Blue Christmas

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‘Tis the season to be
Jolly, joyous, ho ho ho.
But I feel more like

Sorry, friends, but no
No, no – I just don’t think so.
All the fun, all the

Joy, all the very
Merry Christmas cheery bell-
Ringing happy types

Can usually
Count me in their number, but
Not this year, not when

Everything seems to
Stress me out, mess me up, dress
Me down.  This year I

Feel anti-Christmas,
Anti-social, anti-fun.
Yep, I’ve got the blues,

The Christmas blues.

(c) 2012.  All rights reserved.

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D-Day for Pitch Wars

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Well, today was announcement day for the Pitch Wars competition.  Sadly, I was not selected by any of the awesome mentors.  But!  I did get some fantastic feedback from two of the three mentors I submitted to, which I was totally not expecting.  That kinda made my day, actually.  Of course, like any author who has sent out a query and had it rejected, I wish the feedback could have been a little more specific and/or had some suggestions for ways to improve, but I know they were all very busy and swamped and I am super grateful for what I got.  However, back to the drawing board go I.

I hadn’t really expected to be chosen.  And I’ve spent the last week or so kicking myself for submitting so early because I took some advice I received during GUTGAA and used it to hopefully fix up my first page.  Whether it would have made a difference or not, I’ll never know, of course, but I really regretted my itchy typing fingers.

If you’d like to find out what I’ll be up to next, or if you’re interested in witnessing a small mental collapse of sorts, then click on through. There might even be chocolate.

Art poetica

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Art is not what you see, but what you make others see. -Edgar Degas

Edgar Degas (The Burrell Collection, Glasgow)
Edgar Degas (The Burrell Collection, Glasgow) (Photo credit: dalbera)
The Green Dress (1897-1901)
La Jupe Verte
Edgar Degas

(c) 2012.  All rights reserved.

The writer speaks

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Friday morning, I visited the third graders at Reinbeck Elementary School.  The kids were all lovely and quite attentive while I prattled on about poetry and writing, punctuated by the occasional attempt at humor.  (My suspicions that I’m not funny were confirmed – not one kid cracked a single smile.)

Mrs. Fleshner introduced me by saying how surprised she was to discover an author in their midst. I imagine it was something of a surprise; I’ve known her a couple years now, as Tadpole had her for third grade last year and nothing was ever said of my writing then.  But at conferences this year, we happened to get on the subject of books and how we just don’t have the time to read as much or as often as we would like.  I said that my problem was that I wanted to both read books and write them, but I didn’t have the time to do both, and that was how we ended up discussing my writing.  She invited me to speak to the class, and I agreed, despite my intense dislike of public speaking.

I surprised her again when I arrived a bit early, laden with visual aids.

Just one more thing

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I’ll be posting about my talk with the students at Reinbeck Elementary School soon.  Yesterday and today have both been pretty long days, though – Cricket just can’t seem to shake this flu bug.  In the meantime, posting may be a bit sporadic.  I imagine everyone’s schedules are in a bit of flux this month, so I hope you’ll all kindly bear with me.  I should be back to normalish soonish.

(c) 2012.  All rights reserved.

‘Tis the season to be jolly and joyous!

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Muppet_christmas_carol

The Muppet Christmas Carol (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I really need to keep reminding myself of that.  Maybe one of these days, it’ll sink in.

It took me all afternoon, but I got my Christmas cards addressed and sent off to all our friends and family.  Well, I put them in our mailbox and put the flag up, anyway.  I watched The Muppet Christmas Carol with the boys tonight before they went to bed.  I’ve been listening to Christmas music all week, and we decorated our office yesterday afternoon.

And yet?  Yeah, my Christmas spirit is still MIA.  If anyone finds it, will you please send it home?  I kinda need it.  Thank you.

(c) 2012.  All rights reserved.

Barren Island Books

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This has been a busy week for me!  It seems I’ve had something going on every night and even when I didn’t have to be somewhere, I still had plenty to do.  Last night, for instance, I had to bake seven dozen (84) cookies for my church’s cookie walk this weekend.  I found a recipe that claimed to make approximately six dozen (72) cookies.  I thought, “Okay, I’ll make small cookies and then I’ll be able to squeeze an extra dozen out of the dough.”

I ended up with a hundred and sixteen cookies.  That’s almost ten dozen.

Tonight, I have to work on my presentation for tomorrow morning.  But this afternoon, you can find me visiting with my good friend, A.F.E. Smith, at her blog, Reflections of Reality.  She’s just started a new weekly feature called “Barren Island Books” and today’s post features me.  If you’re interested in finding out a bit more about what sort of books I enjoy reading, head on over and check it out!

And even if you couldn’t care less about what I like to read, do check out the rest of her website.  A.F.E. is a great writer and has a wonderful site, full of neat odds and ends.  You won’t regret visiting her, I promise.

(c) 2012.  All rights reserved.

To the journey

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This was originally posted on Griffin’s Quill on November 30 as a reflection on Goal Achievement Month for Authors. I had planned to post it here as well a bit sooner than this, but, well, you know how it goes…

Hmm…

I started this, my GAMA post, on November 7.  You can see how well that went for me.

November disappeared on me this year.  I was all set to do GAMA and NaNoWriMo and have a fantabulous month.  But you know that old saying about the best laid plans of mice and men?  Well, I used to know it, too.  Then November snuck up behind me and walloped me over the head with this really cool frying pan I saw on the FAIL Blog the other night.  Now I have no memory of pretty much anything beyond the last five minutes.

I’m like Dory from Finding Nemo, only hopefully much more endearing and much less annoying.

Christmas spirit – or lack thereof

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I’ve been trying to get in the Christmas spirit this weekend.  After all, it’s a new month (December!  How the heck did that happen?), and Christmas party season is already in full swing.  I’ve attended three so far and the month has barely begun!  But I’m not sure that my Christmas spirit has yet found me.  In fact, it seems to be more and more difficult for me to locate with each passing year.

I’m having trouble figuring out why this is.  When I was younger, Christmas was my favorite holiday.  And I don’t just mean when I was a kid, either, which shoots Seymour’s theory of all play and no work in the foot.  The music, the food, the happiness that seems to fill the air and everyone around – I love it all.  I love the decorations and Christmas trees and the hot apple cider that the Hardin County Auditor’s Office puts out for visitors to the courthouse every year.  Most of all, I love spending time with my family, especially the people I don’t often get to see.

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