While my family drama novel steeps for a bit, I revisited my “Stonepvnk” historical sci-fi novel Psychonautica and sent out another query letter, synopsis, and first three chapters. Surely there’s an audience for ancient Greek mathletes on psychedelics fighting Egyptian zombies with show-tunes.

My alternative programming tonight is F1.

Some analog #archaeogaming on NPR yesterday: finding the rules of an ancient Roman board game with @waltros.bsky.social and others: www.npr.org/2026/02/23/n... #classics

Chat, here’s a friendly reminder that I’m selling fine art prints of my North Dakota photos. DM me if you want to get friends’ rates. I have about 100 pix to choose from. No offer too small! #NorthDakota #NoDak #NorthernPlains #GreatPlains #Photography www.andrewreinhard.com

Come See Me in the Good Light was transcendent. Well worth subscribing to Apple TV or at the very least signing up for a trial. Love, fear, courage, laughter, and poetry. Most of all: grace.

Cleo (18) is proof that you’re never too old for mischief.

For the #Archaeogaming crowd: You can play as Venture, an archaeologist in Overwatch 2! overwatch.blizzard.com/en-us/heroes... #archaeology 🏺

I really wish my Australian/Kiwi friends who live 17 hours in the future would do me the kindness of telling me winning lottery numbers for tonight’s drawing here. I’ll Venmo you half the winnings.

I finished the first draft of Monkeybrain (69,497 words). A little short, but will grow a bit during rewrites. If anyone wants to read the thing now to tell me what’s good, bad, or missing, please DM. I need your (monkey) brains. You’ll learn about Alzheimer’s, hospice, and the 1969 Libyan coup.

68,431 words tonight in Monkeybrain. I’m tying all the threads.

I started writing the final part of Monkeybrain tonight after a few days off. It focuses on the abuse suffered by her and her younger brother, told in various dissociative states. 67,155 words and counting.

One day a termite knocked on wood. He tasted it and found it good. And that is why your cousin May fell through the parlor floor today. —Ogden Nash

I made friends with this #SuperbOwl in Oklahoma.

I’ve asked this before in all seriousness: How do we nominate the Internet Archive as a UNESCO World Heritage Site? How do we protect it as a cultural resource of global importance, especially now? (I’m not affiliated with either org, just a concerned citizen.) #UNESCO #CRM @unesco.org @archive.org

65,619 words now in Monkeybrain. Part 3 is done and I’ll start the final part this weekend. Almost finished.

I’ve started back up on Monkeybrain, now into Part 3. Total words as of tonight: 63,340.

Remembering Dad today (4/9/46-2/2/25)

Where’s Jeff Goldblum? Montrose, Colorado. February 1, 2026

After writing the meat of Monkeybrain, I’m now wondering if I shouldn’t recast the whole thing as a horror novel. Misery meets Still Alice. My father was confined to bed because of his cancer and his primary caregiver was my mother, who has dementia.

What adventures await? #archaeology #CRM 🏺

Part Two of Monkeybrain is done and the book is now at 60,343 words. Two more parts to write, but I need an emotional break.

57,492 words in Monkeybrain tonight. My goal is to hit 60k by tomorrow night, finishing Part Two. Reliving Dad’s suffering from exactly one year is an emotional gut-punch, but again, writing through it helps. He deserves good words. #AmWriting

I forgot to post the Monkeybrain word count last night: 56,000. This has become a compulsion.

I am working from home, and my guilt mounts every hour for not continuing to write my novel. But I have a schedule: 0630-0800 and 1930-2130 set aside for Monkeybrain. The middle hours drag, but I let that tension build, making each night’s reunion burn. #AmWriting

Tonight: 52,195 words in Monkeybrain. Dad is now officially in hospice, and Mom and I learn about morphine.

“Fire and Ice” by Robert Frost (1920). This poem is 106 years old and still resonates today.

48,544 words in Monkeybrain tonight in which Dad signs his DNR with Mom as his witness.

I’m thrilled that Archaeogaming (2018) is still a bestseller for Berghahn Books in 2025. It’s part of a half-price sale happening now: #archaeogaming #archaeology #anthropology #DigitalArchaeology #MediaArchaeology #GamesStudies

I went ahead and pushed on to Part Two of Monkeybrain, and I’m already at 45,244 words, more than halfway!

@durbin.senate.gov @duckworth.senate.gov @repschneider.bsky.social Defund and disband ICE and hold its agents accountable ASAP. The violence must stop.

I just contacted my congressman and senators wrt ICE to get that “organization” defunded, disbanded, and its bad agents held accountable in a court of law. If you feel similarly, please do the same. We don’t need ICE larping 2000AD comics. We don’t need ICE at all.

Lake Michigan at Waukegan Beach. January 24, 2026. -11F (-24C). I had the place to myself :)

Jack Frost. Waukegan, Illinois. January 23, 2026.

I did it. I finished Part One of Monkeybrain (30k words) and will take a break before starting Part Two focusing on my father’s cancer and how he and my mother dealt with it in the final two weeks of his life when I moved in to help. This is actually cathartic for me to put myself back through this.

I just submitted Walkover Country: Archaeology Poems from the Plains to North Dakota State University Press’s Poetry of the Plains & Prairies (#POPP) chapbook contest. Fingers crossed.

Two VERY GOOD days of writing. 27,160 words in Monkeybrain with a little more to go in Part One. We are in the really difficult place now.

As some of you may have noticed, I’m writing a novelization of my mother’s Alzheimer’s journey. The first part of the book is told from my mother’s perspective. I should be finished w/ the first draft of Part One in a week. If anyone would like to read it to let me know if it’s on track, please DM.

Chicago and Lake Michigan from the air. January 20, 2026.

21,420 words in Monkeybrain this morning. Airports are great for writing, but I am done for the day. Mom is living more and more in her head as her Alzheimer’s gains a bigger foothold. She is close when I write, lucid and loving in her dreaming.

20,414 words in Monkeybrain tonight. It feels great breaking through 20k. The story is still growing.

Today we found a flintlock pistol modified with a modern pistol grip.

18,726 words in Monkeybrain today.

I rescued this owl from barbed wire this morning. We vibed for a bit. Creek County, Oklahoma. January 18, 2026.

17,667 words in Monkeybrain tonight. Progress, progress. If memory serves, @greatdismal.bsky.social used to post daily word counts as he drafted. It helps keep me focused, and I like seeing the new totals, even if it’s just a paragraph for the day.

Pawnee County, Oklahoma. January 17, 2026. Mossy discarded boot. The stone is inscribed with a dove and May 1906 (the 9 is carved backwards) and the initials EB. Found on a sandstone bridge.

16,277 words in Monkeybrain. Nice breakthrough tonight, but it’s still hard to deal with the subject matter.

Pawnee County, Oklahoma. January 16, 2026.

15,283 words in my Monkeybrain novel. It’s hard to push through some bad writing to get back to the good stuff, but it’s important to keep that inertia.

Same, armadillo. Same. Pawnee County, Oklahoma. January 15, 2026.

14,284 words in Monkeybrain. Trying to keep a writing schedule when traveling is difficult, but I will try for a paragraph each night just to keep the momentum going.