Tomorrow is the big day when our nest empties. (The link, by the way, leads to a parody of what life is like as empty nesters from “The Toque,” a Canadian eZine.) Our only daughter goes off to university. This past few weeks has been a tumult of organization, preparation and upheaval. I’ll be glad when the process is over. Not sure about anything else, but the process is wearing me out!
I had dinner last night with Ronnie and Julia Sevin, editors of the Corpse Blossoms anthology. They were displaced from New Orleans and are staying in the Houston area for the time being. They’re young, and this is a crushing blow, but they are very upbeat, optimistic and determined not to let Katrina get them down. If you want to help them out, you can either make a donation via their site or buy a copy of the anthology, which is still proceeding, maybe on schedule, maybe a little delayed. Though the book is available from other online stores, if you pre-order directly from them, they get more of the money, which they may sorely need in the coming months. The anthology has one of my stories in it, as well as tales by Kealan Patrick Burke, Ramsey Campbell, Tom Piccirilli, Scott Nicholson and an up-and-comer named Bentley Little who shows promise.
A story fragment occurred to me last night and haunted me all night long, so I got up and wrote the first 1300 words pretty much exactly as I’d dreamt them. I have no idea what the story is going to be about or if it’s actually going to get finished, but I found myself compelled to write the images down, and now I’ll take a while to think about what it’s all about to see if there’s a story there. Its working title is “The Big Stall.”
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