Since we last spoke. Or I wrote and you read. Or, man, what is the correct nomenclature here?

I went through edits with my editor. Twice. The second one took less than a few hours. This process started with a breathtakingly lovely letter from her. And it ended with me pressing “send” a few weeks later.

The manuscript now goes to the copy editor.

I filled out an author questionnaire sent by my publisher. I answered it as truthfully as I could. But I write fiction….

I was asked about blurbers. Those writers who might be nice enough to write nice things for the book jacket. Hey, if you want to blurb me, let me know.

We had some back and forth on design. On what the cover should look like. As long as it doesn’t look like any of these. I told them who I thought should design it. They were thinking the same person. So that’s good.

I had my author photo taken. By my friend Jane Heller. It was a cloudy day so we did the thing on her back balcony. Took less than half an hour.

Now I’m starting to think more and more about my next one. I started it but then the final edits of Waiting for the Man took over, but now I’m ready to start writing again. Creating. That is, when I’m not getting bogged down by the NHL playoffs, or by the hilarity of politics in Canada right now. How hilarious? Let’s see: politicians in Montreal (and some of the suburbs surrounding it) are being exposed for being on the take for years; Canada’s governing party is being embarrassed by a very embarrassing man; and Toronto’s mayor is, well, funny. It is touched on here, in what is nominally a weekly online discussion about sports. But that’s hard to do in Canada right now. As you can see. Canadians are good at laughing at themselves. Because what’s the alternative?

So when I get around to ignoring all the stimuli, and that’s tough, don’t get me wrong, I have more work to do. There’s always more work. Aided, as always, by other kinds of stimuli.