notes & things | 10/6/2024

Steadily, the nights have begun to feel more autumnal. Even with the windows still open, we find ourselves reaching for covers far more frequently and burrowing further down into them. Today, I pulled out the box with Halloween decor and put everything in place for the next month or so, that is, everything that was tucked away (sometimes Halloween decor doubles as all-year-long decor. ) Tonight I closed the window and made a pork chop crockpot concoction that my grandmother used to make and got pretty close to the same flavors (oddly this was a dish my mother did not remember/could not tell me how to make but I remember it vividly.)  

I've been working steadily on the vampire poems and a little on some flash fiction experiments. Also a little on plotting out and the first portions of the thrifting and writing book I've been saying I'm writing, though its much less writing and still more getting my ducks in a row (I guess I have "concepts of a plan" at this point, lol). Like all things, planning only takes me so far and really I should just dive in and see what happens.  

I've been buried in freelance work otherwise, working this weekend steadily on what will likely be some of the last of the Halloween specific things I will be asked to write as we move further into the month. Thankfully, the few Christmas pieces I was assigned have paused. They were causing a whole lot of temporal whiplash, especially the days I was sitting working on them with the A/C humming behind me. I am also hung up again on some chaps that are a bit more difficult in layout, so have been working out the kinks on those and getting the final versions prepared to start printing.  They're a handful of last season's books to get out, as well as the beginning of this year's list. Plus submissions from the summer for the next round that will begin next fall. I've fallen behind on some content things I hoped to make for my own stuff, so will hopefully be able to chip away at them--including some reels I want to make for #31daysofHalloween.  

I am trying not to let the more shortened days make me feel like I am rushing to get things done, but they always do. Meanwhile there are still little bits that are not work---quiet breakfasts, plays, lots of horror movies to get me through a busy month.