Realms of the Raven

I had my (supposedly) final interview today at work for the new test job I’ve been jonesing and angsting over. It went really well - I like the Product Unit Manager (PUM) I interviewed with and he made noises like it was a done deal after he talked to one of the managers and HR. He did say I should hear back this week and if I didn’t, that I should send him an email on Friday morning so he could check on what was going on.

I’m pretty happy (and tired) but I won’t be totally at ease until I have the formal offer. Of course it also means moving my office and taking a bunch of stuff home because it’s possible that I will have to share an office again - BLEH.

Okay, I start the weekly checkins today. Sorry if I bore some folks but a centralized location will be better than being individually quizzed by people since Sunday is check in day for the diet challenge.

238 lbs
baseline
75 lbs to go

We’ll have to see how this all goes since tomorrow I have an interview (supposedly final) for the new test job I’m jonesing for. Did I mention I tend to stress eat? LOL

Ah well, hopefully I’ll be so nervous I don’t WANT to eat.

Hook them TOO!

C has been listening to me wax poetic (well, at least excitedly) about the various authors I really like and Morgan Hawke in particular. She and JaynieR have taught me SO much. I keep expecting him to start rolling his eyes but so far he’s been very polite :)

Today I needed a little while by myself and decided to go to the store - well, there might be a littel bit of procrastination in there too, but what else is new. So before I escaped and stranded him with the Morganator (our pre-schooler), I brought up my copy of Morgan Hawke’s Victorious Star on the laptop.

He only made it through the first sections but I think he may be hooked, or at least well on his way.

Muhahhaahhahahah :)

Maybe this is some offshoot of suckitis, I’m not sure. I’m not quite sure why I’m doing this to myself but I am a bit stuck on the WIP - not because I don’t know what comes next but rather I seem to have some fixation on selling the danged thing. Mind you, I KNOW as an unpublished writer I really do NEED to finish the blasted thing and then sell it, but I keep getting the urge to try to pitch it anyway.

How weird is that?

At the same time I’m sorta dreading the currently unknown realm of synopsis and query letter. (How come I hear from some folks that I need a 2-3 page synopsis and some folks I need a paragraph or two? That’s a rather large disparity, no?) Just what the heck is the synposis supposed to contain? Only the information I’ve actually revealed in the story or the backstory/world info that underlies the information? I have no clue!

Then I get hung up on what publisher…. In this, at least, I’ve had a little bit of success by listening to what a few pubbed authors have to say about the ones they have or are working with.

Ah well, I guess I’ll start collecting data now so when I finish Raven’s White Hart, I can get cracking on the other things required to sell it. And, in case you’re wondering, I do NOT expect that having the data will stop me from fussing at that point either.

So - if anyone has advice on the synposis questions, lay it on me! If you have publisher advice and don’t want to post in public, feel free to PM me (Private Message/Mail for those acronym challenged folks)…

After discovering that RT 2007 is in Houston and several people I really really want to meet will be there, I’m determined to go. It’s too late for me to go to RT this year, so RWA Nationals will be it.

However, I’ve been trying to think of some incentive for a while that might make me lose the extra person I’m carrying around. Every since Baby #2, I’ve had two people’s worth of weight. I can’t seem to get up any real motivation to get rid of it “just because” but I know I want to - boy, I sound very weird, huh?

But I came up with a challenge. My first “goal” weight before I reassess is 140 lbs. My guess at my current weight was about 210-220 so I figured I had about 70-75 lbs or so to lose. RT 2007 is in about 65 weeks. A tiny bit more than a pound a week. That sounds doable.

So I set a goal, if I get to 140 lbs by RT2007, I get Dakota Cassidy to try to help me find a new look. If I do not, I take all the loop babes out for drinks.

Now, as long as I never admit to C that I’m trying to lose weight, things should be good. He has an unfailing ability to get me to eat things out of spite! The Food Police have nothing on that man - he thinks he’s encouraging me but it sounds a whole LOT like nagging to me.

I think this is a good plan and head home. When I get home I get brave and step on the scale - YIKESSSS 241. That’s more like 101 lbs to lose! Hmmm - that doesn’t sound so doable in 65 weeks.

So now I’m going to try to stick to the original estimate of 75 lbs so 175 or so by RT 2007. I’m only going to weigh myself once per week - more makes me NUTS and we’ll see how I do. Either way, I win - hanging with the babes! But dang, if I’m pubbed by then AND lost the weight… I’ll need a whole new wardrobe!

Once my partner in crime/evil twin Jaynie and I determine what day of the week weigh ins will be, I’ll post a baseline weight on that day and then start posting weekly updates.

Okay, so last night I was working on scene leading up to and the scene of the first kiss in my WIP. I probably wrote and erased for a good hour, only ending up with maybe 600 words.

I just came to an almost dead stop trying to write the first kiss scene. I wrote and rewrote, I fussed, I changed the order, I fussed. By my designated curfew time, I had probably written over 2000 words but only 600 remained for the day’s quota.

And I still wasn’t happy. I was unsure as to WHY so I send to snippet to my critique partner and even let C read it. C wasn’t wild but didn’t gag or tell me to go back to my day job.

Still unsatisfied and I wasn’t sure why. This is getting OLD.

So off to work today, I got some Real Work done but also spent a while trying to figure out why I was unhappy. Was it merely a case of the much vaunted “suckitis” or was it more? Maybe it DID suck? I swear my mind was doing a very nice imitation of a tornado or a ferret on crack.

Finally got home and sent an additional copy to my Test Reader to see what she thought - dreading, of course, the “Lame” verdict. Thankfully she says it’s not lame but was very sexy - though it needed a revamp on a line or two. (Thanks Erin!)

But the more I think about it, the more I think perhaps I’m in the wrong POV altogether and THAT’s my issue. This is the first kiss. The heroine is already very weirded out by now and I’m in the hero’s POV. Add to that the fact that most readers want to “be” the heroine.

The more I think about it, the more I am becoming convinced that’s the root of my suckitis.

So I think I’m going to rewrite that section in the other POV and see if that removes my issues. Not being TOO dumb, I’ll save the current version just in case i need to revert to it.

Tyler Blackwood tagged me so here goes:

Current Clothing: Polar fleece pants and shirt
Current Mood: good - actually got to 25% done on my WIP tonight.
Current Refreshment: Coffee
Current Annoyance: one of my cats is trying to sit on the mouse while I’m using it.
Current Avoidance: Huge visio state model for day job.
Current Smell: Mango lip gloss I have on.
Current Thing You Ought To Be Doing: Sleeping
Current Thing or Thing on Your Wall: Dry erase board and EC “hunks” calendar
Current IM Person You’re Talking To: No one, I turned it off when I was writing.
Current Jewelry: 3 sets of captive bead rings, a fire opal ring and necklace. And a piece of body jewelry.
Current Book: Sylvia’s Bad Boys Ahoy - just came in the mail.
Current Worry: Whether I can finish and sell my WIP. And whether it sucks, despite a few reassurances that it doesn’t.
Current Favorite Celebrity: Lofa Tatupu
Current Obsession: writing
Current Love: writing
Current Longing: more sleep
Current Disappointment: Have to do yet another interview for the new job I thought I had bagged.
Current Lyric in Your Head: “The Internet is for Porn”
Current Music: none
Current Favorite Book: No one favorite
Current Wish: That I can sell my WIP and get my fiction writing career off the ground.
Current Happy Thing: I got 25% complete on the WIP!
Current Undergarments: Fuschia and Teal panties
Current Desktop Picture: Glowing Tendrils
Current Weekend Plans: Laundry, housecleaning and writing when I can.

I want to see JaynieR’s list!

I have been trying to work on Raven’s White Hart daily - usually succeeding in getting SOME writing done. Not as much as I wanted to or planned to, but some.

Today I finally hit a new milestone - 25% of my estimated 65K is WRITTEN. Of course I realize that means I still have 75% to go but this is by far the furthest I’ve gotten in my (way) earlier attempts.

Had a piece of chocolate to celebrate and now it’s time for bed.

*skips off to bed*

So Annalee Blysse has tagged me. Wow - never been tagged before :)

I have to narrow down my guilty pleasures to only five so let’s see…

1. Reading - it might sound trite but I own over 1300 ebooks and my house is FULL of book. I’ve lined the upstairs hallway with shelves to contain the paperbacks and have them carefully sorted into genre, then author, then title. But I probably by easily over 50 new books a month. Of those, I may keep 1 or 2. At some point I really have to list the many stacks that are outgoing on half.com or something and get rid of them. I’m constantly reading.

2. Chocolate - I love chocolate. I don’t eat a huge amount of it at a time but I apparently need to have a steady supply on hand. I do have to hide it from the men in the house, though.

3. Craft Supplies - One of my major space hogs is my crafting supplies. I wander back and forth between mulitple crafts - beading, jewelry making, knitting, stained glass, quilting, cross stitch, etc. I have an entire craft ROOM but still have trouble resisting visiting the craft store just to “look around”. Unfortunately that almost alway seems to include buying something.

4. Office Supplies/Storage Containers - I have absolutely no idea why but I have a real liking for always having a lot of office supplies on hand and I am always looking for new and more convenient/nifty/odd ways to store the items I have.

5. Cats - I’m an absolute sucker for cats. I love petting them, I visit the adoption rooms at pet stores just to pet the occupants, I pet the boarders at the vets. I have my own 7 indoor cats, all rescues, but I am always oohing and ahing over other ones. Thankfully I don’t usually bring them home.

I’ll have to decide who to tag next, I’ll get back to you on that!

So, I had the first two chapters of my WIP to a small local critique group I belong to. The last meeting (when I didn’t have anything ready to look at), one of our members pointed out another person’s WIP had an issue - “Everything is blue!” We all laughed and it got fixed.

Today it was my turn. Somehow I had subconsciously set up one of my secondary characters so she was acting like a dog! She snarled, she growled, ROTFLMAO. I about fell out of my chair and for a little while all I could think of was the crit group member’s comment that she didn’t read paranormals but for the first 2/3 of the offering, she thought it was my heroine’s psychic dog!

It’s really funny sometimes what other people see that never would have dawned on you!