Just a Thought or Two....

The Wednesday before Thanksgiving is generally one of the biggest bar nights of the year. During my 20's, I was often in the thick of the crowd, angling to get a drink or pushing my way onto an overcrowded dance floor. Truth be told, I always had a good time.

But now I'm in my 30's and things are different. Don't get me wrong, I still like to go out and have a good time. But tonight, as my youngest daughter and I are recovering from a nasty bout of food poisoning that hit us last night, I realized that I wouldn't want to be anywhere else than where I am right now. Thanksgiving is about giving thanks, and being grateful for all that we have. So I'm sitting here, feeling extremely blessed that I am surrounded by my little family.

And of course, I am extremely happy that the food poisoning has run it's course and I will hopefully be able to gorge myself on turkey and all the fixins' tomorrow. ;-)

Reality versus NaNoWriMo

Ok, confession time. I am failing dismally at NaNoWriMo. At this rate, I'll be lucky if I get to 25,000 words by the end of the month. And I don't even know if I'll like those words. Quite honestly, I'm not sure what my problem is. After all, I like challenges and I'm kind of stubborn when I commit to something. I know where my novel is going (for the most part, however sometimes the characters surprise me). I love to write. Hell, I'm a full time student in a Creative Writing/English Lit program for the love of God.

 I have tried to cut the distractions out of my life. Namely, I've (almost) stopped playing Angry Birds and I haven't been a Twitter-holic lately. (I draw the line at giving up Words with Friends, though. Not gonna happen.) And no, it hasn't escaped my notice that I'm sitting here blogging about not writing. I think part of the problem is the word count. Getting 1667 words per day is somewhat difficult. I can easily hit 500, sometimes even 1000. (I actually went a little over a 1000 words while at Spawnderella #1's Girl Scout meeting the other night, surrounded by a gaggle of screaming girls ranging in age from 5-8. Go figure.) 

So what I guess I need to do is to not be hogtied by someone else's lofty goals and just be happy with what I can accomplish. Of course, that doesn't necessarily solve all my problems, but it may help to take the pressure off. In the meantime all I can do is keep writing, a little bit at a time. 

Micro-Publishing? Maybe.

Although I am far, far away from ever getting a book published (if it ever happens at all), I am curious about the publishing process. After all, there are quite a few options writers have regarding getting published nowadays. There's the traditional route. Then there's the self-publishing option. I just learned of yet another option, something called micro-publishing. 

A local company hosted an information session at the library tonight and I decided to go see what it was about. It sounds like an interesting process. Micro-publishing doesn't involve agents - instead, the author and the publisher work together. The author pays the publisher up front and there are a number of services offered - editing, publicity, printing, etc. From what I understand, the author submits a manuscript to the publisher. If the publisher accepts it, the author and publisher work closely together to turn it into a book that readers will (hopefully) buy. After the publisher gets it printed, it is then sold on Amazon, B&N.com, traditional bookstores, the author website and the micro-publisher's website. There aren't any book advances offered, and the micro-publisher actually requires their payment up front. (Along with assorted fees along the way.) 

Overall, it sounds like a viable option for getting published - especially for somebody like me who is a relative newbie to the whole process. Of course, authors should exercise due diligence and make sure the micro-publisher is competent and not just full of hot air. The people I met tonight from Gypsy Publications definitely seem like they know what they're doing. I talked with some of the authors they represent as well, and they seemed happy with their experiences. 

So who knows? I am aiming to finish the novel in December, provided I stay on my current writing schedule. (Yay NaNoWriMo!) And per the advice of the great Stephen King, one must let their manuscript sit for at least 6 weeks after it is finished before re-reading and starting the second draft. That means I might actually possibly maybe submit my manuscript to them as early as next spring. That's a scary and daunting prospect to be thinking about right now - but it also gives me a little impetus, a little something to look forward to. 

But first things first - I have to finish the novel....while going to school full-time, being a full time mom, part time freelancer and working on some other writing projects. Not to mention the myriad of other important things I do - like Facebooking, Twittering, playing Words with Friends & Angry Birds....no worries though. I can do it. I think. 

Drumroll Please...He's Home!!!

Tuesday did not start out very well at all. I returned home after dropping the elder Spawnderella at school. Then I realized I had accidentally spilled coffee on my garage door opener, rendering it useless. And of course, I didn't have my house keys on me because for some reason I have my car keys and my house keys on two different keychains. So I was locked out of my house. In my pajamas. (Yes, I drop my child off at school sometimes in my pajamas, no judging please - its not like I get out of the car, so really....who cares?) Anyway, the bigger problem was this: Spawnderella #2 must get her anti-rejection meds every 12 hours. I give them at 9am and 9pm. And it was 8:55am. Giving anti-rejection med as little as 15 minutes late can have dire consequences - you know, like an episode of rejection. Not good. So of course, I start to freak out. (Quietly, as to not alert Spawnderella #2 to the gravity of the situation.)  If I can't get into my house, what am I going to do? How the hell am I supposed to break in? And although I live just down the road from the pharmacy where we get the anti-rejections meds I didn't really want to waltz through there in my damn pj's just to see if they by chance would let me buy a single dose of her medication. So I decided to take the damn garage door opener apart to see if I could simply dry the inside of it out using some tissues and hot air. (Just call me MacGyver.) Lucky for me, it worked. (Ok, I also had to take the battery out and dry it off. Then I put the battery in the wrong way and didn't realize it until the damn garage door still wouldn't open. Whatever.) So we made it inside the house at 9am on the dot and I gave her the meds. Whew. Oh and for about 20 minutes afterwards my garage door mysteriously kept opening and closing all by itself. Maybe that's why the Jehovah's Witnesses knocked on the door - perhaps they thought my garage door was possessed and needed saved. I don't know. I just knew that my morning was going to hell in a handbasket and damn, it was still early!!!!

So there I was, doing laundry, trying to study and watching Maya turn my living room into a Barbie convention from hell......Until I received a text from John saying that HE WAS FLYING IN THAT NIGHT!! Woo-hoo, finally! Of course, my first thought was oh shit I better shave my legs....But anyway, at 9:30 Tuesday night, he strolled through the airport and back into the waiting arms of myself and our two girls....making Tuesday officially one of the best days of my life. He's been home for a few days and its been super - having him home sharing the parenting (and the dishes and the laundry among other things) has definitely improved my demeanor. But I'm not sure about sharing my wine.....;-)

p.s. After the garage debacle I learned my lesson and now I have my keys all on one keychain. Which is great...until I lose my keys.

Writing as a Journey - Learning A Little Bit More Every Day

I love to read. I mostly read fiction and it's also what I like to write. However, the college experience is already broadening my horizons. During the last few years I have wanted to write a non-fiction book about our journey through our daughter's liver disease and subsequent liver transplant. But something always held me back. Mostly I think it was fear of revisiting that horrendously scary emotional point in our lives. So instead, I have been working on a fictionalized version of those events. To me that seemed easier. 

But recently, through one of the classes I'm taking, I realized that now is the time to write the non-fiction project as well. One of my required classes is a memoir writing course. We are reading different types of memoirs ("Born Standing Up" by Steve Martin, "Just Kids" by Patti Smith, "Truth & Beaty" by Ann Patchett to name a few) and we are constructing our own. (And because of these books I have most definitely developed a taste for non-fiction - who knew?) 

We had a wide range of freedom - we could write about our whole lives OR a specific event/time period, etc. We turn in 3-4 pages every week. Dr. S then critiques them and gives them back to us.  I was very nervous, but what I've found is that it's actually cathartic to look back on that time and then look at Maya (and our family) today and see how far we've come. I think I needed that kick in the pants - a structured course that would provide the necessary tools AND a deadline. I like to think I'm laying the groundwork to be able to turn it into a book that people will want to read - a book that might be able to provide not only information but maybe a little bit hope as well. 

Of course, I'm still working on the novel - and that project is also getting a kick in the pants due to the upcoming NaNoWriMo. And there are a even a few short stories being brought to life right now. Besides, I've got to write - what else am I going to do through the upcoming frigid season in Ohio? 

The Armpit of Virginia: Also Known as Ft. Lee

I feel the need to preface what I have to say here with this statement: I am grateful for the military and all they do to protect our country. I am also grateful to the people who helped John during this nightmare of bureaucracy. But I also feel the need to say that there are a number of people in the military who probably wouldn't last long in the private sector because they are lazy, stupid, power hungry gasbags. So here goes....

After a week of vague half-answers and laziness on the part of a few sergeants, John finally received some worthwhile information today. Of course, this information came after making repeated phone calls to military personnel OUTSIDE Ft. Lee - namely the Ohio National Guard organization. It seems that he finally caught the attention of someone fairly high up in the military's chain of command and that person promptly called Ft. Lee to find out what the hold up was. Turns out, there was no good reason anyone could come up with for not letting John outprocess and go home. From an outsider's point of view (outside the military anyway), it looks like this whole mess could have been prevented if a certain sergeant (or two) had pulled themselves up, dusted their lazy asses off and actually did their assigned jobs. In fact, after these phone calls were made, a certain sergeant actually threatened to keep him there longer....just because he could. (Well, now he can't because this particular case has been removed from his duties.) It seems that he was angry that someone higher up than him found out that he screwed up and was actually making him do his job. I wonder how long he would last if he had a job in the real world instead of being cushioned and protected by the military.

Anyway, John is going to (hopefully) be able to outprocess on October 25th. That doesn't mean he'll be home on that date. That's just the first available date the lieutenant could give him. Outprocessing isn't rocket science - its an appointment that involves signing a bunch of paperwork and takes about 30 minutes.  After outprocessing, a soldier is set up with a plane ticket home and that's that. Today John was told that his situation was a "discrepancy". Even the military personnel that I spoke to today through the National Guard said they had never seen this before - and it was most definitely NOT John's fault in any way, shape or form.

So that's it - that's our tax dollars at work. Ineptitude at its finest. Thanks alot, Ft. Lee.

And Still We Wait.....

We are going on seven days of being in military limbo. John is still being detained - for no reason other than the fact that the military has not gotten up off its collective ass and issued the necessary paperwork to outprocess him. They did find the "lost" paperwork that created this mess in the first place. They did lift the "flag" they put on his file. Emails and phone calls are supposedly being traded between the appropriate personnel about getting him released - any day now. But we've been hearing that for a week. On top of everything else, a different sergeant was in charge today and he made John (and the unlucky few around him) give up his phone for the day because HE said they weren't allowed to have them. Excuse me, what? Luckily, the lieutenant returned everyone's phones to them within a few hours.

But seriously, enough is enough. John has jumped through all the hoops, passed all the tests and shown that he has what it takes to be a soldier - excelling through Basic Training and AIT. Yet for all intents and purposes he is being treated like a prisoner instead of someone who has enlisted to serve and protect his country. Interesting.