Under the weather.

Hey there,

It's been a rough couple of weeks. Between my disability issues being a problem and stuff like mild heat sickness on Memorial day, never mind the ongoing WTF!!1! of figuring out what's going on with this diabetes stuff, I have been having a rough time of it all. I was honestly finding myself on the verge of giving up on all of this for a little bit. Depression really sucks the life out of you.

I'm going to keep making the attempt here, though, because that is what this is all about. I am eyeballs deep in edits on books. I'm still making adjustments on books 3 and 4, because I'm still not happy with format stuff. These are not adjustments on content as much as in things like page layout. I think that somebody changed their software when I wasn't looking or something. Stuff is all just a little out of place. Which is driving me bonkers. Still, I am confident that I will have both out next month and book five shortly there after.

I'm almost finished with the final round of edits on book five. So, I'm thinking late August or early September. Provided I can nail down what ever it is about the format stuff is making book three wonky. I have to order proofs and go through them to make sure I have everything fixed before I slap up a link for y'all to purchase.

I am also beginning the process of setting up the eBook version of the first trilogy of the series. (I can't believe I just typed that!) The books that I've been learning the process on are my Filianic writings. If you're curious about them, take a look over here . I have another blog that I run where I post about witchcraft and stuff. These books are connected to that blog.

Craft of Writing: The Color Code

My color coded writing BUJO

If you've noticed, I am someone who has multiple projects going on at one time. I have an ardent love for color and this is actually a helpful thing. Not only does this mean I pay a little closer attention to things most people wouldn't notice (like the iridescence of a cowbird's feathers) but it means that I have a ready tool to stay organized: color coding. You may have seen a hint or two of this in the pictures I've posted of my writing bullet journal.

I don't just color code my blogs in my bullet journal. I use color coding everywhere. Post-it notes of a certain color are used for school information for the kids and those of a different color are for my general reminders. The list is endless. Color coding can get overwhelming if you don't keep a key somewhere. One of my bookmarks for my writing bullet journal has the name of each blog written down in its assigned color. At the front of my daily planner, I have a page with the key to how I color code and note things in it.

The key for color coding is not just knowing what color goes where. It is also consistency. Using the same color for the same project every time means you don't necessarily need to read the entire page to find what you are supposed to be working on next. You can just scan for the color and then read that line. It can cut down on your unproductive time by mere seconds, but those seconds will add up over the course of a day. The biggest challenge in color coding your work is sticking with it.

Let us put aside the questions of what the perfect pens are or the best medium for you to use in organizing things by color. After the first flush of 'I'm getting ORGANIZED!' wears off, color coding can feel like a lot of extra work. It is tempting to switch back to doing everything in a single color pen or just grabbing whatever is handy. If you can endure the period of getting familiar and comfortable with your color coding process, you will find that it doesn't add much time to your planning sessions, as long as you keep your work space organized. (That, however, is a post for another day.)

Now, color coding your work is not for everyone. Some people need less and some people need more structure to their organizational processes. Color coding works for me and I find it works especially well with bullet journaling. My bullet journal is relatively minimalistic with the exception of the color coding. This is because I have multiple bullet journals going on and not enough time to make everything fancy. (This is why I use stickers in my day planner. Because at least one of my bullet journals or other planning tools needs to be a little fancy, right?) You may find that something else works better for you. If so, please share in the comments! I would love to hear your ideas and what works for you.

Success!! (Sort of.)

Hey, I think I figured out my formatting problem! Now, I have to go back and change ALL of the headings for chapters and such. But, at least I know now what I need to fix.

♥

Locales: Tor Caldri

Picture from Pexels.com

Tor Caldri is located within the kingdom of Tarsus, one of the northernmost sub-kingdoms of Evandar. It is upon Wyvernmount, named for the famed creature that old tales said lived upon the peak of said mountain and kept the city under their protection. No name is remembered for the wyvern. Only signs of this ancient tale is seen in the insignia of the corps of the city's watch and of the city officials. The city banner is of a gold wyvern couchant upon a white field with a blue fess. Where the fess is usually a sign of martial honors, for the city of Tor Caldri, it is a sign of the great river it is beside, as is the white field.

The Usige Ban river is known as the White River in the common tongue of Evandar. In the ancient language of the first Evanadari people, it was known as the Caldri river, which also means white river. The river is known as the white river because of how many rapids it has. It springs from an underground fountain at great force, emerging from the upper face of Wyvernmount as a great waterfall of frothy water. The cavern it emerges from is unreachable because of the sheer face. This face is on the northeastern side of the mountain above the city. The water tumbles down and into a channel that runs along the eastern side of the city before sloping down the mountain in a more natural path.

Tor Caldri, known as the White City in the ancient language of the Evandari people, is a Free City. That is a city that has no kingdom allegiances and is a free state of itself. Most Free Cities are border cities, such as Farden on the eastern Dakon Bar/Evandar - Ranyth border. Tor Caldri is the site of an ancient border that no longer exists as the kingdom of Tarsus expanded in earlier eras. Tor Caldri retains its Free City status as it is the site of the High Council of Evandar, where the sub-kingdoms of the land hold council and discuss region wide issues such as trade, infrastructure, taxes and tithes to the High King. The High King is overlord of the entire Evandar region and rules for a designated period before another is voted in by the council.

This unlikely place is the seat of the high priesthood of Kaileth, the god of change, winds, and chaos. Where the city is laid out in a most orderly fashion and much of the buildings are faced if not constructed entirely of marble, the main temple of Kaileth is far older and is made from common stone. Grand structures erected as temples to the other principle deities of Evandar (the god Sigurt and goddess Roen) are popular pilgrimage sites, the main temple of Kaileth has largely been ignored. This is perhaps due to the reputation of the priests being insane or the unpredictability of the deity in question. Change, however is coming to the priesthood with the passing of the ancient High Priestess Theodonia.

The construction styles of the buildings of Tor Caldri varies, as this is a very old city. It is a walled city with an inner and outer wall. Within the inner wall is the old city. This is where the official buildings of the High Council, the priestly orders, and the most reputable of businesses are located. Most of these buildings have marble and are built with columns much like the Romanesque architecture of early Medieval Europe. The exception to this is the eldest buildings which make up the temple complex of Kaileth's priesthood. The courtyard of the old city is surprisingly large. On the western side of the courtyard is the priesthood of Kaileth. On the southern side is the temple complex for the priesthood of Sigurt. On the eastern side is the temple complex for the priesthood of Roen. At the northern side of the courtyard is the government buildings for the city, the summer palace of the High King, and the chambers of the High Council. Interspersed between these buildings and the wall of the old city are residences of the wealthy. The space between the inner and outer wall is where the new city is located. A bustling market is located within the courtyard of the old city that is set up daily. In the new city, however, there is no common market square but rather roads where businesses align. Thus the butchers and people who peddle meat products are on butcher's row as the fullers and seamstresses are on a street named for the predominant trade there.

At a corner where the old city and new city meet on the eastern side of the city, there is the public baths and wash. Here the people of the city come to communally wash their goods. This is a place of a great deal of public activity and gossip. Servants of wealthy households rub elbows with the poorest of the city in a general sense of good will. The wash is separate from the baths but water from both runs through pipes from the river itself. Tor Caldri has something like infrastructure to ancient Rome where water is used in a rudimentary septic system for the city. The runoff from this is drained out into the half moat that is around the southern edge of the city. When the moat reaches a certain height, sewage and waste flows out through a gate into the river to be carried away.

Note: I apologize for the lack of a map. I keep trying to draw a satisfactory map and failing. I hope that my description of the city is helpful.

Editing is hell. Someone get me whiskey.

Dear Reader,

I guess it was Hemingway who said "Write drunk, edit sober." With the amount of frustration I have been having with reformatting things originally designed for print into an eBook, I am of the mind that I need some whiskey to get through this. Sad part it, I can't drink my very favorite form of alcohol anymore. Even a whiff of alcohol is too much for me with the cocktail of medications I am on. So, somebody, have a shot of good whiskey on my behalf. Maybe say a prayer or two as well.

If I'm lucky, Bullshitticus and company will smile on me and give me what I need to fanagle this stuff into order. I honestly thought that it was a simple matter of upload the document and push a few buttons. But errors keep popping up because of how I put the thing together. Someone smack me the next time I say "This should be easy." because it is NEVER easy.

Super busy last few days.

Hi there,

It's been really busy at my place for the last few days. Things are just beginning to settle down some. As such, I should be able to get some real work going on posts here. I am making good progress on edits to book four. It is more of a novella, but I don't think that is going to be much of a problem because book five onward are monster length. Not because I'm rambling but because there's so much plot.

I'm beginning to find my way out of the creative hole I wound up in on my serial stories and on book seven. If all goes according to my hopes, I will have major progress done on those by the end of June. Just in time for the summer break to start for the kids. In the meantime, I'm steadily working on getting things prepped for said break and more structured schedules for the kids. This should mean better time writing, right?

The boys are coming up with some awesome stories that I'm encouraging them to write and illustrate. I'd love to share their work but they don't want to right now. And that's ok. Budding artists need time to grow and develop their style on their own. I will confess, though, my eldest is doing some amazing work on drawing very detailed diagrams for inventions he'd like to make. And my youngest has some pretty wicked ideas for things that should happen, like inventing a tornado that cleans everything up and you can turn it on and off with a switch and control it with a remote control. The two of them are working on how that would work.

The Iron Lily: Part 15 - Halthor the Haunted.

Halthor woke with a grunt when the door to the traveler's rest opened. The sun wasn't very high above the horizon. His sleep was by some small mercy free of nightmares, but it was not restful. Some new reflex drove Halthor to reach for the small axe at his hip when a figure entered the building. Ewen nodded at Halthor as he muscled in a pile of wood with his brother/cousin behind him, holding a slightly smaller pile of wood under an arm.

As they replenished the stock pile of wood, Halthor sat up. He looked about himself and found that his goods had been brought in. "The pony showed up when the night singer's fell silent. Ewen has him on the leeward side of the traveler's rest with some hay to crop. No sign of the dog yet," the second man said as he turned to shove some wood into the fire. The battered looking pot hanging over it swung slightly after a stick struck the base of it. Halthor could smell something in it. Probably oats and nothing more, he thought to himself as he stood up to stretch. "I threw some of the dried fish uncle sent with you in there just before we stepped out. I'm not much fond of mudfish but beggars and all that. I don't have any of the witchweed to make it taste any better. But it is better than plain gruel. Ewen said that it was important that you had more in your belly than oat porridge. Something about you going south to see ..." Ewen looked up at the mention of his name. He simply looked at his brother in amazement.

His brother waved a hand dismissively in the direction he was mentioning, completely unaware that the ferryman was looking at him."You said my name," Ewen stated in quiet astonishment.

"Yeh, what of it?" his brother answered gruffly, stirring the pot briskly. The sudden tension in the room made Halthor feel like dealing with the night singers would have been easier. As he made his way outside to relieve his aching bladder, he could hear Davian say, "I'm not deaf, you know. I heard you this morning." The door swung shut and Halthor made his way to a discreet spot at the side of the building to piss. He wasn't sure if his host and guide were going to be arguing or not when he walked back in.

Halthor wasn't comfortable with the idea of listening to what could be a violent argument when he needed someone to point out the road he had to take. In his moment of discomfort, he heard a noise behind him. Halthor looked over to see the red eared dog that had become his companion before passing through Hyle trotting over through the snow. The dog sniffed at Halthor's foot and then looked up at him expectantly. "What?" Halthor muttered at the dog. The dog lifted its leg and pissed on the side of the building. "Really? That's what you're about? Cold doesn't bother you, your pecker's got a coat," he scoffed as he arranged his clothes to deal with his own need.

The wind mercifully died down while Halthor was exposed. The dog sniffed at where Halthor urinated as Halthor tied the drawstring of his trewes tight. He resettled his tunic, jerkin, and coat over himself. Glad that he was wearing his split mittens, Halthor walked back around the side of the building. As he passed by the pony, he patted it on its side. The creature butted its head against his shoulder. Halthor paused and looked over. The pony shook its head and butted its head against his shoulder again. Halthor reached up and scratched the pony between its ears.

He thought about Alaric, his father. He didn't think that the master builder expected this to turn into such a dangerous journey. Halthor ran a hand through his hair, knocking back his hood. As the wind caught stray locks and blew them into his eyes, his hand rested on the pony's head. "What would he do with this?" Halthor said quietly. "Why didn't he tell me he was my father? Why didn't he tell me?" Halthor looked at the hammer hanging from its loop on his left hip. "Maybe he did and I just didn't understand," he sighed, "I'm a fool. I'm a cursed fool at that."

He thought he could almost hear Alaric scoff. "You're the one who sent me on this, old man," he muttered to himself, "Not right that you laugh at me for the trouble I'm in." The wind moved through the trees and Halthor seemed to hear a voice calling his name from the shadows. He turned and looked over. In the deepest shadows, it seemed there stood a man. Halthor squinted against the darkness. The figure looked familiar.

The longer he looked, the more the figure looked like Alaric. A sense of dread pooled in Halthor's guts. "You're not him," Halthor said. The figure waved at him with a sense of purpose, trying to motion him over. Halthor's hand dropped from the pony's head. As he reached down and touched the hammer, the figure's resembalence to Alaric diminished. The face was a mask of wrath as the beckoning gesture became one of challenge.

"Go back to the darkness," Halthor said and spat in the direction of the figure, "Tell your masters I'm not stupid." The figure seemed to grow larger as clouds scudded across the sky. Halthor took the hammer in hand and pointed it at the figure. "If you want a taste of iron, I'll gladly give it to you," he said. The eerie shadow figure split and vanished as a hard wind shook the stand of trees that gave it shape.

"I've got his hammer," he muttered as he slipped the hammer back into its loop, "And that is enough, I suppose." He stooped and walked into the traveler's rest. He half expected the room to be filled with gore after answering the shadow creature's challenge. It was how his luck seemed to have been running. When his eyesight adjusted after he shut the door, he saw that the brothers were sitting by the wood pile discussing something as they gestured at the ground with spoons as they ate from bowls. Ewen looked over and motioned Halthor over.

"Eat, we think we figured out the best way for you to get to Weck-in-Wood. You need to follow the trees, not the road. Stay on the field side of the trees. Come nightfall, you'll meet up with the road at the traveler's rest just north of Weck-in-Wood. After that, press hard through Weck Forest. The next traveler's rest is in the curve of the ox bow where the river loops into the forest. It's a harder passage but they won't look for you to go directly there. The rats of Wynnwode expect everyone to travel the road they'd tax us on passing."

Book Review: The Cloud of Unknowing

Title: The Cloud of Unknowing
Author: Anonymous, 13th Cent.
Translator: [I failed to note this.]
Publisher: [I failed to note this.]
Date: [I failed to note this.]

I've started to read the Cloud of Unknowing. The historical context of this text has made for facinating reading, but a part of me wants to skip a head to the real text. I'm ging to finish reading this context setting preface, though. A lesson in patience is necessary if I am finding this fustrating. This preface is that lesson.

Grace is hidden in us all. Few learn to (or attempt to) uncover it from the mound of daily cares and falsehoods that creat a placid seeming life.

Carelessness as a part of sin? An interesting concept that isn't voiced much.

[Edited to add: I read this and the other texts on Christian theology as I was exploring Christianity and seriously considering conversion to that faith.]

Originally published: 8/23/06

Note: I have a copy of this book on hand. I will revisit it and actually write a useful review on this. This is one of a few book reviews that are going to be cross posted to another blog of mine.

Recommendations: Hidden Citizens.

If you are like me, you write with some sort of theme music in the background playing to help bring the scene you're writing more to reality. I listen to a really wide range of music. There is an artist that I haven't been able to get enough of. They're called Hidden Citizens. They do theatrical style re-envisioning of popular music. It ranges from Beethoven's Fifth Symphony to Flock of Seagulls I Ran. Their take on the Moonlight Sonata is eerie and I love it. I highly recommend their music.

Locales: The Great Dragon Mountains.

Photo from Pexels.com

Just as here on Earth, in the world of Evandar there are continental mountain ranges. The continent that the kingdom of Evandar is located is divided into thirds. One third is desert away to the west of Evandar. One third is relatively temperate which is where Evandar, Ranyth and several other countries are located. The final third is off to the east of Ranyth that is grasslands.

A massive chain of mountains divides the temperate zone in half and then spreads along the lower edge of the polar region (which is progressively more tundra like as you move away from the mountains) from the small grassland plain on the western edge of Evandar to the distant ocean at the far eastern end of the grasslands east of Ranyth. A small spur of mountains extends into mid-western Evandar. Another, somewhat larger spur of mountains extends down along the far eastern edge of the grasslands. The extensive chain of mountain ranges is known as the Great Dragon.

The various ranges that make it up have names pertaining to parts of a dragon except for the small spur that extends into the mid-western region of Evandar. The Dragon's Teeth is the portion of the northern range that moves from northern Tarsus into northern Ranyth. The Dragon's Spine extends from the southern edge of the Dragon's Teeth to the south until it reaches the sea. The Dragon's tail is a very long range that is actually made of several smaller mountain ranges (much like the Appalachian mountains here in the USA).

It moves from the north-eastern edge of the northern most duchy of Ranyth east across the border of the great grasslands. The spur that extends down along the far eastern edge of the grasslands where the continent meets the ocean is unnamed by the peoples of the Evandar-Ranyth region. The ocean is considered mythical by many. That, however, is something for another day.

Flora et Fauna: Source material.

At the right you see me holding a very small sample of the library I have put together regarding plants and one of my notebooks where I record things I have learned from other sources. It may seem a little odd to talk about research where I have been talking mostly about different plants and animals.

I wanted to give you some insight into my working process in today's post. Much of what I write in my flora et fauna posts is in a style that is relatively close to how one would find such things described in actual texts. I am attempting to create a body of work that can provide additional realism for the world I have created. I am also attempting to synthesize a modern simulacrum of the medieval texts focused upon fictional plants.

This project had its seeds planted early when I was a child and my late paternal grandmother was explaining plants to me. She had an earlier edition of Margaret A. Grieves A Modern Herbal (I'm holding volume one in this picture) and I was fascinated by how detailed the plant descriptions were. The line drawings that were sprinkled through out the pages were jaw droppingly stunning in their level of detail. It reminded me of the botanical and naturalist sketches and paintings from the 1800s by people like John James Audubon.

As I started to dream of my little world, I found myself looking at details in close attention. I was curious how a tree would grow in a bog so I studied bogs and trees for a time. I was curious how dragons would reproduce, so I studied dinosaurs, birds, and monotremes. I would think of an evolutionary niche and try to figure out what lived in it. In many ways, I was thinking about the world's story even as I was thinking about how imaginary plants like fireweed were used. There's a reason why my world building notes occupies multiple volumes.

Sadly, they're all disorganized. This is part of the reason why I haven't a new plant or animal for you today. I am still in the process of organizing them. But, my source material for inspiration is always at hand because it comes from the world around me. And our world is just as wonderfully magical as the world of Evandar. Indeed, an Evandari person would be awed by our world. Not just because of our technological prowess but because of the amazing diversity of the biology of our planet.

Craft of Writing: Have a back up plan

As recent events may have shown, it is vital to keep a backup of your work. Now, the backup needs to be in a format that still works with your machine. While the floppy is iconic (hence my choice of whipping an old one out from storage) I don't think that there is a single piece of tech on the market right now that uses them.

Thumb drives are pretty awesome. I have a few. I have backups of my backups. This is how I discovered I hadn't lost half of book four, it really was novella length to begin with. (It was a NaNoWriMo project that clocked in at exactly 50K words.) The most important part of having backups is to make sure they are current. If your last backup of your novel or other digital project was thirty versions ago, you are going to lose a lot of work if your system decides to take a dirt nap.

This is where planning to archive work is a good thing. Once a month, or more frequently depending on just what exactly I am working on is, I make backups of my current projects. I also check to make sure that the archives of previous projects are still good both on the computer and on the storage device. Having lost a few novels due to things like data being corrupted on the disk, I am extra careful about making sure that I am not risking this again.

I strongly encourage you to do something similar. I don't want you to go through the anxiety, stress, and heartache of losing major work all because you forgot to back it up.

♥

No book reviews today.

Dear Reader,

It's been a crazy busy day over here. I some how managed to avoid sunburn while taking the kids to the park. When I wasn't busy with the kids or spending some time with my husband watching the kids be little goofballs, I was working on crochet projects instead of writing. I know, goofing off isn't the best of ways to use writing time, but I think I needed that recharge. More things coming next week, hopefully one of my exciting projects will be ready.

Also, good news, I didn't lose crucial parts of book four. I just forgot it was novella length. Now to continue editing!

♥

Recommendation: Papermate InkJoy pens

If you are a planner or a pantser in your writing approach, I'm still sure that you may appreciate a bit of color in your writing equipment. I picked up a package of Papermate InkJoy minis last September. I have been using these things constantly in my bullet journals, my planner, and a bit of scribbling for fun. These things are fantastic.

I'm not usually one to say that a ballpoint pen is fantastic. I confess that I am pretty picky about my pens, even the ballpoint ones. That said, the InkJoy pens have great ink flow. You can write at almost any angle with them for a decent period of time. The color saturation is wonderful, hence my using them to doodle on the side of my grocery list from time to time.

They are also dirt cheap and last for forever, it seems. I use these things on a daily basis and they're still going strong when most of my other ballpoint pens that are larger would have died. I dare say they may possibly last as long as my gel ink pens. The really nice thing about these pens is that there is little to no bleed through on most of the different kinds of paper I have used. I haven't tried them on onion skin weight paper but that's because I don't have any to try them on.

Rating: 10/10

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Note: This is not a paid product endorsement. I'd probably die of shock of Papermate noticed my blog existed, let alone paid me to write about any of their products. ♥

Technical difficulties.

So my computer started acting really weird today. I quipped to my husband that I needed:

• an old technician
• a young technician
• the head of Bill Gates

He laughed. I sort of resolved the problem and ran a virus scan to make sure. Somewhere in the midst of all this, I discovered that book four had lost the second half of it. It just stops at the end of chapter seven. I'm now trying to figure out which thumbdrive the back up is on.

I'm still thinking I need those three things to prevent future issues.

Flora et Fauna: Climate zones of Evandar region

Dear Reader,

Maps are hard. Please accept this common map of Terra with an astrolabe. I've been struggling to draw a good map of Evandar. Just general map of Evandar, not including the other lands around it or the major landmass it is on. I now understand why cartographers are historically of a cranky sort. It is not because it is maddening to define a space. It is because the Cursed One is in the details mocking you with each smeared line. (Yes, I believe I will be using that particular sentence in a reference to cartography or manuscript copying in a future book. Scribes were just as cranky, after all.)

Imagine if you a land that stretches from a place with high peaked snow clad mountains year round to a balmy region like the Mediterranean. At the north is a range of mountains that has the classic Alpine climate. Moving south, the mountain range diminishes into hills of a more temperate climate. There is an occasional high hill but the land becomes progressively more flat until it reaches the sea. On the Eastern side of Evandar, the hills continue until they meld with the mountains. The eastern arm of the large mountain range known as the Dragon's Spine are older than those at the northwestern end (known as the Dragon's Teeth). The Dragon's Spine marches down to the sea where they turn into crumbling cliffs due to the influence of weather and water. On the western side, an unnamed spur of the Dragon's Teeth dips into the hilly region but this spur is older than the Dragon's Teeth proper and is more like the southernmost portion of the Dragon's Spine, sans the weathering by way of the sea.

The differences between the Dragon's Teeth and the spur that extends into the western part of Evandar is like the differences in size between the Catskill mountains and the Himalayas range. The Dragon's Spine ranges from likened to the Rocky mountains at the northern end down to the size of the Appalachian mountains at the southern end. Evandar sits in a zone where a plate is being forced under another. Earthquakes are rare because this zone has not shifted in a long time, but they do happen from time to time. There are a whole body of stories about these terrible events. Most of them focus upon a bound individual being tortured beneath the stones themselves. Some of this is folk memory of the last Great War, some of this is a desperate attempt to understand the unpredictable nature of earthquakes.

Moving from the east to the west, the lands become progressively flatter and more arid. Lush temperate tropical forest gives way to grassland that ends on the edge of a desert. The northern end of the grasslands meets the desert before it reaches the cold arctic climate. The southern end of the grasslands leads into a marshland that surrounds a region of an active but very damaged volcano. Geysers are here but not very active during the period of the majority of the novels. The cataclysmic blast of the volcano nearly a full epoch before humans was what caused the 100 Years of Winter that the dragons and other elder species speak of.

The mountains of Evandar and Ranyth cause some odd weather patterns. On the western side of the range, heavy snow is infrequent. At times, however, an odd storm will come out of the east over the mountains. These eastern wind born storms are known to be especially bitter and come during winter. The air literally smells differently to the people of Evandar when it blows out of the east. This is because these storms carry more humidity and therefore more snow with their bitter cold.  The anomalous weather pattern is due to great winter storms moving up from the ocean across the ithmus and then the Shadowed sea into Ranyth where the mountains act to force the storm to curl on itself and move over to the west. Something like a Nor'Easter but worse.