A Face Worse than Death

Yippee! My contributor's copy of Probing Uranus arrived today. My story is "A Face Worse than Death", about half way through the book.

I'll let you know when it's on sale.

(And I'm back at work on the e-book.)

A bit too interesting

I haven't got much writing done in the last few days.

On Thursday I got my hair done, and a new photo taken for the website. It was overdue, but it meant that I didn't get any writing done in the morning. Then in the afternoon I got gastroenteritis. So no writing then either, and not much sleep that night.

By morning I wasn't ill any more, but I was very tired. I opened one eye and asked, "Can you get yourselves off to school and work without me? Good." And I went back to sleep.

I got out of bed at about 11, and managed some breakfast. I'd just logged on to check my email when the phone went.

My son needed me to collect him from school. He sneaked up behind a friend, and flipped the friend's hood over his face. The friend span around and shoved my son violently into a concrete column, knocking him dizzy.

To be fair, he apologized profusely afterwards.

So I had to get dressed and take my very shaken son to the doctor. It took most of the morning to establish that no, he didn't have concussion and no, his arm wasn't broken. Whew!

And I collapsed into bed for the afternoon - so no writing done on Friday either.

On Saturday I was supposed to be tour guiding at the Roque. It was icy overnight, so I got a phone call saying we might have to cancel, then one saying they couldn't cancel and be careful. So I left early, in case I had to drive the last bit at 10 km/h.

Once above the tree-line I slowed down, and kept a wary eye on the shadows, where ice might be lurking.

And pretty soon I had to stop, because a bus had gone into a slide and was now stuck, and blocking the road.

Well this was great. I couldn't get past the bus to the Roque, and I couldn't phone them, because that bit of the road had no mobile coverage. All I could do was to stick around, and explain the situation to any of my clients who came up that way. I couldn't do spit about the ones coming up the other side.

So that's what I did. And then I went home. By which time I was too tired to write.

Oh well, tomorrow is another day.

Dieting jokes

I just got a delayed birthday present or a tea towel, with jokes about slimming, a card with a joke about slimming, and a post card with a joke about slimming.

Do you think this says something about me or her?

Actually, the answer is, "both." And I enjoyed the giggle.

Yoga

This morning I awarded myself a trip out to the ethnographic museum in Los Llanos, just for a change. It was fun. They had a temporary exhibit of stateus inspired by prehispanic rock carvings and statues, and I was touched to find they'd included one of me doing yoga.

The continuing suitcase saga

Yes, I got it back.