Animal Control Fail

We interupt my frantic day and my stress over not having written anything in two days to bring you a rant on Animal Control and Stupidity.

There was a family who lived in a house with three dogs. A big dog, a medium dog, and a little dog. This family loved their newest big dog and didn't much care for the medium dog. They didn't care much for the little dog either, but this story is about the medium dog, we'll call her Maggie.

Maggie used to bark and howl and annoy the entire neighborhood until the family invested in a shock collar. The neighborhood was happy. The family was happy. Maggie wasn't so happy. In fact, Maggie acted like she'd been severely beaten and was extrememly aggitated anytime someone came near her- not violent, but very scared.

For whatever reason the family chose this week, they decided the front yard was a good place for Maggie. Not the backyard that's fenced in where the three dogs are usually kept. No sir, a tether on a tree in the middle of the yard. There, Maggie spent her day pacing silently, around and around the tree, backing away as far as her tether would allow any time someone walked down the street.

They neglected to give her water the first day. The second day they put out a black bucked in the nice warm sunshine for her to drink from. The third day, the bucket was knocked over from the night before so she had no water (though a neighbor brought her some). The fourth day, the bucket was back. The fifth day, a nice 84 degree day, nope, no water to be found.

The family tied Maggie outside at 8am and brought her in around 7pm every day. Other than those times, they ignored her completely. Even though she stood right next to the driveway where they came and went throughout the day, they didn't even bother to look her way.

A neighbor finally called animal control, explaining to the nice dispatch lady that this animal was being neglected, that it was hot and she had no water, that for a change, the family was home all day but still no one had come out to attend to Maggie in any manner. Other than the tree she was tethered to, Maggie had no shelter. Had a storm come while the family was gone all day (as they usually were), poor Maggie would be screwed. The neighbor explained that she wasn't on speaking terms with the family because they very rarely answered their door and they didn't treat their kids much better than Maggie (but that's another rant). As such, the neighbor would appreciate if the animal control officer could visit the family and inform them how to be decent people responsible pet owners. And no, please do not stop over afterwards and tell me how it went (who really wants this? Anyone? really?) If they felt they must call to explain how the issue was resolved, that would be fine.

And so it came to pass (five more hours with no water later), that the animal control officer drove down the street. Did he pull in to see the family with Maggie PLAINLY tied up fifteen feet away from the street right in the freakin middle of the yard? Oh no. He pulled in to ask the neighbor if she had a dog that she kept tied out all day. *headdeskfacepalmflailingfail*

Meanwhile, the family wrenched back their curtains and peered through their filthy, crayon-scribbled windows, across their foot and a half high lawn (except the circle that Maggie has trampled down), at the animal control officer talking with the neighbor. Subtle much (for everyone involved)?

Redirected (and seemingly not having consulted any of the information that the nice dispatch lady had taken), he drove the ten feet across the street and went to talk with the family. They didn't even bother to come outside, they spoke through a screen door. The animal control officer left a couple minutes later.

The result: Maggie is still outside on her tether without water (an hour after he's left) and it's pretty obvious to the family which neighbor called animal control on them.

Thank you, officer. You have been so damn helpful.

Eggs, Spring and yet another creative distraction

Mother Nature decided to make spring come to Michigan during spring for once. It's kind of crazy, because in all my years this has never happened. We might not have snow, but it's still cold and usually raining.

With the first day of Spring coming in just three days, we're (vastly) enjoying temperatures in the upper seventies. I've even cleaned out a few of the more protected flower beds close to the house (because this IS Michigan and for all we know, we might have two feet of snow by next weekend). Crocuses and daffodils are flowering. Have I mentioned how crazy this is? We're several weeks ahead of schedule here.

And so am I.

Easter usually hits me as an 'oh crap, that's next weekend?!?!' event. Which means our Easter decorations usually sit out for a whole two weeks (maybe). This is a little sad, because we have a long running tradition of painting wooden Easter eggs every year and I'd prefer to enjoy them a little longer after our effort in creating them. This year, we're on top of things!

When my son was born fourteen years ago, I had this grand idea of painting an egg for him every year so he'd have a little memento to take with him when he eventually moves out. Yeah, I was kinda planning way ahead, but this comes from a similar thing my mother did for my sister and I when we were little. We picked out a new Christmas ornament each year, and when we moved out, we had a pile to start decorating our own tree with. Well, I do that too, but the overachiever in me had to one up my mother and pull in a second holiday.

But now I have two kids and a lot less time. You can probably figure out which years were more of a last minute rush than others from this photo. We've done glitter, and little designs. That second one in the bottom row was finger painted by one year old fingers. And some years, I've actually had time to sit down with my tiny paint brushes and have some fun.

My son is rather past the excitement of painting eggs. In fact, he'd probably much rather calculate the number of eggs he'd have by the time he moved out by pi and multiply by the circumference of Jupiter and then applying that to some ungodly number theory game he learned in math.

Thankfully, my daughter is my mini-me and loves painting so she paints her own eggs now, which frees me up to take over the task of creating one for Mathboy. He also loves Nerf guns, which is why, this year, I decided to use that particular phase to decorate his egg.

Ok, so it's not particularly Easterish. I gave up on that years ago and went for documenting what ever they are into at the time.

My daughter has hermit crabs. So yep, we have a hermit crab egg.

A dragon egg? Sure, why not.

Swords? Definitely.

My daughter was a little easier. Some flowers, glitter and more glitter! That worked for several years before she started painting her own.

A couple years ago it occurred to me that I should make a few eggs for myself or I'll be left with none when these kids finally do move out. Tie dye was fun in egg form for something different.

So how does one make one of these things? 

It's pretty easy. First, get thee to a craft store and buy a bag of wooden eggs. You might notice that mine are different sizes. Some years I had left overs. The medium size come four in a bag. So do the small ones. The large ones are sold individually. Some years I had to go with whatever size was still on the peg a week before Easter. Hence, we have an assortment. 

If you're fortunate, you might find a brand of wooden eggs that are round on the bottom. Most are not. This is ok really because it makes it much easier to stand on the table to paint and dry. Look for ones with the smallest level of flatness on the bottom. You won't notice that once they're all painted and piled in a basket.

 Then you'll need some acrylic craft paint. Just a little goes a long way. Gather some brushes, water and some inspiration and you're ready to go.

 Paint a base coat. You can either paint a solid color or water the paint down a little and do a wash. I'm rather fond of the wash so the wood grain shows through a little. For this year, I did a wash of mix of pearl white and pearl blue. If you opt for the wash, it dries very quickly and you can get right to painting.

If you're going to add glitter, you'll need wet paint to for the glitter to adhere to. Be aware that painting over glitter isn't the easiest thing so only put glitter in the areas you don't plan on doing anything else with. You could also add the glitter to smaller spots at any point by shaking it onto any wet paint area - making little dots or squiggles of paint works wonderfully. 

 And then paint your design. Yep, it's pretty simple. I'm a fan of long, thin bristled brushes, mostly because it better hides the shaking my hands do these days. I usually do something more in the random design arena on the opposite side of actual painting so it can look Easterish if it ends up with right way in the basket.

And then there's the other side. 

At this point, I write their names and the year on the bottom and bring it outside for an overall shot of Krylon clear coat. The clear coat also seals in any glitter.

Once it's dry, it goes in the basket--where it will come out several times as the kids go through the pile and organize them by year (as my daughter did in that long picture), and chat about which ones they painted, and hide them, and find them (or I find them a month later). The best part about them is that they don't chip, they don't rot, you don't have to find a way to eat a dozen hard boiled eggs and they make a great conversation piece year after year. 

And now I can check that little project off my mommy list for year. Hooray!

Time to get motivated

Ever feel like flinging your uncooperative character across the room? Well now you can! Want to stomp on their stupidity? Literally crush their limbs...err...whims? Yep, you can do that too.

Made from gloves, which I'll toss out the trendy term 'upcycled' to pretend I'm up on the lingo, these little guys (No, I didn't use that extra finger to make them gender specific) are ready and waiting for your abuse (a.k.a. motivation). They are posable and padded for to protect your knuckles.

I'll use one of my current characters as an example.

"Hey 152, can I talk to you a minute?"

"Okay."

"So in that last chapter, I thought I had issues with William slowing the pace down with all his tidbits of history."

"The Williams are bad."

"Yes, yes, we know that. But it turns out William wasn't my problem. It was you!"

"Me? What did I do?"

"It seems your killing people, even by accident is making you difficult to sympathize with. You're going to have to cut that out."

"But, it's not my fault. It's what I do. I don't want to change!"

"Oh yeah?"

"Okay! Okay! Rewrite me! I'll change! I promise!"

Yep. They work. And I feel better too. Win win!

Character motivators, coming to a OCGR Nano raffle near you. Or me. Yeah, mostly near me. Sorry.

Some Cyborg Weasel Fun

Immersed in editing mode as I am while A Broken Race works its way through its first round of critiquing, I've been staying busy with other little creative projects to get my 'make something new' fix. Sewing has been fun, but since spend most of my workday in front of a computer, sometimes its easier to sneak in some creative moments there.

So last night, I retired my two year old cyborg weasel cling and borged this little guy. Now he's armed and ready to stalk me during all those times I'm wandering around on the internet rather than writing.

I'd attempt to take some better close up pics of all the little details but the darn glossy finish made it very difficult to get even this pic to turn out half decent. Who came up with the idea of a glossy finish on a laptop anyway? Windex and paper towel manufacturers had to be in on it.

Thanks to Ian, I just had the realization that I have the file for this. Duh. How about I just crop some bits of it for close ups? *smacks forehead*

The temptation of a shiny new plot

I'm sure you've been there, set on a plot, in the middle of one, bored with one...and then along hops a plot bunny. It sits there, staring at you, enticing you with its promise of something better, something fresh, sparkling and new. Ooooh shiny!

It captures you with its hypnotic stare. Never easing. Never resting. Taunting you while you slog through your current project. Sowing seeds of doubt over which thing you should be working on.

"Just take a few days to get to know me", it says. Try this out. You might like it. You might like it a lot better than that thing you're working on.

But you know what? If you give in to the plot bunny... more will come! They breed like...well, bunnies! Lock them away until you need a new idea, but don't give in to their hypnotic stares. Oh, and keep them separated!

Yes, another NaNo raffle prize is born. Bunnies, monkeys, birds... what could be next?

A little bird told me

My efforts to cut back on my various obligations has led to a little extra time which has in turn lead to a creative explosion. Not only have I been writing more lately, other projects have demanded to be worked on. My sewing machine has been getting a workout.

These Babbling Birds will be part of this year's NaNoWriMo prize selection. Ever wish you had one of those little birds everyone claims told them the juicy bit of info? Well now you can have one. Babbling birds are sure to offer all the best gossip on what your characters have done in their past or what they might do in a given situation. Who's going to hook up, keep a slave in the closet, or re-gifted that birthday gift from their mother and got busted? These little birds know and they can't wait to tell you. They really shouldn't. No, really they couldn't. But if you must know...

This little project was inspired by my fellow ML, Adrianne. She's always suggesting things that light my creative fire. Darn you and your creative distractions! She made this pattern for cute valentine gifts. I twisted them to avian gossip slingers. I'm sure this says something about us, but I'll let you draw the conclusions.

You can find her pattern and step by step instructions here. Along with not so innocent intents, I added wings, a fabric tail and button eyes. I would also like to add that good old cotton fabric is ideal for this project. I had some heavier stuff sitting around for other projects (which will be featured here soon) and tried it on the cream-colored birds, but as you see, they look a bit stiff. It was also much harder to turn their beaks right side out.

As a slight side blaming note, this project was encouraged by my need *cough* want *cough* to try out the Drtiz Tube Turner I'd purchased months ago (for yet another sewing project that I haven't really started yet beyond cutting some pieces out). These are awesome tools. I shall never sew small pieces again and dread turning them right side out. Now its so easy! I used it for the birds themselves and the wings and tails. The rounded dowels that come with the kit also are prefect for pushing stuffing into all those little hard to reach places-like beaks.

A single resolution, an edit, and a treat

A couple of my NaNo buddies latched on to this idea so I hopped on the boat (yes, a few days late). Pick one word for your 2012 New Year's resolution. It might sound a little odd, but my word is: Less.
Yes, I want to be less this year.
Less busy
Less distracted
Less obligated
Less stressed
I made some good steps toward this at the end of the year. Now I just have to keep going.

The first round of Untitled Sequel edits is finished! Wow, that went fast. Mostly it was cleaning up all the little notes I left to myself when charging through NaNoWriMo. Things like: go back and verify number of days between A and B. Or my favorite: Might want to give MC at least a sheet else he's fighting naked. Oops! Or maybe not... Ok, ok, I'll get him something to wear. Maybe.

There were also a couple typo-heavy sections that I obviously typed with my eyes closed while visualizing a scene. Untitled Sequel (nice title isn't it?) is now going onto the shelf. But, you can tune in to Flogging the Quill very soon and weigh in on the first page.

For the first time in seventeen days I was home alone all day. My beloved silence, how I've missed you! I treated myself to a viewing of the new Conan the Barbarian. As I wasn't expecting anything spectacular in the plot department, I found it entertaining. If you like good-looking, half-naked muscular men cutting each other up with swords, a little sex and generally watching Jason Mamoa do anything, you'd probably enjoy it too. Having watched the 1982 version a good dozen or so times over the years, I can easily say the effects, dialogue and general plot were much improved. There was a lot of blood, violence and the sound effects people obviously had a great time with wet, squishy blood sounds. So yes, pretty much what you'd expect from a Conan movie. I'd call it Spartacus lite. Speaking of which, I can't wait for Season 2!

Wrapping up before Christmas

As the end of the year approaches, kid obligations are in a lull and business slows thanks to the oncoming holidays, I finally have time to get to some of the things I've put off...some for a very long time.

First and foremost, I've had time to work on the sequel to Trust that was my NaNo Novel this year. As of this morning, I've cracked 80k. Woohoo! I'm aiming for 95-100 knowing that I have a lot of things earlier on that I can clean out during edits which will bring me back into the 90k range. Then its getting shelved for awhile so I can take Trust from the shelf where it's been resting since October and polish then launch into query round two.

Then comes one of the projects my kids dread: The mom cleaning of their rooms. The Purge. We started with an hour in each room. So far, two stacks of outgrown clothes, one huge box of books to be donated to my NaNo book drive, and a bulging bag of garbage. Round two tomorrow.

As I baked Christmas cookies this past weekend, I found myself needing my missing seventh cookie sheet to toss into the oven/staging rotation. (Yeah, there were a lot of cookies.) This poor cookie sheet as been sitting on top of my son's bookcase for...egads...umm...years? He'd been working on some little sand on stickers craft thing at the time and we put it away when he lost interest. You guessed it, he never got interested again. So on it was piled his scrapbook and everything that should have gone in it.

Now, I knew I was behind on this little motherly project, but as I unburied the cookie sheet (which was in pristine condition compared to is long used counterparts by the way), I discovered I'd not updated his scrapbook since second grade. He's in eighth this year. *headdesk*

Hours later, report cards tucked away, certificates proudly displayed, pictures attached, and birthday cards, movie stubs, artwork and award ribbons arranged, the much pared down pile was tucked neatly into the pages of the scrapbook and a stack of artwork and reports went into a box in the attic. Whew!

Tomorrow brings my daughters scrapbook, but that's only three years behind. Bah, no problem. Who am I kidding? *shudder*

I'm not crazy, I'm just creative

As I was getting my day started (wandering the internet), I came across this article -- Scientific American: The Unleashed Mind: Why Creative People Are Eccentric -- and being a little eccentric myself, I had to go check it out. Whoa! How true! Not that I see my characters chasing me around (other than in my writing area), or have a germ free zone, and I do shower regularly, but on so many other accounts, a huge resounding yes!

Confessions of a recovering overachiever

Sorry for the sudden lapse of silence, but after a month-long blogging challenge with my discarded characters, I've needed a little time off.

Fourteen years ago, pregnant with my first child, I had lofty visions of all the wonderful and meaningful things I wanted to do for and with mhy children. It started with a journal while still pregnant, covering everything from current events, to family history and then milestones as my children grew up. I would soon become involved with their schools, their hobbies, and all things connected to them. We would make our own christmas cards every year, by hand. We'd make Christmas cookies for family, co-workers and neighbors. We had big family birthday parties. This was all great and wonderful and everyone was happy.

However, somewhere around hitting forty I came to the conclussion I'd run out of patience and time. Year after year becomes a rush of one project leading to the next with little to no downtime in between. You may remember that last year I buried my tattered superwoman cape. This year I'm going a step further. I'm allowing myself to put my overachiever tendancies aside and join the ranks of the average.

Last month I offically put in my notice that I will not being taking on the Young Writers Program next November. I also put in my notice that I'll be stepping down from Girl Scouts as of the end of this school year. And even bigger, (because this has been one of my pet projects for eight years now) I'm handing off half my elementary christmas craft program to my new assistant whom I'm training this year. Then, after next year, I'm done with that entirely. That's three huge time-sucking programs crossed off my list. Whew!

I will also freely admit that I didn't make Christmas cards this year. We're using up extras from years past. We're cutting back cookie production to immediate family only. My christmas tree has way more ornaments on one side than the other, and yet, my normally twitchy self is ok with that. Half my outside Christmas lights didn't work this year so I threw them away and I haven't replaced them. In fact, I let the kids put the working ones up and they look pretty atrocious. Oh well.

Now if all this cutting back will give me some of this mythical "free time" to do the things I like to do for me, I'll be a happy average woman.

My weekend back to nature adventure

Is it just me or does that look like a mob of Ents?

Being overwhelmed with work as I have been lately, I needed a little break from home, laundry, all those little things you see around the house that need doing when you have a spare moment and even my laptop. Actually, everyone needed a break from their computers. So, this weekend we set off on our first family camping experience.

I grew up camping. It's what we did two or sometimes three weeks out of the summer. We landed somewhere new, wandered off, made friends, stood barefoot in snake infested swamps to catch turtles, went swimming, got rained on and didn't care, built rambing sand castles for hours, and slept like the dead. Somewhere in my later teen years the camping bug was lost and road trip vacations took over.

When I had kids, we started off with the road trips. Fun getaways, but expensive. I was looking for a change, and so this year, Santa brought us camping gear. Yay Santa! I spent most of my free time last week digging through memories of what supplies we had with us when I was a kid and more than a few hours running from store to store to find the best prices on those items. Fully outfitted (I hoped), we set off for a one night dry run (close to home and a store) at our property.

We set up the tent in no time. This huge, 3 room tent gave everyone the privacy they wanted and offered plenty of room to store our stuff inside. It might not look very big here, but its 10' x 18'. That's a tent!

I did a quick check of my flower garden (filled with a the overflow from home) and found it flourishing. The Japanese iris are four feet tall!

The creek has become quite overgrown, but we did get to wake to frogs croaking, ducks quacking and what sounded like an entire aviary of birds singing. A wonderful sound to tell about later, but not so appreciated at 6am.

Breakfast over the fire. Yum!

When we weren't getting eaten alive by the rabid mosquitos, we explored. The bark had fallen off this tree to reveal generations of insect artwork.

Sadly, the trip had some work involved. The grass hadn't been mowed since last fall (my husband's job) and our stick pile had grown into a mountain thanks to multiple wind storms last year. My task was to make a dent in this:

Which I did, but only a small dent. That mountain is huge. The big logs were saved for future camping trips, but the sticks went into the fire. I might have been away from my laptop, but you know what my mind was doing while my body was chucking wood into the fire? Working through upcoming scenes. Even without my laptop, it seems I can't go a day without writing in some form or another.

The kids had fun and we accomplished a good amount of work. We had everything we needed except a bug bomb for all the mosquitos. I'll call the trip a sucess and am ready to head out for a longer trip next time. But, after all that packing, setting up, hauling sticks, breaking camp, and unpacking, I'm going to do this:

Post Thief

Thank you, Blogger, for removing my current post with all its whacked out spacing issues you inflicted on it. Your awesomeness never ceases to amaze me. If you could magic back my post and the comments Liz and Fred were kind enough to leave, I'll cut back on my sarcasm. Maybe. (But don't bet on it, it's just who I am.)

Spring yard tour

I've still been busy writing, and am happy to report an average of 1,500 words a day. As such, I'm short on witty energy to share. Instead, I give you evidence that spring is in full bloom in my yard.

Spring wouldn't be complete without tulips

Carpet Phlox

New tulips I planted last fall.

The cherry tree is in full bloom.

The tulips have come back year after year. Gotta love that.

And the stragglers, those bulbs I find while redoing flowebeds that get thrown in a hole to see what color comes up.

The Battle of Snowman Hill

The neighbors might have thought me slightly deranged as I wandered amidst the hastily build snowmen with a paintbrush, but really, it's nothing new. Winter has brought penguins, dogs and dragons to my yard in the past, so why not a snowman battle?

It might have been the cold medicine, or perhaps a hope to engage my laptop bound son in an outdoor activity, but the snow was right and the temperature just above freezing so I indulged my creative urges. Bundled up and fortified with hearty Sunday lunch, I headed out into the front yard.

Why not the back yard? Because my son spent about five minutes outside, not helping, and I wanted him to have a good view of what he missing out on as he sat on the couch with his laptop in the warm comfort of our home.

My daughter helped instead. Which was nice, but she's much smaller and my cold wracked lungs were well worn out by the time I'd rolled most of the six snowmen's bodies, traipsed through the previously unmarred feet of snow in the backyard to the woods at the back of our property for appendages, and slopped all of the snowmen together. But she was having a merry time gathering icicle weapons for them and I was gaining good mommy points by the minute, so I persevered.

For the record, paint doesn't last long, not in the form you first paint it anyway. Good thing I grabbed the camera the moment we were done because they're faces lost all definition within ten minutes. The blood spread nicely though. Yep, snow men bleed red. Who knew?

Special Guest: Chrystalla Thoma

I am very excited to announce that we have a special guest today! All the way from Cyprus, please welcome author, Chrystalla Thoma.

Jean: Hi Chrystalla. Welcome. Can you tell us a few things about yourself?

Chrys: Well, I’m Greek. *allows time for the appropriate bouzouki music to start playing and handsome Greek men to dance and smash plates* I come from Cyprus, an island in the Eastern Mediterranean, right underneath Turkey, above Egypt, and next to Syria and Lebanon. Which makes for an interesting culinary and musical culture – oriental pop, rock and Greek music, mousaka and taramosalata and hummus!

Jean: The closest I get to anything Greek is the occasional gyro or baklava binge, but handsome, plate-breaking men sounds very enticing.

Most authors love cats and live in remote houses. Are you like that, too?

Chrys: I own no cats and no house – but I do have a hybrid energy car (a Toyota Prius)! I possess herds of wild books that graze on my shelves and floor, and I’m married to the best husband in the whole world, imported from the tropics of Costa Rica. *waves at Carlos* I have lived for some years in France, England and Germany, and am now immune to foreign (i.e. non Greek) cooking. *g* As a world traveler, I am definitely a typical author.

Jean: Excuse me a moment while I protect my discarded characters from your wandering herd of wild books. While I do that, why don't you tell me about your upcoming book?

Chrys: “Dioscuri” is a modern, urban fantasy version of the ancient Greek myth. Dioscuri was the name given to the twin brothers Kastor and Polydeukes, Zeus’ sons with Leda, one of whom is mortal and the other immortal. Zeus mated with Leda in the form of a swan and she gave birth to two eggs. When they cracked, the Dioscuri emerged, along with Helen the Beautiful, the very same who allegedly caused the downfall of Troy…

Jean: I see. Break the eggs to make a story… Where is the story set? What happens?

Chrys: The ancient gods have woken again in Athens, and there is war. The two brothers fight against the monsters. When the mortal brother, Kastor, dies in battle, his immortal sibling Polydeukes takes things in his own hands and makes a dark deal with the Underworld. A deal Zeus will sooner or later discover and all hell will break loose.

Jean: *shudder* I've studied enough Greek Mythology to know that deceiving Zeus is never a good idea. Where can people learn more about you and your work?

Chrys: “Dioscuri” is coming out with MuseItUp Publishing in March 2011. You can find me and my stories here: http://museituppublishing.com/musepub/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=91&Itemid=82

You can follow my ramblings about Greekness and mythology and about my stories here:
http://chrystallathoma.wordpress.com/

Thank you for having me here!

Jean: Of course, anytime! My host of discarded characters thanks you for not stepping on them during your visit.

If you haven’t yet had the pleasure of reading any of Chrystalla’s work, head on over to her blog and get started. My personal favorite is World of Shells. I think of that story every time I look at my daughter's hermit crabs.

Thank you for visiting, Chrystalla. Keep those great stories coming!

Relaxing

Yes, yes, I'm writing and all that, but I'm also trying to relax more this year. You know, keeping that crazy superwoman six feet underground. So far, I've been fairly sucessful.

I've found joy in critiquing again. After a thousand some crits in three years, I was getting a smidge burnt out. I stepped back last October and took a few months off. That felt darn good. Now, I'm getting back into sharing the writing wealth, reading some great stories, flogging people with rubber ducks (its a long story) and meeting writers I've not worked with before. So far, I've avoided overcommiting myself in that regard. So far.

Writing has been slow, but I've just about go my second short ready to spring into submissionland. Which is good, since that one has a January 30th cut off. Novel work is on hold at the moment during operation re-freakin-lax.

So what the heck have I been doing? Watching tv. I don't do that very often, but my evil husband signed us up for Netflix. Evil Netflix has full seasons of my favorite, long-lost tv shows. Call it reenergizing the creative juices.

My mornings are filled with episodes of Stargate Atlantis. Evening brings an episodes of Earth 2 shared with my children, which is perfect for introducing kids to Sci-fi--very famly friendly compared to much of what is out there currently. Next up in the queue: FarScape.

What a better thing to share with my kids, than my love of sci-fi tv? I have to bring them over to the geek side before they get too exicited by friends and teen stuff. I don't have much time left.

What are your favorite sci-fi shows?

Things I learned by hosting a book drive

You may have caught wind of the worldwide bookdrive to benefit National Novel Writing Month that took place last October through December.

My region managed to gather roughly 2,200 books. After typing in all the ISBNs of the books recent enough to have them, about 600 were accepted to Better World Books, who will be selling our donated books on behalf of The Office of Letters and Light . A percentage of those sales will go to fund their writing programs, including NaNoWriMo. The rest of our books will be sold in a local book sale (happening in my garage) this spring. The proceeds will go toward our regional donation to OLL next NaNo season.

As the bookdriver for our region, I learned some interesting things about books, subjectivity and love.

1. Asking writers to give up their books, even for a good cause, is like asking them to pull their own teeth.

2. When picking books to donate, I discovered my bookshelves were subconsciously divided into three areas. Nostalgia (top shelf): books I keep for the memories. Love: books I will read over and over or are of a series I loyally follow. Storage (bottom shelf): books I will not read again, but I haven't found another home for.

3. There are books that many people buy and read because they are popular. I have a lot of them in my garage right now (a lot of the same books, I might add). Popular does not equal love.

4. I currently have 1,600 books in my garage just sitting there until spring that I can read. Awesome! Not that I have the time, but still...

5. Of those 1,600 books, about 10 looked interesting at first glance. That rather reminded me of this 'subjectivity' thing that we're always getting harped on about by agents and editors. The 'not right for me' phrase went through my head 1,590 times as I picked up each book to scan it. I wasn't skimming bookshelves, with only a spine to attract my attention. I had each book in my hand and had to turn it over (and, of course, spend a couple seconds skimming the blurb by habit) to locate the elusive ISBN number. I got a good look at every title and cover. Still, 1,590 books were not for me--sadly a good third of them were even genres I regularly read. And these are published books, with every tool available to grab my attention. Don't worry lonely novel submission, I love you.

6. I discovered that even if the book is free and sitting in my hands, I will very likely overlook a new author, interesting cover, snappy title and possibly awesome back cover blurb because I'm looking for names I know and trust to deliver a good story. Damn. That doesn't bode well for most of us, does it?

7. Book Regret. People will donate books and then realize they miss them and want them back. Awww. Love.

8. A room full of used books smells far more pleasing than a room filled with used clothes.

9. People leave things in books, including book marks. Lots and lots of bookmarks. Many of those were mid-book. Does this mean the reader never finshed reading? We'll never know. The most unusual thing I found was a photo of ice. It may have been an ice cave, it was hard to tell.

10. If you tell people about a book drive and remind them as often as politely possible (in person, by email, and by handing them flyers) for two and half months, some of them will follow through and deliver. However, there will always be one or two that pop up two weeks after the fact and announce they could get piles of books if they were given a few more weeks/months. Procrastination at its finest.

Thanks to all who donated! If you're looking for good books, check out Better World Books. They offer free shipping worldwide, have a huge selection, and support many non-profit literary organizations, including my favorite, NaNoWriMo. :)

But mom, they're only eight dollars

My entry for the 100 words for $100 blogfest is here

When my eight year old daughter announced that she'd love to get a hermit crab, I smiled and nodded. Like most childhood yearnings, I figured the love would pass if I gave it a little time. After all, we already have a dog and fish, and she has her own aquarium full of fish in her already cramped room.

Then, this year, she ended up getting her first grade teacher, the one that had introduced her to hermit crabs, as her third grade teacher. While this teacher no longer has the hermit crabs, I was persuaded to inquire as to the care and expense of those little shelled beasties. I was told it was easy, they were cheap and didn't smell. "Don't smell" almost sold me. However, I knew from my son's yearning for an anole (now dearly departed) at the same age, that I'd be the one that very likely ended up taking care of the new creature. I really didn't need more creatures to care for.

We wandered into pet stores over the months to pick up dog and fish supplies. Each time, I'd find her peering into the hermit crab tank.

"But mom, they're only eight dollars. I have eight dollars. Can I get one? Please, please, please?"

"No."

For her birthday, she asked for a hermit crab. She didn't get one. Months passed. For Christmas, she asked for a hermit crab. Oh, fine. After all, we already had a vacant ten gallon aquarium and greenery left from our anole adventure. How much more could an eight dollar hermit crab need?

December found me on covert missions to the pet store to price out supplies. I cleaned out our tank and santized it. I cleaned the greenery, climbing log, spray bottle and requiste, shallow stone bowl that had been up in the attic. I purchased a pre-boxed hermit crab kit for $24. Awesome. We're done.

I put everything in the tank, wrap it up all pretty and hide it in my bedroom.

Two days later, it occurs to me that this preboxed kit doesn't include the dirt all the care sheets say they need. I go back to the pet store. Hermit crab soil, $3. Oh, and they need a salt water bowl too, $8. And the sand included in the pre-boxed kit is sized for a tiny plastic tank. I'll need more, $8. They like coconut houses to hide under, $6. That's gotta be all I need. Right?

I sneak all my new stuff in the house, discreetly open the wrapping paper, put the new purchases inside and hide it in the bedroom.

Four days before Christmas it occurs to me that opening an empty tank isn't all that exciting and pet stores will be closed on Christmas. Then I envision getting to the pet store only to find they are sold out of the hermit crabs and my daughter crying. I should really get a hermit crab right now. I sigh, go back to pet store and get the $8 hermit crab. As I'm standing in line, I realize that I don't have anything for top of the tank. Duh. $12 for a screen top.

I creep back into the house, sneak into the attic to get our former cricket keeper container and run to my bedroom. I again open the wrapping paper, put the new top on the tank and close it up. Then I figure out that I'll need the dirt now for the crab to live in while we wait for Christmas. And the food. I bite back a scream, open the wrapping paper again, locate the required items and then hide the crab behind some stuff on my dresser and the tank with the other hidden presents.

Christmas morning finally comes. Squeals of delight fill the house as my daughter opens her hermit crab tank, and then box containing the crab which is soon named 'Shelly'. The tank is gleefully set up. Shelly is released. Hooray!

The next morning I am informed that, "Shelly is lonely. The care instructions say they like friends. I still have $8, can we go pick out a friend?"

At this point, everything is set up and she's got the $8. I shrug. The pet store people about know me by name now. "Sure, why not?"

The pet store only has two crabs left to choose from. She picks a rainbow shelled crab, soon to be named, 'Wiggly'.

I notice that the tank we get the crab from is nice and warm. I remember reading that humidity is important and our house is incredibly dry. If we want healthy, happy crabs, we'll need a heater. The ten gallon sized heater is $24. I bow my head and take a deep breath.

"Mom, look! We need to get a pretty shell in case they want to change shells."

Of course we do. Spare shell, $3.

"Mom, do we have salt water? The ones in the tank do."

I'd remembered to buy the bowl for the salt water, but not the solution to make it. Yet another smack the forehead moment. Bottle of salt water, $4.

"I don't think they like the powder food we have. Shelly didn't touch it."

Shelly hadn't touched it in five days. I had to agree. Bottle of pellet hermit crab food, $5. The misting bottle we had was also missing its spring and no longer sprayed. New misting bottle, $5.

$110 later, I have two happy hermit crabs, one ecstatic daughter, and I am duly reminded that nothing ever costs "only eight dollars."

Holiday update

This week is all up in the air, kind of working, everyone home, trying to write, and trying to catch up on all the blogs and critiquing and writing I let go since pre-NaNo and the Christmas frenzy.

I've been percolating my 100 word sentence for Elena's 100 words for $100 contest. Yesterday I put my idea down and shaved my 109 word monster down to exactly 100 words. It will be revealed on or after the 1st as per the contest rules.

Christmas came to my house in a flurry of family, food and kids opening presents. My twelve year old son was ecstatic to recieve his very own laptop. Now I can use mine without finding myself logged into his facebook or gmail account. Yay for privacy for both of us.

My eight year old daughter was thrilled to get the hermit crab she'd been asking for. We have since added another hermit crab friend, so our family now contains crustaceans, Shelly and Wiggly. Both are a great source of amusement for her and obstacles the rest of us have to make sure we're not stepping on when she has them out of their home to play.

I don't have anything up for critique next week, so my time will be spent getting my next NaNo short edited and introduced here. Healer and Blue Warning both gathered a pile of critiques I need to go over and then I'll be sending the shorts out into submissionland.

My cold had finally subsided to a random cough here and there and I've been able to sleep in two days in a row. Even better yet, I've been able to sleep in bed (I spent the majority of a week on the couch so my husband could sleep) and through the entire night. It's been wonderful.

I hope you are all enjoying your post Christmas/pre New Year week!

In search of a day off

I've been sick, not horribly sick thankfully, but with one of those lingering colds that sends me into coughing fits and leaves me perpetually tired. Despite my best efforts to get well it just doesn't seem to be happening. This could be in due to that cursed, tattered, red superwoman cape.

I have tried to take the stupid thing off. The ties are stuck and they are impervious to all cutting items. Setting it on fire while its stuck on my person is probably not a good idea.

Now, since school is finally out for Christmas break, I thought I'd might catch a break with some down time. Alas, it has not been so.

Saturday: "Mom, when are we going to bake Christmas cookies? It's almost Christmas!" Oh crap. We made cookies and fudge, but I cut way back this year from all the goodies I normally bake. I make my son get out of the car and deliver the goodies to our usual list of recipients.

Sunday: I'd already made plans (and reservations) to spend the night with my friend and her kids at an indoor waterpark with an overnight winter cabin stay. This was our solution to not doing our usual gift exchange because no one really needed more 'stuff'. It was fun, but the chlorine filled air did little to help my angry sinuses. Running around to keep my little Ms. I-don't-like-the-waterpark-for-whatever-sudden-reason and the teen, Mr. I'd-rather-hang-with-my-Ipod, entertained while keeping an eye on our two water loving tweens was hardly restful.

Monday: Got home in the afternoon and had a pile of work to catch up on. Being self employed has its downfalls. There are no minions to take up the slack when you are sick or out of town (or both). Not to mention, people want everything right away, cause you know, it's almost Christmas and they didn't plan ahead for their gift items. Somehow, despite the fact that we are hit up with an xmas countdown sometime in July and are inundated with said countdown from November first onward, this winter holiday manages to sneak up on some folks like the stealthiest ninja. Then there's dinner to squeeze in before running off to play Boy Scout secretary for a rambling two hour committee meeting which makes me an hour late for the recorded tv show finale (that we missed due to being out of down) that my family is impatiently waiting to watch with me.

Tuesday: I'm going to take the day off darn it. Umm yeah. Until I get a call from the mother-in-law saying she needs groceries, and she needs them now because she's out of Coke. No one else is apparently capable of getting her the correct kind of Coke that she wants. Then I realize that instead of waiting until Christmas eve day, I could take care of it now. I usually get her an extra bag couple bags of groceries--filled with all the treats she wants but doesn't dare buy because they're not on sale--so I might as well drag my behind out in the twenty degree winter weather and go to the store. And while I'm at it, I better drop off the eight forty pound boxes of books at the UPS store from our NaNoWriMo Used Book Drive that have been sitting in my garage before we get a below freezing day and the bottom boxes get wet. Oh and there's more work to do that I also have to deliver.

Wednesday: Ok, I'm at least going to sleep in. Darn it. The dog sees a squirrel invading our bird feeder and whines right outside my door, then right next to my head in case I missed the signal that he wants to go outside. I take care of the dog and crawl back in bed. Just as I'm getting back to sleep, the phone rings. It's right next to my head and the kids are sleeping so letting it ring will only wake them up too. I sigh and answer it. Wouldn't I love to donate to Special Olympics? Great cause, but you people call me ever other freakin month. It's 8:30 am. Heck no. I fall back on the pillow and close my eyes. The phone rings again. Our investor--that we've been playing phone tag with for three weeks--calls to give me an update on our accounts. Then the business line is ringing... downstairs. Someone needs a last minute Christmas gift. Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.

Is one day with out being needed by someone, when I need a day for me, too much to ask?