rlfj: Blog

I've heard from numerous readers about wives and significant others having symptoms like what I wrote about and the results. I heard from people who had family members with ovarian cysts, torsions, fallopian tube problems, ectopic pregnancies, and all sorts of other things. These things are real and dangerous and require serious medical care. Many thanks to my medical editors. I think they gave me the info to get it right. The women's clinic I mention is modelled after the Bellevue Women's Center in Schenectady, where my youngest daughter had her daughters. Very good quality medical care.

I am still getting emails on coronavirus. Even though the disease seems to kill both Republicans and Democrats alike, not everybody believes that. I have been informed by conservatives that the death tolls are inflated because the CDC, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (they always leave off the P when talking about it, not sure why), has ordered doctors to report all deaths as Covid deaths. I found that curious, because the liberals have informed me that the CDC has ordered doctors to stop reporting Covid deaths in order to keep the death count low. I hope the guy at the CDC giving out the orders is keeping it straight! This is giving me a headache. Oh, no! That's a symptom!

Lots of different things going on in Chapter 15. Enjoy!

Now you know why I asked about detailed info on female anatomy several weeks ago. I wanted to get the details right on IUDs and oophorectomies. After writing parts of the story I realized that I didn't know what I needed to know. Several doctors and nurses were able to respond and help me. Many thanks.

We are beginning to see signs of PTSD among the doctors, nurses, EMTs, and paramedics who are responding to coronavirus victims. Several have already committed suicide and many others are openly discussing not being able to continue working in the health field. I hate to say this, but I wasn't surprised. We've seen it happen before.

For those interested, I've begun publishing on bookapy, the publishing site affiliated with SOL. Not sure how that will work out in the long run. They aren't linked up yet with Amazon or iBookstore, for instance, and royalties are only paid quarterly. On the other hand, a purchase through them earns a higher royalty payment to the author. At least the authors can still publish elsewhere at the same time. We're just going to have to see how this works out. For those interested in purchasing elsewhere, send me a note.

FYI, Chapter 12 was the last chapter that could be considered in any sense political. Just remember, because a character says something, it doesn't mean I am saying it. It's fiction! That being said, I just can't believe that some people think coronavirus is political! For all of you who think it's faked, please feel free to take some hydroxychloroquine, wash it down with some disinfectant, and get in your tanning bed. Me, I'm going to listen to my doctor. Please don't complain. I'll just hit the Delete key.

Another complaint, of sorts, has been about the lack of action in this story. Where's the 'trigger time'? Sorry about that. Grim's no longer in Iraq at the height of the war or serving on a SWAT team. He's a civilian. As a general rule, civilians are discouraged from running around shooting people. Then again, his name is the Grim Reaper. We'll just have to see how that works out.

I gave a lot of thought to this chapter. I started writing this story over the winter, with some parts going back to 2019. I wrote the section where the spring of 2020 occurred before anybody knew about coronavirus. At that point I went back and added a quickie paragraph, and that was what ended up being published. It wasn't long after that before it became obvious this was something truly disastrous. I seriously considered taking a break for a month before publishing this chapter in order to see what was happening with this mess. Instead, I compromised. I added quite a bit more but left some of the details vague. For all the readers who purchased a copy, first, thank you, and second, when the story is finished you'll be able to download the entire story with all the final edits and fixes.

One thing that has struck me about the current crisis is the plethora of heartwarming ads from various companies telling us all to stay apart so we can all be together later. It reminds me of a section in A Fresh Start during Hurricane Katrina, where Carl Buckman was talking to the head of ExxonMobile about freeing up some helicopter capacity. "I knew that three things were going to happen. After the storm, some of their helicopter capacity would be offered to the government, that some wonderfully heartwarming commercials would be generated about how they were helping, and that before I was out of office Lee Raymond would be knocking on my door for something worth billions of dollars and I would give in." Art imitating life, or life imitating art? Or maybe I'm just a cynic?

Another instance of life imitating art occurred just a few weeks ago, while watching Monty Python and the Holy Grail, with one very eerie scene. "Bring out yer dead." "I'm not dead." "Well, he will be soon, he's very ill." That was a very weird experience and nowhere near as funny as it once was.

For those curious, I took the details on the UGA history doctoral program from the Guide to the Graduate Program in History at the University of Georgia. It took a while to work through the UGA website to find it, but it gave me a lot of information on what Grim would need to do to get his doctorate. It's nineteen pages long; six pages are for the master's program and thirteen pages are for the doctoral program.

Minor issue at the end of Chapter 11, in that a reader pointed out that Oprah is now living in California. I simply added a line stating she had to be in Chicago for some reason and that was where they met. Hey, it's fiction.

One of my readers commented that I should mention some appropriate veteran's organizations. While I invented the West Georgia Veterans Coalition in the first story, there really is an IAVA, the Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America. There are also the Wounded Warrior Project, Team Rubicon, and many others. Many of these groups have dedicated programs to help with PTSD and suicide prevention. If you or a friend or a relative need assistance, there are groups out there to help. You just have to ask.

Not much to write about in Chapter 11. Enjoy!