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My drug of choice is writing––writing, art, reading, inspiration, books, creativity, process, craft, blogging, grammar, linguistics, and did I mention writing?

Wednesday, June 10, 2015

Blog Status Report/Summer Schedule (A few Meta Things)

This can't be our actual status report since it clearly shows we actually have a budget.
Thank you for sticking with me through an "artsy" phase.

For those of you who are not so excited about me publishing the LARP I ran at Kublacon, I appreciate your patience as I finish up this project. It'll be tucked away into the deep dark crevasses of The Reliquary and we'll be back to our usual shenanigans soon. I know it's not "fiction" in the typical sense of the word, and I know that my own creative writing isn't as popular as a snarky listicle or social justice rant, but I take care of an 18 month old and work as a teacher, so writing is very much a careful allocation of time and energy resources. I often have to decide if I'm writing a really slamming article OR working on fiction in a given week.

There may be more "artsy phases" ahead since I really don't seem to be able to blog and write fiction with a toddler in tow, but I will try to spread them out with some regular blogging. If only these damn things would fix themselves dinner once in a while. What is THAT about?

I have a couple more characters and a couple more notes to post for the LARP. I should have that finished by this weekend along with some final thoughts. In particular, thank you to subscribed folks for your patience while I posted two and three characters a day. Because of that, not only was I able to survive a weekend of watching the little guy solo for the first time ever, but this also won't drag out half way to July. I should be able to finish things up by this weekend while only publishing one bit of the larp as a second post each day.

I'd like to direct your attention to our latest poll. (Best world building in fiction.)

We are currently in the nomination process, and I can already tell you that this poll is going to be fricken EPIC. There are already DOZENS of nominations and lots of seconds. So hop over there and add your two cents, or just second what you want to see go on. (Or third it. Or fourth it....) Because if a FEW titles get multiple "seconds" I might just cull everything without multiple seconds to keep the poll from going into semifinal or even quarterfinal rounds.

As usual, it's up to YOU. So if you want every damned world on that poll for a three-month battle royale, be sure to second everything you feel deserves to be on the poll.

I'm teaching summer school again. Yes, really.

I know I said I wasn't going to, and I was going to take the time off and focus on writing this summer, but the family jumped in and pretty much insisted that $35/hr gigs were not to be written off and that they would get me enough back up in the form of housecleaning and kid care that I would not have a summer like the last one (when I was working 60 hour weeks before I ever sat down to write a word). This might be my "Charlie Brown trusting that Lucy won't pull the ball this time" moment, but by fucking Jove, let's give it the old college try. My retirement fund is mostly a dilapidated 401k from my restaurant managing days (that vaguely resembles the burnt cat from Hercules), and some discretionary income I've managed to squirrel away into CDs, so an infusion of real money into an IRA or something now that I'm ~coughnotinmythirtiesanymorecough~ is kind of a no brainer. And I'm sure not making enough writing to buy a retirement yacht...or even a retirement yurt.

The smoke ring represents my dreams of being able to eat
anything other than ramen in old age.
See it floating away....
This means that the Tue, Wed, Thurs schedule for summer will likely be pretty low key. Instead I'll put something "slow burn" up on the weekend. At least that's the plan. Lucy might pull the ball.

4 comments:

  1. First, I'm very much enjoying the "artsy" LARP stuff! As a former DM/GM turned "Writing Facilitator," I can appreciate the amount of work you put into fleshing out all the characters. I'm rounding out an NPC at the moment who is fighting me tooth and nail about being an NPC.

    [Hush, Maren! I said you could have your own stories! You're just not allowed to overshadow the Newbie Super in Chicago because it's his story. I swear you couldn't have been this obnoxious when I was 9! Yeah, you probably were... Beej created you and now just can't stop sending me data dumps. And will you just RELAX?!? For gods' sakes, I will get to your stories! I promise. Sheesh.]

    Second, and again, I must express my horror at the thought of teaching. A friend recently suggested that I teach a course on relational database design after a lengthy email conversation about the 3NF (third normal form), especially after I admitted that I've been known to take a database all the way to the 5NF (fifth normal form)... JUST BECAUSE I COULD. He was being serious. I broke out into a cold sweat and managed a feeble, "Heh heh." When relaying the tidbit about teaching to a colleague later, she nearly fell out of her chair laughing. As she's still recovering from a total hip replacement, that would have been bad.

    Teach a course? No. Never. Come in as a guest lecturer to educate and amuse the students on how NOT to design a database? Hmm... maybe.

    And now I must run off to continue editing a story my co-Writing Facilitator and I wrote a few years ago. Fun, fun, fun!! (Seriously. I'm enjoying the process. Oh, hush. You already knew I was weird.)

    ;-D

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    Replies
    1. Well, I'm glad you like it at least. Nothing I've written in the last week and a half (besides the poll on Monday) has gotten more than 50-60 page views.

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    2. [Dear Chrome: Y U HATE ME???]

      I'm one of the lazy people who reads the blog in an RSS reader. Tsk. And I haven't had a chance to share the series with my RP peeps. I think many of them would enjoy it. ;-)

      And now... to find time for ALL THE THINGS. Dang, and I don't even have an 18-month-old person in my house. Can't use that excuse.

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  2. Another vote for loving the larp stuff - I'd love to play in it :-)

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