This is what I have to say about last night:

Homemade brownies. Mmmmmmm.....

That pretty much sums it up. :)

My natural work habits ran up hard against the CFS this weekend with my first round of Kat revision. My instinct (formed by many, many years of college final exams!) is to throw myself into that kind of project full-out and work until it is done. That's not just an ingrained habit, it's actually fun when it comes to a project I love - that sense of full absorption, where I'm living and breathing nothing but the novel. Unfortunately, that's just not possible right now, so I've been revising at a much more staid and ladylike pace than I'm used to. Still, I finished all my revisions (in ink, on the paper copy of the manuscript) early this morning, and now I just have to type them all in, forcing myself to take long breaks in-between each session. There have been some good, unexpected side-effects of that system, actually - although I don't have that totally-immersed-and-swimming-in-story feeling, I have found myself thinking of interesting new changes to make between the sessions, because I'm getting a longer time to simmer over all the individual sections of the novel in my subconscious.

Better yet, it meant I got to take time off to bake brownies with Patrick last night! In fact, I'm about to reward myself with a brownie and some loose-leaf Earl Grey tea as soon as I finish this entry. (Rewarding myself for what? Who cares? It's an excuse for a brownie!)

And since I had to lie down and take a break after my first revision session this morning, I read this week's issue of Strange Horizons, and it is wonderful - my favorite in a long time. First of all, there's a great art gallery of Kat Beyer's work, which I love. I met Kat this spring at Wiscon and was blown away by (and totally jealous of!) the fact that she's such an amazing artist AND writer. I love the sense of wonder that fills all of her paintings, but I think my very favorites in this gallery were The Moon's Boat and Treasure Map.

Adding to this week's Strange Horizons goodness, there's a podcast interview with Ben Rosenbaum, one of my Clarion classmates and favorite writers, who's smart, articulate, and funny, and always, always worth listening to.

And Leah Bobet's story The Girl From Another World just...wow. I loved it. Read it!

And now it's definitely brownie time. :)