The Trouble with Vacation

I just had nine days off in a row. And the best part? I only had to use 3 vacation days to make it happen. It was a blissful break, and one much needed and well earned. I ate a lot of great food, rested hard, rocked the family time, and got a decent amount of writing done.

The problem is that this morning I arrived at the office to find 1500 emails waiting for me (that is not an exaggeration). Funny thing is, I'm actually glad to get back into the swing of things.

Happy Monday, QQQEers.

Big Audio Tunage

I'm not really here, because I'm on Vacation, but you can find me at Project Mayhem this morning, sharing one of my favorite holiday songs. If you like Radio Clash, you'll probably dig it.

I'm Back

So ... my sister got married. That's us in the photo. Mostly this will be a post of photos. This is where we were:

And this is the building where we had the dance (inside):

I'm not going to go a whole lot more into the wedding, because my family, and my personal, life aren't really the point of this blog.

More to the point of this blog, I met up with a bunch of awesome writers and bloggers on Sunday night at the Cambridge Common Restaurant. Here's the proof:

This is all of us, including my daughter, Middle Grade Madi, who is a HUGE fan of Anna Staniszewski. Anna brought Madi some awesome swag, and we're all looking forward to her next book!

And all of us without my kid, for privacy purposes.

Madi with one of her favorite authors!

Anna, trying her damndest to be as funny as me.

Heather Kelly and I, which reminds how sad I was Jon Arntson (no link, because he's re-focusing) couldn't come.

Me and Kristen Wixted. Woot! I'm embarrassed to admit I didn't even know Kristen lived in the area, until she commented on Sarah's blog, but I'm so glad she came, because she's just as cool as she looks.

Sarah Fine and I. This is a terrible photo. Just look at the next one instead.

Yes. This one. Sarah was the writer I looked forward to meeting most. Not for any weird reasons you might be considering. Mainly, because she has a book coming out soon that looks like it's right up my alley, but also because we correspond a lot, I've looked up to her for a few years, and it's very exciting to see someone you've known since (almost) the beginning, achieving their dreams.

Other than all that nonsense, it was a wonderful trip (in spite of one travel day of horror), and I'm extremely happy for both my family, and for all my writer friends who have great news occurring in their careers. I'll get on some queries tomorrow, but for now, I need to write.

Summer Vacation Blog Hiatus

Grrr. I suppose the Spanish are due congratulations, and my Azzurri got much farther in the tournament than I expected, but still. Grrr.

Now the pundits are having the conversation of whether this Spanish side is the greatest national team in the history of the sport. I don't know about that, but they did trounce us yesterday, even without Villa or Puyol. I don't think there will ever be a team better than the Brazilians of the 70s, but this Spanish side may be a close second. If they win the next World Cup it will be hard to argue.

Anyway, as you probably noticed from the title of this post, I'm going out of town, and the blog will be shut down until at least Wednesday July 11th. Or maybe I'll try to schedule something for Tuesday the 10th, so I can get two queries in that week, we'll see.

In the meantime, since I know you'll miss me, I wanted to point you to some things you can read, in case you haven't had enough of me already. And seriously, there's no need to read all this crap today, just come back if you need a QQQE fix while I'm gone.

Some of you who've known me longer have probably seen a lot of this stuff, but some of my new readers may not have:

Creative Writing:

Lake Argo, a Fantasy/Sci-Fi vignette, which was published in the Vine Leaves Literary Journal Issue One

The Deafening Silence, a bit of Contemporary Flash-Fiction, which was published in the anthology: Literary Foray, from Static Movement Press

Cubic, a Fantasy/Horror short which was published by Underneath the Juniper Tree

Babysat by the Man in the Moon, a Flash-Fiction memoir, which is unpublished

Dragon on my Back, a piece of Horror Flash-Fiction, which was published in the anthology: Literary Foray, from Static Movement Press

Older Interviews and Guest Posts:

Interviewed by Jessica Bell at The Alliterative Allomorph

Interviewed by A.B. Keuser at her self-titled blog

Gender & Publishing, a guest post for Justine Dell

Best Old Posts:

How I showed a Facebook Scammer what's up

Hold on to 16 as Long as You Can, or Why I Write YA

I should probably stop linking now. Even I'm getting bored. But do me a favor, if you see one you've never read, and you want to visit, be sure to follow the blog it's on, and be sure to leave a comment, a few of those posts are hurtin' for comments!

And have a great week and a half, I'll miss you all dearly!

Japanese Garden at the Washington Park Arboretum

Okay. Finally back to Things I Did on Vacation in Seattle with my Family. Is that title too long? Who cares. It's all about the photos anyway.

If you don't know this by now, I consider myself an Asian-o-phile. My writing includes several things I find awesome about Asian culture, like martial-arts, calligraphy, religion, mysticism, and so forth. I don't know exactly where that love comes from, but it's been there as long as I can remember.

My daughter Kylie is the same, except she is really fascinated by Japan, in particular. She's already taught herself to speak some Japanese, and even write the simplified form (Hiragana and Katakana, as opposed to Kanji, which is the more complicated writing most of us are familiar with).

Anyway, the point is, one of the most beautiful places we visited while in Seattle was the Japanese Garden at the Washington Park Arboretum. They have a real Tea House, which was unfortunately closed when we visited, and a pond that is filled with some of the largest Koi I have ever seen.

Here are some photos:

These lanterns are either iron or stone, I can't remember. They're absolutely beautiful at night, though.

Here come the Koi.

For some reason I couldn't capture one with his mouth wide open. They look really funny if you can.

This lantern was a gift from Seattle's sister city, Kobe, Hyōgo Prefecture, Japan. It weighs three and a half tons, and is hand carved out of granite. It is nearly 200 years old.

That's my daughter, Madison, pouting on the grass. We had a bit of a meltdown that day because we'd been doing so much walking.

Those are turtles, sunning themselves on the rocks. Madison would not believe us that they were real because they literally did not move for hours.

Our camera is shite, and none of us are great photographers, but these pictures turned out okay, don't you think?

If you'd like to know more about the Japanese Garden at the Washington Park Arboretum, please visit the website.

Another (sort of) Sick Day

Well Madison's been running a fever since last night and Kelly has to work a double today so I'm staying home from work again. Then to top things off, Nesta, our puppy, had a big brown accident in the kitchen this morning - so I've been unable to do a normal post.

Thanks for the continued support everyone, and go take a look at last Friday's post, titled CANARY, if you haven't already.

I'll try to post something more meaningful later on today.

Workation

Sorry there won't be any post today and probably not on Monday either. I have to fly back home to handle some business. My pop died recently and the estate is still in probate.

At least I'll get to see some real mountains.