Amy Lane's Blog: Writer's Lane, page 182

Imbolc

Mary (who loves me more than I could possibly deserve but I'm not complaining!) sent me a Wiccan desk calendar for 2011, and I'm loving it very very much. One of the interesting things that I noticed is that yesterday was Imbolc. It was also Groundhog Day and St. Brigid's day, but since Groundhog Day was covered not only by the Bill Murray movie, but also by the AWESOME SPN episode, Mystery Spot, (the funniest parts are pictured here:)



And St. Brigid's day is not only VERY Irish, but also VERY overshadowed by St. Patrick's Day, as well as VERY depressing, because it seems like being holy is not a whole lot to be sainted for. (I always picture saints as going into battle using a staff of oak and some chutzpah and then suffering horrible deaths in the name of freeing the people. Of course, the more I know about Christian history, the more I realize that they were more often the enslavers as opposed to the enslaved, but still, you always sort of hope that Saints are more interesting than the Wikipedia blurb suggests. It just seems like chastity is such a negative action, yanno?)

But Imbolc is sort of a day of hope--you light candles, you bake cookies, you say a little prayer that the sky ain't lyin' and that spring really is coming back, and there will be fertility and joy and more cookies and maybe even, if you laid your garden right (which I didn't and don't, although I've promised Squish that I would go buy her a big pot and some seedlings) you'd get flowers.

So yesterday was Imbolc. No candles, because THAT'S a recipe for disaster in this house, no decorations, because Valentine's day is JUST around the frickin' corner, and no cookies because I was running around like a rat without a tail yesterday...

But I remembered the hope. There will be pretty days, and there will be flowers. Squish and I will make sure of it, I promise.

Anyway, beyond that? Have been very very busy. Tuesday and Wednesday, Chicken's school had testing in the morning so she went to school at eleven o'clock. Since she gets out at 2:45, this is REALLY frickin' inconvenient--no lie. There was also some signing Squish up for Kindergarten, a parent/teacher meeting to get Zoomboy set up with a 504 (which basically says that teachers MUST accommodate his ADHD, even if they don't believe it's a real thing wrong) and in which all teachers involved said, "Ritalin is not a bad thing!" I'm inclined to believe them. I mean, yeah, I did okay, but "doing okay" also meant getting most disorganized person of the class of '85--and no, until I graduated, that was NOT an actual category. It would be super-cherry-candy-awesome if Zoomboy could go through school and not be labeled "quirky" or "weird" or "eccentric"--he's going to have enough trouble being "shy", and, well, son of the weirdo writer-lady with too many cats who tends to laugh at all things inappropriate. (Starting to loathe that word, though. It can be said with such high-n-mighty-snide-n-trite disdain.)

About the only thing I really have to kvetch about, though, is the fact that I managed to keep a horse-bridle on my hair-trigger temper for once--as I was pulling into the parking lot to register Squish, the DIRECTOR was pulling out of her parking spot, which is, btb, A FOOT AND A HALF wider than the parking spots for the normal everyday peons such as myself. So, on my right is some Mercedes bling-mobile that scared the heck out of me, and to my left? Not a whole lot of line. It was like this parking spot was designed for people with Geos and Kias, and the rest of us were shit-outta-luck. So I thought, "Well, yanno? I"m gonna take up the six inches of line, and I know no one can fit in next to me, but if someone DOES fit in next to me, neither of us will actually be able to GET OUT OF OUR CARS!!! So the director lady sees me doing this, and does the hand up, "Excuse me! Excuse me! No one will be able to park there. Could you PLEASE fix your car?"

Well, I'm not usually shy about voicing my opinion in public (uhm, you all may remember a moment in Arco Arena, wherein I seriously considered decking a complete stranger for sticking her dumbassed officious nose somewhere it had no fucking business, yeah?) but... well... I was about ready to commit Squish to public education. Now, at this point, I need a backhoe and a jackhammer and some fucking miracle solvent to find my faith in public education under the deeply rooted bitterness tree that recent events have planted in my cynical little heart, but, well... Squish. My beautiful, beautiful Squish.

She's gonna do SPLENDID in public school. Everything about her SCREAMS suck-up-to-the-teacher-until-they-love-me-so-much-I-have-to-pass, besides the fact that she's hella fucking bright and could probably pass kindergarten in about a month, as long as someone not-the-mama was giving her the tests. (She'll shine you on if she gets the chance-- no lie.) Public education, for her, is going to be a beautiful, beautiful place.

I wasn't going to do that to her. Seriously. I made her put her belt back on, I fixed the car, (and no, in case you were curious, I COULDN'T get my big fat ass back in when someone else pulled up next to me leaving six fucking inches of clearance between us--I had to come in from the other side. I hope I dinged the bling-mobile, just a little.) As I got out of the crap-mobile, the director was getting out of her car as it idled and going to put her cones in the middle of her spot so no one took it. I sighed loudly.

"What's wrong, Mama?"

"Nothing, sweets. I just allowed myself to be bent over by the man."

"Is that bad?"

"Only if you're me. Let's go, baby--your education awaits."

Beowulf, Knitting, and ADHD

OKay, this is weird--it's only happened to me a couple of times.

It's what I call "complete blankout" and it's the reason that, not once but TWICE during college, I sat through an entire conversation in which someone broke up with me and still imagined that we were together. (Fortunately, not much time had been invested in these relationships, because THAT would have been much more embarrassing.)

It defines moments with my parents when they were telling me things they felt were VERY IMPORTANT and I couldn't actually remember the conversation.

It's a strange moment-- a moment in which someone may be asking you a question or stating something, and you find your attention is just ABSOFUCKINGLUTELY elsewhere. Maybe it's on what you had for breakfast. Maybe it's on the knitting--which is usually your attention FOCUSER, but has now become the SOLE FOCUS of your attention.

Maybe it's on the fact that you really didn't get a lot of sleep the night before, and it might be a good idea to fine tune that WIP you've been working on.

My kid's ADHD specialist told me that this happened when a kid with ADHD was under a great deal of stress--and suddenly, those breakups I don't remember made SO much more sense. It's the traffic cop in our head that filters our priorities--suddenly, he's not just on a doughnut break, he's OUT OF THE FRICKIN' COUNTRY SPENDING EMBEZZLED MILLIONS ON GANJA AND HOOKERS! And when he's flown the frickin' coop, it doesn't matter what your attention is ON, what matters is that it is OFF what it should be on, and what it SHOULD be on is critical to your life and well being.

In this case, I think the knitting saved me. Suddenly I remembered that I only got to play with the knitting because of the claim that it kept me focused. If that was a lie, then I would no longer get to play with the knitting, and that threat alone was enough to put my fingers in motion and make me listen to the important shit going down.

I mean, you all know I knit a little every day, but I'm not NEARLY as productive as I used to be--but still. A little. Every day.

Damn, it's funny how much a little every day can mean to us, isn't it?

Anyway--so thereyago, it's a little vague, but it is the absolutely true story of HOW KNITTING SAVED MY ASS. Believe it is true.

So, true to the heroic nature of the Great Fiber Art, I got home and found (Bless you, Chris!) the link to These Socks in my mailbox.

They are perfect. The are socks for a warrior. I may very well buy the pattern, not because I'm gonna commit to knitting them, but because if knitting is going to SAVE YOUR ASS, then maybe it needs a more heroic form to take. Besides. I want that frickin' picture of that awesome goddamned sock on my wall, you think?

*nods head* Yeah, I think. I may be knitting a shawl out of Lion Brand Homespun (Pity. Me.) but, dammit, I'm gonna have a framed 8x10 of some real goddamned knitting on my wall. Because knitting makes heroes of housewives sometimes--sweartadog it does.

Of Calendars and Keys

So, I've been lucky enough to be home this last month, and the subject of 'word count' came up. How many words can you write in a certain space of time.

Well, I was appalled, because novel wise, I'd only written around 55K--and usually, even with the EDJ and soccer/dance/karate oh-my, my word count is higher than that.

But, I've got these handy day-calendars now (okay-- I tried this a couple of years ago, and they worked, but when things got REALLY hectic, with the four kids, I settled for writing stuff on the back of my hand because the day calendar was just too darned much trouble) and I started looking back at my month to figure how it could have gotten away from me.

First of all, remember that the more kids around, the less chance I actually have to write, and we'll start from there:

One week of Christmas vacation
One four-day weekend
Three dentist appointments
Two doctor's appointments
Two kid-shrink appointments
Four ADHD classes
Back to school night
Guitar Recital
Teacher's conference
Two sick kids (on different days)
Final edits on Talker 2
Two edits on Yearning
Two book releases w/guest blogs
One manuscript submission (and acceptance)
Gathering Squish's Kindergarden submission
One failed meeting to register her (not my fault)

And...

Losing my keys.

Now, Losing My Keys (and, yes, it deserves to be capitalized) didn't happen until Friday afternoon, but it managed to completely fuck up Mate's weekend. Mine, yes, but my devastation was emotional--his was actual.

I lost my keys on Friday--literally, got home on Thursday night with them and spent all of FRiday looking for them--and after two days of Mate telling me that he HAD TO WORK on Friday and even on Saturday, my complete idiocy resulted in:

* Three hours Friday, spent bringing kids home, and taking Big T to a radio station. (That last was sort of cool-- T submitted his favorite songs to the radio station, they picked his playlist and he had to come in and record his intro. Like I said, cool-- but *I* was the one who was supposed to take him!) He went back to work after all of that and stayed until almost nine, and I felt like crap.

* All of yesterday (when, remember, he was going to work) during which he spent the day getting the car towed to the dealership and getting the keys replaced.

*My neck deep weepy guilt, because there was no WAY he wasn't mad at me, and he had every right to be, and he was trying not to be because I felt like crap.

*sigh* And then he reminded me that the reason we had to get the car towed was because I had already lost the first set of keys in August. So that's two sets in a year.

I've been flaky like this my whole life, right? It's just that some times it seems like more of a burden than others.

Of course, the bright spot is, as it always was, Mate--

"I have no idea where they are! Damn, I may as well read the damned cards to find them!"

"You do that!"

"Okay, fine."

"What do the cards say?"

"The cards say that the kids made me lose them."

"Seriously?"

"Yeah-- five of staves. Staves are responsibility, the kids are playing with them in the picture--I say it means the kids made me lose them!" (Yes--I did just pull that out of my ass-- but I swear that was the picture!)

"Was it really the kids, or was it the five people playing in your head that made you lose them?"

*crickets* "Uhm, probably option B."

"I thought so."

So there was that--how a life of leisure can really be so full and so weird that 'leisure' is a dirty word.

And, I must confess, I just acted very badly, not an hour ago.

Big T's alarm went off--it's REALLY LOUD and he was sleeping right through it. (I mean, it IS Sunday morning!) Anyway, it woke me up in the next room, and so when I stumbled over to his room to turn it off, I was, well, peeved. So I stood at his doorway and surveyed the single-serving sized version of the apocalypse that is his room and decided to just get his attention. I called his name (loud enough to wake Mate in the next room) a couple of times, and no dice. Wasn't moving. So I took my life in both hands and tried to take the four steps that would let me turn off the damned alarm.

I stumbled twice, almost broke my neck, turned off the alarm, and smacked my sleeping giant of a son on the shoulder.

"WHHHHAAAAA!!!"

"Could you turn off your own alarm! Jesus Christ, T--you can hear that thing in the next block!"

"Wha?"

"Go back to sleep. Just turn the damned thing off next time!"

And he has now gone back to sleep--but I think I owe him big when he wakes up. Like I told Mate, I was just going to turn it off for him until I realized my life was at stake walking across the damned room!

Anyway-- that's tricks. I think today I might get to catch up on some of your blogs... I sure have missed you in my life of leisure!

WE HAS COVER ART!

Jack and Teague (& Katy's) first story officially HAS COVER ART!

Okay--I hadn't expected to be quite so excited about this but I AM. Remember, I started these stories about three years ago, and they took me, one installment at a time, about two years to finish. Suddenly, they have a cover, and they're going to be OUT THERE for review and look and...

zomg zomg zomg. Guys--for those of you who follow my m/m and are a little leery about reading something m/m/f, Teague is... well, he takes the idea of tortured hero to the extreme. YOU WILL LOVE HIM. Trust me. Just.... just trust me. And Teague's wolf is so handsome... I love it...

*swoon*

Me happy. (Tonight is also ADHD class, which doesn't sound exciting, but Mate and I have been going out afterwards, so it's officially date night! HUZZAH! Good day!)

*beam* Off to write some more LP:-)

The Fool

I admit-- I'm a rank novice at this whole enterprise, and that's one of the most enchanting things about it.

Our tarot cards have arrived, and I am utterly beguiled.

This image is taken from my deck, Fenestra, and the art boggles me-- just the fact that what you read into the card is influenced by the deck you've chosen which is influenced by the way the art spoke to you before you purchased the cards, that complicated dance of meaning, choice, and future is intangibly beautiful, and the art of laying the pictures down and telling stories of a life that are drawn out from the pictures?

It's everything I've loved about literature.

I particularly love this card.

The fool represents the wanderer, the person with that blithe optimism to just start a new enterprise with only a smattering of possessions and a faithful companion in his cache. He has courage, is unencumbered by prejudices, bitterness, or preconception, and can not only think on his feet, but thrives there. Of course, he's not without his flaws--he tends to dodge responsibility--or at least be conveniently absent when it lands. He has no real home, so he is eternally searching for security, and he may be a little afraid that something secure will be the death of his optimism and cheerful rambling around the psychic landscape, and that's a problem. A person should have a home.

In the picture, he's about to tread into dangerous territory without a thought in his pretty little head--but there's also the suggestion that his very purity of heart is going to get him through. Maybe he's a lucky bastard who's unaware of his blessings--could be true. But he is also wise, and joyful, with the heart of a child and the prudence to know when to share that joy with the people around him. The sun at his back and the wind in his face are simple pleasures and he loves these small things and indulges in them as often as possible. Perhaps he's not as foolish as we first assumed--perhaps he just needs drive, decisiveness, emotional ties and a certain material stability to render him a fool no longer, but a friend.

It's a pretty story, anyway, isn't it? I like it... I think I'll look at some of the other cards to see what they have to say.

Of course, there is going to be scads and scads of things that I am unaware of (and that some of you reading this post are probably DYING to tell me--I've noticed that there are many layers of meaning to a card that I'm just flat out going to miss)--but that's okay. There used to be (still is) scads and scads about knitting that I was unaware of, but I practiced, made mistakes, practiced, and obtained a certain fluency with the medium, and I will continue to do so, I hope until my shriveled fingers stop twitching because my wool and my needles are a part of me as much as breathing is. I don't know if this particular infatuation is going to dig as deep a trench in my soul and take root--but there's always hope.

I am, after all, the fool.

Potpourri

* Good news on the picture front--I've talked Mate into a small camera, for me, because I'm tired of doing this shit on the blog. *woot* I'd love real pictures of the kids growing up again. (Yes, I know, this means I'm carrying around a phone, an iPod and a camera. That's not the point. The point is, I KNOW HOW TO USE EACH DEVICE WITHOUT HELP! Uhm-hm. You're feeling me now, aren't you?)

* Went to Big T's LAST Back-to-School night tonight. (He's on a 4x4 block, so each semester is actually four year-long classes.)
Big T, in accordance with his goals for high school, wanted to achieve a 4.0 (check) and he wanted to take an honors class. He's now in Honors Chemistry, and I'm a little trepidatious. (Don't care if that's a real word or not. Me likey.) His teacher is a nice guy, but, if I may borrow a phrase from about a thousand years ago, sort of a poindexter in his delivery--he doesn't hammer his main points with the mighty weapon of Thor, if you know what I mean, and he was VERY surprised to hear that T had an open IEP (and grateful for the heads up, bless him. Like I said, nice guy, but T usually needs a little drama with the presentation to be able to discern what's important from what's not). But that doesn't mean T can't do it--I have some faith. Of course it helped that the teacher before that was Big T's weight training teacher. Big T had this guy last year and dropped sixty pounds in a semester, and is now the program's success story. (*big wide grin* That's my boy, oh yeah, that's my boy.) So, hearing the weight training teacher congratulating me on what an awesome kid I had? Well, you know. It sort of gives me reason to think he really CAN do anything he puts his mind to.

* Also tried to enroll Squishy in Kindergarten. *sigh* *fume* After double checking on the website and making a phone call, I got there to discover that they'd pushed the open enrollment date back to February. I've got a date on February the second, and I'll go in there with my remarkable packet to prove that she's human, and some paperwork that I'm having Mate fill out because no one can read my handwriting. *sigh* She's going to be in full day Kindergarten. I sort of hate that part, because I LIKE the idea of a half-day Kindergarten, but I LIKE Zoomboy's school, and I want her to be in the same place. Chicken and Big T were in two different schools for all but two years of their schooling--and there's good reasons for that, but it's been a COLOSSAL pain in the ass. Next year marks the first time we'll actually have three kids in two places instead of four kids in four. (Big T will have his license by then and be enrolled in Junior College and have a job. I think. The level of responsibility this entails, vs. what he has now secretly makes my head explode. I know he can do it, because *I* did it, and I'm pretty sure I was nowhere near as together as he is--but I also had four years of balancing drama, band, and whatever was going on in my pointy little head at the time, and I don't know if he's done all that. We'll figure it out. We always do.)

* Talker's Redemption is doing pretty well (cross fingers!) so far. People seem to like it--I'm getting a LOT of reports about how painful it is, so I think I've done my job. It's selling pretty well on two fronts, too--but for some reason it took forEVER to hit All Romance e-Books, and apparently that's the BFD of e-book sales right off the bat. *shrugs* Hey--people like it. I'm happy.

* Oh yeah-- true to form and my inability to actually stick to a timeline, I took a better look at the paperwork for "I Love You, Asshole!" (the Marcus & Phillip novella) and it's going to be out in MAY instead of March, like I originally thought. Oh well, nothing going on in March, but two books in April--I'll just have to deal, yeah?

* Yeah--I've been having some fun with internet Tarot... I'm kind of digging it, actually. It's all about symbols and interpretation and using basic facts to extrapolate a larger truth--sort of an English Major's wet dream, actually (although I'm sure there are male English Majors out there who are just big-eyed and horrified at the thought that anything so off the key could possibly be in their millieu. Screw 'em. I'm sticking to the idea that interpreting Tarot is the same thing as that big ol' volume of symbols that used be used in order to write and interpret Japanese Haiku in competition. It's a legit form of interp, and it's a hell of a lot of fun!)

* I'm working on a shawl now in Lion Brand Homespun. God, I used to love this yarn. now I can't finish it fast enough. It's making me CRAZY, but I think the recipient will love it. It's a mitered triangle in garter stitch, starting with a WHOLE LOT of stitches and then decreasing once on either end and twice in the middle for every other row. The sheer deliciousness of this pattern comes from the fact that there are fewer stitches every other row. Doesn't sound like much, but it's sort of like writing a book. You push, and it's ponderous, and it hurts your shoulders, then it picks up a little faster and a little faster and a little faster and then... you're rolling that boulder down hill in the final stretch! LURVE that feeling!

* Speaking of... I'm in the peak of the hill part for Living Promises... and that puppy is about to go downhill into the speed part really soon! WHHEEEEEE!!!!

And that's all I got... not bad considering the fact that at first I thought I had nothing at all!

Sharing the happy, sharing the sad...

But mostly happy, really...

* Tonight, we're going out to dinner. Big T suggested it--he asked, actually. We used to go out all the time, before Things 3 & 4, and since Mate and I were SO impressed with our brain trust (because SERIOUSLY, it's not like either of us slackers got a 4.0) he said, "So, can we go out to Red Robin?"

Hell to the YES we can do that! Goddess bless them both--I'm so proud I can't even use real words.

* I sent everybody to Jessewave's site yesterday to see the wonderful write up for Wishing on a Blue Star. What I DIDN'T know when I sent them there was that this review for Talker's Redemption would be there. And I was happy. Very very very happy.

* Mate, darling Mate, updated the website. My Christmas short set on Green's Hill is there, as is my story from Wishing on a Blue Star, and my upcoming projects as well. Enjoy!

* Squish and I had the following conversation today about petting slugs:

"No, baby--you can't pet them. The oils from your hands will make them shrivel, and you'll be touching mucus. Ick."

"It's not Ick! They're adorable creatures!"

"That's creechy, sweetheart. They're creechy. Not creatures. Creatures have fur."

"They are too creatures! I want them to be my pets!"

"The cats will eat them!" (blargh!)

"Oh. Well. Then we'd better let them stay outside."

*whew*

* I found this and remembered this poem, and for reasons some of you know, it felt incredibly personal.




* I thought of John Keats, and then this one did too.



* And then I decided I had to pull my head the hell out of it, and I went to the two things that always make me happy--Supernatural and kick-ass music, and then I felt a whole lot better.



May you enjoy the happy and deal with the sad. It's very very probable that it'll be all right.

Short Photos of Fiber Content

Okay-- tomorrow, I'm going to be on TWO different blogs. I'm going to be on Marie's blog tomorrow, talking about The Crazy Tree, and I'm going to be on Wave's talking about
Wishing on a Blue Star.

I'm also up for awards in a couple of categories over at Love Romance Cafe (voting instructions are here if you're interested) and basically? I'm well covered on the internet in the writing department tomorrow.

And that's why I led with my kid showing off scarves. The first one is in her two favorite colors--pink furry and pink shiny, and the second one is for Littlewitch, who asked for something in vampire blood with maybe some black, and now she will maybe stop pasting "Write bitch!" on my Facebook, because, you know, knitting is good on her end too!

And Squish made me pose for the one of us together. She's the best part.

Oh yes-- and BOTH my teenagers brought home 4.0's this semester... dude! I don't even know what to do for them! I want to throw them a parade! WOOOOOOOOOT!!!!!!!!

So come visit me in those other spots on Friday--I might even be coherent, and maybe charming!

Redemption

Goddess, I love these stories.

For one thing, they were dragon ridden--I started writing and couldn't stop. I love it when that happens, even though I've had to learn to temper that ride with real things, like housework and feeding the family and going to the bathroom.

For another, they represent everything I've come to believe about love. Chemistry may be a bolt from the blue, friendships may spring up in an instant, but love, real love, comes from existing side by side, seeing the best and the worst and maintaining that slow, strong burn that can sustain both parties of one of you is brought low. Tate and Brian are friends first, helpmates second, and lovers a strong, spectacular third. The first two things feed the third one, and it wouldn't be such a precious emotion if it wasn't for all of the work that goes into it on the other fronts. Dating is fun--don't get me wrong. But in a way, dating is "Disneyland love". Dating is always the best of things, putting on your best clothes, leaving behind the unpleasant realities in order to make a good impression.

What happens in Talker and Talker's Redemption is sort of the exact opposite. It's loving each other through the worst of things. It's finding the best of yourself for your lover when you couldn't find it for yourself. It's courage where you didn't think you'd find any, and humor when you have very little to laugh at and optimism when the only thing you have to wake up to is your lover, and that's more than enough.

Talker's Redemption is available from Dreamspinner Press tonight, and through the other avenues, like Amazon.com and ARe tomorrow or the day after. (It always takes a day or two for the story to hit the other sites.)

I am, of course, anxious as to how it will be received.

Everyone's chief complaint about Talker was that it was too short--they wanted to see more. When asked why I wrote it as a novella instead of a novel, my answer was simply that it hurt too much. Talker's life, Brian's life--they are painful, and while I found that their stories very much worth telling, it just HURT to live in that place with them, so I stuck to the flashback format, even though I knew it drove people crazy, mostly because it gave the whole piece a sort of hallucinatory, prose-poem feel that added depth when I was emotionally incapable of giving it length.

This one was worse. I literally relived Tate's worst moments in his head with him, when he was frightened and vulnerable and in SO much pain. I used the same format, and it made the emotional peak of the story just that much more painful, and it left me as open and as bleeding as it left Tate. The ending is quick, and sad, but it, hopefully, leaves the reader with that hope, the same hope they had at the end of the first one: as long as these two people can continue to wake up to each other, that's all they need.

It's funny--I'll peruse goodreads.com and try to find a rhyme or a reason to why people will like one writer or one story as opposed to another. I've long since realized that so very much of this is subjective, shaped by a reader's past experiences, perceptions, and beliefs about mankind in general, and so very much of this is out of my control. But I've noticed that of the things I CAN control, people tend to be more passionate about my angst than about my comedy. This isn't true for everyone, but if you put two antagonists in a ring, one of them fighting for Talker and the other one fighting for Bella's Brother or Danny Fit, I'm thinking that even though Balla and Danny are higher rated, it would be the person fighting for Talker who would win.

It's why I had to write a sequel. I'm passionate about these two kids too. But it's also why I kept it short. You can't sustain the sort of energy it takes to win that fight and continue to do things like eat and sleep and raise kids and function--at least sanely. You come home from a walk or a trip to the grocery store in tears and sobs enough times from running that plotline in your head, and your husband starts making crazy talk-- things like taking the computer away or not writing for a while or maybe, picking another genre, like haikus about the cats.

So Talker's Redemption (I also call it Talker 2) is short. But I hope it's also powerful. And I hope that everyone who has rooted for these two kids from the beginning loves it too.

And, of course, there is the inevitable: Holy Goddess, Merciful God, let it not suck!

On being nocturnal...

Zoomboy is sick--that horrible high fever, crushing head-ache, lay there like a dead fish sort of sick that apparently only bird-boned, intense little boys get, because he's the only child I've had who gets sick like this. Anyway, when Zoomboy is sick, he demands cuddles, and he's been sick enough to be laying down in our bed watching television.

The cuddles turn into a nap.

The nap makes me wide awake at eleven o'clock at night, and, well, since there are kids in our bed, and nothing else exciting is going to be happening there, I stay up late.

And last night, I lay down for cuddles at eleven o'clock, figuring that, well, what the hell, I'll just sleep like a normal person.

I woke up at three a.m., with a driving need to edit "I Love You, Asshole" (The Marcus/Phillip story) so I can send in the revised vision for editing, instead of the old version. (I think my beta readers will enjoy the changes I made!) I edited until six, and then went back to bed--until seven-thirty, when Squish woke me up going, "Mom! Mom! Mom!" I wobbled out of bed (my feet are giving me hell) and went staggering down the hallway to look around the living room in bleary-eyed confusion.

"Mom! I'm in the bathroom!"

So I staggered back down the hall."

"What's wrong?"

"I'm in the bathroom."

"Yes. You're going pee. You're doing a great job."

"Thank you."

And apparently, that's all she wanted.

So there I was, up. And Zoomboy got up too, and he sat on my lap. I think... that's all I remember until about 10:30 a.m. So anyway, that's why I'm feeling like that guy in the picture. Chicken tried to tell me that my bedtime was 1 a.m. tonight--and I might take her up on that.

And in fiber news?

Went to the LYS, and saw that Babetta's was YARN BOMBED! It was AWESOME-- and we have a picture on Chicken's cell phone... I swear we'll download them shortly, so you can see. Seriously-- it was adorable. She has a very young tree outside her shop, and it was covered in acrylic glory--apparently it only took the White Ford Suburban an hour and a half to sew all those little ruffles on that tree. I was so tickled--and so was Babetta! I WILL get you that picture, because, I'm sayin'... damn.

Anyway, while we were there, Squish spotted her two favorite fiber drugs--pink furry and pink sparkly. Babetta has a bunch of drop-stitch scarves as samples, and Squish has wanted a scarf for so long. Every time I've taken her there, she's fondled the drop stitch specialty yarn scarves and talked about when mom would make her one... so this time, as she found her favorite drugs and fondled them hopefully, I committed... I'm about halfway done now, and it's furry and soft and blindingly pink. Don't worry... although the camera situation is still iffy, I'll have Squish pose in front of the computer--it's so very her:-)

And that's about all... next week is going to be wrapped up in getting Squish ready to sign up for Kindergarten. Can you beLIEVE the amount of paperwork we have to provide to the world just to prove we're human? I mean... she needs proof that we've taken her to the dentist? Really? Anyway--so up to my elbows in doc appointments and dentist appointments and the usual--writing.

Of course, only the best stuff happens at night:-)