miscellany

salem in october

We went to the Salem Haunted Happenings Grand Parade tonight.

Most of my photos are blurry, but some of them are fun anyway.

I think the best part was likely the East Beverly All-Star Lawn Chair Drill Team, as always, but the band playing industrial goth covers of 80s songs was also made of win. I never knew Genesis songs could sound so hardcore.

There were also a number of adorable doggies. Some of them in costume.

And pirates.

And after getting a Pumpkinfest beer, we passed this guy on the way home:

I love this crazy town. A few more occasionally blurry photos are over on my Flickr photostream.

By erin, ago

regularly scheduled kittens

There’s been far too much book excitement around here, and not enough of what is truly the heart of this blog: the kittens.

So, here are the fluffmonsters in their natural habitat, cardboard boxes.

Tessa is actually sitting on even more of the crumply paper. She’s been in there for hours, though, so it must be more comfortable than it looks.

Bucket is managing to sit in the sunshine and in a cardboard box at the same time. Talented, talented kitty that she is.

By erin, ago

tousled & autumnal

It’s autumn! For reals! I have socks on! My coffee was pumpkin flavored this morning! It was iced coffee, but still. Autumn! Oh, how I adore you, season of mists & mellow fruitfulness.

The circus is officially out of my hands. It’s strange, but it’s been a long time coming. So while occasionally glancing wistfully in the direction of the Revisionland Hotel, I’m working on a new novel. Right now it’s grown-up Alice in a 40s noir-inspired Wonderland. I have a couple of languishing works in progress that I probably could have gotten back to, but my brain was craving something new. I’ve written 25k in just over a week. I need to read some more detective novels to get the flavor right, but so far it’s interesting.

And I decided I needed some updated photos of myself, so the boy indulged me in a photo session yesterday. Still getting used to the new camera lens, but after some trial & error, I’m pretty pleased with the results. The best ones are now on the about page, and here’s how the rest of that hair tousle went:

By erin, ago

nine things for the ninth day of the ninth month

  1. I sent my completed revisions back to Agentland last week.
  2. My revisions did not reach Agentland last week, due to the inconsistent wonderment that is the internet. I blame Mercury in stupid, stupid retrograde.
  3. Revisions are safe & sound in Agentland now, for real & for true.
  4. Instead of being a normal person & taking some time off post-Revisionland, I currently have 22k of a new novel that I started last Wednesday. Yeah.
  5. I really don’t know why I didn’t get Florence + the Machine’s Lungs ages ago instead of this afternoon. Am in music love. Reminds me of Bat for Lashes.
  6. Still fooling around with the new camera lens, thus, low-light photo of the statue of Thoth next to the computer:
  7. I wish I’d discovered that BPAL sugar notes smell divine on me years ago, because I feel like I’ve missed out on a lot of lovely scents. I have the 2010 version of Sugar Skull on right now and it’s gooooooorgeous.
  8. Nine things was probably too ambitious, wasn’t it? I just liked the theme, what with the date.
  9. Yeah, I got nothing. Ah well.
By erin, ago

beyond revisionland & also an albino squirrel

I am out of Revisionland for the moment. Beyond Revisionland looks an awful lot like Revisionland, but Septembery.

I spent most of last week finishing & polishing & re-polishing. I’ve lost all perspective, which is usually a sign that I need to stop looking at it for awhile, so it’s gone off to Agentland.

I spent all day yesterday reading Mockingjay. I’m very conflicted about it, and I suspect I’ll be processing my thoughts on it for a good long while. I mostly enjoyed it while I was reading but I just didn’t love it the way I loved The Hunger Games & Catching Fire. I think part of it is the scope. While HG & CF had a lovely, intimate immediacy to the circumstances,  Mockingjay is much more vast, and I’m not sure how well it wears it.

Also, during Revisionland internet hiatus, I got my albino squirrel from Sleepy King.

Because, well, I needed an albino squirrel.

Squirrel photo taken with my new camera lens that just came in the mail today. I’ve been meaning to take more photos & I always get good Salem shots in the autumn, so I figured I’d invest in a new lens. It’s a Canon 50mm f/1.8 II and no, I totally don’t know what it means other than it does that fuzzy background thing I love, and from a few minutes of playing around with it, it takes gorgeous photos of kittens.

This may be the first time I’ve ever caught the Tessa yell on camera.

Still getting used to it, but so far I kind of love it. A few more shots of Tess are over on my oft-neglected Flickr photostream.

In other news, summer decided to have a last hurrah so it is far too hot, and I kind of don’t know what to do with myself now that I’m out of Revisionland. Maybe I’ll take more photos of kittens. Or peek at one of those WIPs that I’ve been neglecting. Or knit. Or something.

By erin, ago