2012, the year of travel
If 2011 was the year of career-related quantum leaps (getting my agent! getting my book deal!!), 2012 is shaping up to be the Year of Travel.
In April, I'm going to the London Book Fair. I'll hopefully be meeting up with Samhain colleagues, and maybe with the literary agent who's handling the foreign rights for Linked.
In July, I'm going to both the RNA conference in Penrith, and the RWA conference in California. (California!) Then in September, I may be going to America again for a work-related event. For me, this pretty much qualifies me as a frequent flyer! Yeah, I know it doesn't really.
As well as the Year of Travel, 2012 is also going to be the Year of Weddings. My Model Cousin is marrying his fiancee in April. My girls are being maids of honour, which is super exciting for them. And in September, The Model Auntie is marrying Dr T-shirt! They're having a tiny tiny wedding, followed by an afternoon tea reception at a hotel, which I think sounds so much fun. Dr T-shirt proposed on Christmas Day, which is totally romantic and makes up for the fact that he will probably attend the wedding in, yes, a T-shirt.
I'm sorry to say that so far 2012 has also been the Year of Illness and the Year of Too Much Work. Which is why this is my first blog post since November. Abstract and I were ill over Christmas and New Year, both the girls have had various bits of time off school before and since, and I'm still regularly waking up with middle-of-the-night coughing fits.
Abstract is busy at work, Sparkler is moving towards GCSEs and looking at sixth-form colleges, and I'm marching towards the finish line of Linked the Sequel.
After about three and a half years, Erica the Red Laptop can no longer hold onto a battery charge for more than an hour, making her pretty hopeless for helping me get more word count when I'm out. I love Erica the Red Laptop, but I'm sorry to say a Dell laptop was not the best choice, because she really hasn't lived as long as she should have done (as well as the battery issues, she has various other ailments, mostly to do with build quality). So, she's been reincarnated into the silver streamlined body of Princess Erica the Macbook Air. Very expensive, very beautiful, very much a learning curve for Immi the PC girl. (Why are the keys that way round, why is the word count this when on the PC it was that, and where is the End key?)
The sheer beauty does encourage me to keep going, though, she's super speedy, and with her wafer-thin body, extra-long battery life and FaceTime programme, she's going to be a fabulous companion for the Year of Travel.
