Month: July 2010

On my blog for my book Unbelievable, I have a link to Michael Prescott’s blog, which has the tagline, Occasional thoughts on matters of life and death. It’s where I’ve found some of most intelligent and articulate writing on these subjects.

He also writes thrillers, and has a new one out called Riptide. From his bio:

“I was born in 1960 and grew up in New Jersey. My childhood hero was stop-motion animation master Ray Harryhausen, and my early ambition was to create special-effects monsters like the ones in The 7th Voyage of Sinbad and Jason and the Argonauts.”

“I attended Wesleyan University, majoring in Film Studies, then moved to Los Angeles, where I wrote scripts for several independent producers. Only one of these films was produced. I also worked as a magazine freelancer, archival researcher, and editor, and eventually started writing books. I wrote a few horror novels (best forgotten) under a long-defunct name, then authored six titles under the pseudonym Brian Harper before switching to my new identity as Michael Prescott.”

He went to Wesleyan! Some of the best people I know went to Wesleyan (my ex-husband for one, Aly Sujo, and Joss Whedon). So you might want to try Riptide

I don’t know why this didn’t occur to me sooner, but the bird feeder I use has always been a bit of a struggle for the pigeons to feed from. And there’s always something of a battle amongst the pigeons for perch space.

It finally hit me that I should just do away with the feeder altogether and spread the bird seed on the ground. I did this for the first time today (after sweeping up the area first, which I’m now going to have to do regularly). Feeding was very civilized as a result!

Three cups of birdseed was also gone by the time I came back with my camera (approximately one minute later.

I hear it’s going to be a billion degrees today. That kinda sucks. But, I’m off today! I can hide inside all day if I want. Anyway, I’m going to get to work. Morning is my best time for writing.

I took this picture of the Empire State Building peeking through the trees on my way home.

I have tomorrow off. I’m going to use the holiday to work, but still! My work (researching and writing) is fun!! God, I miss my writing life. I can’t wait to get back to it. I will always be grateful to the U.S. Census for giving me a job when I really needed it, but as I was telling one of my Census co-workers, much as I love them (and I do, these people are great) I miss working on my book full-time. Keying in and filing time sheets just can’t help but compare really badly to the research I’m doing now.

For instance, just before leaving for work yesterday I was reading the latest email from an astronomy professor named Dr. Mark Whittle. He’s been helping me understand what he talked about at a presentation at the recent World Science Festival. (Thank you, Dr. Whittle!) I’m tying something he worked on back to something Leonard Bernstein said at a Harvard lecture 40 years ago, and then I’m tying all of that back to singing Mozart, Bach, and others. It was painful having to leave that.

Finney update: Finney is MUCH better. He’s been completely off the pain killers for a few days now and he’s peeing normally. He and the treatment we’re giving him is going to be part of a study about cats with cystitis. So life at Perry Street is SO much better now.

So You Think You Can Dance Update: ALEX. For the love of God. ALEX. I’ve watched that hip hop routine a billion times. If you aren’t watching the show you are really missing something this season.

This is a picture of a a fire I passed by on the way home. It was pretty intense. I wonder what the outcome was. I guess I’ll find out when I walk home today. Unless it’s a katrillion degree out. In which case I’ll be taking the subway.

Holiday tomorrow!!

Remember the red shoes that were sitting out in front of my building?

Well, this time, in the same spot was a pair of blue sneakers. It’s a very tiny mystery, but still. What is with this spot and shoes?

This year the Fourth of July fireworks are on the west side!! I’m going to try watching them by the river, but depending on how many hundreds of thousands of people are there (and the heat) I may retreat to my roof. But I’m excited about what pictures I might get–of the people and the whole scene, not the fireworks.

We get Fourth of July off at the Census. We didn’t get Memorial Day, but we’re close for Fourth of July. I wonder why that is? We have a bunch of vets at the office so it felt kinda wrong that they had to work that day. Although I think they were glad and happy to have the work, so there’s that.