Author: Robin McKinley

It occurs to me, rereading the end of the previous blog,** that:  WHERE THE JOLLY DOODAH DO THEY GET THEIR DEFINITION OF FORMAL WRITING? BECAUSE THE DOCUMENT IN QUESTION IS 1,000,000,000,000,000 WORDS LONG?  HOW STUPID IS THAT???? might be misinterpreted. It could mean that possessing, indeed being responsible for the creation of, a document 1,000,000,000,000,000 words long is stupid.  We won’t…

I HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAATE MICROSOFT. So. Hello. Returning at last to what is supposed to be the new blog. Perhaps slightly depending on how many more things go wrong.  [QUITE A FEW ACTUALLY. THIS POST SHOULD HAVE GONE UP THURSDAY OR FRIDAY LAST WEEK. DEPENDING ON HOW BAD MY BLOOD-PRESSURE HEADACHE GETS I MAY TELL YOU ABOUT IT…

I have now been without email for four days & I am not in a good mood.* & I hope that the company/corporation/gang of thieves/festering lumps of toxic detritus responsible are all frantically selling their vintage Jaguars at nadir-approaching prices on eBay to hire mobs of SAS-trained security forces to protect them from their customers’ & increasingly ex-customers’ wrath.**…

[NOTE THAT MY EMAIL HAS BEEN DOWN THE LAST 24 HOURS. I’m a TERRIBLE correspondent, that’s TERRIBLE, so lack of return-electron reply is not surprising but if you’ve tried to contact me & it’s bounced or behaved strangely, that’s why. & yes, Blogdad is going to move me away from these bozos as soon as system is, you know, movable. But, meanwhile,…

Part One: laundry That wet laundry sitting there has been waiting to be hung for three days.* Never mind, I am writing the blog. That load of laundry in the washing machine has been waiting for you to add soap & turn it on for three days.** Never mind, I’m writing the—WAIT A MINUTE. Adding soap & turning the machine on takes a minute.*** Deal…

…to get back online. I mean, I’m on line every day, like almost everyone else on the planet who has a computer or a local library or a school or a friend or a café that has a computer. & indeed I’m very, very grateful that on line exists. Covid, no car* & a manic perpetual motion…

Thank you thank you THANK YOU** to all of you who read or heard SFWA’s mad*** announcement yesterday & expressed some kind of positive spin on ‘oh wow how did that happen? What were they on anyway?’† Extra points to the people who threaded the technological maze & emailed me to say nice things about it. I am not in the least scorning good…

My stepson has been calling me Grand Matriarch.  Works for me.

Okay, this post is not going to be about Genghis’ name.* This is a digression on the clear indisputable fact that technology is possessed by demons.** Also, yes, there is a reason why I’m scrambling*** to get back on line now rather than a week/month/decade† from now & supposing the freaking technology lets me there will be an interesting…

My last dog died two & a half years ago, in the middle of the first, worst covid lockdown over here*.  I nearly went with her out of sheer despair.  I’d only moved up here a little over a year before, I’d moved into this house less than six months before, & the renovations, furthermore,…