Thursday, October 30, 2008

All These Internets

I just realized that I haven't updated anything on my MySpace page in about two months. I'm geeking out right now, even as I type, and using my laptop to upload the new cover picture to my site. (I'm writing to you on the "big" computer. I'm totally multi-processing. Cool, huh?

There's just far too much to do in any given day, though. Especially since all I want to do is sleep. I taught class last night, and I think that went pretty well, though I didn't end up revealing anything terribly ground-shaking about the writing process or craft, we had fun. Or, at least, I did. Zach, one of my students, came up with a fun writing exercise for all of us to try. It's a progressive story, where each person writes a line of the story, folds the paper over, and hands it to the next person. So, because you can't see what the last person wrote, it can be VERY strange. Here's how mine turned out (I wrote the first line, those that follow are my students'):

On a dark and stormy night, he danced the rumba.

He fell down the stairs.

She stopped trusting her sister after the melted crayon incident.

Thinking the bottle was empty, I forgot to screw the cap on tightly; as a result, my skin is covered in permanent purple ink.

He realized there was a problem when his mother, glazed eyes, crumbled dried worms into the children's salads.

Her boyfriend had an "in" with the guys at the organ market; she could get hearts for cheap.

Loose objects floated around the room -- magazines, chairs, lamps-- all headed towards the newly opened vortex.

The walls seemed to resonate with the emotion Bill was transmitting. Could it be possible?

Wednesday, October 29, 2008

Me, Every OTHER Day

I think I finally have a writing system that's working for the two books I have under contract this year. I've been working on one book a day. So, today, is HONEYMOON OF THE DEAD's turn, and tomorrow is my alter-ego's prequel day. I figure that way I'll actually make forward progress on each book during the week.

Clever, no?

Unfortunately for HONEYMOON OF THE DEAD, my writing time is going to be shorter than usual because Mason has an early release day. We're planning a nature hike at the Minnesota Valley Wildlife Refuge again. He so loved the "road of smooshed grasshoppers" that we're going to check it out again. On the flipside, I decided that an afternoon hike was the same as a work out at the gym, so I skipped that this morning. After I finish updating this and my livejournal, I hope to get a few minutes of writing time in before it's time to go pick him up.

Also, I have class tonight. I'm supposed to be lecturing on "Show, Don't Tell" the great myth, but I think it may morph into something else. We'll see. I do need to get some photocopying done before tonight. I suppose I should head down to the basement and look for that sooner rather than later.

In other news, the election continues to make me jittery. Hope is a scary thing.

Tuesday, October 28, 2008

Baking and the Apocalpyse

The closer we get to election day, the more I've been baking.

I know there's much talk about a landslide for the good guys (as my son says: Vote Obama!), but I'm still scared. If only the otherside hadn't stolen elections before, then I could probably stop cooking.

If I get fat, I'm blaming it on McCain.

Monday, October 27, 2008

Me, Elsewhere

What, you expect me to post here?

Dude, it's Monday. So, that means you can find me over at Something Wicked talking about how cool it is that reading made my son cry, and then over at Wyrdsmiths giving a half-a$$ed apology to George Lucas. What, you expected more? One word, my friend: midiclorians.

Hey, and I'm back to my regularly scheduled routine. Hooray!