My natural impatience is showing, these days, like a slip I just can’t keep from sliding down. I feel like the universe set me and mine on some sort of divergent path last year, in fact, right about this time–beginning with the apartment fire (still traumatized), then Clarion West (the summer heat is making me wistful for my comrades), then the drunk driver totaling our car, then personal stuff with Chris, then unemployment, then continued unemployment, then, then, then. It’s been an intense learning experience, as times of extended crisis should be, and I feel like we are getting close to the end of it, to a new beginning. But we aren’t there yet and it’s stressing me right the fuck out.

So, please excuse my occasional bouts of radio silence. It’s better for us all, otherwise you’d have to read pages and pages of me agonizing over why.things.don’t.move.faster.because.I.want.them.to and other assorted control issues and irritations.

In other news, and there’s a bunch:
1. My short-short-short, “The Ghost of Henry’s Past” is a finalist in Fantasy Magazine’s May Madness Micro-Fiction Contest. Winner is by reader poll, so I would sure love it if you would go read it, and if you like it, vote for me (and 2 other favorites here). Go on. I’ll sit here while you do.
2. There’s a lot going on at Brain Harvest. If you haven’t read this week’s story, “Snake Eyes,” by Kevin Bishop, go now. I’ll wait again.
You should also vote (more democracy in action!) to choose which story, published in May, will be read by our voice talent for our first ever mini-podcast.
And! Visit the site tomorrow to get all the details on Brain Harvest’s first ever fiction contest. Cash prizes! Celebrity judge! Fame, fortune, adulation, envy!
3. Finally, I sure would love it if you rifled beneath your couch cushions and sponsored me as a writer in the 2009 Clarion West Writeathon. The money goes to keeping the workshop alive, as well as to pay instructors, help students with scholarships, and all kinds of really good causes. I’ve pledged to write a new story each week of the workshop, and to send a special “e-book” of all the raw, ugly, unfinished drafts to all who sponsor me (so be sure and email me and let me know you’ve sponsored).