For a free audio version of this post, click here. When we started into the aftermath of Dean’s crash & burn, a dear friend reminded me that I only had so many spoons each day, and when I was out of spoons, I had to stop whatever I was doing and rest. She also reminded […]
Continue Reading
To Get A Free Audio Version of This Post, Click Here. In 2011, our close friend, Bill Trojan, died. His death wasn’t sudden—he had untreated diabetes—and yet his death was sudden. He literally keeled over at Worldcon in his room. The end, for him, in many ways was both swift and slow. Swift, in that […]
Continue Reading
If you would like a free audio version of this post, click here. A series of articles have appeared over the summer about the ways that the pandemic affected us as human beings. One of the most obvious is that people have forgotten how to behave in public. Vox did a long article on this, […]
Continue Reading
To Get a Free AI Audio Version of this blog, click here. Every time I complain about being too busy to get all of my work done, I toy with the idea of quitting school. I’m taking classes every spring and fall semester at UNLV. Dean tells me I don’t have to work hard at […]
Continue Reading
To Get a Free AI Audio Version of this blog, click here. I suspect spring in Las Vegas will always have reminders for me. In those first dark days of the pandemic, when we were wiping off our groceries and viewing our neighbors with great suspicion, when we were wearing cloth masks that were makeshift […]
Continue Reading
To Get a Free AI Audio Version of this blog, click here. I write better in Spanish than I speak. Much better. Some of that is because I have read Spanish with varying degrees of competency since I was eight. Many of my problems speaking the language come from either a lack of vocabulary or, […]
Continue Reading
I know, I know. The title is harsh. Because the topic is harsh. Remember, I have decades worth of experience watching and trying to help writers. And I have learned, to my chagrin, that some writers are beyond help. Or rather, the help those writers need is beyond anything I or any other writer/mentor can […]
Continue Reading
I don’t know about the rest of you, but I’m tired. Bone-weary, in fact. The last six years or so have been a terrible rollercoaster, filled with disaster upon disaster. There have been some lovely moments, and a few victories for those of us who still believe in the power of the human spirit, but […]
Continue Reading
The title of this post seems obvious. How do writers fail? They quit. Yes, they do. But it’s about more than quitting, really. This post is about when they quit. Let me start with a quote from John Mellencamp that slapped me about the face and neck when I was casually reading the AARP Magazine. […]
Continue Reading
Every year, we buy the Pearls Before Swine daily calendar. When we started into 2022’s daily calendar, I hesitated. Stephen Pastis had written all of the comics in 2020, and he was commenting on the then-current events. I told Dean that I did not want to relive 2020. Dean told me I didn’t have to […]
Continue Reading