Work duels

Is it just me or does sending an email claiming "Peace - accept my apologies - sincerely sent" completely erroneous when i hear than an hour later the person who sent it is trash talking me two minutes ago? That doesn't fall into the category of a sincere apology in my book and i hope not in anyone else's.

This whole mess is over a insignificant phrase on that project I worked on. Right, the project that she REFUSED to have anything to do with until after the deadline had passed. And then she went berserk over something she wanted change.

Well, i'm done being brow beaten, bullied and being pulled into the middle of her attempt to skirt around what has already been set in stone. She can make up stickers for all i care to change the phrase.

She's pretty much running uphill without any bullets. I did this as a courtesy to the company. I volunteered my help. It's not like she can make me do it. So why would i go out of my way for someone who's being a SNARKY JUVENILE BRAT?

Holiday Plan of attack

Tidy is not a word you would use to describe my house. I'm an artist. I like to spread out and look at stuff. However with the holidays creeping up fast (and guests, and projects, and, and...and), I had roughly a week to get myself organized and get all those extra little clutter piles hidden away.

Obstacle 1: Cake making supplies EVERYWHERE.

An overflowing box shoved next to my tv, doesn't count as organized. Especially when half my utensils and tools are also strewn about my kitchen in various places. Some drawers won't close creating a hazardous walkway.

Solution! I got one of those slide under the bed rubber maid bins and amazingly, everything fits in there with room to spare. I even managed to get rid of several extra utensils and now all my drawers CLOSE! Happy day!

Obstacle 2: Extra art supplies with nowhere to go!

I keep my art supplies relatively neat and organized in my lower dresser drawers. However, they're stuffed to the brim and I bought more...cause i needed them!

Solution! Another of the slide under the bed bins proved to be the solution, which again gave me room to spare after cleaning out two drawers. Now i just have to clean up all the spilled glitter.

Obstacle 3: That wonderful task of Folding clothes has reared it's ugly head again. Remember how much I hate that chore? Aka, most useless task ever that must be done! Well, part of the cleaning involved laundry which is followed by folding.

Solution: I'm using the time to go through my clothing to find items I've never worn, and never intend to so i can get them out of my apartment and off to good will. Somehow there's immense satisfaction in stuffing a bunch of ill-fitting or misshapen clothing into garbage bags.

Obstacle 4: Finish Christmas Shopping

I really only have three people left on my list but they're the difficult ones to shop for. My brother, who recently has been giving me cookies, My mom, the techi geek for whom anything i want to buy is crazy expensive and My dad, who tells me every year "I don't want anything"

Solution:......Pending. But there is still time.

Obstacle 5: Getting my house super clean for guests

This one's pretty self explanatory. Not that my apartment is Dirty per se, but you can't operate on my counters like you can at my sister's place. But with so much to do, i found myself getting distracted and forgetting to finish cleaning areas.

Solution: Enlist Super Mom. Yes, the person who spent decades teaching me how to clean properly after her training in the military, has agreed to be roped in as a final sweep after I've done all the hard work. And she works for food :) Thank you mom.

Lock and load!

After 1 week with the Droid 2

Ok so just over a week ago, I got my new Droid 2. Here's how things are going so far:

Battery Verdict so far: not a problem.

• Even after almost a whole day playing angry birds and constantly turning it on to run it down as much as i could, the battery still had some charge to it, although about twenty minutes before i went to bed, it told me to plug in.
• I then spent a day calling anyone i could think of and talking for several hours. This ran down my battery more, but it still lasted beyond the 12 hours.
• I also tried just leaving it in screen off mode for an entire day and was surprised that the battery bar barely moved.

Aps:

• Google Maps seems convinced that my location is about a half mile from where it actually is at any given time, but i did some of the calibration tests and now it's finally got it right.
• I've almost beaten Angry Birds
• I've made good used of Package Buddy and Gas Buddy, Barcode scanner (which has already saved me 30$) and Ringo Lite which has given me back my standard ringtones and alerts.
• The FAST browser was put to use looking up online inventory of DSW to help out my friend Lindsey.

Other:

• The camera took some getting used to: You have to hold it and wait for it to adjust to the lighting to get a better picture. But it still worked capturing a Kodak moment with my dad this weekend.
• One time the phone froze completely, and the other, it decided to dial numbers but not let me talk to people or for them to talk to me. Both of these issues were resolved by following the salesman's advice of popping out the battery to reset the phone. It's not a huge inconvenience but it would be nice if i didn't need to do that.

My only gripe has little to do with the phone itself: The cover that I bought to protect my investment was broken within the week and is now being held on by double sided tape. That and the phone won't fit in the charger stand I got, with the back cover on. That has been annoying.

So far, that's not enough for me to give up on the phone. I can see hundreds of uses for this little guy. I just have to get used to some of it's quirks.

Also some other suggestions: DO NOT PAY 30$ for the chargers in Verizon stores! You can save 10$ by picking it up at Best Buy . If you go online: just the chord charger (not the multimedia station) is as little as 10$ not including shipping. Heck: On Amazon You can get a car charger, a wall charger and a media cable together for under 5$ (not including shipping). Thank you Boyfriend Jon for warning me away from these crazy prices.

To Scrooge or not to Scrooge

I've told stories about Christmas time that show just how un-Christmas-spirit-like people in general can get. Remembering stuff like the woman who pulled up on a curb to make her own parking spot, and the ungrateful terror of a child who made a fuss over a broken DS, along with the most recent woman who nearly T-boned me because she was determined to have a parking spot i had no interest in...made me rather ill tempered and turned me into a scrooge for many years. This year I'm trying to stay in a good frame of mind.

I pretty much have all my Christmas gifts planned out for family and Boyfriend Jon. Friends this year are getting cookies and other edible things because i need to be cheap. The girls i babysit, i have a rather amusing plan for them which i need to get their parents involved.

This year, I decided to do most of my shopping online to avoid the insane crush of anxious bodies in the stores. Venturing out seems to be too hazardous. Pretty much the only gift I'll have to go to the store for will be my dad. He hasn't been jokingly named "The princess and the pea" for nothing. So i'll actually need to feel that one before I buy it.

For a change this year, I'm not feeling a lot of Holiday stress. Just the normal "Ack! stuff to do!" kind of stress. Perhaps i'm still coming down off of the NaNo caffeine high, but I'm just not so worried about the holidays. Nope, my freaking out seems to be limited to the prospect that Boyfriend Jon's family will be meeting my family for the first time. Now not that that is something to be about. No rational reason for it, just normal instinct of: "(insert Darth Vader theme song here)"

Good, reassuring news, though: The opportunity at work I jumped on, proved very fruitful. Despite being cautioned by multiple people I just had an instinct that it would be a good idea to be anything BUT passive on.

Our lovely graphics designer at work unfortunately was temporarily laid off this summer and, for some corporate reason that makes no sense, my company couldn't hire her back on in time to do the annual calendar. When i found out that there most likely wasn't going to be a calendar, i got my gumption up and let the people in charge of the project know that I was sure i could do it. They took me up on my word we got to work. In a matter of a week and a half we finished and sent it off to the printers. The end result was amazing if i do say so myself.

This chance I took payed off very well in two ways. 1) I got the attention of the head honcho at my company for stepping up to the plate at the last minute as a pinch hitter and swinging a grand slam and 2) the people at my company now know what i'm capable of doing in graphics, which i actually enjoy. I've already been asked if i could help out with some other graphic based projects. YAY! Could this open more doors for me? I'm hopeful, but not depending on it.

Droid

I'm getting a Droid. As an avid sci fi nut, I can't help but think of how fun it would be to have my own R2D2 running around after me.

No, not that kind of droid, unfortunately. One of the new spiffy android style phones. Which is cool all on it's own, but kind of looses its zing when compared to the ultimate little droid.

Disclaimer: These are MY opinions, and things I've found. I'm receiving NO incentives for this post.

Yup, it's time for me to join the world of smartphones. Me, I don't intuitively understand everything about these cool little phones other that i can see a lot of uses for it in my life. That, and I've done a LOT of research.

Here's a pretty quick version of how I came to the conclusion to get a Motorolla Droid 2 when I made the decision to really look into it back in September.

Where my starting point was: I currently own a Samsung Alias 2. I got this phone because i started to avidly text with a variety of different people, including my sister.

Something you should know about my family, we have a lot of terms that we instinctively say in other languages. Words that won't go into auto fill easily. My old phone kept trying to make me say things which makes no sense. That's why i opted for a qwerty keyboard and never will go back. I also got the flip phone version because my hip joint is talented and has managed to unlock every candy bar style phone I've ever owned. One of those pocket phone calls was a call to Canada. Yeah, not a happy phone bill.

My Alias has served me well. I heard a lot of complaints about the battery life but since I plug my phone in to charge EVERY night, it honestly has not been an issue. In the rare occasions when i was not able to plug my phone in at night, i typically still had some charge the next day. I never failed to get a "woah" out of people who watched me open my phone in both ways. That was always amusing.

Why I decided to change: Ok, I'll be honest. Boyfriend Jon strikes again with another AWESOME gadget that i can't totally resist. He has the Palm Pre. And he was quick to show off all the things he can do with his phone; tethering, google maps with GPS, comparing prices online right there in the store, and then he introduced me to Angry Birds. That was my tipping point. I knew i was going to get a smart phone and soon.

Initial Research: I frequently walked into cell phone provider stores and started playing with the phones for about 20 minutes. Right now I'm a Verizon customer so i started away from there (Old Italian trick my dad taught me. Start elsewhere and then bring other vendor's offers back to the place you like and see if they'll beat it). This was back when the iPhone was all the rage.

TO SET THE RECORD STRAIGHT. I'm neither for nor against Apple products. If it does the job well, i don't care about brand. I own an iPod and haven't had any problems. But that doesn't mean I'm just going to go buy a iPhone.

Every single sales person at AT&T tried to get me to buy that phone. After playing with in store models, being show all the bells and whistles by salespeople, and then playing with a friends iPhone, here's what i think about the iPhone.

iPhone: With the iPhone, personally, I'm not a huge fan. I instantly took a disliking to the touch screen keyboard. That vibrating thing it does when you touch a key is a big deterrent to me. Same as on the Droid X. I also missed having a simple call, end call buttons which doubled as "recent calls" and "cancel everything" buttons. The screen felt cluttered, and i was annoyed by the fact that i couldn't talk on the phone and surf the web (if absolutely necessary) at the same time. I did like the two finger zoom, huge Ap store, and video capabilities.

Palm Pre: I briefly considered this phone because Boyfriend Jon already had it. However at the time, the slider keyboard version was not available at Verizon. They only had the Palm Pixie which reminded me of a blackberry; aka Not for Anne. The Palm Pre Plus came out more recently and i was definitely drawn to its compact size. Silly women's work pants with TINY pockets. However, the tiny keyboard wasn't working for me so well.

I also did a LOT of internet comparison. Some of the best sites i found were this:

http://www.pcworld.com/article/199844/iphone_4_vs_droid_x_a_headtohead_comparison.html

http://cell-phones.toptenreviews.com/smartphones/

http://mashable.com/2009/10/29/droid-vs-iphone/

Why I chose Droid 2: I chose the Droid 2 for me because of these reasons:

1. I wanted a phone with talk and same time surf capabilities
2. Large slide out tactile keyboard (big selling point with me)
3. Google Maps is a must for those rare occasions when i get myself horribly lost
4. touch screen with two finger zoom
5. Tethering capabilities
6. Larger screen (if i'm going to have a larger phone, I wanted a larger screen to go with it)
7. 1 stop away bus application
8. syncing capabilities with Google Calendar which i use more than Outlook
9. Bar code scanning
10. Angry Birds :) (Best money spent on a phone game)

Ok so the last four are Apps, but think of them as reasons why i'm upgrading from a standard phone. For now I'm looking forward to picking up my new toy tomorrow. I've heard bad things about batteries on the Droids (and every single other smart phone) so i'll post an update in a few weeks to see how its doing. Now to name it...hmmmm.

I welcome comments, but please keep things civil. Like I've said, these are my opinions only.

Nano 2010 Day 30

While i may have technically finished NaNo 2010, I probably won't be stopping just yet. Indeed i have a full day to continue writing. Which means that I might tap out a few hundred more words or find any excuse in the world to not write.

I mean, my apartment is a disaster. I have piles of clean laundry waiting to be folded. I need to run about a dozen errands. My refrigerator could use a clean out. I have remnants of a Mario brick that i made for my friend Kenny that need to be cleaned up.

I'm getting the feeling that the first half of December will once again be the clean up Anne's apartment marathon.

I'm rather apathetic about the status of my story. It's not finished, of that i'm sure. And while this series sounds exceedingly interesting in my head, getting it out onto paper was a chore. Too many things fell into the realm of "no way would my character do that" and no man's land of "how would they do this without it being totally contrived?"

I know where i want the series to go, and i've noticed it falls along the lines of one of my favorite author's series:

Which in the process of finding these images....found out there's another book *gasp*. Good series about how humans can adapt and find ingenuity even in the most strange ways.

Nano 2010 Day 29 - WINNER

At about 8:30 pm Monday, November 29th. I crossed the 50,000 word mark. See my pretty badge to the left?

My story is far from over. I'm estimating that i have somewhere between 10k and 20k more words before the story is actually finished. The reason for that wide range...is that I'm not entirely sure what my resolution is. It could make the story more convoluted, or it could be simple and straight forward.

Truth is; I don't really know how to end my story. (whimpering noise)

We'll see how it goes as i think it through. Still have one more day to make a decision before i officially hit the end of NaNoWriMo.

Nano 2010 Day 27

Word Count: 46,670
Today's Quota: 45,009

Three days left.

While i'm very confident that i'll be able to weasle my way through the remaining 3k+ over the next three days.

What i'm not confident about is being able to finish this story satisfactorily on time.

The first year i did Nano, back in 2008, I remember seizing my cousin's hand when she arrived for thanksgiving and exclaiming, "Oh my god, I have absolutely NO climax."

Well this year, on Black Friday, i saw my cousin again and this year i said "I have a climax but NO resolution."

The fact of the matter is that i can in no way create an empirical question that will cause the characters i have spent the last 46k words building....to give up her little brother for a very handsome man. It just ain't gonna happen no matter how much i want it to happen and not sound completely and utterly contrived. And i cannot think of a way to resolve the divide between the two sides.

So it appears that by Friday, i will have a very good story put together with no ending....again. At least i haven't spent most of November wanting to throttle my pathetic main character. We'll see how i feel about finishing the story in December.

Nano 2010 Day 26

We're down to the pickle area of the home run of NaNo 2010. Just four days left.

Word count: 44,001
Today's Quota: 43,342

Today i would like to spotlight the amazing amount of success that Boyfriend Jon has achieved. I'm so proud of him that today at the write in, Jon was able to not only surpass the 100k word mark, but also to complete his story. While i am extremely jealous of this, he is fully deserving of a moment of fame on my blog. I am so proud of him.

At the moment i am neck and neck with a married couple who are also competing in Nano. But we are all on track to pass the 50k mark on time. We also had another new comer to Nano win recently and still have people well on their way.

To any fellow Nano-ers who are reading this, regardless of wether you are going to reach 50k or not...i am so proud of you. This is a crazy thing to attempt and even if you've only written a couple hundred words, that is more than you would have written. This is not easy and many people won't even take the plunge to attempt such a daring adventure. Major koodos to you for trying.

50k or bust.

Nano 2010 Day 24

Here's what you missed the last few days.

• I'm about a day and a half behind quota.
• It snowed in the Seattle area and with the temperature dropping down into the TEENS....froze and the whole area became pretty much a disastrous mess.
• My Jury Duty was canceled due to the weather after I had already set out to try to get there
• I was labeled "Ice Butt" by Boyfriend Jon because I stupidly hadn't layered clothes on the bottom half of me turning my derrière into a ice cube.

My muse outright refused to cooperate last night. I managed to get about 600 words written before i was hung up on details for writing a male character. So i have quite a bit more to write tonight in order to get caught up and then more to get ahead for tomorrow. I'm thinking i'm going to write a quick outline of what i want to happen and then switch back over to my other MC so i can keep the story moving.

Given how much i slipped and slid and very nearly pinwheeled down onto said ice butt while walking, i couldn't believe how many people in the Seattle area tried to drive in cars that seemed, to me, to be obviously a bad choice from the get go. Many sub compact and sedan cars that couldn't possibly have 4 wheel drive were out trying to keep up with chained trucks and SUV. I was reminded yet again that common sense was not so common. Most interesting was the SUV who ran a red light and came within a foot of T-boning a turning car.

I was thankfully excused from Jury Duty on Tuesday since the courthouses closed down due to weather and didn't have to make it up the next day. I decided to walk to Boyfriend Jon's place instead of the several additional miles to get to work.

Thanksgiving this year will be a break with tradition. I am not going to be spending it with my immediate family and traveling out to the peninsula in this weather. That just ain't happening. Instead i have invited Boyfriend Jon and Kenny to do a simple regular sized meal with brownies as desert and work off the meal by playing Call of Duty Black Ops. I'm excited because A) a lot less stress, a lot less food, a lot less leftovers and B) i haven't played that Call of Duty yet and have really enjoyed the previous versions.

I'll review it when i have time.

First snow of the season

Behold, the view from my back patio (which i promised but neglected to follow through on until now) as well as the fist snow in Seattle of the season.

Funny point of interest:

I call this area...the swamp.
It's advertised as "Wetland View"

You can't see it in this picture, but there's a shoe stuck in the mud in the left area of the photo.

I'm going with swamp. I even have my very own Swamp Monster. It's a gray cat that hisses and spits at everything and gets into cat fights with other pets all the time. I'm pretty good with cats, at worst they would just run away, but this guy treats everyone like a supernatural kitty hating monstrosity.

I love snow...provided i can choose to not be somewhere. Jury Duty has put quite a damper on that choice. It's been snowing most of the day in Seattle and for a change it's sticking! I'm just glad I have a warm coat and it's not too bad of a day.

Nano 2010 Day 20

Quick post today:

Word count: 33,364
Today's quota: 33,340

Just barely ahead for today because i spent most of the day meeting The Cake Boss, Buddy Valastro.

After that went and helped out my sister for a while.

Now its 10pm...and I'm going to try and get some writing done.

Meeting the Cake Boss

Today is the day in which all prior buffer is lost due to the fact that I GOT TO MEET THE CAKE BOSS!!! Somehow I'm totally not sad about losing my lead.

Yup, met Buddy Valastro boss of TLC's Cake Boss series as a relatively recent fan, and more recently an obsession with baking cakes. He is the sole reason I took the Wilton's Cake Decorating course, and made Josh and Christabelle's wedding cake. I was so floored by what he was able to do that I knew that would become my next hobby.

I waited in line for about twenty five minutes to meet this guy. The last thing I waited in line that long for was to go into the Kube93 haunted house three years ago and I was steadily becoming more drunk the entire time, also a rare occurrence for me. I was with a group of friends then and it made the time go a lot faster. At least until we got to the front of the line and then realized that no one had bought tickets. Woops.

While i waited, i put my super speed reading skills to work and read through about forty-ish pages of his book. Two things jumped out at me right away.
The first being when he was introducing how his father and mother met. As it would just happen to turn out, Buddy's Mother came from the same city in Italy that my family hails from. Small world right?
The second was the story about how he came to start working in the Bakery when he was young. He described a scene that could have come straight out of my own childhood. Starting a fire in the cul-de-sac and what happens when your very Italian father finds out. They put you to work because then you're too busy to think up crazy stunts like that.

I bought the book, and though it was a little on the expensive side at 26$, After reading a bit more i find it was worth the money. Mostly because of the Carlos Bakery recipes in the back.

My initial impression of Buddy was somewhere along the lines of traditional squealing fangirl noises in my head. I do not do that often and usually it's only around puppies. Thankfully, i managed to hold onto my poise long enough to untangle my tongue.

"Hey there, how you doin?" Buddy asked me smiling warmly. He didn't sound at all like he felt he had to be there. The impression i got from him was rather the opposite. If i had to guess, i would say i was left with the impression that he genuinely enjoyed being there and meeting the fans.
"Not too bad, and yourself?" i heard myself ask as though we were casually meeting on the street. I thought to myself what the heck Anne? Tell him how much you love his show! my subconscious screamed at me. Thinking he probably heard that all the time, as we posed for the camera, I thought up a question I had always wondered.
"I got one question for you." i said as i held out my hand to shake his. He took it and firmly grasped it with his charming smile.
"wha da ya got?" he says in his Jersey accent.
"Do you actually like the taste of Fondant?" i asked as i reached to retrieve my camera from the lady.
"well when i roll it out, i roll it really thin so that it doesn't mess with the flavor." he says but he's got his look on his face like when he's caught off guard.
"oh ok." i said as the woman ushered me along. But he kept talking.
"But you aint gonna find me eating it straight out of the bucket. So no way." he said as he smirked and used his hands to pantomime the action of eating something. A common thing that i see in my own family.

In the brief seconds that i got to meet The Cake Boss, i instantly liked him. It's nice to meet celebrities who are first and foremost nice people and don't behave as though they're a gift from god. Seeing as how I've met two that are like this...i was glad to find my most recent idol was friendly and charming and seemed like a real down to earth guy. I'm excited to read the rest of his story and try out some of his famous recipes.

Nano 2010 Day 19

Word Count: 31,872
Today's quota: 31,673

Yup, still holding onto my buffer, though barely. I'm having trouble concentrating on writing any more. It's becoming very evident that time seems to speed up starting the week before thanksgiving. And all of December is practically a blur.

There's so much that i want to get done and it seem like there's no time to do it in. The end of November is aproaching fast even though i have some kind of a buffer. My sister is starting a remodel that she wants an extra pair of capable hands working on (me) and i still want to get around to making up the new end tables for my apartment which will match my previous furniture that i made earlier this year.

So much to do, so little time.

Nano 2010 day 18

Word Count: 31,675
Today's quota: 30,006

Today was the last day of the Thursday Write Ins at Panera. Next week and the following week are both currently scheduled for Friday.

We had a lot of fun conversation wise today. Someone we got on the topic of Mange cake, and a variety of other there equally weird conversation topics. As such, my brain is a little fried at the moment.

I've found a weakness to my democratic approach to the length of time on the word wars. Unless it's structured, so many people's opinions get thrown in which doesn't make for productivity. And as in the case of today: We end up doing a word war that's literally 27 seconds.

I'm thinking that next time i will need to take charge of the reins again and beef up the structure.

For a change this week i participated in the actual writing of the word wars instead of just monitoring the time and surfing the net. And once again, i remembered why i typically don't write. I'm so distracted trying to keep track of the timer that any attempt to write something with any resemblance to where i wanted to go in my story, just plain ole doesn't work. For some reason i decided that a very sweet and caring friend of the MC was going to force a kiss on her out of the blue.

While we were at break between the word wars, i read what i wrote and very nearly pressed the delete button because it was so bad. I'm not even sure there's a sentence that i can use from there. Perhaps next time, i'll just write at my own pace and add to my story instead of sprinting like everyone else.

Trust me, no one really wants to read my stream of consciousness. They'll get dizzy.

I have managed to hold onto my day's buffer and I'm looking forward to some time tomorrow to pull even further ahead.

In other news: the project at work that was SUCH an opportunity, proved to be quite a headache and I'm kind of glad that it's over and the new calendar has been shipped off to the printers. Done, over with, woo. And in the process of finishing up, i did get one very nifty thing out of it: A personal thank you from the executive director of our site which did not come through his admin. For all that it's not tangibly worth anything... it meant a lot to me.

Nano 2010 day 17

Word Count: 28,365
Today's Quota: 28,334

Yup that's right. With zero words written today, I am still ahead of the suggested quota. Yay! It appears that I'm finally out of the slow chapters which make writing seem like trudging through knee high snow drifts (which i have only ever had to do once but remember with distinct clarity).

I wrote about 95% of a chapter yesterday which depicted what i call slow action. For me, normal action is when the characters are leaping about, explosions, and running full out. Slow action is when a lot is going on, but everything is slow and vividly tense. Like...climbing down into a nest of dangerous and terrifying creatures. Think of Aliens with Sigourney Weaver when she faces down the queen and threatens the egg sacks in order to get Newt back. A lot of what happens goes on in the character's minds rather than in physical action.

Last night my secondary main character Colton Stone made the nerve wracking trip back through the Grake infested ravine wearing a mask and webbing formed from a Grake which he killed earlier. He copies their body language and mimics their sounds using his size to intimidate other Grakes away from him.

Ok, i know it's a stretch but hey, its MY story. As the great Marius (Colin) once said "if you want to have a pink and purple polka dotted hydra as the head of the mafia...you can do that so long as you're consistent.

I've decided to write an alternate chunk of a prior chapter which depicts a huge catastrophe in which my primary main character, a student doctor, goes along with other field doctors in order to help with triage. Originally, i wrote that the catastrophe included the city power plant but when i stupidly went back and edited, i realized i hardly had any scenes that showed the lush and alien landscape let alone any of the wildlife that the settlers are forced to co-habitat with. They could be in a post apoctolypitc earth for all that i showed the natural setting of the alien planet. Thankfully, i will be able to keep a lot of what i have already written when i go back and edit since my MC, Sierra Septis, concentrates mostly on her triage patients. It won't be hard to alter the wounds to reflect that they were inflicted by natural means.

Thankfully most of this scene will be action style since the MC and the doctors are racing to the site on quads. I might not write it tonight, but it's on the forefront of my mind.

The next scene in line will slow down some since it's mostly about the news of the bandit (Colton) and Sierra's little brother finally graduating. I'm not sure I'm ready to loose momentum. It will, however, set the scene for the next chapter where little brother is in the wrong place at the wrong time.

[Insert ominous and infuriating cliffhanger music here]

Nano 2010 day 16

Word Count: 25,183
Today's Quota: 26,672

This is why you don't edit. This is why you don't go back and get sucked back into reading what you already wrote.

I had nearly a full day's buffer on my writing. But I scrolled back up to review a certain creature on my alien world that i had mentioned before or to think up a creature name that suited the situation. I noticed that i misspelled a word and before i could stop myself, I had right clicked on it and started editing.

Before long i was 19 pages down and still editing and it was getting very close to my bedtime. And though i had only written about six hundred words, I decided i couldn't forgo sleep another night.

That's when the thunder and lightning storm hit the northwest. I quickly backed up my story and unplugged my electronics and went to bed. Bed....glorious bed. Despite hearing about big gusts of winds, knocked out power, and thunder and lightning...i slept like a baby.

No more editing!

Nano 2010 day 15

Word count: 24,544
Today's Quota: 25,005

It's the halfway day. Halfway through the month, halfway through the quota, halfway through the story right?

yeah, right.

While I'm nearly there for the quota today, I'm far from halfway through the story. Or at least i don't think i am. It's hard to tell because it's all in my head.

I went into this month with two stories. A main story that was inspired by local events, and a prequel that explained how the characters got there. Both had awesome story lines and major intrigue when i ran them past my sounding boards.

So far i wrote a grand total of 1,216 words on the prequel story, and all the rest on my main story. Whoops. I had hoped to be spending my time half and half, but wound up writing pseudo Star Trek fan fiction which was totally NOT my intention. Any attempts to make a organized space faring military/civilian ship inevitably make me want to write the next line as "And then Warf beats the living shit out of X with his bat leth."
*sigh*
So i quickly abandoned any hope of writing that story this month. It's becoming terribly annoying to have to add up my word count every day. If i were smart, i would simply copy and paste the words from the first story onto the second and just not select that when updating my online backup copy. However if i were smart, i wouldn't be attempting this without a firm outline and detailed story/character plan either.

Another day lacking a decent night's sleep, 500 ish words till quota today, delicious tiramisu in my fridge, and Jury duty to look forward to starting on Monday. Woo.

Nano 2010 Day 14

Word count: 23,425
Today's quota: 23,338

For a change i thought I'd post after I'd already done the necessary typing for the day. This will be a quick post but i did want to say the following.

Attempt #1 at Tiramisu: FAIL! Bad, completely disproportional recipe offline! What a waste of good marscapone cheese! If i could comment and warn people away from the recipe i would. Ended up with tiramisu flavored goop the consistency of thin cake batter!

Finally decided to do a search on the files on my computer...and lo and behold i found my sister's recipe which i had typed up and saved...totally not burried in my documents in a folder labled "Recipes"

Attempt #2: Incredible. Perfect. Delicious.....about half gone already.

Nano 2010 Day 13

Word count: 20,159
Today's Quota: 21,671

So, the NaNo site decided to be dumb last night. At 11:33pm i posted my word quota for the day. I looked over at my graph, and it showed that i was below the suggested quota line.

Wait WHAT?

Turns out last night was the night that NaNo decided i needed to update my time zone to coenside with DST which occurred LAST week. Why it chose this weekend to be all annoying about it is beyond me. While YES, i should have updated my time zone the day of...i didn't. What's weird about this is that I know that pretty much EVERY night this week i have posted my word count after 11pm. I have proof on my Google docs where i upload my additions every night to make sure my story is backed up if something detrimental happened.

So now that calendar where i was SO careful and lost waaaaayyyyy too much sleep over attempting avoiding any other kind of day than green....is all screwed up with a big bold awful red mark.

I did indeed make the 20k mark last night so it just plain ole wrong.
Grrrrr.

TO ANY NANO-ERS READING THIS: UPDATE YOUR TIME ZONE NOW BEFORE NOV 29! YOU WILL BE VERY UNHAPPY IF YOU DON'T.

I'll be spending my time until mine and Boyfriend Jon's anniversary dinner typing furiously trying to reach and pass the day's quota. It's the weekend and that means BUFFER time!!!

Nano 2010 day 12

Word Count: 18,368
Todays' Quota: 20,004

Yesterday was just for casual writing. Between a severe lack of sleep, the write in, and my cousins spending the night which means we talked until way too late.....trying to make a full 1667 words just wasn't going to happen. I knew this early and accepted that i would have a yellow mark on the calendar widget. Although today, I'm kicking myself as I drink my first cup of coffee this week.

I wrote a grand total of 923 words just so that i could stay ahead of the quota for the day. I finished the last "slow" chapter and now is when the action starts which is my forte in writing.
I'm not sure why but I've been complimented several times for my action writing. Vivid details, what my characters are thinking, when they act vs react. I'm pretty excited to write tonight.

Tomorrow is the 1 year anniversary for me and Boyfriend Jon. Since it's smack dab in the middle of Nano, we're saving the more major celebration for December. But we will be making a trip to our favorite steak road house:

Jimmy Mac's in Renton: If you're looking for high class, don't come here. If you're looking for a (sanctioned by my brother who lives in Texas) INCREDIBLE steak, fun atmosphere and to die for bread rolls...this is the place. Peanuts are available as you walk in, and you're supposed to throw the shells on the floor which can make walking through in stilettos rather difficult. But the food and the staff completely make up for it. It's worth the drive through rush hour traffic for us. Their crab cakes are also high on my salivate over list. Casual, filling and very reasonably priced for steak. This place is going on my Rave Page.

Nano 2010 day 11

Current Word Count: 17,430
Today's Quota: 18,337

It was time for a freshening up of Firefly's Haven hence all the changes to the design of my blog. This had nothing what-so-ever to do with procrastinating on writing. Really.

Most of last night was spent cleaning, straightening, organizing, and sorting. I did three loads of laundry which have been sitting since before NaNo got started. I also worked on a project for work that has already gotten my skills noticed by the Executive Director as well as a couple of other higher ups. These skills are the ones that range beyond data sheets, inventorying coffee, and fixing printers. Call me crazy, but I do have higher aspirations in life. I'm probably too excited at this opportunity. My boss keeps reminding me that I do have regular duties too.

Between the cleaning and the project I did manage to get some writing done. Ironically I hit my best stride to date, tapping out a crazy 2k words in just under an hour. The TV was off, the writing music was off, and the only sound aside from the tapity tap of my keys was the buh bump of my dryer spinning the last load of laundry.

Remembering that just a few days ago, I was ready to give up the whole Nano experience for the year, i read back through my blog.

Turns out between this and talking with Mark and Colin who have been my sounding boards from the beginning, that every year, I have had a serious breakdown from feeling overwhelmed and weighed the possibility of quitting. Usually its when the rest of my life's normal stress is at it's highest peak.

So as of right now, thanks to Mark, Colin and Boyfriend Jon, I am not quitting. We'll see how i feel once Jury duty time hits.

Oh yeah, I got a Jury summons. The second time in the last two years. And ironically, it falls in late November. While i doubt someone as young as myself has a good chance of being picked, I think it would be quite an educational experience to serve on a jury. Provided that the crime is not one against children that is. That is a case they do not want me serving on.

Write in Number 2 tonight. Cousin Margaret and Cousin Nikki are joining me on the east side for a couple days. Hopefully some more people will show up. This time I'm actually going to attempt to write during the write in which usually produces less than stellar results.

Nano 2010 day 10

Holly crap we've hit the double digits!

That's right, it's a full 1/3rd of the way through November and supposedly our novels.

Word count: 15,553
Word Quota: 16,670

That gimmick on the widget that I was talking about yesterday, is proving to be cunning and surprisingly effective not that i know what it is. Now that i know if i don't keep writing until i hit 1667 words for the DAY, that I'll have a yellow mark on my record.

Even in my sleep deprived, coffee filled, "why on earth am i doing this?" brain, that's just not ok. It's worse than not ok. I just can't let it happen. I can't break the cycle of green days by being lazy. I must have the Green Day o_O

So I'm not entirely acting like a zombie yet, but the toll of burning the candle at both ends is really starting to take a toll on me. Boyfriend Jon tried to introduce the concept of naps during the day, but it just doesn't happen very often. Especially not on a work day.

Tangent:
Although, i just found a way to insert photos. So maybe being sleep deprived is good for something. And after the following attempt:

Yeah, I think that works a lot better. Cause me + HTML do not make for the prettiest of sights. Nifty...learn something new every day.

Sorry you all had to witness my technology deficiency.

Untangent:

Cousin Margaret and Cousin Nikki are coming over tomorrow to visit me and hopefully spend some time not writing, but enjoying each others company. Although it is becoming apparent to me that I really need to clean my apartment so they'll have a place to sleep. Thankfully, this will force me to do some much needed laundry, dishes and straightening.

Nano excerpt

I thought i might give those who are not my Nano buddies a chance to see some of my writing. I'm a little proud of this considering the following:
I am not a man. Thus writing a conversation between two men about a woman when said woman is the object of one's affections and the others annoyance was extremely difficult. I just tried to get the feel to be as awkward and uncomfortable as possible while using the minimum amount of dialogue. And this was the result:

Williams stood by patiently. They had never really had any reason to be enemies, and thus with the Marrissa issue, things were tense, but not volatile

Colton picked up his satchel and slung it around his shoulder. Together the two men turned back towards Home Camp. They walked in silence for a few steps before Williams broke the mood and explained his unusual behavior.

“So, Marrissa.” He started looking uncomfortable. Colton understood his hesitation at this subject. The last thing either of them wanted to deal with was the drama involved in a love triangle. If Williams set his mind on proving his love for Marrissa physically, Colton would be in trouble. Though he wasn’t small or weak, he couldn’t possibly stand up to someone with not only warrior training but also constant needs to stay fit in order to protect Home Camp. Colton’s strength lay in his upper body, and his long, limber limbs.

“She’s all yours.” Colton replied abruptly. Her eagerness had early on put him off of any interest in her as she grew into womanhood. For all that she was willing to help Kyland with all sorts of chores in an effort to get Colton’s attention, she wasn’t bright. She didn’t think for herself, nor try anything new.

“Kyland said you might say that.” Williams said. He reached a muscular arm up and scratched his head. “But…well, I mean, could…” he trailed off.

“Spit it out Williams. What’s wrong? I have no interest and will do anything I can to stay out of your way.” Colton offered, holding his hands up to his shoulders indicating he was hands off. He hated when others weren’t straight forward when asking for something.

“That’s good of you. But my problem is, well, she won’t stop talking about you.” Williams admitted looking all the more uncomfortable.

“Me? Why?”Colton asked. Mentally he checked back over the last several encounters to see if he had inadvertently done something she might have taken as an advance. When he come up with nothing other than common courtesy, he shook his head. Crazy female notions. He thought. “Williams, I treat her like any other female in Home Camp for Kyland’s sake only” Colton was about to add his feelings on her annoying factors when he happened to glance at Williams face.

From the slightly distant look and contented smile, Williams looked completely ensnared by Marrissa’s feminine wiles, even if they weren’t directed at him. Yet. Colton thought with determination. Put together, Colton estimated they would make a good pairing assuming the old adage opposites attract, was worth something. He was tall, she petite. Strength, gentle. Yes, definitely a good pairing. Just leave me out of it.

“Good. I just didn’t want something like that to come between us. I mean, I know we’re not really friendly, or anything.” Williams said. For all he had faced down countless Grake hunters, Bamdor beasts, and Lantries and bore multiple faded scars from such encounters, he was proving overly shy about broaching this subject. “Do you think there’s anything you can do to, you know, discourage her?” Williams stopped Colton with a broad hand on his shoulder. Hope was written all over his face.

Practically nauseated by this conversation Colton did his best to put an end to it quickly. “I’ll see if I can think of something.”

Thankfully it seemed to placate Williams and they continued on their way without any more uncomfortable words being exchanged.

They walked back through Home Camp Gate and separated with an amiable wave. Colton made to head back to his bulb high up on one of the trees when he noticed Marrissa walking anxiously toward him. She caught his eye and broke into a kind of trot that made her breasts bounce nicely regardless of what female contraption she had under her clothing for support. Catching himself admiring her body, he quickly reminded his male instinct that he needed to deter her away from him and towards Williams.

There was no avoiding her now as she joined him, her face halfway caught between worry and trying to smile becomingly. The result made her look all the more uncertain and awkward.

Deter her. Colton thought to himself and set his face into a brooding scowl. “What?” He asked roughly.

She looked taken aback as his less than welcoming tone but said, “It’s Kyland. He’s really not good right now. He threw me out of the medical hut when I asked him what was wrong. I think we should go talk to him.” Marrissa said smiling sweetly.

Colton did not miss that dangerous word women used when they were trying to snare a mate of their choice. ‘We’ was an entrapping word. “No,” he stated flatly. The smile faded instantly from her mouth. “I will go talk to Kyland, you need to go…” he cast about quickly looking for a reason to send her in Williams’s direction. “Go attend to William’s arm. He said he strained it earlier today. He said he wanted you to look at it because you’re so much gentler than Kyland.” Never mind that Williams had said no such thing. The supposed compliment had the desired effect on Marrissa. She blinked several times as if it had never even occurred to her that Williams might appreciate her skills. Colton saw a flicker of pleasure cross her eyes which were now fixated away from him. But she recovered quickly and her face assumed a disinterested and defiant stare when she looked back at him.

“Fine.” She said and flounced away. Hopefully Williams would have enough sense of mind to play along with the ruse. Colton quickly diverted his course to head back to the medical hut which lay at the back of Home Camp.

That's what I have so far. Hope you enjoyed it.

Nano 2010 day 9

Word count: 13,774
Quota for the day: 15,003

So i figured out what was up with this NaNo gimmick. Or widget as they call it:

Last year, this thing was pretty simple. If you crossed word quota for the day, the day turned green. This year, suddenly I started seeing yellow pop up. This is the description they give you for what the widget does:
My Month is a simple display showing overall progress and how you did on any given day. Light green and red show where you were above or below the goal for the day, bold green and red are reserved for days where you did exceptionally well or monumentally badly.

Am I going crazy or is there actually NO mention of the color yellow ANYWHERE in there? I start going crazy and can't figure out why some of my days are showing up Yellow when i have indeed posted the recommended word count for the night. So last night around 10:30 (being a work night this is already late for me, and thus prone to bad decisions)...i decided to figure it out.

I posted one word under the daily quota for the day. Still red.
I posted the exact daily quota for the day. Yellow
I posted one over the daily quota for the day. Yellow -_-
With the "exceptionally well" in mind, i posted 100 words over the daily quota. Yellow.
200 words over daily quota. STILL Yellow (by this point I'm cursing)
Finally i went and looked at my stats. It says i still need 183 words to reach 1667.
What?
So here's what i figured out.
If you write below quota for the day: you get red
If you write above quota for the day: you get yellow
If you write a cumulative 1667 words on top of whatever you had the day previous...you get green.

Way to go NaNo site. You've managed to get 400 odd extra words out of me. You've gotten sneaky in your terrible threes.

Nano 2010 day 8

Words to date: 12,095
Quota for today: 13,336

Sorry, there was no day 7. It was my mother's birthday so i spent most of the day with her, and only wrote about 400 words throughout the day. That's ok though, cause i spent all of Saturday writing with Jon and clearing both day's quota.

In other news, my mother FINALLY opened the ivory tiled Mah Jongg set that i bought for her on my glorious trip through China Town San Francisco back in March. We played a round after finding instructions on the internet which I'll probably copy and make look really authentic on nice thick velum for mom to keep with the box which had none. I won the game.

I took her to see "The Social Network" at her request which we arrived to an hour early thanks to good ole Daylight Savings time. We watched the last ten minutes of it and then wandered into "Hereafter" a Matt Daemon flick about psychics and sensitives to the dead. Though we only saw the last 45 minutes of the film, both my mom and I were intrigued. It had an artsy film that i typically don't care for where at the end I'm left going "huh?" but i attributed it to having missed the first half of the film.

We then made our way back into "the social network" on time and were able to watch all of it this time around. It certainly does make you wonder if there's any basis of truth to this story. And though Mark Zuckerberg has publicly denounced it as pure fiction, I wonder if it might just be an exaggeration of things as perceived by the co-founder. For example: if someone forgets to invite you to lunch, a lot of people will take it as a personal snub.

I had a bit of a freak out last night. Suddenly coming to a bunch of overwhelming conclusions. Most of them are personal, and thus will not be written down. But I'll say that I worry probably too much about the problems of those i love. I've considered the fact that writing NaNo might be too much for me to take on right now. Not that i can't do it, but that there are other more important things and opportunities that are presenting themselves right now, prior to the end of November. Things that really need my attention.

I'm not behind yet, but it's started to feel a little bit like I'm writing a homework assignment rather than an amazing story straight from my soul like it did the first couple of years. So I'm not giving up, but I am aware that this might not have been a good year for me to take this on.
Boyfriend Jon and other friends have been so supportive in helping with my burden.

I will finish out the write ins and cheer on my fellow NaNo-ers, but i'm not sure what the fate of my NaNo story is. It's exciting and intriguing, but I'm just not sure what to do in order to keep what little bits of sanity i have left this month.

Nano 2010 Day 6

So today is a trip down memory lane. I've said it before, you can meet the most amazing people while doing Nano. And I'll say it again; Boyfriend Jon is amazing.

I"ll try not to gush too much but it occurred to me that exactly one year ago, Boyfriend Jon and I had our first date which we agreed was not a date.

I freaked out to Annie, took especial care with my makeup and even de-fuzzafied my sweater before arriving at Panera silently praying (or as close as i ever get to praying) that he wouldn't bring anyone else with him.

That night began an amazing year full of laughter, movies and video games, reassuring uncertainties, and sharing successes. I didn't know you could fall in love that fast.

Tonight is crossing the 10k line and completing one fifth of the story. I'm going for 12k though to get a buffer in place for week two which any nanoer will tell you is the hardest week.

Nano 2010 day 5

Well, it turns out i was overly cautious. But the thirteen people who did show up, had a great time.
As it stands, i'm well behind quota for today having spent my day running important errands and doing a not so important craft session making a mario brick box.
In other news.....i have officially beaten Plants vs Zombies and now MUST WRITE!
toodles.

Nano 2010 day 4

Ok, got a unusual start today.

Woke up at 5am to take boyfriend Jon to a early morning doctor's appointment. And then sat there furiously writing while I waited for him to be finished. Let me tell you this: I did not miss work this morning. But i did miss the extra sleep and snooze button pushing.

While sitting there, i crossed the quota for the day and then some. But after a while, my eyes started to glaze over despite the giant mocha sitting next to me. After i caught myself staring at the same sentence for more than five minutes, i switched over to a hilariously fun game called "Plants vs. Zombies" that my friend Josh introduced me to about a year ago. You can find it in Pop Cap Games.

Let me tell you, that was a lot more fun than trying to sit there contemplating the most wordy way to say something and trying to give an effective view of triage....something I've never had to do. Thank you Cousin Nick from New York (pre-med student and a volunteer firefighter) for a six paragraph summary on that subject!

Instead, i was bravely fending off zombies with "pea shooters" and "star fruit" and "sun flowers". I get a satisfying thrill every time one of their heads pops off! I think maybe i was overdue for some writing distraction. And since I'm ahead of quota, i didn't feel so guilty.

Tonight is the first 2010 write in. Based on traffic on the site...i'm estimating nearly thirty people. How many actually show up is beyond me. Last time i predicted 12 and ended up with 25. So perhaps I'm being overly cautions in my estimation.

Depending on attendance, we might be spilling beyond the capacity of the conference room. Which might give me more credence to entice the Redmond Library to let us use one of their meeting rooms. Though we love Panera, we might have outgrown them. We'll see tonight what our numbers are.

I have my ducks, power strips, extension cords, countdown timer and my laptop. Just gotta run home and snag the sign in clipboard and my camera that i forgot.

Nano 2010 day 3

Word Count: 4,662
Today's quota: 5,001

The person in charge of the NaNoWriMo blog had an evil awesome moment.

Tavi was kind evil enough to post about cookies. Not just any cookies, but the mother of all recipes: Nestle toll house chocolate chip cookies.

and then, *gasp!* she put up a picture of them!

That was it. I was drooling. I wanted cookies. Nearly ready to start chomping on my laptop screen, i went to my kitchen at about 11pm looking for the makings of said cookies. If i had to, i knew i would stay up past midnight to get at least one batch of cookies.

Butter, check. Flour, check. Sugars, vanilla, and baking soda/powder, check. Eggs...crap, i only had one. And just as i was thinking, well...i can make a half batch...to my dismay i realized i had NO chocolate chips anywhere! As an avid baker...this was kind of amazing for my kitchen to be completely devoid of chocolate.

Oh no! The thought of no cookies sent me into the twilight zone. It was nearing midnight and i would need to be up at (ack) 5:45am to get ready for work. I would be a zombie in the morning if i went to the store to get cookies right then.

VERY reluctantly, I made the responsible choice and went to bed *sniff* without my cookie fix.

Typing went much better last night. I coaxed my muse out of hiding with a promise of some action scenes. With her help, I sprinted past the quota for the night and then kept right on rolling. Today, I'm about 350 words short of the quota without having typed a word, but I think it's time to start putting a buffer between me and that quota. The second week is always the hardest.

At this point, I'm stuck on my first story, and quickly getting the ball rolling on the second. Unlike last year, my character, while still humanly flawed, is NOT a simpering, whiny, break down and cry for hours on end, kind of girl. I don't finish a scene wanting to pick her up and slap her. Nope, she's a student doctor.

And a very fatal flaw in my plan has emerged. While, in real life, I have sutured a wound in the past and know how to make a decent field dressing, much of the healing art escapes me. So I've solicited my doctor in training cousin from the east coast's help in making up for my lack of knowledge. Woot for family connections!

Nano 2010 day 2

So day one didn't go nearly as well as last year. Last year, i rounded the 7k mark before going to bed. It was also a weekend.

After spending 6 out of 10 hours at work staring at an excel spreadsheet, trying to intimidate, scare, coerce, coax, or otherwise make the stupid chart do what I wanted to, i had a massive headache. Good news is, the chart finally bent to my will and started behaving itself.

Bad news is, after doing a workout with my friend Kenny, getting food, and going to the craft shop for mario brick supplies my headache was in full swing. I dropped Kenny of at his apartment and went home.

But i was still about 600 words short for the quota for the day. And i was determined to not let day one set the tone for the rest of the month. I needed to at least clear quota. So i pulled on a robe and snuggled under a blanket, pulled up my laptop and began to write.

I got about 150 words on the first story before my muse gave me the middle finger and promptly stopped helping. So i decided to switch over to my second story and do a little more character development.

My muse seemed to like this idea and begrudgingly started helping again, quietly suggesting that I kill off my MC's father prior to the story so i can make the connection between the first book and the second book right away. So off i went, pounding out another 900 words before my eyes started glazing over.

Looking at the clock, it was my normal work bedtime which might have accounted for the tired feeling. But with the headache furiously battling against the asprin i took before sitting down, I knew it was futile trying to stay up and write even more. The quota was reached, and that was all Nano land was going to get out of me for day one.

So off I went to bed. It did not escape my attention how right it felt to be laying down. My comforter was the perfect temperature, my pillows laying in exactly the right configuration. Within moments, i was dozing off into dreamland bliss.

But it was not meant to be as a fellow Nanoer texted me about an hour later with questions for Boyfriend Jon about a Netbook. I passed the message along and then laid there, suddenly feeling too hot and with the headache finally dissipating to the back of my head.

With both Dreamland and my novel calling to me, I laid there contemplating getting back up to write some more.

Evidently, I laid there too long because the next thing I knew, my alarm clock was going off alerting me that it was time to get up for work and i was left wondering where the night had gone.

Still tired, i managed to get myself to work in a semi-conscious state. And as the morning tasks started, I realized i had forgotten a very important component the day before.

COFFEE!!!!!

Now I typically don't drink much coffee so thus I am very susceptible to it's effects.....

.....as my co-workers are starting to notice........

someone want to try to pull me down from the ceiling?

Nano 2010 day 1

I think i forgot how to say NO. Although this time, it's mostly to myself.

No Anne, you don't have time to help someone with a completely unnecessary craft project. You should be writing!
No Anne, you won't have time to clean your apartment later, You'll be writing!
No Anne, you don't have plenty of time to get a workout in ALSO on day one when you should be bolstering your buffer because you should be WRITING!

Uh woops. I guess my brain hasn't quite clicked that it's November and that means every spare second available should be spent with fingers on the keyboard typing.

So for today after work, i have a workout scheduled with my workout buddy, and then I'm going to a craft store (dangerous for me) to get the makings for a Mario brick box for said workout buddy's cosplay costume of, you guessed it. Mario. And at some point I'm sure i should eat that pot pie which has been sitting in my microwave since lunch.

I'm not sure when I'll be writing at any given point today, but I am sure that this is the start of many nights of burning both ends of the candle.

On a side note, I think i might have convinced my cousins to join in on this madness!

Giddeup muse!

NaNo 2010 Launch Party

Things I learned last year from Nano:

1. There is no such thing as too many power strips and extension cords
2. Candy is not a good reward for most immediately after Halloween.
3. We can fit a surprising number of people out in the main seating area.
   
4. The conference room gets WAY too hot in a short amount of time between packed bodies and running laptops
5. I need to think up better prizes
6. The train horn worked great as an attention getter.
   
7. I really need to try to get some work done at the write ins and not just orchestrate everyone else.
8. 5 minutes isn't long enough for a Word War
9. Trying to write down everyone's name is kinda silly when you could have a sign in sheet.
   

I took all these lessons from last year and put them into action this year. Surprisingly, it did very little to quell the knot of anxiety in my stomach. However once my Riker (Annie) and Data/Worf/Jordie (Boyfriend Jon) arrived and added their support, it slowly dissipated.

The turn out for the Kick off party was quite a bit less than I was expecting given the forum traffic. But as Boyfriend Jon pointed out, it's one thing to say "yeah I'll be there" on the forums and quite another to actually show up.

That's OK. I'm sure we'll see a surge come November. And as a plus side, we managed to convince three people to the point where they signed up there at the kick off party! YAY!

No really, i'm still alive

Sorry it's been so long; had a rather crazy couple of weeks.

So a couple of quick updates:
This is not trash people! Sometimes, I can't believe my city. I have found so many incredible things just literally thrown in the trash that are still in pristine condition.

Among these are:

• A perfectly good rolling suitcase, (black, no smells, rips, or uncooperative zippers)
• A brand new pair of tennis shoes (tag still on!)
• A full knife block set (the knives didn't match the brand name on the block...but they all fit!)
• 9! backpacks, totes, and other such bags all stuffed inside each other.
• a working lamp with a tiny nearly imperceptible dent in the base

and most recently: a messenger style laptop bag in burgundy. What's more? Giant nuclear powered laptop fits inside said bag! So i have myself and Eddie Bauer brand laptop bag in my favorite color!

In other news:
Nano is just single digit days away. I'm halfway between jumping around in joy and freaking out from all the work that needs to be done.
Not only am I hosting again this year, of which my main concern is capacity, but I'm writing a story that's new ground for me. I've never written a crime thriller before! Annie: I maintain that it is NOT chick lit!
Why oh why does the library have a 1 day a month maximum?!? This plan does not work for Nano at all! And when i spoke to the help desk about the local library sponsoring the event...they told me that i should go to the one already sponsored at a different library.........26 miles away! Right. You would think that writing novels and libraries would go hand in hand wouldn't you? It's like PB&J.

I'm meeting with the inspiration for my fictitious Uncle Marcus tonight since he seems to be able to magically pull ideas out of my head like popcorn. Also as a retired Marine, I'm hoping he can shed some light onto some of the military aspects of my story.

Agonies of planning and being right brained

My dad said to me the other day: "I don't understand why you do this writing thing. All it accomplishes is driving you crazy."

Indeed, he's observed this three year long obsession with his usual disregard for right brain type things. I'm his only right brain child. Even my mom for all her creative talent is an analytical thinker. I'm not sure what he understands less; My need to create for the sake of creating or why i purposly do something that to his mind wouldn't be worth the stress. Indeed I have yet to publish either of my two novels, or even begin to attempt to edit them. So it's no surprise to me that he is confused by my Nano obsession.

Don't get me wrong. When I need help, he's there for me. He calmly explained details of the Godfather to me that didn't make sense during my first year when i wrote a story mirroring the Italian mafia. Both being Italian, and growing up in New York during the height of the Mafia, he had plenty of experience and insight to share with me. When i wrote my second novel, he stuck by his word to not request my help with family projects during the month of November.

But I keep getting the impression that he had hoped my obsession would flame out instead of getting stronger. When he heard of my idea to skip Thanksgiving altogether for this endeavor, I think that might have sent my very traditional father over the edge from indulgence to politely protesting my involvement.

Since this is the place where I can air my opinions I will do so:
Personally, I don't enjoy Thanksgiving. It's another one of the holidays I believe has lost it's essence along with Easter, and Christmas. Instead of spending the time giving thanks for all we have, it's become a stressful day of entertaining, cooking and stuffing your bellies beyond what you normally would eat. Yeah, sure. The prayer might proclaim thanks, but everyone's mind is on the feast laid before them, and if there will be enough mashed potatoes left when the bowl reaches them.
I would honestly be more happy with a simple roast chicken, mashed potatoes, green beans and cranberries. A single normal serving on a normal size plate. I would be immensely thankful for that.

No response from a ML or my muse

It's rather frustrating to put a lot of time and effort and thought into an email, only to have it sit at the recipients inbox, received but unanswered.

I sent a message to one of the current MLs asking some specific information to better help my own group and the process of becoming an official ML next year. According to the sent mail register, they've gotten it, but not responded. I sit here wondering if I've been blown off, or if being MLs, they're too busy to answer.

Oh well, life goes on. Or at least i hope it will get a move on soon.

My muse is also ignoring me it seems. I've run into some problems with how the landscape will lay out and how it will play a roll in the story itself. I need some kind of natural barrier, a ravine, a chasm, or something that has a dangerous nest of creatures living at the bottom of it. Just when i think i have something, it slips away in the realm of "too unlikely".

Meanwhile Nano is looming; we're coming up on the 15 day countdown. I just hope my story doesn't loose steam before Nano actually starts. I think i'll start doing word prompts off of the website tonight to get myself back in the mood to write without analyzing.

Also, Boyfriend Jon turns 26 in a couple of days. I know I'll be making him his favorite desert tomorrow, but the rest of the day will be up in the air for now.