Reading: I’m still finishing A Distant Mirror but I left it at work a few days ago and picked up Joe Abercrombie’s Best Served Cold. I read the first book of Abercrombie’s First Law trilogy but the second book failed to grab me. Best Served Cold really has me by the throat.
A bad-ass mercenary captain is tossed off a tower balcony along with her brother but she didn’t die and is hell-bent on revenge. So its her, a northman looking for redemption, a numbers-obsessed killer who wants the order of jail and a haughty poisoner and his assistant all out to kill seven men who deserve it. Its fun, and often telegraphs its punches but its fun enough that I don’t really care.
I’m digging the whole gritty fantasy noir vibe. It is scratching a similar itch to the Gentleman Bastards books and inspired me to burn up a batch of Burning Wheel outcasts out for blood.
Planning: UFC 129, some gaming and the finishing touches on my portfolio.
Writing/Creating: Portfolio stuff for now but I have notes ready so that the moment that is done I can start on two other things that need writing.
And you?
Githyanki Diaspora 
Reading: Lately I get my fiction through audiobooks during my commute. Right now it’s ‘Altered Carbon’. I’m pretty sure if I were reading this I’d have already put it down. It’s not bad, but it’s not really stand-out either.
As an audiobook it’s just engaging enough for me to keep listening. I am ready to get done listening and get into the second book of ‘The Hunger Games’.
Also read – ink on paper – ‘101 Things I Learned in Architecture School’, which has a lot of things pertinent to drawing in general, and makes me want to sit down and do some perspective drawings of imaginary rooms and buildings.
Planning: Putting the garden in on Saturday. We bought plants instead of starting from seeds this year.
Playing our Apocalypse World / Smallville rules mashup ‘SCAPE’ this weekend, set in a small town on the Oregon Coast in the 1920’s.
Creating: Making a slipcase for the book I finished sewing up last night. Doing my daily drawing.
I really liked Altered Carbon and the rest of the Takeshi Kovacs novels. This first one is the most obviously noir of the three. The next one is modeled after a sci-fi war novel.
AW/Smallville rules mash-up? That sounds wild. Please do tell me more.
Ooh, I gotta get my hands on Best Served Cold! I enjoyed all three of those other books, but I do only remember much from the first and last.
R: Finally finished China Mieville’s Kraken. Also just finished up Black Prometheus, a collection of critical essays about Karl Edward Wagner. Lastly, trying to start Peter Watts’ Crysis (dependent on time, not quality of the book).
P: Taking care of a sick family, hopefully not too much overtime, and finishing up my “pulp baby” story.
C: Hopefully a cleaner house for the family. Various and sundry percolating game ideas. Lots of doodles. I did one inspired by your King Kong story, but it wasn’t a keeper. I’ll send any that are.
READING: The latest “Lapham’s Quarterly” in the bathroom and re-reading Perrow’s “Normal Accidents” on my commute. The current LQ topic is “work”.
PLANNING: Nothing. We just moved from Vancouver to Toronto and we’re both sick and lacking any furniture at all. Totally living moment to moment right now!
CREATING: Improved business processes, communist sensibilities in conservative territory, and phlegm.
Good luck in dealing with the high stress of moving, Brad.
Reading: I just finished Granville and Granville Mon Amour, by Bryan Talbot, and three anthologies, two of which kicked ass, and one of which was pretty good. I am debating what to read next. Maybe Holly Black’s Red Glove, which follows White Cat.
Planning: Dim Sum with friends tomorrow, apartment cleaning, trying to straighten out my motther’s 2008 tax penalties and interest (she died in 2010, and had had dementia for years before. My father, who died in 2009, was not so good at dealing with the tax responsibilities.) Other lawyer stuff and job searching stuff and estate stuff.
Writing / Creating: PBEM moves, but I need to do the Dreamation game write ups and start working on the larps on our plate. i also need to decide what, if any, ftf games I’m prepared to run and for whom.
Finished a couple of books on sufism that were pretty cool. Taking a break with books and watching cartoons and movies now that I got my Netflix going again – rewatching Ghost in the Shell 2nd GIG and really loving it.
Playing Might & Magic: Clash of Heroes – imagine Tetris meets a strategy rpg videogame. Our Mouse Guard game should be back in a few weeks.