Slack-a-lackin

Reading: just finished Hogfather, by Terry Pratchett
Writing: procrastinating!
Coffee units: 4
Notable nibbles: well, John prepared the frozen broccoli. That's pretty awesome.

Okay, I'm supposed to be producing words about now. And I will, I'm sure. It's just hard to focus when it's practically vacation time!

Yesterday we enjoyed some impromptu vacation, since John had the day off. We just decided to go visit Mt. Saint Helens. Hooray! We hiked around outside of the Johnston Ridge Observatory, where there is a decidedly wonderful hiking trail amongst the baby alder trees. It was beautiful, sunny and cool, and the icy breeze coming off the peak made the lack of shade enjoyable. (Yesterday, anyway. Today my scalp is letting me know that no shade does not make skin happy.) We even saw ground squirrels and horned larks, two very adorable creatures.

After our hike, we stopped for pizza (Papa Pete's Pizza in Castle Rock) and coffee (C&L Burgers, Ice Cream and Espresso). They were out of regular coffee, so we had Americanos to which the girl kindly added a liberal dose of half-and-half. I am ashamed to say that after 15+ years of mocking Americanos, I found this to be one of the most delicious coffee beverages of my life. I just might become a convert!

And let me add that I drank that Americano without sugar. I've spent my whole life loving sweet coffee, and now I'm going over to the dark side. Who knew it could happen? I just know that I can't wait to be on the open road on Thursday morning, a strong cup of black coffee in one hand and an Acme donut in the other!

Chocolate chickpea cake part deux

I want to be clear on something here. I am not an exceptionally good or nice person. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I have morals and I try to be decent, but I am more lazy than I am good. So it's not very often when I get to shine up my halo, and it's all because of that chocolate chickpea cake.

While the cake didn't turn out as luxuriously truffle-ish as the last time I made it (okay, I should have listened to Fiona when she was like "Take the cake out of the oven, Mom. NOW."), it was still acceptable, if a titch dry in the corners. With enough strawberries and whipped cream, dry can be managed. Everyone who tried the cake seemed to like it, and our gluten-free ZS member took seconds. Hooray! I didn't even know if the guy liked cake, or chocolate, but since this is one of the few cakes I really like, I felt like I needed to bring it out for him.

But the good part happened just a few minutes ago. I remembered that my neighbor was just recently diagnosed with gluten intolerance, and that she and her family were struggling with it. And lightning struck! I had a lot of cake left (that's what happens when the family 5 you're planning to fete at a baby shower misses the event), and I knew I would probably gobble it all up if I kept it around. So I took half of it to the neighbor's house!

Her husband answered the door and called her over with a "Honey! Gluten-free cake!" And I swear I have never seen a hand move so fast or eyes shine so brightly. Her kids had come home from something that night eating cookies and she was really suffering. That cake saved the day.

I went home happy, my dusty halo gleaming over my head.

Chocolate chickpea cake and romaine salad

Reading: the Willamette Week drink guide
Writing: hopefully, yes
Coffee units: 1. God, that needs to change!
Notable nibbles: apple slice with cinnamon

I just want to point out that those questions are much harder at 10 in the morning. Normally I wouldn't be blogging until at least 7 pm, but today, I had a thought on my trip home from the grocery store.

Tomorrow we're going to a potluck, and I planned to bring healthier choices--one of my friends just had a heart attack, and I don't want to tempt him with anything too decadent. (As if I could tempt this guy--I just learned he used to chef for a 4-star restaurant. Not that I'm worried or anything.) So I picked up some salad ingredients and stuff for that amazing chocolate chickpea cake that rocked our world last month, and somehow or other, walking along in the sunshine, I started imagining just how my world premier appearance on Oprah would proceed.

OPRAH: Here's Wendy Wagner, writer, mom and all-around amazingly cute woman. Wendy, I understand that you successfully lost 60 pounds a few years ago and have kept it off. What's your secret?

ME: I think first you have to recognize that you have to love yourself, and you can't be too hard on yourself. (Patting fat rolls) I'm still no super-model, Oprah! (laughter) But I think the first rule of success is simple.

OPRAH: Please, share it with our studio audience and folks at home.

ME: You just have to say, "No! You can NOT have that cookie!" No matter what. It doesn't matter if you walked 5 miles or haven't eaten anything all day. Cookies are evil.

OPRAH: Ohhh, that's deep. Don't you agree, folks? (crowd cheers) Do you have any other advice, Wendy?

ME: Well, if you really want the pounds to come off, you can step things up with rule #2: "If that has cheese on it, it's not going in my mouth." Yeah, that'll do it every time. Cheese makes cookies look like innocent girl scouts. It's pure fat.

(crowd cheers louder; Oprah wipes a tear from her cheek. I smile and wave--)

Anyway, before I could step into Oprah's arms for a soul-to-soul hug, I nearly got hit by a minivan and I stopped daydreaming. But I guess that's how I lost 60 pounds in a year and kept it off. I could stand to lose another twenty, but there's no way in the world I'm cutting out pie.

Jen rocks!

Reading: Richard Matheson: The Collected Stories, vol 1
Writing: finished 1st draft of Mayan apocalype story; began revision of another
Coffee units: 3.5
Notable nibbles: strawberry-spinach salad

I just returned from a very enjoyable reading by the very amusing Jen Lancaster. I was accompanied by the incomparable E, who is the one who introduced me to blogging and books born from blogs.

Sometimes you just have to go do something like a girl.

This weekend turned out nutty, of course. The balance between Zombie Squad and family didn't work out quite as well as I would have liked, and I missed the main event, which was apparently crappy for the ZS crew. I feel like an asshole--you know, like that person I've been trying to put behind me, who always flaked out at the last minute because she got overwhelmed and freaked out. (Hey, I can still feel guilty as hell even I wasn't doing any actual flaking. I'd like to point some fingers at the US Navy. But I'd still feel like a jerk.)

I probably wouldn't feel so guilty if I hadn't had such a good time being with the kid. You know, I am really going to miss my brother! Thank goodness it's just 4 months.

Okay, I've got some writing to do. I think. This Lohra revision is seriously kicking my ass. It just isn't as fun to knuckle down and clean up the disaster of this book as it is to write stories. But if I want to have a book to sell, I better get off my ass!

OMG!

Reading: just finished The Graveyard Book, by Neil Gaiman. Totally enjoyable!
Writing: started new story while drinking coffee at the Artemis
Coffee units: 4. But who's counting?
Notable nibbles: Shaker lemon pie (at the Artemis Cafe, of course)

So much going on I have decompress before I get down to work. I'm not even sure if I can manage complete sentences right now, because I'm just too full of emotion to think properly. So I'll list, even if that's incredibly lame.

1. My adorable baby brother leaves for the Persian Gulf next weekend.
2. My adorable baby brother arrives at my house Friday night for one last hootenanny.
3. Saturday is Zombie Prom, the most exciting day of May!
4. Saturday my family is celebrating my adorable baby brother.
5. My best friend in the world is GOING WEDDING DRESS SHOPPING! Tomorrow!
6. Might do something too nutty and exciting to blog about today.

Whew. I'm breathing out the strung-out energy and breathing in peace. Whew. Okay. Yeah, maybe I won't get much sleep this weekend, but it'll be okay.

Oh, and number 6? I'll keep you posted.

It's page 80, folks

Reading: Children of Poe, edited by Peter Straub
Writing: none, duh--that's why I'm blogging
Coffee units: 3
Noteworthy nibbles: veggie wraps with edamame and yogurt cheese.

So at some point in time, I kind of promised myself I would save Lohra and her friends. Her book is horribly damaged--absolute first-time-novelling crap--but I love Lohra and Tris and their entire posse of whacky guys. Imagining them dying an ignomious death at the bottom of my junk drawer just seems ... wrong. Terribly, terribly wrong. I *have* to rewrite it.

But of course, I've hit page 80 and now I am panicking. Page 80 in this version? It's 197 in the original. That's 110 pages on the cutting room floor! Where am I going to get 90,000 words to put in this story? I'll be lucky to clear 50K! Oh my god, I think I might be hyperventilating.

Okay, relax, Wendy. You can do this. With an intervention from some gods and Starbucks, this book will happen. And it will be done. DONE.

Man, I just don't know if there's enough coffee in the world to succeed at this task!

Sunshine!!!

Reading: Children of Poe, anthology
Writing/editing: still high from finishing a great story the night before last
Coffee units: 1, but more SOON
Noteworthy nibbles: smoothie!

I already feel productive this morning, since I hot-footed it down to the food co-op to pick up some donation items for our ZS raffle. It is so much fun to shop when you're not spending your own money! I almost blew all our dough on Sigg water bottles and vegan condoms, but I paced myself, and we have a few more dollars for the future.

I've got plenty of stuff left on my to-do list, but the sun is so cheery and it's warm and the birds are chirping and I'm distracted. There is nothing like Oregon spring to distract me from anthing I ought to be doing. Rewriting a novel? Loading the dishwasher? Catching up on a week of laundry? I have to admit, puttering in the garden or going for a walk sounds waaaay more exciting.

Also, I have to admit that after 30 Day of Night last night, I'm just pleased to live in a place that even has sunshine. I've never wanted to live in Barrow, Alaska, but that film certainly makes it look awful!

Day of the half-alive brain-dead

• Reading: The Northwest Nature Guide, by James Luther Davis
• Writing/editing: nada, but maybe a little Lohra action in a minute
• Coffee units: 2
• Noteworthy nibbles: orange creamsicle, hopefully to be followed soon by a strawberry popsicle.

Okay, so an orange creamsicle isn't exactly the healthy follow-up to lunch that I ought to be enjoying, but my throat is sore and I have no voice, so I'm indulging in all the cold slurpables I want. Take that, winter flu! (Still assuming this is the winter flu and not H1N1 or, in my personal opinion, The-Virus-of-Endless-Exhaustion.) Yeah, this flu business isn't helping my healthy eating or working out goals for the month. I spent 2 hours napping this morning.

That kind of lifestyle also doesn't help my writing output at all. It also doesn't help that post-kiddo-bedtime, my usual writing time, is the time when I sit here, drooling, half-asleep, barely able to type the words "the cat sat on the mat." The only thing I've successfully completed are Facebook quizzes. I am apparently Anne Shirley, the queen of the zombie killers, and I'll probably find out what element I am before the day is through.

Uggh.

Uggh.

Home sick. But I'm placing much faith on the curative power of The Princess Diaries. How did Julie Andrews become so wonderful?

Hell fires

Reading: Hell House, by Richard Matheson
Writing/editing: nada
Coffee units: 3
Noteworthy nibbles: asparagus and goat cheese risotto

While I'd like to work through some editing and sketch out some ideas for a new story, the slight fever I'm running reccomends an early bedtime. I'm just waiting for the kiddo to fall asleep, and then it's time to snooze!

Needless to say, since I'm slacking, I felt perfectly justified finishing Hell House. What an awesome book! Truly scary and truly inspirational. I am hoping to create a few haunted stories now!

I just hope I don't get as sick as John's been. Poor guy! He's barely eaten anything in two days, and last night he slept in the basement to stay close to the bathroom. I really missed him. Pink Poodle is a pretty cuddly stuffed animal, but not even close to a sweetpea.

playing catch up

Reading: re-reading I Capture the Castle, by Dodie Smith
Writing/editing: worked up a 2nd draft of the werewolf story
Coffee units: 2.5
Noteworthy nibbles: saltine crackers with red pepper hummus

John is home sick today. I would joke that it's the swine flu, but that seems too chancy. Poor guy. His tummy is killing him.

It felt wonderful to sit down with my story about Ellen the werewolf and do some work on it. I mostly filled in some blanks that had been rushed out of the first draft, and I have to admit I did insert an image that was totally stolen from the office where we have ZS meetings. I had almost given up on this story, but my writing partner was eager for something to read this week, and I didn't have anything else that was close to ready. So I am going to print it up and subject Sue to it. Poor woman.

Other than that, I merely tidied up my desk, read a bit and daydreamed about the ballet that John and I saw on Saturday. It was a wonderful performance, and the ballet men were magnificent. Yay, culture!

Snackfabulations!

• Reading: just finished Killing Bridezilla, by some funny chick mystery writer. What? I love the chick lit!
• Writing/editing: just got home from work, so ... no.
• Coffee units: 2 (the 2nd pot is still brewing)
• Noteworthy nibbles: fresh sheep's milk cheese (the milk came from sheep milked Tuesday!) with French bread, apple slices and organic Californian strawberries

Really, there hasn't been much exciting to post about besides the delicious snack. This is what happens when I stop at New Seasons on the way home from work and John is at home with a sick midget, needing a snack. YUM.

I also just want to point out that stores that actually expect to sell clothes should carry clothes in sizes beyond S and XS. What is up with that? I stopped by the cutest shop yesterday and would have been tempted ... except that apparently my body is unwelcome in those clothes. Weirdly enough, the shopgirl was awesomely nice.

Cute sick midget

Reading: re-reading I Capture the Castle, by Dodie Smith
Writing/editing: worked a bit on Lohra, ch 3, but plan to delete everything I did
Coffee units: 3
Noteworthy nibbles: Mentos

Also noteworthy, but not for a good reason: the asiago potato salad from Fred Meyer. Unfortunately, what's noteworthy is that it has bacon in it. But not on the label. Bummer.

Today was a great day, even though I spent it indoors, listening for Fi. She stayed home sick, the poor little tyke--fevery, pukey, miserable. BUT I did get the ZSC011 Facebook page all set up AND I finally cleaned the corner of the counter in the kitchen. We had a little shelf in there that John took out and replaced with a much cuter shelf, and there was all kinds of what-not and mess all over the counter after that project. I feel much better now that it's not dirty.

But yesterday--yesterday was a fantastic day! I spent the entire afternoon with my friend Erin, catching up on girly chitchat (like her wedding plans! Some cute little girl just might get to play flower girl this fall!), and then I had ZS at night, where I got to enjoy anti-girly chitchat. I even did a little running in the morning.

So. Good times. Now I just hope I don't get Fiona's flu!

Blogging just because I can!

I got to work early today so I am taking a second to post a blog. Because I totally can!!

Yesterday's ZS sewing bee was an awesomely good time. I can't say enough good stuff about my ZS crew. Or the spinach salad (hold the chicken) from Burgerville. Man, if you're going to sit down in the park with your friends and eat lunch, I highly recommend that spinach salad!

Tofu, Rice, Veg

Reading: Cockatiels at Seven, some chick mystery writer
Writing/editing: hopefully starting Chapter 3 of Lohra version 2.1!
Coffee units: 3--yay! I bought creamer!
Noteworthy nibbles: Tofu, Rice & Veg

Finally! After almost 3 years as a vegetarian, I have come up with a comfort meal as satisfying as baked chicken. But to do it, I had to make the discovery that not all tofu is created equal. Tonight's TRV (Tofu, Rice & Veg) was acceptable--I used Woodstock Farm's extra-firm, and it's firm, but not amazing. There's some crazy local brand at People's that kicks its ass, and after I discovered its solid, fork-resistant texure, it's hard to even look at anything else. Trader Joe's 2-pack of super firm is almost good enough ... but I was at New Seasons, and I had to make do.

I can't believe it took me this long to realize that the tofu I get at Safeway and Fred Meyer's is pathetic, squishy stuff. I had noticed that I made better tofu sometimes than others, but I never blamed the tofu itself. Just me. But I'm okay! It's not me, it's the industrialized soy stuff. Yay!

Anyway, once you get some good, super-duper firm tofu, go ahead and marinade it. Don't be afraid of the salt products--they're your friends. Bouillon or soup base, 1 or 2 Tbs of soy sauce, some booze, some crushed garlic: it's nothing fancy. Soak it for 15 minutes or so, then toss the marinade and the tofu into a skillet and let it heat up. Eventually the tofu will slurp up all the marinade and become brown and delicious. Do whatever you like to the rice, as long as it's not too fancy, and find some kind of basic, tasty veg: broccoli fits the bill, but tonight I went crazy and bought some asparagus. It's finally available from CA, so I bought some. Consider it a warm-up for the Washington season. Anyway, chuck it all on the plate and pretend you're a normal family, enjoying a meal with three distinct food groups that don't touch or ask for sauce.

Yeah. It's as June Cleaver as I get nowadays.

We gathered together

Reading: Darker Than You Think, Jack Williamson
Writing/editing: critiquing for my writing partner
Coffee units: 5 (is that bad?)
Noteworthy nibbles: creme brulee at Pix

I can totally explain the five cups of coffee. See, the Ahabs (John's brother and sister-in-law) came down Friday night. Saturday night my brother surprised us all with a (20 hour) visit. The combination of visitors and awesome games shorted my sleep cycle by a chunk or two, and then I sat around for an hour just chatting with Jak. Just chatting, in my family, means drinking coffee and running off at the mouth. So I had some extra coffee. And then some with dessert. And then some when I got home.

Soooo yummy. Coffee is wonderful.

It's hard to explain how nice the weekend turned out. Sometimes a lot of company can be too exciting, but we balanced everything out and I feel peaceful, warm and fuzzy.

Oh, and exhausted. Maybe I should have another cup of coffee?

Friday, I'm in love

Reading: Darker Than You Think, Jack Williamson!
Writing/editing: --made 1300 words on the Lohra rewrite already!
Coffee units: 1.5 + 1 cup of hot cocoa!
Noteworthy nibbles: hopefully going out for dinner tonight!

This is the kind of day where a girl just wants to use a lot of exclamation points. I managed to get a quick (10 minute) "run" in this morning (I ran a little, walked a little), which makes me feel like a champ. I will probably do a lot of walking this afternoon, but getting in some speed first thing in the day is pretty neat. Don't tell my sister, though. She's been trying to convert me to running for forever, and I don't want her to get smug.

Last night I saw the movie Paprika. What a great movie! I highly recommend it.

Writing has gone badly this week, but this morning I am off to a good start. The Lohra re-write is more re-writing and less editing. Looking at the previous draft is like looking at a 125,000 word outline that isn't necessarily correct. There's a ton of work to be done, but I feel very confident. It helps that every single rewritten passage is about 250X better than the original!

I am really hoping this rewriting goes well, because I haven't had the best luck with editing and revision in the past. I am good at churning out the crap and good at editing short stories, but when it comes to a book, WHUFF. It's SO hard. So hard. I need to flex muscles I'm not sure I even have! And I need to see everything all at one time. Which isn't easy. I hope I'm getting better at it, though. I'd like to someday finish a book.

One Pokey Little Puppy

• Reading: Just After Sunset, Stephen King
• Writing/editing: --working on the 3rd draft of Lohra's story (made a whopping 200 words tonight)
• Coffee units: 3.5
• Noteworthy nibbles: Seeds of Change korma simmer sauce

Once again, a depressing night's work. Now that I've set the goal to be done with the 3rd draft of "Lohra" by the time we go to vacation in May, a million and ten things keep popping up: my own psychoses (absolutely freaking out about the state of the kitchen, my own overwhelmedness, and my deep and abiding feeling that John will never marry me because I'm a) a slob and b)ugly and c) probably getting bored with a boring, ugly slob), my kid, tomorrow's lunch, my psychoses ...

Oh yeah, there's not enough coffee in the world to keep me writing tonight.

A walk in the park

Reading: Just After Sunset, Stephen King
Writing/editing: --working on the 3rd draft of Lohra's story
Coffee units: 2 at 7:55 pm. Might need a half cup to make it through the night.
Noteworthy nibbles: Chocolate Chickpea Cake with strawberries

While I had planned to make this a bust-my-hump work day, the good weather changed my plans. I had to go for a little hike this morning. Wowser, was that a good choice. A Monday morning in Forest Park, at least in April, is still quiet and peaceful. The birds were singing their songs at the top of their lungs, and the trillium was out in full bloom. I managed to keep on the trail--but barely. There was a moments of total nature dorkdom when I almost fell into Balch Creek. Yikes! That would have put a chill on the morning.

I didn't wind up getting any writing done during the daylight today. My little girl was the unfortunate victim of a run-by vomiting, and I had to pick her up early to wash her. She didn't mind the extra 2 hours of play-time!

I can't believe how big of an improvement this draft is over the previous version of "Lohra." I guess I've actually learned something in the last 2 1/2 years!

The horror ...

Reading: Writing Horror, edited by Mort Castle
Writing: too soon to tell
Coffee units: 1 cup
Notable nibbles: none, cereal being too boring to note

[No idea why the bullets didn't work today.]

One day, after writing two novels and some shorter stuff, I realized that the best parts of everything I wrote was either gory, terrifying, eery or horrible. And I also realized that no matter what kind of project I was working on, writing those parts was best part of the writing. So since Nanowrimo wrapped up, I've been letting myself explore my horrible side.

I believe that the main reason I like horror so much is because of my childhood and where I grew up. See, I lived at the end of a very long, very windy road. Highway 38, a two- or sometimes even three-lane highway following the curves of the Umpqua River, gave way to the infinitely narrower Loon Lake Road. Our road. It hung from a cliff face, its other side mouthing a sheer ravine that at points looked bottomless. At others, particularly in winter, that side of the road went straight into the creek. After a storm, the creek would ride high, floating foam and entire bodies of trees and sometimes loose boulders. After a lot rain there were points where the water came right up to the white line. Each trip along that road scared the shit right out of me.

It was a half hour drive to the grocery store, and we usually went once a week. So imagine being a quiet, introverted, carsick child experiencing a good 52 hours of absolute terror every single year. Combine that with loneliness, no tv and a love of books?

I was doomed to become a horror writer. The great thing is that after many years' denial, I am now willing to admit that I love horror and anything scary. Thanks to my virtual godfather (after reading On Writing by Stephen King, I have adopted him as a kind of bibliographical family member. And hero. ), Stephen King, I am no longer afraid to be a speculative fiction writer. It was like he gave me permission to write what I liked after all the college years of shame. I might never be part of the canon, but what the heck. At least I'm having fun!