Writing Advice From Dream Dishes

April 20, 2021annabowling Leave a comment

This post is not about tableware. I have some funky dreams sometimes, and this last week, I had one of the memorable ones. Combine that with the need to unplug for a couple of days (aka why Monday’s post is here on Tuesday) which gave me the time to write privately about aforentioned dream, about blogging, and about how to get from here to there, and this post is the result.

Yes. I sleep exactly like that. Every night. Okay, not literally ,but I like the mood. Anyway, in this dream, I was personally responsible for all duties of a primary caregiver to multiple friends and family members at the same time. This included a childhood friend (whom I haven’t seen in years) who had been complicit in their own kidnapping with a charming significant other (who wasn’t that nice) and it all culminated in a kitchen full of dishes.

By full, I mean full. I don’t mean the sink was full of dirty dishes. I mean that it was overflowing the sink, the dish drainer, the counter space, the stove, the table, the chairs, every flat ?, dish upon dish upon dish upon dish. Every last dish in the house. The parent of the abovementioned friend had followed me into the kitchen, literally wringing their hands over what I was going to do about it all. There was some talking; I don’t remember it, but finally, I grabbed the closest dish at hand, turned on the tap, squirted a drop of dishwashing liquid, then grabbed my rubber duck scrubby brush. “I’m going to wash one dish,” I told them. They asked again, what was I going to do now? Once again, “I’m going to wash one dish.” Which I did.

I woke soon after that, so I don’t know how long it took to take care of everything, but the bit about washing one dish stuck. As my contemporary writing partner, Melva, asked me, what was I trying to tell myself? Not a lot of room for interpretation on that one. Which is fine. Bird By Bird, and all that. Makes sense. Low hanging fruit. Open the file. Thousand mile journeys and single steps and all that. Not exactly news, but it has parked itself at the forefront of my brain, which is not at all a bad thing.

I, personally, am highly motivated by all things stationery – pens, papers, notebooks, etc- and I love to organize. Again, not at all news. True, though, and something I can applly to the whole dish thing. Melva and I set a deadline to be done-done-done-ity-done with draft two of Drama King two weeks from yesterday. There’s also getting myself back in historical romance mode, because I feel like I’ve been circling the metaphorical airport for forever on that one, and I would like to land now, please and thank you.

Today is for this blog entry, the re-do of Melva’s and my ZoomerTimes interview re-do. I may have misnamed it previously as BoomerTimes, which in retrospect doesn’t make as much sense, since the interviews are conducted on Zoom. Prepareation for that is putting on my Actual Author cosplay garb. Hair, makeup, etc. After that, there may be a few domestic matters, possibly involving groceries, and most assuredly followed with cup of tea, a good historical romance, and kitty cuddles. That’s enough for one day.

Typing With Wet Paws: New Big Box Edition

April 16, 2021annabowling 2 Comments

Tails up, Storm Troopers! I’m Storm, you’re aawesome, and this is Typing With Wet Paws. Exciting news this week, on a couple of fronts. Still working on the picture things, so I will get Aunt Anna to put important pictures of the week on Instagram, because there are some good ones.

First of all, Aunt Anna and Aunt Melva have a date for a do-over of their video interview with Boomer Times. That will happen on April 20th, now that Aunt Anna has her new glowy box that can use Zoom. I may or may not make a guest appearance, because the human who was in charge of the recording had his kitty with him when everything first started. I have a very good feeling about cat-positive journalism. We will let you know when the video is up, so you can watch whenever you are so inclined.

Aunt Anna is also taking a very fun workshop with Eryka Peskin about figuring out how to reconnect with things she’s always wanted to do. A lot of those have to do with writing and growing her brand. Mostly, that has to do with what kind of writer she is and the kinds of stories she has to tell, along with some planning stuff (that I will sit on.)

The biggest news on the feline front is that we now have a big box in the house. Some human furniture came in yesterday, and with it came the best part – a huge box. It is, of course, mine. I’ll explore the furniture that came in it later. I can be inside it, or on top of it, or I can scratch it with my claws. Cardboard is my favorite thing to scratch. I don’t scratch furniture. I am a good girl. I know the box can’t stay forever, but it will be here for a whilel and then there will be more boxes. The human furniture is called a storage trunk, and I am NOT allowed to go inside that, but the humans did put my cat bed on top of it, suggesting that I might be interested in sitting there, as it is near the end of Autn Anna and Uncle Rheuben’s bed. We will see about that.

On the reading front, Aunt Anna is moving through her Goodreads reading challenge, with 39 books read out of her goal of 90. and 12 books ahead of schedule as she hits 41% of the 90. She has figured out Audible Pllus very recently ,aka today, which means that she will get to listen to a lot of books while she does her blogging stuff. Also while playing Sims or surfing the interwebs.

Not while writing, though, because that is when she needs to focus on her own stories, not somebody else’s. This week, she gets to do one of her favorite writing things, and that is taking a bunch of notes and ideas and turning them into a scene that goes in the middle of some other scenes. That’s sometimes easier than completely new things, because she knows where the whole story is going and what job that scene has to do. Sometimes, also how long it has to be.

For those kinds of things, she likes to first get into the soft office, aka the beed (well, on top of it, not in it like sleeping) with a notebook and pens and an appropriate beverage. Also with me, because I am her mews and I need to be on top of everything. Literally.

Tomorrow, we will be doing some of that writing, and brainstorming video ideas. If Aunt Anna doesn’t want to hear people talking when she is writing, she can also listen to weather sounds even if that isn’t the weather that is really happening. I am not sure what to make of that but rain is her favorite, especially rain with cars driving on wet asphalt. There are other sounds, like carriage rides and crackling fires when she needs to be in a historical mindset. I, of course, add to it with very loud mototr purring, which is the most important sound.

That’s about it for right now, and I have a box to explore, so I will catch you next week.

Headbonks!

Typing With Wet Paws: Workshop Prep Edition

April 9, 2021annabowling Leave a comment

Tails up, Storm Troopers! I’m Storm, you’re awesome, and this is Typing With Wet Paws. The main focus this week is Aunt Anna getting ready for her workshop that is tomorrow. If you are curious about this or wish you could be there, guess what, you can. There is a link to learn more about attending as a guest, orrrrr you can get personal attention for the entire course at her Patreon, on the Play In Your Own Sandbox tier.

greatest hits picture of me, because Aunt Anna is wrangling with WordPress about pictures

Things are doing pretty well around here. The windows are open sometimes, and I can smell wonderful things. Getting into the window is tricky, as Aunt Anna has moved some stuff around, and they are bringing furniture in here. Aunt Anna is making what she calls a rustic bookcase from wooden crates. I think that I could probably make good use of those as scratchy things, but we will see about that.

Aunt Anna says people may want to pardon the dust on her Patreon, as she is making some changes, as things like pick a blog or video topic aren’t up yet, but you definitely can ask.

Okay. Reading challenge on Goodreads is pretty much holding steady, but that doesn’t mean Aunt Anna went without consuming any stories. This past week was for binge watching three shows on Amazon Prime, The Wilds, Picnic at Hanging Rock, and Thirteen. She recommends the first two, with some reservatins on the first one, and needs to rewatch the second one if she wants to truly form an opinion on it, but it’s great for background voices while playing Sims.

Aunt Anna has been having a great time putting Sims 4 on her new laptop. It reminds her of when she was a people kitten, and her teacher, in an open classroom, noticed that Aunt Anna did a lot better on days when people kittens were allowed to bring their own toys for free play time. Aunt Anna brought Barbies on thoe days. Can we spot the future writer here? I would have brought Mousie, or maybe a jingle ball.

This week is also when Aunt Anna takes part in a Reclaim Your Dreams workshop with Eryka Peskin. In case you are wondering what that means, you can find out more about it and even register for a virtual retreat if that sounds like your thing, here. This is not a sponsored post; Aunt Anna finds she gets a lot out of Eryka’s workshops and even sometimes coaching.

Of course the most important thing this coming week is the writing. Even though Aunt Anna usually gets her superpowers back in fall, they seem to have been on backorder this year, which is completely understandable. She feels a lot more in her groove these days, which is due to a lot of things. Faith, modern medicine, family, friends, a computer that actually works, reliable housing, me. You know, the important stuff. It’s an interesting phase to watch, and from what I hear, thisis how writers get books. Me, I just sit on them. So it’s win-win.

Headbonks!

still working on the signoff picture thingamaboodle

Free Writing, The Chaos of Organization, and Other Stories

April 8, 2021annabowling Leave a comment

Wednesday’s blog on Thursday should give an iindicator of how acgtual Wednesday went. I had the very odd (for me) experience of oversleeping yesterday, which gave an element of surreality to the entire day. I meant to blog. I meant to edit. I got most of my social media current and then played Sims.

Theoretically ideal wakeup time today, and since I get a feel for the things I need to do the next morning, the night before, the task list wasn’t too hard to make. Unfortunately when it came to “what do I want to blog about today?” the immediate answer was “the fluff if I know.” “Fluff,” in this case, being a family word for a word that rhymes with “duck,” and is not often said around small children.

In practice, butt in chair and fingers on keyboard allows me to move on down the list instead of beating myself up over not knowing what to write. Because I do. I do it every morning in my morning pages, aka free writing. That means whatever is in my head goes on the page. This morning, for example, I filled two entire pages out of arranging the pens in my ballpoint pen cup in rainbow order and writing down my opinions of each one. That’s all. Not earth shattering in importance or creativity, but I did it and came out of it ready to take care of this whole Thursday thing, or at least figure out my priorities.

Right now, they feel like a jumble. My main job ondraft two of Drama King is to look for missing scenes, smooth out rough ones, and get word count up to goal. For A Heart Most Errant, I need to get back to addressing the first round edits and get it back to my editor. I paid for her services. I should use them. I want to use them.

There is also prep work to be done for this upcoming Saturday, where I waill present my workshop, Play in Your Own Sandbox, Keep All the Toys. This is my most popular workshop, and I love giving it. I also need to reacquaint myself, because ehhhh, it’s been a while. I could probably learn from taking my own workshop. Going back to the well, as it were, is usually a good idea.

Yesterday, I had to run some adult-y errands in the morning, and planned to attack my backlog of work like a valkyrie, but what did I do instead? Completely tear apart my shelves that hold notebooks, pens, paper, etc, and re-making them with the help of some distressed wooden crates, putting, as my mother would have termed it, “like with like.” I hated that term when I was younger, but Mom was on to something. This also means that my inability to find the set of A5 divider pockets I bought on that same outing extremely vexing because it’s not where it’s supposerd to be, even though the binder and papers are all ready for them to join the fray. I can only assume they are hiding because they know what I have in store. I don’t blame them. I also know me, and I know that utter chaos is the black moment that comes before things snapping into place. Aka, don’t sweat it, keep going.

Photo by Elly Fairytale on Pexels.com
there will be fairy lights

Which is basically where it leaves me right now. I have work to do, soem right the fluff now, and soem that cam be done after. Butt on chair, fingers on keyboard. Stock photos are fine when bookshelves are not ready for their closeups. The important thing is to keep making progress in the right direction.

Plan B and Other Stories

March 22, 2021annabowling Leave a comment

For the last few nights, my brain has been throwing some killer slumber-less parties, with me as the guest of honor. It is not my favorite thing. Being awake at night is different from being awake during the day, and while reading is sometimes possible, especially listening to audiobooks, or letting the robo-voice in my Kindle app turn any book into an audiobook, writing, well, that’s a different story. Pun intended.

We will start with the planner aspect, because I am definitely a planner. Normally, I like to take time on Sunday afternoon to plan out the week ahead. This week, I did plan on Sunday, but the current lined vertical layout, eh, no. Done. Over it. I ended up taking blank pages of a vertical layout from an old planner, glued them to the lined vertical pages that glared at me, and then followed a YouTube tutorial to design the layout. it’s pretty functional rather than decorative, but I am okay with it.

I also took a picture of it, but can I remember what file I saved it to? Nope. I have absolutely zero doubt that I will find it when looking for something else, so I will trust in that outcome and keep going forward.

The worst part about a week like this is that I had to postpone my weekly chat with Melva Michaelian. I like to be current on my assignments when we meet, so moving that back a couple of days and spreading the backlog over those in-between days, should make things a lot more manageable. There’s also figuring out which family members will be home when, when we want to handle some adulting things, like housecleaning, recycling, and quality time, because I actually like the people who live with me, so that is a very good thing.

When my brain gets all oogy, as Real Life Romance Hero puts it, making lists helps me a lot. Focus on one thing at a time. Why am I feeling uncomfortable about that? What could I do to make any degree of change in that matter? How would I like it to look, ideally? There are definitely medical and spiritual components, but I’m focusing on the mental parts for right now.

Taking those couple of weeks away from planning in my catchall planner were not a good idea, even though it felt okay in the minute. Planner fatigue is a real thing, but it doesn’t have to be a block in the road. I like a lot of different kinds of planners. Try a different format, et viola. Stop fretting about what isn’t working, turn to something I know does work, and see if that gets me somewhere better.

This time, it kind of did. Housemate has her staycation this week, so we are scheduling how to best manage the days when there are two adults in one apartment, and even the days when there will be three. Real Life Romance Hero has his days off as well, so there are going to be days when I will, most likely, have to put on the hot pink cat ear headphones and put on the flashing ear lights. That’s our family signal for I Am Working On Writer Stuff. Do. Not. Disturb. Or. Else. Do Not Fight Me; You Will Not Win.

Because I love writing. I really, really, really do. Even when I am tired. Even when I am super tired. Planning helps. Pretty stuff helps. Tea helps. Remembering why I do this, remembering that it’s the kind of work I have wanted to do since I was but a wee little princess, and my best shot at being the me-est me that ever there me’d, well, that goes a long, long way.

Cat Trees and Kneeling Chairs

March 15, 2021annabowling Leave a comment

Last night, I promoted the kneeling chair I have been using since the 90s from office chair to cat tree. This was a difficult decision. Somewhere deep in the storage unit, I do have a more traditional office chair, a gift from a local writer friend two moves ago. We will be digging it out, but probably not until my back stops twinge-ing, I am not sure exactly what the cause of this back pain is, but the most likely culprit is the kneeling chair.

I still love the dratted thing. I bought it decades ago, with money I earned from working retail. I probably paid more than I should have for it, but A) it was my money, B) a favorite author/writing inspiration had that same model chair and loved it, and C) it was (and is) pretty darned cool. It is, however, old enough to own property, join the military, get married without parental consent, and drink. It has probably wanted to do exactly that over the years we have been together, and it deserves its retirement as Storm support. (Unless Storm decides she no longer wants the chair now that it is not my office chair anymore. She is a cat, after all.)

Real Life Romance Hero moved one of the kitchen chairs in to take the place of the kneeling chair. I like the straight back, and I am already feeling the change in how using the computer physically feels Back support for the win. While I do believe there is a lot of truth in the proverb that a poor workman blames his tools, I am also fully aware that having good tools does’t hurt.

That’s largely where we are in a lot of things in the Annaverse. (Is that a thing? I say it’s a thing, and I rule the Annaverse, so now it’s law.) We have been in our apartment for six months now, so half as long housed as we were unhoused, and believe me, we are insanely delighted to be able to say that. It’s time to not only put down roots, but to make sure those roots are the right roots for the lives we want to live. For me, that means embracing life as a writer of romance and romance related blabber, and making sure that I have what I need to do that job most effectively.

Thankfully, for me, that means making a lot of lists. I would take a picture of the papers and binder discs that are scattered all over the stripped bed right now (housemate is off doing mega laundry; she is a superhero) but my back says that is not an advisble move with the angles I would have to put myself. Sitting in a straight backed chair is good, though, and lying on my side in a pillow fort is good, too. Fortunately, those are both writing positions of choice. So far, so good.

Research is underway to get a new laptop PC. We have become, over the last couple of years, the laptop graveyard> I am not going to give up on the vintage MacBook Pro, but the others, well, those probably are best suited to recycling. The HP laptop with no H key, and the screen that folds all the way back when it wasn’t designed to fold back at all; the hot pink laptop that I still love but which screen won’t show anything unless I I lie flat on my back and hold the screen at an angle that is best described as three-quarters closed. This is probably a severed wire, and probably an easy fix. We will see. RLRH also has his share of laptops that have gone to that great power strip in the sky. I can’t play Sims on that one, though, and that’s become essential. Hence the research. Writing and Sims. I know my priorities.

We may also be doing some research into office chairs, and/or pick up an interim chair in case the chair in storage won’t fit in the back of Housemate’s car, and will need to wait for when we rent a van and move the “real” furniture home. Furniture comes from a variety of sources. Parents’ homes, secondhand, locally sourced, brand new, and the nebulous area of me finally deciding that the best way to incorporate the hammered copper topped coffee table my grandfather made when my dad was little is to repurpose it, maybe as a dresser topper, or maybe with a new set of legs, to serve as a dining table or desk. We will see. I know I want my secretary desk, that I have been in love with since I was about four, for my longhand pursuits, and then pick everything up and take it to a separate computer desk when it’s time to transcribe.

As for the writing, my plans to jump right into it this morning snagged on getting the mega laundry ready to head out, with a pause for my weekly conference with Melva. We talked about the audio complications that kept our interview from going as well as we all wanted, how an offhand joke will make a great scene for our planned Christmas collection. That will probably go into the notebook I am setting up for my collaborations with Melva, most likely in index card format. Getting stuff down in the quickest away possible and filing it away works well for me to get the thought where it belongs and letting me focus on the work I need to be doign now.

I am very much into “now” right now. What can I do now? What works best for me now? What do I need right now? What is no longer serving its purpose and needs to move on along so it doesn’t become a stumbling block? What have I put away that I really need to bring back out because I miss it and want it and it’s part of the bigger picture and always has been? There’s a lot of stuff like that.

For today, getting this blog post up, even if it’s a big blob of blather, was essential. I don’t need the guilt of a missed blog post dogging me into writing time or family life, and consistency is something I want to improve. Hence this, and also trusting myself and my words, hence stopping it here and moving along to the next thing on my list for the day.

Typing With Wet Paws: Mental Health Day Edition

March 12, 2021annabowling Leave a comment

Tails up Storm Troopers. I’m Storm, you’re awesome, and this is Typing With Wet Paws. This is an unusual day as everybody’s mental health days seem to have coincided, so this will be more of a zoom-by post. I am super good at zoomies, as Aunt Anna can tell you, especially in the middle of the night. Woo!

Writing this week did not go as planned, but that’s what next week (and an especially beautiful writing assistant) is for. In the meantime, time to relax and take in and give belly rubs (to me) and all of that other good well filling stuff.

Aunt Anna and Aunt Melva’s video interview would have made a great sitcom episode, as Aunt Anna, famous for technology problems, had a lot of sound issues, and, well, basically got to sit there and look pretty.

There was some insomnia involved, aka Aunt Anna being up to join me in Midnight Parkour for a couple of nights, and then this morning, the crash. That means she took a big nap, and now feels pretty okay, but still needs to read and watch and play stuff before she can do much braining. It also means, that since both Uncle Rheuben and Aunt Linda are also tired, that all of the humans are staying in tonight and getting pizza and then “being feral cats” as they say. I have never been a feral cat, myself, as I was born in a house (with a LOT of cats, as my first mom says) and went directly to my first mom and then to these guys. When I had my walkabout last summer, there were a couple of feral cats in the area I wandered, but we didn’t talk much. The possums were cool, though.

So anyway, what we get here is Aunt Anna helping me with this post and then she is going to flop on the bed to catch the cross breeze from two open windows (it is very very nice spring-like weather here in NY) and relax with the whole family. I, of course, am very very good at relaxing. Well, not at Midnight Parkour time, but most of the rest of the time.

Anyway, Aunt Anna plans on a bunch of reading, and since she just got some new library e-books, plus she has Kindle Unlimited, that is going to be all set. Nice mixture of historical romance and contemporary YA. I am unsure of the number of cats involved in any of those stories. There will also be some planning involved, maybe a new planner because the academic calendar ones are starting to show up on store shelves, and most exciting of all, it will be new laptop time. Aunt Anna has a history with laptops (see her incompatibility with technology above) but things like her Kindle Fire not being that great for Zoom conferences and such, it is time for a new device, with a camera and a microphone, which means she may as well give the You Tube thing another try, because there are not a lot of historical romance Book Tube channels, and none that Aunt Anna has seen by kids her own age, so that’s a hole in the market that she might like to fill. I’ll let her talk more about that later.

Checking in with Goodreads, that shows us that Aunt Anna is currently kicking tush and taking names in her reading challenge for 2021, with 26 books read out of 90, putting her 29% of the way to her goal, and a full 9 books ahead of schedule. Go, Aunt Anna, go! I am pretty sure that my cuddling with her at reading time is a big, big help with all of that. I will continue to do my part.

Shouldn’t be long now before the pizza, and I will of course be needed to supervise everything, so I am going to bounce (seriously, I have a very sproingy trot) and get down to business. Headbonks!

Spring Thaw?

March 3, 2021annabowling Leave a comment

This past weekend, I had a raging case of insomnia, felt-like-subzero temperatures, two clogged sinks, one smoke alarm that is lasagna-sensitive, one pair of glasses gone walkabout (and then brought back home) an opportunity to improve family communication, two power outages in the same day, and a general feeling of swamp-edness. In short, pretty much what one would expect for the end of February.

All of this did tospyy-turv-i-fy my plans to kick butt and take names in the realm of double edits, and, after a talk with the magnificent Melva, sticking a toe into new writing for Queen of Hearts. :Ulp: This week also brought a-in retrospect, hilarious- DM conversation with a person inviting me to present a virtual workshop for Organization A, when I thought they were asking for Organization B, Oopsie. Thankfully, both parties were able to laugh about it, and there are now not one but two workshops in my reasonably near future, one in April, and one in one of the autumn months. More details on those as they are confirmed. Having a workshop to give in April makes up, to some degree, not being able to attend a regional RWA conference in person, like I did in the Before Times. Hopefully soon, we will be in the After Times, and I will once again be picking our conference shoes and packing an extra bag to bring home all the free swag and signed books.

Right now, I am looking at doing my start of week planning (writing related) in the middle of the week, which feels…weird. Chalk it up to the change of seasons. Before Times Me would be inclined to say “eh, this far into the week, write it off (no pun intended) and slack until Monday, then come out of the gate swinging.” Not going to lie, that option is still appealing. Especially so, since Real Life Romance Hero has the windows open, for some gorgeous fresh air, which we definitely couldn’t do back when the temperatures were in the single degrees. Welcome to March in New York.

March in New York means that leaving the house requires a few special considerations. Bring along your parka, bikini, umbrella, sunblock, hair ties (if your hair is long, because wind is brutal) plus sunglasses, a sweater or three, rain boots, and a travel mug that can handle hot and cold beverages, because there will be times during the day when you will want both. Possibly both at the same time, but we can’t have everything. Before I know it, there will be baby ducks i n the lake in the park that is a few minutes’ walk down the street. No Tulip Festival this year, because Covid, but I am expecting the flowers to be there anyway. Things are coming back, and I am happy to see them come as they will.

One thing that came back, unexpectedly, was watching TV. I binged the third season of Disenchantment. The end of that season came far too soon, so I am now in the position of finding another show to do the same thing, but this is why I set up my catchall journal/commonplace book with lists of shows and movies I want to see on the streaming services we have. Actually, there are a couple of titles I need to add. Maybe reading historical romance will be next. I did, however, finish Maya Rodale’s Dangerous Books For Girls , which is nonfiction about the stigma against romance novels, and where it came from, as well as how to handle it. Working on a review of that, but I do want to look through my reference books in storage and find some of my older books about the romance genre. Some things are wildly different than they were in the 80s and 90s, and some things never change. I have thoughts about all of it.

Spring is also time to check out all of the new pastel and floral stationery things that are coming out, beause pretty stationery makes me want to use all of it, which works out well when I am writing and editing a lot of things. Which is what I am doing, come to think of it. April is Camp NaNo, after all, and I think I want to participate this year. We’ll see how it goes. Sometimes preparing a project notebook is like getting a garden ready for planting season. At least that’s what I remember from what my mom used to do in the spring.

Spring is not my favorite season, but I do like the aspect of coming back to life, which is very much in line with a lot of my, well, life, these days. I don’t hate that. Also, I have hot pink kitty ear headphone with lights, so those alone are a fun reason to gt back to the keyboard. Pictures forthcoming.

Sea Legs, Inside Out

February 17, 2021annabowling Leave a comment

Happy Wednesday, Liebchens. This post is not about pirates (well, there may be pirates, tangentally) or the Pixar movie (haven’t seen it.) Wednesday is kind of my Monday this week, and I am okay with that. We had a full house at home for the first two days of the week, so those became family days. A trip to the storage unit yielded the box that is now in the kitchen, holding my AlphaSmart. I have missed that baby, muchly, in the year plus we were apart. Having it back now feels right, and that it came at the right time. I have t he first round of edits on A Heart Most Errant on my desk, Melva and I are currently second-drafting Drama King, and laying the groundwork for Queen of Hearts. For this week, my part is to write the character profile of our heroine, Heather (Chasing Prince Charming readers already met her in that book.) I am not using any kind of template, but may or may not be developing one as I go. We’ll see. I am circling Her Last First Kiss and figuring out the best way to get back on the horse, and taking a more planned approach to my blogging, not only here but on Buried Under Romance, and MelvandAnna.com.

Phew. That feels like a lot, but it’s a good lot. I could use some normal about now. Finding a big box of normal in storage felt super duper good. I honestly do feel like I am getting my sea legs back after too long on land, writing wise, . There’s even the outline of a pirate trilogy in the works (see? Pirates.) and learning the best way to have what I want to do and the best way to do that work together in the most amicable fashion. The whole sleep cycle thing remains a work in progress. The weighted blanket is amazing, thought the whole sleep schedule thing, and valiantly pushing through fatigue to Get Stuff Done is usually not the most effective way to reach the goals I want to reach.

Like today, for example. Not only is Wednesday my Monday this week, but 1PM became my 9AM, as sleep sometimes happens in two or more shifts. Before, I would have thought of that as some sort of failure, and lugged the failure weight along with me as I stabbed things with a stick (metaphorically.) I’m over that. If my Sunday afternoon planning session ends up happening on Wednesday evening instead, that’s not a failure, it’s an adjustment. Still feeling all of this stuff out, and making note, while I do, on what works. If you know me, you know me and notes. Good thing.

For today, even with the “late” start, which is an on time start, because it began when I woke from a decent amount of sleep, the plan is: blog, plan, and work on character profile. I like doing all of those things. While I would like for the profile work to happen at the same time I am watching a movie, or streaming some sort of TV show, but I am not there yet. There, in this case, means watching streaming stuff. I want to be there, and it will come in time, but for now, my background noise is usually YouTube. Maybe an audiobook. Maybe I will listen to somebody I don’t know play computer games. I do that sometimes.

I am also looking forward to a super fun workshop that starts of February 22nd, Revive Your Resilience, with abundance coach Eryka Peskin. This post is not sponsored, (though I am totally open to such endeavors) but Eryka did mention that she would not be heartbroken if I shared the word. I have taken several of Eryka’s workshops, and even wrote a thing or two for prior events, and I highly, highly recommend checking out her stuff, which you can do with the link above. Five days, five exercises to help you figure out How To Bounce Back, and a super supportive community, including me, because I will be there. It’s also totally free, and there will be giveaways.

In short, it makes a lot of sense to have all of this going on at the cusp of the change from winter to spring. We live even closer to the park now than we did in our first Albany apartment, and soon there will be baby ducks. I will take pictures of them and visit them on a regular basis. Maybe I will bring the AlphaSmart.

Typing With Wet Paws: Planner Rehab Edition

February 12, 2021annabowling Leave a comment

Tails up, Storm Troopers! I’m Storm, you’re awesome, and this is our regularly scheduled Typing With Wet Nails. Aunt Anna had some notes for a regular sort of post for me to write today, but it turned out to be a domestic tornado day, with maybe somebody coming by to take care of some plumbing issues. We don’t know if they are going to come or not, or when, so Aunt Anna doesn’t want to get too deeply involved in writerly things (also, she is sharing the office-y space with Uncle Rheuben, so alternative stuff to do is the ordedr of the day. As it often does, this turns to planner stuff.

One thing that Aunt Anna has learned is that the best planner or notebook is the one that she actually uses. She has also understood that there will be more paper. Sometimes, the best way to find out what sort of notebook a cover wants to be is to set it up and then see what transpires. Since Aunt Anna still needs to print out her reading tracker stuff, and she has other covers that are that size, and she just got the color and pattern of filler paper from Yellow Paper House that she has been drooling over for literally years (since Skye was the kitty here; that’s longer than I have been alive) this provides some useful direction. She took everything out and put in only the new paper, then started adding other things, like this.

Aunt Anna still needs to figure out the divider situation, and probably add some page lifters to the front and back, so that pages don’t slip underneath the ring mechanism. She will probably use this for thinking on paper, maybe for writing snail mail letters. She’ll figure it out. This assortment of colors for the pages is called Cool Seaglass, which reminds her of oceans and shorelines and the way they used to have regional RWA conferences in the Before Times. Probably t6here will be some later on, but, for now, Aunt Anna will capture as much of that in a notebook as she can.

Next, we have a setup that is for sure only temporary (unless she falls in love with it, but don’t hold your breath.) Aunt Anna loves her micro Happy Notes inspired notebook that she made from scratch, but it needs a cover to protect it, and keep a pen and other accessories together. Also it is slightly larger and less likely to get buried in the bottom of her purse.

Though the book itself is passport size, the cover, by Webster’s Pages, is pocket sized, which is bigger. Aunt Anna is basically trying this to make sure she likes having a cover on the micro, or if she would rather have a pocket sized traveler’s notebook, like this used to be. We’ll see what happens. It will probably be one of the two. She’s still in transition when it comes to figuring out teh whole notebook thing, but she has come to accept that this is part of her process.

Purr-sonally, I don’t mind at all, because every new thing she tries means that I get to lay on and play with a lot of different stuff. That is all very good as far as I am concerned. Sometimes, dealing with all of this paper and pen stuff is what allows her brain to settle on all of the writing stuff that is on the back burner when she is stationery-ing.

Since I promised (or vaguely alluded) last time, I do need to update you on Aunt Anna’s Goodreads reading challenge. Right now, she is doing pretty well, at nineteen percent of the way to her goal. That means she has seventeen books read out of her goal of ninety, putting her seven whole books ahead of schedule. One thing that helps a lot is audio books, and another is turning in a little early and reading while cuddling me. Cats and books are natural companions on cold winter’s nights.

Okay, I think that is going to be it for now, since Aunt Anna has to go do other stuff and I am not allowed to use the computer unsupervised. (Last time there may or may not have been a surprise delivery from an unnamed provider of catnip items.)

Headbonks!