Time Reject

Remember that time I foolishly thought I had finished my book?

Yeah, that time.

Funny, right? How many of you laughed? I bet you laughed.

I’m laughing, if only to keep from crying.

No, I jest. I sent it off to a friend who is…vicious. Which is exactly what I needed. Turns out that the 78k words all needs to be trashed. So awesome. I love it.

Also, I have now officially been working on Dean’s story for THREE WHOLE YEARS!

…I might need to go cry now. Or find a very stiff alcoholic drink. 

I’ve been quiet for a bit for a couple of reasons. One, I’ve been having some health issues. I have fibromyalgia on top of a preexisting auto-immune disorder and it’s been acting up real bad lately. My doctor prescribed me a med that fucked with my moods, my sleep, my appetite, and did nothing for my pain. I am thankfully off of that medication, but now I have another issue. I have migraines. Tension headaches. Headaches in general. This particular headache has not gone away in 12 days. They’ve given me codeine. It’s not helping.

Work is also kicking my ass because I’m flat out refusing to be the bitch of the store. Or, well, I refuse to allow sales reps to treat me (and my position) like it’s dirt on their shoe. Which means that every day is a fight. Which is exhausting.

BUT! Aside from that, I’ve been…slightly productive. My main reader ran away from me and has left me high and dry, so I poked a couple of friends (one, a previous beta reader from my time in Marvel fandom who kicks my ass and makes me figth for every word and sentence; another who is an old friend who’s opinion I trust). So now I’m back on the editing track! Which makes me productive, in my mind.

I’m not dead. Not yet. As much as I might wish it were so when my head is fucking pounding and I’m watching my beta rip the shit out of my novel. (She called my baby boy autistic. Which makes me laugh hysterically. Because it’s probably very true.)

The past week (or so) has been vicious to me. I’m sick. I have an autoimmune disorder that means my body fights me every step of the way. Well, actually, correction. I have several autoimmune disorders. The second one, fibromyalgia, is the one that is currently kicking my ass. My doctors put me on a medication I want absolutely nothing to do with but really have no choice on. This medication makes it almost impossible to do things I need to do on a daily basis, like eat.

It’s a common thing with invisible illnesses. We only have so many moves allowed to us, so many activities we can do without having our bodies give up the ghost and say “nuh-unh, not happening. sorry.” We call these activities “spoons” and I’m running out of them.

Not to mention that the medication I’m on makes me about as creative or artistic as a spoon right now. Which makes me grumpy. I want to write, to take all this out on someone in my story. But I really can’t get up enough energy to care, or to make myself write.

tl;dr: writer is feeling sorry for herself and wants to stop feeling like crap.

I have an addiction to Netflix which is somewhat sad but pretty standard for me. I have crime shows, scifi dramas, random movies, documentaries on the weirdest things, and kids shows. I get home and I start flicking through them to find something to watch. Now, a while ago I added a whole bunch of apocolyptic documentaries and shows to do a little research into how other people think the world is going to end, yadda yadda.

And so I pop on National Geographic’s Collapse. This? Is very interesting. And it is giving me books to investigate for my world. Will any of this actually have any bearing on the actual text? No, probably not. But I’m a researcher at heart. So I enjoy this and watch how people think the world will end in the Year of the Apocolypse. And wonder if anyone will ever stumble upon my theory which, well. I hope no one has come up with yet. :)

I ordered business cards a little bit ago (well….Thursday) so that I could toss them around Arisia and Boskone, since both have a decent amount of industry people around and I’m trying desperately to get published. Figure it’s also a way to get a lot of free publicity since I know I pick up a ton of cards and handouts at conventions and go through them later on. So I wanted to have some done up and finished in time for me to toss them around like Monopoly money.

I got them last night.

They~ Are~ Aweeeeesooooome~~

The back of the card is a black field with white typewriter-esque writing that says “Writer.” Which, well, I am. So it’s perfect. On the other side has my penname, my location, the URL for the tumblr and the blog, and a QR code with a direct link to the blog. :D

So excited. I’ve got a business card holder on the way too, so now I can hand them out. Granted, I also have other cards for proofreading/just general “me” business cards….and then my actual day-to-day business cards. The only persona of myself that does NOT have business cards is the penname I’ve used since I was 10. But that’s okay. Because that…really doesn’t need association with any aspect of my life. ;)

…BUSINESS CARDS!!!!

As a Welcome To The New Year project, I decided to do 12 facts about some key characters. I had planned on doing a total of 6 but then kind of found out that was next to impossible and really frakking difficult. The 6th character is also someone that doesn’t show up until book 2, and doesn’t get the starring role he’s due until book 3, so I didn’t bother with the cutie. Not that that logic makes sense if you apply it to the ones I DID do, but hey. Logic. Who needs it? Certainly not me. ;)

Anyway. I did all these fun facts over on the blog, so I’m posting links here for them. Enjoy!

Dean Prescott || The Black King
Graham Parker || Medic
Lea Woods
Anders Chryse || Scry
Troy Parker || Breaker

As a note, I should (AT SOME POINT) have Dean’s spotlight up soon. I’ve only been working on it off and on since October. I mean, really. Lazy writer? No. Not really. More like anxious writer trying not to spoil things accidentally. Hopefully by the end of today/tomorrow I will have it up and done. Hopefully. We’ll see. :)

Oh, and:

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!

Anyone who will be in the Boston area January 13 through 16 should definitely stop by Arisia. It’s held at the Westin Waterfront, which is off the Silverline or a real quick walk from South Station on the red line.

Why is Arisia awesome? Well, on Friday night they have a Batman through the Ages panel. This makes me thoroughly excited. That and Bar Fleet. I will enjoy it muchly! Drop me an ask if anyone is planning on going. :)

If anyone ever says being a writer is easy, laugh at them, and then walk away. If they ever say being a proofreader or editor is easy, throw something in their face. Preferably something liquid. Why do I say this? Because I had the inane idea of doing something special because it’s a new year and doing a bunch of facts on a bunch of my characters.

DO YOU KNOW HOW HARD IT IS TO COME UP WITH 12 FACTS ABOUT MY IDIOTS? NO? WELL. IT IS. VERY. VERY. HARD. *has breakdown*

That being said, HAPPY NEW YEAR! It’s 2012, the year of the Apocalypse. I’m taking bets on whether it’s going to be zombies, bunnies, robots, nukes, or Nostradamus. The pot starts at $10, people. Any takers?

Anyway. I am drafting up business cards (*sob* why am I broke?) and trying to finish up these 12 facts and decided to slack off for a bit. Now, though, I am going to go back to those facts and then post links to them in another post here. My New Year’s Resolution is, honestly, to do more with the blog and tumblr, to finish editing book 1, finish writing book 2, and to start getting an actual web site up and running. Let’s see how long all that lasts, eh?

Am in the editing stages of book 1. Am also in the hell known as holiday retail hours. Granted, I’ve been working way more than I should be, but that will end soon(ish). I’m not allowed to work crazy hours when it’s dead at the store. The good news is that during these dead months there’s nothing to do, so I can edit and write and spam everyone!

In case I don’t surface for a while, I will be at Arisia in January. I’m hoping to have business cards made up for the event where I can direct traffic here and to the blog. Which is also a promise that I will not vanish and that I will get this done. :)

Also, I should have some sort of short out before the end of the year. Just to try and get this going.

Today was just not my day. In writerly terms, I mean. Well. It started out awesome, still slightly buzzed from the booze and show I saw last night (fuck yeah Bent Wit Cabaret! Gonna miss you!! ;~;) and then I had coffee and brekkie from Panera and made the train and even though everyone on the damned train was an absolute shithead I was still all bouncy and cheerful.

Which, I gotta say, is a huge ass abnormality for me. :D

Blahblahblah skip to me snagging a copy of the Metro (free newspaper given out in cities large enough/lucky enough to merit them, they’re awesome even if they are mostly AP reprints) and then looking at the front page. THE WORLD OF 2050.

Cue me deflating and going “Aw fuck.” at the paper. Then, about ten minutes later, I get an email from Publishers Weekly about a new promo for a book that’s got superheroes and the tension of The Hunger Games. Cue more “FUUUUUUUUUUUUHH…. D:”.

So not my day. Since, ya know, my world is set in a dystopic future society with superheroes and the viciousness and emotional torture of The Hunger Games.

So, maybe instead of writing book 2 I’m going to sit back and edit book 1, write the missing bits, send out to my first readers, get their opinions, revise, and hopefully be able to send book 1 off by summer to someone. Because, dammit, I do not want to miss this damned bubble if that’s the case. Durnit, someone will publish me!! >|

NaNo. Yeah. Uhm. About that….

Between work and freelancing and everything else, I’ve kind of…not done it. It’s the 11th and my word count SHOULD be 27,788. What is it? Like… 8k. Wanna know how I won last yea? I had a desk job that didn’t care what I did so long as I answered the phone and did the email and dealt with walk-ins. This year? I have a job where I’m on my feet 8 hours a day, no where near a computer to write at and so have been relying on my cell phone and Evernote, and incredibly nosy coworkers who keep swiping my technology to see what the hell I’m up to.

So, yeaaaaaaah. That’s a total bust. Which kind of sucks. :\

Totally quitting NaNo. Am so less stressed now.

I’m notoriously bad with money. I’m impulsive and ridiculous. I also have weaknesses for certain things. I’ve heard all about how awesome Mint.com is so I figured I’ve got nothing to lose, let’s try it out. What have I found out? Mostly that I’m shameless. And ridiculous.

I budgeted $50/month for coffee. This is assuming that I get a medium coffee at 7/11 every day for 30 days. Or that I get a $4 awesome coffee from the coffee shop next to work for 14 days. For $50/month, I could buy a new pair of pants. Or two DVDs. If I abstained from coffee for a whole year, I could buy a brand new computer. Well. A $600 computer. Which is, roughly, about the price of the one I’m on right now. It was the price of my tablet package (which went on credit). Or I could put it all away and concentrate on going back to New Orleans…

My coffee addiction—no. My CAFFEINE addiction is keeping me broke! GAH!

SAD WRITER IS SAD!!!!

(and also failing miserably at NaNoWriMo, thanks for asking)