The year is winding down. I have gone from far too much work to fit in a week to just about enough to fill a week. And that feels like a vacation.
Speaking of vacations, Z scored us a night at the Gun Lake Casino hotel, which we will take advantage of in the very near future. I look forward to getting out of town for a day or so without having to drive hundreds of miles.
Reading
At the end of last month I picked up several of the poetry books published by the Grand River Poetry Collective, and immediately moved them to the top of my to-read stack.
Writing
November is the Month of Writing, so I am writing! I have fragments of a few stories, and home to complete at least ten by the end of the month. I originally hoped to do one a day, but already I am several days behind, due to some low-grade depression and a mid-grade bout of food poisoning. Still – as long as I write a little every day, I will be content.
One of the tactics I use in order to keep myself sane is to only work on one story at a time, and when I am finished with a story (which is not the same as finishing a story) I generate another prompt and let it stew until the next morning. That gives me more time to get my head in the necessary space to do some focused work.
And it also makes for some interesting dreams.
Weekly Writing Prompt
Subject: Evolution, Possession
Setting: Outpost
Genre: Cyberpunk
Listening
Béla Fleck and the Flecktones, “The Sinister Minister,” from their 1990 album Béla Fleck and the Flecktones.
Interesting Links
- “Everything I Know about Self-Publishing” (Kevin Kelly) This is an EXCELLENT resource for figuring out how you want to publish your work, and the benefits and pitfalls therein. I am a huge proponent of self-publishing.
- “Call Your Congresscritters: OpenAI Laying the Groundwork for Massive Federal Bailout” (Gary Marcus, Naked Capitalism) – Originally published at Marcus’ Substack. In my expert opinion, it would be better for every one of these parasitic AI companies to crash and burn and disappear, than it would be for even a single dollar to go toward keeping them afloat.