Barb Caffrey's Blog

Folks, I wanted to give you a brief update regarding my Mom’s dog, Ms. Brat (also known as Bratty). She’s still hanging in there and is starting to use her front paw more and more. She is drinking water and has sporadically eaten in the past week. She’s always been picky about her food, so it’s nothing new that nothing we have tried to give her has pleased her. (It’s the same with treats, too. Sometimes she loves one variety of treats but won’t touch the other; other times it’s vice versa.)

Mom and I have been cautiously optimistic regarding Brat’s health. That said, sometime this week Brat is going into the vet’s office (a new one, as our old one retired a few years ago. Most of the routine coverage has been done at places like Petco.) in order to rule out any other problems. (For example, this not wanting to eat much at all thing is new. Why is this going on?)

Anyway, I have been doing what I can this past week to deal with mundane issues everyone on the face of the Earth has to deal with from time to time. I’ve also written some into the novel I’m writing that’s a prequel to a friend’s novel series. Once I get up to the time his series starts, I plan on writing a parallel story from my character’s POV. (I figured if Anne McCaffrey could do that in Nerilka’s Story, so could I.) It’s fun trying to fit the various pieces together, and add in small touches that my friend had in subtext but were never overt, or things that make sense from my character’s perspective (he’s a fifteen-year-old prodigy of a sort, but doesn’t realize it as he mostly thinks about what he lacks rather than what he has, as people tend to do at age fifteen).

When I get to the point I know it’s going to be a real book — into the 80K to 90K range — I’ll discuss it more. Until then, just think good thoughts for me, eh?

Because of focusing on this book, I’ve written almost twice as many words this year as I had all of last year. There’s still a month and a half to go, so I’m going to try to eclipse last year’s total and leave it in the dust. (Go from twice as many to three times as many, at the very least.) Or, in other words, I’ve written about 33K words and know there’s much more to say from my young character’s perspective.

As far as editing goes, I have two long-term edits that I must finish up soon. One I’ve taken a great deal of time on, partly because I love the author’s work so much and partly because there just haven’t been enough hours in the day to get everything done. (Too many crises, not enough of me, as it were.) The other, I’m starting a third pass on–this one’s nonfiction–and is the third book in a series of self-help books. (The first one, it’s more like a fourth or fifth full pass. But I’ve stopped and started many times in the past months.) Plus, I have two books where my client wants me to update their original files with better editing, along with two new novels…never a dull moment around Chez Caffrey, that’s for sure.

Finally, I watched in sadness as my Milwaukee Brewers flamed out in the playoffs earlier this month. They had a great regular season, winning 92 games and losing only 70. But in a best of three series, you must win one game to force Game Three. The Brewers bats were quiet, one of their best pitchers ended up coming up with a dreadful injury (he will miss nearly all of 2024, it’s been reported; the pitcher’s name is Brandon Woodruff) and couldn’t pitch, and despite sparkling defense I guess it just wasn’t meant to be for the Brew Crew this year.

One of these years, the Brewers will go to the World Series again. They last were there in 1982, when I was a youngster. I remember the series well, in fact, and would’ve never dreamed back then that the Brewers, forty-one years later, still hadn’t managed to go to the World Series again, much less win it.

But it won’t be this year, and I find that both vexing and sad.

I may write a longer post about the Brewers in a week or two, mostly because I remain so conflicted about how the season went. To have a great season like that, only to meekly bow out — at home, no less, as the Brewers’ record was better than their opponent’s record — after two uninspiring, even insipid, games just made me feel awful.

So, that’s about it! Keep thinking good thoughts for Bratty, would you? And if you have any thoughts re: anything I’ve discussed here, go ahead and share ’em. I’m always happy to talk writing, editing, or just about anything else. (As I’m sure you know already.)