Had my nine-month checkup.

Cancer still dead.

Any number of messy medical issues remain, but none of them are going to kill me.

The good: the eye surgery has been a success. I can now read newsprint with my left eye, where before it would just have been a blur. My retina has been slowly uncrumpling.

In bad news: my knees are in worse shape than I thought. Knee replacement has been recommended. I’m reluctant to do this until I get over the side effects of my 2019 hip replacement: a tilted pelvis, scoliosis, 24/7 chronic leg pain, and a limp.

For the last two days we’ve been beset by hordes of tiny, very hungry mosquitoes. They’re barely larger than gnats, but they show up in battalions. I’ve never seen mosquitos this tiny. Did they just hatch, or is it a new invasive species?

This weekend I’ll be attending Bubonicon 55, the latest iteration of New Mexico’s premiere science fiction convention. (And it’s a little staggering to realize that I’ve attended almost all of those 55 cons.)

In case any of you want to come by and say hello, I’ll be at the following events:

Friday August 23, 8:15-9:05. Reading.

Saturday August 24, 11:00-Noon. Panel. Stop that, Droid! Beyond the three laws of robotics.

Saturday August 24,3-4pm. Panel. Research joy: writing about something you know absolutely nothing about.

Saturday August 24, 4:30-5:40pm. Mass autographing.

So it looks as if I have a busy Saturday, and nothing scheduled for Sunday at all. When I’m not busy at a convention, I’m generally seeking amusement somewhere on the premises, so feel free to come over and say hi.

Another dip into the archives today. Found was the copy-edit on THE RIFT. I was reminded that the manuscript was seven inches thick and amounted to a historically significant 1066 pages. (My own grueling Battle of Hastings) It was an open question whether binding technology would actually get a book that long between covers.

After I handed in the ms., I had a meeting with my editor, John Douglas. He said, “We could work really hard on tightening and cut 15%, or we could just send it to the printer and see what they say.” I honestly thought the ms. would benefit from judicious cutting and had come up with a figure of 15% on my own, but by that point neither John nor I had the stamina to do it, so it was sent to the printer and to my surprise they put it in print.

Found in the same box were the corrected page proofs, which amounted to 750-something pages. The proofs and the copy-edit together filled about 80% of one banker’s box, and I filled up the rest with reviews, a story of mine from a Dutch prozine, three screenplays (one never finished, one sold but never filmed, and the third turned into a chaotic mess of episodic television).

All to be sent to TAMU’s climate-controlled bunker come Monday.