20241231

[As usual, three weeks lag here, if you aren’t reading this on my Patreon (https://www.patreon.com/blazeward). If you’d like your news fresher, and the monthly Anti-Stodgy/Redneck Chef newsletter, all I ask is a buck to help keep the lights on around here.]

Tuesday. Having just completed Corsac Fox 7 on a Tuesday, and just realizing that, kinda giggling.

This brings Block One to an end and lets me take some time off and work on other projects. Got a lot coming. Natch.

Couldn’t sleep the other night. Bad reaction to a new medicine involved hard insomnia. Couldn’t turn the brain off. Like, went to bed and got maybe 90 minutes of sleep over the next 9 hours.

Laid there and meditated instead. Learned a long time ago that meditation is almost as good as actual sleep.

Had a concept.

Background: Boundary Shock Quarterly’s next issue deadline is coming up for “Fading Empires” and I have a bad feeling about the number of stories I’ll get. (have 5 stories in hand with a deadline tomorrow.)

Meditating brain goes back to a Mechwarrior campaign 30-odd years ago. Big mess of a thing, but the GM had us all create 4 characters. One pilot, one infantry, one mechanic, one whatever. That let us have battles, missions, all sorts of things. Lots of fun.

I have a spook/thief named Brother John. Crazy SOB. Was once tasked by the head mechanic with finding a large laser, a targeting radar, and a replacement knee joint off a Rifleman mech.

Walks out of camp.

Drives back two days later in a flatbed, with those three things on the back.

Where did you find a dead rifleman to strip for parts???”

Dead? It was supposed to be dead?”

Long pause.

John, where did you leave it.”

Brother John points. “Thataway.”

They arrive to find the pilot superglued to the one working leg of his mech, with no idea how all the parts got detached and put on the truck, and I refused to tell.

That guy.

Fading Empires suggested the Mechwarrior/BattleTech universe of 3025, before the Clans.

Spent all night churning up ideas.

Spent the last couple of days filling a new notes document.

Planning to start writing it tomorrow. First of a new universe, but short fiction first. If I get enough words for BSQ, you’ll probably see it first. It not, it’ll go in there. And a lot of depth to play with, digging and exploring certain horror elements and tech ideas I’ve considered.

And Corsac Fox Block One is done. Need to write Science Officer 16 to round out that trilogy. Got ideas for an Assassin Procedural. Got this Brother Gion thing (changed the names to protect the guilty. Pronounced the same).

Going to go start making day-old lasagna for tomorrow shortly. Literally bake it, let it cool, maybe have a chunk, then warm it tomorrow for dinner. Been doing a lot of cooking lately. More recipes of weirdness coming.

But it’s Tuesday, and my 2024 is pretty much done.

See you on the far side.

shade and sweet water,

b

West of the Mountains, WA

—————————-

Thank you so much for being my patron and for funding these essays!

If you’re reading the free version (which is published three weeks after the Patreon version), please consider joining the ones who do pay at https://www.patreon.com/blazeward. It’s only a buck and helps keeps the lights on around here.