Wheee!  So I totally passed up buying a Beauty and the Beast novel that focused on a modern day version from the perspective of the beast - because I found a copy of Beauty by Robin McKinley! I check the Borders we do our weekly crit group at every so often to see if they have any other McKinley books in that I don't own already - and this week there were two copies of Beauty that were not there before! I was very happy.  And we finished the group early enough there was plenty of time to go wandering around.  Which considering it was Suzan, Linda and I was a bad thing.  I'm far too easily encouraged to buy - and Suzan and Linda are all too willing to suggest - especially Suzan!  I bought a book called The Princetta, which is a story about a princess turned pirate.  That's all I needed to know to buy it....

I'm very excited about what my fellow critique group is writing and I look forward every week to seeing their stories unfold.  I'm still focused on finishing The Barking Dog before I bring any more chapters, which means at best another month or two before I'm really ready.  But that's okay!

Progress is being made in that quarter as well.  I'm coming to the close of the section which will mark a big achievement in my opinion.  I hope that next month, despite my mom's race and the quickly populated weekends I will be able to write more focused than this month.

I'm still pumped from reading The God Engines and driving home I puzzled through some other points of the book that left me thinking.  It's a fascinating read!  I'm going to read another McKinley book, Spindle's End, next.  I'm starting to attempt to think through some of the other books on my shelves and put them in some sort of order of how I want to read them.  Of course I know I'll pick one up when I feel like reading it, but I should try to get through some of the others soon!!

So far this week is going by slowly, but I'm being very productive.  Wrote a bunch yesterday, got a lot of stuff done.  Finished one book, read another, wrote a really good chunk and set up the next, necessary bit.  I'm starting to think about the rest of the week.  Tomorrow night Amanda and I are going to church in Grand Prairie.  Thursday and Friday nights will be spent at home, I believe, during which I will clean and read and write in preparation for the weekend.  Saturday a bunch of us are going to TCC for a creative writing workshop and Sunday is craft day.  Lots happening, really exciting, and look - the Olympics are on!

Okay, so today is the year anniversary of all the new credit card restrictions.  Supposedly this is going to make the big, bad evil credit companies behave! Except.... things have only gotten worse.  Look, I know I don't even begin to understand all the rules and what's going on, but I do know that before all this mess I managed very well on my own.  Yes, I had a balance I was kicking myself about, but I was paying it off and the interest rate wasn't awful.  I'm not sure what it is now, it's something I need to do a little detective work and figure out, but things are getting stupid.  I paid off a credit card two weeks ago - or was it a week ago? Whatever! I paid it off, I'm so excited that I did! In another six months I'll have paid off another one and then it's time to tackle the black holes in my life; my two albatross birds.  However, credit rates and rules are going crazy.  I understand that in the long term this is supposed to be helpful, but right now it sucks and it's frustrating and I'd like nothing more than for it to all have never happened.

Next on the list.  Health care.  Excuse me Mr President, but we have a war going on.  Yes, I'm sure health care is very important, but in this economy, with a war going on, I think there are other things to worry about other than gouging me of every penny I have.  I'm literally dreading when we have to change insurance; seriously dreading it.  How much is it going to go up?  Will I be able to afford it?  What else is going to be up'd in price?

We're experiencing a terrible winter this year.  Tomorrow it's going to snow again and if we get the projected two inches of snow we'll have had the snowiest winter ever in Texas.  This means it's been cold here.  The winter is usually when I can get by with tiny heating bills and save up some extra money.  Not this year.  I'm paying as much, if not more than I did to cool my apartment.

I know I'm complaining, but all of these things are out of my control.  I can't exactly get the credit card companies attention, and if I could they wouldn't care.  The president doesn't care about little me, he's thinking about the country and the long-term plans.  And the weather sure as heck doesn't care!

Today is Monday, can't you tell?  I had a mostly sleepless weekend because of dreams and just not being able to stay asleep. I even went to bed early last night and I'm more exhausted today than I have been in a while.

Friday was loads of fun because I spent it with Amanda and we ate dinner with her family, saw Valentine's Day and got gellato at Piccomolo.  The down side was that a toddler ruined most of the movie and an older gentleman talked at us for almost an hour at Piccomolo.

I had a weird, terrible, horrible dream Friday night/Saturday morning that Amanda and I were kidnapped.  It was so bad that I text'd Amanda just to make sure she was okay....

Saturday was the writer's meeting - and we had a blast!  Might not be getting as much writing as I'd like to done at these, but they are so much fun!  I also found The God Engine, which I blogged about but have yet to read.

Sunday I went to church at my old professor's church, loved it, thinking I'll go back again.  After that I went to my parent's place and watched the Olympics with my dad and wrote. 

Tonight I hope to do some outlining work on some other projects and write a bit.  The end of Suspicion is so close! I can see it looming in the distance! ...and then I start Premonition.

Mostly, today's just a Monday and a blah one at that and I'm tired and whaaaaaaa~~~

Can I just say that seeing mounds of snow in Texas is still really weird?

Yes, I've been quiet the last few days; I don't know that I've had anything really to say about the last two days.  Well, I could have said something - I can stretch nothing out over a very long distance if I feel inclined to do it.  I'm gifted that way I guess.  (Yes, I will pretend my long-windedness is a gift, thank you very much!)

See, Monday was work-work-work-real-hard aaaannnnndddd go to La Madeline and write-write-write-omg-I-don't-feel-like-writing! And right when my battery was about to die I finally found the pace and figured out how to wrap up this problematic area.  Good job me.  Wait till you have to leave to figure something out!  Tuesday I had meetings.  Work meetings.  I got a new work project which I feel very confident about and can crank out without too much worry - which is nice.  I have this tendency to expect myself to do everything perfect the first time - which is impossible and unreasonable and silly.

I also listened in on Digital Book World's webinar while I was working on said project.  I'm in the office for a long time by myself, it's nice to hear voices sometimes. It was all about designing for the Kindle and ePub formats; fascinating even if I didn't understand half of it.  I discovered they're hosting something called The Round Table, which seems to be a weekly planned discussion of mostly the book industry.  I think I might try it out, see what it's like if only because it'll be interesting and there will be semi-live people.  I really don't mind being in the office alone, I'm really quite capable of being happy left alone, but occasionally it does get old.

I am disappointed in myself; I haven't done much knitting and I just realized this morning I'm really not doing well on the whole working-out thing.  It's frustrating but I'm going to try to remedy both issues.

Also, is it acceptable for me to not understand why non-Catholics participate in Lent?  I sort of get it, but honestly it means nothing to me.  I guess I should do some research to understand the why.  In college I had a very dear friend who would do Lent and last night at the critique group someone was ranting about what they're giving up for Lent (that ensued an entirely hilarious conversation, but not the point).  Maybe I just don't get it.  It seems like one big contest to see if you can go without your favorite addiction for 40 days.  Oh well, chalk it up to things I don't understand in the world. (Like fasting, I mean I understand spiritually the reasons, but at face value, the way most people approach fasting, I really would like to ask them what the point is.)

Circling back to the critique group.  I'm not sure what it is, but the last two weeks have been just crazy.  It's like we're all drinking the same cracked out water because the tangents we get on and how much we laugh - it's just unreal.  I guess that comes when you really like your company.

I've referenced her blog a few times, but Janice Hardy's Re-Write Wednesday blogs are just always great.  She did one today that touches on The Spit Shine of a novel.  She lists several groupings of words people either use too much or wrongly.  I don't need to do this now, I'm still working on putting words on the dang page, but later I think I will try to search out these different words and try their place in things.

So this recent onset of snow, snow and OMG MORE SNOW?!?!?!  left me with little to blog about because my face has been pressed against the glass watching these mysterious fluffy fat flakes of white stuff drift down from the sky.  This is Texas; we get anorexic pieces of hail and dare call it snow maybe once a year.  The last twenty-four-hours have provided a rare glimpse into what a real winter-wonderland is and the change on the landscape has been mystical - though it hasn't been without it's problems.  Had to cancel plans for the theater last night, wound up using my broom to literally sweep a foot of snow off my Jeep, and just getting out of the apartment complex was tricky simply because no one had been attempting it.  A silly person on the way into work decided to drive in all the turn lanes and then swerve in front of me several times; one time I was sliding because I was driving on snow and couldn't get traction to stop.  Idiot.  Oh well.  I drive a nice, big Jeep.  He would have been squashed had the light not turned green!

Okay, so Valentine's Day is coming up this weekend. I belatedly realized that I'm already planning on spending it with some of the most wonderful people I know; my parents.  We'll probably while away the afternoon just being in the same room, have dinner and then I'll go home, but it's what we do.  We aren't really an exciting family-time type of family, but they're my family and I love them.

I think that Valentine's Day doesn't really bother me - it's the people who feel that a day pledged to celebrating love is an excuse and a right to bemoan their singleness.  I think that's silly.  I think that people should really take advantage of V-Day and take the opportunity to tell people in their lives that you love them and that they're special.  Those are my thoughts.  There are more than a few people I'd like to tell them to stop being so selfish but I know it won't do any good.

I recently subscribed to John Scalzi's blog, Whatever.  I stumbled across his first chapter of his new book, God Engines. I read it. I need to read all of it. Why didn't I see this yesterday when I would have been at Borders? Boo! And here I am pleading to not buy any more books until I read a good chunk (5-10!!!! I promise!).  I'm grumbling about this decision but I'll stick to it for a little while longer.  I'm so intrigued by the idea behind the book that the first chapter reveals!  But I can wait.  I read Zeus yesterday, finished the Glass Castle last night, so now I want to read McKinley's Sherwood book and I'll probably go ahead and read Touch of Evil .... and then I have a whole shelf of stuff to pick from!

Ug. Blogger lost the last bit of my post.  So lets see.... I plan on writing some this weekend.  Surprise, surprise.  Get my bangs trimmed most likely.  Hopefully see The Lightning Thief and Wolfman.  And that's all I'm saying.

First up - the Write Your @ss Off Round Up!

I know a lot of people wanted to come and couldn't make it so we all pretty much stayed connected via twitter for most of the day, but two lovely ladies did come to my place and hang out for a stretch of a bunch of hours and write - and also entertained me by listening to me whenever I just had to talk.  I might need to warn people that I randomly interrupt people with tangents, weird thoughts or whatever.  I like talking to people!

My word-count total for Saturday was 3,501.  I had a lot of problems to work through so there was a lot of sitting there and staring off into space as I puzzled things out.  I continued through Sunday and wrote 5,688 on Sunday while everyone else was watching the Superbowl, for a weekend Write Your @ss Off total of 9,189.  I'm really happy with that number! I'm even happier with the ratio of where I'm writing what if you look at the numbers across the board.  I should probably include a snapshot of the excel sheet I'm tracking everything in so you can see exactly how crazy and micro-managing I'm being about this!  I only do it because I know I need to see something to help me change.

Okay, well, I'm not really sure I have much else to say other than writing stuff....  I didn't do much else this weekend.  Gee this isn't a very eventful blog.  Sorry!

The weekends make me sad because hardly anyone blogs - and then Monday there are a billion things to read.  I thought that Cornell DeVille's blog this morning on his continuation of Show vs Tell was great; I really need to read this over again later!!!  There's even a little contest going on that I think I might enter for the fun of it and the exercise!  Jane Friedman does a weekly Best Tweets for Writers and I tend to start following some people just because of what she's included in this weekly blog edition.  I just recently started following Janice Hardy's blog, and I'm so glad I am!  Today she did a bit called Ready, Set...Where's the Action?  Something I'm trying to do more of she underlines really well.  And lastly, it's Monday so that means Writing Excuses!!!! Their latest blog is on Roleplaying Games as Tools for Storytelling.

Yes, more book talk.  So almost right after I posted my last blog where I bemoan my writing - I read Janice Hardy's weekly Re-Write Wednesday blog entitled, The Frankendraft.  Now, this actually helped me to see that my story isn't buried, it's still plainly obvious - to me of course - and I don't see it as having some of the other bits she talks about - so maybe there's hope for me yet!  It's a little encouraging at least!  However, yesterday was all about indulging in a semi melt-down/pity-party about how terrible I was doing and woe is me, I should be doing something else!  I laid down around 11 on Wednesday night, got comfortable - and then - EUREKA! I had a brilliant idea I should have had ages ago when writing the first draft. I even twittered about it! And then I promptly cuddled up to my pillows to go to sleep.  Except then I was too consumed by the idea to do anything else.  In short, I got up and wrote until 2am.  I was very tired, please excuse the randomness as I tend to keep a blog in edit until I feel like posting it. This one happens to cover three days.

On another topic... I need to get my bangs trimmed, but the idea of sitting down in a chair while someone waves scissors around my head gives me nightmares of what happened last time.  They're just bangs - right?  I'm not ready to trust someone with the rest of my hair; I just want my bangs trimmed. Oh - well then I think I might need an eyebrow wax too.... Blarg - being a girl is expensive!!!

So I'm still reading through The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo and I keep wanting to scream at it.  I find myself not caring about the MMC and really only about the bits on the FMC - unfortunately 3/4's of what I've read are about the character I don't particularly care about. Grrrrr!  At least last night she came into a more prominent role.  I'll save my other thoughts for my book review.  [edit] Finished last night. I want to burn the book.

I'm currently sitting at my desk wondering what reason I could have to try making Bakerella's new Oscar Cookies. OMG they look so YUMMY!

And yet more book drama - Macmillan takes a shot at Amazon in an add for a new book with the bottom text saying Available Everywhere Except Amazon!  Other book publishers are joining in on the whole mess and a friend and I have started a GoogleWave to keep a semi organized chronicle of all the stuff that's going on because - well - I'm a drama whore.

OMGOMGOMG - This just made my Friday! Robin McKinley shared the new cover of her upcoming book, Pegasus.  I'm super excited!!!!

Today did not start out well.  I woke up at 7:28 and freaked out. I usually leave my apartment between 7:30 and 7:35.  Today is also the start of a new class.  Today was not a good day to be late.  On top of this my clothes were either damp and still in the dryer or still in the washer because silly me didn't get home in time last night to do anything but catch some evening news and read some stuff and go to bed.  Also, weirdly, I wore my socks to bed and the elastic on the ankle/calf part was so tight I think it bruised me.  Oh - and I'm wearing a dress and forgot to shave my legs - but thank goodness it's one of those maxi-almost-floor-length dresses so if someone wants to stare at my ankles they'll see I didn't shave.  Sorry. I was sort of running late this morning.  *sigh*

Okay, so I don't remember whose blog I read it on but it is vastly true that the recent mess with Amazon and Macmillan is really hurting the authors that fall under the M-Umbrella.  There are a number of people who discuss that at length and much better than insignificant me will, however, I can tell you about what I'm going to do!  I went through their website today, more specifically the new releases and I've picked out - oh - seven book - I want.  Now I can't possibly buy seven new releases, I'm scraping the bucket this week, but I can buy two or three to do what I can to help out.  The ones I really want are Zeus: King of the Gods, a graphic novel by George O'Connor to feed my current Greek mythology addiction.  It's not really a brand new release; it was released in January, but I figure the guy still needs sales.  I used to read a lot of historical fiction; not so much anymore unfortunately.  The Forgotten Legion by Ben Kane looked interesting and promising, so it has a big star by it's name.  And, to feed another guilty pleasure - a vampire novel; not just a vampire novel, but a vampire and werewolf novel!  Touch of Evil by T. Adams and Cathy Clamp.  Hey - it's research to see if I really want to keep shelving my vampire story idea!!

The stupid thing torments me.  Yesterday I had some great ideas for it that I wrote down on my little notepad and filed away to type up later when I have time.  I also had some good ideas for some other stuff, but none that irritate me like a story I don't think I want to write because everyone is writing vampire stories!  At least this morning while driving to work I came up with a really neat twist to another idea I've had, but started out as a fanfic idea I couldn't write because the author expressly says on their website: do not write fanfics!  So I'm really happy to have worked it so it's new and original but with the same overarching issues and problems.  The new ideas I had for it are super nifty to me at least and I like them so I'll scribble them down and file them away for later.

I am seriously considering starting on another project that maybe a short story or a short novella length work.  It's romancy in nature, which is strange for me, but is very Christian in nature and is derived from a huge game of "What if....?" that I played once with someone I used to know.  I have struggled with how similar the FMC is to me and how to make her less like me - but I don't know that I can and not completely change aspects of the story.  Then again I have to accept that the idea came from my own personal, on the fly decisions about what I think I would choose to do if certain things happened to me.  Going to snag a few people for brainstorming help on this one and see where it takes me.

Is it just me, or am I slowly starting to just talk about books and writing ideas and stuff?  I really do other things.... Like tonight I'm going to church!  I just stand at a computer and check kids in and hand them an adhesive name-tag and smile and say something witty (if I'm lucky) but more often than not I'm just hopelessly silly.

Oh hey! I just realized today that the Super Bowl is sometime this weekend.  Wow....

And yet MORE drama! Well, it was coming eventually.  So far I've only seen one tweet about it and two articles from Cult of Mac, nothing that puts things in concrete terms to me - yet.

Annnddd now I've typed my lunch away.  Today is getting better!!!

Bah!

I'm having one of those not-so-happy nights.  As I read through bits of my novel, I know I can write better than what I'm currently doing.  Really!  I've seen me do it before! But -- it's not good.  Or at least I'm at a point where I reread stuff while the critique group is reading it and all I can think is OMG this is utter crap!  Yeah.  And then I groan and wonder why in all that is sane in the world am I still plugging away all determined like at this project.  It's a wolf-by-the-ears situation; I really refuse to let go because I'm determined to finish the thing. 

Maybe I just need fresh eyes on it now that I've had some critique and revised the first bit of it to get another opinion.  I'm just not sure what to do.  I have two friends who have said they will read through what I have and give opinions.  I'm just frusterated with myself and having a pity-party tonight.

Also wondering if maybe I should set revision aside and work on a short-story or something this week and then come back to my novel with fresh eyes.  Hmmm, I'll make a decision tomorrow after I've slept on it.

Okay, so as relaxed as my weekend was - this was not so in the rest of the world.  I'll touch on that in the end.  :)

Friday - hockey game - we won!!! Spent this with my friend Amanda.

Saturday was like... make up for all of the time I haven't made the edits my critique group suggested.  I spent the day at Barnes and Noble critiquing and rewriting stuff.  I wrote about 4K, added some really nifty stuff and am still very excited about my writing process. Oh - and I bought books.  Yes, I know I said I shouldn't - but I did!  I bought Becky Levin's book The Writing & Critique Group Survival Guide (this time I smartly copied and pasted that, because even though I try, I keep getting the title wrong!  I'm sorry!!!!)  I also got Sunshine and I think Rose Daughter... Crud. I can't remember!!!!!!  Oh well, both Robin McKinley books!  Other than that, I didn't do anything really useful Saturday; just reading and writing - but I loved it!

Sunday was mostly a useless day. I took out the trash! And did dishes! Watched 500 Days of Summer and went to a hockey game - again - only we lost this one  :(

Today I need to be very useful.  I need to do laundry, change the Chinchilla cage, clean, clean and clean, and hopefully revise and pretty much rewrite the next scene because I had some great ideas for it.

I have also decided I dislike my planner. I want a small monthly view calendar and I want to be done with this almost useless one I have now.  I think I saw one at BnN that fits what I want that if I get everything done as I need to this week, I just may treat myself to.  Ug - and have I mentioned that buying into the BnN membership thing has made me want to go and use it more? Because I really do need to make sure I get my money's worth!!!!

This week should be the normal type of busy.  Tonight being domestic, with some knitting time thrown in, tomorrow Critique Group, Wednesday church Thursday the Book Club - where I give my unfavorable review of the book everyone else loved and I - ah - didn't, and Friday I hope to hang out with people, go to movies and clean like crazy for Friday - because Saturday is Write Your @ss Off Day!!!!!

And on to the DrAmA!!!!!!!

I think I've become a real-life-drama-nut.  Like, I really like reading about crazy stuff that really happens, except this news isn't really the giddy type, it makes me sit back and grimace and think.  The thing this weekend is the whole Amazon vs Macmillan debacle, which can reasonably be said to happen as a result of Apple debuting the iPad.  Everyone has an opinion, everyone thinks this way or that; I'm erring on the side that neither are really right, but I agree far more with Macmillan than Amazon.  Now, you can read the full release from Macmillan here on the free edition of Publishers Lunch.  And then there was Amazon's rebuttal and subsequent removal of all Macmillan titles.  Nathan Bransford posted a blog this morning explaining the whole mess; he always has a lot of really good stuff to say and plays connect the dots with stuff.  I thought Scott Westerfeld posted a really interesting and insightful blog about the whole mess, and I think I agree with him on most points.  However, over at Fiction Matters, they posted an article that is more favorable to Amazon.  I'm sorry, but I just have a hard time with the seller dictating the price of what the publisher can sell their product for.  All in all, I'm reading everything and it's fascinating! If it also makes me sad.

Anyways, lunch is over!  Still plugging away at Girl w the Dragon Tattoo!

OMG - I needed the relaxedness of last night so bad!  I got home and yes, I preped dishes for the dishwasher, and I did a few other things, but mostly I just did a little exercising time, watched a movie, some writing and I did my first ever card embroidery!

I talked about it a few days ago - but another opportunity to do it came up when someone close to me had to have a sudden surgery. I've made the card, but I still need to cover the stitching on the inside with something which requires glue... which I don't have.  UG!  But I'm really happy with my first card embroidery.  It's simple, but cute and made made.  I'll probably do one or two more like this and maybe change the dimensions so it'll fit in a normal envelope.  I tried an overly complicated design first, and then went for this simple text and daises.  If you do too much you start forgetting which line goes with which dot and then it's all messed up!

I'll be starting my next one probably this weekend and hopefully sending it out soon as well since it's for an upcoming event that I'm being all say-nothing about.  :P

This weekend should be a lot of fun. Despite the crazy weather, my friend and I will be going to the Stars game tonight.  I'm really excited!  Not only do I get to go to a hockey game, but I get to go with my best friend!  I'm going to take a lot of pictures this time, of us and the game and hopefully they do really well tonight!  But if not - we're going on Sunday too!  I'm hoping to get a lot of writing and revision done on Saturday, as well as a load of domestic things.  Maybe I'll even fix the darn vacuum cleaner.

I absolutely have to register for the Writer's Conference tonight or tomorrow! Must-Must-Must!  I'm excited because several people I know and adore are going so even though I'll probably be a wallflower, I'll still have fun!  It also puts some more pressure on me to finish my novel.

I'm looking at the big picture of writing The Barking Dog and I'm considering cutting a huge portion of the Premonition section at the beginning that's just yet more stuff, more stuff, more stuff. I'm thinking I may just cut to some big action and allow the reader to get backstory details through flash-backs or filler paragraphs. Not sure.  I still have several chapters to go before I get to that section and by then I think I'll have a lot more of an idea where I want to go - or at least I hope so!  I won't cut anything at the moment, I'm still fleshing out the beginning and working on that.  I'm altering some of the plot so that more of the major stuff comes in at the beginning instead of later on.  Really, I am very much excited about it all.  I like my story, I think there are probably some areas I could do better on, but I'm learning and I'm continually doing better!

I swear stuff costs more than it did two years ago when I moved out on my own for the first time.  A dollar doesn't buy what it used to - which sucks considering no one is making more than they used to.  I probably need to sit down and evaluate where I spend what and reign in some of my spending and redirect it better, or something.  It's frustrating and I have to do better.  I'm not broke, but neither am I saving as much as I wanted to.  I'm probably also my own worst enemy when it comes to spending and impulse buying.  I don't know if I know how to say no to me sometimes... This is probably a very dangerous thing.

Today was a really successful writing day.  I totally plowed through chapter 2 and came up with some stuff I really liked.  The critique group really helped me see an opening I missed for inserting more world info.  Tomorrow I'll work on editing that and get the whole bit over to my friend who is doing beta reading for me.  It's really exciting.  I just hope I can keep this up. 

So Paperback Writer suggested this interesting site today that makes up words. This could be very useful for when I need to make stuff up in writing and just need a quick word!

Now, I think I've mentioned this but I'm going to the DFW Writer's Conference.  Well, Inky Girl tweeted today this blog entry about Conference Tips from Jane Makuch.  I really need to finish my manuscript and work on a short this-is-what-my-book-is-about.

Anyways, short blogging day!

See, after last week I knew this weekend would be a lot of fun - and I was right!! I love it when that happens.  ^__^

Friday I went with a friend to see Legion.  Now I wanted this movie to be good.  I know, I know - it was doomed from the moment you put an angel on it and expected me to take it seriously.  However, the first 3/4's of the movie I thought were done really well and though not exactly believable, were good and entertaining and drew you into the story.  That last 1/4 with the angel-car-chase and weird moment-on-the-mountain were.... like from a completely different, cheesy movie.  I liked the characters, even if they were a bit predictable.  Jeep gets my favorite character award for simply being named Jeep!  I liked his character, even if I thought he was foolish at times.  For the most part, I really liked and thought the characters and setting worked.  The plot wasn't even that bad - the dialogue during the last bit, however, killed it.  When an audience laughs during what should be the most poignant moment of the film - well - you know something wasn't done well.  My biggest beef with the movie - the name.  Legion was the name of a demon and I was totally ready for some demon interaction - which I didn't get.  Hollywood should have done a little more research and given it a better, more fitting name.

Saturday I made cake-pops (I have pictures... I will probably do a follow-up cake-pop blog because I have 20 more pops to dip that we didn't do Sunday. I should have been more like, hey lets all do an activity! CAKE-POP TIME!) and cleaned and did shopping stuff.  I also went out with some friends to Trinity Hall, which is always an awesome experience! And I saw my first karaoke!  I remember vagely having really bad karaoke at SAGU, but I never hung around or participated in it.  This was an interesting experience though.  Small room, lined with couches, and a big tv that played random Korean tv with the lyrics to whatever songs they pulled up.  It was fun!!  (even if I was a wallflower....)

Sunday was mostly cleaning and reading Recorded Attacks until people came over around 2:30 and we started knitting and crocheting and watching movies.  I think we watched Dr Horible's Sing-a-Long Blog, Star Trek (the new one), Connie and Carla, and Howel's Moving Castle.  I did a big chunk on the scarf I've been working on, which is good since I'm getting bored of it!!  I don't know that I want to do another circularly knitted scarf again.

So I'm getting head aches, and I think it's due to my eyes.  I need new glasses/contacts and I haven't done anything about this issue yet. I have one more set of contacts to go through and then I'll get my eyes checked.... I'd better switch contacts soon and make my appointment.  This whole hard-to-focus-on-stuff is a pain.

I look back at the last week and I failed doing some things I had hoped to get done.  So this week I will be more proactive!  First, I'm sort of excited about this one, I'm going to try my hand at embroidering cards.  I got the idea from the What Katie Does blog, which if you're a fan of tshirt surgery, you probably know her website, Oh My Stars.  I went through a phase in college where all the shirts I wore were taken apart and put back together in interesting ways.  Some better than others!  Anyways, I must refrain from saying more on this project until it's reached the recipient since I think there's a slim chance that person might read this.... *waves*  I will, however, update with pictures later!

[edit] I'm actually going to see about making a get-well card tonight after writing if I can grab the materials.  My boss had an emergency surgery this weekend so I'll make a card. I printed off one design and punched it out during lunch and then looked at the pattern... and realized I couldn't make heads or tails of it! Need a simpler something I think!

This week I want to eat at home more.  Except for Tuesday because it's impossible.  I have more than enough food to feed myself this week and I don't need to go out and spend money on food that is more fattening and less healthy than what I have at my apartment.  And I bought blueberries! YUMMY! I have a tub of that plain, vanilla yogurt.  Vanilla yogurt + blueberries = YUMMIER!!!!

I also failed last week on editing on my 2nd chapter of The Barking Dog.  Granted it's a huge undertaking because the chapter was ginormous but it still needs to be done and I totally dropped the ball in favor of other things, so this week I will redouble my efforts to not only edit that but write some more and do some more chapters in the Writing Magic book.  Most of my writing numbers have been either in my blog or rp related things this week, which is not what I wanted, but it was a really stressful week so I will forgive myself a little.

Also, I didn't do anything this last week.  I stayed up too late and struggled to get out of bed and just get to work last week. I want to try to get in bed reasonably this week and get up in the morning and do the whole Wii thing.  It makes me feel more productive about my day, even if it is only a little bit of exercise.  I should do it!

Alright, I have successfully rambled through my lunch of leftover lasagna from yesterday and will now proceed to muddle through the red items in my email in-box....

So if I dared to think that yesterday was a crazy mess of stuff - today was worse.  Because it's work stuff I'm not really going to explain it except that by noon I was considering how nice and isolated the space under my desk looked, but by 3pm I could see a promising light!

I even picked Practical Demonkeeping up again during lunch for some mindlessness and discovered - the second chapter and third were much better than the first! I'm starting to have the feeling that's how Fluke has to be - because I've heard such good things about it! ....but the first chapter...I can't finish it! I may just have to jump to the second.  I don't anticipate finishing it today as I have a nice little laundry list of things I would like to do.  Like dye my hair, put the frelling Christmas tree away, clean the bathroom and the sink area (maybe scrub the tub!), actually put laundry away (what a novel thought!), cook a freaking meal for the first time in a while, change out light-bulbs so I can see in my bedroom and do something about the pile of jewelry on my dresser and the shoes at the foot of the bed.

And something has to be done about the rabbit.  I swear all she does is DRINK and PEE, which makes things SMELL.  And now she is at my place indefinitely.  Oh my.  Well, something will have to happen because I need to de-smell my place for the Crafty Day on Sunday.  She might have to hang out on the patio on Sunday.  I swear I change her cage twice as much as I do my Chinchillas and it still smells.

--

The next day.....

This is sort of like two blogs in one since I - ah - forgot to finish this yesterday! I went home and promptly began a systematic method of being lazy and having bursts of energy and doing something.  My hair is dyed, the bedroom has light in it again, I cooked, the Christmas tree is disassembled and ready to be put in a box .... Now I just need some serious deodorizer for my place and to maybe, finally figure out what's wrong with the vacuum cleaner! I think it needs to be taken completely apart... I'm thinking I may need to take it to a vacuum repair place. Do they have those in the city?  I can't find anything on yelp.com and I've taken apart all the pieces I know how to take apart and it's still not working.  Ug!

At least today seems to be looking better than the rest of the week - as far as work goes.  Everyone is happy, things are going well and I'm so happy about that!  Tonight I'll go see either Legion or Book of Eli at the movies and bake cake for more cake-pops.  Saturday is National Pancake Day so I'm thinking about setting up shop at an IHOP and eating pancakes and doing some much needed revision.  Well, I say much needed because besides Monday I haven't had any time to work on it at all! So sad.  :(  And I'm at a funny part too!  I decided on some motivation for the FMC which will be better than her just doing stuff just because.

Oh, and sometime over the last week I wrote my 100th blog... And I didn't even realize it! I should have had a blog party or something, or made a nice little speech. Oh well!

Ug - I have a headache and it's lunchtime and I'm not eating.... what's wrong with me?

This has been an enjoyable weekend.  Origionally I was going to be volunteering for church and thus the entire weekend would have most likely been a blur of which I would only now be returning home to collapse into bed until tomorrow.  Instead, Friday I went with my friends to see Leap Year; a new romatic comedy about a girl who goes to Dublin, Ireland to propose to her boyfriend and meets an Irish man who - well - I'll let you play connect the obvious dots.  Cute, funny, but most of all I liked the question the Irish man posed to the girl.  If a fire happened and you had sixty seconds to grab whatever was most important to you - what would you grab?  And she learns the truth.

Saturday was a day of accomplishments! I got up and did stuff, I seem to recall washing some dishes and writing a bit before heading out to the mother-ship of Half Priced Books in Dallas where I quite literally walked around lost for about an hour before the rest of the year-round-writing-group showed up; by this point I had a stack of six books and was walking around rather wide-eyed.  They politely collected me and we seized some tables in the meeting room and set to - well - socializing.  I was a bad participant and spent half of the time talking to Suzan and Criss, found out about this program called SuperNoteCard..... I feel like my plotting life has just grown simpler by leaps and bounds!!!!! I even managed to finish rewriting all of chapter one!! I'm so excited about that - I feel like with chapter one done, I can go through the rest of it!  I even made a half-hearted attempt at starting chapter two, got a little ways into it and stalled - there were more books to go look at!!

I bought the following:

• The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini - I've heard things about this book, seen it everywhere, might as well read it, right?
• The Stupidest Angel by Chris Moore - yes, another Moore book for my shelf.  He's so funny!  I'm going to save this for after NaNo this year.
• Grim Tuesday by Garth Nix - I bought the first book in this series and have yet to read it.  It was only $2.50 so I couldn't see why I shouldn't buy it.
• Swords of Ice and Other Tales of Valdemar AND Crossroads and Other Tales of Valdemar both edited by Mercedes Lackey - Okay, I'm slightly addicted to the world of Valdemar, not going to lie, and I haven't even seen these anywhere else.  Figured it was worth it!
• The Wish, Ella Enchanted and The Two Princesses of Bamarre by Gail Carson Levine - These will all be quick, easy reads, but really good I think.  She's such a good writer!

Gotta love HPB!

Today has been a lazy day.  I'm slowly cleaning with the goal of eventually going to Wal-Mart and getting something to store wrapping paper in and get the tree down finally.  I'm still working on the same scarf, taking it as I go.  I unfortunately realized Friday that my Netflix were all still on the coffee table - and have all been watched with the exception of one I'm really not interested in watching.  I thought I sent them off like Tuesday - but apparently I have failed myself!  *sigh* Whatever will I do!!  Maybe go see Book of Eli tonight.....

I finished the birthday scarf! And I can show pictures off because, well, this friend doesn't know about my blog and even if she did I'd still be excited about actually finishing a project this year!  LoL!! See - I do stuff besides read and whine!!  It's red, not pink like the picture kinda makes it out to be.  It's silly how excited I was to stick the completed picture up on Ravelry and move the status bar to 100%.  This maybe the new motivator for finishing projects.....  I'm working up on the stripy scarf for my other friend who may or may not ever actually get it.  He asked me to make him one when I was in a really good mood and I found yarn I liked so I started.... I like the scarf, I'm knitting it on those round, circular needles and the yarn's nice and soft.  I'm not exactly motoring on ahead on that project, so I'm toying around with the idea of some others and looking forward to the 24th and the crafty day!!  I think I need new yarn..... And apparently I have a free weekend!!!!

I keep going to start revising and.... I don't.  I just don't revise at all.  I do nothing.  It's bad.  I need to do something about it but I'm not sure what.  I'm still sort of stuck on what I'm doing and without an identifiable goal, well, I'm a bit listless.  That was written this morning.  I had a long conversation with a friend of mine and he read what I'd revised, as well as what I'd rewritten and we decided that the rewritten was aimed in the better direction and was just more engaging so I believe I have a bit more direction now, though it's still a daunting task.  Since I suddenly have my weekend free I will see if I can't encourage someone to go to a  movie tonight and the rest of the weekend will be spent completing chapter 1.  I am more encouraged by this, but in the manner and style I'm writing now all three books will just be sections of the same book....if that makes any sense..... Oh well - hopefully it does and will and I can plow through this with grace and poise and come out with something decent on the other side!!!!

Okay, so after the critique group I'm accepting that I really can't just fudge around some of the words to make it all work out - I need to actually rewrite most of it.  Keep the text open in one window and rewrite in another, like new yWriter project.  It's depressing - because it's a lot of work - but at least I know that now and I can prod myself into working on it more and more studious.  I had other people make up my mind for me!  Well, they didn't say anything about just needing to start over, that's not how the group is, but based on some of the feedback I think it would be more beneficial to revise the manuscript that way.  Follow the lead of what I originally wrote and write it all fresh, sparkly and new.  However, this will mean entire chunks of time I must disappear and rewrite the blasted thing.  I'm also struggling again with whether or not Suspicion has enough meat to stand on it's own frail little legs or if I need to cut out some fluff and smash all three back together and plow through it all.  I'm back to squirming over this and complaining to myself and I'm probably going to agonize over the whole mess a lot so please feel free to ignore all of this ramble because I still haven't eaten breakfast or taken anything.  (This was written Wednesday morning....)

Now, this bit is written Thursday afternoon....  I'm still nowhere near certain about what I should do about this problem.  I rewrote the bit I took to the critique group but I'm at a point where I'd like someone or someones to bounce ideas and worry off of but I don't know if I want to take it out on my poor critique group who has several of us who are agonizing over stuff as it is.  *sigh*  I need my own personal editor I can bemoan the what-if's to and force to read three different versions of the same scene. I will take applications after this blog.....

For some reason I thought that I could get up Wednesday morning and do a measly 20 minute exercise - nope.  Woke up and my pounding head said No Moving.  I'm not going to church tonight; my head is rebelling enough I wish I hadn't worn my contacts at all.  I think I will spend tonight shuffling around my apartment cleaning. Yes, cleaning.  The whole place is a dump and in need of serious cleaning, like scrubbing and cleaning.  I also need to do something about the dear little rabbit; I call it the dear little rabbit because I'm tempted to call it other not quite so nice things.  Thursday morning was a bit kinder to me so I'm hoping that Friday will be very nice to me indeed and let me do some exercise since I seem to be doing well.

I've managed to clean up my kitchen and fix my vacuum cleaner the best I know how.  It's still spitting out some stuff but it's by far much better than it was.  I apparently accidentally sucked up some of the rabbit bedding which did nothing more than clog up the hose and I had to unscrew all the little plates so I could get to this clog of recycled, puffy stuff.  Not sure what I'm going to do about this problem; it's rather perplexing.  Not sure if people plan on coming over tonight, but I do plan on cleaning more and actually cooking dinner.  I may have the weekend free after all, which would be super, as I want to clean, clean, clean and finish this scarf and work on some more revision. Did I mention I'm taking applications to be the confessor of all my revision nightmares??  At this point I'm really not kidding.

Some people are ridiculous and I want to start rambling about true Christianity but I think that Don Miller really does say it all best when he addresses what Pat Robertson said about Hati suffering it's just desserts.  You read that right.  Plus, I've just about decided that Don Miller has to be one sexy man if only for how he thinks about things because often times I feel the same way.  Would it be weird if I twittered at him and asked him on a date?  Yes, yes it would and I'll stop letting revision drive me crazy - in like a month or two.

Blogs, Books, Stuff.... Rick Rioden - you know the guy I've been talking about for a bit? Well the cover for his new series is up here.  I will be hungrily awaiting the paperback!  I think we all know that I have developed a taste for real-life drama, and I have to say I feel sorry for Moonrat after this blog where she recounts a conversation with one of her authors.

I think I'm done for the day on this blog. I'm sure I could talk about other things, like my twitter obsession, how much I've been reading or how the cold weather has given me nosebleeds, but it all comes back to trying to figure out my revision and how to tackle it....  *sigh*

I think it's pure stubbornness I'm wearing my dress today.  I bought it before Christmas but it was just too cold and pointless for me to wear anything other than jeans to work.  It's a brown dress, which is even more pure novelty considering I don't particularily like brown or wearing it - but this one has a design of blue colored teardrop and semi-nike-swish things that go absurdly well with my blue cashmere sweater that - well - I kinda felt super compelled to buy it.  And thankfully the weather is copaerating and it's warm enough to wear it so today is a good day.  I'm also feeling much better!  I think that tomorrow I will push myself to get up and exercise.  I put it off on the weekend and yesterday for not feeling well at all, but I think tomorrow morning I will be pretty well off.

Last night I lay awake in bed and contemplated a new prologue for Suspicion and I penned out a few paragraphs I think I will have the critique group read.  I'm rather thrilled with the idea as well as expanding the novel to include various bits from other characters perspective other than the female main characters.  I think it will help the reader fully understand the complex plot that was just lost on the first draft.  Lots of nothing happened and then in a few thousand words everything happened and left even my head spinning for how in hades it all came to a point besides the fact that green is a very suitable color.

I was reading Brandon Sanderson's blog, oh my, yes - blogs, and the whole thing about his books being made into movies intreigued me.  I've sort of been forcing myself to ignore that he writes anything other than Wheel of Time but I do believe I will have to read his books, and at the current rate I am devouring printed pages of stuff I should easily be able to do that - later this year.  Heck, I started Robin McKinley's book The Hero and the Crown last night; I probably haven't read it since Jr High.  I can't believe I haven't read it between then and now - it's such a crime!  I will probably also finish it tonight or today or something impossible like that because I just could not sleep despite how exhausted I was so why not read?  (and of course between the time I wrote that line this morning and now after work, I finished the book.)

Perhapse I need to be interested in thicker books.  Then I would spend more than three days reading it.  It's a little exciting to move on from a book so quickly, but it's also a bit of a let down.  I wish they lasted me longer, but I am glad to have read them.  I'm going to force myself to hold off reading The Blue Sword until tomorrow.  I believe my current plan is very much to not go to church tomorrow because my fever has yet to leave me and the headache is still permanently wrapped around my head so that even after ingesting drugs to dull it - it's still just there outside of sight and hearing like.

So I leave work very soon and I'm going to go on to the Borders where we have critique group at instead and probably eat some soup at McAllisters and piddle around on the next scene of Suspicion and force myself to be yet more productive today.  Ug, and I must also get food for that little varmet the rabbit - and it needs fresh bedding.  I ached and hurt so bad last night I almost didn't clean the Chin cage, but I did.  I don't have the right bedding for the rabbit.  The rabbit gets expensive, absorbant stuff.  That's what happens when the animal actually sits in their bedding; they get the better stuff.  My Chins, who have a tray that slides out of the bottom of their cage, can have cheapy crushed corn stuff that absorbs and whatnot and so long as I am mindful of changing it every few days works rather well.  However, I'm starting to feel that their cage isn't getting really clean and I'd like nothing more than a chance to hose it down and scrub it - but where do I put the Chins while I do this?  I'm pondering over this question and browsing CraigsList.  People are bound to have cages they don't need anymore, what with small children learning the responsibility of an animal isn't all that glamerous.

Woohoo! Third morning in a row I've managed to get my arse up and out of bed and do a 20 minute work out!  I'm proud of myself. And I'm actually startled that I'm feeling it in my legs; it's a really light work out, I have no illusions about getting an awesome, toned body.  I do hope to drop a bit of the weight I gained ....wait, I almost said this... last year.  Yikes. Last year.  I still sort of forget the magnitude of an entire year passing; I'm sure it'll hit me later.  According to the Wii I've lost a little over half a pound in the last three days.  I don't believe it.  If in a week I'm still decreasing, well then I'll own up to loosing half a pound, but I seriously find any results this quick to be suspect.

Last night I started a master plot matrix for Suspicion and .... dare I say it? I'm getting excited about revision.  Excited - yes! I can't wait to rewrite that first scene because I know I can do it better; I know a better way to incorporate more details than I did last time, to introduce the reader to the world better, earlier on besides the first blunt detail...

I probably won't get to that until Saturday, if not Sunday - and perhaps not even until next week.  Tonight I'm going to get off work, run home and get my nice, warm hoody and go to BandN and read the Olympian book, and buy Redeeming Love, our book club book I thought I bought off of Amazon.  I've been waiting for it to be delivered and went online to go complain and found that as I had purchased the book, the seller was updating that they were out of them - so my purchase was refunded and supposedly I should have gotten an email.  I didn't. I now need to go buy the book and get to reading.  Ug!  Anyways, if all goes well I will also see some late movie with Amanda tonight.  Saturday I want to finish the Olympian book if I don't Friday.  Then there's a church meeting at 4pm for the youth group, my friend's going to church with me, and I know I'll be too distracted to get anything done if it doesn't happen before the meeting.

And OMG there are a lot of movies out that I want to see!  Alvin and the Chipmunks, Leap Year, The Princess and the Frog, Did You Hear About The Morgans, Nine, Invictus, and The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus which is strangely not playing in very many locations.  I think tonight it will be either Leap Year or Nine.

Plus I will need to start baking cake on Saturday night - because I want to have cake-pops ready for Home Group on Sunday!!  I'll need to decorate on Sunday morning/afternoon before Home Group.  And maybe I'll make another batch Sunday night if I don't go to my other friend's house.  Yes, busy weekends ahead.  Next week I will be taking advantage of every opportunity to relax because next weekend I'm volunteering my whole weekend to the church media team.  It's a good opportunity, but it's also a whole weekend when I'm starting to really try to get writing done.  I believe I will be selfishly taking Monday, Thursday and Friday to myself for writing, lounging and knitting purposes!  ....oh but I need to read....

Right - so I am still working my way through On Writing and loving it! Will read the Olympian book tonight and tomorrow at BandN, buy at least Redeeming Love for the book club and if I think I can read Isabel Allende's House of Spirit's before 2/1 when EA will be hosting the discussion on it, I'll pick that up.  Lastly, I believe I will be acting on my friend's suggestion and buy Maggie Stiefvater's book, Lament.  Not that I don't already have a hefty list of things to read already, LoL!

An update on my 1K a day.  I decided to go ahead and bite the bullet and created a spread sheet with all the stuff on it I need to track my progress.  I started on the 4th and have written as of the end of my lunch break, 6,007 words on various writing projects.  I expect this number to go up this afternoon, but I can honestly say I'm happy I'm doing this.  It's encouraging me to just write and go, go, go!

Blogs, blogs, blogs - have been a bit dry recently. Lots of recaps on last year or stuff about this year, whatever.  However, I just about keeled over when I read this entry from Rick Riordan's blog, Myth and Mystery talking about the new companion guide to the Percy Jackson series and - There Will Be More Camp Half Blood Books!!!!  Meaning he's not done with Percy Jackson's world! I'm very excited, in case you can't tell...

So I'm trying some different ways of keeping track how much I write a day.  I'm not really sure what would work best.  I had a great widget during NaNo that measured my daily average, but I don't know what I could do now in place of that.  I'm avoiding using excel.  I have Chaos Manager and I'm trying out just inputting a daily activity that records how much I write but I get annoyed with the reminder.  If you have a suggestion - let me know!  Today I wrote about 700 words on a prompt, that I need to finish the little story and then I believe I'll be over the 1K challenge for a day number!!!

The crafty afternoon/night is catching on!  There are several people who are interested and I'm really excited.  I also want to go buy more yarn in case...well...I don't know in what case but I want more on hand!  LoL.

So I'm really struggling with rewriting Premonition.  I've forgotten some small details, things have grown fuzzy and I'm beginning to wonder if it wouldn't be better if I put Premonition aside and revised Suspicion.  It might give me better ideas for a more finished product on the second book.  I'm very torn here.  On one hand I just want it finished but on the other I'm trying to think about the most logical, and best use of my time.  It's either that or I need to go back and reread stuff to see what I might have forgotten.  Bah - so frustrating! Why couldn't I finish it in December like I'd planned?  I'm going to give it a go today and see how I do on plotting out the novel tonight and I might just start rewriting that opening scene.

It's cold.  It's really cold today.  I cranked up my heater last night and sort of over-did it, but I wasn't cold!  I even managed to crawl out of bed this morning and do a 20 minute exercise. I'm telling myself I'll do one tonight after I do some lazy news watching and plotting.  *sigh*  I'm going to save my eloquence for my writing  :P 

Really I have been doing stuff.  I've just not had time or the patience or the state of mind to compose much of a blog.  So far I haven't written a stinking thing other than co-writing.  People come over and play Wii with me.  And people come over to hang out.  And...I don't know.  I'm exhausted, and going to bed; will leave you with the few links I had compiled over the last many days. 

I wanna learn how to knit this!!!!! I need knitting help, I really do; I'm hoping that the crafty group we're putting together to start meeting in January will help me some.... I dearly hope so....

Ug - so I will finish my trilogy despite hell, high water or whatever!  However, I know the chance of it ever doing anything other than sitting lovingly on my shelf is a chance thing; this article underlines it and I can understand why. Doesn't mean I won't finish The Barking Dog!!!!