Nano is No Mo
Posted on November 29, 2007 - Filed Under Writers, adventure, writing, writing life
For those of you out there who participated in Nanowrimo (write a novel in 30 days - well not really, because 50,000 isn’t long enough for a novel) I guess it’s come to an end. It has for me. In fact, it ended about week two for me. Which was disappointing in a way and yet freeing in another.
You see, I found I really couldn’t just write on command. Which is not to say that I can’t write or am even going through any kind of block right now - actually, I’m not. But I found that I couldn’t just blindly write down words just for the sake of the word count. The story I’m working on actually matters to me. It’s an idea I’ve had for a long time and characters I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about and getting to know and I found I simply couldn’t sacrifice the time they and it needed to breathe, so I could do right by them.
So after two weeks, I said, ’screw it.’ This isn’t the way I want to write my novel. I want to spend time with it. I want to go at it like gangbusters today and tomorrow think about it - maybe tinker, maybe do some research for a locale or find the write music to inspire me. I want my process to stay organic, which has always been for me. I don’t really write outlines and deep character profiles and long winded synopsises, I live the story, so to speak and write down what happened.
The writing at breakneck speed, not stopping to look, or reread, even for typos - to find the better word because I didn’t have time to do it the day before because the ideas were so fast I could barely get it down as it was, the crunching the numbers for the sake of numbers just don’t fly for me.
Know what I mean?
I think it’s a great idea - and probably does help some writers - makes them rise to the challenge or makes them accountable for their stated goal of writing a novel. But I actually have written one - I didn’t need to prove that to myself and when I realized that, I realized I didn’t have to do it.
I hope everybody who was involved enjoyed themselves and got something out of it. I did get something out of it but not what I expected. Congrats to whomever the winner is.
WC
Be Happy
Posted on November 28, 2007 - Filed Under Deep thoughts, joy of creating
I do not think of all the misery, but of the glory that remains. Go outside into the fields, nature and the sun, go out and seek happiness in yourself and in God. Think of the beauty that again and again discharges itself within and without you and be happy.
Anne Frank
Seven
Posted on November 27, 2007 - Filed Under Just For Fun, brain farts, meme
Angie, over at This and That, tagged me. Now, though I’ve done similar memes and you all know far too much about me anyway - I’m doing the meme cuz Angie is new in the neighborhood and I want to support her. So, seven more things about me. 
1. My ass has its own zipcode - and at the rate I’m going I will be my own island soon.
2. My favorite food when I was a kid was a BLT with peanut butter (can you say, Elvis?) on toasted Hillbilly bread (yes, there really was such a thing).
3. When I’m writing a story, I often have conversations between the characters and I play all the parts and I have these conversations out loud - usually while I’m walking the dog or taking a shower. Anyone who witnesses this probably thinks I need to adjust my meds.
4. And while we’re on the topic of talking out loud, I sometimes have conversations with my dead father.
5. I think that the global warming thing is a bunch of crap. However, I am worried about the planet and the world at large because there is so much hatred in the world that we will likely blow ourselves up in an effort to kill each other, long before the planet goes belly up.
6. I like George W. Bush. In fact, I voted for him twice. I do not always agree with what he does, nor do I support all of his ideas but I believe he has done what he feels is best for the country. I do not believe he deserves the utter hatred that has been piled on him, nor do I think he deserves the personal attacks. It’s okay if you disagree with the man, but he is not the second coming of Hitler or Satan. His biggest crime, it seems is that he is a Republican and is determined to make up his own mind about what to do in his capacity as President.
7. I can’t watch horror movies anymore. Which is odd because I couldn’t get enough of them when I was a teenager - now if I watch them, they make me afraid of inanimate objects like doors and radios.
Well there you have it seven more things about me that you didn’t need to know. Hehehe.
If you want to do the meme and pass it on, consider yourself tagged - if not, no worries.
WC
Are You a Meese or a Man?
Posted on November 25, 2007 - Filed Under Humor, WTF?, acts of idiocy, brain farts, my opinions
Okay, so I just spent the last three hours in computer hell. Yep, on my first official day of blissful unemployment, I nearly saw my life flash before my eyes.
It all start a few days ago, when I noticed my mouse was acting weird, not responding. I knew I had to make the dreaded trip to Radio Shack and buy a replacement. Of course, the model I’d had was no longer in production so I had to buy the new and improved version. The new and improved always makes me a bit leery. I guess I’m just a little set in my ways but frankly, I don’t understand the obsession to build the better mousetrap - or mouse as the case may be. My view is, if it’s not broken and it works, why improve it? And who gets to decide if it really is in fact, improved? I digress.
So, I buy the new mouse and the new and improved part starting bugging me. It has this thing called auto scroll which means the wheel is utterly useless and apparently is just there for show. You have to click the scroll button and this lameass icon pops up and then you move the mouse up and down to get the scroll thing happening. Me no likey.
So, I got annoyed with it and continued to get annoyed with it, so I whipped the cheapo mouse I bought for the laptop and stuck that baby in. It worked okay, but it’s a bit on the small side. Anyway, blame it on the two glasses of wine I had tonight but I really started getting steamed with logitech and their new and improved and I decided to uninstall the software for the logitech mouse, since I wasn’t using a logitech mouse, I was using a cheapie no name mouse, and what’s the diff?
And off I went, wildly uninstalling useless software for a useless mouse. I had to restart the computer as we all know, in order to change the settings. Which I did.
I plugged in el cheapo and then boom, no mouse action. I mean, NO mouse action. I panicked - so much so that I asked Roomie for his assistance (forget the fact that he’d had way more than my two glasses of wine) and we spent hours trying this and that, constantly unplugging and replugging, rebooting and generally tearing out our already thinning hair. Not a pretty site. Not pretty at all. In fact, I started seeing odd shapes and funny colors. I heard voices sneering at me and frankly, I didn’t feel at all well.
Finally, Roomie wandered back to the livingroom to his movie and Jack Daniels and I stayed at the computer. My life is on this damned thing - at least that which means anything (read manuscripts, stories, poetry, blog posts, yikes!) so I was pretty invested in solving the problem. I even contemplated calling the IT from the doc’s office and paying him his bagillion bucks an hour to fix it if it was really too much of mess.
So, I realized that the problem really began when I uninstalled the dumbass software, so through painstaking hit and miss, using keyboard shortcuts and the tab button, I finally managed to reinstall the darn stuff.
But when I rebooted, I still had the el cheapo plugged in and it wouldn’t work. My fingernails were starting to look awfully tasty and frankly, I had very little hair left to pull out. So, just for the hell of it, I plugged in the damned logitech and rebooted.
Eureka! We have meeses once again. I guess I learned my lesson - You can’t fight progress and quit fricking uninstalling shit. Sometimes it matters.
Smile
Posted on November 21, 2007 - Filed Under Deep thoughts, I'm in awe, beautiful photos
Isn’t it amazing that with all the science, technology and every other gadget man has invented he just can’t top what nature brings us without even trying? Smile, damn it, smile.
WC
Gobble Gobble
Posted on November 19, 2007 - Filed Under Holiday, Just For Fun, brain farts
Hopefully, you won’t have as hard a time finding your turkey (or whatever meat/non-meat you are having) as this fellow.
Enjoy your day, eat like a pig, say a prayer of thanks for all the wonderful things in your life and even for the not so wonderful things. I’ll see you guys in a few days - as my new lifestyle approaches, I am excited. But also a bit focused on wrapping things up.
Love you all, see you soon. Happy Turkey Day.
Annie
Apologies…
Posted on November 14, 2007 - Filed Under Blogging, Dear Readers..., acts of idiocy, brain farts
Hey Kids,
Look, I just wanted to say how much I appreciate all your visits and comments. You can’t know how much it brightens my day to see y’all here. And I know I’ve been a miserable visitor myself. No excuses - I’m just scum.
I gave notice at my soul-sucking-mind-numbing-energy-consuming job and a week from Friday is my last day. Hooray! Consequently, I am trying to get as much wrapped up as possible. Consequently, I have no brains left when I get home.
I will probably just not post for a few days. I will try to get by your places and read and comment - I really will - but it may be a few days. It may actually be after I’m done with the job. If we’re being honest here - that’s more likely.
I will make up for my hideous slackeristic behavior - very soon. I promise.
I plan to take a few weeks off and just write and blog and recharge after the job is over. So, I should have ample time to catch up.
And really, thanks for all your support and sympathy and good wishes through this ridiculous journey of the last few months. I have learned a few things - which I may talk about later. But not now.
I love you guys. I really do.
Annie (aka Writer Chick)
A Boy and His Lawn
Posted on November 13, 2007 - Filed Under Just For Fun, WTF?, brain farts, men, my opinions
What is it about men and lawns? I mean, seriously, what is it? Roomie is absolutely obsessed with his lawn. The garage is jam packed with fertilizers, weed killers, cutters, trimmers, edgers, hedgers, mowers and blowers and even a damn vacuum. Yep, a vacuum, so he can vacuum up the leaves that are demarking his carpet of green.
This man will go out at 7 pm and in the dark, on his hands and knees trim around the sprinkler heads, so the lawn gets its daily drink. He has this complex set of sprinklers all on timers, all going off in sychronized glory in the wee hours of the morning. Good thing, since we are now officially in a ‘drought’ out here and the water police are always about. Wouldn’t want to get a lawn ticket, now would we? I wonder what the fine is on that? Or is it community service - 200 hours in a desalinization plant?
He can also spot a weed or a nasty ol’ mushroom at fifty paces, regardless of the time of day or night. I think he maybe must do some of this by smell because I sure as hell can’t see it.
Last year, he had a little pile of brown gook on the lawn one day. I thought it was cat barf. We have quite a few free roaming felines in the neighborhood and God knows cats love to barf, especially on other people’s lawns. No biggie, right? Wrong. Roomie became obsessed. He took samples. Took it to all the other lawn nazis in the neighborhood for opinions and analzysations. The ultimate consensus was that it was some rare lawn virus and it took him the longest time to find the right antibiotics to kill the damn thing. I think part of the problem was that most doctors won’t prescribe meds for lawns - but I digress.
So, this year, in fact, quite recently - the devil grass came and wreaked havoc with the lawn. Naturally it was the neighbor’s fault because he had had the nerve to seed his lawn, rather than do the right thing and pop a couple grand for high grade sod. Roomie always looked down on neighbor’s lawn and was constantly offering lawn tutelidge to neighbor. The devil grass was the last straw and roomie went over and had a serious heart to heart with neighbor. In the end, neighbor agreed to order the sod like he should have in the first place and he was replacing Roomie’s lawn where the evil grass had choked the primo sod grass.
This morning at 6 am, Roomie was out there watering the tender new sod grass and speaking to it softly. Coaxing it to take root and not to feel embarassed that it wasn’t as experienced as the rest of the sod lawn that got put down two years ago. I believe he made introductions all around and the new sod grass felt welcomed.
Now, I’m all for a nice lawn. In fact, I’d say that Roomie has the nicest lawn on the block - but the thing that boggles my mind is that this is the same person who doesn’t see two weeks worth of crumbs on the coffee table, cleans his bathroom three times a year whether it needs it or not and wouldn’t know what to do with coffee dribble on the counter, or grease on the stove if his life depended on it.
How can a man be so attuned to a lawn and so clueless about his own home. The place where he eats and sleeps? I swear, the livingroom could be piled to the ceiling with old to go containers, strewn with two weeks of dirty laundry and fur balls the size of basketballs and he’d never notice - but if a leaf falls on his newly mowed lawn, it will wake him from a dead sleep.
So, I ask you, what is it with men and their lawns?
WC
Cat Boogers and Heaters
Posted on November 12, 2007 - Filed Under WTF?, brain farts, empty head
I’m sure I’ve mentioned my behemoth of a cat, affectionately known as Boodie. She is a funny animal, both in looks and manner and lately (for reasons known only to God) I’ve been watching her - observing her.
One of the weird things that I’ve noticed about Boodie is that she has a tendency to get boogers. Now, I haven’t had that many cats in my life because I’m partial to dogs, but I’ve had a few and I’ve never had one who got boogers. I mean the real deal. Like she’ll jump up on my bed to come and get some affection and there it is - a big, black, giant booger hanging out of her nose. For a cat who mostly sleeps and eats and rarely ventures outside my room, I find this fascinating. What could she possibly be doing that causes giant clods of gunk to crawl up her nose and gross me out? I started to think that maybe she was using her cat box as a sort of soccer field - or perhaps she doesn’t understand that the stuff in there isn’t recyclable? I have tried to teach her to use a hankie but she prefers that I dig it out with a Qtip as she sits in my lap.
Aside from her eating and napping she has one other love - my portable heater. It’s one of those types that looks like an old fashioned radiator, that you plug into the wall. The heating mechanism heats up oil or something in the coils and it is energy saving and quite green, according to the box it came in.
Boodie is utterly in love with this heater. Whenever I can’t find her, I’ve only to look in the direction of the heater and there she is. She loves it so much that she works to get most or all of her front paws under it and her face smooshed up against it. Why it doesn’t turn her in to an appetiser, I’ve no idea, but she basically owns the damn thing and she’d carry around as a pocket book if she could. Or, possibly she’d drag it into the cat box with her, while she is playing turd soccer and farming (still don’t know which).
Also, she will not eat anything except dry food. She hates tuna, chicken, fish or any human food, will not go near a cat treat or a scratching post (she prefers my leather chair for that) - though she will on occasion go after the dog’s dry food if she feels I’ve shorting her food supplies.
And the damn cat doesn’t meow like any other self respecting cat. Nope. She chirps - like a bird. Again, a first for me - never knew a cat could warble until I met this one. She when she wants something she sings for it. Cute, eh?
And then, why is it, that as soon as you sit down to pee, the cat chirp, chirps and sticks her butt up in the air in order to be scratched? Is it merely that I’ve sat down and she knows I won’t move for a little while or is there some connection between humans relieving themselves and butt scratches? Yet another mystery I will never solve.
Anyway, as you can see, I haven’t much going on in my brain tonight, or I would be regaling you with much more interesting blog fodder. Sorry - it’s a brain fart.
WC
We, the People…
Posted on November 10, 2007 - Filed Under Current Events, Dear Readers..., Election 2008, The Constitution
How many of you out there has read the Constitution? I have, but to be honest it’s a bit of a blur and I didn’t retain much understanding of it - if I ever had any to begin with. The language is archaic and far from modern day nomeclature. Yet, it the foundation upon which our country is built.
There are those out there who like to think of the Constitution as a ‘living document’ which is code for ‘I can change it to suit my current political ambitions’ and there are endless interpretations of the documents. There are lawyers, judges and others who specialize in it - and every Tom, Dick & Harry - or every Tanya, Diane & Henrietta love to spout off about their Constitutional Rights.
Yet, how many of you really know what your Constitutional Rights are? I don’t mean what the likes of Al Sharpton or Jerry Falwell may spout, I mean straight from the source?
The truth is, that most Americans if quizzed on the Constitution would likely fail that quiz even if they were looking at the document during the test. We don’t really know what’s in it or what it means.
My friend Dave Kluge had this and many other realizations one day while watching a Presidential debate. Each debater was citing the Constitution and yet were at odds with each other in what they were saying. Dave found this confusing and it made him stop to wonder if people, generally really understood the Constitution and what the Framers intended.
Long story short, he started to research the document and continued to make some very interesting discoveries. His research ulitmately turned into a book The People’s Guide to the United States Constitution.
It’s very exciting to know any author who has had their book published, especially if you’re an author yourself - but I was excited about this book for many more reasons than that. I realized that it was something I wanted to know about, to learn about and ultimately understand. So, I happily attended his book signing and bought my very own copy - which the author was happy to sign.
The book is clear, concise, very reader friendly and informative.
A lot of us out here in blogland bandy about our political views and cite the Constitution, yet I wonder how well we know it. I’m going to know it a lot better once I finish this great book. Check it out. You may find it’s something you just have to have too.
WC
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