Tag: Nanowrimo

Wednesday Writers Cafe

~ tahenryauthoress ~ Leave a comment

Good evening my friends. It has been such an interesting week and in some ways a seriously frustrating one. Monday I rushed home from a play date because the Reindeer Firetruck was coming through our neighborhood and kiddo didn’t want to miss it. Yeah, we needn’t have rushed. It drove by our house at 915PM. Seriously? My kid has been in bed and asleep for over an hour. By the time he’s old enough to stay up late enough to see Santa on the Reindeer Firetruck he isn’t going to care. sigh

If you follow the news at all you might know that the PacNW is flooding right now. Never been so happy my house is on a ridge. I often complain about it because there is no taking the dog for a quick flat walk. Any direction you go from my house involves hills. Loving my hills right now.

Tuesday: stayed home as it rained cats, dogs, elephants, and porpoises. My son refused to leave the house which was possibly wise but that meant that I couldn’t get the ingredients I needed to bake cookies and bacon cheesy bread for family. So Tuesday night after the board meeting, I got elected to the board FYI, of the country club on my mountain neighborhood, (this should be ringing some bells), I drove down into town. Yep, it was flooded. And there was the usual selection of idiots who drove off the road into a gully. sigh. But despite all that, it was still more pleasant than taking my son when he doesn’t want to gIMG_20151209_100940o shopping.

Wednesday I baked. Here I am in all my glory of stripped apron, hair every which way, and yesterday’s make up still smeared about my eyes. Photo by my ever so cute son, so I apologize for the composition. LOL. Eventually we drove 20 miles away to a Scholastic Book Faire, where I was reminded it could always be worse than having sold only 25 copies of my book. And no this isn’t a wind up to having sold only 24 copies. I bought a number of full, 50K plus word novels, for 50 cents at this book faire. FIFTY CENTS. Think about that. You sweated out a novel, edited it, had it beta’d, edited some more, finally got an agent who got your book in front of an editor who liked it enough to offer on it. You were traditionally published. Bells and whistles, kudos to you. And your book did so bad it ended up at a Scholastic Book Faire for fifty cents a copy.

Tonight I am at Wednesday Writers Cafe, yeah babysitter! I have actually been adding words to my NanoNovel. Yeah me! Last year I didn’t even touch my NanoNovel til mid January. But this year I am ready to continue spinning my tale of intrigue. And it’s not even mid December. LOL.

They got their hands on the video. They are watching. They will find the murderer picking up a delivery of roofies. And that will give them probable cause to bring her in for questioning. Can’t wait, so I’ll get back to that now. TTFN

 

I’m getting too old for this sh…

~ tahenryauthoress ~ 1 Comment

Today is definitely a day to curl up on the couch and watch Lethal Weapon.

But I won’t be doing that. I still have a house full of family tIMG_20151204_182405631hat want to go hiking at the summit.

Let’s back up a little. Friday night was the TGIO (Thank God It’s Over) Party for Nanowrimo. I baked two cakes and a myriad of cupcakes for the event. What can I say, I’m a little compulsive. But it is always reassuring when people rave over the homemade carrot spice cake with cream cheese frosting ( I like those ego strokes.) The party was fun, but I was really too tired to enjoy it fully and feeling a bit guilty. I sent the family, including the out of towners off to see Christmas lights without me.

Then Saturday…cook, bake, and cook some more because starting at 3 was our annual Sinterklaas party. I had 41 rsvp yes, and roughly 33 show up. That’s about average I find. But the party was seriously insane in that, we’re all too old to be frat party obnoxious, but we can still be so loud you almost have to shout to be heard. The kids were quiet in comparison.

So now all the family has been taken back to the airport. I’ve convinced the hubby that the house does not need to be cleaned before we relax. LOL.

Although at some point, I really need to figure out what …huh…it took me all day to write this post with all the interruptions and now I don’t know what I needed to figure out. LOL  – probably something about Christmas cards. wrinkles nose. Or maybe something about finding writing time so I can finish my nano novel from this year. I left our favorite detectives right at the good part, right when they got the set up to bring down the bad guy. Now they’re cooling their heels waiting for me to get off my butt and type some more.

This weekend I am going to my first author Q&A session where I am the author. Is that flipping cool or what? But my son is dying for me to come play a board game with him. How can I say no when he knows “for your taste, I think you’ll be yellow.” Smart kid. TTFN

Er….I forgot how to title things…

~ tahenryauthoress ~ 6 Comments

This whole radio silence thing feels WEIRD. Like Nano ended and my life picked up at full speed and I just lost my blog by the side of the road. LOL.

So since Nano I have cleaned my house. Like the kind of cleaning you do when your son has a cat and you have cat allergic family members coming to stay with you…cause he does and I do. In fact my Father in Law arrived yesterday and my Sister in Law and family arrive today.

Why are they coming now? Because Saturday is Sinterklaas. It’s a Dutch Christmas time holiday where a jolly fat man leaves candy in your klompen. Grown ups move about from house to house eating and drinking special treats all evening long.

So that’s it, cleaning and preparing for a party. And in the moments I wasn’t doing that I was earning coins in the subway surfers game because my son fell in love with this little Japanese anime girl but you had to get 95K by last night midnight and my kiddo couldn’t do it. So he asked me to help. My husband thought I was crazy to do it. I probably was but…this morning when I gave my son my kindle and told him to load up subway surfers he started to cry. He was so overwhelmed. He didn’t think I would do it. Pretty damn cool to be a mom some days.

So what’s on the horizon?

Well, Family, Friends, big ass party (40 odd guests I think.)

Next weekend I am giving an author chat to a book club which read my book. Thank god it’s at a Tavern, I think much alcohol will be required so I don’t die on the spot.

Then I need to finish this year’s Nano novel because….drum roll….

Sheri J Kennedy and I are teaching a ten month long seminar at the North Bend library, third Saturday of each month, from 1030-noon, entitled Nano to Publish. The idea is to help people take their raw Nano novel and cook it up into something to be served to the reading public. So I need to have  a raw Nano novel to demonstrate my cooking on. LOL

What about the blog? um…huh…Well I missed my writers cafe update last night, cause I didn’t go…FIL here and all. And I think Friday’s writers cafe will be pretty not happening for me for a while. I enrolled the kiddo in a Leonardo DaVinci’s inventions class on Friday mornings through February. I think I’m going to have to wing it a little. I feel like the weekend workshops were not all that well received. But I plan to still blog about what I uncover while researching how to help people publish their stuff. And book reviews, book reviews will continue. What do you think about a movie or tv show review each week too?

How about we just agree you’ll show up to read and I’ll show up to write and we’ll see where it takes us….

 

Nano 2015 – The End

~ tahenryauthoress ~ 13 Comments

Ladies and Gentlemen, drum roll please…..

NaNo-2015-Winner-Banner

That’s right folks. I done did it.

I awoke this morning to discover my husband was walking the dog, I think he’s bucking for husband of the year, and my day only went up hill from there.

I wrote at coop where every few minutes another mom interrupted me to ask how nano was going, wasn’t it the last day, how many more words did I have to go, why was I talking to them then. But I know they meant to be supportive and so I thank them for their love.

I waited til the hubby got home to head out to write in. He was sure I would make the last “few” words I needed with no problem.

I went to write in. Where again I was surrounded my supportive people.

In the end yes, I made those words I needed without breaking a sweat. But I have to chalk a lot of that up to people who supported me, loved me, believed in me, held me accountable all month long. So while I get to win Nano this year, as always every year I feel like there are many people in my life who get to post this winner banner on their blog, too.

My novel is not done. I have just figured out how they might be able to catch the killer. So we have to do that. Then the big denouement scene. Then the wrap up. I expect another 15-20 K ought to do it. But I won’t be writing that tonight. It’s dessert time.

Words today: 4106

Time Spent: 4 hours

Total Words 50094

 

 

Nano 2015 #29

~ tahenryauthoress ~ 4 Comments

Gettin’ close to the end now. Have you ever had your coffee feel like it was working in reverse? Seriously today I had two latte’s at write in and by the time I got home from that I could have gone straight to bed and to sleep.  All I could do was stumble about the house mumbling about all I needed to take care of.

Words: 1900

Time: 3 hours at write in, 30 more at home.

Total words: 45988

Est Comp: Dec 2

 

Nano 2015 #28

~ tahenryauthoress ~ 2 Comments

Evening friends. It is cold here. Like dear god I hope my fingers and toes don’t fall off while I walk the dog cold. Ergo, I am writing this post quickly before I go give the dog his evening stroll just in case I can’t type when I return. LOL

Words Today: 1761

Time Spent: 2 hours at a write in, 90 minutes writing I think

Total Words: 44088

Estimated Completion Date: Dec 2

So I need to write around 3K a day to make 50K. I am ok with that.

I’m at a really good point right now, they’re searching the killers house. Spence is interviewing the killer who’s playing games with Spence. It’s fun. If I hadn’t been hosting friends for games and dinner I would have written on for hours and hours I think. But sometimes you need to recharge. Made colcannon to go with my left over seven pounds of ham, played hours of games with friends. Good day.

Nano 2015 #27

~ tahenryauthoress ~ 3 Comments

Greetings on this post turkey day. I actually ended up at a retail location today. Gasp shock horror. See it went like this.

Dragged the kiddo out of the house by 9 to make write in. Returned home precipitously because kiddo gave himself a stomach ache chugging hot chocolate. Kiddo then asked for Sushi, I said there wasn’t time today. But the bug was planted in my head. Took kiddo to a Lego class and went to the local public library to write. Got some words in. Got some books for the kiddo and a copy of Inspector Gadget saves Christmas. It’s time to convert him to an appreciation of Inspector Gadget.

Then on the long drive home the word sushi reared it’s head in my brain for the fiftieth time since I told the kiddo no. Next thing I knew we were taking the sushi turn off. Placed our order and then needed to kill 15 minutes.  Kiddo being the savvy kiddo he is says, “We could go to the GameStop mom and let me play the demo games.” Yeah ok.

Which is how I found myself in a retail location on Black Friday. LOL

Words Today: 1666

Time: 2 hours

Total words: 42327

Est Comp Date: Dec 2. (how is that possible, 1919 to finish on time.)

 

Nano 2015 # 26 – Sort of

~ tahenryauthoress ~ 5 Comments

Good evening on this Happy Turkey Day. The reality is, I never much liked Thanksgiving. I don’t really like turkey for starters. And when I was a kid it was all about football. Don’t get me wrong I like football about as much as the next guy, especially when you factor in the next guy is my Dutch husband who only watches soccer. LOL

But as I got older Thanksgiving meant one thing to me, Black Friday ads. I loved Black Friday shopping. Getting up before the crack of dawn to go buy presents. Coming out of a store with baskets full of goodies as the sun rose in the sky. Some years we would be at home and I would leave the hubby in line for the electronic gizmo of the year and go forage into a store, returning occasionally to find Starbucks had been delivering courtesy coffee and muffins. Other years we would stay at my in laws and go to their shopping district which was so snazzy that Target was way too down market to have people in it. It was surreal, employees at the end of every other aisle asking if they could help you find anything. Then we would go out to breakfast.

Either way after a nap we would decorate our house for Christmas. Tree, lights, ornaments. The whole nine yards. Then we would curl up with a copy of White Christmas and wrap every present we bought.

But now it’s all for shite. Black Friday is ruined by even Blacker Thursday night shopping. It’s just wrong. It’s brought the sport down to the level of the common man. Anyone can shop with a belly full of turkey, it’s getting up at 4AM after playing cards with your in laws til midnight that makes a true champion. (laughing) My husband’s employer doesn’t give Friday off. (Bastards) And White Christmas is ruined by bad memories. (Don’t ask.)

So what’s turkey day for this year…well we went for a three hour hike. Took a family hot tub. I made a ham. We watched the Wild Kratts Christmas special. And now my husband and son are currently trying to beat Bowser in his castle at the end of the new Super Mario brothers game while I try to write 22oo words before bed. All the Christmas shopping is done. (except for me, my husband is a dawdler) All the presents are wrapped. (see previous parenthetical statement) The house will be decorated on Saturday in between write ins. And this year post decorating the house I think I’ll watch Lethal Weapon as my Christmas movie of choice. It feels appropriate.

 

 

Nano 2015 # 25

~ tahenryauthoress ~ 3 Comments

Tonight at write in we got to talking about how some years, the idea of Nano ending is just heart breaking. You want it to go on. You want the fun to go on. Last year in fact one woman and I kept meeting every Tuesday morning after Nano ended because we were so sad to see Tuesday morning write ins go. That and I am one hell of a cook and I always made her breakfast. LOL

This year, I can’t wait for Nano to end. I don’t even care if I make 50K at this point, I just want the pain to be over.

Some might argue I’m just having a bad day. But the thing is, until write in I was having a lovely day. I woke up to discover not only had my husband made me coffee but he had already walked the dog. I got to play Twisted Fish with my kiddo. I vacuumed the house, organized all his legos, and cleaned the oven so tomorrow when I’m baking the house won’t smell of smoke.  It was a good day. Home school was easy. Then we watched a fixer upper show together and took a nap. For a normal everyday day, it does not get any better than that. It just doesn’t.

And write in was fun. All except the trying to write part. That sucked. I just want the pain to be over.

Words: not enough

Time: Way too much

Total words: about 5K less than it should be.

Estimated Comp: sometime after I lose.

I am too tired to be objective at this point, so I will say goodnight, sleep tight, don’t let the editing bug bite.

Nano 2015 # 24

~ tahenryauthoress ~ 5 Comments

Greetings and Salutations from the Roadhouse. I love this place. I even love the drive here. No matter which way you go it involves a drive down a tree lined windy mountain road with the river rushing by on one side or the other.  I love the Makers Mark Bacon and Caramelized Onion fondue which comes with vegetables and fruit and oh alright I’ll admit it, French fries. It’s just warm and cozy and I always write well here.

Tonight was the happy hour write in. And there was easily a happy hour of chatting with V and S before we got down to brass tacks. But words were written by all.

Words Tonight: 2093

Time Spent: 3 hours at the write in but not all of it was spent writing. LOL

Total words: 36, 389

Est. Comp. Date: Back to Dec 3 (1945 needed to finish on time-good year)

Number of bizarre conversations overheard: 6,7,12, 54…oh I lost track. But it was definitely entertaining locals night at the roadhouse.

Excerpt:

“I assume you brought Matt to fill in those of us not in the inner sanctum on our legal position.” Board member #5 asked.
Matt nodded and cleared his throat. “Legally speaking, if Harold has embezzled a considerably amount of money from the country club accounts, you, as the board, could be held responsible.”
“Don’t we have insurance for this sort of thing?” Board member #7 asked in horror.
“Not against deliberate defrauding.” Matt calmly replied.
“How the hell did that happen?” Board Member #5 shouted.
No one answered. Dead silence dragged on.
“Someone made that decision Gregg?” Board Member #5 said.
Gregg sipped a small amount of wine before answering. I thought to myself he was stalling rather than actually wanting the wine. “Harold and I discussed it when he took the position and decided we could drop that rider from our policy and increase our accident coverage without substantially changing the cost to the club.”
“You decided? This wasn’t brought before the board for a vote?” Board Member #4 challenged.
Gregg shook his head shortly.
“And the legal ramification of that?” Board Member #4 turned to Matt.
Matt shrugged. “It would really depend on the wording of the board charter. But without seeing that my guess is that you are all still on the hook. This board is responsible to the membership. Everyone is being cagey about the financial ramifications but it looks like over a million dollars is missing. That’s enough to bankrupt this club.”
“I think that’s premature.” Gregg tried to interject but the rest of the board members were too busy exclaiming and starting to formulate sentences, arguments, or attacks.
I circled the table pouring more wine onto troubled waters, but my goal was not to soothe but to increase the tension until someone said something of value to the case.
I popped my head into the kitchen. Malin barely looked up from her notepad where she was scribbling notes and rubbing her nose in equal frantic measures. Interesting. I wondered if she knew she rubbed her nose when thinking hard. At least she’d look like Rudolph by the time we met back up with Spence later. I kept my laugh to myself and went back to the dining room to collect the lunch dishes before people started throwing them.

New Charactermalin.png: Malin Brody

The State Police Psychologist she is brought in to evaluate the responses of the board members when they find out a whole lot of money is missing. She also has a bit of a ridiculous crush on Spence. Drama, Drama.