running on ooblek

Above: I was doing a quick doodle for today's Blathering, and Peter Pan just popped in there without me really intending to put him in. Any suggestions for a caption? :-)

I booked Urban Tapestry's flights to GAfilk yesterday through Travelocity.ca. I did try a travel agent to see if she could match the prices that Jodi found on Travelocity, but it was no go...turns out the agent would have to add service charges that would push up the fees.

If this is the case for most flights, I wonder how in-person travel agencies survive? Perhaps because some people are uncomfortable with booking flights online. Or maybe they make most of their money from travel packages that include hotels and other services.

A survey for you travelers out there: When you book flights, do you prefer doing this online or in person / over the phone? If online, what service do you use?

Anyway, I'm happy our flights are booked. :-) There were several ways we could have done this, but after discussions with the GAfilk concom we decided it would be easiest if we booked our own flights then have the convention reimburse us. I used XE.net to convert Canadian to U.S. dollars based on that day's conversion rate.

This whole process would have been so much more of a hassle before the Internet.




Writing update:

A while back, I had mentioned that an associate editor at a publishing house had passed my mss up to the head of the imprint. It's been two months, but I know it could be a lot longer. :-)



Meanwhile, I'm just about finished revisions based on the helpful comments from an editor at another publishing house. Many thanks to Luisa, Reid and Jodi for proofreading my revised mss! I'm grateful to those who slogged through Round #1: Jeff, Ruth, Allison, Dave C., and Parki. My agent will be submitting the revised version to the first editor (the one who made the suggestions).

Running On Ooblek!

A long while back, I talked about Ooblek, a mixture of cornstarch and water which becomes a collodial suspension. When it sits in the bowl, it's liquid. Once you apply pressure, it changes state to become a rigid solid. Explanation: the cornstarch particles don't dissolve in the water but float instead, making a thick liquid. When you put sudden pressure on the water (like smacking down your hand), most of the water runs out from between the grains, leaving the solid cornstarch particles behind. When you take the pressure away, the water runs back again.

The result is VERY cool, and it's a great outdoor summer activity with kids. And as you can tell from this YouTube video, also with adults. Thanks to Jeff for the link!



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busy lives and priorities

CRAAAAAAZYbusy week since I'm leaving for Columbus on Thursday morning. Lots to do before I leave, so be warned that Blatherings will be sporadic between now and next week.

Despite the crazybusystuff, I spent most of Sunday afternoon doing musicstuff, and it was wonderful. Like the novel writing process, I find it incredibly satisfying to submerge myself into the songwriting headspace, when the world outside fades away and I'm only aware of lyric, melody, and harmony...and how it all fits together.

It's been ages since I've made a solid chunk of time (e.g. more than 30 minutes or so at a time) working on songs, and Urban Tapestry currently has two new songs scheduled in our GAfilk concert which I haven't yet finished writing. :-) I say "MADE" instead of "have" time because in the end, it's all about priorities, really. Whenever someone says "I didn't have time for xxx," it really means "I chose to do yyy instead." Which is fine, of course, as long as you purposely chose to do yyy (watching a tv show, checking your LJ Friends list, whatever) instead of letting it suck up your time accidentally.



Two-thirds of our new Harry Potter song is finished! Allison, Jodi and I brainstormed on a private Writeboard about Harry Potter stuff, and I put together a lyric from all our ideas. Then I played around in Garageband to find a melody. Strumming a guitar for longer than a few minutes at a time is too hard for me...this has made songwriting more of a challenge since we no longer have a piano (and I haven't yet had a chance to rearrange my office so my MIDI keyboard is easy to use with the recording set-up).

In Garageband, however, I can use MIDI instruments to provide accompaniment as I work on a song, then e-mail the mixed-down MP3(s) to Allison & Jodi to learn, including individual parts as well as how everything should sound all together. The songwriting session also taught me more about recording level tweaking, and I feel better prepared to give Seanan's flute track another shot...I realized my first recording attempt was way too quiet. One problem with Garageband, though...extracting the individual tracks to send to Seanan's engineer in an uncompressed state. Turns out Garageband isn't really meant for that sort of thing, so I need to find another solution. Meanwhile, however, Jeff Bohnhoff has kindly volunteered to help me since he's also doing work on Seanan's CD.

BLOG READING SURVEY RESULTS

Out of 64 respondents, 30% say they read 1-5 blogs a day, on average. 27% read over 20/day, 25% read 11-20/day, 19% read 6-10/day. I realized too late that my question was poorly worded, however, since some people counted their LJ Friends' list as one blog.

30% of respondents have no blog of their own. 27% do, and 25% maintain MORE than one blog.

There were a ton of interesting comments on blog-reading habits; I'll summarize these in an upcoming Blathering.

"A SIMPLE LIFE" SURVEY RESULTS

Wow, interesting discussion after yesterday's Blathering! It's clear that a lot of people out there feel that their lives are way too busy, and many actively seek out "alone-time." I also discovered that Chris Conway wrote a song called "Simple" on his new CD; I've posted the lyrics, with permission, at the bottom of this Blathering page. Do read the lyrics...they tie in so well with what I talked about yesterday. If you'd like to a listen to sample soundclip, go to his CD page and click on the MP3 link for "Simple." After hearing the soundclip, I ordered his CD. :-) Jodi had also played me some tracks from Chris's new album a couple weeks ago and I loved them.

Anyway, here are just a few quotes from the "finding your own time" discussion:

"It would be so easy to buy into the life that many people lead, which is working to *support* doing the things you love to do, and then trying to satisfy many interests and "obligations" instead of finding ways to do what you love to do to make a living, and saying "no" quite ruthlessly to anything that doesn't fit your work and true, heart-desired interests." -- zencuppa

--

"Heh, being single until the age of 40, I am now paying for all those years of slacking off by working at home and helping to raise two young children. Not to mention studying for a CS degree and vainly attempting to learn Japanese. Ah well, it'll get easier soon. Right? Right?! Please tell me it will. Somebody PLEASE!!! :) :)" -- David Goulden

(David was the sound engineer for our Myths and Urban Legends CD! I was surprised and tickled to see his post.)

--

"We spent two weeks of just us and our four suitcases (should have been three, but for special stuff). We used everything we brought, and missed nothing from home (food and replacing broken items aside). To me, this was a call to simplify in a truly dramatic way. We were content, we exercised a lot, ate healthy and lightly (both of us lost weight) and felt good. It's time to change." -- jhayman

--

"One thing that has helped this year is building in time at the beginning of the week (usually an hour or so) to clear my head and do nothing but look at various tasks to do and prioritize. I've also dedicated the first four days of the week to specific areas of my job (journal editing, union work, teaching, research), which guarantees that I can get to at least the top things in each area. I know I'm not going to get to everything I'd like every week, and I'm pretty much at peace with that, as long as I have a handle on what's on my plate and can pick what gets done first. Knowing what's on my plate makes it much easier to say no to things I really can't add to my load. I still say yes to too many things! But to fewer, these days." -- sdorn

--

"I try hard to take a walk every day -- at work I do this by eating a quick lunch at my desk. It doesn't always work; I often end up deep in a conversation or caught by a blog post or a bit of debugging. But most days I get at least half an hour to an hour of walking by myself." -- mdlbear

--

"I ask my husband and my children for help when I need some selfish time. Then I mostly leave our flat and go to have a walk or visit friends. They can't involve me again when I'm not there! ;)And afterward I'm much more relaxed and patient with my family, so that's no bad deal for them either. :)" -- kinder1of5

--

"Sometimes I think my job gets in the way, but sometimes I think that even if I had money enough not to have to work, I still wouldn't be able to do all the things I want to. I think I'm just greedy. There's *so* *much* out there in the world! Even the creative things alone choke up my time, and then there are the chore-like things that have to be done, like cleaning.

Sometimes I do feel like I don't have enough alone-time. (Though that's balanced by the fact that I'm alone at work most of the day-- but then that time isn't mine.) Reading is one of my great escapes-- I always make time to read, even if it's just on the bus or just before bed or just at lunch time. I usually read while eating.

Sometimes I just stop, take a deep breath, and give some of those things up for a while. Most of the time, I deeply wish that I didn't require sleep. :)" -- vixyish

--

"Oh, I understand the need to simplify. It was the driving force behind us moving to Lincolnshire. As time goes on, we strip more and more of the dross out of our lives, only leaving the quality that we cannot live without." -- stevieannie

--

"My life is definitely too busy. I do get selfishtime, usually just after the kids have gone to bed I come online and do a bit of netsurfing, but it's nowhere near the amount of general free time as I got pre-kids. Other amounts are highy variable. The only way to get regular time for me to do something was to book myself onto a course (the stained glass one, which is still ongoing).

The problem with being a parent is that even when one programs in a 'free weekend' one is still normally very busy and snatches the time at home to do tidying and laundry and sundry such exciting activities. It gets easier as the kids get older and more capable of self entertainment :-)" -- oreouk

--

"The idea of people who are sustaining rather than draining...that just triggered a flood of memories. (But I should use my own journal instead of turning this one into a vehicle for self-psychoanalysis.)" -- phillip2637

--

"I just got done packing a lot of stuff out of my "Current hit list" file into the "Consolidated To-Do List" file because I was feeling overscheduled....The next step needs to be prioritizing activities within the Consolidated list (right now they're alphabetized...) and pick out projects for a couple of the other nights in the week. When I get to the end of any project area, the whole what-on-what-night allocation gets reconsidered and probably shuffled some." -- msminlr

--

"John has Jamie out for a walk, giving me time to check LJ and relax a little while Liam sleeps. This is my selfishtime for today. If I don't get a little every day, I start to get crabby and snappy, which isn't good.

My life too busy? Hell, yes, but I also feel like I have large stretches of time full of activities that don't seem to accomplish anything. And my house is too full of stuff. Something snapped recently, and I have boxes in the dining room full of stuff that I'm preparing to give away. Books, clothes, old toys, and the contents of scary boxes, where I realize that I haven't used the contents for years and years, and why do I have this in the house, anyway? It's exhausting, but it's going to be worth it." -- kchew

--

"I definitely need my own space and time for my self when I can just BE myself. It's that what I love so much when being on holiday with kinder1of5...We definitely need this time off, from both work and family. Sometimes we just need to be ourselves and nothing more." -- Aryana

--

"I absolutely need time on my own. A lot, really. I know some people who do a lot to not be alone, to always be surrounded by people ... I am the opposite. I love people, don't get me wrong, but I do reach a threshold at some point where I just need to be by myself for a while. And it's not a hard point to reach. Like, if I know that I will be seeing people every evening for, say, a week, that's probably too much for me already, if I don't have time during the day to be 'on my ownsome'. So I try to avoid scheduling that. Or conventions - I love conventions, but I usually go away to be on my own for some time every day, otherwise I would get antsy and bad tempered etc ... doesn't have to be long, but when I get people overload ... I just need five minutes away." -- sibylle

--

"I need a lot of "me" time to do the various projects I have to do -- computer work, housecleaning, etc. It's difficult to do when there's a little one around and/or underfoot. We've had to wait until M was asleep before R and I could do what we wanted to do." -- poltr1

--

"Naps? Children have naps? Oh, why didn't someone tell my children that? They had/have a habit of napping in the car (hard to make the most of your "alone time" while you're driving home from the supermarket!)

I sometimes feel that I have scheduled too much activity for the children and for myself, to the point where I wonder how much time I would have to do class prep, etc, if I were to go back to teaching right now. I tried cutting out some of the children's extra-school activities, but it was like digging a hole in dry sand - something always slipped along and filled the gap.

Simplicity is being away on holiday with only three changes of clothes and a few books - how come that makes us so happy? :-)" -- fifona

--

Simple

By Chris Conway, recorded on his new CD, "Close The Circle"
(Hear a song clip on his CD page)

I used to want to be clever
Smarter than all the rest
Took a while to discover
That keeping things simple was the ultimate test
I used to want to dazzle
Like a lighthouse on the shore
But ships all know the light just warns
Of rocks on the old sea floor
It's the



chorus
Simple things I'm still learning
A little bit like this song
If you sing your life too complicated
Nobody can sing along
With you

I used to want to get noticed
Grab my slice of fame
I wanted to know everyone
And for everyone to know my name
Then I saw it coming
I saw I was in danger
Of being the only one that I knew
In the hall of a thousand strangers
It's the

chorus

I used to want to be mysterious
Wanted folks to try and figure me out
And if anyone got too close
I would vanish in a cloud of doubt
Like a kid playing hide and seek
My plan soon ran aground
Coz If you hide too well, you just might find
You secretly want to be found
It's the

chorus

(bridge)
And a notion, an emotion, leads me far astray
From the straight line I spied to point B from A
And this action, this distraction takes me to the sky
Before I fall I must recall - I need to simplify
My life

Sitting in my little green room
All kinds of gizmos at my side
Computer screens and DVDs
But I could not be satisfied
In the corner I saw my guitar
Like it hadn't been touched in years
Before too long a new little song
Lit a fire against my fears
It's the little song you now hear
About the

chorus



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birthdays and mortal Mesozoic mice

Happy birthday to my friend, Allison! Today is the final official day of the virtual birthday party for Allison and Jodi, though stragglers are welcome. Please feel free to drop by and say hello. Attendees so far: pbristow, tibicina, eviltofu, kitanzi, janeg, thette, mdlbear, braider, filkertom, zencuppa, unkbar, patoadam, tnatj, thatcrazycajun, djbp, msminir, blueeyedtigress, vixyish, sdorn, filkergem, barkerland, trystel & Luis), pwi1, it_aint_easy, andpuff, damedini, mvt, faxpaladin, poltr1, frstythesnowman, sposter, unclechristo, sexybass, scs_11, Dave Clement (via sexybass), sal_utations, Erin, beige_alert, peteralway, Bill Roper, missquirt, ldwheeler, fireskin, and starmalachite. It's been fun seeing old and new friends drop by, though I know quite a few are still at or on the way home from Filkcontinental in Germany. Party ends at midnight. :-)

I'm submerged in my novel writing these days. I have a few illustration and writing assignments between now and Christmas, but I've basically decided to focus on my novel(s) until then. Right now I'm doing a lot of cutting and toning. Sort of sounds like a painful cosmetic procedure, doesn't it? I'm being ruthless and cutting out anything in my book which doesn't contribute to the story, no matter how happy I am with the writing. It's hard; I don't think I could have done this right after finishing the book...a good reason for setting aside a story for a while before trying to self-edit.

Cutcutcut. Owowow. But through the pain, I can see a leaner, stronger story emerging, and I'm very happy with the improvements in the story and also in my overall writing; anything that makes me a better writer is a good thing.

Speaking of pain...my favourite Mesozoic mice have finally kicked the bucket in the latest Parry and Carney. Alas, poor Ferd and Dan. I knew thee too briefly.



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Why writers aren't normal

Above: a graphic I created to replace the current placeholder on the NaNoWriMo site; it will be shrunk down, of course. As I mentioned before, I will re-tooling many of my Inkygirl comics for NaNoWriMo this year, but also coming up with a few custom-made for the event. Registration and forums for NaNoWriMo are officially open, for those interested.

My own NaNoWriMo novel is still out there. RECAP: The original version was rejected by an editor at Publisher #1 but she said she'd be delighted to reread it if I made certain revisions.

Meanwhile, my agent had sent the original version to another publisher, where the associate editor liked my mss enough to pass up the chain to the head of the imprint. I'm still waiting to hear back from Publisher #2, and am keeping my fingers and toes and knees crossed. If you have any spare body parts you'd be willing to cross for me, I'd be most grateful.

If Publisher #2 offers me a contract, I will jump up and down. I will run outside and scream and then jump up and down again and embarrass myself in front of the neighbours, who are very likely to call the police. Meanwhile, however, I'm going to keep working on revisions in case Publisher #2 turns down to original version; I feel that the revisions have made my mss that much stronger. When I've finished those revisions and sent it out again, then I'll be able to go back to my next book project.

One of the hardest aspects of freelance writing, I find, is the waiting. Waiting for an acceptance, waiting for a rejection, waiting for edits. Part of you is mad with hope that a particular editor will want to buy your book, but another part is bracing for rejection (and having to tell your friends and family you were Rejected Again). It's enough to drive any normal person batty, which is why most writers aren't really normal, of course.

:-)

I cope by focusing on the writing; the writing keeps me sane. When I'm writing, I forget about everything else. The rest of the world fades, and I can pour myself into what I love doing best. It's why I keep a daily writing notebook...that way, even if I'm swamped in administrivia or waitingstress or other necessary but not favourite parts of freelance writing, I know I can always WRITE SOMETHING EVERY DAY; it reminds me of why I go through all the stuff I'm not so crazy about.

Speaking of which, I should do some writing now...

(Cross-posted to Inkygirl)

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Illustration Friday: Quiet

Above: I created this image in Corel Painter for Illustration Friday. This week's topic: "Quiet."

Late yesterday afternoon I went out for my first long-ish walk since I got sick. It was pouring rain, but I didn't care; I craved fresh air and some exercise. I took my big umbrella and (almost) waterproof boots and went splashing about the streets.

On the way back, the clouds parted and I felt sunshine on my face. It was one of those odd breaks in a storm when the light is at its most interesting: dark and gloomy in places but brilliant in others. For a few minutes, the world is more sharply outlined, as if everything before was only a shadow.

In that brief break, I happened to look up...and there was a rainbow, arching over the houses and trees. It's been ages since I've seen a rainbow, and I felt my breath catch at the beauty of it.

Funny how little moments like that can feed the soul.




For those interested, I've updated He's Dead, Jim with a report on one of my favourite episodes, The Naked Time.



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