I’m Sorry, But You’re Setting Yourself Up For Disappointment.

I say this because this blog has become huge with a certain group of people lately: people who are searching for asymmetrical bobs.  Although definitely a fan of the A-bob, (it’s good for thick, thin, straight or curly hair!  It’s always in style!  It rocks in the summer!)  I can’t really help you.  Except to say this this is my favorite asymmetrical bob:

 

and I found it here: http://www.hairfinder.com/haircollections2/spring-hairstyle-3.htm.  Knock yourselves out.

 

But really, this is a blog about writing.  I’m working on a new idea, and it seems more novel length than short story.  Am I ready to take this on again? Hmmmm….

 

Pieces out: 30

Goal: 40

A Very Perkifying Email

Oh, something cool happened the other day!  I received an email from Suzanne Vincent of Flash Fiction Online.  She said that she was teaching a workshop on writing sci-fi and fantasy for the flash fiction market at a local Con.  She asked if she could use “Ray the Vampire” as an example.  A good example, she was quick to specify.  I really appreciate her saying that, because otherwise I would have wondered.    Plus she called me Ms. Yardley.  I felt all fancy and almost started putting on airs.  But not quite.

I love that story.  I hear more about that story than any other.  I wrote a novel based on Ray, and it went down really well at Girl’s Camp last year.  No, I’m serious!  I brought it in binder form so that I could edit in my “spare time” (what a dreamer I am) and the 12-17 year old girls went nuts.  I’m only slightly tongue in cheek, here.  They got angry at characters and cried in the right parts and I ended up with some sweet main character fan art.  It’s good to know that it reaches that type of audience.  In fact, the girls requested the second book in that series for camp this year.  It needs a total overhaul before it even reaches that point, and maybe this will be incentive.  I should really shop the first novel around again, but I’m going to concentrate on RunStarGirl first.  One thing at a time.

Anyway, you can read “Ray the Vampire” here.

Both of my kids woke up crying tonight.  Which is why it’s 4:30 in the morning and I’m typing instead of sleeping.  I hate illness.  I wish that we were just created out of titanium.

 

Pieces out: 30

Goal: 40

Yay! And Unyay!

I did it!  I booked my first Cup of Comfort for Parents of Children with Special Needs book signing!  It’s in my home town during the fair.  I’m excited because it was a Big Scary Step and I took it.  I also have a few other things in the works, so we’ll see.  Anyway, I thought that I’d start with my hometown because it isn’t as frightening.  Any my mother is there. 

I used to run a lot, and then it dwindled down to nothing.  I’ve started up again, and it feels really good.  I have a little Nike Plus mini that dances around on my Facebook page and says how far I have gone.  Most of the time I’m walking and pushing two kids in a stroller, and that’s awesome, too.  We’re covered in sunscreen and smell like Disneyland.  I used to think up my writing ideas as I ran.  Now I’m more worried about running through the broken glass that litters the road.  I think of stories right before I fall asleep.  Then I forget them.

My friend told me that he had a tick attached to his lower eyelid.  I shuddered and danced around the house in revulsion.  Sure, I have written about a vampire, but the honest-to-goodness concept of something drinking your blood?  It’s so abhorrent.  It’s so vile.  That blood is mine, I created it, and it belongs in the body!  You should see me go ballistic around mosquitoes and horseflies.  How dare they?  I mean, really?

Las Vegas, like everywhere else, is panicked about the Swine Flu.  It’s all over the news.  “We have two flights come in from Mexico a day!  Wash your hands!  Stay home if you’re feeling the slightest bit tired!”  I turned off the news and watched the second X-Files movie instead.  It was disappointing, but still beats swine flu news.  Barely.

Things in my google history: cineraria, blood type personality, calico alien run, las vegas to los angeles distance, lyme disease symptoms, shark tote bag,  nectariferous spot in buttercups

A Las Vegas Conversation

Me: What’s with the police?  I passed six cop cars on the way to your house.

Mason: There was a murder at the convenience store.  *points*  We all heard it.  They still haven’t caught the guy.  Let’s talk about books!

Let’s talk about books, indeed.  I finished reading his, and it was incredible.  There were times where I didn’t want to put it down but had to, and when I reached the end, I still wanted to read more.  When it comes out (no date as of yet), it’s one to pick up.  Mason Ian, folks.

So after the police looked through every car window with a flashlight, (I had a Shiney mix in the front seat and a sewing machine in the back) I drove home.  There were more police cars and an ambulance at one of the high schools, and a robot checking out a bomb with a “strong chemical odor” at Burlington coat factory.  I grew up in a very small town, and if anybody was waving a gun or making bombs, everybody knew about it.  Especially since most of the pipe bombs tended to go off, destroying faces and hands.  Yep, I still remember that, you guys.  That’s your claim to fame.

I wrote some stuff!  And sent some stuff out!  And went running and nearly died because it’s so.  Freaking.  Hot.  I’m reminiscing about cooler days…see photo.  A fractured Illiterati at an undisclosed location earlier this month.  I’m going back there this weekend, hooray!  More scary dolls and big mouthed bass, yes!

This is what writers do!

In Which Phones Are Abhored

I’ve been dragging my feet long enough.  Starting in May, I have three months to promote my story in the Cup of Comfort series.  I’m torn.  I donwanna.  But really, I wanna.  It feels arrogant and vulnerable to say, “Hi, hello, do you want to interview me?  Would you like me to come do a book signing?  I know that you have absolutely no idea who I am.  kthx.”  But really, I need to buck up and learn how to do this.  So I’ve thrown off my shyness.  I’m remembering my New Year’s Resolution to do things that scare me.

This morning I looked up a few local bookstores.  I was thinking, hey, they’ll give me an email address and I can make a formal request for a signing opportunity.

Nope.  I have to call.  Physically call.  Like, on a phone!  I have to pick up a phone in my hand, and then dial numbers, and hold the thing to my mouth!  And a stranger will pick up the other end, and I’ll say things, and the stranger will answer, and this stranger and I will have a stilted, awkward dialogue where I throw myself on their mercy.

I abhor you, phone.  I abhor you.

I mean, calling my friends is one thing.  But even then, I usually send off an email.  How many times have I shown up on your call list, Illiterati?  Hate hate hate!

I’m thinking of just going in person, because I conduct myself better in person than on the phone.  I can read faces and body language.  The phone leaves you in the dark.  Not to mention that the second I pick the dastardly thing up, my children turn into wild, shrieking banshees.

Anyway.  I’m going to call/barge in and try and set some things up.  I’m also going to email (I hope!  Please let me email!) the local newspapers, and the newspapers back home for interviews.  I’m actually excited to talk to the people back home, because it’ll be fun.  I’ll try and do a signing at the library or something, (we don’t have a bookstore) hopefully when I come up to see Jan.  So Jan!  We need to coordinate!

I suppose I should be afraid that I’ll show up at a reading and nobody will come.  Honestly, I’m not fazed by that at the moment.  If I can strap myself down and make these phone calls, the hard part will already be finished.  That’s my real fear.  That’s my real dread.

That, and getting lascivious fan fic about asymmetrical bobs.  I know it’s coming.

 

An asymmetrical bob, people.

Thank goodness that I didn’t Google “asymmetrical bob with bangs” because there would have been gleeful, rolling-on-the-ground hysterics!

Strawberries and Supernovas

Cassiopeia Supernova at www.hubblesite.org.

There’s a story by…Ray Bradbury, I think.  I read it years ago, and the premise is that when it reaches a certain temperature, people basically go nuts and kill each other.   It’s not quite that hot yet, but it’s getting there.  You don’t want to be within smacking distance of me when all of this goes down.  80 degrees in the house?  At 1:30 in the morning?!  You have to be kidding me!  I’d open the window but then all of the mosquitoes, pollen, and gang members would get in. 

I can’t sleep.  I never sleep.  When I’m awake at night, I eat strawberries and look at pictures of nebulas and supernovas.  I muse about my stories.  I change all of my character’s names, and then change them back again the next day when I’m lucid.

Things in my Google history: asymmetrical bobs, hand spasms numbness, Marin County CA, moray eels, bloodstone, anti perky, glitter shoes, Cassiopeia, Rand’s We the Living

Everyday Weirdness

Today was a two-acceptance day!  Woo hoo!  I haven’t had one of those in a while.  Everyday Weirdness will run my story “The Dead Girl” on Thursday, April 16.  I’ll link you then, but feel free to check them out now. 

http://everydayweirdness.com/

Dolce and Gabbana and the Apocalypse

So family came a-visitin’, and when that happens…we shop.  And eat at delicious restaurants.  And then shop some more.  Not saying that I mind, because that certainly isn’t the case.  But let’s get real, people.

Something you’ll hear out of my mouth, usually in a joking manner, is, “When the Apocalypse comes…”  When the Apocalypse comes, you’re not going to survive because nothing is going to be organic; it’ll all be radiated.  When the Apocalypse comes, I’m shacking up with the folk who know how to make bricks out of mud.  When the Apocalypse comes, every single person in that Dolce and Gabbana store is going to fling up their arms and die.  I didn’t see a scrapper among them.  Although I tend to have hope in humanity, and perhaps somebody will toss their sunglasses aside, throw off their hobo purse, and totter off in their skinny jeans to prove me wrong.  Which would be awesome.  If not, at least they will all look pretty when they go.

There are a lot of Apocalyptic style anthologies coming up, and this excites me.  Although not driven to write a “Dolce and Gabbana Shopper Survives!” story, I am musing on a few other ideas.  A rule-stripped society is a fascinating topic.  But then I had read Lord of the Flies about five times before high school.  Along with Alice in Wonderland.  It’s a fantastic combination.

I’ve been writing quite a few poems lately, and have maybe three stories and two essays in the works as well.  Feast or famine!  While I’d like to buckle down and just carve one out, life is gleefully throwing itself in my way.  And I find that I don’t mind so much.  Sometimes I feel driven, almost obsessive.  I think there should be a game plan.  I think that I should have this many irons in the fire, and be submitting to these places, etc. etc.  And while I certainly should have goals, I think that a meandering path suits me best.  I want to try a little bit of everything, and enjoy myself as I go along.  Sometimes I forget that.

On the not-as-fun side, April and May is filled to the brim with doctor’s appointments for my son.  Cardiology echoes, EKGs, and MRIs, oh my.  The usuals.  We also think that he’s on the Autistic spectrum as well as having Williams Syndrome, so we’re doing some more testing.  These are not the usuals.  If  he does have both, there’s a phrase for it, and it’s “dual disability”.  Translated into layman’s terms, it’s “Aw, snap.”  But knowledge is power, and knowing is half the battle, and the other half is guns, or however that goes.  I’m not one to back down from a challenge.

As far as challenges go, I still won a song and dance that will be coming my way.  I entered into a new challenge with a different person, and the loser coughs up rollercoaster rides for the winner.  Really, if we’re rollercoastering together, we’re both winners, right?  I’m just going to be the winner that won’t have to pay!

Hey, I just received an email saying that my poem “what you believe” will be in the May issue of Dustin LaValley’s Micro 100.  I’ll link you then, as well, but take a look at the site if you’d like.  Rock on!

http://www.micro100.blogspot.com/ 

Pieces out: 30.  Are you kidding me?!

Goal: 40

Today I sang at a funeral.

Because I do things like that.  I even did a nice, sweet, funeraly song instead of something haunting and creepy.  You’re welcome.

I have also been playing Indigo Prophecy today.  “I need to hide the body!  I need to mop up all of this blood!  Augh, however shall I escape the police?!” I have realized two things from this:  1) I have been stressed to the max, and game playing always makes me feel better, and 2) I would be a horrendous criminal.  My bumbling shenanigans would terrorize the town for exactly 2.3 seconds before I was captured.  Gotham is safe from me, folks.

I found two anthologies that sparked my interest.  They are Demons: A Clash of Steel anthology and the Shadows of the Emerald City anthology.  I love taking beloved classics and discovering how dark they really are.  Malice in Wonderland, anybody?  Seriously, sometimes I’m surprised that we’re not all super jacked up.  More than usual, I mean.

 

Pieces out: 32

Goals: 40