Finals

Nothing can make you grateful to be done with school like proctoring a final exam.  The nerves rolling off my students today are enough to make me anxious.  So glad 2013 was the year I finally finished.

Christmas Spirit?

So I am totally in shock that Christmas is only a week away.  I am totally not ready for it.  I honestly don't know where December went.  I know part of it is that I've been sick a lot, but still, it's been tough to wrap my brain around.

Anyway, tonight Tracy and I finally got our Christmas tree up. (Our anonymously donated tree from last year :-)  And I also put up a cute decoration that my Mom and I made as a joint effort when I went to visit in October.  Hopefully if it looks like Christmas I can get my head around it.

Additions to My Favorite Characters List – Television Edition

So I was looking back over my blog and was looking at the favorite character's list I created back in 2011 and it occurs to me that there have been some updates to that list.  Since I've had kind of a low energy week (stomach flu followed by monster cold, yay)  I thought I'd have some fun and update my list.  Today's editions all come from the world of television and fall into two distinct categories.

 It’s All the BBC’s Fault

Sherlock Holmes (played by Benedict Cumberbatch in Sherlock) – Tracy and I rewatched the first episode of Sherlock yesterday, and I was struck again with how well done this show is and Benedict Cumberbatch’s brilliant portrayal of Sherlock Holmes is at the heart of that.  He creates a Sherlock who is fascinating, insufferable, and heroic all at the same time.

John Watson (played by Martin Freeman in Sherlock) – Okay, so why do we put up with the above mentioned insufferable consulting detective?  Mostly, because John Watson does.   The dynamic friendship between the nearly unbalanced genius and the steady everyman makes for amazing television.

The Doctor (played by David Tennant and Matt Smith in Doctor Who) - Yes there are other actors who’ve played (and will play) this role, but it is these two who really created a character I could get behind.  The Doctor always likes who you want him to like and helps the people you want him to help.  And he does it while being irrepressibly goofy (at least in these two incarnations).  It’s awesome.

Donna Noble (played by Catherine Tate in Doctor Who) – Okay, so I love Rose,  Amy, Rory, River, and Clara but Donna Noble is my favorite companion of The Doctor.  There are two reasons for this – first, she and David Tennant’s Doctor create one of the best male/female friendships I’ve ever seen on TV.  Second, because Donna proves that even the most ordinary person can be extraordinary if someone gives them the chance.

It’s not Easy Being Green – the Arrow Gang

Felicity Smoak (played by Emily Bett Rickards)  – This character was supposed to be on the show for one episode…now’s she’s everyone’s favorite.  Including mine.  If Oliver Queen doesn’t kiss this girl at some point in the future, I will never forgive him.

John Diggle (played by David Ramsey) – Okay, so I’m getting the theme here that I like the depiction of friendships on television.  Digg and Oliver are hilarious, and I love that Digg is always willing to call Oliver on his crap while still being the steadiest possible friend.

Oliver Queen (played by Stephen Amell) - So yes, there was an Oliver on the old list, and Justin Hartley’s Oliver is still awesome and by far the funnier of the two.  But when I think Oliver Queen now, I have to admit Stephen Amell’s broodier version is the one that pops into my head.  Especially after the episode “Three Ghosts.”

Workity work

So on January 6th, I go from one part-time job to three.  And as of today, one of those jobs got bigger (Salt Lake Community College offered me back the second class that they pulled a few weeks ago). While I do have some concerns about the logistics of this change, surprisingly enough the overriding feeling I'm having is excitement.  Yes, I'm having a holy-crap-I'd-better-finish-up-some-stuff-and-be-prepared feeling, but beyond that I'm looking forward to actually being out in the world doing what I trained for 10 years of my life to do.   Would one full-time job be the ideal?  Yes, of course.  But one thing's for sure...I won't get bored.

Grateful

This has been one of those spots in my life where things have just been happier.   Even with having two weird flare ups of not feeling well, it's still been a amazing couple of weeks.   On the serious real-life side of things I have an internship with the Church Archives starting in January.  Still only part-time, but it's really interesting work that's going to pay decently.  That combined with teaching for the U and for SLCC actually makes me feel downright employable.  It's an extremely good feeling.

I've also watched three good movies in the last week.  First, Thor 2 last Saturday, then the epic Doctor Who special screening on Monday, and today Catching Fire.  All three of them were respectably clean and thoroughly entertaining.  It was a great run at the movies.  It also reminds me of how grateful I am to be married to the world's best movie buddy.  Tracy isn't nearly as in to Doctor Who as I am, yet he still went with me and we had a really fantastic time. 

There's also been a bunch of other things, both serious and silly that have gone on in the last few weeks.  I got to babysit my friend Pam's little boy this week for a couple of hours, and in spite of going through the terrible two's he was a total angel for me.  My long standing favorite show  (Castle) and my new favorite show (Arrow) had great episodes that were again respectably clean and also mushy.   I had a great chats on the phone with my Mom and my cousin Jennie.  Thanksgiving dinner turned out really yummy.  I got the "Jayne's Cunning Hat" card while playing the Firefly board game with Chris, Stacia and Tracy.  Tracy's Mom and Aunt came for a visit last weekend.   It's almost December and I went outside without a coat today. I got an amazingly sweet note from my friend Becky.  In fact, it's been so awesome, I feel like I'm forgetting things.

And can I just say again that I'm married to the most amazing-perfect-fit husband on the planet!

Like I said it's been a lovely few weeks.  I definitely have a lot to be grateful for. 

Random Silliness

I know as a Superman fan I have no right to say this...but seriously it was about stinking time...

http://insidetv.ew.com/2013/11/19/arrow-oliver-mask-photos/

One Week

I made it an entire week without french fries...a stressful week no less.  There's hope :-)

Changing My World

So since our last visit to Boise in October, Tracy and I have made a pact to give up drinking soda.  For three weeks now we've been successful.  There were honestly times when I really hated it,  but it is finally getting easier.    The next mountain I'm trying to climb is giving up deep fried foods, including chips.   A few years ago I managed to swear off both for a couple of months and it actually started doing some good, so I'm hoping that will be true now and that I can keep it up.

I still haven't figured out exercise, and I know that's the next piece.  My anxiety and depression issues get a bit worse when my brain isn't active, and I don't want to spend any money or look like an idiot.  So someone really needs to invent a way for reading to burn calories :-) Still, Tracy and I have talked about parking farther out in parking lots, and little things like that, so hopefully that's a start.

I know I'm never going to be thin - seriously, in junior high school I was in drill team and track and basically ate the same foods as my size 6 friends and was still a size 13, so I'm not expecting miracles here.  But I would like to lose enough weight to be happy with myself in pictures and to be able to do all of the things I want to do.  

Even writing this on my blog is a little terrifying.  However, I'm comforted by the fact that not very many people read it, and those that do already like me, chubbiness and all.  At least I hope :-)

Surprise in Fiction

So it's National Novel Writing Month, and I thought about giving it go on a new project but instead decided to stick with working on my current project, with a goal of having a complete revised draft by the end of the year.  This work mostly involves writing "glue" scenes, that get things from point A to point B, and working on bolstering the plot and characters.

This got me thinking about my favorite plots and characters, and something that I've realized in the last few months about storytelling - it's terrific when you you're reading/watching a story and the characters do something surprising.  It's extremely annoying when your reading/watching something and the characters do something randomly out of character for the sake of surprise.  So what's the difference?   My two easiest examples of this come from tv show Castle.

The example of something delightfully surprising was in a early episode of Castle, when the two main characters Kate Beckett and Rick Castle end up on separate blind dates in the same restaurant.   You expect the average TV formula that they will get jealous of each others dates and end up sabotaging their own dates.  Instead, the writers did something kinda brilliant.  Instead of caring about each others dates, they both become obsessed with talking about the case they're on, and as they are talking to their dates come to the same conclusion about who the potential killer is.   They then abandon their dates to go and solve the mystery together.  The scene hits all the same emotional notes of the expected scene, and yet manages to reinforce the partnership and the crime drama aspect of the show.

My example of annoying out-of-character surprise also comes from Castle.  In the end of the last season, Kate Beckett got an offer a job in Washington, D.C.  and she took it.  Sounds like a reasonable plot complication right?  Uh-uh.  The show has made an absolute point of the fact that Kate Beckett is ultra-committed to her job as a homicide detective, even at the expense of other career ambitions, making the D.C. job feel like a convenient manufactured drama.   Could there have been a way for this same plot point to be in character?  Oh, I'm sure.  Give Kate a couple really sucky cases, where she feels like she doesn't have enough power to get justice and such a change is at least explainable.

So why am I talking about this?  (Other than the fact that I like talking about Castle.)  Of course, when I'm writing my book I want there to be surprises and things that come unexpectedly to the reader.  I hope my novels aren't predictable, but I do think I could use some work on the whole surprising thing.  It's hard, at least for me, to figure out how to do this.   I've really tried, in my own work to look for those little moments where something amazing happens that even I didn't quite plan for.  As far as I know, I've only pulled it off only once in the current novel.   But I'm hoping I that as I revise this draft I can come up with more ways to build pleasant surprises into my story.

Dangerous Ice Cream

So we had the missionaries over for dinner last night, which turned out pretty fun.  They had picked some walnuts earlier in the day and they and Tracy got some enjoyment out of trying to get the things out of the shell, we have walnut shrapnel in our dining room, but it was pretty entertaining. 

The funny, though quite embarrassing moment of the night came when Tracy offered them some ice cream.  I had bought what I thought was Rocky Road ice cream, but when Tracy went to dish it up I'd bought something else that was coffee flavored.  Luckily he caught it before he'd served it.  I couldn't believe that not only had I not noticed it was the wrong flavor, but that we'd managed not to look at it until we had missionaries there. They gave me a good-natured hard time about it, and it lead to us sharing stories about our other near misses (or not quite misses) with things we didn't want to eat or drink.  And now I've given them a new story to tell (sigh).

Another Archives Blog Post

http://slcoarchives.wordpress.com/2013/10/24/utah-mining-and-the-built-environment/

Salt Lake County Archives Blog Post

I've been volunteering at the Salt Lake County Archives and wrote a blog post for Utah Archives Month.  Here's the link:

http://slcoarchives.wordpress.com/2013/10/02/we-must-act-green-space-and-recreation-in-salt-lake-county/

Trends

I think one of the official signs that your getting old is when you have to suffer through a trend more than once.  Seriously, I'm so sick of the word "color" being synonymous with neon brights that I'm ready to hurl something at the next bright yellow desk accessory or bright pink t-shirt I see.   I love colors - pastels and saturated reds and greens and blues, but brights give me a headache.  That's another sign you're getting old, when the things twenty-somethings love give you a headache :-)

Labor Day Adventure

So I've been seriously craving some trees, water, and mountains and so today Tracy and I decided to check out the Alpine Loop which winds up behind Mt. Timpanogos and comes out in Provo Canyon.  The scenery was really incredible. (I mean look how cute this guy is!)

On our drive we went to an area called Cascade Springs where they had a hiking path and boardwalks around a series of springs and waterfalls.  It was a little crowded but lots of fun.  All in all a great day!

Pickles!

So a couple of weeks ago in an effort to expand my homemaking skills (and because we had A LOT of cucumbers that day) I tried my hand at making refrigerator pickles.  Everything I had read said they preserve for a couple of months without all of the drama of normal canning.  So I made three jars of them using a recipe I found online.  When I first tasted them they were pretty tart and spicy, so after doing some reading, I thinned out the liquid with a bit more water.  While I would tweak the recipe (more dill, less garlic, less vinegar, no red pepper flake) they are pretty good.  We've been eating them instead of our jar of store bought ones, so I think that's a good sign.  The other day, after eating about half a jar, Tracy said something like, "I don't think you'll have to worry about these going bad before they get eaten."   It made me pretty happy.

Handwriting

I recently read a magazine article extolling the virtues of writing by hand.  Apparently, it does all of this good stuff for our brain that typing doesn't. It helps with memory, curing depression, and a whole number of things including creativity.  I definitely write more creatively when I write by hand. 

The other night I sat down to write for "a few minutes" and quite a while later found that I'd written over 1600 words, and they were good words.  It also helped that I put my headphones on and listened to music that matched the mood of what I was writing.   Still, I think the process of writing by hand definitely does something for my creative brain that mere typing doesn't tap in to.  

From a creative writing standpoint it also has two other real advantages.  First, when I type the handwritten material into the computer I'm able to give the words a quick edit with out getting bogged down in major revisions.  Also, typing is a great task to keep me connected with my novel on days when my brain is to tired to work on new material.

Crazy Day

So I went to start a part-time job this morning at a retail place that on the surface seemed like it might work for me at the moment.  After about three hours I began to feel increasingly anxious and uncomfortable.  It wasn't that the people weren't nice, they were, I could just tell it was a really bad fit.  So, I politely asked to take a break and decided to go and call Tracy to see what he thought.   Not only was Tracy supportive, I also received an e-mail offering me a chance to teach a fall class at the U.  Though it was an emotionally rough 15 minutes as I made my exit from the job, I think I made a good choice, and I'm excited at the chance to do something far more up my alley.

As weird as it was, I'm definitely feeling blessed. 

Some Good Stuff

Some good stuff from the last few weeks -

- My cute husband is definitely my hero!  When I went to go to a job interview yesterday I discovered my keys were locked in the car and Tracy rushed home to help me.  He also helped me with a big Young Women activity on Wednesday night (which my Mom also helped me figure out.)

-  I've had a chance to spend some time with both old and new friends lately.  For example, a couple of weeks ago Evevanne came down and we got to hang out for a Saturday, it was so much fun.  She got me the cutest flip-flops I've seen in in a long time - and I really needed flip-flops.  Michaele's in town so I have someone to commiserate with about the ups and downs of history.  Pam is one of the world's best writing buddies. And last month Becky Criddle and I got confused about the date we were having lunch - the great part - even though it wasn't the day we had e-mailed about, we both planned for the same wrong day.  It was funny and awesome!

- I'm reading books and writing again.  This is a good sign, when I'm at my most stressed I stop doing these things, so it's good to be back at it.  Though I've got a long way to go I'm just past the 150 page mark on the current novel I'm working on.

Yes, there are still some challenges going on in my life, and in my head, but it's great to look back and see the good things that happen.

Relatively Good News

Just found out that the Graduate School is nominating my dissertation for the Council of Graduate Schools Distinguished Dissertation Award.  Apparently they can pick one dissertation to nominate in the field of Humanities and Fine Arts and I'm fortunate enough that they've chosen mine.  Though I don't expect to win by any means the winner is announced in December and gets a $2000 award and  a trip to California in December (good timing!). 

Apparently the thesis editor who helped me get the manuscript ready for submission liked it and told the Dean of the Graduate School about it, which is how I ended up being nominated.  It's great that someone who doesn't really know me liked it well enough to suggest it for something like this.  Yay!

This Week in Our Life

It's been a bit of a long week, after a weekend of ups and downs.  Tracy did a great job of blogging about our last weekend in Boise.  So if you haven't already you can check that out here.

http://potrazeebee.blogspot.com/2013/06/our-week-of-ups-and-downs.html

I will add my own note about seeing Man of Steel.  First of all, like Tracy I think it's just short of miraculous that we got together my mom and John, Tracy's mom, Jeff and his family and Tom and his family all together on the same night.   It's odd that even as much as I adore Superman, I'm pretty open to people doing their own take on the story.  In fact, it's one of the things I like about it.  This movie was definitely Superman-as-gritty-science-fiction movie.  Almost everyone who went, including me, agreed there was just way to much mayhem for a Superman movie.  Seriously, since when does Superman randomly smash through building after building?  However, the movie makes an interesting choice with the way they handle the Lois/Clark dynamic and I really loved it.  I'm hoping for a sequel with more story and less smashing. (As Tracy just aptly put it "Less of a Hulk movie")

In my real life - I've applied for seven jobs in two days.  Four full-time history jobs (they're in Washington State, Washington D.C., Colorado and Massachusetts), one part-time online teaching position, and two local retail jobs, hoping that something will pop up.  I'm definitely dealing with some unemployment blues and at least applying makes me feel like I'm doing something about it.  I'm also taking a workshop next week at the church employment office.  Also, Tracy has been really good for me today, and in spite of our ongoing car repair saga, right at the moment I'm feeling hopeful. 

10th Anniversary

Friday was Tracy and I's 10th Anniversary.  We had made some okay plans, but Tracy surprised me both by getting off early and with reservations to a restaurant that just earlier in the week I told my friend Pam I was craving, clearly he knows me well.   We then went to Deseret Book where I used a gift card I got for my birthday (thanks Tricia!) to find a fun book.  Last we went to a park less than ten minutes from our house that turned out to be really beautiful (it was a good week for parks.)  In any case it was a wonderful day and I can't believe we've been married ten years.  Time flies when you're having fun.

Tracy posted a cute picture of us on his blog:
http://potrazeebee.blogspot.com/2013/05/ten-years-of-happiness.html

In an unrelated note we ended up with some discount tickets to Lagoon because of the book I bought at Deseret Book, so if anyone wants them let me know.  

Memorial Day Fun

Yesterday Tracy and I went on a picnic with his brother Chris, Stacia and Talon. Chris suggested a park in Bountiful which ended up being up in the foothills.  It was a beautiful park that had been landscaped to leave patches of scrub oak and shrubbery and it had an amazing view across the valley.  There was hardly anyone there and we really had a great time.  It led Tracy and I to go check out a park near our own house that we'd never been too, and it's really cute and has great trees, so I think we will be going back sometime soon.

Hobby Mania

I have too many hobbies.

Seriously -  here's a list of things I do, or am learning how to do, or feel like I should be learning how to do (at least the ones I can think of at the moment):

-Writing Fiction (though this should be a profession, but it's a hobby until someone pays me for it)
-Writing Poetry
-Reading Books
-Papercrafts (Cards, scrapbooking, etc.)
-Crafts (anything not falling into the above category, including jewelry making, decoupage, home decor DIY....I'm beginning to think this list would be freakishly long if it weren't for the word "crafts")
-Learning to play the Piano
-Crochet
-Gardening
-Cooking
-Baking
-Camping
-Postcard Collecting
-Watching TV
-Going to the Movies 

This list does not count the things -  like learning to play the guitar -  that I started enough to actually buy books for, but never did anything with.  (Though this is part of why Tracy talked to me after coming home teaching and asked me out on a date so I'm pretty happy about that one) It also doesn't count things - like playing volleyball - that my younger self was good at, but I can no longer really do.

Apparently I like projects and goals and learning new things.  However, I sometimes think that save item #1, my sheer number of hobbies keeps me from being particularly good at any of them.  Yet they also keep me doing things that are happy and productive.  (Even those last two have helped me make friends.)   I sometimes just wish I had a little better focus, and a few more hours in the day.

Graduation

Friday was graduation day for me.  I might not have even done the whole ceremony and party thing if it weren't for the encouragement of my family.  My Mom and John, Dad and Jill, and Tracy's Mom Tricia all came down for the day and came with me to graduation.  I got a little teary eyed at one point during the ceremony, still surprised that the day had finally come and so grateful to be sharing it with my family. 

 

 If you're interested Tracy caught a video of my part of the ceremony and posted it on YouTube:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=moND1lfQqJk&feature=youtu.be

The party was also a lot of fun.  The theme of the decorations was of course Red.  When you graduate from the University of Utah and your favorite color is red it seems like the obvious choice.   Tracy brought me the gorgeous flowers below and I did some DIY to create the sparkly red letters.  The adorable little cap and tassel candy pops were my mom's brainstorm and they were really fun.  I really appreciated everyone who took the time to come to the party.  It was an amazing day!

Happy Busy Day

Today was a busy one, Tracy and I (well especially Tracy) worked pretty hard, but it was all on really feel-good stuff.  I cleaned up the patio, Tracy mowed the lawn and put new compost and dirt in the raised garden beds, I got the first round of veggies planted and then Tracy took on washing all of our windows.  It's amazing how just having clean windows makes a house seem more sparkly inside and out.

The happy part not only comes from a day doing good stuff, but it also comes from the fact that I checked my student records yesterday and everything is signed off.  I am actually, factually graduating this Friday.   This, plus awesome encouragement from my Mom and John, got me excited to plan my graduation party, so last night we went and bought some decorations and I got the bulk of the food ordered.  It should be a terrific, laid-back day to cap off seven years (yeah, that's way too long, but hey at least I'm done) of school work. 

Pinewood Derby

Our ward activity this afternoon was a Pinewood Derby, Tracy and I both made cars for it.  It was the first time I had ever made a Pinewood Derby car, and with some sawing and wheel attachment assistance from my cute husband I think it turned out pretty well.  

Tracy's blue car with the yellow stripes is a tribute to one of his Cub Scout cars that once won "Best Boy Scout Colors" and has an awesome hood scoop. 

My car's decoration was something I debated a long time over until I found the perfect set of rub-ons/transfers/decals in my scrapbooking stuff.   A lot of people liked the design, which made me happy.

It also made me happy that our cars both made it to the finish line in every race, and my car actually won one of the four races it was in.  I came in sixth out of about twenty cars, one theory about the success was that Tracy had accidentally put my wheels on slightly crooked, but we later found out that only having three wheels touch the track might be an advantage.  Considering we didn't use weights or graphite or anything it was a pretty good result, and definitely a fun day.

The Big Return

So over the last seven years at the University of Utah I have checked out A LOT of books.  However, since they don't actually require you to ever take anything back unless someone else has requested it, there has been this cache of 20 plus books on my dissertation topic that I've had for years, literally.  Add to this the odds and ends from various projects that just never got returned and I've had half a bookshelf full of the Marriott Library's books.  Tonight, inspired by the feeling that I might, actually, really be graduating and by the urge to get those shelves back, I gathered them all up and tomorrow Tracy and I are going to return them.

It's the most excited I've ever been to return library books.

Bookworm

Just read a statistic from the American Library Association that the average number of books checked out each year by library card holders is seven.  I was shocked and a little horrified.  Seriously, seven books is like my monthly minimum.  I've read 22 library books since the start of this year, and that doesn't include things like cookbooks that I get just to browse or books I check out but don't like and so don't finish.  If I ever check out only seven library books in a year, someone probably needs to make sure I'm still breathing.

Plot in Need of Thickener

So I'm working on a novel I started in mid-February, a new novel that has now reached over 80 pages.  I'm trying to write it as fast as humanly possible, resisting the urge to revise and just plowing through.    The trick with this is that one of my biggest weaknesses as a writer is that I struggle with action/adventure/mystery style plots.  Now if I were a romance novelist or a literary fiction writer this probably wouldn't be quite so much of a problem, but the stories I like best have action and intrigue and well...story, and I want my novels to have the same thing.   Therefore I tend to spend a lot of time staring at blank notebook pages and scribbling ideas until something makes some sort of sense.   If the writing fairies could grant me a gift (besides making a living as a writer) I would ask for a natural talent for plot.

Final Draft - Dedication and Acknowledgements

I should probably warn my Mom and Grandma not to read this without Kleenex handy...

Tonight I put the last touches on my final draft of my PhD dissertation.  Yes, I still have the format review from the Thesis Office to go through, but this is the last draft that will deal with the content of the dissertation.

This was also the draft that allowed me to create the dedication and acknowledgements of the dissertation. 

I may have talked about this before, but my grandfather, Roy Logan, passed away shortly before I moved to Utah to attend graduate school.  Even though he himself didn't get a college education he was one of the most valiant and consistent supporters of my educational goals.  The same week I found out I had been accepted at the U was the same week we found out his cancer was terminal.  From that moment on I decided that if I actually managed to get a PhD my dissertation would be dedicated to him.   Today my dissertation dedication page reads, "To my grandfather, Roy Wallace Logan."

The acknowledgements also give me a chance to thank some important people, though these are mostly sources of funding and professors, I thought a couple of lines were worth posting here.

"I owe a great deal of gratitude to many people...for their help with this dissertation...my fellow graduate students, especially my friend Michaele Smith...Finally, I would like to express my heartfelt thanks to my friends and family for their patience and encouragement, especially my husband Tracy Cope who provided critical feedback and support and without whom this dissertation would not have been possible."

There wasn't room to list all of you by name, but chances are good that if you read this blog you are in fact amongst those friends and family I am so grateful to have.

As my mom mentioned just today, there really is starting to be a light at the end of the tunnel, and all of you at one time or another have helped me see it.

Thank you.

The Ankle of Doom

So I'm starting to feel a little cursed in the ankle department.   While standing to walk in to a church meeting today I managed to step wrong in my slightly high heeled shoes and turn over the same ankle I sprained last month.  Again felt the lovely pop and now it's swollen and difficult to walk on again.   I take heart from the fact that it's not as bad as last time, but still, it's a little frustrating. 

Forty-four Pages

It's been 13 days since I made my 1,000 word a day goal and I'm startled, honestly, by how effective that goal is.  Today I was really tired when I sat down to work, and at first I worried that this was the day that I wouldn't make it.   Still, I did manage to think of a scene I need to write for the novel that is a follow-up to Rell, and once I got started it was a bit easier than I expected.  Overall, the goal has led to forty-four pages of writing in less than two weeks.  Which is pretty exciting, considering that when the month started I was staring down the biggest case of writer's block I'd had in recent memory.  

I think there are a couple reasons for why this works:

First, 1000 words is a significant number of words, enough to feel like an accomplishment and yet not so large that it's impossible.

Second, I've done my very best to treat it almost like it's work hours that I need to put in.  Not a hobby, or something that would be nice to get to, but something that I truly must do every day.

Now, here's hoping I can keep it up. 

The Interesting Consequences of Being A Decent Cook

Ok, so I'm not claiming to be a chef or anything, but I'm finally to a place in my life where I can admit I'm a pretty good cook.  I can experiment and things come out well and I've gotten to the point that 80 percent of the time (unless I'm baking) I don't even use recipes anymore. 

However, there are some interesting consequences to being a decent cook.  For example, a couple of weeks ago some decent brand frozen dinners were on sale at the grocery store and so I bought a couple thinking they'd be good for lunches when I'm home.  Well, I had one today, and it wasn't awful by any means, but it wasn't really good either, and I unfortunately could picture what it would taste like if I'd made that dish myself.  Now granted it's a more complicated dish than I would make for lunch - ever - but still I couldn't help but make the comparison.  So, probably won't be buying those again.  

It also changes what I order at restaurants.  I never order pork chops, because Tracy's grilled ones are so amazing why would I bother, and I'm ordering steak less and less for the same reason.  (He made AMAZING steaks for Valentines Day.  I'm very lucky.) I do like ordering salads, because while I could make them, it's a lot of work to not only chop all that stuff, but also to buy it and keep it fresh enough that it's there when you actually want one.

I suppose it's good that I'm more inclined to eat stuff I've made myself, but I also think back to being a single girl and eating lots of frozen easy stuff, because, honestly it wasn't really that much worse than what I generally cooked.  Not as tasty, but occasionally easier :-)

1000 Word Goal Update

So first four days of the 1,000 word goal were amazing.  I worked on the two projects I was ideally supposed to work on and managed to write 18 pages.  Today though, it was pretty painful, I spent a lot of time staring at the computer and being extraordinarily frustrated and the last 300 words were mostly a bit of goofing off - an image I had in my head about two very brilliant but very different people meeting across a library study table.  Basically a random scene I have no current use for.  Still, I managed it.  There's hope for me yet.

Change Can Definitely Be Good

So our New Beginnings for our church's Young Women Program is tonight and since I'm Young Women's President in our ward I've been preparing some things to say about Personal Progress (this is the goal setting/recognition program for the young women).  One of the things I'm going to talk a little about is the history of Young Women Recognition Programs in The Church.  The first program was a Beehive Handbook from 1915

Requirements of 1915 handbook included: 

-  Care successfully for a hive of bees for one season and know their habits. 

- Cover 25 miles on snowshoes on any six days. 

- During two weeks, keep the house free from flies, or destroy at least 25 flies daily.

- Without help or advice, care for and harness a team at least five times [and] drive 50 miles during one season. 

-  Clear sagebrush off of one-half acre of land.

As leaders of the Young Women we are encouraged to participate in this program with our girls.   Can I just say how grateful I am that the new program contains a lot more scripture reading and a lot less fly killing and agricultural knowledge?  Because I'm pretty sure I'd flunk that in a hurry. 

New Writing Goal

Here's the thing...I have time right now to be writing.  I have dozens of ideas and projects that need my creative writing energy and yet I've had a hard time getting myself to do it.  So new goal - 1,000 words a day, 6 days a week.  I just need to sit in my chair and turn on my computer and type, even if it's crap.    Wish me luck.

The Geek Girl Bucket List

So recently on Pinterest I saw someone's geek bucket list,  a list of amazing - very fictional - things one would like to do if it were possible.  And because I had a cranky morning, I decided I needed something silly and fun to do for a minute, so here's my own version.  

One thing that struck me about the list on Pinterest though was how many of the things sounded cool in theory, but when you really thought about it would be kind of horrible.  Seriously, super powers sound awesome, but I don't know that I want all that responsibility.   So I tried to make my list things that really did sound fun to me.  (And even with that, numbers 4, 6, and 7 I would only want to do on a day when I was feeling particularly resilient.) 


Jenel's Geek Girl Bucket List
1. Temporarily replace Jimmy Olsen as photographer of the The Daily Planet (Superman)
2. Join a book club with Lorelai and Rory Gilmore (Gilmore Girls)
3. Work a case with Castle and Beckett (Castle)
4. Work a case with Sherlock and John (Sherlock)
5. Become the official historian of Starfleet (Star Trek)
6. Co-pilot the Millennium Falcon (Star Wars)
7. Co-pilot Serenity (Firefly)
8. Convince The Doctor, preferably Ten, to take me back in time to meet Abraham Lincoln (Doctor Who)
9. Become Minerva McGonagall's teaching assistant (Harry Potter)
10. Take an archaeology class from Dr. Indiana Jones
11. Visit Rivendell (Lord of the Rings)
12. Visit Narnia (The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe)
13. Have Belle take me on a tour of the Beast's castle, before the spell is broken  (Beauty and the Beast)
14. Rhyme with Inigo and Fezzik (The Princess Bride)
15. Be in a position to end a conversation with, "Mulder, I think you're crazy." (X-Files)

I know - silly - but my brain needed a break and I needed to blog, so actually I'm multi-tasking :-) 

Ringtones and other Random Bits

So one of the cool features of cellphones is supposed to be customizing them, right?  I changed my ringtone today (a peppy bit of music from BBC's Sherlock) and realized I hadn't changed it since we bought the phone about a year ago.  Maybe it's a sign that I'm getting old.  I have at least changed my background wallpaper twice.  Yeah, it's a fall photo, so not exactly current either.  I suppose I could take this as a sign of the fact that I just have better things to do with my time.  Yeah...that's a nice theory :-)

I actually realized I have a second thing to say about ringtones (who knew it was such a fascinating subject).  I love having ringtones and other pop culture related paraphernalia that are just a little bit geeky, but that, unless you know what they are from don't seem obviously so.  There's something nice, in my late thirties, about celebrating my geekiness in a slightly lower key way.

Love Letters to Places

So this probably should be on my long neglected book blog, but I didn't want to deal with the difficulty of kick starting it yet again so I'm going to post this here.

Right now I've got this massive urge to work, not on the novels I'm supposed to be working on, but on an idea for a novel that takes place on a semi-mysterious island in the Puget Sound.  This isn't really a surprise, in fact it's a habit of mine.

I've realized that all of my novel settings are in essence love letters to places that mean something to me.  Even Rell which is set in a fantasy world is inspired by the high desert, river-centric landscape of southern Idaho.  One particular scene, even though it was a combination of places, was so specifically detailed that my cousin Jennie upon reading it said she felt like she recognized it as a place she had been. 

And it's not an accident that Capstone is set in the Washington D.C. area.  One of the most fun experiences I've had as a writer was planning an action sequence in the Metro station in Alexandria that I used everyday while researching at the National Archives a few years ago. 

One of the great, and yet I think sometimes lousy rules of writing is "Write what you know."  And I can't remember who exactly it was that wisely changed this rule to "Write what you love."  Not only does writing about these places make it easier to get the details right and also invest my stories with things that reflect my specific personality as a writer, but I also think it's a way for me to stay connected to these places even when I'm at my boring old desk reduced to looking at (literally at the moment) pictures of sunrise on Whidbey Island or a sketch of two people strolling hand in hand in front of the U.S. Capitol.

I also have this possibly crazy notion that anything I can do to up my emotional investment in the story I'm telling will eventually translate to those people who read my stories.

Doctor Who

So I was beginning to wonder if my geek credentials were going to be permanently tarnished by the fact that I hadn't watched Doctor Who. Every time I turned around, someone was extolling the virtues of the nameless Doctor and his time-traveling Police Call Box.   So it came up on Netflix and I started watching it.  Now, I was nervous because apparently people get REALLY into this show, and frankly I don't think grown-up me needs the return of Superfan Jenel of the X-Files years.   The good news,  I like the show, it's fun and funny and VERY geektacular (William Shakespeare and multiple Harry Potter references in the same episode, yeah, sign me up.)  The even better news -- as much as I like it, I have no urge to write bad fan-fiction, or name my firstborn TARDIS. 

However, between the good Doctor and reading a book set in the UK this week I actually said the phrase, "I'm rubbish at math" in conversation yesterday.  (At least I didn't say "maths" which is the pure Brit version, I believe).  Anyway, the current book I'm reading is set in the desert of eastern Oregon, so that should help me reset my vocabulary:-)

Muffins

So apparently I'm going to feel the need to post every time I bake something.  I made apple-cinnamon muffins tonight from scratch and they are at least as good as the ones from a mix.  Yippee!!