Drunken Owls and Other Delights

Even though my weekends are pretty much only a day and a half of free time (I open Saturday mornings and get out at 2pm), I'm happy with the fact that I still manage to get a lot done in that time! And I even got to sleep in this morning!

Yesterday we headed over to the Petco to buy a new cat tree as the old one is getting quite worn out and flimsy (verdict: Jules is quite happy with it, but Cali is yet to give it much attention). This one has a slightly different footprint so we were able to slide it up against the window, giving me a lot more room behind my desk chair and the ability to access my filing cabinet. And as for today, we did a very-much-needed trip to the grocery store (not mine, but an affiliate) to restock. The great thing is that we're both under the same corporate umbrella so my hard-earned rewards points and associate discounts work there as well, and we ended up saving a ridiculous amount of money. Sweet!

And now it's time for me to get cracking on the writing session. I'm about twenty pages from finishing off this cycle of 'remaster' revisioning of A Division of Souls, so I'm well ahead of schedule for getting this one ready for release. Go me!

The rest of my week isn't so bad...there's only one midshift this week and the rest are opens, and I have Thursday off in which to relax a bit before A and I go on a little midmorning roadtrip down the peninsula to a lovely garden park!

WHOOF. It's Bay Area Summertime, which means it's our turn for a few weeks of extremely high temperatures. Our summers are usually much cooler, with the heatwave coming rather late in the season, and this year is no different. It's been in the 80s and 90s over the last couple of days, which is NOT fun, considering us San Franciscans really don't need AC or fans 90% of the year. I'm just glad that my store is a bit on the cool side! (Speaking of which, I'm scheduled to do dairy upstock the next couple of days, which means I get to hang out in the cooler parts of the store, yay!) The only downside to this is that several customers will also grok to the fact that my store is a perfect place to cool off. It's a double-edged sword: we'll make our budget and then some, but it'll be super busy and I'll be exhausted by the end of it.

My writing sessions have been kind of wonky the last couple of days as well, partly due to the weather making it a bit too warm and stuffy in the apartment, but it is what it is. I'll catch up eventually. I'm also getting close to ready to try out a few things in the Mendaihu Universe on the 750, probably in the next week or so, so I'm looking forward to that.

Oh! And I did the smart thing and scheduled my latest Covid shot the day BEFORE my day off. I always do that, just in case the vaccine kicks my ass. The first one laid me out back then, but all the shots since then have only left me achey for a day or so. A few of my coworkers made the mistake of not scheduling it like that and ended up calling out the next day, which for me was NOT fun at all. [I don't blame them for feeling ill at all, only that those days where I'm doing twice the work because of their being out end up laying me out eventually.]

Hope everyone has a good (and much cooler) week!

I'm currently reading what I'm hoping is the last go-round of Queen Ophelia's War, and this time I'm basically doing the spot-checking of minor errors -- most of which seem to be word repetition or missing words. A lot of it reads really well so I'm happy about that. It's got the same vibe that In My Blue World did for me, come to think of it. I'm not doing the fixes right now, but merely noting them on a notepad so I can focus completely on the reading. I'll do those fixes once I'm done, and those shouldn't take more than a few days unless there's a huge problem that needs focusing on.

Either way, if all goes well this book should be out and available by April! Woo!

Surprisingly, I've got today off instead of Thursday, which had been the norm for ages, but I'm not going to complain. It's part of a conversation I had with a few of the managers last week regarding the Front End Manager position. As much as I'm capable and willing to work that weird 11:30am to 8pm shift to watch over the front end (as it says on the tin), it can also be super exhausting and frustrating, especially if I have two of those shifts one right after the other. (I really don't know how the lead FEM does it. They have more patience than I.) I offered a compromise: I'll keep one of those shifts, and the other Adult In The Room -- the one who finally came back from LOA -- can take the other. That way I can focus more on what needs doing without feeling overwhelmed or exhausted by the end of it.

Meanwhile, I've been tempted to return to the blogging these last couple of weeks, but I don't think I'm quite ready for it yet. I'm doing well with revision on Queen Ophelia's War and getting my daily words don, and even doing another reread of Theadia as the follow-up revision project, but I'm also thinking that Busy Time At The Day Job is coming up quick and I may not have the spoons for it just yet. So instead of jumping back in with the themed posts I'd been working on, perhaps I'll wait until December and do the Year End Review entries. Doing them twice a week like the usual schedule or just once a week to save my sanity, I'm not sure, but we'll see.

On that note, I'm going to spend the rest of today just enjoying the time writing and doing other things I've been wanting to do!

Whew! Been a few weeks since my last entry here...I've been up to the usual nonsense: working at the day job, writing and revising while at home. I've kind of let myself slide into a week-by-week cycle to get used to the work/writing balance, which is always a good thing...I've been doing that mainly to fight that old habit of thinking I need to hit word count every week. I used to do this way back in my high school days as a way to deal with distraction and get my work done on time. Nowadays, though, I've just been utilizing the process just to make sure I stick to my good habits and don't slide into bad ones again.

Anyway -- I'm sure some of you are wondering when I'll ever get back to posting at Walk in Silence, yeah? Okay, maybe one or two of you at any rate. I haven't really made any solid decisions on what I want to do with that site right now, other than 'not what I've been doing for the last several years because I'm bored with it'. I do have a neat idea, but it's something I think I'll need to plan a few weeks in advance to give myself time and space to work it all out, create a backlog, and see where I can take it. You'll know soon enough.

And what about Theadia? Currently at Chapter 27 and this book is getting longer and longer...!  I'm pretty sure once I finally wrap it all up, I'll split it up into a duology. It's got that Bridgetown Trilogy epicness to it, which I'm quite happy about.

Okay, back to the writing trenches!!

I fear I'm lagging ever behind with my writing, and it's nobody's fault but my own, really. Just me giving into a lot of distraction. So with it being the first of the month once more, I'm going to try again to reel it all in and Get Things Done. Follow the whiteboard schedule again and figure out a way to make it work around my odd Day Job schedule.

Was also thinking that I haven't used the 750Words site in a while. I purposely stopped using it when I got to the sort-of finish lines of the two novels I was working on, just to take a break. I'd like to pick it up again, though. Even if it's just random incomplete ideas or incoherent rambling. Something that I can zip out in a half hour that won't interfere with the revision work I'm currently doing.

Other than that...? Not much to report! Hope everyone has a wonderful new month! :)

As of this past Thursday, I am fully vaccinated! Had shot number two that morning (same place as before) and as expected, by day's end the brain fog and muscle ache started settling in. Sleep that night really sucked, as by then EVERYTHING ached and kept me awake. The next day I had a slight fever and more muscle achiness (even in my fingers!!) so I spent most of that day listening to new music releases and catching up on webcomic reading.

Thankfully I felt 110% better by Saturday morning, because a) I finally could take an Advil now to quell an accompanying headache I'd had the entire time and b) I could sleep in, which I did. Small price to pay, but I'm glad it didn't completely lay me out, and I'm glad I'm now fully vaxxed up! Still wearing my masks, though, because I'm not THAT PERSON (you know who I'm talking about). Today I'm back to normal, and we went for a three mile walk around the neighborhood and got tasty breakfast sammiches as rewards after.

The downside is that I'm about half a week behind on Diwa & Kaffi revision work, so I need to catch up on that ASAP. Maybe later this afternoon after I finish the laundry and vacuum the apartment. Oh, and I also need to call my mom and wish her a Happy Mother's Day too! Heh.


Hope everyone has a good week ahead!

Not too much to report here, as I've been taking it easy this weekend. I wanted to Read What I Have So Far for the two big writing projects and did that instead of getting any new words done. I often do this near the start of every project for a few reasons: one, to see if any of it holds up and holds my attention (which yes, both do, yay!), and two, to get a firm grasp on the story and its many moving parts. This second reason is the more important of the two, as it's my way of establishing continuity.

And let me tell you, my novels ALWAYS start off with the shittiest continuity ever. This is mainly due to me trying things out just to see where they go. This includes character traits and personalities, extended family and friends, time of day, whatever. I used to say I was 'flailing' at this point, but I don't think that's a good word for it. More like 'feeling my way', honestly. After maybe four or so chapters, I'll do a Read What I Have So Far and see what works and what needs work. 

That said...Project A is going in an unexpected but fun direction and I'm quite happy about that, but I definitely need to straighten out the continuity. Project B, on the other hand, is going a bit slow but the continuity is just fine. So all in all, I think I'm happy enough with both that I can start moving forward starting tomorrow. Woo!

Wednesday already??  Eep!  This month is going by far too quickly for my liking.  Need to gt more done!!  Yeah, I know, I'm doing a crapton of stuff already as it is.  But at the same time it's working out just fine.  The days are gong by fast because I purposely have a very full plate and I'm doing what needs doing to keep it running smoothly.

[Note to self: get off your ass and get those In My Blue World postcards created and printed for Worldcon already!!]

Made a concerted effort to mute a handful of people on Twitter lately.  (Don't worry, none of you who follow me here as well.)  Mostly the consistent doomcriers and retweets of doomcriers.  Yes, I am well aware that bad things are going on.  I just don't need the constant reminders or the nihilism.  And I'm not blocking you, I'm merely making the sane move of having a somewhat positive social media feed. 

Other news: It completely blows my mind that we'll be visiting London again in a few weeks!  We've got a few exciting things lined up for it, and if we can, I'd love to meet up with some of our friends there.  Of course, I'll be out of pocket and not posting (except maybe a fly-by or two), but I will most definitely be bringing my tablet so I can do another major revision/edit pass of In My Blue World.  I do find that doing edit work (as well as behind-the-scenes notes and outtakes) is quite relaxing during vacation.

Okay, back into the trenches. Another busy day ahead!  Have a good rest of the week, peeps!
 

It's been a nice couple of days here in SF, with the temps hovering in the upper 50s and lower 60s -- the New Englander in me still isn't used to that, twelve years later -- but we're not complaining.  Gives us reason to leave the house and walk around and do things and shake our cabin fever (or alternately, our hibernation instincts)!

It's been a busy month in Spare Oom.  I've hit nearly all my beats (as I've been calling them) so far, which keeps my hands and brain full for most of the day, but the end result is that I'm getting a hell of a lot done.  For my daily 750 I've only missed a few weekend days, and I'm okay with that -- especially since a good percentage of that output has been actual fiction and not rambling filler.  Same with working on the final revision of Meet the Lidwells (if I'm not too busy I may just finish that today!) and the ongoing work with the Apartment Complex story (I really need a title for that...).  I've been solid with my blogging, having posted only one fly-by (due to being in Anaheim at the time).  Same with the personal journal and the weekly poetry.

On a more personal note, I've been thinking lately of trading in my 12-string guitar, as I've rarely picked it up since I bought it.  It's a nice lower-end Epiphone that was pretty much new when I bought it at Tall Toad up in Petaluma, so I'm sure I could get some money for it.  More to the point, I was thinking of maybe trading it in for a second electric of around the same price.  I talked with my sister (who's well versed in many things guitar) and she's given me some suggestions for what to look for.  Not sure when that'll happen, but it's on my to-do list.  We shall see.

On that note... hope everyone's having a good week! :)