What is it?

It is a stunt to raise money for Clarion West, a 501(c)(3). Various CW workshop alumni and others pledge to accomplish a certain amount of writing. Nice people then pledge a certain amount of money, should they meet that goal. Although, actually, you kind of pledge the money anyway.

I thought it started a week ago?

It did. I didn't request to be included until the workshop had already started, and it took a few days to get my page up, and then I was out of town all weekend, and then -- oh, nobody wants to hear my excuses. Anyway, I have been doing the actual writing part of it since June 17, the official start date. So I'm not as far behind as it might seem.

So, how do I sponsor you?

My page is here. Although Google theory holds that "here" is a poor link word choice. Okay, if you want to sponsor Julie McGalliard as a CW write-a-thoner, click on the link.

How much should I pledge?

I am asking Goth House readers to sponsor me in the extremely lucky amount of $13. Or, if you hate me, but like the cause, sponsor somebody else.

And why should I do this again?

Because you love writing. And writers. Even when they show up and want to sleep on your couch and drink your booze and make you take them out for sushi on their birthday.

No, really, why?

Because you love writing. Even if writers are a pain in the coccyx.

Okay, why are you doing this?

Because I believe in the cause, having benefitted from it tremendously last year. Because lots of my CW siblings are doing it, and I started to feel left out. Because I have this novel that I want to finish while I still think it's a good idea.

Are you going to be updating Goth House during this time?

There will be at least one Goth House update between now and the end of the six-week write-a-thon on July 29 -- when I announce the for-sale version of Yellow is the Color of Poison, the next Goth House collection, and the first trade paperback.

I might post progress updates to the parlour. Although I'm not sure if anyone is really interested in reading stuff like, "finally got the bank scene to flow when I started writing it in longhand immediately upon awakening as opposed to staring numbly at my computer screen the previous night."

Also, I'm really hoping to get taken out for sushi on my birthday.

So, finally, Alexandra and her aunt show up.

Because, in 1983, everybody eventually shows up in the mall.

This is a fairly short, fairly simple entry, but it was deceptively hard to come up with because I needed to change my character designs for both teenage Alex and her aunt Bethy. I had come up with character designs for them before, but I didn't like them.

For some reason, I didn't start believing in teenage Alex until I gave her the side ponytail. This hairstyle came bubbling up from my suppressed memories, like the asymmetrical bob the espresso girl is wearing in previous installments. (The term "barista" didn't come into use until the mid 1990s, but my use of the term "espresso girl" shows why "barista" was needed.)

Actually, I had fuzzy nostalgic feelings for the asymmetrical bob, although I only got my hair cut that way once. (My hair has the wrong texture to show off any cut that's too geometric.) But I sort of cringed with embarrassment when I thought of the side ponytail, and that was when I knew it was the right hair choice.

It's funny about 80s hair, but the only hairstyles from that time that still look normal are the ones that looked the freakiest then -- the spazzed-out multicolored punk/wave styles.

Just a couple of days ago on the bus, I saw a young woman point out to her toddler a guy walking down the sidewalk with three-foot hair spikes.

"Look at that guy's hair!" she said. And we all looked.

(Written on Saturday June 9, not posted until I had a chance to edit)

Paul is out of town and I spent the morning trying to come up with character designs I could live with for teenage Alexandra and Alexandra’s aunt.

Around 11 am, the doorbell rang. I was pretty sure it was religious types -- other people usually knock -- but I was wearing pants, so I went ahead and opened the door.

It was a couple of little old ladies. I think. There were two of them. The one in front was a little old lady, I know that much, and the one behind her gave a general impression of little-old-ladyness, but I didn’t spent that long looking at them, and you know how notoriously unreliable eyewitnesses are.

This is for Jack Bell -- I started to write a comment on this post of his, it got long, so I'm posting it here instead.

Transhumanists are annoying because they use "transhumanism" and "the singularity" sort of interchangeably, which seems to me that transhumanists are using the fairly reasonable** speculative concept of a Vingean Singularity as a justification for their wacky beliefs.