Lately my life has become more interesting as it’s gotten progressively busier. Life as an editor remains gratifyingly challenging, especially in this current economic nightmare. I work with some truly exceptional authors and I am constantly in awe of the work they produce. Two of my newest books to hit the shelves are Armored Thunderbolt by Steve Zaloga and The Gettysburg Companion by Mark Adkin. If you’re at all interested in WWII or the Civil War you’ll want to check those out. Add to them the very recent works of Charles Jones, David Danelo, Kirsten Holmstedt, Col. Dominic Caraccilo, Lt.Col. Andrea Thompson, and George Bradford and I’m definitely over the moon with what they’re accomplishing. I joined a gym and am now going there regularly, still running, and (hopefully without jinxing it) dating. I’ve even cleaned my apartment. And all of it, or at least my perception of all it, flows from my writing which is going very well these days. Not that I can’t edit or run or date when I’m not writing, but it just seems that when the story is moving well so am I.

In fact, in 9 days I plan to do just that, but until then I am addicted to polls. I need my fix. Zogby starts me off in the morning followed by a check of Pollster and Real Clear Politics for a rolling average of the biggest national polls. Then, around 9ish, I clock in with Rasmussen. My day isn’t complete until Gallup come out with their three day rolling at 1pm, but then I need more and slide by 538.com for some real hardcore stats. If that isn’t enough to satisfy I’ll cruise a few blogs and even as a last desperate act, the network websites.

Sarah Palin – if god does exist she conclusively proves he/she/it has one wicked sense of humor.

Something about crisp mornings, gray skies, and the rustle of leaves gets my blood up…er, perhaps I’ve said too much, but I do love this time of year. So much so that after getting out to the park I came back and started tearing my apartment apart. I’ve already thrown out about two garbage bags worth of stuff, mostly papers and odds and ends that I no longer need or recognize. I think I found four adapters, fifteen dried up pens, untold number of elastics, a raft of New Yorkers and Locus magazines, old bills, old clothes, notes from ex-girlfriends (don’t ask,) parts of manuscripts, CDs, post-it notes reminding to do stuff I have no idea if I ever did, and dust, lots and lots of dust. Spatially it makes my apartment a whole lot cleaner and mentally it makes me feel a whole lot better.

Between sneezes I also worked on the novel and tried a new chicken place for dinner. Not exactly a spell-binding Saturday I’ll admit…hmm, maybe I’ll make some stuff up next time.

Movies: Ridley Scott to Direct The Forever War

Fox 2000 has acquired rights to the 1974 novel The Forever War by Joe Haldeman, and “Ridley Scott is planning to make it into his first science fiction film since he delivered back-to-back classics with Blade Runner and Alien,” Variety reported. “Scott intended to follow those films with The Forever War, but rights complications delayed his plans for more than two decades.”

“I first pursued Forever War 25 years ago, and the book has only grown more timely and relevant since,” said Scott. “It’s a science-fiction epic, a bit of The Odyssey by way of Blade Runner, built upon a brilliant, disorienting premise.”

This book is brilliant. It’s been one of my favorites since I was a teenager. And this movie by Ridley Scott will be stunning.

There is a transportation hierarchy when in Central Park and it goes something like this:

1. Taxis (they’re NY taxis, ’nuff said)
2. Horses (they’re big and slow and pull tourists around)
3. NYC Parks golf carts (see #2, minus the tourists)
4. Rickshaws (oh so bloody annoying as they park in the running lanes)
5. Cyclists (useful for blocking all of the above)
6. Runners faster than you (show offs)
7. Runners/you (marvelous creatures)
8. Runners slower than you (less marvelous, but they do provide a nice ego boost as you pass them)
9. People running with baby carriages (nothing like terrorizing your infant before work)
10. People walking dogs (take Lassie to a farm already)
11. Squirrels (smarter than most of the above, except runners of course)
12. Tourists (if only I believed in god then I’d know they were all going to burn…)

Ok, Central Park really isn’t the war zone I make it out to be, but when you step inside you need to know the score. Taxis will pass other taxis IN THE RUNNING AND BIKE LANES. That fact that there are runners and cyclists in said lanes never quite computes with them. Cyclists will yell at runners to get out of the way. Runners in turn curse out tourists, especially those that tend to gather in a group in the middle of the road. Dog walkers, at least those that do so in the running and biking lanes, are universally loathed (in part because those leashes are deadly and in part because based on the size of the dog they clearly have a bigger apartment than you do).

On the plus side, Central Park isn’t Times Square.