[_Journalized_11.14.2011_]

And so comes to a close what seemed like an endless crush of deadlines.

Yesterday, I pressed SEND, and off went an article to ISIS about a Dylan recording that I discovered in the process of working on something else. If nothing else, what I've written about seems likely to correct a little corner of the history about the artist's catalog.

But also, the Cassavetes project, while not entirely finished, on my end of things is complete. I may have some light administrative work to do, before month's end, but no more heavy lifting for it, as of November 3.

What I'm looking forward to between now and February is time to annotate and write the prose parts of the Dylan dissertation, and also the time to resume my daily fiction-writing schedule. That went on hold back in October, as I remember it, as the magnitude of the then-current project-load became fully apparent.

In the vein of resumption, I started a new short story yesterday. It was born in one of my nightmares, the kind that I have that can fuel things like my short film I Was Blank (and Dreaming). Only, this one sparked a story.

It is titled "The Coffin Door." Ever since reading the exquisitely dark A Heritage and Its History by the inimitable Iris Compton-Burnett, last summer — I was on my female novelists of the middle Twentieth Century jag, at the time — I've wanted to try a piece that is all, or almost all, dialogue. "The Coffin Door," as it turns out, is that piece.

Have you tried the new short story from Mixer Publishing, yet? It is my haunting little single, "The Dirt Baby," and today would be an excellent day to drop a dollar on a copy for your Kindle. Where is the link, you ask? Oh, right here to Amazon, I say, as I supply it. Thanks, friends. I hope that you enjoy it.

More to come.