Caitlín R. Kiernan (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
greygirlbeast) wrote2010-10-10 01:03 pm
greygirlbeast) wrote2010-10-10 01:03 pm
"Cartoon messiahs became cartoon destroyers..."
And today is 10/10/10. Read into or out of that what you will. Having little, if any, use for numerology, I make nothing whatsoever of it, except that it is a calendric curiosity and inevitability. Like 9/9/09, or 8/8/08, and so forth. I wonder who thinks the sky is falling today?
---
Yesterday I finished the introduction for Two Worlds and In Between. Well, at least I hope that I finished it. I don't like writing these sorts of things. Anyway, it comes in at 1,541 words. I take George Orwell to task over that silly and too often parroted comment, "Good prose is like a windowpane.” But, also, I think writing instructors often fail to present the quotation in the context of the essay it has been taken from ("Why I Write," June 1946, originally published in the final issue of Gangrel, Summer 1946). Above all else, Orwell was a propagandist, which is not a bad thing. He had messages that needed speaking. And he needed them spoken very clearly (though, he was still awfully fond of metaphor, hence Animal Farm). But to think this applies to all prose, it was arrogant and short sighted of Orwell to think this, and idiotic for writers today to follow this edict.
I also cleaned up the keynote speech I gave at the HPLFF, because S.T. Joshi has asked to publish it (I can't remember where).
And that was work yesterday. I sat here and wrote and edited while Spooky went to South County to see her parents and her brother.
Oh, and thanks to Cat Conley (![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
catconley, "The Awkward Marmoset") for sending me a copy of Greer's Moonwise. It was a pleasant surprise.
Last night there was far too much CoX.stsisyphus showed up, and may even have joined out weird little group of vampires and supernatural ne'erdowells.
---
Please have a look at the current eBay auctions, which include the "napovel," written in the Minneapolis/St. Paul airport during our captivity there. All bids are much appreciated. We not only have to pay the taxes this month, we also have to consider the fact that both my iPod and cellphone were fried during the trip to Portland.
It's something of a mystery, and I know fuck-all about electronics. Neither will hold a charge now, and the iPod actually appears to have been wiped clean. I suspect my shoulder bag, at some point, came into contact with a strong magnetic field. I just don't know when it might have happened, or where. But as I rely heavily on both for writing, they will have to be replaced or repaired very soon. It may be the lithium-ion batteries only need to be replaced. I just don't know (and if you know anything about these sorts of conundrums, please say so).
---
I've been getting some good feedback on "John Four," which felt like a sort of story I haven't written before. So I was very nervous about it.
---
Somehow I forgot Sonya's (sovay) birthday. So, happy belated birthday, Sonya.
And now, more photos from Portland. I was amazed at the lushness of the neighborhood where we were lodging. Everything was green. I think of Rhode Island as being lush, but it can't compare to what I saw of Portland. So, here are some glimpses of the lushness and greenery:
All photographs Copyright © 2010 by Kathryn A. Pollnac and Caitlín R. Kiernan
---
Yesterday I finished the introduction for Two Worlds and In Between. Well, at least I hope that I finished it. I don't like writing these sorts of things. Anyway, it comes in at 1,541 words. I take George Orwell to task over that silly and too often parroted comment, "Good prose is like a windowpane.” But, also, I think writing instructors often fail to present the quotation in the context of the essay it has been taken from ("Why I Write," June 1946, originally published in the final issue of Gangrel, Summer 1946). Above all else, Orwell was a propagandist, which is not a bad thing. He had messages that needed speaking. And he needed them spoken very clearly (though, he was still awfully fond of metaphor, hence Animal Farm). But to think this applies to all prose, it was arrogant and short sighted of Orwell to think this, and idiotic for writers today to follow this edict.
I also cleaned up the keynote speech I gave at the HPLFF, because S.T. Joshi has asked to publish it (I can't remember where).
And that was work yesterday. I sat here and wrote and edited while Spooky went to South County to see her parents and her brother.
Oh, and thanks to Cat Conley (
catconley, "The Awkward Marmoset") for sending me a copy of Greer's Moonwise. It was a pleasant surprise.Last night there was far too much CoX.
stsisyphus showed up, and may even have joined out weird little group of vampires and supernatural ne'erdowells. ---
Please have a look at the current eBay auctions, which include the "napovel," written in the Minneapolis/St. Paul airport during our captivity there. All bids are much appreciated. We not only have to pay the taxes this month, we also have to consider the fact that both my iPod and cellphone were fried during the trip to Portland.
It's something of a mystery, and I know fuck-all about electronics. Neither will hold a charge now, and the iPod actually appears to have been wiped clean. I suspect my shoulder bag, at some point, came into contact with a strong magnetic field. I just don't know when it might have happened, or where. But as I rely heavily on both for writing, they will have to be replaced or repaired very soon. It may be the lithium-ion batteries only need to be replaced. I just don't know (and if you know anything about these sorts of conundrums, please say so).
---
I've been getting some good feedback on "John Four," which felt like a sort of story I haven't written before. So I was very nervous about it.
---
Somehow I forgot Sonya's (
sovay) birthday. So, happy belated birthday, Sonya.And now, more photos from Portland. I was amazed at the lushness of the neighborhood where we were lodging. Everything was green. I think of Rhode Island as being lush, but it can't compare to what I saw of Portland. So, here are some glimpses of the lushness and greenery:
All photographs Copyright © 2010 by Kathryn A. Pollnac and Caitlín R. Kiernan
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We've had a spate of things (okay two,
I don't know jack about iPods, but check the port on the phone. This may be the culprit if it seems loose. If not, it probably will be helped by a new battery, they do stop holding a charge after a while, and I was surprised about how cheap they are the last time I had to replace one.
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whose charging ports were not securely soldered to their connectors, so after a while it became impossible to charge the battery again because it had ceased being able to complete that circuit.
Not at all likely, given I've had the iPod five years, and the phone a year, and both developed this problems within days of one another, perhaps even at the same time.
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That tree is gorgeous. (Or is it two different trees?)
Different trees.
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Thank you!
That's beautiful greenery, especially the last photograph. I love old moss-gnarled trees deeply.
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FWIW, I liked 'John Four' the most out of the three items in Sirenia 58. The only jarring element (for me) was the phrase 'interminable eschatology' in the first paragraph. Aren't we being told in this story that no one's doing -logies any more, that there's no logos left, etc.? But even 'interminable eschaton' sounds distractingly purple in context of the rest of the story. And, also, I found myself wishing it didn't have such a neat just-so conclusion, but trailed off in uncertainty -- the way 'Pickman's Other Model' did, for example. (I apologize. I'm only quibbling because I liked it so much I read it twice at first sitting.)
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