The Olympics are winding down, which means I’ll let other people record things on the DVR. I still have a lot of Olympic coverage to go through, but now it won’t be ‘fast forward to the fifteen minutes I have to see so I can delete this to make room for the next four hours of coverage’. I’ll be able to sit back and watch the other stuff with some interest. At least I got to see some of my favorite Olympic sports (weightlifting, cycling, basketball and team handball). Now, there is a two year gap until the Winter Games and the better of the Olympics if you ask me. So after all is said and done, there should be a pleasant uptick in my productivity… and by uptick, I mean actually working.

I have been working on the ‘sick man’ idea, and I thought I would combine that with the idea of a positive Poisoner’s School story (taking an idea from Silence So Sharp). I like the idea that someone has to be trained to do something monumental, but there is a very hard deadline – death – to everything. Right now, I am just trying to figure out what sort of disease our main character has and whether or not it’s a lingering disease or something caught in the course of training. While I like the idea that this prospective poisoner making the ultimate sacrifice, I also like the idea of someone being passed over by all the other schools, but the least liked school takes this person and turns them into something far better than the others could have foreseen, if they knew that this school did something good. Now, I just to figure out the timeline and a decent enough set of crises – shouldn’t be too hard.

As far as the novel goes, I need to get a package together for the artist. Poor thing – she thinks I have an outline on paper for the novel. She thinks I’m prepared.

Anyway – there is something else I must discuss. Something near and dear to my heart: pens.

We are witness to the passing of an era, ladies and gentlemen

The pen you see above is no longer being made by Pentel. I looked. No longer in .5 mm (my favorite) and not even in .7 (which will do in a pinch), they no longer exist beyond the ones I have horded. I even ordered a package online once, but they’re not there. I can’t be the only one somewhat put out by this, but I might be the only one who is complaining about it. I would call on others to go to their website and protest the loss of this fine tool. No, I am being serious. All one of you. Hop to it.

Well, there is nothing else to report – the Olympics are winding down and my miffitude (that’s your new word, by the way) about my favorite pen being discontinued and a new novel eagerly awaits production. I hope your day is far more level than mine has been so far.

Sincerely,

Seething Apathy