) because it robs the world--and selfish me--of so much good art I could be enjoying otherwise. I wish I could take all of their anxiety and roll it up in a ball and ship it to those guys who spend a lot of time stomping around the internet fussing about how the world doesn't understand their genius and plotting ways to game award processes. Except I know that that's anxiety, too. It's a way some people deal with it--by seeking validation any way they can, and blustering if their self-image isn't constantly reinforced. Just a some people deal with it by internalizing and eating themselves away, or being paralyzed into being unable to write or unable to submit, or withdrawing, or--my favorite, and the most subtle of all!--pulling themselves back from their art, no longer being honest and making themselves vulnerable through it, and creating something more facile than true. What's the answer? I don't know. I suspect everybody has to find their own solution, because everybody's anxiety manifests in a different way. I've dealt with it recently by getting angry and sad enough that I feel like I have something to say that's worth saying, and reminding myself that it's better said poorly than not said at all. I've dealt with it by (with the help of my spouse [hello, spouse!]) making space to work early in the day, when I am relaxed and not yet feeling the press of worries and duties of the day. I've dealt with it by bulling through, but that doesn't work in the long run. I've dealt with it through medication, which does, sort of, but you still have to use the respite to get to the underlying issues. I've dealt with it by figuring out what I was afraid of, and remembering that--like Molly (remember Molly? This is a post about Molly)--I have lived through worse. Also, you know, this is my job. And I love it. And I'm doing it to the best of my ability, which is pretty damned well, actually, because I am good at my job. And I am entitled to my voice, and to the space to speak out with that voice. My falling silent will not, in fact, in any way improve the commons or its diversity. It will rather diminish that. People don't have to choose to listen to me, but they have no right to tell me not to speak. And if people are unhappy with my books, they can write their own damn books. I'm sure as hell not stopping them. They shouldn't let their anxieties stop them, either. Molly doesn't need anybody. She, unlike her brothers, can take care of most things herself. But here's the thing: they're noisy little guys. They talk to me, their toys, birbs, bugs on the ceiling, each other. I've only heard Molly vocalize (other than a defensive hiss) on two types of occasions, and until this morning, it was only one. If she is somewhere else in the house and doesn't know where her brothers and Scott and I are, she will pause in her explorations sometimes and emit a perfect little "Meow?" or two until somebody says--in cat or human--"Molly, we're over here." And this morning, she was sleeping on my feet, and was startled awake by a boy-noise in the hall. She sat bolt upright like a little meercat, front legs dangling, the better to survey the situation. And while she was sitting there on my feet, she emitted a little, muttering growl, as if to say, "This is my spot, and I will fuck you up if you come for me here." Molly may be anxious, but she also has something to say, and she apparently has a platform to say it from. If a six pound semiferal kitten with PTSD can manage it, so can we. |
| Wednesday, January 11th, 2017 | |
| 2:40 pm | Dear Senator Warren and Senator Markey; Here is the text of the emails I just sent to my U.S. Senators, Elizabeth Warren and Ed Markey, I grant the right under Creative Commons for anyone who wishes to repurpose this text for their own use when contacting their elected representative. *** Dear Senator Warren, In light of recent allegations and ongoing concern about foreign meddling in the U.S. Electoral process, and in light of concerns that President-Elect Trump may, in effect, be influenced by a foreign power--and in light of ongoing problems with the incoming administration regarding Hatch and anti-nepotism law violations--I strongly support your efforts to use every legal means to vet such appointees of the incoming administration as are subject to Senate confirmation, and oppose those who are unfit for duty. You're a fighter, Betsy, and you're our voice. Please speak loud and clear. Best, *** Dear Senator Markey, In light of recent allegations and ongoing concern about foreign meddling in the U.S. Electoral process, and in light of concerns that President-Elect Trump may, in effect, be influenced by a foreign power--and in light of ongoing problems with the incoming administration regarding Hatch and anti-nepotism law violations--I strongly support your efforts to use every legal means to vet such appointees of the incoming administration as are subject to Senate confirmation, and oppose those who are unfit for duty. We believe in you, Ed. You have our voice. Be loud with it. Best, |
| 10:09 am | see the city's backside INT: BEDROOM: 8:00 AM |
| Tuesday, January 10th, 2017 | |
| 8:36 am | brown paper packages tied up with strings Let's talk about cats, baby. So  scott_lynch and I have adopted three kittens: Molly, Duncan, and Gurney, variously known as The Swarm, the Breakfast Mafia, and Mayken, Inc. They've been with us for a little over a month now, and they're pretty great, frankly. They have a twitter feed at @kjittens if that's your sort of thing.Duncan and Gurney are littermates, about six months now. They're cuddly purrbeasts who like to supervise everything. Duncan is black with some messy white splashes that make him look like he's been in his tuxedo on a long night out drinking with Cole Porter as played by Kevin Kline. He's a tidy little beast with an anime nose. Gurney is rangier and seems to be a solid gray until the light hits him and you realize that he's actually a broken-stripe mackerel tabby whose markings are in two almost similar shades of gray, except one is more silvery and one is more matte. Molly is a stocky dilute tortie, and a semiferal. She's about a month older than the boys--seven months now--and we're working very hard to warm her up to humans. Slowly, slowly: she will occasionally allow petting now. If you are lying down under a blanket and don't make eye contact. Or if she's busy eating and you scrunch down and make yourself small. This is a major victory, because she's basically a slightly less angry version of Shadow Unit's Angry Kitteh come to life. She's more of a Skittery Kitteh. She came into rescue after being netted on a street in New Jersey, and somehow was lucky enough to make it from a city animal control shelter there to the cat rescue in Connecticut that we contacted when looking for kittens. They housed her with the two boys, and the three bonded firmly enough that it would have been kind of monstrous to break them up. So we have three cats. The GRD is still not, and never will be, catsafe, so we have a divided house again. Containment protocols! Fortunately, it's an old house with a lot of doors. So many doors.               |