Anemone Sidecar Chapter 4 is live and I'm riding

I wrote this story in February of 2006. It’s vintage. A few people who workshopped it with me said they had no idea who would publish something like this, and the way they said it didn’t sound encouraging. I submitted it to Snow Monkey sometimes in 2006. I never received a reply, though months later some people told me they spotted it on the “forthcoming” list. I saw that list with my very own eyes, but then it was gone. Years passed. Novels were written. Babies were born. (Okay, only one, I tend to exaggerate sometimes. One baby easily feels like a dozen.) Still later, I found a confirmation that the acceptance email was indeed mailed to me. Blame this on Yahoo. My memory is poor—at one point I must have forgotten about this little odd story. At one point I must have also slightly revised it.

Then another acceptance email came from Anemone Sidecar, which is sort of Snow Monkey’s cousin, as far as I understand. Is it still available? Three years later? Sure, why not, I thought. Why not? With on-line ventures coming and going, a revival, even three years later is worth celebrating. Go read “Monotonies of Winters”! It’s quirky, it’s experimental, it’s a blast from the past and there are no others like it! It’s in Chapter 4, on page 5.

Representing the Process of Writing--Visually

For some reason I'm not able to embed the video in a way that shows all of the viewing screen, even if I fiddled with the html. And it buggs me. Here it is on Youtube.

Two-headed ostritch

Or what do you see?

Lunch Backwards

My second stop motion project is Hcnul. I used WindowS Movie Maker. It was fun and tasty to make. That's plain yogurt, by the way.

Stop motion animation with Windows Movie Maker

I spent the day working on (okay, playing with) stop motion animation with Windows Movie Maker. Just set each frame at the very minimum of seconds allowed (Under “Options”) and you’re good to go. I was inspired by PES on Youtube (also check 'Prank Call', 'Western Spaghetti' and the X-rated 'Roof Sex', with some chair action,) so I spent a good hour looking at apples, oranges, kiwi and dry fruits, but I was very aware of my technical limitations. At one point my 6 year old grabbed the raisin at which I was staring and swallowed it. Here you go, an actor, gone. I reached for another raisin, but it just didn’t have the right personality. Eventually I settled on dry kidney beans. It took me 5 minutes to make the movie (the technical part), from start to finish. Hooray for conceptual simplicity. However, the ending just wasn’t right, and I’m re-shooting tomorrow. Tentative title? “Awakening and Death of a Red Kidney Bean.” The death wasn’t a part of today’s production. I envision moderate technical difficulties tomorrow. Stay tuned.


My 6 year old made the cutest “Baby Snail” stop motion, but she won’t agree to make it public, at least not yet.

Novel as a scarf?

I’ve had a busy week—being new in town, even in a town I’ve lived before for two years, takes up different energy and creates different energy as well. I look at things already with nostalgia—we’ll be leaving just in a few short months. There are new buildings, new people, the same snow covered hills.

The kids have settled into a routine of watching old Russian cartoons before bed, and this leaves me with a good couple of hours of writing time. Or doing nothing time. Doing nothing is still doing something—so I sit and think and try to weave my novel, my characters’ stories in my head, while my baby sleeps on my lap. I sometimes wish I could write novels in 3-D, with things happening simultaneously on different facets. Does this make sense? I don’t know.

Last night I saw my novel as an unraveling scarf, and it totally made sense, but this morning, when I tried to imagine it again, and to bring back the thoughts that came with this image, nothing happened.

I just finished a short chapter, only about 800 words, to be expanded. I noticed that my writing style is different, but I’m not worried yet. Anything goes in the first draft.

Un-stucking my characters over tea

I went to the Frob for lunch with a friend today. We haven’t seen each other for a year, so it took us about 20 minutes to get ready to order and then another hour to get ready to pay. Then we drove to the Fantasy Palace for more tea. I love discussing my novels in progress with C. I told her about the chapters I already wrote and where my characters were stuck. C always asks the best questions. Like, what are their motives? This helps a lot. The twin sister is hiding in the woods in a tent, with her kidnapped niece. Why did she kidnap her? For some reason when she asks me, I can start brainstorming possible solutions and everything comes together, in a fluid, organic way. When I ask the same questions myself, I often don’t have any answers. So now I feel I made major progress in terms of moving my characters in the direction of…well, I’m more aware of their motives and I think I’m good for the next several chapters.

So how warm exactly the weather is?

See for youself. Shorts no t-shirt weather.

Well, not really.

I'm happy to have the opportunity to wear my amauti again!

And it is fairly warm today!

First photos on a wet, snowy day in Iqaluit

( Click on the photos to enlarge)
If you look carefully, you'll see a small plane about to land.



An absolutely irresistible pup! Very typical for Iqaluit--no collar, no leash.




That's the playground I like, because of the view. You can't really appreciate it from this photo, but my husband got me a better camera, and on a sunnier day I'll try to take a better one.



You can see snowflakes--gray smudges. On the ice below we spotted quite a few snowmobiles, and one sled pulled by dogs.

Notes from the trip to Iqaluit

Predictable: I carry my pyjama clad 4 year old into a cab at 3AM, and half way to the airport realise I forgot his boots.

Funny: The four year old falls asleep before take-off, wake up at 10 minutes stop-over 1 hour into the flight, in place called Vampiro (gotta Google it, and it might not even be called Vampiro) and asks, “How come we’re still not flying?”

Miraculous: The baby slept the entire 4 hour Ottawa-Iqaluit flight.

Outrageous: We normally fly on First Air, and their strategy of serving a hot chocolate chip cookie 1 hour before landing is a perfect distraction for everyone involved. When they say ‘hot’, they mean it. Canadian North offered an alcohol infused coffee with whipped cream. How’s that fair? Okay, I admit it, I really wanted it, and no, I don’t think they would’ve given one to a mom flying alone with 3 kids.

Forgotten: How crappy the produce is in the store. How wonderful the arctic air smells.

lay lie laid lain

I admit it--every time I need to use one of "those," I either look for a synonym, or google. This post will be my reference from now on, and maybe one day I'll just learn the forms.


recline (intransitive): lie, lay, lain
place (transitive): lay, laid, laid
falsify (intransitive): lie, lied, lied

Mini Stories

I'm addicted to fifty words mini stories. Yes, there's a prize involved, but the fun is still pure. I love the challenge, and am impressed with the depth that one can get with such brutal constraints. Another advantage? I can compose them in my head! I come up with a version late at night, before falling asleep, and in the morning I write it down and polish. Last night I tried to summarise my novel in 50 words. I wasn't successful, but I'm working on it.

The deadline is August 1oth. With the rate I'm going, I should have about 100 mini stories to choose from.