June 21st, 2006

I love a day that is longer than I am, unspooling itself with radiant light from end to end. Bright before I awaken, bright as I close my eyes to sleep. I love the solstice. Ten million hours of daylight stuffed into one day.

We got our first heat advisory today. Welcome, summer! I put away the Claritin about two weeks ago. Goodbye, spring! I took twenty-six Claritin this year, and on some days I was still pretty miserable. I may have to increase my local honey intake during the winter months.

I made Thai for dinner. I went out to the deck and snipped cilantro for a garnish because my cilantro plant is a mighty behemoth, full of tender little leaves begging to adorn and enhance my meals. Oh, it was tasty, and smelled so good. I love using the cilantro so much, I am considering hunting down a fresh salsa recipe that calls for loads of it. When the tomatoes ripen. Yes, indeed, there’s four green, little tomatoes on two of my plants out there. Soon, soon, soon. My basil plant, which looked to die, is full of vibrant green leaves. Fresh pesto made in the very near future. I gave in and gave the lemon balm a bigger pot, and it’s ginormous and beautiful. I staked the sage, and it survived the process. About time to bake some fresh herb bread, I think.

Everyone has big plans. At Sophia’s school they’re talking about embarking on a building project to renew some or all of the aging buildings on campus. At my writer’s group there’s a hot and heavy discussion about forming a writer’s colony. I would love a place to go for a couple of weeks at a time to get away and write. However, I think what I have in mind (a quiet, simple refuge) is not what others have in mind, so I’ve resolved to stay out of the discussion for now.

The staring into space part of Cualcotel is proceeding nicely. I’ve outlined a plot in 25 cards, a system that’s so alien to me I actually had to look up how to do it on the intraweb (I used a mishmash of these two methods, for the curious). I’ve no idea if it will work, but my story now has triple the number of bad guys it did last time around. It looks like I’m headed away from primarily internal conflict. That’s probably a good thing.

I’m also thinking over the slushbomb F&SF on August 18th plan. I’d love to take part in that. I’ve never submitted anything to F&SF, and don’t think I have anything written I would submit to them. That’s part of my own fears about not being genre enough for standard specfic markets, though. What is it I write, again? Still, if I can come up with and execute a crunchy enough idea by August 18th, I’m so about slushbombing. It’s like carnaval, no? Also, while I’m being a fun feminist, I’d go to an Equality Now Serenity showing if there was one here in St. Louis. Maybe there’s one in your neck of the woods?

Continue reading