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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Birthdays and home recording studios

Happy birthday to my music partner, Jodi! Allison's birthday is this Tuesday, so I've decided to host a virtual birthday party on Livejournal. You're all invited...feel free to drop by. Happy birthday also to John Hall (whose birthday is today) and a belated happy birthday to Alisa Garcia (whose birthday was yesterday)!



Above: Allison and Jodi blowing out candles at a surprise birthday bash in Germany, at Filkcontinental last year. To those at Filkcontinental this year (right now, in fact): hope you're having fun!



Other big news:

My home recording studio is set up! "Epi-LJ" was kind enough to lend us his MOTU 828 to try out, but in the end we decided to opt for a more portable set-up, plus an audio interface with MIDI. Jeff, Ray and I visited Saved By Technology yesterday, and Jeff bought me the last part of my 40th birthday present (long story, but tendinitis and other factors got in the way up to now) as well as an early Christmas present:

- A Presonus Firebox (here's a review): 24-bit/96K Firewire recording system with 6 inputs, 10 outputs, MIDI, S/PDIF and Cubase LE software (I'm still opting for Garageband for now, tho)

- Audio-Technica AT2041SP Studio Pack: comes with two microphones -- an AT2020 side-address cardioid condenser mike and an AT2021 small-diaphragm condenser mike. I already have one other microphone (dynamic).

- Mike stand (I already have one, but figured two would be good)

Yes, I know we could have spent a lot more money for higher quality equipment, but music recording is a hobby for us, not a business. Besides, we can always upgrade later when my books start selling bazillions of copies.

;-)

Anyway, Jeff set everything up last night and YAY it all works fine with my computer. Jeff even made up a short fun piece himself using loops and my voice...it was SO great to see him play around with musicstuff again, and I'm hoping this set-up encourages more of that. Many people don't realize that my technonerdboy husband also has a pretty creative side as well. :-)

Now I just have to learn more about twiddling. Y'know, when you see sound engineers twiddle knobs and such during a recording session? I can see why learning more about The Art Of Twiddling Knobs could greatly enhance the quality of a recording. Thanks to those of you who have been offering recording equipment and recording advice in LJ.

And HUGE thanks to Jeff Bohnhoff for being our consultant throughout this process in e-mail, live chat and by phone. We called him yesterday before opening any of our packages; if he had said "ARE YOU GUYS NUTS THAT EQUIPMENT SUCKS" we would definitely have reconsidered our purchases, but he seemed to think our set-up is perfectly fine for now, for what I want to do.

Very excited! Not only will this be useful for Urban Tapestry, but I'm looking forward to experimenting more with my own instrumental recordings as well as doing recordings for other people.

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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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Inkygirl revamped

Thanks for all the good wishes, everyone. I'm feeling almost normal today.

Last night, Jeff and I played Magic again. We've been playing a couple of times a week, and I'm enjoying it more than I expected. I have a red-green deck, and Jeff is white and blue. I spend way too much time admiring the artwork.



I've revamped Inkygirl, by the way. The cluttered look was driving me batty. It was somewhat of a challenge, rebuilding the template with CSS; I had orginally stripped out all the CSS when I started Inkygirl in Movabletype years ago, just as I did with Blatherings. I've realized I don't yet know enough about CSS to start from scratch yet, so I took the default MT template and heavily modified that instead. Once I'm more comfortable with CSS, I'm going to design a template from scratch.

Anyway, feel free to take a look. Look Ma, no tables! My previous Inkygirl design relied heavily on tables, as does Blatherings; I plan to revamp Blatherings sometime in the future as well. I'm not happy with the colour scheme, so will also be fiddling with that...though with CSS, it means I can more easily change the colour scheme and look when I feel like it...one of the reasons I switched to CSS. Thanks to Ray for the ColorBlender and Color Consultant Pro links; I'm going to check out both.



I still have a lot to do in terms of layout and colours and fonts, but I'm already much happier with the look than before. As I've mentioned in my most recent Inkygirl post, I will also be narrowing the focus of Inkygirl somewhat; I'm no longer going to be maintaining the telecommuting jobs listings part of the site. I already get enough work that I no longer need to comb the job boards every morning.

I'll still be posting shorter entries highlighting useful resources and blogs for writers, but I'm also going to start posting longer articles about the business and craft of writing as well, plus expanding on some of the publishing news I post in Market Watch. And of course I'll keep posting my writing cartoons. :-)

I know the revamped Inkygirl isn't perfect, but I admit I feel stupidly proud of the fact that I've learned enough CSS on my own to do this much in just one day. Hey, and once I'm a CSS expert -- look out, world!

Link O' The Day: I suspect many of you have already seen this, but I hadn't. Thanks to Luisa for pointing me to this Nerdy and White video (Weird Al Yankovich) which made me laugh way too much (and with which I identified way too much :-D). Ray pointed me to the original video, which I also hadn't seen.



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Someone kicked my head off and stuffed it down a barbecue pit

Sick. Ugh.

No writing for me today.

Back to bed.

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