One of us has to make Kate some money.

Here's looking at you, kid.

I'm going to die of waiting for the editor to get back to me and tell me everything is all wrong.

Not going to happen. Those last two essays were phenomenal - there's something about the mixture of rarified exhaustion and passion for the topic that sings. It happens occasionally for me, but not nearly enough. It did happen with "Truth, in the Middle", and manoman, am I pleased with that.

"But I also spotted my personal diagnostic of an unhappy office: a big yellow poster telling me I didn't have to be crazy to work here, but it helped. "

So freaking true.

Kick-ass essay, erika. I've been fingerprinted I don't know how many times, and it always makes me feel like that.

I'm going to die of waiting for the editor to get back to me and tell me everything is all wrong.

Oh stop that. You're a marvelously talented writer. You really are, you know.

... besides, there's no possible way you can be suffering from an attack of insecurity about your writing, because I have ALL of that insecurity in my possession, right now. ALL of it.

(Why yes, I need to finish my sample chapters by next week. Excuse me while I panic and flail.)

Nah. I have some of the insecurity Jilli. A sustainability expert contracted to a publishing house is checking my book for validity RIGHT NOW. And I sent this out confident that I got every detail right. Guess how much of that confidence is left right now while I'm waiting for the verdict.

This little freak out goes to negative 11?

Guess how much of that confidence is left right now while I'm waiting for the verdict.

Oh fine, then. You can have the insecurity about fact-checking. The insecurities about, oh, being able to put together a coherent and entertaining sentence? All with me right now.

A quick beta/advice on a sentence, please?

Goths don’t all think they’re vampires, they’re not all depressed and suicidal, and if Goths are in a cult, than so is every single fan of an organized sport.

I think that does what I want it to, but I can't really tell at the moment.

Piffle. Your insecurities are false, as I just understood everything you posted, Jilli, even though it makes no sense whatsoever.

That'll put marzipan in your pie plate, bingo.

Your "than" should be "then."

If you're worried about clarity, you could change the serial commas to semicolons. Might help.

Goths don’t all think they’re vampires, they’re not all depressed and suicidal, and if Goths are in a cult, than so is every single fan of an organized sport.

You mean "then" instead of "than". I might either end the first sentence after vampires, or put a semi-colon in place of the comma after vampires, but punctuation is not my gift. As a statement/explanation, I like it just fine.

xposty goodness.