Weekly Update - 11/20/24

As go the seasons, so do the days of our lives.

That is to say, mercurial and difficult to figure out, even under the best of circumstances. The weather here in NorCal has been cold and rainy, which is certainly better than the option of snow that we have across much the rest of the globe. But I keep thinking back to that bit from 'Groundhog Day,' where Bill Murray says, 'It's going to be cold, it's going to be gray, and it's going to last you for the rest of your life...' It's probably not that, but it's been the first two for a while that the third seems a definite possibility.

I shifted some stuff around based on what I was feeling and what I wasn't, and returned to Phil's Tale before posting the second part of Selected Servicing for alpha readers, and a reminder that'll be available to all Patrons next month. I'm still working on some commissioned stuff, but I threw up a poll for what I'll do for next Friday, i.e. the day after Thanksgiving, a.k.a. Black Friday. That's part of the VIP perks level. Those Patrons have until noon PST on Sunday to vote, and tell me what they want a new chapter of. I'm aiming to have a new Brewster's for Friday or Saturday. I was trying to get one done last week, but I've learned some days fighting against the muse is like trying to jump up Niagra Falls. Usually I can finagle a way, but sometimes I just write what's on my mind and let the stories flow that way.

And next week's my birthday. 50 is only a couple more years around the corner, so that's... a thing. I remember being in my early 20s, being convinced I was going to be a war correspondent and dead before I turned 30, my face getting blown off in a remote battle of some war nobody had ever heard of. But my life took a different path. No living fast and dying young for me. No wife and kids either, I suppose, or at least, not for now. Every time I dabble with one of the dating apps, I get someone trying to rope me into a BitCoin scam, which, hilariously enough, I never fall for, but I still often try and string them along for as long as possible, for my own amusement.

Tomorrow or Friday I'm going to do one of my quarterly 'meat runs,' where I head south over into the mountains and visit a couple of local butchers, fill up an entire cooler full of meat and sausage, and then bring it back to store it in our freezer. I started this tradition almost fifteen years ago, and I try and do it at least a couple of times a year, and always just before Thanksgiving, so I can have a massive turkey sandwich on Thanksgiving Day with the best damn turkey I've ever had in my life. (From Corralitos Market, if you're curious - their smoked turkey is utterly to die for.) I also pick up a bunch of sausages from the Freedom Meat Locker, down in Freedom, CA. (Yeah, I know, I know... the name of the town makes me roll my eyes too.)

We've been having a decent influx of new people as of late, which is nice. If you haven't dropped into the Discord, I highly recommend it, as it's generally on whenever I'm working, and I've been known to answer all sorts of strange and unusual questions, from my musical tastes to how many of the places I mention in my story really exist or not. (Buster's Cheesesteak is absolutely real, and you should absolutely go there, for example.)

My public release schedule for the next few weeks looks like this: 11/23 - FG5, QT:UM2; 11/30 - QT2:25; 12/7 - BTS 11; 12/14 - Captains' Day 2, QT2:i5; 12/21 - Before The Storm 12.

Anyway, enough of my rambling for the week. I've been asked to bring back music for the weekly posts, and someone was asking me about Dragon Ash (who I mentioned in Morgana's Gift) and I'm happy to put some here. My favorite song of theirs, Asanagi Revival, isn't available here, but here's the song that first hooked me on them, "Life Goes On."

Dragon Ash Life Goes On - YouTube