Five on Friday: The Nutsy Fun Edition
1. I entered the Golden Heart yesterday. (Woot!) Right now, that means I submitted my entry form along with the fee. I have yet to send the submissions to the mothership (a.k.a. RWA National offices in Texas), but since I just queried BROKEN this fall, I’m confident that it’s ready to go.
2. People are still finding my blog by searching ‘WTF’– I mean they’re doing this a lot. Guess my theory of random words (Michael Jackson, Phillies, Halloween costumes for cheap) doesn’t really work as well as abbreviated swears.
3. Montana and I are attending a wedding tomorrow (yes, that’s Halloween) where the bride and groom asked people to dress up. I mean they printed “Costumes are encouraged” on the invitation between “at 5:00 in the evening” and “Reception to follow.” I think that is a bold bride. Of course, my first idea was to break out my wedding dress and my costume would be a bride, but remembering how stressed out I was before my wedding, I’m going to take mercy on this bride and just dress nicely. And, of course, I have the boots. (There is a bit of a western theme…)
4. NaNoWriMo starts Sunday. I’m building this into my writing plans, but more for support than word count. Writing challenges make me twitchy, but I love the camaraderie.
5. And, since this is the Nutsy Fun edition, I’m going to end by saying have a Happy and Safe Halloween! Enjoy these amazing (and sometimes twisted) jack-0-lanterns as my treat to you!
And, just so you know it’s still me…
Last Tuesday in October
Hi, all! Just wanted to pop on to say thank you, thank you, thank you for all the wonderful cheering and support last week! I appreciated every last comment and happy thought and send such lovely writing thoughts back. You are all…
Had a fantastic weekend with all kinds of writing thoughts, and even though the cost was a small cold, I’m still doing great. My goal for this week is to really hit a stride so I can attack November (and my version of NaNoWriMo) head on. And, judging by all of the writing drums I hear in the jungle, you’re with me!
And, speaking of fabulous writing, don’t forget to pick up Anna Campbell’s Captive of Sin, out today! How’s that for no tricks, all treats?
Now, back to the writing, but before I go, a little smile for you. (And a big fat congrats for L.A.’s recent FastDraft success–here’s your reward, L.A.!)
Yup, it’s official. I’m crazy.
So I’m sitting and thinking yesterday, and for the love of mergatron, I cannot how remember how I stumbled on this path, but I did.
I had an idea for a story.
Now, this isn’t new to me. I get these quite frequently and duly write them down on little scraps of paper, slip them in my “Ideas” file, and let those little suckers germinate until they sprout up and grow. But this idea I had yesterday started rolling downhill like a boulder pushed from Mount St. Helens and it gathered momentum, tumbling down until it crashed at the bottom into an explosion of rocks and gravel and crazy wild-idea shrapnel.
I quickly wrote down the jist of it, just so I could tell Montana about this fun idea I had, and those few paragraphs just flowed. Like lava. (Guess I’m going with the volcano metaphor.) I called Montana and read it to him, and as soon as I finished and heard it out loud for the first time, I got chills.
So, cutting out the parts about how brilliant I am and making this long story short, I’m skipping to the end of Montana telling me to start writing this story NOW and me getting the first 1000 words written last night.
Now, I’m not telling you this to milk you for applause or polite appreciation of the enormity of my Corpus Callosum, but to tell you I’m temporarily abandoning you. I want to give this book a try, and my goal is to have it done by Christmas, so in a NaNoWriMo like run, I’m going to be focused on this fun, fun book for the next 2 months. I’ll still come by and post updates and things, but they might not be quite what I’ve had before, nor will I be blog-hopping as much. I will be posting on Facebook and Twitter so please come say hi, but for now I’ll simply say…
![never_give_up_never_surrender[1]](http://pamwritesromance.files.wordpress.com/2009/10/never_give_up_never_surrender1.jpg?w=359&h=254 "never_give_up_never_surrender[1]")
That’s it–no more peanut butter and potato chips before bed
I had an odd dream the other night.
I was in my living room with a few people. It was a quiet afternoon—no big whoop, right? Wrong. My cell phone rang—Alyson Hannigan was calling me.
Now, I’m sure this had something to do with the How I Met Your Mother marathon Montana and I had recently (one of my top 5 all time shows), but let me continue with Le Grande Freaky Dream.
Alyson starts asking me about my books and I’m trying to remember my elevator pitch for either my romantic comedy/paranormal lite (you remember the rom-com-para-lite) or my more recent dark historical. But I can’t remember my pitches!
And I’m frantically trying to remember something—anything!—but can’t, and to make matters worse, people keep streaming into our house, and not only people, noisy people! Kids, those raucous friends from your partying days—there are even jets flying overhead and nobody can shut the freaking door!
So, while I dig through every pile of paper in the front room for any scrap of a query, I get cagey and start asking Alyson how she found out about me. I mean, I’ve recently queried my historical, but even in my freaky dream state I know I didn’t query her. Alyson tells me she’s looking for a movie to do, and even in my freaky dream state I realize that she would be Perfect for my rom-com-para-lite. (And holy cow, would she!)
At this point, I’m desperate, so I head into our bedroom for a little peace and quiet so I can talk to Aly (you know—it’s what her close and personal friends call her) and search every square inch of the back of the house for a query because I know I left a pile of them around somewhere! So I’m making small talk with Aly, flinging stuff right and left, but finding nothing. At this point, Montana comes in and I send him out for my laptop, because I know my queries are on there.
But before he can return with my trust Mac or before I find a scrap of a query (because, you know, it’s not like I keep every draft of every single permutation of every pitch or query I’ve ever done), I wake up.
Being no stranger to freaky-deaky dreams and not needing a psychology degree to figure this one out, I tell Montana about my torturous night and make myself a cuppa tea, heavy on the sugar and cream.
And reflect on the wonderful thoughts of Aly making a movie from my book.
Feel Good Five on Friday
Hello! So wow–how was that Marilyn Brant Week? Pretty amazing, I know. It was such a party that I’ve spent the last week recovering from it, that’s how amazing it was. I think it’ll go down in the books as legen….wait for it…dary.
So, in honor of Marilyn’s awesome book (According to Jane, available at Amazon and major bookstores everywhere) and Friday and everything else that’s good, it’s going to be a Feel Good Five on Friday around here, so kick back, get ready to smile, and enjoy.
Feel Good News: That same According to Jane is #2 on Amazon’s Contemporary Romance list. If that doesn’t get you smiling today, nothing will! Congratulations, Marilyn!!!
Feel Good Read II: “The Bear Went Over the Mountain” by William Kotzwinkle. You may know him as the author of the Walter the Farting Dog books, or even as the writer who novelized the movie E.T., but thanks solely to Montana, I’ve discovered this absolute gem of a book. Here’s a brief description as posted on Amazon: In Kotzwinkle’s merry send-up, the author of the hit novel “Desire and Destiny” is a bear, a real bear, who after finding the manuscript under a spruce tree and attaching his nom de plume, Hal Jam, becomes rich and famous overnight. Obtuse editors, star-hound agents, and a right-wing televangelist and Presidential candidate all warm to Hal’s warm, bearish honesty without bothering to read his book–or to notice that he’s an animal, for that matter. I started this last night and almost didn’t put it down. It’s simply delightful, and possibly more so to those of us trying to write our own hit novels. Sadly, it’s out of print, but you’ll be doing yourself a huge favor if you find it online or at a local used bookstore.
Feel Good TV Show: Really, was it any wonder I was going to pick “Glee” for this? If you haven’t watched it yet, please get over to Fox.com or Hulu.com and watch it. Watch an episode, watch one of their awesome videos, watch anything with Jane Lynch. If it doesn’t get you laughing or singing, check your pulse.
Feel Good News Story: You’ve probably already heard about this–it was everywhere this week (including my post on Facebook), but I find it simply too delightful not to post again. Two drunken idiots in Wales were picking on people on the street when they decided to pick on some cross-dressers. Only they weren’t cross-dressers–they were cage fighters on a night out in “fancy dress.” They started to pick on these supposed trannies, and one of the fighters came up behind the idiots and dropped them with one punch each. It’s just karma in its rawest, most sparkly form, and it’s beautiful. Read the story and see the clip here.
Feel Good Movie Clip: I was introduced to Baz Luhrmann (writer of Romeo + Juliet, Moulin Rouge, and Austrailia) many, many years ago when I saw Ballroom Dancing. Well, the talented Mr. Luhrmann was on Dancing with the Stars a few weeks ago as a guest judge, leading the amazing Barbara Ferrer to write about it on her blog. She also posted the end scene from Ballroom Dancing, and I’m posting it here as my final Feel Good of the day. You don’t need to know anything about it–just watch it, and if you don’t get choked up at the 4:00 minute mark (followed by more around 5:40) with all of the pulsing, optomistic, triumph over anything feel goodness, then I just don’t know.
Have a great, feel good weekend, everybody.
