I like rules.

There, I said it.

In my seventh grade "I-Search" paper, Do I Want To Be a Writer? (which once upon a time was going to be a Relics post, but I think it might be boring), I read various books about writing as a career and reported the findings. One of the books said that writers were kind of anti-authority, rule-breakers. In my paper, I dutifully mused that this might be a problem for me.

Yeah, I dig rules. And I dig people who dig rules. I find rules to be very freeing, in that as long as you're following 1-6, keeping hands and feet to yourself, raising your hand before you speak, taking the hall pass if you had to use the ladies, sharpening pencils quickly and quietly... you could do whatever you wanted. It's a shame the teachers never caught on and added "7 - Pay attention to the teacher, Katie!"

Working within the boundaries of rules, a child (and now adult) such as myself can successfully beat the system while riding along in its current. Why be the fish out of water? The water keeps you moving.

So, as a writer forming my technique, I came up with Rules. Ahh, sweet rules. Rule 1 - the first draft is crap. Just get it down and then wait six weeks, let one person read it, then make changes as necessary. And the great part is, it worked! Book finished, book improved, book published.

So why is it that now, when I'm still basking in the glow of that sale, I am shaking things up? The WIP is nearly finished. It just needs a resolution. Rulemeister Katie and Little Green Notebook are SO ready to resolve things and get that first draft tucked away for six weeks.

But what's this? Rebellious Hellion Katie (seen here in an undated file photo) isn't obeying the rules. She's not just blissfully ignorant, distracted in that hazy, cop-out way writers get to be. She is BREAKING the rules. She's revising in the first draft. She's changing things and adding scenes and taking things away. And furthermore, the six-week rule is about to get kicked to the curb. Not just ONE person, but TWO, will be taking a gander at this puppy before the paper has even had a chance to unfurl.

And Rebellious Hellion Katie is not sorry. In fact, she looks like she's enjoying herself, which as we all know, is completely unacceptable behavior for a writer.

What's the moral?

Seasons change, people change, yeah? I guess you have to go with what works.

PS - that second photo is notable because I spent the entire evening with one pant leg rolled up and never noticed.

Ooh, that's a good name.

Such a good name that I think I'll use it twice. In the same book. For two completely different characters.

Everybody who's a supergenius take one step forward.

Not so fast, Katie.

This one is for you, M.E.

I have a "how I got my agent" story that I'm sort of afraid to tell, especially after reading some of the tales of woe on the more popular publishing blogs.

I knew my agent in high school. We were in a lot of the same classes, with the same crazy classmates and crazy teachers. I will tell you this: he drove me insane. But he was also hilarious and smart and no matter how self-righteous I was (answer: very extremely), I at least had the sense to exploit those qualities. So we worked on a lot of projects together, projects which went on to be hilarious. To us, at least. At the time.

Years pass. In short, I emailed him because I saw his listing at the alumni website. I sent him my book, and he liked it. The whole process took about five days. Then he sold it. (I pride myself on my continuing ability to exploit his talents.)

I don't know a ton about the literary world (clearly), but I do know this: my agent knows me. He's passionate about my book and put it in the hands of an editor who felt the same way. He tells me I'm not a bother when I ramble on the phone about my dog and the weather and my family.

(He inserts the correct chapter first-pages in several copies of the manuscript when I have discovered the morning the submissions are going out that I've mislabeled, oh, 27 chapters, and convincingly hides his horror at my suggestion that maybe nobody would notice if there were two each of chapter 11 and chapter 14 -- a shameful example of our weak morals here in Hollywood.)

In short, he's pretty awesome and I think that deserves to be acknowledged publicly.

Besides, if someone can carry off the following exchange in 10th grade AP European History, you always want them in your corner:

MS. M_____: And furthermore, I hate you ALL and you're never going to amount to anything if you don't start acting like grown-ups instead of preschoolers. Sit up straight! Don't give me those sad faces! I can't stand being part of this farce -- (she notices M's hand up) -- what is it, M?

M: I just wanted to tell you that you look very nice today, Ms. M_____.

MS. M_____: Thank you, sweetheart. You know I'm not addressing any of this to you.

M: I know.

MS. M_____: But the rest of you are useless vermin and just looking at you and thinking the future of our nation rests on your sad shoulders is enough to make me etc. etc. etc. ...

And so on.

Excuse me for rambling, I just got to reminiscing about high school and thought I'd indulge myself (my elf -- everyone needs an elf to blame things on).

Conflicted.

I am interested in this book (about which I learned on Miss Snark's blog a while back), but I have zero desire to be spotted waiting at the dentist's office reading a book whose cover features a prominent swastika.

I'm scratching my head over this.

I also want there to be a version of "which" to follow the form of "whose".

* A book what's cover...?
* A book which's cover...?
* A book whiz cover...?

Clearly it's time to go to bed.

Forgot one.

The granddaddy of all my confessions:

- Night two of the National Championship (dog show), Best In Show night, I always wear my cat socks.

Last night I dreamt I went to Manderley again.

Untrue, I did not dream I went to Manderley.

I dreamed I went to the Jersey Shore.

I have never been to the Jersey Shore. I have never particularly wanted to go. But in my dream, I somehow ended up there, scrambling out of the water, trying to beat the rising tide up the sand. And far off in the distance were these strikingly beautiful mountains, similar to the Alps. And all of a sudden I knew why people liked the Jersey Shore so much, and talked about going "down the Shore".

I'm afraid to really look up a picture. What if New Jersey really is that beautiful and I've been missing out all my life?

Awful Truths

All right, Maia tagged me with this meme where I have to disclose a bunch of horrible things about myself. I was fairly certain I didn't keep much of it under wraps, but I'll see what I can dredge up.

- I occasionally Google designer dogs and click on the sleazy breeders' ads so they have to pay

- I've owed the library $11 for about four years

- I adore the movie "For Richer or Poorer" with Tim Allen and Kirstie Alley

- Once I took Nyquil so Chris couldn't make me watch another episode of "24" on DVD (he knew, and I was sick, I just could have waited)

- I think a lot of people who spout off against purebred dogs are ignorant and short sighted, and I can explain why at a later date if anyone cares

- Politically, I describe myself as conservative (you can think of me as a Libertarian, if it helps)

- I love McDonalds SO much

- Before my book sold, I would read books and be like, "My book is way better than this."

- I had a dream once where I killed someone with whom I was having conflict, and in my dream I was only sorry I might get caught, not sorry I'd killed the guy

- I'm starting to think there's actually no hope for humanity

(Oh, I have to tag people. I tag Amber (I insist that you disclose the screensaver thing) and Chelsea.)

The leap.

Lucky for me, I'm obsessive compulsive. Or maybe obsessive impulsive. I don't have to open and close the door four times, but if I eat one of the truffles, chances are I will eat all of the truffles, and too bad for you if you didn't show up early enough to get one.

Similarly, when my brain made the transition from writing casually to writing full length, completed novels, suddenly there was no question that I was going to write full length, completed novels. There was the question of whether anyone would like them or want to read them (that question still remains, of course), but there was no longer doubt that the rambling story would find a conclusion and then be revised into something resembling a book.

But how, I wonder, did that decision come about? I don't remember making it. And yet, at some point, between the 50,000 aimless words of "The Ashley Incident" and the first draft of "The Girl Least Likely", I made the leap.

And now, like people who never wanted kids and then had one, or people who do an exotic liver cleanse, or Scientologists, I want this for everyone I know and love, especially my writer friends. I want them to write a full-length, completed book. And I know they have it in them, is the thing. But I remember what it looked like from the other side of the canyon (figuratively, although from my dining room, I can see the other side of the actual canyon), and part of me is paralyzed by the same fear that gripped me during "Ashley Incident" (and won, considering that Ashley & pals have been relegated to the Longform - Back Burner folder).

When I was a senior in high school, I worked on a short "film" called "Count Milkula". It was the story of a vampire who ignites a revolution because of his milk-drinking ways. He is imprisoned and ultimately poisoned, and his vampire BFF takes up the cause for him. I planned the everloving daylights out of that project. I have a notebook of shot lists, prop lists, set diagrams, etc. The day I shot it, things went slowly. We didn't get everything we needed. One of the actors got in big trouble for missing class.

The end result being that I never finished the damn thing. The set was too complicated to recreate. The actors couldn't miss class anymore. I lost the will to go on, so to speak. And I'm not exaggerating when I say that the unfinished business took an enormous dent out of my self-confidence that I'm probably still repairing to this day -- or at least compensating for, with my manic determination to finish my books, to get through the process and begin again. By God, I'm going to start something and then I'm going to finish it!

That story makes it sound like I need to find peace with Count Milkula, to soothe that delicate teenager who was suddenly confronted by the sad fact that, no, not everything turns out right, no matter how much you plan it all out. Part of me is convinced that, if the tape were still lurking in my parents' house, I would edit the damn thing just to get it off my lifelong to-do list.

But... maybe not. After all, every writer needs a neurosis, yes? And maybe what drives every word I write is the unfinished business of a milk-drinking vampire.

I don't know. What I meant was for this post to be encouragement to people on the verge of going for the longform writing project (*cough* you know who you are).

How do I tie this up neatly?

On murdering one's darlings.

Confucius say: People who leave yesterday's coffee mugs on desk sometimes take grody drink of yesterday's coffee.

In high school, one of my teachers taught us this phrase. The fact that for years I went around misquoting it as "kill your babies" is neither here nor there.

I still have about 4,000 words of resolution to go in my WIP. And the way the climax turned out has given me a bunch of tiny tasks, mostly maintenance for one character in particular, and a bolstering of one subplot.

Standing now at third base and preparing to make the run for home, I scan the field and see that something is wrong.

Somebody has to go.

"But HER?" Little Green Notebook asks. "Surely you don't mean HER! We love her!"

We do love her.

"She has a purpose!" LGN squeaks.

I know she does. But I'm starting to feel that her purpose would be better served by another character.

"You're going to lose that awesome joke about the dogs."

That's true.

The notebook hides under a coffee mug while I think about it.

I made a list of pros and cons. The pros outnumbered the cons. How is that supposed to work, anyway? Does quantity win? Because the numbers are in favor of keeping this character, but my gut tells me she must go.

Early in my TV career, I worked on the best development team ever. Because there was so much trust built into the team, you were pretty much free to say anything and believe that it would be received openly. That team taught me two things: (1) the story is the king, and (2) if it doesn't work, cut it. No matter how much you love it.

I love this character, but I suspect she exists more for me than for the story.

Perhaps I should let the husband read before I haul out the excavator and start removing large chunks of storyline (see, and that's the thing -- she's outside the storyline -- and that's how I know she has to skedaddle).

Obsessive and self-indulgent.

Who, me?

I wanted to plant this link here: Winston's Youtube debut

Please be careful if you're at work; there's audio (music). Nothing scandalous, but co-workers in close proximity will know you've taken a break from the TPS reports.

And how this relates to publishing: if the number of times I've checked the view count is any indication, I'm going to be a flaming wreck with my Amazon sales rank next year.

Cheerio!

Bargaining

I'm at 58,638 words. 1500 of those are from tonight, which is good. I didn't write yesterday, but that bit about my conversation with Little Green Notebook is actually pretty close to how I spent my time. I mean, people are coming out of the woodwork to kill/save my protag. I guess that's what you get when you call a book "Seven Sisters".

I missed a party tonight, but the writing means this evening is not a wash.

Although I am having a Mighty Struggle with myself, and it goes something like this:

Every 250 words, go make three quilt squares and deal with the laundry.

The problem (maybe it isn't a problem) is that after the first break, I just kept writing. So now do I go make three quilt squares, or 15 quilt squares, or am I off-duty for the night? Have I earned my way out of this evening's writing cage (written my way out of the proverbial paper bag)?

I will say that since the middle section is finished (first draft finished), the writing now feels more like a sprint than a marathon, and that is A-OK with me. Suddenly things are tumbling into place.

Maybe this thing won't hit 70,000 words on its first draft.

I think my drafts of "The Girl Least Likely" went like this: 1st: 55,000 words; 2nd: 80,000 words; 3rd: 91,000 words (yikes is right -- we're talking YA here); 4th: 81,000 words; 5th: 78,000 words; 6th: 70,000 words.

So now my brain has adopted 70k as the acceptable goal. But I guess no one would collapse into a sobbing heap if it went a little ways one direction or the other from there.

All right, off to do quilt squares and get another glass of water.

The bargaining chips of life... what are yours?


Comments from original posting:

MrsDubois said...
I never keep bargains with myself. I'm a total lax gatekeeper. I'll be like "OK, so you have to do the bathroom, but you can do another page or two." and then five pages later, I'm all "Hey! You fooled me! You're such a stinker!" and I let myself go on.
I have no discipline. None at all.
8:58 AM

Katie said...
Oh, but let the bathroom go! Keep writing!
I have to bargain to get myself to sit down and write. You would never know by watching my work process that this is a career I chose for myself. You'd be like, "What horrible person is forcing that poor girl to torture herself with all that writing?"
I blame Little Green Notebook.
9:01 AM

Christy said...
Bargaining doesn't work for me. I have to put off everything until there is so much work that I could have a heart attack looking at it. Then in an awesome combination of self-loathing and general kick-assness, I get it all finished in a frenetic display of activity. And then I go back to slacking again.
10:50 AM

Mia King said...
I am definitely a carrot-on-a-stick kind of writer. If I do this (write 1,000 words, finish a page, finish a chapter), I get something, usually chocolate. For some reason dangling a potential future advance just doesn't do the trick - I need instant gratification. Lately I've been using the Mrs. May's natural cashew clusters to help me slog through a rough patch in my manuscript ... at this stage, I'm all for whatever works to help me meet my deadlines!
4:30 PM

Where did I put that kitchen sink?

Thank heavens I'm forgiving of my first drafts. As my WIP draws near its conclusion, I find myself and the Little Green Notebook spending an awful lot of time together. "What about this guy, Notebook? He showed up in Chapter 3" (before I abandoned keeping track of chapters and started just calling them all "Chapter Break") "and as you can see, I've put a nice little tease for him back here in Chapter Break, so he really needs to come rushing in, guns a-blazin'."

"Ah, yes," says Notebook. "Shall we have him come in now or when they get to the beach?"

"Well, he's a good swimmer. He could show up at the beach looking all hunky. Maybe shirtless."

Notebook flips her pages and sighs. "It's pouring rain outside. There's actually a tropical storm coming ashore at this point," she says.

"Okay, so make a note of that -- shirt."

"Uh oh," Notebook says. "I have something to confess."

"I don't like that tone, Notebook."

"It's just that I have this character called KF rushing in and saving everyone at the beach."

Oh, yeah, her.

"Should I write shirt next to her name?"

I'm so lost in the maze of thoughts in my head I almost miss this, which would be very embarrassing for KF. "What? Yes, please. All females should wear shirts."

"Boring," Notebook mutters, but she makes the note.

"So what if KF and the hunky hero are working together?"

"Great idea!" Notebook dashes off some notes to herself. "And then after the guy we thought was bad saves the protag on the beach, KF and Hunky Hero can come running in and save them again."

"Uh..."

"You know," Notebook says, fluttering her pages. "Like, maybe from a giant land shark."

Hmm. I try to look like I'm considering it.

She tries again: "Or from that bad guy who needs resolution."

"What? Which bad guy?"

"The bad guy who has that girl. And he really should show up, because we need to know what happens to that girl."

Notebook has a point.

"And," Notebook says, "that other girl."

"Notebook, are you making things up again?"

"Of course not," Notebook says. "You made this note yourself: the other girl. The one who made the phone call to that one lady who's going to show up and save the day at the beach."

"Wait, wait, wait." Now this is just getting silly. "What lady? We already have five people lining up to save the day at the beach."

"Yeah, but this one is teased deep." Notebook has clearly been listening in on TV meetings. "You know, from the top of the book."

"Come on, Notebook. Cut me some slack."

"Cut it for yourself!" she says. "It's your book."

"I know it is." I sigh. "Okay. Here's what we're going to do..."

Notebook and I powwow, and a few minutes later, the entire thing is worked out.

"Wow," says Notebook. "That's really beautiful."

"Why thank you," I reply. I admit that I'm pleased with myself. "And you know, this is only a first draft. I can thin some of this stuff out and make the ending even tighter."

"I think that would be a good idea," Notebook answers, blushing. "This seems to be a problem you have on a regular basis. Maybe you should seek professional help."

"Maybe you should seek a recycle bin."

"Now, come on, play fair," she snaps. "I helped you out of this jam. The story is wrapped up like a Christmas gift from me to you."

A little late, I think, but don't say it out loud.

"So we're good?" I sit back in my chair. "I can just start writing now?"

"Go for it, Champ," Notebook says.

"I can't believe we worked it out so neatly."

"Neither can I," Notebook says. "And let me tell you, it's a good thing you decided not to pay off that whole huge thing with those files. I really appreciate your willingness to let that subplot die a few chapter breaks ago with no resolution." She absently ruffles her pages and yawns. "Because you know how much readers love huge plot holes."

"Now hold on," I say. "We can't let the files slide! We have to deal with this."

"Oh, all right. You could have someone go burn down that building."

Wait a second -- Notebooks can come up with ideas? She's been holding out on me. "That could work."

"It just needs to be someone old enough to drive."

"Right."

"I suppose it could be the bad guy. He could do it on his way to the beach!"

"You're brilliant, Notebook!"

She flaps her cover modestly. "Aw, forget about it."

"So..."

"So we're done," she says.

"Done, as in done?"

"Done, done, done."

"So now," I say, opening the file on my computer, "I can write! And there are no strings hanging off the back of my metaphorical dress."

"None," Notebook says.

I set to work. First word: The. Progress already!

"There's just one thing," Notebook says.

I glare at her.

"Don't any of these people ever have to go to the bathroom?"


Comments from original posting:

Holly Kennedy said...
Great blog site! Congrats and good luck with your first novel when it comes out in 2008. All the best from a fellow author.
7:28 PM

MrsDubois said...
Dude. Stop saying you don't have a muse. It's clearly The Green Notebook.
And I really think you owe it to her to give her a name. Seriously.
1:57 AM

Katie said...
Hi, Holly! Thanks!
Amber, oh Lord, maybe you're right! Don't tell her that, though -- she'll ask for a raise.
8:52 AM

Therese: said...
This post made me laugh!
Congratulations on your book deal, Katie. And thanks for stopping by my blog!
I'm intrigued that you write dog shows for TV... What does that entail, exactly?
1:19 PM

Real quick, fun with titles...

Paperback Writer just posted a fun blog about titles and suggested some fun title generators, from which I got this list of golden nuggets:

"Never Mind The Troll"
"The Flight of Mother Goose"
"Chasing New York City"
"The Good, the Bad, and Batman"

There's also this one and this one.

I might note that my titles vary in origin, ranging from entire books that grow out of a phrase that catches me to something tacked on at the last minute that ends up working well.


Comments from original posting:

Rashenbo said...
Heheh, that's cool! :) Found you on bksp.org and thought I'd pop over and say hello
9:55 AM

Maia said...
I went to title generator and ended up with "The Sisterhood of Jesus." Great title. Thanks for that link, Katie. I generally obsess over titles, and like Paperbackwriter, I need one to begin a project. Love the new picture of your dog. I should post a picture of my King Charles on my site. They are the cutest dogs on the planet. My boyfriend works with a guy who has a King Charles called Freddie, even cuter than my own Lucy, I must admit. I always ask if Freddie would like to come for the weekend, but this guy is on to me now and won't let Fredders out of his sight. He barely got his dog back last time I had him. Dog crazy!
4:36 AM

MrsDubois said...
I'm in love with "Never Mind the Troll". BRILLIANT!
5:53 AM

Stop and smell the shurploz.

"What's in a name? That which we call a rose By any other word would smell as sweet."
Mr. Shakespeare

On the subject of naming characters.

I have always loved names. They're so closely tied to identity and image. Maybe it was my young writer's brain that compelled me to beg for baby name books at the grocery store checkout. To make lists of names -- names I would want, names I wouldn't want, random names matched up by numbers, names of my friends, name I would rename my friends...

So now I'm in the cat-bird seat, aren't I? Because I get to pick whatever names I want (as well as the personalities that go with them). Except suddenly, all of that random list-making is useless to me. Because character names, to me, are never random assignations. They have to Mean Something. And even when they aren't tied directly to a character by definition, there are never multiple names that will do. It has to be the Right Name.

One of my favorite resources is the patron saints index. It's organized by topic. (And if you go to the "by name" search page, you can find awesome names like Swithbert, or St. Laurence O'Toole, whose heart we saw at Christ Church Cathedral in Dublin.)

Some names come easy, and some require agonizing. For instance, Willa, the protag in the work-in-progress, came easy. Jake, her male counterpart, did not. Alexis, the heroine of The Girl Least Likely, came easy. Megan, her counterpart, did not. Some characters come ready-made, as with the heroine of the next book.

I make use of popular name lists if I'm naming teens whose parents might have been in the mood to go with the flow. I shy from them if the parents are free-spirited. Naming a character for an upcoming project can be a months-long process. Currently, I'm working through a whole Rebecca vs. Elizabeth thing for the next-next project. But the book after that is easy -- her name is Issa.

Fortunately I'm fascinated by names, so the whole thing is like one big self-indulgent (I almost typed "elf-indulgent") party.

I may not know my characters' favorite flavor of ice cream, but you can be damn sure I know their middle names.

Writers? Where do you get your character names?


Comments from original posting:

Maia said...
I love the name Issa. Very nice. I always go to Google and look at Baby names. I've also got a list of unusual names I've heard over the years, just so I can use them in a book someday. I don't like using common names because everyone has known someone with that name and maybe didn't like that person.
I had an Estonian friend whose sister was called Vike and I wanted so badly to use that name, but it was too hard to figure out that the "e" was pronounced like a "y," so nobody would get it.
2:04 PM

Katie said...
Thanks, Maia. I was in my car, talking to myself about the story, and the name just worked its way in. It's a little more left-field than I usually go, but it's a future-imperfect story, so I think it fits.
Drawing names from real life is funny. A few names in my book are "tributes" and "mentions", but probably the strangest thing is that I have a really great, noble character named after a friend I had a huge falling out with. But the name suited the character. I hope this person doesn't read the book and think the whole thing is one big apology.
3:17 PM

MrsDubois said...
I HATE picking names. It's my absolute least favorite part of writing, period.
Which is why my characters all have sorta cop-out names. LOL
5:52 AM

Kim Stagliano said...
I enjoy choosing names. Hybrids of people I know who share traits with a character. Names with a certain cadence or alliteration. Names needed to convey ethnicity. JK Rowling is the best - her character names are fun to figure out. Like Sirius Black - Sirius is the dog star and Black turns into a dog. Malfoy - where "mal" means bad or evil. Madame Maxime - who is part Giant. Fun stuff!
6:13 AM

The little green notebook.

I am interrupting a really productive writing jag to blog about this, because I feel like I need distance for a few minutes.

All over my office and through my file cabinets are "development" files. Handwritten notes and ideas and blathering on about stories both pursued and forgotten, storylines carried out or smashed.

How the green notebook happened into my life, I'll never know. All I know is that I would be lost without this damn thing. It has notes in it that actually mean something. It has outlines that actually carry the story along. It has bits of dialogue that elevate the work. It has germs and scraps and lists, and they all mean something to me.

The green notebook is almost always with me, and not in the emotional sense. I mean, it's in my purse. And let me tell you, if my purse got stolen, there's not much in there that would cause me the anguish of the little green notebook falling out of my hands.

It's just a little system, and by God, it works.

It even negotiates deals for me, karmically. In exchange for all of my penitent blogs about ideas I've let slip between my fingers, I found today the basic premise for an idea that I had completely forgotten about. And it's an idea that doesn't suck.

So how about that? Everyone should have a little green notebook. It's the first note-taking device that has ever actually worked -- not let me down.

Okay, back to work.


Comments from original posting:

Chelsea said...
I have a blue notebook... it gets lost regularly and then shows back up. I think it's meant to be in my life. Granted, I am not putting anything more earth shattering in it than grocery lists and birthday reminders...but hey, it works!
Oh, and the word I have to type to verify that I am a person and can post this is coocy....hmmmmmm.
8:55 PM

Maia said...
I need a notebook too, but for some reason can never get organized enought to carry one. I have ten thousand slips of paper instead, which is maddening. I had an idea while a bit tipsy in the Caribbean over the Christmas holidays. It was brilliant! Do you think I could remember it five minutes later? I'm still waiting for it to come back.
5:03 AM

The queen of pain.

I have a knack for injuring myself in really dumb ways. I'm not the kind of person who drops a ten-pound weight on her toe and breaks it. I'm the person who punches herself in the eye. Who throws her shoulder out of whack jumping up to get the cookies off the top shelf. Who routinely claws herself with what didn't seem like really sharp fingernails.

This morning, I slammed my head with the bathroom door. It hurt. It hurt the left side of my head, but it also, for some reason, hurt the right side of my head.

I thtupid.

In other news, noise-canceling headphones. You can't hear yourself type. And that one part in that one song, where the guy whispers into the microphone, suddenly make you think there are voices in your head.

Which clearly is not the case, as I practiced exorcism-by-door-slamming just this very morning.

Winston is cute but he smells funny.

It's a cracktical matter.

A dearly beloved co-worker just said, "SEE? That's why you sold a book!" when I said something about being on a special kind of crack that makes you perfectly rational, and that the crack is called "cracktical". I certainly appreciate the sentiment.

To carry this over to the theme of writing:

My first instinct in ending any story is that there's a kind of ambiguous event that leaves everyone a little bruised, yet stronger. Maybe the people who were supposed to be nice turned bad, and everyone is a little scarred. Maybe the situation wasn't totally resolved. Maybe maybe maybe. Maybe I can bring a parade of misery to the world.

I have a lot of respect for the no-nonsense piece of my brain that's like, "STOP. You self-indulgent ninny." Because I, personally, hate books with unresolved endings. There was a really popular book a few years ago that I detested. The writing was really good, but the storyline was so bad and so depressing. I don't demand my endings gift-wrapped and tied with satin ribbon, but by God, people should come out of the story stronger, smarter, happier, better somehow. Redeemed.

I think it's easier to write an ambigious ending, which is ironic, because that type appears most often in really literary writing, which is supposed to be much more complex than mainstream. A bad happy ending is no better than a bad sad ending, but a good happy ending might be the hardest thing yet. Not the least reason for this being that it requires the writer to put an ear to the fourth wall and take suggestions from the book's audience.

It doesn't have to be puppydogs and ice cream cones, but it needs to be a giving ending.

And so, because of this, I made a major change to a character relationship in my WIP today. I had been going off in a certain direction, and I finally pulled back the reins and got things back under control.

Not surprisingly, it improved the story.

Duh! The only person who can't see stuff like that coming a mile away is the writer who's writing it.


Comments from original posting:

Maia said...
I like a good strong ending too. One that shows the main characters have changed for the better, have learned something. Literary endings sometimes are very ambiguous, which is what we expect from that genre, but mainstream or chick-lit or YA should wrap things up nicely, imho.

I'm having some second thoughts about the ending of my own WIP. I've left one relationship resolution hanging, and I'm wondering if I should. Strange this writing thing, gives us absolute power, but sometimes we're not sure what to do with it!
5:25 AM

Silence.

Big fire in Malibu yesterday. Strong winds, lots of trees to burn.

As I was driving up Laurel Canyon, almost home, I passed three firetrucks driving over the hill from Hollywood. I can only assume they were on their way out to the fire. No sirens, no lights. Just a silent procession of three big trucks, making their way to a forest fire.

It was such a strange moment. What kind of person takes a job where he routinely offers his life up to his fellow man?

The feeling of it is still with me, in a way I can't describe.

Why I do not have children (or kittens): a writing fable

Today, two things happened (again):

1) I forgot another fresh idea (at the time thinking, "Gosh, I wish I had something to record this onto" -- as I used to carry a little digital voice recorder in the car -- and also thinking, "Well, surely I won't forget THIS one.")

Bah humbug!

2) I converted a rough shell of an idea to YA and suddenly it found its voice. And now I am thuper excited about this story, wanting to dive right into it and forsake all others.

But I recognize this behavior in myself: I call it a maternal instinct toward my stories. You know how a mom cat will fight to the death to defend her kittens? And she's all over them for a while, feeding them and cleaning them and nosing them around so they get up and walk like real cats? But then a few months pass and she's over them, kind of?

That's how I get with new ideas. If something jumps up out of the murky subconscious and plays its cards just right and strikes me as the Hot New Thing, I get all googly over it. I explain it to the husb in the most loving but vague terms (which leaves him puzzled yet polite and encouraging), and I make lists of character names, and I start plotting things out, and OH, it's just awesome. I would write it a love poem if I were willing to waste that creative energy on anything but caring for my beautiful new idea.

And then, once I have a few pages of notes, and maybe a first page (I love to write first pages), and some characters written out, and a couple of other random things in place...

I kick it out of the nest and go back to my Work In Progress -- you know, the one that's Almost Done. The one that needs time and love but not that fervent, breathless passion. The kind you can work on because you have your hands in the clay of it; kneading and working on the story and characters.

If the hatchling is meant to fly, it will spread its little wings and mind its own business for a while.

If the hatchling is not meant to fly, well...


Comments from original posting:

Eileen said...
I do this too! I have this LOVE affair with a fresh new idea.
7:48 PM

Maia said...
I have too many first pages of Hot New Things cogitating on my computer, too. I guess they are half baked ideas that may one day provide some inspiration for a bigger project, or maybe they're just products of my half baked imagination!
5:13 AM

Oh, by the way: I read a BOOK!

I know this doesn't seem like that much of an achievement. And fifth-grade Katie who collected all of those Pizza Hut gift certificates for Book-It certainly wouldn't have much to say about someone reading a measly single book. (Tangent: I never got to use my Book-It gift certificates, because they were buy-one-get-one-free or something, and whatever you had to buy was too expensive for my parents to indulge in... man, that sounds angsty!)

But I have been in a significant reading rut for the past, oh, year. This doesn't mean I'm not reading, it just means I'm reading either non-fiction books about the psychology and behavior of dogs or fiction I've read a million times. In other words, I'm not taking chances.

But a week or so ago, I plucked from my bookshelves the copy of The Kite Runner (by Khaled Hosseini) that my stepmother gave me for Christmas 2005. And... I read it! Yes, indeed, I read it cover to cover in a matter of days.

Supply is not the issue here. My bookshelves are overflowing with great (I'm sure) books, just crying out to be read. "Pick me!" they squeak. "Pick me! No, not Pride and Prejudice again! Me me me!"

I was so thrilled by this achievement that I considered starting a second blog to deal exclusively with books I've read and my impressions thereof. But then I thought, I don't like reviewing things. I just want to read. And I certainly don't want to wreck my author karma by making a bunch of smartass remarks about other people's books.

About The Kite Runner, I will say: in a very few places, I was ambivalent about the voice. Too much description from a first-person POV for my taste (and the narrator is a writer, but there's a POV switch that rang false to me). But overwhelmingly, I enjoyed the tone, setting, flavor, and, yes, even the story. (And I can forgive my impressions of the voice because it's all part of painting the setting, which was really well done.)

Next up: Odd Thomas by Dean Koontz. Another Christmas book. Will someone tell me the deal with Dean Koontz? I always thought he was mainstream as all get-out, but the voice in this book impressed me right off the bat. A few chapters in, I see chinks in the armor, I feel the strain of forced detachedness, but I still like it well enough that I could give Koontz's other books a chance. There's nothing better than finding an author with a huge backlist to love! Could keep one reading happily for years.

That's all. Today we're off to the beach, so Winston can bark at rocks and make the other dogs wonder what the heck his problem is.


Comments from original posting:

MrsDubois said...
If you are going to read Dean Koontz, you must, must, MUST read Life Expectancy.
Must. Seriously. It's a fantastic book. It's so great that I would even buy you a copy and mail it to you, were I intrepid enough to have bothered to save your mailing address. Whoops.
Creepy and funny and well written--I think you'd dig it. It's not a deep thinker, but it's crazy entertaining.
12:04 AM

Maia said...
Now I want to read Dean Koontz too. Over the holidays, I was riveted by The Constant Gardener by John Le Carre, my first real thriller I guess. Now I want to read all his books. If Koontz can write half as well as Le Carre, then I'll soon be addicted.
4:47 AM

Katie said...
Amber ~ so you're saying this wasn't a fluke? He's a good writer, and I've been ignoring him all these years? I'll definitely look into the book you mentioned.
Maia ~ I'm going to have to start a list for all of these books to read. I'll let you know when I finish this book if the quality held up. But thinking about it, I have read/seen/heard a lot of people saying that it's among their favorites... so it's probably good!
7:17 AM

Inspirations and the muse.

I know Amber has said that her daughter is her muse.

I don't think I have a muse. I keep thinking about it. Stephen King has the guy in the basement, and in response to that, some (female) authors have put out the idea of the girls in their basements.

We call the downstairs level of my house "the basement", but my sister-in-law is currently living there, and I don't think either of us wants to sign her up for the job.

Winston cannot be my muse, because he is far too frustrating. And where I can easily imagine that every day, Amber's daughter learns something new and gets smarter and brighter and funnier, Winston does not bring much to the table, creatively. (You might say he's the anti-muse -- he likes me just the way I am, especially if I'm devoting 100% of my focus and attention to rubbing his belly.)

So.

So I suppose I've kind of let the universe know I have an ear open, just in case my muse shows up and wants my attention.

In the meantime, I'll just keep plugging away on my own. But I realized yesterday that there are things and situations and places that inspire me more than others, that really get me thinking.

Here's a list of those things:

1. The 1st movement of Rachmaninoff's Piano Concerto No. 3 (maybe the whole thing, but my CD only had the 1st movement)

2. Jane Austen (in fact, if I do have a muse, she is probably straight out of the pages of a Jane Austen book, and the explanation for her absence is therefore clear: she is wandering the garden and flirting with the neighbors when she ought to be sitting here combing my hair! Bitch!)

3. Sitting in the window seat of an airplane and staring at the landscape (which is ironic because I always sit in the aisle seat -- bathroom access is very important to me)

4. The song "Virgin State of Mind" by K's Choice, the song "Pretty Dress" by Rosie Thomas, the song "Earthbound" by Rodney Crowell, the song "Jolene" by Dolly Parton.

5. "The Cloister Walk" by Kathleen Norris, "Gone With the Wind" by Margaret Mitchell, "On Writing" by Stephen King, and the Harry Potter books

That's all that springs to mind at the moment.

What inspires you?


Comments from original post:

MrsDubois said...
The funny thing about my daughter being my muse is that she was my muse before she was even conceived. I kid you not--whenever I have internal dialog with my "muse", she's always been a young girl with long brown hair. And what do I have in my house now? A young girl with long brown hair.
Only now she gets older. And potty trains. You should teach someone/thing to potty learn. LOTS of stories there. LOTS.
1:13 PM

Chelsea said...
Hmmm...I think my inspiration is generally expected reaction, if that makes ANY sense. I mean, my creative outlet is almost always cooking...so, I cook in anticipation of my audience going gaga. Although, I guess I am inspired by the weather, the ingredients and magazines too. hmmmm.
And I disagree with Amber. Avoid Potty learning if you at all can. I suggest having a baby that uses the toilet from day one if you can swing it. PL'ing sucks.
10:54 AM

Katie said...
That makes sense, Chelsea.
And potty-learning... potty-training Winston was enough work for me, and that only took a week.
8:42 AM

Kayli wants more pony stories.

Further adventures from the ice cream notebook.

Untitled
the Blaton family children camp and are yelled at for being noisy

"Even Barllet their Husky sheep dog who was a Colly"
this might only be funny to dog experts

"The only reason that the house was quiet was that the kids were outside pretending to be cops and some robbers and once in a while a banker or something like that."
that's it, Katie, sell it

"Like cool man that's so cool"
at least my dialogue flows


My last day as a turkey
this promises to be upbeat

"They call me Linky the sweet turkey but I'll be sour with all that lemon juice though."

"Oh! My 30 feathers gone to that stupid place called waste."

his friend Sam the horse helps him escape by tossing him over the fence and then foiling the farmer's wife's attempts to ride after him
"I dashed off I could only go a half a mile an hour I'm just naturely slow, so what."


The flying catfish
blah blah flying catfish, a secret note explaining they only fly once every 100 years

Notable for the use of the abbreviation "T.E." instead of the words "The End".


Bigger Than Life
who doesn't love a giant hamster?

"Once there was a little family of hamsters but one isn't so 'little' because its as big as a dog!"

"Whenever a cat or small dog chased them he scared the cat or small dog away, but if it was a big dog or another big animal all but him ran through the hole in the fence but he couldn't because he was to big."
see, now things are looking pretty dark for this hamster, but it turns out he just climbs over the fence


Let Me Tell You About My Dad
this one is in cursive

"He sits around reading the newspaper for an hour and doesn't wear green on St. Patricks day!"


Make my day!
a story about a girl gang who like to shout the titular phrase at people

"Rebecca, who was very ill tempered automatically shouted make my day so she joined the club. For example [actually "erample", because I had not yet mastered the cursive letter "x"], when she got -11 on a test paper and the teacher said, 'I'm going to call your home!' she shouts: 'Make my day!' in the teachers facinated face! Then the dumb teacher shouted 'I'm going to call your house two times now!'"
you have to admit, that's a pretty dumb teacher

but Amy is the true rebel:
"So she said 'Make My Day!' when they wanted her to join there club and kicked everyone in the club. Suzi was stunned."
Suzi can apparently dish it but not take it.

And that, as the saying goes, is all she wrote.


Comments from original posting:

MrsDubois said...
I love going back through and reading my old writing. It's hilarious and heartwarming at the same time.
I will admit that you were far better than I at that age. Far, far. ALTHOUGH. I did write a story in 6th grade that was impressive in that it was 90 wahbillion pages long. OK, not that many, but close.
1:39 AM

Katie said...
It is kind of heartwarming -- I feel a strange affection for the snotty little brat I obviously was.
1:50 PM

The ones that got away.

How strong does a gust of wind have to be to knock over a metal chair with mesh seats? Thankfully, not strong enough to push said chair through our sliding glass doors -- just strong enough to knock it into them and give us a nice midnight scare.

I've never experienced anything like this wind. Certainly not last year, when we first moved into the house. It's a strange, lonely kind of wind. It cuts right through what you might have assumed were warm clothes and knocks the neighbor's wicker reindeer all atumble. I don't like it.

In writing news, as the internet access is out again at home, I'm blogging from the office. Which is a great opportunity to depart from the Relics series and write about things I don't have anymore.

Two things, in particular:

First, yesterday's idea.

I'm not a big writer-downer. I tend to think that if an idea is worth writing about, it'll stick with me. I have one "what-if" scenario that's been bopping around my head for a few months. It's just the faintest germ of an idea, and it might not be the kind of thing I could write, but to my knowledge, it's a new take on a current issue. And that one has stuck. But yesterday's new idea, which, when I thought it up, seemed equally as sticky AND new AND worthwhile... Well, that's one's gone. And I'm trying to give myself the chance to get it back -- gently but persistently suggesting possibilities, which so far have all been rejected.

So wish me luck. I'm going to keep poking around for it. If I can't find it, I'll just chalk it up as a bad idea.

Second, going back to the idea of relics --

I was in fifth grade when my father's mother died of lung cancer. The wake took place during a school trip to Sea Camp, or whatever they called it. My parents determined that I should go to Sea Camp and not to the wake. One of our assignments at Sea Camp was to keep a journal of our time there.

Let's get one thing straight: I am not an adventurous person. I don't WANT to swim with sharks -- even nurse sharks (or "nursing sharks" as Chris accidentally said last night, which is gross and hilarious). I don't WANT to play tag in the swamp (although I had a good time). I did enjoy the thing where we started with a piece of coral that looked like a plain old piece of coral and ended up finding bazillions of awesome sea creatures on it. That was cool.

But overall, it's not my kind of thing. Add to that the fact that the kids from my school actually started a full-on, boy vs. girl RIOT, complete with brooms in the air and rocks being thrown, etc., and it was an interesting weekend.

I'm sure I documented all of that just fine in my green journal, which I turned in as instructed.

My teacher's note, after reviewing it, was some dour observation that I didn't seem to have a very good time at Sea Camp. Looking back now, I don't know if it was an actual criticism (knowing this teacher, it was) or just an impression. This is the teacher who marked down my Pioneer Game journal a few points because I named the pioneers' donkey "Jonny" and "that's not the correct spelling of Johnny", and also because one of the character's brothers went back to Ireland to care for their dying mother and "people didn't go BACK to Europe."

Flash forward to 6th grade, safety patrol trip to Washington, DC. Another journal is assigned. This time, I am determined to please the teacher. So despite all of the actual, real emotions and spats and drama and boredom, etc., I experience, I make sure my journal is jam-packed with sunshine and roses. The whole thing is a sham, which I know as I write it. It's full of vapid praise for Our Nation's Capital and whitewashed accounts of sharing a room with three other girls, who fought the entire time. It's a lie.

The teacher loved it, and was so glad I enjoyed this trip more than Sea Camp.

The green journal is gone. I'm sure I destroyed it, feeling ashamed of my honest accounts of a trip I didn't want to take taken two days after the death of my grandmother. Probably the first really true-to-myself thing I ever wrote -- struggling to fit in, struggling to live up to expectations under which I struggle to this day -- tossed away because a teacher told me it was too honest.

I kept the Washington DC journal, but I didn't pack it up and bring it to California. I didn't even crack it open and read it.

Why should I? It's just a big fat lie, and I even knew it when I was 11 years old.

Relics, Part 2: The Ice Cream Notebook

Two quick bits of Other News:

1. Winston ate an entire sample of eye cream last night.

2. I'm about to start a scrappy quilt... Only 320 more scraps before I can start piecing.

* * * * *

Continuing the series about my childhood home and the few items left behind... Probably the one thing I was most excited to find (because The Play has been safely with me in California for years now) was my third grade creative writing notebook.

That was the first year anyone encouraged us to write narrative pieces. You might say I jumped right in. Reading back through these is an exercise in bewilderment, humility, and wonder. There is also a little compassion for the class and teacher who had to hear me read these out loud.

The notebook itself is a simple wirebound notebook with a pink border surrounding a surreal field of ice cream cones in a sea of ice water (I don't know who would do this to an ice cream cone, but that's neither here nor there). Shiny cherries fall from the sky, unbound by the geography of the pink border. Across the bottom, in fuschia, are the words "Fantasy Freeze (TM)". The price tag indicates that it was purchased at SuperX for $1.39. The back cover has a diagram of how a computer network is configured, which I'm sure was on the minds of all the girls lining up to buy Fantasy Freeze (TM) notebooks. At the top of the cover, someone wrote katie [sic] in permanent ink.

Inside, the stories start small and pick up steam. Reading them, I get the strangest sense about this third-grade child who felt compelled to create sprawling epic stories, most involving ponies (???), carefully using all of her friends' names (an important political move, considering these were read aloud in class -- like calling the radio station in 7th grade and saying good night to your loser friends AND the popular kids who don't even know who you are), and a striking affinity for naming streets. Anytime someone goes anywhere, the entire route is documented.

Third grade was one of the last years of real, unpredictable transition in my early life; my divorced parents were asset-swapping and I don't really remember where I lived that year or the years before. But in my stories, everyone has a home. And usually five or six siblings, a whole mess of friends, and loving parents who say the darnedest things.

And at least one pony.

Selected Excerpts

Me Myself and I
an autobiographical piece
"And I can't forget to say my brother and sister are brats."

Fee Fi Fo Fum
a fairy tale about a pretty girl who apparently has short-term memory problems
"One day on her walk she heard Jim the faithful paper boy anybody could count on. She walked right on past until she hear the words Jason Olen missing! Oh help she screamed running bloody murder!"

"My are you beautiful darling. I was born with it she said in a dazed voice."

Ribbons the Pony
searching for a new home for a retiring circus pony
"The auction was all day and everyone was sweating by the time it was over. But Ribbons had not been sold so they went door to door but no one had room for a pony."

"She already met the girl that helped her up because she fell on the pebbely road she couldn't help laughing at herself she didn't ballance good on her bike." <-- ripped from the headlines is that right there

What I love about this one is that it's three pages of a little girl named Nancy scheming and scheming to get her dad to buy Ribbons, and at the end I throw in the fact that they also bought another pony.

The Show Pony
a theme we've seen before
"Maybe said his little girl that hated the horse maybe the leather maker will take her [the farmer says] I don't want to see her go but we cannot offord to keep her. or the other horses but I won't sell them."

I want to know what's so great about the other horses. In the end, the leather maker does not take Sparkle; another farmer takes her, renames her Rebal, and trains her to work with wild animals.

A Most Unusual Pet
This story is five pages of talking about my friends and naming streets in a quest to find a Halloween costume. In the last paragraph, when the main character has decided to be a rock star, the mop she is planning to use as a wig comes to life and she is left with a MOST UNUSUAL PET.

Okay, that's probably enough self-indulgent blogging for today.

Next in the series: My seventh grade I-Search paper.

Uno mas... one little pet peeve.

This popped into my head, and I have to get it down, because clearly I forgot about it the last time.

Paragraphs that are all the same length.

Now, I don't mean in a hook or a query letter or whatever. But in a short story, or an excerpt from something longer, a page that isn't interesting visually actually hurts my brain to look at.

The implication is: "Everything here is more of the same."

Change it up!

Relics, Part 1

I have totally forgotten to blog about this. Must be a mental block of some sort.

When we were in Florida for the holidays, I went into the west closet in the office of my parents' house; this is the only place where my possessions are still stored. Eight years ago, that closet was crammed full, but now it's dwindled to a crate full of photo albums, a box with some really random memorabilia, a box of books, and a Rubbermaid tub full of memories.

80% of the space in this tub is taken up by letters. I was an avid correspondent in my youth. I wrote letters not only to friends at summercamp but to friends who were not at summercamp. I wrote to my mother, my brother, my older sister, my boyfriend, my girlfriends, and everyone else. When I went to college, that circle expanded to include teachers. Summer between freshman and sophomore years, I wrote random letters to two of my film school classmates. One of them was a guy I hadn't known very well until we worked on a project together at the end of the year. He found out I'd broken up with my boyfriend and took me to Waffle House to cheer me up. I didn't know at the time that six years later, we'd be married. (The other guy I wrote a letter to is a good friend.)

One of the crowning achievements of letter-writing, Ever In the History of the World, is an epic called "The Play" written by myself and my friend Alex (used to be Scott). He was a freshman in college and I was a senior in high school, and every letter we exchanged also contained an act of The Play, starring him, me, our friend Kelly, my cat Tigger, an evil antagonist who cannot be named, Bill Gates, a Swedish man named Oter, and a cast of millions, including a talking snake.

The Play, an Excerpt
Act 23: My Once-In-A-Lifetime

SCOTT: I have an idea. We'll get arrested and put in the dungeon*, then we can rescue Kelly!
KATIE: Scott, that is totally the most brilliant idea you've ever had, and I'm not just saying that because I'm in a drunken stupor ** with 65% of my judgment impaired. Let's go!
(They go.)
END OF ACT 23

Everyone loves to get letters, yes? I'm sure I brightened a lot of mail-fetching expeditions (and the volume of letters I received indicates the same about my correspondents). But let's be honest; in most cases, I was writing for myself as much as for the other person. Why? Because I had something to say and I wanted somebody to hear it. I guess you could say I've been blogging all my life -- just on paper.

But at the same time, a letter is more than an open missive to the internet; it's a connection, a moment, and a reminder that, even if you're just looking for a brain dump, the recipient is the person whom you chose to dump toward.

I still have two or three boxesful of stationary; at this rate, it will last me the rest of my life.

I think I need to start writing more letters.


* Bill Gates's dungeon; he had kidnapped Kelly.
** I didn't drink in high school, I just wrote plays about it.

Next blog: Relics, Part 2: The Ice Cream Notebook

Comments from original posting:

Alex said...
Hey - I have all the letters and that nice, bound copy of the play you sent me. What I really want in life is to see Kelly's film school short that was based on one of the acts. I want to see someone playing me.
8:49 AM

Katie said...
I have a copy of that somewhere.
9:11 AM

Alex said...
You have a copy?!?! Can you not sense my excitement by the use of intermixed "?" and "!" marks?
How can I get a copy from you?
12:10 PM

Katie said...
Bribery is usually a pretty good option.
8:47 PM

Geography

Last night was the second big wind storm we've had this season (I almost said "year", but we all know that can't be true!). Last week the wind blew toward the south, into the wall of windows. You could hear the big gusts smacking against the glass. Last night, it blew from the east, coming in huge surges and then quieting for a couple of minutes and surging again. We really thought that the pepper tree might hit the bedroom wall. Branches were hitting the balcony railing.

This week, the moon is in perfect position so I can see it in the sky when I wake up in the middle of the night. Or at 6 am, which is what time my alarm clock went off this morning. Why? Because today I go back to work.

I never, ever, ever get sympathy when I whine about going back to the office after a month hiatus. And no matter how much I dread it, the first day back is always a good time. After all, I happen to work with some really great people. But that doesn't make the drive any easier.

This morning I came out to get my coffee just as the moon was setting over the mountains across the valley. Against the pale blue sky, it looked like a forest fire or explosion just on the other side of the hill.

One of my favorite things about this house is that you can't tell you're in the middle of the city when you look out the back. It's just trees. In the distance there are buildings and lights, but the whole thing gives you the feeling that you're hidden away from everything.

Cheers!


Comments from original post:

Alex said...
It's interesting that you like the view out back where you can't tell you're in a city. One of my favourite things about my house is the view from the bedroom at night, you can see a giant H on the hospital and I feel like I'm in an apartment in the Bronx. I've never been in an apartment in the Bronx, the view is just how I imagine it would look.
10:47 AM

Katie said...
I took another look this morning just to make sure that's what I love about it; yup. You should come visit some time. I'll introduce you to my Canadian friends.
7:40 PM

Obligatory New Year Post

Happy New Year! Raise your hand if you can believe it's 2007 already. What happened to 2006?

I have high hopes for '07. I was talking to a friend about this at our NYE gathering: I think I'm developing a superstition that my decades all resemble one another. "---3" years (1993, 2003) are all about change and struggle. Harmony comes in "---4". "---5" brings change, but good change. "---6" brings big change and a little bit of angst, which I did experience. "---7"? Well, '97 was a good year. Busy. Productive. I also ran 3 miles a day and weighed 123 pounds and wore a size 3-4.

I could live with that, although I would settle for walking three miles a day and weighing 133 pounds. (Hell, right now I'd settle for... but we won't talk about that.)

Really. Goals ("resolutions" might be a better word -- more customary):

(1) Now that the contract is nearly buttoned up, work with my editor to get "The Girl Least Likely" into publishable shape.

(2) Finish up "7S" -- actually, this first draft should be done by the end of January.

(3) Get a first draft done of "AW" by the end of the year -- now THAT would be something.

(4) Sew some baby quilts for some future babies I know about.

(5) Blah blah be a better person get in shape eat healthier stop tossing bottles of rum off the counter (it was an accident!)...

Hope 2007 brings prosperity and happiness for all of my loyal readers. All five of you.

Mwah!

k.