Holy crap! Sarah Palin is resigning as Alaska’s governor!

TRUTHSEEKER revisions are turned in. The book is nearly 50 pages longer than it was, and probably still needs another twelve pages added in.

I am going to spend the weekend watching movies, reading comics, and possibly catching up on some of my other reading.

*tud*

July Thinks To Do:
- finish TRUTHSEEKER revisions
- revisions for DEMON HUNTS
- proposal for Walker Papers #6
- write “Hot Time in the Old Town Tonight”
- Chance graphic novel proposal
- an essay or two for the Chance GN
- getting together all the materials for that GN
» includes asking my team if they want to write essay things
» and getting color notes to Jason
- Mia graphic novel proposal
- Walker Papers short story

I have moved:
- proposal for WAYFINDER* so I can also
- pitch WORLDBREAKER (at least in any serious form)
- Marvel application

to my August thinks to do.

ytd km swum: 48.7

I made the sage observation to my mother this morning that I’m not very good at not going to extremes. She said, “No kidding. It’s good you’ve discovered that.”

*laughs* I /am/ aware of it. In this particular care I mentioned it because I’ve started swimming again and I started at a measly 1K instead of a mile, because I’m trying hard to build a habit instead of over-doing it and stopping again. I have two more 1K swims before I step up to 1500 meters. But Mom said she’d been looking at my recent blogs and thinking, “She needs to slow down. Just because she has an idea doesn’t mean she has to implement it immediately.”

What a strange and interesting and foreign idea that is. But I do know it, really: you should see the list of projects I’m *not* working on. The Fundable idea really caught my fancy, and seemed worth giving a shot immediately (though it would’ve been smarter to not offer my Facebook fan page readers a Walker Papers story at the same time, duh, but OTOH, I didn’t put a time limit on that one), but the CC thing is much too big a project to deal with this year, possibly where ‘year’ means ‘the 12 (or more) months beginning July 2009′. I’m not trying to fit the Walker Papers Junior stories into my schedule, even though it’s a great idea and I’d love to write them. The list of projects I’m *not* working on is much longer than the one I *am* working on…but I’m aware that the list I *am* working on is probably on the extreme side. I’m not entirely sure how to stop that, either.

I mean, on my current list of things to do, 3 are negotiable: the graphic novel proposals and submitting a writer’s portfolio to Marvel. But I’ve finished the Chance GN proposal anyway, and there’s some momentum with that since the first GN is coming out in November, so it’s a good thing to have done. The second’s been on the table for a year now, and if I put together a script and synopsis then the whole thing turns into my artist’s problem for a while, so it doesn’t seem all that overwhelming to me. The Marvel app may wait until I’ve actually got the fifth Chance issue in my hot little hands, so it’s not hugely pressing. And the rest of it is stuff I actually have to do: the Old Races short story, the proposal for the sixth Walker Papers, the revisions on DEMON HUNTS…those are definitely July projects!

That still all looks like too much work/going to extremes, doesn’t it? *headdesk* Someday perhaps I’ll manage to find the actual balancing point…

(Actually, no real head-desking going on, I’m really feeling quite cheerful and enthused about things right now. Exercise does that to me. :))

Bryant has got me thinking all sorts of thoughts now, with regards to not only sustainable funding models (I love that phrase. I could use it six times a day!), but also about direct marketing models and, tangently, Creative Commons Licensing.

Essentially, a creative work licensed under CC is an open invitation to play in someone else’s sandbox. There are a variety of licenses available which offer lesser or greater opportunity to play. The most restrictive is a redistribute-only license; the least restrictive is “give me credit on this, and you may go forth and make money from this if you can”.

I think it’s an inherently awesome idea. I’d love to develop something under CC at some juncture (no, it will not be any of my current published works, those are all copyrighted and my publishers really would not understand), just to release it into the wild and see if anybody found something to run with. CENTENARIAN, which I have vague ideas of making my Experimental Development Book, seems like the most obvious potential piece to license under creative commons. It’s a thought, so it is!

- finish TRUTHSEEKER revisions
- proposal for WAYFINDER* so I can also
- pitch WORLDBREAKER
- revisions for DEMON HUNTS
- proposal for Walker Papers #6
- a Janx & Daisani Old Races story
- Chance graphic novel proposal
- an essay or two for the Chance GN/getting together all the materials for that GN
» includes asking my team if they want to write essay things
» and getting color notes to Jason
- Mia graphic novel proposal
- Walker Papers short story
- Marvel application

I honestly can’t decide if that’s an OH MY GOD IT WILL NEVER GET DONE list, or an “Oh actually that’s not so bad” list.

I also have no fewer than four books I’m supposed to read for potential blurbage and at least three other smaller things I said I’d read for people. I’m going to try *very* hard to spend my Sundays reading this month, but man, I’m having a hard go of it lately.

*WAYFINDER is really an August project, which may mean so is pitching WORLDBREAKER, but hope, or ambition, springs eternal!

Ok, here’s what I’m going to do with “Hot Time in the Old Town Tonight”, as well as any other stories I might eventually put up for commission.

The fundable.com commission window is open through July 7th. If you pledge during that time you’ll receive the story on August 7th as one of the original commissioners.

In November, I will open up a “buy it now” option where you can buy the story directly from me for a minimum of $10 (the minimum amount required by Fundable, just to keep the playing field level, and you can pay more if you want, just like through Fundable). That “buy it now” option will be available from November 7 to November 30, so approximately the same number of days the Fundable option is available.

After November 30, the only way the story will be available will be if I find a short story market to sell it to, or eventually through an anthology. So there you go: those are your two chances at buying in to a CE Murphy short story. :)

Okay, I’ll post one more time next Monday or Tuesday before the window closes, and I promise to shut up about this in the meantime. :)

In possibly the fastest-ever reversal on a comic book I’ve ever experienced, X-MEN FOREVER #2 put me off reading the series entirely. I’ll probably pick it up in (softcover) trade, but wow, I’ve never gone from really quite eager to read a series to dropping it that fast. There’s no continuity between 1 & 2. They skipped a huge chunk of action, which we will presumably learn As The Story Plays Out, but it’s not a storytelling ploy that I’m willing to accept. It just pissed me off, and even Ted, who is *much* more lenient than I am, said, “Well, I can wait for the trade now.”

I also picked up the hardcovers for ASTONISHING X-MEN 1 & 2, because I’m hopelessly behind on the X-Men in general, which is not a good state for someone who’d like to write for Marvel to be in. I’m still pissed at one of the Astonishing storylines (and think Joss’s Emma and Kitty sound like Spike and Buffy, which, no. gah. bad. wrong.), so Ted was very surprised when I picked them up. B I have to start catching up *somewhere*, and Astonishing is at least an obvious and visible break point from some of the stuff that’s come before. And I’ve *read* most of what’s come before, so at least I’ve got legs to stand on there.

At P-Con, paulcornell2/Paul Cornell and I were bemoaning the lack of a Complete Marvel Graphic Novels page on the internet. We believe it should exist. We believe it should tell us all of the Marvel graphic novels, and the order in which to read them. We both, it turns out, have thought, “I should make that list!”, and then thought, “Wow, but such a lot of work, somebody else must have done it by now,” but neither of us have been able to find it. I suspect there’s an entire internet full of Marvel fans thinking, “I should make that list! …wow, but such a lot of work, somebody else must have done it by now…”

ytd km swum: 47.7

I awakened this morning to discover the short story commission has reached its minimum goal! On Friday, August 7th, I will send out “Hot Time in the Old Town Tonight” to all of my patrons, who will be the only people to see it until I find a market elsewhere for it or even possibly until I have enough stories for an Old Races anthology. If you were waiting to see if the story was going to be a go before becoming a patron, perhaps this is the time to act.

I’m trying to figure out if it would be…fair, for lack of a better word, to let people become patrons via direct payment to me instead of through fundable, which requires a $10 minimum. I think I’d probably still have to set it at $5 or something, because I would not want people who went through fundable to feel ripped off, but I’m kind of afraid that offering a buy-in option after the base goal is met is…well, not fair. If people, particularly those who’ve become patrons, would like to weigh in on this, I would be very interested to hear your opinions.

My friend bryant/Bryant (who suggested this experiment) refers to this as a potential sustainable funding model. One of the peculiar things about being a writer is that there is no steady paycheck, and there’s not a great deal of direct-market paying work done on individual levels (tons of fan fiction, yes, and plenty of freebies, but less in the way of finding a market than, say, many musicians or visual artists seem to have managed). Mostly we sell books or short stories which are provided to the reader via a publisher, so this is an interesting, exciting, and somewhat terrifying thing for me to try. I would *love* to be able to do this quarterly, presumably with stories of differing lengths and therefore differing minimum commission goals.

Thank you all very, *very* much for making this work for me. You have no idea how excited I am, or how much I’m looking forward to writing this story. I’ve known since the beginning that there was some kind of story about Janx and Daisani and the Great Chicago Fire, and now I get to find out what it is!

We had a very nice day in Dublin. Talked to someone about a possible Sekrit Project, and was roundly insulted by Pádraig (”Ah,” says he, “I don’t read any superhero stuff anymore, yourself included. EXCLUDED. Yourself EXCLUDED!” *laughs out loud, again*), and we didn’t find what we were looking for but managed to find other things instead, and I got very nearly the entire proposal for the second Chance graphic novel written on the train. Which is to say, on the computer while we travelled on the train; I was not in actuality writing *on* the train. That would be silly.

All right, lads. Here’s the thing: with the 4th of July weekend coming up in the States, I don’t want to wait to do a last-minute post/nudge for fear of missing people, so I’m jumping the gun a bit and asking for people to post/spread the word about the Janx & Daisani short story commission. There are eight days left and the pledges already have brought it to 83% of the way there–another $136 will get all pledgers a short story that no one else will see for months, possibly years. I’d really like to see this work, as much for the sake of experiments as for the potential of periodic direct market sales.

The teaser again, from “Hot Time in the Old Town Tonight”:

“She was too young, even for a man with no age, but she caught his eye. Slim, dark-haired, with long fingers caught in the skirt of a shapeless dress, she was clearly not a child of wealth. She no doubt belonged to the riverboat upon which she stood, a shabby thing that had seen better days. Even so, in the fire’s light they both bent toward beauty.

It was her gaze, fixed on the sky, which arrested him. Others watched the fire, drawn in by its glow and movement, but she looked upward as though she could see what soared above the smoke. That was quite impossible: even knowing who danced there, Daisani could barely see them himself, but the girl watched as if she knew. Such seeing eyes were enough that he might have gone to her then, despite her youth, but tonight; tonight Chicago was burning.”

(It’s okay, by the way, if I get /more/ in donations than the base amount I’ve set, which is 10 cents per word & factors in Paypal fees. Anyone who donates will get the story, whether they donate to help meet the base amount or if they donate after it’s been reached.)

The pledge site: http://tinyurl.com/hot-time-commission

Thanks!

miles to Minas Tirith: 427.2

off to dublin for the day. i will not be at the word wars!

Today I have only raked for an hour (the local birds approve, although despite the really *huge* pile of straw now the back garden still doesn’t look much improved over before I’d spent two hours raking it. I’ve got at least another hour’s worth of work left, too. And I am soooooooooore.), walked to get kitty litter, walked to get pants, done Pilates, and cleaned the kitchen. And yet somehow, I’m still all worn out! And I have a blister!

I also have some ambition to work on my website after a while, though dozing on the couch has its appeal too…

miles to Minas Tirith: 421.9

Yesterday I got an interview request email from someone who’d just read URBAN SHAMAN, which isn’t all that unusual. They mentioned that picking it up was the result of an experiment they were running, which is entirely unusual. It was all very mysterious, with no explanation of what the experiment *was*, just a promise that it would be explained in the review post. So I answered the questions, and a report and interview is now up at GeekTreasure.com. It’s actually a pretty damned interesting experiment, I think, and not just because I ‘won’. :)

I have had a busy damned day.

Biked to the gym this morning (yay, hardly any bike butt!), swam, stopped to make a hair-trim appointment, came home, went to to get my hair trimmed (this time they did the back exactly how I wanted, shaved at a #2 setting, and entirely fucked up the rest of it. I said I was trying to grow the top out to the length around my ears and she trimmed all the top stuff and didn’t trim it over my ears at all. Now I look like I have layers, which I freaking hate, and it’ll be at least four or five months instead of two or three before it’s anywhere close to where I want it to be. Why is it so goddamned hard to get a decent haircut?), went shopping, came home, went shopping at the other store, came home, spent an hour raking the back garden to great effort but very little visible effect (there’s a huge pile of straw by the fence, so that’s visible, but the garden looks pretty much like it did before), came in and cooked dinner.

I believe I will go take a shower to get all the sun screen, dirt, sweat and shorn hair off me, then spend the remainder of my evening watching a double-header feature film presentation, possibly of “Ever After” and “The Replacement Killers”. Because that’s an obvious combination. :)

I gotta say, though, the Chinese doctor guy apparently knew whereof he spoke. He told me I had a water imbalance which caused my asthma (which he said wasn’t asthma, that it was a water imbalance *laughs*, but he obligingly referred to it as asthma), and gave me these foul-tasting little black herbal pills to help correct it. I have this wheeze that catches me up when I’m doing vigorous activity (or when I lie down to sleep) and I’ve had extremely, extremely dry eyes when I wake up in the morning for ages. Both have disappeared, the former so much so that I find myself inhaling and *expecting* my breath to catch and being surprised when it doesn’t. I was very VERY surprised while I was out raking and flinging bits of dust and hay and dirt around to not once be caught breathless, particularly since the wheezing is always worse in the summer so I tended to figure it was allergies. Anyway, now I seem to be able to breathe and it’s awesome! And now he’s got me on foul-tasting little white pills to help reduce tension in my shoulders and they appear to be helping, too. Who knew?

miles to Minas Tirith: 417.9
ytd km swum: 46.7

At more or less the same moment I completed the major TRUTHSEEKER revisions, I also was notified that the fifth and final issue of “Take A Chance” had been completed.

Holy beans. Banner day. I’ve actually managed to create a comic book series. I’ve actually managed to get it on the shelves, a whole story arc (fifth issue will be out next month!). It looks beautiful, there are parts of the story that make me laugh, I’m…I’m genuinely a little stunned.

Holy beans.

tersa and others pointed out to me that perhaps the 10K daily steps thing was meant for people who were not also riding their bike to the gym and swimming. Unless, Tersa said, you’re an overachiever.

I fear she was making an insinuation, but it is not one I can grasp.

I’m going to finish this pass of revisions on TRUTHSEEKER today, come hell or high water (and at the rate I’m going, ie, not having started yet, it seems likely one of those will arrive before I’m done), then take the weekend off and Monday/Tuesday address anything that’s still relevant from my editor’s revision letter after the MASSIVE REWRITES. I’d hoped to turn this in two weeks ago, but it’ll be in by the end of the month, which is Good Enough. Because I’m not behind the 8-ball. :)

Somehow I have ended up with a list of things to do in July which is longer than the number of weeks in the month, which was not at *all* my intention.
- A Walker Papers short story of some kind (or possibly even two)
- a Janx & Daisani Old Races story
- two one graphic novel proposals
- one novel proposal
- an essay or two for the Chance GN/getting together all the materials for that GN
» includes asking my team if they want to write essay things
» and getting color notes to Jason
- possibly do revisions for DEMON HUNTS if I get a revision letter
- get started on WAYFINDER
- and oh yeah, pitch a third book in this series to my editor

miles to Minas Tirith: 413.9

I have rapidly deduced that the problem with the bicycle is that it will cut into my Walk to Rivendell quite dramatically. I’m going to have to put some actual effort into going out for a daily walk, and I’m not likely to get anywhere near the 10K steps one is ’supposed’ to manage. OTOH, I swam yesterday and today too, which has to go in the plus column for the bike.

I am beating my head against revisions. At some point one of us will emerge bloody and victorious, but I’m not sure it’s me right now. I’ve clawed my way past page 300 after spending most of the day trying to remove pages from a chapter that was just too goddamned long. I have at least two more scenes that need POV-switching, and I have to decide if the new bit I introduced earlier is going to come back in immediately or in the second book, but actually besides that it might not be so bad, because the rest of the book is from the heroine’s POV anyway. Maybe I can finish this revision pass tomorrow after all.

I need to email my colorist and my letterer and do a Magical Words post. *whimpers* I have no brain left.

eta: ok, lithera just totally made my day with this video. :)

ytd km swum: 45.7
ytd wordcount: 190,000

Important things I have learned this morning:

1. It is all well and good to get up and bike to the gym. However, it is necessary to bring some kind of sustenance (ie, an apple) and eat it after swimming but before biking home again. Otherwise by the time I arrive home, I will be light-headed and nauseous from the dramatic inverse of energy expended to energy ingested. Being nauseous makes me disinclined to eat, which makes the situation worse, until eventually I am white-staticky and shaking and cannot function. Fortunately, today at least I recognized the latter half of that cycle, and ate as soon as I got home.

2. the Pilates class at the gym which is “starting soon” is in fact not starting until the fall, because everybody who’s expressed interest has also said, “Ah, but I won’t be able to make it until September so,” except me. So I’m going to have to re-apply myself to Pilates at Home, which I’ve kind of been eh about lately. Exercise is hard.

3. OW OW OW BIKE BUTT OW

ytd km swum: 44.7
ytd wordcount: 188,200

since several people have asked:

In other news, bicycles are fast! I zooped over to the store on mine, and it was, well, fast! I donno if it’s just that I haven’t ridden a bike in three and a half years or if the handlebars are actually much further down than they used to be, but it felt a bit thick and wobbly. I did have to raise the seat, so I kind of suspect it’s the placement of the handlebars, so I’ll stop by the shop tomorrow and see if I can’t get him to raise them some. And to loosen the brakes a bit too, because wow grabby. But I have a bike again! And it’s fast! NEEROW ZOOM

After a ridiculous number of attempts, I have shoes that do not hurt my feet. That is good. I also got 2600 words written on the train commute. That is also good. And believe I have ended up, via these massive revisions, with a scenario that will permit me to write a third book in this series if my editor wants one. That’s good too.

The drunk asshole on the train who made fun of my hat and upset my tummy by doing so is less good. It’s a very cute hat, I know he was drunk and an asshole, but wow, it’s amazing how a random stranger’s nastiness can puncture a person.

Tomorrow morning I’m going to put my new shoes on my feet, get on my newly-fixed bicycle, bike over to the pool, and swim. So mote it be.

But right now I’m going to the war room. *shakes spear, runs off*