Thank you, Mom and , for coming over and helping on Friday. It was greatly appreciated. :) Also, I’m glad that you guys got some grandkid time. I will do my best to keep up the kitchen.

Backlog of Horoscopes

For 7 Oct 2009:
TAURUS (April 20-May 20): Is there anything in your life that you don’t really want but nevertheless find it hard to part with? A situation or experience that gives you a perverse sense of comfort because of its familiarity, even though it has a steep emotional cost and doesn’t serve your higher dreams? If so, the coming week will be an excellent time to change your relationship with it. You will make dramatic progress if you brainstorm about how you could break up the stagnant energy that keeps you entranced and entrapped.

For 14 Oct 2009:
TAURUS (April 20-May 20): Right now you’re like a sulking cherry tree that hasn’t bloomed for years but then inexplicably erupts with pink flowers in mid-autumn. You’re like a child prodigy who lost her mojo for a while and then suddenly recovers it when her old mentor comes back into her life after a long absence. You’re like a dormant volcano that without any warning spurts out a round of seemingly prophetic smoke signals on the eve of a great victory for the whole world.

For 21 Oct 2009:
TAURUS (April 20-May 20): My friend Alcea, the pagan priestess who leads group rituals, is a responsible sort who has humble respect for the power of the spirit realms. She thinks there can be value in seeking help from the beings who dwell on the other side of the veil, but you’ve got to be careful. They can be as clueless and misguided as the less evolved characters who live on the material plane. That’s why Alcea is especially impeccable around this time of year, when the veil between the worlds is thinner and our dimension is more accessible to the spirits. Having said all that as a caveat, Taurus, I want to let you know that this would be an excellent time for you to call on the help of your most intelligent, interesting, and loving ancestors.

For 28 Oct 2009:
TAURUS (April 20-May 20): In my ideal version of Halloween, we wouldn’t scare ourselves with images of ghoulish skeletons, eyeballs floating in cauldrons, and hissing, three-headed snakes. Rather, we’d confront more realistic fears, like the possibility that the effects we have on the world are different from our intentions . . . or that we have not yet reached our potential . . . or that people we like might completely misread and misunderstand us. Then Halloween would serve a more spiritually useful purpose. It would bring us face-to-face with actual dangers to our psychic integrity, whereupon we could summon our brilliant courage and exorcize the hell out of them. Costume suggestion: exorcist. (Begin by exorcising yourself.)

We did Trick-or-Treating in Howell again this year. Instead of hoofing around the premanfuactured housing community like last year, we went closer to downtown Howell, where and her sisters lived for a time. I was really proud of Hunter for not complaining about being tired (Mr. Can’t Stop Moving – tired? Nah!), but masks are out for him for next year. That’s two years in a row of insisting on a costume with a mask, and then doffing it within ten minutes of candy-gathering. I have a feeling that will finally get her wish of using makeup to make him something ultra gory. Haul status = minimal. Less than the community from last year. Apparent kid fun status = huge. So, all in all, total success.

Have I mentioned how beautiful some of the houses in Howell are? No? Well, they are.

Got the last bit of Chapter 6 from The Glass Crown typed up on my lunch break. I still think that diners are one of the best places to work on writing projects. It’s now off to the Alpha Readers. Also got the next five pages worth of art from Rick for Fight or Flight, and wow. Just wow. Once again, I have to say how lucky I am to be working with such a talented artist.

I have this unsettling feeling in my stomach. I don’t know if it’s the time of year, and the natural change in the air, or if it’s something I should be paying closer attention to.

I miss my little nemesis.