Tag Archives: wip

Writing, Life, and Your Day Job

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1. Raise your hand if you recently woke up, struggling to push the September calendar off your face? Summer just snuck off and left me with lunches to pack, and kids to haul around to ballet, tap, Girl Scouts, Boy Scouts, soccer practice, and healthy dinners to plan and make and try to eat between all those activities I signed my kids up for. I look at it and I’m tired already. Plus I’ll be 40 this month. Oh yeah, and I am back at work.

 As a teacher, I had two glorious months off for summer.  Did I write daily?  Did I finish my WIP?  Nope.  I committed to spending more time with my babies, and wrote a little at night.  I wasted a lot of my late evenings fighting my addiction to popcorn with parmesan on it, and movies On Demand.  But all summer I longed for my normal, comfy writing time–the two hour window from when I get home from work and the kids get home from school. But I look at the week ahead and wonder when the heck I’ll get back to my characters. Sorry for griping, I mean I do love my job, and I am the only one to blame for my kids having evening activities. How do you manage writing, life, and your day job? I’m curious to see where it fits into your schedule.

 2. Speaking of lunches, don’t you hate packing them for work or school? I rarely let my kids buy school lunch because it gets expensive and they serve too much processed food. On TV the other night, the news had a story about a business in Seattle that makes and delivers healthy lunches to school for your child. Fantazimo What a cool idea! I also found out I went to high school with the couple. They started this because of their son having Celiac disease.

 3. The teacher store I shop at is also an Indie bookstore. While I was there the other day, a new book caught my eye. And really, how could it not?  Fat Vampire by Adam Rex. I’ve heard about this book and I love the cover, but I don’t think I’ll look at the Icees I get my kids every time we go to Target quite the same way ever again!

4. Speaking of Target, off I go.  We’re out of school lunch snacks and toothpaste, and 3 things from my son’s school supply list I forgot to buy.

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A List Blog and Our New Dog

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1. I’ve decided my favorite blogs to read are list blogs where the blog writer numbers everything.  I love to read blogs and I tend to skip really long blogs because I’m using time I should be spending writing.  I know you all know how I feel.  You look up at the clock and think, holy cow, now I’ve wasted all my writing time and it’s time to make dinner!  With that said, I will write my blogs this way from now on.  Or until next week when I’ve forgotten that I was going to write my blogs this way.

2. It’s been difficult to get anything done because of this.  Our new puppy, a chihuahua named Pepper.  So fun and adorable, until she poops on the floor.  She’s getting better, but we’ve run through a whole container of Lysol wipes.  I don’t love being reminded of the days when I potty-trained my kids.

3. I’m 27,000 words into my WIP, which I’m so excited about, and which distracts me from the query blues on my other story.

4. So all summer I’ve hardly written, because I’ve been hanging out with my kids and watching too many movies, and eating too much ice cream.  So in the past week I’ve really been on a roll with the WIP and the bummer is that now it’s time to go back to the classroom and get ready for the job I’m actually paid for.  My kids on the other hand, can’t wait for school.  They’re sick of summer, sick of the pool, sick of entertaining the dog, etc.

5. The thing that I look forward to at this time of year is when Target, the best store on earth, moves all of their back-to-school stuff out and moves all the Halloween stuff in!  I’m guessing I have about a two-week wait to see that.  I’ve already decided I’m putting up Halloween lights inside around my writing nook, and leaving them up until it’s time to put up Christmas lights.  I think I’m inspired artistically by decorative lights.  I’ll post a picture when I get them.  How about you?  What are you looking forward to now that summer is ending?

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