Jennifer Apodaca's Blog, page 123

Friday Five

Let’s do Friday Five where we talk about 5 random things from our week

I’ve felt better the last two days than I did Tuesday as far as the headache! Yay! The rest is a constant battle, but we all just do the best we can one day at a time, right?
Wizard thinks I’m the best wife ever Last night, I made him homemade chicken nuggets. If you haven’t done it, trust me, it’s a messy, time-consuming process. It’s probably been three or four years since I last made them for him, partly because I try to feed Wizard a somewhat healthy diet. But he’s been asking for them, so I made them. Wizard was so excited, he may have eaten too much Don’t feel sorry for him, I think he was secretly adding extra wine to my glass when I wasn’t looking to keep me happy while I was prepping and cooking. Now I’m dead tired as I’m writing this blog, which I think was part of his plan to keep me from working more tonight :-). Sneaky Wizard.
Wizard also has a wicked bad case of car fever. The car we’re going to replace is eight years old–we keep our cars for a long time. We were originally going to wait a few more months, but it depends on how bad Wizard’s car fever gets, LOL!
Wizard told me last night at dinner that he really misses Bailey. You know what I think? He’s softening toward the idea of getting a dog! It’ll take another six months or so, but maybe??? (And just so everyone knows, we’ll only get a dog if we’re both committed.)
I’m making progress on Savaged Devotion! It’s slow and hard to measure because of my crazyass process, but the important  thing is I’m making progress, and Justice and Liza are pushing me to finish their story. Not only do they want their love validated, but there are characters in this story that really need to be taught a lesson!

Bonus Friday Five: I need the Wing Slayers to hush up and let me finish this book before I think about Eli and his desperate need to find his mate Savi, or how Ram and Ginny can get their happily ever after!

Okay that’s my Friday Five plus a bonus. Now it’s your turn! And I hope you have a great weekend!

Wednesday Worthy

Today is a quickie. Yesterday dissolved into another frustrating day with the headaches, and I’m waiting for a call back to my doctors. Let’s talk about something else So…

Is he worth talking about?

Weekend Roundup

It’s been a pretty good weekend all things considered. Wizard and I finally pulled the trigger and booked our airline tickets to go to Florida for the NINC Conference in October. It’s at a beautiful resort right on the gulf and we’re both excited. I’m going to split my time between going to workshops and hanging out with Wizard. I just hope nothing goes wrong and I can get on that plane now that we’ve bought expensive airline tickets. We still can’t get any resolution with my physical problems including nerve pain, tinnitus and queasiness which can making flying an interesting challenge. But you know, sometimes you just have to leap and hope it’ll work out.

Otherwise, I wrestled with the book and rewriting pages. I had to fix a timeline issue that I knew was going to be a problem weeks ago, but I kept fighting it. It’s so irritating when I do that! I waste more time trying to make it work instead of going back and fixing it all. I really love how Liza and Justice have both grown so much, and their love really will triumph in Savaged Devotion.

After this book is done, I plan to take a break, then I’m really looking forward to getting back into the Wing Slayer Hunter World to tell Eli’s story in Primal Magic and Ram and Ginny’s story in Fallen Magic. Frankly, I, and maybe the world in general, could use a little magic right now.

So that was my weekend, how was yours?

Friday Five

Happy Friday! And it’s time for Friday Five where we share five random things about our week. Assuming I can remember five things…

At dinner last night, Wizard and I got in a fight about donuts. We never fight about normal things like money or kids. Nope, we fight about donuts. Wizard has a craving and is trying to convince me that we must buy at least six or a dozen at a time. I insisted we can buy one for each of us, or just one for himself. He called me mean. This is pretty much how we fight. Then we started talking about something else and forgot we were fighting
Wednesday I went to physical therapy again. I feel like I must warn people–when a physical therapist tells you to lay down on a table, RUN! FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, RUN! Okay it wasn’t that bad, and what’s she’s doing is necessary but…ouch, and also, good job at finding that really sore tendon the very first try,  LOL!
Why is it my characters talk nonstop to me all night long and when I’m doing anything but writing. But the second I sit down at the computer, they’re suddenly mute?
Insomnia sucks.
I’m going to lunch with Biker Witch today, and that’s pretty much the highlight of my weekend. Otherwise it’s me riding herd on the characters in Savaged Devotion. One day, I will tame this book, one day…

Now it’s your turn, tell me five random things about your week. And have a great weekend!

Wednesday Worthy

I’ve been on a cowboy reading jag lately. But when I went looking on my two stock sites that I buy pictures from, this is the best I could find:

So what do you think, is he worthy?

Weekend Roundup

Had a great weekend, but wow I’m tired as I’m typing this on Sunday night. All the kids just left, we ate, swam, had decadent chocolate cake, and the kids and Wizard got me a new laptop computer for my birthday. My old laptop was a dinosaur, this one is a bit smaller and lighter. It’s totally unexpected and I’m thrilled!

Jett (Middle Son’s dog) came to visit too. On Saturday, Middle Son sent me a text that said, “I told Jett how you are. He thought it was hilarious.”  With this picture:

I was in the kitchen cleaning the counters, and had stopped to check my phone and take a drink of coffee–I laughed so hard I splurted coffee and had to clean the counters again

And at our house, Jett’s not allowed on the couch. But while the rest of us were out in the pool, this happened:

 

Special K (CPA Boy’s wife) was supposed to be watching him, but instead of telling him to get off the couch, she took a picture. Then she texted it to all of us to let us know how the no-couch rule is working out. I love her!! LOLOL!

How was your weekend?

Friday Five!

Let’s do our Friday Five where we list five random things about our week:

I had a great birthday!
I got medically overruled on Yoga and am not allowed to try again until we resolve my shoulder
On the same subject, in the a last ten days I’ve seen two specialists, a new physical therapist and today I see my GP to get a referral to a pain management specialist, and try to get everyone on the same page for a treatment plan. Which is a lot like herding cats. I’m so over this. Basically I have two different diagnosis–a problem in my shoulder and a problem in my neck. No one knows which came first. But it looks like the two met up in a perfect storm to annoy the shit out of me. (Okay that last part isn’t an actual medical diagnosis, but an expression of my frustration, LOL!)
Yesterday I had time to write! And I wrote until I couldn’t do it anymore. Today I hope I can do it again.
The kids are all coming out with Jett.  I’m so looking forward to it!

Okay now it’s your turn to share your Friday Five!

Have a great weekend!

 

Fires, Storms & Wednesday Worthy

So Monday we had a fire in the hills behind out house. We were lucky this was a couple of miles from our house and moving away from us.

This is from our backyard.

This is close up to the fire before the police closed off all the roads. Note: We were not in the way of any emergency vehicles.

 

A huge shout out to the Fire Departments! They got crews on the ground, and both water and fire-retardant dropping aircraft in the air, very quickly and knocked down the worst of it in about six hours.

Then Tuesday we had a massive storm cell with thunder, lightning and torrential rains move through. This isn’t a great picture, but can you see how hard it’s raining? It was wild!

More possible thunderstorms are predicted today…which isn’t ideal for us. We planned to go out to dinner for my birthday. We won’t go if it’s pouring and snarls the traffic. Even this chocolate cake–

–isn’t worth fighting Southern California traffic in a downpour. Trust me, people in So Cal can’t drive in the rain! But I can’t really complain since the kids are all coming out this weekend, bringing the food and cake, and doing all the cooking too. I’m looking forward to that!

Now for our Wednesday Worthy candidate. I chose him because he looks like he looks like he could be a fireman taking a break.

So what do you think, is he worthy?

 

Weekend Roundup

I’m still recovering from my Yoga class last Thursday, LOL! I found muscles that had been in retirement for years. They were not happy with me

This weekend, I worked when I could around my bad shoulder. I’m making progress on Savaged Devotion, it’s just frustratingly slow. Today I see another doctor to find out what the next step is to resolve the problem. I’m grateful for all the doctors, but boy, I’m tired of going to these appointments and tests.

On the upside, I’m meeting Biker Witch (my sister) for coffee today. That always cheers me up.

But I don’t want to talk about me, I’d much rather hear about you guys! How was your weekend? What’s new in your lives? Talk to me!

Jen Does Yoga!

Yesterday I decided that I’m sick of waiting for some miracle cure for my bad shoulder and neck to take a Yoga class. I just got up and decided to go.  Mind you I can do forty minutes on the elliptical machine and still walk afterward. I do stretches and balancing at home. And every one in the freaking universe tells me Yoga is awesome! It’s the nectar of life, the brain food of geniuses, the reason to live! Yoga cures stress and writer’s block all at once! Plus its low impact! There’s no downside.

I told Wizard all this.

He’s like… “I think they’re talking about normal people.”

I whipped around. “What does that mean?”

He threw up his hands. “Nothing. Go. You’ll be awesome. I’ll see you when you get back.”

Yeah, that’s what I thought he said. So I go to the Yoga class at my gym. It’s a big room with laminated wood floors and WAY too many mirrors. But there’s only about 10 people in the class so plenty of space. This should be pretty easy, right?

15 minutes into Yoga I was sweating buckets and slipping on my mat. I looked up into the wall of mirrors noticed my hair had frizzed and my tongue was hanging out like this:

Actual picture of Jen in Yoga

But I wasn’t giving up. There were people in there who were decades older than me!

30 minutes later I pushed up to a contorted hip twist with an extra shot of try this sucker…and my foot slipped on the mat. But I caught myself.

Whew! That was close.

One second later I felt a pop. Right in my…I kid you not… my butt muscle.

Ummm…oops?  My right side, where my butt meets my thigh, sent out a rays of sting pain in all directions. Then I did a real “tree pose,” the kind where I crashed to the ground on my side. The instructor saw me, but I pushed up to sit on my knees like I was fine. I sat there for a second, looking at the door and thinking two things:

RUN LIKE HELL

and

DON’T TELL WIZARD I HURT MYSELF

All the while the gentle strains of mind control muscle kept playing, and the human pretzels kept flowing into different physically impossible contortions. And all of a sudden, I’m asked myself, “Are you really giving up because you pulled a muscle? Seriously?  Oh hell no.”

I finished that Yoga class. I did every freaking pose, modifying for the fact that I’d just discovered a new butt muscle. And no lie, after the class the instructor made a point of telling me how good I did.

BHAHAHAHA!!! I think she felt sorry for me.

After that, I  went home, sat my butt down on one bag of ice and had another ice pack over my shoulder. While downing ibuprofen with coffee, I described the torture to Wizard in slow and excruciating detail, each and every moment.

Then Wizard said, “So you’re done now, right? You’re not going back to Yoga next week?”

“What?” I gaped at him, confused. Whatever gave him the idea I’d give up?

This is a true story, and this is how I also write my books. I make mistakes, get lost, fall down, but I throw some ice on the pain and keep writing.

Happy Friday all! Hope you have a great weekend!

P.S. I really hope I can get out of bed today