It appears that it has been a bit longer than I intended before the next chapter of my MAU story came out.

Sorry about that.

Life has been rather busy for me the past month.

Let's see...lemme get the bad news out of the way first.

4 weeks ago I was diagnosed with bladder cancer. Bummer
3 weeks ago I had a cystoscopy to remove said cancer. Ouch.
It still hurts a smidge when I use the restroom, but "I'm feeling betta" ( Monty Python accent )

Work:

Work has been exceptionally busy with me working on two major projects and the interfaces for each project as well as 3 minor projects. It is like my boss wants me to earn my pay or something crazy! :)

Home:

My wife and I are in the ending phases of a hardwood floor installation and painting project that has gone very over budget and over time. A "simple" 2-4 week project that we started in Feb is still going. The floor is in, but the painting, not so much.

Play:

Borderlands 2 is an awesome game. Enough said there.

Defiance ain't too shabby either, but I just got it and I am still trying to figure it out.

Rift is now Free to Play and Whispr, my lvl 54'ish Rogue is wanting to come out and play. Whisper was taken, how unfair. :)

Summer is here in MN. Since we got snow in May, the joke has been that we hope summer will be on a weekend this year. My weekend schedule is somewhat busy with extravehicular activities of the very fast motorcycle variety. I guess this is actually good news for me, but maybe bad news for the writing part.

Writing:

All of he above has impacted the writing, but in addition to the "bad" news, I have also managed to distract myself with a story idea I had almost 2 years ago. It is tentatively titled "Reality Storm" and it follows the adventures of a group of MMORPG players who find themselves in another world and turned into their characters. I have the first few chapters written and was considering posting the start of it. I have been mulling over giving the story a minor tie in with my "I am NOT Mystique" story, but that is just an idea at this time.

But...another story idea hit me when one of my favorite authors posted a blog update about her stories. The idea proved to be hard to dislodge and ignore, thus I started doing _lots_ of research and fleshing out the start of a plot for that story.

Good News?

The Cancer was the lowest grade and least invasive. A simple cut and single dose of chemo at the same time was all it took. The only bummer part is that it has a high return rate. 50-75% and as a result, they want me to have an exam every 3 months. They don't knock you out for the exam and it is not pleasant having that thing stuffed up there. Lesson learned, if you have blood in your urine, see a doctor ASAP.

Now, about the "MAU: More Than Meets the Eye" story...Chapter 14 and the final "official" chapter is about 80% complete. I have 6,200 words written and managed to eek out 1,117 words today. I "just" have one final scene to write and it will be done. Okay, maybe two final scenes, but that's it...honest. There is an Epilogue for the story, but that is already written so there could be a rather rapid posting and finale after ch 14 is finally ready to be posted.