possibly pointless blabbering

Technology Is Not My Friend

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Last night, the battery in my phone died. This phone has been through harsher things that sitting in the charger. This is the phone where Skye became a gamer kitty, the phone that helped me set a goal of hitting one thousand Instagram posts (yeah, that one’s on hold) and hung out with me during long stretches of insomnia. It’s the phone with all those pictures of Skye on it(but yay Google Photos, for having it all.) This was also the phone I was counting on for some casual scrolling and possibly Kindle app reading before bed, so its ultimate fading to black was not what I had in mind. Time to call in reinforcements.

Those who have known me for a while, also know my history with electronics, which may point in the direction of this piece is going. I first retrieved my old PC laptop, the pink one I still love, and, someday, plan to find if there is a way to make it work without having the screen at an angle that is best described with this symbol: <

she does not display this much screen when open this far, these days

That is the angle at which I have to have the screen, if I want to be able to see it, not complete blackness. I already have the phone for that. The MacBook Pro will probably be fine after I take care of that three beep thing, which should be an easy fix, but not very helpful in the middle of the night, when I want to do some casual scrolling to wind down. Next solution was to boot my elderly tablet, which spent most of its time reminding me that it’s been a while since I turned it on, and that I have changed several passwords in the interim. Also that Google app is not responding. Google app is not responding. Google app is not responding. Etc. At least Spotify worked, so that was a happy ending in the short term.

As soon as I can stop the triple beep, this baby is back in business

The longer term solution will likely be an easy one, as well. Easy fixes for the laptop issue, acquire new phone, and then comes the phase of the process that I actually consider fun. What is the aesthetic of this new device going to be? We’re talking wallpapers, screensavers, possibly themes, if I want to go whole hog on this kind of thing, There’s arranging all my must-haves, like Spotify, my photo apps, Sims FreePlay (why did you have to die in the middle of the chocolatier quest, phone? Do you not understand the depth of my desire for that gingerbread house furniture? Have you learned nothing from the fact that my ice house has no kitchen or bathroom because those items are now locked until the next ice quest comes around again? I have staying power. I can wait, but not if all my Sims die because I can’t get to them.) and Netflix.

Hot pink bag in the bottom left corner holds my tablet. Purple case holds my Kindle, which is fine.

I will qualify this by saying that A) Netflix is still Mehflix (this is totally me, not them) and B) I can access Netflix on other devices, most notably the desktop on which I currently write, but this is the principle of the thing. I cannot take the desktop to the comfy end of the couch, and I definitely can’t tuck it in my planner and take it out into the wide, wild world. Or laundry room, because there’s that, too.

Umm, Anna, I hear a voice saying, isn’t this a good time to table the electronics thing and focus on reading paper books, and/or doing art in the un-phonable time? You don’t even like using the phone as a phone, so, y’know…not seeing the giant problem here. That voice, by the way, is probably me. I have a love/hate relationship with electronics, and I probably always will. I got dragged kicking and screaming to my first ever computer, and now I can’t imagine writing without one, even if I do usually (read: almost always) compose in longhand first. Skype allows me to collaborate with Melva, face to face, when two hundred miles apart, and Skype on the phone means I can go into the only room in our apartment where I can shut the door and not have to work around another human, while Skyping: the bathroom.

Since this is a need, we’ll be taking care of it soon, and, before long, I will be introducing the new electronic device, and/or reintroducing the restored one. This is not a question, but a fact. In the meantime, I have galleys to scour, and there is still the tick tick tick of the clock counting down to the Z Publishing anthology deadline. I am pretty comfortable with that.

TLDR version of this whole thing: Phone died. I wanted to kvetch. I have kvetched. Back to the galleys I go. (Also, if I don’t respond to messages right away, refer to whole phone thing above.)

Typing With Stuffed Paws: Anything That Doesn’t Look Like An Umbrella Edition

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Greetings, foolish mortals. Sebastian Thunderpaws Hart-Bowling coming at you, with some of the stuff of the week that was, with special guest, Writer Chick. Why is Writer Chick here on Friday? Easy. She went to what Skye’s notes refer to as the people vet, and there was apparently medicine involved and she forgot what day was what day, and here we are. Anyway, what that means is that she did most of my work for me, so I will drop her link to last week’s Buried Under Romance here, and hand it on over.

Read it here.

Writer Chick also read this book, and will be reading these:

Current library TBR

I will pause (or paws) here for some fur-sonal maintenance, while Writer Chick has her say. Here’s the picture she had as her header:

The header that would have been….

Interior, coffee shop, day.

Two women, A and N, sit in a booth, with hot beverages and various art materials. Both hold pencils in hand, blank pages in front of them. A traces around the base of a plastic to-go lid, then sections the circle into pie-like sections.

N: (peers at A’s page) Is that your umbrella?

A: Hopefully.

N: Do you know how to draw an umbrella?

A: (deadpan) Yes. Erase everything that doesn’t look like an umbrella. :flips the lid, to add small arches to the inner edges of the circle, then erases parts of outer circle that do not look like an umbrella:

Annnd scene. :curtsies:

This scene, as you may have guessed, comes, as the best dramas do, from real life. Real life, in this case, meaning my real life, and my weekly breakfast with N. This week, it was an artist’s date (artists’ date, as there were two of us?) N brought the wrong paper, so ended up doing her sketch on regular notebook paper (spoiler: it looked fabulous anyway, and I want real versions of the dresses she sketched, please and thank you.

I, as promised, brought my new water=soluble crayons and watercolor paper, along with a pack of baby wipes (for the smushing around of colors) and mechanical pencil (for the drawing of things,) metal ruler (for the drawing of straight things) and fancy eraser (for erasing of drawn things that are in the wrong place.) The umbrella thing was a passing mention. IT’s for the cover image of my April monthly planner section, so, really, all I needed to do was sketch, and N wanted to see how the water-soluble crayons worked, and the background kind of happened on its own. The black blob in the corner was supposed to be another umbrella, but that didn’t work out so well, so now it’s…a shadow? Ominous cloud? Artistic license? Yeah, I’ll go with that.

We both drew, as we talked about writing, and both put some color on the pages. N had woodless colored pencils. These are new to me, and I am guessing they are colored pencil guts without the usual casing. I paid attention to the way she held the pencils (she is an artist of some years’ standing) and how she lay down the color, while I scribbled and glopped crayon onto my paper, then attacked it with baby wipes, turning aimless scribbles into soft washes that built on each other. We talked about stories we’d both like to write, vague terms for me, more specific ones for her, and the domestic tornadoes whirring through both our families, thankfully at lower levels.

When Mr. N came to retrieve us, he asked, as he always does, if we had a good meeting. N, as she always does, said that we did. She waxed (pun intended) rhapsodic about the crayons, and the store at which they might be purchased. Mr. N is, himself, an artist, so this is relevant to his interests as well. In time, they dropped me home. I touched base with Real Life Romance Hero, then dug out marker paper, to try the same design on another surface. Yep. Still works.

N did suggest that I could tilt the umbrella, to show it from an angle instead of straight on, and I may try that, later, but, for today, I am content to say that yes, I do know how to draw an umbrella. At least this umbrella, and that’s all I really need to know. Okay, except for the size of the monthly divider, but I can tackle that one another day.

TL:DR: Yes, I can draw an umbrella. Yes, this applies to writing. Yes, I am being purposely vague because I have to be out the door in five minutes. I have a picture of an umbrella, though, even with color, and a mood, from a certain perspective, and I am confident that I can draw it again. I can also write books. This is very useful, because I am a writer. Tell the story and don’t worry about all the fiddly other stuff.

Yeah, so that’s about it. I will direct Writer Chick back to one of her multiple calendars, and, hopefully, things will be back on track next week.


Peace Out,

Digging Out

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Here we are, once again at Monday. The cold is mostly gone (mostly,) and there is a whole lot of snow outside. The temperature is in the butt cold range, and Real Life Romance Hero is home today, as his place of employment would rather their people not freeze, so this is not as solitary as I would have expected for the day when job one is to figure out how I am going to dig out from basically a week spent away from “real” writing work.

This, of course, begs the question, what is real writing work? Snow is my favorite weather, which is a plus for someone living in NY, during winter. Everything crisp and clean and sparkly, is one of my favorite sights. Because I live in a city, this also means that clean and white and sparkly does not last very long. There are piles of greyish brown ice, puddles of yellow from local canines, odd bits of twigs and shed evergreen needles, trash, and probably a few things that we would all prefer not to itemize. It is kind of like that with writing.

Having a cold like the one that moved in with our family means that butt in chair and fingers on keyboard is not always going to happen, but there is no law against bringing pen and paper to bed. Which is, no surprise, something I do anyway, and, sometimes, all that pen and paper do is sit there while I sleep. They also sit there while I don’t-sleep, because I have hit a thread of insomnia.

Insomnia and colds have a few things in common, namely that the person is in bed, but not having a lot of fun, but they are both well served by a pair of earbuds and audiobooks. Even though the books available at the click of a button (Overdrive) are a sliver of what’s available in the wider world, having a selection of books available in an instant, where I can crawl into my blanket fort and have somebody read me a story, is good for both body and soul.

In the best of all possible worlds, there would be a sort of air lock between sick days, or snow days, or sick days followed by snow days, and regular writing days/return to everyday life after several days of being out of the norm. All of that stuff I’d wanted to do over the sick week, was still there when I got up this morning, and, at first glance, it did look like big chunks of gray and brown ice, with all the traditional accoutrements.

There’s the part of the process that is standing in the middle of the mess, hands on hips, aghast at how much accumulated in my functional absence. Then there’s the “how do I do this stuff again?” portion of our day. Obviously, I can do this, because I was in the middle of doing it when the cold dragged me under, and the snow snowed me under. That snow, though, is still sparkly and pretty and fun to play in, even though there are big icebergs in the middle of the parking lot, so it’s enough to get my boots and mittens on, and tread outside.

Since there is a parking area outside our building, instead of going straight to the sidewalk, none of the actual tenants (aka me) actually have to shovel. This means my back is safe (from that.) I know, I know, I am rambling, and need to get back to the writing things. That, as things would turn out, is exactly what I am doing, rambling down these bunny trails. This is the time to slap everything on the page and/or screen and then see what sticks, afterwards.

A lot of that is messy, but, if I keep at it long enough, the order begins to appear. Today, I swept the crusty tissues and books to be put away “later,” from the coffee table near my desk, and arranged the desk organizer thingies, acquired before the storm, and let my brain free float. Part of that was expressly so that I could follow up on YouTube videos I’d watched, on sick days, about better use of Instagram, aka, the social media platform that appeals to me most, at present. Does using a white board to reflect light, and taking the picture in front of natural light, get rid of the yellow tint that has plagued my pictures for a while now? Could be.


How are you digging out of the weekend?

The Daily Thunderstorm

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Welcome to the daily thunderstorm. Such is August in New York’s Capitol Region. I don’t mind it. Actually, the booms and flashes and wet stuff are my favorite part of a summer day, apart from the part where day turns into night. Night, as it were, is not far off, or at least the part of the day where I have uninterrupted writing time. Which, technically, never happened, as I am not alone at home today, with Real Life Romance Hero in residence. Housemate will be home within the half hour, so, realistically, this is probably going to get posted tomorrow, rather than today, because that’s the way things go. It probably doesn’t help that, because I am still figuring out the Mac, which will probably include a Safari upgrade, I am relying on YouTube for my musical accompaniment, and, well, how can I possibly listen to Mykal Kilgore sing Drew Gasparini’s “I Loved You Too Much” without actually watching the video? I’m only human. Or Mykal Kilgore singing “Disaster,” also by Drew Gasparini. Okay, fine, any video that has both names in it is one I really should not be playing when I am meant to be writing.

There are different types of writing. Blogging, I can do with family mucking about. Usually. There are always exceptions. Some things, I can do in bits and snatches, propped on a pile of pillows at the end of an air mattress (non-leaky variety) with the Mac on my lap desk, and legs contorted in what is probably not a real yoga position (writer pose? is that a thing?) Other things require complete silence and solitude (though true fact, for me, that’s not a lot) and yet others need to be where I am alone among people. This is one of the reasons there is part of my brain devoted to figuring out what bus route will drop my at my favorite coffee house, because I miss that place, and the atmosphere, but writing is one of those things that can be done in an endless variety of places.

For now, I’ll go with the sound of the actual thunderstorm as my background music. We’re close enough to the road that I can hear one of my top three sounds of all time, cars driving on wet asphalt. (The others, in case anybody was wondering, are RLRH snoring, and Skye crunching her treat) Part of my brain is working on my Drama King assignment for the week, as Melva and I will have our weekly meeting in person, as part of my retreat. Blabbering here actually lets another part of my brain work on other things (aka fiction writing) on the back burner, and a lot of issues sort themselves out that way, so I won’t complain about that, either.

Preparations for said upcoming retreat are underway, which is, in itself, part of said retreat. Once I decide what’s coming with me, (and after I do laundry, because clothes covered in dry sweat are not conducive to either rest or creativity) that’s committing to what I’ll have on hand for the time that I’m away. As with the last retreat, there will be no internet. This is not as scary as it was the first time, especially, since I remind myself that I spent the majority of my life, at least half of it, in a time when the internet did not even exist, so it’s a pretty good shot that I will be able o survive. Not so sure about my Sims Free Play Sims, but not going to give that too much emotional energy.

This will be the first trip with the Mac, and I’m looking forward to that. Skye is still the main draw, of course, but picking out the right books, the right DVDs (I figure a couple of movies, and one season of a TV series should do me fine) – those are important. What I bring is what I’ve got, and I need to have a plan in mind. Four books seems about right (plus Kindle and charger, because one never knows) and morning and evening pages books. There are two pocket size inserts for Li’l Pink, headed my way. They should arrive by Friday, which is perfect, because we should be hitting the road Saturday morning, and having a whole weekend to set up a pocket sized planner, which includes but is not limited to copying vital information from Big to Li’l Pink, that’s about as good as it gets for planning. Which definitely means I need to make sure I bring the right planning supplies, or I will be kicking myself for the entire retreat.

Well, not the entire retreat. There will be Skye, and there will be Melva, and there will be a decent sized TV, with nobody to fight me for the remote. There will be books and my shiny new computer, and all my imaginary friends, and a fully stocked kitchen, and maybe, possibly, there will be thunderstorms. If not, There’s always downloaded ambient sound.

 

 

 

Rambling, Beneath The Roses

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Welp, one day behind on the blogging thing, the photo editor I usually use is giving me guff (but on multiple machines, so it’s probably them and not me) and the picture I thought I was going to use for a different sort of header, I did not actually take as a photo, but sent as a direct message to a friend. It’s that kind of day. Right now, I am in my newest writing nook, which probably will not be permanent but it sure is comfy.

There is now a full sized air mattress taking up most of the living room. I have an armrest pillow in place, and the head of the mattress is flush with the wall, so I do have back support. The new futon/bed is in the bedroom, which feels kind of inside-out-y, but I’m going to roll with it. My house, my rules right? The mattress is also directly below the three rosebush plants (mini variety,) York, Tudor, and Lancaster, (white, red and white, and red, respectively) that captured my heart on Saturday morning. Appropriate plant life for a historical romance writer, if there ever was such a thing.

The weather is pretty darned decent (by my standards) today. Light rain, off and on, temperate enough that I can actually cover my flesh without feeling smothered, and, maybe most important of all, cool enough for tea. A sign of autumn to come? I sure hope it is, because I am pretty much (i.e. totally) done with summer. Seeing as how we’re at the end of July, that is not surprising. There is a lot on my mind, these days, so I’m going to put a bunch of it here, and get along with my day.

First off, I have a new item to add to the Coming Soon page. My essay, “Greetings From Boxville,” will appear in the New York’s Emerging Writers nonfiction anthology, from Z Publishing. I angsted a lot about that essay, then finally wrote what basically amounts to a blog entry, and sent that sucker on its way. This may be something to remember; when in doubt, do what comes naturally.

There is Chasing Prince Charming news. Melva and I agreed, on Monday, that we are done-done with this draft, and it is going back out into the wide world at the end of the week. Eep. Been a while since this kind of thing has happened, but it’s exciting, too, this regaining of the metaphorical stride. Melva and I are taking two weeks off to work on individual projects, and write down notes on Drama King, then come back together and get that story back in gear. This time, we know how we write a book together, along with each other’s strengths and not-so-strengths, and the story world is no longer uncharted territory.

Sleep has been, for the past couple of weeks, to use a technical term, poopy. Last night was my first good, full, night’s sleep in a while, and I appreciate the heck out of that. I could use a few more nights like that, aka all of them. Cooler temperatures help, but the fact that I could get up this morning and make tea, without feeling as though I had to drag my own corpse from wherever I was when I figured sleep was not going to happen, so may as well have caffiene, followed by midmorning crash, is enough to put a bounce in my step. Hence the actual blogging.

When I am done with this, there will be fiction writing, which, right now, feels like a rare treat. I had hoped to use July to outline the selkie story, but that’s not what happened, though I still want that story to happen, as well as A Moment Past Midnight. Not sure, right now, I I want to target one of those for November and NaNo, wait until Her Last First Kiss is at the end of its second draft. I’ll figure it out.

Sometimes, a change of perspective can be a good thing. There’s probably something to be said for being closer to the ground when I write, these days. The desk I’ve loved as long as I can remember, with accompanying office chair, is still in storage, and looks like they will remain there until we move to the next place, so finding where my writing space is, in this apartment, is of paramount importance. A lot of us writers are going to have a lot of different writing places in our lives. Yesterday, Housemate asked me if I missed Old Apartment. I said no. I miss having Skye home from camp, and I miss going to my favorite coffee house to write (which I can still do; it’s only a bus ride away) whenever I wanted it, but it was time to make a change.

Sometimes, it’s like that with writing. There are times to strike out and try something new, and then there are times when the best thing to do is go home. Sometimes, those two things can happen at the same time. Funny how that works. I love it when things that shouldn’t fit together, do, and in the very best of ways. Is this a new season of that starting? Hope so.

Blabbity Blab, Theory and Practice

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Helpful hint: going out to do laundry and run errands in the freezing rain does not hasten Martian Death Cold out the door any more quickly. Even so, I think I’m going to live. Right now, I’m at my desk, the too-bright sun that comes after yesterday’s lovely greyness, poking through the slats in the blinds. Wind is whipping the branches outside. The big candle is pretty well burned down, which means it is probably time for a new big candle, or at least a nice votive or tealight. My mug is empty now, and I am debating whether it is time to put the kettle on for more tea, or to grab my water bottle.

In short, it’s a winter Monday. Outside my closed office door, there are cat and Real Life Romance Hero. On today’s schedule: this blog entry, then work on the second batch of edits/rewrites for Chasing Prince Charming. I have my weekly Skype conference with Melva tonight, and breakfast with N tomorrow, so I need to get some Her Last First Kiss in there somewhere. The temptation to burrow into a blanket nest and binge watch the remaining episodes of Les Revenants (creepy French drama, on Netflix, which I deeply love, and will probably gush about in more detail at a later date) is strong, though not as strong as the biggest lesson I took away from this past weekend’s CR-RWA meeting; treat writing like a business.

That means that writing time is writing time, and nothing else happens during that time. New rule for this week: blog entries get one hour of my writing time, maximum. This may result, at least in the near future, to an increase in free form rambling, but that kind of stuff tends to sort itself out in time, with the right amount of practice.

My original plan was to have a defined topic for this blog entry, but I got to sleep at the lovely hour of four in the morning, because Martian Death Cold does not respect circadian rhythms, and I am burning too-bright daylight here.  I am looking forward to seeing what Melva has don e on this next chunk of Chasing Prince Charming, and what notes she’s made on my segments, so I can do my share in making a good thing even better. I actually like rewriting. Sometimes, I like rewriting more than writing. There’s less pressure, and I’m not as concerned about making everything perfect, as I am when creating a first draft.

That seems somewhat backward, as the whole point of revising/rewriting is to make the writing better, but go figure. Writers are weird. Granted, we are at the part of the book where there are not a lot of changes to make, and we are likely approaching the section that is going to need the most work. Stay tuned for that one, because there will probably be much to say on that matter.  There may or may not be muffled sobbing at some point, but we have our sights set on the end of March to get the whole thing spiffed and back to the lovely people at The Wild Rose Press, and we’ll see how that goes.

For today, I have fewer than two hundred words to get to my magic seven hundred, which, thanks to some scheduling math, figured out in the margins of my notes from Saturday’s CRRWA meeting, now means at least seven hundred words in sixty minutes, tops. This is where preparation would come in super handy, So would another bag of sugar free cherry cough drops, because I recently squeezed said bag, and the cough drop count has gone down to three. I am good on tissues, though, which may come in handy if I hit on any especially emotional parts of the manuscript this afternoon. I would give it fairly high odds, because I know this story, I know Melva, and I know me. It’s pretty much a sure thing, and I am more than okay with that.

Almost to the magic seven hundred. I want to promise that Wednesday’s post will be more structured (unless anybody actually looks forward to my free-form rambles, in which case, today is your day. Break out the bubbly.) Blabbity blab, theory and practice, hey, look, there we go, enough words now. Time to open the file and see what wonders may be wrought.

TheWriterIsOut

 

 

 

The Big Candle

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Since I started hygge-fying my office, lighting a candle has been part of the routine when I open the desk for the day. When I first started, I had a single votive on hand, a tealight, and two mini jar candles. When I blew through those, there was only one option left. The big candle. I do not remember when the big candle came into our home. but my educated guess is that it was part of a holiday gift from somebody’s work. The scent is Autumn Wreath, the maker, Yankee Candle. I’d always thought it was too big for my desk (cue visions of the entire thing going up in flames, taking a bunch of my notebooks and favorite pens with it) but here it is, and now, I find it’s the most natural thing in the world to have it there.

One of the biggest things about having the big candle on my desk was that I didn’t want to waste the wax. In the candle world, this is known as tunneling, when the candle isn’t burned the proper amount of time on its first outing. When that happens, the candle remembers how far it was burned, and that’s how far it will burn throughout its life. This means all the wax isn’t used, and, at the end of that particular candle, there will be a bunch of wax clinging to the sides, either to be carved out with a knife, possibly with the  help of boiling water or a stint in the freezer, or tossed, along with the jar, because it’s too much trouble to get the stuff out, merely to have a plain glass jar, for some undefined purpose. In that case, the jar gets tossed. Maybe the garbage smells a bit better that week, but that’s about the only benefit.

For this particular candle, that meant a three-hour burn. That meant three hours of me at my desk, keeping an eye on the flame, while simultaneously doing my thing (aka manipulating the lives of my imaginary friends.  There may or may not also have been the final two episodes of the US version of Being Human, which may or may not have made me cry, and may or may not have spoiled me for jumping directly into another series. This will probably mean more time for books, both the reading and writing of same, with the big candle along for the ride, in either event.

Even with careful attention (I am going to blame the Being Human finale) I did end up with some tunneling. There’s still a bit of wax around the rim that should have melted, but apparently I didn’t time things correctly, and now I am either stuck with the one thing I didn’t want to have happen, or…or I could turn this around. Fold a strip of tin foil twice, make a sort of tin foil tenty kind of thing, around the mouth of the candle for about half an hour, and boom, back in business.

This is all a very word-pad-y way of saying that, sometimes, writing is hard. Or weird. Or crammed into five minute bites, when what’s really needed is a good solid couple of hours, but there is life and…there is tin foil. All the good stuff is still there. The story, the characters, the world in which they live, those are all still there, only clinging to the jar instead of melting into lushly fragranced …good…smelling…stuff. The fact that I am writing this blog post when the clock ticks down to 5PM should be an indicator that I am quickly running out of English for the day and need to replenish the well.

The default has been bingeing on Being Human, but that’s all done now, and I’m not ready for a new show yet, although the fourth series of the original, UK version is now on request at the library, and will be on its way to me soon. Or I could read. I could build a new house out of my TBR pile, and there are friends’ manuscripts calling. I’ll figure it out, but, either way, I will have one eye on the big candle. We’ll get through this together.

Typing With Wet Claws: Special Snow Day Edition

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Hello, all. Skye here, for a special Tuesday edition of Typing With Wet Claws. This entry is already special, because it is Tuesday instead of Monday, and it is special because I am blogging for Anty. It is also special because today is a snow day. Anty loves snow days. My picture today was taken when Anty informed me I would be blogging today, instead of her. There are a couple of reasons I am writing her blog today.

Yesterday, we took Uncle to the Right Now Human Vet. He did come home, and was not wearing a cone of shame, so I gather they helped him feel better. He is napping right now, but he people vets are very good at making humans feel better. Anty is not napping, even though she is tired, because she has a cold.  It is the kind of cold that makes her forget where she put things (including important things like her water bottle and box of tissues) and she is not sure if she wants to wash the mountain of laundry or stick a flag in it and claim it for Mars. Claim them for Mars, really, because there are two laundry baskets, but only one is overflowing. I think they smell fine, but the humans have other ideas. I do not understand humans.

Even though Anty took a picture of me waking up from a nap, she would not let me take a picture of her in return. At least I think that is Anty under the pile of blankets. Every once in a while, a hand comes out from the blanket pile, to grab a tissue or book, so it is probably her. She may drag herself to her desk and make some attempts at writing. Her desk currently looks like this.

Deskscape121217

Anty insisted on removing the tissue box before taking this picture.

When Anty first dragged herself out of bed this morning, the outside looked like this:

Snowscape121217

This is the view from our balcony. I am not allowed on our balcony.

Anty loves snow, and she especially loves snow days, when plans get canceled because there is so much of the white stuff on the ground that humans (I should say most humans) prefer to stay inside rather than go out in all of that. Since I was rescued when I was six months old, I have never been outside in winter, so this is all hearsay, but I have been told that white stuff is cold, and makes snowballs on the fur of us fuzzy kitties who do go outside. No, thank you. I will stay inside, sit in front of space heater, and ask Anty to turn it on for me. Not for the humans (okay, maybe Uncle, because he is my favorite and I love him the most.) For me. We cats put the “creature” in “creature comforts.”

Normally, Anty would be out in all that white stuff, probably taking pictures, and, in the best of all possible worlds, she would somehow manage to time things so she could walk through all the holiday lights in the park, at sundown, with a takeout cup of hot cocoa from her favorite coffee house, to fuel her. That is not happening today. What is happening today, instead, is that she will stay inside and drink a lot of liquids, stay under her blanket pile, and read books. I, as her dedicated mews, will stick close by, in case she needs comfort, inspiration, or love beams. Unless Uncle gets up, that is, because he is my favorite and I love him the most.

Anty can still have the hot chocolate, because we have some in the pantry, and there is an outside chance (pun intended) that she may pile on the outerwear and head to the laundromat anyway, because 1) Anty does not appreciate the fragrance of a good laundry pile, and 2) she actually finds laundry relaxing, and uses the wash and dry times to read and write. Both of those things are things that she can do here, with me nearby, so I do not see the need for venturing out.

What I do see the need for, and I think Anty would agree, is taking advantage of what might seem like downtime. We cats know that naps are important. We did put the “cat” in “catnap,” after all, and it is often in those quiet moments, where a person is not really awake and not really asleep, maybe even a little fuzzy-headed, (by this, I mean inside their brain, not fuzzy like kitty fur) that the internal critics are also taking the day off, wrapped in their own blankets, feet in fuzzy slippers, sipping cocoa, and criticizing each other instead of the writer humans. When this happens, the writer’s imaginary friends are free to play, without the governing eye of those critics. Since Anty is feeling out ideas for maybe writing a Christmas story next year, this could be the start of something.

Personally, I think she should start space heater and then open another pouch of cat food, but that is only a suggestion.

I think that is all for today, so, until Friday, I remain very truly yours,

skyebyenew

see you Friday

 

 

Breeding Unicorns and Other Things

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Welp, it’s a Monday. I have the big mug out, second dose of Lapsang Souchong tea to fuel me, because I’m going to need it. Right now, I am in my office chair, under the Irish fisherman blanket Housemate knitted for me and Real Life Romance Hero. I am wearing an oversized sweatshirt, hood up over my sleep braids, flannel pajama pants, and thick socks. Tomorrow, N and I are shifting the focus of our weekly meetings from planning/critique, to actual live writing. I may or may not still have a free birthday pastry on my Panera card, and, although I am cutting back on sugar, there may still be a cherry Danish with my name on it.

Last night, I watched Outlander with Housemate, in the living room, at the same time, something I haven’t done since I started recapping the show for Heroes and Heartbreakers. It’s a different experience, not only knowing that I did not have to recap (would not have been recapping that episode anyway, as it was an even numbered episode) but knowing that I would not be recapping next week. Oh. Right. That happened. Watching as a fan is a different matter than watching to recap for a website post. No need to count scenes where the OTP are together (zero, for this episode; some habits are hard to break) or write down memorable quotes (Nothing on that front, but the final stitch on a sailor’s shroud going through their nose, and that it needs to be performed by a friend, that, I remember.) No need to chart the course of the ship (as in relationship, not the actual sailing ships, but those, too) although Claire has a plan to warn Jamie, and Fergus chooses an interesting time to man up, but we will see how things go.

I also didn’t  watch as closely as I would for a recap, though I will be interested to see if I’ve trained myself to do that when next week rolls around. Some habits are hard to break, and, as I look for more freelance gigs, this may be a skill that comes in handy. One never can tell. I am not ruling out a re-watch, possibly on a smaller screen and/or closer to my face. This may mean moving the comfy chair closer to the TV, as well as a trip to the optometrist, but rearranging furniture counts as a creative pursuit, right? I’m going to say it does.

That’s not for today, though. Today is for working on Drama King and getting ready to work on Her Last First Kiss tomorrow. N and I have already extended our meeting time so that we can allow for more writing time. Having another person across from us, doing the same thing, expecting there to be more story than there was when we took our seats and opened our notebooks, is a powerful motivator. No distractions, no quick checks on Facebook or other social media, no looking something up on the internet real quick, only pen to paper, and the knowledge that we get to talk about what we’ve written, immediately when we’re done writing it.

This reminds me of a writing group I attended, for many years, with M.P. Barker, and Melva Michaelian, where we came to the group with paper and pen (no electronics) and wrote to prompts (or not; going rogue was allowed, as long as we wrote) for a set amount of time. I want to say it was about fifteen or twenty minutes at a stretch, and we would have two such sessions, with a break to chat and snack in between. I liked that dynamic, both the actual writing, and the knowing that, while I put pen to paper, the others were doing the same thing.

Even on evenings when getting into my groove took longer than I’d like, I eventually did, because there was that energy of other writers doing their thing, of being surrounded by others of my kind. I was, to my knowledge, the only writer in the group with an eye on a career writing historical romance. I have a talent for being a unicorn in these kinds of groups, the only X in the bunch, whatever X might be for that particular bunch.

I do get semi-unicorn points for my meetings with N, as she is writing contemporary romance, and I am writing historical, but it’s still romance, and N does have some historical projects in the pipeline, so only semi-unicorn. Half unicorn? Unicorn/horse hybrid? Is there a name for that? Halficorn? Theoretically, can unicorns and horses breed? This is not a question that I spend a lot of time pondering, but it does arise now and again. I don’t think I’m the only one to have this question, in the entire time of human existence.

Today will probably be a day for filling the big mug yet again, as I put on the big girl panties (flannel today, because we are now in late November) and move the Drama King scene from notebook to screen, then get my notes ready for tomorrow morning, so I have a roadmap for the new scene. Today feels, to a small extent, the way I felt riding home from that long-ago writing group. There’s that same flutter in my stomach, that yes, that this buzzing around me, the story people as real and alive as the person next to me, hands on the steering wheel, bright as the headlights that cut through the dark, as we talked about where our respective stories were going, what we’d written that night, what we planned to do with that during the week to come.

 

 

 

The Unblank Page

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There are ten days left in my current morning pages notebook, and I do not know what notebook I will use as its successor. Having notebooks is not the problem. I have notebooks. I have a lot of notebooks. Some might say I have too many notebooks. Some would be wrong. There is no such thing as too many notebooks. There is, however, such a thing as not having the right notebook, and for those, like me, who take notebooks seriously, this can become an issue.

I am also moving into a new planner at the end of the month, and I have that book on hand already. Morning pages are different. Those are for whatever is on my brain first thing when I wake, and, for those, I prefer for some design element to already be in place. If there are multiple designs that repeat through the book, that’s ideal. I got the same effect by rotating through different colors of ink for each entry, so I’d be fine with doing that again, as long as there is something on the page already.

I have tried, in the past, taking plain lined pages and adding stamped images or fancy washi tape to give some interest, but it’s not the same. I want to come to a page that’s move-in ready. This is going to involve some research, which will mostly consist of combing the shelves at local chain stores, flipping through notebooks and journals on display. There are a few factors at play here. The format of the book, size, cover material and design, whether or not there is a bookmark, the design and texture of the pages, and what sort of pen, what color of ink I will use on these pages, all come into consideration.

This may sound touchy-feely, or special-snowflake-y, to some, but every writer is different. I can only speak for myself. When the right notebook and I find each other, I’ll know it, and that’s going to have to happen within the next ten days, because that’s when this notebook will be full. I kind of like having that kind of a deadline.

Deadlines are great. Deadlines mean there is a limit to how much thinking, how much preparation can be done, because there is an ultimate destination. A post has to go live, there are no more pages in the book, the story is told. I love writing endings, and, since I write romance, that means I get to write happy endings. No matter what went before, the hero and heroine are going to be together at the end of the story, and they’re going to be happy about that. Anything up until then? Fair game.

My favorite endings aren’t sunshine and rainbows all around; there’s an element of the bittersweet to them as well, which only heightens the HEA for the lovers. They may have made important sacrifices along the way, lost people important to them, but they’re still breathing, and they have each other, and that’s a good place to start the rest of their lives. If we don’t see these characters again in related books (and I would love to see more true standalone romances) that’s all right. we know they’re going to be fine. I love sending a pair of lovers off into the sunset that way. After all they’ve been through in the course of a book, they’ve earned some time alone, and there are more lovers to meet. more adventures to be had.

It’s not that different from coming to the end of a notebook. I don’t normally write-write (as in writing fiction) in my morning pages, but I have used those pages to work story problems out, on occasion. So far, I haven’t had a manuscript and morning pages book start and end at the same time, but that could be a goal for 2019. Not saying that it is, but not ruling t out, either. I’ve done a lot of thinking, recently, about why it is I prefer a predesigned page for my morning pages, and why it matters what notebook I choose when I pick out a dedicated notebook (and/or pretty legal pad) for a new project.

What it comes down to, for me, is the unblank page. Pablo Picasso said that all creation begins with destruction. The first mark or dab of paint on a blank canvas destroys the blankness of that canvas. I’m not a Picasso devotee, but have to hand him this one. It’s not only different colors and shapes on a physical page, but coming to the day’s writing with a sense of what will be on the page, be it paper or screen.

Having designs on the page when I pick up my pen for morning pages reminds me why I’m there. Not that I can’t figure it out without pretty pages, but they do make the experience richer. Maybe that has something to do with the kinds of stories I like to write, as well as read. I want the details. I want the information. I want to know what the room looks like and smells like and what the weather is, and if my people are comfortable or not, if they’re tired, hungry, impatient, if the room is too hot or too cold, who else might be around, that kind of thing.

With morning pages, and with writing, the hardest part is putting that first mark on the page. After that, it does get easier. Sometimes, pages are filled quickly, sometimes it takes a while longer, and I am fine with that. Fill one page, then another, and then, before I know it, the book is almost done. Not that hard when one looks at it that way.