Eugie · Foster's · Self-Indulgent · Musings

Gah! Got a summons in the mail for grand jury duty. Grand jurors, unlike trial jurors, meet twice a week for a two-month term. I actually think this might be an interesting experience, as I've never served as a grand juror before. Except for one, itty bitty problem: I've been summoned to do my civic duty during the upcoming legislative session.

The cosmos is pointing and laughing at me.

And now I wish I was at work today so I could pluck Title 15 of the Official Code of Georgia Annotated off the shelf opposite my desk and figure out if I can get this deferred. Guess I have no choice but to peruse LexisNexis online, which is a pain to navigate through.

Lessee...Code Section 15-12-2: "Any person summoned to serve as a juror in any court of this state shall be excused from such service during his attendance as a legislator in the General Assembly."

@#%$! Close, but no.

Ah, here we go. Code Section 15-12-1(a)(1): "Any person who shows that he or she will be engaged during his or her term of jury duty in work necessary to the public health, safety, or good order or who shows other good cause why he or she should be exempt from jury duty may be excused by the judge of the court to which he or she has been summoned or by some other person who has been duly appointed by order of the chief judge to excuse jurors. Such a person may exercise such authority only after the establishment by court order of guidelines governing excuses."

Editing bills for the General Assembly during session counts as "work necessary to public good order" doesn't it? Urg. Hope so.

Should be writing upstairs at my desk in my library-office, but it's cold in the house, and the electric blanket is all toasty warm, so I'm curled under it with my laptop. Ergonomics fooie, I sez.

So the results from the vet came back, and Hobkin has a staph infection, apparently a methicillin-resistant one. He gets another course of antibiotics. Poor lil guy! But it's a relief having a definite diagnosis and simple treatment.

However, as one skunk-related worry resolves, another rears up. The housing crisis and economic recession caused Hobkin's godmother to lose her house. She'd been unemployed for a while, and with the job market being what it is, she ended up exhausting her savings and then having to default on her mortgage. She declared bankruptcy, and she and her houseful of skunks relocated out-of-state.

We're devastated. I hope she manages to get back on her feet soon. Really, really hope she does. And now Hobkin doesn't have a place to go when we're out of town. His godmother was wonderful. We completely trusted her to look after him, had total peace of mind boarding Hobkin with her, secure that she was both capable of and would look after him with the same care and attentiveness that we would.

I don't know what we're going to do next month for Christmas when we go to visit fosteronfilm's folks. We can't take Hobkin with us because skunks are illegal to own as pets in Illinois, and we simply can't board him at our vet's. It would be far too stressful. We're considering getting a professional pet sitter, but even if we can find one who'll sit a skunk, I very much doubt they'd have any experience caring for one. And even if they came by four times a day (which is how often Hobkin's meals are), Hobkin would be alone for huge chunks of time. He's used to having someone with him essentially 24/7, not to mention sleeping with me at night. I think he'll be sad and lonely being alone for so long. I would be.

Don't know what to do. Wah!

The 2009 Nebula nomination period opened yesterday and runs through Feb. 15, 2010. This is the first year of the revamped Nebula nomination rules, a process that really, really needed an overhaul. It promises to be much more transparent and commonsensical than the previous system.

I invite folks to peruse the Carl Brandon society list of 2009 short stories by writers of color and the Nebula suggested reading offerings at the SFWA.org site for some fabulous fiction to consider nominating.

And, of course, my own shameless plug:

My novelette "Sinner, Baker, Fabulist, Priest; Red Mask, Black Mask, Gentleman Beast" was published by Interzone and reprinted in Apex Magazine in 2009, making it eligible for Nebula consideration.

Folks can read it for free from Apex's site or listen to a free podcast of it, read fabulously by Lawrence Santoro, at Escape Pod.

Just got back from another vet appointment. The follow-up urinalysis from last week's visit showed there was still blood so we brought Hobkin back for more tests. Today's results: x-ray was clean (no kidney stones, whew), waiting on the urine culture results. And we're $340 poorer. Sigh.

But I'm glad we could confirm that Hobkin doesn't have stones. And he was really well behaved. Although obviously anxious. Poor lil guy.

Been sitting on this news until it was announced: Bards & Sages named me their Author of the Year for 2009! Squee!

The website I've been working on went live this week: LouiseMarley.com. Check out the shiny! Louise is a talented writer and musician, and it was a pleasure working with her.

One hamster down, but several scampered in to replace it. Jeff VanderMeer invited me to be a guest blogger while he's doing his whirlwind book tour, Jeremy Tolbert asked if I'd like to narrate a story for Escape Pod, and I've had a couple folks approach me about contributing some nonfiction pieces.

My hamsters, once again (eternally), overfloweth.

Got a note from the editor of Bards and Sages Quarterly with two pieces of very sweet news. The first I'm holding off on sharing until they announce it, but the second is that they want to reprint "Gifts Not Asked For" in their forthcoming anthology, Bardic Tales and Sage Advice: Vol II. Sweet!