The Witching Well

One of the things I like most about working for a university is the fact that the campus shuts down between Christmas and New Year’s Day. It’s one of those lovely little perks you get in exchange for putting up with the lower pay of the not-for-profit sector, and unlike tuition remission (for you, your spouse or your dependant kids), everyone gets the benefit.

Even those of us who actually do have to work during Intersession.

Those of us who support the admissions cycle have to deal with the fact that we’re staring at the January 1 application deadline for next fall’s freshman class, and there’s no way we can just not show up for a week. But we can show up in ratty old sweats. And we don’t have any meetings to interrupt the day, so we actually get things done. And we get comp time later on. Like when the weather is nicer, or we actually have things to do. It’s like tacking 4 extra vacation days onto te 4 weeks I already get each year.

Did I mention I get to wear sweats?

I think the answer may simply be “why not?”

The World’s Highest Website.

Why is it that I always find something I’ve been looking for (1) after I’ve given up actively trying to find it, and (2) when I really can’t justify buying it?

I stumbled across this while looking for information on a completely different weapon: Fighting with the Quarterstaff.

Last week, my husband left his assistant curator position at the Museum of Science, Boston, and today he starts as the new Curator at the Andover Historial Society. Andy’s been working in natural history for a few years now, but his undergrad work was in and his primary interest has always been history. So very exciting stuff indeed. Go, Andy! Yay!

Of course, this is also going to be a transition for me. I’ll be spending more time on the train, for one thing, now that he’s not working in Boston, too. But that also means I’ll be getting more reading done. Which is not a bad thing.

Go, right now, over to Asimov’s and read Connie Willis’s Inside Job.

This is the game of Lost. It costs no money. All you have to do to play is sign up and invite others to sign up, too. Like a pyramid scheme, only not, you know, illegal.

Here’s my Lost invite to you: http://www.lost.eu/e84d. Go on, click it. You know you want to.

via Whistling in the Dark.

I’m wondering how hard it would be to make a flintlock explode in someone’s hands. You know, in a really bad way. And I wonder how much damage it would do. Time to do some research. Yay, research!

We have a houseguest. Our friend Kate is in town from Providence for a local theater gig and is crashing with us for the week. Consequently, we did nothing but housework over the weekend. Our apartment is cleaner than it’s been in months, and I’m feeling guilty now because I haven’t touched my novel in three days.

I suppose the fact that three days away feels like forever is a good sign, though. It means I’ve developed of a routine regular enough that I notice when it’s disrupted. And I’ve been making enough progress that I don’t actually dread facing the keyboard. I may not have figured out yet how I’m ultimately going to handle my psychotic killer with the pharmacological Gift, but at least I’m getting him and most of my other major characters along the road to where they need to go. A bunch of them have just walked into a dangerous situation in which a lot of blood is going to be spilled (my fist big fight scene — be afraid, be very afraid) and at least one of them is going to be severely injured (maimed, actually). Even the psychotic will be unhappy with this one. Which is good, as he’s been having too much fun lately anyway.