Wednesday, January 27, 2010

The Three R's

I'm taking a break from working on the list because all it is doing is making my head hurt.
First off, I'm not doing that bad on getting my scene for writing group done. Of course, it's mostly translating from comic script to prose, so really is shouldn't be that hard. I'm confident it will be at least done in long hand before the night is done.
I haven't even begun to find a place for my rejected short story. I've been too busy trying to find a humor literary magazine. I've had no luck, I think that's mostly because it doesn't exist.
As for the rewrite of the First Line story, I'm stuck. I've given it to others to read. I've gotten advice but I don't like the way the story has to change. I have this image in my head of this character and I feel like anything that I do makes her not the person she is. I'm crazy, I know.

I might take a break and read for a few. Right now, I'm currently in the middle of reading Anne Rice's Queen of the Damned. I just recently read the Vampire Lestat and long ago I read the Tale of the Body Thief. Even longer ago I read the Interview with the Vampire. I know I'm reading out of order, but everything still makes sense to me. Anyway, I like Anne Rice but her books can be too descriptive sometimes. It feels like it takes me forever to read them.
When I was on vacation I read Tuesdays With Morrie. That was a great book. It was really short and to the point. And the point was amazing. Live and Love.
After that I read Brian Eggers' A Heartbreaking Work Of Staggering Genius. The book definitely started off strong. I couldn't help but feel awful for the author, but later on his sense of entitlement kind of annoyed me. In my experience personal tragedy never entitles anyone to anything but having to work harder.
The last book I read was a YA book called Wicked Lovely by Melissa Marrs. It's about faeries and it was pretty good. The story was quick moving and an interesting subject. I haven't really read a lot of fiction that deals with fey but the stuff that I have read I like. I've got the next two of the series on hold at the library.

Now I'm off to work on Writing, Reading and Researching submissions.

Tuesday, January 26, 2010

Where did the time go?

Ah the start of vacation, it seems so long ago. It was the last time I posted. I would like to say that I got everything done that I wanted to but I didn't. It just wasn't long enough. However, I did get some of the stuff done that I wanted to so it wasn't a complete failure.
What's been going on since vacation? Work. There are lots of changes happening at work and most of them involve me having more work to do and not getting compensated for it. And that's all I'm going to say about that.
What else is going on? Two doctors appointments. Don't worry I'm not sick. It's just that after walking up to 13,000 steps everyday I work (yes, I wear a pedometer), I can't step down on my left foot without crying out in pain. Why? Well I have bunions on both sides of both feet and on the outside of the left foot my deformed bone is causing a giant blister inside my foot. I have a shot of cortisone in there right now, which is helping but it's a temporary fix. The only permanent solution is surgery. They want to straighten the bone. Sounds delightful! The only bright side is that I'll get medical leave from work if I do end up having surgery.

I have the next two days off and I have a To Do List for those days.
-Finish editing my story for First Line. I'm struggling with this real bad and I'm not sure what to do.
-Finish my scene for writing group next week.
-Find a humor literary magazine that is currently accepting open submissions and preferably pays.
-Find somewhere else to submit my story that got rejected from Apex Magazine

I guess I better get started.

Monday, January 11, 2010

Vacation

Now that the busy season is over and done with at work, I have decided to take a break. Do I wish I was somewhere warm and sunny right now? Heck yes but I'm not. Instead I'm just taking a vacation from my stressful and time consuming job.
I don't have any definite plans for this week other than catching up with a few people. Aside from that, I plan to just get stuff done. I need to finish taking down the Christmas decorations, clean the house and work on posting more books on half.com and eBay.
What I really want to get done is lots of writing. I have to work on the story that I need to send to The First Line by the end of the month and I have a few other things to work on, like my next section of story for my writing group. We just met last night and normally wouldn't meet again until the first Sunday in February but due to birthdays, the Super Bowl and Valentine's Day, we wouldn't be able to meet at least until the 3rd Sunday so instead we're aiming for January 31st.
I also hope to get some reading done. I started the year out with Neil Gaiman's American Gods, which was good but long and slow moving, thus making it the only book I've read this year. If I'm trying to keep on schedule for 50 books a year, I'll need to read two books this week to catch up. A book a week is my usual goal. So now I need something short and light to read. Maybe my week off will include a trip to the library.