Basic Bus Hair, part 2

(Just a reminder folks, this was written in 1986. Before the internet had pictures. Kind of like PC's before windows. Unix people lived in a linear world.)


Ok, now the standard disclaimer. The following information is provided ONLY for entertainment purposes. Some instructions are highly illegal and will get you a Darwin Award faster than you can say, "Oh, I wasn't really supposed to DO this?"

Keep the Driver Happy

"FIFTEEN MINUTES!" - vetern van driver S.Scott Travis, in response to the question, "When are we going to get there?"

Hi boys and girls! Today we're going to learn about van drivers. Van drivers are those insane saints who volunteer to drive us fun places like Colorado (fun), the Snook school, (fun, fun) and Houston at 5pm (we're having big fun now!!)

Since these people are already operating with fewer than normal brainwaves, it is very important that we do our part to help them keep the van on the road, or relatively close to it. Here are some rules for van riders.

Some rules are easy. We call these rules Common Courtesy.

1. Close all doors before the van enters the highway.
2. Talk to the driver every 20 minutes. Check pulse, blood pressure and respiration rate. If any of these are more than 50% above/below normal, it may be time to change drivers.
3. Resist the urge to offer creative ideas for shortcuts.

Some rules require more self-discipline. We call these rules "only in your dreams"

1. Refrain from asking the driver every 5 minutes questions like: When will we get tehre? When do we eat? When is the next reststop? Wailt at LEAST 7.5 minutes between questtions.
2. Do not remind the driver of the current speed laws every time the needle accidently creeps over 55mph. He can read.


Parts of the Van

"THERE'S NO SPARE TIRE!!" - Jimmy Waller, Tunis, Texas, Halloween 1985

Windshield: (Ideally) A clear glass plate, allwoing the driver to look out ot the van while still protected from the elements. (Realistically) An opague, brown thing needing to be swept clear of bugs every thirty minutes.

Jack: A large metal contraption which wanders freely through the van, crushing food items and luggage. When needed for it's designated purpose, it burrows beneath the heaviest piece of luggage.

Spare Tire: 1. Removed to make more room for luggage.
2. stored on the outside of the van door, from where, upon sighting an old tire on the highway shoulder, it jumps off and rolls to the side of its soul mate.

Tires: 4 black objects, worn by the van. Hopefully all four are inflated to manufacturer's specifications. It is helpful if all 4 maintain contact with the road surface at all times.

Steering Wheel: Holds driver in place. May also be used to direct the vehicle in teh desired direction, or at least the general vicinity.

Heater/A.C: Climate control, operated by the navigator, who decides the temperature of the day. There is no comfortable, only too hot or too cold.

Stereo: A gift from the YL committee. Pull the fuse and pretend it's broken.


Packing the Van

"Honest, Wayne, we only had 15 people, max!" - Any Snook YL leader, after the blowout.

YL features the Ford Club Wagon as our favorite 15 passenger vehicle. Why? Naturally, because although there are seatbelts for 15, there is space for 31, if packed by a professional. You too can pack like a pro. Here's how:

Begin by seating large people in the rear seat. Try to get four or better, five, use shoe horns and lubricant, such as potato chip grease or sheen to glide them into place. These folks now effectively form seating for four more people. (Check the A/C rear units.) Repeat this procedure with the remaining bench seats.

Two people will occupy the front passenger seat, within the seatbelt. One small person is folded and placed within the space between teh front passenger seat and the glove compartment. Another fits conveniently between the two front bucket seats. Two more fit on the running board and one lucky soul occupies the driver's throne.

Congratulations! If you have done the above correctly, you have converted a 15 passenger vehicle to a 31 passenger vehicle.

WARNING:

Do not attempt this if:

You are traveling to Colorado or any other long distance.
Tires cannot pass the Lincoln Penny Test
A YL Area Director will be traveling with you.

Just shut up and get on the van...

In honor of my newest project, I am actually digging up something I wrote about twenty years ago. Basic Bus Hair was written and Kinko-ed to be a Christmas present for the folks I did Young Life with while going to college. I was a "rural" YL leader, which meant visiting the high school and going to YL club involved at least twenty to thirty minutes of highway driving, on the Highway of Death, as we call it now, a stretch of highway that cannot be widened because it's the habitat of some bizarre, bloom-every-fifty-years-for-an-hour, wild flower. Of course, maybe if we did destroy its habitat, we'd find out that it is the only thing keeping Global Warming from accelerating, but that, my friends, is a topic for another book.

Point is, a lot of the stuff I wrote for Bus Hair, may come in handy for the new van thing, so I need to type it anyway, may as well type it here. Because twenty years ago, it was typed on a blue Royal portable. A Christmas gift from my parents.

So without further deviation, Basic Bus Hair - A Guide for the Ride, by A. Vanna Ryder.

Basic Bus Hair - An Introduction

"Only your hairdresser will know for sure." Miss Clairol, 1967

Bus Hair. It's not a big issue these days. Everyone is talking about the impact of busing on the lives of children, but no one dares to talk about the effect that buses have on hair. It is a nasty, nappy business, one hairdressers won't talk about; one most writers get squeamish about. Since I cut my own hair, have an A in my creative writing class, and have traveled extensively on the Big Dog, I consider myself a leading expert on the touchy, or untouchable topic of Bus Hair. Well, at least the only person I know that has spent more than five minutes thinking about it.

And so I submit to you, a handbook on bus hair. Where to get it. How to get rid of it. How to enhance it. but this handbook will only mention bus hair once:

Bus hair is the affliction which causes your dirty, greasy hair to stand on end after being on a bus. The amount of time spent on the bus matters not. The only prevention: Don't get on the bus. The only cure: Shampoo. In Between: Invest in a hat.

Chapter One: Changing Drivers

"I'm not tired. I can go another 500 miles." Van Driver, 3:51 am. The accident occurred at 4:17 am.

Sometimes, drivers get restless. They are called exhausted drivers. Exhausted drivers are bad drivers. They weave, they change lanes without looking. They sleep, they crash. Boo!!

Fresh drivers are Happy Drivers. Happy Drivers are alert. Happy Drivers are aware. Happy drivers are generally more fun to be around and a heck of a lot safer. YEA!!

Sometimes, a tired, used up driver must be replaced by a fresh driver. Fresh drivers may be found in a variety of places. They mat be sleeping in the back of the van. The may be riding on another van in the caravan. Perhaps one can be found hitchhiking along the highway. In a crisis, any will do.

Guidelines for new drivers:

1. Never change drivers in a moving vehicle, unless directed to do so by the trail boss.

2. Choose replacement drivers carefully. Preferably those with:
a. current drivers license.
b. defensive driver's card, or the Sears Safe Driver Card (free to anyone 5 or older at any participating Sears Store) (**2006 note. This certification is now available on the internet and any fine On Line driving school or university)
c. Small Seeing Eye dog, since up front space is limited.

3. It may also be necessary to replace the navigator. The navigator is the peron who occupies the front passenger seat. His job includes climate control, music selection and volume, communication with other vehicles via CB radio (2006 note, cell phones, now) and, most importantly, to announce loudly, "YOU MISSED THE EXIT!!" at the appropriate time.


More exciting adventures tomorrow, when we will learn about Keeping the Driver Happy and the Parts of the Van.

If you're reading this, you won't be "in the van"

Try to learn something about everything and everything about something.
-- Thomas H. Huxley

Everyone needs a friend like my friend Lynn. You have to be in shape for it, of course. Actual real life conversation:

L: I need to to 20 Tuesday. I'll do five in the morning and then meet you for 15.
(we run long distance every Tuesday, for marathons. Told you being in shape was a requirement)

Me: (not wanting to look like a wimp) Nah, come right over. I can do 20.

I mapped out the run on mapmyrun.com and about mile four into the run, I broke the news to her that what we were running would be a little more than 20, maybe closer to 21. Around mile 14, I came clean and told her it was a little more than 23. Did I mention the temperature was getting up to 87?

Point is, every writer needs a friend like Lynn, not because she drives you to unfathomable physical feats, but because she's is interested in everything. She asks great questions and wants to really learn about anything. Grass growing to the local murder on page one, to the Space Station. We don't always know answers, but we spend the four or five hours we run talking about a million subjects. Never a dull moment.

Even better, she's read some of my really sucky manuscripts and she's still my friend. (Although, she's learned not to ask to read things anymore. See, I told you she's smart.)

But yesterday, we spent a good deal of our time "populating the minivan." The minivan, most likely a KIA because it is funnier than a Chrysler and easier to type over and over, is the setting for a book I'm starting to pre-write. Lynn knows a few characters who belong in the minivan touring Alabama. And we have a new phrase for folks who get on our bad side...

Yeah, that person belongs "in the van."

If you can't annoy somebody with what you write...

I think there's little point in writing. ~ Kingsley Amis

And some days, I think the only person I annoy is myself. The days when the words are working against me and not for me, when I can't for the life of me get this stupid passage right. When the inside of the brain isn't matching the screen or the paper in front of me. But I guess annoying myself is better than nothing.

Sure it's really easy to push a few political buttons and tick people off, but where's the fun in that? Anyone can do that. It's the idea of writing a story that can get under the skin. Not just the annoying, as in angry kind, or the pull the carpet out of normal people's lives kind, but kind of like Jane Smiley's A Thousand Acres, where you finish the book and walk around for three days saying to yourself, "Oh, so that's why so and so is like that." Not out loud of course. But you finish the book and feel like you understand the world better. Not because of some obscure facts about old secret societies, but because there was some measure of truth (not truthiness) and you really can understand people better.

I guess that's why Smiley won the National Book Award. Go figure.

So many ideas, so little time...

“As I look back on what I have written, I can see that the very persons who have taken away my time are those who have given me something to say.” Katherine Paterson

I had a visitor last night that kept me up too late, late enough that 4:30, which is already hard enough, was even harder. Add in the start of Daylight Savings time, and I don't think many people will want to be around me today. But this morning, thinking about the visit, and all my crazy relatives (and I use that term in the most medical sense possible. Almost every one of them would do well with meds and some kind of therapy), I did come up with a germ of an idea for my next book. Possibly the sequel to the Purse Driven Life. Could be interesting. Could totally remove me from the grownup table at the next family gathering. Yep, it's that good.



"The last thing one settles in writing a book is what one should put in first." Pascal

"I rewrote the ending of 'Farewell to Arms' 39 times before I was satisfied."- Ernest Hemingway

Thirty nine times. And it's a war book. See, I am in good company. I'm only on Practical Flying's fifth or sixth ending. And I think I like this one.

Writing, Walking, and Talking

Walking is also an ambulation of mind.
-- Gretel Ehrlich


In every walk with nature one receives far more than he seeks.
- John Muir

All truly great thoughts are conceived by walking.
- Friedrich Nietzsche

He who limps is still walking.
- Stanislaw J. Lec

I am in the middle of rewriting some action scenes from the WWII novel. One thing working on this book as taught me: I cannot write action scenes sitting still. I have to feel the adrenaline with the characters. Since I don't have access to a Douglas DC-3 to crash land for this, that means a run. Walking works for emotional scenes, but for action, it's running and the faster the better. With the soundtrack from a horse movie in the MP3 player.

The biggest thing I've noticed in writing books I've read, at least the ones by actual novelists and not just nonfiction writers, is the love of some kind of physical exercise of the rhythmic type, either walking or running. No cycling, no machines, no aerobics class. Not even treadmills, it's outdoors, even in the rain. Walkers include, CS Lewis, Tolkien, Madeleine L'Engle, Annie Dillard, Natalie Goldberg, Terry Brooks, David Morrell, Anne Lamott. I ought to take a poll, to see if my favorite novelists do as well. Or at least my favorite novelists this week, since that seems to be a changeable thing.

I'm sure Austen, and the Bronte's walked, it's what they did back then. I'm betting on Dostoevsky too, at least for travel, if not exercise. I'm thinking Margaret Atwood as well, mostly because her characters spend so much time in physical motion, that I would imagine she does as well. Besides, she's Canadian, which is so much like British, except without the Queen and the accent, so she must walk.

Walking helps writing, it informs is. Talking on the other hand kind of messes things up. Hemingway used to warn people that if you used up all the words talking about a project, you wouldn't have any left to write it. I am so guilty of that. I get all excited about something then talk about it once too often and poof, I sit down to write and I don't "see the scene" anymore. I'm trying hard not to do that with this new book. Which is easy, since I'm still in the research and stewing/dreaming stage. It will be a walking novel, not a running novel. And I think my dog is quite happy about that.

Book Recommendation

I have to recommend any book that says you have to spend time dreaming most days. Terry Brooks' Sometimes the Magic Works is like Novel Writing 101 about the mindset it takes to write a novel. Or maybe I just admire him because he writes huge honking novels AND they get published. He freely admits that had he started writing recently, his earlier stuff wouldn't cut the mustard. But he is in his sixties and still learns and used his imagination. How many sixty year olds still do that? It doesn't take much imagination to pull the slot machine handle, which is the family legacy I have.

But so much of my writing time this week has been re-visioning some of my key scenes. I'm hoping to get this all done by the end of April and I really think I'm on track. Then on to bigger and better things. Right?

The Joy and Necessity of Coffee

There is one thing worse than waking up and facing the day ahead from the starting point of 4:30 am. And that is facing the day from 4:30 am without coffee and breakfast. Sure, I know there are people in the world who face days and weeks without breakfast and not necessarily on purpose. I am not one of those people. I am blessed enough to have the prerequisites of a good, oatmeal and raisins breakfast every morning, courtesy of my husband's employment and my microwave.

But today, we will have none of it. Insurance physical, scheduled at 8:30 am. So I'll be there four hours hungry, and I'm so sure, pleasant to be around. At least I have a starbucks gift certificate sitting in my walled, ready to spring into action as needed to rescue me from the low blood sugar condition. Fasting pretty much since dinner last night, at 6pm. So, we're going on twelve hours of no calories in. Water is the only thing I'm allowed.

I hate drinking water. There, I said it. Here I am, a certified, personal trainer, pseudo athlete and I am admitting I hate drinking water. I will never be one of those who travels with the little water bottle, like a baby bottle, always in hand. My fluids need to contain if nothing else, caffiene. Flavor is another plus, but not those silly fruit flavored waters. Water was created as a base, not as an end in itself, that's my personal belief. It was made so that we wouldn't have to crunch coffee beans in the morning, something way too loud for the wee hours of dawn. It was made to keep us moving, not move through us. I now, I am out of like with every fitness professional and dietician who has ever walked the earth, but there you have it. I think some of you agree with me. You know you do.

Three hours until breakfast. Better hope you don't run into me...

The Essayist Glut

I discovered that rejections are not altogether a bad thing. They teach a writer to rely on his own judgment and to say in his heart of hearts, "To hell with you." ~ Saul Bellow

In tenth grade, I read a lot of Erma Bombeck and Art Buchwald. I wanted to be a humorist essayist as long as I could remember. Unfortunately, I didn't have a family willing to do funny things for me to write about. Nowadays, every blogger is an essayist. So competition is up. And it's the ol' supply and demand. Loads of supply. Demand is okay, but if you call it non-fiction, it had better be provable facts, right? So, there are two major things lacking in my career as a humorous essayist. Humor, being the big one. And someone willing to write me checks for writing them. I did find one market...but that's another story.

I'm reading a book right now by Barbara Ehrenreich. Her job title, essayist. She is witty, funny and lives in Key West Florida. There are lots of essayists out there, most don't claim it as a job title. Most just post on their little blogs and go on with real lives. Since I don't have a "real life" ie paid employment on a regular basis, I have to get the essay production up.

I've got three of her books sitting in my library pile, and so far, the first is a quick read. Nickel and Dimed is about some time she spent trying to see if one could really "live" on the living wage. No surprises to people that actually do, or rather try to. Not really, not without roommates, family, a community. Which contrasts with the American Ideal of pull yourself up by the bootstrap. What she proves, so far, in the 122 pages I read, is that hard work doesn't make you rich, just tired. Rich people, the kind that make their own wealth, may work hard, but there is another thing, a talent, an idea, something besides plain old hard work. I've been there, done the menial labor thing. Or should I say, service industry.

Some accuse the growing service industry for the lack of state money for schools. Seems Merry Maids, and places like that don't have large things like plants and factories for fat property taxes. The maids sure don't make enough to own property to tax. I guess the problem with trickle down is it is indeed a trickle. And the service class is growing, and the user class is holding steady, and the in betweeners are diminishing. As is understanding.

Green with envy....

I Googled Dan Brown and Da Vinci code. Over seven and a half million sites are listed. And I bet some of the websites are by people who have actually read the book. There are book sales, the famous movie sale and big movie stars, and then an entire cottage industry of anti-Da Vince code books. That's what fascinates me the most, how all these books debunking a novel are selling like the devil.

But the idea of writing a book, a novel, and having it be such a huge cultural thing, something that gets so many up in arms. Is it the subject or the story? I don't think it's just the subject, although it's important. But lots of books are written about really controversial subjects. They don't tend to sell millions and millions of copies. That's the rub. How do you write a book that does that? Thing is, if what Mr. Brown says on his website is true, it's not like he sat down to write a cultural battle ground. It was a story, one that kept gnawing at him and he got to the point where he had to write it. Since he already had a couple of b-list thrillers out there, he could get someone to publish it.

But I'm reading the book with my pen and highlighter. There's a lesson in there somewhere for commercial fiction writers. No one has accused Brown of being a literary high brow. But there hasn't been much Grisham-like critism either. (I think Grisham is a good storyteller, but he head hops so much, I get the concussions. Needless to say, I don't read his stuff unless necessary.) There has to be something in the book. Or an email address for an application to sell your soul.

Like I needed something else to do...

I am rapidly re-writing a large chunk of Practical Flying, now that I know how it really ends and hopfully will be done with that by the end of the month, or at the latest mid April. I'm not sure I'm ready to start editing the Purse Driven Life yet, although, I might zip through that while I'm researching the next project.

For the next project, the first phase is to re-read the Brothers Karamzov as much as I can. Yeah, hold your excitement. I know, gee, lets reread an eight hundred page book over and over. But with PF looking at coming in at a 200K word count, at least I can say I come by it honestly.

But while over at Crafty Peaches, I was musing on the political climate of the day and decided it was time modernize the BK. I think I would enjoy the project, and it would definitely be a challenge. But I could be fictional and political at the same time, plus write about the church. See, the idea has merit. So as part of Phase one, I will be tromping out to the Book Store to get a copy of BK that I could call my own, mark up, write in, etc. I wonder if it comes in a large print edition. Could you imagine hauling that booger around? It would have to come with a retractable handle and wheels, like a suitcase. Maybe a retractable stand as well, so you could just raise it up and start reading, since it would be difficult to hoist it up onto your stomach while lying on the sofa. Hmm, any publishers listening?...

Those with ears, let them hear, those with blogs, let them prop...

Our scientific power has outrun our spiritual power. We have guided
missiles and misguided men.
-- Martin Luther King Jr., Strength to Love, 1963



Mr. King wrote this in 1963. What would he say now? Today we can communicate faster and farther and cheaper than anytime past, but what do we have to say? We have concentrated more on methods than message. Anyone can have a blog, but how many blogs, mine included, are more about individual gripes and whines than really having something worth listening to. What would Martin Luther King Jr. say on a blog?

It's an age old question. Style over substance, method over message, etc. Then again, when you concentrate on the message, you get accused of preaching, that what you're communicating is only a sermon thinly disgused.

I'm reading Natalie Goldberg's Thunder and Lightening. Re-reading, because it's one of the few books that was on top of a box. But she talks in it about how the need the write comes from the desire to be heard. It takes seed in childhoods where children are seen and not heard. It's the urge to talk to Mom, Dad, teachers, etc and be heard. Rarely, she said, do people say they write because they need to be heard by grandparents. Somehow, they always have time to listen. But I can see where a lifetime of being shushed could lead to a desire to write. And I think the proliferation of blogs, especially by the younger, twenty-somethings and teens, is an outgrowth of the business of the adults in their lives. No one is around to listen to their stories, so they post them on line, and others might or might not read about the boy in physical science and the horrible wilted salad they served for lunch in the cafeteria, or how worried they are about the new zit on the end of the nose. Comments, props, etc, become so important, they are signs that someone out there is listening. And even if the reader doesn't agree, there is at least the illusion of being heard.

That's all it is, the illusion of being heard. You know someone visited the site, but you don't know if the reader really read, or was watching the latest movie trailer at the same time. In the desire to be heard, I think most of us are too busy with self, etc, to hear like we want to be heard. So we are compounding the problem. And the blogosphere grows...

There was another quote that came with Mr. King's. Seemed like a good final thought.

Stress is an ignorant state. It believes that everything is an
emergency. Nothing is that important.
-- Natalie Goldberg, O Magazine, October 2002

Lies and the Lying Liars that tell them....

I'm still waiting for James Earl Jones to call me. He should be calling any day now,to let me know that our dsl service at home is ready to go. He hasn't called yet, and I'm bummed. But not as bummed as my dog, who is stuck in the house because we don't have a fence yet.

Thing is, when I called, the friendly customer service person assured my that my internet connect would be ready the same day my telephone service was. Lies. Then, when I tried to call and find out what the deal was, and why the little dsl lights on my router weren't blinking the way they're supposed to, the happy lights, the computer generated voice referred me to a website! ARGH! I would be happy to visit your website....fix my dsl and I'll be there!

On the plus side, without internet access, things at the story factory are moving right along. Nothing else to do at four thirty, so I really have to work!

But just some friendly advice to the Friends of Mr. Jones: Talk to each other, eh? I'd be lessed stressed if I knew before hand it would be an extra week.

And Mr. Jones? I'm sitting by the phone, waiting for your call....

Moving on up....across the west side..

The best way to realize the pleasure of feeling rich is to live in a
smaller house than your means would entitle you to have.
-- Edward Clarke

In an effort to prove correct this theory, we are downsizing our house this weekend. Our children's friends don't believe it.

Actual conversation.

"You're moving to a bigger house, aren't you?"

"No, smaller. 800 square feet smaller. Like cutting off this whole section."

"Smaller?"

"Yep."

Long, pregnant pause. "That doesn't make sense. Why?"

I could see the gears turning in my inquisitioner's head. It made no sense to go smaller. Although, we did have plenty of room in the old house. Too much room. Except for holidays, who needs two kitchens? and I would much rather spend the extra cleaning time writing. Lord knows, I have my own little blog universe to keep up with. I would have more time to regale my six regular reader (thank you, thank you) with more comments to disagree with.

I am sad about giving up the fifteen by sixteen room I get to use as an office. But I'll get over it. More excuse to go out to my favorite coffee shop with free wireless internet, Tuscany's.

But that is 800 square feet less to dust, vacuum, mop and other related tasks. At least an extra hour a week to squander on the latest VH1 best of show.

Today is Saturday, and the Story Factory is closed until next Thursday due the coming relocation. Have a great week.

More on vacuums.... Random Friday thoughts...

The spread of evil is the symptom of a vacuum. whenever evil wins, it
is only by default: by the moral failure of those who evade the fact
that there can be no compromise on basic principles.
-- Ayn Rand, Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal, 1966

I should first clarify today's entry by saying I didn't actually read the book. This is one of my emailed daily quotes. Don't want to appear smarter or more well read than I actually am!

And I am not in any way implying that the morally neutral Roomba is evil and that the presence of a Roomba is the invitation for evil to spread. Really. Unless you believe that pet hair acts as a shield against evil. And that is a topic for another day, as I personally believe cat hair is evil and a Roomba would therefore be an active defense against evil and not one of Ayn Rand's vacuums. Which begs the question, When is a Roomba not a vacuum?

My all time favorite vacuum advice comes from another mother with two sons, Larry Crabb's wife, Rachel. She says you should store your vacuum in the living room, plugged in, so when people come over, they can see that you were just getting ready to vacuum when they interrupted, so they'll excuse the yucky rugs. I may need that excuse more in the new house, since the yucky carpeting there doesn't hide dirt nearly as nicely as berber.

Nature abhors a vacuum and the universe is expanding toward chaos. Vacuum here meaning nothingness and empty space. Jesus says that evil moves into empty houses in greater quantity. Which Rand is saying above, that if there is lack of action for good, action for evil will necessarily take over. The antidote, being, do good. Maybe why a large part of the New Testament isn't necessarily "Don't do bad" but "Do Good." If you are doing good, you're too busy to do bad, and you are less likely to want to screw up the good you are doing. Less likely, but not unlikely.

So if you want to not compromise on Basic Principles (BP), it helps to know what Basic Principles you aren't compromising. And this, I believe is the basis for most arguments and wars. Not apathy, although it helps, but the disagreement of which principles are the ones that cannot be compromised. If one sides key BP is that you should save money for private sector at all costs, and the other side's is that no one should go to bed hungry and illiterate, there is a conflict. If one side thinks that their version of God is true and another thinks theirs is, you have Armageddon.(This can be as simple as denomination vs denomination or as big as Islam vs Christian). I'm not saying there isn't one true Truth. I believe there is. But if part of the one true Truth is that ALL people are fallen image bearers of the Creator, one must tread lightly and treat them as such.

"The battle is not against flesh and blood, but powers and principalities..." Those flesh and blood fallen image bearers? We're supposed to be all on the same side.

And that's why God made dogs....

http://nielsenhayden.com/makinglight/archives/007292.html

One of my favorite blogs had an comment about people who costume their iRobot Roombas. That alone, is ,um, interesting. But then, sixty eight (at last count) blogging faithful had commented on the costumed Roombas. Many offered their own favorite Roomba stories. Many involved the Roomba harassing feline pets or alternately, the cats hunting down the Roomba. More time than not, the Roomba won, as in one story where the cat ended up "treed on the microwave, which was on top of the refrigerator." To make the picture funnier, the cat was crouching behind an avacado. Now, not one person asked why the avacado was on top of the microwave on top of the fridge. To me, if the thing rolled off, there would be a Letterman-esque mess on the ground. But that's what Roombas are for.

Most of the Roomba owners said they had bought the little vacuum device to help with the war on cat hair. One careful reader asked why none of the Roomba stories involved dogs, just cats. It was suggested that most people who blog about Roombas were cat owners. Someone else mentioned that the Roomba was about the size of a dog biscuit for her Great Dane.

But I think the real reason that dog owners tend not to have Roombas is that picking up and eating messes on the floor is what dogs do! Have a dog? Roomba not required. My dog will eat ANYTHING on the floor, except microwave popcorn. He will eat leftover movie theater popcorn off the floor, however. I'm starting to be very scared of microwaved popcorn. But socks, game pieces, things way too big for the Roomba to scarf up? The dog will take care of it!

And dogs will let you dress them up a lot easier than cats. Not quite as easy as Roombas, but you make your choices in life. Dogs will perform the same functions on the lawn. Try that with a Roomba.

Longing for the days of random staff parking...

Main Entry: random
Function: adjective
1 a : lacking a definite plan, purpose, or pattern b : made, done, or chosen at random
2 a : relating to, having, or being elements or events with definite probability of occurrence b : being or relating to a set or to an element of a set each of whose elements has equal probability of occurrence characterized by procedures designed to obtain such sets or elements


Random suggests working or acting without deliberation, intention, or purpose. I toss the word random about without much thought, so today, since the political writers are still off counting votes, I would muse on my favorite word.

Back in 1986, when I began working for The University, I was assigned a brown parking sticker. Yep. Before the hand hangtags, we had lovely, permanently affixed stickers. You could tell how long someone worked for The University by how many stickers were on the back windshielf. Of course, professors only had one or two. They could afford new cars, at least the engineering profs. The Fine Arts folks, I think they didn't have to worry about parking, their offices were in the steam tunnels.

But all over campus, there were streets marked for Random Staff parking. So if you wanted to park a couple of miles from your work location, you could do it. If you wanted to park next to your work location, well, you had to get up early. I worked in a dining hall, so if I wanted to park on the road behind the dining hall, I would have to get there before the morning crew, who started at 5:30 am. I wasn't scheduled until 11:30. Thankfully, the security guard liked me and saved me a spot near the dock every day.

Or my still-in-school roommates would drive my car and take me to work, then park near their classes, since there was plenty of random staff places near classroom buildings.

I think the decline of random staff parking was a big hint in the direction of the university. It was the consolidation of power by the newly minted Department of Parking and Transportaion. They weren't writing enough tickets with random staff parking so convenient and available. Changes came swiftly.

PTT was not associated with the KK, the Kampus Kops, (University Police) While removing the traffic and Parking duties improved the attitude and professionalism of the KK dramatically, they were also the victims of the PTT parking vultures. They (the KK) became one of "us".


So, to improve control over our destinies, parking lots were now assigned. At higher prices. And parking permits were no longer guarantees that you could actually find a spot, it was only a "hunting license." PTT became a "player" in the University world. They had the money and the power. And the ability to make one's life a nightmare, if you were someone who was calendarly-challenged.

Random : lacking a definite plan, purpose, or pattern. I could no longer be random staff. I had a degree in Math and was working in a dining hall supervising the counting of lime green jello. Until PTT, my career was random as well. But by forcing me to park with purpose, I had to actually get employed with purpose at some point.

But not anytime soon...

Patience, virtue, and the power of a well placed expletive...

When the habitually even-tempered suddenly fly into a passion, that
explosion is apt to be more impressive than the outburst of the most
violent amongst us.
-- Margery Allingham, Death of a Ghost, 1934


The first thing I thought of when this quote came across the desk this morning was my dad. I inherited a lot of things from my dad. His height, his tendancy for acne, his dry wit and appreciation for a good cup of coffee, especially on cold mornings here at the Story Factory.

The one thing I did not inherit was his even tempered-ness. The man had "Patience is a virtue" written under his high school year book photograph. And no one seemed to disagree. Not something anyone would accuse me of in high school.

I only heard my father curse once in my entire life. And the event was so impressive, I can still remember it clearly. I must have been a sophomore or junior in high school, because the incident happened in our Texas garage. One of the neighbors, Jeff H. (Who, incidently, grew up to become a policeman, scary) was pounding the head of another eighth grade neighbor (can't remember his name, he didn't grow up to a career in law enforcement) into the cement garage floor. Repeatedly.

I remember the adreneline that flowed as my brother (Yep, I remember his name, and he too is in law enforcement...a pattern?) called my father because of the fight. My father didn't run, didn't panic, just calmly walked out of the kitchen, holding his coffee cup, and bellowed. "Get your f***ing asses out of my garage. Now."


The two boys froze in action. Jeff stood up and walked across the street to his house, the other boy went in the other direction to his house. Neither spoke a word. No one did. There were three other boys in the garage, and they just stood staring, mouths agape. Dad took a sip of coffee and went back in the house. The neighborhood, once they started talking about it, talked about it for the next fifteen years. We never heard those words come out of my father's mouth again.

I've thought about Dad quite a bit as we've been packing up to move out of the house that he helped design and pay for, but never got to live in. Lung Cancer moved faster than the building contractors. But mom fixed things so that the house became more than we could afford even before she passed on. And when I walk through the house, I can still hear her voice complaining about how this or that wasn't done right and she would have made sure it was, if only her husband wasn't dying at the time. But her daughter, alas, was incompetent and didn't take care of her mother very well. Leaving the house is like leaving a bad memory behind in that respect and I feel like a huge whiny parrot is getting surgically removed from my shoulder at closing next week.




I write down everything I want to remember. That way, instead of
spending a lot of time trying to remember what it is I wrote down, I spend
the time looking for the paper I wrote it down on.
-- Beryl Pfizer

I have one huge legal pad of things to do. I've only lost the pad seven times yesterday. I may get through the next seven days yet....

My second post for today

This is my second post for the day. My first one involved some little blog ring quizzes, which were fun. But alas, an html tag was missing, which made blogger go "Yuck, take it back..." and my browser didn't like the yuck message, so the whole thing tanked. I'll take it as a sign, that the world didn't need to know the results of my pop quizzes. I just don't think I want to do them again, it's way too late this morning, and I have work to do.

We're moving to a new house next Monday. What makes it really interesting is that we didn't know exactly where we were moving to until last night. Before that, we only knew we were moving From. But the new house is nice. I won't have as long a commute to my office. Instead of walking through the house all the way to the attached apartment on the other end of the house, I'll only have to get out of bed and walk across the room. Cuts the commute distance significantly. I'll be able to spent that much more time crafting mediocre fiction!

That's one of the two major displacements of the move. I'll have to move the story factory into the bedroom, and the dog won't have his own room and kitchen any more. I'm sure he's really worried about it. Not many dogs have their own room let alone their own 800 sq ft apartment, with kitchen and laundry room. He will have some serious adjustment to do.

The move itself is going to be about a mile and a half down the road. Ok, almost two whole miles. That's closer than our last move of three miles. The street name, White Stone has some fantasy plot potential. "The Secret of the White Stone Fellowship" or something like that.

So, back to the grind. Packing, well yes, that too. But my primary job this week is to remind the family, "Hey, that's the last time you'll ever ______ in this house."
Priorities, you know?

What kind of ...are you?

The most wonderful thing about the internet lately, is that if you can't find something to write about, you can find a wonderful blog quiz to fill up space.

Your IQ Is 120

Your Logical Intelligence is Below Average Your Verbal Intelligence is Genius Your Mathematical Intelligence is Exceptional Your General Knowledge is Above Average

A Quick and Dirty IQ Test

I believe this means I can write, but can't plot. Funny, I always thought myself quite logical. But it was this silly question about tickets and jail, I'm sure. I read too much into things, like poor Jane can go to jail for other things we don't know about.

Your Scholastic Strength Is Deep Thinking

You aren't afraid to delve head first into a difficult subject, with mastery as your goal. You are talented at adapting, motivating others, managing resources, and analyzing risk. You should major in: Philosophy Music Theology Art History Foreign language And now I know what I should write about...see according to the wisdom of Blogthings, I'm doing exactly as I'm designed to do, writing sweeping historical sagas. Friday, March 03, 2006 I'm listening, but... "The experts are always telling us to 'Listen to your body!' But if I listened to my body, I'd live on toffee pops and port wine. Don't tell me to listen to my body-it's trying to turn me into a blob." -Roger Robinson, New Zealand masters runner and author Spring Break is drawing near in our little college burb, and that means one thing: All of my favorite running routes are clogged with college boys and girls trying to get in the best shape possible before Spring Break. I'm not sure what bothers me more, the fact that they started about three days ago or the fact that they will most likely be successful. Because twenty year old bodies can drop pounds faster than David Letterman can drop watermelons off of New York buildings. Quick and dirty. The forty year old body, however, says, "No, wait, I remember that pound. Let's not throw it away, we could need it." The forty year old body is a pack rat. But after Spring Break, the wannabee's will be back doing whatever it is they do and the roads will be clear and there will no longer be the thump thump of feet as some hulky college boy zips past me on his way to the post run beer. Of course, it will also be one hundred degrees from then on, all the way to October. Writers tend to walk and run a lot, believe it or not. It's time to think things through. And sitting in front of a computer is more conducive to growing hips than growing novels. So they move. C.S.Lewis, Madeleine L'Engle, they are among the walkers. Annie Dillard, runs. Anne Lamott, walks. Fiction that moves requires movement, I guess. Thursday, March 02, 2006 Writein Lessons from Isak Dinesen "When you have a great and difficult task, something perhaps almost impossible, if you only work a little at a time, every day a little, suddenly the work will finish itself."– Isak Dinesen I love Isak Dinesen. In her short story, "The Young Man with the Carnation," here is a conversation between the Lord and the writer: "Come," said the Lord again, "I will make a convenant between me and you. I, I will not measure you out any more distress than you need to write your books."..."But you are to write the books," said the Lord. "For it is I who want them written. Not the public, not by any means the critics, but ME!" "Can I be certain of that?" Charlie asked. "Not always," said the Lord. "You will have to hold on to that." And that is why writers write. An internal compulsion, rather than a financial scheme. I don't know if anyone starts writing to be rich. I mean, it's a nice dream, but it doesn't work that way. Even the overnight successes, when you dig a bit deeper in the story, like Stephen King, Terry Brooks, John What's His Face the Lawyer, all of them had day jobs for a long time. (Grisham, that's the guy. I knew the name would come.) Anyway, I think I'm learning more about everything writing this book, even if it never gets published. (Although there is a part of me that screams, 'all this work? what do you mean it may never be published???) But the act of writing it, editing it, revising it, that's where the learning comes. And the next book will be stronger, better, more publishable. Not necessarily published. But life supplies material and the material needs some processing. Fiction is for me the best way to process things. Which is why writing the first draft of Purse Driven Life was so theraputic, dealing with the Mom thing. And Solomon's Mind is helping with the pastor thing, indirectly. But it's all a gift, like fresh picked cotton waiting to be spun and woven. Or whatever it is you do to cotton. I just buy it done. Books are just buying it done. Writing is the doing. Wednesday, March 01, 2006 Top Ten Reasons to get up at 4:30 in the morning... 10. No annoying phone calls from irate Republicans who want me to vote for their candidates in the primary Saturday. I can't vote in the primary anyway, I want to be able to sign the petition for my favorite independent candidate for governor. 9.The children are sleeping all snug in their beds. 8. Email is sparse. 7. When you answer someone's email at 5 am, they think you are supervirtuous. 6. Guilt free naps at one in the afternoon! 5. Dog has no expectations of being let out every time a car drives by. 4. Work uniform for morning writers: fleece robe and fuzzy slippers. 3. Husband wakes you up anyway, no point in sleeping for another hour and a hslf and feeling worse. 2. New coffee maker. 1. I'm getting about six pages edited each morning, as well as finishing moring pages and two blog entries. Productivity rocks! Tuesday, February 28, 2006 Here in Camelot, we eat Spam a lot.... There's a country song I heard once, "If I had a nickel for everytime I wanted you back .... I'd have a dime. One thin dime." Lately, if I had a dollar for every piece of spam that has offered me cash, I wouldn't need a job. Today's offerings, not including Christian Home mortgages ( I'm not sure if the loan company is Christian, they only loan to Christians, or most likely, the house itself must be saved... haven't asked my house yet, I'm afraid of it's answer). Anyhoo, today I've been offered at least 40K in scholarship money. I'm guessing that either Duke University or the College Board has sold a list. But with forty thousand dollars, my oldest son could at least eat at college. He would be up to his armpits in spam. And since he's already five foot seven at age 12, that's a good sized pile of spam. Even for Monty Python fans. It's amazing that junior high humor remains forever at the junior high level. I found Monty Python in junior high, where my classmates, at least the male ones, would re-enact entire skits over and over again during lunch. (and classes too, but I don't want to be a bad influence.) Now my two sons are doing the same thing. Like a cycle. The giant wooden badger doesn't loose its luster, even after thirty years. I guess no one ages in Camelot. The spam has too many preservatives. Monday, February 27, 2006 The Degeneration of Good Intentions.... Plans are only good intentions unless they immediately degenerate into hard work. -- Peter Drucker My first thought, a question really, was is this Mr. Drucker of the Green Acres Generl Store fame? I mean the quote is profound, but I could see Sam Drucker saying it. But then I realized that Sam and Peter most likely weren't the same person, or he'd have the same first name. Amazing how brilliant I can be at five am. Peter Drucker, had he run Drucker's General Store, would have had something of Walmart Proportions in several years. He was born in Vienna, 1909, got a PHd in Public and International Law and moved to the States in 1939. About the time of Hitler taking over Europe, which makes me wonder if he was Jewish, timing wise. The little bio I read didn't say. But it did say he's written 35 books, fifteen that are management classics and 2 novels, and one book of autobiographical essays. I'd like to read that one. He wrote for a long time for the Wall Street Journal. The thing that impresses me, he wrote and published his latest book in 2002. So that would make him, what, 83 when he wrote his last book? Amazing. History lesson over. But I love this quote. Plans degenerating into hard work is what writing is all about. The problem is, it is so much easier to talk about what you want to do, then to actually sit the butt in the chair and work. It's easier to stroll along the fiction section of the book store and see where your finished work would be shelved, than to sit and finish. It is easier to talk about writing than to sit and write. It is even easier to listen to some one else talk about writing, someone who's actually done the work, than to do the work yourself. Or myself, no reason not to claim the problem myself. The more you talk about something, specifically a writing project, the bigger it gets and the more difficult it becomes to actually write it. Because, in my case, the talent is easily outpaced by the imagination and planning part. Hemingway used to say that when he talked about a work before the writing, he would "use up" all the words and not be able to write it, as if the act of talking about it would be the brain's equivalent of writing. The gray matter says, Been there, done that, wait for the movie. And the page remains blank, or worse, the words are there, but feel flat, lifeless, and flogged to death. I'm not sure what my point is, besides the fact I really need to get some work done this week! Friday, February 24, 2006 Thoughts about doubt... I hear and I forget; I see and I remember; I write and I understand. --Chinese Proverb The rule of the writer is not to say what we can all say but what we are unable to say. --Anais Nin I believe in not quite knowing. A writer needs to be doubtful, questioning. I write out of curiousity and bewilderment. --William Trevor The old saw about writing is Write What You Know. But the above talk more about writing what you don't know. Or finding out what you do know through the writing. Kind of like morning pages. I really don't know what I think about things until I run a few miles pondering it and I don't know what I feel about things until I scribble a few lines about it in a ten cent spiral notebook. I have tons of these notebooks in a closet, a closet I'm getting ready to pack up before the move. My first thought is do I really want to keep them? Am I going to read them someday? Probably not. Will my children read them some day, and would they want to? There's a lot of stuff there written early in the mornings, illegible. But if I keep them all, there's quantity. There's a solid feel in this little box, my words have a physical weight and heft that is quite comforting. So, yeah, I'll keep them. I've been having my kids shred a two foot stack of printed manuscripts, earlier versions of Practical Flying. The shreds are being used as packing material, so my words are protecting fragile things. Kind of comforting. It's absolutely amazing how much the book has changed. But write what you know seems like bad advice in a world where we really don't know. Not that there as ever been a world where we do know, but it's so much easier to find things we don't know. To write is to learn. Or the path, process, whatever zen word you'd like, to learning. At least my bumpy trail. Some people think on their feet, some think with their voices, (and verbal, oral thinkers drive me nuts!) and some think on the page. Guilty as charged. Tuesday, February 21, 2006 The hardest thing to describe in words... I think sounds are the hardest thing to describe. I say this, because I'm trying to describe someone's voice in my current book. I can hear this character's particular voice in my head, she sounds exactly like one of my dear friends in college. Funny, I haven't talked to her in almost twenty years, yet her voice still stands out in my head. Of course I would give it to one of my favorite characters. The goal, I would say, is to take the voice in my head and describe it so you could hear it in your head the same way. But I'm not sure that could be done, not without a bonus cd or Mp3 file with the book. So the challenge I guess is to remind the reader of someone they have heard with a similar voice. Because we probable all know someone with the voice. Thing is, I could use some forties actress for an example, but readers my age or younger would be left out. And can't use current stars/celebrities with similar voices, since they weren't even a twinkle in their daddy's eye. Shoot, their daddy's weren't even twinkles for some of them. But is it the exact sound I'm looking to convey, or the quality. Like one character has a smooth voice, a with a lilt to it, like she just came from a church choir rehearsal and wasn't done singing yet. One character has a fake breathlessness to her voice that she learned from her mother. Kind of Mae West, but more phony, because she won't speak to women in the same tone. And main character's voice, kind of raspy with the hint of a permanent case of laryngitis. Which makes her singing really awful. She really can't sing. The couple of mentions of that have been edited out, but it does tell you something about the character. Does it bother her she can't sing. Don't know, I'll have to ask.... Monday, February 20, 2006 It's the emotions, stupid If you stuff yourself full of poems, essays, plays, stories, novels, films, comic strips, magazines, music, you automatically explode every morning like Old Faithful. I have never had a dry spell in my life, mainly because I feed myself well, to the point of bursting. I wake early and hear my morning voices leaping around in my head like jumping beans. I get out of bed to trap them before they escape. --Ray Bradbury The rule of the writer is not to say what we can all say but what we are unable to say. --Anais Nin The world I create in writing compensates for what the real world does not give me. --Gloria Anzaldua One of the reasons a writer writes, I think, is that his stories reveal so much he never thought he knew. --Cecelia Holland A common thread in all of these quotes...all of them make me think of the emotion thing I've been working on in my fiction. Funny thing is, as I'm going through my ms, asking "what is going on emotionally here?" I know, can sorta feel what the characters are feeling. The hard part is putting it in words, and even harder is putting it in fresh, non-cliche words. My family didn't do emotions. They were messy, so we just weren't going to have them Later in life, my mother allowed herself to have feelings, and she would also tell us how we felt. Always helpful. Of course, she wasn't on the bullseye, in fact the ol' arrow didn't even hit an outer ring, just went whizzing by. So, when it came time to get married, our pre-marriage counselor gave me a full sheet of little faces with feeling words underneath, like Happy, Perplexed, Depressed, Satisfied, etc. I wore the durn thing out. Now I need to find another copy, for my little characters to use. Can't hurt. Sunday, February 19, 2006 More great quotes Otherwise known as what I will be pondering as I go run this afternoon.... Everyone has talent. What is rare is the courage to follow the talent to the dark place where it leads. -- Erica Jong Risk! Risk anything! Care no more for the opinions of others, for those voices. Do the hardest thing on earth for you. Act for yourself. Face the truth. -- Katherine Mansfield Typos are very important to all written form. It gives the reader something to look for so they aren't distracted by the total lack of content in your writing. -- Randy K. Milholland, Something Positive Comic, 07-03-05 Something for everyone! Friday, February 17, 2006 Once more, with feeling... I am starting another full run through of edits of "Practical Flying". My crit group, bless their little hearts, continue to say that my writing is fine, just utterly devoid of emotion. Yeppers. Story of my life there. So, I instigated a two step plan of action. The first step is to read books that contain said emotion. Step 2 involves writing at 4:30 in the morning. I'm finding that it's easier to write emotion before the brain is fully awake. And I can even ignore the dog snoring now. I know the characters and I know what they are feeling, when I actually stop to think about it, but I'm not getting the work done. I'm still not able to get the reader to feel it as well. I'm too afraid of telling the reader what to think and feel, because I hate that in books. I like the E.L.Doctorow quote, to the effect of don't tell the reader it's raining, let him feel the drops. Wait, I'm on line, no reason not to get the quote exact... If you did not write every day, the poisons would accumulate and you would begin to die, or act crazy or both -- you must stay drunk on writing so reality cannot destroy you. --Ray Bradbury A writer is like a bag lady going through life with a sack and a pointed stick collecting stuff. --Tony Hillerman Planning to write is not writing. Outlining a book is not writing. Researching is not writing. Talking to people about what you're doing, none of that is writing. Writing is writing. --E. L. Doctor Nope, those aren't it, but I just found them and I like them. Here is what I was looking for : "Good writing is supposed to evoke sensation in the reader--not the fact that it is raining, but the feeling of being rained upon." E.L. Doctorow That's what I want to do. Back to the saltmines... Thursday, February 16, 2006 Fat Bodies, Thin Lives "It is only by following your deepest instinct that you can lead a rich live, and if you let your fear of consequence prevent you from following you deepest instinct, then your life will be safe, expedient, and thin. Katherine Hathaway. Funny, but Hathaway here shares the same last name of one of the great "thin" characters of sixties/seventies television - Miss Jane Hathaway, the banker's secretary on Beverly Hillbillies. She does seem to embody this quote. I read it this morning in a cluster of quotes sent by email and it got me to thinking about American obsessions with celebrities and sports heroes. Is our cultural fascination with these folks stemming from the fact that we perceive them to have "thin bodies and fat lives?" The paparazzi does portray them as being and doing everything that a person could want, and most interviews include words to the effect that they are living their dreams and doing every thing they always wanting to do. How many in our real everyday lives can say that? I come from a people of safe, expedient, lives. Thin lives, where conversations dwell on the lives of others.And most of the women eventually pushed the scales to two hundred and fifty or more, none over five foot three. My aunts and grandmothers would constantly talk about others, and tear them down. I can still remember cringing when I heard them critizing yet another family member or public figure, kind of the "who does she think she is?" kind of thing. And wondering if I was the topic when I wasn't there. (Apparently, yes.)Looking back, it was so they could feel better about the choices they made, or lived by default, this I see now. That may be the main point. That fat lives, and thin bodies, neither can be live by default in our society. Choices must be made, both at key moments and ordinary times. The easy way, to accept the defaults, lets the blame for poor decisions appear to belong to others. But it's still the fault of the defaulter, not the one who set up the defaults. Yet, everything around me insists the key to life is to be safe and expedient. Insurance ads, fad diets, new laws and products are all screaming that life can and should be safer and thus more satisfying. There are no ads in print or television telling you how to follow your passions, only how to make more money working from home on the internet. Of course, one other option is offered. Numbness. Which came first? Fat bodies or thin lives? Is one the result of the other? I could see where either could be the first, but I'm starting to think maybe the obesity epidemic we're facing in kids could be the result of the thin lives they are witnessing and living. "If that is what life is going to be like, pass the Twinkies..." There is no place to run, explore, have adventures, except for sports and video games. And unless a child is extremely talented, they are not encouraged to continue to play sports after a certain age. No one plays for fun anymore. I love novels where this is the character's struggle, to accept the defaults or choose to follow his or her heart. Even the old Austen and Bronte books deal twith this, the choice between expediency and societal norms or to live in line with one's heart. I'm starting to see that the characters I write about have no problem with living according to their passions, it's almost second nature. Maybe, since role models have been so few, I'm just making up my own. Wednesday, February 15, 2006 It's day 2 of the great 4:30 am experiment... and the hardest thing about getting up at 4:30 in the morning is not the actual getting up, but the going to bed at a reasonable hour. The whole world seems to be conspiring against it. There are meetings, soccer games, etc the rest of the week. Which in themselves are fine and dandy things, but they do go on! But on the plus side, no one really emails at that hour and the rest of the cyber world is silent as well. Now, if only I could actually get some bona fide work done. I mean, I spent yesterday morning dinking with Yahoo Briefcase, so I could more easily move the working copy from laptop to desktop. Too many places to work on it. But that pretty much shot the whole morning yesterday. Oh, and a couple of blog entries. But blogging actually helps get the ol' writing muscles primed. Or so I believe... Tuesday, February 14, 2006 It's 4:30 am...do you know where your brain is? I know where mine is...it's still in bed sleeping.But since my life has been declared a disaster area, the only time I can find for writing lately is either at four thirty or midnight. For some reason, I am actually more creative in the morning lately. Midnight, the only thing I want to to is watch Clint and Stacy redo wardrobes on What Not to Wear. So I am sitting at the old desk, it's dark outside, and the dog is snoring. At least I have coffee. Lots of it. I have my file open. Another plus. And I am avoiding the act of figuring out which file is more current, the laptop version or the PC version. But as far as actual writing, it's not quite happening yet. At least not the fiction. I do have a couple of essays that need writing, so maybe I'll at least crank out a draft on one of those. Something, even,hey, a blog entry will justify getting up this early, right? What I really want to do is search on line for a new house. Because our house, the one we are living in right now, the one we built while Dad was dying, now has a contingency contract on it. So we are technically homeless. Or as my brother says, I'm his unemployed, homeless older sister. I could use this in a memoir, couldn't I? I could use a "little" creative license and say we were homeless with 2 children, three guinea pigs and a dog for months. That's the latest rage in memoirs, fictional embellishment. I could really dig up some sympathy. But I really need to dig up a house. One that doesn't have a room falling off and sinking into the front yard, like the one we looked at yesterday. Friday, February 03, 2006 A quote I can relate to... The trouble with being punctual is that nobody's there to appreciate it. -- Franklin P. Jones When I was about sixteen, my father gave me a watch for Christmas, although he was quite adamant that it wouldn't do any good. He said I didn't need a watch, I needed a calendar and a keeper. I think he knew this not because I was always late, but because he was the same way. Mom, on the other hand, was always at least thirty minutes early. Even when she was in her fifties, she would not do ANYTHING in the morning if she had a lunch date. She didn't want to be late. That meant no running errands, even at nine, for a noon lunch. See, opposites attract. Or compulsive people bring out passive aggression in others. One of the two. Wednesday, January 25, 2006 I know where I want to live.... Today, while my third graders were taking a "practice" version of the standardized test that will decide their futures, I glanced up and saw where I want to spent the rest of my life. It was printed right there on the stack of maps hanging above the chalk board....Rand McNally's Simplified World. Doesn't it sound peaceful and euphoric? I spent the next fifteen minutes imagining what life was like in Rand McNally's Simplified World. I bet for starters, there were no border wars or land disputes. Because everthing was spelled out right there in vivid primary colors. You really can't argue about the big solid black lines that emphasize the permanence of boundaries. I don't think there will be standardized tests in the Rand McNally Simplified World, because the one thing I have learned about standardized tests is that there is nothing standard about them. There are so many exceptions and other issues... There will be no complications in Rand McNally's Simplified World. I guess that would be pretty obvious, but think about all the things that complicate life and imagine them gone. Like illnesses. Demands on time. Conflicting soccer schedules. Not a problem in RMSW. All computer programs will be compatible with all computers, regardless of age and operating systems. All video games would likewise work in any system sitting around the house. There would be NO free agency in football, baseball or basketball, and Most Importantly, the American League would match their rules to the National League and get rid of those pretty boy DH's. Pitchers would be well rounded ball players once again. AND, there would be no BCS computers telling us who the number one team in College Football is. It would already be known, because the pollers would all agree. The point system for the Ryder cup team might also be a bit more understandable. Hmm, did you notice how the most complicated things in life revolve around war and sports. I'm starting to wonder if there are any men in RMSW. There are some days that this would sound boring. But this week does not contain any of those days. I'm going to pack. The place may not exist, but hey, at least I have a map... Tuesday, January 17, 2006 They should call it Job Security If you read the article referenced above, you'll see it's a study by cardiologists. They were studying the effects of a low calorie diet on the heart and longevity. Not a temporary, weight loss low calorie diet, but a lifestyle of eating well balanced nutrient dense food, but less of it. Like 1400 to 2000 calories a day. The typical Westerner eats from 2000 to 3000 calories a day. They found that the hearts of those who ate less were about fifteen years "younger" than the regular eaters. Hmm. Interesting, but that's not what got my attention. After stating all the benefits of this lifestyle, they say it is NOT recommended for the general public. Instead, normal people should just moderately cut calories and exercise moderately. My cynical self says, Well of course the cardiologists don't want Americans being healthier longer. It seriously impacts their abilities to own and feed their Hummers. But someone pointed out to me that perhaps they make the recommendation because they don't think Americans would do the healthier thing. It's not part of the American dream to want less. It's too hard. Hogwash. This is America. We don't do ANYTHING moderately. I think the moderation would be harder. We are an all or nothing people. We don't moderately jog, we run marathons. We don't do anything small when we could do bigger and better. Maybe the truth is, with low calorie eating, people would be hungry, and grouchy. Can you say immoderate Road Rage? And then, no one would have a calorie budget for McD's and other window foods, (food that passes through more than one window before consumption) so there would be millions of high school students unemployed and unable to purchase bling and baggie jeans and computer games. The entire economy could collapse, all because some cardiologist studied the heart. Well, all this talk about food makes me hungry... Saturday, January 14, 2006 Quote of the Day You know it's really bad when the only reason you log onto your very own blog is that you want to read the quote of the day. As if the eight that get emailed straight to me each day aren't enought. I am a quote junkie. I started a word document a few years ago of assorted writing quotes, mostly fun and inspirationl. It's up to about fifty pages now. And I still open it up and read around. Since it's Saturday, thought I'd share a few of my favorites. Then I'm going for a nice six mile run, because it's just too pretty outside to sit in the cave all day. I call my office a cave. It was my mother's bedroom when she was alive, but now it has my desk and file cabinets and her $3,000 adjustable bed (with massage unit) that seems to be unsellable. But it's a great place to stack things. The room is a cave because it's 16x16 with one (ONE!) window, the smallest allowed by the building code. CAVE! I promised quotes: "Every compulsion is put upon writers to become safe, polite, obedient, and sterile." --Sinclair Lewis "Nothing gives an author so much pleasure as to find his works respectfully quoted by other learned authors." --Benjamin Franklin Autobiography is an unrivaled vehicle for telling the truth about other people. -- Philip Guedalla People who throw kisses are hopelessly lazy. -- Bob Hope Traditions are group efforts to keep the unexpected from happening. -- Barbara Tober Nothing much happens in Jane Austen's books, and yet, when you come to the bottom of the page, you eagerly turn it to learn what will happen next. Nothing very much does and again you eagerly turn the page. The novelist who has the power to achieve this has the most precious gift a novelist can possess. --W. Somerset Maugham I'll post some more the next time I have nothing good of my own to say. Monday, January 09, 2006 Maybe I should make it Monday and Wednesday. Lesson learned. Sunday's aren't good nights to plan on blogging. If someone were paying me and it were a job, I suppose I could make it more of a priority. But it's the NFL playoffs. The final feast of football before the famine known as basketball and hockey season. And the Olympics. I am probably the only person in America who cannot stand to watch the Olympics on television. Now if I were to be given tickets, good seats, etc, I could be persuaded to watch in person. But I'm just not a spectator lately. It's like life is too short to watch everyone else have all the fun. I have things I want to do. And people to do them with. But we're supposed to be spectators, aren't we? Isn't that why there is such a glut of fan paraphenalia out there? Even things we could do ourselves every day, like Nascar. I know, we can't drive 200 miles an hour in circles everyday, but we drive. We just don't get paid obscene amounts of money for people to live vicariously through me. I would rather get my vicarious living for free. Checked out of the library. Or at Barnes and Noble. I'm just waiting for my Pride and Prejudice action figures. Mr. Darcy rides and swims. Wednesday, January 04, 2006 Today my Spam name is Restful Waters... No, I promise, this won't spur on another blog. I have my 4.8 blogs to keep up with. I don't write enough on the one's I have, don't need any more, thank you kindly. But I am experiencing a Restful Waters feeling of peace. I've been rewriting a huge chunk of the WWII book and it's finally all coming together. There have been at least four different endings, with different combinations of marriage and children and it finally dawned on me. The story ended about thirty thousand words before I typed the words the end. Can you say, Not Good? Like figuring out how to start a book, I think figuring out the end of a book is just as hard. I guess for mysteries, it's not that hard, you solve the crime and book done. But for something like this, where I have the stories of the main characters mapped out for the next twenty years, it came as a shock to learn that the story I'm telling in this book ended oh, before the war. So, with that in mind, I finally figured out the way to get all the main characters together for a great ending that didn't sound too phony or forced. It brings in all the skills of the characters that I have been cultivating and showing off all through the book. I guess I just wasn't paying attention to my own fiction. Monday, January 02, 2006 Yeah, I needed another blog like I needed a hole in my head... Yep. I couldn't even keep my resolution to blog on Sunday's and Tuesday's but I found time to start another blog. Oh well. It's a place to store my funny spam stories. And put things out for one of my online groups. But if you want to look, feel free. I have finally figured out all the things wrong with my World War II novel and am hard at work fixing them before my crit group meeting this week. I'm hoping that I can get my edits caught up to where they are in the story so I don't have to back track too much. But then again, it's like the book has changed so much since they started I have to give them all credit for keeping up as well as they have. Tuesday, December 27, 2005 New Year's Revolutions There are two kinds of people in the world. Those who make New Year's resolutions and those who don't. I am one of those who does. Sure, a lot of them get broken, some even before the end of our annual New Year's party. I don't, however, get carried away with them, like the famous New England Preacher, Jonathan Edwards. http://www.reformed.org/documents/Edwards/j_edwards_resolutions.html I think he got a bit carried away, like he did with most things. Like spiders. http://www.jonathanedwards.com/text/Spider.htm But there has to be something about the new year, the fresh slate, that gives up hope that this year will be the one. The one that is better-stronger-faster and helps us jump higher and run swifter. Like looking ahead to spring even though there are two months left of winter gray. I have learned a few things about resolutions. They're just goals with a holiday decoration. Here are my tips for keeping New Year's Resolutions. 1. Never make them on New Year's Eve. In front of a lot of people. After the champagne. 2. Have an end point. 12 weeks is a much better time period than a full year. You can do anything for 12 weeks. Really, ask anyone who's ever done a 12 step program. 3. Tell a few people about them, to keep yourself honest. If they fall over laughing, then you might want to rethink your plans. 4. Some things are best not resolved. Especially if they involve other people. Only make resolutions where you can control the outcome. (Note to self, forcing children to make beds daily is not a new year's resolution. It is a pipe dream.) Notice, there is nothing there that says you should blog your resolutions out into the universe. Or shouldn't. The only one that I will put out here is that I have set myself some artificial deadlines. I will blog here on Sunday's and Tuesdays. If Blogspot will cooperate. That's not always a given lately. And then I'll update the reading blog as needed. I have a lot of reading to do to get seventy five this year, so off I go. See you next year. Saturday, December 24, 2005 Warning...political rant.... The date on this post should be yesterday. I wrote it and blogger swallowed it whole. Oh well. Ben Franklin once said, They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety. You can go ahead and skip this if you're not in the mood for politics. I'm not really, but I need to get this out of my system, so I don't bore my family and friends with it all holiday. Excuse me, Christmas. There was a letter to the editor in our local paper today, someone blamed the whole flak about the War On Christmas on some folks trying to get the attention off of other topics, like indicted Congressional Leaders, Thirty Thousand jobs gone at GM and the fact that Iraq and Afganistan were staring to have better infrastructure than New Orleans and the Gulf Coast. Amen. But I digress... Point the first....America is not safe. No place is safe, not since we broke the lease in Eden, if you read Genesis. Hundreds of years ago, immigrants came to the shores of North America, not because it was safe, but because it was free.There was death on the ships, there were less than welcoming Natives, there were unfriendly tourists from other countries. As well as imported criminals. Nope, not safe at all. If safety was the goal, people stayed put. But now, we're obsessed with safety. A safety that never existed. If there is an accident, a militant mob forms with the expressed intent of "THIS WILL NEVER HAPPEN AGAIN." As if tragedy isn't a detriment enough, new laws, regulations and products come into being to insure safety. Yesterday, one of the local letter to the editor contributors responded to the fury about the illegal spying. She said she had nothing to hide, they could spy on her all they wanted. Um, darling, that's not the point. The point is that democracies do not spy on their citizens. The point is that there is a consitutional set of checks and balances to make sure one branch of the government does not get more uppity than the others. Our country's core value has changed. Core values, all the rage in board rooms and church leadership meeting. Companies and congregations ask "what is our core value, what is most important to us?" Now there is a spoken value, what people say out loud, and then there is the hidden core value, what really is important. So take a hypothetical church. The spoken core value is that following Jesus is primary. The hidden core value adds, as long as it isn't too weird. Don't rock the boat. Accept Jesus and be like us. Once upon a time, when Ben Franklin was only dreaming of his electricity and printing press joining together and forming Blogdom, freedom was the core value. One man would not be in charge. It's changed. Now safety is supreme. From "Let Freedom Ring" to "Let's build a wall to keep out the riff raff." You know. a wall worked so well for Berlin, we OUGHT to build one across the southern border. In fact, there are some pieces at the George HW Bush Library that could be used. What makes me sad is that our military men and women are fighting for our "freedom." And it's being lost not on the deserts of Iraq, but in the halls of Congress and the airwaves of Foxnews. Wednesday, December 14, 2005 Spam verification Well, I added a couple new things to the ol' blog. I like the nifty quote at the top and yes, it does change every day! Too fun! Then, because of all the spam bots putting weird comments on my blog, I had to turn on the word verification. Another site I like to visit, Query Letters I love, uses word verification and the folks leaving comments all make up a fun definition for their word verification word. So, if you want to leave a comment, go ahead and test your creativity. I dare you. Monday, December 05, 2005 Life Motto I actually wrote this a few weeks ago, but the ol' blogger system was too bogged down to post it. My main character, Jane, found her new life motto while shopping in the Lack's furniture store. Huge red banners hung from the rafters. "No interest until 2007," they proclaimed to anyone who would look up at then. She looked at them carefully then approached one of the sales staff. "Would you sell me a banner?" "They're adverstising signs, what do you need them for?" "I only need one. For my mother. I want to hang it in my kitchen and whenever my mother comes over and starts to talk about fixing me up, I'll be able to point to it to explain my current personal policy about dating. No Interest 'til 2007." It's no longer November.... And that means NaNoWriMo is over and life will assume some normal routine that doesn't depend on writing four thousand words a day to "Catch up." Finished the thing, with about sixty five thousand words when all was said and done. Does it need work? You betcha. Lots. But not until January. But for your reading pleasure, here's a short exerpt: “Can you tell me how much longer the turkey has until it’s done?” Maura sighed, a long, loud, self-pitying sigh. “Your father used to cook the turkey. I never did learn how.” “Well, I usually just read the directions and I do allright,” Jane said as she walked over to the oven and took the orange and brown turkey-shaped oven mitts off the counter. She slipped them on her hand and saw Caleb coming into the kitchen. “Gobble gobble,” she said, using the mitts as puppets. Caleb laughed. “You go on back to the kids room, Caleb. There’s hot stuff in here and I wouldn’t want to you get hurt.” Maura warned. “I want the toy-key puppet,” Caleb said. He held out his arms to Jane. “The turkeys have to work right now. They can come to the playroom and visit when they get home from work.” Jane smiled as she said it. “You can’t give those to him to play with. They’re oven mitts. We’ll need them after dinner for the pies.” Maura shook her head, clearly exasperated. “When you’re a mother you’ll understand these things.” “Funny, nothing I learned in college biology classes told me that pregnancy causes the control freak hormone to gush out of control,” Jane muttered under her breath. “They’re just oven mitts, Mom, he can’t hurt them. Even if he did, we got them at Wal-mart. You could get an exact duplicate tomorrow for half price.” “I shouldn’t have to pay any price, since I already have them here.” Clint said nothing during this entire exchange. He was programming phone numbers into his new cell phone and whistling whenever the voices around him grew louder. Jane pulled the turkey out of the oven and uncovered it. She stabbed it in the thight with the meat thermometer and waited for the red needle to creep up to the internal temperature. Still lacking a hundred degrees. She recovered the pan and shoved the whole rack back into the oven, then adjusted the temperature slightly higher. “Your father always cooked the turkey at 300. Turn it back down,” Maura ordered. Jane looked at Lisa for help. “Dad also started cooking at five am. We started at ten. Unless I turn this thing up a bit, we’ll have a few more days until dinner.” “It’ll be fine, Mom,” Lisa said. “The kids and Clint are getting hungry.” “Would you rather we hurry it up, Clint?” Maura asked. Clint’s eyes went to his wife’s face, then back to Maura. “Yes, ma’am. I’m starving. Lisa wouldn’t let any of us eat anything all day, said we’d spoil our appetitites.” Lisa smiled her approval. Maura hurried over the the golden yellow side by side refrigerator. “Here,” she said as she opened the right hand door and pulled out an enormous tray. “I made this to snack on while we waited.” Snack on? Jane thought, Three families could feast on this alone. There were heaping mounds of brocoli, cauliflower, black olives, green olives, midget dill gherkins and sweet midget gherkins. A bowl of ranch dressing sat in the center. Each section was separated from the others by stalks of celery and sticks of carrot. Jane picked up a carrot and dipped it into the dressing. “Jane, that’s not fat-free dressing.” Maura said. Her left eyebrow arched slightly. “I know, I don’t eat fat-free,” Jane said. She put the carrot in her mouth and let the creamy sour cream based dip melt on her tongue. “I’m just saying maybe you should think about it. You had a little pouch on your tummy the last time you wore those black slacks. You’re not some twenty year old kid anymore. You need to start watching.” Maura took an olive an popped it into her mouth. There was something wrong about being lectured about diet by someone with diabetes who has the shape of an Idaho baking potato. Raw, not after it’s been turned into French Fries, or as Maura now called them, Freedom Fries. Her postition as the Social Secretary for the Republican Women’s group made it important that she stood strong on important issues. Like what to call fast food. Normally, Jane would let it roll off her back more, then later, she’d have a beer with her dad and they would compare all the snappy comebacks they would have said if they weren’t so diplomatic. Without Dad around to release the pressure valve later, Jane was starting to wonder what would happen if some of her thoughts actually leaked out of her head. For sure, she would be demoted from the grownup table in the dining room to the children’s table in the kitchen. The problem was, Jane was starting to think it would be a good thing. “So, Jane,” Clint said, “How are things in dodge ball land?” “Silly, Clint, she can’t teach dodge ball anymore. Too violent.” Lisa said, rubbing Clint’s balding head. “I could, if I found away to connect it to the standardized tests. I think dodge ball and No Child Left Behind are made for each other, myself.” Jane said. “Hey, we finally agree on something political! Who’d guessed?” Clint smiled. “You’re right. Both are barbaric, based on old ways of thinking.” “Whoa, that’s not what I meant...” Clint stammered. “I think we should leave politics and religion out of Thankgiving,” Maura said. “Neither one belongs on a family holiday.” Lisa and Jane looked at each other. Every now and then, Lisa showed signs of seeing the insanity that emitted from Maura’s mouth. Lisa grinned. “Ok, no God and country will be mentioned any more today. What about grace?” “Who’s Grace?” Maura asked. “I can put out another place.” Sunday, November 06, 2005 Crafty Peaches I don't know what scares me more. The fact that some spammer or his/her spambot has christened me "Crafty Peaches" or that I'm actually thinking of adopting the name as a user id for my spam email addresses. You known, the free email addresses you set up so you can go to some website and sign up for the newsletter and keep the surveys and "you won!" emails from getting mixed up with your real emails. Like the ones from Flylady and Sitemeter. I've been known to use character names, family names, dog names, but talented fruits? This is an area I have somehow missed. Crafty Peaches says so much more than Tranquil Waters (or was it Nyquil Waters?) Like fuzzy on the outside, then sweet, then poison at the core?? All I can say is that Crafty Peaches sure is popular! I get at least a dozen emails each day, all wanting Crafty Peaches' opinion on politics, softdrinks and televisons shows. And, Crafty Peaches is offered many discount pharmaceuticals. Some obviously for personal use and some to share with friends. And Crafty Peaches is invited to visit all kinds of websites. I wonder if Artsy White Grapes is ever invited. Perhaps I can come up with a talented fruit id generator for my friends. There's Conniving Pears. Radical Oranges. Durable Apples. Yeah, that's a great userid. I can see the spam now...Hey, Durable Apples! Your Opinion Counts! I guess it's better than Spoilt Persimmons. Tuesday, November 01, 2005 A journey starts with the first step... And a novel starts with the first sentence. I'll playing with it, but here is the beginning thus far... Rose Franklin found out she was conceived out of wedlock in the Walmart parking lot. Not that the actual conception happened there, but for some reason, her mother decided to reveal Rose’s history at the Navasota Walmart, next to a large dirty Ford F-150 that smelled like it had been hauling manure that morning. For a moment, Rose imagined her mother’s shopping list: Walmart: Laundry detergent Paper turkey centerpiece and matching napkins Tell first born daughter she’s a bastard anti-perspirant hemorroid cream trash bags “Gee, your dad and I got drunk, and three months later, I realized I was carrying you,” her mother blurted out, as if she were asking what aisle the soap was on. “I hope they’re not out of those turkeys. Alice had one at her house last year and it looked so cute on her table.” Rose shook her head. Only her mother would think a paper turkey would be the perfect classy Thanksgiving centerpiece. After all, the woman hated fresh flowers. The F-150’s horn alerted her that it’s driver was ready to go get more manure and if she didn’t get out of the way, her life would end, fittingly, in the Walmart parking lot. Her mother was already in the doorway of the store, probably miffed that the retired shop teacher that welcomed shoppers wasn’t quite quick enough with the buggy. She had no idea that telling your daughter she was the product of a night of binge drinking wasn’t something you did while walking through a parking lot. It had to be difficult to be that inappropriate, yet at the same time, but hyper-concerned about what everyone thought of you. It was the dichotomy that defined Maura Kean’s life. And therefore, Rose’s as well. Monday, October 24, 2005 I wish I said this first... "A good story often reads so easily that civilians seem to think that the darn things write themselves. Whenever I leave the house, I make sure that one of my novels is hard at work. I expect five pages by the time I get back." - David Morrell I mean, don't you. I feel like I almost have a real blog. An bona fide spammer made a comment. I'm on my way now!! Sunday, October 23, 2005 Through Painted Deserts and Plains. A few years ago, like almost 20, I spent my summers working in the kitchen at a well know youth ministy's Colorado Ranch. It was at the time, a perfect life. I worked in the summers and avoided the scorching Texas heat. My regular job was only budgeted for nine months a year, except I could pay a little extra for health insurance for the other three month. So, I had insurance, no expenses, use of a vehicle and a home nestled in the valley of the San Isabel National Forrest. Doesn't get much better. I thought about this today when I started reading Through Painted Deserts : Light, God, and Beauty on the Open Road by Donald Miller. I love it and hate it right now. I love it because Miller notices everyting, from the traffic in Houston at 2am to the different species of trees on Interstate 45 from Houston to Dallas and how they hide everything at night. I hate it because it is a testament to my stupid fears. The camp photographer Deb and I, spent our off days traveling Colorado, back roads and old mining towns. She'd snap rolls and rolls of film, I'd scribble really bad poetry into old lab notebooks. I did that back then, write really bad poetry. I was a lousy poet, because I didn't like to read poetry. If you don't like reading it, you don't need to be writing it. But I wasn't smart enough to know that back then. I wrote about her photographs, mourning that the black and white prints we developed in the camp darkroom didn't capture the differences in the green of the trees and the green of the grasses. They couldn't give the sound, the whisper, of the July wind in the Aspens. After our adventures, we'd take the prints and the notebooks of bad poems and sit in laundry room, waiting for the industrial washers to finish our week's worth of dirty shorts and wool socks and plot the next adventure. It didn't take to long to realize that we would soon run out of places within a couple hours of the camp, and we never could get two consecutive days off. So we started devising Plan B. A summer of cruising. A cross country trip in her Subaru. We'd start in California, where she lived the rest of the year, and end up in New Jersey, at my grandparents. We'd take pictures, write stories of the people and places in the pictures. We never went. Wasn't money, we could've worked it out. For me, it was fear. Don't know what I was afraid of, maybe the unknown. But it kept me from what could have been the best summer. But those silly voices, saying it was a stupid plan, it was irresponsible *(if you cna't be irresponsible when you're 23 and single, when can you be?) It was scary. I don't know if Deb ever went. I hope she did. And now I read this stupid book and wonder what could have been. Friday, October 14, 2005 Adjectives that will never be used to describe my books ....And I think I'll be okay with that. I got my new catalog from Quality Paperback Book club today. The sheer number of adjectives and adverbs used to promote books is mindboggling. I'm thinking of suggesting a rationing program. Conserve adjectives and adverbs, save some for future generations. The gushing reviews are so "stunning, dazzling, and powerful" that I want to order each and every "astonishing" new novel by every "beloved" and "best-selling" author. I have found the ads to be "[S]trangely affecting." On one page, I can order a "feat of imaginative sympathy and technique..." because the author "delivers images of odd beauty and a mounting existential distress that hangs around long after." Mounting existential distress that hangs around long after? Sounds like the last time I tried to cook Thai food from scratch. These authors work with a "Dickensian vocabulary and an Atwood-like ability to meld literature with science fiction." The novels themselves have "deceptive simplicity,...extraordinary emotional depth and resonance." They are "finely wrought and shimmering with intelligence." But wait. I could also have books that are "painfully funny and brilliantly executed." "Utterly original." "A dazzling epic." Do writers sit down and say, "I think today I'll write a novel that's 'buoyant and beautiful'?" Or "daring and unforgettable?" How about "witty, wise and heartbreaking?" "Brilliantly absurd?" "delightfully improbable?" Or, "Enchanting...beautifully crafted and as dazzingly imaginative as it is dizzyingly romantic." I think the world would be a better place if someone, preferably someone rich and anonymous, bought every book reviewer a copy of Strunk's Elements of Style. There are adverbs and adjectives being ABUSED out there, people! It is up to those who love words to rescue them and redeem then to infrequent usage so that they may regain the power and the glory that is in excellent descriptive writing. Please, send a book reviewer a verb. You'll be glad you did. Wednesday, October 12, 2005 Had the subtitle all wrong... It's not "a bag lady's tale", it's the "Hand-bag Lady's tale". Kinda my tribute to Margaret Atwood on the way. I wonder what Ms. Atwood would do with my material. I'm thinking my main character needs lots of lunatics in her life, so she might be a waitress. At an Applebee's kind of place. Managed by an Iranian, like my old pal Moshi. And his rich cousins, Khalid and Omar. So the insanity is balanced. Or she can have a computer support job. On the phone, so we don't have too many customers to describe.Something that keeps the number of main people in the single digits. After my last book, I need a set number of people to keep up with. A girl CAN have too many imaginary friends, doncha know. Speaking of friends, some of my real life friends want to be "in" the book. Hmmm, what if I do and they don't like it? Or if I fictionalize them so much they don't recognize themselves? I have nightmares of Truman Capote, who used all his friends conversations in his stories. The poor society ladies read all about their own lives in the New Yorker. I know, I can have the main character, still unnamed, whining about listening to her walking buddies, J,A & C, who spend ENTIRELY too much time complaining about how hard it is to find size four jeans in this town. Or maybe size 2? Then I can jet them out to Aruba for the rest of the book. So they'll be there and still be my friends when it's over. Monday, October 10, 2005 A Purse Driven Life - A Bag Lady's Tale I think that's looking like the title of my NaNoWriMo novel. Of course that could change, but I'm liking the idea now. My first idea was something I've already worked on a bit, like a couple of pages of really bad writing. Really bad, the main character bored even me. If I don't want to spend time with a character, I doubt a reader would. So, I thought I would start over on the chemical plant thriller. But since NaNoWriMo should really be brand spanking new really bad fiction, I decided to try this new idea. I know, a Christian Writer had an advice book by just about the same title.The Purse-driven Life: It Really Is All About Me by Anita Renfroe. I haven't read it, but I did read a few pages on Amazon. It looked fairly interesting and I'm sure Anita is a wise and witty woman. But it is nonfiction, and since A) I haven't seen it on the best seller list anywhere, and B) Titles aren't copyrighted, I think I'll snag the title. Because it so fits my idea. As much as I'd like to use her subtitle, I'll not steal that too. Gotta have some originality. But, the story: A woman dies and her daughter and niece find over fifty purses in her closet. Her life is then told in relation to some of the purses that the women remember the older woman owning. Not a spiritual growth book in any way, more like catharsis. But not really, because my book will be FICTION and certainly NOT based on any mothers I may have known in ANY way. So don't get any ideas, it's NOT a memoir. And if you accuse me of writing about actual events, I will put you in the book and my friend, it won't be pretty. I still need to do some important research. I only own one purse. Off to the mall! Friday, September 23, 2005 Everything I learned about writing a novel, I learned from running marathons. Everything I learned about writing a novel, I learned from running marathons. If you go out too fast, you’ll be exhausted at the end. Others around you may go out too fast. Ignore them. Sometimes, you have to go at it alone. There may not be anyone on the roadside cheering you on. You can only worry about the step you are taking right now. You can’t run mile 14 while you are running mile 2. Neither can you write your acceptance speech for the Booker Award if you haven’t finished the first draft. You can’t put forth effort without taking in nourishment. Food for the body, food for the soul and information for the mind. Read, reflect and research. It gets tiring and even a bit boring in the middle. Get through it anyway. There are people who are faster than you. There are people who look better that you. But no one else can run your race, and no one else can write your work. It’s all about endurance. And that’s something you can build, it’s a skill. There is no feeling in the world like finishing. Tuesday, September 20, 2005 It's T minus One Month It's almost October. Which means I need to finish the book I'm currently working on by October 15. Why? So I have two weeks off to plan, plot and, rest (I know, it doesn't start with pl- but this is a blog, not a Sunday Sermon) for National Novel Writing Month. I'm most likely going to be a municipal liaison this year, so at least by the end of the month, I should be able to spell liaison correctly on the first try most of the time. But I figure, if I can coach over two hundred college students to run twenty six miles, I can cheer lead while highly motivatied, caffeinated people write really bad novels. Not only that, but I can write a really bad novel as well! It's much more fun to write really bad novels with friends. So if you're game, check out NaNoWriMo and come on out and play with us! PS I finally, after all this time, noticed that I've mispelled procrastinating in the header of my blog. UGH! That is why I need an editor of my very own. 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