Bitses

Where is time going? Why are the days flying past so quickly? It seems impossible and ridiculous that two and a half weeks should have passed since the last time I posted. And it’s not like I have anything to say–I just felt the need to say whatever. So I’m just going to write a bunch of bits.

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Last night my sister and I watched the 2nd and 3rd episodes of Caprica. So far, so good. As far as I can tell, a lot of stuff is being set into motion, and I’m starting to be very curious to see how it all plays out. And not even interested to see how it plays out in a way that leads to the world of Battlestar Galactica–just interested to see how it plays out on its own terms. That being said, there is something connecting both series that I’m curious about. In BSG, Joseph Adama, Bill’s father, is known as a great jurist. (Or at least that’s my recollection.) In Caprica, he’s Joe Adama and he’s a corrupt mob lawyer. I want to know how one man becomes the other. I hope I’ll see it.

Whatever happens, the ads for this week’s episode make me want to see it now. My sister and I talked about watching two episodes every other week; I’m not sure I can wait that long.

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After finishing Deborah Crombie’s Necessary As Blood a couple of weeks ago, I was absolutely compelled to start the series at the beginning again. I flew through the first seven books–A Share in Death; All Shall Be Well; Leave the Grave Green; Mourn Not Your Dead; Dreaming of the Bones; Kissed a Sad Goodbye; and A Finer End–but now I’m slowing down. I think it’s partly because I remember the more recent books more clearly than the older ones; I’m having a “Oh, yeah, this one…” reaction.

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I’ve also been writing: scribbling the first draft of the mess-in-progress, and averaging over 500 words a day, which is a smoking pace for me; and writing posts for The Moody Muses.

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I’m unlikely to watch the Super Bowl tonight–it’s not how I want to spend that time–but I hope the New Orleans Saints win. They’re underdogs and that city has been through enough. It’s not even that I don’t want the Colts to lose. It’s really all about the Saints.

Deborah Crombie’s Necessary As Blood

I finished Deborah Crombie’s Necessary As Blood on the bus today–it was a fabulous read, that kept me up too late for a couple of nights–and as I was finishing it, I realized one of the things I like about the series, in addition to the ones I’d discovered originally: I like the relationships between the characters. Not just Gemma and Duncan, and their children, but the ones they have with their coworkers and friends, and the relationships those people have with each other. I also read the books to see how those relationships develop, to see what happens next.

Realizing that tonight made me realize that I love the same thing in my two guilty-pleasure TV shows, NCIS and Bones, and it’s one of the many things I loved about Battlestar Galactica. I’m not sure this has any meaning for my writing, but I suspect it does. I know that I’m interested in the connections my characters have with each other. There’s a line in U2’s great song, One: “We get to carry each other.” I think that’s true; I think we carry each other through our friendships. Maybe that’s something I need to hold in mind as I keep scribbling away.

This Says It All

Kristine Kathryn Rusch says something here that describes my reading habits perfectly:

I read fiction for entertainment, relaxation, and enjoyment. If I want to work, I read the history, literary essays, biography, science, and legal books that grace my shelves.

I’ve never been able to put into words why I prefer genre fiction when reading fiction, why, if I’ll read dense histories, I won’t read dense fiction. The above explains it brilliantly.

I am a happy woman.

So Busy! (In a good way)

I didn’t realize until just now how long it’s been since I had something to say here. Yeesh. The interesting times in my personal life have become duller–thank goodness!–but I’m still scribbling quite a lot. I’ve written well over 5000 words since January 6, which is crazy-mad productive for me.

I think a change to my process is behind this new productivity.

Among the Missing

I haven’t been around (except the occasional tweet) because of:

• Scribbling: not a lot of words generated, but they’re being generated steadily;
• Being at the Moody Muses. I post every Wednesday. Come visit all of us;
• Interesting times in my personal life. Nothing I particularly want to talk about and it’s not a catastrophe or anything, but it is a time and energy drain, so less time and energy to talk.

Good books in the last week or so: A.S. Byatt’s The Children’s Book (I still haven’t figured out what I think of it); and Anna Katherine’s Salt and Silver, where any number of tricky technical issues — world-building, knowing where the story really begins, tone, etc. — were all beautifully handled.

I’m not sure what I’m reading right now. That personal issue makes me prone to grazing. Ah, well…

Excited!

I don’t have much to say, except that I’m beyond jazzed that the NHL’s Winter Classic is being played at Fenway this year and it’s about to start.

These days I’m more of a baseball and football fan than a hockey fan, but in my early 20s, I dated a guy who started skating when he was four years old, so I learned to love the game. My father tried to teach me what icing and offsides were, but it took my boyfriend and never-ending Bruins games on TV.

When we broke up, I lost touch with the Bruins, but I still remember enough that I’m sure I’ll enjoy the game.

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Currently reading: A.S. Byatt’s The Children’s Book. It’s diffuse and I’m not entirely sure where it’s going, but I’m finding it compelling nontheless.

Attacks of Creativity

I was just at one of my favorite blogs — Already Pretty – and it struck me how into playing with clothes I’ve been lately. I’m mixing and matching pieces from my wardrobe in ways I haven’t before, and I’m very aware of accessories, thinking about how this necklace will change the look of that ensemble.

I’ve also been subject to attacks of baking: cookies, scones, quick breads. I don’t know where that’s coming from, but I’ve baked and baked and baked in the last couple of weeks. I went food shopping this afternoon, and came thisclose to buying pie crust. Fortunately for my weight management efforts, I’ve been able to give away most of what I’ve made.

What I realized a few minutes ago is that all of this is about creativity. I’m expressing myself with all of this. The odd thing is that I still find it surprising that I’d be creative. Apparently, I don’t think of myself as being a creative person, despite over 13 years of writing seriously.

When will that sink in, o universe? When will I finally see creativity when I look at myself?

Random Book List

I thought it might be cool, every now and again, to post a list taken from my book inventory. I went to Random.org, a random integer generator, and generated two sets of random numbers. One was the number of books I was going list, something between 1 and 20; the other was a list corresponding with the line number in my book inventory spreadsheet. Today, I’m posting 7 books.

• Way Out West by Blanche Marriott (Not yet read)
• To Wed a Stranger by Edith Layton (one of my keepers; her death still makes me sad).
• Blame It On Cupid by Jennifer Greene (Not yet read)
• Quotidian Mysteries by Kathleen Norris (I love Kathleen Norris)
• The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkein (a classic)
• The Superior Person’s Second Book of Words by Peter  Bowler (Not yet read)
• The Age of Voltaire by Will and Ariel Durant (I haven’t read everything, just dipped in from time to time)

Out of 1,293 books in my inventory, 533 are unread. It’s almost certainly a matter of time, mood and memory, as in remembering I have a given book, not aligning. I wonder how many of them I’ll read this year.

Hmmm… Maybe I should throw down the gauntlet to myself, and commit to reading at least 25 of my unread books in 2010.

Books and Other Happy Things

I went to the library today, fully intending to pick up the items I had on hold and then leave, leave without borrowing anything else, because I already have plenty of books to read.

You know what they say about best-laid plans? Yeah, that applies here.

The library’s great because it allows me to take risks, to borrow things I’m not sure of. The downside is the due dates; they pressure me. The dates on the new things are particularly demanding; I know I’m not going to renew, say, Her Fearful Symmetry, and I don’t think I’ll be able to read it before it’s due. And that’s just one example. The pressure to get those books read feeds my reading itchies; I can’t settle down to read Book A because I know I need to get Book B read. Maybe I need to start thinking of the borrowed books as possibilties, not obligations, as things I borrowed because I wanted to read them, not as things I have to read. Maybe I’ll be able to read more.

I should be able to read a lot next week — I’m on vacation. I usually take the week before Christmas off so I can get some shopping done. This year, I finished early, so the week is all mine. I should be able to get a good bit of writing done, too, but I’m really looking forward to wallowing with books. Even the thought of it seems blissful.

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In other news, starting tomorrow, I’m posting on Wednesdays at the Moody Muses. I’ve been a fan of the Muses for ages, so I was hugely flattered to be asked to contribute. I’ll be posting reminders here, as time goes by; I hope you’ll visit (if you aren’t already).

The First World War

I read about a quarter of Sir Martin Gilbert’s The First World War before something very like boredom stopped me in my tracks. It’s certainly not Gilbert’s writing — he manages to wrangle a great deal of information into clarity without entirely sacrificing its complexity. The problem is the thing that made that particular war so awful: It was the same stuff, different day, for years. If insanity is doing the same thing over and over again, expecting a different result, WWI is insanity in action. But reading the same stuff done over and over again is…boring.

I also think I quit reading because the pointless, criminal waste of all that life makes me sad.

And now I don’t know what I’m going to read. I have a bad case of the reading itchies.