Friday, March 28, 2025

Short stuff!

Welcome, I’m Mary Louisa Locke, the author of the USA Today best-selling Victorian San Francisco Mystery series and the Caelestis Science Fiction series. In this daily newsletter, I reflect on my life as an indie author trying to age gracefully. Occasionally, I will also publish some of my shorter fiction in this newsletter to read for free.

Daily Diary, Day 1668:

First, a reminder that the complete short story, Dandy’s Discovery, is now up, so if you want to start at the beginning, go HERE, which lists all the published scenes in reverse chronological order.

Yesterday it finally got sunny around noon and got up to the mid-sixties, and although the next couple of days, more clouds, cooler weather, and maybe even a slight chance of rain are predicted, this morning the sun broke out briefly. Hope this means it won’t be too chilly this evening when there is an outdoor gathering as a send-off to one for the couple to one side of us who spend their summers up in Washington State near one of their kids. This every-month-or-so, started last year when a new young couple with a baby moved in to our cul-de-sac as a way to welcome them.

I also hope we have a little sun tomorrow, since in the afternoon a friend is supposed to come to visit, and as usual the plan is to sit outside (so neither of us will feel we need to be masked.)

Meanwhile, I did cut back on walking yesterday (two twenty-minute walks) to give my legs a bit of a rest (my muscles were complaining, which actually was a good sign and a very different sort of discomfort than arthritis.) I think I should be able to get back up to my sixty-minutes total today, and this is on top of doing morning yoga and regular cleaning.

No phone calls today, and besides some time spent organizing promotional activity for April, my plan is to start to write the short story, which is now tentatively called Mr. Wong to the Rescue. From experience, I know this will be slow going at first, so I am also going to practice patience.

Here is another rose bloom on an otherwise completely bare rose bush. They are coming back one blossom at a time.

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