Well…heh…it’s a good thing our trip to Wisconsin was so relaxing and idyllic. As it turned out, we needed all the R&R we could muster to face our return to Los Angeles.
There are a number of reasons my blog dried up and blew away over the past couple of weeks. First and foremost was Jenn’s surgery, which she discusses here; the latest update, for those who haven’t been following along via social media, is that everything went according to plan and she’s recovering nicely. Those of you who know her will not be surprised to hear that she’s hanging tough and battling back.
But we’ve also been disrupted, distracted, and displaced by a domestic disaster. A burst water pipe from the upstairs apartment severely flooded our condo. It happened just after I got home from work on my first day back from the trip, coming down with con crud and already exhausted. Suddenly, water started pouring through our walls, ceiling, out from behind our fridge and through the light fixtures. We mitigated the damage as best we could, but descended over the next several days into a convoluted hell of insurance companies, contractors, lawyers, and hotel rooms. Life has been a twisted skein of logistics, and I’ve logged more freeway miles and phone minutes this month than I usually do in a year.
I could go on about other little disasters that piled up on top of that one. Like the fact that two colleagues on my shift are quitting in the next couple of weeks. Or that I’m basically hemorrhaging money. Or that the Kings’ spirited title defense went down in a valiant sputter (despite the best efforts of money players like Quick, Voynov, and Williams). And for the love of all that’s holy shit, Game of Thrones, season 3, episode 9. I mean, seriously, right?
Despite it all, we’re hanging in there. Jenn’s family has provided invaluable help, taking in our cats and sharing their home. We’ve gotten great advice and support from our friends and family across the country via email, Twitter, Facebook, and MySpace. Wait, no. Not MySpace.
Anyway, it’s been an experience. I’ve ricocheted from Tarzana to Yucaipa to Brentwood to Thousands Oaks and back, non-stop for two weeks. I’m running on fumes, but I’m incredibly grateful to everyone who’s reached out to help us in our time of MASSIVE RELENTLESS STRESS. Thank you, everyone!
And oh yeah, I took it as a point of pride, and of existential defiance, to try and keep positive and productive in light of every frustration. In the midst of this blitzkrieg of personal disasters, I managed to finish the first draft of a startlingly long novella called “The Machine Storms.” It’s a far(ish) future SF tale about a created family whose safe and comfortable existence is jeopardized by extreme weather, rogue nanotechnology, and nefarious greedy villainy. Talk about art imitating life! I started it at Taos, in an ideal writing situation, and finished it while living out of a suitcase during an ongoing crisis. For that, even if it never sees print, this beast will hold a place in my heart.
Related Posts:
Tagged as:
Game of Thrones,
Jenn Reese,
Jonathan Quick,
Justin Williams,
Los Angeles,
Los Angeles Kings,
Slava Voynov,
The Machine Storms,
Wiscon
Necessary Evil (2013) concludes Ian Tregillis’ dazzling Milkweed Triptych, and I found it every bit as great as the preceding volumes, despite life’s every attempt to keep me from reading it. (And there have been a lot, lately!) By the way, this is book three in a series, so…inherent spoiler warning.