Well, today I celebrated by 31st
birthday by, well, goofing off a little! I had planned to put in a
full day's work today, but it didn't happen. One chapter instead of
two; still, three days solid work should see this first book done,
and I reckon that isn't a small thing. I think I've pretty much
decided not only that I'm going to immediately to the second Alamo
book, but that I'm going to make it four and two. That isn't
absolutely certain at this point, but I'm leaning that way. I already
have the plot of the next one firming up in my mind, and I think I
should probably take full advantage of that if I can. The current
idea is that I take a few days off after finishing this one, then
plough right into the second – you can be sure that I will
chronicle this on my blog.
The Enterprise Experiment is coming to
an end after two episodes. Last night I watched an episode where
nothing happened. Literally. Some aliens had killed some other
aliens, hooked them up to a machine to steal their precious bodily
fluids (I dub them Ripperites) and the Enterprise crew...turned up.
Had a look around, left, then Captain Archer – who seems to have
decided that all decisions must take at least a day to make and have
little basis in reason – turned around and started a Quincy-style
investigation. Then the bad guys turned up, Doctor Thermian told him
that humans had the same precious bodily fluids, and they cried for
help to yet another alien ship which turned up. Sigh. There was some
rubbish about a slug, and Ensign Sato learned a valuable life lesson
while throwing gobblegook at an alien. (She apparently is better
capable of translating previously unknown languages on the fly than a
computer. Science!!!) So, that's that.
I will start another experiment shortly
instead. Right now I'm in the middle of preparing for a new Labyrinth
Lord campaign, starting in a couple of weeks time (I've been getting
the itch to run again for a little while, and this is one that I
haven't ever properly run) so that's occupying quite a bit of my
'not-writing' time...as is the Kerbal Space Program, about which more
tomorrow, but once that's set up I'm going to start some researching.
My library, as anyone who knows me will testify, is a bit bonkers. I
have shelves on the history of spaceflight, on Early American Wars,
on the Russian Civil War, on Polar Exploration, Roman History...it
goes on like that. As part of my ongoing 'bring order to chaos'
personal campaign, I intend to pick one topic a month and work on it.
This will mean reviews for the blog, probably thoughts that I might
write up in essay format...heck, I've wanted to have another go at
that damn dissertation since I discovered the bloody thing. I'm a lot
better writer and researcher now. I suppose, ten years on, I damn
well should be, but I want to be a historian again. Been too long.
(There is the possibility that a couple of books might come out of
this as well – I've been wanting to write my 'history of the space
race' for ages. And I don't think a good one-volume Russian Civil War
has ever been written. I probably should learn Russian first for that
though...which is on my to-do list, actually.)
Hmm...what else? I had a splendid
birthday today, I should really flag that!!! A fantastic meal, great
bundle of gifts, but more important than either of those the good
wishes of a lot of great people. That's the main thing...in most
ways, that's the only thing. I got to read the last Lost Fleet book –
except that I hope it isn't the last. Detailed review to follow, but
the gist is that it is a good book as part of a series, but doesn't
really feel as if it caps off any of the ongoing threads that we
really care about. I've been acting under the assumption that it is a
trilogy, but I really hope that it isn't the case and there is
another one – or possibly more than one – on the way. When I set
out to write military science-fiction John Hemry/Jack Campbell was
one of my big influences, I'll admit – the Lost Fleet books are my
favourite milsf series of the last decade. Though I really should
start those Kris Longknife books...I think a 'month of milsf' might
be coming up at some point, though I intend to start with 'War of
1812...ish.' Probably.
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