Things Got Done. It started with Extra Work Shift on Monday. That was Arctic HellzoneDay 2 of 3. So, walking to work Mon, Tues, & Wed evenings all counted as Accomplishments. Extra time required for Bundling Up, for the walk due to lots of ice on walkways, and for thawing out and de-steaming glasses at the far end of travel.

I mainly BAKED things. Oatcakes, oatmeal chocolate chip cookies, apples, casseroles, sugar cookies, and classic shortbreads. Stress baking? YUP. I mean, this nation is sliding hard into fascism just as we’re facing multiple new pandemics & climate collapse, and many people I care about (including myself) are facing economic hardship & physical peril as a direct result.

And yes, I have lots of thoughts about all that, but I’m not ready to post them yet. When I do, I’ll start with a content warning, because outrage fatigue and despair are real & dangerous, and I don’t want to contribute to anyone else’s struggles against same.

So I think a lot, I write things, and I bake.

My one foray onto my new Bluesky account the day after the inauguration disaster proved that a) I do have good filters installed, as none of my feeds were entirely a doomscroll, but b) it was still a mistake. The first freaking thing I saw was a boosted post from someone berating cis allies for not checking in on their trans friends the previous day, and how that proved how insincere all cis support was at root, and how no one trans could trust anyone cis to have their backs anymore…

And in my head, I said, “Well fuck you, some of us were offline because putting on our own damned breathing masks before trying to help others is key to surviving the next decade.” Then I blocked that person and everyone in their replies who was going OFF about how rotten and hypocritical “supposed cis allies” were. Cathartic and satisfying, if mostly symbolic since none of them probably would ever come across my tiny online presence anyhow.

Betrayal is valid grounds for explosive anger. I get that. But I refuse to stand in the explosion target zone. I did check on my non-cis friends, the same way I always do, by reading their posts & reposting things. Lurking is my love language.

Me and my rejection sensitivity will be sticking to the mutuals feed for the foreseeable, reposting or posting book stuff. (If you’re on Bluesky, I’m @kemherkes@bluesky.social there.)

Happy thought—one more week, and I get to delete Facebook forever. Maybe I should feel sad about that, but I don’t. I miss the platform I joined, the one where I kept up with distant friends & met wonderful new people who walked beside me on my authoring journey to publication & beyond, but that one’s been dead since 2016.

Another Big Doing of the week was the purchase of a new computer monitor. Now I can stop calling the 6+ year-old one I’d been using my “new” monitor, huh? Why yes I am investing in things that I expect to rise sharply in price soon.

I also researched and purchased two new runner rugs to keep Pippin safe. Now when he skids around the hall corner he will no longer gouge holes in the hardwood floor and slam his poor little body into walls. Floofy toe beans and slick surfaces do not mix well.

(I await the day he inevitably slips on the edge of the tub and gets a full dunking in the new deep tub. It’s happened multiple times in the old low tub, so it’s only a matter of time. But I digress.)

Got a bit of writing done, altho not much, and did a bit more research than that.

Thursday was a work day with Dex Greenbright (HI DEX!) on Friday, got to talk promotions and convention, life, the universe, and so on. And got to give my laminator machine a workout.

Words cannot express how much I am loving having a dedicated office space again. With room to do stretches and yoga and nap and read as well as work at the desk.

Creative Ups & Downs—no downs! Only ups! (I know, I’m shocked too.)

• I might be doing a cool author-related thing in February. Has to stay vague for now. I hope to have more specifics after Capricon.

• People have followed me to Bluesky, the Fediverse, and to my free Patreon tier!

• Side note, if you want to get these blog posts straight to your inbox, the Patreon free member tier is the only way to do that right now. Newsletters from the website will eventually happen…probably? Every time I attempt to complete setup, I lock up with decision paralysis. If you’ve been following via FB reposts, remember, that channel will be going away at the end of the month.)

• Someone bought a paperback copy of Controlled Descent. The second-best sales are those I cannot track to any specific promotion or effort on my part. Organic sales are rare for me, and therefore all the more precious. (The best ones are those that lead to a reader who becomes a friend, hello to all of you!)

Media updates:

I am cruising through Stargate: SG-1 season two now. I am developing Strong Opinions about this show. I applaud its attempted examination of its uncomfortable White Savior premise, especially given these are 1990’s episodes. And props to the series for tackling heavy philosophical, social, and ethical topics from the foundation of trying to do A Right Thing.

That said, in most episodes, the moral quandaries are either swatted aside with deus ex machine solutions or evasions…or they’re resolved in ways that alternately amuse and horrify. ANYway. I’m not here to dissect the Heavy Stuff. the GatewayWorld.net wiki does a great job of that. I just want to snark on a few niggling things that keep bugging me.

Why the FUCK is a machine that regularly ejects a huge plume of disintegration energy kept in a small room with little space around it—AND NO SAFETY ZONE GUIDES? That whole ramp is an unmarked death trap.

Related: if they expect to have to defend this portal from invasive forces ever (and they end up scrambling a defense every few episodes…) then why is there ZERO emplaced defensive weaponry? Claymores on the side walls at the very least. Maybe they’re worried about damaging the gate’s peripherals, but I always feel sorry for the troops who march in with rifles and pistols to face armored opponents wielding high-energy blasters. It reminds me of stories about mounted horse cavalry charging machine guns in WW1.

Cultural points that don’t hold up well include aliens who are non-white if they’re primitive but white if they’re “advanced,” with the exception of the Asgard/Grays, who are portrayed with puppets. Dishonorable mention goes to the romance-y plot lines that invariably fall flat. Although at least they aren’t all dumped on the women. Tied for worst eps so far: the painfully tone-deaf "Teal’c rages at former best friend for marrying his wife because they both thought Teal’c was dead/we can fix brainwashing with electroshock therapy subplot” episode and the “Perfect robot duplicates get created by an alien and just get left with the alien once they’re discovered to be Not The Real Characters.”

I’ll come up with more by next post, I’m sure.

IN look world, I’ve added more titles to my TBR, and I am waiting to get to the top of the holds list for Heavenly Tyrant. In the meantime I’m rereading Grace Burrowes romance novels because comfort reading is self care.

And that’s it for now. Have a cat pic.

Or! OR! if you like your local library, you could request a purchase. Free for you, sale for me, everyone wins.

Most libraries need the following info for ordering print books:

• Title: Relics From A Traveling Show

• Author: K. M. Herkes

• ISBN: 9781945745201 (paperback)

  Every library system does things a little differently, but most want their collections to serve their communities, so most of them are very responsive to patron requests.

If you like novels more than short stories, I recommend my series The Rollover Files for hopepunk tales of about an alternate world where moms with midlife crisis superpowers have been saving the world and making the military nervous since 1943.

I also have a completed, quirky slow-burn science fiction thriller duology with a romance chaser: The Stories Of The Restoration.

All my titles are available from Amazon, Apple, Kobo, Hoopla, Barnes & Noble, Bookshop.org, Overdrive and many other fine booksellers.

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