Musings
an Online Journal of Sorts

By Alyce Wilson

A graphic from the upcoming Wild Violet issue

I'm going to keep today's Musing fairly brief, because I still have quite a bit of work to do for the spring issue of Wild Violet.

I might have gotten more accomplished, except that Saturday night I took the evening off to play Confed, the role-playing game created and run by a friend, The Cheshire Cat. I might have stayed home, if it weren't for something I happened to transcribe in my interview with science-fiction author Charles Stross.

I had spoken to Charles Stross when he was a keynote speaker at Philcon in late 2006, and various life events and complications had kept me from transcribing the interview until now. As you might imagine, I feel a certain sense of urgency to finally publish it. I'm also pushing to finish the spring issue before my Dad visits next weekend, so it won't be hanging over my head while we're spending time with him.

But in the interview, Charles Stross said something that made me reconsider taking a break: "Mary Gentle told me some years ago [...] what you've got to do is to put your social life ahead of your working life, because you have friends. They usually have a day job, while they're unavailable for socializing for large chunks of the week. So you fit your socializing around when they're available for socializing. Otherwise, you won't see them. And after all, you can always work whenever you damn well feel like it, if you're a self-employed, full-time writer."

So I marched downstairs and announced to The Gryphon that we were going, because "Charles Stross says we have to." To be technical, I'm not a full-time writer yet, since I still have to do other work to pay the bills, but I do set my own schedule, so the principle is the same.

Here's what I've got left to do for the issue:

• Complete final drafts of my book reviews (four full-length, five capsule reviews).
• Layout the book review pages.
• Edit one article and eight reviews from Serbian journalist Rada Djurica's coverage of the Belgrade Film Festival.
• Layout the Belgrade Film Festival pages.
• Complete a final draft of the "about this issue" blurb.
• Layout the "about this issue" page.
• Proofread Charles Stross interview, my Philly Film Fest pages, the Belgrade Film Festival pages, and the "about this issue" page.
• Check all links and title bars.
• Update the archives page to include the previous issue.
• Update the main index page to link to the spring issue.
• Compose a message for the mailing list, notifying readers the issue is online.

Copyright 2008 by Alyce Wilson

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