Thirteen Things I Learned About Myself and NaNoWriMo 1. That I can win. This was my first year trying and I'm flushed with triumph. 2. When I push myself in my writing, I can get it done. 3. I can do this and still have a life. 4. I waste a lot of time doing nothing. After seeing how many words I could produce in a day, I realized I do spend precious minutes doing nothing. A disconcerting discovery to be sure. 5. Oh, I do love to write. Being immersed in my writing takes me away. 6. The more I wrote, the easier it got. Except for the end. I finished my book yesterday but realized I had come up short for Nano. I spent two hours adding 500 words. 7. Instead of being exhausted creatively, I'm invigorated. I'd love to jump right back into it today but I don't think my back could take it. 8. The idea behind Nano is to turn off the internal editor. Discovered my internal editor is as much a part of my writing as anything else. 9. I need to go back to the gym. I devoted the time I would have been at the gym to writing. 10. My kids have a sixth sense. If they see I'm heavily involved in my writing, that's the time to totally misbehave and get into stuff. For example, Thing wandered out of the kitchen naked and covered with flour. I asked her what she'd been doing. "I peed in the flour." File that under "why I drink." 11. Non-writers think I'm insane, but they respect it. 12. Atmosphere is inconsequential when I write. If I can crank out 4K words while "Power Rangers" is blaring non-stop from the t.v., I can do anything. 13. I MISSED YOU GUYS AND THE BLOGOSPHERE IN GENERAL. I'm going to start catching up today.

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The Big Push

As you can see by the word count on the right, I'm getting close to goal on Nano. To be honest, I didn't think I could do this, especially considering the amount of other things I needed to do. I'm determined to win this year, so I will be absent from the Internet for most of this week.

My Thanksgiving was non-eventful, not even post worthy. Didn't go shopping yesterday, nothing of any interest to buy. But I did write, over 2k words. And I changed my template. Don't get warm and mushy with this one, it won't last. I just needed a break from color. I'll be getting fancier once Nano is done.

Partied Out

It was party central here at the ol' ranch this weekend. Diva turned 7 on Thursday and Thing turned 4 yesterday. Here's Diva getting her ears pierced for a birthday present. Thing got in on the action as well. I wasn't planning on her getting hers done, but she insisted. I figure the pain of the piercing would pale compared to the pain of the temper tantrum I'd experience. Neither one cried. Diva has way too much pride for that. Thing started to cry until she looked in the mirror. As soon as she saw her ears, she was thrilled.
Yesterday was Diva's party. We counted somewhere around 23 kids at the house. It was total chaos. There were kids everywhere. Nothing was broken and they didn't make as big of a mess as you might think. Afterwards, we had a small family party for Thing.

All in all, it was a pretty successful day. My fingers hurt from undoing the twisty things toy manufacturers insist on using in packaging the toys. I'm way behind on Nano so today is going to be a writing day. I'm too tired to do much else and I have to wait until the garbage pickup has come in order to finish clean up. We filled all the trash and recycling plus put some stuff in my neighbor's cans. At least I'm done with festivities, at least until Wednesday when it's time to get ready for Thanksgiving.

My Thirteen Favorite James Bond Movies In honor of Casino Royale's opening tomorrow, I'd thought this appropriate. 1. Goldeneye. It probably isn't chic to go with a Pierce Brosnan film first, but this movie had everything I liked about a bond movie and the bond girls were interesting. Sean Bean made a great villain. 2. Goldfinger. I love the golf game with Bond and Goldfinger. Oddjob's a great villain. And Pussy Galore? What a name. 3. Thunderball. Seems so quitesssential Bond. 4. Never Say Never Again. Not part of the Broccoli Bond franchise but more Thunderball than Thunderball. Barbara Carerra was great and I liked the older Connery in this movie. 5. On Her Majesty's Secret Service. George Lazenby was not a bad Bond. I didn't like Telly Savalas as Blofeld but the action scenes were very good. Diana Rigg seemed like the kind of woman Bond would marry. 6. License to Kill. "He didn't agree with something that ate him." I have always had a soft spot for Timothy Dalton. I thought he made a great Bond. Two trivia pieces: the guy who played Felix Leiter also played Felix in "Live and Let Die" in 1973 and the actor who plays the puppet president is the son of the actor who played Kerim Bey in "From Russia With Love." 7. From Russia With Love. Red Grant was a great bad guy. Lots of great locales and the whole Cold War element was terrific. 8. Dr. No. Where it all began. 9. Diamonds Are Forever. Vegas, baby. I loved the two assassins, Mr. Kidd and Mr. Wint, were very creepy. 10. Tomorrow Never Dies. Michelle Yeoh was terrific and it had a remote control car. 11. Live and Let Die. One of the few Roger Moore movies I could tolerate. Jane Seymour was so pretty although her tarot card reading sucked. 12. Die Another Day. I didn't like this movie the first time I saw it, but I like it better now. The invisible car is so cool and the fencing scene is terrific. 13. Chitty Chitty Bang Bang. Yeah, I know, not a Bond movie. But it has Truly Scrumptious, a Bond girl name and Auric Goldfinger singing that choochee face song. Links to other Thursday Thirteens! 1. (leave your link in comments, add you link here!)

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The purpose of the meme is to get to know everyone who participates a little bit better every Thursday. Visiting fellow Thirteeners is encouraged! If you participate, leave the link to your Thirteen in others comments. ItÂ’s easy, and fun! Be sure to update your Thirteen with links that are left for you, as well! I will link to everyone who participates and leaves a link to their 13 things. Trackbacks, pings, comment links accepted!

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Why I Drink Part 4

Remember in the movie "Airplane" when Lloyd Bridges' character kept saying "Looks like I picked the wrong week to quit...." And he'd pick some addiction and they got worse each time he said it? That quote always runs through my head when I've had a bad week and last week qualified. Something happened at hubby's work which created a huge problem for us. I spent two days trying to help sort it out. Nothing which is going to make us fall apart but royal pain in the butt. Anyway, in the midst of this, Thing and I were out shopping. I stopped by the reptile store and picked up some crickets to feed to the toads at school. Thing loves to hold the bag so I let her. Y'all know where this is going. At the stop light on our way to school, Thing suddenly screams and bawls. I look in the rear view mirror and there she is, waving the popped bag of crickets around. I managed to catch six but the other 19 were loose in the car. They could still be in there, I don't know, haven't seen them.

It really cracked into my writing but I made up for it on Sunday so I'm back on track. Hope everyone else is having a productive month.

Why I Drink Part 3

Diva: What's for dinner?
Me: Chili.
Diva: I don't want chili.
Me: Too bad.
Diva: (crying) Can't I have something else?
Me: No
Diva: (Escalating waterworks) Please, my head hurts, I can't eat chili.
Me: (gritting teeth) We are having chili.
Diva: (crying pitifully) Can I have a piece of cold pizza?
Me: (in a proud moment of parenting) Fine just stop bawling.
Diva: (watches everyone else getting chili) Can I have some chili?
She ended up eating two servings.
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I am absolutely giddy with excitement over the release of this book. When I heard it was coming out, I started counting the days. I am one sick puppy.

Pain in the Pinkies

I'm knocking on 10K words for Nano so far and my hands are paying for it. Actually, it is just my pinky fingers. They hurt. About 30 years ago I broke both of them. My friends and I had gone Christmas caroling and I tripped. In trying to save whatever sweet treat I had in my hands, I landed on both pinkies. I didn't realize it at the time but I had broken them. Up until now the breaks haven't meant much except something to show off at parties. They healed so fast when I was a kid, I doubt there was much they could have done and as I said, they didn't give me much grief. Until now.

I'm a typist. I touch type so my fingers are generally in the correct position. My wrists probably aren't because I'm lazy but they don't get bothered. I noticed this weekend my pinkies are really sore. They're fine while I'm typing, but afterwards they hurt. I suspect there is some arthritis in there and hence the aching. It isn't slowing me down (I have kids for that) but I certainly feel it at the end of the day.

Weekends are not good writing days. Too much to do. Even when I have a block of time, the constant interruptions put a crimp in my production. So I spent the weekend doing stuff to keep my week light: housecleaning, cooking with the intention of having leftovers, laundry, etc. I'm hoping this week will be a big production week.

Which leads me to the last tidbit for this post. I'm going to be pretty scarce over the next couple of weeks. I've gotten myself into a jam and I will need to spend some time getting out of it. Don't worry, nothing bad or dire, just a little overwhelming. I will tell you all about it at the end of the month. I probably won't post much but I will try to go through the blogroll. A lot of times I do visit without commenting (Gypsy, I can't comment on your blog right now, tried 3 times yesterday. Its not you, its me and the problem will clear up when I re-boot). So if you don't see anything from me for the next couple of weeks, I'm alive, just swamped.

And We're Off....

Halloween was a rousing success. The kids got a major haul of candy. This is them in front of City Hall after they trick or treated in the downtown area. The kid in the mask is my son's friend who pretty much invited himself along. Hey, the more the merrier. We went up to my folks' neighborhood that night and there were hardly any trick or treaters. People were giving my kids handsful of candy. And it was the good stuff. Full size candy bars and tubes of Mentos (I had no idea they actually had their own website...Hence I had to include it). The only odd thing was we had trick or treaters at our house. In the four Halloweens I've lived here, this was the first time. The street we live on has no street lights. At night, it is pitch black. Most of the houses are on one acre lots and are pushed back from the street pretty far. It is not an inviting place to go trick or treating. Anyway, we got home and hubby went outside to get the mail. When he came back in, he forgot and left the porch light on. Twenty minutes later we get trick or treaters. I had no candy. I was a bit irritated because these kids were well into high school. I think that is too old. But I gave them some of the candy my kids collected. They have enough they will never finish. Once the kids left, I turned the light off. At 9:30, after my kids have gone to bed, there is a knock at the door. Two teenage girls were trick or treating. Okay, it is so dark out there, it is a wonder they made it to my porch without falling on the steps. There is one light on in the living room. What in the hell were they thinking? I told them I had no candy. Talk about stupid.

The next day began NaNoWriMo. My kids also had the day off, the teachers had an in-service day. Luckily, my folks to the kids for most of the day and I got over 2500 words. Yesterday wasn't as good but today I'm on a good pace. Hope everyone else is doing well with Nano. I'm finding I have a lot more time than I thought I would. I've also discovered I can't sit in a chair and write for hours, my back won't allow it. So I've been breaking up my writing into sections with a set number of words per sitting time. Once I hit that goal I go and do something else. So far it seems to be working.