Through the muck and the mire...

So first off, apologies for the down time between posts.  Between Christmas, work and the fact that I've had a terribly bad, weird face headache thing for the past several days that has had me all hopped up on meds and unable to sleep most nights, blogging has been one of the last things on my mind.  But it's almost New Years and then I mean to buckle back down on my somewhat neglected writing and get to work.

So "The Plan" has me finishing my editing of Runaway Train by the end of January but it is very difficult going right now.  I don't really know how to edit and it is much too short so I'm still trying to figure out what to add.  Some of it I have figured out but I'm fighting every step of the way not to get drawn into a shiny new project that would be much more fun than the muck and mire of editing this novel.

But on a slightly brighter note, I found a novel I want to adapt into a screenplay.  I've been hunting for sometime for a novel in the public domain that I could write a screenplay from, and I finally found it.  The book (*shakes a bit with fear at the thought that someone might steal her idea*) is "Rilla of Ingleside", the last of the Anne of Green Gables books.  It follows Rilla Blythe, Anne's youngest teenaged daughter, through life on the home front of World War I Canada.  It was always my favorite of the Anne books and I think it would make a fabulous movie.  I don't know where adapting that will fit into my writing schedule, but we'll see.

Well, I'm off to heat up some leftover green bean casserole for lunch, so fare you well.

Merry Christmas!

Yes, I realize that it's not actually Christmas yet, but this will likely be my last blog entry until after Christmas, so I thought I'd wish you all a very merry Christmas.

This last week has been hectic but with one day to spare (Aaron and I are going down to visit my family tomorrow) my Christmas shopping is done, so I just have to finish wrapping everything today and make some Christmas cookies and then I'll be ready to go!!!!

So amid all of the crazy shopping and what not, I hope you all have time to sit down and spend some time enjoying the season with friends and family and remembering that it's not about the presents or what not, but about spending another year with your family and friends and relaxing.

And a very merry Christmas to you all!!

Planning out 2011

So being the planner that I am, I made out a plan today for how I'm going to do all of my writing projects in the New Year.  The plan goes as follows:

By December 15th: Finish editing and printing out "Christmas at the Holiday Inn" for my friends and family

By January 31st: Finish editing Runaway Train, find and submit it to beta readers

By February 28th: Receive Runaway Train back from beta readers, make final changes and begin submitting to agents.  Also, finish writing and editing the short story "The Banks of Belronan."

By March 31st: Finish outline/research for Script Frenzy screenplay and submit "The Banks of Belronan" to a short story contest.

By April 30th: SCRIPT FRENZY 2011!!! Write screenplay.

By May 31st:  Finish outline for sequel to Runaway Train, currently titled Hand-me-down Mercury.

By June 30th: Finish editing "Finding Innisburg" and submit to beta readers

By August 31st: Write Hand-me-down Mercury and finish editing and begin submitting "Finding Innisburg" to agents.

By September 30th:  Finish rewrites on screenplay and find and submit to beta readers

By October 31st: Finish outline for sequel to Hand-me-down Mercury.

By November 30: NaNoWriMo 2011!!!! Finish Hand-me-down sequel.

By December 31st: Finish last rewrites on screenplay and submit to agents and begin editing on Hand-me-down Mercury.

So that is the plan.  Yes, it is extremely ambitious and yes, probably out of my reach.  But on my 22nd birthday I gave myself three years to make it as a writer.  Three years to do what I really love with my life.  And  I don't want to get to my 25th birthday and feel like I didn't give it my best shot.  So I'm going all out.  If I can pull this year off like this, I will get to the end of 2011 with a total of two novels and a screenplay being submitted to agents and another two novels in various stages of editing.

Also, you'll notice that according to the plan, on two separate occasions, I will need beta readers for my novels.  I'm taking volunteers now if you'd like to help me prepare my novels for submission.  "Runaway Train" is a post-apocalyptic love story.  The theme is that even when everything changes in your life, sometimes, nothing really changes at all.  Right now, the main characters are in their early twenties but recently I've been contemplating the idea of possibly making it a young adult novel by putting the characters in their teens.  It might be an interesting change so I'm interested to see what people have to say about that.

"Finding Innisburg" is a mystery/thriller novel about a young man and his quest to find out why there is a classic American town in the middle of the Guatemalan jungle.  I'll be interested to know if it's gripping enough or if it rambles too much. 

If you would be interested in reading either of these and providing me with feedback regarding them, please shoot me an email at locachica1357ATyahoo.com.  Just let me know which one or both you are interested in and I'll be in touch. 

And of course, throughout 2011 I'll be updating you all on my progress as I try to make something of myself so STAY TUNED.

And now, for the second part of this increasingly long blog entry, there is a pineapple express going through Seattle right now and it is just DUMPING rain outside.  It's pretty remarkable.  (for those of you who don't know, a pineapple express is when warm, wet weather systems move up to the Pacific Northwest from Hawaii, bring lots and lots of rain and mild temperatures)  Also, I woke up this morning to find out that Santa had come during the night (a bit early, but I'm guessing he's trying to get a head start this year) and left two presents with my boyfriend's handwriting on the tags.  It was very cute and I'm excited to see what they are.  

Happy Holidays to you all, and good night!

15 Days until Christmas!

Just a quick update since I need to be heading off to bed.  First off, I'm sure you will all be happy to know that "Christmas at the Holiday Inn" is done being written.  It is just shy of 9,000 words which is a good short story length.  I'm planning to print it up at Kinkos and give copies to all of my extended family (grandparents etc.) for Christmas.  But don't worry, I'll still be posting it here, so once I've had a chance to edit it, look for it sometime around next weekend hopefully.

I also made a splendid batch of Christmas sugar cookies today, after 45 minutes of trooping around Seattle trying to find some cookie cutters.  You'd think they'd be easy to find but it took four stores before I found some.  But they turned out good and I'm going to make some more closer to Christmas to serve as gifts for our landlords, people at work etc.

Happy Holidays to you all!

Sore tongues and short stories

Well I don't have a whole lot to report on today but it is my day off so I thought I'd better give you all some sort of love today.

Yesterday I was at work and we got in these candies which look like popsicles but they are hard, sour candy on the outside, and soft taffy in the middle.  So I decided to try one out and I ate the whole thing.  Now the outside is rough from the sour stuff that they put on it, so it's like rubbing your tongue down sand paper, and you know how if you eat too much sour candy, the acid wears away at your tongue after a while.  So the combination of those two things meant that my tongue was just totally raw by the time I was done and extremely painful.  Aaron and I got Thai food last night from our favorite Thai restaurant on Capitol Hill, Jai Thai, and my dish had lime in it which was very good but the acid just killed my tongue and I finally had to stop less than halfway through my dinner and just eat the rice.  Even today my tongue is a bit sore, although better than it was.  But I learned my lesson.  No more sour popsicle candies for me! Although it was yummy, I have to say.  But not worth it.

As far as the short story, I'm having a really fun time writing it.  I love Christmas and I'm just making this story fun.  It doesn't have any super deep meaning and I'm not worried too much about tone or pacing or all of the stuff I'm usually concerned with in a longer piece.  I'm just plugging along at it, enjoying the atmosphere of snow and holidays and just having a lot of fun.  I started it yesterday after writing a rough outline the day before and I'm already at 4,784 words which isn't bad for two days of work.  I estimate it will be about ten thousand words by the time it's finished which puts me about halfway through.  We'll see how my estimate holds up at the end.  But I'm hoping that when I post it here for you to read, possibly as soon as next week, that you will all enjoy reading it as much as I am enjoying writing it.

Well, that's all from me.  Happy writing and happy holidays to you all!

"Christmas at the Holiday Inn" Preview

So for you, all my faithful readers, I have a Christmas present coming up.  I am writing a short story entitled "Christmas at the Holiday Inn" which I will be posting here closer to Christmas.  Hopefully it won't be too long to post on here, but if it is, I'll just find another way to put it online and then post a link. 

The basic premise for the story will be a number of people from all different parts of the country and world and different walks of life who all end up getting stuck at the Seattle airport in the snow on Christmas Eve.  They are put up at the Holiday Inn by the airline, and one family, deciding to teach their children about the true meaning of Christmas, decides to put together a whole Christmas celebration at the hotel.  Hilarity and warm feelings ensue.

So look for "Christmas at the Holiday Inn" in it's entirety closer to Christmas!

Happy Holidays to you all!

The End

Well, Finding Innisburg is finished.  All the loose ends are wrapped up, all the appropriate people have gone to jail and the two main characters are getting married.  I typed "The End" very happily about five minutes ago and now am feeling very accomplished.

Am I happy with it? Yes.  I think the story came together well considering I started at the beginning 31 days ago.  It didn't go exactly like my outline, but it works pretty good.  I probably won't read over it or try to edit it for at least a month to put some distance between me and it but I'm satisfied.  With some editing and padding it won't be half bad.  It ended up at 51,079 words which isn't as long as I had hoped but my stories usually gain some words in the editing process, so I'll probably be fine.

Whats up next?  Well, since I haven't been able to come up with a brilliant Christmas story idea, I think I'll write up a short story about a selkie who falls in love with a man.  We'll see how that turns out.  But for right now I'm going to go toast up an English muffin and pour myself a glass of celebratory milk. :P

Christmas in October

So let me just start off by saying that it is way too early for Christmas. I don't really consider it the Christmas season until after Thanksgiving. And yet, since I work in the retail industry, I get exposed to the Christmas hype way, way too early. But I love it. Christmas is my favorite time of the year and I really excited as soon as it starts to feel like Christmas.

So about two weeks ago I walked into Rite Aid by my house and lo and behold, they had Christmas wrapping paper for sale. (For all the overachievers that wrap their Christmas presents in October, I guess.) Since then, more and more Christmas stuff has begun to find it's way into the stores: wrapping paper, decorations, fake Christmas trees. I'm still not sure who buys this stuff before Halloween, but that's not the point.

The icing on the cake was yesterday at work. The week after Halloween, Blockbuster does it's big "Holiday Reset." We move all our product around, change all the signs to Christmas-themed signage, put out tables of novelty gifts (this years it's Snuggies, Star Wars gifts, and, of course, Silly Bandz), and create three full bays of the old, classic Christmas movies on our New Release wall. So yesterday I pulled out the signage from the back office and began to sort through it to prepare myself for the reset starting Sunday. This years signs are light blue with white snowflakes and red ornaments hanging down that look like DVD's. They are so festive and Christmasy and I got very excited and spread them all over the floor in the store and jumped up and down and then had to put them all away again. So I thought it would be appropriate today to share with you my top ten favorite things about Christmas:

1. Lights. I love Christmas lights, especially the white ones. And now that it's getting dark earlier, they'll be even more visible.

2. Snow. Not completely Christmas related, but I love snow. They are predicting a very snowy winter this year and I'm hoping they are right.

3. Cold weather. I love bundling up and going out into the icy weather. I love coming home to a warm apartment and cuddling up with a cup of tea.

4. The bell ringers. I'm like Pavlov's dog in this regard. The Salvation Army bell ringers are such an integral part of Christmas for me that I get excited just to hear them.

5. Buying presents. I love to get things for people and then watch them open them.

6. All the people. I love the hustle and bustle of the city at Christmastime, everyone rushing around in the cold and hurrying in and out of stores.

7. The holiday pay. Christmas, New Years and the second half of New Year's Eve are time and a half pay for us.

8. Business at work. I love it when it's busy at work and people come hurrying in to pick up movies to take home to the family.

9. Egg nog. You didn't think I was going to forget about the food, did you? Egg nog is manna from heaven.

10. Green bean casserole. Thanksgiving and Christmas are usually the only times that I get to have this.

Now I'm just waiting for the Christmas tree to go up on the Space Needle and the first snow and then it will really be Christmas!