Ranting and Bitching

I can taste victory

2011-02-20T23:22:00.003-03:30

So Sariel sucked me back into it. The Forgotten is being eaten by the research monster at the moment and the urge to write was tickling my fingers.

I just passed 19000 so it is looking like 20000 by the end of the week may be possible. Not sure why that is such a big deal but I like nice round numbers

A B C D E F G Barney is my enemy.

2011-02-10T10:12:00.002-03:30

For those of you not familiar with Barney he is an obnoxious 6 ft tall singing purple dinosaur who has been the bane of my existence for the last 17 years. He is also like crack for babies and toddlers and my 9 month old is thoroughly addicted.

This morning I woke with a segue worked out perfectly in my mind as well as how to feed some back story. It needed to be written right away for fear of losing it so I did what any responsible parent does. I plopped by baby in front of the one eyed babysitter and turned on Barney.

Seemed like a great plan until you try to write a scene very high in sexual tension and violence to a backdrop of If your happy and you know it and Family is special

Ugh someone shoot him and make stew already

So I'm a freak

2011-02-09T23:52:00.003-03:30

Writing these days is hard. I was doing quite well for a while even if the end product ended up being shelved or needs a complete rewrite but at least I was writing. What happened ... AW.

Logically AW should help me with the writing process but instead it gives me an ulcer. OK maybe not an actual ulcer but definitely some unexplained stomach pain. I was thinking it was because I got too hung up on all the "rules" but the truth of the matter struck me in the face today.

I was reading a thread about those who claim to want to write but never do. Someone mentioned that fear of failure hold many back and I kinda laughed because the opposite is my problem. Failure is something I can live with. Commercial success with an imperfect product is not.

I was to follow the rules and produce perfection or die in oblivion trying. Problem is people can't agree on the rules other than adverbs are evil.

May I never query

2011-01-24T23:40:00.002-03:30

It is official I am far too neurotic for this line of work. Nathan Bransford recently announced a contest on his blog where teh prize is a manuscript read blog.nathanbransford.com and all you have to do is post the first paragraph of a WIP.

Sounds easy right.... no way. I almost vomited hitting 'post' knowing that judgemnt would ensue and not just by Nathan but also by my unpublished peers.

When I finally produce a manuscript I don't immediately want to burn ... I mean trunk, querying may just cause me to have a stroke.

I abandoned it why

2011-01-19T00:37:00.003-03:30

I was doing some writing tonight and got about 1000 words in between the baby shitting and demanding to be fed so I guess I can't really complain. It has been a slow few months between Christmas and loosing my computer to the flood but now that I have a shiny new laptop I ran out of excuses not to write. When I finished the chapter I was working on I found a draft of what I had completed of Sariel and realized i was over 18,000 words into it when I walked away.

Now I am sitting here trying to figure out why I abandoned it. I still like the premise and for a first draft the balls it sucked were relatively small. I am not sure I am going to go back to it right away but I am quite glad I managed to retrieve what I had dome of it.

If I can finish "forgotten" by the end of February I may go back to work on it before I start editing. Unlike "blender" wich was 30000 word of epic fail I think I may be able to salvage it

Huck Finn and teh N word

2011-01-17T09:42:00.002-03:30

I am shocked

New edition of 'Huckleberry Finn' to lose the 'n' word

by Keith Staskiewicz

Categories: Autobiography of Mark Twain, Censorship, Classic Novels, Controversy, Fiction

What is a word worth? According to Publishers Weekly, NewSouth Books’ upcoming edition of Mark Twain’s seminal novel Adventures of Huckleberry Finn will remove all instances of the “n” word—I’ll give you a hint, it’s not nonesuch—present in the text and replace it with slave. The new book will also remove usage of the word Injun. The effort is spearheaded by Twain expert Alan Gribben, who says his PC-ified version is not an attempt to neuter the classic but rather to update it. “Race matters in these books,” Gribben told PW. “It’s a matter of how you express that in the 21st century.”

Unsurprisingly, there are already those who are yelling “Censorship!” as well as others with thesauruses yelling “Bowdlerization!” and “Comstockery!” Their position is understandable: Twain’s book has been one of the most often misunderstood novels of all time, continuously being accused of perpetuating the prejudiced attitudes it is criticizing, and it’s a little disheartening to see a cave-in to those who would ban a book simply because it requires context. On the other hand, if this puts the book into the hands of kids who would not otherwise be allowed to read it due to forces beyond their control (overprotective parents and the school boards they frighten), then maybe we shouldn’t be so quick to judge. It’s unfortunate, but is it really any more catastrophic than a TBS-friendly re-edit of The Godfather, you down-and-dirty melon farmer? The original product is changed for the benefit of those who, for one reason or another, are not mature enough to handle it, but as long as it doesn’t affect the original, is there a problem?

What do you think, Shelf-Lifers? Unnecessary censorship or necessary evil?

*****************

I don't get it. Why woudl parents deprive themselves of an excellent teaching tool? If my kids ever read huck finn you can be Damn sure it will be the original and not this one

2010 reading list

2010-01-10T10:06:00.005-03:30

I am late and probably going to forget a few books but ...........

City of Bone Cassandra Clark - January 1st

It was an OK book and an easy read. Definitely YA and it seems to write down to it's audience a bit though

The Hitchhikers Guide To The Galaxy Douglas Adams - Jan 2

Funny and entertaining. Definitely recommend it to anyone who wants a quick amusing read.

Blind Alley Iris Johanson - Jan 4

The Clerics Quintet R A Salvatore - Jan 12

Salvatore usually makes me have a vested interest in all his character including the antagonists but somehow this series fell short in that regard. I just wanted them all to die, and not because they were bad and deserved it but because they bored me to tears. The Protags were interesting and amusing but beyond them I was very disappointed that he didn't live up to my admittedly high expectations. Maybe I should have read this BEFORE I read his really good stuff

False Memory Dean Koontz

Breathless Dean Koontz

Wizards First Rule Terry Goodkind

Outlander Diana Gabaldron

Been lazy

2010-01-08T14:26:00.002-03:30

With both this blogging and writing. In the last few months I haven't accomplished much of anything (maybe 2000 words) on Sariel and about the same on another work in progress.

So for new years maybe I should resolve to do more writing. I am sure I can squeeze some in between the vomiting and peeing that inevitably comes with being 23 weeks preggo.

So my new years resolution in regards to writing is to update my progress at least weekly even if it is shameful, ESPECIALLY if it is shameful

These are a few of my favorite things

2009-09-17T21:42:00.003-02:30

So Since I have nothing to say today it is time for more Smexopedia. Today is the letter D and on object of my obsession Vin Diesel.

Sexy man + hot bike = WIN

And because one pic is never enough

I need distractions

2009-09-15T20:34:00.002-02:30

Last night was a slow night at the bar. I had three customers who had all been recently topped up withtheir alcoholic beverage of choice and I was pretty much standing around like a piece of furniture. With nothing else to do I found a pad of paper and sat down at the bar to work on Sariel.

I have been so utterly unproductive lately it shames me to speak of it. I have carved out time to write and spent 90% of it staring at a blank page. Late night I wrote more than I had in three weeks.

The funny thing is that as soon as I sat down to write somone invariably wanted something. I scribbled out about three pages between demands for more beer, cooking food, and cashing out lottry tickets and chatting. I was writing again though and that was all that really mattered to me. It occured to me that before the move I did most of my writing at work between customers or while caring for 3-6 children. Sometimes I even got it done while 6 or 7 grown men were sitting 4 feet away playing D&D.

It had never occured to me that I needed mayhem and distractions to write. I had only ever heard that people wanted peace and quiet. Guess I'm just a weirdo *shrug*.

From now on when I carve out time to write I will pack up and head to a bar of coffee shop I guess. As long as it works I don't care. I will save my quiet time for transcribing.

BAAA I'm a sheep

2009-08-18T18:47:00.003-02:30

Because everyone else is doing it and my blog has been sorely neglected as of late.

BAAA I'm a sheep

Rules: Don't take too long to think about it. Fifteen movies you've seen that will always stick with you. First fifteen you can recall in no more than 15 minutes.

Exorcist - First scary movie I ever saw and the beginning of a life long obsession with scaring myself shitless
X-men 1, 2 and 3 - I love the story behind the X-men. Although the powers may not be believable I find government reaction to civilians having that much power entirely plausible.
Iron Man - the fact that I have two Marvel movies back to back tells me I need a new hobby. I love the Iron Man story though. Samuel L Jackson being cast a Nick Fury is just icing on the cake.
Lucky Number Slevin - Someone was one some seriously fucked up narcotics when they wrote this but I love it.
Shakespeare in love -
Titanic- This movie came out when I was 16. It's not my fault I was genetically predisposed to fall in love with it. I have to give credit though to a move that can make me sit still for three hours even though I know it is going to end with a sunken ship.
Spice World- never before (or since) has a movie been made of such epic fail.
In Bruges - Colin Farrell nuff said lol. Actually it was probably the beginning of my obsession.
The Departed - I love a movie where most every main character gets shot in the head.
Dragon Lance, Dragons of Autumn twilight - I can't remember the last time I got so excited when I saw a movie on the shelf. It wasn't nearly as awesome as the book but I own it anyways. ..... I have a problem.
Twilight - Better than the books but that is not much of a compliment now is it?
30 days of Night - Vampires in Alaskan Winter. Why didn't I think of that?
Max Payne - Best video game adaptation EVER
Resident Evil - A very close second. I don't even play video games but thanks to a gameaholic husband I know they were pretty true to the story.
The Pagemaster - My favorite children's movie of all time.

Digging out the ruler.

2009-07-18T22:14:00.002-02:30

After spending a few months on a writing forum that will remain unnamed, I have noticed a lot of measuring going on. Many people seem to be caught up in how many words others are producing in a set amount of time and trying to figure out how they measure up.

While aspirations are undoubtedly a good thing I can't help but feel drawn back to school where I would listen to the guys I hung out with talk about who had the biggest dick.

Now much like the measuring contest of yesteryear writing measurements don't tell us a whole lot. There are extreme cases like where a writer does only ten words a week that we could compare to a 1 inch penis but for the most part writers will write however much works for them.

I'm not going to say I never have the urge to whip out the ole yard stick and see how I do compared to others, but people like Lori or Scarlett would just give me an inferiority complex and the writers version of erectile dysfunction (also known as writers block). This hardly seems constructive.

Instead I concentrate on my own writing and set my own goals. For me I will be content to write, edit, polish, and submit one novel a year. Other people would cry if they couldn't finish one in a month. There is nothing wrong with either of those goals as long as the writer picks one for themselves rather than force it upon themselves because they feel inferior otherwise.

I could probably bang out many thousand words in a day but I prefer to put out words that make sense when strung together and that takes time for me.

I also have to wonder how much time writers loose to wangsting about poor output when they could be using that time to actually .... you know.... write words.

Of course I coudl be writing words instead of wangsting about wangsting but, I'm a special case.

The letter C

2009-07-16T13:22:00.002-02:30

So haven't had any new entries in mt smexopedia lately.

I'm a slacker get over it.

The letter C is next in the alphabet and for this one I bring you Dane Cook

picking but not packing

2009-07-15T15:15:00.004-02:30

So I have been picking away at Sariel but not making nearly as much progress as I would like. Out of the progress I have made far too much of it is in red ink.
For those of you not acquainted with my anal retentive nature, red ink is place holders. Mark sets the table while chewing Miya out. would be an example. Now the prose sucks but I know what has to go there and it allows me to move on. Well in theory that's what it does. In reality all it does is give me something to wangst over while I try to write the rest of the story.

Blender (my short) is moving along much better and I think I have a better feel for where I want to go with it now. All I need now is my own computer so I can get more writing time on it.

I have the ferry booked for July 23rd so that is the day I am moving off the island. I am SO not ready. Insurance still has all my stuff and I have painting and whatnot to do before the move as well.

Today will be my last day at work. Still have yet to figure out how I am getting home from that one as my van is in the shop.

My brother is flying in tomorrow to help us with the move. I am going to have to find some time to ignore him so I can write. He is pretty supportive of my writing though so that shouldn't be a problem. I also pick up my last cat from the kennel tomorrow.

Is it August yet?

Got bored

2009-07-09T00:21:00.003-02:30

I was bored and blog stalking Lori when I found this. Seemed like a good cure for my boredom so here you go. Now you too can be bored out of your skull while you read it,

1) Where do you write?

Couch, van, work, bed, and at the computer desk. I think I may have consistency problems.

2) When do you write?

Usually when I should be doing other things. Between customers at work, When my son is occupied with video games, and when I want an excuse to be antisocial

3) Planner or Pantser?

Pantser. Complete and utter pantser. It is all outlined in my head but I have been known to scrap 90% of it.

4) Coffee or tea?

Coke (cola not contraband substances)

5) Pen and paper, or computer?

Pen and paper. It sucks for speed but my OCD can't handle my abysmal typing skills and still make progress.

6) What gets you in the writing mood?

Reading good books, watching good movies, and getting bills in my mailbox.

7) What pulls you out of the writing mood?

Having people touch me. Seriously I am not a touchy feely person and it messes with my mojo.

8) What’s the best writing advice you’ve ever read/heard/received?

"That's what first drafts are for." is right up there with "It's only words, you can change them later." .Wow sounds really lame when you write it out.

9) Got muse?

No but I have a cat does he count? I have a lot of inspiration but I think we all do the difference is what we choose to do with it.

10) Who is the biggest supporter of your writing?

My husband, brother and mother, and myself of course. It seems silly to list myself but without the faith in my own abilities I would never get anything done. Other people having belief and faith is not what allows me to take the leap and potentially waste hours/days/weeks of my life I am never going to get back. It is believing in myself that gives me permission to do that.

11) Sound or Silence?

am pretty sure silence is an urban legend. I have heard of it but never experienced it for myself.

http://emilymurdoch.wordpress.com/2009/06/16/got-muse-a-writer-to-writer-meme/

The end is in sight

2009-07-01T18:37:00.002-02:30

Not on either of my WIPs (that would be too much to ask for) but insurance will be settled up from the fire sometime this month (15th at the latest). Personally I think 5 months is a ridiculous time span but it will be behind us soon.

With all things insurance related slowly winding down the move is looming before me. I don't really want to move as I hate it with every fiber of my being and would rather give myself a home lobotomy but it is happening in three weeks anyways.

Now writing must start ramping up as well.

I built myself a wall when it came to writing and it took me almost a month to realize it. As Sariel grew I began to feel the story was rapidly outpacing my writing ability. Nine years away from the writing game suddenly seemed like a lifetime and with every word I felt as if rust was flaking off the gears.

I would write in a frenzy and then throw it all away because it sucked. Well it really did suck but I realized I was not giving it my best and that was why. If I never finished the thing then I could not be rejected or ridiculed and THAT was starting to look like a winning proposition.

When quitting started to look like an attractive option I knew I had a serious problem. I have walked away from projects before but never one I had invested so much time in. I had a million excuses (husband, son, work, insurance, getting ready to move) but no real reason for my abysmal writing performance. In an effort to self correct I actually broke down and outlined. OK so it is only eight lines scribbled on a cash register receipt but it told me where I need to go next and I have no excuse for getting off track now.

Valkyrie = Sariel

2009-06-17T14:43:00.002-02:30

Yeah word math.

Reworked the title and am extremely pleased with what I finally came up with.

Sariel as not only an angel of death but also a rumored fallen angel just works so much better. Plus it doesn't put me in mind of Tom Cruise or the Avengers.

fun for everyone

2009-06-12T14:01:00.003-02:30

Ethan has recently discovered the Diary of a Wimpy Kid series. At first glance I thought it was stupid but hey if it get him reading who am I to complain.

So I started reading it to him the other night and OMG both of us were laughing our asses off. Billy even quit playing a game to come listen to the book.

It isn't the best book ever written. A lot of it is done with silly comic book pictures the kid (who is actually a grown man of course) drew in his diary and it is a bit choppy (not bad) but that is what gives it its charm.

It is so simple I was kicking myself saying "why didn't I think of this" when I was done.

Hands down it is the best grade school book I have read ........ well probably ever.

The greatest compliment

2009-06-09T09:35:00.004-02:30

I have been babysitting a pair of sisters for almost three years now. The oldest is turning nine this summer. This girl is crazy talented when it comes to drawing and painting. At six she had already far surpassed most adults I know in artistic ability.

She wasn't a big fan of reading though and I must confess that broke my poor writerly heart. She would illustrate long drawn out stories (20-30 pages) but never put a word of text in them. Last fall though she woke up at about 10 o'clock one night I was babysitting and found me scribbling away at a novel that I have long since scrapped (or delegated to MS word purgatory if you prefer) and started asking questions.

Within a week she was adding a few words to her books and her teachers were commenting on how much more she was writing (or so she told me). Yeah me! I somehow without trying inspired a kid to write.

A few days ago at work she gave me a copy of a book she was working on to read. It was about a magical Pokemon who granted wishes and was helping Picachu find his friends. She wanted me to read it and let her know what I thought because she had decided when she grew up she wanted to write books like me.

I opened it up preparing to smile and nod politely as I usually do when kids show me their work and pretend I thought the sun shone out of it. Actually I was blown away. The spelling caused my brain to scramble a few times but the story itself was well plotted and contained decent grammar. The illustrations were stellar of course but with this girl I would hardly expect anything less.

I told her exactly what I thought and showed her how to use quotation marks to make it a bit clearer and easier to read. I also told her there was no reason she had to wait until she grew up to write books, there was no reason she couldn't start now.

Whatever comes of my writing be it huge publishing contracts or a life of obscurity I know it has had at least one positive result. It taught this girl to love books enough that she wants to make her own. For me it doesn't get any better than that.

Am I done yet?

2009-06-04T13:20:00.002-02:30

So for two month I ran all over town trying to price every last little item in our home that was destroyed by the fire. Last week I finished even though everything else in my life suffered. I even realized I had two stories from Lori in my inbox that I never even got to read. (very sorry about that personal apology coming via email when i finish this) As we are typing everything up and getting ready to turn it in I am informed they need MORE information. Basically they were going to have to pay out too much so now we need to figure out when we got everything, how much we paid, where we bought it and remember where we got all the new prices from so they can depreciate our claim.

Awesome, really that's just fucking awesome. It has been three months and I am basically starting over from scratch. So I have 2 weeks to finish the new list and hand it in so I can have some money by the end of June.

So guess what I have done almost nothing on in a month, writing. Well that's not true I wrote a lot but had to scrap it all because I had gone off on a crazy tangent that served no purpose other than to amuse me. A bunch of cheerleaders got their asses kicked in my tangent.

I wanted my draft done by the time we moved but it is not looking good unless I give up sleep and food.

The up side is I have been spending less time on AW. That place should be called how to give yourself a complex about your writing in one easy step. I love it but it really slows up the process the more I read because I am completely and totally unable to give myself permission to write badly except on my blog and places like that.

Dave has to die.

2009-05-04T09:35:00.003-02:30

Lat me start this by saying I love my husband. Really I do, id I didn't there is no way I would put up with this insanity.

Saturday I was sitting on the couch writing away. Billy and Ethan were downstairs playing a game leaving me to struggle through my segue in peace. I have transitions I really do.

So I am sitting there writing/scribbling and minding my own business when Billy comes up and sits next to me. That's not a problem I think I may have even grunted hello. Lord knows sitting with me is not enough though he has to LIE on the couch and put his feet up by my head. ACK feet get them away!

That is how it all started. I spazzed and tried to shove his feet away without actually touching them. This is actually even more difficult than it sounds. Eventually I snapped my shit and told him if he didn't move them then I would be forced to take violent actions and stab his toe with my pen. Not wanting to be acused of not listening to be he moved them.... SO THEY WERE TOUCHING MY BODY.

This, so far as I am concerned, was an act of war and a full out wresting match ensued. Eventually I had him pinned in his coner of the couch using MY feet told hold him there and went back to writng. Every time I put pen to paper he shook my book. He wanted to know if he was in my book. No dear but if you keep driving me crazy you will be AND you will die a slow and horrible death.

Apperently this sounded intriging to him because he continued with the foot harassment and book shaking. He was warned I will name his character Dave. There were no plans for a Dave in my book but I think I can work one in. Disembowlment sounds painful but I am open to suggestions.

My wife is crazy

2009-04-28T10:33:00.003-02:30

That is totally what my husband was thinking yesterday. I met him for lunch and I was discussing am email I had sent to a priest I know because I needed some info about Catholicism for Valkyrie. The following conversation ensued.

Billy - Why do you need to know about confession?

Me - Because my MC is Catholic and is feeling really guilty about something so I want to know how it works. I am also wondering if other people could guess how bad you were by how long you were doing the rosary thing.

Billy - What did she do?

Me - Accidentally killed someone.

Billy - If it was an accident why not go to the police?

Me - Because it happened during the commission of a crime.

Billy - What crime?

Me- Breaking and entering.

Billy - I thought she was a good guy??? (insert thoroughly confused look here)

Me - She is, he had a gun though so she tried to disarm him.

Billy - Yeah but she was on his property so he was within his rights to pull a gun on her.

Me - Well it's not like she broke into his house.

Billy - What? I thought it was a B&E. Where did she break into.

Me - A brothel.

Billy - God this is going to be weird isn't it (referring to my WIP)

Personally I don't get what is so weird about breaking into a brothel, accidentally killing someone and then feeling bad about it. Honestly I am not even 100% sure she is going to kill dude but whatever. Weird or not though when this beast is finished he will tell me how awesome it is because he knows how I love to have my ego stroked. Then I will send it to someone who won't lie in an effort to get a blow job.

Writing is a dangerous profession.

2009-04-24T12:20:00.003-02:30

I'm getting to the good part in Valkyrie which means it is now in my brain 24/7. This is all well and good when I am doing mundane tasks like loading the dishwasher. More complex tasks like walking have now become an issue.

Yesterday I walked into the wall while coming out of the sauna at the gym. I was too busy thinking about how my MC was supposed to lure someone off. Today I went into the land of make believe while driving and almost rear ended a semi.

I seriously need to find an off switch in my brain.

strength.

2009-04-21T13:34:00.005-02:30

Writing has been coming along even though my word counter is not moving. I will get it typed over I just like to procrastinate.

I broke down and started picking at the second story that is living in my head. It is much darker (apocalyptic) and I am finding on the days I can't concentrate on Valkyrie I can focus in on that one a bit easier.

We are still dealing with insurance and working on coming up with a price list of everything we lost. Just looking at the list overwhelms me most times but I am going to have to suck it up and get it done.

None of this however is what I came here to blog about though. I was complaining to a friend the other day and she made a comment about my strength that got me thinking. She said that she didn't know how I found the strength to go on when bad things keep happening to me. I have been hearing variations of this my whole life (what can I say I'm cursed) but I never really understood the sentiment behind it.

When things go wrong I do what I have to in order to survive. Bills still need to be paid, kids still need to be fed, husbands need to be yelled at for leaving dirty socks on the floor. As much as I would often like it to life does not come with a pause button that will allow me time to crumple on the floor in a blubbering heap.

I don't do anything that these people who comment on my strength wouldn't be able to do themselves in the same situation. This got me thinking that maybe it was not my strength that they were overestimating but rather that they were underestimating their own. Perhaps too many of us are approaching life with an 'I can't handle it' attitude. Many things in life are determined by our own attitudes so if we enter adversity expecting to be broken by it then it will become a self fulfilling prophesy.

I don't delude myself into thinking I will succeed at everything I try but rather knowing that no matter what I will come out whole on the other side. Well that or dead, I guess dying is always a possibility.

I may never make it as a writer but I will not let the possibility of failure cripple me. Like everything in life true failure for me would come from never trying.

must see video

2009-04-16T10:37:00.002-02:30

If I could figure out how to embed video I totally would but I suck so instead I will post a link. Why you should never judge a book by its cover

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9lp0IWv8QZY&feature=related

because it made me LOL

2009-04-14T16:07:00.001-02:30

So I was procrastinating and found this

``Imagine if every Thursday your shoes exploded if you tied them the usual way. This happens to us all the time with computers, and nobody thinks of complaining.``

- Jeff Raskin

It made me laugh much harder than it should have so I had to share.

Exploding shoes. It just doesn`t get any better than that.

I need an exorcist.

2009-04-14T14:51:00.002-02:30

A new story has taken root in my brain. It is messing with productivity although I am studiously ignoring it. I did take ten mins to write down the basic premise for future use but it NEEDS to go away. NOW

Tapping away at the keys

2009-04-10T12:58:00.004-02:30

So I am finally transcribing again, and with that comes editing. It is a slow process and if I try to speed it up and my non existent typing skills start to show but is is progress all the same. I have a lot more written than last time I updated and have a much more definitive outline.

I wish I could type as fast as I think. If that was the case this thing would be done already. I know most of what is going on and have hammered out the dialogue in my head. Grammar is a different story but that is what editing is for. I hope to have my first draft done by the time we move in August so I really have to concentrate more on writing and less on the other stuff in life.

Right now the thing that is subtracting most from my progress is Battlestar Galactica. We are watching the series on DVD and my love for Apollo is interfering with my love for Valkyrie. Don't get me wrong I still have great love (and almost no loathing) for Valkyrie but Apollo is messing with my schedule.

For those not in the know here is Apollo.

better late than never ...... I guess.

2009-03-20T13:18:00.003-02:30

I finally got an inventory list from the insurance company this week. Not bad it only took them a month, and then some. It was incomplete, which is hardly surprising. What did surprise me was some of the stuff they missed. I can understand how they missed Ethan's UB Funky toy but how on earth did they miss

A sectional couch
A computer desk
A computer chair
An end table

I mean really this is not something you may have simply overlooked. This stuff is HUGE. Incompetent asshats.

They are also Lazy. They did my kitchen first. Evey grocery item I had was labeled with the bran and the weight and any other irrelevant information they could fit in the space. Yet for each room they only write x number of books. How am I supposed to know if any books are missing if you lazy bastards don't even give me titles?

Of course teh universe must balance its self somehow though and with all that douchebaggery behind me tonight we are having a late St. Paddy's Day party.

WOOT bust out the booze and let the immature foolishness commence.

the letter B

2009-03-19T10:10:00.003-02:30

Time for another entry because, well why the hell not.

Today's babealicious entry is Jessica Biel.

Blargh

2009-03-11T18:01:00.004-02:30

It can't be helped, I have tried and tried to come up with a new name but it just has to be Valkyrie. Hopefully by the time this beast is ready to see the light of day most people will have forgotten about the movie. A girl can hope anyways.

Other than that it has been a craptastic day. I have a headache that won't go away, a six year old who is in I question all authority mode, and I am dropping everything. All I want to do is crawl in bed but I soon have to go pick people up from work and if I sleep no one will watch the monster.

Is it tomorrow yet?

D&D, Magic and the fifth circle of geek.

2009-03-11T12:15:00.004-02:30

So we are settled into our friend Ryan's place where we will be staying until the end of the school year when we will commence looking for a more permanent residence. That's going quite well and most of our free time is being filled playing Magic cards or D&D. Really I thought it just didn't GET any geekier than that but alas, I was wrong.

On Sundays a bunch of his friends come over to play Star Wars, a tabletop game similar to D&D. While waiting for the festivities to commence three of us got into a rather heated argument about whether or not Blade would be classified as chaotic good or chaotic neutral. It struck us that when you get into an argument about the D&D alignment of a comic book character you really no leg to stand on if you ever try to deny your geekdom. Lucky for me I don't even try.

Writing is coming along slowly and transcribing even slower. It is my own stupid fault because I picked up new books. One was Nightmares and Dreamscapes by Stephen King. It was pretty good although I was less than enthusiastic about a few endings. The other was Northern Lights by Nora Roberts. I only picked up the latter because it was lying on a counter at work and I was bored but it sucked me in. I ended up reading it in less than two days but that was two days of virtually no writing.

So now I am on a self imposed reading sabbatical and will not read anything else until I finish transcribing what I have done and write at least two more chapters. That should light a fire under my butt. Unless of course Lori sends me something in which case I will break my own rules and read it.

The letter A

2009-03-05T10:11:00.004-03:30

Just because everyone loves to look at random hotties I have decided to start a smexopedia on this blog.

What is that you ask. It is simply an alphabetical list of hotties. Today is the letter A. I choose Angelina Jolie. I am aware you would normally arrange it by last name but if I put her and Hugh Jackman in the same post the computer may melt so I am erring on the side of caution.

Oh yes the letter A truly is a lovely letter

What do you mean they are not real?

2009-03-04T11:48:00.003-03:30

So I am writing away the other night. No maybe that is not quite right it was more like I was writing a chapter and then viciously scribbling it out, Lather, rinse, repeat. These events were accompanied by much huffing and puffing. Eventually Billy asked what the problem was. Poor poor Billy.

I told him that my characters kept wanting to do things other than what I wanted them to.

He looked at me with one of those long suffering looks that makes me want to smack the person and said "Melisa, you made them up you can make them do whatever you want."

Oh yeah cause it is THAT easy. If it was that easy every Tom Dick and Lucy would be a published author.

I tried to explain to him how characters take on lives and personalities of their own. How there was so much more to them than what gets put on paper. "I could tell you what color underwear they are wearing" I said trying to prove my point.

"Of course you can. You make up their underwear too."

ARGH he was so not getting the point. I mean really why would I say this if it was not true. Does he think I like sounding like a crazy woman?

I suppose technically he is right and I could write what I want them to do instead of what they want to do but it comes out really crappy so why bother.

On another completely unrelated note I washed Push last night. Good movie. Chris Evans just moved up a bit on my hottie list.

Getting my groove back.

2009-02-27T13:47:00.005-03:30

It is coming slowly but surely. Having to rewrite what I already had done is harder than I thought because I keep thinking the original was better (even though it probably wasn't) and bemoaning the loss of that book. However I am moving forward again and hopefully I will soon be past the part that I already wrote once and ready to move on to the new and exciting part.

I am now living across the road from a library which is totally awesome and I am hoping it will boost productivity although in reality it will probably slow it because there are just too many books to read and not enough days in my life to read em all.

I am back into the swing of going to the Gym now as well. I went yesterday and realized that I lost 10lbs in February without even trying (no gym no diet) I guess that proves that stress really does burn calories.

Hopefully I will have my comp back soon and all my man candy photos with it. It is amazing how much I miss being able to link a random hottie to the bottom of a post when the mood strikes me.

I lost my words.

2009-02-23T13:08:00.003-03:30

Not as in I am suffering from writers block or anything but I literally LOST a few chapters. I do a lot of my work longhand and then type it up later because my life does not always permit me to sit at a comp when I feel the need to write.

Feb. 2 we had a house fire (everyone is ok) though and PAGES AND PAGES I was planning on transcribing that afternoon are gone now. I have tried to recreate them but I was living in a three bedroom house with 10 people (6 adults, a 6 year old, 5yr old, 3 yr old and 1yr old) and although I don't need silence to write that was just to much. So I have done NOTHING since January. NOTHING!!!

I feel like such a slacker and am hoping to get back into the groove tomorrow now that we are settled in at a friends house. I am afraid that I left it for so long I will not be able to get back into it properly. I know that is just self doubt and really has no foundation but it worries me all the same.

'Cause you needed to know that

2009-01-27T17:54:00.022-03:30

Random facts about yours truly.

I will often forget to eat or sleep if I am reading a good book. Peeing happens only when it is an emergency and the book travels with me.
I do things just to say I did. Like smoking in the boys room.
People were shocked when I got married and still after almost five years ask my husband how he did it.
I am just as likely to sing a Mariah Carey song as an Alice Cooper one.
I think willful ignorance should be met with corporal punishment.
I collect Smurfs.
I lost count of how many times I read "The Long Walk" after 12.
I genuinely like very few people. In fact I probably have enough digits to count them all.
I don't drink coffee or tea.
I have a tattoo and plan to get more
Once I cut off a piece of my finger. Despite doctors saying it was impossible it grew back.
I love being on stage in any capacity.
I hate cell phones. The best part of grocery shopping is being incommunicado, I don't want life finding me.
I have severe ADD, and mild OCD. this means nothing ever gets finished but it is always perfectly started.
I have an IQ of 186.
Despite said IQ I often do the stupidest things imaginable.
I love working out. It is the only physical release I get for my anger since DH strongly disapproves of my desire to 'smack the stupid' out of people I meet.
My first major celebrity crush was Marky mark
all these years later I still see no reason to regret that
I think tattoos are very sexy and all men should have a few.
If I had my way I would have nine kids.
I once beat the shit out of a would be abductor with a shoe.
I have no fear of walking alone at night in any city I have ever been in.
Spiders reduce me to a blubbering idiot.
Despite this I have a spider tattooed on my body .
I kissed a girl once and decided it was overrated. Tried a few more times though just to be sure.
5 years ago I had never seen a super hero movie. Now I own more than I care to count and have numerous crushes on men in tights (or iron)
I love live music. I have seen Thorn Lee, Novax, Sloan, Alice Cooper, Hot hot heat, Econoline crush, Treble Charger, Sum 41 and Dr. Hook. This is not nearly enough though and I intend to expand on that.
I am horrible with names and give most everyone I meet a nickname. Some are innocent enough like "flower girl" but others like "captain acne" should probably be kept to myself.
I hate when the music I like find its way into radio shuffle. Buck Cherry, Jason Maraz and Hinder are all prime examples of music I loved but got overplayed.
I can talk books until the other persons eyes glaze over.
I have only ever put down one book without finishing it and that was "Viking" by Fabio. "Old man and the sea" would be on that list too though if I hadn't had to write a report on it.
I love 80's hair metal.
I have natural red hair but everyone thinks it comes from a bottle
I define "low maintenance"
One year Billy forced me to celebrate Valentines day but agreed to let me pick the movie. We watched Hannibal. Now he pretends the day doesn't exist.
I also don't celebrate anniversaries.
I have still not finished the original Mario game.
I often laugh at the conversations going on in my head. Drives everyone around me batshit.
Despite getting knocked up repeatedly by accident I seem to be having an exceptionally hard time doing it on purpose.
I absolutely despise fan fiction. It doesn't matter how well written it is you are still mooching off another persons ideas.
I am the oldest of six children.
No we don't all have the same parents, in fact no two sibs in my family have the same parents.
In the seventh grade I failed a genealogy project because the teacher couldn't read my family tree.
I saw star wars for the first time when I was pregnant with my oldest and too fat to move. My brother had taped then off the TV so I watched them one after the other. The last 15 mins of the last movie was missing. To this day I have not seen the "I am your father" bit.
In high school teachers used to complain that I didn't put in enough effort. Apparently they were unaware of how much effort it takes to graduate when you rarely go to class
I play magic cards and love going to tournaments.
I paid $40 for a Lord Soth figurine.
When my parents first met my now husband they were shocked by the lack of piercings, tattoos and criminal records.
I often add old high school acquaintances (whom I hated) as facebook friends just to see if they got fat.
In most cases they did but there are a few regrettable exceptions.
I am only doing this because I can't figure out what to do with my characters at the exact moment. There are two equally appealing possibilities.
I love Lindt chocolate truffles. They are defiantly the food of the gods.
Alice Cooper was a major inspiration for mt current WIP.
I am currently playing Dungeons and Dragons.
I have an obsession with flair on facebook.
I am the only licensed driver in my house, there are days I hate it.
I go a bit overboard at Christmas, Like I bake a bazillion cookies and give out home made chocolates overboard.
I could totally be a hermit as long as I had internet.

Progress and setbacks

2009-01-26T14:49:00.002-03:30

So my word counter went from 20% down to 10%. I realized that this project is going to require at least double the words I thought it was. Definitely making progress though and even better not even a little part of me wants to scream at it to "go to hell". Normally I do really well for a while and then my mind demands I engage it in something new, I really don't see that happening this time I am far too in love with this story.

Setbacks are MAJOR in the naming department though. Originally the book was supposed to be titled Valkyrie but Tom Cruise went and fucked that up with his new movie he has coming out, or maybe it is already out but either way it now sounds lame where when I first thought of it it sounded tres cool.

So fuck you Tom Cruise and I don't mean that in the same way I would say Fuck you to certain other male celebs.

So it is still without title :(

Oh noes! I caught the emo.

2009-01-22T13:57:00.008-03:30

Self doubt is not an affliction that I am normally bothered by. Usually I am laughing at people who tell me I can't do something or am not good enough and informing them that contrary to their uneducated (and IMO worthless) opinion "I AM THE SHIT ". In fact my biggest personality flaw is probably a lack of modesty.

Don't get me wrong now I have plenty of others, like the inability to keep my opinions to myself, but my ego is definitely my biggest issue.

So now that I have caught the emo I am not quite sure what to do with myself. It hit me out of no where today when I was writing away and then suddenly second guessing every word I put down. My internal dialogue went something like

"Am I using that word too much?"
"Should it be a the noun or pronoun here"
"crap maybe I should put the comma before that word, no definitely after, no before"

well it just went on and on. Eventually I had to put the writing away because the end result was really choppy and read like a book report.

Maybe I will take a break from writing and try to do a bit more reading, that usually clears my head a bit.

Now I just have to decide which super hero I want to come save me from the emo.

Should it be Wolverine

Or Iron man

Or Johnny Storm

.

Oh the decisions a girl has to make. Life is such a burden

That's hardly the weirdest place I've ever done it.

2009-01-20T13:57:00.010-03:30

SO I went to the gym the morning and then was supposed to meet Billy for lunch at one. Left me with a 2 hour time block that I had to fill. So I headed over to the food court and hauled out my note book and pen. After about 10 people asking me how my homework was going ('cause you know, I look 16) I dug my MP3 player out of my gym bag. I got a significant amount done and hammered out some nitpicky details. It is amazing how not having access to the interwebz can boost productivity.

Well now I am off to type up what I got done and try to avoid the urge to look at flair.

And just because he has been living in my head for a few days

MMMMMMMMMMMM. Hugh Jackman

EEEEEEK. It's a pervert!

2009-01-15T13:39:00.005-03:30

well perverts actually. If these two don't behave I am going to have to give my male lead erectile dysfunction. Every time I turn around I am hitting backspace or scribbling something out because my leads won't keep it in their pants. I promised them they could have sex later in the book but I guess I forgot I am dealing with horny teenagers here. Even when I am not writing but just mentally tweaking the plot they keep trying to find a way to get out of their clothes.

Other than that it is coming along OK.

In real life my van is in the shop because I broke BOTH my front doors in separate and completely unrelated bouts of stupidity. I am house bound and going stir crazy. I didn't think it would be this bad because I never go anywhere anyways but I had to give up the gym for 4 days just when I was getting back into my after Christmas groove. Last night at work one of our regulars either told me I was fat or asked if I was pregnant. Not sure which as my sign language is quite basic but either way I feel I need the gym more than ever.

One of my new years resolutions was to fit in my skinny jeans. the other was to read less and write more but Lori keeps sending me stuff and then my mother in law gave me vampire porn to read.

It is the Kiss of crimson series. by Laura Adrian. She really needs to take an anatomy class. You can not touch someones sex. you can't rub it or suck it or do any of the other crap you tried to claim because .................... it is not a tangible object. I checked and double checked and then enlisted some help in the search. Get a dictionary!

The stage is set.

2009-01-08T13:11:00.002-03:30

Well now that I am past 5000 words I feel like I have gotten a good start on my current WIP. So I back burnered everything else and this one completely took over all my conscious thought and a good chunk of my dreams as well but It is starting to take shape and gain direction.

So far the hardest part of this one has been naming people (I hate naming people) and trying to decide how graphic parts should be. But at least the story is flowing and there are no walls in the foreseeable future.

Twilight is over, so is 2008

2008-12-31T09:02:00.009-03:30

I finished book four of the series last night. It took me 5 days to read the entire series so I think it is pretty safe to say we aren't dealing with foundation shaking literature here.

For anyone who has never read the book but intends to, you should probably stop reading here. In case you are slow that was your spoiler alert.

I knew a lot of the problems with the book going into it thanks to Lori and Papercuts but I turned off the part of my brain that listens to them and decided to judge the book on its own merit. After all they were (sorta) wrong about Eragon.

Lets start with my biggest problem a certain irritating twit named Bella Swan. I actually wished I was a fictional character so I could eat her. I don't even have to be a vampire I would go cannibal just to silence her constant whining. So yeah she is whiny did I also mention she is stupid? How about her serious Daddy issues?

"Oh I'm SO in love with Edward. I love the way he bosses me around, never lets me out of his sight, and sneaks into my house without my knowledge to watch me sleep. It makes me feel so safe and secure and loved." ok that's the end of my swooning Bella impression, but really her psycho vampire boyfriend does these things and she is cool with it. She is everything I hate about female leads. Bella is dependant, whiny, needy, insecure, and helpless and even worse she was created by a woman.

Edward come here a moment please. Surely you didn't think it was only Bella I had issues with. You are my second biggest issue with the piece of fiction. I can get that you don't wanna eat humans and sacrifice to save them. That's cool and even kind of endearing but you are also a psychotic control freak. Any man treated me the way you treated Bella and I would smack him into the next state (or province) with a restraining order. What vampires can ignore them? Well then I guess I would just to have my shape shifting friend deliver the message. Oh and what is with the virgin thing? I mean I get you not wanting to break Bella and all so I can see holding out on her but surely in the 99 years you have been trapped in the body of a 17 year old boy you stumbled across at least ONE promiscuous vampire girl. I mean from what I gathered you are hot enough to melt solid rock and you have women both mortal and immortal throwing themselves at you like groupies and you abstain because? Oh yeah because you are old fashioned .... no wait they had premarital sex back then too hence the gunshot weddings. Sorry you are not a believable character for me either.

NEXT .....................................

With the notable exception of Alice the rest of the coven seems to just stand around and with their turn to be useful to the plot. I mean for three books Rose was about as fleshed out a character as the dining room table.

Now on to the technical side.

You know I can swallow the whole daytime vampire thing as soon as I pointed out to myself that I had made the (IMO inexcusable) mistake of confusing vampire lore with Dracula lore. Yeah Dracula could be destroyed by sun and holy relics and a whole bunch of other things but vampire lore is much older than that and varies throughout the world. Most of us are familiar with the European version so that is what we set all our preconceived notions about vampires by but it is not all there is out there and in much lore they are simply nocturnal the same way an owl is not because they CAN'T go out during the day but because they don't wanna. Why they had to sparkle though is beyond me.

Stephanie Myers writing though is a different story all together. She is NOT a gifted writer and she does not make up for this short coming by being a spell binding story teller. Her story is very linear with many characters being two dimensional until it is their turn to take the spot light. She abuses, the, comma in a , way I haven't, seen since second, grade. For a while I though speech impediments ran rampant in the town of forks. I mean if I put all those pauses in the conversation there was no other assumption to make. well that's not true I could have assumed she lacked technical finesse AND that her editor is an idiot both of which would have been correct. I actually honest to go almost threw the book after reading this

Hey, Edward. Skipping, Bella?

ARGH!!!!!!

Sometimes she changes tenses in the middle of a sentence or from singular to plural. I shut my eyes and shook my head to clear it but the evidence was still there when I was done.

So yeah all that annoyed me but do you wanna know what the worst part was?

I read three full books and part of a fourth (over 600 pages) full of mistakes that a 10 year old would catch. I did my best to swallow that a woman not suffering from munchausen syndrome could seriously fall in love with the vampire stalker. I even did some of my own research so that I could read about a vampire going to school during the day without getting a side stick from laughter.

I did all this for two reason

1. I hoped Bella would eventually get eaten
2. I knew the sex was coming.

Well I was wrong on one *tear* but number two was looking promising. Edward promised to have sex with her while she was human as long as they were married. Like a good little puppet she went along with what she wanted and then came the honey moon. FINALLY this book gets a redeeming quality ------------------------ WTF do you mean it's the next morning? I spent 600 pages in purgatory and I don't get ANY details? How did you get those bruises? What happened to the poor pillows? NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

SO not fair.

In review:
The book was poorly written.
The characters were unbelievable.
There was no sex.
There was minimal violence.

Since I would hate to end 2008 with THAT literary catastrophe I am reading some Steven King now. "The Dead Zone" has to be better.

Comma abuse

2008-12-28T10:10:00.004-03:30

Comma abuse is right up there with apostrophe abuse when it comes to things I can't stand to see in a book I am reading. It is only bested by seeing the word alot in a professionally published book.

I mean do there people not have books proofread before they are published? I recently showed a few sentences from New Moon to an eight year old and she immediately spotted the incorrect comma usage. That is pretty sad IMO that an eight year old caught it but some overpaid editor who probably has a degree in this shit can't manage to figure out there should not be 2 commas in a 5 word sentence. Brilliant.

New moon doesn't abuse apostrophes but lost of other books do. Apparently it is hard to remember 5th grade language arts.

Oh and there is some horrid sentence structure in the Twilight series as well. To the point that sometimes I had to read a sentence three times to be sure of what she meant.

If it was a blog I was reading or an email or even just a letter someone wrote me I probably would not even notice there flaws but I find I am seeing A LOT of them in recently published books as if both authors and editors have forgotten the basic rules.

Write what you know ???????????

2008-12-22T11:52:00.003-03:30

Boy I remember hearing that many times when I was just starting out with vague ambitions of maybe someday being published. It was something I was never good at because the sentence sounds so damn literal. I rejected it flat out and after many failed attempts at the great Canadian novel I have finally figured out what it means.

I have two work in progress now and writing them feels like 'coming home' yes I am still struggling with trying to avoid adverb abuse, and where to split chapters and what is needed info and what is useless background information but that is on the technical side. On the creative side where stories are born things are just flowing ...... maybe too well.

I have found this is especially true in my second project as I started to write the opening scene. I have been grappling with it for a few weeks never sure how much detail to put it, how vague to be, and worrying it would traumatize someone. Problem is the book opens with date rape and I had it butchered trying not to be to graphic until I realized that date rape (well all rape for that matter) IS graphic and horrendous and if it makes people uncomfortable to read about it then that is a good thing because it also gives victims a voice.

So as I started to write it I realized there is value to writing what you know and that writing what you know does not mean you have to be autobiographical it just means putting your own voice, experience, and emotions into your characters.

What's in a name?

2008-12-18T10:16:00.000-03:30

I hate naming things. I have a cat named King Kong because I delegated the task to a three year old. Naming my children was harder than birthing them. I don't name plants because well A) it's weird and B) I suck at it.

So I am trying to name a girl in a new project I started today and ARGH! No name seems right. I can't go name her Bertha or something because she is supposed to be hot as rocks and yet all the sexy names I can come up with seem wrong for a 16 year old girl.

My Inferiority complex

2008-12-09T11:57:00.003-03:30

Since Lori is showing me up in the writing department I decided it was time to get down to business and take a day off from using my screen time to read Sins and get some more words on paper/screen.

My biggest issue is when transferring work from one medium to the other I tend to edit in the process and that slows me up.

I am however making slow but steady progress. Once I learned to read my own hand writing I had to convert my short hand scribbles into coherent story. I think tequila may have helped with this but alas I have none.

Santa can you bring me an extra 3 hours a day of quiet?

I prefer the devil you don't

2008-12-07T11:07:00.003-03:30

I have heard many people say "better the devil you know than the devil you don't" I have decided that is just a cliche used to avoid making necessary changes in you life because I really preferred the devil I didn't know.

When I first moved to my current town I thought it was lovely, I lived here 2 years thinking people were nice, and friendly, and compared to my home town OH SO normal. Then I took a job at a corner store and figured out this town is full of Alcoholics who like to drive around drunk, wife beaters, pot heads (which I can deal with) and perverts.

Now I have always believed a dirty mind is a wonderful thing BUT I prefer to save my lewd comments for those willing to listen to them. The people I have met around here just creep me out and have made me consider painting my windows black.

Also I live in a good sized community but every pervert I encounter knows where I live. If it was just one or two I would assume they were the problem but since it is a dozen or more that have told me where I live (and I have never been more specific than up the street) I assume I must be the problem and have a perv magnet in me.

Seriously I was happier living in oblivion where I didn't have panic attacks in the night and want to make sure the door was locked.

Writing has all but come to a stand still lately between time constraints and reading but I am hoping to get another chapter or two done on Monday while I have an empty house. I have a billion quick notes that I need to transcribe into long hand so very little creative juice will be needed just grunt work.

making friends

2008-12-06T15:10:00.004-03:30

HMM I have empty screen syndrome. That is when I look at my screen and everything I wanted to say just flees my head (also known as ADD in some cultures)

So i figured if I just start writing something would come to me. So far all that came to me was a snotty kid and a hungry cat. I mean that literally I have been interrupted twice in the time it took to type this.

I am going to my husbands work party next weekend. That should be good for me I guess as I really need to make friends. I have a grand total of one friend who does not live either in another part of the country or in my computer. I used to have lots but they all annoy the shit out of me now.

I like my online friends because I can turn them off and blame it on my comp. Don't look at me like that I KNOW you have wished people in your life came with a mute button.

So I am putting myself out there and seeing if I can meet someone with friend potential. I have strict criteria though so it may be hard.

Criteria

1) you must be articulate. I am not asking for Shakespeare but you should at least be able to tell a story without making me want to puncture my own ear drums.

2) you must be educated and have a desire to learn. I don't mean you have to have a degree from Harvard law but you should at least understand how time zones work and not really think that a channel is getting our weather wrong because they are an hour in the past (seriously run into this) I am also not interested in spending my time with someone who will never think outside their own narrow experience.

3) You must not be judgemental. I have no use for anyone who is going to write me off for having a kid without even knowing how old I am. Regardless of how I look I am NOT 16 and there is nothing wrong with my having a six year old.

So really that is not a lot to ask yet it has been years since I have found anyone I want to spend More than 20 mins with.

Take some paxil and leave me alone

2008-12-01T12:05:00.005-03:30

when things go bad in my life (and they usually do) I always try to remind myself that it could be worse, I generally do this to other people too. For example if my husband comes home complaining about his boss I will point out that it could be worse, he could have gangrene in his right testicle. Now of course this does nothing to rectify the situation at hand but it does get his mind off his issue so I do understand how this can be a helpful tool in pulling yourself out of a funk.

What I DON'T get is why when people try to think of a way it could be worse they always need to to compare it to me.

ex. A friend of mine is humongously pregnant and having a hard time moving around. I know this sucks I have BTDT and I was empathizing with her when all of a sudden she says "well it could be worse you know at least the baby is healthy, lord knows I don't know what I would do if I had to deal with your pregnancies"

Now could someone please tell me WTF my abysmal pregnancy luck has to do with her being fat and uncomfortable?

Or when someones kid is giving them a hard time and they complain they will follow it up with "well I guess I really have nothing to complain about because at least I have all my kids with me" again WTF does my loosing a child have to do with your kid stabbing someone with a thumb tack?

Mad at your family 'oh well I am better off than Melisa who doesn't see her family often'

Really I am glad to know that reminding me of my misery can help you to feel better but I would really like to resign my post as the totem pole you compare your craptastic life to when you want to feel better. Why not just pop a paxil like everyone else when you need to feel better and leave me out of it.

Can anyone recommend some good emo music I can wallow to?

Hey life, leave me alone

2008-11-25T09:02:00.005-03:30

Why is it whenever I get into a good groove for something life comes along and demands I do something else?

Take yesterday I was reading "Camera Shy" for Lori and my phone rang like a BILLION freakin times. Oh and of course it was not telemarketers or people I could otherwise ignore It was my boss and husband and my other boss.

Then after I finished reading I set out to make supper and do the house work I was supposed to do during the day, HAH yeah right. My cat came in covered in sheep manure. Kitty bath time :) let me tell you King Kong (yes my cat is named after a gigantic fictional ape) does not like water. What I wanna know though is where did he find sheep shit to roll in, I mean really I am stuck in the middle of suburban hell, there are no sheep around here.

I think he may have pissed off a mage kitteh

Moving on I get Ethan to bed and head towards a nice hot tub after which I will work on my current book. Along comes Billy and asks "are we watching Heroes tonight". So after unleashing a string of mental explicatives that would curl a sailors hair I gave up. I had to watch last weeks heroes on the comp (because I fell asleep last week) and then go up and watch this weeks episode.

So nothing of great importance (except Lori reading) got accomplished yesterday and since I am sitting in front of my comp at the moment I think it is safe to say nothing will be accomplished today either.

Well except maybe starting a chapter or two of my reread of "Camera Shy" well MAYBE just MAYBE I will start twilight today as well. After all it is better to mock - I mean criticize- a book that you have actually read because otherwise you just sounds like an ass regurgitating the opinions of others.

Talk dirty to me

2008-11-24T09:47:00.005-03:30

I have been in a rather musical mood of late so I figured what better to blog about than my current musical interest.

I don't care by Fall out boy is my current favorite song. Listening to that even makes housework fun. I love it IMO it has all the components of a great song. It is well written, has a good beat and a singer who is actually capable of singing.

I think that last part is the most important. In fact I will listen to a bad song with a good voice. Take Gavin Rossdale's recent release of love remains the same. Really the song its self is not that spectacular but his voice just entrances me. I told Billy the other night I could listen to that man sing a dictionary.

The lead singer to Hinder is another example of this. While I would listen to Gavin sing a dictionary I would listen to him sing a thesaurus Lips of an angel is an awesome song but I am more than willing to listen to him sing his crappy songs like Better Than me on repeat as well.

I guess I have a 'thing' for a certain type of voice. Those raspy, deep, almost growly voices make me weak in the knees.

I may be a happily married woman but Jhonny Rzeznik talk dirty to me.

Crazy Bitch

2008-11-20T19:39:00.005-03:30

OMG the bitch is fucking CRAZY, there is no other word for her. Oh you probably wanna know who I am talking about right? My main character.

See I was having problems with my segue I knew where the story had to go but I was having difficulty making it go there. Turns out that is because miss crazy bitch turned out to be a serial killer. I had no PLANS for her to be one in fact it kinda flies in the face of my whole outline but she apparently has a mind of her own.

So now that I have reconciled the fact that she is a completely sane serial killer the story is making progress again. It will make much better progress if I ever get a lap top but what can ya do?

In other news

My 6 year old has discovered Beastie Boys, Oh nothing makes me prouder than hearing him sing about how his mom stole his best porno mag. Why do other moms get kids who love the gummie bear song and mine is into Alice Cooper and Motley Crue?

It should be interesting at parent teacher interviews next week

Preparing

2008-11-16T08:31:00.003-03:30

So I have an interview for child care with a new family in 3 hours. I also have dirty dishes in the sink, a pile of laundry, floors to mop, a shower to clean and a child to make look presentable (giving up on that last one).

Oh yeah this is gonna be SMOOTH.

In other news I took Ethan to a food drive movie yesterday. They were showing the Polar express at the theater and admission was food. Great sounds liek good cheap fun .... did I say fun I meant torture.

Figuring it would be kinda busy we showed up an hour early. we waited in line 45 mins for our tickets. THEN we needed popcorn. Ethan had a gift card to cover that, yeah except they have a new system and the card would not work ..... goodbye money.

The movie malfunctioned, the arcade ate my change, and then I had to go straight to work when it was over.

Jesus is it Monday yet? I need a nice slow school day.

Oh did I mention I am also procrastinating because I SHOULD be cleaning and preparing for an interview right now?

Hello wall

2008-11-12T12:03:00.006-03:30

So I have hit a wall. The problem is not that I am out of ideas or anything like that. No I don't have anything so poetic as writers block. I just can't focus long enough to put anything good on paper.

I am so bloody stressed out right now that my writing is choppy and has no flow at all. It seems a cruel joke of nature that my ADD flares up when I am stressed out and need to work out a valid solution.

I KNOW where I need my story to go next, I KNOW what point I need my stupid bitch of a main character to make in order to get there but I am unable to enact a smooth transition.

In other news I am job hunting again. The family I babysit for recently experienced a lay off and will no longer require my services. WHY WHY WHY does this shit always happen right before Christmas

Time, I lack it

2008-11-05T12:22:00.004-03:30

I have REALLY been meaning to update this but holy fuck batman I cant get 10 mins to myself. well except now when I obviously have time to type.

So I left off at Halloween. I believe you could probably quote me as saying I love Halloween, I recant.

After school six kids came over to watch Halloween specials eat cookies and then join me for a supper of worms and eye balls (they decided meat balls look more like eye balls than brains). There was minimal drama when one parent tried to take a kid home so they all stayed to trick or treat with me and their parents met us here at 6.

So there I was (stupid me) thinking wow these kids are being SO good and there is only one of me to six of them (age 1,2,5,5,6,8) so when we add 3 more grown ups to the mix it should get easier, Um NO.

See what happened was at 6 when we were getting ready to go there was no longer a clear chain of command for them to follow so all hell broke loose. We did after 20 mins though get them out of the house and no one was bleeding (at least not profusely)

So we go trick or treating and once we get on the street it starts going pretty smooth. I only screamed twice both for walking into a street although I yell to get off the grass a few times.

I dressed up and went trick or treating as well. SOME people refused to give me candy. Those commie bastards are so gonna get it. I was gonna egg their houses but though they might figure out It was me so I decided to wait until Christmas eve, Fuckers will never see it coming.

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It's the most wonderful time of the year

2008-10-31T14:02:00.006-02:30

Halloween of course. I love this holiday because it is so low pressure (unlike Valentines) and there is no pressure to give gifts. Nope it is perfect I get to hit random strangers up for donations of chocolate. Halloween was SO invented by a woman.

We made pumpkins, and put up decorations and baked cookies and for supper tonight we are having worms and brain (spaghetti and meatballs)

The down side is getting 6 kids ready for the festivities. I took two to school at noon and while I was there helped the two oldest change into costumes. Have you ever spent a significant portion of time at an elementary school on Halloween when you were not a student? It is freakin mayhem. And the baby was in my arms growling at all the kids in scary costumes so that got me mobbed by prepubescent girls who are baby obsessed.

I am going trick or treating tonight with 6 kids (but 3 more grown ups are coming) and I think if people were nice they would give me vodka in my bag.

I will post some pics when I get my sizing issue dealt with

Lord of the Star Wars

2008-10-27T08:59:00.009-02:30

So a few weeks ago I got Brisinger in the mail. I was NOT impressed despite waiting 2 damn years to read it I had no desire, I blame Lori. Seriously got to figure out how to make typing her name bring you to her blog so people will know EXACTLY who I am blaming.

I loved Eragon and Eldest with a passion normally reserved for uber hot celebrities and she ruined them in one fell swoop with a very simple phrase "lord of the star wars" At fist I backed up against the wall of denial, There was no way I would have missed something that major as the book being a rip off of star wars set in a middle earth style setting, she had to be full of shit. I may be a book whore but I like to think I am a book whore with standards!

****warning spoilers ahead, in fact if you don't want me to give away the entire plot you should stop reading now****

Her words stuck in my craw though , seriously what the fuck is a craw?

craw

[kraw] Show IPA Pronunciation

–noun

1.	the crop of a bird or insect.

2.	the stomach of an animal.

—Idiom

3.	stick in one's craw, to cause considerable or abiding resentment; rankle: She said I was pompous, and that really stuck in my craw.

Origin:
1350–1400; ME crawe, prob. akin to crag ²

OK so now that I have that bit of Googling out of my system.

I thought about it and thought about it and started to see teh similarities.

When the story starts there is one known dragon rider in the world and he is evil, as well as fucking insane (Vader?) but then a young boy (skywalker) discovers a dragon egg and takes off with an old man from the village who just HAPPENED to be an old dragon rider (ObiWan). The evil dragon rider king Galbitorix controls everything but the varden (resistance) are fighting to overthrow him along with the elves. Eragon (young skywalker) falls in in love with an elf princess (leah anyone) and is trained by another old (freaking ancient) dragon and rider everyone assumes in dead (yoda). At the end of book two we find out that one of the Crazy evil dragon riders is Eragons dad. How did I NOT see the "I am your father" moment coming?

So this was where I was when book three arrived.

I am not one who ever to let words go to waste and since I owned the book I decided to read it. Before I could read it though I had to reread book one and two because I have a weird compulsion that forces me to reread the prequels if there is more than a month between books so that I don't forget any important details, in fact this is the main reason I don't read sequels until they are completely written but I thought this was a two book set when I first bought it.

So I am rereading Eragon and Eldest and discover despite Lori's evil whisperings I STILL like the books. I became engrossed in them again immediately and finished both books in four days and moved on to book three.

I was very impressed as he seemed to move away from the star wars comparisons (at least in so far as my weak Star Wars knowledge was concerned) he went into a lot of detail about HOW Galbitorix had the powers he did and we learned more about his family tree including the fact that his mama was incapable of keeping it in her pants and that Brom (obiwan) and not Morzan (crazy evil dragon rider) was his daddy.

The one down side though was that the book was NOT a trilogy as I had been lead to believe and there is ANOTHER book coming. I will let you all know my final opinion in a few years.

So after rereading I have decided that although Paolini obviously draws on star wars for inspiration and may have in book one and two shown less creative ability than I would have liked the books are still enjoyable and well written with few plot holes and very little left unexplained, there are no sub plots left to wither, and the characters are believable. I can totally wear my Eragon shirt in public with my head held high (now I have to GET an Eragon shirt)

Why there

2008-10-26T00:09:00.003-02:30

I work in a convenience store and for some reason THAT is where inspiration keeps hitting me. I mean today I FINALLY came up with the PERFECT first name for one of my lead characters while I had a line up of customers. WTF . This is PROOF the universe hates me because the cosmos KNOW I have ADD and yet they keep letting the muse shit in my brain at inopportune moments. Thanks a lot cosmos now I have a mans name written on my hand. I did get about 3 pages of long hand done between customers though, unfortunately it is all in short hand so I am praying it will still make sense tomorrow when I try to re write it.

I so need a fucking lap top

Working on my bucket list

2008-10-25T09:44:00.004-02:30

I don't have an exceptionally interesting bucket list by most peoples standards which is odd because most people seem to think I am rather eccentric however overtly imaginative or not I am getting it done, slowly but surely.

So here was/is my list

1) Live in Newfoundland

2) Have one shot at every bar on George Street and walk off the street

3) See Alice Cooper before he dies (note I said before HE dies not before I die)

4) Go to OZ fest

5) Have kids

6) Go to Australia

7) Own a Newfoundland Dog

8) Start my own business

9) Write, and publish, a novel

10) Get inked

11) Feel sexy in my own skin

That is it. I have no other desire that I feel my life will be incomplete if I die without doing it. This could be directly related to the fact that I have enough weird life experiences to supply most people for ten life times by the time I was 14 and started thinking bucket list though so the mundane seemed more appealing.

So here I am at 26 and I think I have made pretty good progress.

1) Live in Newfoundland - I moved to Newfoundland in 2000 and while I left for a year I came back. I guess this is my hearts home although I wish some loved ones would move here

2) Have one shot at every bar on George Street and walk off the street - incomplete but not for lack of trying. There are over SIXTY bars on that street and although I am pretty good drinker I only made it a little over half way through. I will try again some day when I have a few hundred dollars to blow though

3) See Alice Cooper before he dies (note I said before HE dies not before I die) - WOOT did that one Tuesday night. I want to do it again, would it be weird to call him my muse? his music unleashes a creative wave in me and seeing his concert has put me into a full out writing frenzy !!!

4) Go to OZ fest- not done yet. I have to travel to where it is going as it is NEVER coming here so I am biding my time but I will get er done before he dies

5) Have kids - Did that turns out I am not as good at having babies as I thought but I did get one healthy little ray of sunshine out of 6 pregnancies

6) Go to Australia - Cant wait to do it. No idea when it will happen though, I am thinking I would like to take Ethan with me so I want him to be a teen at least

7) Own a Newfoundland Dog - This is in fact one of the main reasons I am striving for home ownership.

8) Start my own business- Done that I am over 2 years as a child care provider now.

9) Write, and publish, a novel - I did part a but my last 2 works were not good enough for publication . One because it just wasn't and the other because I think I was trying too hard to be someone else rather than trusting in my own ability and words to be worthy

10) Get inked - did that in may doing it again next summer

11) Feel sexy in my own skin - shockingly that never happened until AFTER having 2 kids. Realistically my body was better 10 years ago but I like it so much better now

I did it

2008-10-24T17:01:00.003-02:30

Yeah I made one, ok so this is my second blog BUT it is one that I have no intention of giving to my overly judgmental family and friends although I may let a few of the cooler ones hang out.

Now all I need is something to write about but I am stuck on the topics of WHY it is ok to eat a container of frosting after going to the gym, how badly I want Alice Cooper, and why Iron Man should be considered pornography.

None of these however seem all that urgent so instead I think I will go play with the lay out and see what I can do for funz