Here I sit, at my new black-and-grey keyboard (this is the kind of keyboard necromancers use, though I think they generally use furrier, squeakier mice, or perhaps even rats, and their keys are probably carved of bone rather than plastic-injection-molded). I drink wine, Yellowtail shiraz, my favorite, which happens to be so very nicely inexpensive. It's after midnight, and I've been writing, a bit, on that Rangergirl story. It stands at 7,000 words. Rangergirl and Gilles de Rais are storming Aaron Burr's fort now, insofar as two people can "storm" a fortified stronghold. Pleasant, and I could finish it tonight, but I'm in no rush.

Oh, what a fine night. Today was quite busy at work (issue goes in on Thursday), and the rest of the week will be even busier (until Friday, when it will downshift considerably, for me over in production/assistant editorial, at least). But I left work feeling strangely energized, and I think I may be shaking the bleak malaise that has gripped me for these past many days. (Did you not notice the bleak malaise? Heather did. Only the fact that I got so much good news this past week kept me from wandering around in a blue study, and even so, I was not as elated as you might expect. The heat was getting to me, and my brain chemistry was, for whatever reason, bubbling unpleasantly. I was sad, and anxious for no good reason. But today it was cool, like autumn, and I felt good.)

After work, I came home to my sweet love, who stayed home today to go to the doctor and recuperate from her illness/fall (which the speed-examining doctor thinks might have been food poisoning. Gee, what a brilliant diagnosis! And he made it in under 5 minutes! Extraordinary!). She was feeling perkier tonight, so we made dinner, then went for a nice long walk around the neighborhood. We are surrounded by lovely houses, including one with a tree that has pinwheels all over its branches, and many with beautiful patios on top of their garages, roofs, etc. I've never been particularly fond of the Spanish style of architecture, but some of these houses are winning me over. After our walk, we watched some Angel, and then dove into some cleaning and organizing. We cleaned out two and a half of the huge boxes of random junk behind the couch! You can actually go into the space behind the couch now! We put a throw rug there! It's a huge step toward completely unpacking, and we both felt better with the house a bit less cluttered.

And as I said, I wrote a bit. Productivity feels good, and I don't feel guilt and anxiety about where I am writing-work-wise. I'm doing fine. I mostly always do fine. But sometimes I forget it.

I like feeling good (which is how I usually feel, actually). A glass of wine, a shiny computer, a full belly, purring cats nearby, a wonderful woman sleeping in the next room (this is not, obviously, in order of priority), a 'zine nearly ready to be sent to the printer, 13 hours of music copied to my computer so far and shuffling merrily away, a new novel half-finished, another novel almost ready to be sent knocking on publishers' doors, in the midst of a grand Western adventure story with Historical Personages... everything in the garden's lovely.

(Except the ants that are trying to steal all the cat food, but into everyone's dish a few ants must crawl, after all, after all.)

I'm reading Cigar Box Faust and Other Miniatures by Michael Swanwick for review. It's nice, a bunch of short-shorts, the form for which he is justifiably renowned. I've got a few other galleys laying around, but I haven't decided which of them I'm going to review yet. I'll do that this weekend, I suppose.