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Monthly Archives: February 2014

John Twelve Hawks is now on Facebook

From time to time, I have written here about John Twelve Hawks, and so I get a fair number of visitors to this blog who have searched the Internet for “John Twelve Hawks.” Some of you fans of John Twelve Hawks may not be aware that he recently created an official, verified Facebook page. He […]

The pruning’s done

All the trees in the abbey’s orchard got an expert pruning today. One of our friends is a horticulturist who used to work for the state Cooperative Extension. He supervised, and Ken and I got some great training in the art of pruning. All the fruit trees are looking good.

Another drop in the compost bucket

It’s shocking how the abbey grounds soak up compost. I long ago lost count of the total number of truckloads of compost that have been delivered here. It’s used for mulch and to loosen the soil when trees and shrubs are planted, plus a large amount of compost is tilled into the garden each year. […]

Spring fever

Picking up rocks in the garden Winter’s back is broken. The temperature today reached 68 degrees. The daffodil shoots are a couple of inches high. While I have been recovering from minor surgery, Ken has a serious case of spring fever. This morning he washed all the windows, inside and out. Then we measured for […]

Revisions done! Proofing again…

New proofs of Fugue in Ursa Major arrived today. This is the second proof set. Revisions after the first proof set were substantial, adding a couple of months to the production schedule. However, I think the revisions have made it a much better book. Three chapters were completely rewritten. There are character and plot refinements […]

Welcome back, Mrs. Fox?

When I first saw this fox this morning, she was sitting in the yard right below an upstairs window. By the time I grabbed the camera, she had headed into the woods. The photo was taken from the upstairs window. Two summers ago, a fox raised two pups at the edge of the woods right […]

Sappho

Le Coucher de Sappho by Marc-Charles-Gabriel Gleyre I have been besotted with the ancient Greeks of late, working my way through the magisterial The Greeks and Greek Love: A Bold New Exploration of the Ancient World, by James Davidson. The book is almost 800 pages long, in small type, so it’s a long haul. But […]

Don’t let them deter you: connect the dots

I am in the thick of revisions in Fugue in Ursa Major. A couple of days ago I was working through a section in which the story’s young hero is trying to figure out what the hell is going on in the world. He sees some strange things, but he doesn’t know what it means. […]