Today is yesterday's tomorrow

Three! pileated woodpeckers in the back woods this morning, laughing their fool heads off, and snacking on a dead tree. kinzel tried to get a picture, but -- no joy.

Yesterday was the best day we'd seen in the last ten, so we took off to Belfast for a dose of salt air, wandered over to Searsport, decided against the Bucksport Bridge, and wound up in Bangor for lunch, thence home. A nice break and -- ahem -- well deserved.

On the writing front, various bits of news: Friday saw a (very nice, but still a) rejection slip in the mail; Baen has tentatively scheduled Duainfey for September 2008; and kalimeg has volunteered to transport the Today's Special quote over to Binjali's on Baen's Bar, for which we thank her very much.

Friday also saw the arrival of the Dover Books catalog, from which I find that the variously colored fairy tale books by Andrew Lang are once again available -- including several colors that were not in the school library.

Progress on Duainfey

42,208 / 100,000 (42.2%)

Today's Special:
Unlike the garden, which was laid out in neat squares intersected by scrupulously raked paths, and the shed, where every tool hung in its place, the house was a mad jumble, every surface occupied by something – sewing in progress, ledger books, candles, trays, cats. Becca must have looked her astonishment, for her teacher had laughed and waved a big hand 'round at the general confusion.
"We've got too many busy people under-roof, that's the truth! And most of 'em subscribe to the belief that it's no use putting something away when they're only going to want it again in a year or two."

Pirate Weather

We had weather today; a nice, crunchy line of thunderstorms, complete with torrential downpours, timed with suspicious exactness to begin just as I was leaving for my doctor's appointment.

I see that there's going to be a Pirate Fest at the wicked town of Rockland in September, which looks like a lot of fun. Who knew Rockland still had an event-free weekend in the town schedule?

Progress on Duainfey

44,119 / 100,000 (44.1%)

Today's Special:
Cook allowed no one else to make pastry; she had once told Becca that pie-making was better than prayer for settling the mind.