#AccountaClub? Thanksgiving week? Who are we kidding?!

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Though the fitness was great this week, of course there’s been no writing or editing worth mentioning, so why not focus on the writing past? That is complete? And conveniently housed in book form?

BUT WAIT! THERE ARE STILL MORE! Here they are.

Even quick reads:

This collection of short stories should be free, and it is from other sellers! Like:

Want it free from Amazon? Let them know!

The Work of Writing 11: Inspiration

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I was looking for a topic for the blog this morning. I had one, one of those genius ideas you think you’ll never forget until you do, and so when I sat down to write, I was blank.

So I thought I’d go with a random word generator to spark something. My first word was “strategic.” OK, I thought, I can work with “strategic.” Until I saw the photos for it, which were all chess pieces, and I don’t play chess and do you want an entire post about how I don’t play chess but it’s a metaphor?

Didn’t think so.

My second word was “subject,” which was such superb trolling from the universe I had to share it. Is there any word that could be less useful to spark a blog post than “subject?”

Isn’t that what I’m looking for?

Word 3: Funeral.

Um, no.

Word 4: Courtesy.

Eh.

Word 5: Basis.

Yes. Really. Basis. “Subject” and “basis.” I spoke too soon about subject being the least useful word.

Word 6: Cell.

Huh. That could do it. Cell. Biology. Phone. Prison. Cell has options. Hmm. Cell. But maybe the next one is better.

Word 7: Threat.

Is the random word generator getting annoyed with me? That one has bad mojo. Maybe I should go back to cell.

Word 8: Crouch. Umm.

Word 9: Will. Now I can’t help but wonder if this goes along with “threat” as in write your. Or will power. Will or cell. Will or cell. Interesting.

Word 10: Cable.

I was going to stop at 10, but cable? CABLE?! What?

Word 11: Knot.

Well played, universe. Well played.

Sometimes the tricks to get us moving work. And sometimes, they kind of don’t. The motivational helper that un-KNOTS the CABLE (what? People say that all the time) one day might not do a thing the next.

And that’s fine.

Sometimes there’s inspiration in the failure.

Like my political side? Read my opinion pieces here.

Check out  my full-length novels: 

Aunty Ida’s Full-Service Mental Institution (by Invitation Only)   

Aunty Ida’s Holey Amazing Sleeping Preparation (Not Doctor Recommended) 

 Her Cousin Much Removed

 The Great Paradox and the Innies and Outies of Time Management.

And download Better Living Through GRAVY and Other Oddities, it’s free!

Peruse Montraps Publishing.

Rewind: Candidly; The Work of Writing Two: #AtoZChallenge

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By Wilson Afonso from Sydney, Australia (Just browsing Uploaded by JohnnyMrNinja) [CC BY 2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0)%5D, via Wikimedia Commons

It’s time for a blog rewind! A replay of a previous post, originally published during the A to Z Challenge on April 4, 2017. Enjoy!

Again.

(More Work of Writing Posts.)

 

Once again, this account is completely and totally fictional which means it never happened and is not true and is made up and is fictional.

And definitely not true.

Ah. New day. A good day. A good day to get some real work done. Some serious work. Serious work. Ser-ee-ous.

Let’s just move that remote off of the coffee tabl–DAMN IT!

I’ve never seen a glass spin like that. End over end. I barely tapped it. Barely. And now it’s everywhere. At least it’s only water. Only water, it will dry. And the glass didn’t break. Good. Back to it. Wait, need a little paper towel to blot it up. OK. Blog post then editing.

Blog post. Right. Blog post. Blog POST. Bloggity blog blog blog. Post.

Some more decaf? Yep. More decaf. Ah, that looks good, just blot the bottom of the cup, looks like there’s a little coffee there, and–DAMN IT!

It’s fine, it’s fine, the coffee did kind of jump out of the cup, but at least it didn’t go IN the toaster. A little under, sure but a quick wipe and, yep, we’re ready to go.

Cofffee is set and stable (ha! So funny. I’m a spiller! A spiller who can laugh at herself. Hmm. Maybe write that down). Time for some real work. Serious work. Ser-ee-ous.

Right after I make sure there’s no more coffee under the toaster.

Check out  my full-length novels,  Her Cousin Much Removed,  The Great Paradox and the Innies and Outies of Time Management and Aunty Ida’s Full-Service Mental Institution (by Invitation Only), and the sequel, Aunty Ida’s Holey Amazing Sleeping Preparation (Not Doctor Recommended) which is now available!

And download Better Living Through GRAVY and Other Oddities, it’s free!

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Blog Flashback!

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person typing on typewriter

Photo by rawpixel.com on Pexels.com

Hope you enjoy another chance to read this post about the Work of Writing! Back with a new Ten Word Photo Prompt tomorrow. One that works; I just saw that something happened to the previous picture, so I won’t use that site again.

Note: The below account is entirely fictional and does not in any way reflect what I may or may not have done at any time, including this morning, even if it sounds like it’s possible, remember it’s totally fictional. Fictional.

  • Good morning! Grasp coffee cup with both hands, staring beatifically out of the window. It’s Monday. Let’s get to it!
  • Oops! Gotta eat! Breakfast!
  • Check twitter.
  • Clean new electric kettle by boiling water. Huh. It needs a trivet.
  • Shop online for trivets.
  • Buy coasters.
  • Read trivet reviews closely. Scrutinize colors. Can it open a jar? Suddenly absolutely, positively need silicone trivets that can open jars.
  • Finally select trivets. Success!
  • Change mind, choose other trivets.
  • Look out window. Onward!
  • Check twitter.
  • Computer slow. Must reboot. Maybe run a check.
  • Shut down.
  • Screen is dirty. Clean screen.
  • Reboot.
  • Run scan.
  • Look out window. Can’t go onward. Must have computer to write.
  • Also must have computer to blog.
  • Also must have computer to edit.
  • Also must have computer to twitter.
  • Check twitter on phone.
  • Still scanning.
  • Pace. Every bit of exercise counts, right?
  • Still scanning
  • Inspiration! Remember the ancient method of writing with pen and paper.
  • Scratch out blog post.
  • Still scanning.
  • Take kettle for a test drive.
  • Scanning finished! Look at handwritten post. Remember why use computer to write everything.
  • Oops! Kettle’s ready. Make tea.
  • Clean out silicone Mana-Tea which also may or may not be fictional (it’s not. It’s adorable).
  • Glance out window grasping mug of tea with both hands. Onward?
  • Check twitter.

Like my political side? Read my opinion pieces here.

Check out  my full-length novels: 

Aunty Ida’s Full-Service Mental Institution (by Invitation Only)   

Aunty Ida’s Holey Amazing Sleeping Preparation (Not Doctor Recommended) 

 Her Cousin Much Removed

 The Great Paradox and the Innies and Outies of Time Management.

And download Better Living Through GRAVY and Other Oddities, it’s free!

Peruse Montraps Publishing.

Wednesday Wisdom, but not so wise.

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brown monkey photo

Photo by Magda Ehlers on Pexels.com

Right now, it feels as though the entire universe is reflected in a pane of glass held at angle, so everything is distorted and out of place. I’m having a hard time believing reality is reality.

Don’t worry, it’s not a mental break or anything; I can safely say in this case, the fault lies with reality itself. Things are weird.

And not my kind of weird, either.

I’m resisting throwing a freight train metaphor in here too, because the whole universe in glass and the train are a bit much and then you think broken glass and the whole thing gets messy.

But I have to say that it’s one of those days where it feels like the very fabric of time and space may be torn open, (shattered? perhaps I should have gone train after all) and “one of those days” makes it sound like they happen a lot. And they don’t.

Blogging seems a little trivial.

It’s as though the very first alien spaceship could land right now, and here I’d be, typing a blog post. Aliens could be fun.

Or very, very not.

Also it’s probably not aliens.

Whatever it is, I hope it’s the thing that gets us back to our real timeline, because this one is not great. We can’t even mock it anymore, it’s gotten too out of control, too depressing.

I hope we can count on the aliens.

Like my political side? Read my opinion pieces here.

Check out  my full-length novels: 

Aunty Ida’s Full-Service Mental Institution (by Invitation Only)   

Aunty Ida’s Holey Amazing Sleeping Preparation (Not Doctor Recommended) 

 Her Cousin Much Removed

 The Great Paradox and the Innies and Outies of Time Management.

And download Better Living Through GRAVY and Other Oddities, it’s free!

Peruse Montraps Publishing.

 

It’s Labor Day!

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Copy of YOU ARE SIMPLY THE (2)The day we honor the resilience and fortitude of the Labor Movement. It’s also a day people tend to barbecue for some reason.

It’s a holiday here, so I’ll treat it as such; if you super-duper miss me, click the image above and check out one of my books! They’re like hanging out with me here, but longer.

And weirder.

Mostly weirder.

 

Some thoughts. Mostly mine.

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beverage blank blank space brown

Photo by Pixabay on Pexels.com

Hammering and drilling again. No idea why or where it’s coming from; I’m starting to think my neighbor has secrets of the mad scientist variety.

At least that would be interesting.

I was wrong about the rain yesterday, and got caught in it, but luckily I had a nice big umbrella, courtesy of Abt Electronics. If you can snag one of their umbrellas during a promotion (nearly typed “premonition”…huh) then do. They are mighty umbrellas.

And with a major digression, I just got an email from TJ Maxx telling me, “these are so you.” My questions: What are “so me,” and how would TJ Maxx know?

Yes, I opened the email. No, there really wasn’t anything there, just categories of clothing. About as disappointing as the real reason for the drilling and hammering likely would be.

Reading this post back, I sure have retail on the brain today. Weird. Not really in the market to buy anything at the moment, yet two brand names have wormed their way into my consciousness enough to end up here.

It’s so odd, we never really know what’s influencing us, driving us, whispering in our ears so quietly the ideas feel like our own. Sometimes we can harness it for our benefit; often we’re being harnessed for another benefit.

Creepy.

Though not quite as creepy as that drilling and hammering that seems to have stopped. Step one to world domination must be complete.

What’s whispering to you today?

Like my political side? Read my opinion pieces here.

Check out  my full-length novels: 

Aunty Ida’s Full-Service Mental Institution (by Invitation Only)   

Aunty Ida’s Holey Amazing Sleeping Preparation (Not Doctor Recommended) 

 Her Cousin Much Removed

 The Great Paradox and the Innies and Outies of Time Management.

And download Better Living Through GRAVY and Other Oddities, it’s free!

Peruse Montraps Publishing.

 

 

So. Yeah. Tuesday.

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slippery foot dangerous fall

Photo by Pixabay on Pexels.com

So much Tuesday. The rain is gone, for now at least, and from here it looks like serious summer. Postcard summer.

The kind of summer that seems impossible in January.

I’ve got a little time-pressure, which isn’t how I generally blog. I like a languid expression of the day, a quiet intro, or middle-tro as the case may be. Not today.

Today these fingers better get moving. It would help if they moved more accurately. I’m typo-city right now.

But here’s the thing about typos. Sometimes they result in the most-fun things, like my previously-mentioned “caffiend.” I mean it’s so perfect, I kinda think that part of my brain did it on purpose.

Or so I choose to believe.

None of those today, though. Unless “thsoe” sounds interesting. Which, come on, we both know it doesn’t.

Fun fact: it took me three tries to get the typo spelled the way I wrote it the first time.

So no creativity in my mistakes. Today they’re just mistakes. And that’s OK too, or so I hear. Making mistakes.

It’s weird that we seem to make more of them when it’s important that we don’t. Pressure or contrary human nature, who knows which, but the need for perfection always draws them in like flypaper.

Does flypaper work? That’s one of those purely-for-simile-effect things for me, I’ve never used flypaper. But magnets get all the metaphors, so I thought I’d go a different way.

But  I digress.

Maybe the answer is to let perfection go and by doing so, lose all of its crafty traps.

Tuesday on.

Like my political side? Read my opinion pieces here.

Check out  my full-length novels: 

Aunty Ida’s Full-Service Mental Institution (by Invitation Only)   

Aunty Ida’s Holey Amazing Sleeping Preparation (Not Doctor Recommended) 

 Her Cousin Much Removed

 The Great Paradox and the Innies and Outies of Time Management.

And download Better Living Through GRAVY and Other Oddities, it’s free!

Peruse Montraps Publishing.

 

The hierarchy of blankness

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Ah, the blankness of a new blog post. Some mornings, a little daunting, but not as daunting as a blank page in a manuscript.

The hierarchy of blankness.

Which I think sounds like the title of a work of literary fiction, which, being literary fiction, would of course end bleakly. After a bleak middle. And a surprisingly unbleak beginning.

That’s how they getcha.

I sit here, wanting more coffee, reminding myself it’s the first of the month so it’s a fun day for bills, and really logic dictates that the rest of the first of the month stuff will go much more smoothly if I have that coffee.

Or maybe I’m lying to myself.

Eh, does it matter? I’ll make it a half-caff. Back in a sec.

And off it brews. I’ve only looked at a tiny fraction of my photos so far, I took thousands. Thousands and thousands of pictures. I might have gone a little overboard, but thankfully, given I was on a cruise ship, not in the literal sense.

That’s a different kind of blankness, the Blankness of Multitudes, which is, of course, the sequel to the Hierarchy of Blankness. It’s a book you dive into hoping that some of the bleakness is undone somehow, but it never is.

But I digress. It’s a state where you see nothing because you have too much in front of you, too many pathways, too many options, in my case, far too many photos.

And to that I have just one thing to say. Is that coffee ready yet?!

Like my political side? Read my opinion pieces here.

Check out  my full-length novels: 

Aunty Ida’s Full-Service Mental Institution (by Invitation Only)   

Aunty Ida’s Holey Amazing Sleeping Preparation (Not Doctor Recommended) 

 Her Cousin Much Removed

 The Great Paradox and the Innies and Outies of Time Management.

And download Better Living Through GRAVY and Other Oddities, it’s free!

Peruse Montraps Publishing.

Scale is weird.

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Glacier Bay, Alaska. How incredibly beautiful is that?!

So I’m starting to see the beauty in blogging ahead. It took a lot of prep before I left for my amazing trip, but having the posts just quietly post by themselves was really fantastic.

Though, it’s pretty difficult to be spontaneous and talk about what’s happening now when planning ahead, and that’s kinda the thing here, so there’s that. Still, it’s good to keep in mind for future reference.

And speaking of beauty, how gorgeous was Glacier Bay? It was difficult to believe it was July, it was coat and hat and gloves weather. Sweet, clean air with that edge of coolness to it.  Refreshing, inside and out.

We couldn’t get off the boat in Glacier Bay, and it was tough to see just how big these glaciers are. Here’s a picture with a cruise ship for scale; I’m not sure it’s the same glacier, I’d have to do some forensic time matching, as the pic above is from my phone. Which is an excellent wide-angle lens.

I think it’s the same one.

Scale is something I had much time to think about way out there, where everything is huge and we are so tiny. Where even an enormous cruise ship looks like a dot. Where you can’t judge the distance, and all you can do is take in the view.

Things can feel smaller than they are; things can feel larger than they are; and all of that is relative to something else entirely. Usually us.

See what I mean? Would you believe me if I told you there were kayakers in that shot?

So I guess what I’m saying is sometimes things really are the glacier. Sometimes they’re the cruise ship.

But mostly, almost always, they’re the kayakers.

Like my political side? Read my opinion pieces here.

Check out  my full-length novels: 

Aunty Ida’s Full-Service Mental Institution (by Invitation Only)   

Aunty Ida’s Holey Amazing Sleeping Preparation (Not Doctor Recommended) 

 Her Cousin Much Removed

 The Great Paradox and the Innies and Outies of Time Management.

And download Better Living Through GRAVY and Other Oddities, it’s free!

Peruse Montraps Publishing.