author: Nicole J. LeBoeuf

What was I saying, last post? Can't do everything in a single day? Right, well, I've have several "single days" since then, and some of them I haven't managed to do anything in. I think the problem is, no matter how cheerfully I say things like, "It's cool! If I just do nothing but write all day then I'll get caught up!" ...I still exert sufficient pressure on myself to shut me down completely.

And I'm still not sleeping right. What the everlovin' eff, body?

(I'm working on that. Getting up closer to on time every day, avoiding afternoon naps, avoiding caffeine past 5 PM, installing f.lux in hopes of making nighttime computer sessions have less impact on my sleep cycle...)

I caught myself using the phrase "working writer" to describe myself recently. Well, I used the phrase; I caught myself experiencing the impulse to qualify it. Y'know. Disclaim it. Belittle myself. "Well, lately it's more like 'hardly working writer'..." I caught myself in time not to speak from that impulse, though, because speaking from that impulse does me no good. For one thing, if I belittle myself, it invites others to belittle me--not that they would, right, the people I was talking to are supportive people, but if I tell them I'm "hardly working" as a writer, why wouldn't they believe me? For another thing, why wouldn't I believe me? Every time I belittle myself, I add another grain of negativity to the huge, heavy pile I use to constantly put myself down.

But if instead of disclaiming it, I own that term, Working Writer, what happens? Well, maybe I just wake up one Thursday morning and say, "Yes. I'm a working writer. So let's get to work." And I do. I get up 'round seven, yeah, and I go to work at nine. (Or thereabouts. Still working on the sleep cycle thing, like I said.) And then I don't just devote the whole day to a heroic but ultimately doomed heave at the overdue stuff. No. I give that stuff a shove, yes, but not to the exclusion of doing the working writer things. Which is not to say that my Patreon experiment, the Friday Fictionettes, isn't part of my work, it is absolutely part of my day job, but--look, I got into this writing gig in the first place in order to sell fiction to paying publishers. And last week the very last story I had out on submission came back with a rejection letter. Now I have nothing out on submission. I should never have nothing out on submission. So I took a half hour or so away from toiling up Mt. Overdue so that I could...

• log that rejection in the Submission Grinder and on my personal database.
• send the rejected story to my writing group for help in fixing it (it's been getting personal rejections with consistent feedback across the board, so it really does need fixing before it goes out again).
• looked through my unpublished flash-length stories for a suitable candidate to submit to Fireside, who are open to flash fiction just for this week.
• read some flash fiction that Fireside has published recently to get an idea of which of mine might be a good fit.

In other words, submission procedures. Which I decided a long time ago needed to happen every day. Which is why I made a line for it in my timesheet template. It's in the "morning shift" section, which is where I done put all the daily "gotta-dos." For a reason.

So. With any luck I will have both last week's and this week's Friday Fictionette published tomorrow. But whether I do or don't, I will be making time for submission procedures. Because I am a Working Writer. Dammit.

OK, so, here's the deal. I am one day into Operation Make Writing Daily Again, and I expect Day Two will actually be Thursday, not tomorrow. Which is not exactly daily, but it's a start.

Mild though it was, the knee sprain really jacked up my weekly round. It inserted a bunch of extra appointments into my life and subtracted a lot of energy. When it healed enough that I could return to roller derby at full strength, even more energy went down the drain because "full strength" is a misnomer. I mean, yeah, I get to do all the derby things, I'm not sitting out of any practice activities anymore and I'm fully participating in scrimmage, I'm going to be in a bout on March 25 and another on April 8--but the energy I'm used to having at my disposal simply isn't there yet.

There's a lot of factors. The injury happened very early in the season, so I missed out on the portion of our season-long schedule that was specifically devoted to building skates back up to competition levels of intensity. Then of course six weeks out of the game means a lot of strength and endurance still needs to be rebuilt. And then there's just the bare fact that roller derby is a contact sport, and it requires a high tolerance for blunt force trauma, both when you take it and then in the following days when you heal up from it. I seem to have temporarily misplaced the knack of bouncing back from a rough, bruising scrimmage and getting up in time for work the next morning.

Then there's the embarrassing fact that I took a rather big bruise near the tailbone about a week and a half ago (don't fall over backwards, kids, I do not recommend it). Now there's this knobbly lump of painful tissue where I'm used to having built-in seat cushions. Worse still, I keep falling on it or bouncing it off of other skaters (or having other skaters bounce off of it, depending on who initiated contact) at every. Single. practice. So that might be something that's sapping my ability to rebound.

(It was fairly OK tonight! I only fell on it once and I didn't even yell. I maybe said "Ow" when I tried to stop a jammer with that part of my butt, but I didn't start bellowing in short pain-management bursts like I did at last week's scrimmage.)

OK, so, excuses excuses wah. But here's the nasty follow-on effect: Because of this energy deficit and the attendant sleep-cycle irregularities, I am now behind in all the things. Seriously, it's been two months since I managed to release a Fictionette on the Friday it's due, I've still got both January's and February's Fictionette Artifacts to type up and mail, as of this morning I was just barely keeping up with the bills and other financial accounting simply from inability to find time to sit down to the task, and I still need to gather and organize materials for taxes, federal and state, the filing of.

So that's why I can't just say, "Today I begin Writing Responsibly for a Full Workday Every Day!" Because I still have to catch up on all the things.

Here's how it goes:

• Yesterday I published the patron-only editions of the Friday Fictionette for March 10 (ebook, audiobook).

• Today I published the free excerpts of same (on Patreon, on Wattpad) as part of a solid morning shift including freewriting, work towards March 17's fictionette, and one typewritten page of an overdue Fictionette Artifact. I did not get an afternoon shift of writing; it seemed more important to Do The Books - tally bank accounts, file away credit card receipts and statements, empty my inbox down to the bottom and pay all the bills piled up therein, especially as all this is prerequisite for dealing with taxes (most of the tax forms were buried in the inbox). But that I got a solid morning shift in, with solid strides towards catching up on overdue stuff, is worth celebrating.

• Tomorrow I may not get to the writing at all, because I will be putting my tax organizer together and also getting ready to check into a bed & breakfast in Longmont.

OK, that last one's unusual. Here's the deal. A whole bunch of people will arrive by plane starting tomorrow. Some will stay here in our house, some will stay nearby. All of them will be playing games at all lodging locations all weekend long. It's sort of a small, private reenactment of Gen Con between a close-knit group of long-distance-friends. I love them all, but in order to preserve my sleep, my schedule, and my sanity, I will need to vacate the premises. My original plan was to visit my parents for the weekend. But after the hit my athletic abilities took due to injury recovery, and given the big games coming up so soon, I couldn't bring myself to miss practice.

So instead I'll be staying at the Thompson House Inn for four nights. It's a bit of a splurge, but not as much as I feared--the rate they gave me is cheaper, despite the breakfasts being no doubt better, than most name-brand hotels we've used for derby travel over the past few years, even considering that those involved an event-discounted group rate. It'll be quiet, since it sounds like they're pretty empty this weekend (certainly a factor in the discounted rate they offered me). It'll be right in downtown Longmont, so no worse a commute to practice than usual. I have the option of popping home and being social for a bit. Also I think afternoon tea on Friday or Saturday will be a lovely reward for getting my writing done.

I'm very excited about this! I've wanted to stay at, or at least investigate staying, at the Thompson House Inn since the first time that me and John and a good friend of ours dressed up to have tea there some ten years ago or more. Now I get to do it. I hadn't even thought about the possibility, honestly. But yesterday I parked the Volt to charge its battery at the St. Vrain Community Hub, and the B&B was right across the street. What the hell, I thought. Might as well walk on over and ask after rates and availability. They're probably booked and too expensive, but it's worth a try.

I told the proprietor I was a writer, and that getting up early for breakfast each morning would ensure I got right to work. She said, "Great! We'll make sure to put you in a room with a desk."

So. Awesome. But before 3:30 tomorrow I need to do laundry, pack, organize my tax documents, do the Wednesday volunteer reading, and attempt some pre-guest housework. This is why I anticipate Day Two of the New Daily Writing Initiative won't be until Thursday.

And now you know.

I have a billion things I'm late with, mostly to do with Friday Fictionettes. This weeks'll go out on Saturday (again) and the Artifacts from January and February over the next couple weeks. I hope.

I'd get more done with them tonight, only there are other things that really need to happen before I go to bed, basic physical care things like exercise and hygiene and actually getting enough sleep during the hours normally allotted for sleeping in. That's sort of been the problem all week--insufficient sleep, a messed-up sleep cycle, limited time and energy to do things in and with, mismanagement of what time and energy I've had, etcetera, etcetera, whine whine whine. But if I'm going to get back on track, now is the best time to start. Which means no college-style late-night heroics, right? Right.

So. More tomorrow and in blog posts to come. Which there will be. I hope.

Good night?

It was a good weekend.

For one thing, I got the Friday Fictionette out only one day late. (That seems to be about as good as it gets, these past months.) "The Witch's Stories" (ebook, audiobook) is sort of a roundabout way of saying wherever you go, there you are, while reiterating that you still can go wherever. Really wherever. I drafted some of it at the Boulder Dushanbe Teahouse, whose hospitality (and tea) is unparalleled.

(I began drafting this post at Conor O'Neill's, which ditto, only for "tea" substitute "beer and hearty pub grub". On a slow Monday night, it's nice to tuck myself into the table on the stage behind the stage-right big screen TV, and no one knows you're there. MAH WRITING NOOK, I HAS IT. Bonus if I get one of the EV charging spots behind the Boulder Country Commissioners office, which is available to all EV drivers outside of regular business hours.)

For another (writing) thing, I met with my brand new writing group. Which is, in a way, a freshly revived writing group, as it's currently all made up of people I met at NaNoWriMo write-ins, back in the day. We had dinner, shared works in progress, and enjoyed some designated writing time, all in the space of two hours. A+ would meet again. And will, if all goes well--we set a date for March.

I have sorely missed being in a face-to-face writing group. Oh, there's Codex, of course, but the face-to-face thing is important. I've missed having real-time conversations about writing. I've missed exchanging manuscript critiques with a group who have similar writing interests, similar writing goals, and similar writing skills to mine. I've missed having a writer's social life.

Heck, I've missed having a social life outside of roller derby. My derby peeps are awesome, but they are a large and vibrant league who not only skate together but also hang out together, host and attend events together, and fill up each other's Facebook timelines. And of course my husband coaches in the league, so derby concerns easily creep into family life as well. (The post-scrimmage discussions with Papa Whiskey can go right up to two in the morning.) So it's very easy for roller derby to consume all my available hours and social capital if I don't make deliberate efforts toward other endeavors.

One of my unstated New Year's Resolutions was to make a deliberate effort toward the writing part of my social life--to reach out to writing friends and see if we can't come together to talk shop or more. So I finally got around to emailing one of my old NaNoWriMo friends (sorry it took so long, Julie!) and, meanwhile, a couple other old NaNoWriMo friends who happen to have become derby friends in the meantime moseyed over and said "Hey, remember that writing thing...?"

I am feeling so energized about it. Also there is now pressure to dive back into my short story revision queue, or to start drafting the novel-in-planning, so that I'll have something I can share with the group. (I have already shared out copies of "Stand By for Your Assignment", but I need to work on another thing while I wait for feedback on that. Also I need to write up my thoughts on the stuff they shared with me. WHICH WAS SO GOOD, Y'ALL, why isn't MORE of those stories finished so I can read them SOONEST?!)

Meanwhile, there was today. Today I got a heroic amount of stuff done, which included hotel reservations and messages left with certain offices and dishes done, and which culminated with crashing my Homeowners' Association's board meeting since it was conveniently scheduled for a Monday. (The board was very inviting and receptive to my suggestions, but I may have just bought myself a new role on a soon-to-be-instigated committee to investigate the installation of a community EV charging station.) Also my daily writting gotta-dos. I was so good, y'all! So I rewarded myself with dinner anna beer an' YPP at Conor O'Neill's (hence the partial drafting of this post there--but only partially, because the EV charging station I was parked at had a posted limit of 4 hours).

In the course of the evening I was reminded that I also have a social life centered around Puzzle Pirates; my crew and flag on the Cerulean Ocean are very active, and they're always glad to see me when I log on. Which they notice I don't do nearly as frequently as I might. I believe the exact words were, "We're just happy to to see ye when ye can make it." Awwww. I suppose I should make it more often, then.

Hello! I'm back. We'll see if it sticks.

This is going to be an injury recovery update post rather than a writing update post. That's because there is more to report on the former at this time, and what there is to report keeps multiplying, and the thing about "this is going to be a really long post" is that it comes with a side of "and I haven't the time or energy to write it today." You can see how that's a downward spiral with no cut-off switch, right? Right.

So!

I am midway through my 6th week post-sprain. Wednesday last week, as I mentioned before, I got the OK to strap on skates. Since then, it went like this:

• Wednesday: some 15 minutes and 3/4 mile of street skating (as reported earlier)
• Thursday: some 20 minutes or so on the track at our practice space before NSOing our regularly scheduled scrimmage
• Friday and Saturday: some unmeasured time at the inline hockey rink in North Boulder
• Sunday: Travel team practice; it was all more or less non-contact (evasive jammer maneuvers around cones and stationary non-skating coaches) and none of it hurt
• Monday: Phase 1 practice and off-skates conditioning, some of the latter being perhaps a bit ambitious at this stage in the game
• Tuesday: After my physical therapist confirmed that I hadn't set my recovery back any, but that I really should go easy on the strengthy stuff for a day, travel team practice minus any scrimmage-format drills or strength conditioning. I ventured a small amount of controlled and limited contact (a pairs-blocking drill with, in my trio's case, the intensity scaled back a bit).

Then yesterday I woke up with a post-nasal drip sore throat and all the aching muscles, which is apparently how my body tells me LIE DOWN ALREADY AND TAKE A DAY OFF. I took the day off.

Today my PT again confirmed my recovery was continuing on track (though she volunteered nothing about my chances of full-contact performance next week). I went to NSO at scrimmage again and skated for some 20 minutes before first whistle.

Tomorrow I am not skating because 1. I'm doing all the other things, like visiting a writer friend for lunch, attending the 300 Suns release party for the results of their "colaBEERation" with us, and also finishing up the Friday Fictionette due that day. (It is coming along slowly, but it's turning out to be a ton of fun to write), and figuring out what to bring to a brand new writing group that's meeting Saturday... and also 2. because I get the hint, already, body, I'm listening this time, please don't shut me down again like that, OK? Yesterday morning was unfun and painful!

You can see from the above paragraph that I will have plenty of actually writing to report in upcoming posts if I actually manage to stay on this daily blogging wagon this time. Stay tuned, I guess?

Ahoy and all that. This post is late because I wanted to include the Friday Fictionette announcement in it, which meant I had to finish publishing the thing first. The text was actually finished late last night, making this one the closest to on-time I've been in, I think, more than a month.

Thus:

Friday Fictionette for February 17: "Known Hazards of Employment in a Pawn Shop" (ebook, audiobook), which has much to do with the oxymoron "an infestation of will-o-the-wisps." I mean, how does that even work?

Puzzle Pirates blockade schedule and sundry news: Blockade schedule below; not much to say about it except it's there and it's hopping. Meanwhile, there have been a bunch of updates to the Ice Ocean that will be exciting to see released in production, among them some improvements to the YoWeb web pages and a "Sloop Mark II" that can be ordered from shipyards just like a regular sloop but which imitates limited edition sloops in floor plan and scene design.

And that's it. Have a great weekend!

Standard reminders: Schedule is given in Pirate Time, or U.S. Pacific. Player flags link to Yoweb information pages; Brigand King Flags link to Yppedia Brigand King pages. BK amassed power given in parenthetical numbers, like so: (14). For more info about jobbing contacts, jobber pay, and Event Blockade battle board configuration, check the Blockade tab of your ocean's Notice Board. To get hired, apply under the Voyages tab.

Doubloon Ocean Blockades

*** Saturday, February 18 ***

12:00 p.m. - Ansel Island, Meridian Ocean
Brigand King attack!
Defender: Meridian's Most Wanted
Attacker: The Jade Empire (2)
(Not all that hopping actually; MMW does not appear to be defending)

6:30 p.m. - Doyle Island, Emerald Ocean
Brigand King holds the island!
Defender: Chthonic Horde (1)
Attacker: Keep the Peace

*** Sunday, February 19 ***

10:00 a.m. - Caravanserai Island, Emerald Ocean
Defender: Cuddly Sloths Of Doom
Attacker: Black Flag

10:00 a.m. - Aimuari Island, Emerald Ocean
Defender: Illusion
Attacker: A Boosted Monkey

10:05 a.m. - Barbary Island, Emerald Ocean
Defender: Cuddly Sloths Of Doom
Attacker: Black Flag

12:00 p.m. - Armstrong Island, Emerald Ocean
Defender: Illusion
Attacker: A Boosted Monkey

Subscription Ocean Blockades

*** Saturday, February 18 ***

12:04 p.m. - Kirin Island, Cerulean Ocean
Brigand King holds the island!
Defender: The Enlightened (3)
Attacker: Babylon

*** Sunday, February 19 ***

11:58 a.m. - Terra Island, Cerulean Ocean
Defender: Secrets of the Deep
Defender: The Coalition

I am tired but I want to post because I'm supposed to blog every weekday and I am trying to get back into my routine and it doesn't work if I don't do the routine so here you go.

Update: Writing - Managed to do both fictionette work and freewriting today, and got back on the morning pages wagon too. If I can do that much every day for a week (and blogging too!), I'll consider it a good start.

I'm a little worried about the fictionette because, while I have the premise and the characters, I don't exactly have the shape of the plot. I don't have an ending. I don't even have a good cliffhanger faux-ending. So I feel like I spent today's session trying to perfect two paragraphs when I ought to have been more or less drafting the whole story. Hopefully I'll have a breakthrough tomorrow morning so that Friday doesn't turn into a panic.

In accordance with established Wednesday tradition, the writing took place at the Longmont Village Inn, a five minute walk from the mall's free public EV charging station. This is a plot point because...

Update: Skating - ...I did some. Yes! I got the good news I'd hoped for at my four-week orthopedics follow-up appointment. The PA actually seemed more excited than I was, and that's saying something. She manipulated my leg and enthused over how stable the ligaments were, she congratulated me on all the physical activity I was able to engage in recently, and she said she saw no reason I shouldn't strap on skates this very day.

So I did. I skated from the car (at the Village at The Peaks mall charging station) to Cafe of Life, which is about three quarters of a mile of sidewalks, street crossings, and parking lots. It felt great. I was cautious, of course, I went slow-to-moderate and I didn't do anything suddenly, but within those careful limits I tried out all the motions, deep carves and toe-stops and sculling and single-foot glides and backwards skating and everything, and nothing hurt. Not a thing.

Well, my glutes hurt from yesterday's exercise. I'll admit to that. But nothing injury-related. Not a peep out of the knee, not until I got home and curled it under me as part of crawling into bed and remembered too late that I still can't do it that way, not yet. But that is not a required motion for roller derby, so it's cool.

Yay! Good news. Now I go thunk. Good night!

Ahoy the actually writing blog! This will be a blog post that is actually about writing. Ok, and about other stuff too, but--writing! Yayyyy.

Friday Fictionettes: So the one for February 10 finally went up late Monday night, and I'm really, really hoping it's going to be the last late edition for a while. It's called "The Gold Drug" (ebook, audiobook), and it's about dragons and dragon-slaying knights and also how you should Just Say No. Cue the voices of Macgruff the Crime Dog, Nancy Reagan, and that voice-over that, while the camera zooms in on an egg frying in oil, intones, "Any questions?" But the wyrmlets never do listen until it's too late. It's enough to break a mama dragon's heart.

I didn't get much writing done today, but what little I did was a solid session on the February 17 release. It will be about... well, take Warehouse 13 but make it a pawn shop. There you go.

Here's the thing: It has been impossible to even hope for a full five-hour writing workday since I sprained my knee. Like I said, I'm still going to all my roller derby practices and Cafe of Life appointments; I'm also now going to twice weekly phsyical therapy appointments too. And the occasional orthopedist/sports medicine follow-up (my four-week check-in is tomorrow). And then there's roller derby events like the triple-header this past weekend and the New Recruit Nights this week. And unexpected naps because I still seem to have only a portion of the energy I count on having in a day. (It's getting better, though!) The only entirely unscheduled day is sometimes Friday, which falls apart under the pressure of "Ooh, an unscheduled day! Do ALL the writing OR ELSE YOU SUCK." (I'm sure I've mentioned before what a jerk my brain is, right? Well.)

So instead I'm just focusing on whatever needs to get done with the most urgency, and taking it from there. Today, that meant a short but solid session toward not being late with the fictionette this Friday.

I honestly thought I'd get more done. I had the time. I even had a sudden surge of energy! Which went toward... improving my living space and fixing things which were broken. Which, honestly, isn't time spent; it's time invested. It's so much easier to get work done when things are less cluttered, more pleasant to look at, and fully functioning. Even when the improvement is to something I don't necessarily interact with every day, but have merely been frustrated with now and again, knowing that it's been improved makes my brain a more pleasant place to be. So I went into the "distraction" with my eyes open. Sure, I thought, I might not get the writing done that I meant to, but I'm going to feel happier and healthier going forward.

Here's a short, non-exhausted list of things that got fixed or uncluttered or otherwise improved:

• Restored my laptop's ability to send sound to the TV via HDMI, such that I can once again VJ Steven Universe marathons. Or whatever I want. This required rolling back the Intel HD Graphics 5500 driver on my laptop. The "Windows 10 Anniversary Edition" version that installed itself on Jan. 25 can take a flying leap from the nearest high-dive into a sewer, by the way.

• Unpacked all my vinyl LPs and 45s (and accompanying concert program books, because apparently these go together) onto a freshly cleared shelf below the CDs. Recycled the now-empty boxes.

• Unpacked the Ion USB turntable onto the top shelf above my desk so it can easily be plugged into my laptop. Stowed the box in the storage closet, along with a few other random objects I've been meaning to shlep down there for a while.

• Digitized one of my 45s just to celebrate. (The Tubes, "She's a Beauty," 1983, in case you're wondering.)

• Rearranged my CDs into four columns on a single double-tall shelf space. Placed a cardboard sheet under each column so I can slide an individual stack forward for ease of access. I am a genius.

• Hung up five things that have been waiting to go back on the walls since we moved into this place back in April 2015. This represents a solid baby step toward emptying the box of wall-hangings that's been sitting in our bedroom since that time.

Now my office and the living room are both less cluttered, and I have the ability to play records in the office. Also it's easier to get to all my CDs now. Also there are pretty things on the walls! So. A sacrifice of potential writing time, but well worth it, I think.

Also, I'm still not on skates yet, but today at roller derby practice I did every single off-skates thing along with my team. Pre-practice warm-ups. Strength training hell. Post-practice yoga. Because it's exciting to be that physically capable again, and because I need to get those muscles back ASAP thank you. This is part of fixing what's broke and creating a happier, healthier future!

My roller derby team is totally my Valentine, y'all. <3 <3 <3

OK, so, I'm still behind on the Friday Fictionette stuff, but I'm going to do a Puzzle Pirates Blockade Report anyway because, hell, I gotta live a little. (Pause for the inevitable jokes about how if YPP is "living a little" then the author needs to get a life. Yes, you are very droll. Ha ha. Also, you can KISS MY RINK RASH.) In any case, the Jan 20 fictionette will be uploaded to Patreon in a couple hours or so, and the Jan 27 one will follow it just as soon after that as I can manage.

So! What've we got? About a kabillion blockades on the Cerulean Ocean, that's what. Also a handful on Emerald and a couple on Meridian. Jade and Opal remain quiet.

Aside o' that, the developers announced something rather exciting last month: Dark Seas!

The goal for Dark Seas is to introduce an entirely new ocean where the rules are a bit different. This shadowy new ocean is a volatile place full of more danger and unexplored frontiers. We are going to introduce some new theme and story elements involving an insidious darkness that is invading the ocean, affecting the appearance of the world and the very nature of the pirates who live there.

See post for more details. It generated a lively discussion, to which Forculus has responded this week. And that has sparked discussion, of course. I'm not going to try to summarize--I, er, still need to read all about it myself. But now you can too!...if you haven't already.

Also, an early heads-up: it's time for the semiannual transfer of ownership of the shipyard shop on Fort Royal on the Ice Ocean. This time around, the shop will go to the crew with the highest fame. To register your crew for consideration, follow the instructions on Demeter's announcement by January 31.

On to the blockades!

Standard reminders: Schedule is given in Pirate Time, or U.S. Pacific. Player flags link to Yoweb information pages; Brigand King Flags link to Yppedia Brigand King pages. BK amassed power given in parenthetical numbers, like so: (14). For more info about jobbing contacts, jobber pay, and Event Blockade battle board configuration, check the Blockade tab of your ocean's Notice Board. To get hired, apply under the Voyages tab.

Doubloon Ocean Blockades

*** Saturday, January 28 ***

12:00 p.m. - Kirin Island, Meridian Ocean
Brigand King attack!
Defender: Barely Dressed
Attacker: Fleet of his Imperial Scaled Highness (5)
Undeclared: Icy Sun

12:00 p.m. - Sayers Rock, Emerald Ocean
Defender: Going Down
Attacker: Delirium
Undeclared: Sons Of Anarchy

10:01 p.m. - Admiral Island, Emerald Ocean
Defender: Rubber Duckies of Doom
Attacker: Cuddly Sloths Of Doom

*** Sunday, January 29 ***

10:00 a.m. - Pukru Island, Emerald Ocean
Brigand King attack!
Defender: Illuminatti
Attacker: The Enlightened (4)

10:38 a.m. - Marlowe Island, Emerald Ocean
Brigand King holds the island!
Defender: Fleet of his Imperial Scaled Highness (2)
Attacker: Sons Of Anarchy

11:33 a.m. - Jubilee Island, Meridian Ocean
Defender: Velt's Boiyz
Attacker: Infamous

11:58 a.m. - Paihia Island, Emerald Ocean
Defender: Dead In The Water
Attacker: Caught In Crossfire

12:00 p.m. - Terra Island, Meridian Ocean
Defender: Infamous
Attacker: Dragon Lords

Subscription Ocean Blockades

*** Saturday, January 28 ***

12:00 p.m. - Iris Island, Cerulean Ocean
Brigand King attack!
Defender: Babylon
Attacker: Fleet of his Imperial Scaled Highness (4)
Undeclared: Fallen

5:00 p.m. - Vernal Equinox, Cerulean Ocean
Brigand King attack!
Attacker: Defiantly Deviant
Attacker: Ice Wyrm's Brood (3)

7:00 p.m. - Spectre Island, Cerulean Ocean
Defender: Elements of Fear
Attacker: Babylon

7:00 p.m. - Park Island, Cerulean Ocean
Defender: Elements of Fear
Attacker: Babylon

8:24 p.m. - Nu Island, Cerulean Ocean
Defender: Phantom's Realm
Attacker: The Coalition

8:32 p.m. - Eta Island, Cerulean Ocean
Defender: Public Enemies
Attacker: The Coalition

*** Sunday, January 29 ***

12:00 a.m. - Remora Island, Cerulean Ocean
Brigand King attack!
Defender: Undertow
Attacker: The Enlightened (4)

OK so hi again after two weeks of radio silence. Let's skip the part where I whine about being embarrassed and ashamed and not knowing where to put my face. Let's just take that as read. Instead, let's skip ahead to the moral of the story, just put that right in the lede for a change: Do the shit you gotta do today because you never know when you'll be unable to do the shit tomorrow.

It's not entirely fair, as morals go--sometimes you can't do the shit because you have to do other shit, right? Like, catching up on a very belated task. Or catching up on your sleep so you can function. So maybe it's not a moral. Maybe it's more of a strategy, OK, a strategy that doesn't judge you and doesn't say anything about your worth and worthiness and virtue, sure, but a strategy, nevertheless, that takes into consideration how the world works. And I should know by now how the world works.

So. For instance. Let's say I take an entire Tuesday off work--just decided writing will not get done that day--because I have a chance to spend some much-needed, now-or-never time with a dear friend. Well, the smart thing to do would have been to do the writing on Monday because of that. Right? I knew that Tuesday was coming. I'd planned on that Tuesday for the better part of the previous week. I had ample warning time is what I'm saying.

(And it was a fantastic Tuesday. Me and one of my very bestest derby friends went derby shopping, and we had a long talkative lunch over excellent pizza, and we wound the afternoon up with an hour or two of a Steven Universe marathon. I am not complaining about Tuesday. Tuesday was the good part of last week. Please, let us have more Tuesdays like that soonest.)

Then there's the stuff that gives no warning other than this is how the world works, haven't you been paying attention? Like, after my awesome Tuesday-with-friend, I went to what should have been an awesome Tuesday evening travel team practice featuring a renowned guest skater teaching us All The Things. Looking forward to it all day, right? Could not have planned on wiping out during warm-ups and spraining my Gods-damned MCL. I mean, yes, I am cognizant of the phrase "able-bodied" having a "temporary" attached because we are frail mortal beings and time is passing, and also we play a contact sport; this concept actually came up during our long conversation over pizza, OK, but proving the concept was nevertheless not specifically on my schedule.

So I'm not skating right now. I won't be skating for, at a guess, some four weeks from the date of the injury. I definitely won't be skating in our February triple-header. (Which isn't to say I won't be there in some capacity, nor that you shouldn't come out and watch it. You should totally come out and watch it. Depending on what support role I do play at the event, I might be able to be your derby buddy. If not, we will find you a derby buddy.)

This has not exactly freed up extra time in my week. I'm still attending derby practice. I don't have to be skating to absorb skills coaching and strategy, and some of the off-skates conditioning I can participate in. I can be a non-skating official at scrimmage. On top of that, I now have physical therapy twice a week, physical therapy homework, a follow-up orthopedic appointment, and a new twice-weekly upper-body workout to keep from falling too much behind my team in metabolics conditioning.

And that's before we get into how very exhausted I am all the time. It's like my body is shorting my usual energy allotment in order to channel more energy toward healing. That's probably exactly what it's doing. And although I can walk and drive and otherwise get around enough to do regular day-to-day stuff, it takes so much more out of me than I realize until I'm back home and drooping with fatigue.

I know. I'm whining a lot for someone whose injury is pretty damn minor. I mean, nothing's torn (that we can tell so far), no one has even recommended an MRI, surgery definitely isn't on the menu. I'm staying exceptionally active, independent, and productive (aside from the writing). "When are you going to start acting injured?" John asked me a few days ago. I said, "I am acting injured. I'm not skating, am I?" as I proceeded to take out the recyclables.

But that's the thing. It is a minor injury. I would not have thought it would impact my energy levels this much. I probably shouldn't be surprised, but I am. I'm surprised, and I feel flat-out betrayed by my body. And all I did was an effin' plow-stop! It should not have wrecked me!

Anyway.

I finally got the January 13 Friday Fictionette out today. About time. It's called "The Sandpit Oracle" (ebook, audiobook), and, like other fictionettes featuring an oracle, it is told in the second person. I am not apologizing for this.

I hope to get the one for January 20 (a bar-story retelling of Monday and Tuesday) done in the next couple days so I can scramble back onto a proper schedule in time to release the one for January 27 (I have no idea what it'll be about, that's how far behind I am) on January 27, for a wonder.

Also I have people I still need to mail fruitcake too. Good thing brandy is such a good preservative.