I spent last week in California with a couple of old buddies of mine, and now I'm home with a month left of summer vacation.  Writing work is in the forefront.  Here are the immediate tasks:

• Send the proofread copy of The Radio Magician and Other Stories back to Patrick Swenson so he can make the final edits.  It's interesting to reread stories I haven't looked at for a while.  "The Small Astral Object Genius" is my new favorite.  Oh, I also notice repetitions of some words, like "sidle" and "genius."  I'm not going to do anything about it, but I thought it was interesting what vocabulary I return to.
• Do the full edit of Low High: Freshmen and get it in the mail before class starts.  I should be starting Low High: Sophomores on the first day of class.  If the writing goes like it did on the first book, I could have it done by Christmas.
• Finish (or salvage) the story I've been working on for weeks.  It's not very often that a story stumps me, but I'm struggling with this one.  I was supposed to have it ready for an anthology deadline at the end of June, and I missed that.

I'll be in Denver this weekend to talk to the Denver Area Science Fiction Association (DASFA), on Saturday at 7:00 p.m. at the Whole Foods Grocery (11 S. Washington St.), and then on Sunday a 3:00 p.m. signing of Footprints with Alastair Mayer at Who Else Books (200 S. Broadway).  Anyone in the area is welcome to attend.

Part of my trip to California last week included a 10-mile hike into the Desolation Wilderness Area near Lake Tahoe.  I provide picture evidence to the left.  I think the lake in the bottom might be Echo Lake, but we forgot to take our map.  Of course, I thought we were going on a 2-mile hike.  All I can say about the 2,000 foot gain by the end of five miles is that growing older sucks! 

Also, as part of the trip, we went into San Francisco and saw a production of Wicked at the Orpheum theater.  It was well done and a treat.  After the first ten minutes I quit thinking about not having enough leg room, and I just got into the story.  Good music.  A fun reimagining of The Wizard of Oz story.