You'd think that planning a small family get-together would be easy.  Most of us don't live in the same areas and we all have busy schedules.  Some are available some days but not on others, and each person's timetable has little correspondence to anyone else's.  Consequently I'm still trying to get people to settle on a meeting date, even.  Our get-together celebrates two forthcoming birthdays - Mum's 83rd and Vikkey's 25th - and also the news that Vikkey and Peter are expecting their first child.  Just don't address me as Great-Aunt Adele.  I have no objection to being ancient, (or, more accurately, ageless), being the dyed-in-the-wool Immortalist that I am.  It's just that it doesn't seem too long ago since little Victoria was gurgling happily while daubing paints and obsessing about Roland Rat.   His name was her first words - though she said something more like 'Woland Wat', and would squeal with delight whenever his maniacal grey

"In the winter of 2010, the ...romance novelist Nyree Belleville suffered the same fate as many a scribe — she was dropped by her publisher. The most any of her 12 spicy romances, penned under the name Bella Andre had earned was $21,000. "So, out of sorts and feeling blue, she sat down one morning and figured out how to self-publish... A few weeks later, she checked her account. She had sold 161 copies. She’d made $281.  She put her other old book online and figured out how to place both on other e-readers. The next month, her royalties bumped to $474. Giddy, she self-published a new e-book in July. She made a jaw-dropping $3,539." Source:  http://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/style/novel-rejected-theres-an-e-book-gold-rush/2011/04/09/AFZdqb9F_story.html

"The Air Force Academy in Colorado held a dedication ceremony for an outdoor stone circle erected last year as a place for Pagan and Earth-centered faiths to congregate and worship.  Despite the controversy and setbacks this has been a step forward for the equal treatment of Pagan religions within the military." Source:  http://wildhunt.org/blog/2011/05/air-force-academy-dedicates-pagan-chapel.html

"A UK developer has created a computer for school children that will cost as little as £10 to £15, potentially ending the education gap between wealthy and poorer families.  David Braben, who co-developed the Elite space trading computer game, has developed a tiny computer based around a USB stick called the Raspberry Pi. The little device will plug into a HDMI TV for video output and will allow a keyboard to be plugged in via the USB port." Source:  http://www.theinquirer.net/inquirer/news/2068735/uk-developer-creates-gbp15-kids

Two very different sketches, of two very different personalities...

Top: Fabian; Second & Third: Rowan - pencil and coloured pencil sketches on lined paper. Some of my fictional characters had their origins in old RPG forums and/or blogs.  Fabian, Tamsin and Bethany Rose certainly did, though all have evolved considerably since then.  I've always found the creative process interesting for its own sake.  As well as using character charts, I occasionally sketch the fictional people I write about.  This week, I've been looking for a way of compiling these in a way that appeals to me.  Sketchbooks, being largely experimental or given over to quickly-done work, oftentimes end up containing a few tolerable sketches hidden away amidst a pile of glorified doodles.  Well, mine do anyway!  I'd like to put together some kind of album-cum-scrapbook which combines the best sketches and maybe even some finished art, photography and various mixed media to depict each character's... well, character, even.  The mild irony is that this will

Watercolour and pencil sketch, finished today...  This is a depiction of Rowan, who appears in my short story  Seagull Inn which can be read in Ruins Terra published by Hadley Rille Books.  He also appears anonymously in another short story, Shell Boy , which is published in Riverside Writers 2010 anthology, and is the main character in the eponymously named novel.