For the month:
Finished: Novella. It's true what they say, PLOTTING IS GOOD! Should do that more in 2009.

Do: Make some effort to holiday-ize the house. We did! We put up our minitree and dug out our Meowy Christmas Cats Caroling wreath, since clearly we have no shame or embarrassment left.

Plan: Gift purchases for THIS year. Sent out. At least some. Better a few than none!

And since this worked better than I thought it would, for the coming year:

Do: Two shorts and two novels. At least plotting. I could get to like this novella business, too. But it all requires more plotting than I'm used to. Guess I'll get used to it.

Straighten: Office. Seriously, when you have to pick your way throughthe space to get to the computer, it's time to clean and eradicate and straighten. And speaking of computer...

Replace: Computer. Sadly, my 1998 iMac is no longer up to thechallenge of modern-day requirements. It's been a good one, though. Time to do research. Technology has never been something I see eye-to-eye with, so this will be particularly challenging.

Launch: New website. It's up, but not quite done -- a few tweaks needed that my webhost, Bill Hibler, is addressing. The Hub and I have known Bill and his wife for many years, so I have full confidence that I'll be asking many stupid questions. It's that tech thing again. Check out http://www.eilisflynn.com/, and get a glimpse of what's coming in the new year. If nothing else, I have all those eNotes articles I want to put up there. At last count it was something like 60.

Happy new year!
Eilis Flynn
http://www.eilisflynn.com/, eilisflynn.livejournal.com, eilisflynn.blogspot.com
ECHOES OF PASSION, coming in 2009

Congrats to Rowena

Nice surprise!

A few days ago, I got email from Mark I. West, famed children's literature professor and editor of a number of volumes on the same, saying that Japanification of Children's Popular Culture had been published from Scarecrow Publishing. This pleased me because about four years ago, when he pitched the idea to his editor at Scarecrow (originally conceived as a tribute to the 50th anniversary of Godzilla), he asked me to write an essay on the topic (I don't have a copy yet, so I don't know exactly how many contributors Mark ended up with).

After some thought, I came up with "Two Worlds, United by Anime," about the anime and manga I read and watched when I was a kid growing up in Japan, and then about the anime I watched when we came back to the States. Then the way these things go, I sent it in and promptly forgot about it. I was happy to read that it had finally been published, and now I can't wait to see how it turned out. Take a look!

Happy Holiday

Solstice greetings

I work with someone whose birthday is on the Solstice, so let me say firstly: Happy birthday, Karen! I remind her that without her birthday being celebrated we can't have longer days.

Snow is appropriate for this time of year, no matter how much I complain. So far we have something like eight or nine inches, and since this is Seattle, that's messy business being near or on a hill. No newspaper -- not a surprise, considering the awkward series of steps necessary to deliver one; if there's a problem anywhere, either from the printers to the distributors to the dealers to the delivery guys, there is no paper on our doorstep. There's a good reason why newspapers are endangered.

But there's enough to look at. Everytime we look outside, there's another flurry of snowflakes. Once in a while there are folks braving the elements, either on foot or in a vehicle, chained and moving slowly (well, chained if they're in a vehicle, but everyone's moving slowly). None of them look happy. And I surely don't blame them for that. We're not used to icy cold temps and snow around here. I've run into more than a couple of locals who're from Southern California, who moved here because they thought this was a mild climate. They shiver a lot. The sensible ones don't drive. But since the buses don't move most of the time in this weather, they end up waiting and shivering a LOT, poor people.

But how often do we get a white Christmas around here? Not often. And I'd like to keep it that way!

Thunder and snow

That's a combination I haven't run into before, or at least if I have, I don't remember. We had thunder and snow occur a few hours ago. I woke up at 3:30 am -- Fido was persistent in wanting food, and even though I didn't give him any (I mean, isn't 5 am early enough for him to have breakfast?? Really??), went down to check my email when I couldn't get to sleep, and soon enough I heard a sound I assumed was a very large truck going down the street. Nope. Thunder and snow. And it's been snowing since.  

If I wasn't on deadline at The DayJob, I wouldn't think twice about not going in. But deadline's next Monday ... I have articles to look over and figure out how to fill a few empty pages ... and I probably should go in later. But once it's light out, and maybe once the snow stops. If the buses come; it's only three miles, but it can be a messy three miles to walk (I've done it in snow and in rain. It can be wet and cold and slippery, as you can imagine).  

This is the kind of day to stay at home and read. If you have that option!

Eilis Flynn

ECHOES OF PASSION, coming next year

People are outside playing in the snow

Weirdoes. *shiver*

They should be inside reading!

Eilis Flynn

INTRODUCING SONIKA, on sale now

Porta-Potties to the left of me, Porta-Potties to the right of me

Why Porta-Potties? Well, you see, the city is doing its maintenance thing in my neighborhood, and so far, the workers have taken over all available parking, cut off water once when they cut into the wrong pipe (they're working on updating the gas lines), broken a hydrant so I came home to gushing water running down the street, covered their holes with large, awkward steel plates, and covered everything with a fine grit, which since this is Seattle has combined with the rain that comes with this season, making everything, well, icky.

It's the Potties that make me crazy, though. There are two of them on my block. They're not even color-coordinated, since one is this institutional green and the other is this flat, faded peach. Not just one. TWO. We are truly blessed. I know this is all temporary, and the Porta-Potties and the spare pipes tossed around and abandoned and the other things just dumped in places randomly will be gone before I can complain too much longer (can you sense the hope in my words? Yeah, I couldn't either). 

But in the meantime, in this season of happiness and joy, I'm tempted to decorate the Potties with some Christmas decorations, just to perk them up a little. 

Eilis Flynn

ECHOES OF PASSION, on sale next year