Eleven Years

~ tahenryauthoress ~ 7 Comments
anniv
On vaca in Hawaii this past spring. 

The hubs and I have been married eleven years now and it’s been long enough.

Long enough for me to know him.

To know what he likes.

To know what he doesn’t.

To know how to laugh with him.

To know how to cry with him.

To know when he’s reached his limit.

To know how he makes decisions.

To know when he needs me to cuddle him

and when he needs me to just take off all my clothes.

To know how to help him.

To know how to cover all the rough spots for him.

To know to let him help me and cover my rough spots.

To know what a partnership is and how to give everything in one because your partner is right there with you.

To know he forgot it was our anniversary the second I said good morning.

And to know his forgetting has nothing to do with how much he loves me.

Imagine what I’ll know in another 11 years.

Fiendish Friday Vanity

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Wednesday Writer’s Update 8/31

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Good evening my friends. It’s been a bit of a rough day. I had a fat migraine. Probably due to too much painting, house painting that is. I clearly rearranged parts of my spine and they are registering their disapproval. Loudly.

Speaking of registering disapproval. The President of the coop my son goes to went off to Italy a week ago. Turns out she didn’t do anything she said she would handle before she left. And worse she didn’t tell anyone she didn’t handle it. Hot potato in my lap in the last 24 hours. Did I neglect to mention I’m the VP of Education? LOL

The lesson to be learned here. Do not volunteer for things. LOL. Ever.

I’ve decided to report on my stated 2016 goals each Wednesday for a little prod of accountability.

– Participate in one flash fiction challenge per month.

√ Finally a writing challenge. Dan posted this one last Friday to kick off the challenge season on his blog. Finish the following sentence. The most important thing about writing a book is…

…. finishing it.

– Prepare and teach “Nano to Publish”.

√ We covered using create space last weekend and a bit about cover design.

– Any time I am not actively working on my 2015 Nano Novel, write 2500 words per week on my spy novel until it is done. (After four years, it’s time to put this mess to bed.)

√ I am no longer dreading digging into my beta changes. But I am wondering why I bother. Seems like everyone has an opinion and they all conflict. LOL. What I really need to do is find my base, my solid, my home. Then the changes will be obvious.

Non writing goals

– Prepare and teach two classes at the coop for the 2016-2017 school year.

√ Preparing, preparing, I swear. LOL

– Take better care of my body, ie. stop compulsively painting, crocheting, and writing until my back or shoulder is so tore I can barely use either.

√ Er, totally broke this. Painted the house to much I could barely raise my right arm this week. oops.

– yoga daily.

√ five out of seven. Good enough for government work.

 

Book Review: Gone with the Wool

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I love Betty Hechtman. Seriously, she just writes happy little books. Sure people die in them but someone is always found out and gets punished for it. Maybe I was twisted early on by Agatha Christie, or maybe I was just twisted already and that’s why I liked murder mysteries at age 8. But something about Betty’s books just makes me smile in that warm and content manner.

Gone with the Wool is no different from her other delights. It’s easy on the eyes. Amusing on the brain. There are no dangling questions of life and liberty. Just the simple crime, solve, justice set up. And it doesn’t disappoint.

Gone is from the Yarn Retreat Mysteries which focuses on Casey, a 35 year old wanderer who inherits her aunt’s house and yarn retreat business even though she knows nothing about knitting. But Casey makes a place for herself in the sleepy sea side town, baking for some restaurants and putting on retreats several times a year. The problem for Casey, and the fun for us, is someone is always getting murdered at her retreats. LOL. I wouldn’t go, even if I knitted. Although everyone who gets murdered is heinously unpleasant, so I probably would escape death. LOL.

Casey always finds herself embroiled in the mystery, even when she is determined to stay out of things. And she always solves the crime. Mostly by letting people talk to her and listening to what they are and are not saying.

℘℘℘℘℘ – Five Pages. I read everything Betty puts out. My only complaint is she takes her time. I want more books. But I admire the finished product. What a catch 22.

 

Saturday Seminar: King Says Con’t

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It’s been a bit since I perused through my file of nuggets from Stephen King’s On Writing, but today seems like a good day to think about editing my disaster of a spy novel. In preparation I’ll consider what King says on the topic.

Two drafts and a polish. (209)

Completely reasonable. I’ve written my first draft and now I need to work out a second one.

Revision formula: 2nd draft = 1st draft – 10% (222) 

Oh dear. That could be problematic for me as a couple of my betas have suggested the second half of my spy novel needs fattening. It’s too lean, too rushed, too barren. Perhaps I should do 2nd draft = 1st draft plus 10%?

If what you hear from your betas makes sense, then make the changes. You can’t let the whole world into your story, but you can let in the ones that matter the most. And you should. (219)

Hrm, one of the betas who said feed my novel was the hubs. And realistically, he is always right. Always.

When you rewrite your main job is taking out all things that are not the story. (57)

It’s been suggested I should dump the sex scenes. But other people like them. So I think really the question comes down to, do I need the sex scenes to demonstrate the nature of the relationship or could I just allude to it and keep things cleaner?

When a novelist is challenged on something he likes-one of his darlings-the first two works out of his mouth are almost always Yeah but. (226)

Ah oh. Did I say Yeah, But in the last response? No, no I didn’t. LOL. But maybe the feeling was there.

The most important things to remember about back story are that (a) everyone has a history and (b) most of it isn’t very interesting. (227)

Ok, one of the sex scenes is back story. Maybe I should change that to a one line allusion rather than a half page descriptive.

It is, after all, the dab of grit that seeps into an oyster’s shell that makes the pear, not pearl-making seminars with other oysters. (232)

Alright, I get the point. I should just dive in and see where that second draft takes me. But before I go…just a bit of amusement. Spot the mistake, courtesy of King. 

“Although deer season doesn’t start until November in Maine, the fields of October are often alive with gunshots; the locals are shooting as many peasants as they think their families will eat.”

Fiendish Friday: The REAL Washington Weather

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Whenever someone hears I’m living in Washington I always always get the follow up…

“how do you live in all that rain, I couldn’t do it.”

sigh. Yes, it supposedly rains 300 days a year in this state. Which is true. Except….

90-95% of that rain happens at night. So what they should really say is we get 275 nights of rain and 25 days. And to someone who loves the sound of rain on her roof, heaven.

The real problem with Washington Weather is the schizophrenia. Stay with me here.

It’s the second week of August. Wednesday I wore jeans, a tee shirt, a sweater, and a scarf. I eventually took the sweater off around 4 but only because I was home.  Friday I wore a sun dress and baked in 93 degrees.

I’m telling you Washington weather needs some medication. Lithium perhaps?

 

Wednesday Writer’s Update

~ tahenryauthoress ~ 6 Comments

Holy crap it’s Wednesday, huh? Yeah that’s what I thought about five minutes ago. I’m not at cafe. But this was a planned pass. I went out Monday with the ladies from write in to send off one of our own in style (extended sabbatical not death). And since I had plans Tuesday as well (Cinebarre=alcohol and a movie with a different group of ladies), there was no way I could pull off three nights in a row. My husband would lose it. LOL

So what am I doing with my planned evenings of relaxation? ROFL. Wild guess and the first two don’t count. Yes, I am indeed doing crap for the club. Let me fill you in on the drama. Last Saturday two fine, upstanding, mature members of the club decided to get into a fist fight at the pool. Yes, you read that right. The police were called. Civil allegations are flying. We as a board are trying to stay out of it, other than to send a nice letter reminding them that swearing, pushing, and name calling are against pool rules-don’t do it again.

But the police want the video. The problem with this is multifaceted.

A) no one on the board even knew if the camera system still worked

B) no one knew where the recording device physically lived until yesterday

C) the remote control is broken which means you can’t use the search function

D) this means you have to rewind to where you want to view. In this case five days ago now. At it’s fab rewind rate of 5 minutes per hour of video, I’ll be going back to the club house, climbing the world’s ricketiest ladder into the attic, at about 1030 tonight, to see if the cameras even caught the incident.

Don’t you want to be me? I live the most exciting life.

I’ve decided to report on my stated 2016 goals each Wednesday for a little prod of accountability.

– Participate in one flash fiction challenge per month.

√ Bwahahahahhaha

– Prepare and teach “Nano to Publish”.

√ Yeah. Class is this Saturday due to some library reschedule fun. At least I’m not sick this time.

– Any time I am not actively working on my 2015 Nano Novel, write 2500 words per week on my spy novel until it is done. (After four years, it’s time to put this mess to bed.)

√ I still haven’t dove into my beta but I can see it as a possibility, soon.

Non writing goals

– Prepare and teach two classes at the coop for the 2016-2017 school year.

√ Actually doing some work on this. Highlighting Guns, Germs, and Steel like I have stock in Sharpie.

– Take better care of my body, ie. stop compulsively painting, crocheting, and writing until my back or shoulder is so tore I can barely use either.

√ Actually my back is tore. I’ve been painting the house lately. And my lower back objects.

– yoga daily.

√ er, every other day this last week.

Book Review: The Last Star

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My number finally came up on the wait list and I got my hands on a copy of The Last Star by Rick Yancey. I have elsewhere talked about the first two installments in this series. And I have to say number three did not disappoint.

My biggest complaint about the first book, The Fifth Wave, was that it was 75% from Cassie’s whiny perspective. The second book, The Infinite Sea, was like 75% the bad ass characters from the first book. So I liked that one a lot.

The Last Star almost but not quite wraps things up. I don’t want to give too much away but let me say that Rick Yancey doesn’t tie it all up in a nice little bow where man kind pulls together to triumph over the nasty alien race that wants to annihilate them. There is not a pretty Hollywood ending. And I like that. Although it made me cry and I don’t like that.

So book three, the battle continues to rage. How does a small band of juveniles defeat a much technologically superior enemy? I’m flashing back to Red Dawn, the first one of course, not the remake. The answer in case you haven’t seen the movie, is with desperate strength and courage.

Just read the series. I know Cassie can be a bit off putting in the first book but keep in mind by book three she will be waxing poetic about Bacon.

Thinking about the bacon-the potential of bacon-gives me hope. Not all is lost if bacon isn’t.

She can’t be all bad, LOL.

℘℘℘℘℘ – Five Pages. I read this Sunday morning while my son and his friends had cartoons and pancakes. In fact I read this while making pancakes and sausage and then was momentarily sad I hadn’t made bacon. I’ll definitely look at other series by Rick Yancey. I probably won’t watch the movie though. Hollywood will just make whiny Cassie more whiny I am sure.

Fiendish Friday: CSI Miami

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There are times when I just feel so…empty of joy. When I am sad and suffering malaise and my heart needs time to process the new normal. I am not a rapid processor. It can take me some months to come to terms with changes in status. By which I mean things like the death of a friend, betrayal by someone, or just a general crappy feeling of being overwhelmed and unable to accept more. God help me when all three coincide – hello life.

Now I am a big TV watcher. I am. I like to crawl into the bed at the end of the day and just watch an episode, or half an episode, and drift off to sleep. It soothes me. But when I get into one of the aforementioned malaise situations, I can’t watch TV I like. What if my state of dysfunction makes me not like the show anymore. And I can’t watch anything new because I know I won’t like it. So that leaves me with….

CSI Miami, because it’s already so bad, it can’t be ruined by my mood. LOL

What do you watch when you have the doldrums?

Wednesday Writers Update

~ tahenryauthoress ~ 4 Comments

Ha- I’m actually at cafe. No, really. I am. I’m waiting on my chicken pesto three cheese gluten free pizza. ooh it’s here. Hold please, must consume food.

Ok, I’m back. So my friend V is very excited about this publishing convention cruise she heard about. But dang it’s pricey. 200 for the convention. 600 for the cruise. plus flight from PacNW to Florida. If only. sigh. Part of me thinks it could be a great investment but then I think for 2K I could do a lot of online marketing. ALOT.

I think it’s probably a no brainer. I’ll saving cruising for the fam and spend my novel dollars where it might do some good.

I’ve forgotten how many interesting and random conversations I end up having at write in.

-Whether a character should be made to be more obviously evil.

-Car accident someone had

-the cruise

-time difference to Germany

-the process of creating a name for a new species

-pokemon go and traveling to catch unique pokemons

 

I’ve decided to report on my stated 2016 goals each Wednesday for a little prod of accountability.

– Participate in one flash fiction challenge per month.

√ Totally did not happen in July and is very unlikely to happen in August. It will become obvious as you read on.

– Prepare and teach “Nano to Publish”.

√ Working on it.

– Any time I am not actively working on my 2015 Nano Novel, write 2500 words per week on my spy novel until it is done. (After four years, it’s time to put this mess to bed.)

√ Beta is back and now I need to fix it. Get out the sledge hammer.

Non writing goals

– Prepare and teach two classes at the coop for the 2016-2017 school year.

√ I got one of the books I was planning to use for research. That’s forward motion.

– Take better care of my body, ie. stop compulsively painting, crocheting, and writing until my back or shoulder is so tore I can barely use either.

√ Been doing well since I have no time to do anything fun. pout.

– yoga daily.

√ Actually I have been doing this.

–  New Goals: Survive the pool board

I think it’s down below ten hours a week which is good because I’m ramping up responsibility at the coop my son attends and where I’m on the board. Yes, I’m on two boards. Yes, I’m crazy. I get that. But I really thought the pool would be low key. And I love the coop. Ok that might be a stretch, but my son loves the coop and I am willing to put in the hours to make it a good place for him to thrive.

I’ve done 3 of the 72 things on my August to do list. Think I’ll make it? ROFL