And now, ladies and gentlemen...Late Eclipses [Amazon]|[Mysterious Galaxy] is officially six days from release. That's less than a week! How am I supposed to get all my freaking out finished in less than a week? Since flailing around screaming that the sky is falling doesn't help with my countdown, here are six things you may not know about me.

6. I love snakes and spiders, have no fear of sharks, and tend to giggle hysterically when I'm on a plane and it hits a patch of turbulence that makes it feel like we're going to fall out of the sky. I am, however, morbidly terrified of pudding. This translates into a fear of any type of slug that isn't so ludicrously colored as to seem like a special effect.

5. I will not go into brackish water, because of the potential for leeches. Even if I am assured that there are no leeches in the entire country, I will not go into brackish water, because of the potential for leeches. Leeches are just not okay. Thank you, Stand By Me. In an attempt to conquer my fear, I kept a jar of leeches in my kitchen for a whole year. Those leeches were okay, because they were behind glass.

4. My collection of My Little Ponies is epic and vast, and contains almost all of the larger buildings from the original 1980s run of the toy line. Yes, including the Paradise Estate, which is roughly the size of a large card table. In that misty, far-off future where I actually have an office of my very own, it's going to wind up evenly divided between research material and plastic horses. Because that's just how I roll.

3. I grew up really, really, really poor, and I read really, really, really fast. These things combined mean that I grew up a dedicated re-reader, and will read books that I enjoy five, ten, or even twenty times. My count on The Stand is somewhere in the mid-fifties. The weirdest thing about my current bounty of available reading material is the lack of re-reading. I haven't read any of my favorites in over a year, and it's making me twitchy.

2. I have these long, elaborate, lucid dreams that seem entirely real when they're going on, even down to my needing to eat and use the bathroom in my sleep. They always end when someone tells me that I'm dreaming, and while they tend to be very realistic and grounded, they also tend to involve elements of "in a perfect world," like, you know, being published. Part of me spends every day afraid someone's going to tell me I'm dreaming.

1. My childhood idols were Vincent Price, Marilyn Munster, and Doctor Who. Considering that, and considering the way my life has turned out, I don't think I'm doing so bad. And I think they'd be proud of me.

Item the first:

lilysea was one of our winners in the random book drawing, but had forgotten that she had already ordered a copy of Late Eclipses. So, because she is a glorious and generous soul, she has allowed me to draw a new winner! calico_reaction, you have won a copy of Late Eclipses of your very own. Please email me with your contact information, so that I can get your book into the mail. As always, you have twenty-four hours (although I may not pick again if you don't claim your prize, as I want to do my mailing this week).

Item the second:

All my cats share the same favorite toy, a fuzzy red squid on a stick from the Animal Planet line of cat toys. They made cat toys for like, six weeks, and then discontinued them, which is terrible, because their toys were AWESOME. The squid is the last survivor of the original batch, and is put carefully away when not in use, since otherwise the fur squad would turn it into so much cotton calimari.

Last night, Thomas and I had a good squid-swing, and I put the squid away, not noticing as I did that he was watching, intently, to see where it went. On a shelf. Six feet above the ground. Fifteen minutes later, I heard a loud clatter, and got up to see what was going on. Nothing appeared to have been knocked over; I shrugged and went back to watching Glee.

Clatter clatter clatter. Clatter. The hell? I got up again, and discovered that the clattering noise was the stick, banging against things, as Thomas proudly toted the squid around the house. I took it away. I put it away. Ten minutes later...

CLATTER.

Sigh.

So yeah. Maine Coons are a) capable of logic, and b) big enough that they can jump really bloody high when they want something. You have been warned.