This totally rocks! I've got a big real dresser now with three good drawers!



( More under the cut )

So the rest of today is going to be spent organizing and putting everything away. Get up, putter, when my back hurts stop and rest. Ari is such a big and tall cat! Look how huge he is compared to the bookcase and microwave!

Also, I started a new challenge - Rob's Daily Painting blog on April 1st. No joke, I've already kept it up for three days. Today's daily painting may be a quick swish and gesture in my art journal with my doing so much organizing though. Those sometimes come out well.

Last night I sketched the first of three cats I'm painting this month, trying for a March 13th deadline. This is ludicrous speed compared to previous cat commissions but that's also a matter of budgeting time. I felt confident enough to start it and seriously hope to finish all three by the March 13th Reveal Date. Not have them shipped yet, but posted so the recipient gets to see them and anticipate their happy arrival.

They're beautiful cats and I'm inspired again after some time off painting waterfalls. Also if I keep that schedule, I'll have my commissions done before the Rocks course starts and be able to devote my Saturdays to painting rocks. Which is always fun too. Rocks are easy but I may learn some fine points about them. So it's likely to help improve my art in general.

Beyond art, there's writing. My good writing buddy Nonny, who has been my muse and writing buddy before, during and after our brief relationship, is back to late night chats that stimulate both of us to work on our fiction. She's got a fantastic novel in progress that I enjoyed in its first iteration, the changes she's made since then are spectacular.

Tonight she was unusually quiet about her work and kept drawing me out about mine. She's providing a level of support that's priceless - letting me open up about my backstory and plot and plans, the details of the yet-to-be-written Garden of Earthly Delights and the future history that connects with it.

I wound up ruminating on the ways all of my backstories connect between novels - the Crosstime novels and their species and worlds connect through various races that discovered parallel worlds. Nomad universe never discovered that but they got faster than light travel. They colonized in a way that avoided contacting any aliens because worlds couldn't be terraformed if there was so much as a microbe on them.

Eventually they'll connect but I'm not ready for that book for a long time. Other than Nomads having some urban legends about lost ships and mystery sightings (many of which were just hallucinations or urban legends.)

Tonight I discovered the little short brilliant Hindu doctor is a widow and last time I talked to Nonny before this, I discovered she invented the rejuvenation process the Nomads have. That erased the last barrier between humans and vampires - they're different and equal if you don't need to have a liquid diet and different instincts in order to live for centuries. That affected society too - older people living longer would slow the rate of cultural change.

Demeter's got the hyper-complex ecology to keep on making medical and scientific advances and the brain power for it. Demeter's a very influential planet in the Nomad history. They were a breadbasket too for a long time before the Nomads really got a handle on that closed fishbowl sustainable lifestyle and they always provided more variety in food and plenty of arts too.

What I realized tonight is tremendous. I know why I lost the first version. It wasn't an accident. It was my unconscious telling me I was not ready to write this book. I didn't have the experience. I was living in New Orleans and until I got sick with a prescription side effect and went wandering stoned through the city, getting tireder and sicker and needing help, I didn't connect with black people the way I did afterward.

Almost everyone that helped me during that walkabout was black. I was welcomed and taken care of and treated well in poor black neighborhoods by kind people everywhere I went. I started smiling and feeling more trusting whenever I saw a black face. One old white hippie helped me out and some paramedics checked on me when I was trying to sleep in a park and asked if I wanted to go to the hospital, but I didn't. I'd just come from there and did not want to go back.

Eventually I got arrested and spent 21 days time served for the misdemeanor of trying to sleep on a streetcar without paying the fare. By then I was giggling drunk on sleep deprivation and Prednisone, hallucinating so tangibly I could only distinguish it from reality by logic - I did not turn into a white whale beached and unable to breathe, I just had an asthma attack and was too weak to stand up. Stephen King was not my cell mate, but the long conversation I had with him was a good representation of his views on writing as expressed in many of his novels and interviews. He didn't need to be there to be there in spirit. The jail was real. The shackles were real. Getting thrown down by guards because I threw a tantrum like a three year old about getting in the shower was real, that was why I got the shackles and wound up laying naked in my own excrement in a cell in the psych ward end of the jail.

When I asked for a shower coherently and agreed not to make a fuss about it they unlocked the shackles and let me shower, hosed the cell clean, gave me clean clothes. Stephen King told me to remember every bit of it because I'd probably never be in a jail again and it would be worth describing from life. He was right. He was my conscience telling me to take it like a writer, accept the adventure, hallucinations and all, as an experience that would enrich my writing.

I made a number of black friends in that jail. We got along well. Not everyone, some people didn't like me, but I pretty much stuck with those who did and some of them were among the guards. None of the guards really picked on me - or the others. It was the city jail, not the state prison or federal prison. Just the city lockup with a lot of misdemeanors and a significant number of innocents, many of them black.

That's where I met the fiftyish mother of a cocaine addict who was up on felony charges of possession with intent to sell cocaine because her son who was living with her and supposedly in rehab, slipped and was dealing dope out of her house behind her back. Caught between a rock and a hard place, she didn't have the kind of names and contacts to get off by turning over drug dealers. She was pretty sure she'd be convicted and she explained to me why she was up on those charges even though she'd never used drugs and she didn't tolerate it in her son and he'd successfully hidden it from her. She couldn't resist taking her son back when he showed up sober and in rehab and wanted help staying sober. She got lied to. She was more grieved that her son had backslid than about what happened to her.

I heard stories that broke my heart in that jail.

I let go of that novel after the three day walkabout. I gave it to a young black woman who'd helped me carry it home when I wasn't strong enough to carry the bag. I'd promised her money and I didn't realize I didn't have it till I got in the door and couldn't breathe, had an asthma attack, knew I had nothing to give her for all her trouble. So I gave her the laptop instead. I let go of it and the backup was in the pocket of the case.

I look back at the original and it was racist. Not totally, but I learned so much just in the three sick days of stumbling around on Prednisone side effects that I'd completely blown my previous characterizations. Everyone in the rough draft was white and Euro-pagan except the Hindu doctor - that may be why she and the painter are the only characters that survived the changes.

Maybe I could not do justice to this book until I came home to San Francisco and live in a building where nobody's the same, where the people across the hall are an interracial marriage and there's Filipino and Hispanic and gay and straight and black and Samoan and Asian - where the diversity is world diversity. Where my being me is one thin stripe in a very big rich rainbow instead of that rainbow-tints rough draft where I found the general story.

The events, the main plot of the book is sound. The big problem was the characters and the minor conflicts told from too narrow a perspective. The book was racist by what I've learned today - liberal, but not really progressive. It had serious flaws and now I know I can do better. In all ways, I can do better with the cast. It's no longer color blind casting of essentially white characters, like an opera cast for the Ring cycle with a black Brunnhilde - who in character is still a Norse Valkyrie even if her face is dark and the actress-singer is black. Now the characters will be truer to who they are and the book richer for it.

For the past several weeks, almost every day I get a notice of a comment on one particular past entry. Just that same entry. It's completely off topic. Some BOT keeps posting variations on an ad for buying brand name purses and wallets. Driving me nuts. I delete it every time and the bot puts up another one a day later.

Anyone else get this problem sometimes? Is there any better way to deal with it than just deleting every time it happens?

I would like to see MLK's dream come true. I would like to see felon disenfranchisement laws rolled back, so that one mistake does not completely destroy anyone's life and those many wrongly convicted can rebuild their lives. I would like to see victim compensation for those wrongly convicted. I would like to see an end to the War on Drugs, which I did not know was so overwhelmingly racist in its enforcement until recently. King's dream lives on and I have shared it since I was a little white kid recognizing this man is right and good when I heard his Dream speech on television.

I also have a dream that GBLT discrimination including marriage inequality end too. I do not think the great man would have objected to that. I think he'd have understood that bigotry is bigotry no matter who's designated as the out-group.

I support the President of these United States, Barack Obama. I voted for him and I will vote for him again. He's doing what he can heading into the 2012 election. We need him to roll back the economic injustice and corruption that has become so rampant even the 1950s would have choked on it.

Today, even a company that has good customer service and long term business strategies, that plays fair with business ethics can't defend itself against the predatory mergers and destructive actions of a few rich crooks. They're not even all the millionaires. They're just the worst of them, at a level where one criminal can destroy tens of thousands of jobs and crash the entire US economy - in ways that leave him profiting by betting against it. Those decent companies giving good value for their products, operating transparently, reducing hours rather than cutting jobs, raising wages to build the economy will thrive under restoring the regulations that stopped the speculators after the Depression. The speculators are free of consequences, no matter what happens they get richer and more powerful.

Those are my dreams today, for my daughter, for my grandkids, for my country.

This year my resolution's more subtle than sarcastic.

In 2012 I'll move toward becoming self supporting and if I get there before 2013, great. If not I'll be a lot closer to it. No hard deadlines, just progress. I'll settle in to San Francisco and develop a good balance in my life.

Last night, to my beloved cat Ari, for all his love and kindness all his life. In eleven years he's shown amazing loyalty, sensitivity, kindness and gentle love. He was purring and snuggling and that felt like the moment to say it. I'm sure he understood whether he knew the words or not. Some time before that I thanked my home care provider, Georgia, for getting my room clean and helping me bathe. I thank people when they do things for me. My cat's just the most recent.

There it is. A Mini Canvas Print Rack from Jerry's Artarama. The mini size comes pre-assembled - the only complaint anyone has about these is lousy assembly instructions for the large size. Good thing too, if I had trouble with assembly I'd still be wrestling it. I just found out that it also has little velcro tabs on the sides to hold it closed while being carried.

Adrenaline is either fear or excitement. I'm in stark terror or I'm thrilled to pieces because the last barrier to going out and selling art on the street just went down. Depending on weather, tomorrow may be my first day on the street.

I've got my alarm clock set for 6AM tomorrow. If it's not tomorrow it'll be Monday - Saturday's got other commitments with class and Georgia coming over. Sunday there is no lottery for street artists and crafters. My schedule will be Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays for going out to sell art. Fridays are potentially the most lucrative of those days.

I also need to do some physical setting up so tomorrow might be spent cutting mats and making plastic bag packages to put new finished artworks in when people buy them off my three pound field easel. I have my Rollator to extend my walking range from the Lottery Spot to the Setup Spot that I get assigned. If it's too long a walk, I have from nine till noon to get there and that will allow some rests along the way.

I blew half of this month's food budget on art supplies I needed to do this. I have 100 mat cutter blades - for the first time since 1995 I don't need to worry about running out before I finish cutting all the mats. Given that, I should do this right and spend tomorrow cutting mats. That gives me three selling days - Monday, Wednesday and Friday - before Christmas. There's no reason to think that last minute holiday shoppers wouldn't run down to Fisherman's Wharf, Where The Artists Are, to get something for an art lover's gift or just to treat themselves for going out doing last minute shopping. Or if they decided to holiday here, run out for presents from Fisherman's Wharf because it's Where The Artists Are.

I'm good at this. I'm fifteen years better at it than when it all fell apart. No-sale days were rare even at the end. Big-sale days - a good one could put savings back into my hands so I'm just not that tight for any shortfall again. In between I'm safe, have everything I need but have a lot of desires like say, a happy holiday meal of tinned ham, yams, black olives, cranberry sauce, some rolls. It's possible to do a good feast in a microwave.

So that's tonight. I think I need to do some serious mat cutting this weekend and see what else I can do to get ready - do this right the first time and have everything ready instead of running around worrying about getting rained out.

I won. I finished The Dark Ones and have a good rough draft to work from. I'll be finishing Trouble in the City slowly at leisure, without stressing over it. It's a good book but I've just been dealing with too many other stresses lately.

Happy news today - I just got my rollator! It's great. I had no idea it would make walking that much easier. I hoped, but wasn't sure it'd help much more than the cane. It does. It rolls easy and gives me better support, my arm doesn't get as tired using both arms. I can tell just going down the hall to the bathroom.



It's also a lot sturdier than I thought it would be! Heavy duty frame, big heavy duty wheels, no strain when I sit on it and the handles make good arms for when I get exhausted and slump to one side. The cargo bag under the seat is good sized and can contain a pastels set and a 9 x12" pastel pad - or several - or pretty much any medium I care to throw in, which will help a lot for doing Street Artist Program with Setup Lite. That is, limiting my gear to the light plein air stuff that I could carry on the bus when I don't have a ride from fellow artist Karl who wanted to work with me on it once he gets back from his trip.

He's got a car so when he's available, I can load up the big Testrite display wall, the big table, all the goodies and have the big grand setup. Figured out how to deal with the display wall being 4 inches too wide - turn it at a slight angle and it won't go over the boundaries of my allotted space if there's a bunch of us in a row.

But for setup lite, I'm using a small prints rack I got from Jerry's Artarama. That'll be very lightweight, still hold the art in a way it won't blow over easily and customers can look at what's in it easily. The logistics are working out. I can do this - as soon as I get a good day again. I've been fighting an enormous flare for over a week and so haven't been out to try, but that rollator is going to make it a lot easier to use the regular bus. And that means not needing to schedule a return trip without knowing the pickup address for Paratransit.

I'll use Paratransit when needed, but not when the streetcar drops me right at the lottery spot if I ride it all the way to the end of the line. This is going to work. I just need to accept that sometimes even with the best prep, I need to put in the hours on my Day Job of Being A Cripple. They schedule themselves.

Progress so far, a half chapter yesterday. Got distracted this morning by my regular caretaker Georgia being out sick, so I got a substitute. She stayed much longer than planned and did more than planned because a neighbor stayed in the tub for 4 hours solid. She kept having to phone in to authorize more time in order to get my holiday bath done.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Many thanks to everyone I love for all you've ever done for me, from my beloved daughter Kitten, son in law Karl, granddaughter Sascha, grandson Gabriel, kitten's cat Gemini (for all her graciousness at mealtimes, her loving care of everyone including grandkids and taking Ari in paw), Zoe (for teaching me and Ari that Siberian Huskies can be sweet, trustworthy and lovable), Annie the Corgi (for making me laugh), Sascha's new kitten for being adorable, CeCe for getting me to San Francisco, Lisa for helping me feed Skip and a thousand other wonderful things, everyone who's ever cheered me on, CeCe for getting me to San Francisco and a thousand other wonderful things, Lisa Polo for helping me feed Skip and a thousand other wonderful things, Charlotte Herczfeld, Deborah Secor and Johannes Vloothuis for teaching me, all my friends for being my friends, Big Cat Rescue for existing, San Francisco for being my home and of course Ari himself, my devoted furry Muse who sheds so many Cat Hairs of Inspiration on me.

I like thinking of Thanksgiving as the day to thank everyone who deserves it. That list is too short by far, those are just highlights. My life is so rich and filled with joy because my list is too big to work out in full detail! Love you all! If you're not named it's because I shortened it, not because you're not on the list.

I haven't started writing yet for today, but that's the up side of not going to a happy family Thanksgiving. I ate takeout, had a bath and presented my beloved Ari with a huge serving of "Solid Gold Katz 'n Flocken" cat food, his top favorite in all the world. Okay, it's the same food he gets all the time, but it is also his top favorite in all the world. He purred and thanked me and chowed down on it with great enthusiasm. Then ran around playing with his catnip mice and jingle balls like a giant sweet silly kitten.

Now I'm off to fictional San Francisco that may be in the past (not sure on the year the book is set in or that sure it matters) to visit some other interesting cats.

Anne McCaffrey died day before yesterday.

In her honor, remembering an author bio that said she had white hair, green eyes and cats, everything else is subject to change without notice... a little white cat with green eyes named Anne became a character in my book.

She has a personality more like my dear feline friend Gemini. I was her favorite waiter for many years until I moved and miss that grateful purr and look. I know she'd have tipped me if she could. She's just that gracious. Her size and build are Gemini's. I know the human Anne McCaffrey would have adored her - how could she resist a telepathic cat with a sweet, gracious attitude and a charming, stubborn ability to take charge of everything around her?

If you have never read Anne McCaffrey's books, she has a lot of telepathic characters in both the Ship who Sang series and the Dragonriders of Pern series. Her dragons had distinctly feline personalities at times.

Anne, thank you for writing all of them. I haven't read all of yours yet, there are still some treats ahead of me. Though you've gone between, you gave the world treasures that never fade. You will always be loved.

These are the Dark Ones. They take the shapes we give them. They live in the places between stories and the pounding blood of our nightmares. They appear where the shadows of your laundry and the stuff piled up on the floor move in the light from outside the curtains.

Sometimes they come when they’re called.

I'm still shaking. It's the first Horror novel that I've ever written and it was tough. I bled with those characters and I feel reamed out - but I did it right. I did it right. I can get back to my happy little Magical Cats novel now. But first I think I need some food, some down time zoning out with TV or reading, a chance to come down from the shock of psychological horror with supernatural stuff cranking up the stakes.