From a maximum of six "New" tags in the stories list, the collection has dropped to two, "Dog Days" and "Waterlily". Part of that is because I personally like "Waterlily" so much that it's hard to feel motivated to work on anything "lesser". Even though I can already tell from the read counts that it's not going to be one the more popular stories.
That's fine. I write for me, and share the writing because I think others will enjoy the work, not because I feel that I need to write to please anyone else. Often (mostly?) the stories I like most are the ones that don't resonate with readers. ("The Prince" was never popular, and I understand why, though I like it more than most.)
Anyway, that's only part of the reason. I did start half-heartedly working on a new chapter of "Step-Something," so I haven't been slacking completely.
The rest of the story is that I injured myself a few weeks back, and will be a while in recovery. Nothing serious, and in theory the extra time being laid up should give me more opportunity to write, but the discomfort (and a fever that took a while to throw) has added to the writing malaise, and I haven't pushed a key in my editor in weeks now.
I'll get back to it. I'm still not sure how I feel about the new "Step-Something" chapter, but I'm going to try to work on it. And I have an idea that I would really like to pursue, but it's going to have to be intolerably long, and I don't see it as being amenable to cutting up, so it's in limbo.
Meanwhile, don't forget the "Random Stories" box on the main page. I click on them from time to time, and if I can forget details of stories that I wrote, I'm sure you can read them as mostly-new.