To increase my fun, I'm making a little offer for people who pre-order my chapbook, Show and Tell and Other Stories, from Tropism Press:

1. Pre-order the chapbook.
2. Email me to let me know.
3. Include a postal address.
4. I will send you a doodle.
5. I do not guarantee that it'll be any good, that it'll be suitable for framing, that it'll be worth money someday, that you'll want to keep it.
6. I guarantee that the doodle will be a doodle.

Jason Lundberg requested a robot, so this is what I'll be sending him:

A fish. And a crab. And Cerebus:

Today's doodle:

I put up a bunch of doodles for Tim and Heather to peruse and use in my chapbook, and since they're up there, I figured why not post a public link to 'em.

Warning: The files are big.

Warning: All observation of such things as perspective, anatomy, and rules of composition have been waived.

So. Here's a bunch of doodles.

How come entire days go by and nobody brings me a donut? I'm not even talking, like, a dozen donuts. I'm just talking one donut. It's 2:11 PM my time, and no one has brought me even one stinking donut.

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Monday doodle:



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I don't really need a donut. I've already had lunch. What I really need is a hair cut.

Finishing up Day Job stuff before heading out of town for the long weekend (Vancouver!), so to my fellow Americans, please don't burn the whole country to a crisp with your sparklers and Piccolo Petes.

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Started using nunchuks in class last night. I am so going to knock my own teeth out.

One of the black belts showed me a manuever in which you hop about awkwardly and hold your toe as though it were injured, and then unleash the deadly fury on your unsuspecting opponent. I need to learn that one. I think I'd have much opportunity to use it.

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Friday's doodle started out as an eye and ended up as a fish. I must follow the inexorable exhortations of my soul.

At Blue Heaven, I told Sarah Prineas that I'd never read any of the Miles Vorkosigan books (actually, had never read any Lois McMaster Bujold), and Sarah looked at me as though I'd just sprouted a second head, and it was wearing a dorky hat. But she kindly sent me Young Miles, an omnibus containing two Vorkosigan novels and a novella, and I just finished the first of the novels, Warrior's Apprentice. And Sarah was right -- Miles is a fantastic character. Physically stunted, smart, and hyperactive, he's an enormously fun and engaging protagonist who protags his ass off through this book. Absolutely perfect summer reading.

I also recently read Jenn Reese's chapbook from Tropism Press, Tales of the Chinese Zodiac. I was a fan of these stories when they appeared in Strange Horizons, and the new framing material and two new tales are very nice additions.

And also from Tropism Press, I've been going through the fiction in the latest issue of the fine zine Flytrap. I was particularly fond of Barth Anderson's and Meghan McCarron's stories, but every piece in this issue features a strong, unique voice. These are stories that could only be written in the way they're written by the writers who wrote them.

And finally, Tim and Heather, the keepers of Tropism, continue to send me a few flash pieces per day as we work on our short-short collab, which is turning my email in-box into my favorite fiction venue of the moment.

Reading. Good.

And here's a bird I doodled:

I seem to be capable of only small yet satisfying creative endeavors this week. I've written three flash pieces over the course of the last three days, which ain't much, but dang it all, it's fun. We're still not sure exactly what we're going to do with them once they're all done, but with some creativity, it is possible to find good homes for flash, either by linking them up and selling them as a single piece, or finding cool markets like Escape Pod that take flash-length stuff. And even if some of them never get sold, they're still ridiculously fun to write, and ridiculous fun is what it's all about.

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I am in wardrobe denial. I am dressed today as though it were October, in one of my favorite long-sleeved tees with a t-shirt underneath. This happens to me every summer, but usually not until August or September. It probably has something to do with the grey, monsoony skies. Come mid-July and I'm probably going to be wearing a jacket. I am going to die because I couldn't not wear a jacket. That's pretty stupid. Arizona summers are pretty stupid.

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Tuesday's doodle looks pretty wired: