Notes from Exile, Beginning of Week Two

Back when I was still at the DayJob every day...

So, the last time I updated, we had just heard that everything at the DayJob was going online for employees as of 16 March and students as of 23 March, when they returned from their spring break. Initially, it would be for a week, maybe two, with an evaluation on 1 April to see how much longer we needed to self-isolate.

Turns out, the isolation was going to be much longer than that. The classes are online for the rest of the semester. All events (sporting and otherwise) are canceled, including but not limited to graduation.

All the St. Patrick's Day parades canceled - even the ones in Ireland! Two festivals canceled outright - the Hounds were supposed to appear and now aren't. One of them was rescheduled for September. The Georgia Renaissance Festival has postponed opening weekend for two weeks. Still, with cancellations happening in May and early June (including the Scottish Games here in Greenville!), I wouldn't be surprised if they canceled the rest of the faire.

So, here in exile (with my sword, I'll have you know!), I've been working from home and watching the numbers on my latest release, SCORCH. It's the second and final in the Tales of the Forest War series - do two books make a series? A duet? A couple? I digress.  I'm working through the final edits/cover design for the first in my new LitRPG series, Arcstone, due out in May. I'm still hoping that I will be appearing at ConCarolinas at the end of May, but that remains to be seen in the wake of all the cancelations.

What have you been up to, my Lettuce Readers? How is your exile going? Are you staying at home? Are you preventing the spread of this awful virus? If I think that I am missing out on going to dinner with friends or seeing movies, I just look at the latest numbers of people infected, and suddenly it isn't such a sacrifice. I will admit that my anxiety is a little high because I don't deal well with change, but I have enough to keep me occupied.

We are a few weeks out from the next writing event: Camp Nanowrimo begins in April. Once again, I'm going to tackle my Baskervilles project and hopefully make it through with something I can revise and improve upon for later. May should be full of revising whatever comes out of April. I'm also beta reading two manuscripts for other writers, so as I said, loads to keep me occupied.

Check-in! Let me know how you are coping during this unprecedented time in our world. Keep me honest - feel free to contact me through my website or this blog and ask me how the nano is going if I haven't been updating. The only way we will make it through exile/quarantine/self-isolation/social distancing is together.

Separate but Together. What was it I said in the last post about the introvert's time to shine?