There will be no chapter of Sunny: The Hippie Chick this Saturday. I have been very lazy this week. I hope to get one to Eric, my editor soon. Eric has been bailing me out recently, turning around chapters in increasingly shorter lead times, but this week I have fallen so far behind that I need to skip a week to catch up. I also hope to get another episode of Stone out, since it is nearing its end.

Dawn

I know my latest serial is not as popular as my earlier ones, but there are about 500 readers per chapter. Today I drove an hour each way to the nearest Apple store to learn that the hard drive has died. I lost all my stories, but the only real loss was the next chapter, half written and two future stories.

There are still a couple monthly chapters to come to A Second Chance, and Interesting Times is at a standstill. I have decided that my next story will be a non-transgender one. I don't want to limit my writing to the genre, and I have seen other writers get in a repetitive rut when they focus so many stories in the genre. Fictionmania explicitly bans non tg stories, but it appears they are allowed here (there is a tag for non-transgender).

I'm in tears much of today. A hockey team from Humboldt Saskatchewan was in an accident last night, and 15 people, most of them young teen hockey players died, and another 14 are in the hospital, some never to play the game again.

Fans of my series’ (River and A Second Chance) may remember that I often claim that I don’t write the stories, my characters do. That is true for a lot of the story, but I do come up with ideas, sometimes months before the chapters will be written. Often these come as I am about to fall asleep, or have just woken, and seem to be like little movies about my characters. I have decided to present a series of these that are waiting for chapters that can use them, sort of like promos for upcoming TV shows, or trailers for future movies.

Just a note to let fans know that I will post the awaited Sleepover chapter tomorrow morning, so that it does not interfere with those of you who will be awaiting Snowfall's theme park story Venture Realm. (I know I will be hitting the refresh button every two minutes around 9 p.m. est until it appears).

I have just posted a new story. This is one that has been on the backburner for a while as I concentrated on River. There are only four more chapters to River, and two are already at the editors, with a third nearly written. So I decided to get a start on this story. I have five episodes written (more if I can find the right stick where I put the update). These will be posted over the next week or two, and then I will have to fall back to a weekly routine.

I've never had my readers tell me the title of a chapter before. But I promised to continue Mark's story from River (the one he told the students in his grade 5 class) if there was interest. Many said I should do so, and told me the title should be the one at the top of this blog. I just finished the story, and for me it is a long one, at 9000 words.

I'm off to see about changing the titles of my chapters. I find that just numbers 1 to 30 (soon) are quite boring. I want to actually have chapter titles. It is sort of to follow the style of some of my heroes (Dickens and Tolkien) but more importantly it gives me a reference to past chapters when I have to look back to check on a fact months later. Hopefully it will mean not having to scan through many chapters to find what I seek.

Apparently. I was getting a bit disappointed in how few comments I was getting to my series River in the latter chapters. Since retiring I have started getting onto a roll, and have several chapters ahead. So I decided to let me readers know that I would post a second chapter this week if I got at least 12 comments. So it is three hours since posting, and normally I would get my first comment about now, or maybe a second one. Today there are 8 (I have made two replies, which don't count).

I know that there are limited fans for my series River, but I feel I have let them down, missing several weeks as my retirement issues worked their way though the system. The good news is that I walked out of the college for the last time on Wednesday, and for the next month I am on holidays, with retirement kicking in on August 1.

Anyway, I just sent Chapter 20 to Eric, best editor on BC, and he sent me a note back saying he will get right on it. The upshot is that I will be posting a chapter before the end of the weekend, after he works his magic.

Saw this really strange cartoon on Canadian television, and discovered it was available on YouTube.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YkU5KIxC3hU

Dawn

Time for an update on my health issues. I had my third cataract surgery on Tuesday. No, I don't have three eyes. The first on my left eye didn't line up correctly, and had to be redone. I can now see perfectly ... at things that are more than five feet away. My close up vision currently sucks, and I can barely read my iPad.

This has delayed my productivity, although I did manage to do my part in getting The Wildcats chapter posted today. And I managed to get 5000 words written on River, my own story. (Wildcats is by Leslie Moore).

Well my little break is over, and chapter ten of River is in editing. My health problems aren't over, but I am feeling better. I hope to get back to a weekly schedule on Monday. This was a hard chapter to write, and I was in tears several times as it unfolded before my keyboard. I won't say more, lest I create a spoiler.

Dawn Natelle

I've seen the word drug used as the past tense of drag in several stories in BC, and it jars me everytime. I know that most (some) dictionaries list it as accepted as well as dragged, but in my area it is definitively s sign of lower educational achievement. It makes me think the character saying the words should be saying "youse guys" and "learnt" as a synonym for taught.

Just wanted to get that off my chest (feeble as it is).

Dawn