Wednesday, January 31, 2007

Return of the Guardian-King...

... is officially done.

Er... I hope. I think. I had a lot of changes. Deletions, replacements, additions... This morning I had one transition I actually had to write from scratch and not get all freaked out about the time running out. I did it and finished at 11:45 am, then brought the galleys to the UPS store at 12:10... So it's out of my hands now, though my editor said we only have three pages of wiggle room in terms of getting everything to fit in what they've set up. So if I exceed that.... Well, I have no idea what happens then. It will be "scary," she said.

But I will NOT worry about that now. I know the Lord was in this thing every step of the way. I don't know exactly what I've turned out, but I know it's what He intended. Anyway, after all the gazillions of times He's come through on this book, day after day, I know He can handle the matter of the three pages.

Pray the editors and typesetting people will be able to deal with all the changes error free because the way I understand it, there won't be any more proofreading. Or only one if there is...

I decided as I was running through these galleys that I was really working through the manuscript at what should have been called the "final draft" stage, and that when I was working through what we called the final draft that should really have been called the "first draft," and that thing we called the first draft was really "the pile of dreck you wouldn't show your dog" stage. I had a LOT of changes on these galleys. More than I've ever had on any manuscript, which I became especially aware of when I started getting carpal tunnel symptoms a few nights ago (and then what seemed like tendonitis, also in the wrist) from changing my penciled in corrections to permanent red ink -- but again, the Lord came through and even though a couple of nights my arm and wrist ached and throbbed as I was trying to go to sleep, every morning all was working fine again. So thanks to all of you who were praying for me. I really appreciate it and saw its effects time and again.

When I first read through the galleys I was overwhelmed by the number of things I found just flat out wrong with the manuscript and other things that needed fixing because they just didn't work. I feel a lot better about it now, happy with a lot of the changes that I made. You always wonder if what you've done has really made it better, because it's so hard to see clearly. I think most of the changes, though, were a definite improvement. I was able to clarify some things, to work some still murky concepts out, jettison others that didn't belong and, I think -- I hope -- tie some of the scenes and developments together much better.

So I'm done. I'm thrilled to be done. Thrilled and amazed to have finished my fifth book! Thrilled to be able to get back to normal life again.

Speaking of, it's time to go eat dinner, then watch last week's Smallville and this week's 24. Yeeee-HAW!!!! I really am DONE this time!

Karen

Wednesday, January 24, 2007

More Snow Pics & Cancellations

Last post I showed the picture I took of the snow the night it was falling. The next morning we awoke to a wonderland. It was amazing. I had to go to a doctor's appointment and so was driving all about in it. By then it was warm enough the streets weren't icy, but they were still relatively empty, and snow was everywhere. I took the camera and was taking pictures all over the place. So I thought I'd share some pics of snow on things that almost never have snow on them. Like the palm tree here.



Like these paloverde trees:








And how about this cholla cactus:

















Okay, I'm tempted to put up more but I have two chapters left to go through tonight and Bible class to do. I've cancelled all my regular activities and am ready now for the final run. Today I asked for and got a one day deadline extension so I'll be pulling up the drawbridge for the next few days. I'll be back, hopefully, (Oh please, Lord, let there be no more deadline extensions!) January 31. At which time this book should finally be done....

Grace,
Karen

Sunday, January 21, 2007

SNOW in Tucson!!! and a Blog Tour

I have 461 pages of galleys before me marked with almost that many flags of issues to deal with, and today it started SNOWING!!! Snow in Tucson! Last time it happened was in April of '95, I think. Talk about a big time distraction. But I'm using it. Do a little work, then go back and look out the window again. When I saw the snow on the palm trees tonight, though, I just had to take a picture...

As the title alludes to, it's also time for another blog tour, this one featuring the young adult fantasy trilogy of Wayne Thomas Batson: The Door Within, Rise of the Wyrm Lord, and The Final Storm, which released last September. I'm sure regular readers of this blog will not be surprised to learn I haven't read them, but others on the tour are quite excited about the series and it's apparently been doing very well on Amazon. Tina Kulesa was eagerly looking forward to putting up her comments on the series for this tour, as was Rebecca Miller , and Sharon Hinck has already posted a very nice interview with Mr. Batson. (One I could totally relate to, by the way.)

For straight from the horse's mouth material, check out The Door Within web site and Wayne Thomas Batson's blog as well. Wayne, a middle school English and Reading teacher, has some nifty artwork he's done himself using a digital art program called Bryce 3D (Daz Studios) to promote the series. Pretty cool.

While others are busy touring I'll have my nose to the grindstone, going through my pile of 461 pieces of paper and their accompanying post-it flags. Some of the the glitches are minor, but others are major, head-banging issues that send me to the Lord screaming "HELP!!!" And I have only ten days to get it done. But don't mind me...

Other folks on the tour this time are listed below. Enjoy!

Jim Black; Jackie Castle; Valerie Comer; Karri Compton; Frank Creed; CSFF Blog Tour; Gene Curtis; Chris Deanne; Janey DeMeo; Tessa Edwards; April Erwin; Linda Gilmore; Beth Goddard; Marcus Goodyear; Todd Michael Greene; Leathel Grody ; Karen Hancock; Katie Hart; Sherrie Hibbs; Sharon Hinck; Joleen Howell; Kait; Karen; K. D. Kragen; Tina Kulesa; Lost Genre Guild; Kevin Lucia and The Bookshelf Reviews 2.0 - The Compendium; Rachel Marks; Shannon McNear; Rebecca LuElla Miller; Caleb Newell; Eve Nielsen; John Otte; Robin Parrish; Cheryl Russel; Hannah Sandvig; Mirtika Schultz ; James Somers; Stuart Stockton; Steve Trower; Speculative Faith; Daniel I. Weaver

Karen

Wednesday, January 17, 2007

Vitalogy

In line with my comments the other day about science being a self-correcting discipline, and the continual change in so-called scientific "facts," I direct you to this new entry by Ed Willett on "self-corrections" in the medical profession. Vitalogy was a book published in 1899 that "attempted to contain within its 1000-plus pages 'the wisdom and experience, the best results of years of practical observation, of prominent and enlightened physicians, upon the simplest and most effectual methods of promoting health, overcoming disease and prolonging life.'" Weird and fairly amusing. Here's Ed's entry. Enjoy.

Karen

Tuesday, January 16, 2007

Arizona Bible Conference part 2

After the teaching on the fact that Jesus Christ controls everything, Pastor McLaughlin turned to an examination of the Synagogue of Satan, mentioned in Rev 3:9... A synagogue is a place of learning, and refers not to a literal synagogue, but to a system of thinking. Satan's system of thinking, with which he has decieved the whole world, is constantly teaching us whether we want it to or not, through the media, education, books, music, other people, Internet, etc. It's a multi-faceted system, holding something to appeal to almost everyone, and can be broken down into two major approaches.

The first represents the way Satan thought at the time of his own fall, prior to the creation of man, and cited in Isaiah 14. It's a system of living for self, with no interest in God whatsoever. ("I will make myself like the most high. I will ascend to the mount of the north. I will do what I want.")

For those who want to live for something beyond themselves, he has a second approach, offering them the various religious systems like Buddhism, Islam, Judaism, cults, etc. If people do manage to believe in Jesus and become Christians, he has counterfeits for them as well. This second approach accepts a belief in God or even in Jesus, but subtly attacks His character, his nature and His word. Satan does this by bringing in counterfeits that seem right, but are just enough off to lead his victims astray.

Wanting to be like God, He has counterfeited everything that God has done or commands. The Bible teachs of another Jesus, another Spirit, another gospel, another communion table... He presents himself as an angel of light and has ministers of righteousness sent out to teach people how to be righteous his way. These are the people who think they are serving God and aren't, mentioned in Matthew, and Romans, and Timothy and Corinthians. We must be alert to them and turn away from.

This second approach represents Satan's thinking after the creation of man, when he went into the garden and questioned the woman regarding what God had said. Satan knew very well what God had said, ("From any tree of the garden you may eat freely; but from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat") but pretended ignorance to trip her up. "Has God really said you shall not eat from any tree of the garden?"

He used this approach again when he tempted Jesus in the desert in Matthew 4, quoting scripture to our Lord in the second and third temptations. Which brings up the startling point that Satan knows the Bible. In fact, few have mastered it as much as Satan -- he's had thousands of years to work at it, after all -- though without the filling of the Holy Spirit he'll never be able to really understand it.

The point is, he can and does use even the Bible to trip up God's people. If we are not solid in what the word of God teaches we will be vulnerable to his schemes, Bible based and otherwise. For they are everywhere.

Karen

Monday, January 15, 2007

Arizona Bible Conference

Photo: Doubletree Hotel in Tucson
This last weekend we held our third annual Arizona Bible Conference for Robert McLaughlin Bible Ministries here in Tucson. After temps in the high seventies for a week, clouds and a cold front moved in just in time for the conference. Not exactly what we would have hoped for to welcome attendees from the northeast and northwest, who had had their fill of cold and clouds. But so what! It was a great conference no matter what the weather.

Pastor McLaughlin continued his teaching on the seven churches in Revelation, taking up again the Church at Philadelphia mentioned in Rev 3:7 - 13 where he left off at the California conference in November.

He started with a brief reference to the doctrine of the open and shut doors, reminding us that God opens and shuts doors in our lives because He loves us and has a definite direction in which He desires each of us to go. When he shuts a door, we should be humble enough to accept it. If we push the door open -- and often we will be allowed to, if we insist -- we will not end up where He wants us to be.

After that he took up the concept that Jesus Christ controls everything, as referenced in Colossians 1:15-17, and many other passages. "The continuation of the universe and creatures and the stabilized atmosphere of our earth depends not on the devil or people or so-called scientific laws, but on the omnipotence and perfect integrity of our Lord Jesus Christ." He upholds all things by the word of His power, even when he was a baby coming forth from the womb, even when he was on the Cross. In fact, when He was on the cross he could have called on the angels to deliver him from the lies, the mocking, the people who had put Him up there, but he did not, because He chose to stay until all our sins were paid for.

So-called scientific laws were not created by science, nor can science uphold them. Science simply observes, investigates and plays with them. (A point that reminded me of something I'd read recently in an interview with Michael Crichton, that "Science is a self-correcting discipline." Meaning that whatever is believed to be true about things today, will most likely be "corrected" as men continue to observe and investigate the environment in which God has placed us.)

Pastor McLaughlin listed some items that supported this concept of "self-correction," starting with Erastosthene's 3rd century BC tally of "all" the stars: 675. This was presented as scientific fact at the time. In 200AD, Ptolemy counted 1028 stars. Flamsteed in the 18th Century counted 3000. In 1862, as telescopes continued to improve, 300,000 stars were counted and today, of course, the count is over 200 billion in the Milky Way alone. The stars didn't change number in all that time, only our ability to see them. Which is, of course, the obvious and major limiting factor in science: our ability to perceive all the necessary information and then to correctly put together what we've perceived. It confounds me how men and societies continually conclude that they've finally gotten all the relevant facts, only to discover later that... they did not.

So it's not science that made the laws or governs them, and it's not science who put us here, and really, it's not science or scientific advancement/invention that will destroy us or preserve us. That power belongs only to our Lord. Science can only observe His brilliance and His faithfulness and His power. And if science contradicts what His word says, then I'll take His word, and wait for those scientists to correct themselves!

More important though, the upshot of examining the fact that it is Jesus who controls everything, who made everything and maintains everything... that He contols the storms, the winds, the thunder and lightning, the rain, the sea... that there is nothing outside of His reach -- the conclusion you come to is that there is not a single problem in your life He can't handle. And yet how often do we get distracted by and focused on the details of our lives and all we can see is the problem. How silly to let ourselves get all flustered and frenzied when we know the one who numbers the very hairs on our heads, and yet holds the planets in their paths and hangs the earth on nothing! It's an awesome study to meditate on.

And that was only a snippet of what was taught the first morning.

Karen

Thursday, January 11, 2007

Vulnerable to Distraction

Over the vacation, my friend Ed Willett's science column noted an article on how older adults are more vulnerable to distraction from irrelevant information. Well, being an older adult, that caught my eye at once, though I don't think it was irrelevant information!

Aha! So there is a reason why I'm so distractable these days. The study, conduced by Canadian scienties at the Rotman Research Institute at Baycrest and the University of Toronto, "has identified changes in brain activity that begin gradually in middle age – and which may explain why older adults find it difficult to concentrate in busy environments and filter out irrelevant information."

So it really is age that allows my son to concentrate with music blaring, and me to be totally distracted by it. I used to be able to write with music, but only if there were no words. In the last few words I've had to go to total silence, because even the notes distract me. Or worse, sometimes the music generates "scenes", which seems like it would be a good thing, but isn't because it's usually not a scene anywhere near to what I'm currently writing, and it's always the same scene. So even if I write it down, everytime I hear the music, I go back to the same scene and whatever I was doing breaks off.

I digress. Apparently there are two regions in the brain's frontal lobes that shift into a "seesaw imbalance" (not sure what that is) -- causing older adults to become less efficient in inhibiting distracting information." Instead of focusing on the task at hand -- reading, for example, or, writing one's book -- we are unable to resist the sudden thought that we need to go check the mail, or we should see what is on so and so's blog today, or how dare such and such reviewer make those comments about my books last year.

As younger people concentrate on a task, activity in the region that is associated with concentration increases while activity in the region associated with thoughts about yourself, what happened yesterday, or what's going on around you decreases. As people age, the activity in the second region doesn't turn off so easily, and the activity in the region that governs concentration decreases.

By the time we reach 65, it gets really pronounced. So the researchers recommend that "Older adults should try to reduce distractions in their environment and concentrate on one key attentional task at a time. It may be as easy as turning down the radio when reading, or staying off the cell phone when driving a car."

A cell phone would be a disaster. I can't even talk to my passengers when driving a car, because I get way too engrossed and who knows where I'll end up. On more than one occasion I've found myself driving home when I'm supposed to be driving somewhere else.

But this does affirm the importance of reducing external distractions and internal ones as well, since it's not just external monitoring that happens in the region that won't turn off. Which fits right in with my decisions to start simplifying my life again.

You can read the full article about the study here.

Wednesday, January 10, 2007

Galleys Are Coming

So this morning I spent several hours with the HP tech figuring out my printer is shot and I need to get a new one. Then I left for Wednesday lunch and returned to a message from my editor: the galleys are done! They may be on their way even now. If not they'll be sent out tomorrow and arrive Friday. Whew! I barely got my newsletter out today, and haven't even started getting caught up on email. Since we're hosting our third annual Arizona Bible Conference this weekend, so I won't be able to work on anything until Monday. I have about two weeks to go through the galleys...

But I've learned nothing if not that the Lord has everything under control, so I won't sweat it. We are all really looking forward to the conference here in Tucson. So many friends, old and new will be flying in. It should be great, even though, after all our months of dry weather and blue sky and mild temperatures, it's supposed to rain this weekend. And drop into the 50's as daytime highs. Yes, it's raining right now, but I don't always believe the weathermen, and everything could be cleared up by the tomorrow. In any case, as I said, the Lord has everything under control.

Grace,
Karen

Tuesday, January 09, 2007

Where the Map Ends Interview

Where the Map Ends is a new website started up by Jeff Gerke, formerly editor for the Realms speculative fiction imprint at Strang Publications, and a speculative fiction novelist in his own right, with six published novels to his credit.

The site was designed to be a place for Christians who love speculative fiction to hang out. There are interviews of the top Christian speculative novelists writing today, lists of books currently available in the market place, writing and publishing information artwork, worldbuilding tools and a rank of other features in the making.

Jeff recently honored me with a request to do an interview, and that interview is now up as this month's featured Interview. You can find it here. (And just to offer you additional incentive, I believe this interview includes the first public snippet of information on what Black Box is about.)

After you read the interview, I encourage you to look around a bit. There's a lot to discover and much more to come. It's a site you'll no doubt want to visit often.

Karen

Monday, January 08, 2007

Course correction - Part 2

In yesterday's post I spoke of the need of making course corrections, periodically -- of recalling one's objective, then looking at the fabric of one's life to see how much it is focused toward that objective. My primary objective is to fulfill God's plan for my life, which means to stay consistent with the perception and application of God's word, and to function in my spiritual gift and talents to proclaim who He is and what He's done. I think I have a talent for writing fiction and a gift for communicating spiritual truths. I don't know exactly what that gift is called. Teaching? Encouragement? Ministering? I only know I'm supposed to be writing novels, so that has got to be a major focus of my life.

My eternal distraction seems to be marketing and networking. There is always something new to do, and many people telling me, either directly or indirectly that I MUST do it. The implied threat is that if I don't, I will fail. My books will fail. Readers won't like me and then my books will really fail.

Besides the negative pressure, there is also positive pressure. Some of the things I need to do are fun and appeal to my approbation lust, and my desire to communicate. These things are rarely intrinsically wrong, like, say robbing a bank. They make a certain amount of sense and from the perspective of sight, the success of my books in the market place, while not a total disaster, could certainly use some help.

But God keeps telling me over and over, "I will do it, you will not." I keep trying to take it back after I've given it over, arguing and fretting and rationalizing until finally I reach the point of leaving it alone again. Then something new comes along and I start it all over again. I think I've reached the end of one such cycle now.

The conclusions that I've come to, again, are that I write long books. And with a market that wants an author's books to release at relatively short intervals, I know I can't write the books I write in the time given if I'm doing all kinds of other things. Particularly things related to writing. Like blogging, for example.

I decided last fall to join two team blogs because I thought it would be fun. I remember reading several different team blogs and wistfully wanting to be part of one. When an opportunity came up, I believe it was the Lord's answer to my request -- not necessarily because He intended for me to do it on an extended basis, but so I could see what it was like. Not long after that, a second opportunity came up. I said yes to that one, too. Because after all, I find that sort of writing easy, and being on different blogs is a way of gaining "exposure" for my books.

But then everything got hard in the writing of Return of the Guardian King's final draft. Suddenly the words were incredibly slow to come. It was like pulling old labels off a box -- only tiny scraps at a time would come out. In between I felt blank and drained. The deadline stretched on and on and my ailment spread from writing fiction to writing blog entries -- at least for the team blogs. I managed to write several entries for one of the groups but for the other, not a one. I thought once the book was turned in and I'd had a rest, the ideas would return. It's not happened.

For one thing, there's been little rest. As soon as I stopped writing the book it seemed a hundred other tasks presented themselves: update my website, write a long overdue newsletter, interviews, email, update my blog's format, back cover copy of the book, the christmas letter, tour the lab, Christmas, leave town to visit relatives, go arrange for a spring booksigning... And the drought of blog ideas continued. Finally it dawned on me that maybe I'm not supposed to be doing them. That perhaps I've gotten in over my head, and am drawing water from a well that has been depleted by my real calling, which is writing novels. That in doing all this other stuff I am not letting that well refill, stealing creative waters what should be saved for the next book.

Blogging also takes time. Already I've spent a couple of hours on this post. I may spend another hour by the time it's all over. And when I post on the team blogs, I'm even fussier. Afterwards there may be comments and I get distracted going back to look for them; the comments may spark thoughts or, worse, angst, and then I've used up more hours on something that really hasn't contributed to the writing that I KNOW I'm supposed to be doing.

Furthermore, since I'm part of a team, I think I should read what other members post and that takes even more time, in the reading, in the thinking about what was read, and maybe in following various links. This is an especially insidious temptation when I don't want to work on what I'm supposed to be working on. And sometimes the reading draws me off into places that don't help me with my work in progress at all, but disrupt my thinking and mood.

Finally, the more tasks you add to your regular list of things to do, the more stuff you have on your mind. I'm a firm believer in simplifying your life, though I seem to have to keep on doing it. Maybe everyone does. Especially in this time when there are so many, many things available to do.

In any case, as a result of my yearly reflection and evaluation, I see that once again, I've spread myself too thin, and have compromised the amount and quality of the time and effort I can devote to my true calling. No matter how fun or even useful an activity is, if it draws you off course from the central calling, it has to go. So I'm turning the wheel back toward that calling now... I've already resigned from one of the teams. The other only asks that I post when the Lord lays something on my heart to post, so I'll give it a little more time and see if He does...

Meanwhile I want to look for ways to streamline other things and work more actively on refilling my creative well...

Karen

Sunday, January 07, 2007

Course Correction -- Part 1

I don't make New Year's resolutions, but I do like to look back on the year, and on where I am today and make some corrections to the course I'm following if needed. The world is such that there are always new things that come into your life, exciting things, fun things... exciting fun things at first that gradually lose their luster. Many of these things are distractions. I guess that's the issue. You set an objective and chart your course, more or less. You set out. Then things begin to come in to distract you from your focus.

And it's no accident. I believe there are unseen forces that deliberately bring them in. Things to clutter your mind with false concepts or issues that are irrelevant to your true objective. Things to pull you off, to get you occupied and distracted from the goal that you are supposed to be heading for. Now you are spending all your time and thoughts and energy -- or at least a good measure of it -- on things that really aren't part of your calling.

I received a newsletter the other day that mentioned having a mission statement. Frankly, the phrase sets my teeth on edge, but this time the author's take on it made me sit up and take notice: "A mission statement gives you a reason to say no."

Why, I thought, that's just like knowing what God's calling on your life is. And when you know what it is, you should be focusing on it and saying no to everything else that comes along to take you away from it. Things that are really not part of it, that eat up time and energy and don't contribute to your God-given objective.

To be effective, we must be selective.

Karen

Thursday, January 04, 2007

Yellow30 Sci Fi

Last summer the folks over Yellow30 Sci-Fi , "an independent forum for science fiction, fantasy and alternate history," asked me to do an interview for their site and I agreed, telling them I thought I was going to finish RotGK by October 1. Of course that didn't happen, nor did I finish by November 1. Not until December did I finally get the chance to answer the questions they'd sent me back in September, though my contact there was very gracious and patient throughout. I'm happy to report the Interview is now up, and I'm their featured author for the January-March volume. They've redesigned their home page and Return of the Guardian-King is right there on the front page alongside some very nice fantasy artwork. I invite you to give it a look at Yellow30 Sci-Fi . (Scroll down for the link to the interview)

While you're there, take a look around. The site features small press and self-published works (not specifically Christian, though it is open to Christian works) and offers reviews (including one of The Light of Eidon), interviews, SF Links (conventions, clubs, webzines and some just for writers) and finally a section inviting new and established writers of SF, Fantasy and Alternate History to submit their works for review. See "Guidelines" for what they will and will not look at. There is even a blog which has the amusing report that a "celebrity author will be the feature for the first issue" of 2007. [That would be me, in case the "celebrity" part threw you. ;-) ]

The blog also mentions plans for starting a printed version of the website that will include all reviews and author interviews. (Small Press, by the way, includes virtually all Christian Publishers. When I looked into joining the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America as a professional, I learned that Bethany House was not one of the designated publishers conferring "professional" status. Hence I've not yet joined.)

Though I continue to try to stay away from the computer, I don't think I did very well today. But the back cover copy is coming along nicely.

Grace,
Karen

Wednesday, January 03, 2007

Dragons at Spec Faith

I have my January post up at Speculative Faith, Here Be Dragons. It will give you some glimpses of my writing process, some elements that will -- and will not -- appear in Return of the Guardian King and a lot of interesting stuff I learned about dragons as they relate to Satan.

Now it's on to a cover copy draft for the back of the book.

Karen

Tuesday, January 02, 2007

A New Year

Happy New Year!


Another year has passed, and 2007 is upon us. I find it cool that seven in Biblical numerology is the number of completion, and this is the year that my Legends of the Guardian King series will be completed!

I hope you all had a great Christmas celebration and are looking forward to the new year. I know I am. What will God do this year? Wonders, I'm sure.

We spent the last week in southern California, visiting relatives and walking on the beach. I got online only late at night, on dialup, to download my Bible lessons from Grace Bible Church. What takes 3 minutes on high speed at home took an hour or more on dialup. The last night the little progress box said it was going to take an hour and 22 minutes so I decided to wait until I got home to do my lesson. I love my cable Internet access! (and how easily have I become spoiled!)

I am staying away from writing as much as I can, and also trying to keep from letting all the things that are lining up on my To Do List rattle me. I know I need to fill my creative well, and part of that means to stay relaxed, trusting the Lord to see that I get done what He wants done and not worrying about the other stuff. In some ways it's an exercise in the discipline of concentration.

I've divided the list into sections: one for catchup on housework, appointments & errands, one for daily to do's, and one for things to do for the book -- the little bit of marketing that I actually do. Which means blog posts, interviews, updating the website, answering emails (I'm embarrassed at how far behind I've gotten on those!), writing my newsletter, setting up a booksigning for the spring, getting postcards made for the new book, changing newsletter services, spiffing up the blog... there are so many things, and here I am claiming I do no marketing. Yet, from the time I finished the book, there was a list of things I could do to the point that if I let myself, I'd do nothing but those sorts of things. Or I could do nothing but catch up things. Or... really... I could easily fill my days with the regular, daily tasks of keeping house and Bible study and so forth.

For that matter, I could fill my days filling my well, because one of the main ways I do that is by reading. I started rereading Robin Hobb's Assassin's Quest over the trip (preparatory to reading Fool's Errand) and didn't get very far before I decided I needed to study it in more depth. Perhaps I'll blog some of my notes on it here. Or on Speculative Faith. I've got a blog post coming up there tomorrow (Wednesday) and am waiting for that to come together right now.
I also have some new interviews to point you to, so look for those, too, in the coming days.
Grace,
Karen