Catch-Up Time: Best and Worst!

Helllloooooo!  First things first.  Yes, I know I've been seriously MIA 'round these parts. My apologies to those who give a flying fig (you know who you are!). I've been busy trying to change my (work) life, which is a lot harder than it sounds, so I let the OOBH slide a bit.  Still love ya, though, and I'm hoping to get back into the swing of things pronto.

So, let's catch up! I thought I'd review the best and worst stuff that's been going on in my little corner of the world. I'll do my best to keep this brief, but I can't make any promises.

The Best

Tina Fey's book.

Holy shnikeys, this woman can write. The book is simply awesome. She shares little bits of wisdom that she's picked up over the course of her career as a writer and entertainer, but she's not obnoxious about dropping this knowledge.  She's infinitely self-deprecating and aware of how fortunate she is, while also acknowledging the hard work she put in to get where she is.  I learned a lot, and most of all,  laughed a lot.  This is stay-up-late-laughing-out-loud-by-yourself-in-your-silent-living-room good.

Learning to shut my pie hole.
I've been working hard on another personal goal lately, and that is to stop giving such a tremendous fuck about everything. I've been much happier. Now, when someone says something childish or annoying to me, I restrain myself and don't respond.  This is huge for me, because previously I'd get into it with them and get myself all worked up, which really helps no one.

Something else I learned from Tina Fey--when someone acts badly you have to ask yourself if s/he is standing in the way of what you want.  If not, ignore them and go about your business. You're not going to change their mind, so why bother?  If they are in your way, find a way around them -- over, under, around!

Seriously, read the book.

The Worst

The ticks

I'm not sure if this is a sign of the impending Rapture or what, but the goddamn motherfucking TICKS have already started their campaign to rule the world.  Is it a bad tick year for everyone, or just ME?  It started about two weeks ago when my youngest son wandered up to me with a tick attached to his chest.  I was totally skeeved out, naturally, but I plucked that sucker off of him and took great pleasure in squishing it till it couldn't be squished no mo'.  Little did I know that that tick had a legion of friends in low places.

A few days later, Jim took the dog for a walk and came home covered... and I do mean COVERED... in disgusting, crawling ticks.  This is how I got the honor of searching my naked husband's nooks and crannies for creepy-crawlies, which was highly unpleasant for us both.  Later that night I found three more of the stubborn bastards on the dog despite being freshly dosed with Frontline, and worst yet, the next day as I sat at work I felt something tickling my arm under the shirt.  Sure as shit, there was a tick crawling on me!  And this was after TWO showers! This morning I found another one on my pant leg.

As a certifiable arachnophobe, this WILL NOT DO.  I've cleaned my house top to bottom, done all the laundry in HOT water, and am one step away from setting off some sort of chemical bomb in my home to make sure I never see another blood-sucking fuckazoid again. FML!

The Day Job
At the risk of being dooced, which is a chance I'm clearly willing to take, I will say that things have gone from bad to worse at my day job. 

Let's put it this way: if you could choose between sitting 4 feet away from a micromanaging boss with no concept of personal space OR an elderly cat lady who chatters like a deranged squirrel all day, which would you choose?  Tough one, innit?

I'm not about to jump into another crap job that might turn out to be worse than this one, so until the perfect gig comes along, I'm sticking it out. But I'm working on it every day and outwardly maintaining my usual sunny disposition, which is all I can do.


The Rain
It has been gray, overcast, and raining steadily for a week now.  I'd make a joke about building an ark and all that, but frankly I'm too tired.  I'm either suffering from SAD or Lyme disease, both of which are super-duper awesome, right?  

Don't act like you're not impressed.

So there you have it! I have so much more to say -- we didn't even get into the whole Arnold Swartzenegger diddling the maid thing or the fact that Hanson has a number 1 song on the charts again (a sure sign of the impending apocalypse)! But I've got work to do, so I'll sign off even with all of this unfinished business.

What have YOU been up to? What's the best and worst stuff happening in your life?

Big News. Huge!

My dearest BOOBHs,

After months of keeping a big secret I can finally share some exciting news with you.

Many of you know Cary McNeal of List of the Day fame. Cary and I have struck up a close friendship over the past couple of years, as I have with so many of you. He was one of the first people in my adult life who truly encouraged me to write and told me I had talent, which I desperately needed to hear but didn't even know it. I came to think of him as a mentor in many ways since he is doing what I would love to do: writing online, working from home, and writing books that make people laugh.

Last year he asked me to co-write a proposal for a new humor book that he had been approached to write on his own. Since he's a busy guy with a lot of irons in the fire and the project had a lot to do with differences in genders, he thought it might be best if he shared the work with a woman. We wrote that proposal well over a year ago but it didn't get picked up by a publisher, so we both just moved on and kept doing our thangs.

A few months later another book idea came along from his publishing contact, and again he asked me to work on the proposal with him. We wrote the 20 page-ish document together, and this time it was different... this time, there was a lot of interest right off the bat! This time publishers looked at it and said, "We can sell this."

So we got a book deal!

Last April we got word that our book had been picked up by Running Press. It has taken many months of negotiations, but now that we have our signed, official contracts in hand we have finally been given the green light to announce to the world that our book will be published in the Fall of 2011!

It's a non-fiction work called Crap I Bought On eBay: Our Shopping Spree In The Wal-Mart of Weird, and it's already pretty hilarious, if I do say so myself. And I do. :)

So, there you have it! I'm so excited to be a part of this project, and I hope that this news gives all of you who aspire to be published a shot in the arm. Remember, it doesn't matter how many people read your blog - it's not about collecting followers or doing give-aways or anything else that we get hung up on in the Blogosphere; it's just about writing consistently in your own voice. You never know who is going to read it and decide to give you a chance!

Oh, and anyone who says that internet-based friendships aren't real -- neener neener!  You're wrong.  

As always, I blog for fun and as a creative outlet, not for monetary gain. But hey, if anyone wants to pay me to do it, I'd be open to that too. Ha ha, I'm kidding! (no, I'm not)

I'm glad we talked. I feel so much better now that we're all in the know, don't you?

Please wish me luck as I dip a toe into completely uncharted (for me) waters.
XOXO
La Bev

I Write Like....

The other day I happened to Stumble Upon a site that analyzes your writing and tells you which published author your style most resembles. Since there are so many aspiring writers out there I thought I'd pass it along so we could compare notes.

I was lazy and just snagged two of my recent posts from the OOBH last week. I suppose I really should have looked harder and found what I consider to be my "best work," but it was Saturday and I try not to exert myself on Saturdays if I can help it.

The first clip earned me a comparison to SciFi writer H.P. Lovecraft.

I write like
H. P. Lovecraft

I Write Like by Mémoires, Mac journal software. Analyze your writing!

KEWL! At least, I think that's cool; I haven't actually read any of his stuff, which is odd considering I do love the genre. Better get on that!

The second blurb I grabbed compared me to Dan Brown. Wow. He's like, all smart and best-selling and shit... so let's take these findings with a big ol' grain of salt, shall we?

I write like
Dan Brown

I Write Like by Mémoires, Mac journal software. Analyze your writing!

Your turn - click here and find out whose style yours resembles. It just takes a minute!

A Great Read is Hard to Find

Hi, all!

I wasn't going to write today, but as always I couldn't stay away. I'll be leaving soon to go to the lake with my family, so I'm sitting here in my bathing suit and shorts with greasy hair - just to give you a visual. While you're visualizing, let it also be known that a few moments ago I realized that the shorts and the bathing suit combo give me a bit of a camel toe. So there's that.

I've been in a bit of a blogging funk lately. It's not you, it's me. I've been busy and preoccupied, and I'm sorry about that.

I've also been reading a lot of good books, which makes me want to write one. Not long ago I made a promise to myself that I wouldn't read any books that weren't like the type that I want to write, and I've kept my word to myself on that deal.

Recently I started The Secret Diary of A Call Girl, for instance, but I put it down around 100 pages in and most likely won't return to finish it. Frankly, it bored me. The writing isn't all that good or engaging, the protagonist is completely unlikeable in every way, and the shock value of hearing about sex with paunchy middle-aged married men for money wore off rather quickly. Sure, it was interesting to read about things that I'd honestly never pondered for more than a moment or two: Fisting. Double-penetration. Anal beads. Lesbian sex.

But the writing was so banal that even those titillating subjects got dull. Now that's bad!

Also in keeping with my promise I picked up a book that my favorite magazine, Entertainment Weekly, has been heavily pimping for some time now: One Day by David Nicholls. Now this - this - is the kind of novel that I want to write.



It's the story of a man and a woman, Dexter and Emma, who spend time together right after graduating from University in London and begin a life-long friendship. Every year on the same day, July 15th (my birthday!), the story finds them each in their lives and you get a snippet of what they've been up to and how they've been growing and progressing (or not, as the case may be). Some years they spend the day together, some years they don't, but the story nimbly weaves in and out of their lives and offers a wonderful and truthful glimpse of what it is like to age from early twenties to true adulthood.

The writing itself is gorgeous. Funny - so funny! Concise. Simple yet descriptive. Many times the narrative reminded me of watching a Woody Allen film, but even better. Nicholls easily switches between character viewpoints and before long you feel like you're in both of their heads. He never judges his characters, he just presents the facts for the reader to draw their own conclusions. There are moments of such poignancy that I found myself dog-earring corners as I read so that I could come back and look at them again later. If I were still a student, this is when I would have underlined a passage that spoke to me.

As you're reading you can easily picture everything that happens as if watching it on a movie screen. Perhaps that is why the book rights have already been purchased by a Hollywood studio and the movie is in the works.

As I read, I thought about who I would cast. For Emma I had Emily Blunt in mind the entire time.

For Dex, I kept picturing Bradley Cooper even though he isn't British and Dex was meant to have dark hair. I just think Brad sums up the whole "raffish, charming, good-looking" type perfectly.

So, if you're looking for a great read that goes by quickly and will make you think and laugh, check this one out.

In the meantime, I'll leave you with this quote from the book:

"And maybe that's what happens; you start out wanting to change the world through language, and end up thinking it's enough to tell a few good jokes."

Happy Hump Day!

Golden Boy?

My Seinfeld peeps know what I'm talkin' about:



We all have that one article of clothing that we reach for first, the one that's comfortable and fits just right and just feels perfect.

Last night I pulled out a favorite t-shirt of mine that I'd pretty much retired a few years ago. It's an XL purple tie-dye that I bought at the natural food store when I was a mere pup of 15 years old. I remember that day so well; it was Springtime, and one of the first warm days of the year. My friend D and I walked down the steep hill from school into town and did a little window shopping, and that shirt just caught my eye. I bought it in the only size they had, which meant that it was far too large to wear out and about. It became my favorite sleep shirt.

About two years later, we had a house fire, and my entire house and all of our belongings burned to the ground. As we sifted through the wreckage, I came across the mangled remains of our washer and dryer, and on a whim I opened the washer to reveal a wet load of laundry still twisted up inside the machine. From that random assortment of clothing, I plucked my Golden Boy, my Purple Power tie-dye.

< insert angelic choir here >

It was the only garment of mine that survived the fire, and I quickly put it back into rotation as my go-to comfy shirt and sleep tee. When I went to college, Purple Power went with me. When I lived in the (co-ed) dorms, I specifically remember getting whistled at while wearing this t-shirt on several occasions. It hits me somewhere mid-thigh, and is baggy enough to show some clavicle up top, but otherwise was suitably modest for walking from my room to the ladies' bathroom, I thought.

Somewhere in my twenties, Purple Power started to get a little ragged. Small holes appeared here and there, and a large rip started under the right armpit. I did not let those blemishes dissuade me from wearing it, and as Jerry says in the clip above, you cannot show preferential treatment to the favorite shirt. Wash, rinse, repeat!

I wore it during hospital stays. I wore it on the night before my wedding. I wore it on those tough nights when the baby wakes you several times a night, needing something and everything and nothing.

One day, a few years ago, the hole under the arm became so gaping that I knew it was time to say goodbye. I folded it neatly and put it on the bottom of my pajama drawer. I didn't dwell on it. I moved on. Purple Power would be there when I needed it, and that was enough.

I'm not sure why, but when I needed it again was last night. As I scrounged through my drawer for something to wear to bed, my fingers brushed against the familiar and well-worn cotton, and I pulled it out and put it on without hesitation. It slipped over my shoulders and grazed my hips just so, and suddenly that gaping hole didn't seem so bad after all. Maybe I'll even stitch it up, despite my lack of enthusiasm for such tedious and domestic tasks as sewing.

Here I am at 6:30 this morning, wearing my Purple Power tee. Yeah, I wear glasses in the AM and no, I hadn't brushed my teeth or hair yet. Deal.



I don't know whether it's because of the shirt or not, but I woke up this morning with words in my head that weren't there before. I wrote them down, and I like them. I think I'll keep doing it. I think this shirt is magical.

A buncha stuff... just me babbling, really

What's happenin', hot stuff?

I'm just relaxing on what remains of my day off. I had a great day - DH's on school vacation this week so I got to sleep in till 7:45 this morning. Woohoo! Got up, drank coffee, did laundry, and played with the boys for a bit, then brought LS to daycare and had a big kid date with BS.

We went to see Coraline in 3D. It was awesome, and very, very creepy. BS amazes me because be never seems to get afraid of scary stuff; I was kind of cowering a couple of times, but he was enraptured the whole time. It's also a cool message - "be careful what you wish for." Basically, kids, your parents may be boring, but at least they're not scary witch creatures who try to eat your soul, so be grateful! Yay!

Now I'm home and DH has taken BS to the dentist, so I'm just chillin', folding laundry, listening to music, watching Grosse Pointe Blank on TV, AND blogging. Look at me multitask! I've got some fun activities coming up that I'm looking forward to, and life is good!

Lessee... in other news. I haven't been writing much, but I have been reading like a fiend. I am convinced that reading is as good as writing; I honestly think it puts my mind in the right place and helps me establish my own voice and style. Or, maybe that's just what I tell myself to justify gobbling up books like they're made out of candy and leaving my own novel half finished. Dunno.

At any rate, it is my habit to go to author's websites when I find one whose work I admire. Almost all of them have tips for aspiring writers, and they all say: if you want to write, READ!

So, I'm taking their advice, and am currently devouring the Outlander series. Damn, this woman can write. She is both prolific and, at times, overly verbose. I found myself thinking in a Scottish accent this week; I became so enmeshed in her language and world that I felt like my brain was in the book. Wow. Her work can be a little too descriptive at times, and I find myself skimming certain sections since there is really only so much detail one can use when describing something like a garden, right? But, her style is fantastic - she manages to create these believable and realistic characters that you feel like you know intimately, she has a massive and impressive vocabulary, and her stark intelligence is just palpable. On her website, http://www.its.caltech.edu/~gatti/gabaldon/ , she says some things that stick in my memory and spur me on more than any of the other "reach for the stars" stuff I've read on other author's websites. I'll paraphrase, because I'm lazy and have provided the link above so you can go read it yourself if you're so inclined. Basically, she says the idea is the easy part, the writing is the hard part. And you won't know if you can do it until you try. And the more you try, the better you'll get. And the hardest part isn't starting, it's keeping it going.

I think she's my new hero, which is why I had no qualms about ordering the rest of the Outlander series from Amazon just now, and why I look forward to every historical, romantic, overly-descriptive word and sentence that she has sent forth into the world for us to read. And yes, Jill, you can borrow them when I'm done. ;)

Updates

1. I gave up beer 2 weeks ago, and have gained 3 lbs. @#!%^&*

2. LS is back on the binky-crack, but only at night. Sigh.

3. Despite my best efforts to spiff up the appearance, I've gained weight, my teeth are barely whiter because I saved 10 bucks and bought the ghetto Rite-Aid strips instead of the Crest strips, and my hair is as unruly as ever because I just can't muster the energy to care enough to blow dry it. Oh, and my skin is breaking out for no discernable reason.

4. I'm discouraged with my writing, and don't even feel much like reading, which is odd.

5. Originality is still dead.

Booooooo. To say that I've got a case of the Mondays is an understatement. I'm trying to do like Little Nicky and "release the good" (cue rainbows & frolicking bunnies) instead of releasing the evil (monster ripping bunny's head off).

I need some white sage up in here! ;)

Originality is DEAD! Tell your friends.

Last night I was kvetching to DH about the fact that the latest novel I read had some themes that were a little too similar to the themes I've been writing about in my little book-ish project. I was complaining about how there just aren't any new ideas out there, how even the most original works I've read recently have become tarnished when I find another book with similar storylines/characters, etc. Now, it seems that I'm falling victim to the same problems. I can only hope that my characters and perpsective are soooo unique (yeah right) that people will want to read my shit anyway. We'll see.

So then, we moved on to some other topic, and I got this terrific idea for my next writing project. It was what Oprah describes as a "lightbulb moment." ;) I was basically bitching about how happy I would be if I never had to work in an office ever again. I suddenly had this awesome idea for a story: what if, sometime in the not-so-distant future, the U.S. government found a simple solution to our economic woes? What if part of that solution was that all offices were disbanded and workers HAD to telecommute?

I'm thinking, every home is equipped with an entire wall that is a television screen, so even though you're in your house, you see the other workers in your office in little Brady Bunch-type boxes on your wall all day long. Of course, they can see you, too, and this is the new face of the American work force. You log into your home office and are "on" all day except for your designated breaks, when you're allowed to log off and go unseen for however long your break is. The internet becomes the driving source of social interaction. There is literally no need to leave your home most of the time, and the government issues restrictions on how often you can drive your car (due to the environmental issues brought on by our overuse of carbon-based fuels, don'tcha know).

The relative connundrum, of course, is that people will become so antisocial that our society begins to crumble. People become socially inept and forget how to get along with one another in person. They forget how to relate... and indeed, perhaps they forget how to actually find suitable mates. Perhaps by saving the world from bread lines, rationing, and global warming, the government causes us to lose that which makes us social, human creatures. And forget about reproducing - we can't even speak to each other in person, much less do the nasty!

What if evolution starts kicking in after a few generations of population decline brought on by mass agoraphobia and social ineptitude? What if the few babies that manage to be born have no reproductive organs?

Anyway... as I went on and on and DH's eyes started to glaze over, he had his own light bulb moment. Suddenly he looked at me and said, "Sounds like 1984."

Well, slap my ass and call me George Orwell, he's kind of right.

Shoot. There really are no original ideas left in the world.

150 pages

I'm plugging along here on this writing project I've started. The wonderful creative rush I had last month has vanished, but I'm working on getting my mojo back. Today was a good day. Yesterday it was like pulling teeth to just get a paragraph out, but today was a good day.

Milestone: I've reached page 150!! Admittedly, it's not entirely sequential; it's kind of in three parts right now and not one of those parts is the end. Still lots of story to tell. Not sure how long it will be when it's done. I'm excited again, and I'm glad I was able to talk myself out of the weak moments I had last week!

We all just have to root for ourselves sometimes, right? :)

I hope you're all rooting for yourselves this week. It's freezing fricking cold just about everywhere, so bundle up and have a great night!!

Ow.

Adding injury to insult, last night I cut my hand open on a can of peaches. I had been spooning some out for LS, when I dropped the can and then caught it with my right hand. The jagged top sliced a rather gaping gash just below my right pinky finger. It bled a lot. I washed it out with soap and water (ouch!) and stopped the bleeding, but then I sat there and stared at it, wondering if I needed to get stitches. I probably should have; it was open enough that I could see the fatty layer under the skin. (blech!)

My mind ran through the scenario that would unfold if I went to the ER. Me sitting there among the truly wounded, holding my boo-boo. Me getting stitches. Me being there for hours and hours just to get a few silly stitches.

So I decided to let DH decide, since he has suffered many gaping wounds in recent years as a result of his lumberjack tendencies out in our woods. He almost always says "It's fine. Let's just bandage it up." He was out picking up BS from school, and LS was happily eating his peaches in his high chair, so I decided to just wait a bit.

That's when things got a little weird. My ears went numb first, and then started ringing loudly. My lips went numb next, and my head got that odd detached feeling you get right before you're going to pass out. I realized that, crazy as it was, I was going into shock because of a stupid can of peaches. I sat down and put my head between my knees until it passed, keeping my hand elevated because it had started to ooze again.

Bizarre, right? When DH got home, I was calm again, and as I had hoped, he told me we didn't need to go to the ER. He'd had worse. ;) So we put some ointment on it and wrapped it up well. It stings and hurts a bit, but I think I'll live. I know I had a tetanus shot when LS was born, so it's all good.

The funny thing is that when it was all said and done and I was relaxing after dinner with my wounded paw tightly bandaged, I felt kind of excited about the whole "almost passing out" experience. It's good grist for my writing mill. Lately, every experience I have gets stashed in a little mental file, to be used whenever, where ever.

I wasn't going to say anything, but just FYI... I'm on page 67 of my very first attempt at a novel. I'm excited about the progress. It is definitely the longest thing I've ever written to date. It feels like a new beginning.

So, the according to my new "spiritual adviser,"

I need to quit my "soul-sucking" job immediately and go surround myself with books in some capacity. She suggested working part-time in a bookstore or library so that I could have time to write, or do some freelance writing. She had me visualize putting the words on the page and being paid to write and seeing my audience love my work....

She told me my spirit guides and the angels around me were cheering me on wholeheartedly; that they want me to find joy in my work again and do what I was always meant to do.

Huh. (I can hear some of you rolling your eyes right now. S'ok, I feel a little bit the same way)

That's cool and all, but somehow I don't think I can leave my admittedly craptastic job to go work part-time at Barnes & Noble (hi, Lisa!!) considering I have to, ya know, pay bills and feed my kids and all. But, it was nice that she affirmed me (her words) and encouraged me and felt as strongly about my work situation as I do. LOL!

She even gave me a tarot card with an illustration of "expectations," which is nice. I will keep it near my computer for inspiration!

Mala's reading was equally vague, I think, but the psychic did nail her spirit animal, identifying a horse right off the bat. For anyone who doesn't know, Mala's a certifiable horse nut who runs a boarding stable, gives riding lessons, etc. Pretty cool! My spirit animal was a dove, indicating my need to find peace in all areas of my life.

It was a different experience, and one that I am glad I had. It was emotional at times and I was surprised that I cried at one point, but it was kind of an intense thing. Afterwards I had a dull headache and felt off-balance for a while, so I had a little reiki head rub while Mala had her reading, and felt a little better. I just got home and burned some of the white sage I bought and now I feel very new-agey. :)