I Can't Stand The Rain

"The good news is," said the rheumatologist when he told me I had fibromyalgia, "is that it won't kill you. The bad news is, you're living in the worst [very bad word deleted] country in the world to have any kind of arthritis, and if you stay here you'll only suffer."

He got that right. The rest of the world ('cepting Baino's half) are enjoying summer out there, while Ireland sits under a chill North Atlantic rain in what the calendar says is supposed to be July.

Surely, if arthritis patients suffer in such weather, our Health Service Executive should be giving us arthritics all grants to cover moving expenses to Orlando. Why not? Think of the money the HSE would save, in years of Physical Therapy for each of us, and doctors' visits, and all these free paracetamol tablets we get. Ooh, I curse your short-sighted stupidity, Mary Harney; it's financial decisions like this one that have crippled our national healthcare system and doomed Irish cancer victims to early graves. Booo! (But send us to Orlando and all is forgiven.)

I hate rain. I especially hate cold rain. And, cold rain in summer? The worst, if only for the injustice of it. My joints and back are sore, and the rest of me is just tired and sad. The dog is restless, and if we let him out he comes back muddy and stinky. This afternoon the pony walked up to our window and stood looking in, as if hoping he'd be invited in like the dog, dripping as he was. We sat in our warm dry sitting room, drank our whiskey coffee, and stared back at him.

Meanwhile, the photoblog often draws comments and e-mails about how beautiful it is here, and how lucky I am. Oh. Really.

And here I was beginning to think that I could even face getting on an airplane, just to get out of here.

Wet Ink,"the magazine of new writing", is supported in part by the Australian Council Literature Board. You can send them fiction (including genre fiction---let me make a note here--), essays, and other prose or poetry. They pay, and they pay well, and bless them they even provide a cover letter that you can just fill in the blanks and send.

The Manchester Fiction Prize can go in this rainy list, as Manchester is hardly dryer or warmer than we are in Ireland. If you don't mind tossing £15 (that's pounds sterling, notice--all of using other currencies may experience sticker shock at the conversion) then you can send in a story and take a chance at the £10,000 prize. That would cheer up anyone, no matter how hard it rained.

The Raintown Review is a perfect-bound semi-annual journal of poetry and prose. "We are more interested in metrical works, including well-rendered blank verse, sonnets of every variety, villanelles and triolets. End rhyme is neither a crime nor a requirement....Any prose we accept will have to be written well enough and be of such import that we can't refuse to publish it." The submission page describes "payment" as one contributor's copy. Personally I don't call a contributor's copy payment, I call it a courtesy. I'm just sayin'.

Cerulean Rain is a bit more honest, saying up front that they "do not pay for work we publish at this time". But, they do publish novel excerpts, and that might do a good turn, publicity-wise, if your novel-in-progress is excerptable. They like experimental, dark, and non-conformity: read the guidelines and more about the publication before submitting please.

And before all this non-paying crap gets too depressing (as if I wasn't depressed already):

Beneath Ceaseless Skies is straight after my own heart, publishing literary adventure fantasy. The submission guidelines are blissfully specific and they pay professional rates for accepted works; they'll even consider novella-length fiction.

Funny... I'm cheering up now.

And, once again, I'm very sorry to anyone who has the title's song now stuck in their head, as I do.