Archive | February 2016

Looking forward to spring – garden plans

Feb29

Is it spring yet?

I was wandering around this past weekend without a jacket, so it certainly seems like spring. We’ve started to order seeds – though I need to find a source for purple seed potatoes – so that makes it seem like spring. There’s only a tiny bit of snow anywhere, so that looks springlike, right?

But it’s not yet March, and I live in the northeast. It’s not spring until May, most years. You don’t plant without some sort of covering until Memorial Day weekend (May 30th, this year). And our last frost date is in mid-May.

Still, I can start planning. Planning is easy.

So what should I plant this year?

P.S. My kale lasted till mid-February again this year before it started to turn brown on the tops. Definitely planting kale again.

P.P.S. We still have a few apples from our biggest tree sitting on the kitchen counter.

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/1070506.html. You can comment here or there.

A different sort of hunt, a sequel short fiction

Feb29

after: http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/1050738.html

Snorri knocked on Felicite’s door, feeling more nervous than he had since his first year of Addergoole. Since his first week of Addergoole.

This had to be done right, or someone else might do something stupid. It had to be don absolutely right, because Snorri did not want The Lightning Blade coming down on Addergoole because the girl that called him Uncle Professor Leo Inazuma had gotten stuck in a bad Keeping.

She answered the door. Snorri tried to ignore the howls and yowls, the flashing lights and the creeping shadows of Hell Night. He bowed shallowly to Felicite.

“I was wondering,” he said, dry and sarcastic, “if you might want to go somewhere quieter for the day.”

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/1070253.html. You can comment here or there.

The Tinies of Ogre-House, a Patreon story, is available for Patrons

Feb28

The Tinies of Ogre-House

This story runs concurrent to the very beginning of the Dragons Next Door Saga.

When the ogres moved out, ‘Opi’s parents and the rest of the older-people were relieved and worried all at once.

‘Opi wasn’t sure what to feel. The ogres had been loud and stinky, but their walls were very thick, and they had been very sloppy housekeepers, which meant they they left all sorts of interesting stuff lying around. The Tiny community living in the thick stone walls of Ogre-House was the envy of many a nearby clan – and, what was more, ogres were almost as good as humans for obliviousness, and they never, ever hired exterminators.

read on… for just $1/month.

Prompt on each month’s theme (including February’s!) for just $5/month.

Your patronage helps support all of the free material you see here on Dreamwidth/Livejournal, as well as webserials and all-new fiction on Patreon!

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/1070028.html. You can comment here or there.

Shot in the dark: Help migrating Addergoole to WordPress requested

Feb26

Some time ago, I started migrating Addergoole from its old roll-your-own to a wordpress site: http://www.addergoole.com/TOS/

However, if you look at the original table of contents (http://addergoole.com/TableofContents.html), you can see that this is a monumental project.

Is there anyone willing to be bribed with promises of future fiction to help me with this work?

Moving a page involves:

Copying and pasting it from the original page
Checking formatting – it took me a couple tries to find what worked for me
Checking for two name changes from original canon to new
Scanning the chapter for all characters and tagging them in the correct tagging format
Marking each chapter in the correct categories

As I said, it’s rather monumental, but I am drowning in long-term writing & personal projects and am not doing well at getting it done myself.

Help?

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/1069360.html. You can comment here or there.

GoFundme Signal Boost: Emergency Moving Fund

Feb23

My friend’s sister/my friend Alice just lost her job unexpectedly, and she could use a little help to get a new place: https://www.gofundme.com/7eqtfg2s

Just today, my sister Alice was abruptly laid off from her job with no warning, leaving her with no income, no insurance, and an apartment she can’t pay rent on without that last paycheck.

Plus, without that job, she’s rushing to find someplace that she can not only afford, but can also find a new job from.

Please help Alice out if you can!

https://www.gofundme.com/7eqtfg2s

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/1068971.html. You can comment here or there.

Through the Forest

Feb18

This is [personal profile] thnidu‘s commissioned continuation of In the Forest.
He was still following her. Keita didn’t know how that was possible, but every time she paused, moments later, there he was.

He was far too comfortable with the woods. People had tried to come after her before – first before the world started getting strange, and then later, their reasons less clear but their hunting no more skilled. None of them had moved like he did.

His feet fell with no noise. He broke no twigs. He left – when she double back – almost no track at all.

And he was still following her.

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/1067958.html. You can comment here or there.

Sting Marydel and the Cliffs of Anterior, Part 7

Feb17

Part one: http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/1049125.html
Part two: http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/1049392.html
Part three: http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/1051270.html
Part four: http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/1054666.html
Park five: http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/1057725.html
Part six: http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/1064287.html

If he’d been asked an hour earlier what he expected from NABU, Sting wouldn’t have been able to answer. Robots, maybe, scary labs, maybe, guys in blood-splattered white coats laughing manically, maybe?

Two seconds after stepping into the NABU office, he had an answer: Not this. Not what looked like a high-end doctor’s office, with soothing paint and a receptionist with an expensive updo and three designer data ports. The frosted glass behind her declared it to be NABU Offices, and her desk had the US Army coat of arms in the front, but other than that, Sting found himself expecting to hear “the doctor will be with you soon.”

“Sterling Marydel?” The receptionist smiled insincerely at him. “Dr. Anjou will be right with you.”

Sting swallowed. This was a level of weird beyond weird. This was like they were reading his mind.

No, of course not. Mind-reading didn’t exist, although some of the vey very best skimmers could do something that looked similar with unsecured data ports.

Sting locked down the security on his own data port – which itself was better than his parents knew it was, through a series of legal-if-questionable upgrades. You couldn’t play the good online games with standard brainware, not and win. And Sting liked playing to win.

“Ah. Mr. Marydel.” A woman in a white lab coat stepped out from behind the frosted glass. “You’ve enabled security, very good. We encourage a certain amount of healthy paranoia in our recruits; the tech that is available covertly is much more invasive and pervasive than the common market. Please come with me.” She gestured to indicate some place behind her that Sting couldn’t see. “I’m eager to get the testing started as soon as possible.”

“That’s not ominous at all,” Sting muttered.

“Well, I could add some evil laughter, if it helps? To properly set the mood?”

Next: http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/1075022.html

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/1067774.html. You can comment here or there.

She Understood… a story beginning written off of a 7th Sanctum prompt

Feb17

From this prompt generator: http://www.seventhsanctum.com/generate.php?Genname=writeprompt

There, in the hyperspace beacon, she understood evil. That woman, with her statues and her beautiful desks, filled with beautiful pens and inkwells, that woman, who surrounded herself in the handicrafts of bygone eras and far-flung worlds…

…she stood in the glaring radiation of the most modern thing she could find, and understood what every piece of every culture she could touch could not explain to her.

The Ruler, for it was she, stood in the cold blue light, staring out at the new world they had found, and felt chilled to the bone. She had found what she’d been looking for. At long last, she had reached understanding.

She reached out towards her desks and her statues, her pens and her rag paper, but there was nothing there that could cleanse the stain from her mind.

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/1067397.html. You can comment here or there.

Partial Summary of the Thorne-Alder

Feb17

It’s been a weirdly up and down month so far.

Patreon
This month’s theme is Dragons Next Door!
I’m working on MB’s prompt; if you happen to be a $5 donor, go prompt!
Going to Asthrifel is the free story for the month. It follows Sage’s far-younger sister Artemisia as she starts school at Asthrifel University.
Attrition was written to January’s theme, set in Addergoole between year 12 and Year 17

Serials
In Edally Academy, Enrie gets a bit of hope!

Fun
Trouble in Cloverleaf – part 3 – Luke and Leo have a fight. Probably-not-canon, continuing.
part 4
part 5
part 5
part 6
Groundhog Day:
Part One: Dreamwidth ~ Live Journal
Part Two: Dreamwidth ~ Live Journal
Part Three: Dreamwidth ~ Livejournal
Part Four: Dreamwidth ~ Livejournal
Part Five: Dreamwidth ~ Livejournal
Part Six: Dreamwidth ~ Livejournal
Part Seven: Dreamwidth ~ LiveJournal
Part Eight: DW ~ LJ

The Magical Disaster, a short written for fun
Witch’sona week, a description of my witch-sona
Stress Relief, a short involving sadism, blood, cutting, territory marking, pain

Renewal Time!
I’m renewing all my domain names AND paying for the paid DW Account, so I started a continuing story, Sting Marydel and the Cliffs of Anterior to raise funds. We’re up to $25 so far!
Part one: http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/1049125.html
Part two: http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/1049392.html
Part three: http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/1051270.html
Part four: http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/1054666.html
Park five: http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/1057725.html
Part six: http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/1064287.html

Prompt Calls
I still have this Addergoole in the Apocalypse “give me ideas” call open.
I need more prompts!
In the Forest was written to [personal profile] wyld_dandelyon‘s prompt: Keita doesn’t want to leave the forest.
The Good Hunt was written to [personal profile] inventrix‘s prompt: Shush was fine until the reveal.

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/1067155.html. You can comment here or there.