Kicking drafts and taking names #amrevising #amwriting

Image by congerdesign from Pixabay

I’m trying to pry dirt from under my fingernails, so of course I run into the door to my writing office before I turn the knob. Damn. It’s a good thing I was distracted, because the moment I open the door the odor of fried food and stale beer, like the kind you can’t get out of your clothes after watching the game at a sports bar (I know, it’s been a while, but you still remember, right?), wafts past me. Part of me wants to turn around and go back to weeding, but I resist.

Yeah, I probably should have listened to that part.

“I understand a ‘Job Well Done’ is in order, love.” My Muse is standing in front of the whiteboard covering one wall of my office. His fried food cologne must be emanating from the rugby jersey he’s wearing. His khaki cargo shorts have a stain on one thigh I hesitate to identify. Deck shoes complete his ensemble. No socks. Nice calves.

“Where have you been?”

He adds a note to the homework criteria I wrote on the board. “Things are opening up. Outdoor seating, and now some indoor seating, but the weather’s too nice to be inside.”

“So, you and Mr. E went on a pub crawl. If you were sitting outside, why do you smell like a sports bar?”

He adds another note. “Do you know fryers smoke? Even outdoors.”

I swallow a snarky comment about fryers and Camels or Marlboros. “Let me guess. You and Mr. E sat downwind. Didn’t think to move?”

He hit me with his brilliant blue eyes, a brow arched. “You make it sound like there was somewhere else to sit. It was like everyone was coming out of hibernation. We had to wait in line at a couple places.”

That sounds about right. “I can’t believe you had to sit downwind of the fryer at every bar you hit.”

“Well, there was one where they didn’t set up the fryers outside.” He adds one more note, then snaps the cover on the dry-erase marker. “Well done, love. You finished your first round of revision.”

I stand beside him in front of the board. “Um, thanks, I guess.”

“You sound disappointed.”

“I wasn’t, until I dug into my homework assignment.” Plotting. This assignment, my last for the class, looks at the story plot points. I’ve been feeling a major lack of satisfaction with the story, even after I figured out the plot to begin with. When I dug into my homework, I realized why. “I need to adjust the plot. Like, a significant change.”

My Muse swaps the marker in his hand for a different color, and adds another note. “That’s a good thing. You found the problem now, rather than two revisions from now.”

“You could have said something earlier, like before I finished the first draft–correction, finished the first draft after seven false starts. Maybe I would have gotten through it faster. Like after only five false starts.”

He rests an arm around my shoulders. The smell of French fries assaults my nose. “You forget one thing, love.”

“What’s that?”

“You don’t always listen to me.” Before I can respond, he continues. “Besides, you got to feel like you accomplished something by finishing the first round of revision. There’s a lot to be said about feeling like you’ve made progress. It’s important for all writers, but especially for one who tossed out seven partially-finished first drafts.”

“So, you didn’t hammer me with the revelation until I finished the first revision? Do you know how much further I’d be if I’d figured this out sooner?” I’m so glad I’m taking this class, because I’m not sure how long it would have taken me to see the glaring weak spot otherwise.

“How much have you learned because you analyzed the plot for your homework?” He tosses the marker onto the sill of the board. “You know the story will be stronger because of it.” He squeezes my shoulders, then heads to the mini-fridge and pulls out a brewski. He points the bottle at me then the board before twisting off the cap and slinging it into the trash. “Get your homework finished so we can work on that other story. I have a few ideas.”

I’m sure you do. He’s right, I can see the places where the plot needs work, which is part of the process. I do find it frustrating to get through one round of revision before I have that head-slapping “DUH!” moment.

Come to think of it, I’ve had a lot of those “DUH!” moments with this story. Sheesh.

Now that I’m done with my first round of revision, once I finish my homework, I’ll move on to a different story for a few weeks to let Book 2 rest. After this class, I have one more to take to get my second badge and move one step closer to my writing certificate.

How is your writing coming along? Enjoy this last week of Spring before the solstice next week!

Lighten up!

Finishing up week 3 of working from home. And self-isolation. I feel like I should be following starship protocol:

Captain’s log 2020095: Icy drizzle and snow pellets today, like teeny snowballs. Cold. Windy. And still waiting out the statewide stay-at-home order. Supplies are okay; no need to ration yet. The crew is restless, but we have little choice but to resist the desire to wander.

Anyway, one thing people are doing during this whole thing to brighten things is put up Christmas lights. I love the idea; the lights are my favorite part of Christmas.

So, I have two strings up, and it does help with mood.

“Mood, maybe. Writing? Not so much.” My Muse grabs a beer from the mini-fridge and settles back into one of the two recliners in my writing office.

“I’m working on revisions.”

“You are, love. Considering you haven’t had to commute for the past few weeks, I thought you would be further along by now.”

“I finished my class. And taxes. And migraine days.” I grab my own beer from the fridge and drop into the other recliner. “I got some other stuff done.” Not cleaning, though. Actually, that’s on my list for this weekend, but I’m not going to tell him that. Better get it done before the weather gets nice and warm and beckoning.

“Other stuff that doesn’t include writing.”

“Other stuff that includes walks in the nice spring weather and … Hey, at least I’m not totally freaking out because I’m cooped up and distracted.” Just sort of freaking out. A little. Yeah, I’ll go with that.

“Uh-huh.”

He doesn’t sound convinced.

“Whatever. I’m working on revisions.” And resisting starting something that keeps poking at me. An urban fantasy. Maybe it’s because I’m waiting anxiously for the next Harry Dresden book–finally!

“You do not need to be distracted, love. You have a space. Use it.”

*Grumble* I do have a space. “My lights are in the common living area. I like my lights.” Especially these days. Maybe I can start working on my real writing office after I’m done cleaning, since my son isn’t here right now.

“Your son isn’t here now, love, but he is graduating in a month. Then what?”

He’s right. It’s not like the job market is screaming for people at this point. “He’ll move back home.” I love my family, but I miss my empty nest. By the time school is out I should be able to get the garden started, so I’ll have … wait. More distractions. Sigh.

“I’ll use my space more.”

“Not just for meditation practice, either.”

I started practicing meditation, but I’ve missed the past few days. “I know, I know. Once I finish going over the hard copy again, I’ll get back into the writing space routine.”

“Good.” He drains his beer and tosses the empty into the recycling bin. “And ignore the urban fantasy.”

“I want to write a story with a dragon.”

He focuses his brilliant blue eyes on me. “No. Fantasy. Finish book 2, your police procedural, and the rural mystery. Then think about fantasy.”

Ugh. He’s right. But maybe I can squeeze a short story in somewhere.

Anyway, I thought I’d share something a little different. This is Zoey when she wants to be petted. (If you have your volume up, ignore the banging and TV in the background. Hubs was making lunch.)

Zoey wants petting (Note: it’s on Dropbox, so just ignore the stupid “sign up for Dropbox” popup)

Enjoy! Stay safe and keep writing!

 

One week in and keeping up so far #nanowrimo #amwriting

It appears that you will have to put up with me writing the post again. I suspect you’ll hear from me every week for the rest of the month.

Hell, I’ll gladly write these posts if it means my writer is actually writing. As I type, Julie is in her recliner in the corner with her laptop on her lap, and headphones on. Hmm. I don’t hear any typing.

I don’t even think her eyes are open.

“Hey, Julie.”

I know she has noise-cancelling headphones, but she should still be able to hear me. *snaps fingers* “Hey, Julie.”

Bloody hell.

She doesn’t even react until I’m standing at the foot of the recliner. I grab her slippered foot.

“Hey!”

Heh. You should have seen her jump.

“What the hell?” she says.

“Were you sleeping, love? I’m not here to watch you sleep.”

She pulls off her headphones. “I wasn’t sleeping. I was thinking.”

“Oh, is that what you call it now?”

She rolls her eyes, then sticks out her tongue. As I expected. I’ve been her Muse too long for much of anything to surprise me.

“Hey, I’ve been writing. I’m keeping up. And I finally hit a spot where I can just write. I’ve been having trouble with the transitions. Which, come to think of it, you could help with. Since you’re my Muse.” She draws out the last in a way that makes me think of a snarky teenager.

“You are fecking lucky I know you so well, love.”

A knock at the door to her writing office interrupts. She sets her computer aside and goes to answer the door.

Sigh. I can feel the energy shift. I suspect my writer’s expected surge of words over the weekend is fading.

Julie closes the door and returns to her recliner. “Just because my daughter is home from school–which, by the way, I wasn’t expecting–doesn’t mean I won’t be able to make my word counts.”

“Remember that, love. And remember you are busy next week, so you have to get ahead in your word count this weekend.”

She grumbles. “Just finish the post already so you can help me concentrate.”

The end of the first week of NaNo. Three more weeks and 40,000 or so more words to go. Lovely. I might have to call in reinforcments. A book dragon, perhaps?

Sweaters, the spooky season, and a surprise #amreading #mnauthor

I was going to save the surprise for the end of the post, but I’m one of those people who shakes the present to try and guess what’s inside, so I moved the surprise to the top. You can thank me later 😀

One morning I got an email that made me do a double-take. Turns out, I entered my book in a contest (I did remember entering … eventually 😀 ).

Murder in Plane Sight won IAN’s Outstanding Mystery of 2019!

Okay, back to our regularly scheduled boring post 😀 😀

Have you broken out the sweaters yet? It’s time to do the ol’ seasonal outfit swap–pack away the summer shorts and T-shirts, and pull out the sweaters and mittens. Now’s the time to stock up on hot cocoa mix and mulling spice (with apple cider!).

Image by StockSnap from Pixabay

I have scraped frost from my windshield a few times already this season. It’s a reminder of what is to come. I don’t mind winter so much, up until the holidays, then I’m good with ending winter and opening the gates to spring. Of course, living in Minne-snow-ta means more than two months worth of winter. Try twice–no, three times that.

Okay, I do like winter, as long as I don’t have to drive in a snowstorm, or on icy roads. On the plus side, no weeding the garden, and a great excuse to stay inside where it’s warm and write.

All Hallow’s Eve is coming. That night kids look forward to. Dressing up is encouraged, and candy is the rage. Adults like Halloween, too. Have you noticed how many people decorate for Halloween these days? It’s almost like driving around looking at Christmas lights. with the inflatable lawn ornaments and the spooky haunted house setups in front yards , and even string lights. Sheesh. On the bright side, it’s warmer when setting all those decorations up than when you set up the outdoor Christmas stuff.

Image by PublicDomainPictures from Pixabay

The trees are shedding leaves like crazy, which is a bummer because they are so pretty when they are dressed up in yellows and reds and pinks and oranges.

And next on the agenda for a writer trying to get her butt in gear? NaNoWriMo! I am anticipating the marathon, and planning to use the excuse to focus on regaining the habit of writing every day (actually to avoid stuff like housework 😀 ). I have a few projects I want to work on, and wonder of wonders, hubs cleared some clutter from my old writing space (since I haven’t worked on organizing my son’s room yet), so I have a cave–er, I mean, a spot where I can hide out.

Have a great weekend! Get that yardwork done before the snow flies!

It’s over … mostly #gardening #minnesota #fall #autumn

Remember the snow from last week’s post? And I had to scrape frost from my windshield a day or two later. No, I didn’t cover anything this time.

How do you spell relief when you are a gardener in MN?

FROST.

Yep. Killed pretty much everything not related to cabbage. This picture is from the vantage of the potato bed. Not a great shot, because I dug potatoes weeks ago. It does look pretty desolate though.

The peppers and the zucchini are now wilty versions of their former selves, along with all the remaining bounty. It was a great year for peppers; I finally stopped picking them because, well, how many stuffed peppers can two people eat?

My seasonal favorites weathered the cold just fine.

brussels sprouts, kale, etc

kale, brussels sprouts, etc

I’m finishing off the last of the beets, and brussels sprouts are next on the menu, I think. Or kale. Or both. The sprouts did really well this year. I have had some already, but after a frost they tend to sweeten up a bit. Kale, too.

The biggest task now is to clean out the garden and till it. I like to take all the raked-up leaves (when I feel like raking them, because with a grove, it’s like cleaning up kids’ toys just before they roll through again; looks like you didn’t do anything 🙂 ) and dump them into the garden before we till it in.

We’ll leave the sprouts and kale alone. They’ll be fine for a while yet. Oh, and another bonus we get almost every year:

I suspect it’s the variety, but we usually get some berries in mid-summer, then another crop in fall, depending of course on how cold it is. The raspberry flowers are some of the few flowers still around for the bees. When I was picking peppers a couple weeks back, I checked out the raspberries. So many bees! I don’t think I’ve seen that many bees in one place all summer. They weren’t the European honeybees, though. They were wild bees, which are furrier then the European ones, but not as big as bumblebees. So. Cool.

The chickens are all laying eggs now, or at least most of them are. And the flock likes to follow us around; a couple of the black ones are really keen on being shadows.

Five of the seven: 3 black, one brown, one speckled

We keep discussing letting them out of the pen for a few hours (putting the dogs in the house, of course), but hubs said he heard a coyote during the day earlier this week. So, probably not letting the chickens out to roam. Not now, anyway. I feel bad because there isn’t any vegetation in the pen (hubs and son “re-landscaped” the area when they redid the pen this spring). I throw tall weeds in the pen for them; its’s a great use for those weeds that are too close to the garden fence to mow.

And more homework! I’m revising my next chunk of my WIP to send off to my writing teacher. I want to get the draft done before NaNo starts. A dream, unless I whisk off to an isolated cabin with heat, internet, wine, and chocolate for a week or two. Still, I’m going to try. Even without the chocolate 🙂

So, as Dory says:

Have a great weekend!