AETW: 326
Dreaming the Dance: 349

Well, yesterday turned out pretty well in the end. I got home from Spinners (which went okay; mixed reaction to “The Rising”, and apparently no-one reads magic realism) to find I’d won First Prize in the Hoot Island Flash contest. It’s not the Grand Prize, but still spiffy. I won Suzy Bright’s book on writing erotica, which I’d considered buying anyway, so it’s kind of like money in my pocket. This was a contest for 100-word funny masturbation stories. It’s not like I invested much time into it.

And, there’s a new publisher at Silver Lake Publishing and they want to re-sign “…Of Human Sacrifice and Parents’ Tears” for a re-released of The Witching Hour anthology. Spiffy.

Today I’ve done a bit more food shopping so we have meals for a few nights, and done computer stuff. I need to get some writing done before I go to pick Ken up at LAX. We’re going to Versailles for dinner—yum!

Drat and blast. I just got one of those damned-with-faint-praise rejections from Weird Tales for, of all things, “Proof of Devotion”: “Alas, not for us. The story is indeed _good_; were we monthly (or even bimonthly) we’d probably buy it. Since we’re not, and the story’s not completely irresistible, we have to pass—this time. May we see your next one?” The funniest part is, this is the third rejection from them in rapid succession, because I’d sent them a lot recently. And they were much less enthusiastic about the other two stories. Right now, I don’t _have_ a next one, because everything’s out except what they recently rejected (“Souls Under Glass”) and a romance and mystery rejected by Woman’s World. But we shall see.

Yay! Ken’s home! I got to the airport early and worked a bit on a new story for an erotica contest with the theme of satin shoes. Teresa and I brainstormed stories when I was in Boston. I haven’t typed it up yet so I don’t know how much I wrote; probably about 300 words, plus notes on the rest of it. Ken arrived, and we went to Versailles and I purred with happiness over my chicken. Ken, however, broke tradition and did not order the #6 meal, but the #1 meal (same thing, but with pork). Shocking. Then we decided to be spontaneous, and went to the movies to see “Scooby-Doo”. Astute readers will remember that this was my most-anticipated movie of the summer, given that I was a huge “SD” fan as a child. Hee. Much to our surprise, Dietrich (the just-stepped-down Baron of Gyldenholt) was in line ahead of us with his young daughter. So we all sat together. Embarassing as it might be to say it, this was the best movie I’ve seen in a while. The first one in ages where I didn’t get popped out of the movie, or wonder what time it was, or squirm because I was uncomfortable and my knees hurt. And we laughed out loud. The best moment was in the end when Daphne and Fred kissed, and a little kid somewhere in the back of the audience went “Ew!” really loudly. We howled. Really, it was spectacular. It had all the charm and silliness and goofy stunts of the cartoon, lots of action, and in-jokes for the adults.

The plan for tomorrow is to eat yummy leftover Cuban food for breakfast, then take the laptop to B&N for a few hours. And buy envelopes at the Staples around the corner from B&N, and a couple of birthday presents. G’night!