Regarding upcoming changes at the Lee-Miller Cat Farm and Confusion Factory

[rolanni]

Dear Friends of Liad and all the ships in space,

we here at the Cat Farm and Confusion Factory appreciate your friendship and support – over the years you’ve helped us through problems, enjoyed the cats, and met us at conventions. Most of you have come to expect news out of East Winslow (especially the “For the Record it is snowing in East Winslow” and the Day Lily Count …) and you’ve seen photos of the snow, the flowers, the snow, the roadside, the snow.... We’ve enjoyed sharing all of this with you.

However, as Jefferson Airplane told us, Life is Change. That’s what’s happening here. Change.

Change?

Change. The Cat Farm and Confusion Factory will shortly be shifting.

All of us – cats, books, people (and maybe some day lilies and daffodils!) – will be moving to a campus closer to the delightful amenities of Waterville, Maine, so close, in fact that we’ll eventually give up our Winslow address entirely.

This is not as sudden a thing as it might appear – we’ve been looking to do this for years, as many of you know. Now, after several disappointments along the house-hunting trail we’ve not only made an offer on a house across the river but had it accepted. A house within a mile or two of the local downtown, the local hospital, the local major grocery stores (the local Gifford's ice cream stand!), the vet's. . .with a much shorter hop to hit the interstate, and a shorter ride to Old Orchard Beach, too. Both of us will have larger offices, and the cats will have a larger and more up-to-date basement. Also, we’ll have a garage to put Skylark the Subaru in and to mount the famous high-tail cat wind vane on.

What’s this mean to you, our friends? Well. . .change.

To begin with we’ll be maintaining our Waterville PO Box as is, so if that’s the address you have for us, you’re good. We’ll be submitting change of address to the PO RSN. . .and that will go out to all those who have need of the home address. Since we’re doing hybrid moving – partly us and partly a moving company – the change will take a few weeks once we go to closing. We haven’t got an ironclad closing date yet, but it could well be before the 40^th anniversary of our joining households back in 1978.

Also, we have yet to sell the house in East Winslow. We’ll be doing some clean up here, and then the pros will come in to make everything shipshape for sale. You’ll notice this takes time ….

In order to keep all things flowing smoothly we’ve petitioned Toni at Baen for an extension on the delivery date for book formerly known as Fifth of Five, which she was kind enough to agree to without question. Ah yes, while the book is slowly in progress it does appear to have a name now: Accepting the Lance.

Other things are still in flux – we’re not sure we’ll be able to afford the planned trip to WorldCon this year, for example – but we will keep you informed as things settle out.

Thanks for all you do.

Steve and Sharon