To Blog or Not to Blog...That is the Question

So, I extended my blogging vacation a little longer than planned. This has been primarily for me to take time to think about whether I really want to continue to blog or not. Lately, it’s become more of a chore than a pleasure to write. I enjoy writing it but sometimes, it feels horribly self-indulgent to think that people might actually want to read…well, about me.

I started my blog as a writing exercise, more than anything. It’s a way for me to get some writing done every day. It’s a great way for me to capture little moments in life, to paint a picture of my life with words. It’s a great tool to rant and rave. I’ve enjoyed it immensely.

I just don’t know if I should keep it going. I don’t know if people really want to read it or if it’s an obligation. This is not an attempt to fish for compliments, it’s a genuine query.

I think my dilemma stems from my current mood. Lately, I’ve been going through one of those self-examination phases. The rational, logical part of me is immensely content and feeling rather blessed with all the good things in life.

The irrational part of me has been feeling rather lonely and a little discontented with my life. Nothing seems quite…right. No matter what I do, I feel like I should do it differently or better. My writing isn’t going as well as it could and it doesn’t seem to be going anywhere. Everyone I know is super busy living their life and I feel like I’m just standing still. I usually don’t mind standing still but my life has recently felt like an episode of “Sex and the City,” where Miranda, the strong, independent lawyer who thinks she doesn’t need a man, almost chokes on her food in her apartment. She has no one to rescue her from choking but herself and she realizes that sometimes being independent just means that she’s alone. Or, like Bridget Jones, I worry that I’ll die in my house alone with only the dogs to find me and they can’t dial 911. It’s melancholy but sometimes being strong and resourceful like I try to be is not always best.

My slight case of melancholia is probably because it’s suddenly turned rather autumnal here, suddenly. I love autumn. I have blogs and blogs to prove that. I’m just not quite ready for it yet. I want the summer to last a little longer, for the last of my tomatoes to ripen and to ease me into the cooler days/nights and the falling leaves. This cold rainy weather shock is not really easing us into autumn as much as it’s shoving us there without letting us look back and question it. It’s making me feel like time is moving too fast and I’m not moving with it.

I’m just not sure what to do about it at the moment. I suppose I could try online dating again to fight the worry of choking and dying alone. The thought has occurred to me. I just end up talking myself out of it because I’ve had some bad experiences. Also, I’m just not very good at dating. I just would rather skip it and jump right to that comfortable stage where you can sit on the sofa watching crappy television without worrying that you’re wearing little makeup, old clothes and didn’t bother putting your contacts in.

This phase will pass. I know it will. When the sun comes out and life gets busier, I’ll feel angry with myself for feeling so self-indulgent. Worse, I’ll feel angry that I posted this on my blog and gave into my self-indulgent urge to whine.

Which is probably why I’m considering giving up the blog. It allows me a receptacle to deposit my whining. It’s more fun when I rant, I think. However, whining seems to be quite a lot easier sometimes. It’s a heck of a lot easier to complain that it is to say good things.

However, saying good things is infinitely better. So, I’ll say that I appreciate those of you that have read my blog while I’ve been writing it. I appreciate the fact that I love my life 95% of the time. I appreciate my two little dogs who are always there for me and will protect me both from Stranger Danger and the disgustingness of “Hoarders”. Rory often comes to my aid when I make noises of distressed disgust- last week, we watched an episode where a man had 2,500 pet rats running around and when I squealed with horror at the swarm of creatures running freely throughout the house, Rory sat on my head and tried to cover my eyes. This is a true story.

I also appreciate life in general, for better for worse, in rain and sun and in spring, summer, autumn and winter. Having a blog lets me have a way to appreciate that.

So, I still haven’t decided if I’ll give it up. Like Scarlett O’Hara said (and I paraphrase)…I’ll decide tomorrow. I can’t decide today.

And clearly since I’ve already blogged, I’m not giving it up today anyway.

Thanks for reading!

Happy Thursday.

Rocky Starts and Better Finishes...

I've had better weekends.

While I managed to relax a little, this was not the best weekend I ever had. It started with my having to fire someone...that's never good.

I've done it before...fired someone, I mean. Sometimes, it's easy because it makes sense. Then there are the times, like this one, where it makes no sense at all and it simply feels wrong.

In this case, it was my candidate who I'd got to know so well, I knew the contents of his freezer. He's a very nice man. His references were stellar. I was excited that he was going to be working for us. He started work on this past Monday. He reported back to me that he loved his job. We tried to reach out to his boss to find out if they loved him as much as he loved them and...nothing. Repeatedly, my account manager reached out to her to see how things were going and...nothing....

Well, nothing until Friday at 3 p.m. at least. At this time, his boss called us to tell us that we needed to inform him that he no longer had a job and that it was effective immediately.

I was, naturally, devastated. It's one thing when you get a warning that the consultant isn't performing well. Normally, we get a warning and we get chance to reach out to our employee, give them the feedback and give them time to fix their errors.

Not this time. They were done with our guy. Never mind that he'd had five days to get up to speed. Never mind that he'd moved his whole life to take the job. Never mind that he'd taken out a huge loan to cover the expenses of moving his life...he was done.

Without trying to sound dramatic, it was one of the worst calls I've ever had to make. It's a different thing when you know it's deserved. In this case, it was only five days worth of work. He never had any warnings. Neither did we, no matter how much we dried to reach out and find out how things were going. They wanted him gone. I pleaded with my account manager to try to work something out so we offered our client a week's worth of 'free' services. This means we would simply pay our consultant his wages and our client would not have to pay a pennny.

This offer was refused. Sadly, this was the point at which I realized that no matter how good my candidate was, they had an agenda and he didn't fit. Otherwise, why on earth would you refuse a week's worth of free labour with the addendum that if the employee didn't improve, that was it?

My guess is that they either found someone cheaper to fill the position or, more likely, someone who'd left wanted to return.

Either way, it left my candidate stranded and jobless, 2000 miles from home and left me feeling like the worst human in the world.

Telling someone they're now unemployed is NOT the best way to start the weekend. This is a new fact I've learned. I don't recommend it so don't try it if you don't have to do so.

No matter what I did for the rest of the weekend, I couldn't quite shake the dark cloud that had fallen over me on Friday night after I'd fired our candidate. It's a human thing, I think. I am human...thus I felt horrible for treating another human the way that I did. Sure, it was my job. Certainly, it was better coming from me than someone he didn't know but...well, either way...it was not fun.

I did manage to get some fun in...I went back to Farmer's Market. I really need to stop that. My desire for farm-fresh, organic vegetables is far outweighing the actuality in which I can use said vegetables. Yet still I buy them anyway.

I managed to see "Harry Potter and the Deadly Hallows Part 2" again. It was just as good the second time because it wasn't so 'momentous' this was NOT the last time I'd see the last move for the first time. This was the last time I'd see it for the second time...not such a big deal. I enjoyed it.

I also got to have dinner with a friend which is always a good tonic for a sad soul. When I returned home on Saturday, I felt infinitely better than I had a mere 24 hours prior.

My Sunday has been great. I worked outside, cleaned inside and managed to conceptualize almost my entire next novel. I'd had an inkling of the plot for a while but only after letting "Emmy" go to fly free into the world of the e-book was I really ready to move on. I'm ready now and I think my new characters are ready for me too. Only time will tell.

In short, it's been an odd weekend that began worse than it ended. I suppose it's better than it ending worse than it began because it means that the week ahead is hopeful. I'm trying to be hopeful too...I just hope that I don't have to fire anyone else. As much as I love my job...it's not always easy.

Then again, I suppose that's true of life in general.

Happy Monday!

Accidental Early Starts...DirecTV and Other Weekendness

This has been another of those weekends that has just flown by. It was one where I had few plans other than to stay home on Saturday morning and wait for the DirecTV man to come. Since it was time to renew my contract, I called them up to cancel with a secret hope they'd lure me to stay by offering me some free goodies. Since I bought an HDTV after I'd subscribed to my original service, I was hoping for a free HDTV upgrade. Lo and behold, my threat of leaving their service guaranteed me a free HDTV receiver and free service for 24 months.

Thus, that was my plan for Saturday morning- to stay home and wait for Mr. DirecTV to come. My window of time was 8 a.m. to 12 p.m. I was pretty sure they wouldn't be there at 8 a.m. but, just in case, I planned on getting up by 7:30 a.m. to be ready. Well, that was a fine idea. I set my alarm for 7 a.m. so I could doze for 30 minutes. When it did go off at 7 a.m., I changed the alarm so it'd go off in another 30 minutes. At least I thought I had.

I dozed. Then my phone rang. It was an automated message from DirecTV reminding me that I had someone coming at 8 a.m. I glanced at the clock- it was almost 8:15 a.m.! I flew out of bed and got dressed quickly. I didn't fancy the DirecTV man coming while I was still in my pajamas.

I let the pups out and ran around and cleared up. Then, finally, I sat down. I glanced at the clock in my living room. I blinked. It appeared to say it was not quite eight a.m.

Well, it turned out that Silly Captain Monkeypants had accidentally adjusted the time on her clock rather than the alarm and my dozing which I thought had lasted an hour had in actuality only been about five minutes of dozing. Yes, i had been up since 7:10 a.m.

Mr. DirecTV came at 9:30 a.m. He had a bit of trouble with my old dish. Apparently there was a hornet's nest up there and he was deathly allergic so he didn't want to take it away like he was supposed to. Instead, he put a new dish up and left the old one so now I have two dishes. I think when the weather cools and the wasps die off, I may have them come and remove it just because I really don't want two dishes.

The installation of HDTV took quite a while. By the time he left, I was quite glad. He was a nice enough technician but he had been working outside in the heat and he was a little stinky. Also, he put those plastic footie things over his shoes so he didn't mess up my carpet and he ended up wearing right through the plastic so his shoes were only covered at the top. I didn't care but i thought it was a little pointless wearing the footie things. Also, the dogs were penned up in the kitchen/Tuscan room area and they don't like strangers in the house. Sookie likes to have a good woof. I call it her "STRANGER DANGER" bark.

I finally freed the dogs around noon. I immediately headed off to a local farmer's market. I'd made the mistake of spending the morning reading Bon Appetit and it had a ton of recipes for fresh veggies, particularly tomatoes so I really, really wanted some fresh tomatoes.

In the end, my Saturday ended up flying by and it was Sunday. Today, I spent most of the day getting "Emmy Goes to Hell" ready to be published as an e-book. It's a lot of work because you have to be very, very specific regarding format. The format for e-books is pretty much the complete opposite of print books so it's all rather tedious.

I perservered and the book is in the final approval status by my publisher. Once it gets approved, Emmy will be on sale for the low price of $2.99 on every electronic device out there. It's also available from Amazon as a hard copy, just in case you don't own a Kindle, Nook, etc. And yes, that was another shameless plug.

All in all, it's been a good weekend so far. The girls and I are currently enjoying a thunderstorm that brought some wonderful, much-needed rain. It's been pouring for a while and I can already see that my parched garden is drinking it up and appreciating every drop. Even when you water with a hose, it's never the same as organic rain. I expect my vegetables to grow a little more quickly for a while.

I love weekends like this where I have no real plans. I only really had the plan of waiting for DirecTV and possibly seeing "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2" again. I didn't end up seeing Harry but that was intentional. I do want to see it again quite badly but I decided that if I wait another week, I'll appreciate more again because it won't be quite so fresh.

For the rest of the weekend, I plan of spending some time with the neglected pups. They hate it when I sit at my desktop and work because I'm ignoring them and despite her best efforts, Sookie is just not a lapdog. I love having her on my lap but the length of a dachshund is not really conducive to comfort or convenience while trying to simutaneously type on a keyboard.

I also plan to go outside in a few minutes and spend a little time dancing in the rain because it's been so long since it rained and it's just so pleasant to feel those drops falling down and cooling everything down. I think that sounds like a lovely way to wind up a weekend, don't you?

Thanks, as always for reading. I hope you had a great weekend. Happy Monday!

Monogamous Reading and Writing

I haven’t really blogged much about writing lately which is slightly ironic since the original purpose of my blog was to talk about writing.

The truth is, I haven’t actually been writing much lately. This is a combination of wanting to take a break. I wrote ten novels in 8 years and I felt like it’d be nice to take some time off. So I did.

Also, I finished my last novel in January and it’s taken a while to deal with that. Since I published The Reluctant Demon, I’ve had several people tell me that it wasn’t edited as well as it could have been and there were typos in it. This is slightly embarrassing, I admit. However, since I just found a couple of typos in the book I’m reading, A Storm of Swords by George R.R. Martin that’s currently in the top ten best selling books list at the moment, I don’t feel so bad.

However, with my sequel to The Reluctant Demon, I wanted to take more time to edit and make sure it was as polished as it could have been. This is one of my excuses for not having written much lately.

Editing takes time. I’m not a fan of it. My normal process is to finish a book, go back and edit and then leave it for a few weeks/months and then edit again. It’s hard to edit something when you’ve been staring at it. It’s also hard to edit something you know so well. I find that my eyes tend to miss a lot of typos or punctuation mistakes.

This time, I decided to have others help me with the editing. I enlisted the aid of a good friend who is a ‘grammar’ queen. She was very helpful but I did discover when I got the edited manuscript back that while she had found a lot of the typos and given me a lot of constructive criticism, she’d also missed quite a few errors. My assumption is that she got sidetracked by the story and didn’t catch everything.

I was still grateful because she found a lot more stuff than I had. Still, it meant I had to go through and re-edit. It was easier this time since I hadn’t read the book in a few months. I found a lot of typos, punctuation errors and even some continuity problems.

Still, I didn’t think it was quite ready so I decided to run it through a final filter, my friend Saz. She is one of those very organized writers who is excellent at punctuation and detail. I sent her the book. She was kind enough to read it and let me know of other errors/typos she’d found.

When I got it back, I made the changes and, finally, it felt like it was done. This whole process pretty much took from January through June.

During this time, I thought about writing something new. I’ve been percolating an idea in my head but I seriously don’t feel like it’s ready to write yet. Also, the idea of writing something while trying to get Emmy ready to publish just didn’t seem like a good idea. I’m one of those people who simply can only read one book at once. By that, I don’t mean that I’m holding a book in each hand and trying to read both books at the same time. I mean that if I’m reading one book, I don’t like putting it down and picking up something else until I’ve finished the first book.

I just don’t like to do it. I am a decidedly monogamous reader and if I read two books simultaneously, it feels almost like I’m ‘cheating’ on the other book. Weird, I know, but it’s true. Also, I like sitting down and getting absorbed in the fictional world behind the pages and if I’m reading a different book, I have to jump between worlds. I like to read one, get absorbed into that world until I’m done and then move on.

You get the idea. This is why I have the same mentality when it comes to writing. I can’t write two books at the same time. I need to focus my energy and passion on one book and then move on. I can sometimes work on other things like short stories but then again, I’m ok with reading a magazine and a book at the same time. They’re like apples and oranges.

So, since I intend to publish Emmy Goes to Hell, I didn’t feel comfortable starting something new until Emmy was off my plate and completely done.

Well, Emmy is finally done. It should be up for sale on Amazon.com in the next week as well as through online retailers. The last step is to get it up for e-readers like the Kindle and Nook. This is not as easy as it sounds as it involves rather a lot of formatting changes in order to be converted into the many and varied formats for each type of e-reader.

I’ll be glad to be done with Emmy. It was fun to write but I’m ready for something new and different. Once the e-reader version is available, I’ll finally be able to put the book aside and move on. It’s taken a while but I’m pleased with the result. It’ll be nice to get back to actual writing again rather than the nitty gritty of publishing. Of course, there’s the marketing but…well….that’s not the same. That’s not cheating on my new book.

So, aside from this being a blog about writing, it’s a shameless plug for Emmy Goes to Hell. Please buy my book. It’s quite funny, quite dark and, as always, just wee bit twisted. I like it more than The Reluctant Demon because there’s a little more to it. Neither book is ever going to be my magnum opus but I think they’re fun reads.

Now it’s done, I can move on and write something new. I’m not quite sure what that will be but it probably won’t involve demons this time around. I’ll keep you posted.

Thanks, as always for reading!

Happy Thursday!

Waiting for the Next Idea...

It’s always hard to go to work on a Monday but after over a week away from work, celebrating the holidays and generally being rather lazy, it’s extremely hard.

It didn’t help that it was a very quiet day at work. It was one of those days where people aren’t returning phone calls, everyone is feeling sluggish and not much gets done, even if you have the best intentions.

For me, it felt a little torturous sitting at my desk when, just yesterday, I’d been finishing up a week off by reading, doing puzzles and playing with the pups.

Now it’s time to get busy again. In my case, this means starting to brainstorm ideas for a new novel. I finished my sequel to The Reluctant Demon just about two weeks ago and while I’m editing it, I want to start something new that isn’t quite so frivolous and silly.
That’s a hard thing as a writer, especially because I’m the kind of writer that I am. I’ve tried techniques before of coming up with ideas by diagramming stories, using notecards…all of the things you read about in writing books.

However, now I’ve written ten novels, I’ve learned that the only thing that works for me is for me to sit down and just…write. All I need is a glimmer of an idea and then to create a character who ‘speaks’ to me and thus, a novel is born.

I’m just waiting for that glimmer.

The problem is, I want my next novel to be good. This is not to say that my past efforts have not been good because I know most of them are, at least, very decent. I mean to say that I want the next book to be really good- the type of book that means something to people.

That’s a lot of pressure. I wonder if when some of the great writers of the past sat down to start a book, they intended their novel to be studied and read for generations to come.

Of course, I’m not sure that’s the type of good I’m looking for. Mostly, I want the type of good that, when I write, I can’t wait to get back to it, to see where my character is going to go and what will happen to him or her. My last books were fun. They were great ways for me to use my imagination and envision what a view of Hell would be like from someone who was only there to rescue her demon lover.

So, I’m beginning my New Year by trying to come up with new ideas. Now the holidays are behind us, it’s time to focus on the path ahead. For me, this means writing. This past year was my slowest as far as writing went. Usually I finish two books in a year or, at least, finish one and get another one halfway done. Last year, I only wrote one. Granted, I published one as well but as far as the writing process went, I allowed myself to be lazy and procrastinate. I could blame my procrastination on a number of things. For most of the year, I was in a job which I increasingly hated with each passing day. I finally did something about it in October. Now I have a job I enjoy that I find rewarding. I also adopted two puppies. They’re not as much puppies anymore as they are dogs. They just turned a year old on December 28th. I had to buy them dog biscuits as opposed to the puppy ones. That was hard because it was a concrete reminder of how things don’t stay the same.

I still think of them as puppies though. They still act like puppies and I have a feeling that, in my eyes, they’ll always be puppies. They’re more self-sufficient now than they were a few months ago but they’re still available for cuddles and love whenever I need it. At the moment, poor Rory has an ear infection so she’s needing a little more babying than usual.

Aside from puppies and work, my slump in writing can be blamed simply on me being trapped in my own head. I’m my own worst enemy- I get down on myself and start believing that I’m useless and a fraud. This year, I’m vowing to not let those thoughts overrule me. Instead, I’ll look at what I’ve accomplished and simply be happy that even if my wildest dreams have not and might not be met, it’s still ok to be happy with what I do and what I’ve done.
I suppose you could consider this a New Year’s resolution though I’m not so sure I want to call it that. It’s ok to make resolutions but I think that we shouldn’t use the New Year as an excuse to do so. Instead, we should make them when we realize we need to change regardless of the calendar date. Still, I can’t help but use the new year as a reason to try to improve. It’s a convenient starting point.

I’m excited to see what the New Year brings. Even if it does mean it’s time to get back to work.

Happy Tuesday!

Seeds of Doubt and Insecurity....

There are some things in life than can make you feel just a wee bit smaller than you want to feel, a wee bit less than you want to feel and, overall, a wee bit more insecure than you want to feel.

Insecurity is a thing that hits first in your teens, I think. I think insecurity is born in you as a tiny seed. It exploits itself at a young age but doesn't take root until the beginning of your teenage years. In some cases it hits earlier or later but in the majority of us, the teenage years are where it really hits.

I watch my four year old niece. She is, as many four year old girls are, adorable. She has no qualms in the world. She's clever. She's funny. She's naughty but she can get away with it because she's adorable and she knows it. When she walks into a room with other children, there's no hesitation; my niece knows she's important and she doesn't expect anyone to feel otherwise. She's a presence and a positive one at that and there's absolutely no doubt in her mind that everyone should be delighted she's there.

And the thing is, everyone is delighted she's there. What's not to love about a beautiful little girl who knows who she is, has no doubt that she's loved and just simply wants to be part of everything?

That, to me, is a gift. It's something that I think every child should have. Perhaps every child does have at first and maybe it's life and experiences that take it away.

Or, perhaps, there are some children that don't have it because it's not born in them.

It's hard to say. As a child, I was always shy. I preferred the company of books to people once I learned to read. With my friends, I was always the type of child to prefer the company of one or two 'best' friends to a plethora of social cohorts. As a teen, this continued. I had a circle of friends I could trust, who would let me be me when I was with them.

I suppose everyone else was 'the enemy'.

It all came from insecurity. In my youth, I had friends who were cute or pretty. Me, I never felt that way. I wanted to be the pretty one but it never turned out that way. My best friend in my childhood was a very pretty girl of whom people would stop and say, "wow, that "X" is a pretty girl!" and there I would be, suddenly feeling lumpy and extraneous.

It's silly when I look back on it but that's when it started. It began the minute people began to recognize others around me but left me feeling...there. It's not such a bad thing. I mean, no one ever said, "look at that [Captain Monkeypants]! What an ugly child she is!" or "Wow, that [Captain Monkeypants] is an unpleasant child."

No, I was lucky that way. It's just that when you start feeling extraneous, extraneous you remain. It follows you through life. You can get through the teenage years and feel awkward, shy and useless by believing that life gets better.

And it does. College hits and you find the place you belong. That's a fun feeling. You begin to establish who you are in life. You may not be the cute, pretty one but you have a purpose and when you find the right set of friends, you feel like that purpose means something.

Insecurity starts to vanish. You start feeling like you matter. The horror of high school is gone and the reality of life sinks in.

But if you've felt insecure before, you'll feel insecure again. That's how I feel. Sure, as you get older, you can start to rationalize things. When someone says, "That "X", she sure is pretty!" you still have an urge to look in the mirror and wonder why no one has ever said that about you. You may not even care that you're not really pretty but still, when someone acknowledges someone else's cuteness or prettiness, you suddenly do care. You start to wonder what that cute/pretty person has that you don't. You start to look at them and analyze their makeup or skin regimen.

In short, you secretly start to feel small again even though the most insecure years are behind you. High school is over. Becoming an adult is a rite of passage. Being concerned about one's attractiveness should be behind you.

Except...it never is. It's always there.

For example, in my current office, we have a woman who comes in from one of our branch offices. She's young. She's 'cute'. I know this because when she's come for a brief stint and left again, most of our staff sit around and say, "that "X" is so pretty!"

And she is...in a way. An insecure person, say, like me, would look at "X" and say, wow, she wears too much makeup. Her eyebrows are plucked too much and if you removed the five layers of eye makeup, she wouldn't be pretty!"

But, yet....it doesn't matter. The seed is planted. The nag of insecurity has risen its ugly head. It results in instant comparisons, of wondering why I've never felt that 'pretty' in my life.

It's pathetic, really. It's a fatal flaw of human kind. We see that which others have and we instantly compare our lot in life. I'm not saying it's right. I'm saying it's true. I'm being honest.

We can spend years building ourselves up, of convincing ourselves that we're good enough, we're smart enough and, gosh darn it, people like us.!

But it all comes down to that sudden, unexpected moment of insecurity. No matter how hard we work to look good, it just takes one compliment to someone else, not to us, to send us into an instant tizzy.

As I said, it's pathetic. It's self-involved. It's...wrong. Why should we care? That person is not us! We're special.

It's all a question of self-perception. I'm not asking for pity. I'm not asking for compassion. More than anything, I want to know if it's just me. We could be the smartest/prettiest/coolest person in the universe but it only takes someone else to upstage us for a moment before we begin to doubt...right?

It's all rather silly really, particularly when, for the most part, in my life, at least, I'm happy. I'm not unhappy with how I look any more. Granted, looking like a Victoria's Secret model might have been more beneficial in life but since I don't have two heads, I have most of a working brain and I have a plethora of creativity, it's not all so bad.

But it still doesn't stop me comparing myself. It's in everything. Why is Stephanie Meyer a bestseller with the Twilight series and I can't even get an agent to read my entire manuscript? Why am I not married as so many of my friends are? Why is the paint on my walls splotchy when my friends' houses look professionally painted.

The list goes on. It's life. It's insecurity. I'm sure everyone has it. I'm sure it's normal. It just sucks that even when you're a grown up, happy with your life for the most part, you can find yourself stopped dead in your tracks by something you didn't see coming, something that makes you suddenly feel insecure.

It's life. It's human. Yet it makes us feel far less so. In my case, at least, I start feeling even more angry with myself that I feel so useless and ineffectual. It's a vicious cycle. It's all rather silly. Perhaps the moral is that you never truly escape from high school, even as the years pass.

Or, perhaps, the moral is that you can escape from high school. It's just that you need to believe in yourself and not compare yourself to others and wonder why your life isn't like theirs.

After all, if everyone's life was the same, life would be a boring place.

Insecurity sucks. Perhaps that means it's time to kiss it goodbye.

Happy Wednesday.

A Perfect Rainy Night...

It's a soggy night out there tonight. It's been raining non-stop since about 10 a.m. and the daytime feels like it never really arrived.

I don't mind one bit. I'm a fan of precipitation. I'd much rather it rained or even snowed than for it to just look gloomy and grey. It's been so dry this summer/fall that the rain is very welcome. It's a perfect rainy day too. I have dinner cooking in the crock pot and the house is warm and cosy.

The puppies don't like it much, of course. They go out, get soaked and then proceed to do weird, wild dives on the carpet, on the couch, on ever visible surface in an attempt to dry themselves off. If I was a neat freak, this might be a problem but it's just water and, well, they're puppies. I can't exactly make them sit still.



It's the perfect night for cuddling up and enjoying the sound of the rain. I'm trying to be good this week and get some writing done. I've been in a slump lately. I entered The Reluctant Demon in the Writer's Digest Self Published awards and I didn't even get an honourable mention. I confess, I've been a bit down about that. The sales have been going pretty well considering I haven't done any publicity. I've sold 40 electronic copies in the past month. This may seem small but that's not bad going for an indie writer who hasn't done any marketing.


It just bothers me that I'm bothered so much about some stupid awards. It shouldn't matter. It just does.



Still, I've decided it's not worth being so sad/annoyed about that I should let it stop me from writing. So this week, I've decided that I'm going to try to finish my novel by the end of November. I'm ready to move on. It's fun to write the adventures of someone in Hell but I'd also like to write other things too.

So, tonight will be a writing night. I hope the pups don't mind too much. Their usual response to my writing is to ignore me while they play together and then when they're ready to curl up on the couch for the evening, they yip at me to come and join them. Sometimes, they'll come in and lie in the doorway, staring at me with those big sad eyes. It's easy to want to give in to eyes like that. Sometimes I do, sometimes I don't. If I ignore them for long enough, they trot off, heads down and sit on the couch all alone until I join them.



This time of year is very strange because the days suddenly feel so much shorter. I'm sure the puppies are still bewildered by the change that Daylight Savings Time has brought about. It's dark so early now and they miss out of the daylight because that's when I have to go to work and they go in their crate. I'm experimenting with leaving them out for half a day to see if they can be trusted without supervision. I work a little later now than I used to and if I have to run errands after work, I feel cruel for keeping them crated when it's getting dark. I'm hoping they adjust to being freed from their crate for part of the day so that I can have a little more freedom myself.



On nights like this though, there's nothing more freeing than being home, in your pajamas, listening to the rain fall as the smell of comfort food perfumes the air with a puppy cuddled up on each side of me.



I've missed the rain. I'm glad it's back.



Happy Wednesday.

Being a Writer is a Nuisance

Why being a writer is a bit of a nuisance, by Captain Monkeypants

1. Because it’s hard. Even when you want to write you
a. Don’t have time for it.
b. Have time for it but suddenly feeling like watching those episodes of “Parenthood” that you have on your DVR.
c. Have puppies who don’t understand why their ‘mother’ is sitting at a weird contraption hitting buttons when they want to play.
d. Discover that Microsoft Word is going to freeze up on you and even if it’s done an auto-save, it’s not auto-saved the fabulous paragraphs you just wrote and you’ll never remember.

If you do actually write, there’s the inevitable question of “Why am I writing.” In my earlier writing days, the rush and thrill of creating something, of creating worlds on paper was enough. Now, as I’m nine books in, I’d love to say I still get that rush but I’ve been out there in the real world and it’s just not as easy to stay wide-eyed and bushy tailed in hopes that the first time you submit it, you’re going to get published because it’s fabulous.

Here’s the thing. It may be fabulous. It may be well written. It may just land on the desk of the editor or agent or publisher at the wrong moment. They may just have read a book that they liked or seen a movie and suddenly, that’s what they’re in the mood for at that moment. So when they read your query letter, they’re just not in the mood for that particular kind of book/story and so they send you back a rejection.

To them, it’s just a casual response. To the writer, no matter how often rejections happen, they still sting.

It’s interesting. My new job as an IT recruiter means that I’m constantly trying to help people find jobs and, at the same time, fill positions we currently need to fill. Sometimes they match up. Sometimes they don’t. Sometimes, I get calls from people who are desperate and out of work and really need a job but when you look at their resume, they haven’t done very much, if anything, in IT at all. They may have used a computer in their life or they may have been able to replace the keyboard on their dad’s computer but it doesn’t mean they’re qualified to work at a help desk.

It’s hard when you get a candidate like that. I want to help them but, really, they’ve called the wrong office. We help Information Technology professionals find jobs, hence the “IT” in “IT recruiter”. I’d love to find everyone a job but it’s just not possible. Also, if they’re been doing something like Help Desk/Technical support and they suddenly want a job as a database programmer, it’s just not possible if they haven’t actually done any database programming.

The point of this is that this type of thing happens to me several times a day, in between juggling candidates who are qualified for jobs and people running into my office needing me to change my direction and start trying to find candidates for a completely new job we just had open up. Yet, each time, when I get a call from an unqualified candidate, I do my best to put aside my frustration and really hear them out. Each one of them is a human who just wants a job. Sure, there may be times when I’d rather work on getting actual qualified candidates into jobs because that’s how I earn my money but it doesn’t hurt to talk to people for even a few minutes just to see if maybe, just maybe their resume is just bad and they actually are qualified.

I’m not comparing this to an agent/editor/publisher, exactly. Unlike my 4-5 calls a day from unqualified candidates, they deal with hundreds, even thousands of submissions a day from unpublished writers. They can’t talk to each one individually. They just don’t have time. They have time to scan the query letter, decide if it suits them and move forward or, more likely, send a rejection.

On the opposite side of the fence to this is the writer, in this case, me, who has sent my novel/short story to them in the hopes that they’ll stop and read it and think, “oh, this sounds promising.” Instead, what usually happens is that they skim the letter, think, “Oh, well, this isn’t what’s selling,” and send the rejection.

It’s sad but true. Sure, vampires are selling now but five years ago, it was dragons and wizards. What is hot now will not necessarily be hot in five years.

I suppose what I’m saying is that sometimes it just doesn’t seem fair. I have so many rejections, there are times that I wonder why I write. I’ve mentioned that before. It’s disheartening. I know the optimist in me always hears, “You can do it! You just have to keep trying!” but sometimes that optimist drowns underneath a sea of rejections.

And I know it’s not because I’m a lousy writer. For a while, I let my self-doubt believe that. I know I can write. It’s not arrogance, it’s confidence. Like a singer who can sing or a dancer who can dance, I’m a writer who can write. Being a writer and submitting something is like going to an American Idol audition, I imagine. There are thousands upon thousands of other hopefuls. The wackiest ones make it to the judges so that their ridiculousness can be mocked on national TV. The pretty ones make it because even though they may not be the best singers, they’re decent and they look good. Some of the power-house singers make it because they’re that good. Yet for the thousands you see lining up to audition, we, as a TV audience, see, maybe less than 10% of those and that 10% includes the worst of the worst.

So you can’t tell me in that other 90%, there aren’t some really, really good singers who got missed because they weren’t boisterous enough or they didn’t have a sad story like a mother who has cancer. I’m not knocking or mocking those that have sad stories it just seems like those are the ones we always see on TV because they make the best drama and, let’s face it, people like drama. In that 90%, how many of them are good but they’re not TV worthy?

What happens to the 90%? Some of them re-audition the next year. Some of them give up. Some of them realize that maybe they’re not a TV singer and find somewhere else to sing. Yet if their dream is of becoming a recognized music artist, chances are they’re going to have to get on TV at some point and thus begins the downward spiral of them trying to figure out what they did wrong.

It might be that they simply aren’t good enough. That would take away a huge portion of the leftovers. Yet maybe they are and then what? I suppose my point is that, as a writer, the biggest nuisance is trying to stay positive, to not let the rejections sink you because if you’re good enough, you know it. There’s only so many times you can submit something, get rejected and still think that the agent/publisher/editor just wasn’t in the mood.

Of course, when you submit anyway, chances are, they’re just reading a query letter and they judge you on that. Just like on American Idol, you get just by a couple of moments of singing. It’s not enough. In the end, you end up with seven+ seasons of a show where the only winner who succeeded was from the very first season. Everyone else who has done well on that show didn’t actually win; the winners turn into Top 40 radio standbys but without any real presence. It’s not about the singing, it’s who can make the money. I think the writing world is the same way. There are plenty of writers who can’t actually, um, write but they can sell books. It’s writers like that who make it hard for writers like me. I self-published. It’s freakishly hard work to get yourself out there. Still, I’m trying.

It’s just a huge nuisance. Ah well, at heart, I do it because I love it and that's the important thing.

Thanks, as always, for reading. Have a great weekend and Happy Halloween!

Happy 500th Blogday to Me!

This is an important blog for me. It's the 500th one I've written.

I can't believe I've been blogging this long and I've managed to accumulate 500 of them. I remember when I was just dithering about whether to start a blog at all. I finally stopped dithering and started blogging. Here I am, 500 blogs later. My very first blog was written on October 14, 2008. That's two days shy of exactly two years ago.

It's been a fun experience, blogging. If you haven't noticed, my blog wavers from being an outlet for issues in my personal life- most notably my miserable job- to being a commentary on the randomness of life. Since I've had the puppies, it's also been a narrative on the trials and tribulations of being a pet parent.

I find it fitting that exactly 500 blogs later and who knows how many whines, revelations and snarky comments about my job, I'm leaving the job in three days. I finally grew tired of my own bitterness and frustration and decided to do something about it.

I've noticed that 'doing things' is a pattern in my life. It's a good pattern. While I tend to be self-deprecating and lack a fair amount of esteem on most days, I do think one of my fundamental good points is that I'm a 'do-er'. I might be a slight procrastinator on the doing but I do eventually...do it.

I look back in my life and I realize that, for the most part, I've always been in charge of it. I've always managed to do what I want, in some way or another. I decide I want to blog...I start a blog. Then I keep blogging and don't shut up so that eventually, I'm reaching my 500th blogday (that's what Captain Monkeypants is calling momentous days in blogging. Blogdays. Sort of like birthdays but not really).

I got bored of living in the Midwest. I wanted to be a screenwriter. I moved to L.A. I wrote screenplays. Then I decided I'd rather write novels but, nevertheless, I decided to do something and I did it. When I decided to write a novel, I did. Then I wrote 8 more. I'm writing number 10, as we speak. Well, not at this exact moment but I'm writing it at work due to the fact that my boss is still acting like I broke his professional heart and has cut me out of each and every meeting I really should attend in my attempts to make my departure smooth. Since he's now officially acting like I'm already gone, I've decided to also act like I've already gone. I'm still doing the work that gets assigned to me but when I have downtime, I'm enjoying pecking away on Emmy Goes to Hell. If he finds out and decides to let me go early, I shall skip down the hallway with joy. Seriously. If I didn't honour the fact I said I was giving two weeks' notice, I'd have left last Friday.

Anyway, after I wrote some of my novels and had been living in L.A. for almost 8 years, I realized that coming back to the Midwest to see my family were the happiest times in my life. It began to feel like I was leaving pieces of my heart/soul behind every time I got back on the plane to go home. I knew it was time to move back. So I did. I managed to snag a job at my current company who, at the time, were shielded by the finances of the university to which they used to belong, and moved back. Granted, my job has never fit me that well but it helped me move back and helped me find some friends here in southwestern Ohio.

After I was settled, I then decided I wanted to buy a house. So...I bought a house. I wanted a dog...so I got two. My most recent 'do-ing' escapade was realizing I'd not only bored my blog readers to death with the frustration and annoyance I felt with my job but also, my family was starting to get that glassy eyed look every time I had a little whine and a moan about it. I also realized I was boring myself with my frustration. So...I got another job.

This isn't my attempts to pat myself on the back and say, 'look at me, I'm bloody brilliant!'. It's just an attempt for me to show myself that despite the fact that I haven't been able to snag that lucrative yet elusive publishing contract or even so much as get a magazine story published, I've done some things in my life that aren't too shabby. My dream is to be a successful writer. My reality is that I'm a writer who needs to do something else to make money. My dream is to find a man with whom I click completely and can share my life. My reality is I have two little puppies and the hope that he's out there...somewhere. My dream is to have a house near the ocean someday so I can smell the sea as I write. My reality is a little house in the suburbs and a pumpkin spice candle.

What it comes down to is that even if I have a mental picture of my perfect life, the reality of what I really have isn't so bad. I look back over my 500 blogs and I see the good as well as the wallowing, depressed badness. Like any human, I have my ups and downs. My choice here, what I chose to do is to publish them online.

When I look at what I have blogged about, it's eclectic. If you scroll down on this page, to the right, near the bottom, you'll see a word cloud. This includes everything from my Stephanie Meyer rants to blogging about deer and Dexter to ladybugs, avocados, Mario Batali and fire extinguishers. It was originally supposed to be about my writing and the trials and tribulations of being a writer. In a way, it is. It's the portrait of someone who is a writer but that's not all she is. It's also the portrait of someone who clearly has had a beef with her job but hopefully that'll change over the next 500 blogs.

I'm going to keep blogging. I hope you'll keep reading. It's nice to know that there are people out there, reading my random musings. To each one of you, I thank you for reading along. It's been a fun 500. Hopefully the next 500 will be more fun. My new motto...less whining....more writing.

Although I don't necessarily mean that literally. If you haven't noticed, I'm horribly prolific. I'm a babbler. Perhaps I should make my motto, less whining, more concise writing.

But that wouldn't really be me, would it?

Thanks so much for reading. Happy Wednesday!

Conversations With Our Old Selves...

Have you ever looked back over a span of your life and wished you could have a conversation with your [X] year-old self?

Tonight I did that. I was scouring my shelves for a notebook in which I could jot some ideas to inspire my latest novel and I came across one in which I haven't written for years.

For a while, I went through a phase where I asked for notebooks and journals as gifts. As a result, I have an eclectic collection that is emblazoned from everything from "Buffy the Vampire Slayer," to a cute toddler dressed in fairy clothing.

Tonight, I pulled out a random notebook. In it, I found a "journal" entry from 1999. I say "journal" because it's clear, back then, I intended to keep track of my life. Unfortunately, my attempts were from New Years' Eve through New Years' Day of that year. After that, there's a couple of blank pages and then a list of "Why I'm grateful I moved to Los Angeles."

It reminded me that I'm fond of lists. Sometimes it's nice to see things in black and white, even though life is rarely that simple. Today, for example, I was told that the job for which I interviewed could be mine. It's going to be offered to me on Thursday when I meet with my interviewer to discuss the compensation package.

It seems so simple. I've been miserable at my current job and thus, this new one should be a blessing in disguise...right? And yet, as I stated yesterday, things things are never that simple. Just as I found a lifeline out of the office that has caused much of my misery over the past year or more, I was offered a lifeline within that office. My boss finally recognized that I had aspirations and hopes. It only took two years.

So now I stand at a crossroads. Do I dive into an unknown future or do I sit, comfortably, on the present past?

The nice thing is that it may be simpler than I'm making it. The new job may end up being of a salary that is too low for me to contemplate. It may offer the hope of commission-based earnings but the base salary may be too hard for me to contemplate in the bill-owing reality of my world.

Or, it may be hard. It may be a job I feel suited for and the salary may be comparable to mine. In which case, my dilemma from yesterday of the devil I know vs. the devil I don't may be relevant.

It's hard to tell. Yet, tonight, when I came across my list from 1999, I was reminded of the simplicity of life. In 1999, I was 24 years old. I had recently read "Bridget Jones' Diary," and so I wrote without pronouns. I wrote feverishly, spilling the secrets of my singleton status as though the diary were my wine-saturated best friend.

I had written the entry on New Years' Eve, 1999. It turns out, I went to see a movie, specifically, "The Talented Mr. Ripley," with my best friend, Saz. I had a good time. Yet, I was clearly searching for the meaning of my life. I was clearly contemplating a move to L.A., a digression from the Midwest to the West Coast. I was contemplating writing a screenplay. I had written, in my own words, "Probably should write a screenplay or something. No point in saying I'm a writer if I don't write."

That was more than 10 years ago. These days, I've been to L.A. and back. I've gone through my resentment of the Midwest and turned, full circle, into being grateful for the simplicity of the Midwest.

I did write a screenplay. I wrote several. Then I wrote television scripts. Then I wrote novels.

Three major feature film scripts, seven television scripts and nine and a half novels later, here I am, back in the Midwest. I think I can safely say I'm a writer, even if my book sales don't agree as much as I wish they would.

It's interesting. Once you get to a certain age, you stop living life minute by frenzied minute. Life slows down and yet speeds up at the same time. You start noticing the small, simple details of life and yet you realize they start passing you by more quickly than they ever have before.

It's been just over ten years. In that time, I've grown from being a dreamer to being a realist. The dreamer in me still exists. I still hope that sales of The Reluctant Demon will increase, that people will realize it's worth the time, even if it has no deep level of significance. It's fun. I still dream that the right person will stumble upon my book or, even, this blog and realize I'm an imprisoned talent trapped in a mundane life.

And yet, the realist speaks louder. The realist has realized that while the dreams are important and even necessary, the reality of life...is now. I may dream of being respected, famous, quoted and respected but, in reality, I exist. I have a house which makes me concrete. I have puppies, which makes me responsible. I write fiction, which makes me creative. I have a job, which also makes me responsible.

I think back then, in 1999, I was still young enough to believe that it was ok to shoot for the stars. These days, I see the stars and look at them with a fondness. I've been there, in a way. I did manage to get the idea to write a novel. I finished that novel. I enjoyed that novel. Then I wrote eight more.

When I step back, I can see that the mere fact that I finished one novel is an accomplishment. I forget that sometimes. In my life, I've always been consistent. In school, I worked hard and got good grades. It was expected of me. In life, it's been expected that I'll make my own way and not rely on others. That, too, is expected.

Sometimes, it's hard to remember that the things that come easiest to us, come hardest to others. Those that know us come to expect that greatness, even "decentness" is an everyday thing. For me, I look at the novels I've written and I see only a series of stories, of characters, of events that are tied together only because I created them. I forget that the simple act of creating them isn't as easy as it seems to me. Once I wrote one book, the rest seemed to be simple.

Then I look back at the journal entry that I wrote on 12-31-99 and I see that, back then, the mere idea of even one novel wasn't even a seed in my mind.

It's amazing how life changes. Some people plan it. Others take it as it comes. Me, I try to plan it but I'm willing to change course if it feels right. In 1999, it seemed right to move my life across the country, 2000 miles away. It seemed right to want to think about writing something.

These days, in 2010, I'm back in the place I abandoned- the autumnal world of the Midwest. I thought about writing and I did it. I wrote about a character who was a hacker and, because I like to be thorough, my research led me to a career in software.

And, so, here I am. I wonder, if I could talk to my Bridget Jones inspired self, whether I'd tell her anything different. Would I change the course of our lives, just to live for another dream?

It's hard to say. Because, when I look back at that Captain Monkeypants' aspirations, writing was my dream, moving across the country was my dream. I accomplished both.

Life is a series of nested dreams. I think it's up to us to decide if we should look at it as a whole, a horizon of unaccomplished wants or as a series of successes, of small conquests that have helped us keep moving forward.

I think it's safer to look at the small conquests. That way, we allow life to keep us flexible. It allows us to go with the flow rather than resolutely say, "No, I won't have that."

It also allows us to deal with life when it says, "No, you shan't have that," even when we think we should.

All in all, I think I'd talk to my ten-years-ago self and tell her that it's ok to have dreams. It's ok to try to accomplish them. If we fail, so be it. If we succeed, power to us. It's about the trying that counts.

And we did that. We're doing that. That's what makes life...life...right?

Happy Wednesday!

Cartwheel like No One is Watching...

I did a cartwheel in my back yard today.

This may sound like an odd thing to say or, for a 35 year old woman, even an odd thing to do. Yet it was a beautiful day outside, the grass was clear and appealing and I suddenly had an urge to do a cartwheel. I've had the urge before but usually don't give in. Today, I did.

I have never been graceful at acrobatics and today proved no exception but in a simple flip of the body, memories of childhood returned. There was a time when girls couldn't resist turning cartwheels whenever there was enough grass. It used to be something my friends and I just did. It was a natural reaction to clean grass on a summer's day.

Then I began to think harder. When, exactly, did we stop turning cartwheels? When was that magical line in life created that made us stop just going with our instincts to do backyard gymnastics and made us start questioning whether we should do them?

I can't even remember how old I was. I just know that it happened one day. It was most likely the same time that standing still, closing my eyes and just spinning to see what would happen stopped.

As a child, I always loved gymnastics. It probably began with a somewhat bad biography-film of Nadia Comaneci, the Romanian gymnastics darling of the late seventies. I used to want to be Nadia. I wanted to walk and twirl on the balance beam, to do a flip on the thin strip of covered wood and land gracefully without falling to the floor.

I tried. I was in gymnastics at school. I never did very well but I enjoyed it. It didn't really help that we had one of those stereotyped gym teachers who liked the 'pretty' girls and since I didn't qualify, he gave me no extra time at all. My biggest problem was fear. I couldn't get past the idea of what could happen if I landed wrong or if I fell. I could never do what the best athletes do- not worry about the consequences, to just do it.

Yet I still believed that I could. If I worked hard enough. If I got books from the library. If I watched the gymnastics on television. If I just worked hard enough, I could do it. I could do anything.

This belief stayed with me long past my gymnastics phase. I was a ballerina at one time, believing that I would someday dance en pointe, gracefully lifted into the air by my partner. There was always something, some passion that would ignite me to want to become something. Another time, I wanted to be in the theatre, hoofing it up, singing and dancing on stage.

I never remember anyone killing my childish dreams of gymnastics glory by saying I couldn't do it. I don't remember my parents laughing at me and saying that it was stupid to want to be a gymnast. Now I look back, I have a feeling that, instead, they smiled benignly and let me live out the dream until I got tired of it, which I inevitably did. My parents, instead, lived through years of my hiding in my room, dancing and pretending I was going to audition for "Cats". I tried to hide it but I'm sure they knew.

Through my life, there have always been dreams. As a child, they were dreams of the future. Nothing was unattainable. I still turned cartwheels as if no one was watching.

Then…I started thinking people were watching. That they would think I was stupid. That I was making an idiot of myself. I think, perhaps, that is when I stopped turning cartwheels.

I didn't stopped dreaming about the future but my dreams became tainted with a side of reality. I started the awful process of worrying what people think. This, as anyone who worries too much about what others think knows this leads to an unpleasant low level of self-esteem.

It doesn't matter though, whether you worry about what others think just a little or you worry about it a lot, you worry about it and it allows self-doubt to creep it. In can be as simple as someone noticing your coworker got half an inch snipped off her hair whereas you just had four inches cut off and you coloured it and no one noticed at all or it can be a downward spiral of feeling like you'll never be good enough for anything, that everything is a waste of time because you're just not good enough.

It all begins with that tiny, insignificant moment in life where you do something and instead of being uninhibited with the carefree airs of youth, you stop and wonder if someone is watching.

It all starts there. It's the moment where you stop doing cartwheels because they're not very good cartwheels and someone else with you is doing them better or you stop because you don't see what the point of doing cartwheels is or you stop because someone tells you to and you listen.

Once that moment hits, it's no longer to turn cartwheels as you did before. It's as though it's become something other than harmless fun.

I'm using cartwheels as a metaphor, of course. But you knew that. I think what I'm trying to say is that there was a time in life where the sky was the limit, that dreams were never impossible and that it was still possible to be anything. I was lucky enough to have parents who never quelled my dreams but let me find my way to them. They aided me as best they could but mostly, they let me live out the journey from conception to realization (whether actual realization or the realization that the dream was nice but it wasn't really for me).

Yet I let the self-doubt creep in when I turned that final cartwheel. I cared too much what people thought and I let it drive me. I still believe that dreams are possible but as adults, it's harder to remember that than it is as a child when reality has fewer boundaries and there are less obstacles to overcome.

I've still tried to follow my dreams as an adult but it's harder to drop everything and change direction when you have responsibilities. I'm trying to make my dreams of becoming a bestselling writer come true. If I was still the wide-eyed, believing child I was, I wouldn't doubt that it was going to happen. I'd still be sitting in the corner, scribbling stories about snails on scraps of paper, writing stories about how the sheep got its fleece and knowing that it was only a matter of time before I was doing book signings and admiring the thousands of copies of my book I saw in stores every day.

As an adult, I wish to be that hopeful, that the scars of reality and piles of rejections haven't made me wonder what I'm doing with my life. Don't get me wrong, I'm still trying. I still want that dream. Being a writer is one of the few dreams in my life that has stayed with me without changing since I was a child. It's just that nowadays, I realize that there's no magic wand to wave, that things don't just happen. I have to make them happen. I can't sit and wait for someone to find my work and say, "by golly! What an undiscovered talent! I wish to make you a bestselling author."

Though I admit, that would be rather nice, wouldn't it? Things like that only happen in fiction, I think. If they happen in reality, they don't seem to happen to me.

Yet, I haven't given up on dreaming. I am trying to work my way back across the obstacle course that sprang up when I started caring what other people thought, the day I stopped turning cartwheels.

So, today, I did a cartwheel. I don't care if anyone saw me. I don't care if it was more of a pathetic kick and spin than a genuine cartwheel. It was the way I always did them.

For a split second, it was a return to the days of my youth where I didn't care what people thought. I did what I wanted to do because I felt like it. There were no voices in my head telling me that it wasn't a good cartwheel, that it was a silly thing to do.

And then I realized that this was the matter precisely: There were no voices in my head telling me not to do it.

It just proved that all along, the voice that has held me back has been the one that has spoken loudest has been mine all along and I chose to listen.

I can't promise I won't still hear it but I can promise that I will try not to pay as much attention to it. If I forget, I'll just go turn a cartwheel. If it's raining, I'll close my eyes and just dance or spin until I get so tired, I'll flop down on the floor and pant like a puppy that has played too much. If it's snowing, I'll make a snow angel in the snow, kicking my legs until the snow is a flattened, diamond surface beneath my feet.

Or, if it's every day, I'll follow my dreams as if they can come true.

Happy Thursday.

Odious Mondays...

Today has not been a bad Monday. It's still very much been a Monday but it managed to go quite quickly and productively which, compared to some Mondays, is a lovely thing indeed.

Also, today was just an ordinary Monday for me whereas, around these Midwestern parts, today was the common back-to-school day for both local universities and school systems. As I drove in to work this morning, I passed by the group of neighbourhood kids waiting for the school bus. They were all dressed in what looked like new clothes, standing unhappily together but not really interacting. As the school year goes on, they'll become more familiar with each other and the dynamic will change but this is a new year and thus, a new thing for some of them.

For me, the newest thing in my life currently is the Interloper. He's managing just fine. For a somewhat disabled dog, he certainly can move when the puppies are in pursuit. I've taken to gently squirting the pups with water from my pink spray bottle when they try to use Odie as a chew toy. It's working…slowly. More than anything, they're simply fascinated by him. They watch to see what he's going to do. When he does ordinary things like eat and poop, they just..watch. Poor Odie seems to have no dignity. The minute the poor dog squats to do his business, Rory is there, about a foot away, watching with her head cocked. When he eats, both puppies sit side-by-side, watching. I've also discovered they're rather possessive of me. They make a point of making sure that they are sitting on my lap and the space is thus occupied. Odie doesn't mind though; he's not much of a lap dog anyway.

I like to call Odie the Odious One. I think it suits him. When I'm feeling Greek, I call him Odysseus. Don't ask me why I sometimes feel Greek. Sometimes, I feel Italian and I call him Odio but that doesn't sound as fun. No matter what I call him, he seems to know I'm calling him.

Though I have to say, I might tease and poke fun at him but he's not having such a bad stay with us so far. He's in his crate, just as the girls are in their crate. The Odious One is not used to this. He's used to being allowed to be free. Usually this translates as sitting in his 'den'- the bottom shelf of my parent's bookcase- for about 8 hours. His den here is a fairly good sized crate with a bed, food, water and snacks. And he gets to run free with the girls. He gets treats like they do and I'm making a conscious effort to make him feel welcome.

He's always going to be Odious the Interloper though.

Aside from the Odious One, this Monday has been fairly run of the mill. The most exciting thing was trying a new pizza place for lunch with some coworkers. It was pretty nice. My life is very exciting, I know. It's very, uh, food centric.

In some ways, I guess it's good that this Monday is pretty routine. It's good that the most exciting thing is a visiting dog and a new pizza place. Things could be far worse. I could be having a bad day at work. The most I really have to complain about is that I'm feeling a little stuck in a rut.

The problem is that I feel a bit trapped in my job. This happens fairly routinely as I've mentioned before in my job. In a non-bad economy, I job hunt. The problem is at the moment, I'm just not sure what I'd even hunt for. So many of my jobs have been supplements to help fulfill my dreams of being a writer. Now I suppose I can call myself a writer but…well, it's not what I really imagined. I want…more.

It's greedy. After all, I'm lucky enough to be able to write in the first place. It's hard for a lot of people to write novels. For me, that's the easy part. The hard part is accepting that reaching a dream sometimes takes a bit of reworking. I used to dream of getting a book published. Well, I took that bull by the horns and dealt with it. I got my book published. My current dream is for the right person to read it and see that I have potential.

That's a lot to ask. It's the type of thing that doesn't really happen in real life and, if it does, it doesn't happen to 'Middlings' like me. I can keep dreaming. There are a thousands of inspiring quotes about dreams out there. There are millions of success stories. There are posters proclaiming that dreams are vital.

So, I just need to believe it. After all, there's not harm in having a dream, is there? No one says it happens all at once. If I take a step back, it's been a succession of achieving a dream already. I used to dream of finding out what I do best. I think that is writing. I dreamed of doing something with it. I wrote nine novels. I dreamed of getting one published. So I did it. I dreamed of people liking my work. I've got fan emails to prove that people are enjoying it.

So, why am I so unsatisfied? Why, as humans, is it so hard to accept what we have and not at what we don't have? Is it just me who can't feel satisfied? Is it because the picture in our heads never actually becomes the reality of our lives?

I don't know. I just know that I need to figure out where to go next and how my dreams fit in with that.

In the meantime, I'll keep plodding along. At the very least, having The Odious One as a houseguest is keeping things from feeling completely routine which on a standard Monday is actually quite a good thing indeed. And, if all else fails, he'll be good writing fodder.

I just have to keep the dream alive.

Happy Tuesday!

No Good Crying Over Spilled Tea....

There are days that are just destined to be days where you really should either say, "do over!" or you should just stay in bed, under the covers.

I know I seem to say something of this sort fairly frequently but I'm not talking about days where it's hard to get out of the cosy cocoon of a warm bed or days where work just kicks you when you're down. I'm talking about the sort of days where you really just shouldn't touch anything.

My day began fine until I left the house. I had my tea in my travel mug. It was raining. It was the sort of rain that was heavy in spots, light in others. As I pulled out on the main road from my street and started to drive, someone pulled out of a parking lot without looking. I had to brake quite hard to avoid him. Fortunately, having just had my brakes fixed, I was able to stop with no repercussions.

When I got to work, I discovered that our alarm was down. I couldn't get in. Usually I'm the first one in the office but today, I recognized the truck of our technical support person who's also in charge of the alarms. I knocked on the door to no avail. It was raining. I finally decided to drive around to the front of the building to see if that was open.

This may seem lazy but I'd worn heels today since we had visitors in the building. Also, it was raining hard and I didn't feel like getting my heels stuck in mud while I got rather wet.

Just as I was about to pull out of the parking lot to get to the front of the building, our technical support person came and opened the door, propping it open. Groaning, I backed up and re-parked in the spot I'd abandoned. As I got out of my car, my tea mug lid came loose and spilled spicy black chai all down my very white shirt. I groaned. When I got inside, I tried to scrub it but a rather ugly brown splotch remained.

My morning passed in a tangled web of muddle. Everything I tried to test to make sure it was working broke. This is good because I'm doing my job but when you end up breaking everything you're supposed to test and things are getting fixed, you end up chasing your tail and tripping over your legs.

I finally went to lunch. It wasn't until I got inside my house, I realized my wristlet was missing. My wristlet is a cross between a wallet and a purse and it holds every bit of valuable stuff I have as in driver's license debit/credit cards, green card, etc. I searched my car, nothing. I searched the route I'd taken when I'd come in. Nothing.

I hoped beyond hope in my haze of muddle, I'd just left it at work. When I got to the office I searched for it. Nothing. I began to worry. My coworker said she'd seen me leave with it but she also thought one of my other coworkers may have had it when she'd come looking for me over lunch. I went to her office. She wasn't there and her office-mate didn't think she'd picked it up.

Thanks to the aid of two of my favourite coworkers, we searched my car and still didn't find it. I was trying not to panic. In the end, I decided the only thing to do to settle my mind was to go back home and search again.

I rushed home. I finally found it. Today was trash day. The wrist strap had come undone as I'd been hoisting my rubbish bins over the fence after they'd been emptied. It was lying on the ground. Since it was brown, it blended in with the dirty concrete. My heart rushed to my mouth as relief flooded in.

I got back to work. The afternoon should have passed well after a successful outcome of that near-scare but I have to confess, I was in a funk.

I'd been in a funk all day. It's all because I published my book in every electronic reader format possible and am selling it for $1.99. So far, no one's bought it. I know I just need to be more patient but even with my Viva La Revolution of Self Publishing! attitude, it's sometimes a little depressing how hard I have to work to get people to buy my book.

And I'm not even talking about the general public. I'm talking about friends and people I know. My closest friends have bought it because they're my closest friends and that's what they do. Yet when I step back, I admit, I get a little depressed that I haven't been able to persuade more than a mere fraction of my facebook 'friends' to buy it.

I know. I'm an idealist. I can't help but think that if it was a reverse situation and someone I knew had published a book, I'd buy it, just to help out. To say, "I know him/her!" It's the same reason I watch some bad movies or bad TV: Because some of the actors in the shows/movies are people I went to school with and it's nice to see them doing well with their life, even if the movies/TV shows aren't particularly good.

In my funk, I tend to over analyze. I get a little disappointed sometimes. When I moved out to L.A. nine years ago, I did so with the promise from a former boss/friend that her sister who was involved in Hollywood would help me with my screenwriting career. I moved out there, tried to contact my bosses sister and...nothing. I contacted my boss and after several attempts I realized that it was an empty promise. I tried not to take it personally but it was hard.

Nowadays, it's different. I have a couple of friends who know people in the publishing industry or they do PR but for whatever reason, they can't help me. I know they have their reasons but on days like this, I start to feel sorry for myself and wonder why all the writing books that talk about the importance of networking don't tell you that the majority of people with whom you try to network can't or won't help out.

It's one of the reasons I'm so jaded at times. My closest brush with getting somewhere was having a class with a Hollywood producer when I first moved to L.A. He liked the idea for my script and gave me ideas on how to fix it. I did and, as he requested, I queried his company with my script. I never heard another word.

It's been like that a few times in my life. It's one of the reasons I like the power of self-publishing. It's not about getting your work published because it's not fit for a real publisher as I still keep reading online, it's about no one else giving you a chance so you make your own chances. You have to "create your own luck," as Jack from Titanic says in the movie.

But sometimes, particularly days like this, I feel beaten down by 'creating my own luck.' I just want things to be easy when, in actuality, it's not supposed to be easy.

And yet if I just tipped the glass the other way, my day could be seen from a whole other point of view: My brakes were fixed, therefore I didn't get hit. I found my wallet. My tea didn't ruin my shirt. I still have a book published, even if it's not getting read by as many people as I'd like.

I suppose it's all about perspective. If I take a step back and realize some of the challenges that my friends are facing every day: sick parents, rheumatoid arthritis, sick spouses, no jobs...I really do feel guilty for whining. In the grand scheme of things, things can always, always be worse.

But on days like this, they feel like that could also be just a little bit better.

Still, tomorrow is another day and it's a Friday at that. That's cause for celebration in itself.

Happy Friday!

A Wonderful, Happy, Hour....

It was another beautiful day today. Now it's officially summer, it seems that Spring is trying to get back a little of the time it missed. It was warm without being unpleasantly hot, breezy with no humidity to hold back the fresh air.

It was the first day in a while where I've come home to lunch with the puppies and not wanted to go inside to the air conditioning. It made it hard to crate the puppies up and send myself back to my own cubicle-sized crate at work.

The afternoon didn't take too long to pass. It helps that I had a meeting with my boss among others. My boss is funny in meetings. He's ok in the ones where the entire staff have to attend or, even, when his own 'boss' is there. Yet when it's small groups of us, my boss is like a fidgety child. He likes to play with buttons on the computer. He also very frequently gets distracted and leads us down bizarre areas of discussion. For example, I learned that the term "crapper", used to crudely describe a toilet, was named after a plumber named something like Thomas Crapper. We looked it up on Wikipedia in the middle of a meeting. We also learned that my coworker worked at the most unfortunate Ruby Tuesday restaurant in the world. It burned down once. A mirror fell on someone's head and half the staff passed out because of carbon monoxide poisoning.

We've had a lot of odd discussions like this when my boss is present. Unbeknownst to him, I've actually started to not hate meetings when he's attending and no one higher up than him is going to be present. They're often quite...interesting.

Anyway, after the meeting with my boss, the afternoon whizzed by. There had been talk of a happy hour after work but, as I suspected, it either didn't happen or it became one of those 'exclusive' happy hours that the annoying little high-school-esque clique in my office has sometimes. I may sound bitter but, actually, I'm not. I just get fed up of the slightly unprofessional vibe in the office that involves whispering, gossip and secret lunches/happy hours. It makes things a little uncomfortable for those of us not involved. It's not that we want to be involved but it becomes a much bigger deal that we're not because of the covertness of everything. It's much like everything in the office that is worthy of a staff meeting to announce something bit- it remains a horrible secret until we're in the meeting. This leads to paranoia and gossip that wouldn't be nearly as present if they'd just tell us upfront what's going on instead of making us wait until a staff meeting.

As I said, the happy hour didn't happen. Instead, I came home and spent some time playing with the puppies in the garden. Then I took my laptop out, grabbed a beer and sat outside and wrote a little of the novel I'm currently working on while the puppies played nearby.

All in all, I have to say, that's probably one of the best 'happy hours' I've ever had. Since I tend to prefer the company of the puppies to most of my coworkers, there was no awkward socializing. There was no trying to be friendly when, mostly, you wonder why you're spending your free time in which you're NOT getting paid to hang out with people you personally don't care for outside of working with them. Also, the beer was way cheaper. Also, it's a rare happy hour at a bar when a furry little dachshund catches sight of you watching her and makes a running leap to try to get on your lap to give you 'kisses.'

Also, I got to work on my novel which is always a nice thing, particularly when the early evening sun is shining down and the breeze catches you just right.

Now that....was a happy hour.

Happy Thursday!

Reflections of a Life at Work...

Today started as another stormy day with the sky so dark, it didn't feel like daylight at all. When the rain came, it came down with torrential force. It cleared up eventually but now it's starting to cloud up again and Mr. Weatherman told us that we should expect more storms.

I don't mind a good storm. I find them therapeutic. At the moment, especially at work, I could use therapeutic. It's one of those times in which I'm trying to be zen but each day presents yet another challenge and I have to remind myself of my mantra: "It's only a job, it's only a job."

It is only a job but it's disgusting how much of a bearing our jobs have on our lives. Sometimes it's just impossible to convince yourself it's only a job. After all, for me, at least, I work 40 hours a week. I get 12 days off a year. If you want to be mathematical about it, at 40 hours a week, for 52 weeks a year, that's a total of 2080 working hours. Take away the 12 days off I get, at eight hours a day times 12, that's 96 hours of vacation/sick time. That leaves 1984 hours per year in which I work.

Yes, I used numbers. Scary, I know. But when you stop to think about it, 1984 hours per year is a lot. That's a lot of time to be spending with coworkers and bosses who drive you a little crazy each day. It's no wonder that sometimes its easy to lose perspective as to the fact that it's just a job.

For me, now I have puppies to come home to, it does make work easier. It doesn't make it better but it gives me an escape. I come home for lunch each day and that hour is the best hour of my day. I get to hug my puppies, eat my lunch and escape from my office. Even on the worst days, I've found that this hour can make any day better.

It's all largely due to the puppies who, in spite of their penchant to dig up flowers, rip up paper, eat my books and chew my shoes, are too easily forgiven. They're currently staring up at me as if to say, "hey, lady, why aren't you paying attention to us."

Of course, on the downside, this makes it incredibly hard to write. I tried to get some time in tonight. I got some writing done. I'm working on the sequel to The Reluctant Demon which, I've probably mentioned, is tentatively entitled, Emmy Goes to Hell. I'm stealing a little from Dante and his nine circles of Hell. Oddly, the sixth circle, the first level in which is considered "Lower Hell" bears a striking resemblance to 'Emmy's' office.

I know I'll have to be careful because it's easy to get sued for libel these days. I'm being careful. However, this time around, Emmy's office in Hell often, conincidentally, resembles mine at times. Strange how that happened. I did make the concession that coffee would be worse in Hell though, in truth, I'd challenge that in real life. Sometimes the coffee in our office is so vile, it's like someone sprinkled coffee in a jug of chlorine and called it 'fresh coffee.'

The fun of being a writer is that you can draw from real life without stealing completely. You can use your observations to be creative. It's one of the joys of my life. I try hard not to be passive agressive in my writing though, to call out friends and foes who I feel have let me down or upset me. I know people who have done that and it never ends well. Instead, I try to add a sardonic layer to my writing in which I gently poke fun at people without being malicious. For example, my heroine in "The Reluctant Demon" calls one of the managers "Voldemort" because, to her, he bears a striking resemblance to the Ralph Fiennes version from the Harry Potter movies. Let's just say that I might have projected one of my own thoughts from one of our own managers there.

By that, I wasn't being mean. I just observed that, to me, this manager did look like Voldemort. Of course, now some of my coworkers have read my book, I have had them giggle that they never thought about the manager like that but I "am so right!"

Oops.

But there's a strange pleasure in that. It means people are really reading my book and remembering small details like that. Ok, it does make it easier if you know it's written by me and you work with me and know that there is a manager who looks like Voldemort. Of course, you probably wouldn't have noticed that until "Emmy" pointed it out in The Reluctant Demon. Still, people noticed and it's fun to have them act shocked but amused at the observation.

Whoever it was that said, "The Pen is Mightier Than the Sword," was definitely right. I have to confess that it gives me a lovely feeling of power over my sometimes miserable work situation to know that no matter how much I'm made to feel like Harry Potter, I can retailiate in fiction. It's therapeutic and it makes for some great writing; nothing is more powerful for writing than a bad experience that riles you up so much you have to do something about it. Me...I choose words. I write in a furious frenzy on days like this. If words could throw up dust as I typed them up, my 'office' would be so cloudy, you wouldn't be able to see me.

It's one of the reasons I do love being a writer, even if things on that front don't always go as smoothly as I'd like. There is a benefit to writing, even if it's not in the form of recognition and sales. It's days like this that remind me, once again, why writing is my chosen form of expression and no matter how much I threaten to quit, I couldn't. It's my coping mechanism and everyone needs one of those.

Unless you're a puppy and your coping mechanism is digging up flowers.

Thanks for reading! Happy Thurday!

Friends and Mothers....

I promise not to wallow today. I can't lie and say that the self-doubt is gone but thanks to good friends and a great mother, I'm feeling a little less like a failure and a little more like a human.

I'm lucky that way. I have people to talk to when I feel down. I've never been much of a socialite. My social circle has always consisted of a few very good friends and some casual friends who I know but don't know well.

I've always been the type of Monkeypants to prefer quality over quantity. When I was a child, I had a best friend and other good friends I knew but although I was always invited to birthday parties, I never felt like I was likely to become a fan of being with the 'in-crowd'.

That carried through to high school. For the first couple of years, my crowd of friends consisted of quiet, shy girls like me who never felt like they completely fit. We had fun- some of my favourite memories of my early high school days are of playing Uno and eating ice-cream sandwiches. As high school passed, my circle of friends changed a little. We all moved in different directions. It's sad but that's high school. It never meant I forgot those friends, it just meant that we were no longer jigsaw puzzle pieces that fit together- we'd morphed into pieces that were from the same puzzle but from different corners.

College was the same. I had a close circle of friends throughout. Sometimes the members changed but I still always had people to talk to, people who would talk to me.

These days, it's not much different- it's just that my friends are scattered. Some, via Facebook, are my earliest friends from my childhood days. Some are high school friends who are always there for me, no matter how long ago we sat in Mrs. Studebaker's English class and laughed at the fact that she said "eggo" instead of "ego."

Some are newer friends, friends I've made in my 'adult' years. I've always been lucky enough to find good friends with whom I have a lot in common and, like me, see the need to appreciate the goofier things in life.

It's these friends I appreciate most because they're the ones who pick me up when I'm down. I can't go without giving a shout-out to Saz in Washington for being there, even when her own life is dark and scary at the moment. And, Ms. P in Texas- I love that you read my blog, I love that I have my puppies because you persuaded me to make getting a dog one of my New Year's resolutions. The other friends out there, reading....I don't need to name you but...thank you.

Since it's Mother's Day on Sunday, I can't go on without mentioning my very best friend- cheesy as it sounds. My mum hates sappiness. She was born in Germany and raised in England so it's not exactly odd that she feels that way. But, at the risk of making her cringe, my very best friend in the world is my mum. No matter how mean I get, how crotchety I am, how much I waffle on and on...and on and on about my puppies...she's always there. When I'm feeling down about writing, she gets indignant on my behalf because she reads library books and lately seems to have been comparing them all to The Reluctant Demon. I love that she always thinks my books are better. I love that I can go home for a weekend and have a moan about my life to her and she always listens. I love that I can take a picture of flowers in my garden and ask her to identify them- she usually does.

Most of all, I'm just glad I have a mother who I can talk to and whine to when I'm down. I can't believe she hasn't hung up on me yet when I get snappy on the phone with her but she never does...unless those mysterious hang-ups when we get 'disconnected' and she has 'no idea what happened' mean she's hanging up on me. Just kidding- she always calls me back.

So, even though I'm still doubting my ability and my skills, I'm not in such a dark place I can't turn around and see that even in spite of the writing, I'm very lucky in my life. I have people who care enough to try to stop me giving in to my self-pity. I also have people who read my blog and make me feel like I'm not just a voice on the wind...someone is reading. For that, I thank you all.

For now, I'll keep the blog going...after all, I always have something to say, no matter how random. It's what makes my blog...my blog

Happy Friday and to all you mothers out there- be it mothers of children, Monkeypants, puppies, pigs, dogs, cats, characters or ideas....Happy Mother's Day.