author: Nicole J. LeBoeuf

The Friday Fictionette release for December 15 is up and available for your perusal. It's called "The Youth Fairy." Here's the ebook and audiobook links for $1/month and $3/month patrons, respectively; here's a little teaser for the rest of everybody.

This one began as a response to a Magic Realism Bot tweet, "An opera singer makes a fortune trading in adolescence." Only I skipped right past the literal idea of adolescence and went instead after the more general fantasy trope of someone who sells youth. How do they manage that? Well, they must be some kind of supernatural being, a fairy or suchlike. Where do they get it from? Well... probably from people who don't want it: young people who are in a hurry to grow up. "Youth is wasted on the young," the fictionette begins, and it goes from there.

Writing from prompts is something I always assumed everyone who was a writer did, because it's an exercise that all my writing teachers going back to elementary school would assign me. Not everyone did it, I knew that, but everyone knew how to do it. Right? Only that's putting it too strongly, know how to do. That phrase implies a skill that you have to learn and practice, like knitting or calligraphy or touch-typing. Writing from a prompt, that's just something you do. Right?

Well, I've had roller derby trainers who thought that things like keeping your eye on the jammer or staying near your teammates wasn't so much a skill you learned as just something you did if you weren't totally stupid. And they couldn't understand why, in my very first few months after passing my skills and safety assessments and being allowed to play the actual game, I didn't just do it. And they got impatient with me, and I felt stupid.

But as it turns out, pack awareness is an actual skill. Teaching it is tricky; it's not like a skating skill where you can demonstrate the individual motions that make up the maneuver. But it's still a skill that one has to learn and practice and develop. Kind of like, oh, defensive driving. In both cases, you've got a list of things to be aware of and stay aware of, simultaneously, at any given moment, and you've got to be able to process that data and make split-second decisions because of it. Teaching it might involve things like, oh, periodically redirecting the student's attention by asking them questions during the activity ("What color is the car in your rearview mirror?" "Where did the opposing jammer position themselves before the whistle?"). And, safety permitting, the trainer needs to give the student a bit of mental space in which to work out how best to wrap their personal brain around the challenge. I mean, it's their brain and all. They know best how to operate it.

So different individual brains will process the skill differently. And some brains will glom onto the skill more readily than other brains will. But it's still a skill, not an instinct that you just magically have waiting within you that you can tap when the time comes, just by virtue of having a brain. It's a skill. You have to spend time learning how to do it before you can be expected to do it.

Same with writing skills. There are skills I've been practicing so long that I've forgotten that they are skills, but they are. Writing from prompts is a skill that can be taught and learned and practiced and developed. And clearly there is an audience who want to learn, or else there wouldn't be so many articles online purporting to teach it. Heck, here's a wikiHow about it.

For me, in my own personal practice, there are three basic steps to working with a prompt.

Choose a prompt. Depending on the prompt, I might choose one or several. A common "spread" might be a couple random words (watchout4snakes is a good source) and one image (e.g. tarot card, InspiroBot poster). Or one Magic Realism Bot tweet, which tends to be just complex enough to stand alone.

Give the brain space to respond. The first minute or two isn't for conscious, directed thought, and it's certainly not for passing judgment. It's for watching the brain bubble. Whatever passes through my brain goes directly onto the page. It's somewhere between free association and automatic writing.

Ask and answer follow-up questions. Questions will arise, either in response to the initial brain bubbles or in direct response to the prompt itself. "An opera singer..." Why an opera singer? Which part do they sing? Buying and selling youth... OK, how do you even do that? What price do you set on youth? Who sells it to you in the first place? What's the effect of selling youth to someone--does their driver's license actually show a more recent birth year, or is it just a physical appearance thing?

These questions are, more or less, new prompts; the brain bubbles up answers in response. And those answers spawn new questions. Questions! Questions are, arguably, the atom-unit of story. Why did they do that? How will the other character respond? And then what happened?

There's actually a fourth step: Then write a scene. This step is sort of like "And then a miracle occurs." At some point, the prompts and the bubbles and the questions coalesce into story. The trick is recognizing that moment and then getting out of my own way and letting it happen. Sometimes it happens very early, the first sentence writing itself in direct response to the prompt. Writing down that sentence and continuing on to the next one is a kind of leap of faith. But the moment I'm starting to get even a little narration, it's time to stop babbling, bubbling, and free associating and just start writing.

What's the worst that can happen? I can get stuck. No big deal. Getting stuck generally happens because I ran into some questions I didn't have answers to. So I stop a minute and ask those questions and throw some answers at the wall and see what sticks.

The important thing in a timed freewriting session is not to interpret getting stuck as a reason to stop writing. I have to write until the timer goes off. When the timer goes off, I stop. Or maybe I keep going. Maybe I can see the whole rest of the scene and I want to get it down. So I do. And then I stop, reluctantly, and mark the session as "To-Do." Those are the sessions that turn into flash fiction, fictionettes, and full-length short stories.

And there you have it: How a writing prompt becomes a story inside my personal brain. Your brain may vary. Void where prohibited. Please do try this at home.

Regular readers of this blog will remember me making happy yet vague noises recently about having sold two stories for reprint. I was finally able to share more information about one of them Tuesday night, the publisher having given me permission that day to do so. Well, the publisher buying the other one got back to me today; therefore, this announcement:

"First Breath," originally published in Ellen Datlow's Blood and Other Cravings anthology, will be podcast in 2018 by the audio horror fiction magazine Tales to Terrify. Tales to Terrify is part of the District of Wonders Podcast Network, including also Far-Fetched Fables and the Hugo Award winning StarShipSofa. If you take a listen to any of those podcasts, I think you'll agree that the prospect of hearing my story produced by one of them next year is very exciting.

I don't know exactly when in 2018; the podcast schedule is not yet set. Once I know, I'll pass the happy knowledge on.

In local news, we're planning to hold our semi-traditional Winter Solstice Yule Log Vigil and All-Night Open House between the hours of sunset on Wednesday, December 20 (when we set the yule log on fire) and sunrise on Thursday, December 21 (when I and anyone else still around and awake will briefly cheer for the victory of the Sun after the passing of the longest night before finally falling asleep). If you are reading this and you'll be around, come on over for as long or as little as you'd like. No need to RSVP. Ping me for the address if you don't already know it.

In terms of clock time, Google tells me that sunset on the 20th will be at 4:39 PM, and that sunrise on Solstice morning will be at 7:20 AM. When I make the Facebook event page tomorrow, that's how I'll fill in the blanks for start and end times.

Considering what I've got for a yule log this year, I suspect it won't last the whole night through. But we've got plenty of other firewood to burn, so it's cool. Don't worry, Sun! We won't let the fire go out! We're here to help you get home!

I will cook some collection of yummy seasonally festive things. Potluck offerings of food and drink happily accepted but not required. The board game collection will be available. Fibercrafts will likely happen; feel free to bring yours and spin/knit/crochet along. If folks want to have a story-telling/read-aloud thing happen, that would be seasonally appropriate too. I will warm up the Rock Band set and place it at everyone's disposal. I'll have a Solstice music playlist for back-up tunes. There might even be roller derby footage watching. I mean, consider the likely majority demographic.

What there won't be is a lot of writing. I mean, not from me. Not regular workday writing. I expect I'll do enough to keep up my 4thewords streak, but for the most part Wednesday and Thursday will be holidays for me. Besides, there's no way I'm going to get a full work day in and also prepare for the party and/or sleep off the all-nighter. (Which isn't to say that, should a bunch of writers come over who were inspired to hold an impromptu write-in, I'd say no. I would definitely not say no to that.)

In some previous years, I've held out an open offer to drive carpool to Drumming Up the Sun at Red Rocks. I am emphatically not offering that this time around. I'm trying to ease my way back into this after taking a couple years off. It wouldn't do to bite off more than I could chew. But if you want to take in the most spectacular sunrise you're likely to see all year in company of a couple hundred Denver-area Pagans, that's going to be happening Thursday morning. You'll want to get to Red Rocks at least a half-hour before sunrise if you're doing that.

And that's the news, and I am outta here.

So I've been praising 4thewords to the heavens, but I haven't mentioned, possibly because I hadn't been acutely aware of them until recently, its detrimental effects. Welllll, "detrimental effects" is putting it a little strongly. It's more that the RPG quest-and-battle style of gamification, in addition to infusing my writing tasks with extra motivation and enthusiasm, also adds complications.

For instance, I've already mentioned the challenge of choosing one's battles. I don't want to "waste" words by not being in a battle. But I don't want to end a writing task with an inconvenient amount of battle left to go. My work day turns into a sort of jigsaw puzzle, where I try to fit tasks and battles together just so. It's not a bad problem to have; generally, if I've got a bit of battle left over, I'll find there's another writing task, one I had originally planned to work on the next day, that I can instead jump on immediately. This leads to more projects making more progress more quickly.

So it's not really a problem at all, is it? It's 4thewords acting exactly as advertised. It's great.

4thewords has also improved my workday pace to no end. Instead of taking long, leisurely breaks between writing tasks, procrastinating when I ought to get back to work, and suddenly finding I've run out of day to do things in, I've begun moving more briskly from one item on my list to the next, mainly because I still have a bunch more words to go before the current monster is defeated. And I've only got 40 minutes left write them in! All right, fine, I'll take that 5-minute stretch break, I know it's good for me. But that's all! I've got to get back to beating up that Nitana! I will defeat it! It will not defeat me! I WILL TAKE ITS FEATHERS AND MAKE THEM INTO A HAT!

Besides, it's an RGP-style video game after the nature of its species. It comes with that classic temptation to keep playing just a little longer, complete just one more quest, defeat just one more monster before shutting things down. Only, in the case of 4thewords, "just one more monster" doesn't keep the player from getting back to work; it requires the player to get back to work.

So this is all wonderful. In addition to encouraging greater discipline, or at least a really convincing cargo-cult imitation of it, it's made me more often successful at getting through my task list by five or six in the afternoon. It's an amazing feeling to get to the end of a three-hour roller derby practice and remember that all my work is done. No obligations are waiting for my tired brain to tackle them. I don't have to do anything but rest, play video games, take a long bath, maybe even go to bed early. Bliss!

Except.

Except 4thewords has to complicate matters by making certain monsters only come out at night. If I am very good and do all my writing between 8 AM and 5 PM, there are monsters I will never see, whose unique battle rewards I will not get to collect. And that's tragic!

So yesterday I deliberately left myself some work to do after derby. (Mainly my blog post. Which was just as well, given the news that altered its subject matter.) And, yes, that meant I got to fight the nocturnal Mawt, the defeat of which rewards the player with Fur and Claws, which are needed to complete certain quests and craft certain objects.

And then my blog post was done and I still had like 800 words to go and it was midnight.

And that's how I got today's freewriting out of the way before 1 AM. Hooray for silver linings, I guess?

Silver lining or not, it remains that, in this particular case, 4thewords is actively working against my personal writing goals. It has put certain in-game accomplishments out of reach of my preferred writing schedule. Oh, there are workarounds, like temporarily changing my computer's time zone or clock. And I haven't ruled out experimenting with late-night sessions as my schedule (and energy level) permits. But it's still a little jarring to encounter a situation where I do have to adapt either my writing routines or my use of the gamification app to make both sets of goals coincide.

And now I have about 50 more words to write to finish off this adorable but inconveniently timed Rudakai. Blast. Guess I'll pull up the new short story and hammer away on it for a minute or two.

Because Aubergine of Metafilter might need a little help eating all that cake.

I had happy news of my own to share tonight, and I still do, but the news out of Alabama right now takes, um, all 40 cakes. I mean. I just. I--

(be right back.)

*Running footsteps diminishing in volume*

*Inarticulate screaming from several rooms away*

*Running footsteps getting louder until--*

OK. OK, thanks. Sorry. I'm back. I just--aaaaugh! Look. I didn't want to be glued to the hour-by-hour election results today. (For one thing, I had a cake of my own to bake.) Thanks to roller derby practice, I couldn't glue myself to the screen. So I went to practice and derby, as per usual, ate all my extraneous brain-power. (It also gave me what feel like lovely shoulder bruises which I will be very disappointed in if they don't color up by tomorrow.)

And then I came home, and I looked at my phone, and there was a text, and the text said, "Thank. Whatever Gods. That be." Or something like that.

I wrote back, "Are you telling me the good guys won?"

And the response was "YES." Just that. Just one word, and I started hyperventilating.

Y'all. Y'all! It happened. All the combined efforts of every allied organization to get out the vote--they got out the Gods damned vote! Postcards to Voters volunteers mailed a handwritten postcard to every registered Democrat household in Alabama. (I wrote 55 of them!). And what the NAACP did was huge. (Seriously. Read this twitter thread detailing their efforts. The opposition shooting themselves in their feet at every opportunity didn't hurt, but that's not a thing you can count on. GOTV! IT WORKS!

OK. OK! So. Much shadowed by this, and that's a fine thing, but: I do have happy news of my own. I have been given the go-ahead to announce that one of my September 2014 Friday Fictionettes, "What Dreams May Hatch," will appear at the podcast Toasted Cake in April of 2018. All the happy dance! This will be my second time getting to hear Tina read one of my works (here's the first). She does a beautiful job. I'm very much looking forward to it, and so, I think, should you.

I had more to say, but it can wait until tomorrow. I think I'm going to just go bask in the celebration on Metafilter and the PTV Facebook right now.

It's here. The new computer is here. I'm using it now. And it's amazing.

I tried to overload it. I've got three windows of Firefox up, one with some 90 tabs open. I've got Chrome running. I've got LibreOffice Calc and Google Sheets ticking away. I've got four Scrivener projects open. And I've been running the Android emulator Bluestacks intermittently so I can play a few clicky game apps between tasks. Two Dots and Dots & Co. and Amazing Katamari Damacy. You know. Clicky games.

And everything's still running smoothly.

I only just discovered the Katamari app, by the way. Once I'd installed Bluestacks, the first app I installed on it was APK Pure for finding and installing the rest of my habitual apps (I prefer that over Google Play), and APK Pure was featuring Amazing Katamari Damacy prominently on its front page. I downloaded it, installed it, tried it out, and accepted it as my new addiction. It runs perfectly, no hitches or skips at all, and it's adorable.

I've only had Firefox hiccup on me a couple times, when I had it load a huge number of tabs all at once. It went into Not Responding mode for about five seconds and then came back. And it didn't take the whole computer down with it.

When I click the sound icon in the systray, the volume slider appears immediately. When I click the Start button, the Start Menu comes up right away.

Every key on the keyboard is functional.

I've had a few frustrations, no lie. There's the usual whack-a-mole game involving Windows 10 "features" that need to be turned off yesterday or, for preference, ripped out of the OS entirely. There's the Dell BIOS default of F-keys' firmware hotkey functions being primary rather than, as I'd have preferred, secondary to their assigned software keyboard shortcuts. (In other words, I'm used to pressing F2 when I want to rename a file or edit the contents of a spreadsheet cell. I'm not used to having to simultaneously hold down Fn to get that functionality. So I keep accidentally lowering my speaker volume, and it's irritating.) I'm going to have to toggle that next time I restart the computer. And, speaking of keyboard shortcuts, the latest version of Audacity has swapped the ones for "record to new track" and "append record to existing track." This is not a trivial change. I do find the new arrangement more intuitive, but the whole P, END, CTRL-S, P, SHFT-R routine is embedded in my muscle memory and it's going to take effort to dislodge it. (Also the shortcut for Stop and Set Cursor is no longer SHFT-A. Now it's just X. That messed me right up.)

But these frustrations are transitory and not originating with the computer itself.

The computer itself is amazing, if somewhat heavier than I expected. I suppose when you pack that much power into a 15" laptop (and also this many watt-hours into its battery), the poundage has to go up. (The power cord, too, is unusually hefty. Its surge protector brick could brain a squirrel.) I used to mindlessly grab the Asus by the top of its monitor in order to move it small distances; just the thought of doing that with the new Dell makes my wrist ache. This morning I woke up with a dream to write down; finding a comfortable and non-disruptive way to grab the laptop and haul it over and prop it up on my knees so I could type the dream down without having to sit up and shake that half-asleep feeling... was a little bit of a challenge.

(The keyboard lights up in the dark! It lights up red. It's very friendly on the night vision, a useful feature when trying to preserve that half-asleep feeling while recording a dream. Also it is stylish. Nothing says MAD GAMER SKILLZ like thin lines of neon red.)

I'm not really complaining. Pack it all in my bookbag, and put my bookbag on my back, and I don't really feel a difference. But let me try to carry my bookbag one-handed by its top handle, and I remember the wisdom of putting the damn thing on my back. At least I'm no longer obliged to pack an external keyboard too.

Oh! And it's got a fingerprint scanner. Because passwords are just so 2015.

It needed a name, of course. Given that this computer is about ten times the computer I probably actually need, I wanted to name it after some over-the-top kick-ass warrior queen or Goddess. So I did. Its name is BOUDICA.

I've just about got everything copied over from the Asus. Of course my writing directory came first; the least work downtime, the better. Also my Firefox profile so I could procrastinate in the manner to which I am accustomed. (What was that about the least work downtime...?) I recorded Sunday's show for AINC on the new machine. I did Sunday's freewriting on it as well as today's full writing workload. Pretty much all I've got left to do is port over my Edit Plus preferences and install the three flavors of Puzzle Pirates.

I have successfully moved MY ENTIRE LIFE onto the new machine, is what I'm saying. And it is good.

Ahoy and happy Saturday! Time to job some pirates, staff some stations, and fire some canons, 'cuz we got blockades. Click that link or just scroll down to see the full schedule.

Well, the full schedule minus Obsidian. And on that note, I should remind you that the next test of the blockade system on the Dark Seas will be next week: an Event Blockade on the island of Triplet's Treasure, hosted by the Oceanmasters' flag of Vilya, consisting of three (3) rounds beginning at noon (pirate time) on Saturday, December 16. Canons effective, maneuvers in use, alliances ignored, obstacles normal, and all ship types allowed. I think those are all the details... Anyway, you'll want to put that on your calendar.

Again, this is an Event Blockade. You're not gonna win an island here. Instead, the prize is determining which island will open to player-flag ownership for a January 6 blockade. If a flag belonging to the Defiant Armada faction wins, it'll be Loggerhead Island. If a Shadow Fleet flag wins, it'll be Magpie Island.

Also on January 6: Livestreaming for a cause! Jazz, Twitch Streamer extraordinaire on the Obsidian Ocean, will in fact be streaming for two causes.

First cause: to go on record as holding the longest puzzling session on record. Jazz will hop on sails at 3:00 AM pirate time and not dismiss the puzzle until 3:00 AM pirate time the next morning. (Exceptions: bathroom break, rechart the ship, that sort of thing.)

So that's the cause of bragging rights. The second and more important cause is for charity. This 24-hour puzzling session will be a fundraiser for St. Jude Children's Hospital. Jazz hopes to raise $500 for that worthy cause.

Wanna help? Here's the donation drive link, and here is Jazz's Twitch stream.

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, December 9 ***

12:00 p.m. - Fugu Island, Meridian Ocean
Brigand King attack!
Defender: Argosy
Attacker: Fleet of his Imperial Scaled Highness (2)

12:00 p.m. - Scrimshaw Island, Emerald Ocean
Brigand King attack!
Defender: Lit
Attacker: Black Veil (6)

5:00 p.m. - Ventress Island, Emerald Ocean
Defender: Spoon Republic
Attacker: Illuminatti

5:00 p.m. - Paihia Island, Emerald Ocean
Defender: Spoon Republic
Attacker: Illuminatti

Subscription Ocean Blockades

*** Saturday, December 9 ***

12:00 p.m. - Kirin Island, Cerulean Ocean
Defender: Babylon
Attacker: Tyranny

*** Sunday, December 10 ***

10:00 a.m. - Hephaestus' Forge, Cerulean Ocean
Brigand King attack!
Defender: Babylon
Attacker: Fleet of his Imperial Scaled Highness (2)

10:00 a.m. - Islay of Luthien, Cerulean Ocean
Brigand King attack!
Defender: Babylon
Attacker: Fleet of his Imperial Scaled Highness (2)

Happy Friday! The latest Friday Fictionette is out; it's "Come Home to Roost" (teaser excerpt for everyone, ebook and audiobook links for Patrons). It's about the possible consequences of committing origami while drunk. It is also tangentially about the potential superpowers of bartenders.

Stay tuned for next week's fictionette, which will feature an alternate origin story for the tooth fairy. (Yes, I've already started drafting that sucker. Some 300 words of outline-ish note-splatter all over the page. Gotta start somewhere.)

In other Friday Fictionette news, you may recall that when I released the Fictionette Freebie for November, I tried posting it to a new venue. In addition to Patreon, Wattpad, and my blog, I published "Love of Country" to the 4thewords READ area. (If you have a 4thewords account, you can see it here.) Well, I'm astonished and please to report that the experiment was a success. It got read, it got rated, and a 4thewords denizen came over to Patreon and subscribed. That rather made my whole weekend.

I am aware, by the way, that Patreon has decided to punch every Patron in the face all of a sudden. (The only reason I'm aware is the outcry from the artists whom I follow and/or support; I didn't get any sort of notification from Patreon about it at all.) I'm not happy about it. I'm not sure immediately what to do about it. I'm considering options. Meanwhile, I do want to reassure my Patrons that I will not take offense if you need to cancel your pledges.

Today was a Friday with nowhere to be but at my desk doing the writing thing, so I let myself sleep in. It is weirdly hard to get up the morning after scrimmage, what's up with that. (That was sarcasm. I know what's up with that. I can probably name you the skaters what caused the specific bruises. It was a good scrimmage.) I figured I could afford to treat myself to a little extra rest, then just offset my usual workday schedule by a couple hours.

But no. Apparently when I start late, I continue slow. Just draaaaaaagging my feet through everything. There is no cure for that but willpower and focus, I guess.

That, or never sleep in ever again. But that would be sad.

Anyway, the new computer arrives tomorrow, according to FedEx. Not a moment too soon, is all I can say. I can almost hear the Asus grinding when I open up a tab session on Firefox. It's like the Asus knows it's about to be replaced and would like to reassure me that I didn't jump the gun or overreact--it really does need to be replaced. See? It can hardly handle having three Firefox windows and Chrome open at the same time! And then you want to open a spreadsheet in Libre Office? Without closing your web browsers down first? EVERYTHING IS HARD. Go, save yourself, forget about me--

Tomorrow evening. I'm hoping. And I'm nervous. I have this cynical suspicion that the problem is actually me. Like, I have only to use a computer for a week, be it ever so PENTIUM i7 QUAD CORE, and everything will grind to a halt again. The rot will set in. I am a corrupting influence on laptops; not even an honest-to-goodness gaming system can withstand my destructive power. It may have something to do with the way I use (or abuse) Firefox with Session Manager. It may have to do with my insistence on running Bluestacks rather than getting a smartphone. It may have to do with my aura.

Well. I just keep telling myself, even if that's true, even if I really do have the anti-Midas touch when it comes to laptop computers, the new one will at least have a keyboard that works. That alone will be worth replacing the Asus for. Although possibly not for the price I paid.

With any luck I'll have good news on that front to report on Monday.

"Blackbird" came home yesterday with rejection note in hand. I sent it back out on its way again today. That's what you do. It's going to be hard to place, I know--not only is it a story with a writer protagonist, but it's a story whose writer protagonist has supernatural writing block, seriously, how pathetic is that?--but someone's gonna love this little story. So it's back out there fighting the good fight as we speak.

Meanwhile, it is that time of year again. Winter solstice is in two weeks. I picked up the fruitcake ingredients today, and I'm planning to have the Yule Log All-Nighter this time around. I haven't done it since we moved into the new place, so this'll be the first one in three years as well as the first one at the current address. I guess I'd better make sure I have batteries for all the Rock Band instruments and review how to set it up for All Play mode.

My relationship with fruitcake turned weird last year. Every year, I bake a fruitcake, and about half of it gets sliced up and mailed to friends and family, or shared around locally, while I eat most of the other half for breakfast every day until it's gone. Which generally takes 'til mid-January. But last year not everyone on my mailing list got a piece. I was too slow. I had fallen behind in other tasks, so getting fruitcake to the post office was just one more thing. And then I got injured, which seriously reduced my spoon supply. And then, probably because I also wasn't re-boozing the cheesecloth often enough, or generously enough, or something, the last quarter of the cake began to mold. Like, bread mold, that kind of mold. I have never had fruitcake mold on me before. Talk about embarrassing.

So I never got a slice out to my mother-in-law. And she was the best mother-in-law in the world, and then, without any warning, right about the time I was discovering the mold on the fruitcake, she died. And now I have this guilt-cloud hovering over the very idea of fruitcake because these were my reactions to the news:

1. Shit, was she worried? Did she think I had forgotten her? I'll never know! And I'll never be able to tell her "I'm sorry, I just got behind on things and fell out of touch, but I still love you," and that sucks, and
2. Shit, my husband and my sister-in-law are grieving the loss of their mother, and I'm sitting here feeling guilty about failing to send her fruitcake? Seriously? Way to make it all about you, Niki.

So there's feeling guilty, and then there's feeling guilty about feeling guilty, and underneath all that guilt is the just plain shock and sadness of very suddenly losing someone who was, in a very real sense, my second mom. And what with all of that, fruitcake now occupies a kind of painful place in my brain.

But I am going to make this year's fruitcake, dammit. Only I'll keep the cheesecloth well-boozed this time, and I'll get through the mailing list promptly. And everything will be fine and not painful at all, and fruitcake will go back to being a thing of comfort and joy (and booze).

And even though it's more of a Samhain thing than a Solstice thing, I'll set aside a piece for Mom Sorsha on Solstice night.

Love you. Miss you. Never gonna forget you.

So there was this neat thing that happened at the end of yesterday's writing task list, and it's another 4thewords thing, and I know, I know it's starting to sound like I'm turning this blog into one big continuous 4thewords advertisement, but I am going to take that risk and tell you about it. Because it's kind of cool.

Here's what happened.

I was working on the new story when I hit the word count total needed to win my current-at-the-time battle. And since I knew I was going to work on the story a little longer and then write my blog post, thus generating plenty more words, I started another battle. I think it was an 800-word monster, maybe 500, something like that anyway.

Because I've always got to have a battle going on, right? If I'm going to be writing, I might as well also be advancing my current quests. But it can be tricky to pick the right monster to battle. It needs to be about the right size for the writing at hand. And "the right size" can be terms of either word count or time limit.

Like, right now, since I don't know how much more writing I'm going to do after my blog post, I'm chosen a 24-hour battle. That way, if I don't write enough to defeat the monster tonight, no big deal, I'll finish it off with tomorrow's freewriting session.

Or, this morning, I picked a 300-word monster to battle when I wrote down my dream. (Yes, I count dream journaling toward my daily word count. It's narrative. It's description. It's story idea generation. It's writing.) Because of the short time limit on that particular monster, I really did need to generate all 300 words by writing down that dream. But 300 words (or rather 260--I have a pretty decent attack bonus) seemed like a reasonable estimate. As it turned out, it was an overestimate, but only at first. I eked out the rest of the words by challenging myself, with some success, to recall more dream details to write down.

But yesterday afternoon, I goofed. I still had some 250 words left on the battle when I finished the blog post. The battle timer had only two and a half hours left, and I had to leave in about half an hour for a three-hour roller derby practice. Where the heck was I going to get 250 more words in the next half hour?

From this week's fictionette, as it turned out. I'd already logged a session working on it that morning, but the alarming prospect of having to forfeit a battle (and break my flawless record of nothing but victories!) spurred me to reopen the project and work on it some more.

And that's how I wound up finishing the first draft of this week's fictionette yesterday rather than, say, in a panic on Friday morning.

And that's yet another reason why 4thewords is awesome. It pushes me to finish projects early.

So, here's the situation.

You've just discovered the existence of a literary magazine, Riddled with Arrows, that pays semi-pro rates for flash meta-fiction and meta-poems. Writing about writing. Which is totally up your alley. Seriously, that arguably describes most of what you wrote in college. So you go rifling through your manuscripts--or, rather, you do the MySQL database version of rifling through your manuscripts, which is to say,

SELECT * FROM `manuscripts` WHERE `wordcount` <= 1500

and you scan the titles until you find something suitable. To wit: a bit of light erotica involving a guy whose lover uses him as her muse. It only needs a little bit of touch-up--there are some sentences that strike you as laughable, but for the most part, it's actually a pretty good 560-word piece.

So you spend the next hour giving it that touch-up, formatting it for submission, and getting ready to send it...

...and then you realize the current submission window, with a deadline of December 10, is actually only for submissions that fit the Winter Solstice theme, "Feasts and Families." Which this story emphatically does not.

Don't you hate it when that happens?

Or is it just me?

...It's just me, isn't it?

Oh well. It's not a total loss. The story is ready to send somewhere; I just have to figure out where. And tomorrow I may just discover a manuscript in my archives that does fit the theme. Or I'll write something brand new. I can do that! A new flash piece in five days? That's demonstrably one of my superpowers!

Meanwhile, I submitted "Sidewalks" to a market that's reprint-friendly, and I spent another half-hour noodling on the new short story. Today was not, by and large, an unsuccessful day, is what I'm saying.