What Else in February

Writing Work

From “David Abbott’s ‘House of Mystery'”, The Omaha World-Herald, 28 Nov 1920, pg. 4.

My intention was to start my rewrite of One Ahead in February, but every time I started rewriting, I ended up researching instead. So, I gave in, got a 30-day membership to Genealogy Bank, and have been wading through PDFs of Omaha newspapers ever since. I have two more weeks to my subscription in which to solidify the time period I want to use (I think I’m going to move it from 1906-ish to 1912, after the death of Alice (Abbott) Rowe) and take a look at the Kirkendall family at around that time.

Query-wise:

# of submissions for Luck for Hire: 7
# of responses: 2
# of submissions for Model Species: 1
# of responses: 2*
# of other subs/responses: 1/1 – two different short stories
*Response numbers includes submissions made in previous months.

Other Life Stuff

February was a very social month for me.* Spring frisbee league started. There was the Superbowl Party at Laura & Josh’s, Tricia birthday gathering at Four Peaks, dinner with Tyler at Thirsty Lion, and the Skirt Chaser 5K. This was the fourth year I ran the Skirt Chaser. I turned in the worst time of my four years, but was actually more pleased than I’ve been the last two years. I’m currently 10-ish pounds heavy and hadn’t run much since the last Skirt Chaser, but still (barely) kept my time under 30min.

Pre-race – Me, Jeff , and Tricia
Photo by Casey Harrison, courtesy Jeff Gehring

*For an introvert, anything beyond hanging out with people one evening in a month is “very social.”

Books Obtained

The Kiss Murder by Mehmet Murat Somer
Brothers of the Snake by Dan Abnett

The first in a series featuring a transvestite sleuth and a the adventures of a group of Space Marines. That’s what I call diversity. Both from PaperbackSwap.

Other Stuff Read

In the land of short stories, I meant to start in on the Nebula nominees, but ended up finishing up The Case-book of Sherlock Holmes instead.

Other Books I Want to Read

At Goodreads:

• Six-Gun Snow White by Catherynne M. Valente
• The Golem and the Jinni by Helene Wecker
• Revenge: Eleven Dark Tales by Yoko Ogawa

At the Greater Phoenix Digital Library:

• The Mad Scientist’s Daughter by Cassandra Rose Clarke
• The Bookman by Lavie Tidhar
• Growing Up Dead In Texas by Stephen Graham Jones
• The Lost Summer of Louisa May Alcott by Kelly O’Connor McNees