I've been very negligent with both of my journals recently, particularly my review journal, sfreviews. My excuse is that I've been very, very busy in the last few weeks. I am not making amends to the journal gods.

I've put a review of the January F&SF on the review journal, although I've already received the February issue (hello?! February?). I can't keep up. I've also got unread issues of Interzone, Black Gate and Aeon, all of which I would love to review. I'm also trying to critique a friend's novel. I need longer days!

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I finally sent of the revised version of The Winter of the Earth to the agent earlier this week. Fingers crossed. I really hope she likes it. It's longer and hopefully better than before. I could do with a break before revising that novel again though. I've done six full drafts and numerous intermediate, minor drafts. I'm getting kind of fed up with it.

Now it's done, though, I've been able to launch into the new novel, The Sleepers. I'm about 5,000 words into it, and it's going well so far. It's more of an adventure than the last one, and I think it'll be more commercial. I'm just about to hit two barriers, though. Firstly, I now need to do some research. I can only put "X", "Y" and "Z" instead of names for so long. I need to know what would be credible and what wouldn't. I'm also at the point where I've set up the main plot thread. It now needs to build up, which is a slow process. Not a lot is going to happen that is dramatic in that plot thread for a few chapters. That means I need to pull in the subsidiary plot thread and make that do the work. I'm not really sure what that thread is, though.

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I'm thinking of making a badge to wear at work that says "I'm only one person". Why is it that all the academics are in my department are allowed to turn down work when they think they've got enough, but the support staff are just expected to do whatever anyone wants to load on them. Since when did I become a contract lawyer? Why am I writing contracts? Maybe it happened at the same time that I became the defacto IT advisor (and, boy, am I not expert on that... I don't know why your computer is doing that. Go ask ISS.) Despite that, I'm making a little progress on the PHP and the MySQL. I at least have an idea how I'm going to be building this content management system I also seem to be doing. (You want me to do the financial projections and your photocopying and to develop a marketing strategy? Why not? My time is infinite.)

Bah. I can't wait for Christmas.

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I stopped off at Morrisons and bought the extended version of The Return of the King on the way to work. I'm pathetically excited. I'm hoping to persuade Steph that we need to watch extras all evening (although I do know we have to go to the supermarket...)

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Hopefully not so long until the next entry, and less moaning in it. If I owe you an email, I'm going to send it soon. Honest.