Readitnweep

Writing goals

2010-11-07T14:18:00.002-07:00

I've lost my way. On my current work in progress (WIP), I have drafted through Chapter 8 - and most of that is the lamest of the lame.

A writing progress blog posted some helpful info about a writer who charts word count progress on a spreadsheet, which he then charts. He said it keeps him writing; otherwise, he has troube adhering to a schedule.

I definetely have trouble adhering to a schedule, but I'm not sure a word count-based system is best. I mean then I'm worried about the number of words and not the words themselves. But maybe, for the intial draft at least, that's all I should be doing, just to get me going. He did mention this was not used during editing.

The other issue I have with this system is that it's natural for me to move from one project to another when I'm stuck. Typically, I write short stories while crafting novels (like now), and I'll switch to the short ones during problem spots. So, that screws up the word count thing.

It's best for me to be concerned with amount of time I'm writing (not on the internet, not reading, not doing laundry...).

So, here are a few things I have to change in order to achieve my goal of finishing this book, so I can get on to the next:

First, I must black out time on my calendar. I may have to adjust things as field trips come up - that means making up the time elsewhere, possibly during the weekend. But the same amount of time must be blacked out. This isn't just a hobby, and I can't treat it as such.

Second, a writing goal does make sense to me, though I'd rather not be as stringent as a word count. So, I'm going to set a goal to complete the intial draft by a specific date. I will also set a draft completion date for a couple of short stories.

Third, I will make it a priority to join meeting of local writing groups in the genre I'm working on. That can't hurt.

I thought writing time would get easier to find as my kids grew out of toddler and babyhood - WRONG!

Writing Tip: News and Info by Year TIME Magazine

2010-09-30T11:26:00.004-07:00

While drafting today I learned that TIME Magazine has a very helpful online archive of their past issues, listed by year, going back to 1923, that comes in very handy while writing a story set long ago - in my case 1926.

You can find the index of years here.

2010-08-07T11:50:00.002-07:00

Back to blogging - finally.

Some overhauling will be going on here.

For now we're trying to gear up for the start of school. Our eldest starts high school. Matthew will be in sixth grade this year, gearing up for middle school, though he still loves things that are way below his age level.

We went to California over the summer and enjoyed Disneyland, the beach (we go to HB and an afterwards jaunt to Zubie's Dry Dock is tradition), Farrell's and Griffith Observatory.

Photos may come when I get my scanner back up and running.

2010-01-25T09:09:00.002-07:00

I know it seems I've fallen off the face of the earth, but we've been dealing with some pressing family business that will take up another month, most likely.

Important tip from someone who is living through the results: At ALL costs, discourage your elder relatives from getting reverse mortgages.

Lincoln Elementary School, Livonia, MI

2009-11-10T21:37:00.004-07:00

If you happen to be a school I used to attend, you'd better watch out. You are destined to be extinct quite soon. First my elementary school, see above, then my high school - well, okay, not extinct, just re-built. But still...

Lincoln Elementary was my school. My mom was on the committee of parents working with the district during the school's design and construction - she fought against the final design, all those glass hallways, in Michigan! - and my brothers went there in the 1950s when it opened. I wasn't the last group to leave Lincoln for junior high, but I nearly was. There was a slide show in the gym the summer of the school's closing. I'm pretty sure this was 1980.

Lincoln was cold in the winter - all that glass again - and warm in the spring and early summer. The classrooms did have pyramid-shaped skylights that helped with light. And the primary grades had "activity rooms," which were a nice feature. I wonder whatever happened to the large under water mosaic scene; I particularly recall the octopus in that. And all the windows in the gym, if you can call them that, were brightly painted boards that could be opened up... somehow, even though they were up near the ceiling.

There was the catapillar jungle gym on the primary playground, and that one tree, backing up to the ravine where you could go "downstairs" back behind it. What a great tree. Since that was on school property - now featuring private homes - I'm sure that's long gone.

A friend of mine captured a brick from Lincoln the day it was demolished. Someone else got a clock. I stopped at the school district to purchase a book they offer on the history of Livonia schools and asked if there was any display in the district office that showed Lincoln. The clerk, looking embarrassed, admitted to me that someone had discarded all old photos and things from the school years ago, thinking they would never be needed, so nothing is archived.

There's no photos of it on the web. Nothing, except a brief mention on the district's Wiki page of "defunct schools" to show it ever existed. It feels weird. Then again, those years feel like they happened to someone else anyway.

It was an odd thing then when we moved here, and the school my sons had attended for one year, built in 1964, was demolished to make way for a shiny new building in its stead. How lucky were we to get a new school for our kids? And then I thought of Lincoln and the guy who lives next door to us now who attended my sons' school nearly a decade ago, and I realized my progress was his Lincoln.

I know it's illogical, that it would still be there on Ashurst if I went back to Livonia today... but I still wish it was.

Hidden Honor by Anne Stuart

2009-11-01T13:41:00.002-07:00

As my kick on historical romances continues, I really enjoyed this Anne Stuart story of Elizabeth of Bredon who falls for the prince while on a journey to becoming a nun. The story has plot twists and well developed characters. It's not heavy on sex, though the chemistry and passion comes through. I'm looking for more of her books to read.

Livonia of the 1970s

2009-10-17T16:52:00.003-07:00

Well, since I can't upload articles (and I can't write without drafting and editing in Word first; I'm just too slow), I thought I'd post about my hometown, back in the 70s when I was growing up there.

My brothers went to Bentley High School - I would have, too, if we hadn't moved to Arizona. On Halloween, we'd run from house to house, gathering as much loot as we could before running over to Livonia Cemetery (also called Livonia Center Cemetery by the retirees of the day) and run amok there. We didn't do any damage; we were far too frightened to. Deliciously scared out of our minds. And then back to the park for the bonfire.

Other memories of Livonia include the beautiful moving Christmas scenes, scattered about Livonia Mall - oh, and Coney Island there. Sanders. Oh, and my brother bought my very first album at the tiny record shop that was right before you walked down to the cinema.

Daly's. And Bates' Burgers. We shopped at Westland, too. I still have some of the crayons from JL Hudsons'. The restaurant there was green and yellow and purple and had, what I thought at the time, was the coolest elevator.

Ah, memories...

Offline

2009-10-17T16:48:00.002-07:00

My computer appears to have its own version of the swine (or sylicone) flu. I'm using my husband's laptop to post this update, but I can't upload articles using it, so I'm out of commission - as far as publishing goes - until he has time to solve my problem.

Luckily, he can fix anything, so it's only a matter of time.

It's warmer here in Phoenix again. Here's hoping it's just summer's last gasp. Hope everyone is safe and happy.

Autism and sibling guilt

2009-10-15T20:02:00.003-07:00

Our eldest son has expressed, more than once, that he feels his brother's autism was caused by him pushing his brother into a wall while they were playing with Star Wars light sabres around the time they were 4 and 2 years old.

We've explained to our eldest about autism and it's genetic roots and that there is no way anything he did impacted his brother. We thought we'd addressed it, had it covered, only for our eldest to reiterate it again a couple of years later.

The emotions of siblings with autism, like any other disability, are complicated. We didn't say anything to our eldest for a long time because we weren't sure ourselves what was going on. Now, we make a point of explaining things as we learn them.

I welcome comments from other parents and siblings about this. How do other parents deal with it? How do siblings deal with it? At home, it's the norm. But out in the world there are looks. My sons are far enough apart in age that they no longer attend the same school - and won't again for another four years. But what about siblings who are closer in age?

Special education students receive different diplomas

2009-10-14T08:30:00.003-07:00

High school was something on the distant horizon - until our eldest began middle school last year. Now, we're not only looking forward to his high school years but that of our younger sons, one of which has autism.

He's in 5th grade now, and he improves vastly every year. But with his brother getting closer to that parchment at the end of 12th grade, we're beginning to think of our middle son's approach to high school.

I became curious: our middle son has spent his education career, thus far, in self-contained classrooms. At a younger age, he had difficulty attending to task and staying in one place. Those days are gone, but he still needs occasional redirection, and abstract concepts are difficult. He's learning multiplication and division easily, but still has trouble with addition and subtraction. And gathering his own ideas to write about something is still a goal to be accomplished, though he can answer questions and tell about things he has interest in.

But, if he cannot get into the regular classroom by graduation, he won't obtain a regular diploma. He'll get a "special" one, as long as he completes his IEP goals. But we want more than that from him and know that he's more than capable.

So, at 5th grade, I'm thinking of high school graduation and how to get him there with a diploma that will get him into college.

This is a huge challenge. How to prepare while not pressuring too much. He'll be in middle school after next year, and that's difficult enough already.

I'm sure there are loads of other parents in this same boat. How do you deal with it? I'm beginning to use flash cards - improve that math, you know - and working diligently on the ever-important who, what, where, when, why and questions.

I have to believe he can get there. In kindergarten, he had no motivation to please. He didn't seem to care if he learned anything or not. Didn't want approval. We got past that. He didn't speak in sentences until 7 and even then they were 2 and 3 word sentences. We got past that. He couldn't hold a pencil until 2nd grade and we're way past that; his handwriting is very good.

I'd love to hear what other parents in this situation think and feel. Does anyone else hear that pomp and circumstance clock ticking?

It's a Scot thing...

2009-10-10T17:48:00.003-07:00

I've really been on a Scottish-man-in-kilt kick lately when it comes to reading, and I have a new favorite author: Paula Quinn!

Her A Highlander Never Surrenders was a great read, and I also recommend her Laird of the Mist. The plots were good, the pacing was great, and the characters were brilliant. Also, she gave a flavor of the accent and the setting without making it too heavy.

Amanda Scott is another sex-in-a-kilt writer who does a good job of conveying interesting characters and unique plots. Now that the weather is beginning to cool off, it's getting time to pull up a chair and read.

Livonia, MI

2009-10-08T12:36:00.006-07:00

I'm starting a tag on my hometown: Livonia, Michigan. I've found that 29 years after leaving the place, I'm still emotionally attached. It was a great place to grow up. The sad thing is, Livonia is stuck in 1980 inside my head. I was there in June of 2005, but I have difficulty reconciling reality with what I remember it to be.

So here we go:

The Mai Kai theatre on Plymouth road was a landmark. My online research gives an opening date of 1963. My brother worked there as a camera operator during the late 60s while he was in high school. As for me, at 14 years younger, this is the theatre where I stood outside in line for the first time to see a movie: Star Wars. That's back when it was just Star Wars without any other name. And I recall shortly before that some others had stood in line at the Mai Kai to see Jaws. That was unheard of. No one standed in line for hours to see a movie. Well, things have changed.

The Mai Kai, a beauty of the ornate and overdone, neo-theatres of the 1950s and 60s, closed in 1993 (again with the online research). It became a George Burns theatre for a time - something I'm seriously scratching my head over - before being leveled in favor of one of the car dealerships that have long lined along Plymouth Road.

I'm real sorry it's gone.

More photos of Toyah, Texas

2009-10-06T15:19:00.011-07:00

I took these in the spring of 2000. The first is a street scene in Toyah. The old bank building (now gone) is to the right. One of the churches is in the center.
Here's a long shot showing the old store/hotel and the bank building. I've read the bank went down in a tornado, but I believe the hotel was actually torn down.
This shot is from TexasScapes.com. The old high school is in the background - long boarded up. I've also read they removed the second floor and turned the whole building into a gym, but the building obviously hadn't been used in ages when we were there in 2000 - decades by the looks of it. In the foreground is part of the town graveyard.

Here is the front of side of the bank building - now gone. It was a beauty in its day and a large building.

Abandoned: Toyah, Texas

2009-10-06T13:47:00.013-07:00

No topical bits today. Nope, today is about the past.

In the spring of 2000 my mind was on the past. My mother had just reunited with her sister after a separation of 69 years. We were driving back across Texas after the grand reunion when Mom and I stumbled upon a nearly forgotten town: Toyah, Texas.

Set about 15 miles from Pecos, you can see the lonely buildings from Interstate 20. The hotel and general store were still standing when we went by, though both were gone when we went through in '07.

According to the Handbook of Texas, a plethora of information on any tiny Texas hamlet, long gone or not, that you can think of, it's the oldest town site in Reeves county and, ironically if you've been there, Toyah is an Indian word meaning "flowing water." Well, there wasn't much of that in Toyah.

It's a sad yet peaceful place now. The high school, a couple of churches and assorted homes still stand out in the middle of the nowhere, marking what was once a thriving community. There are abandoned, well out-of-registration date vehicles dotting the area and an old cemetery at one end. It began as a trading post for ranchers and had, at its peak in 1913, over a thousand residents, though the numbers began to fall during the Great Depression of the 1930s.

The 2000 census had 100 residents enumerated, but we never saw anyone while we looked around the town. It's an interesting place to visit, worth the stop to look around and wonder. Stop and look around if you get the chance of it.

Dying

2009-09-29T14:20:00.003-07:00

Dignity in Dying caught my eye as I trawled through the news this morning.

When my father was nearing the end, after two quadruple bypass surgeries and 34 years of battling heart disease, our mother had to decide: would he die at home or in a hospice? She nearly chose home, but this would have meant nearly $5,000 a month in care, just to have a trained nurse at the house at night - only at night. Mom planned to care for him during the day, she was a RN, but she was also 77 years old and has severe arthritis. At the last moment, she opted for hospice care, crying as she did so.

Thank God. Dad had dignified, caring people around him, making him as comfortable as someone whose organs are shutting down can possibly be. My thanks to Hospice of the Valley here in Phoenix for the wonderful care they gave him and for the gentle way they helped Mom and the four of us through the minefield of losing someone you call Dad.

2009-09-28T10:49:00.004-07:00

I read this article this morning in USA Today about surfer Clay Marzo who was diagnosed with Asperger's in his late teens. A film has been made about him, titled Just Add Water, due to his incredible and unusual surfing skills. The emphasis, according to the article is on how Asperger's has allowed Marzo to focus with acute intensity of improving his surfing. Yes it mentions that he has problems with the social aspects of the sport, such as greeting fans, but leant on how it helps him. Has anyone seen this film? I'm adding it to my list of must sees.

Surgery and autism

2009-09-27T17:29:00.003-07:00

Our ten-year-old had ear sugery two weeks ago and is now doing really well, though he' s still irritated he can't hear out of his right ear.

I had tried to research beforehand, looking for anything about children with autism having surgery but found nothing, so we punted.

Matthew had a tympanoplasty mastiodectomy, which means he had a cyst in his right inner ear that was damaging the bone that runs along behind it. They had to cut all along the back of his ear, through the skull and into the ear channel to clean it out. He has to go back again in 8-14 months as this is the only way to make sure, after healing, that they got it all.

We didn't talk about the surgery until the day before, though obviously he'd been to the surgeon's and knew something was wrong with his ear and that he would have surgery where the doctor would have to cut in behind his ear at the hospital. Perhaps we should have prepared him more, but I was concerned about worrying him before time.

Matthew is very verbal and high-functioning; he really didn't have any problems with the pre-op stuff at all. But he freaked when he woke up in Recovery, kept asking me where he was and was calling out - very clearly and loudly - to anyone walking by in hopes that they'd take the big "thing" (bandage) off his ear. He calmed down easily though. In about an hour he was behaving normally, though he was terrified and upset at first. This is when I started questioning whether I'd done the right thing in not going over it with him more. I'm still not sure about that. We explained what would happen and that he'd feel weird. Well, he was under for two hours, so yeah, he felt weird. I told him it would hurt for a while. Did I not say enough there?

He was very sleepy on the way home - we left one hour after surgery. We made him as comfortable as we could at home, and he slept most of the day and evening. By that night he was feeling much better, and the following day, when we removed the big bandage, he was back to normal, other than an occasional ear pain.

Anyone going through this surgery: the swelling and scar is alarming at first, but it heals very quickly and goes down behind the ear to be far less noticeable. After a few days he wasn't asking for anything for ear pain anymore, though I had talked to his teacher and school nurse beforehand, so they were aware. The first couple of days back the nurse called him in at lunch for Tylenol as we were concerned he may not express how much discomfort he really felt at school.

Important note: You can't blow after this surgery. At. All. He can't blow his nose or snort. And his tuba lessons are definitely out until the surgeon gives his okay at our post-op (if then).

But he's doing fine and seems himself.

Taming the Highlander by Terri Brisbin

2009-09-05T07:32:00.002-07:00

I've really had a thing for romances set in medieval Scotland, and I was happy to pick this one up. I liked the plot: a highlander, Connor MacLerie is feared by all due to his fierce reputation. He had to have a wife due to his position and Jocelyn MacCallum needs to save her family and a match between them would solve both problems. But Connor is determined his life won't change... or will it?

I liked Brisbin's writing and found she used a good balance of setting the scene with bits of history (some books have a bit too much of that for my taste). And I liked the romance here. Yes, there was a bit of the erotica but not too much.

This was a fun read and I'll add Brisbin's name to my index card list of authors I look for on my treks to the book shop.

Asking Older Relatives Questions About Family History

2009-09-03T16:28:00.004-07:00

In 1998, I quit my mortgage processing job to stay home with our two boys. I spotted a blurb in a parenting magazine suggesting sending a list of questions to older relatives to find out about family history.

I opted to hand-write my dad and each of his siblings a letter and a list of questions because they were all in their 80s and 90s, and I thought by writing it all out myself to each one it would show them how much I cared about their responses.

Out of the eight I wrote, I received four back. Glad I did. Now, nine years on, three of those four, along with the remaining ones who didn't respond, are all dead. But I have long letters, telling of the lives of their parents and themselves at a time when the automobile was brand new.

I recommend asking your relatives questions and writing down their answers yourself if they don't. Here are some of the questions I asked:

What chores did you have to do?

What did you do when they were done?

What sort of things did your family have for dinner?

What did your family do on Christmas/Easter/Halloween?

What did you want to do when you grew up?

What regrets do you have, if any?

How do you want us to remember your parents? Yourself?

What is your first or strongest memory regarding politics when you were a child?

What do you remember most when you think of family gatherings (good or bad)?

What was school like for you?

What has been the most significant change to our society in your lifetime?

Sunday at Tiffany's by James Patterson

2009-09-03T16:19:00.002-07:00

This was the first of Patterson's books I've read, and I didn't know what to expect. But the summary, about a woman who falls in love with her childhood imaginary friend, really intrigued me, and I was anxious to check it out.

Glad I did. It's an easy, fun, romantic read. The chapters are very short - almost too short for my taste - and the point of view skips around a bit, but I didn't find it confusing, just slightly distracting at times.

The characters are well crafted, and the plot grabbed me. I was hooked on the story from the second page and had a very hard time putting it down.

2009-08-16T11:32:00.002-07:00

Our three boys are going back to school tomorrow, my husband's going to Vegas on business and Mom has flown to Vancouver with a friend for a train tour. Tomorrow is going to suck, no two ways about it.

So, I'm going to work on some projects around the house; I've not been able to work on my book all week, too keyed up about school. And our middle son has to have ear surgery, which means cutting through the skull... oh yeah, fun times. So, I'm a real wreck.

Today we're going to the library, stopping at Target for some last minute supplies for packing lunches. I hated packed lunches as a kid so now, of course, I do this to my own kids. Loads cheaper than buying.

Just finished reading James Patterson's Sundays at Tiffanys which I enjoyed very much, and thank you, Mr. Patterson, for using the ending you did. Next in line is a Truman Capote: Breakfast at Tiffany's, which I've not read yet. Then I guess I'll read the next Diana Gabaldon.

The start of something...

2009-08-04T12:09:00.002-07:00

Stepping into the twenty-first century here by starting a blog. I tried to start up a MySpace page but can't figure it out. Guess this century only goes so far with me. :/

I'm going to keep track of my progress, or lack thereof, with writing articles on eHow. Currently, I'm dealing with a paypal issue, so, in the meantime, I've started writing my first article. I have a list of about 60 to write. I'll see how this goes.

Have spent waaay too much time online this morning screwing with all this online/blogger/myspace/flickr stuff. Knowledge doesn't come easy.