Drunken Owls and Other Delights

I've been doing a lot of thinking about changing things up creatively. I mentioned this on my Welcome to Bridgetown blog the other day, but I'll explain it a bit more here: I've been focusing on my writing as an almost-daily thing for what, about thirty years now? At least since early 1996 when I bought my first PC and figured that if I was going to make this a successful thing, I was all in, working on something almost every single day. [Not counting the occasional points in time where Real Life Stuff took precedence, of course.] 

Thing is, writing wasn't the only creative outlet I've always been interested in. I of course have a clinical obsession with music, so it only makes sense that I've always felt a bit of an urge to explore making it to some degree. I've started a few garage bands and recorded dozens of incomplete demo ideas over the years, but I've never gone any further than that. I've also had a love for visual arts which unfortunately has not been given much attention at all.

So I was thinking...I'm at a good point in my writing career. It's no money-maker, but I'm proud of the seven books I've self-published (and the eighth one I'm on the verge of finishing). I've learned a hell of a lot in that thirty year stretch. I'm not burnt out, and the spark to do more is still there. But over the last several years, I've had this feeling...as much as I enjoyed dedicating so much time with my writing, I always felt like my other two creative loves fell by the wayside. It frustrated me, because I'd want to write songs or draw something or focus on photography (a newer and unexpected interest) and yet the outcome always fell far below my expectations. I knew it was because I wasn't allowing them enough time and focus, and at first I tried juggling them with my already full writing schedule AND the Day Job, but I've finally admitted that wasn't enough.

SO. 

What I was thinking was that, perhaps once I finish Theadia and prep it for self-publishing, I was going to take a bit of a creative breather and instead shift focus to one of those other outlets. Like I said: music and visual arts. I know enough at this point in my life that I can get away with not having to relearn too many of the basics -- and besides, I'm more of a learn-as-I-go person than a take-classes one anyway. And as always, I love doing things DIY. 

Does this mean I won't be writing? Well, no...just that I won't be writing every single day. If an idea hits me that's worth trying out, I'll give it a go. And I'll most likely be following up on the Trilogy Remaster soon enough as well.

I just want to see how far I can take my other creative endeavors for a while.

My current shortened work schedule is not the best, but I'm making do by taking care of the various errands that need doing and trying to get most of my writing done on my days off. I've been good this week so far by preparing some blog posts ahead of time so I'm not rushing through them the night before they go live. I used to do that during my last few months at the Former Day Job, actually, so I should probably pick that habit up again.

Recently I'd seen something someone posted on Threads that intrigued me. I don't remember the exact wording, but it had something to do with questioning why you might be utterly exhausted at work even despite getting a good night's sleep and not physically overexerting yourself. The problem, it said, might have to do with what I believe they called "open threads" that are left open that drag you down. I immediately understood what they meant by that and why I'd been exhausted myself: having a positive but busy day at work might leave me tired, but never completely drained. On the other hand, if I go into work with that feeling of dread that I have to pick up those 'threads' in order to keep them from hopelessly unraveling, then that would be why I feel so mentally exhausted, and in turn feeling like I'm dead on my feet. There have been days where I have to constantly plan at least two or three steps ahead in order to get multiple things done on time -- which I'm good at when it's needed, mind you -- but the exhaustion comes from that multitasking constantly being interrupted. And I think that's one of the issues I've been having these last couple of months. It's not that I can't do the job, it's that I can and have been doing it, only to be waylaid by outside forces and people should know better than to derail me like that. And that is why I've been feeling tired.

Anyway, I have Thursday off so I'm going to get more work done on Theadia and have some Zen time with my cats to recharge. :)

I'll be honest, I hadn't expected to be so LAZY during this weeklong vacation of ours! That is, it was nice to be able to sleep in for a bit every single day, getting woken up around 7am by the cats and not the alarms. We kept ourselves busy with local shopping and a lot of gardening. We didn't have much planned anyway, so I'm fine by that. I definitely need to get myself up and moving more, though, because I've gotten a bit lazy because of it all.

Our mattress shopping the other day worked out well and we should be getting our new one delivered on Monday. Which is good, because our old one is fourteen years old, sinking in places, and we're starting to slide off the now-squishy edges. We'll just have to herd the cats into the next room so they don't get underfoot of the delivery guys or sneak their way outside.

And speaking of outside, we're both rather proud of ourselves now, having done some heavy weeding yesterday around the tree plots in front of our house and replaced them with a few small borders and a few plants. There's still work to be done like getting a few more borders and perhaps some small gravel to ensure the dirt doesn't wash away, but it does look significantly better!

As for writing...I admit I've been a bit lazy there as well, but I allowed it due to the fact that I needed to debate whether or not the newly inserted scenes in Theadia should be in there after all. They were good, just that something didn't quite feel right, no matter how I tried to get them to fit. Yesterday I finally called it and edited the most recent one out, and might do the same for a few others as well.

Workwise, I see that I'm back to a shorter workweek again (sigh) but this also means that I don't need to go in until Wednesday, so I'll be here for the mattress delivery and can get other errands done that I hadn't gotten to this past week.


Hope everyone has a good week ahead!

And as I hoped, it started with us sleeping in until the cats woke us up at 7am demanding to be fed. That's the one thing I actually wanted to do this week: sleep in take my time deciding what I wanted to do that day (if we didn't already have plans). So far so good!

Today was a somewhat late run to Costco, but we are now well stocked in needed things and we managed to survive the chaos that is the parking lot. The one we go to in Colma is right next door to a Trader Joe's so while A started the shopping, I popped in to TJ's for a few other needed things. The traffic today was weirdly busy so it took us a lot longer to get home, so lunch was late and dinner ended up being crackers and cheese.

We spent the rest of the afternoon watching the last three episodes of The Fragrant Flower Blooms with Dignity, an anime on Netflix and a manga I am extremely obsessed with at the moment. On the surface the story does give the sense of "why do these teens have ALL THE FEELS" but let's be honest, we were all like that when we were 15-16. The manga is up to about 170-plus chapters right now, and the new anime series only covered maybe the first forty in this particular 13 episode season. I'm definitely hoping it gets renewed, because it's extremely well done and very faithful to the source material.

And speaking of anime obsession, I hear that Your Name will be playing in Japantown in February and I am extremely tempted to go see it. Another personal favorite that I highly recommend.

SO! Any other plans this week? Aside from more sleeping in, we'll be visiting the in-laws for lunch and maybe heading elsewhere in the North Bay afterwards, going to the Haight tomorrow, and going for lunch and high tea on Thursday (which also happens to be my birthday). Not too much planned, just a vague idea of going outside and enjoying the day. And that's just fine with me.

Hope everyone has a good week!

I took the first week and a half of the year off from regular blogging, as I've been doing over the last couple of years. There's no real reason behind it other than a nice mental break and not rushing into a new year surrounded by deadlines. Gives me a chance to rethink my priorities and get things in order. I did get some formerly "I'll deal with it later" stuff done, like going through very old paperwork I can shred and things like that. I'm actually kind of missing the deadlines, considering I spent all of December rebuilding and sticking to them, just so I'd have a fresh start come the new year. That's a good sign, I think.

Writingwise, I've been doing pretty good with the Theadia work lately. Writing those 'INSERT NEW STUFF HERE' scenes have been a bit of a chore but I'm reminding myself that these are rough drafts that can be revised later once I do yet another reread. I'm also glad to say that I think I've finally come up with an ending that I'm happy with! This puts me roughly back on schedule, which I was starting to worry about.

But now that this short hiatus is over and done with, it's back to the mines! Even though we're both taking the week of my birthday off (next week!), I do plan on maintaining my creative schedule. Especially now that I have more creative toys I can play with! 

Did I just order another external hard drive? Yes! This one is a 20TB that was on sale for $229 (not bad, considering it was $50 off), and it would replace not one but THREE of my older externals that are currently and quite precariously perched on top of my PC. [This is the main reason I let the cats on the desk but nowhere near the hardware. They've knocked them over before.] I figure it's worth the price and I'd feel safer having all this stuff on newer drives, as these are at least five or six years old last I checked, and they've gotten a lot of use. I figure this will be my birthday present to myself, heh.

The downside is that this will make three somewhat chunkier drives taking up space, so I might want to look into some minor desk rearrangement. It'll definitely mean less wires though, and that's a good thing. Maybe another riser for the main monitor, which would give me a bit of space underneath for things like my journal and art stuff. Something to think about, anyway.

Meanwhile, the new year is going as expected. Which is to say, a few bumps in the road but otherwise bearable. New Year's Eve was a LOT busier at the day job than predicted, and we were sadly understaffed due to multiple call-outs (legit or otherwise), so I was exhausted by the end of it and slept through into the new year, only woken up once by local neighborhood fireworks. The following day I did have another minor dust-up with a coworker which eventually involved management that led, much to my lack of surprise, to nothing. At this point, though, I've decided that was the last time that would happen. And the next time it did, I would escalate up the chain of command. [And possibly involve the union rep -- who does not get along with main boss at all.] I've decided that 2026 is The Year of No More Personal Bullshit. 

Point being -- I'm in charge of my life here, and it's about time I followed through with it.

It's been a bit of a busy weekend here, partly because of the chaos of last minute holiday shopping (and a bit of personal frustration) at the day job, and also a planned drive up north to have lunch and trade presents with the in-laws, but somehow I still managed to get a fair bit of writing work done regardless. I suppose that's a good sign that I was able to handle it all without the encroaching stress or anxiety that comes with having a full social schedule!

Some things (like this entry) come a bit later than usual, but digging in my heels and powering through seems to be the best course of action for me. I've written and scheduled the last writing-blog entry, I'm still on top of the daily words, and I've got the next couple of days off where I can write the final music-blog entry, work on Theadia, and also get a serious amount of house errands done as well.

Alas, I will be working both New Year's Eve AND New Year's Day, but from past experience it shouldn't be too painful. Nowhere near the chaos of Thanksgiving and Christmas Eves. Here's to hoping they're both regular shifts!

PG&E seems to be suffering all kinds of power grid failures lately, though, and that is extremely concerning, and I've just received another warning about it a few minutes ago. We've already had the power go out twice already, so I'd rather not have it happen again, thankyewverymuch.

So yeah, I'm going to post this now in hopes that the new year is decidedly less chaotic. I'll definitely be here on Wednesday! See you then!

As it happened, my store lost power about a half hour before I was about to log out and head home, and the last time that happened it was hyperlocalized to maybe a few grids in the neighborhood, but on the way home I noticed it seemed a little more...widespread than usual. A few major intersections had no lights, and several workers were standing outside their shops, waiting for the power to come back on. Thankfully, our house hadn't been affected at all (I'm convinced it's because the school across the street is on a different grid than most of the rest of our block, and we're lucky enough to be on it). 

That is, until about 3pm when it went out.

And stayed out until 9pm last night. It's usually never off for THAT long, and that's not a good sign. And some sections of our part of town are still out, apparently. 

Long story short, it looks like there was a fire at a substation over in the Mission District -- clear across town, mind you -- that caused a cascading fault and power outage of epic proportions. And not only that, the phone service didn't seem to be working either, other than the occasional PG&E notifications. It's still only at 2 bars right now, when normally we get 4-5. So whatever happened, it must have been pretty bad.

And of course, the PG&E outage site is still showing possible outages around us. Fingers crossed that it doesn't crap out again!!

Unlike last week, the only exciting thing we had on our list of things to do was head over to Costco to stock up. Various meats to put in the freezer in the garage, the cheap $4 rotisserie chicken, paper goods and whatnot...the usual stuff. We usually only stay there for less than an hour tops, considering we know what we're looking for, and it's the crowd chaos that keeps us from staying long. Most people are good about it, but I keep forgetting you need to have the mindset of "I need to go from Point A to Point B so Damn the Torpedoes and GTF Out of My Way". 

I've never gotten used to that. Living in Boston, I learned that everyone understood Other People Existed so you learned quickly how to do the Weave. Navigate the oncoming crowd by making it obvious what your path will be. I got pretty good at it and could slide down Newbury and Boylston Streets at a good clip with no problem. Here in California however, it's sort of an undisciplined meander dead center in the aisle with the expectation that other people will get out of your way or go around. They know you're there, but you're just background noise. Which, you know, fine, but when I'm trying to follow A to the next aisle, the last thing I need is for you to push your cart in my way, stop dead center and abandon it as you walk over to the bags of apples you set your eye on. I know it's a bit of a cultural thing, but it does test my patience now and again...

Anyway! In other news, I believe I have found a solution to a problem that's been bothering me for the last month or so regarding Theadia! In particular, I've been trying to write a few of the WRITE THIS LATER chapters but feeling as though they're not quite working. I knew exactly why: I just didn't have any resonance with the character. The more I tried to write them, the more it felt as though I was trying too hard. Thing is, the scene needs to be in there, so I knew that it wasn't the scene itself but the character. I'd written two chapters with them in it, and was dreading writing more.

The other day while I was at work, it occurred to me: I do happen to have another secondary character that had been seriously underutilized, someone I introduced as a possible connection to one of the leads, and somehow forgot to use them anywhere. So over the last few days, I've been going through those new chapters and changing names (and genders as it happens, so I'd better keep an eye on pronouns!), and that seems to be working well. Hopefully the further I go with this revised character, the better the chapters will be!


Hope everyone has a good week ahead!

It's been a busy couple of days here, with not one but TWO holiday-themed events! On Thursday we headed over to the Botanical Garden in GGP for LightScape, a truly breathtaking show of lit-up plants, trees and sculpture. I went in thinking it would be kind of fun and enjoyable, but it ended up surpassing my expectations! I'd say my favorite two moments were walking past the Moon Viewing Garden with an actual (inflated) moon in amongst the tiny lightning-bug-like lights that gave it a starry-night look, and the Perennial Garden with several tree light scupltures in the shape of cherry blossoms. I'm glad I went, because apparently it's been selling out!

The other event was of course our yearly trip to the Opera House to see the Nutcracker ballet. As I'd said to A, every time I hear it I'm reminded just how brilliant and wonderful Tchaikovsky's work is. I've always been a fan, but the more I listen, the more I discover what he was trying to do with all the parts of the music. Again, it's the 'I can hear the math' in me, heh. I have to say their production this year was top notch, which is saying something since I always like going to it.

Later on, we were wondering what other holiday stuff we need to do. We'll need to watch Terry Pratchett's Hogfather, of course, which has become one of our favorite Christmas Day events. We've also watched some corny Hallmark holiday romcoms, of course, and I recently thought about watching While You Were Sleeping, which is one of my favorite sort-of-Christmassy movies. We'll have to think of a few other things to do, of course...