Odds and Ends

Yesterday was Bits and Pieces and today is Odds and Ends.

Ends:
Day 17 of NaBloPoMo and it’s no more fun for me than it was on day two. Blogging daily is fun; it’s good practice, but being an “official” part of NaBloPoMo is not fun and that’s because I don’t enjoy the new host site, Blogher. Blogher isn’t a bad place, it’s just not anything I enjoy and I don’t feel they do anything to make the event feel special to participants. I find it difficult to connect with other bloggers on the site and their groups don’t appear to be very active. I did find a “Blogging Along With NaBloPoMo?” link and got a little excited thinking all my questions would be answered, but when I clicked the link I was informed it was a dead link. The old NaBlo site may not have been very active either, but their blogroll was much better and it was an easier site to navigate to find groups and meet other people. File NaBloPoMo 2012 under: Bummer.

Odds:
I had recently submitted a short story to the Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine and I really liked the story and had high hopes for it. Yesterday I got a note thanking me for letting them read my story, but after careful consideration they didn’t believe it was suited for any of the spaces they currently have open. So there it is. Rejected. Dumped. Tossed to the curb. The old heave-ho. The dumparooni. Thrown under the bus. Expunged. Discarded. Turned down. Jilted. Oh well, it was to be expected, right? It’s all part of the game, right? Nothing ventured, nothing gained, right? And at least it got careful consideration instead just getting regular consideration, right? It pisses me off just the same. Not for me, mind you, my stoicism will carry me through (and no, those aren’t tears, I just have something in my eye so don’t mind that), but for all the loyal Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine readers who won’t get to read a really good short story!

An Odd End:
I know someone who was once very ill with diabetes. His kidneys had failed and he spent four hours, three times a week, on dialysis for a very long time. His blood levels were very difficult to control and I think he may have been what’s called a ‘brittle’ diabetic. He was a very sick person. He was on the transplant list and one day his pager goes off and he’s told to go right to the hospital because they have organs for him. He got a pancreas and a kidney and after the surgery he was no longer a diabetic. Pretty amazing. It’s now fifteen years later and I just found out from him that his kidney is starting to fail and he’s going to be going back on dialysis. It’s a sad story. One of those stories that makes me stop and think about things.