Sunday Update - Week 10

 Ten weeks in.  Hard to believe, eh?

Okay, so it was a week.  I did my 40 hours of work and not much else, but let's see if I can't turn this into something more interesting.

I wrote words yesterday!  514 of them all in a row.  Actual fiction words!  (Not work words, which I do all the time.)  I'm not sure what this is or whether I'll actually finish it, but I don't care.  I had a thought, I sat down and typed it out then added to it and the next thing I new, I had a whole page (single spaced because who the hell cares).  

Yesterday, I also exercised.  Shocking, I know.  I did 9 minutes on the exercise bike.  1.8 miles worth of pedaling at between 10mph and 13mph.  I know it doesn't sound like a lot, but I probably shouldn't have done even that much, because I am feeling it today.  Blerg.  Weight: 160.2

I usually do Wallyworld on Saturday, but the weather was so gross, I pushed my shopping back to Sunday.  I mean, the stuff falling from the sky was actually splatting.  Like raindrops with slush in them.  Gross.  I'll do the grocery thing later this morning - sore legs or not.  

I'm still reading that submarine book.  I'm about 2/3rds of the way through now.  I mentioned something in it that had happened in the '60s and Hubs remembered it, so I told him the story that wasn't made public back then.  Pretty cool.

Oo, yeah, I also made pinto beans yesterday.  I tried the slow-cooker method using unsoaked beans.  Put the dry beans in the pot, added enough liquid so it was about two inches above the beans, set it to low, and let it cook.  The instructions said 5-6 hours.  Dinner was 9 hours later and the beans were still not done.  11 hours.  They took 11 hours and that was only because I turned the pot on high for the last 3.  I won't be doing this method again.  Soak 'em overnight.  Boil 'em until they're soft and creamy - 45-60 minutes.  Voila.  

I did use beans in last night's dinner.  I took some of the slightly under-cooked beans and threw them into a pan with ground beef and green onions.  They mostly finished cooking that way.  Just a little more texture than beans ought to have.  I served it over rice.  It wasn't the taste sensation I was hoping for, but it wasn't bad.  Ya know, there are shockingly few recipes online for Pinto beans that aren't chili or refried beans.  Such a versatile little bean, you'd think there'd be scads of ways to fix it.  :shrug:  I'll figure something out.  They're cheap and they're chock-full of healthy shit.  

Today, I have to make granola bars.  After groceries because we're out of condensed milk.  

Exciting life I lead, eh?  

Anyway, that's it for me.  Nothing much else going on.  What was your Week 10 like?

Saturday Reading Wrap-up - 5/1/21

May Day!  May Day!  Umm... yeah, I always get the urge to do that on May 1st.  Sorry.  Anyway, here's the skinny on my reading week...

No new books this week.

Books Read:

30) Curtains for Three by Rex Stout (4/29/21) - Hard-boiled crime - 5 stars.  Not new to me, but I think these books can never be appreciated enough.  Part of the box lot I received.
Review: "Nero Wolfe is always fun and this is no exception!"

29) Equal is Unfair by Don Watkins and Yaron Brook (4/27/21) - NF - 5 stars.  Not new to me, but not appreciated nearly enough.  Paid full price after an accidental one-click when I was trying to add the hardcopy to my cart.
No Review.  

28) Eye of the Monster by Andre Norton (4/26/21) - SF - 5 stars.  Not new to me but way underappreciated.  I've had this book for years.  I got it when I bought a box of Andre Norton's at a garage sale.  I'm still working my way through them and I hadn't read this before now.
Review: "This is probably my favorite Andre Norton out of all I've read so far."

No DNFs.

Currently reading... A fun SF/F anthology of chicken stories.  Yes, CHICKEN stories.  It's eggcellent so far.  ROFL

What's did you read last week?  Anything fun?

Fiction and Lying for a Living

Let me start out by making one thing perfectly clear...  I am a fiction writer.  I don't 'lie for a living'. 

Never once have I tried to imply that the fiction I write is in any way the truth.  That's what liars do.  They try to convince you that what they're telling you is, in fact, the truth.  No fiction writer I know does that.  We write fiction and we proclaim loudly that this is fiction.  It's not reality.  That would be non-fiction.  Or journalism...

Wait.  Scratch that.  Actual journalism is about facts and reality.  You know, TRUTH.  Not sure what's going on with what they're calling journalism these days.  I'd call it fiction, but I don't want those people associated with my profession. 

Remember back when the so-called memoirs of a certain person caused a hullabaloo because it was revealed that his non-fiction had been mostly made up? 

Remember back when that news anchor got caught making shit up about his experiences and foisting them off as the truth?

Remember when news networks used to carry reports of those embarrassments?

Well, now it seems the news networks have become the very embarrassments they used to report on.  :sigh:

Anyway, fact is fact.  Truth is truth.  Reality is reality.  Nothing anyone says or does changes that.  "Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn’t go away." - Philip K. Dick.  It also doesn't go away just because someone has tried to replace it with a homemade reality cobbled together out of whims and assertions and bullshit. 

Journalism and news - whether in written or verbal form - should stick to the facts and to truth.  Leave the fiction to the fiction writers, please. We have enough competition amongst ourselves, thank you very much.  And just as we novelists don't lie for a living, you shouldn't be lying for your living either.