Jorge Cham nails it. Except my chair is blue and doesn’t come above my shoulders, this could be me with a student. I even look like the professor, except I don’t wear vests. (But I do wear shorts until it snows.)
"Piled Higher and Deeper" by Jorge Cham www.phdcomics.com
FrankenKitty 4 #wewriwar
Frankenkitty
Welcome to Weekend Writing Warriors. This is a sample from my work in progress, “Frankenkitty”, and I hope you enjoy it. It started out as a young-adult superhero book, and well, you’ll see. In last week’s snippet Jenny’s friendship with Amber and Mary grew, and in the midst of the highlight (or low-light) of high-school biology -fetal pigs- she let them in on the secret. Today we begin to see where they’re going with it.
Mary carefully sounded out “Experimente in der Reanimation von abgestorbenem Gewebe,” and then said, “That doesn’t mean experiments in reanimation, does it?”
Jennifer nodded, “Yes it does, Experiments in the Reanimation of Dead Tissue.”
“And the name inside,” Mary continued, “That’s not really Frankenstein, I mean the Frankenstein?”
“It is, my neighbor Mrs. Jones gave them to me. She was his great-granddaughter; these are his lab-notes.”
Amber laughed, “Do you think they’d work?”
“I’d like to try; bring back my cat Mr. Snuffles.”
“That’s not possible; he must have been insane.”
Whatever was there, no matter how ill-conceived or incorrect, wasn’t insane. Amber sat there, slightly stunned, “You know, Jenny, it might just work. ”
This is a work in progress. In other news, I’ve become a booktrope author, but more on that latter. It has meant a change in pen-name. Last Weeks is here and you can read the whole chapter if you’d rather.
I’m also looking for reviewers for my nearly ready book “The Curious Profession of Dr. Craven”
Passage
Passage
Cale Young Rice
A dark sail,
Like a wild-goose wing,
Where the sunset was.
The moon soon will silver its sinewy flight
Thro the night watches,
And the far flight
Of those immortal migrants,
The ever-returning stars.
An Arc
No, not this kind
This kind
My first “real” book, “The Curious Profession of Dr. Craven.” is in the final throes of production with booktrope. (You can see the kind of company it will keep at runawaygoodness. So we’re talking about a professionally edited and quality work.)
Right now I’m looking for reviewers. That means I’m giving away, yes free – though I want a review, advanced copies, or ARC’s. If you’d like one please fill out this form.
It’s a sweet romance set vaguely in the regency, definitely in the towns that are now London suburbs, and certainly a dashed good read. Any book that starts with grave robbing and the heroine waking up on the hero’s anatomizing table can’t be all bad.
Garden Under Lightning
It’s been raining, constantly. Time for a poem about spirits.
Garden Under Lightning
Leonora Speyer
(Ghost-Story) Out of the storm that muffles shining night Flash roses ghastly-sweet, And lilies far too pale. There is a pang of livid light, A terror of familiarity, I see a dripping swirl of leaves and petals That I once tended happily, Borders of flattened, frightened little things, And writhing paths I surely walked in that other life— Day? My specter-garden beckons to me, Gibbers horribly— And vanishes!
Autumn Thoughts
Aster seed puffs.
Hoar-Frost
Amy Lowell
In the cloud-grey mornings I heard the herons flying; And when I came into my garden, My silken outer-garment Trailed over withered leaves. A dried leaf crumbles at a touch, But I have seen many Autumns With herons blowing like smoke
Across the sky.
Serenity
Serenity
Edward Rowland Sill
Be still,—be still!
Midnight’s arch is broken
In thy ceaseless ripples.
Dark and cold below them
Runs the troubled water,—
Only on its bosom,
Shimmering and trembling,
Doth the glinted star-shine
Sparkle and cease.
Life,
Be still,—be still!
Boundless truth is shattered
On thy hurrying current.
Rest, with face uplifted,
Calm, serenely quiet;
Drink the deathless beauty—
Thrills of love and wonder
Sinking, shining, star-like;
Till the mirrored heaven
Hollow down within thee
Holy deeps unfathomed,
Where far thoughts go floating,
And low voices wander
Whispering peace.
Christmas Cake.
Christmas Cake is one of our family traditions, brought over from the “Old Country.” Well not so old, as we have current connections to England. It’s a solid good Fruitcake. By English standards, we’re too late. Should have set this up a year ago for proper aging.
In any case here’s the recipe:
- Cream 2/3 cup butter or margerine. Add 2 cups sugar and 2 tablespoons molasses. Cream.
- Add 5 eggs, one at a time. Then turn the mixer up and cream the lot.
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It should look like this. Then add:
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Add a couple of pounds of candied peel, a cup of raisins and a pound of candied cherries. |
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After mixing, it will be rather stiff. You’ll need to stir it with a spoon. Traditionally everyone in the house should take a turn giving it a stir. |
| Then put it in a greased springform pan. The beer can is for scale. |  |
| Bake at 350F (200C) until done. It might take 1-2 hours or more. I often leave it overnight, after turning the oven off. It should look like this: |  |
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Poke holes in it, and then “feed it” with about 1/2 cup of brandy. Cover it with foil and store in a cool, dark place to mature. I’ll feed the cake every two weeks or so until Christmas. |
FrankenKitty 3 #wewriwar
Frankenkitty
Welcome to Weekend Writing Warriors. This is a sample from my work in progress, “Frankenkitty”, and I hope you enjoy it. It started out as a young-adult superhero book, and well, you’ll see. Last week’s snippet introduced two new friends, Amber and Mary. This week Jenny makes an important decision – to take up medicine. Her friendship with Amber and Mary grows, and in the midst of the highlight (or low-light) of high-school biology -fetal pigs- she lets them in on the secret.
Dissecting the pigs was a two-week long dive into the smelly gross insides of a preserved animal. The smelly preservative didn’t easily wash off, and Jennifer’s little brother took to wrinkling his nose and teasing her about it at dinner time. She replied by wiping her hands in his hair; this was, if anything, even grosser, but at least the smell of little brothers washed off.
It wasn’t until halfway through the pig that Mary and Amber noticed something very unusual about Jennifer – she really knew her anatomy. There were details that even Mr. Jefferson missed when he walked around the groups brave enough to dissect, that she would point out.
“Jenny,” Mary asked, “where did you learn this, and don’t tell me study hall; we were all doing math last time.”
Amber concurred, “I was helping you with consecutive number problems.”
“I have this book, these books, at home; they’re all about anatomy, and um,” she paused, “a few other things as well.”
“Can we see them?”
Jennifer couldn’t say no to her friends.
This is a work in progress. In other news, I’ve become a booktrope author, but more on that latter. It has meant a change in pen-name. Last Weeks is here and you can read the whole chapter if you’d rather.
Country Lane in the Fall.
To Autumn – Keats
Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness,
Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun;
Conspiring with him how to load and bless
With fruit the vines that round the thatch-eves run;
To bend with apples the moss’d cottage-trees,
And fill all fruit with ripeness to the core;
To swell the gourd, and plump the hazel shells
With a sweet kernel; to set budding more,
And still more, later flowers for the bees,
Until they think warm days will never cease,
For summer has o’er-brimm’d their clammy cells.
Who hath not seen thee oft amid thy store?
Sometimes whoever seeks abroad may find
Thee sitting careless on a granary floor,
Thy hair soft-lifted by the winnowing wind;
Or on a half-reap’d furrow sound asleep,
Drowsed with the fume of poppies, while thy hook
Spares the next swath and all its twined flowers:
And sometimes like a gleaner thou dost keep
Steady thy laden head across a brook;
Or by a cider-press, with patient look,
Thou watchest the last oozings, hours by hours.
Where are the songs of Spring? Ay, where are they?
Think not of them, thou hast thy music too,–
While barred clouds bloom the soft-dying day,
And touch the stubble-plains with rosy hue;
Then in a wailful choir the small gnats mourn
Among the river sallows, borne aloft
Or sinking as the light wind lives or dies;
And full-grown lambs loud bleat from hilly bourn;
Hedge-crickets sing; and now with treble soft
The redbreast whistles from a garden-croft,
And gathering swallows twitter in the skies.
R. Harrison, Creative Enterprises 