Yay! And today I can pay my #CatTax, too!

#CatsOfCoSo
#FreeRangeCatFriends
#AGoodDay

They *do* eat grass, too... but dessert first.

#BoringDystopia

(Cane stalks from a guarapo vendor get dumped at this bin. They're after the sugar.)

#BonusBellyRubs

Did not have enough eyeball left for late-night editing.

But! It's just past 4 on a new day.

All is well. Time for a run. 💪🏻

😅 More admin tasks took over. Eesh. So much for "balancing" my schedule after a week's hiatus from the newsletter.

Let's see if I have eyeball left enough to edit this one last piece before bed. 🤞🏻

Brain buzzing from admin work today.

Going for a walk before newsletter.

One important lesson from teamwork is that everyone has different ways of communicating, and different needs they're trying to meet *while* communicating.

The world is a tougher place to navigate when we don't pay attention to what our communication gaps are telling us.

Some folks are looking for answers.
Some folks want to be heard.
Some folks need to be reassured.

Ego gets in the way of so much learning in our world.

Putting together a review this morn, I keep returning to a definition of love from one of the books:

For Alaya Dawn Johnson, love is radical honesty, radical trust, and radical vulnerability.

Now, "radical" isn't the same as "absolute", even if it shows up as similar. To me, "radical" suggests a deliberate choice to lean into honesty, trust, & vulnerability when alternatives exist.

But this tall order needs a super healthy ecosystem in which to thrive.

Do we do enough to cultivate all three?

Bad pun alert. #Humour

😅 Did you folks know about this?

I was chatting with Colombian friends today and they told me that the word for this hairdo, locally in the 80s, was the "Alf", like the show. Did *we* ever call it that? I feel like two North American cultural items were exported at the same time and got fused in the process. 🙃

The horses who pass through my park in the morning are like big ol' raccoons. They garbage-dive for fruit peels and cane sugar, the giant sucks.

Happy Thursday, CoSo, whatever your dumpster-diving brings you for brekkie!

(Also, be careful when petting your hooved friends in the rain.) #Nature

#CookiesForDays
Or more like--
#CookiesForNeighbours
#CoSoBakes

(Also: I used to hate oatmeal raisin cookies, and now I... kind of prefer them to the chocolate chip variety? Is this a sign of ageing? Should I be learning how to make fig newtons? 😬)

Afternoon cookies (using up the rest of the dough from Monday).

Swing by, bring a book, and let's down these suckers with tea or something stronger.

#AmReading (One more book before I can write that darned review.) #CoSoBakes

Another story rejection today, which is perfectly fine - it means I'm back in the fray!

The trick with rejections is to know where you're going to send the work next.

This story received glowing comments from three readers before it was first sent out, so when I read today's rejection, I had it out to its next possible home within the hour.

(Second trick with rejections: *do not agonize over the contents of the rejection letter; there are no hidden clues!*)

#WritersOfCoSo #WritingCommunity

Today, we use a recent Trek event to reflect on the pain of near-future storytelling that imagines worlds as ugly as our own and also somehow more optimistic.

There are plenty of real-world touchstones for the Bell Riots of DS9, which we just marked this past week. But are there real-world touchstones for the *change* that DS9 imagines will come after one bout of violence goes too far?

#StarTrek #SFF #Humanism #Economics #Housing #BellRiots #Politics
https://open.substack.com/pub/mlclark/p/the-bell-riots-and-us

🙃 And there's a transport protest today on the highway (ongoing union issues with the state). I'll save you the noise this time, but some trucks are trying to toot out tunes, so - points for creativity.

(I can't fully concentrate until they pass, though, alack.)

#TheTootening #Colombia

Some days I really just want to live in a cabin, well away from all this nonsense. Porch chair. Suspenders. Battered old book of poetry I've read to death. Cat in the window. Lazy old beagle called Colonel McGruff snoozing beside me, except when needed to huff a low howl of a warning if anyone comes up a narrow dirt road.

Is it the whisky wagon, here to drop off my monthly jug alongside coffee and grains? No? Well, that's also what the bear-deterrent of a shotgun is for.

#Perfection #LifeGoals

Minor annoyance this morning, which I'm turning into a chuckle.

I run early to avoid people. I have told this to the tinto vendor Marisol in the park. Early = no dudes bothering me. Usually.

But yesterday Marisol was eager to tell me that a friend of hers has seen me leaving the park and thinks I'm nice and wants to take me out for coffee. I told her I'm not interested, but...

Guess who was waiting with her today, to try his luck anyway? 🙄

The dudes, I'm used to.
But las traidoras? Por qué?!

There's a principle in publishing that it's a mixed blessing to come across a terrible published author.

On the one hand, you think, "Wow, if that crap could get published, maybe there's hope for me yet!"

On the other hand: "Wait, if that crap has been published, maybe it's because the system is built to favour crap."

I feel that way when seeing EM teach everyone that knuckleheads can be billionaires.

It's funny for a beat.

Then it's all just a sad reminder of how mediocre our systems are.