Today’s Odd Thought brought to you by hunger and a food-starved brain searching a mall on a Saturday afternoon.
Monthly Archives: June 2010
BUSK. A piece of whalebone or ivory, formerly worn by women, to stiffen the forepart of their stays: hence the toast, ‘both ends of the busk.’
– 1811 Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue : A Dictionary of British Slang, University Wit, and Pickpocket Eloquence (unabridged) compiled originally by Captain Grose
I have received a few submissions at Facebook for the graphic icon for “Reading Cats,” and I should have the final decision — and a developed icon — by the end of the weekend. Thanks to all of the entrants, and a great looking bunch of felines; for your own safety, may they never learn to read!
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And, without further side-lining, let’s get to what you clicked that link to find: publishing industry professionals offering up their advice and opinions on books, writing, and all things literary! Continue reading
When Dauviere came by Amalgam’s way,
he said he could not leave but could not stay:
forever he was trapped right where he stood,
and then he left the river town for good.
I wrote the Amalgam poems in the mid-1990s while nearly napping under a tree. They were seemingly nonsensical stanzas about a fictional town named Amalgam, its residents, and its larger world. I collected them one-by-one in a word processing file, which I printed and stashed away in a notebook.
In November 2009, I had a dream in which a hit man chased me and a group of “dream acquaintances” deep into the sub-cellar of an abandoned military building. In a room at the base of a rubble-filled shaft, he warned me to “dig up the Amalgam poems and post them.”
This poem completes my compliance with that instruction. I have posted one each Thursday, and now they are exhausted.
“Don’t feed him! If you feed a cat, it won’t catch mice.”
-Things a Hypothetical 19th Century Grandma Would Say
First link of the day comes from Jessica at BookEnds. Following up on a fantastic post by Nathan Bransford about the importance of keeping a “series bible” to keep track of the little details in your fictional world, Jessica explains the difference between a series bible and a style sheet, and why an author should seriously consider developing a style sheet before his or her work goes under the editor’s knife.
I am using that as my intro today because Jessica’s idea hadn’t even occurred to me, even though I do maintain a rough series bible for the Observer Tales. (The releasable stuff, I rework into Observer’s Gloss entries.) Now I have another project!
On to the rest of the links: Continue reading
This week I have begun a variety of summer renewal projects. I have potted 10 new plants in my new place, and have begun a photo catalog of my bookshelves. (I may post these to the blog, if encouraged.)
I have also begun a targeted revision of The Ligan of the Disomus, and a related short story, The Woman Who Wouldn’t Die. Although I do not subscribe to the common wisdom that a work of art is “never finished, merely abandoned,” I am glad that Ligan had not been picked up for publication before I had a chance to sketch out and complete a few short stories in the Observer’s world, and thus work out some larger-scale plot and character development decisions.
But, enough about my writerly life! On to the links from other writers: Continue reading
From The Reshaping of Everyday Life : 1790-1840 (1988) by Jack Larkin:
Just after Chloe Peck was married in Rochester, New York, in 1820, she wrote to her sister of “our family, which consists of 7 persons.” Living and eating together in the Pecks’ establishment were the newly wedded couple and five unrelated men and boys—the journeymen and apprentices of Everard Peck’s bookbinding shop.
Today “family” denotes people bound together by marriage and kinship … but early-nineteenth-century Americans almost invariably echoed Chloe Peck in describing their domestic groups as “families,” suggesting their sense of the household’s functional unity … [Everard] Peck a few years later wrote of his strong sense of responsibility for “the welfare of those connected with us, and the harmony and good order of our family.”
Afterthought: I whole-heartedly recommend this book to anyone who wants to understand the tenor and common details of early U.S. history.
Today is my last day at my day job for a while, so I’m decompressing in anticipation of a week off, otherwise known as my real job of loafing and writing.
(According to Mutiny on the Bounty co-author, James Norman Hall, “Loafing is the most productive part of a writer’s life.” I agree.)
So, instead of a bit of Advice From a Dude, or another short story, I think I’ll close out this Friday with a few “background” links: two from the dark days of the Revolution, one about a Carolina shipwreck, and two food-related links — complete with archaic recipes! Continue reading
igly. See ugsome.
ugsome. horrid, loathsome. Frequent almost to the 17th century; revived by Scott in THE ANTIQUARY (1816): Like an auld dog that trails its useless ugsome carcass into some bush or bracken. … Also ugglesome, uglisome (16th century) … A stronger form of ugly (which Chaucer in THE CLERK’S TALE, 1386, spells igly).
– Dictionary of Early English by Joseph T. Shipley (1955).