status
Got some help this morning to finish coppicing the virburnums, and we decided which of them we’re going to uproot and remove next week. As of right now, I’m eight pages into the script I started yesterday, which is too slow: I lost too much of yesterday to processing contracts and documents.
CURRENTLY READING: NO PLAN B, Lee & Andrew Child
INBOX: a hopeless 93. Back to work.
RIGHT NOW: drinking coffee and working on tomorrow’s edition of the newsletter, wherein I probably talk a bit about new and current projects and also The Great Nazi Wisteria War Of 2022.
LISTENING: episode 365 Hypnagogue Podcast.
JAPANESE MICROSEASON IS:
READING: THE INFLUENCING MACHINE: JAMES TILLY MATTHEWS AND THE AIR LOOM, Mike Jay
INBOX: 119
MOON STATUS:
I have to clear my inbox down and figure out my work/life schedule for the next four months. There may be a lot more process and setup talk here over the next little while, once I get things under control.
I have spent every available moment of the last several days writing one of the most complex and demanding outlines I’ve ever produced, and finished it sometime past midnight this morning. It’s something like five thousand words long, and it still doesn’t feel complete, but there’s enough of it for others to assess whether or not it’s 1) any good 2) producible. And it’s been wrestled to the point where it feels like it’s out of my system and I no longer have to lay awake at 5am obsessing over its structure.
I have overslept and am still wiped. I have a bunch of ignored emails to process this morning. And I should start next week’s newsletter, as this week’s edition was just the text of a talk I gave a few years ago,
Stand by, reader.
Newsletter goes out as normal on Sunday. Otherwise, I seem to be resolutely away from internet engagement; working on podcast-slate pre-production, doing admin with publishers, starting autumn garden prep, starting to plan work and life design for next year. Back soon. I meant to experiment this week with returning to a computer channel model, but I guess that’ll have to wait.
Inbox: 112, apparently. Huh.
Listening:
I took a long weekend off, but now it’s go time. If you read my newsletter, you’ll know that I am now commenced on a very large new project – you can subscribe at this link here to get the updates that will only happen on the newsletter, and read a few previous issues. So now I’m locking myself into strict work routine, which I may get into at another time and update the spring version of my work routine list. Locking myself into that method will also allow me to figure out how to fix this place up so it’s doing more work.
But, for today, I’m getting into concept work and outlines, and taking a new moments here and there to admire my last experiment, which was sowing autumn/winter crops. About 70% successful, which isn’t so bad.
Currently listening:
Last Kindle highlight:
The Russian offshore system generates so-called black cash: a slush fund to help buy influence abroad. For example, one lawyer running companies connected to Russian banks also owned companies connected to Czech politics. His employees provided over half of the total donations made to the political party of the Czech president, long considered an ally of Putin.
HOW TO STAGE A COUP, Rory Cormac (link)
Those little while flowers are on a zitava pepper plant that I raised from seed in June. With a bit of luck, it will produce peppers next year. I could use a bit of luck this week.
I need to start writing the newsletter today, and also to start figuring out some of the extra bells and whistles that the new hosting platform provides me. I’ve been talking recently in the newsletter about returning to digital publishing, which I’ve done a lot of in the past — NORMAL. CUNNING PLANS, ELEKTROGRAD and FREAKANGELS are just a few examples — and I’ve just today thought of a fun way to do that, so today’s status is: thinking.
On loop today: NEW SPACE MUSIC, Brian Eno, which you’ll find in the 2CD edition of NEROLI. I would suggest doing a Discogs dive for a copy if you need it, and don’t buy the single-CD edition by accident.
It is the Japanese microseason of:
After a week off, LTD is back on.
The rains have come, and have awakened the clover seed laying in the dead beds of my garden. This means I have a shot at wilding a few square metres of dirt at the end of the garden into a pollinator patch and wildlife corridor in the spring. After a few months of working with the soil, I’ve come to think of a garden as telling its own kind of story.
Sunday’s newsletter is written and ready to go out — you can subscribe here and read a few previous issues too if you like. This week includes writing advice, using an example from one of my more famous pieces of work, and a poll. I fed the plants this morning and gave everything the once over, and then planted myself at this desk to work, which included finishing the newsletter and doing some things on this site. While watching the rain pass on Ventusky and through my window. Occasionally sitting outside to feel the new chill. It’s been a tough and beautiful summer. The rain has become a novelty to enjoy.
With autumn comes the need to adjust my schedule. I want to try some new things here. I may even puzzle out a way to serialise some fiction – I’ve been getting nostalgic for the years of doing FREAKANGELS every week, though I’m sure I was less joyful about it when I was having to actually do it. (For those who don’t know, FREAKANGELS started as a weekly webcomic.) But I know I remember feeling it was a good thing to put something new out into the world every week.
Anyway. LTD is back on. And I have plants growing.
The newsletter went out today, and you can read it and subscribe for your own at this link here.
If you’re one of the daily readers of this site, be advised that I’m taking the next week off from online writing, as I need to focus down on a big project and also build in time to get away from screens for a bit.
According to my 72 Seasons app, this is the Japanese microseason of Limit Of Heat. And, right enough, the wind has been ripping through the garden this week.
I still have to get the newsletter started.
Today I learned there is a thing called “galactic superwinds”:
Galactic superwinds—large outflows of gas created by a combination of supernova explosions and stellar winds—are closely connected to a galaxy’s earliest stages of development and evolution, including aspects like its size, shape, and even how many stars will eventually call it home.
STATUS: all quiet here. I have to get to work.