The Book
The other day I made contact with my book’s future physical existence and all is good. We are talking about next year and I feel like that deadline is very doable.

I decided I didn’t want to design my own book, only because I am not a book designer, I am good at designing and drawing posters but to design a book and cover would mean having to learn a bunch of new software and I don’t want to do that right now. I want to get this one finished, edited and in the hopper so I can immediately jump into the nearly finished second book.

On Scrivner, I made my last three folders, the current folder I am working on, the next folder which is the last chapter, and the epilogue folder. I didn’t realize just how emotional I would feel.

Tonight I am working on 1894. The closer I get to the end, the longer it seems to take. The other night I wrote about the death of someone who is quite...

The weather has been going back and forth between chilly winter cold, hail, rainstorms, drizzle, fog, mist and then suddenly the sun will come out and it starts to look like spring and back again. This will go on probably until April, maybe May. I am already dreading the summer, especially now that everyone seems to have decided the Pandemic is over. I’m staying inside all summer.

The Book
I am still using Merve on YouTube to keep me focused and it is still working. I tried a few others but I get the feeling some are just attention seekers. I don’t even think some of them are actually working or studying. I don’t want to see their faces, and too many of the “Study With Me” think their face on my screen squinting into their screen is helpful, I can tell you from experience, it is not.

Right now I am nearly done with 1890, I have this last section to tidy up. It is pretty much already...

I try to keep abreast of all the news while at the same time purposefully trying to avoid the corporate media bullshit. This includes all cable news, and all social media. My one saving grace has been a newsletter called Letters from an American by Heather Cox Richardson over on Substack. It is refreshing to read about what is going on in the news without all the hyperbole and added clickbait.

Just putting this out there for no reason: I hate talking on the phone.

The weather has been glorious. It has been pretty much non-stop rainy cold dreary gray days and pitch black dark and stormy nights. We had an intense ice storm the other day, more like raining hail that sounded like bullets hitting my windows and then the sun came out. Then it started raining and then the wind picked up.

This type of weather usually starts around the end of September and doesn’t let up until maaaaaaybe...

The Book
So I got to thinking about it, and ended up moving a whole bunch of stuff that used to be in Book II back into Book I again, and then moved even more stuff back into Book II.

And I also moved that one body part section I was so excited about working on back into Book I , so no Book IV. Since I removed so much from Book I, now I have plenty of room to add this section.

Technically I’ve been working on Book I and Book II simultaneously for six or seven solid years now and yesterday, it felt like everything finally fell into their proper places.

I originally wanted to just cram everything into one mammoth book. And then after having no choice but cleaving it in two, I am pretty happy with how I was able to get two solid books out of it, one is the beginning and how it all started and the other is a continuation but with a lot more photos from the collection.

The research for...

With everything going on in the news, it has been hard to stay focused. I am only allowing myself 3 hours of Internet time, and zero social media - everything else is devoted to “book time.”

I love my writing rituals so much, every single day I am at my computer writing. When I get up, I eat the exact same breakfast I’ve been eating for a few years now: Sliced cherry tomato with pearl mozzarella, pickled cauliflower with sliced up cucumbers, about a 1/3 cup of grits w/ cinnamon, and a glass of Green veggie Drink. Then I read the news, articles, essays, journals, and after I am sufficiently sick of people on the Internet, I start getting my writing beverages ready.

One tall glass of ice water, one tall glass of iced latte (3 shots espresso), one cup of strong coffee with a tiny bit of 2% milk. Then I load it all on a tray and carry it upstairs to my studio, and this is the exact moment...

The Book
Back in October, I read something I didn’t agree with and started researching this delicious morsel of information, because it related to a topic in my book. I needed to know if what I read was true or not. I didn’t believe it was true.

For months I went on this wild-goose chase and the longer I searched, the more I had a sinking feeling that it either never happened or that there wasn’t really enough information there to confirm that, no matter how much I wanted it to have happened.

When I research, I research. Endlessly, obsessively, hours and hours of searching, using different words and phrases and spellings, searching for articles in old newspapers, newspapers in different languages, old books, old magazines, clippings, letters, websites, authors, museums, libraries, chamber of commerce, anything I can find until I feel I truly felt like I had come to the bitter end of...

When did things become so beige?
Everyone seems to be ok with vanilla, beige, banal, homogenized and normcore, it seems to be everywhere now.

And when did “book publishing day” turn into a Wedding Day event? I only ask because the book pre-order ritual has turned into the book industry’s very own version of the Wedding Registry.

1885
I am still slogging my way through 1885, and like everyone else, I have been preoccupied and keeping an eye on the news, but I am only allowing myself 3 hours of doom-scrolling and then I shut it off.

Because of Covid-19, the internet has turned into our main source of connecting with one another, which can be a blessing but unfortunately, it is also detrimental for any type of creativity to sustain itself, especially writing.

Recently, I found myself craving a sort of anonymous virtual artificial creative working companionship to keep me company...

As I watch this dystopian nightmare play out on my devices, everything feels like real-life Black Mirror.

First, the weather report:
It is really really dark here on the Oregon Coast. I see a few of my neighbors lights on, otherwise it is quiet and very dark.

The Big Dark has officially arrived.

The rainy season is here. As soon as it gets dark outside I am ready to get to work. Bonus if there is a windy rainstorm.

On the Oregon Coast, there are a few different shades of dark.

• Summer Twilight Dark
• Autumn Midnight Dark
• Winter Black Hole Dark <- - - - we are here
• Spring Grey/Gray Dark

I heard an owl hooting - and much to my extreme delight, I just heard a response. A call and response, they are communicating in a language that is millions of years old.

Right now, I am currently in my element that works best for my mental health and creative output. The summer hell-scape...

“A paranoid is someone who knows a little of what’s going on. ”
― William S. Burroughs

“Nobody owns life, but anyone who can pick up a frying pan owns death.”
― William S. Burroughs

“Silence is only frightening to people who are compulsively verbalizing.”
― William S. Burroughs

“I don’t care if people hate my guts; I assume most of them do. The important question is whether they are in a position to do anything about it.”
― William S. Burroughs

“The first and most important thing an individual can do is to become an individual again, decontrol himself, train himself as to what is going on and win back as much independent ground for himself as possible.”
― William S. Burroughs

“When you stop growing you start dying.”
― William S. Burroughs

“There is nothing more provocative than minding your own business.”
― William S. Burroughs

“Never do business with a religious...