Science fiction, fantasy, mystery and what-not
Today’s music choice is a song that keeps stirring during my writing thinking session this week. I’m mulling three different novel ideas. One of them ends up with this song, “Kashmir” by Led Zeppelin (1975) in my stream.
I have some vivid impressions of this song on the album that it came from, Physical Graffiti. Nineteen years old, I’d completed basic training the year before, and technical training at the beginning of the year. After that, I was assigned my first duty assignment at Wright-Patterson AFB in Ohio. I met two other guys there. One of them had a Ford Mustang Mach I. He used to play Physical Graffiti on his car’s eight track or his room’s stereo almost all the time. He especially loved “Kashmir”.
Haven’t seen him since 1976, when I left for the Philippines. Wonder what he’s been up to.
Floofgagement (floofinition) – An arrangement centered on an animal to do something or go somewhere at a fixed time.
In use: “Having so many animals – seven cats, three dogs, two birds, a rabbit, and pygmy goat — they naturally had many vet floofgagements.”
As I landed in Pittsburgh last night, a Smith cover of a Beatles/Shirelles song began streaming. I haven’t lived in Pittsburgh, PA, since the early seventies. I usually visit the city for about five days at a time every two or three years. But it offers that energy that says, home. My soul feels more settled among the neighborhoods nestled among the western PA. rivers, mountains, and bridges.
Here’s “Baby It’s You” (1969), written by Burt Bacharach, Luther Dixon, and Mack David, and performed by Smith.
After writing a snubnopsis – a typo that caught me off guard. Freudian slip? My dark side asserted its opinion about having an agent read it and react positively? Don’t know.
Okay, to begin again, after writing the synopsis and submitting twenty queries, I was alternatively discouraged and excited. I’m told that all writers endure these cycles. I endure mine in edgy desperation, not sharing it with anyone outside of my posts. Not asking for a shoulder, mind you, just stating facts.
I’m always disappointed in the submission process. One, some agents are so nebulous and wishy-washy about what they’re looking for, offering scant evidence of what’ll attract them. Many fall back on that old expression, “good writing”. They know it when they read it.
Two, some of them offer a huge buffet of wants. They want it all. Send it all to them! Hurry.
Anyway, though, that done, the writing mind struck out on a hunt for a new story. I’m due to write a third book in a series, after e-publishing the first two. The problem that I face is that I’ve outlined the third book, so it feels like it’s already written, or something. Muses are sirens with other ideas. That’s why I’ve eschewed outlining. I prefer pantsing. It feels like the territory is always new and fresh when I follow an unplotted, organic trail.
Oh, boy. What I know, though, is that I want and need to write, to begin again, to follow the muses, find a story, and write it. I dislike the downtown. I’m addicted to drifting through the day, imagining characters and their situations. As usual, after careful consideration, I’ll do something impulsive. Then I’ll start writing like crazy.
Flight is boarding now. Later, gators.
Floofweight (floofinition) – Weight that an animal seems to weigh when they don’t want to be moved.
In use: “The cat was a little ten-pound meatball of long fur, but she seemed to weigh about two hundred whenever anyone tried to move her. Of course, she also usually deployed claws, too.”
I haven’t flown in about a year. It’s surprising how much has changed at the various airports and airlines. Most critically, I let my TSA Pre-check expire. Now I must wait in lines, strip down to my boxers, flash my privates, and share everything that I have to eat with anyone in a five foot circle before going through security.
One thing that hasn’t changed are my people. I don’t know them. I hope they’re my tribe. You’ve probably seen them, one arm bent at the elbow, a cuppa coffee extended in front of them like a bumper, marching their bags in search of. Soon as localized, I found a Peet’s — YES! PEET’S — and purchased a coffee.
High airport prices haven’t changed. $3.19 for a small coffee. Yikes. If it wasn’t a bonafide medical emergency, I may have passed. But caffeine was calling and the sky was falling…
It was needed, though. Looking forward to another thirteen hours across land and through air before reaching the final place.
Cheers
Flying today, left for the airport at no coffee dark thirty. Now at the second stop and awaiting the next conveyance. Naturally, my stream turns to flying and jet songs. There’s a lot out there. One immediately springing into the stream was Frank Sinatra, “Come Fly With Me”. I banished that, replacing it with Steve Miller’s 1977 offering, “Jet Airliner”.
Enjoy!
Flooflegy (floofinition) – a poem or song of a serious nature about or including an animal, especially a housepet or companion.
In use: “Some considered that mention animals in a tangent manner, such as “Me and You and A Dog Named Boo” by Lobo, as a flooflegy, even though the dog’s placement is just as a rhyming tool through its name, boo.”
Michael Seidel, writer 