17 May 2006

I know what I forgot to talk about yesterday! My folks are back from Australia, and they brought a blank book for me and a T-shirt with turtles on for Mark and a mini-didgeridoo as a present-at-large. This last is a most excellent present -- well, they all are -- it's like they know us or something -- but we can't consistently make it go yet. When we do, Ista blames herself. She examines her hindquarters with her dismayed look -- oh, how rude of me, did I do that? it doesn't smell like I did that -- and then runs around in circles in hyper mode. Delighted with the latter part, just dismayed at first.

I can't wait to try the mini-didgeridoo with Robin. (My folks did think of this eventuality when they bought it.)

And in the middle of writing this journal entry, I got an e-mail from Aeon that they're buying "Michael Banks, Home from the War." This makes short story sale number fifty. Can that be right? I suppose that's what happens when you start at one and keep counting: eventually you get to fifty.

It seems weird, though. It seems like a lot, and it doesn't feel like I've sold a lot of stories. It feels like I've sold "some" stories. Some. Yah. Well, fifty is some.

I think it's the rejection slips that do it. It's very easy to think of oneself as an oft-rejected story, but very few people care about that part. Mostly it just matters that there are stories out there, and I wrote them, and people can read them. And that does matter quite a lot, actually. Also I get money and illustrations for them, which is always good.