The universal leisure we enjoy in Retropolis makes it possible for us to join all sorts of book clubs, civic organizations, charities, and secret societies.

One group that manages to be a combination of all of the above is the Retropolis Ladies’ World Domination Society.

You know them: you grew up surrounded by them. They may have invited you to tea. Their motto is Don’t MAKE Me Come Down There.

‘Down There’, of course, refers to anything below, and within range of, their Orbiting Tea Room and Global Obliteration Platform. Armed with lethal, color coordinated ray guns, these determined ladies are an unstoppable force for order, style, and niceness.

Membership is for life, and is by invitation only.

Thats about all I’m comfortable saying on the subject. I spent six years in a camouflaged dome, after that other time.

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So here’s the new, improved version of one of my older T-Shirt designs for The Retropolis Transit Authority. I’m gradually working my way through some of those older ones. I started this redo sometime last year, but the Thrilling Tales schedule wouldn’t cooperate and so I’ve just now finished it on, of course, T-shirts, a poster, an archival print, a coffee mug and mousepad, all at Retropolis.

Curiously, the Ladies’ World Domination Society is Inspired by Actual Events.

Science! I’ve just added three somewhat different Faces of Science to my Retropolis shop: each (naturally) involves a certain amount of cackling, while one features Death Rays, one adds Giant Robots, and one, uniquely, offers up some Common Sense. And slide rules. Because slide rules are cool.

They’re all available on T-shirts, posters, coffee mugs, greeting cards, and mousepads.

Today marks the end of The Lair of the Clockwork Book at Thrilling Tales of the Downright Unusual. It’s been a long ride and I hope it was worth the price of admission, which is a pretty safe bet seeing as how it was free. Unless you’ve bought the book, of course, which makes you My Hero.

Speaking of the book, the Kickstarter hardcover edition is chugging along. I have to finish reviewing the (beautiful!) proof today and I haven’t heard anything new about the die for the cover stamp, but we’re making progress. The full color paperback edition is already available.

I’ve completed my short list of changes for the Thrilling Tales site: it’s all ready now for its Intermission. That will start up on Thursday and it’ll run through the summer while I try to get ahead of you, both on Part Two of The Toaster With TWO BRAINS and on the next Real Serial..

I’ve got a lot of preparation done for that next serial. (I even have a working title now!) I’m setting this project up with Celtx. I was a little nervous about its proprietary format, given the limited number of ways you can export a project, but eventually I realized that whether it’s for the web or the print version I always just copy and paste anyhow. I do like its systems for adding notes and creating character descriptions, including images, and the index card system and Plot View look like they’re going to be pretty useful for me.

I’ve picked up a refurbished Thinkpad so that I can realize my years-long ambition of writing out on the porch during fine weather… which we suddenly don’t have. The laptop remained a good deal even after I replaced a couple of missing things, but between you and me and the entire Internet it was still quite an extravagance. For me, I mean.

So I hope you’ve enjoyed The Lair of the Clockwork Book, and that you’ll think about buying it in print; and I hope you’ll also get a kick out of the upcoming Intermission. In the meantime I’ll be busy working on the things you’ll see after that summer-long feature concludes.

For my part I’m looking forward to a somewhat more relaxed schedule. I should be able to get all caught up on TWO BRAINS and still have plenty of serial pages for you to enjoy, and maybe even get another thing or two done along the way. That, anyway, is The Plan.