2020

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2020 sucked. The few bright spots cannot compensate for the vast amounts of suckage. It has sucked so badly that it will undoubtedly poison at least half of 2021, too. I am grateful for those bright spots. Really. So I will use them as the most fragile of platforms as I look ahead. We voted…

Read More Looking Back, Looking Ahead
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I like glowing things. A few weeks back I ventured (gloved, masked and with Lysol & large plastic tubs waiting in the truck) to a local Goodwill store. I needed cheap cotton work clothes. While there, I found this lamp. For half off the listed price. It’s a 9×4 inch Hollywood Regency style crystal boudoir…

Read More Fae Lamp, Finished!
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MIRRORMAZE is a very cool anthology with a deft literary framework surrounding the diverse stories. It’s a dreampunk anthology of mind-melting SFF from editor Cliff Jones Jr. and Fractured Mirror Publishing, released on December 8, 2020. I’ve read the galley, and now I have print copies in my hands. The anthology is a great collection…

Read More Mirrormaze has launched
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I’m building covers for the self-published version of my M/M erotic romance space opera MORO’S PRICE. Bear in mind, I’m still finessing the art placement and text on both covers. Cover #1 links in some themes from the story (faceted diamond, star-field, male fighter in silhouette), but I still think it looks a little too…

Read More New Covers for Moro’s Price
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Since the first week of November I have had to listen to Christmas music at work. First, I enjoy Christmas. The lights on winter nights, the spectacle, the food, the myriad messages of hope for humanity. This year more than *ever*, we need to hold on to delight and peaceful interactions. I even like most…

Read More I roast Christmas Songs
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After getting the rights back recently, I’m self-publishing my 103,000-word fantasy quest novel THE PURIST through Draft2Digital. When his wife is outcast from humanity, the last bard of a dying race thwarts a secret war and ancient gods to rejoin her. I made some minor revisions from the version that came out in summer 2018…

Read More Republishing THE PURIST
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After five satisfactory years, NineStar Press and I are temporarily parting ways. I’ve enjoyed working with this vital LGBTQIA publisher, and plan to do so again with new work in the future. That means that my space opera MORO’S PRICE, my fantasy THE PURIST, and my contemporary erotic romance MAESTRO are temporarily unavailable, until I…

Read More Unpublished and Published
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Backstory: there’s a virtual gallery opening today that I’d wanted to attend, at a specific time. I have artwork in this show, I’m proud of the work, and I love the gallery. I also am lucky enough in the midst of a pandemic to *have a FT job with benefits*. It’s nearing the end of…

Read More Artists explaining themselves
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Donald J. Trump lost. Now in addition to being a *known* conman, grifter, liar, coward, cheater, bully, racist, semiliterate ignoramus, incompetent businessman, serial adulterer, serial rapist, malignant narcissist, and likely traitor… He is that thing he feared most. A loser. Exposed as a loser. I don’t hold out much hope that the majority of his…

Read More US 2020 Elections
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If anyone is coming here as a result of the Art Quilts show, the Fire Mountain seed bead contest, or TusCon 2020 (or anyone but trolls and bots, really), please bear with me. An update caused a few problems, which I hope to fix in a few days. To paraphrase the late great Douglas Adams,…

Read More Wonky site, bear with me
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Well, my very outspoken needling of Trump & his Trumpculties on Twitter has resulted in my *second* account throttling, this time for six days. So if you don’t see me on Twitter this week, posting or answering, that’s why. Yes, I did say that specific Trump proxies should be ‘chomping Oxy by the dozen.’ I…

Read More Second Twitter ban!
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From here I cannot see two oceans. Standing astride this ridge, one foot Touching sunset The other, night. On each side, cool winds taste the same.   From here I see no difference between Factory or farm, trailer or mansion, No hint of hand or ideology behind The lights that in distant valleys bloom. Thrumming…

Read More Continental Divide
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So, I have this job. I like the work, it pays well, and offers fascinating coworkers. (I’ll skip the Trumpcultie militia members who still refuse to cover their damn noses with masks.) Backstory: for various safety reasons we can’t bring in earphones or our own players. We have to listen to radios, which in my…

Read More Fake drama, failing democracies
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I wrote this post about beads a few months back. I’ve since been quietly processing the news that Kalmbach Publishing shuttered both Bead & Button Magazine and its annual flagship exhibition the Bead & Button Show. Covid19 may have killed the 2020 show, but it revealed larger market flaws and fragility in that part of…

Read More Beads, Diversity, and Green Cities
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I’ll have work showing up in two anthologies this year. The first is the remarkable Mirrormaze, a dreampunk anthology of mind-melting SFF from editor Cliff Jones Jr. and Fractured Mirror Publishing, to be released on December 8, 2020. I’ve read the galley. It was stunningly well-put together. You should pre-order this book! My story is…

Read More New Anthologies
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Spoilers! I’ll be honest: the main reason I got a new phone was its swanky camera, better rates from T-Mobile, and a reduced subscription to Netflix. The main reason I wanted Netflix was The Jim Henson Company’s ‘The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance’. This ambitious prequel to the Dark Crystal movie promised intriguing characters, plus…

Read More Dark Crystal Cancelled
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Nineteen years ago, I’d almost pulled up to the parking lot at my factory job, when shocked co-workers flagged me down in the street. ‘There’s been an airplane accident in NYC. Big one. Management wants us to stay home today.” I drove the 20+ miles home listening to NPR coverage. Once home I turned on…

Read More 9-11 Memories and Fake Drama