Expect me when you see– Oh look, it’s me!

Bless me, Father, it’s been 15 weeks since my last confession.

Oh, hey.  Yup, it’s me– sticking my head out of the dark, tarry abyss I’d fallen into.  I’m still working myself out of it, so I can’t give you all the details right away.  With luck, I’ll be able to fill you in on all the details over time.

So…where have I been?  What have I been up to?  And has my snarky, shellshocked demeanor lightened up much?

Take a wild guess.  Anyway….

First, I’ve been chained to my Macbook for a few months, learning by doing sound work on my own.  The results have been the current mixes of Afterhell Vol 3 “Bloodbath at the Giallo Hotel.”  The folks at Transdimensional Media and the Willamette Radio Workshop have helped me a lot, giving me advice and feedback.  It’s still in work.  Watch that space.

Second…  Jamie started her sabbatical away from the day job in late June.  Now, on the surface, this fact flies in the face of common sense.  A sabbatical usually means more free time, not less.

Ah, but most people don’t make the mistake we did.  We told our relatives.  What’s been the real time-sink of late?  Them.

Simple reason why.  Best encapsulation:  “Free time?  Great, then you guys can drop everything and travel hundreds of miles to see us!  All of us!  Every last freakin’ one of us.  Y’know, before we all die.”

So except for a few weeks where we took a break and came home for this year’s WRW Writers-On-the-air Workshop, Jamie and I have been traveling.  Lots.  Driving for hundreds of miles, up and down the west coast of North America, dipping a little bit into Canada as well as the usual scouring of the western US (but not before enduring some bigoted US Customs officers who ought to be pelted with oily anchovies and shoved into large vats of rancid goat’s milk every time they ever say “Oh, one of those,”) schlepping laptops, luggage, and suntan lotion –when we have it — until every other part of our bodies ached like an all-over tetanus shot.

Thus, if any of our relations are reading this, and if you bugged us to go out all that way to see you… you owe us.  Big.  And you will not know the day.  You will not know the hour.

Anyway, I’m hoping to post more details and less snark as time passes.  We even have pictures that might be fun to post for everyone’s perusal.

That brings me to an interesting question for all and sundry.  Is there a decent image editor for OSX that doesn’t cost an arm and a leg?