Mortaine’s Blog

The ocean yesterday was “surgey.” In SCUBA class, we learned that this means there’s a lot of back and forth movement below the water’s surface as the waves come and go.

So last night, I dreamed I was a woman in Scandinavia (not sure when: not modern, but not completely caveman days either), trying to fight the ocean to keep from losing people from her community. So, she/I waded out into the surging waves and used ropes to guide people to shore if they ended up in the water. This was all in some kind of cavern– at sunset, the cave closed off and the violent water stilled, but at dawn, the cave opened and the water surged in and the cycle repeated.

There were a few times where I had to fish dead bodies out of the water– not only had they drowned, but the force of the water had broken all their bones. They were bleached white and bloated.

At various points, people from the community would come by and see the women fighting the waves and admire their courage and stamina. It was really amazing to see these women fighting against an impossible force of nature and, if not “winning,” at least not really succumbing, either.

I often have dreams involving the immense destructive power of water. I’ve dreamed about walking along Lake Michigan from Evanston to Chicago, using the piers as a shortcut. I’ve dreamed about immense tidal waves leaping to shore destroying everything in their path. Sometimes, I’ve dreamed I was present when the wave hit, sometimes I was on a boat being tossed around. Sometimes I dream that the water is going to hit, or it hit once and will return soon, and everyone is trying to get away before the barriers on the shore all break away.

It’s interesting that I don’t spend much time at the beach, yet I never want to live more than a few miles away from it, and it fascinates my imagination in ways that I can’t fully express in words. Perhaps I need to spend more time in the water.

Today is the Boston Marathon.

I find it absolutely bizarre that I noticed. Truly indicative of my mental orientation these days.

I missed my March audible.com downloads. Whoops. I feel really dumb about that. I even thought about it just before bed last night, but I decided the credits would still be there in the morning. My mistake– they don’t roll over. I have to use them each month. But they’ll give you a one-time credit for a missed month of downloads; I’ve emailed them asking for them, since I was dumbass and forgot to use them. Meanwhile, I’ve already used my April credits on The Gunslinger (Dark Tower 1, Stephen King) and The Alienist (Caleb Carr: a suspense/mystery). I also want to take advantage of the free downloads on audible (a couple of Everest hikers and the 9/11 hearings).

Note to self: Package half.com order to ship tomorrow. Also, check Asimov’s/Analog/SF&F mags subscriptions for renewal dates. See PeanutPress for buying them on Palm.

is not here today, and I brought my lunch to work.

Didn’t get any writing done this week. I did a little writing last week, but not much. Only some on Thursday. This week: will do more.

Finally got the Memos to sync on my Clie. For some ass reason, the To-Dos won’t sync now, either. Whatever. I keep 4 to-dos, and I never do any of them.

Worked on the Rejections scrapbook today. That was fun. Got “To Name a Beast” title page finished and the rejection slips pasted in. Someone from BIAW suggested using quotes from famous writers on their rejections as sidebar content for the book. Not a bad idea.