Catching up is hard to do

Well, let's make the attempt, anyway.

I have finished reading both Dragon in Exile (#3200 in Books>Literature & Fiction>Literary on Amazon.com LOL), and Alliance of Equals (scheduled for publication in hardcover July-ish 2016.  Hoping to forestall the inevitable:  USUALLY the eArc, if there is one, is offered from Baen 3-4 months ahead of hard copy publication).  I find that Dragon does solve a problem that has been on the board since I Dare, advances both bishops and at least one knight, and puts the rook in a more advantageous position.  Which is to say, yes, Stuff Happens.  IMHO, of course.

Stuff also Happens in Alliance of Equals, and! byerlady, I'm betting that Stuff will happen in The Gathering Edge, which will, in part, take us back to Surebleak.  It will still, I fear, be a novel in which more than one character will be precipitating the Stuff that Happens, but that's what we've got, this arc.

So, that.

Yesterday, Steve and I were waked early by clucking, and by Belle in Huntress Crouch in the bedroom's back window.  We looked out to find four adult turkeys and about 20 chicks marching single-file along the edge of the grass and the wild-land.  I grabbed Sprite, and then Trooper, and took them to my office window, which overlooks the same section of our property, and we watched until we thought all of them had made a left hand turn into the weeds and trees just beyond the end of the house.  We kept to the window, listening to the clucking -- and here came one more chick, peeping anxiously, clearly lost.  He stared around him, appeared to hear the peeping of the band, but not sure of his direction, took the air, landed in a birch tree more or less where the rest of the band had taken their left, apparently got his bearings and leapt into the air, heading for the head of the line.

Well!  You don't get that kind of excitement every day, and, since we were awake, anyway, and it was a beautiful day, we drove down to the ocean, arriving just as the tide turned from low to high.

We walked on the beach at OOB for an hour or so, picnicked at Pine Point, then drove down to Wells, in order to Find the Town, which we did.  Goodness, it's, um. . . packed tight.  Maybe six inches between the houses.  Maybe.  Drake's Island is a little roomier.  I need to check a map, though.  From the drive, it looks like oceanside Wells is distributed between Drake's Island, Wells Harbor, and Wells Itself, and the link between the three is Route 1 and only Route 1.

After Wells, we continued in a southerly direction, through Ogunquit, to pick up 95 and so to home.

It was a long day of driving, and I drove all of it, without falling asleep, which was another reason for making a long drive.

So, that was yesterday.

Today in the mail comes a "used" edition of Who Buries the Dead, about which I have a funny story.

I had originally ordered this book with The China Mirage, through ABEBooks, through a vendor in. . .Michigan, I think.  That vendor cancelled Who Buries, as being unavailable, but in good time sent on my non-fiction book, which -- surprise! -- is a brand-new hardcover.

In the meantime, I went back to ABEBooks and saw that there were two copies of Who Buries at a price I was willing to spend -- one copy in the UK and one copy in New Jersey.  I ordered the book said to be in Jersey, which I received today.

It, too, is a brand-new hardcover, but that's not the interesting part.

The interesting part is the mailing label.  The book was sent to me from -- wait for it -- the UK vendor, paperbackshop.co.uk Ltd -- with a return address of 801 Penhorn Ave, in Secaucus, New Jersey, arriving via Global Mail.

Also today, I have brushed three coon cats and clipped claws.  Scrabble also wished to be brushed and I tried to accommodate her, but I was using the Wrong Brush.  As always, she declined to have her nails done.

As soon as I'm finished this blog post, I'll vacuum the house, which for some reason looks like four cats live here, and get on with the rest of the day.  Also, I think we may be expecting a box of authors' copies of Liaden Universe® Constellation, Volume 3.  Which would mean that the books we're to sign for the Uncle can't be far behind.

. . .I think that catches us up, except for the part where I need to figure out a good reason to drive down to the ocean once a week and walk on the beach for an hour or so.  Hmmm...

Oh, and Steve has been wandering around the house today, taking Sekrit Cat Pictures.  Here's one of Belle, helping me read Alliance of Equals:

Belle at work. Photo by Steve Miller