slow progress

Progress has been slow on finishing ye new story, "Pickman's Lazarus", because of ye new addition to ye household, pictur'd above. My elder sister came to stay for four days and brought with her two five-week old kittens, male and female, of which I was to pick one to adopt. I couldn't decide and so I have adopted both. Ysobel (with grey ears) and her wee brother Basil are quite delightful; but they insist of being around me, & when I come to my work table to begin work on writing ye new story, these wee kittens insist on climbing allover me, & then they discover how nice and warm ye laptop keyboard is, so they camp out on it, and the pressure of their little paws on ye laptop keyboard creates textual havoc to my story. I cou'd move my laptop to ye bedroom and lock ye door, but this afternoon the cats were sleeping in a spot of sunlight, and I took advantage of their nap to do some real work on the first portion of my story (set in ye past, in Boston around 1925) whut is now, at almoft 2,000 words, near completion. Part II will be set in ye present. I am writing this new story as ye final tale for my already-compiled next book for Centipede Press, An Ecstasy of Fear and Others--although if S. T. really likes it he may want to snap it up for use in Black Wings VI...maybe...