Okay, so sometimes I can tell the difference between public and private and what should and shouldn't be posted on my website. 

I just vacuumed the house. While, unusual in itself, it's still not worth reporting here. What is worth reporting is that when I reached my office, one of my cats was still curled up on her little footstool couch. She normally would have scarpered under the bed but had obviously decided I wouldn't come down to the office with The Infernal Machine. Most times, she'd be right. Today, she was very, very wrong. Much hissing, followed by a mad dash up onto my desk to hide behind my monitor while The Infernal Machine did it noisy work.

After putting The Infernal Machine back in its Cupboard of Doom, I came back down to the office to reassure my cat that all was well. And there was a strange odour. Not the usual kitty smells relating to waste products (I am, like all life-long cat owners, sadly too familiar with those) but still something very pungent and distinctly animal. Kind of spicy, almost, and not completely unpleasant. It was strongest around the back of my monitor where the cat had been taking cover. Then I realised: it was The Smell of Frightened Cat.

I've read countless times that fear has a scent -- however many times have you heard that animals can smell your fear? -- but never before experienced it. I wonder if people put off as strong an odour when in a state of extreme terror? Not regular body odour,  or sweat, or bad breath, or anything like that. But a distinct feary smell. Makes me want to start putting people in confined spaces and scaring them very badly, just to find out. You know, more than I already do.
 

After much encouragement from people who know what's good for me, I've built this little WordPress site:

www.kirstynmcdermott.com

I'll be primarily using that as my blog from now on, but keeping this LJ because it's a very convenient way to read my the numerous LJ's on my friends list. I might still post here from time to time, although it won't be a regular thing. Maintaining two blogs would do my head in. I guess the WP site is meant to be my "public face" now, but I've never been too good at knowing the difference between "public" and "private" and usually defer to caution anyway. The amount of LJ posts that were started and abandoned half-way through ...

Anyway, I'm over there now. Unfortunately, there doesn't seem to be a way to automatically cross-post from WP to LJ unless your site is self-hosted, which it isn't right now. I'll try to remember to pop in here and manually link to stuff.

Right, that's it then. As you were.

I'm pretty good at keeping secrets if they belong to other people. But if they're mine, somehow there's always a leak or two. I just can't help it, no matter how many times I tell myself, "Kirstyn, just keep your mouth shut." So, for a handful of people out there, this is not going to be news. But for everyone else ...

Today, finally, after several weeks of fingernail gnawing and pinching myself, I received and signed contracts from PanMacmillan for the publication of what will be my first two novels. Not the first two I've ever written (which is a Very Good Thing, believe me) but the first two which will actually be published and printed and put on the shelves for unsuspecting members of the public to procure.

It's real. I have contracts. I have, scarily enough, contracted deadlines.

This has been a mighty fine year so far. The only way it could get better is if it started raining kittens. Or ponies. Huzzah!
 

Well, some hetero sex is okay. But absolutely nothing from you gay, lesbian, bi or transgender folks. In fact, we'd rather not mention you at all. Okay? Excellent. As you were then. You know, back in your filthy little closets.

I'm not going to start ranting. I might never stop. But here is an informative and thoughtful non-rant by cassiphone about the latest ridiculousness from Amazon, with some useful links, including this summary from the Denver Internet Examiner. And here is another useful post from the Dear Author blog.

There is also a petition, which I've dutifully signed with added comments, even though my heart of hearts tells me that such online petitions are noise at best, and even though I don't agree precisely with the wording. (Protesting censorship of certain books by essentially saying, "But why aren't you censoring *these* books as well then, you hypocrites, nyah nyah nyah!" doesn't really work as an argument for me, but their hearts are in the right place.) I think you're better off spending a few minutes writing an email direct to Amazon yourself. This will have much more impact than simply whacking your name on the end of a e-tition.

Here's what I sent them, which is a polite version of the rant I would otherwise have posted here:


I don't know how much good it will do, but if they get tens of thousands such emails, it will at least tie up hundreds of customer service hours replying and re-replying (I intend to respond to whatever form response I get back, and respond again, until the novelty wears off) and that will cost them real dollars.

Which in turn will make me feel much better than simply ranting in the face of the inter-void.

UPDATE: Received a formbot reply from Amazon that said:

Hello,

Thanks for contacting us. We recently discovered a glitch in our systems and it's being fixed.

Thanks again for contacting us. We hope to see you again soon.

I've never really been a nail biter. But, ever since I was a little kid, I've had this on-again-off-again nervous habit of picking at the skin around my fingernails, usually around my thumbs. Mostly I use my the nails of my index fingers, or my teeth, and don't even really notice I'm doing it until I've actually done damage enough to hurt. Digging out the quick, tearing the corners of the cuticles, leaving oh so very alluring tatters of skin. When I was in kindergarten, I apparently dug so deep into the side of my thumb it caused quite a significant infection and I had to have it wrapped in a splint for weeks so it could heal. I remember the thumb splint, and the weird application device my mum used to apply the wrapping, but I don't remember what the wound itself was like. Mum says it was pretty bad. I haven't really done anything that dramatic since, but still the habit remains.

It doesn't really bother me all that much (I was never gonna be a hand model, not with the scar from being chomped by my grandfather's pet galah when I was four), except that it is a sign of anxiety, and I tend to get anxious about being anxious - especially when there is no good reason for it - cause that can lead to other not so nice emotional states.

So here's the weird thing. Right now, I'm actually happy. An amazing, permanent-grin sort of happy. Have been for weeks now. My life is good. Certain parts of it are fucking awesomely awesome, and are only going to get more so in the immediate future. I don't remember ever experiencing such a prolonged period of actual, honest-to-goodness happiness. My private journals, which go back decades, seem to concur. And it's not any sort of mania. It's calm, and it's healthy, and it's good. And I'm pretty pleased about all of that.

But, damn, if I'm not going to town on my poor thumbs right now. Most of the time, I have a pretty good idea of how my mind works, even when it's not working. If anything, I do too much self-analysis. Spend too much time talking to myself inside my own head. But right now, I'm just a wee bit flummoxed.

Think I might wear band-aids on my thumbs for a couple days, though. Cause, you know, the alternative is just so attractive.
 
On the plus side, I got my third tattoo this afternoon, a line of mirror-writing across my ribs. It hurt a little more than the ones on my arms but not a hell of a lot. I was almost falling asleep near the end. It was sort of ... relaxing. Like an extreme form of meditation. Anyway, I'm very happy with it. I'm very happy, full stop. No matter what my stupid thumbs have to say.
 

They're almost three weeks old now, and the last person whom I really wanted to let see them in the flesh rather than from a photograph has seen them, and most of the traumatised skin has flaked away, and they look quite photogenic. So, here they are. My new tattoos:

The quill is on my right upper arm (click to embiggen):



The raven is on my left arm, sort of curving around. I've included a detail of his head, because my tattoo guy did such an awesome job of capturing exactly the expression I wanted ... if ravens can be said to have an expression:

  

Yes, they hurt, but only minimally. As a sensation, I'd consider it closer to irritation than pain ... like someone scratching lightly at your arm for almost three hours. By the end, you just wish they'd hurry up and stop.

And I love them. Very, very much.
 

Tomorrow, I'm leaving for a week away in Newcastle. It's where I grew up and most of my family is still there so I try to go back at least once or twice a year to visit. It's always strange. It doesn't feel like going back home - it hasn't been my home for well over a decade now, and I don't have any particularly fond memories tied too closely to place or locale - but there is a certain inevitable nostalgia about any time spent there. Stuff that's changed, stuff that hasn't. Stuff about me that's changed, and stuff that really hasn't. For better or worse.

Anyway. For practical purposes, a visit to Newcastle for me means very limited internet access. This is primarily because I'm staying with my mother and she does not have an internet account at home ("I can do anything I need to from work, Kirstyn.") She also lives in Maitland (about 40 minutes further up the Hunter River from Newcastle) and at last check there is still no local internet cafe. Five billion and one "antique" shops, but no bloody public broadband. So I take my laptop with its cruddy 56K inbuilt modem that only gets used in desperate times such as these, and dial up every couple of days to check my email which is about all my patience can stand.

Usually, I try to view the whole thing as one of those fabled retreats from technology which are meant to be so good for the soul. Usually it sort of works. I realise that I don't actually *need* to have the internet at my beck and call, and I do feel a little clearer of mind after being unplugged for a week or so.

But right now, for various reasons, I do not want to leave the internet behind. I'm dreading being cut off from certain things, certain people. I'm already having withdrawal symptoms and minor pangs of anxiety. It's not good. Last week, I seriously considered buying an iPhone. Cause, you know, I need to have 24/7 access. To everything. And everyone. Need it.

*sigh*

Welcome to the 21st Century, McDermott. Now, when do we get those implants?

I'm not going to paste it right here, cause I care too deeply about the collective sanity of my friends list to subject any of you to such wrongness without warning. See how nice I can be? Seriously, I'm all about the sugar and spice.

But tell me the truth, is there any way, at any time (even given the excesses of the 1980's), at any place, that this publicity photo could have been considered even remotely right?

Warning: You will need to lie down afterwards. You might want to look into retina transplants and mind-scrubbing. Sorry.
  

I know there is a genuine need to report on such significant events as the Victorian bushfires, and I know it's important to show the personal devastation experienced by those who have been directly affected, to give the tragedy a face and a voice and a story that the rest of us can touch and feel, to fill in the gaps with hard, painful detail. I know this, and I respect it.

But to the Channel 7 reporter who asked a tearful, dispossessed woman who had just learned that a member of her family, presumed dead, had actually survived, "Can you describe the relief you feel right now?", you can fuck right off. Can she describe the relief she feels? Do we actually need this woman to perform for us in order to get some idea of how she feels? Surely her face, her tears and shaking shoulders are enough. Surely our imaginations can fill in the blanks.

And this followed immediately by a young man, in his mid twenties, distraught and obviously shellshocked, the voice over letting us know that he has lost two small children in the fires. The reporter's preceding question not aired this time, but it's all too clear from the man's response, barely more than a whisper, that it was probably in the same vein. They're not coming back, he struggles to say, what can I do? His eyes never leave the ground. A man stands beside him, one arm wrapped around sagging shoulders that might never straighten again.

Because what this man really needs is a fucking microphone in his face and some prick demanding he articulate his loss for the benefit of the ravenous viewing public.

There are lines being crossed here, lines which shouldn't even be approached, and I feel complicit in watching.
 

Awfully, predictably, it seems that at least some of the devastating fires currently burning in Victoria - including the Kinglake fire - have been deliberately lit. Which means, while dozens of people are burning to death in their houses and their cars, and countless more are losing their loved ones, their homes, their livelihoods, their communities, and their memories, at least one if not more sick cunts are glued to their television screens, rubbing their sick, sweaty little hands together, and feeling like pathetic and trivial gods.

If you can, call the Red Cross and donate what you can to their appeal fund: 1800 811 700

Prove to those sick cunts that they are definitely in the minority, and that the rest of us human beings are actually worthy of the name.
   

... you're walking through an underground shopping centre car park and a guy in a wheelchair, his left leg right angled and bristling with one of those metal pins-and-braces deals they put on for really bad injuries, calls out to you as you approach and asks if you can help him get his chair into the back of his station wagon, and you find yourself keeping a subtle but minimum safe distance while surreptitiously inspecting said pins to make sure they actually do go all the way into his leg, and that the awful knee-to-ankle scar is real and not made from latex, before saying, "Sure, no problem at all."

Just in case, you know, he's trying to pull a Ted Bundy on your arse.

So you help him with his crutches and fold away his chair and close the back of his station wagon for him, learning all the while how he was down from far north Queensland on holidays, only he had a motorcycle accident, and now there is a bone infection, and so he's stuck here in Melbourne for at least three more months with the stupid wheelchair that's too heavy for him to get in and out of his car easily on his own.

And he thanks you and says, "It good to know there are still nice people in the world." And you smile and wish him as speedy a recovery as possible, and walk away feeling good but still mentally tallying up the good samaritan points (which surely must offset some of the wicked things you've done, or are planning to do), and realise that here you are all dressed in black in the height of Melbourne summer, wearing your I Killed Amanda Palmer t-shirt no less, stalking through an underground car park in your sunglasses and boots, and maybe the poor helpless guy in the wheelchair was just a little trepidatious about asking for your help.

Just in case, you know, you mugged him for his groceries or something instead.

But yes, it is good to know there are still nice people in the world. Get well soon, broken leg dude. Hope you make it back home before winter.
 

I still love you, LJ. You'll always be foremost in my heart. But sometimes, you know, a relationship gets a bit stale. Sometimes, a girl needs a little outside stimulation. And this blog was quite flattering in its courtship. But fear not, my dear LJ. It was merely a one night stand, a fling, a dalliance. I'll always come back to you.
  

It's after 2am and I should be in bed, sleeping. Hell, I was in bed until a few minutes ago, although not sleeping. Just lying there, in the awful heat we're promised at least three more days of here in Melbourne, and wondering if it would make things a bit cooler if I actually started to flay myself. My body does not deal at all well with extremes of temperature. In winter, at least, I can always put on more clothes, curl up beneath more blankets, turn the heater up an extra couple of notches. In summer, once you're down to your skin, that's pretty much it, baby.

I went out into my backyard after I got up and stood in the dark beneath the stars and decided it was maybe 3 degrees cooler outside. Contemplated sleeping in the backyard, on the grass. But I'd have to put clothes on for that, which would defeat the benefit of those extra 3 degrees. Fuck it. Hate summer. Hate the heat. The film of near-dry sweat that is always there. Seriously, have a shower, dry off, and bam: sweat. Again. Still. I refuse to waste water by taking another shower now just to cool down It can wait until morning. Yeah, okay, later in the morning. When the dreadful sun comes up again.

I have Important Things to do tomorrow (yeah, okay, today) and I really should try to get some sleep. And I am tired. It's just that it's a weary sort of tired, rather than a sleepy tired. I did no real work tonight, even though I planned to start my new story. Just pushed words around on my Asus for a while, read through some old bits and pieces that I thought maybe I'd work on instead, and then gave up in disgust. Wrote a couple of emails. Christ, I think I might move to Tasmania. It's colder there, right?

Doesn't matter how much water I drink, I'm still parched. And my fingers taste like salt.

My poor cats are stretched out as much as they could possibly be. I guess I should just be glad I don't have fur. Maybe I should shave them both, would that help? Scary witching hour thoughts, Kirstyn. Get the fuck back to bed. Anyone know where that switch is? You know, the one that turns off your brain?
 

The past few days have been very good all round. Thanks to the brilliant and gorgeous tallaudrey for the inspired new title for this journal. The old one was ... old. And grumpy. And not really me anymore. Much prefer this one.

Anyway. Attended the Aurealis Awards in Brisbane over the weekend and had a truly amazing time. Caught up with lots of lovely old friends, made some lovely new friends, drank way too much, slept way too little, partied way too hard, stumbled across something delightful and unexpected, and ... oh yes ... won a little award. I didn't have a speech prepared because I seriously, 100% totally, definitely for sure, knew I wasn't going to win. deborahb  was going to win. Which was just as well, I thought as I sat down for the presentation right at the back of the theatre, because of all those stairs. Let Deb tackle the stairs. But I did win, and I didn't fall down the stairs, and I think I managed to say something vaguely intelligent and funny and thank most of the right people.

What I forgot to say was how awesome the other authors in my category are. Seriously. They all rock, and I felt pretty damn humbled that the judges chose my story over theirs. Which, as anyone who knows me can attest, doesn't happen all that often. The feeling humble stuff. It was kinda ... cool.

Oh, and while half-napping on Saturday afternoon in my hotel room before the big night, a beautiful new story bloomed just about whole and entire inside my head. Which almost never happens. And I think it has a happy ending. Or, at least, a not unhappy one. Again, with the never happening. Strange days, good days. Not even the 40+ degree temperatures we're forecast to have down here for the next week are really depressing me. So, there you go. Shiny.
 

For paulhaines , who called it first:



So damn obvious now, although it doesn't explain why I loved the Benjamin Button movie but never could stand Forrest Gump. Maybe the Cate Blanchett/Tilda Swinton factor has something to do with it ... because I would sit through almost anything to watch either of those ladies do what they do.

Or maybe it's David Fincher, who could direct almost anything and make it interesting and absorbing and worth the price of admission. Almost.

I really should track down the F. Scott Fitzgerald story. Oh wait. I loves the interwebs.

I'm on a quasi News Fast at the moment. Mostly cause I'm actually ker-razy busy with a bunch of stuff, but also cause it's something I do every now and then as a kind of media detox. (Yes, I have heard that Obama is President now. I'm not that far off the grid.) I just feel happier, calmer, saner, when I tune out The News for a few weeks. Until I start to feel guilty about allowing myself not to care about what's going on in the world, and tune back in, and then the whole damn thing starts again.  Ahem.

But I accidentally read something today which reminded me why I'm on a quasi News Fast. There's some new self-help book just published called Changing Relationships by a Dr Malcolm Brynn. (No, you google it, I honestly can't be arsed.) In the review-posing-as-news-story, Dr Brynn has the following to words of wisdom to impart:

If you had a very passionate first relationship and allow that feeling to become your benchmark for a relationship dynamic, it becomes inevitable that future, more adult partnerships will seem ... a disappointment. The solution is clear: if you can protect yourself from intense passion in your first relationship, you will be happier in your later relationships.

Now, maybe he's being misquoted out of context, or whatever. My leftist sensibilities insist on giving benefit of doubt here, but really, what I want to say is: Fuck you, Dr Brynn, fuck you very much.

Protect ourselves from intense passion? Protect ourselves? So, what, we can better put up with being bereft of intense passion for the rest of our lives? What you and your ilk really mean is, put up with being bereft of intense passion in all aspects of our lives, right? Put up with putting up, because that's what happiness is all about. Being content. Not rocking the boat. Being grateful for what we have. Excising the desire for social change. Excising desire for personal change. Excising desire, full stop. Except, of course, for the desire to buy that massive plasma screen television with the surround sound home theatre system and latest must-have game console, which will make us so very, very happy.

Protect myself from intense passion?

Really. Truly. Fuck you very much.

Obviously, I need to maintain my fast just a wee bit longer.
 

.... are a goddamn bunch of freaks. Quite happy with my own brand of familial dysfunction, thanks.

           
  
 

The family of a dear friend of mine owns a business which sells, among other things, industrial cleaning products. Very good stuff, if the following testimonial from the website is anything to go by:


Thank for supplying us with your marvellous cleaning product to clean up my friends house, after he had passed away in the house 3 days before we found the body.

DYNAMIC cleaned all the dried blood and body fluid from the walls and floor like you would not believe,plus it removed all the odours as well.

We then used it to cleanup the kitchen and bathroom,they came up clean and shining,I would recommend it to anybody.

So, the next time that annoying old putrefying corpse problem rears its stinky head, you know what to do. Or if that bathroom of yours has just gotten out of hand again. Actually, it does sound like the sort of stuff I really should keep around the house ...

Happy New Year.
 

Really. Really really. I don't spend anywhere near enough time on the internet as it is. What's that? You don't spend enough time on the internet either? Really? Really really? Wow, like, let's just be BFF!!

Enjoy.

Because this is a beautiful thing which needs to be seen:



Even after all these years, it's still one of my very favourite NIN songs, and there's something about the Johnny Cash cover that tears me up a little inside whenever I listen to it (especially if I watch the video), but oh god how I adore this Sad Kermit version.
  
Truly. Doesn't it just rock?