Crazy, Jam-packed, Chaotic Week: Complete

Well, this has been a hectic week. A quick recap, shall we?

Tuesday - I actually worked since I was getting the weekend off, then literally as soon as I was done with work Hubby and I drove about an hour to go see a free, public, park stage theater performance of "Chicago" with Ronoxym and Cyhyr, whose due date was literally the next day. The performance and seats were both "meh" but it was still a great time hanging out with the two of them for one of their last nights sans child.

Wednesday - Work, some down-time with the Hubby, then off to Spink's to do some last-minute wedding planning. Stayed until about midnight, causing me to go to bed at 1am - and wake at about 6:30 the next morning - two days in a row...

Thursday - Work, left early, prepped for the Jack & Jill party - the bachelor and bachelorette parties combined so the couple can party together, threw said party, stumbled home around midnight. So, three days of about 5hrs of sleep.

Friday - Last-minute prepping for Spink's wedding, laundry, the rehearsal and rehearsal dinner, and writing my Matron-of-Honor speech.... at midnight.... I tried pausing to write about three different times that day, but my time got interrupted by more pressing matters. Now we're on day three of 1am-6:30 sleep schedule.

Saturday - THE WEDDING! Super-last-minute stuff the morning of, nearly didn't have time to get ready before the processional started, had the wedding, stayed for the clean-up, took Spink's wedding gifts to her home, took care of her cats, and then finally crashed at home at the semi-decent time of 11pm. That's when I found out that Cyhyr had her and Ron's daughter that morning! YAY! Congrats, you two!

So, I'm going to pause for two celebrations:

Spink, you and your new hubby look adorable together. Enjoy FINALLY
being Husband and Wife! <3

Cyhyr, you did so good. The pics are adorable, and you look
awesome. I'm sure she's going to have soooo much love from
you and Ron! Enjoy your new family. <3

 Alright, enough of the mushy stuff.....

Sunday was a "down" day. I didn't have anywhere to go, aside from taking care of Spink's cats, and so I relaxed, I read, and I tried to write a little. I was still too tired to create a coherent sentence, but I did manage to come up with a new character.

Temp's player decided she wants to do a one-night-only - presumably - game of Dread. So, I had to come up with a character for her game based on a list of archetypes I could choose from. I chose Waif.

About a decade ago, Hubby's one friend came up with an RPG where all the characters are on a foreign planet. For some reason that no one can explain, the average life span of humans dropped to 20, and so the world was populated by orphans running society. They broke themselves into factions based on intelligence, skill, and the jobs they were best suited for; kind of like Divergent. Sadly, this RPG didn't go for long before Hubby's friend abruptly stopped it. Still, I enjoyed the character I created, and so I decided that this would be my Waif character now. I wrote up the basic profile, and after my writing group tonight I'm going to work on the character's personality profile. See, Dread uses a questionnaire that the players are supposed to answer in first person as their character. This becomes the character's profile for use in the game. I'm excited to see what Artie - the character - comes up with!

But back to last week's writing. The final crazy day of my week was obviously yesterday. Finally back at work, followed by laundry and one last visit over to Spink's place in the morning to take care of the cats, and in the evening to give back her keys and spend some time with the newlyweds. I did manage SOME writing at work and at the laundromat this time, though.

I also managed to squeeze some writing in at work last week too, just not for the "Glitches" script, per se. I do have two "Glitches" free-writes, one of which I think I'll read tonight at Group. I needed to get the creative juices flowing, and so I went with just character interaction to try to get a feel of the dynamics among everyone. The one free-write was of a brand new character: Geoffrey "Fidget" Wilkins. I believe I mentioned him last summer or the summer previous. A quick recap is that he and Lucas were saved by Dom - or Mateo, I still haven't decided on "Neo-Wolverine's" name - from a government sanctioned research facility. Fidget is a Techno-Mind. Basically, he's a telepath, but he thinks in binary, and so his mental communication is with electronics. I was trying to really figure out how his powers work, and so that was my free-write: Fidget explaining his powers to me.

My other free-write is the one I'm going to read tonight. Dom - who is Mateo in this version; trying it out - is arguing with Emily about her use of the Glitch Reference and Identification Diagram in order to categorize her students. She feels it's a natural part of society, and he strongly feels like it's Humanity's way of turning Glitches into second-class citizens. It ended up being a 2pg, single spaced story. It will be interesting to get feedback about it.

But wait! Because we're not done yet!

I read Ron's AU about Devon and Trish - or Arson and Lighter in his version; only using their codenames and petnames for each other. It was enjoyable, but it had some flaws that I pointed out. He was polishing it this week, but for obvious reasons he hasn't touched it in a few days. I don't know if he'll post it anywhere online once he's done due to the mature content - sex and murder - but we're both still excited about it.

And of course, as with Please, Let Me Explain, Ron's story jump-started my own Muse. This time, instead of Willow whining that a line or two aren't right - causing me to completely shanghai the whole story - it's Trish in my head saying "Come on, we can do better. Show him how it's done."

So, a bit reluctantly since I didn't want to yet again steal Ron's story concept, I started up my version of the AU tale last Wednesday. I wasn't able to get much writing in this week, but I am up to about 2100 words.

I really can't control Trish....

Between the language, the violence, and the sexual content.... yeah, I might finish this story because it's fun, but it may never see the light of day. It just bypassed "mature" and headed straight for "NSFW." But, uh, thanks for getting me to write again, Ron!


Let's switch gears, shall we?

It's now a new month, which means it's also time to catch up on ModernMrsDarcy's 2016 Reading Challenge!

Honestly, I think I'm the only one in my group still actively participating, but the other women are all at least still reading; even if it isn't any of the reading challenge categories. That's still a win!

What about me, though, where do I stack up? Let's see:

Challenge created by ModernMrsDarcy

It may be hard to see, but I checked off "A book you've been meaning to read" by completing "Magnus Chase and the Sword of Summer" this Sunday. At first, Hubby and I thought that maybe the Kane Chronicles were a bit lack-luster because they weren't Percy Jackson and Friends, but after reading Magnus Chase, I'm not sure where Riordan went wrong with the Kanes. Especially since I LOVED Egyptian mythology as a kid, and have always been kind of "whatever" about Norse mythology.

Yet, Magnus was hilarious. Riordan went back to a method that worked: oddball chapter titles, a snarky but still lovable main character, and LOTS of tongue-in-cheek sarcasm. I really enjoyed this book, as I predicted I would, which is why I was trying to hold off until September so that I could go straight into the next book in the series: "The Hammer of Thor."

Under normal circumstances, this is where I'd give my in-depth review, but I really don't want to give much away, and this blog post is hitting epic proportions already. So, I'll just state that for August I was able to fall back on the book I was aiming for last month: "Reformations" by Sandra Brewster, a woman who happens to be in my writing group. It finally made its way back to my local library, and so I picked it up over the weekend. Again, while technically NOT recommended by a librarian or book seller, enough of the women in the writing group have promoted Sandy's book for her that I'm going to count it for that category. It's fairly short, so if I breeze through it I might be able to play catch-up with another story.

I wouldn't know where it would fit on the challenge check list, but Ron already finished Riordan's latest: "The Hidden Oracle"; book one of "The Trials of Apollo." Anyway, he's offered it up for us to borrow, and since we're planning on swinging by to meet his little one today, I feel we'll be heading home with a souvenir. Something for Hubby to read while I go through "Reformations" and then possibly jump right into "Hidden Oracle" myself to finish off the month.

This plus my plans of turning August into Neo-Script-Frenzy Month; it's going to be a wonderfully hectic close to the summer!

August Will Be New Script Frenzy Month!

First off, a quick call out to my nephew whose birthday was last week:

Love ya, sweety!

Alright, back to business. Sorta.

I slacked off this week. I didn't even remember to check-in over at Writers’ Huddle for the summer writing challenge. I've been stalled because I can't seem to figure out where to go next with my story, and so I've been avoiding it all together.

On the plus side, I'm about 2 days ahead of my schedule to finish reading "Magnus Chase and the Sword of Summer" on time. I keep teasing Ronoxym that Magnus is just a blonde-haired Boston version of Devon. The more I read the story the more I feel it's true. I find it so amusing that Rick Riordan and Ron essentially came up with the same character. On top of that, it's not like Ron was influenced by Riordan, since Devon's been around for over 3 years before Magnus Chase was printed. At least 2 years before Magnus was introduced to the public.

Speaking of Ron and Devon, Ron's still chugging away at his super Alternate Universe one-shot. Since in this reality Devon is an actual, psychotic Brotherhood member, Ron just writes that he's "Arson"; his Brotherhood code name as well as Street name when he was homeless. It's hard for Ron to even refer to this evil version as Devon, which is interesting. Anyway, he's been writing at least a little bit each night this past week; checking in with me on his progress pretty much daily. Hey, at least ONE of us is writing, right?

I'm excited to read it. He just finished up the first draft last night, but he says he still needs to go back and rework it since he doesn't think he got Trish right in the first half. Still.... EXCITED! You don't know how hard it is for me to continue writing this instead of hopping over to Google Docs to give the story a read through!

Now me? I think yesterday I finally broke my mental block. I gave up trying to figure out the opening scenes. I know more-or-less what I want to happen, but I just can't get the details. So, I allowed myself to just jump to the next scene I DO know the details. It's such a simple thing: allow yourself to NOT work linearly. Yet, it was exactly the sledgehammer I needed to get past my mental block.

I couldn't get very far before doing actual work at - gasp! - work! However, I at least decided to just write up an outline. There won't be a natural stop like in a novel or movie, but if I more-or-less know where I want to go in this "season" - as it were - of the comic then it might be easier for me to fill in the blanks. I know I want to follow the Devon storyline, so I'll write that up first. I'll then go back and put in the character arcs for Chayse, Willow, and Lia. Then probably go back through again to sprinkle in the redone Marvel-Canon characters, as well as Lucas and the concept of the Challengers of Heaven.

I feel like I'll be going back through my James Patterson MasterClass notes for this one. That, and any I make during my next class! For a birthday gift - BTW, Happy Belated to me!!! - my mother bought me another MasterClass for the second year in a row! This time it's screenwriting by Aaron Sorkin; best known as the writer for "The West Wing", "Sports Night", and "A Few Good Men". Such great timing! I start seriously working on a comic script and MasterClass sets up a screenwriting course that started THIS WEEK. Like, I'm one of the first people to ever take this class! So exciting!

A friend of mine is also beta-reading "Glitches" for me and is planning on giving me his notes later today, so that's just as exciting. We already discussed the pitfalls I managed to pick out in my obsessive read-throughs. So, I'm waiting to see what else he could advise me on. I mean, he already gave me one or two really good notes on things I never would have thought of myself due to the subtlety of it.

So, no, I didn't really do anything this past week aside from avoidance and obsessing. However, now I have all the tools I need to get me pumped again. I'm sensing a writing comeback. Okay, so I don't know HOW good of a comeback this SPECIFIC week will be, since Spink's wedding is this weekend, and so my free time is pretty booked. Still, August is looking GOOD.

I'm apparently also very modest....

2012 New Years Resolutions and Starting Fresh

Well, a Happy New Year to you and yours!

Image by SilentReaper

I am hopeful that 2012 - with it's obvious lack of wedding planning and packing/moving - is a LOT less crazy than 2011. Don't get me wrong, all in all, 2011 was a great year and 27 seems a great age. However, all the chaos kind of messed with my writing abilities.

So the new year means starting fresh! And I had a nice start! This morning I woke up and was inspired to work on my fanfiction!

Yeah, you heard me! I worked on my writing! Was so inspired I actually wore my ScriptFrenzy shirt! Granted, I didn't actually work on the ACTUAL story, but I still worked on the skeleton and fleshed more of it out.

OK, to sound a little less like a slacker, let me start off this year by letting everyone know how I work when it comes to at least this story.

1. I decide where I want to go with the next chapter, and then I find the song I'll use as the "parent inspiration". Basically, in drawing sense, I get a reference for the chapter.

2. Next, I use the lyrics to get a broad view of the plotline that I want for that chapter. I try to interpret the lyrics in prose form and usually write out next to each lyric what it could mean in the story's prose.

3. I then take these notes and start threading them together to get the actual timeframe of the story. This lyric will refer to THIS part of the chapter, and this lyric will refer to THAT part of the chapter, etc.

4. Once I know where I want to go with the chapter - and make sure that at least most of the lyrics are represented - I start up on the true skeleton of the chapter. I start fleshing out the details. This is when I whip out the handy-dandy notebook...

....not THAT notebook....

....and I write out the broad overview of the chapter.

5. Once my skeleton is complete and fleshed out I finally take out my netbook/sit at my desktop and actually START WRITING!

Yeah, yeah, I know....

Anyway, this is when I take my narration in my notebook and I actually plug in dialogue and go in to the details of everything. I then polish it up and the next thing I know... it's done!

Anyway..... since it IS a new year, I decided to start fresh. My main resolution is to write more. To work on my stories - or really ANYTHING - at least once a week. To do weekly updates here. To just.... WRITE! I am so determined to actually finish this story before 2013. I started it August 2010 and so I think that would be more than enough time! Well, I worked a little on my story this morning, and I'm writing this update, so far the resolution is in tact!

The other fresh start is the new look I have for this blog. I've read more blogs lately and they look pretty swank. A lot of them bring in interest with pictures - hence all the ones above. Also, I use a LOT of emoticons when I'm writing things on DeviantArt.com, and so it just seems blah when I can't use the emotes anywhere else. In fact, if it wasn't for the fact that DA specifically requests that people don't use the emoticons outside of DA, I would have them plaster those adorable emotes all OVER the place here!

I'm not sure if I like the pictures though. It takes a while to find them and they just take up a lot of space.

Well, I now know at least two people read this blog, and so my last bit to spruce up this place is to tweak who can leave comments. Now you don't need to be a member of Blogger.com in order to comment. So please, I'd love to know what you think of my posts. Are they helpful? Are they amusing to read? Is there anything I can do to make the read more enjoyable? Just leave a comment below!

Love you, guys, and HAPPY 2012!!!!

Writing Hiatus Coming to a Close?

Wow.... I've been gone for a WHILE! The whole wedding planning thing just KILLED all writing free-time. I'm hoping to get some free-time soon though, so... YAY! ^_^

For any of my readers wondering why the hiatus lasted so long, I believe you deserve to know...

JUNE - I got the wedding invitations out (ridiculously late in the game, but it turned out alright). I spent a week out of state house hunting with my fiance. We started off attempting to look for apartments since we want to move again in about five years, but no one would even attempt to show us their apartments since we wouldn't be moving in until almost four months later. Next up was the three available houses for rent. One was basically a crack-house, another was way too expensive, and so we ended up with the first we looked at. I then spent the rest of the month figuring out wedding details, such as the florist and the reception decorations.

JULY - Work took over a lot as more employees dropped like flies. There was the Independence Day festivities - including my sister's car dying and so busing her around took up some time. My cousin got married. I had my birthday/surprise bridal shower (yay!) and my fiance visited for a week, and so no time for writing while we dealt with more wedding planning.

AUGUST - More work. More wedding planning - figuring out the last-minute details. My fiance's sister got married (long story, but in the end we're OK with her getting married only six weeks before we did - at least it's easy to remember their anniversary). And then the major chaos comes in! At the end of the month I discover that nearly everything we already had planned for the wedding fell apart! We weren't having normal suits/tuxedos for the groomsmen. Instead we were using Jacobite shirts. And I discovered that the shop I ordered them from (back in JUNE!) still didn't have the shirts - in fact, they never even ORDERED them! Turns out the color I wanted was no longer available and instead of contacting me to ask for a back-up color they just let the order drop! So I had a nearly month-long battle to get the shirts I needed. Next up, we had decided that one of the key components of our centerpieces would be sets of dice; however, my fiance discovered that getting the number of sets we needed would cost an exuberant amount. So I had to rethink what to do for the centerpieces! The craftsman I had be talking to for nearly a YEAR still didn't have our wedding rings ready! The company custom-designing our favors also didn't have the order done yet. And even more chaos was thrown at me... I did get two breaks, however, when my mom took me to a concert and my best friend took me to another one later that week.

SEPTEMBER - A month-long battle with my vendors. Trying to get a hold of them, arguing with them, trying desperately to get my products from them, and finding the money to PAY them! My fiance was supposed to come down to apply for the marriage licence, but couldn't make the drive due to the floodings brought on by Hurricane Irene. The next week nearly the same thing happened! I was getting nervous that he wouldn't be able to come down in time to get the marriage licence application filled out!!!! In the end, he managed to come down for a less-than 24-hour visit in order to get the legalities of the wedding sorted out. I ended up having to cancel a lot of other plans, however, since we had to work non-stop on the last-minute details. I then spent a day in New York City before hitting up yet another concert (I got a lot of them as birthday gifts this year!). All of the last-minute planning and the last couple of weeks before quitting my job just killed my free-time.

OCTOBER - And now we have this month! Well, we had the wedding go off without a hitch (well, a few hitches, but I was so mellow that day I didn't care at all!). Then it was a psuedo-honeymoon with the new husband. Basically, by day we would pack up my stuff for the move, and by night we would slink away to a hotel and enjoy being newlyweds. A lot of stress built up - again - as I feared that a) we wouldn't be able to pack everything in the limited time frame, and b) even if we did - it wouldn't all fit on the truck. Well, we got everything safely up to the new house, and my mom stuck around for almost a week to help organize the new place. However, now my life has been filled with the process of UNpacking, and organizing my new life up here. Not an easy task considering one of the key factors of moving up here was my fiance's social life. His friends ADORE me, and so his large social circle became mine as well. This is normally a good thing... but I can barely go a day without SOMEONE stopping by the house! And so any writing free-time is instead used to entertain unexpected guests. On top of all that, a large majority of this social circle are part of a LARPing group. And so I spent three straight days learning the rules of the game they're currently playing, as well as creating a character for it - and then playing in the game last night!

But now the LARP character is created, I more-or-less know what I'm doing, and they only play the game about once a month so the person in charge has time to bring in more players, create characters, and come up with a storyline.

I'm more-or-less done unpacking. I mean, there's still more to go, but it is now a slow process - basically unpacking just a box at a time until we can slowly raise money for more shelves and/or dressers.

The only other distraction is to finally get back on to the job-hunt. A lot of time will be killed as I look for job, and then more when I finally have one.

However, I do feel like I have the time to write - I mean, I had the hour to write this blog entry, so it's a start! Also, I've been mentally figuring out the next chapter for nearly a year now! Wow, to think that I started What is Truly Meant to Be: A Hey Arnold Musical over a year ago! It's a little embarrassing that I've only written six chapters in a year! Boy, am I a bad author! I'm hoping to pick up the pace this next year....

Anyway, as I was saying, I have a large portion of this chapter already figured out, and so I'm hoping to have the newest chapter FINALLY posted before Thanksgiving! YAY!

Thank you so much for sticking with me over this crazy hiatus.

Slacker McSlackson is Slacking Off!

Boy have I been slacking again. Well, after a few days of pulling my hair out I finally finished my next chapter. It was a bit of a squeeze, but I managed to get it up on Fanfiction.net on May 31st. Still feel bad that it kept me two full months to give my readers another chapter. Especially since it was the shortest one I've written. I also don't think it was all that great..... :-/

It got a lot more reviews than the last chapter however. And they were all positive reviews too, so I didn't go through the "writer's funk" that I did the last time. Funny, a chapter I felt was crappy seemed to impress at least a little. *shrug* I guess I'm a lot harder on myself than I thought. I am starting to convert hard-core ArnoldxHelga shippers in to *Spoiler*. I'm both super excited that I write the love triangle so well as to convert these shippers so easily, but also a little fearful to bring it all full-circle and return to the ArnoldxHelga ship! At this rate I might keep Helga with her new beau, but it just doesn't feel right to do so. At the same time, I'm going to be hard-pressed to prove to everyone that Arnold does deserve to still win Helga's love.... GAAAH! What did I do!?

June 1st my stories had 72 visitors, but 210 hits! Before that the most I had was 73 visitors and 177 hits on April 2nd, right after I posted my last chapter before my Script Frenzy hiatus. Other major days include 62 visitors and 115 hits on Oct 26th when I posted my second chapter "Goodbye to You". Then on Feb 28th I had 65 visitors and 112 hits for the posting of my second chapter of my Valentine's Day story. Finally, there's the 155 hits and 60 visitors for my "I Will Always Love You" chapter posted on March 9th. Either way, my return from my hiatus was met with a large crowd and I thank them all!

I also picked up a few new readers this time around, so I'm super excited about that! Thank you to all my new readers! YAY!

Some of my new readers are from that Hey Arnold forum I spoke of last post. *Waves* Hey guys!!! Thank you for supporting me! We really are like a nice little online family, aren't we!? Loves!

And it's that warm, fuzzy, welcoming feeling I get from the forum that is my downfall. Instead of writing the next chapter of my story - which I've had more-or-less planned out since November - I have been lurking on the forum just waiting for someone to post something so I can comment back... *sigh*

Also, while working some more on Acts 2 and 3 of The Jungle Movie my partner ChibiSunnie brought up InuYasha: Final Act. InuYasha used to be my favorite anime and so, now that I was reminded that the TRUE last season of the show was up online I HAD to go watch it! 26 episodes, 3 days, emotional rollercoaster, and now InuYasha withdrawal!!! Must. Not. Search. For InuYasha. Fanfiction!

I also finally got around to finding and purchasing the next two volumes of Fruits Basket after two years, and so I was hooked on reading them. Only three more volumes to go before I'm done with that series. Will I go through withdrawal like I am with InuYasha?

My fiance is also reminding me nearly daily that I still have the 4th Percy Jackson story to read. However, he told me the story ends in an epic cliffhanger and he still has the 5th book with him - four hours away. I'm trying really hard to wait until the last minute to read that book so that I can go straight in to the 5th one when I visit him at the end of the month. Will I go through Percy Jackson withdrawal as well!?

Then, while writing a post for the forum I discovered that a webcomic I once enjoyed was back from it's multi-year hiatus. I had to go back to reading it, however I couldn't quite remember where we left off and so I had to read the old comics first to remind myself.

Reading webcomics then gave me the urge to start working on my own again, and so at least one night was wasted with that. It probably would have been more, but I only have Photoshop on my desktop and my desk itself is such a mess it's hard for me to get to the computer.

Then there's the search for the last wedding vendor I need: The florist. I also have to finish collecting addresses of everyone from my fiance's side of the wedding guestlist so we can FINALLY send out the invitations. I'm also starting to work on smaller details, like the center pieces and favors.

All these distractions are keeping me from writing. They're also keeping me from cleaning and it's a perilous path to go from my bed to my bedroom door. I REALLY need to organize!

I honestly don't foresee myself working on another chapter any time soon, but I still wanted to give everyone an update on where I am.

The Rest of April

OK, so I didn't really blog at all during the month of April because I didn't want to take any precious time away from working on my script for Script Frenzy. And so, here I am, giving another recap of the rest of the month.

FRIDAY, APRIL 8

Gaah, extended shift at work. I was there for nearly twelve hours and so no time to write today. At first I had no fear that I can make the 100 pages throughout the month, but if I have more work shifts like this I'll be too tired to write! I'm still so far behind! I should have about 27 pages by today and I'm still stuck at 5! I've also started to talk to a few other Script Frenziers that live in my area. Script Frenzy has these discussion boards set up for your region for just this purpose. We're all excited about having other Frenziers so close and so we want to all get together, chat, encourage each other, and talk about our scripts. I'm both nervous about going alone to meet people I only know through the internet, and also excited about meeting them!

SATURDAY, APRIL 9

I had an opening shift. And so I had about four hours to think about what I want to do with the plot, but dealing with my sister's attention-whore dog meant I only had enough free time to rework the 5 pages I already had written - my co-writer ChibiSunnie had sent me notes. She's actually a great cheerleader! She seems to love just about anything I write and when she critiques me she always gives me an example as to why it should be reworked as well as her idea of how to fix it. THAT is a great proofreader/editor! Loves to ChibiSunnie! Thanx girl!

SUNDAY, APRIL 10

Another opening shift. I'm sooooo tired ~_~'
I worked some more on the opening scene of the script, but I don't want to send ChibiSunnie any more of the script until I at least have the scene done. I just wish I wasn't so tired all the time, I feel like passing out whenever I start writing. GAAAAH, if I don't get a move on I'll never get to 100 pages! I'm so far behind here!
Originally us local Frenziers were all going to meet up today. I'm glad the plans fell through. I'm too tired to do anything today! Plus I really need to work on my writing and probably shouldn't procrastinate any more by meeting up with people instead of scripting. I'm also a bit relieved because I'm still super nervous about meeting people I only know via the internet. XP They all seem nice enough though.

MONDAY, APRIL 11

Finally a day off! I got some writing done, but I also did a lot of research again to make sure I have my facts straight. I looked up some regional info for Central America and got suckered in to watching more "Hey, Arnold!" episodes in order to get the characterization down.
On top of that, more people chimed in on the Facebook discussion board ChibiSunnie and I set up for this script thing. It's cool to hear what people think of our ideas, and listen to what they envision for the movie. However, I got really thrown off by this one girl that threw in her two cents. She was upset, like, REALLY upset - almost insulted - that Chibi and I are keeping Arnold's parents alive. She strongly believes that his parents should have died in the jungle so as to not degrade the abnormal family Arnold grew up in. She felt that Arnold finding his parents alive would further promote the "Traditional Family" and therefore make kids that don't have this family structure feel bad about it. Also, she felt that it is a depressing message for orphans who really can't have their parents back, no matter how hard they want to find them. I understand where she's coming from - and I mentioned this - however it seems too depressing a message to not have Arnold's parents alive. Plus my fiancé mentioned that Arnold is such an optimistic kid who feels anything is possible and discovering his parents are dead is just too much of a shock to his world view that it would completely change his character: "it would break him; he wouldn't be the Arnold everyone loves." Anyway, I wasn't the only person who felt that his parents should be alive and every time we stated such she would come back complaining that it's sending the wrong message. To me it felt like it was inching towards a flamewar and when I warned as such everyone was like "Um, no, don't overreact". XP *sigh*

TUESDAY, APRIL 12

Putting off writing some more... I'm really getting bad at this! Looking some more at the Facebook discussion page in order to get inspired, someone gave a suggestion for a key point in the script's plot - Arnold confessing that he likes Helga back and kisses her. The girl's suggestion? Arnold is so grateful that they are alive that he kisses her out of gratitude and elation. She also stated that the danger they are in just before the kiss - and therefore the fuel to the fire, as it were - should be a cliff-hanging-of-doom similar to the ending of the Disney movie "The Hunchback of Notre Dame". Of COURSE this then meant I needed to watch this scene to get a feel for it again, especially since I hadn't watched the movie in years. Next thing I knew I was watching the full movie! Gaaah!
I then was going to go straight in to the Direct-to-Video sequel, but my mom asked me if I wanted to watch one of the movies she rented. I could always use more bonding time with my mom - especially since I'm moving out of the house for the first time in October. And so I abandoned the Hunchback sequel - and script writing - in order to watch "Leap Year". At least the movie was worth it. XP
In the end I did manage to at least finish the opening scene - FINALLY.

WEDNESDAY, APRIL 13

I'm so beyond tired of the messed up way I need to work on the script in Microsoft Word Starter, and so I downloaded the program Celtx from the Script Frenzy website. TOTALLY AWESOME!!!! This program is my new favorite toy! I'm having so much fun working with it and writing the script now is so easy!
ChibiSunnie even came up with a nice solution to the "Arnold's Parents Should be Dead" issue brought up on the forum. She agrees that Arnold's Non-Traditional family should be celebrated and valued. She came up with a crafty way for Arnold and Grandpa to state that they are a family as is, and so even if Arnold can't find his parents he'll still have a family to come home to. Arnold then demonstrates his valuing of his current family by stating that he wouldn't change his life for anything, he just needs to know what happened to his parents.
I was also able to finally get started on the second scene! Dear lord, I'm nearly 1/2 way in to the month and I'm just starting the second scene! I'm starting to get nervous, like really nervous that I won't be able to get everything done. I'll have to write all night and just keep going until I have to go to work tomorrow at 4.

THURSDAY, APRIL 14

I wrote pretty much all morning and FINALLY got some headway on this script - about 10 pages! I finished off the second scene and slid right in to the next scene - which was one I actually had fun writing. Only three scenes in to the movie and I'm already 24 pages in! The pacing is so far off, but right now I'm looking for page numbers. Once May starts I can go back and trim all the fat. I'm still pretty behind though. I should be at about 47 pages by today. I do have tomorrow off, so maybe I can catch up then! I doubt it, but I can try!

FRIDAY, APRIL 15

Well THAT didn't work out! Since I had the day off and my work has a "customer appreciation day" sale tomorrow that we are NOT prepared for I thought I'd be nice and volunteer to come in to work to get the place ready for the sale while those who were scheduled can continue with their normal day-to-day. Apparently my co-manager couldn't "handle people today" and decided to hit the "eject button" on her shift - which meant that I was then the acting manager and we STILL aren't ready for the sale tomorrow! It also meant that my "I'll go in for like two hours" turned in to "I'm now stuck for six hours!?" On top of that I had an appointment tonight, and so that killed about another hour or so. I did manage to squeak out about 6 more pages, but I'm not sure I'm going to finish Act 1 before Monday like I intended!!!!

SATURDAY, APRIL 16

OMG! Am I dead!? I feel like I should be. We just barely survived the sale today. I didn't have a moment to breathe before I raced to another appointment - this time with a possible wedding florist. Since I have NO CLUE what I want for my flowers the meeting went super long. I went in to work at 6:30 and didn't get back home until about 7:30.... I was too tired to write anything!

SUNDAY, APRIL 17

Oh thank GOD I have the day off! And I legitimately had the day off this time! I was able to actually crank out some writing today. I was still so tired from yesterday, and I had to again deal with my sister's attention-whore dog, but I still managed to write some pages. I'm getting closer and closer to finishing Act 1!
The other distraction today was that it was the first time in a long time that Mom and I were able to just sit down for a while, and so we did a LOT of wedding planning today! On top of that, I'm visiting my fiancé for Easter this upcoming weekend, and so I have to get as much stuff figured out before Friday so I can talk to him about stuff. Two of the main things are the wedding invitations and RSVP cards as well as our wedding favors - both are being designed by me! Since I don't have Photoshop on my netbook I have to make sure everything is PERFECT before I show him, because I can't make any changes while I'm up there and we need to at least get the invites and RSVP cards printed! We're getting married in October! Anyway, needless to say this chewed up more of my time off.

MONDAY, APRIL 18

I wanted to finish Act 1 before today, and the entire weekend resulted in just four pages being written! Plus I still had to quickly file my State and Local Taxes! Man, I nearly forgot about them! At least I had the Federal taxes done already! At least I got to work on my next-favorite scene: Helga being forced into yet another moral dilemma! I love doing this to the poor girl! You just get such comedic moments when she's forced to do what's right even when she can't stand it.
In a writing furry I was able to knock out about 8 more pages, and so we're now up to 42! Still not where I need to be, but I'm back to a manageable amount of daily pages to still make 100 before the end of the month! So I'm not as nervous anymore. Plus I did finally finish the damn first act! A 42 page Act 1 for a 90-min movie! That is WAAAAY too long, but again, I don't care right now. I'm looking for page numbers right now. I'll trim later!

TUESDAY, APRIL 19

Well, I didn't really get any writing done today. I just don't know where to go now that Act 1 is done! That was the only part we really had figured out - which is probably one of the reasons why it ate up almost 1/2 our script! After work today I spent the evening on the Facebook discussion board to try to figure out what to do for Act 2. Today was also Donation Day on Script Frenzy. The whole program is non-profit, and so donations help run the site, and pay the people who run everything, as well as help fund writing programs in schools. I did my part... by purchasing about $95 in merchandise. At first I was just going to buy a shirt, but then I couldn't figure out which one I liked. So I bought three different designs, and then I bought the keychain, and decided to just go ahead and buy a travel mug too! I also spent some time on the Script Frenzy forum talking to the local Frenziers and attempting to set up a meeting for April 30th to celebrate our Script Frenzy attempt this year.

WEDNESDAY, APRIL 20

Awwww, Script Frenzy didn't manage to raise the money it intended or needed! I wish I could do more - or just straight donate - but I just don't have any more play money. Anyway, I didn't get any writing done again today. I did my normal 8-hr opening shift today, only to be called back three hours later to do the 5-hr closing shift! I am sooooo tired! ~_~' On the plus side, at least I know the place is all set for me to open again tomorrow... I just wish I wasn't "Walking Death" when I go in.

THURSDAY, APRIL 21

Well, my original plan was to do all of my vacation packing after work yesterday so I could leave for my fiancé’s right after work today. Unfortunately, being pulled back in to work last night means I get to do all of my packing today - as well as all of the last minute wedding stuff to make sure I'm set for my visit. In other words - yet again I don't have any writing done! This is almost a week of me not working on the script! I went from "I'm almost caught up" back to "I don't think I'm gonna make it!" I know I pretty much won't get any free time to write while I'm visiting my fiancé for Easter, and so now I have only four days to write 58 more pages!!!!! Oh, I'm not feeling so good........

FRIDAY, APRIL 22

As predicted, there was no time to write. I spent four hours in a car, spent the next couple of hours cuddled up next to my honey - understandable since I haven't seen him since Valentine's Day. We then went to a LARP his friend was hosting, however the three of us were the only ones who showed up, and so it turned in to three 20-somethings running around a playground while being frozen by the frigged wind. I think we wasted about three hours doing that! I was not in the mood to write anything after that, but at the same time I just kept thinking that I couldn't have better spent that time working on the script! On the plus side, I did talk about the script and was able to get some feedback from the guys. It was nice to hear their encouragement and enjoyment of what I have so far. There was also a really bizarre movie reference that I wanted to include in one of the scenes, but I didn't think anyone would get it, so I kept it out. I had multiple votes to go ahead with the obscure reference, and then when I asked ChibiSunnie she also told me to throw it in. It was fun including it.

SATURDAY, APRIL 23

Today was spent catching up with my sweetheart, hanging out with some of his friends, and a lot more wedding planning. There's not really much else to tell.....

SUNDAY, APRIL 24 – EASTER
My fiancé does the price changes at his local grocery store. This means he goes in to work at about 1am every Sunday in order to update all of the signs and prices before the public comes in for the week - and he doesn't get a break just because it's Easter. And so I was up at about 12:30 with him, and just couldn't fall asleep while he was at work. So I finally found about eight hours of alone time and I cranked out some pages to make up for the week of neglect!
I still wasn't sure what I was going to do for Act 2, and so I just decided - in order to just get page numbers - I would just write scenes I have figured out and I'll link them all together later. I found out that Celtx can shift whole scenes around in the script, and so I planned on doing just that if I decided the scenes I write are actually out of order. I attacked a pretty vital scene that I was inspired to write. I also wrote the Act 2 intro scene. I finally had Arnold and the Gang in the jungle! Hazzah! I also went back and tweeked Act 1 a little. All-in-all I managed to get about 11 more pages written. I had finally crossed the 1/2 way point! Now I just needed to write about 11 more pages each of the remaining four days I knew I had writing time available. It seemed daunting, but at the same time I had been knocking out about 10 pages each sitting anyway. Still unsure if I'll actually make the 100 pages before the end of the month!

MONDAY, APRIL 25

Just like Saturday, I spent the day with my future-hubby and didn't get any writing done, although I did manage to bounce some more ideas off of him.

TUESDAY, APRIL 26

Much like on Friday, I didn't have much time to write. I spent my last few hours with my sweetheart. I drove four hours home. I unpacked. I went to work. I came home and crashed. I did manage to finally get an internet connection so I could post my page count on ScriptFrenzy.org....

WEDNESDAY, APRIL 27

Hooray for work drama! I had a huge blow-up with my co-manager and she ended up storming out on her shift - which would be the second time in like two weeks! Anyway, I was not in the best of moods and so I just wanted to veg when I got home - especially since it is my Mommy's birthday and I didn't want to be a grumpy-puss. After work - which I left late from because of my oh-so-wonderful co-worker - I went on a mad dash all over town trying to find my mom her favorite ice cream, which is of COURSE Rum Raisin and is one of those flavors that's "seasonal" for whatever reason! After checking three different places, and driving the entire length of the town to get to the different stores, I finally found the ice cream. Between this, needing a shower to un-gross myself for our birthday outing, and the actual feasting and shopping..... well, there wasn't much writing time available.

THURSDAY, APRIL 28

I finished up the scene I was working on while visiting the fiancé. I also worked some more on that Act 2 opening scene that I also started on Easter. I was only able to add about three more pages though.

FRIDAY, APRIL 29

My last day off of the month. Crunch time. I had some notes from ChibiSunnie which made me completely rework the first half of that key scene from Act 2. I actually don't mind, because the scene completely works better with the rework, plus it extended the scene so I have more pages! ^_^ I also wrote more of the intro to Act 2 scene. Still only have these two scenes, and there is absolutely no way I'm going to be anywhere NEAR done with this script by tomorrow, but maybe I can at least hit 100 pages after all...

SATURDAY, APRIL 30

Well, this is it, the final day. I went to work and intended on writing afterwards, but work ran long - as usual. I then finally did what I have been nervous for all month: met with the other Frenziers. We set up a reservation at a restaurant we can all easily get to, I threw on one of my Script Frenzy shirts that I bought, and stood outside the restaurant trying to nonchalantly show off my shirt so that the others would know who I was. I also spent about 10 minutes trying to connect to a Wi-Fi so I could bring up the profiles of the others so I knew who I was looking for. Finally, I thought "maybe they're inside already" and went in to wait. No one was there yet and it kept about another 10 minutes before SOMEONE showed up - a chick named AWordOrThree. We both waited probably yet another 10 or 15 minutes before finally giving up and informing the hostess that we didn't need the large reservation table after all. We were shown to our booth and we hit it off great! We spent nearly two hours talking about ourselves and Script Frenzy, and then I went on and on about the awesomeness of "Hey, Arnold!" Finally we realized that our parking meters were about to expire and neither of us had any more quarters, and so we had to say our goodbyes.
I got home and finished up my revisions from yesterday. I posted the scenes on Script Frenzy, bringing my total up to 63 pages. I thought to myself that since I didn't have to go in to work until noon the next day I could possibly stay up until midnight and just write like crazy for the next four hours. I still may not make 100 pages, but at least I'd be closer to my goal. I fought with myself for a little while, but I just couldn't get inspired to write. After a month of non-stop writing all I wanted to do was READ. With a few nudges from my fiancé I finally picked up the third book in the Percy Jackson & The Olympians series: "The Titan's Curse".

And so, at 8:21pm on April 30th I threw in the towel on my quest to write a 100 page script in just one month. I made it to 63 pages - nearly 2/3 of the way. I'll still be working on the script in the upcoming months, but after a bit of a writing hiatus. Script Frenzy, I will try again next year and I WILL conquer you this time!

Touching Base and Giving Reviews

It's been a while since I last posted and I just wanted to touch base. As per usual I've been horrible when it comes to writing. After I posted my last chapter and blog post I had every intention of continuing writing that day. However, I was actually interested in getting the skeletal timeline down for the script I'm starting April first for Script Frenzy. That way I can just sit and write because I knew where I was gonna go with it. However, work got in the way. And then my co-manager got sick and so I had to pick up more hours which got in the way. And I was only doing openings and so I was exhausted and wanted to sleep, which got in the way. And then my sister was never around to take care of her dog and so I was the one that played with the needy mutt - which, you guessed it, got in the way. And so I STILL don't have much of an outline done and I'm probably not going to when April comes around. So I'll probably spend the first week or so of Script Frenzy just piecing everything together and then knock out the 100-page script over a weekend or something.

Further distractions took form a day or so after I posted my last chapter. I did something I rarely did - I drank coffee because I was DRAAAAAAAGGING at work. I don't know if it was the fact that I only drank coffee maybe twice before in my life and my body wasn't use to it, or if it was the brand of coffee Subway sells: Seattle's Best, or if it was my listening to a co-worker when he told me that adding a package of hot chocolate mix to the coffee helped make it less bitter, but somehow, for whatever reason, that coffee made me so sick that I actually left work early for the first time. After an hour or so nap I felt a little better, but kept myself bedridden. I wasn't feeling well enough to write, but I was also getting bored and didn't really feel like playing video games. That was when I saw it, one of two books my fiance lent me nearly a month prior and was constantly begging me to read. Percy Jackson and the Lightning Thief.

We had seen the Disney movie "based" on the book and he ended up falling in love with the series - even declaring that the author Rick Riordan officially dethrowned his previously favorite author: Orson Scott Card - which also dethrowned "Ender's Game" as my fiance's favorite story and series.

I had been dragging my feet for the same reason I dragged my feet about Harry Potter - the book series was written for children half my age. I'm not sure why this was an issue for me since I've been OBSESSING over "Hey, Arnold!" for the past year and a half - and that series not only ended nearly a decade ago, but was for ten-year-olds. I still play with toys on occasion and watch movies that are aimed at children, so why am I embarrassed to read childrens' books? Not sure, but it was an issue.

Anyway, there I was, sick, in bed, bored, and staring at this novel my fiance has been begging me to read, and so I did. I was instantly drawn in to Riordan's writing, mostly because it so closely resembled my own writing style. If I write similarly, obviously I would enjoy how it was written. Plus, it gave me hope that my writing style could be publishable some day - even if it were for middle-schoolers. Another bonus for Riordan was my love of Greek Mythology. Finally, the story itself was actually really funny, even to the point of me reading passages that I enjoyed out loud to my fiance so he knew what I was laughing at while we were on the phone. I greatly enjoyed the story and even acknowledged my fiance's "I told you so"s.

Well, now I really was in trouble, what little precious time I had at home was spent reading this novel instead of writing my own. Sure, I thought about my own story a little while at work all of those hours alone, but nothing was committed to paper. Also, since I didn't really remember the Greek mythology too well it kept me at least twice as long to read "The Lightning Thief" because I was going through my "reference book" at the same time. Let me explain, sure, Riordan was good at having different mythology references explained. He understood that the average thirteen-year-old wouldn't know who Medusa was. However, a few years ago my fiance - who is a HUGE Greek Mythology buff by the way - told me about this book he had as a textbook in one of his classes: Mythology: Timeless Tales of Gods and Heroes by Edith Hamilton. I have always enjoyed just reading the myths in this book, but now I was using it to get the "full scoop" on the references Riordan used in his story. For example, one of Athena's children starts freaking out around spiders and references Arachne. Riordan has it simply explained that Athena turned Arachne into a spider and that Arachne's children - all of Earth's spiders - always had a grudge against the children of Athena. Reading my "reference book" further explained that Athena was the goddess of crafts and invented the loom, and so when Arachne claimed she could weave as well as - if not better than - Athena, and then proved it in a contest against the goddess, Athena raged against the girl, causing Arachne to become so distressed that she committed suicide by hanging. Athena felt guilty and turned Arachne into a spider so all could appreciate her weaving prowess.

Anyway, my point is that for every single reference Riordan makes in his book, I then spend about twenty minutes reading the myth corresponding to said reference. I've read at least half of the myths by now. Worse yet was that my fiance had also given me the sequel "The Sea of Monsters" to read. He wanted me to bring home the whole series, but I stopped him at two - not thinking I'd even read them. Well, I was able to hold off on the second story for almost a week, again working on the movie script skeleton, but I was really in a reading kick now - especially since I'm actually tag teaming the "Mythology" book and the "Percy Jackson and the Olympians" series - and I could not be stopped.

Also, my fiance's best friend hosts LARP games, and when I'm visiting for Good Friday through Easter, they will be hosting their Changeling game. Since I'm visiting, I'll be participating even though I've never played this game before and know nothing of the rules or characters. So now I'm reading "The Sea of Monsters", the "Mythology: Timeless Tales of Gods and Heroes", as well as the wiki-pages for "Changeling: The Dreaming" - which then leads me to read my book "Irish Fairy & Folk Tales" by W. B. Yeats since the majority of the characters in the Changeling game are based on Irish faerie myths. Yup, reading four things all at the same time, plus spring cleaning, plus wedding shopping now that it's nice enough to go outside again, plus all of the stuff I told you about at the beginning of this post, and so I don't really have extra time to write - another reason I haven't posted in almost a month.

Aside from being busy, I've been uninspired to write the next chapter for one very important reason: I'm not sure how to portray Brainy. He was never really developed in the series and so I more-or-less have to build him a personality for my story. I'm afraid of two things: 1) I'll make him in to a "Marty Stu" and/or 2) people will root for him over Arnold - whom I think I'm already alienating from my audience with my last chapter. Honestly, even I'm not sure how Arnold could possibly win Helga back one last time, and so more feet dragging.

Anyway, my laundry has been done for about an hour now and so I should really get back to that. Sorry to everyone eagerly awaiting my next chapter. I strongly suggest reading any of Rick Riordan's novels. ^_^

Where Does the Time Go???

I'm so annoyed with my writing availability right now! I really wanted to post my "realistic" chapter for my Valentine's Day fluff piece a day or two later. It's now over a week later and the story still isn't done!

Between work, wedding appointments, impromptu social events, and taking care of my sister's overly-needy dog, I've only had about an hour or so to write every day, making this chapter's writing process a long one. And the longer I take writing this, the longer it will be until I can get my next chapter for my main story posted. GAAR! I just want to post this chapter already!!!!

The thing that really kills me is that one of the days this past week, I was getting my hair dyed. I had an hour wait before they even started, and then I had the hour or so of them dying my hair and me just sitting around. I COULD HAVE BEEN WRITING!!! But I decided last minute to go get my hair dyed right after work, and so I didn't think to bring my netbook with me. Then, the very next day I went to one of my laser hair removal appointments. There is no point in bringing the netbook since 1) I'm blindfolded so I won't get blinded by the laser, and 2) the whole thing takes maybe fifteen minutes. However, I didn't anticipate waiting over an hour and a half for them to finally get me in to my appointment!!! I COULD HAVE BEEN WRITING AGAIN! Nope, instead I had to spend both days staring at the walls - because I didn't want to read a four-month-old issue of Glamour - and humming along to the same radio station I'm stuck listening to while at work! Such wasted days!

I have tomorrow off, and so normally I would be able to finish my story with all of my free time. However, I just recently got a volunteer position with a local production company and so I'm now spending my weekdays off there. In theory, the company office is only open until five, and so I might be able to write after that, but it never seems to work out when I'm done with my actual work at four. I wouldn't hold your breath that I can get any writing done any time soon. We'll see.

At the home stretch

**A/N: Alright, so originally I was posting on my bio on FanFiction.net, however it's starting to get lengthy and I was only posting monthly. I'd like to truly keep my readers up to date on my progress of my stories - especially since lately I've been taking friggen THREE MONTHS to post my next chapter/story. I'm just transferring my previous updates here and then I'll post simultaneously.

Anyway, I'm not entirely sure anyone really CARES enough to read my progress, but if you are one of my faithful readers who would like an update every once in a while, please sign my guestbook so I know who I'm writing for. I'd like to say "hi" ^_^

Whoo! Last of my posts off of my profile. I'm all caught up now! YAY!**

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OLD FF.NET PROFILE POST:
Dear lord! Another month bites the dust! I never thought a chapter I was excited to write would take this long to do so! Between getting sick, visiting my fiance, the holidays, the Wedding Show Season starting, having THREE people all decide they were going to quit about an hour before each of their shifts (leaving a staff of 3 to run a Subway Restaurant), losing about a week "researching" on TVTropes.org, and Frontierville on Facebook devouring my life... Well, writing fell to the wayside. However, the writing bug DID bite me again, and my next (lengthy) chapter is about 70% complete... so maybe before MARCH I'll actually post the third chapter! So sorry if any of you have been waiting!

Hmmm, well THAT didn't work...

**A/N: Alright, so originally I was posting on my bio on FanFiction.net, however it's starting to get lengthy and I was only posting monthly. I'd like to truly keep my readers up to date on my progress of my stories - especially since lately I've been taking friggen THREE MONTHS to post my next chapter/story. I'm just transferring my previous updates here and then I'll post simultaneously.

Anyway, I'm not entirely sure anyone really CARES enough to read my progress, but if you are one of my faithful readers who would like an update every once in a while, please sign my guestbook so I know who I'm writing for. I'd like to say "hi" ^_^

And yet ANOTHER short update. Keep in mind I was purposely doing this because originally these were all on my profile...**

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OLD FF.NET PROFILE POST:
Wow, I had NO idea that this next chapter would take so long! Anyway, the whole "writing while on vacation" thing didn't pan out. Ended up going hard-core on the whole "wedding planning" thing instead. :-P And then work and Christmas sort of snuck up on me. However, I DID manage to write the first two pages of the chapter! Yay progress! So, if anyone out there is actually reading this and waiting for my next chapter I thank you for caring and I apologize for the wait. I hope it proves worth it! ^_^

Well that didn't work did it?

**A/N: Alright, so originally I was posting on my bio on FanFiction.net, however it's starting to get lengthy and I was only posting monthly. I'd like to truly keep my readers up to date on my progress of my stories - especially since lately I've been taking friggen THREE MONTHS to post my next chapter/story. I'm just transferring my previous updates here and then I'll post simultaneously.

Anyway, I'm not entirely sure anyone really CARES enough to read my progress, but if you are one of my faithful readers who would like an update every once in a while, please sign my guestbook so I know who I'm writing for. I'd like to say "hi" ^_^


Sorry again for the short update... **


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OLD FF.NET PROFILE POST:
Happy belated Thanksgiving, Americans. Well, I HAD intended to post the next chapter by now - especially considering how much I was looking forward to writing it. However, I spent about a week trying to write the song (see below update) - and I still don't have it finished :-P And then I got sick and spent almost a week in bed (downside to having a desktop). And finally, this week was taken up with 10-hr work days, Thanksgiving, cleaning the house FOR Thanksgiving, working on wedding invitations, packing to visit my fiance, and finally, working on my resume... And so, not a lot of time this month to write. Perhaps I'll find time while on vacation next week.