Mrs. Mitty Lives...

And still rambles. ;)

So, hello out there, if anyone still remembers me! I still remember you, my small band of readers, and have been keeping up on reading your blogs, for those still writing them.

I have been off on a complicated and uh, interesting journey through RL and FL (that'd be real life and fantasy life).

First, the less complicated FL: I discovered MMORPGs. That is 'massively multiplayer online role-playing games', like World of Warcraft and Aion, for the uninitiated. They are also massively time-sucking and can be very addictive, if you tend to have that kind of personality. (Just ask your teenage kids; lots of them play MMOs.)

Now as to the RL: It's complicated. Two years ago, I left a marriage of almost 30 years. I am not going into the whys and wherefores, but suffice it to say we are still legally wed but living apart, and it was a reasonably amicable parting. I think it would be safe to say the experience is akin to having your brain moved from your head to your shoulder, and having to rewire your circuits to make all your parts work properly again. Or something.

Anyway, I'm back to writing. At least a little. At least working up to looking at my novels in progress.

For now though, my focus will be on non-fiction, trying to get back into print with articles, and on blogging. The day job is more a labor of love than lucrative, so rather than look for a second job (which could be a fantasy anyway, with 15% unemployment here) I am aiming for supplemental income from writing and a couple of other freelance ideas I have floating around. Wish me luck.

I hope you all are doing well in life and with your writing. Looking forward to catching up with you all!

Writing? What's That?

Oh, my. I sure am having a little vacation from writing. Getting itchy to get back at it, too. I have now been out for dinner the last three nights in a row and out for lunch and to our town's beautiful huge horticultural and sculpture gardens today.

Also, I am amidst the rather sizable project of adding a new(ish) computer to my home network and cleaning up and salvaging three other computers to try to make one super-duper other new(ish) computer out of those parts (and maybe a couple of new parts).

Whew. Stop the world, I wanna get off!

Okay, not really, but I am so ready for some "normal"!

The good news/bad news portion of this post is that the weather is looking like it might be sufficiently nasty around here tomorrow for a snow day. That would be GRAND as far as I'm concerned! I have so many irons in the fire, I'd love a whole bonus day to get some of them taken care of.

Hope you all are having some nice, normal, productive writing time!

A Fine Mess

No, I'm not talking about my office - although I sure could be. (Well, no, that's actually more of a disaster area.) It's my Western. Hoo-boy! Where to begin???

I did what I planned, which was to start looking it over and form a plan of attack for filling in the holes. But this is going to be a more gargantuan task than I anticipated. (Note to self: Go with linear writing for future WIPs!)

On just the first quick scan, without actually reading, we have a case here of The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly. I'll enumerate them in reverse order so I can end on a positive note and feel some optimism as I close out the blog entry. {g}

THE UGLY
#1: Since this is to be book one of three, I *really* need a Bible to keep track of all the details. The problem is, I have FOUR multi-page story Bibles, various parts of which contradict each other, and this is only including information from book one. ::rolling eyes at self:: As to why, don't ask 'cause I don't know how I managed that one. {g} Before I continue writing, these must be condensed into one coherent, non-contradictory Bible.

#2: My original chapter one and opening of chapter two are written from the POV of a character I've already decided to eliminate from book one except as a reference.

THE BAD
#3: I have to choose which ending I want to go with - the original or the longer one - which will impact the whole story arc. Either would be good, I think. One will make the book shorter and more typically a western romance and more like what I had in mind for the series when I first conceived it. The other ending will make it longer, more dramatic, and more of a saga, and perhaps more rewarding for the heroine and hero. I have to know my ending before I start plugging holes or that will be a futile exercise.

#4: I am having just a tinsy crisis of confidence: I wonder if I've bitten off more than I can chew with this story (though I am usually pretty good at telling that thought to beat it when it pops into my head). Since it's not strictly romance, or historical, or murder mystery, or paranormal, but has some of all of that, is it Just Too Much? (Or is it Just Too Much for a first novel?)

THE GOOD
#5: I still like the story. Whew!

#6: I really like my characters, except for the baddies, and I really *don't* like them (as it should be).

So. All in all, I think I can do this. As I said, a lot more work to be done than I had thought, but now I have a more realistic idea of where it stands.

Onward!

Decisions, Decisions...

Okay, I know this is silly, but I am dangling on the horns of a dilemma:

Which do I read next? Both are nice, big, fat, juicy books I'm looking forward to reading in equal measure --

Dragonfly in Amber (book 2 of Diana Gabaldon's Outlander series - I just finished a re-read of Outlander a couple weeks ago)

-or-

Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell (which I got for my birthday last month and have also been dying to read)

HELLLLPPPP! {g}

Great Books of Words

I don't know about you all, but I really do love words. Good Words. Colorful Words. Tasty Words! (Okay, yes, My name is Mrs. Mitty and I am a wordaholic.) I love the way they look, the way they sound and knowing or learning where they came from. I love the way it feels to say them and to know all about them.

Browsing my library, well, my scattered hoards and stashes of books, actually -- to suggest that my books are in some order resembling the tidiness of a library would be a big fat lie, not to mention putting on airs {g} -- I find that a lot of them are about words.

Here's a little sampling:
A Classical Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue
Synonyms & Antonyms
Websters New World Thesaurus
Roget's Thesaurus
Brewer's Dictionary of Phrase & Fable
A 1923 edition of a huge (4" thick with teensy-tinsy print) dictionary with all kinds of good old words in it...
The New International Webster's Comprehensive Dictionary (another big fat one but only about three years old)
And the list goes on.

I suppose it's no big surprise for a writer or a reader to have this kind of stash. I will say the Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue and the Brewers are my favorites, followed closely by the old, yellowed dictionary. But I'm curious to know if other readers and writers have any really special or unique favorite word-books.

Do you? And if so, what books are they? I'm always on the lookout for new goodies.

Getting On

We've spent more time with in-town, out-of-town, and out-of-state family in the past week than we typically do in a year. It's been good to have everyone here, and good to hear all the family stories told again. But it's also been exhausting, and it's time to make our way back to routine.

Tomorrow I go back to work at my day job, and tonight I will at least do this blog post and take a look at one of my WIPs. Between the usual Christmas chaos and Dad's brief illness and passing, I have written nothing in the past three weeks.

The western still needs to have all the holes plugged with something before I can call it a complete first draft. It was my (perhaps unrealistic) plan to get that done over the holiday break from school. But I think I forgot we were going to be doing all that HOLIDAY stuff then. ::Making note to adjust goals accordingly for next December.::

So there. I've written a blog entry, and now I'm off to spend a few minutes looking at one of the WIPs, see where I've left off, and try to decide what to work on tomorrow.

Hope you all are doing fine and I wish you the best of Happy New Years!

Life Again

I didn't imagine I'd be posting this news so soon, but my dear father-in-law has passed on already. He went gently, surrounded by his big loving family, so we are very grateful for that.

I was so lucky to have him for a Dad for 28 years (I lost my own Dad at 14). I couldn't have wished for a better second Dad (and I told him that several times over the years).

He was "Mr. Goodwrench" to a lot of people, a skilled auto mechanic who bore a startling resemblance to the advertising world's Mr. Goodwrench. And he was the guy who could fix anything with duct tape. But most importantly, he was a good man, a good husband and father, a good friend, and a beautiful example for living with morals, values and priorities in order.

He will be greatly missed.

Life

Life is hard sometimes. Like now.

We're facing the loss of a very loved person in our family, my father-in-law. The doctors give him about six to eight weeks. I don't know what to say, or not say, here on the blog, except that he will be terribly missed by all of us when he's gone.

He is in hospice care now and we will all be spending a lot of time there, so I don't anticipate blogging much for the next couple of months.

Until later, then, hug your loved ones and be well.

M