Lost in the Stacks

High summer hijinks in a time of transition for the international zombie action thriller author

In another time, I might have found this image of books stacked on a hardwood floor in front of a recliner romantic and relaxing, but in the real world, my OCD-afflicted psyche is screaming in agony at the chaos in my office/retreat because LIVE, from MONTE VISTA in the scenic San Luis Valley of Colorado, it's FRIDAY NIGHT!

Christmas in July

Looking at these photos cooled me down while reminding me there’s only so much summer left to get things done. Your mileage may vary.

The calm before the next snow at Meadowridge Park, north Colorado Springs:

And the westering sun along Meadowridge Drive:

Then comes the snow:

I actually enjoy shoveling the driveway. It’s a great calorie burner, which comes in handy at a time of year when calories tend to be ingested in excess.

Oops, it snowed again. It’s okay. I need the exercise.

Besides, it’s Christmas. Hard to believe people get so stressed among all this. But then, it’s July. Seems so far away, right?

It’ll be here before you know it. Make hay while the sun shines, and all that.

State of the Apocalypse, High Summer 2016: Days of Slow Boats and False Starts

In case you’re wondering why this blog has been dark for so long

I forced it back in the hotel room. I had material to work with in regards to a disappointing movie I saw, and that was as far as I got with it. It’s as far as I’ll go now, because I prefer not to think about it. 

Maybe sometime I’ll wax risible about the squalor of living in a small room with four cats tracking crumbs of litter from their box across our bedspread, the bad breakfasts among the worse tenants, the borderline neighborhood with the crumbling drainage canal running through it, etc., but that day will be well into a future in which I run out of more pleasant things to contemplate.

Jack and Otis, on a blue throw we encouraged them to sleep on when they jumped on the bed, so we could save the rest. Keeping cats off the bed was futile, so we might as well train them to rest on something we can take away and wash. We used the laundry service to do our bedding every other day when the housekeeping staff didn’t get to them. We vacuumed with our own heavy-duty machine, and mopped the bathroom with a Swiffer to make sure things stayed clean.

I’ve had this computer set up at my new dwelling in Monte Vista, Colorado, for a week now. It’s taking me more time than I would like to find creative traction among the moving boxes and the crisis-a-day repairs of the house.

We could not get out of the Purgatory Hotel fast enough. And, no, Puff did not get packed in a box. She rode inside her own carrier, as seen behind the box.

 

I can’t say when, but I know I’m getting there. The bookshelves have been reassembled and the books reordered. Arrangements have been made to cope with the ancient wiring in this century-old pile in a high valley with notoriously erratic electricity in aging infrastructure of its own.

It’s a matter of adjusting well enough to bring up the lights on the board in the creative part of my brain. Bleeding Kansas and Grace Among the Dead were written in a well-established place that seems a fading dream now. I wonder if I may have to rewrite The Wrong Kind of Dead entirely because my head is in another place far removed from where it was two months ago. Two months that seem almost like twenty years.

I’m getting there. I can’t say when, but I’m bashing away at the metaphorical block. We’ll start with this post, a few photo dumps, and take it from there. Here’s hoping your summer is treating you well. We only get so many of them.