The weather has been nice all week, but I’ve been ill, and I haven’t had much time to enjoy it. I’ve managed to get a couple of reviews and articles posted, but that’s been it. Now that I’ve started to get my legs back again, my wireless network connection, which has been iffy all spring, has gone completely kerflooey. I may have to scrap everything, router, adapter, extender, and start over, and at the moment, I’m not up to it. Without the use of a thumb drive to transfer data from one spot to another, there are too many programs on my upstairs computer that I can’t access from down here on my laptop. It might be time to call in the professionals.

I may not take a solid break, but it sure sounds to me as though it’s time to cut back on blogging until I get everything under control again. (I might even start getting caught up on emails, a task I’ve been promising myself since ever so long, longer than I care to admit.)

I’m going to be busy for the next week or so, hopefully not any longer than that. Company’s coming, a changeover to a new computer, Turkey Day, and another outpatient surgery scheduled for Friday.

I’ll be back as soon as I can. Have a great holiday, everyone!

We were quite lucky. Storm Sandy gave us only a glancing blow, as it turned out, although that was bad enough. We had lots of rain and high gusty winds, 45mph or so, but our power stayed on — the lights flickered twice, and that was all. We were well prepared with food, bottled water, flashlights and a portable battery-operated radio, but we didn’t need them. I haven’t turned on the TV yet to see what damage was done along the shore here in CT and farther south along the East Coast, including New York City. Horrendous, I imagine. I know lots of people are in a lot more trouble than us.

There is one huge branch of a tree in our back yard that missed our deck by several feet, otherwise we might have lost it. The storm was essentially over by 10 pm, although it was supposed to last for several days, it was so large. I looked out it see if were raining, and I saw the moon shining brightly between the clouds. That was a great relief!

Today it is still windy with lots of gray clouds but the sun is also out, shining brightly for the first time in several days. I don’t know if you remember the date of our snowstorm last year, when we had no electricity for five days, but it was exactly a year ago. I really didn’t want to do that again!

I’m doing much better. I was hoping to get something posted this evening, but after spending some time trying to catch up with emails and not quite succeeding, I decided to play it cautious and not push myself when I shouldn’t. Look for something new tomorrow, though, or if not, Wednesday for sure.

Coming soon are a review by Michael Shonk of an unusual Philo Vance appearance on TV, a long installment of Mike Nevin’s usual monthly column, Dan Stumpf’s opinion of a movie you probably never heard of, Fingerprints Don’t Lie (1951), and as I’m often fond of saying, much more.

The surgery of week before last went well, but I had a step backward yesterday. Not a big deal, according to my doctor, but I’ll have to slow down for a few days. I’ve been thinking about this. I’m going to take his advice — that goes without saying — and go a step further and stop posting here until after Labor Day.

I’ve taken an End of Summer break before. It’s always good to take some time off to deal with things that haven’t managed to get done over the summer — nothing too physical this time! — and that’s what I’ll be doing over the next few days.

Best wishes to those of you in the path of Hurricane Isaac. I’ll be watching news reports and thinking about you. Stay safe!

[UPDATE] 08-30-12. Thanks for all the get well notes, especially Randy’s, which gave me a much needed smile yesterday.

I’m on the mend at last, but I still have to take it easy for a few more days.

There is a post on the EQMM site that I’d like to call your attention to, especially if you’re a pulp fan and Black Mask magazine in particular. It’s written by Keith Alan Deutsch and it’s entitled “Black Mask Magazine, Steve Fisher, and The Noir Revolution.” In it he gives a small salute to Fanny Ellsworth, the editor of the magazine who took over from much more well known Joseph Shaw in 1936.

The changes she made to the magazine have never been given much attention before, and the article is well worth your reading:

http://somethingisgoingtohappen.net/2012/08/29/black-mask-magazine-steve-fisher-and-the-noir-revolution-by-keith-alan-deutsch/

I’m having some out-patient surgery done tomorrow. Nothing urgent about it, but there’s no reason to delay it either. I’ll be home by dinner time. I don’t know how wobbly in the knees I’ll be afterward, so I thought I’d give myself a longer break and take the rest of the weekend off as well. I’ll be back here by this time on Monday, if not before. See you then.