my writing week (4) 24

Hi all,

Yesterday, a deluge of health issues and other problems felt like it was going to sweep me down a river of despair, into a sea void of hope, filled with sharks that ripped apart... You get the idea. But today, a few dykes have been built to hold back the storm waters.

More about that next week, as this post is about last week. Particularly it is supposed to be about my writing efforts last week. Well, surprise surprise, I actually did some writing on four days last week, which is pretty good when compared to previous weeks.

Of the days I didn't write, one day was spent on a train and bus, escorting my mother down to visit my sister at St Vincents in Melbourne. My sister was getting anti-biotics dripped into her as she waited for an infection to clear so they could operate. They wanted to put a bit of skin grafted from her stomach up her nose to patch a leak. Brain fluid, for lack of a better term, was leaking out her nose. She had the operation on Sunday and it seems to have worked. Yaaa for my sister.

The trip to Melbourne did not help my cold. I was hoping to give it back to the citizens of Melbourne, but they didn't take it. They didn't seem as grumpy as when I first started what is set to become regular visits about a month ago. Perhaps that was because my grumpiness now exceeded theirs.

My sister had volunteered to accompany me to the oral surgeon in a little under two weeks. There is no way she will be able to do that, so I had to find a new volunteer.

My computer started acting up last week. The internet connection kept dropping out. I wondered if it was my wonderful never-cause-a-problem computer or perhaps the modem. Then my thoughts turned to my ISP provider. But what if the aging cable from the phone to the computer was the problem? Or the filter? Or, worse still the telephone line. Perhaps the nick in the cable I caused with the shovel while digging out drain pipes was finally causing problems. All I knew was that it would probably take a slow process of elimination to fix, something I really didn't feel like doing while I was as sick as a half dead dog.

The only good thing about having a cold, is that I have been reading a lot more than usual. I finished reading volume 4 of the Year's Best Australian Science Fiction and Fantasy, which I reviewed in my last post. I have read volumes one to four. Of the lot, volume 2 would be my favourite, followed by volume 1 and then volume 4.

I have been watching Outcast - a British science fiction mini-series, set on a newly colonised planet where everyone speaks with British ascents. So far, it is a lot better than similar attempts, as it is aimed at adults and has lots of dark secrets.

Speaking of adult science fiction, I am looking forward to the new series of Torchwood. It is to be screened on the cable channel BBC TV from July 9. Its premise is that suddenly no one dies anymore on planet earth. The last series of Torchwood was easily the best television science fiction produced that year.

Anyway, it's back to reinforcing the dykes.

Graham Clements.

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