The Best Day Ev-er!

Status of my Life: School ended today (what could be better? Seriously.) and the tech guy called....drumroll...he recovered everything! Yea for tech gurus! All 771 of my files are now restored to my new hard drive on my laptop and on a disk, and on a flash drive, and on...Yeah, I'm not gonna lose my stuff again.

So when I told my husband that I'd lost everything this is what he said, "So basically you've wasted the last six months of your life?!"

Me: "You are so pessimistic." (The tech guy was working on it.)

Him: "Well, you have."

Me: "I have to go pick up Isaac from piano."

Him:

Later on when he told his friends at work what he'd said (he teaches elementary school too, so works with 99% women) they said, "I cannot believe you said that to her!! You're such an IDIOT!"

Yeah, that's what I wanted to say too. So thanks Fox Hollow teachers. You guys rule.

But I did get everything back. I think I'm still missing one little section of something I was working on at the time of the freeze. I don't think it had been saved at all, so when Word quit, I lost it. And I can't really remember what it was or where it goes, but I know which novel, so I'm trying to puzzle it out. I'm sure it will all work out in the end.

Reading: Nothing. Just doing the happy dance.

Lost my Laptop

Status of my Life:  Trying to recover from the weekend, and writing new stuff.

My laptop died.  I got the white screen of death.  Everything I've ever written is on there. Everything.  I haven't cried yet.  I have recovered some stuff via emails with attachments.  I have a guy looking at it to get the data off.  I'm hopeful.  But now I'm no longer mobile. I have to sit on the PC to work, and it's hard!  And my version of Word is really, really old.

Sigh.  Oh well.  Life goes on.

Reading: WICKED LOVELY by Melissa Marr (LOVED it!)

Keepin' On

Status of my Life:  I missed the Survivor finale.  That's what you get for DVR-ing stuff and falling behind.  Grrr.  I've been rewriting the beginning pages of SHADOWS, revising and editing SHADOWS and FREEBIES.  I wrote a short story last week in the "cyberpunk" genre, and started the sequel to FREEBIES.  Right now it's called FREEDOM.  See why I can't keep up with reality TV?  And "So you Think you can Dance" just started and I love that!

The life of a writer - or maybe an insane OCD lunatic...take your pick!  This is basically what my day is:

Check email.

Read something someone sent me (usually while eating breakfast)

Go to work (where I check email, read, do critiques, check QT, write, edit, revise, whatever)

Go home and put cartoons on for my daughter

Write

Read something someone sent me

Take my son to piano

Check email

Read blogs

Pick my son up and take him to baseball

Read more blogs

Do critiques I'm behind on

Write

Check QT

Check email

Put the kids to bed

Read/Write/Blog

I'm exhausted just writing this!

**Notice that I don't eat, I hardly ever sleep, I don't make dinner, my kids watch too much TV...

and I should probably be fired!

Reading:  TRUANCY by Isamu Fukatu

Needing a vacation,

RedDuck

Second Drafts and Neighbors

Status of my Life: Just finished the second draft of FREEBIES. It's a lot of work to read your own stuff and try to find something wrong with it. :) Ha, ha! I edited, changed, revised, rewrote, and finally made it to the end. Now the second draft is done. I have people reading it, and will make changes in the third draft. It's an endless (vicious?) cycle...

You know you have good neighbors when they call you at work. My backyard was semi-flooded last night because the irrigation water wouldn't turn off. I live in a townhome, so I have a home-owner's association. I called the city, public works and finally my HOA president. All in the car on the way to work. I know, I know, don't talk on the phone while driving.

Well, too bad. I already did. Multi-tasking, you know...

My neighbor happens to be the HOA president. She called me at work. This may not seem like a huge thing, but my family doesn't even know the name of the school where I teach. So the fact that my neighbor does makes it significant.

I have to go buy a new tappy-thingy. I'm not really sure what they're called. The spigot thing you twist to turn the water on and off. I guess it has a tag on it so I can buy the right one. I wouldn't know, I'm sitting on the computer blogging!

Reading (Read): THE BATTLE FOR THE LABYRINTH by Rick Riordan. I adore Percy Jackson. A-Dore.

Better get to the hardware store,
RedDuck

Thanks Betas!

Status of my Life: Went out of town for the weekend and saw IRON MAN. Um, loved it. Great flick. Stay through the credits to see a little teaser. Revising and rewriting both SHADOWS and FREEBIES. I want to query in September...

A big shout out to my Beta readers. They've really pointed out some great things for me to consider in both my manuscripts.

So thanks hkelley, vampwriter, jlealopez, sarahjen, wheelsgr, justwrite, suzyq, wiggypop, Karyne, and coming soon cujo5. And my live friends Ali, Ilene, Stacy, and Jennifer.

Thanks.

Reading: FINDERS KEEPERS by Linnea Sinclair

Staying Focused,
RedDuck

Getting Other Readers

Status of my Life: I started a short story today for the Writer's of the Future contest. This is going to be hard for me. Once I get going, I tend to go and go and go...And shorts have to stop, well, shortly. :)


Well, I still have some crit buddies. I went to a conference in March and several accomplished authors said that it's important to have objective individuals (other than family and friends) read your book before you submit it. I started freaking out.

I don't know anyone (besides family and friends).

So I'm done right? Gotta have Beta Readers. (I capitalize them because they are SO important, it really is a title.)

Nope. I joined AQ Connect and had a good group going there. There's been some problems and I lost all the men reading my book, which has two male MC's. That sucked. I still have a few ladies and they're great, but I really need some testosterone.

I've been on QT for a few months and have gotten some good friends and readers there too. Now I'm wondering how many is enough? Everyone has their own opinion. Some I really agree with and change and revise and work myself to death at their every suggestion. Others, not so much.

I can see why authors say to have someone else read your stuff. It really is invaluable. And by reading other's writing, I can see where mine is weak - and fix it!

Reading: Graffiti Girl by Kelly Parra

Looking for male Beta Readers,
RedDuck