I'll be at my local caucus tonight which should be fun and interesting. What I'm really looking forward to is tomorrow when the campaign volunteers stop bugging me! You'd think I had a lot more than one vote by the way they are stalking, I mean, contacting me. I must be on every list there is... 15-20 calls a day. At least 10 volunteers have ( Read more... )

I never know what to do in between Christmas and New Year's. I should probably be taking down the tree and putting away the holiday decorations but I'm not quite ready -- things will look so bland without them! Or, I could be thinking of the New Year and making resolutions (or goals, which sounds much better!) Doing actual "work" doesn't feel right ( Read more... )

Okay, the tree is up and decorated, the garland is on the bannister and the centerpiece is on the dining room table. Seems like that should all have been done in an afternoon but it's taken over a week! So many things -- expected and unexpected -- keep popping up lately. And I'm not done with the Christmas shopping yet... But, I'm trying not to get ( Read more... )

That's the sign that hangs in the hallway at elementary schools when it's too cold and nasty to go outside for recess. And it's how I feel today! More snow came and piled on the snow and ice we already had. And it's not even officially winter yet! And being at the end of a dead-end street means we don't get plowed out right away... But that's okay ( Read more... )

Winter has arrived -- it tiptoed in during the night. Our street is completely ice covered and the sleet is still coming down. What to do on a nasty day like this? There's only one thing TO do... bake cookies! Oh, and I might work on my wip. I'm so behind in "stuff" that I'm not sure I'll get to it today. This is what I struggle with almost daily ( Read more... )

I really enjoy my ICL students. For the most part they are enthusiastic and determined to improve their writing -- and it's great being a part of that process. But yesterday I was editing a nonfiction article from a student and it just didn't "feel right." Previously he has struggled with proper grammar and punctuation. Really struggled. But this ( Read more... )

I have been on a quest for the last few weeks. Not exactly searching for the Holy Grail, but for something almost as hard to find. A Thanksgiving flag! I like to change the flag that hangs by our front porch every few weeks but I haven't been able to find a cute/whimsical turkey flag. Oh, there's the generic "fall" themed flags with pumpkins and ( Read more... )

I tried to do NaNoWriMo this month. Really, I tried. But it just doesn't work for me. I got some great feedback from my editor on the first 3 chapters of my wip and I got totally hooked back into that story. But that means writing, revising and editing as I go. I discovered I LIKE doing it that way! With NaNo the point is to "write freely" and ( Read more... )

Now that the conference is over I can get back to my wip. And after talking about it with my editor I feel I'm on track with the story and the direction it's heading. Wrote yesterday morning, again in the afternoon and again after pool! I don't usually work like that but I'm so drawn to this story it was fun and felt great. 3 chapters (4,125 words ( Read more... )

I don't even know how to describe the weekend conference. Amazing-wonderful-extraordinary-stupendous... the list of adjectives go on and on! I got to hang out with my incredible editor Liz all weekend! We did a presentation together Sunday morning that was a blast. I think we totally dispelled the myth that the author/editor relationship is ( Read more... )