word mining central
Do you like half-cat home security systems? Rogue physics experiments? Rebellious teenagers? If so, you should be reading, “The Ground Shifted”, the latest story I’ve published. You can find it in the Young Explorer’s Adventure Guide, Volume 5, now available in stores.
The anthology contains 24 science-fiction stories for middle-grade readers (and up —and don’t tell me that doesn’t include you because it totally does) that will take you on adventures all over the universe.
Day 331:
It turns out this cave isn’t just a cave, it’s a chasm that stretches a good length to the southeast. It was hard to tell from above because it’s narrow at the top and deep at the bottom.
The other problem with that is that it means I can get drop-in friends from above of the exploding/arrow wielding/growling/pony spider type pretty much any time.
So today I hauled multiple sacks of straight up dirt back there to see if I can fill in some of the less cavernous caverns, at least until I can properly secure them.
The hod doohickey is on hold by the way because I’m still puzzling out the drill bit problem. So large leather bags of dirt it is. Good thing I eat so much ducken and their skins make such a fascinating leather.
Tomorrow I’ll start filling the holes and taking down some of the trees. Hopefully without exploding neighbors.
Day 330:
I did manage to shore up the chamber I mentioned yesterday, so now I can go through a heavy set of wooden doors and drop a support beam behind them if I think something’s chasing me.
This has been very effective against the zombies, but the exploding giraffe-corgis still sneak up on me and explode on a regular basis. Do not like. Head hurty.
I also dug out a much smaller second chamber. Ok, actually what happened was that while I was pulling ore out of the big chamber on my way to sheep Nirvana, I followed a vein that, when I was done, was essentially a chamber in and of itself and just needed the walls to be shored up a bit.
It’s a good thing I did so, because as I got to the back of it, I discovered it opened to the outside world — not cleanly, but in a “hey zombies can fall in this hole and kill you” kind of way.
So that’s secured as well.
Day 329:
I’m trying to shore up the chamber that goes out to the cave covered in trees, because making that area secure means having somewhere safe I can run away to, and I certainly don’t have that right now.
So far it’s going well, but when the sun begins to set I can hear the zombies growling above me. It’s a bit creepy.
Not that anything about this place is exactly peaceful. I mean seriously I don’t think I’ve gotten more than a day without a major adrenaline rush since I got here. I don’t think it’s called an anxiety issue when the environment really is trying to kill you, but I could be wrong.
Either way I’m thinking I should find some plants and experiment with trying to make tea. Something soothing.
I’ll probably poison myself shortly.
Day 328: I’m almost out of sand.
Which means I have to go back to the place that I’m trying to secure, the cave entrance on the west side near the sheep, because that’s the closest semi-secure space that far out, which is where the nearest sand deposit is in the bay thing.
In other words, these had better be enough axe heads to thin those trees, because I need to thin the trees to be safe enough to gather the sand to make more axe heads to thin the trees.
I just want some warm wool socks and a view of the valley from a tall mountain. Why is everything so hard?!