Exhaustion, Vampire Anatomy, Depression and the Saturday Morning Breakfast Serial

Hi all.

It's been a while since I've posted. I'm going to try to make up for that by giving you a nice, long post. Assuming I can stay upright that long.

Once upon a time I was diagnosed with an Unspecified Chronic Fatiguing Illness. It was pure hell for about two years, then it went into remission. (WHOOO FREAKIN' HOOOO!!) Most of the time I'm fine. Sometimes it nails me. If I take care of myself the bad spells usually don't last too long any more. The trick is taking care of it. Also, weird things can kick it in. Travel is hard on me. A case of the flu can do it. In this case, it was the food poisoning.

It wasn't a bad case by any means. I was functional after the first day. But I'm dealing with the whole exhaustion thing now and it sucks. So if I don't post periodically, forgive me, just figure I'm getting my rest.

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One of the panels I was on at MileHi involved Paranormal Research. We got a complaint part-way in that we were talking about regular research and not paranormal. But it really is the same thing. Research is research. Not sexy, but true. You need your regular facts to be perfect if you want your readers to believe the paranormal. . . to take that leap of faith. Also, if you are working with an existing mythos, you need to know what you're doing and be respectful. Yes, you can tweak the rules, but you have to know what they are first.

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Which leads me to a discussion I had with Cathy on a different occasion regarding vampire anatomy. (1) Why can't they eat solids? (2) Are the teeth hollow and used for absorbing the blood, or are they solid and just open the vein and the rest of the mouth is used for sucking purposes? (3) Do they swallow the blood or absorb it?

So we're discussing this (No wonder people stare at us oddly and eavesdrop so voraciously. Our conversations are MUCH more interesting than some others. At least on the weird scale.).

With regard to the solids -- I'm asserting/assuming that the death of tissue when a vampire ceases being human includes the esophageal muscles. Obviously not the tongue, or they couldn't talk, suck or swallow properly, but the esophagus is the set of muscles between where the tongue lets of and the stomach, etc. If it atrophied solid food would get "stuck" about mid-chest.

IF the teeth are hollow, I would assume they basically have a hollow root system that dumps into the throat where the blood can then be swallowed or absorbed. (My personal take would be swallowed with blood being absorbed much the way alcohol is -- only more so. Which would lead to research on HOW alcohol is absorbed by the body.)

On the other hand, my personal take is that the teeth are TEETH, that they are used for puncturing and tearing with the mouth muscles and tongue used for sucking and swallowing. (See above re absorption.)

But you have to decide what your rules are, research so they make sense, and then ABIDE BY THEM.

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Depression

I have it. It sucks. Generally it gets worse when I'm exhausted and feel like crap (situational and hormonal triggers). Big shocker there. I'll work through it. I always do. But I'm not feeling particularly cheery. I can and will get past it. But if I sound grumpy, it's not you, it's biology.

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And now with regard to the Serial. I'm pooped. I spent all yesterday doing the edit pass for the first book of the new series. (Recreating everything I lost when the computer crashed and I lost both the original and back-up copies). Cathy is going over it now to catch everything I missed and it will go to the editor at the beginning of the week. But I repeat, I'm POOPED. So I will ask you to forgive me, and to tune in Monday when I will hopefully feel better and can create something worth reading. Right before I launch into the second draft of the second book of the new series.

Until then.

HAPPY HALLOWEEN or whatever holiday you favor. HAPPY BIRTHDAY MOM!!! I LOVE YOU!!!!

And good night.