Storytime

Yep, it's that time of the year when Halloween merchandise is battling Christmas stuff and the end of the year is looming. Frankly I'm sure it was Easter only a few weeks ago. But no, the truth is facing us. Unavoidable. We have 78 days left till the end of the year. And of course I started 2019 with a clear head. I knew what I wanted to do (kinda) and knew exactly    supposedly how I was getting there. But I have no idea what I have done! Realistically there have been 288 days in which I have done...something. Often I don't know what. That is over 6912 hours of something being achieved. Some days getting out of bed counts! Going to work....being with family....actually writing something is a HUGE achievement. So...basically I set off with goals and have meandered. Perhaps this should be me next year... Perhaps not. On the positive side I still have about 1872 (plus or minus a few) hours left to accomplish great things. Starting....hmmmm...

So, one of my goals for this month is to submit a piece of work. Very vague, as I have no idea what to submit nor to where. But I know it's time to start sending work out into the world. So I began last Friday. Began is the right word...I started to search for places for submissions...got side tracked...ended up on a garden site. Naturally I head out between showers to check out the garden. Yep still there. Still needs work. Back inside, after coffee and snack (can you have a cuppa without a snack? ) then yes I have found a place to submit. Then... Over the weekend I paint a Very Hungry Caterpillar. This week we are celebrating the 50th anniversary of this book, so I HAD to create a caterpillar that the kids at work can feed. How could I not? Monday and I have a few hours before work so I carefully go through some poems. Which ones to send? I have three selected to work on. I then head outside because... the rains have brought out a collection of funghi. ...

So I'm working on an edit of a WIP. I have given this work to a cold reader, so I have her notes as I go back and work through. Looking at the big picture stuff as well as all those tiny niggly details. Some details are not tiny, as I've changed two characters names already...OMG the mistakes that causes! I have begun to research how writers go through this structural edit. I have looked at the Hero's journey...and all the many variations. I have noted where my novel meets these milestones...the 'call to adventure'.....the 'threshold guardians'. And I have... Gone off to play in the garden and dream of what will be. This appears to be one of the many  problems I face. Getting down to it. I'm so easily distracted. I know I should be doing work. Research. Getting my head around... But frankly I would much rather... Be on a beach. Somewhere. Anywhere. I put down some more notes, work on a chapter. Realise that s...

Second week of Vicki the Lefty (as in learning to do most things with the left hand). I'm finding I can do more and more with the old dependable right hand, to a limited degree...but alas longer than five minutes on the keyboard or using the mouse and it aches. So we are limited to a lot of left handed sloooooowwwwwww typing, the mouse clumsily used on the left which has translated to a few poems being attempted, but that is it. So what have I done? Hello the wormhole of Netflix. We won't go there. I've also done some clumsy left handed gardening. Although I have a lot of ideas..especially when I'm able to really dig and lift heavy things. I have ordered some plants... Nothing like lounge room gardening. I have spent time with this little fellow. And his mum of course. I have actually been listening to some podcasts that have been recommended to me over the years. From Stuff You Should Know - with Josh and Chuck ( I can only do very small ...

I am so good at starting things. So very damned good! Start clearing my desk, then distracted. Start cleaning the windows..half house done and ooops..distracted. Start a garden bed... and before I finish (and I so see it all in my mind how I want it)....distracted. Begin weeding a garden bed....distracted. Anyone else see a pattern emerging? I begin a poem...never finish. Begin a short story....it falters and stops. So whilst on our writing retreat a few weeks ago, one fellow scribbler suggested I write the end of the junior novel I've been working on. The interesting fact was that I could see it. Visualise the scene as though it were in a movie. So I wrote it. It's not a whole chapter, not even the entire scene...just that last image I had at the ending of this book. It's the first time I've worked like this. I am a plotser...a by the seats of my pants kind of writer. Planning to me is boring, is tedious. It takes time away from the fun! ...

I put my hands high in the air, I am easily distracted. Doesn't have to be by much. Could be by a plant, a bit of sunshine, a bit of rare rain. I'm easily distracted and therefore I procrastinate. I should be writing but heh, it's a good day and the garden needs work. I should be writing but it's sunny and there is washing to hang out. I have a million excuses, some of them even good excuses, why I can't be writing right now. There is family and frankly that is very important. I have my husband and children...in-laws...and very much loved grandchildren. Children won't be children for that long, they grow so fast. So if there is a choice between family and writing, family will win time and again. Then there are other distractions... These distractions are easily avoided but, alas, most are so much fun. This is where choice comes into it. In an attempt to not be so easily distracted I have my laptop set up so all I do is write on it. An...

I always love to see how writers--or actually 'writers' - spend their day. I'm amazed at those that get up in the wee hours before work and calmly put down a few thousand words. Or those that send the kids off to school then settle down in their office and write six chapters. My designated writing day, which is a Wednesday, goes a lot like this... I sleep in. No alarm set (unless I've booked something exciting like doctor, car service, hair cut etc) and wake up about 7.30. Today thanks to small purring creature it was about 7.10. Leisurely breakfast is had. Then I pop onto the computer. Alas no writing yet, I check emails and the old reliable face book.  Three quarters of an hour later I'm ready to get dressed. Then--- I hang out the washing. Get distracted by furry child.....  Then of course, I'm ready...to head to the shops. I had to you see, there is this handbag I've been thinking about. You know how it is, that insistent niggle of 'If ...

At the beginning of September I decided to give one of the, many and varied, writing software programs a trial. I signed up and thought, yep in 30 days I will have an idea if I want to purchase it, or whether it is not for me. I had heard rave reviews and even though I ummed and ahhhed and debated, I decided to have a go. What could I lose? I had, after my 'success' with finishing the Shillong edit in August, decided that I would give another manuscript a go in September. And that the software program would aid in this rejiggery. However.... Five days in and I knew it wasn't for me. Not at the moment at least. Mainly because I am not a planner. I tend to have an idea, I may nut it out a bit here and there (mostly in my brain, not on paper) and then I go for it. Now this could be a reason why so little actually gets done...but this, as I have discovered and now had reinforced, is how I write. I began well....that was after watching the tutorial. Just one, ther...

Always curious - this is my thought of the week...where do you write? What is your writing space? Do you have your own space, perhaps an office just for you? Or do you share a space with 3 children, a guinea pig and a fish that edits over your shoulder? Or are one of those that write (happily) in a coffee shop or cafe, away from the procrastinations found at home. Those dust bunnies that sing out, the washing that NEEDS to be done....NOW. This is where I write . (Perhaps I should have tidied up?) This is a nook in our bedroom. So not the ideal place to write, behind the chair is our chest of drawers, beside that my art/craft supplies (even messier than my desk :) The window to the left looks out to the bank behind the house and onto the backyard (if you can imagine even MORE messier than previously talked about) which in one way is good as I don't get distracted - until the birds come in. When the silver eyes and finches flit from tree fern to ivy...I'm lost. To the righ...