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September 11, 2001 . . . we all know what happened, we all know people who were affected by it. I am fortunate enough not to have lost anyone that day, but New York is my home. I grew up there, I worked there. I lived and breathed New York until about ten years ago when I moved away, so when that second plane hit and we realized it was intentinal, it made me angry. I felt violated.

Seven years later, our lives have changed enough for us to point back to that fateful day. Seven years later, justice really hasn’t been served, has it? Sure, a few higher-ups have been captured and imprisoned, but what has that accomplished? As Americans, we’re still hated by the people that formed those groups, and while I don’t live in fear that they will take action again, I am saddened that their beliefs are so strict that we cannot live in tolerance of one another.

Such is the allure of science fiction novels that depict a future in which a united Earth goes forth to explore the universe. These problems were resolved, tolerance and unity became the standard, and most people are happy. Life is not science fiction, not will it ever be, not from that angle. But it’s sure nice to daydream about it.

While daydreaming, I will not forget those who lost their lives on September 11th. I will not forget our armed forces who have tried and tried to bring order to the Middle East. I will not forget their families who live without them on a daily basis while tackling the normal challenges of everyday life. I will not hate those who can’t understand sharing and tolerance.

I can hope that change will come, that people will come. I don’t think my generation will be the one to do it. Perhaps my children’s generation. All I can do, beyond hoping, is teach my childen right and wrong, while hopefully, some other woman in the Middle East is teaching her children about right and wrong, about sharing and tolerance, and about the responsibility of change.

I will remember. And my children will learn.

It’s been an interesting week. I’ve been going to bed at 8:30 several nights in a row, which isn’t even enough time to check on laundry progress after the two year old goes nighty-night. I need it, so no complaints. I feel more clear headed, and I’m using my lunches at work for various writing tasks. I’ve been reading, too. In the evenings, I read a bit of Hunting the Hunter before bed, and I’ve also started Neil Gaiman’s American Gods at a doctor’s appointment. The Think-Sideways assignments are waiting for me, but I just haven’t had a spare ten minutes times three or four to work on the freewriting.

Today’s task is to work more on Nighthunter’s Bite. I’d like to complete the story soon, and get back to editing. I’m really in edit-mode which is making the writing difficult. Sunguard needs my attention. Someone’s been hinting to me that it could be more than just a short story, but I need the short story done before I think any further on it. There are two anthologies I think Sunguard will fit fairly well, but deadlines swoop in when the work’s not getting done.

So many things to write and edit, and so little time . . .

There hasn’t been a lot going on writing-wise, but I’ve been busy. Treischan Strength was rejected, and I’ve resubmitted it to an anthology. I signed up for Holly Lisle’s Think Sideways course, which runs a year long, so the child issues that are due to come up soon shouldn’t affect it. And, I read S.L. Viehl’s Omega Games, and am slightly afraid of what she intends for the end of the series. The main character received some advice from a new friend on how to handle her current family issue, which is pretty much an issue that’s run the course of the series. If she follows his advice, the series is going to end on a sad note, and I hope it doesn’t. I can only wait and see, now.

Evenings have been useless for writing, so I’m back to lunch break writing for a few weeks. Progress will be slow, but if there IS any progress, I will be happy!

I’m not going to whine, I’m not going to make excuses. I’m going to understand what’s wrong and deal with it. Unfortunately, what’s wrong with my writing and my writing time is really beyond my control and just requires patience from me to get through it all.

I’ve had the luxury of working a pretty terrific dayjob that allows me thinking time for my writing, usually at the expense of speed getting through my never ending workflow. If I didn’t get enough done before lunch, I’d make it up after lunch. If I didn’t get enough done after lunch, I’d make up for it the next day. Don’t misunderstand – I don’t steal company time to write, it’s just that I’m usually thinking about two different things at once anyway, so why can’t one of them be something I love? 🙂 Having my mind in two places was okay before, but not now. I’m entering the third trimester of my pregnancy, and I cannot play with my workflow anymore. I cannot chance handing my workload over to my co-workers without it being 100% up to date. Totally not fair. So with the super-focus on getting stuff done at work (and taking on -voluntarily- a scanning project that will help those gals while I’m out) means my lunch break writing time is being compromised. I have a hard time switching tracks in my brain from patent workings and data entry to the creative output I need for writing.

Also creating an obstacle is the combination of my two year old needing a later bedtime and my own need for an earlier bedtime, shrinking that precious time to a mere hour to an hour and a half, which needs to be divded between writing, household stuff, and oh I don’t know, ME time? It took us a few days of fighting the 7 – 7:30 bedtime routine for the little girl, and she wouldn’t actually go to sleep until 8 or after. We pushed that up, so our routine with her starts at 7:20/30 (playing, reading with her in her room, singing bedtime songs) and ends quite smoothly by 8pm. Sound asleep, she’s freed me to do my own thing.

Which means finishing up the dinner cleanup, putting away whatever toys we never got her to do, dealing with the day’s mail, starting a load of laundry, and then am I free to write. Or try, anyway. My bedtime has dropped to between 9 and 10pm, mostly because of the Nighttime Joys of pregnancy (leg cramps, bathroom needs), I’m only getting an hour and a half to two hours of sleep at a time. Between that 10pm and 6am, I’m up and out of bed at least 3 times every night.

So faced with all this, my creative energy is dwindling. My time available to stir up that energy is fading, right along with my desire to put out stories. It’s the sleep, it’s the strain on my body, it’s the demands of keeping my day job going strong. Heck, even sitting at the computer is getting more difficult with the big baby belly in the way.

I’m dropping my weekly goals to one item from here on out, which will be geared toward completing projects, but focused more on paying any level of attention to the writing. Reading is included in that, especially if it’s my own. Marking up manuscripts now for editing later might work. My monthly goals are going to change, and I don’t think I’m going to make my submission goals for the year. And considering the baby is due the end of November (and will likely show up via c-section), my recovery and his well being are going to take precedence over the writing. Not to mention, my computer room is in the basement of my house and stairs after a c-section are quite limited, I won’t even be at my computer all that much.

I knew this was coming, and it still makes me sad. I feared with my first pregnancy that I’d forget how to write, and while some things needed practice to get back into, my muse was still there. I just had to rework some of the technicalities of the writing. I can do it again. I just didn’t want to give it up this soon. Comparing again with my last pregnancy, I wrote a little bit, but gave up very early on. This time, I wrote nearly every week right through week 26 (that’s about 6.5 months). So really, I did better. I’m glad for that.

I’ll just have to take it one little bit at a time from here on out.

I know when some weeks are impossible for completing anything, and I’m glad this was one week I did expect it. That said, I was able to not stress out over my lack of finishing anything I started. And, I was able to continue writing in dribs and drabs, keeping my projects alive. So what did I do this week?

* Once A Thief – Realized the main character is poking her head up in about three different short story ideas right now, and that I need to give her some free writing time next week to find out who she really is, and what problems she’s really having. Once I know that, I can fit her into the correct story, and move the two others back into worldbuilding/plotting and come up with appropriate main characters.

* Sunguard – did some market research and found an anthology I believe is appropriate which sparked a revelation that my ending was all wrong.

* Crit – read a story for crit, and will try to get the crit done this evening. It’s a short story (flash fiction) so it shouldn’t be a days-long project. I just need to sit down and do it.

The one bad thing I did was daydream about my submission being accepted. I wasn’t getting anything done anyway, so that’s not the issue, but it’s silly to get my hopes up. There are a lot of writers out there who are as good as me, and some better, and I have lots of practicing to do. That said, I do have a lot of faith in this story, and I want it to have a home like I’ve never wanted it before. But that will come in time, not on its very first venture out of the house.

I’ve been toying with the idea of writing a workshop on Time Management for writers to participate in S.L. Viehl’s workshop week, but ironically enough, I don’t think I have the time to write it up this particular weekend. Maybe I’ll set it up and just post it when it’s ready. It’s not that I’ve mastered time, I think I’ve come a long way in understanding where it is, and where it isn’t in my life, and I’ve gotten pretty effecient at determining how to use it. My July goals are near completion. The last item, writing a short story, is complicated because of the character issues. I hope to get it done, but like I said, this last week and a half of July promised distance from my writing. Maybe tonight, after the crit…

Here’s a link to the workshops for next week. If you’ve got any interest in writing, go check it out Monday – Friday. Paperback Writer

Considering the level of exhaustion we experienced from our ultrapacked three day weekend, I’m surprised I accomplished anything at all. I was not in an editing mood and couldn’t get there no matter what I did (exahustion, I’m sure) so I started the new short story (urban fantasy, untitled) and started getting my submission package together for Treischan Strength. The final edit will start over my lunch tomorrow, and hopefully I’ll clean it up enough to mail on Tuesday.

Time is not my friend. I need to harness it, maybe bottle it, and portion it out as I see fit. Actually, I do prioritize my tasks based on the time I have available, but it just doesn’t always fit into my imagined schedule.

I’ve been continuing the Sunguard edit. I tried to work on Once A Thief, but the character changed the rules on me as I got to know her, and the story is an entirely different idea than when I started. I’m keeping the old idea for future writing, and going with the new one this upcoming week. I completed a critique this week, and will try to do one more this next week.

Goals for this week are aggressive, but I’m giving it a shot. I have my priority items including a final edit and submission (Treischan!!!). We’ve had way too much fun with the holiday, so it’ll be nice to get back into a normal routine where writing fits into my preplanned schedule. 😀 Hope your week goes well!

I used my lunchbreak to do some market research, focusing on anthologies this time. None of the listings on www.ralan.com really jumped out at my before, but I wanted to give myself a second chance. I looked at the themes based on what I’ve already written and what I’d like to write, but this time, I really looked at the themes.

I selected two based on partial writings I have saved. There’s a celtic anthology that I can use to help complete Nighthunter’s Bite, which I’ve been stumped on forever. There’s another one that didn’t have the theme listed on Ralan’s site, but which I discovered on the direct website specifying “radio” and “alternate worlds”. It reminded me of a scene I wrote for an exercise a few weeks ago, a scene I can now morph into a story. Both have December deadlines, so I have enough time to write the first drafts and edit them to my heart’s content.

My only fear with anthologies, is that everyone else will be writing these themed stories, and if mine doesn’t get accepted, then all those people will be sending their stories to the same markets as I will be. I suppose I can always tweak them to be different so they don’t look like antho-rejects. . .

That’s a lot to be worried about without the stories being written though, so I’ll add these little projects onto my August and September plans. Wish me luck!

Interesting find today. I googled “Sunguard” to make sure no one else had recently published a short story by that name and came across a company named Sunguard with an interesting product. Would you use a laundry aid to put UV protection into your summer clothing? It requires a 15 minute soak and is good up to 20 washes. The company claims dermatologist recommended as well as approval from the Skin Cancer Foundation.

http://www.sunguardsunprotection.com/

It’s even affordable.

And for Star Wars fans — http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Thyrsus. Who knew?

Yes, my blog is more than about writing now I suppose…

It’s interesting to me, that the less time I have available, the more I accomplish. For instance, until my daughter was a year old, her bedtime was 5:30pm, based on her needs for sleep. I had from 5:30pm to about 11pm every single night to fit in dinner making/cleanup, laundry, game playing, and writing. I even pushed it to midnight some nights. The writing got done sporadically, the game playing was too much fun, and dinner was eaten in peace every night. Over time, my daughter’s bedtime has moved up to about 7:30pm, and since I’m pregnant, I need to be in bed by 10pm. I give myself a half hour to read/unwind at that point, but it must be done in bed. So I went from five and a half hours every night to do these things, to about two and a half. And somehow, I’m managing better now.

Maybe it’s because we’ve managed a nice evening routine with the two year old where even if we have separate dinners, we’re all together for it. Meals tend to be gobbled down, and cleanup doesn’t always happen to completion. (Thank goodness for the dishwasher and a husband who knows how to use it!). By 8pm, I’m usually on the computer. That leaves two hours to enjoy my time, do some laundry, and prep for the next day. (Is it any wonder I haven’t done my nails in a few years?)

I have lists to thank. Yes, you read correctly, lists. I make a series of lists that keep me organized. No more too-tired-brain wondering what the heck I had to do. Now I look at my lists. There are three, really, that tie into each other. One is a Writing Goals (Monthly) list. Based on the time I predict I’ll have and what I feel most needs to get done, I make my writing goals on the front page of a notebook. The next pages follow with a Home list that lists home/finance/family related things that need to be done over the next month that isn’t part of the normal weekly chores. Then there’s the weekly page. One page for seven days of tasks. I break down 3 – 5 tasks for each day, a balance I hope of writing and home needs. At the end up the week, I tear out the weekly pages and make a new one.

My intention is to accomplish something writing related every day, however minor. This helps me do that. My notebook, by the way, goes everywhere with me. Whereever I am, I know what I need to fit into my day, so on those lucky days when someone else offers to pick up the two year old from daycare, I can complete an item on my list — early. 🙂 I feel almost sane!

So tell me. How do you stay organized?

I made a bunch of goals for myself this week, but I wonder if I didn’t overcommit. I put the Sunguard edit on the back burner to thnk some stuff over, but I think I’m ready to get back to it. I gave Treischan Strength another look at (with some comments from the Roving Crits boards on FM), and marked that up to be edited again. It’s in good shape, and should only take one night to work out the details. I’m just waiting for feedback from two other folks I emailed it to before I finalize it. (Either that or when the mood strikes). I’m also working on The Lonely Orchard which posed more of a problem because of backstory issues. I think I have those mostly worked out, so it’s just a matter of putting in the time and getting a few scenes rewritten.

The two year old’s birthday party is this weekend, so we have house-cleaning and party prep (and monthly bills) to get to this week. I’m hoping for a high energy week so I can keep up with my Wish List. 😉

Here goes nothing!

I’m holding myself to high standards right now, so the edit is taking a while. I took a new approach to find the Voice this story seemed to lack, and was drawn in by the freewriting. I enjoyed the results so much I was tempted to rewrite the story in First Person, but I got some feedback and — I agree, btw — it wasn’t enough to hold the story. So I will stick with my original 3rd person viewpoint.

I’ve been reading a lot more lately, focusing on short stories. I have a tendency to subscribe to several fiction magazines a year, and not touch them until the bug hits. I usually end up devouring 6 months of magazines in the span of just a few weeks. It’s good though. I’m reading some quality stories and then hitting my stories for editing and I’m learning that my stuff does not yet compare with these published stories. Yet. I’m learning from them. It’ll be my turn someday. 🙂

It’s pretty easy to read a first draft and pinpiont what’s wrong with it. It can sometimes even be simple to decide how to fix it. The hard part is getting your brain to move into fix-it mode and making those changes. It’s a challenge, and it’s rewarding once I get it done.

I worked on Sungard tonight, contemplating a name change to The Fallen Sun, but we’ll see after I make it through this edit pass. I only got through 1.3 pages out of an orriginal 7 pages, and 1 page of that was new material. A few more nights of this and I should be able to make it through safely. 😉 I’m looking forward to getting it all fixed!

I wrote three stories in May, and have another two in the works. It wasn’t quite the success I hoped for, but I am very pleased that I completed those three stories. This particular May was very very busy, and I feel like I’m lucky to have completed anything at all.

On to June… I’d like to complete those two in-progress stories (Eve and Queen’s Diamond). Then I need to choose which stories should be edited (I’m aiming at 4 for the summer), and choose markets to submit them to. It’d be nice to get 1 – 2 edited before the end of June, despite the father’s day holiday, the daughter’s birthday, and all the weekend fun we’re planning. 🙂

I pulled several prompts so some ideas could simmer on the back burner, and guess what? I still got stuck. I know, I’m doing a lot right now between fighting the exhaustion still, training a temp, and dealing with the terrible twos. Regardless, the writing is still there. The stuck wasn’t laziness, it was in indication something was wrong.

So I decided to let the idea-in-progress sit on the back burner and I’d proceed with another idea for now. I went with a premise I came up with on my own and was pretty charged up about it on the way home from work. I narrated parts of the story to msyelf on the drive, and it’s the one I want to write next. Then as I’m driving home, trying to remember the bits of dialogue I entertained my steering wheel with, I realized what was wrong with the other story idea.

I had actually combined two of the prompts I pulled and deep down, I think my brain knew that and was struggling to seperate them. Well, forget that. Now that I know what I did, I like it! And I’m going to work with it more as soon as I’m done my current piece. I wrote about 400 words this evening, and can probably finish it off tomorrow.

If only I could have two more hours in my day. Oh, well.

So it’s not recordbreaking progress, but it is progress. I pulled two prompts for the challenge, and am close to finishing one (“Anthony”), and working out the ending for another (“Sunguard”). I also am eager to finish “Once A Thief”, which is also from a prompt, but one I pulled two months ago. My plan is to use it for my 5th story for the challenge, which allows for my own source of inspriation. The news sparked an idea for a SF short story which I’m affectionally thinking of as “Broccoli” if only for the cute way my daughter says it. I’m writing over my lunch breaks a little bit, and writing on paper in the evenings until we get a nasty computer situation worked out.

The point here is that I *am* writing. Hopefully this weekend, I can bring something to completion. 🙂

Interesting that the short story I’ve chosen to work on, is about the very thing I’m having issues with. We are who we are, and for me that’s being a writer. I can’t change that, nor do I wish to. However old ways, distractions, life, tend to block my path. While my distractions tend to be family related and therefore positive events in my life, it isn’t so for my poor little thief who wants to change, but cannot.

January, February, and March were mostly nonexistent in terms of my writing. I signed up for the 2YN class that Zette offered once again on www.fmwriters.com. But since I have some distractions coming up in the future that will prevent me from finishing the class, I’m choosing to withdraw. I’m keeping my notes and will write it another time, but seriously, writing a novel about a mom searching for kidnapped infant is not a good thing to write while the writer is pregnant.

I realize, too, that my one rule for writing “Finish what you start” has fallen by the wayside. I have one novel that I started but could not finish (Shadow of Blood), and I started building another novel (Winter Warrior) though I did not start the writing. I’ve also quit editing Forgotten Star after overediting and receiving a right-on crit that freaked me out. I view this with a positive attitude since it proves that my desire to write is still strong. Unfortunately, I need to re-discipline and get these projects under control.

I think to finish Shadow of Blood, I need to revamp several chapters in the beginning, and rewrite/replan with the intention of which character takes precedence. That darkness of the story, and the confusion between two main characters took the focus off track. I am NOT ready to do this now, but it will be my first step when I am ready to work on novels again.

For now, it’ll be short stories. I need to get this one written, and hopefully edited, then I’m going to hit the May Story-A-Day challenge again. I need to start somewhere.

My life is chaos, and an update (as well as writing) is sorely overdue. These, and my monthly achievements/goals will be forthcoming…

Bad News: my web site, hosted by Jatol, is gone gone gone. So it’s back to square one on the web site issue.

Good News: my artist friend has completed her art (originally inteded for my web page) so for now, I’ve posted the image on here. She’s an amazing artist. See for yourself.

It’s been a busy past few weeks, with very little writing completed. I’m working on some crits and some worldbuilding, and the edit is brewing on the back burner for the moment. The little one has changed sleeping schedule, and so I’ve had to adjust my writing time and focus. I think I have a handle on what I need to do now — which includes scaling back some of my writing goals. Someone reminded me that I have a full time job, a house and a family. While I do better when I can obsess over my writing throughout the day, I need balance so that everything works, so that when I can write full time, the family will still be here…

It’s been quiet here; the day job has required more of me, mentally and physically, so there was an adjustment for my brain to go through. I’m back at it, in baby steps, and by this weekend hopefully I’ll be up to my usual progress.

* Crit: done, finally. It was a good story, and I really wanted to make sure my comments made sense.

Dealing with some sickness, but made a little progress:

* WW – researched metal working for some critical components of my Winterstorm city of Storm Hold. Felt like I was back in school in some combination of science and history class.

* Crits – still working on that one crit, just having a hard time focusing. (Bad cold, go away!)

Life took over for a few days, took a break. Unfortunately, I didn’t accomplish any of my goals for the week but lots of fun was had. [1 birthday, 1 anniversary, 1 new neice]

Started the crit, with markups in the text.

Read Forgotten Star Ch 2, and started marking up where changes need to be made.

Dealing with some technical issues with MS Word, too… Stinky.

Vacation: read some short stories, and came up with a few ideas for Winter Warrior.

7/22: Reviewed my July writing goals and came up with a plan for this week. Selected a story to crit.

Vacation prep, and departure for sunnier climes will leave me out of contact, and off writing during this time. I’m taking along some small projects to work on, should the desire hit me, but it’s supposed to be a vacation, so no pressure.

Forgotten Star: reviewed the layout of the next 3 chapters and rearanged a few things. Made some edit notes as well. I’m taking the chapters up to bed with me for redlining edits. The rest of my energies were spent on trip preperation.

The week is flying by, and I need to put the brakes on. I completed another crit, and I’ve got two more in queue now so that should hold me for a bit. I worked out (I think) the magic naming issues in Forgotten Star, and I started an edit of The Lonely Orchard (more of a review/analysis). I should hit the full edit tomorrow.

Writing has been slow this week due to baby related exhaustion, but I’m still on target for making my goals. My main goal has been to make reasonable goals, and so far it’s working. The crit is taking longer than I anticipated, and bills are nagging at my while I *am* writing. I’ll be doing those tomrrow to shut them up. Forgotten Star is going well – the new chapters are solid, and while I have veered off my outline, it’s to tighten up the story. Winter Warrior has been dancing in my thoughts again, ever since I transcribed my notes, and I’m eager to get working on it, but that has its own time and place. Right now, Forgotten Star is priority. If I can get my minimum done on Friday and Saturday, I’ll be able to start editing on Sunday.

I’ve been rereading Forgotten Star and updating my outline to reflect changes in the last draft. I had forgotten (haha) some events that were included in this novel, so this was a good time to go through the entire draft. I’m shocked at how horrible some of this stuff is written (a testament to my improvement over the years), but the foreshadowing and hinting is done right.

The new scenes are going well. It’s difficult to start in with the main character back in her days of innocence and ignorance, but I made the jump and it’s going well. I’m almost done with the third new chapter (C) — still need 2 more scenes –and should be able to start the fourth (D) soon.

I wanted to start the edit early, but I’m just not quite ready for it. I’m having one issue with the magic system’s naming system (of skills/abilities), so I’m planning a brainstorming session for when the read-through is finished.

The critting is continuing, and I think it has sharpened my analyzing skills.

So far, it’s been a good month of writing and I’m dangerously close to meeting my goals, desprite baby’s teething these past few weeks. 🙂