Two Little Christmas gifts yesterday. Finally got the beast off the ground, the one that has had me entirely brain-dead and bottom-sore. It's that point where Sisyphus is watching it roll away, but this time, it's rolling down the OTHER side of the mountain, for better or worse. There's a lot to do with it, but at least the lot can be done, while up to now it's been shambling towards [REDACTED], inchoate and unplanned as a.... let's not finish that sentence.

So I'm alive again. Good to see you all.

The other gift was a sale to Andromeda Spaceways Inflight Magazine, currently scheduled for April 13. I've been trying to crack that market for over a year, now, and I finally hit on the right combination of humour and wonder. I'm really glad, because it's a print magazine, which is essential to the story. It's a Monster at the End of this Book (yes, with your furry pal grover) kind of schtick, and I'd been hoping to write something like it when I grew up. Who knew it would take thirtysomething years to get off my ass and do it?

But it's been a very hard Christmas. We didn't expect to have been this badly delayed on stone-rolling. The wee beast, (aka Ms. Keller) is really having a hard time, and we've had to stop what we're doing every hour or so to get her up, take her out and/or give her a bath if she didn't make it outside fast enough. I'm developing "dog elbow". Take that Mr. Borg (Bjorn Borg, not 7of9).

We've also come from visiting a dear friend of the family who is in the last stages of terminal pancreatic cancer. That one's hard to talk about, so I won't.

So like all Christmases, much family, a little sweet & a little bitter.

And there's much catch-up to do, including reading asakiyume's new story, The October Witch. Yay!