[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. Coffee warming in the microwave. Need caffeine. Idiot woodpecker wanted to share the word about his dread lord Woody at 545 this morning. Joys of living in the brush.
Brighter side, just had a tiny bunny hop past my window a minute ago. Haven’t had buns around here in a while (coyotes and hawks).
Summer has begun. This weekend, accompanying the Fabulous Publisher Babe™ to one of her in-person sales events in Kent (Nerd Fest) to help her sell books and generally hang out. I’m getting better about peopling, but lemme tell you, I’ve gotten a little feral these days.
Hard time for creative artists. Average people have fallen in love with how easy AI makes it to create art and books, without ever asking where those machines learned. The folks responsible stole everything and didn’t pay a cent for the copyright infringement. Imagine me walking into your house and emptying the refrigerator, then leaving. That’s that AI is to writers and artists.
Known several folks who have seen their sales tank bad enough that they’ve had to go back to work. I live in fear of it, but that doesn’t pay the bills. If you use AI, understand that I consider you among the lowest forms of thief. You should stop. Or walk away from being around me. Either or. I’ve walked away from folks who were excited to tell me how they used AI to “write” their book and publish it. Last person, I’ve stayed in touch with since 1987. Won’t be talking to him again. Possibly ever.
I write. That involved thinking words up and putting them down, then selling them to people. How much effort did you put in?
Yeah, grumpy.
Past the quarter mark on Corsac Fox 8. Writing this one kinda into darkness, by setting up a scenario, populating it with some interesting characters and ideas, then letting them take me places instead of having a plot. All I know at this point is length. And got lots of story to fill to get there,
Also started the fifth Mick story. You’re getting #1 tonight, some of you. The Warrior In The Garden. Been slowly worldbuilding this out as I go, and have some interestingly dark places to take Mick, because Corsac Fox tends to be lighter and I just finished the Urban Fantasy about a thief and his Marxist Awakened Goat sidekick. Not exactly sober and serious literature, as you can guess.
Not a lot of news past that. Summer has started and that’s a mental and emotional transition for most US-ians. Since I don’t have kids in school or dayjob, it tends to blur, save that I’m mowing a lot right now until the dry season arrives in a month.
Y’all have fun and remember to read Thrill Ride Magazine (Assassins and Vigilantes just dropped) and Boundary Shock Quarterly (Space Westerns coming July 1). Keeps me off the streets, ya know.
shade and sweet water,
b
West of the Mountains, WA
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