NOT MUCH TIME LEFT...(10 DAYS LEFT)

Status: PACKING, PACKING, AND PLAYING PAX IMPERIA WHILE I DO IT.

I did get in some writing on The Vampiress Hunter though. 18 new pages of titilating stuff for future readers to pore over.

Watching: Nothing. TV's screwing up again--so it's going to be D-U-M-P-E-D.

Listening to: Lots and lots of taped music while we pack.

Reading: Kushiel's Scion. Page 716.

TOPIC: CHAOS REIGNS

I can't stay on for very long these days. Even after we had lost the internet for a few days this past week, I spent some needed time writing.

Just to *write*.

I just don't know when I will get back to it.

Presently, I spent yesterday helping my wife pack her stuff up and mine. We got most everything broken down and boxed. But we only have ten days left before we have to leave here.

It'll take us five to get everything ready. Three to move things into a new storage unit--if my aunt comes through for us. I just found out that my grandmother--on my father's side--passed away this past January.

I only met her once--when she and my aunt came up to give me my father's things--pictures, photos, his service records from his tours in Vietnam so many years ago. (He died in 2004 of throat cancer.)

But my aunt won't say how my grandmother died. She said it was quick and sudden--that's all she knows.

I worked a little bit more on The Vampiress Hunter.

Added a few new chapters.

But on the 25th, I'm going to be posting one last entry here. It's going to be for my new mailing addy.

Anyone is welcome to snail-mail me. Just to drop me a note, say hi, or whatever. I'm way past the stress threshhold nowadays.

I just want to get the fuck out of here as fast as possible. We're both strained and exhausted from having to deal with an uncaring management and a complete tool to boot.

I just want out so we can start over again. It may be several years before we can do anything with our housing situation. Things up here aren't good at all.

I have my inlaws stressed out, my mother wants me to still sell everything I've owned and collected these past 34 years and move back to Vermont.

She won't even say why.

All she keeps giving me is the run around--but I don't need (or want) to be pawned off yet again and be dumped in an unhappy living situation because my family finally got what they wanted.

I'm not doing it!!!

I'm an adult now...I can't make my own fucking decisions!

On another front, April may finally be pregnant. I know I've had false alarms in the past, but this seems different somehow.

It'll be just really bad timing if it is. Good news for us--as we've been trying for 7 years--but the fact that we will be homeless in less than 2 weeks time...?

Isn't going to help matters much.

I'm still in appeals with Social Insecurity. They claimed that I am now cured because of my past job history and the fact that I can write a book.

I am sooo seriously considering suing these assholes for just being stupid...

But now I have to find a way to save up the $1000-$2000 needed for pro-bono work. Because--as I keep finding out--no one will take the case unless it's a money-related money matter or a backpay issue.

Hopefully, in 5 months time, I'll have the money saved up and a lawyer to represent me on my disability problems--not because I can do this and that.

Having Factor Five Leiden has complicated things a great deal more than I thought.

Sky

NEW MARCHING ORDERS ARE FINALLY IN? (33 DAYS LEFT)

Status: Packing up still. We have about 92% of the heavy stuff boxed up.

I also wrote a few more pages on The Vampiress Hunter today. A little happier I can write, but it doesn't take the heavy apprehensiveness that I am feeling right now.

Watching: Nothing.

Listening to: Taped music. "Red Phoenix"--by Decoded Feedback

Reading: Kushiel's Scion. Page 555.

TOPIC: GODS...HOW I HATE THIS...

Can't say that I'm all overjoyed by the latest news we got from housing. (Three weeks after the fact.)

They didn't count the amount my mother-in-law gave my wife over the past year ($217) against me as "income"--but the new housing voucher numbers leaves me with a bit of a conundrum: Can we realistically stay here by moving into a one-bedroom?

Will housing allow us to?

But either way, we're screwed six ways till the start of the next century.

That's for sure.

I have to prepare for all types of contingencies. I can't just wait until housing gives us the all clear--which could take another week.

At least I know now that I have to get a storage unit. And the bigger...the better. (We have a lot more stuff than I thought.)

I wrote a little more on The Vampiress Hunter--giving Marlena a date for the night.

At least she's having better luck than her is creator at the moment. :9(

(It bites when your book characters have it better than you do.)

Sky

TUESDAY TIDBITS.

Status: Currently writing on The Vampiress Hunter--Chapter 4.

Doing: Writing this blog; surfing the net; answering e-mails; working out. (Not to mention bleeding from passing of more kidney stones.)

Watching: Rick Steve's Europe on PBS.

Listening to: "Cowgirl" by Underworld; "Head Like A Hole" by Devo; "The Touch" by Stan Bush

Reading: Reunion by Michael Jan Friedman


TOPIC: GETTING BACK ON THE HORSE


Yeah. It sucks.

Being set back from your goals.

But I am not going to let these problems hinder me from delivering one kick-ass novel.

The Starchild will be published--whether I have something to say about it or not.

So, to get things going again, I have begun Chapter 5 of The Vampiress Hunter. (If I can only stop from hitting the G-key every time I try to spell the last part of the title...? Sigh...)

Anyway, some deviations from the norm about vampires so far:

• Maria likes cats and has one of her own. His name is Sebastian. And he's a bug-eater extraordinaire


• She watches TV.


• She also eats. What, I'll have to invent. (If she likes chocolate--then she likes other things--right? Does this make her a true vampire? I dunno. Quite frankly, I enjoy bending the classic genres and breaking them a little. Gives people something new to look forward to.) But it's not moshing on blood packets--like they show in the movies, shows, and whatnot.

More in a bit.

A PREVIEW FOR MY ZOMBIE NATION BOOK SERIES

Status: Currently writing on The Price of Freedom; Zombie Nation: Outbreak Zero

Doing: Writing this blog; surfing the net; working out

Watching: KIRO 7 News

Listening to: "Storm Trooper in Drag" by Gary Numan; "Born to Be Hated" by Hocico; "Annie Would I Lie to You" by Iris

Reading: Resistance by J.M. Dillard (ST-TNG)


TOPIC: ZOMBIE ALERT!

Okay. You know the drill ladies and gentlemen!

Drop and give me 40! (lol)

Seriously.

Nah. I'm just joking. No one needs to do push ups if they don't want to.

Anyone know how to get rid of zombies? You know: Those fun-loving, evil-looking, dead guys we always hate, fear, and love?

I decided to embark on a Halloween tradition--apart from my normal day to day postings of my books--and give the horror angle a whirl.

So starting in October, I'm going to be posting chapter drafts of both my Vampiress Hunter novel, and this new Zombie Nation: Outbreak Zero series on my skysbooksonline group. Two novels--one running for two weeks at a time.

As part of the Halloween tradition.

Zombie Nation: Outbreak Zero is the first novel--and I haven't figured out what the storyline is overall or how long it will be.

But the premise is sound: A deadly virus pops up in South America--causing people to die at an astounding rate. But a meteorite hitting outside a local village is also causing people there to get sick and die of a mysterious illness. Now, whether or not the two are connected--remains to be seen.

But the dead start to come--taking over the continent and then spreading north at an alarming rate.

Anyway, I'm not too worried about the particulars. The novel is being written in a first-person perspective--like my Stories of the Dead Earth (not a zombie saga, but one that is an extremely cool fantasy series)--features a 15-year-old heroine, and has a lot of suspense and horror.

And maybe some comical wit penned throughout.

And no, this has nothing to do with the Andromeda Strain. It's just something which came up out of the blue--from a dream of mine a couple months ago. (The kind that you can't get rid of.)

Also, a recent news article helped fuel things a bit for the book--so I included that in the opening chapter.