Dinner Tonight…

… was the best ratatouille ever.

The secret is to be willing to grate most of a seven-dollar block of fresh Parmesan, and make sure you put a decent amount between every layer. Also make sure every vegetable you use to make it was in the ground/on the vine three days ago at the most.

Between us, HRH and I ate the entire thing. I was expecting to put half of it away for lunches this week. Liam helped us by eating a mushroom or two, a bit of sweet pepper, and some aubergine that I told him was another kind of mushroom, ferried to his mouth with forkfuls of rice.

Evidently I will have to make more. Good thing I have extras of all the ingredients, and it’s dead simple to make.

A Lovely Way to Begin the Week

I have just discovered that all three of my books have gone into second printings at some point or another.

I knew that the Wicca book had a second printing six months after it was published. I expected the spellcraft book to reprint at some point because it sells well, but I had no idea when it might because it had the largest print run of the three. The green witch book had the smallest print run as it was a more specialized title, and to be honest I wasn’t expecting it to reprint for a while.

Well, today I got the total sales-to-date figures for all three of them, and as sales of the spellcraft and green witch books outnumber the size of the original print runs, they must perforce have reprinted. In fact, all of them seem to have sold an average of one and a half times their original print run so far. That’s within two years for the spellcraft and Wicca books, and within one year for the green witch book.

I have a backlist that sells, and sells steadily! I am doing the bookgeek dance of joy!

Twenty-Six Months: Addendum

I was just looking at some pictures of our weekend in Oakville, and I forgot to record that Liam discovered salmon sashimi.

Yeah. The kid who generally isn’t interested in meat or fish eats raw salmon like it’s going out of style. Also, he will eat chicken bites that have been marinated in sake and garlic. Go figure.

Made Of Awesome

Three sheets edited today, one more than my average on this project. I am mighty mighty, especially since there was a toddler careening around and plastering himself against the French door to my office, pressing his face against the glass and squealing “MaMAAAAAA!” at irregular intervals. One of the interruptions was to give me a daisy he’d pulled out of our garden, complete with huge smile on his face, before dashing back outside with his father.

So yes, I am made of awesome. I think my back isn’t talking to me, though. On the other hand, I am sinking back into the swing of this script instead of fighting against it; it’s a momentum thing. While this is good in one respect, in another I fear I am losing brain cells.

Keeping me company music-wise today were The Cowboy Junkies (Miles From Our Home), James Ehnes (Bach’s Solo Sonatas & Partitas for violin), and Jaqueline du Pre (the Dvorak cello concerto). I picked up Tori Amos’ American Doll Posse when it was released this spring and it didn’t grab me. But I had it running in the background while I worked after dinner, and I’m warming up to it. It will never approach my love of The Beekeeper or Little Earthquakes or Under the Pink, but it may end up hovering somewhere around my feeling for To Venus and Back.

Help Me…

… Shelfari is consuming me alive.

Last night was a bad, bad time to follow a link sent to me, to a wonderfully engrossing site that networks people via the books on their shelves and helps you look at what other people like to read in order to help you find new stuff. It wouldn’t be so bad if the Flash bits didn’t take so long to load, and if there was a straightforward way to search for one’s edition while adding one’s titles to one’s list. (At least, I think they’re Flash; it may be a simple Java application. Whatever. It takes too long.)

Or maybe it’s just that I have too many books. Or that I’m work-avoiding.

Break’s over.

Break To Gabble

Argh! Not only is this slow because I have to compare three documents, eliminate some minor differences and maintain others, but I have to dance around all these damned newly added tags and code. It slows me down dreadfully. Did I mention that I’ve been through this script or variations of it four times already, and it now bores me? Boredom makes focusing very difficult.

I’d plead for release via death, except that would preclude getting paid for finishing the work.

I will finish this first sheet tonight. I will.

I’m only halfway through.

*headdesk*

Break’s over.

(Why do I have no Walnut Whips left? Why?)

LATER, 10:49 PM: DONE! Well, the first sheet of thirteen, anyway. Now, to bed with a cup of warm milk because I”ll be damned if I’m going to wake up at 4:30 AM like I did today. Also, I have a book to finish.