And, DONE

I now have the complete manuscript of Faerie Blood sitting on the couch beside me. It is 404 pages in length. The final word count is 97,557, or 111,100 if I do the traditional estimation. By my estimates, if it were to be put into mass market paperback form, it'd come out about 265 pages.

I implemented the vast majority of my reader comments, though one or two scattered things I let stand. Renewed thanks go out to all of you on my Friends list who have assisted me with this novel. Should it see print, you will be acknowledged! And for those of you who (wisely) advised me on my wordiness, my too-abundant commas and semicolons, and my penchant for too much description, you ain't seen nothing yet. Just wait till I finish Lament of the Dove. ;) I will be needing you and your sharp eyes even more for that one, I am here to tell you.

There are more things I could do to Faerie Blood to try to tighten it up. But at this point, honestly, I don't think I will even if Luna happens to tell me no. I need to let this book get out there and circulating more. And I need to start working on other things, so that I'll have more things to get out there circulating. Lament is not the only thing tugging for my attention, and I need to keep going with other works now.

I'll be removing Faerie Blood soon from my active drafts page, since it's now getting filed as Done. But I'm going to do that tomorrow, when I'm awake. And AFTER I have composed the cover letter to go with this manuscript, taken it to the post office, purchased it postage and rubber bands and envelopes, put its galoshes on its little feet and sent it off for its first day of school.

And now, bed!

The Kitty Report

I took Polly in today for her annual kitty exam. Needless to say, Polly was Extremely Displeased about this.

She expressed her displeasure in no uncertain terms on the way to the vet's, requiring me to crack the windows of the car, and she continued to express her displeasure once we were shown into the waiting room. She hissed at me when I tried to open the carrier to let her out. She hissed at the tech who came in to weigh her, though the tech did actually manage to pick her up without needing gloves. She hissed at the doctor, and ran to hide behind or under every object in the room while the doctor patiently moved each thing out of the way to give herself a clear reach.

But this time around at least they didn't have to send me out to the lobby for fear I'd get bitten by my own cat, and the doctor did succeed in giving her a physical exam. However, though Polly was due for both rabies and distemper vaccines, the doctor decided to skip that part--figuring she could get away with it since Polly is not allowed outside except under supervision.

Turns out Polly's lost over a pound since her last exam, and the doctor chalks this up to her thyroid problems and recommends I get her back on her meds when I can. Which I knew already. I told her about Polly's recent erratic appetite, though, and occasional bouts of inappropriate urination, which she suspects are early signs of kidney problems--not surprising for a cat of her age. So I was given various samples of kidney-formula old kitty food, to see if Polly likes any of it. And I picked up some more Cosequin, since that stuff is good for her joints.

Got her home and out of the box now, and she perked right up when I cracked open one of those cans of wet cat food. Tore right into it, too, though she didn't eat it all. I suspect more of this stuff will be showing up in her diet in the near future.

Catching up

Today has been a day of catching up.

I'm way behind on my LJ comments. I've got stuff that's been waiting for weeks for my attention! But now I can actually start getting caught up, now that the manuscript is GONE! So don't nobody be surprised if you start seeing answers coming in from me to stuff that's gone unanswered for weeks. This is not LJ acting up, this is me having had my life eaten by the book. ;)

Those of you who don't have LJs but who may be reading this anyway, and to whom I owe email (Yngvar, I'm looking in your direction), y'all can expect me to start getting caught up on that, too.

Also, I expect to allocate some time to work some more on the pending coding I promised for the Two Moons pages, so as to assist janne and others on the staff in maintaining the site now that I've retired from the staff.

I'm also now catching up on Lost. I watched episode 8 tonight, "The Confidence Man", and found it suitably gripping! spazzkat informs me the next one on the queue is going to be Intense. Hopefully, I shall be able to get farther along on this show before the next season starts up. ;) And I've got a couple episodes of the new Doctor Who to watch as well, since I missed the last part of the Aliens With the Zippy Heads Invading Earth plot, and I missed the Dalek episode as well. (Side note: tonight's episode? CREEPY. SEVERELY CREEPY.)

I started getting caught up on overdue housecleaning, as I had pledged to my beloved solarbird that I would clean the bathrooms once the manuscript was gone. I have not yet completed this task, but now at least it is STARTED.

Who knows? I might even get farther along on adding more old logs to my web page's logs database. Actually, I'm about ready for a new overhaul to my page, but damned if I know what I want to do with it yet. But at least I did add a new Julian log from AetherMUSH, circa 2001, "Thwarting the Child-Takers". I consider it an exercise of getting back into the mood to write Julian for Lament of the Dove.

Starting tomorrow, as well, I resume my normal exercise activities. Starting to feel that lack!