Archive | May 19, 2016

Private Party, a story of Stranded World, now up on Patreon for patrons

May19

The story that began with this little series…

A Wink…
Nothing Could Possib-lie Go Wrong (Summer)
Places One Doesn’t Go (Winter)
At Home (Spring)
Sight and Sense (Autumn)

…is completed here on Patreon.

The man glared at Summer through the tilted fence panel. He wasn’t a pleasant-looking man; he had stringy hair and a weedy beard, a greasy, pallid complexion and notable body odor. But he was an important man, at least at the moment. “This is a private party!”

Summer’s cheeks were flushed and she was just about ready to die. She’d gone through this fence before — with her mother, when she was very young, then later with Winter and Autumn, and later still, all five of them together. She’d stepped a little sideways, and… what had gone wrong this time?

She coughed. “Sir, I’m sorry… (read on…)

Pledge now and read all my stories!

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/1108032.html. You can comment here or there. comment count unavailable

#ThrowbackThursday: Alone Together

May19

May 19, 2011: [community profile] dailyprompt: “eight line poem” and “I want to be alone.”
I wrote something with placeholders for names and, as I went… I realized that the placeholders made more sense than names:

“I want to be alone.” [3] stared down at her notebook, the pencil limp in her hand.

“Now, honey, you know it don’t work that way.” [2] cuddled her briefly.

“It oughta,” she sighed.

“Now don’t let the bosses hear you talking that way,” her teammate scolded. “They’ll start thinking you’re defective, or, worse…

continue reading Alone Together here.

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/1107768.html. You can comment here or there. comment count unavailable

Grandpa-to-Me Cooking

May19

There’s a rage, it seems, for Farm-to-Table dining; there’s a few restaurants open in Ithaca right now that tout it and it gets play in some blogs. In short, it’s local food delivered to local consumers – in restaurants, it’s high end stuff made with low-food-miles food. I find it an interesting movement, but I live in the Frozen North, and I like my oranges, and my fresh produce in December, and so on.

There’s also – as we found out when we were taken out to a fancy place for dinner for our birthdays in Troy a few weeks back – a trend for buttermilk-fried ramps right now. And let me tell you, they are delicious. Ommity nommity tasty, with just enough onion flavor. We bought some ramps from our local farmer’s market and tried it out – so good

But to bring this around full circle, trendy things are pricey, and ramps have a very short growing season and are in fashion right now, so much so that people fear overharvesting.

Enter my grandparents’ farm, and the small forest there that my parents harvest for wood. And a visit to meet with my other (surviving) grandmother at my parents’ place 2 weekends past.

And my mother just happens to say “oh, would you like some ramps? We can go dig them.”

Let me tell you, grandpa’s-woods-to-table tastes even better than farm-to-table.

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/1107496.html. You can comment here or there. comment count unavailable

Private Party – A Patreon Story

May19

This story of Stranded World began as a series of connected vignettes on Dreamwidth, all of which are collected here; the story then continues to an actual conclusion of sorts. 

There was a man at the festival with an eye-tattoo that winked.

Autumn hadn’t been sure the first time. There were several beautiful pieces of ink wandering around this ‘fest – it was pushing a hundred degrees out, and everyone was wearing just about as little as they could get away with. And there was this man, topless and wearing short khaki shorts and Birkenstocks, and the eye centered on his spine had a perfectly-shaded iris. And then it was closed. And then there was the pupil again. Continue reading →

Landing Page: Inner Circle

May19

In the world of the Circled Plain, most of humanity lives within walled cities, protected from the monsters outside.

The cities’ walls are nested, circle within circle within circle, and the richest and most powerful live the deepest in the city.

They call the social and economic climb from the outer rings towards the inner the Ladder. The climb is hard, but there are always ways to jump rungs.

Jumping Rings
Taslin and Valran have both knelt in service to climb the ladder.
But they will have to make it through their ten years before they’ll see the fruit of their labor.
Jumping Rings updates every other Tuesday.

Chapter One: Taslin (LJ) Kneel
Chapter Two: Valran (LJ) Kneel
Chapter Three: Taslin (LJ) Duck
Chapter Four: Valran (LJ) Duck
Chapter Five: Taslin )LJ) Thrust

subsequent chapters posted here.

Other Stories
…This turned out a little creepy… (LJ) Marri & her Patron, Biccon
Meeting (LJ) another Servus
The Flow and the Fountain (LJ) – why one doesn’t use too much magic
Remembering the Fallen (LJ) – how the Flow changes one
Now Hiring (LJ) – fic around demific
Meeting the Archmage (LJ)
(LJ)

Meta
Teswarnen Eshmarn, the Second Circle Deputy Oligarch of New Indapala
 (LJ) – character information
The Lands of the Circled Plain (LJ) a setting story for 3WW

Worldbuilding 1: Architecture (LJ)
Worldbuilding 2: Inside and Outside (LJ)

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/773360.html. You can comment here or there. comment count unavailable