A Teeny Twinge

 Caz and I have found a flat in Northam, near Bideford. It's modernised but the building is old, with thick walls and a well, of all things, in the garden. Covered, of course, with decking on top too. And a built-in barbecue unit in the garden wall. I'm really hoping for a good summer, spent eating charred chicken and sausages.

 The beach at Westward Ho! is about a mile away. So is the beach at Northam Burrows, and Appledore harbour is close as well. Sometime this summer we'll be sitting in the little waves with Izzy, helping her stand as the water laps round her feet. Isn't that sweet?

 Both Caz and I have what we might charitably call fractured families. The situations are similar but different, and hopelessly complicated besides. They've led us to the same point, a determination that whatever else may happen, our daughter will always know she was loved and that we will fight for her. We'll make mistakes - what parent doesn't? But they will not be the same mistakes that we suffered, which in honesty were whoppers. If our relationship goes wrong we'll work at it, and we'll make sure Izzy is protected from any hurt. That was vital to us in any relationship, even before we met. For Caz and I, getting married was only partly an act of love, it was also an act of trust.

 Heh, I'm a new father, and suddenly I run at the mouth about emotional things. Funny that.

 Perhaps this new emotional openness is why I'm getting jumpy about Angry Robot. The open submission period ended two months ago, and AR has been contacting contributors with rejections ever since. But they haven't contacted me. I submitted three pieces, one of them within days of the window opening, so it should have been reviewed early, in theory. And there's been no word. No rejection email.

 I can't help feeling a teeny twinge of hope about that. I know the lack of contact proves nothing, it gives no guarantees. But still... a teeny twinge. I have been so lucky these past two years that mere high odds seem a piffling thing. Perhaps the run of good fortune will extend to one more lucky break.

 Perhaps.

All Change

 All change for the Blakes. Again.

 Caz has to return to Barnstaple to work after her Maternity Leave is over. That's not til August, but if we renew our tenancy it must be for 6 months, which takes us to the end of October, so we're not going to. We're leaving in April instead - yes, another house move... sigh. I already have a new job as Assistant Manager in the Sue Ryder shop, for 2 or 3 days a week, which means I can look after Izzy while Caz is at work.

 It also means I handed my notice in to Barnardo's yesterday. It's a shame, because I've made a good job of that shop. I've taken it from scratch, a new outlet, to the point where it ranks 4th or 5th in the South West area, is deluged in donations and is turning over a fair amount of money too. And I did that in 6 months. Other new shops have had to close on some days, or have needed help from elsewhere. Mine hasn't. I'm proud of that.

 In theory this means I'll have more time to write. In practice there's a bloody great flaw with that. The flaw is 54 centimetres long, cries a lot and is called Isabella Lucia, or in the common tongue, 'Grizzabella Grumblebot'. I expect to spend a lot of time cuddling her, soothing her cares, or else taking her out in the stroller. To the beach, or the park, when summer comes. By July she'll be ready for ice cream...

 For no reason at all, here's a photo

 So anyway, writing. One thing I look forward to is resuming my activity with the Barnstaple writers' group on the first Saturday of each month. I enjoy those meetings, there are a lot of good authors and good people there, and it's nice to mix and talk. With any luck I'll be able to join them in May. And who knows, by then I might have some writing to share. It's a case of fifty words here and ninety there at the moment, just crawling along and not much more. I've always been mopre focused than that. But the best man at my wedding spoke of how my priorities had changed since meeting Caz, and since the Grumblebot arrived, well...

 And I'm not complaining at all.

All Worth It

 Izzy has taken over the world.

 Well, my bit of it, anyway. She screams unless she can sleep next to my wife, in our bed, which means Daddy has to go sleep on the air mattress so he doesn't roll on her by accident. I like the air mattress, but it doesn't mean I sleep uninterrupted, because Caz wakes me when she needs help in the night. Izzy then sleeps all day while I'm at work, the lazy pest, so is rested and ready for another grizzle-fest that evening.

 A man can grow weary of it all, but then Izzy goes and does this

or something like it, and I'm reduced to an adoring wimp again.

 Meanwhile, I returned to my shop after two weeks Paternity Leave to find the rails half empty, not much stock sorted and bags of unsorted donations piled every which way. Some were even in the shop, which means I couldn't open as it's a Health and Safety risk. Today, my third day back, I finally caught up... more or less. I'm worn out and I've hardly started back.

 But look at that photo. All worth it, eh?

Yikes!

Not waiting anymore. Isabella Lucia arrived just before midnight on February 4th, at a touch under 6lb. She's utterly gorgeous. I'm in awe of my wife, who dealt with the birth so well and has managed since on a teacup of sleep a night, because Izzy won't rest unless she's being held by Mummy.

Daddy's a bit tired too, but I feel a tad reticent about saying so. A punch on the nose often offends y'know.

Since the birth, Caz and I have realised a number of things. One is that we should have practised putting the stroller/car seat combo together more often. We've learned that Daddy sleeping on the edge of the bed does not work, because it ends up with Daddy shouting "Yikes!" just before he hits the floor. And we've also learned that a single child can have more wriggly bits than you'd expect to find in a box of worms. Getting a sleep suit on that little Houdini is hard.

But she's healthy, and all her bits are where they should be. She's strong too. A fetch round the nose from an irate Izzy has quite an impact.

Of course, the rest of my life has fallen away a bit. I'm off work for a fortnight, and have written a total of 450 words in four days - and those on the night Caz and Izzy were kept in hospital and I was too wired to sleep. I'm just glad I played the Vice Captain's Cup in the pool league the day before Izzy came. Well, the day she came, in fact - I won the title, and the final ran until 12.30am on the day she was born. Quite a day, eh?

So that's all for this blog. I'd like to think of witty or clever things to say, but I'm too tired, and anyway all the things I feel are trite. Like knowing my daughter is the beautifullest little girl in the world.

Trite. But a bit true.

A Little Time

 Still waiting for Izzy.

 Caz had to stay overnight in hospital a week ago, because the pesky child is giving her high blood pressure. When the nurses tried to monitor Izzy's heartbeat she kept wriggling away, so the record had gaps in it. Later they did a scan and she kicked the scanner thingy right off Caz's stomach. That girl does not like to be prodded.

 Methinks an infant who can kick that hard is probably OK.

 I'm still working when I can. I mean, I work at Barnardo's all the time, not just when I feel like it, but I'm writing when I can too. I submitted The Death of Ghosts to Angry Robot a couple of days ago, with quite high hopes to be honest. I've rewritten volume one several times, because it's never seemed to me that it was quite smooth enough as a story... not quite impactful enough... I don't know. It hasn't felt right, that's all. The work has paid off, because now the opening 20 chapters feel very good indeed, among the best stuff I've ever done. There are three very strong characters in there, with clear voices of their own, and the pace is very high. There's a lot to tell in Ghosts, I don't want to spend 50,000 words wiffling about while I set the scene.

 And I have other stories to tell, too. I've mentioned some of them. Chained Dragon, about the struggle against a shadowy band of sorcerers who have wiped out whole cultures before. The Pyramids of Saqoma, which tells of an effort by a river civilisation to find out who founded their land, and built the very first pyramid out in the desert. There's The End of All Roads, set in a trading city out on the steppe where cultures meet; and The Playground of Fawns, which tells of rebellion and hope in a culture ruled by god-Emperors. Just those stories could run to nine volumes, and that's not the whole list. I need more hands to type with and above all I need more time, if I'm to get these tales written down.

 [Please buy my novels, Angry Robot, so I can quit work and write for you instead]

 In a couple of weeks I'll be a daddy and time will be even shorter. I can't wait. I think of how my life has changed since I met Caz, how much better it is, how full of love and laughter like I've never known. It's terrific. All I had to give up was a little time.

 I wouldn't change that.

Waiting for Izzy

 Well, here we go, then. Into the last 4 weeks of my wife's pregnancy, which means that from here, we're on alert.

 Everything else has sort of faded into the background. Whenever my phone rings I snatch at it, in case it's Caz ringing to say her waters have broken. If the baby kicks and she lets out an oof I leap off the sofa (and that baby can kick. I'm starting to think she might be a centaur). In my nervousness I talk to the baby a lot. Also, any mother unwise enough to bring her infant/baby into my shop had better be prepared to spend a long time listening to me blather on about how great my daughter is going to be.

 I doubt they enjoy this.

 But I can't stop doing it. Waiting for Izzy has become my life. People say she'll take over once she's born, and I think, what's different? She's taken over already. The bloody child already owns more clothes than I do. On my day off we found the car seat doesn't fit, so we went and bought another one, which meant ages wiffling about in Mothercare, and then more ages finding a stroller that will fit the new car seat. So much for a relaxing rest day. And the devil of it is.... I want my days off to all be like that. I'm trapped. No prison is as secure as the one you build yourself.

 I've been working extra hours for Barnardo's, because I was on my own over Christmas and New Year and fell behind. Got to do the job well because we need the money for Izzy. I hardly ever go out now because the money needs to be spent on Izzy. We don't have alcohol at home, and soon won't have pop either, because we're making a healthy environment for Izzy. Caz uses steam cleaners and bleach scrubs to make the house safe for Izzy. It's ridiculous, you'd think she was the Queen of Sheba.

 All of this comes as a culture shock. I'm used to living on my own, choosing my own hours, making my own decisions. Now? If I get permission to sleep I'm doing well. And this is just the start, this is nothing, compared to what I know is coming down the road... and can't wait for, so I can take the last scrap of my independence and throw it cheerily away. Told you. A prison I built myself.

 Caz and I went to see The Force Awakens the other day. We're not Star Wars fans, but we thought we'd give it a try, and it's the best movie in the franchise by a distance. I mention it because I don't have a clue when we'll next be able to mosey out for the evening. Maybe in the summer. The summer of 2030, that is.

 Got to go now. Caz has gone awful quiet and I'm worried...

Review of the Year

 2015 is nearly over, and here's what you've all been waiting for. Yes, it's my now traditional review of the year.

 Trouble is, I haven't watched, read or been involved with as much this year. My life's been so full that there hasn't been time. The largest part of that is that I got married, of course, one wonderful day back in August. But I also changed my job twice, ending up as a shop manager in Yeovil, which meant moving house, and all while my wife was pregnant. She still is, by the way; our daughter is due in February. Guess what the headline will be in next year's review?

 But despite all these terrible hardships, I have managed to sneak off now and then for a bit of enjoyment, so here goes. Spoilers may lie ahead, so watch out.

 Best film is The Hunger Games: Mockingjay - Part 2. I said last year that the first Mockingjay film was the best of the series, though taken from the worst book, and the final movie continued that. It's very cleverly done, keeping true to the novel but changing enough to make things interesting. It also makes it clearer that Coin really was a bad woman, ready to start all the old terrors again - meet the new boss, same as the old boss. A movie well worth seeing.

 I liked The Martian too. It's very hard to write a story in which the main character is alone nearly all the time, because dialogue is so important. Without it you have to be clever, and the writers here pull that off. I know, I'm a sucker for good writing. I can't imagine why.

 Speaking of which, the writers of Doctor Who need to either pull their fingers out or quit. Since Capaldi took over all the wit, all the subtlety has gone out of the show. It's set pieces now, dramatic incidents and gribbly monsters, but little of the sense of fun and character it used to have. No wonder viewing figures are falling.

 In books, I read Iain M Banks' The Player of Games. This is, simply, brilliant. It's set in the far-future Culture, where everyone lives comfortable lives - but not in the Empire of Azad, which is brutally ruled by a power elite chosen on the basis of how successful they are in playing the game of Azad, after which the empire is named. The game is said to be so like life that success in one means sure success in the other. The Culture is trying to build diplomatic bridges to the empire, so it recruits a talented game player named Gurgeh and sends him to Azad to play. As the story develops Gurgeh begins to realise there are larger games being played than the one on the boards. His journey through all this is horrifying as much as anything, but the book is seamless, as close to a perfect piece of SF as I can remember reading.

 I tried to read A Song of Ice and Fire again, too. It's my third effort to get into the books that became Game of Thrones and I can't manage it, I just can't. I know the series is more realistic than most Fantasy, I understand that it deals with moral ambiguity and the role of women in society. But it's just so dull. George R R Martin writes as though his hand is moving through treacle. The TV series might be just as good as I'm told it is - I wouldn't know - but it was taken from bad books. And really, one novel since 2005? I don't know what Martin is playing at. A writer's job is to write. One novel in the last ten years is absurd.

 So, there it is. I can almost hear the shrieks of dismay already. Hopefully 2016 will include more high quality like Banks or Mockingjay, and less dreary sludge like Doctor Who or George R R Martin. And hopefully I'll be able to look away from my daughter for long enough to notice.

 Have a great Christmas, everyone, and in the New Year may the Force be ever in your favour. Or something.