It’s about a month and a half until wheels up. We leave “Elbonia” and return to the USA. I’m not sure what exactly what our lives will look like. That said, the pieces are falling into place. Landry will go back to school. The kids have been accepted into a school that we were hoping for. I have a stellar recommendation letter from my boss in hand for the job search.
We’ll have numerous purchases to make: house, second car, dog, etc. For these things, we have been saving for a long time. I’m excited about a house of our own. We’ll be able to make changes as we see fit. If we can find a place without an HOA, we may even get a few hens and see how that goes.
The Brain (resident black cat) was distressed by the disappearance of most of our worldly goods about a month ago. We released him from the closet and he came upstairs and cried mournfully when he saw the changes. He’s been extra whiny ever since. But he does like it when we open the window and let him feel the fresh air and watch the birds. He wants to eat the magpies that squawk at him. They’ve figured out he’s under house arrest and have taken to hopping around on the back porch looking for bugs.
Work has been demanding in the last few months. I keep telling myself that it will settle down and I’ll be able to catch up with the more normal admin assistant stuff I’m supposed to be doing. And then it doesn’t settle. My role at work has expanded and while it’s nice to be trusted with more things… It is more things and this is a part time job. Sigh. The best I can do is the best I can do. There are only so many hours.
I don’t know if I’ll miss it here or not. My gut says no. I’d like it more if the air were clear year round. The mountains are stunning when they aren’t hiding behind layers of cloud and pollution. It’s not the easiest city to get around. And it’s gotten more expensive to live here in the past year. I really can’t wrap my mind around the culture. Not saying the culture is bad. I just don’t understand it.
I have been writing. I finished a short for an anthology for Raconteur Press and submitted that. Then, a story idea attacked me. I sat down to write it; it was supposed to be a short vignette or scene just to placate the idea. A quick and dirty vampire romance was the goal. And then, oh my dears, I started… Dare I say it?? I started thinking.
What if, what if, there was more to the vampire’s bite than blood letting? And then, it turned out my “ethical” vampire had a housemate. That little vignette has blossomed into 5800 words and growing. I don’t even have a market for this. Most of my stories have been aimed at an anthology. This *might* fit an anthology for Three Ravens next year. Or maybe I’ll hold onto it and use it in anthology of my own work. It works in the little Urban Fantasy world I’ve been building. Unwittingly building. I’d never really written Urban Fantasy before Raconteur Press. High fantasy? Yes. Sci-fi? Yes. But not this.
And now there are multiple characters and some of them come up time and again. Mrs. Davis has made it into three stories. One published, one submitted for publication, and a third I wrote on a lark. That was one of the first stories I shared with JL Curtis (oldnfo.org) . He liked it which gave me enough nerve to start making submissions for publication.
Self-publish for this vampire story may be the better choice as it’s going to rapidly grow past the “short story” window and head straight into novella. I have a concise writing style, so it’s a little surprising to me that this story is only really starting to get meaty at 5000 words in.
Okay, so that’s reassurance that I am alive, I am writing, and an update on my life in general.
Tuvela Two-Step 