DRAMA DRAMA

Life happens and boy did it happen at my son's house last night. Once before I commented that every where you turn you can find story material to write about. I think if I lived with my son for about a month I could come up with enough material to keep me busy for a year. Never a dull moment around this house that's for sure. I really enjoyed my visit though.

I actually managed to sleep in till 8a.m. Yeee haaaaa! Now, I'm just waiting for the rest of the house to come alive. My daughter and I will be driving back to Raleigh today, with a couple of stops along the way. I can hear my nice big comfy bed calling my name now. Inflatable mattresses are a great invention. But a REAL mattress with a supportive backspring under it and a foot or so rise from the floor, is sooooo much better for my aching back. The really fun part of a blow up mattress is trying to stand up once you've laid down on it. I felt a little like a turtle who'd been turned over it's back, waving my little arms in the air as I tried to roll over and flip myself into a sitting position and then move on to conquer the dreaded "stand". Had to actually giggle a couple of times! If you're ever dating someone new and trying to impress them with your grace and poise...DO NOT agree to sleep on an inflatable mattress.

Time to hit the road...tea first, packing of the car next, then "we're outta here!"
Talk to you all on Monday.

THE DAY AFTER

I hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving Day. Moriah and I arrived safe and sound in Mountain City, TN. NO SALMONELLA! Just delicious, juicy, tender turkey. My son rocked it and Danielle made amazing stuffing from rice bread and mashed potatoes that were to "die for". Everything was really terrific.

Today we are off to visit local antique stores and then into Boone to wander for a bit. No Black Friday spots! We'll leave that for the rest of the crazies out there. This evening my son has invited several of his friends and their families over for a "second Thanksgiving feast". It's going to be a busy, busy day, but I'm really looking forward to it.

I brought a copy of Deadly Letters with me and I'm leaving it with Adam so he can read it and give me his feedback. I'm looking forward to seeing what he thinks. Uh...maybe. No really...I need feedback and he is one of the few people I would trust to be honest with me.

NaNo will be uploaded today!

THANKSGIVING CHEER

Just wanted to take a couple of minutes to wish every one of my beloved followers a Happy Thanksgiving! Soooooooooooo, well...HAPPY THANKSGIVING!

It felt very weird yesterday not to have a goal for my writing. I rested and didn't do any writing at all. I'll hit this keyboard hard and heavy on Monday...until then I'm spending quality time with my family. From the time November 1st rolled around, till Tuesday, my mind has been filled with plot lines for Damaged Goods (title may change on rewrite). I've only been half present no matter what I was doing or who I was with, till I had my 50,000 words typed.

I actually cleaned my house yesterday...for the first time in 18 days. Surprised it wasn't stinkier than it was! I had a wonderful visit from a friend who I haven't seen in 40 years! She was here visiting family. We'd reconnected through Facebook several months ago and it was fantastic seeing her again! She is one of the few people on this earth who knew at least a small portion of the circumstances in which I grew up. We talked a little more about that because of the book I've just completed.

Dorothy was right...sometimes "there's no place like home". I don't ever want to live in Peekskill again, but it is so wonderful connecting with friends from years past! I'll travel up that way in the spring, when things "thaw" in that neck of the woods, to do some detail research for my manuscript. Until then I will stay in touch with all my wonderful friends living there and visit them when I make my visit.

EAT DRINK AND BE MERRY TODAY! LOVE ALL OF YOU!

POULTRY WILD SIDE

I typed for six hours yesterday! Gotta be some kind of record...at least for me. I now have 47,670 words for my NaNo challenge and I will complete it today...as I have big plans for tomorrow. My goal today is to be finished by 1:00.

I hope everyone has great plans for Thanksgiving. I will be visiting my son. He bought his first home this year and wanted to celebrate turkey-day in his own home. I personally am thrilled not to have to do all that cooking, cleaning and planning. My concern: salmonella. Yep, that's right...I'm having my first Thanksgiving at my son's house and I'm worried about being poisoned. But here's the thing...a turkey should never be defrosted at room temperature and it should never be stuffed the night before and then stored in the frig till it's popped in the oven. Does my son know this? Do I dare tell him? Nope. Gonna take my chances. Gonna walk on the poultry wild side and pray I don't spend Thanksgiving evening in an emergency room having my stomach pumped...hmmmmmmmmm, I see a story developing here......

Talk to you later...NaNo, NaNo...........

FLOWERY FUN

Okay I confess. I didn't write one blessed word yesterday. I was up bright and early, put a roast in the crockpot, blogged and went off to play with flowers. The Moravian church here in town collects donated flowers from funerals, weddings, showers, social events, etc. and they tear the arrangements apart and re-do them into smaller arrangements and then donate them to nursing homes, shut-ins, low income families, etc. People who don't normally receive flowers. Even several retailers in town donate their flowers when they are in full bloom and they can't sell them.

Flowers make everyone smile. This was so much fun and rewarding at the same time. More churches should do this! My creativity was at full alert and I was in awe of some of the beautiful arrangements some of the ladies created. A talented group...that's for sure.

After we got done "flowering", a group of us went to lunch. We spent about two leisurely hours talking, munching and getting to know one another. I finally got home around 3:00 and needless to say...was totally and completely unmotivated to begin writing what is starting into the very dark side of my childhood. So I took a break.

Today it is dreary, rainy and joyless outside. A perfect day to be writing ugly, gloomy memories. NaNo, NaNo.........

MATTRESS TOPPER

My heart is heavy today and I feel very blah. I didn't write yesterday. I got so caught up in "life events" that I didn't get around to my manuscript at all. I've noticed a change in me. If I don't write during the day...I get sort of depressed and feel like I've failed to do my job.

I blogged yesterday and kudos to me for doing that...but I didn't open Deadly Letters and continue working on it, even though that was my game plan for yesterday afternoon. Spent the morning doing some household crap, grabbed a quick lunch with a friend, had to go Brad's store to take him some medicine he'd left at home, then came the really FUN part of the day. I went to Target to buy a mattress topper. Oi Vey. I found the one I wanted, asked an associate to scan it for a price check...great price, struggled getting it up to checkout (those things are heavy if you get a good one), no offer of help from sales associate. Got it home, struggled getting it upstairs...opened box...CRAP...someone had switched out the less expensive one for the cheap one. I got tricked. Called store, talked to manager, she checked other stores, found one, struggled to get box back downstairs, scared the hell out of dog, drove to other store, struggled to get box into store, delivered it to customer service and can you believe it...in the mood I was now in...I got MS. ATTITUDE at the service desk. I almost went Madea on her ass, I was so completely pissed off. Talked to the manager, finally got my mattress topper, lugged it out to car, drove home, lugged it upstairs, took 30 minutes to get it opened and situated on top of mattress...FINALLY I had my new mattress topper.

Was it worth all that struggling? Definitely. I slept great last night. But maybe that's just cause I was so exhausted from all the lugging and struggling. At any rate, there was no way my brain was going to function and allow me to do my manuscript re-write justice, so I wimped out. I CAN'T do this in November!!!

Today...I continue with Deadly Letters...no distractions! Ooooo was that a butterfly I just saw?

CRISIS AVERTED

OMG...almost had a heart attack this morning. I woke up to NO cable and NO internet! Panic!! I felt so cut off from the world, so helpless, frustrated and pissed at the cable company. I called their office, but couldn't get thru cause a recording told me I had to call during "office hours" which started at 5a.m. and it was 7:35 when I called. WTH??? Now I was really concerned. I mean what if aliens had arrived during the night while we were sleeping and stole all our cable signals. I called friends and family..."do you have cable?" Everyone did...except us...or so I thought. It had become personal, until I called our next door neighbors and was so relieved when they told me they didn't have any signals either. WHEW! At least the extra-terrestrials weren't just after me. I found a different number for the cable company and a wonderful recording told me it was an outage in our area and they were working on it and should have us back up and running by 8a.m. Breathe, breathe...disaster averted.

How addicted to electronics are we? Almost all of the agents I am contacting accept only emailed queries now. If I'm not connected to the internet...how could I send them anything? How could I research the agents I'm considering without internet? How could I find out about writing contests? How could I find out about possible freelance assignments? How could I Facebook???? Yeeee gads! I'm starting to sweat again just thinking about it. Breathe, breathe.......

I actually wanted to blog about something else today, but I'll save it till tomorrow. I need to get a stiff drink right now...oh wait it's only 9:15? Oh what the heck............