Sleep etc
I was actually sleeping pretty well for most of the time between my return from Chicago and my flight to Boston.
And then my sleep schedule fell apart again.
Partly it was probably jet lag, and my usual difficulties with sleeping in places other than home, and my usual difficulties with sleeping in general. But I think it was also partly something else, only I don't know what.
The upshot was that for most of my time in Boston, and most of the nights since I got back on Tuesday, I've had about five hours of sleep a night.
Which really isn't enough.
I've been doing oddly well given that little sleep, but am nonetheless not thrilled with it. Especially because it sometimes results in two-hour afternoon naps, which won't go over so well after I return to work on Monday.
Last night, I went to sleep, thoroughly exhausted, around 1 a.m., and woke up around 6. NyQuil and white-noise generator and sleepy music didn't get me back to sleep, so I did something else I've been trying lately: get out computer and read. If I keep reading, then fine, I keep reading; if my eyes drift closed, then around the third time that happens I put the computer down and I often manage to get back to sleep.
That worked this morning. I don't know for sure, but I think I fell back asleep sometime between 6:30 and 7 a.m.
And slept until noon.
Which on the one hand is great. Ten-plus hours of sleep doesn't catch me up on all the sleep I've missed in the past couple weeks, but it's a great start.
But it left me kind of unprepared to face the day.
Eventually I got up, did some more magazine reading, did other bits of this and that. Had some lunch. Dealt with a few emails that I set aside to deal with later much too long ago (apologies again to the people who sent those). Did a little editing. Took notes on a possible way to rework the submission page so that submitters will have to explicitly indicate that the story is not a simultaneous sub, a reprint, etc.
Then off to Sonya's birthday party, which was filled with fondue and friends. I was still kind of dazed, possibly from the sleep thing. Wandered around, chatted with people, stuffed myself on fondue.
(The reason I don't generally have meals consisting of lots of little bits—tapas, chaat, sushi, fondue, etc—is that no matter how many little bits I have, it doesn't feel like a real meal to me, which tends to result in my eating too much of whatever it is. But it was certainly tasty. And the chocolate fondue for dessert was especially good.)
Got all set to leave, and then had a long discussion of romance novels with Sonya and Twig. Expressed dissatisfaction with latest Crusie (I keep neglecting to post about that). S and T decided on starting points for me to start in on Suzanne Brockmann, Julia Quinn, and Susan Elizabeth Phillips (I had read a couple of hers before and wasn't thrilled with them, but they convinced me to give her another try); I ended up borrowing five books from Sonya, to add to my current reading list. (One each from those three authors, plus Crusie's two latest collaborations, which I hadn't even known about. Am apprehensive about the latter, as I haven't much liked her previous collaborations, but at this point I think I've read all of her other books, so I'll try these for completeness.)
(I've been meaning for months to post about books I've read this year; will do that some day. For now, suffice it to say that I'm currently in the middle of or about to start the following: Walk to the End of the World, Gardner's latest Year's Best SF, The Master and Margarita, The Nex, God of Small Things, Eclipse 2, Seven Cities of Gold, Schismatrix Plus, the new version of Mary Anne's new book, and probably two or three other things I'm forgetting. So adding five romance novels to the list may be folly.)
I'm heading for bed shortly. Tomorrow: more magazine stuff; more attempts to tackle to-do-list items; Halloween hanging-out with the Evanses; perhaps reading some of M's draft.