Shitty day...cont'd

UPDATE: My water was turned on at 11:17 a.m. Finally. I'm clean, no more stinky Lisa. Yay!

So it's 10:48 a.m. I'm still at home. The water company didn't turn on my water yesterday as promised. So I called when their office opened at 8 a.m. The woman's response: "oh yeah, your water was supposed to be turned on yesterday." No shit? Really? Thanks a lot. So she says she'll contact the driver and have me the first stop. Uh huh. I'm still here and it's almost 11. I called back and she said she'd call the driver. That was 30 minutes ago. I have 3 faucets on so I can hear when it's ready for me. Then I have to take a quick shower, no long, glorious shower as I'd hoped. I have to get to work for our Christmas party at noon. Ugh.

Per a short story I need to write. We have a title folks. The Curse of the Brussel Sprouts: Foul Wind. He he. It will have pirates, vampires, cursed brussel sprouts and romance. Speaking of romance. Nice segway, eh? Last night I asked our crew captain if there were any single, Scotsmen in our crew. Over the age of 18. Don't worry. She said there was. He's even a year older than me. She's quite the matchmaker. And I gushed over my achilles heel of Scottish and British accents.

I sign on a few minutes ago and he happens to be on, usually very, very quiet. But I get greeted with "ahoy there ye wee lass ye." So she obviously went to work in the past 10 hours since we talked. Oh dear. Keep your fingers crossed, I may have a Scottish pirate boyfriend. Hey, a girl can dream right? It's research folks, RESEARCH. Ok yeah, "wee lass" made me giggle uncontrolably. I admitted it, now back off.

Shitty day update

Water is STILL off. Municipal fuckers. Paid the bill TWICE. Still no water. Ugh. When I calm, I'll read comments. Thanks for your cheer-ups :) I'll use them soon.

Warning: Loads of whining ahead

Disclaimer: Don't read on if you a) hate complaining, b) want to maintain your cheery disposition today, c) dislike profanity, d) don't like whining unrelated to war, world peace, poverty, etc. This isn't about any of those.



Last chance...



Ok, this has been a really shitty day. It started last night actually. I got home from work and there was an orange piece of paper hanging from my fence. A piece of paper letting me know that my water had been disconnected for non-payment. But I had made an online payment two days before on their "fancy new payment system." Bullshit. I called this morning when they opened and they said that the online payments take 72 hours to process (it didn't say that anywhere online, I looked before I paid.) And that if I wanted my water back on I needed to bring in another payment. I also must add I didn't know my water was close to disconnection, I made a payment 4 weeks ago....

I then learn I am out of checks and can't find another checkbook. But, I had a couple checks from my old account with the ex-dh. So I shamefully used one of those to pay the water bill. Thanks babe. If he reads this before I talk to him...oops. I then leave for work (unshowered but I used parfume, don't worry I don't smell) and my gas tank is almost empty. I just learned that my bank account is empty too. Go figure? I have a check to deposit though, so I'll make it till next payday. I go to the nearest gas station, but turns out they only take debit. WTF? Mine is declined since I haven't made the deposit (don't worry, not overdrawn - just at zero since there are a couple pending charges). They won't take a check since the address is Gresham, a whole HOUR away. Luckily, ex-dh came to the rescue again. I had my old wallet with me which had the debit card for our joint account (he still uses it, I don't). Thanks again babe. Don't worry, this only put you out $40 total :) You're the best.

I get to work, plotting money stuff in my head on how to fix it all (it's fixable, I just overreact easy). I sit down at my work computer and suddenly my profile is gone. Meaning my files, programs, settings, etc. Everything vanished. Isn't this just the king of all fucking days here? It's a good thing I'm smart because I figured out how to fix it. The day is slightly looking up but I'm still pist.

Update: Just talked to the ex-dh so it's all good.

Switching topics. People have relationships on Puzzle Pirates. I don't know if I've made that clear. So, you know, hoping to snag a PP Scottish boyfriend. Maybe he'd adore me so much he'd come to Oregon. Could happen, right? Well, I snagged an admirer. But, he's a bit younger than me and American. Careful what you wish for folks.

I feel better already just complaining. I'd just erase the post since it served it's purpose, but then I may get out of the habit of posting again so you're just going to have to deal with my bitching right now.

P.S. A PP friend told me a joke to cheer me up. What do you get when you cross a snowman with a vampire? Frostbite. Hahahahahahaha!

Bite the bullet

I know, it's been a reaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaalllly long time since I posted. Work related things have been all-consuming. Ok, that's not the whole truth. The past week or so hasn't been that bad. But you know when something has built and built and it becomes overwhelming? That was blogs for me. It had been so long since I've written or read one that it was daunting.

How would I catch up on all these great people's posts? I'm such a terrible person for not reading them. I get frustrated when blogs I read aren't updated at least weekly and here I am doing it. I suck!

Okay, I was beating myself up too much. But neurotic people tend to do that. After several frantic and concerned e-mails from people and the endearing "come back" comments on this blog that were popping through my e-mail, I decided to bite the bullet.

It feels good to blog again. I know, I'm acting like I was away for a year but it damn near feels like it! I posted on our chapter blog yesterday about PR for writers.

I didn't realize how much I had come to rely on blogs, both reading and writing them. Writing is an isolating profession and blogs allow me to keep in touch and see how others are doing. And writing a blog keeps me writing and my sense of humor going even in the dark times in my life.

So I hope you'll forgive me for my absence. I hope to never go that long without reading or writing blogs again. It gives me chills to think about it.

In lighter news. My puppy got a haircut so when I get home tonight I'm taking pictures of her in a Santa suit for my Christmas card. I'll post the pic, it will be adorable I'm sure. She's been a hellion lately. She destroyed almost all of my pink ornaments one day. I heard your gasp, I know. Blasphemy. You're probably surprised I kept her. I am too some days. I started crating her again while I'm at work and within a few days she began eating her poop again. Ugh! Always something.

Today my Christmas gift from the ex-dh should come in the mail. He was sweet enough to buy me a fancy widescreen monitor. The reason this is uber fantastic is because I can have two Microsoft Word documents open side-by-side. Outline and book. Woohoo! I'm so excited I can hardly contain myself.

I have to admit I have still been playing Puzzle Pirates, but I have cut back the time a lot. But, before you start saying "Lisa, writing is more important. That time should be spent writing." I have rationale to playing the game. Several good reasons really. 1) Most of my crew is from England and Scotland. As many of you know I am highly fond of those areas of the world. I am researching language and culture via the game which will help me in an upcoming book. It's true! Stop giving me that look. 2) I may write a pirate book. Hey, you never know! 3) The most important reason is it furthers me in my quest to find a hunky Scotsman. My exposure when from 0 to like 20 guys. Unfortunately most of them are minors and I don't condone illegal acts in that regard. But, I'm willing to be patient.

What have you been up to? Exciting plans for the holidays?

What is the Internet?

So I haven't been online in a week. How crazy is that? I didn't think I could go without internet for that long. It's been interesting. I did a lot of knitting.

Last night when I returned home from my luxurious weekend of nothingness, I open my computer and e-mail. There were e-mails in my outbox. Work related e-mails of sending off info or projects before the holiday. Some personal ones of sending off info before the holidays. IN MY OUTBOX! For what? Six days? God I'm stupid. I have to keep changing the e-mail server settings between work and home and I must not have changed them back. So sorry to anyone who thinks I'm ignoring them!

I went to bed in a pissy mood because of that. Then I woke up, got ready for work, made it out to my car and noticed there was snow in my yard. That made me a bit happier because I got to stay home a couple more hours and wait for it to melt away before I drove.

Tonight I'm hoping to write and edit. Yes Michelle, I will make 30,000 by the end of the month. It's game time. I'm going to put on my writing outfit. Pink velour sweats, a feathered pink hat, my pink chenille scarf, pink University of Oregon sweatshirt, pink slippers, pink....just kidding :-) Sort of.

Lastly, I must publicly congratulate the Oregon State University Beavers for their Civil War win. Well done. God, where's the bathroom. I think I'm going to puke...

I'm a slacker

Yup, I know it. It's been what, a week since I posted? Yikes. I guess I just ran out of things to say for a bit. Scary, I know. Things have been pretty busy for me lately, lots of day job stuff and freelancing gigs. I haven't written anything since the beach retreat two weekends ago...

I'm looking forward to Thanksgiving. It's one of only two times (Christmas, too) that I enjoy cooking. I also enjoy the five day weekend. Unfortunately, this year is the first ever that I don't have any money for Black Friday shopping. Usually I save up and do all my Christmas shopping that day. But not this year. Luckily the University of Oregon vs. Oregon State "Civil War" game is on that day to distract me from my woes. Although I'm probably going to buy a wireless router for my parents house. No food till the end of the month is less important than internet at their houses :) I kid, I kid. Kinda...

It also looks like NaNoWriMo is a bust for me this year. Oh well. I know I can finish a book, I was just hoping to have finished this one by the end of the month.

So, what's going on in your lives? Any Turkey Day plans?

Puzzle Pirates

Often lately when I'm chatting with Elisabeth online, she'll say, "what are you doing?" I'll admit, most of the time I'm tempted to lie and say, "writing like crazy!" Or, "I've written 20 pages!" Or, "patiently waiting to see your next chapter."

But the truth is, it's usually, "I'm playing Puzzle Pirates." The game is absolutely addicting. You make a piracte character and spend the first several sessions practicing puzzles. When ye are comfortably enough you can be a jobber on a pilly with other real live people and battle against bots.

You earn gold and can buy new clothes, weapons, houses, furnishings, shops and other establishments. You can also join a crew. I love the crew I joined. They're fantabulous. Very welcoming.

If you like interactive games that are long term, you should check this out. Yarrr!

Glossary:
Ye - "you"
Jobber - "worker on a pirate ship - not a crew member of that ship"
Pilly - "pillage - situation where you would job for a ship or pillage with your crew to get gold"
Bots - "computerized pirates - they are the characters with two word names"
Yarrr - "yarrr"

I'm baaaaaaaaaaaaaack

I made it home from the beach today, incident free. The weather was beautiful. Much less scary than when we went last February. Back then the windows were shaking from storms. This time we were tempted to close blinds because it was so bright.

I wrote a little over 5,000 words. I was hoping to write about double that, but it's 5k more than I had. In order to complete NaNo, I'll need to write 2,500 words a day. YIKES!

We had a great time. Lots of chatting, writing, chatting, writing, chatting, chatting, writing, etc. These are such a great group of women to know!

Anyway, off to bed. I'm tired and it will be a long week at work.

Oh! Before I publish post I'd like to inform the "masses" that AC/DC is supposed to go on one last tour. AC/DC!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Holy crap that's big news!

Away for the weekend

This weekend, several of us from our writing chapter are going to the beach for a weekend of distraction free writing. Being that I haven't written anything in a week...I'm hoping to make some major headway this weekend.

In my absence, I'd like you to talk amongst yourselves. I'll give you a topic: The Holy Roman Empire was neither Holy nor Roman nor an empire. Discuss.

Confession

Elton John/Kiki Dee - Don't Go Breaking My Heart

It's confession time. I confess that I've secretly fantasized about singing this song as a duet with, well, several gorgeous men (but in the fantasy I can sing well).

What's your confession?

A special birthday today

Today is Elisabeth's birthday! Go over to our chapter blog (where I posted more in-depth birthday wishes) and say happy birthday!

Thursday Thirteen

Thirteen Things about Lisa Pulliam 13 urban legends in honor of Halloween (copied from here) 1. Two dormmates in college were in the same science class. The teacher had just reminded them about the midterm the next day when one dormmate — let's call her Juli — got asked to this big bash by the hottest guy in school. The other dormmate, Meg, had pretty much no interest in going and, being a diligent student, she took notes on what the midterm was about. After the entire period of flirting with her date, Juli was totally unprepared for her test, while Meg was completely prepared for a major study date with her books. At the end of the day, Juli spent hours getting ready for the party while Meg started studying. Juli tried to get Meg to go, but she was insistent that she would study and pass the test. The girls were rather close and Juli didn't like leaving Meg alone to be bored while she was out having a blast. Juli finally gave up, using the excuse that she would cram in homeroom the next day. Juli went to the party and had the time of her life with her date. She headed back to the dorm around 2 a.m. and decided not to wake Meg. She went to bed nervous about the midterm and decided she would wake up early to ask Meg for help. She woke up and went to wake Meg. Meg was lying on her stomach, apparently sound asleep. Juli rolled Meg over to reveal Meg's terrified face. Juli, concerned, turned on the desk lamp. Meg's study stuff was still open and had blood all over it. Meg had been slaughtered. Juli, in horror, fell to the floor and looked up to see, written on the wall in Meg's blood: "Aren't you glad you didn't turn on the lights!" 2. A girl and her boyfriend are making out in his car. They had parked in the woods so no one would see them. When they were done, the boy got out to pee and the girl waited for him in the safety of the car. After waiting five minutes, the girl got out of the car to look for her boyfriend. Suddenly, she sees a man in the shadows. Scared, she gets back in the car to drive away, when she hears a very faint squeak... squeak... squeak... This continued a few seconds until the girl decided she had no choice but to drive off. She hit the gas as hard as possible but couldn't go anywhere, because someone had tied a rope from the bumper of the car to a nearby tree. Well, the girl slams on the gas again and then hears a loud scream. She gets out of the car and realizes that her boyfriend is hanging from the tree. The squeaky noises were his shoes slightly scraping across the top of the car!!! 3. My mother swears this is true: My great-great grandmother, ill for quite some time, finally passed away after laying in a coma for several days. My great-great grandfather was devastated beyond belief, as she was his one true love and they had been married over 50 years. They were married so long it seemed as if they knew each other's innermost thoughts. After the doctor pronounced her dead, my great-great grandfather insisted that she was not. They had to literally pry him away from his wife's body so they could ready her for burial. Now, back in those days they had backyard burial plots and did not drain the body of its fluids. They simply prepared a proper coffin and committed the body (in its coffin) to its permanent resting place. Throughout this process, my great-great grandfather protested so fiercely that he had to be sedated and put to bed. His wife was buried and that was that. That night he woke to a horrific vision of his wife hysterically trying to scratch her way out of the coffin. He phoned the doctor immediately and begged to have his wife's body exhumed. The doctor refused, but my great-great grandfather had this nightmare every night for a week, each time frantically begging to have his wife removed from the grave. Finally the doctor gave in and, together with local authorities, exhumed the body. The coffin was pried open and to everyone's horror and amazement, my great-great grandmother's nails were bent back and there were obvious scratches on the inside of the coffin. Comments: It is a fact that once upon a time, before modern embalming techniques were in widespread use, people were found on rare occasions to have been buried alive. It's most likely, however, that 18th and 19th century horror stories involving premature burial were inspired by the medical discovery that victims of suffocation and drowning could be resuscitated — that, though they appeared dead, they really weren't. To say the least, this was a frightening realization for many people. In any case, so strong was the fear of "precipitate interment" during the 19th century that some of the wealthier folk were known to stipulate in their wills that their coffins be outfitted with signaling devices ... just in case. 4. A woman goes to buy a large cactus from a nursery, and brings it home. Later that day she notices something very odd. The cactus appears to be breathing! She calls the nursery she purchased the cactus from and says, "I know this sounds crazy, but I think my cactus is breathing." The woman she is speaking to tells her to immediately get out of the house, and that she (the nursery woman) is going to call the bomb squad. The bomb squad comes to the house and loads the cactus into a van. Just as they get it into the van, the cactus explodes and out come thousands of scorpions! It seems that several scorpions had laid their eggs in the cactus, and they all hatched at once. 5. A very stylish teenage girl grew tired of spending hours carefully "ratting" (teasing) and spraying her hair to attain an extreme beehive do. She washed her hair in sugar-water, allowing it to harden in the style she wanted. At night, she carefully wrapped a towel around it and slept on a special half-pillow designed not to disturb the hair. One morning she failed to come down for breakfast. Her mother went to her room only to find her dead in bed. When the towel was removed from her head, it was discovered that she had been gnawed to death by rats (or bugs — I've heard both versions). 6. A teenage boy drove his date to a dark and deserted Lovers' Lane for a make-out session. After turning on the radio for mood music, he leaned over and began kissing the girl. A short while later, the music suddenly stopped and an announcer's voice came on, warning in an urgent tone that a convicted murderer had just escaped from the state insane asylum — which happened to be located not far from Lovers' Lane — and that anyone who noticed a strange man lurking about with a hook in place of his right hand should immediately report his whereabouts to the police. The girl became frightened and asked to be taken home. The boy, feeling bold, locked all the doors instead and, assuring his date they would be safe, attempted to kiss her again. She became frantic and pushed him away, insisting that they leave. Relenting, the boy peevishly jerked the car into gear and spun its wheels as he pulled out of the parking space. When they arrived at the girl's house she got out of the car, and, reaching to close the door, began to scream uncontrollably. The boy ran to her side to see what was wrong and there, dangling from the door handle, was a bloody hook. 7. A young lady is alone in her apartment. She goes to bed with her dog on the floor beside her. In the middle of the night, she is woken up by a strange sound. She is alarmed, but reaches down to the dog, who licks her hand. She is reassured and goes back to sleep. In the morning, she finds the dog hung in the shower. Where the dog slept, she picks up a note which reads "Humans can lick, too." 8. I wish to warn you about a new crime ring that is targeting business travelers. This ring is well organized, well funded, has very skilled personnel, and is currently in most major cities and recently very active in New Orleans. The crime begins when a business traveler goes to a lounge for a drink at the end of the work day. A person in the bar walks up as they sit alone and offers to buy them a drink. The last thing the traveler remembers until they wake up in a hotel room bath tub, their body submerged to their neck in ice, is sipping that drink. There is a note taped to the wall instructing them not to move and to call 911. A phone is on a small table next to the bathtub for them to call. The business traveler calls 911 who have become quite familiar with this crime. The business traveler is instructed by the 911 operator to very slowly and carefully reach behind them and feel if there is a tube protruding from their lower back. The business traveler finds the tube and answers, "Yes." The 911 operator tells them to remain still, having already sent paramedics to help. The operator knows that both of the business traveler's kidneys have been harvested. 9. One night a woman went out for drinks with her girlfriends. She left the bar fairly late at night, got in her car and onto the deserted highway. She noticed a lone pair of headlights in her rear-view mirror, approaching at a pace just slightly quicker than hers. As the car pulled up behind her she glanced and saw the turn signal on — the car was going to pass — when suddenly it swerved back behind her, pulled up dangerously close to her tailgate and the brights flashed. Now she was getting nervous. The lights dimmed for a moment and then the brights came back on and the car behind her surged forward. The frightened woman struggled to keep her eyes on the road and fought the urge to look at the car behind her. Finally, her exit approached but the car continued to follow, flashing the brights periodically. Through every stoplight and turn, it followed her until she pulled into her driveway. She figured her only hope was to make a mad dash into the house and call the police. As she flew from the car, so did the driver of the car behind her — and he screamed, "Lock the door and call the police! Call 911!" When the police arrived the horrible truth was finally revealed to the woman. The man in the car had been trying to save her. As he pulled up behind her and his headlights illuminated her car, he saw the silhouette of a man with a butcher knife rising up from the back seat to stab her, so he flashed his brights and the figure crouched back down. 10. There were two roommates (yes, I know, another college story), Sarah and Megan. Sarah was the theatrical type and loved acting. She was in all the town's plays. Megan was more of a book person, she loved to read and her studies were her first priority. Anyway, there was a huge play called "Oh, Susannah" that Sarah was in, and it was coming up on Saturday... so every chance that Sarah got, she would practice in the park (that's where she got her inspiration) for hours. Every time, she would beg Megan to go with her, but Megan would stay in the dorm and read. Well, on Saturday Sarah was a hit. Being the star, she was detained after the play, and got home really late. As she entered, she heard her roommate's rocking chair squeaking in the corner, but couldn't see it, not all the lights were on. Must be waiting for me, Sarah thought. Putting her stuff away, she went back into the main room. From the corner came a voice. It sounded rather husky, but that wasn't what agitated Sarah. "Oh, Susannah, don't you cry for me..." came the voice. "Stop it Megan! Don't give me that crap, okay?" said Sarah. "Oh, Susannah, don't you cry for me..." "Stop it! I mean it, Meg!" "Oh, Susannah, don't you cry for me..." "Stop!!!!! That's it!!!!" Sarah screamed as she flicked on the room's lights. Sarah gawked in horror at the sight. Her roommate's body was in the rocking chair, but her head wasn't, her head was on the wall, kept there by a butcher knife. From behind the rocking chair she could hear laughter – maniacal laughter. "Who's there? Who are you????" From behind the rocking chair jumped a man, later found out to be the butcher that escaped from the sanitarium in the next town. All the time he was cutting Sarah, he was singing, over and over, "Oh, Susannah, don't you cry for me... I come from Alabama with a banjo on my knee." Pinning Sarah to the wall next to her roommate's head, he screamed, "Now, Susannah, don't you cry for me!!!!" 11. Be careful the next time you go to a cinema. These people could be anywhere!! An experience of a friend of my brother's wife left me speechless. Please do send this out to everyone you know. This incident occurred in Bombay's Metro cinema (Among the best in town). They were a group of 6-7 College girls & they went to the theater to see a movie. During the show one of the girls felt a slight pinprick but did not pay much attention to it. After sometime that place began to itch. So she scratched herself and then saw a bit of blood on her hands. She assumed that she had caused it. At the end of the show, her friend noticed a sticker on her dress and read the caption. It read "Welcome to the world of AIDS". She tried to pass it off as a practical joke but when she went for a blood test a couple of weeks later (just to be sure), she found herself HIV Positive. When she complained to the cops, they mentioned that her story was one of the many such cases they had received. It seems the operator uses a syringe to transfer a bit of his/her infected blood to the person sitting ahead of him/her. A horrible experience for the victim as also the family & friends. The WORST bit is that the person who does it gains NOTHING where as the victim loses EVERYTHING. 12. A couple was invited to a swanky masked Halloween Party. She got a terrible headache and told her husband to go to the party alone. He, being a devoted husband, protested, but she argued and said she was going to take some aspirin and go to bed and there was no need of his good time being spoiled by not going. So he took his costume and away he went. The wife, after sleeping soundly for one hour, awakened without pain, and as it was still early, she decided to go to the party. In as much as her husband did not know what her costume was, she thought she would have some fun by watching her husband to see how he acted when she was not with him. She joined the party and soon spotted her husband cavorting around on the dance floor, dancing with every nice chick he could and copping a little feel here and a little kiss there. His wife went up to him and being a rather seductive babe herself, he left his partner high and dry and devoted his time to the new stuff that had just arrived. She let him go as far as he wished; naturally, since he was her husband. Finally he whispered a little proposition in her ear and she agreed, so off they went to one of the cars and had a little bang. Just before unmasking at midnight, she slipped away and went home and put the costume away and got into bed, wondering what kind of explanation he would make for his behavior. She was sitting up reading when he came in and asked what kind of a time he had had. He said, "Oh the same old thing. You know I never have a good time when you're not there." Then she asked, "Did you dance much?" He replied, "I'll tell you, I never even danced one dance. When I got there, I met Pete, Bill Brown and some other guys, so we went into the den and played poker all evening. But I'll tell you... The guy I loaned my costume to sure had a real good time!" 13. This was in the "Washington Post"... the title of the article was "Best Comeback Line Ever." This is pretty damn good. Drunk and horny, he still came up with this! Police arrested Patrick Lawrence, a 22-year-old white male, resident of Dacula, GA, in a pumpkin patch at 11:38 p.m. Friday. Lawrence will be charged with lewd and lascivious behavior, public indecency, and public intoxication at the Gwinnett County courthouse on Monday. The suspect allegedly stated that as he was passing a pumpkin patch, he decided to stop. "You know, a pumpkin is soft and squishy inside, and there was no one around here for miles. At least I thought there wasn't," he stated in a phone interview from the jail. Lawrence went on to state that he pulled over to the side of the road, picked out a pumpkin that he felt was appropriate to his purposes, cut a hole in it, and proceeded to satisfy his alleged "need." "I guess I was just really into it, you know?" he commented with evident embarrassment. In the process, Lawrence apparently failed to notice the Gwinnett County police car approaching and was unaware of his audience until officer Brenda Taylor approached him. "It was an unusual situation, that's for sure," said officer Taylor. "I walked up to (Lawrence) and he's...just working away at this pumpkin." Taylor went on to describe what happened when she approached Lawrence. "I just went up and said, 'Excuse me sir, but do you realize that you are screwing a pumpkin?' He got real surprised, as you'd expect, and then looked me straight in the face and said, "A pumpkin? Damn...is it midnight already?" Links to other Thursday Thirteens!1. (leave your link in comments, I’ll add you here!) Diana Peterfreund; Tracie

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Tag, I'm it!

S. William Shaw (he's awesome, go check out his blog) has tagged me to provide my darling readers with five interesting things about myself. This is a difficult task.

1. I'm interested in vampires, obviously for those of you who know me. But you may not know that the first dream I remember having involved me being chased by a gorgeous vampire through a garden maze at a castle. How old was I when I had this dream? About five I think. I used to pretend that the vampire and I were getting married and I'd walk down the slope of our backyard in a processional. The first movie I remember watching is The Lost Boys. These are the things that started me down a slippery slope, folks.

2. I love video games, particularly old school Nintendo. But I also enjoy X-Box and computer games. My favorite computer games are the Age of Empires/Age of Mythology series.

3. In high school I was part of the first members of our StRUT program (Students Recycling Used Technology) and the only girl in the program. I loved hanging out with those guys. Those were some of the best classtimes in school.

4. I have an odd fascination with the psychology of serial killers. I've always wanted to study what makes a person become a serial killers - nature/nurture stuff. In another life maybe I'll pursue criminal psychology, or at least write about it in a book. On a related note, I just learned a couple of years ago that a distant cousin of mine on my dad's side is in the Oregon State Pen for serial killings. Eerie.

5. My maiden name is Catto, which is of Aberdeen, Scotland. An ancestor, James Catto, invented one of Scotland's first whiskies - Catto Whisky. I collect anything to do with Catto Whisky (bar mirrors, shot glasses, ash trays, pitchers, etc.). Ebay has been a gem in this habit. The odd thing is, I've never tasted the stuff. They don't sell it in the U.S. I've been told by the distillery company that it is sold in Canada so I'm planning a trip in the spring. The best way to have me love you forever - give me Catto Whiskey stuff :-)

Wednesday round-up

1. The winner of 4 lies and a fib is....Erin! I have been married, but I have no clue how to write calligraphy. My hand writing looks like a 3-year-old boys. Way to go Erin!

And I'd like to say something about your answers (Bethany, Eli, Piper and Paty) - why is it none of you picked #5? Do you all readily believe and not question the idea of me peeing my pants? Not cool, people. Not cool.

2. My dog was adorable in her princess dress last night. As you can see in the second pic, she's a licker.



3. NaNoWriMo has begun! I'm proud to say I already have half today's word count done. Woohoo! My plan is to write 2,000 - 2,500 words during the week so I can spend the weekend editing.

4. You HAVE to read this post by Lit Agent X if you are on the agent search. It seems so many writers expect personalized rejections or don't realize how special it is when they receive one. Think about how busy an agent is. Read the post to remind yourself that they struggle too.

Halloween, aaaaaaaah!

Happy Halloween!
















What do you have going on for Halloween tonight? I'm looking forward to reading some chapters for Elisabeth, watching scary movies, eating candy, scaring trick or treaters and dressing my puppy up in her princess dress costume (payback for eating my books).

I'm also hoping to get to some of my own editing if the mood strikes. Tomorrow is day one of NaNoWriMo. I'm panicking quite a bit, but once I get in the groove things will go ok. Especially since my writing chapter has a weekend writing retreat. Hopefully I'll pump out a lot of words next weekend.

Well I'm going to go shake my booty to Time Warp and the rest of the Rocky Horror Picture Show soundtrack. "It's just a jump to the left..."

Happy Halloween!

Weed out the fib

I've been tagged by Erin! :-)

Among the 5 items listed below, one is a lie. You get to try to determine which it is, and post your answer in the comments.

1. I once worked at Walt Disney World
2. I have a large collection of yellow things with smiley faces on them
3. I've never been out of the country even though I live only 6 hours from the Canadian border
4. I did calligraphy on my own wedding invitations
5. When I was about 7 years old I laughed so hard I peed my pants

I tag Elisabeth, Piper, Paty, Bethany, Lillian, S William and Princess in Golashes. Muhahahaha!

Ass Flasher R-Us

The weekend was fun. I'll tell the story with pictures.

Saturday morning I headed south to Eugene for the Duck game. There was an accident on I-5 so we sat in traffic for a while. Luckily we were surrounded by Duck fans, and some poor Beaver fans who were going to miss Kick-Off because of the traffic (their game was 3.5 hours earlier than ours).

This guy has a great get-up on his car. As you can see, on the left of the bumper hangs a Beaver and a Husky hangs from the right. Boy, I love college football!



After the game, we stopped at my house so I could get ready for the Halloween party. I went everywhere the night before to try and find a black short-hair wig, but I only found a pink one. You may be surprised to know I didn't want to wear the pink one. I thought black would have completed the costume better and toned it down a bit. Oh well.



I would like to report that my push-up bra was a success. My mom took a picture of my cleavage on her camera phone and began sending it around. At that point I had had a good amount of everclear, so I didn't stop her.

The party was a lot of fun. I was happy to two of my favorite men, Chris and Adam (in pics below Chris has the Harley rag and Adam is giving a solid impression of Zoolander's Blue Steel look).





Unfortunately they didn't have the Everclear jungle juice I had hoped for. So I drank a half dozen Smirnoff Black Cherry drinks before I thought I'd die of over-sweetness. I took a couple swigs of a keg tap filled with Pabst Blue Ribbon, but I went back to Smirnoff. PBR is disgusting. And I should mentioned that there wasn't a keg at the party, a guy showed up in a keg costume and his hat was filled with beer and it had a tap on it. I failed to take a picture. Dammit.

I tried to do a little swing dancing, but I kept yanking my dress down to avoid any Ass Flashing incidents. But in the inebriated state I was in, I yanked much too hard and made numerous tears in my costume (not to mention a couple of incidents of ass flashing when I was swung too hard dancing - thank God for the black tights). When I returned to my parent's house after my dad picking me up (he's so awesome, he drove me so I could drink), my mom said "you look like someone threw you in a haystack and molested you." I should have taken an after-picture with all the holes. It was a sight to see. Hopefully I can patch them up and sell the costume on ebay next year.

My dad drove me back to Salem yesterday (isn't that cute with Roxy sitting in his lap?) and he worked on fixing one side of my fence so my dog can't get between the front and back yard. I want to keep her in the backyard when I'm in the house, otherwise she barks like crazy at the passing cars in the front.



He patched the gap with chicken wire, but Houdini still almost made it through, as you can see. He had to make it like a prison fence, with wire tilting at an angle to prevent climbing.



While he was working on that, Roxy drug a branch bigger than her and played in my pile of leaves.





And I'll leave you with this photo that I find beautiful - an Oregon autumn. It's hard to tell, but each of those trees have leaves of different colors. Red, orange and yellow-orange from left to right. Bea-uuuuu-ti-ful.



All in all it was a great weekend. How was your weekend?

Wardrobe malfunction

A couple months ago I posted about being excited for my first ever costume Halloween party (my friends in college were anti-costume). And it's already arrived, the schindig is tomorrow night. I bought the pink fairy costume. It's really cute and it's PINK! Yeah, baby.

So I tried it on. The black part around the middle is an over skirt. The pink tulle crap below the black is an under skirt. The over and under skirts are NOT connected. Meaning - the underskirt is see-through since it's tulle, and doesn't start until 4 inches below the bottom of my butt, which is barely covered by the black.

Let me tell you why this is a problem. If I were to sit down or be shakin' my booty (it is a dance party, after all) enough for the black part to shimmy up it's fullness (yeah, I got a ghetto booty) - then my ass is on display. Elisabeth has dubbed me the Ass Flasher.

So I must find a way to cover my bum from any potential ass-flashiness. Particularly since I will be enjoying a healthy amount of jungle juice. Which, by the way, I will spiking my cup with my flask of Everclear because the boys who make this jungle juice are softies and make it weak. They use one bottle of Everclear for an entire Coleman cooler of juice. That's like 1/10 of an ounce per plastic cup. But the fact I could drink those boys under the table is neither here nor there.

I found a pair of knee high boots for $3.25 at a second hand store. Hoorah! I really wanted to wear fishnet stockings. I never have and why not whore it up a little? It's Halloween. But, if the Ass Flashing happens then the fishnets will do nothing to cover. So I may have to get black tights. LAME-O. Ugh. At least if my bum escapes the black pleather while I'm dancing and I'm too inebriated to notice, I won't blind the other party-goers.

But now I have to find tights. Double ugh. And the black and pink wig I got for the costume ain't cuttin' it so I have to try and scour the remaining Halloween costume items in stores, elbow grabby moms in my way and trip annoying kids running around my ankles, to find a solid black wig. Triple ugh. I need to remember to fill my pink 6 oz. flask with Everclear. I better make a list!

And the Duck football game tomorrow (Go Ducks!) got moved from 12:30 to 4pm start time (that games are usually 4 hours). The game is an hour south of me (with football traffic on top of that) and the party is an hour north of me (start time of 9pm). Hopefully I can sleep in the car after the game on the way back to my house then hall balls trying to get ready.

I totally forgot the point of this post because I rambled and whined. Oh well. It's Friday. What do you have going on this weekend? Are you dressing up for Halloween or going to any parties?

And if I don't look like a giant, pink freak - I'll post a picture of me in my get-up.

Thursday Thirteen

I already posted today, but I forgot it's Thursday Thirteen. So I'm posting twice.

Thirteen Things about Lisa Pulliam 13 men on my "list" (you know, the ones who don't count as cheating if you're in a relationship) 1. Johnny Depp (there are no words to describe this man) 2. Gerard Butler (if feels really warm in my office all of a sudden) 3. Howie Dorough (of the Backstreet Boys, he's been on my list since before I knew what sex was) 4. Ethan Embry (the only blonde on my list) 5. Jake Gyllenhaal (he stole my heart in Bubble Boy and has kept it ever since) 6. David Burns (he was in Real World: Seattle - too bad the red eye doesn't show you he has two different colored eyes) 7. Rufus Sewell (he makes such a great bad guy) 8. Criss Angel (his eyes, oh his eyes) 9. Stuart Townsend (he played a good Vampire Lestat, but I loved him as Dorian Gray) 10. Jesse Bradford (he's the inspiration for my WIP hero) 11. Jeffrey Dean Morgan (so scruffy and adorable like a big teddy bear) 12. Zsadist (ok, I know he's in a book but if he were real he'd be this guy) 13. Joaquin Phoenix (I love his lip scar)

Get the Thursday Thirteen code here!

The purpose of the meme is to get to know everyone who participates a little bit better every Thursday. Visiting fellow Thirteeners is encouraged! If you participate, leave the link to your Thirteen in others comments. It’s easy, and fun! Be sure to update your Thirteen with links that are left for you, as well! I will link to everyone who participates and leaves a link to their 13 things. Trackbacks, pings, comment links accepted!
View More Thursday Thirteen Participants

I have 69 years left

According to three sites that predict your day of death, I have 69 years left. That puts me at 93 years old when I die. That's a long ass time to live. Each site predicted my death within a couple months of each other in the summer of 2075. I've always disliked the summer, it makes sense I would die during one.

That seems like such a long ways away, but yet it creeps up fast. I remember my 13th birthday party like it was last year.

Speaking of birthday parties and traditions. An odd thing happened to me when I was 11 years old (men, stop reading - this story is about a woman's monthly visitor). It was the fall of when I was 11, my 12th birthday was the next spring, in April.

I remember my mom asking me about my birthday party, just idle chit chat to amuse a kid. I told her "mommy, my period is going to start on my birthday." Of course, she thought I was silly. I was only 11! And predicting the Day of Doom? No way.

Well, guess what happened on my 12th birthday party? Yup, the Bleeding Beast arrived. You can ask my mom, she was freaked out. It was fun being the only fifth grader on my period.

What's your death prediction? Gotta be spooky for Halloween :-)

My personal Hell

I've seen this on a couple blogs lately, so I decided to join in the fun. Welcome to my Hell.

OSU Beaver fans
Circle I Limbo

General asshats
Circle II Whirling in a Dark & Stormy Wind

Parents who bring squalling brats to R-rated movies
Circle III Mud, Rain, Cold, Hail & Snow

Drivers who go 55 in a 55, but 60 in a 50
Circle IV Rolling Weights

Militant Vegans
Circle V Stuck in Mud, Mangled

River Styx

DMV Employees
Circle VI Buried for Eternity

River Phlegyas

People on motocycles who drive in the shoulder during traffic jams
Circle VII Burning Sands

Osama bin Laden
Circle IIX Immersed in Excrement

Saddam Hussein
Circle IX Frozen in Ice

Design your own hell

What would you add? I may steal your ideas and make a new one.

Tiffany - I Think We're Alone Now (Music Video)

Last, but no least. I guess this song speaks to the romantic in me ;-)

The one thing I just realized is that I must really be a child of the 80s. Yikes.

What are your all-time favorite songs?

Escape Club - Wild Wild West

My dad and I used to rock it in the car when this song came on. Isn't the arm/leg thing rad?

Take On Me

My all-time favorite song. How can you not love this?

Video day

I'm blogging at the Mid-Willamette Valley RWA chapter blog today - stop by and say hi. But before you go, I'm going to be sharing my three favorite songs in the whole wide world. Thank GOD for youtube because up until now I've only had these videos in my head.

And honestly, I play these songs in my head. They're kind of the soundtrack to my life. Do I scare you? I think the youtube stuff comes up as seperate posts, sorry for that in advance.

Huge pink pen!

One of my co-workers gave me a gift today. She fully supports my pink habit and I love her for it.

As you can see by looking at my normal-sized hand, this is a giant, pink pen. I think I may write my next novel longhand.

Link

I have some links to brighten up your Monday.

First, courtesy of Michelle Rowen please check out the Cleaning Hunk. I got dibs on Jason in the cowboy hat!

Second, Piper Lee sent me a link to a wonderful video about the smartest dog in the world. I need to get Skidboot to spend some time with my dog...

Third, my dear friend Kelli Matthews sent me a link on 50 Strategies for Making Yourself Work. She's trying to stop the insanity of my watching Laguna Beach. Thank you, Kelli. Thank you.

You'll be happy to know that I redeemed my Laguna Beach watching with a couple hours of Scrubs thanks to my new best friend, scrubsfan26 on YouTube. He has a lot of Scrubs episodes on his site for our viewing pleasure.

Avoidance behavior

As you all know, I'm in editing mode right now. I'm struggling to know at what point I've edited enough. It seems so subjective.

So I've got the day off, all by myself, my parents are taking my dog for a couple of days so I can focus. What am I doing? I watched season 3 of Laguna Beach on MTV. Laguna Beach people! That is a new low for avoidance behavior.

I always thought that show was sooooooooo stupid. So what do I do? Watch 10 episodes of it on my day off. Good lord.

I need to get to work.

P.S. Kyndra and Cami are not nice people. Cameron is so not hot. Alex doesn't know what he's missing with Raquel and Tessa is a doll.

Love story of my generation

Romeo and Juliet. Darcy and Elizabeth. Rhett and Scarlet.

Jim and Pam.













Yes, that's Jim and Pam from NBC's The Office - remake of the British comedy. They love each other. They laugh together. But they can't seem to simply get together.

Pam, o Pam. Don't you see how wonderful Jim is? He's the perfect man! He's kind, sweet, cute, funny. And he really knows how to pull pranks on Dwight.

Jim, don't give up on her. You need to be patient because she just got out of a bad relationship. If you love her, give her time. You deserve the best and she's great for you.

Sigh. We all need a Jim.

Thursday Thirteen

Thirteen Things about Lisa Pulliam 13 places I'd like to visit that I've never been before (in no particular order except for #1) 1. Scotland - all of it. The castles, the Highlands, everything. I'd love to drink a bottle of Catto Whisky (made in Scotland, in my ancestrage) while planting my butt in the middle of Aberdeen (where my family is from). 2. England - lots of places; London, Bath, Stonehenge, Oxford, Whitby (where Bram Stoker wrote most of Dracula) and more. 3. Mutter Museum in Philadelphia. All sorts of cool creepy human body stuff. 4. Transylvania. They're building a Dracula theme park. A DRACULA THEME PARK. How can I not go? 5. Some really cool museum I saw on the travel channel (in Germany or England) with creepy cool stuff in it. 6. Neuschwanstein Castle in Germany 7. Greece. ALL OF IT. All of the ruins. 8. Rome and Venice, Italy 9. British Columbia, Canada 10. Salem, Mass 11. Hershey, PA. Mmmmm, chocolate everywhere. 12. New Orleans 13. Gold Hill, Oregon to the house with the cool magnetic stuff going on.

Get the Thursday Thirteen code here!

The purpose of the meme is to get to know everyone who participates a little bit better every Thursday. Visiting fellow Thirteeners is encouraged! If you participate, leave the link to your Thirteen in others comments. It’s easy, and fun! Be sure to update your Thirteen with links that are left for you, as well! I will link to everyone who participates and leaves a link to their 13 things. Trackbacks, pings, comment links accepted!
View More Thursday Thirteen Participants

More editing

I feel like I've been posting a lot about editing lately. But it has been my main focus so I guess it makes sense.

I'm trying to put together a master checklist for revisions, things I need to remember to look for and fix while I'm editing. Most of this relates to language use and the actual writing mechanics, not the storytelling.

Here is what I have so far:

• Senses (seeing, hearing, touching, smelling, tasting)
• Showing vs. telling
• Active vs. passive voice
• Tighten sentences
• Eliminate redundancies
• Info dump/too much backstory
• Emotion
• Body language and nonverbal communication
• Consistent details (hair and eye color, etc)
• Varied sentence structure (does every sentence in a paragraph start with "he said"?)
• Word repetition - I downloaded ywriter which gives you a list of the words you used and how often
• Setting
• Description
• Too many "ly," "ing" or adverbs
• Eliminate most dialogue tags
• Mixing tenses

Do you have anything to add?

Dogs rule part 2

A more in depth version of yesterday's story.

ELKHART LAKE, Wis. (AP) - After a disabled woman's cat started a house fire, her specially trained dog came to the rescue, then died trying to help the cat still in the house. Jamie Hanson said the 13-yearold dog named Jesse brought the phone so she could call 911 and also brought her artificial leg.

"She got me outside and then she heard the cat upstairs and she went up there to get the cat and she wouldn't come back to me," Hanson, 49, said at a news conference Monday at Aurora Sheboygan Memorial Medical Center where she was being treated for her injuries.

She received third-degree burns to an arm in the fire Sunday night at her home in the town of Rhine south of Elkhart Lake, the Sheboygan County Sheriff's Department said, adding that both

Hanson, who lost a leg in a car accident three years ago, said she was on the couch watching television when the cat ran over the back of the couch.

"And he jumped onto a table that had a candle on it and tipped it over and lighted the artificial plants on fire," she said. Hanson said she fell off the couch and was unable to get her artificial leg from the table, "so my dog got my leg for me and went and got the phone and brought the phone to me so I could call 911."

She said she tried to put the prosthetic leg on, but it was too hot, and the dog, a golden retriever-German shepherd mix, came to her aid again before going back inside for the cat. When rescuers arrived, the house was fully engulfed in flames, the sheriff's department said.

Hanson was in the doorway and was assisted by a deputy.
She was no longer being treated at the hospital when The Associated Press called Monday evening for further comment.

Did you see that people, the dog DIED while trying to save the CAT. I rest my case. Loyal to the death. I know I've mentioned this before, but I read somewhere that if you died in your house, a cat would eventually turn on you for food, while a dog stands loyally by your side until it too died. Lastly, a good dog/cat joke. Now I rest my case (unless I find something else).

I jest, I like cats. I do. I just LOVE dogs.

Dogs rule

Yet another reason why I am a dog person:

RHINE, Wis. (AP) - After a disabled woman's cat started a house fire, her specially trained dog rescued her by bringing a phone to call for help. Jamie Hanson, 49, received third-degree burns on her arm in the fire that killed both of her pets, Sheboygan County Sheriff's officials said Monday.

The fire started Sunday night when Hanson's cat knocked a candle onto a chair. Hanson's dog then brought her a phone, allowing her to call for help.

Hanson, who lost a leg in a car accident, told the dispatcher she was disabled but would try to leave the house, Lt. Chad Broeren said. Firefighters found her standing in the doorway as flames engulfed the home, he said.

She was taken to Sheboygan Memorial Hospital. Her injuries are not life threatening, Broeren said.

I bet the cat started the fire on purpose (not for suicide, for homicide).

Moving on. I had a pretty good weekend of revisions. I did a lot of color-coded highlighting. Man, that really helps. I recommend that you give Margie Lawson's EDITS system a try. It really helps you see where you have too much internal thinking or description, and where you need more emotion.

How was your weekend?

Stupid utility company

It's noon on a Friday. I should be at work. Am I? No. I'm sitting in my house waiting for the local gas company to come and light my furnace.

The other day I filled out an online form to request service. I filled out all of the required fields marked by an asterisk, not filling out the unrequired ones. I chose an available service date of Wednesday (I filled out the form on Tuesday).

On Wednesday I got a call from said gas company requesting I complete the application. I guess the non-asterisk fields were actually required. Silly me for not being a psychic. Then she informed me that they couldn't come until Friday. Well why do they have a calendar that allows you to choose your service date?

I requested a time window of their visit, as every other utility company I've dealt with will give. She said they don't do that, it will be somewhere between 8 a.m. and midnight. Wow. Thanks. She said since I work, I should just leave a key somewhere for them.

Excuse me? Am I super paranoid or is it odd that it's completely acceptable for a stranger to have free access to my house for 9 hours? I told her that was unacceptable. And I have a dog. She told me I should leave my sweet, 12 pound Angel outside while at work. Umm, no. It's cold outside. She convulses with cold when I make her go to the bathroom outside in the mornings.

So, here I am waiting for the gas company to come. Not able to leave my house in case they come just because I didn't want to leave a key for them. Bastards.

On a brighter note. I just got a MySpace bulletin from the show Dexter. They have posted their second episode online for free! Woohoo! I don't have Showtime so I rely on the kindness of them. Here is a link for the first two episodes, but I'm not sure if you need a MySpace account.

A brief rundown of the show is it's based off a book. The main character is a serial killer who works for a police department studying blood spatter. He only kills other serial killers. Is that a cool concept or what? I'm off to watch episode 2.

Other blog post

I forgot to mention I blogged on our chapter blog today about pitching. Check it out :-)

Editing

This is how I feel right now. I'm editing. Da Da DA (with menacing music in the background.) I have yet to figure out the editing process that works for me, but I think I'm close to that point.

I really like the deep editing EDITS system. But I only feel that is beneficial once my draft is somewhat clean (i.e. all the plot stuff is fine and I'm just making it sound pretty). Getting from my horrid first draft to the point where I can use the EDITS system is what makes me want to rip my hair out.

I feel overwhelmed, like I don't know where to begin. But I've read what a lot of other people do and thought about what works best for me and I think I've figure out something that may work.

Lisa's Ten Steps of Editing Hell©

Step one: Make sure there are no places where I left a comment to myself of "add more description" or things like that. I need to be working from a complete draft for a good edit.

Step two: Make sure each scene has in it what it should. I refer to the list I make for each scene during the plotting proces, which has things like a piece of backstory or moving along the heroine's character arc, or adding another twist to the plot.

Step three: Go through and highlight various components a certain color. That way I can just focus on dialogue or setting on a read-through.

Step four: Try and leave the book alone for at least a week. If you can, don't think about it either. Start thinking about your next book. That way when you return you are looking at it with a fresher mind and sharper eye.

Step five: Read the manuscript line by line, making sure each one is in top shape.

Step six: Read and analyze each paragraph, making sure you are packing a punch with each one.

Step seven: Analyze each page, making sure I get the most from the spacing, etc.

Step eight: Read each chapter, making sure it has everything you want in it and makes you want to continue reading to the next one.

Step nine: Read through the whole book and look for grammar, punctuation, typos, etc. It's best to wait until you're basically done changing text around.

Step ten: Save the book as a new file and format it to print like an actual book. When reading it like it would be in a paperback, you may catch things you didn't before and see spacing problems that you otherwise wouldn't have seen until the copyedits stage. Here is how to print it like a paperback: Open up the page setup menu in Microsoft Word (under the file menu). In the margins tab, make it 0.39" all around. The gutter should be 0.16" and gutter position as "left." Under the paper tab, select "custom" as the paper size and manually put in 4.25" x 6.89". Under the layout tab have the section start at "odd page." Select the box that says "different odd and even." Make the header and footer each 0.2". Click ok.

What is your editing process?

NaNoWriMo time already? Holy crapoly batman

There's no way that it's almost November. No effing way. I don't know that I'm 100% ready for NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month for those unfamiliar). But is anyone really ready to buckle down and write at least 50,000 words in a month?

The thing about it is you are supposed to write 50k on a brand new book. Not adding 50k to a current manuscript. But, I don't really care about that. If you are 20k into a single title book and doing NaNoWriMo and suffering through it with millions of people is the only way to get that book done by New Year's - then DO IT!

So what you don't "technically" win. You still have 50k and you were able to take advantage of the forums and other tools made available during that month. The point of this is to buckle down and write. Don't let the "must be a new project" convince you of not joining in the madne...er, fun.

Since I live alone and don't have any children, or hell, a lot of social activities outside of my writing chapters - I think I am going to revise the book I'm working on while starting up a kick booty paranormal idea I've got brewing. If I get stuck on writing, I can switch over to revising. Then back to writing again. On average during the week I think I could devote at least 3 hours to writing, and more on the weekends. I need to get my house in order so I can leave it be for a month :-)

I am issuing a challenge to my blog readers. I challenge each of you to participate in NaNoWriMo. If you are up to the challenge, please leave a comment. I'll contact each of you for an e-mail address, maybe even a snail mail address and I'll send you things to keep you motivated. We can do eeeeet! (could you hear Rob Schneider there?)

You don't have to finish. Hell, if you can't keep going after 20,000 words. So what? You're 20k closer to the end than you were before. Who's with me? (maybe I should give half-time pep talks at football games).

Romance is NOT porn

When I started blogging, I told myself I wouldn't talk about politics. It's nothing but a way to divide friendships. But I've found something that pushed me over the edge.

Fred Head, candidate for State Comptroller in Texas, is running against a woman who had a romance novel published in 1990. Read the story here. You can click the "back" button at the top to read more about Fred.

Can you believe this guy? I mean, I can. But jeez louise that's an uneducated assumption. I encourage all Texas writers to spend your free time campaigning against this guy.