A Time For Everything

Happy Friday!

Hope you're well.

The new car continues to surprise and delight. Not only does Google Maps show up on the HUD, but the car will read my texts to include emojis. I got a laugh out of that the other day. I can also pick podcasts from my HUD if decide, in transit, I want to listen to one.

I also discovered that my driver's seat can move in several additional ways. The front edge, over which our knees hang, can be levered up and down! The seat itself can be moved up and down as well as forward and back. The seat back can also be  angled forward and back. All electronically!! No pumping the lever.

It's not a great picture, but I was in a moving car. (DD was driving, not me.) But you know what it means, right? After all this time...?

Yes, after my sad post on Wednesday, the heavenly stars aligned on Thursday night and my boys won in regulation. That means they got the two winner points and the other team got no loser points. And on top of that, the two teams ahead of us in the standings lost last night, meaning we had a four point leap toward the team in that 4th place position we're trying to acquire...

Of course, we have to keep the winning going... :0)

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In other news, I opted against moving forward with that online publisher I'd submitted my cookie book too. She wanted more and more revisions before coughing up a contract and I just don't have the time to devote to that process at the moment. There were a couple other reasons, but that's the big one.

Have a great weekend!

Happy Good Friday and Happy Easter Friends!!

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Hope you're all well. The new month has started, the new quarter has started, and the new week for me tracking various and sundry habits starts tomorrow.

March was rough for me. I've been in a funk for the better part of the first quarter and tomorrow seems like a good day to begin my climb out of it.

I've created my new habit chart. Stickers are at the ready. I'll be percolating the exercise plan of attack as well as the meal plan and menu items. I've ordered KETO test strips. They come with a guide book and an app, so we'll see how helpful that ends up being.

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As I mentioned Wednesday, I'll be spending some time in that dang cookie book this weekend trying to figure out how to explain the revisions I plan to make--if I plan on moving forward with this online publisher.

An online friend was kind and generous enough to beta read the first three chapters and help me understand what the editor meant by a few of her comments. The whole process isn't working the way I expected, which has contributed to my frustrations and the desire to drop kick the whole process into outer space.

But...

The purpose of submitting & publishing with this publisher is still a valid one--to get my work in front of a new set of eyeballs.

The question is: am I willing to do the work necessary to make that happen or do I take my story back, hire an editor, contract out a cover, and publish it myself...

I'll let you know on Monday, once I figure it out. :0)

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Have a great weekend!

Remember the "cookie book"? I wrote a book for submission to an online publisher and submitted it back in January. I was told by the editor who received it that it could be 12 weeks before she got to it. That would have put us at the end of April.

The book is titled "To Linzer & to Cherish."

Instead, the editor got back with me within a couple of weeks, requesting/suggesting some changes to the submitted text (the first 1250 words of the book), which I made and resubmitted. She was satisfied with that change and wanted to see the whole thing after I read a book she recommended and applied the concepts as needed.

So...I reviewed and revised all 23K and sent it to her. Now that she's read the whole book, she's made another observation and requested an outline of how I'd make changes IF I were to proceed. If I tell her I want to make the changes and how I plan to do so, she'll request/send a contract...

Which sounds exciting, but I've spent way more time on this book this quarter than I anticipated and it's thrown me for a loop. I'm not working on the book I was supposed to be working on and I'm feeling a bit discombobulated in general. And this new directive which is somewhat time sensitive is yet another knot in the yarn of my life at the moment.

The offering of a contract sounds like I'll get in the Christmas anthology this year, which was the hope.

So what's the problem...? I'm not sure exactly. Part of it is that--I write the way I write and I have decent ranking numbers on Amazon. Readers don't care as much as editors do about a lot of things... And it's not like my writing won't be all the better for it, but just ugh...

Anyway...enough whining. :0) I told her I'd let her know by Monday, so my weekend will be busy...

Have a great week.

My darling DD caught sight of these in Dollar Tree the other day and brought them home to me. They definitely brightened my day as well as my week, which didn't start off great. It's ending on a better note, thanks goodness, but I'm glad it's the weekend. (They're salt & pepper shakers, if you couldn't tell.)

I heard back from the online publisher to whom I submitted "the cookie book" I mentioned a few weeks ago. It wasn't a request for the full, so that really bummed me out. I'd had my own doubts about the opening chapter, which was all that I was allowed to submit for the query, but I wanted to get it off my plate and didn't listen to my gut. So while I'm not surprised or devastated at this point, it did sting a little on Monday.

The editor did invite me to revise and re-submit, giving me until the end of next week to get it back to her for possible inclusion in this year's anthology. So guess what I'll be working on this weekend and into next week? There's not a whole lot of work to do so I should be able to get the alterations done and a new query sent...

Anyway, hope you're well and have a great weekend.

Now that Thanksgiving is barely but officially behind us, it's time to think about and start planning for Christmas.

DD has already requested something non-traditional for Christmas dinner. Actually she claims that Christmas dinner has no requirements like Thanksgiving dinner does and has requested spaghetti. Spaghetti is not something I eat often anymore, so I don't think we're going that route, but chips and queso and deviled eggs are already on the short list of nibbles.

Sadly, Sonshine will not be flying home anytime soon, but the Brown Eyed Girl and her soulmate are planning a visit home.

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So far, so good... I reached my word count goal of 1400+ words yesterday and today. Just Saturday and Sunday to go. I do think I'll end up exceeding the projected final word count. Not that it's a bad thing, more words just means completing this WIP might take a little longer, and I'm trying to get to some other projects sooner rather than later.

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I hope you and yours had a lovely Thanksgiving. See you Monday.

I really love rubber ducks. Don't know why or how I came to it--probably a duck too cute to resist--and now I have a bit of a collection.

Perusing Facebook yesterday, I saw a rubber duck advent calendar!

Unfortunately, it's not the worth the $42, so I'll have to pass.

Then DD saw an ice hockey advent calendar...

Which has some cute stuff in it and is probably worth the money because creating one yourself would cost way more when you only need one of something rather than buying in bulk like the makers of this would do...

I did see some cool ideas for homemade advent calendars, so I might try to put a little something together for DD as one of her (early) presents.

Anyway, I hope your week is going well. 

 Mine is going well enough--I got edits back on the first half of the book. My editor had a lot to say and a lot of suggested tweaks and fixes. It's going to take a minute or two to go through and make decisions.

On top of that, I'm not quite finished with the book. I have 500 to 700 words needed to write a transition scene, but I have no idea what to do. I sent the second half of the book off the editor without that scene, because I need the rest done. I'll have to do my self edit on that bit.

As a result of me not finishing, I'm not going to make my pre-sale deadline, so I've got to go with plan B for the Facebook group takeover event I have on the calendar.

Lessons learned-- From now on, no scheduling a release until the book is done. And no scheduling events until I'm confident the book will be ready.

Catch you on Friday!

DD's pumpkin turned out rather well. Sadly the middle part so heavy, it began to droop and sag almost immediately. But she had fun doing it, and I had fun watching her.

I spent a lot of extra time on the book this weekend and I made a huge dent in the necessary tweaks. My editor has everything up until where I was stuck and she's almost done, so we should be able to trade halves this week. I'm hoping by Wednesday or Thursday at the latest to have my issues sorted.

My due date to upload to one specific retailer is November 8th--Sunday. I should be able to get the completed if not fully edited document uploaded. Then I can upload the final version a few days prior to the go-live date.

I'm cutting it close, I know, and I was this | | close to postponing the launch, but after the progress this weekend, I feel confident enough to stay the course.

And for the first time ever, I'm seriously considering a written plan for my writing / publishing goals for 2021 with milestones and due dates. Because I saved money not going to my conference in October, I'm "splurging" on a couple of book covers for the historicals I've had in my back pocket. One is complete, the other is almost done, so I'm hoping a deadline will get me across the finish line.

Anywho...have a great week.