Florida, Writing Lair, & Last 200 Words

It's hard to pause during summer to write about stuff, but I'll squeeze in some quick updates:

Florida: I was in Orlando, Florida last week for a conference. Clint brought the kids and we stayed in the Disney Coronado. They did all the touristy stuff while I did conferency stuff. Not an ideal vacation for me (insert pitiful woe-is-me music here), but I still did a lot of bonding with my coworkers, ate some good food, drank some great drinks, and attended at least a few sessions that reinvigorated me for the upcoming school year. Oh, and I got to go to Gatorland (and feed baby alligators!).



New Writing Lair: Aside from a few finishing touches like window trim and attic-access, my art/writing studio is finished! I have a little stereo in there now for music, cabinets with all of my drawing/painting supplies, my lounge area if I want to relax between writing sprints, my "fireplace" for cooler evenings...I even stocked it with wine for when I get writer's block (one bottle is leaning toward empty already). It's a good thing this space isn't equipped with a toilet and a fridge because at this point my belly and my bladder are the only two entities that can convince me to leave.

Driving Test: Trinity finally overcame her driving-anxiety and got her license today. It was her first time taking the test and you're allowed to miss fifteen points. She only missed one! I say this with excitement because back in the day I missed... well, let's just say a few more than one. ;)

I'm thinking this is enough updates for tonight? Here's the last 200 words for Black Lilies, chapter four. If it sounds familiar, it's because I actually posted this one in the past for reasons I can no longer remember. Anyway, it'll be the only 'last 200 words' that repeats.

 "I’ll tell you my name as soon as you tell me who you are, and what’s going on.” I crossed my arms and stepped back in a show of defiance. The assignment that was crumpled in my hand fell over my fingertips onto the linoleum floor. Moving quickly, I reached down to pick it up.
 “I’ve seen this stationery before” he said, leaning forward to look at my paper.
 “It’s not stationery, it’s just my assignment. It’s what I’m supposed to be working on right now, but I’ll get an ‘F’ now because of your impromptu performance of the Star Spangled Banner.”

 He squinted his eyes, examining it closer. “Let me see that.”

 Why would he want my paper? There was barely anything written on it. I shrugged. “Here.”

 I tried to hand it to him, but he didn’t move to take it. Instead, he tilted his head, as if trying to get a better view. He mouth gaped open before he quickly snapped it shut. His body seemed to freeze. “I know this writing.” He jerked back, his fists clenched at his side. “Tell me your name, clever girl.”

 I stood silent.

 “It’s you, isn’t it? You’re Aviva.”

 My mouth fell open, and he disappeared.

(206 words)

The Curse of Sharenting

Think about an embarrassing photo of yourself from your childhood. Maybe it's that one where you're sitting naked on a toilet as a toddler, or that prepubescent pic with the giant braces and bad hair. Thank goodness that old cringy photo is tucked away in some dog-eared album, right? A sealed-off remnant of your childhood.

Now imagine that picture, plus hundreds more, posted on Facebook for everyone to see, with cutesy little hashtags, day after day, year after year. One of my 7th grade students got me thinking about this issue right before summer break, when she commented that she had deleted her Facebook account because her mom kept posting pictures of her. "It's not that the pics were embarrassing or anything," she explained. "I just don't want my friends seeing what I'm up to everyday. It's weird."

It's no wonder teenage kids have veered away from facebook and are gravitating toward social networking sites such as Snapchat that allow for more privacy and anonymity. Maybe they’re trying to escape the barrage of childhood photos that force them into endless public scrutiny. Maybe they just want to live their lives without being a “celebrity” on their parents' timelines.

If you're an '80s child like me, you’ve never had to deal with the crux of parents with smartphones. Our personal childhood moments--bath time, potty-training, the first day of fifth grade, awkward junior high dances, etc.--were safely tucked away into photo albums and scrapbooks where only a few close friends and relatives would ever see. Yet as parents today, we never stop to question what it’s like for our own children to have all of these moments (embarrassing, adorable, or otherwise) exploited online.

So let’s pause right now and ask this question: How will the adult version of your child feel having his/her entire childhood chronicled on social networking? As Celia Walden (writer and wife to Pier Morgan) states, our kids have “got a lifetime of being subjected to other people's gaze and other people's judgement.” So why would we, the parents, choose to add to this? At the best, even if our kids are comfortable being in the limelight, highlighting every moment of their lives is taking something meaningful away. If every moment is special then none of them are.

The answer is, we shouldn't.

Even taking our kids’ right to privacy out of the equation, there are other reasons why sharenting is wrong. Such as the fact that it’s inconsiderate to your friends/followers. Imagine going to your Aunt Hilda’s house and being forced to endure two hours straight of little cousin Joey’s photos (a phenomenon that we actually endured in the ‘80s). Yes, you’ll insert the appropriate “Awwww”s and “Isn’t that adorable” in the right places, because you’re a polite person. But meanwhile you’re kinda wishing a chunk of acoustic ceiling will inexplicably fall down and gouge you in the eyeball just to have an excuse to escape. And you’re also kinda thinking Aunt Hilda could use some conversational empathy here, because who in their right mind thinks that anyone enjoys this form of torture?

Yet you yourself do the same thing every day on social media. Nice to meet you, Aunt Hilda. Luckily your family and friends aren't held hostage on a couch. They can slap a polite ‘like’ on your posts and move on. But do you really want to put them in this position rather than simply downsizing your posts to interesting, relevant things they genuinely care about? I constantly hear the argument “If people don’t like what I post, they can unfollow me.” Well kudos to you, standing your ground and all that. But close friends and family will never unfollow you because they're decent people, and maintaining a relationship with you is important to them regardless of how annoying you are on Facebook. So now you’re just *that* person. The person whose grating posts they’ve learned to slap a cursory ‘like’ on as they scroll past.

Another interesting fact about over-sharenting? It’s a sad attempt to dig for praise or approval. When I was a kid my mom's parenting strategies (like many moms of the '80s) fluctuated from amazing to downright crazy and everything between. I could write a book on this woman and the complexities she went through while raising me and my sister. Yet one thing that stands out is my mom never felt the need to constantly showcase her good parenting moments online. To be fair, the internet didn’t exist back then, so no mom felt this need. Being a good parent in the ‘80s had its own intrinsic rewards, such as creating laughter, warm feelings, and unscripted memories with your kids...memories that were never cheapened by the rehearsed facade of a facebook post. But many moms today have the mentality that good parenting is wasted if it’s not publicized on facebook. Like, “If others can’t see how much I’m rockin’ it, what’s the point?”

Over-sharing mommies, it's time to face reality. Other than Grandma and maybe that super devoted aunt (who you can easily text), no one cares about your thousands of photos. And on some level you know this, which means you're doing it for yourselves. For the likes. The comments. The dopamine rush you get every time someone reacts to your post. The positive affirmation. As stated by 'Wellness Mama' Katie in her article Why I Don't Post about My Kids Online, “I get it. Parenting is hard and positive feedback is helpful. I definitely bounce ideas off of friends or ask for advice in person. I just try really hard not to use my kids as a means for social affirmation.”

The final (and possibly most important reason) moms need to escape the clutches of sharenting is because constantly being in Photographer-Mode means sacrificing the present for the future. That is, you miss out on so many of life's amazing, impromptu moments in your attempt to capture them on camera--all so you can look upon that snapshot later and reminisce on a memory that you never truly experienced. Instead of fake-smiles for the benefit of the camera, let's embrace the genuine smiles our kids radiate when they're living life for real.

I’m not suggesting that we should never post pics of our kids. Our kids are a huge part of our lives and it would be silly to pretend they don’t exist. In the last few months Facebook has shared memories of my daughter holding a crocodile, my son hanging upside down from a punching bag, and both my kids engaged in an epic shaving cream battle in the bathtub (clothes ON). But there’s a difference between sharing an occasional whimsical or anecdotal moment of your kids, versus turning your timeline into a relentless baby album chronicling every moment of your child until he is now ten-years old and frankly not-so-cute anymore (sorry but...truth). I know the excitement of being a brand new mother and wanting to share every moment of the experience, which is why upon entering motherhood I called my own mom every-other-day and texted her a barrage of photos. But for the sake of social networking, one or two carefully selected pictures a week will still capture the adorableness of your handsome little cherub just as well as a dozen.

Remember, once your child reaches the age of awareness, it is no longer your life and your experiences you are sharing. It is theirs. And frankly, some things need to remain unshared, and precious. Childhood should be one of them. How about we stop feeling consumed with posting a record of everything our kids experience, and just enjoy the moments as they come? My most treasured moments with my kids are the ones you don’t know about. Why? Because I keep them close to my heart--not on Facebook.

Dirt Bike Jousting, Squobbing, & Last 200 Words

Quick highlights from the last few weeks:

• I went to a party on Mother's Day weekend held by my sister's neighbor. He has a bazillion acres, which means in addition to all the normal party stuff (such as an open bar and catered tacos), there was also zip-lining, Whore Shoes (like Horse Shoes but with spiked stilettos and some interesting rules), and THIS: 

Welcome to the world of dirt bike jousting, where hillbilly meets class. 

(Kind of like me when I wear a dress).

• Trin is in the midst of all her graduating-stuff right now, which means I'm in a state of squealing and sobbing...squobbing? Yep, I'm a big fat squobber. Prom, Grad Night, and then the graduation itself. My baby girl!
• I'm finally having a housewarming party. Er--if you can even call it that given that we've lived in our home for over nine months now. Here's the invitation:

Alright, that's enough recapping for now. Here's the last 200 words for Black Lilies, chapter three.

“By God, sweet girl, you can see me.” His lips spread into a triumphant smile, and then he glided past my desk. “We’ll discuss this after your mathematics lesson.”

I swallowed hard, my hands clutching the side of my desk, my stomach stuck somewhere in my throat.

Mathematics lesson? I found myself lipping the phrase, though I knew his proper speech should be the least of my concerns.

“What’s wrong?” Brett whispered next to me two beats after the strange man had left, snapping me out of my trance as he touched my arm. “You look really pale, Viv.”

I already knew the answer, but I needed to be sure. “Brett, has anyone new been assigned to Rosa’s desk?”

“Not that I’m aware of,” he said, glancing in that direction. “It’s been empty since she moved. I saw you looking over there earlier. What’s up?”

A feeling of panic flooded me at Brett’s words. I couldn’t be the only one who was able to see and hear the oddly-dressed stranger. I couldn’t be. Because that would make me crazy.

Or it would mean I was seeing a ghost.

(188 words)

Chasing Echoes Trailer

Last week I asked Trinity, "What can I bribe you with to get you to make a trailer for Chasing Echoes?"

She immediately replied, "Sushi."

The girl is 15 years old, and she wants sushi. Whatever happened to pizza with extra cheese?

Anyway, I agreed to her terms, and here is the sweet little 90 second trailer Trinity created (be sure your volume is up):

On a related note, sushi ended up costing me $58, so I probably should have pushed for that pizza.

Murder Mystery Dinner

My daughter is 15 today. 15! I'm not old enough to have a 15 year old. I'M NOT. 

Shut-up.

Anyway, she's having a Murder Mystery Dinner in our backyard. They've been at it for about an hour and 45 minutes. I'm allowed to take pictures, but she says I'm not allowed to break the 3rd wall--or is it the 4th?--some drama-term where I can't shatter the illusion of the drama they're enacting. It's like Juliet dramatically crying out "Romeo, Romeo, where art thou Romeo?" and someone else cutting in with "Hey, fifth period is almost over." 

So we agreed I would just pop in and out as an investigative reporter. Here's all that my investigative snooping has yielded so far:

Guests starting to suspect each other

Let the interrogations begin

A very suspicious dinner

It's pretty cool, actually. Every time I go out there, they're totally in character (save some giggling and laughing). There was one moment where I lit the candles on the table and Trin was all "Wow, thank you, uh, Investigative Reporter, for lighting our candles. That's so nice and...unexpected." But you know, apparently I'm both an investigative reporter and a thoughtful candle-lighter-person.

I was going to write more but Trin just burst in here saying they solved their murder! Apparently Papa Vido killed Barry Underwood because he was promised land or something... They're popping open their victory champagne now (aka: sparkling cider) and then we're doing birthday cake. The cake is an adorable, partially decapitated jackalope (made by Teri). Jackalopes are somehow related to murder mysteries, right?

--------

Just came back from singing Happy Birthday. Here are the last few pictures for the night:

That poor torched jackalope.

Happy Birthday to my little girl! The one who is now four inches taller than me and could easily kick my ass. But she's still, and always, my baby girl, and I don't care if that's a cliché, because it's true.

Pet Names

I want to do a blog post. Really, I do. But I am so, so busy.

I was talking to an author during lunch today who subs at our school from time to time. At one point, we had the following conversation: 

Her: "So let me get this straight. You're a full time teacher here?"

Me: "Yes."

Her: "And you have two kids?"

Me: "Yes."

Her: (Long pause) "When the heck do you have time to write?"

Me: Well I'm not really a 'good' mom, per say...

At this point my fellow coworker Brad shouts across the lunch room, "Oh, come on! Every time I see your kids out on the street holding up their 'Will work for food' signs, I'm impressed by their work ethic."

Thanks for that, Brad. 

In other kid-related news, I realized that I call everyone in my household "baby." Trin will hand me my thermos of iced-coffee and I'll say "Thanks baby." Clint will come home from work and I'm all "Hey baby." And so on. The problem is when you call everyone baby, they all respond. No one is sure which "baby" is your target audience. So I told the kids tonight, "I need new pet names for you guys. What do you want me to call you?"

"Sexy Taco," Trinity blurts out. Without even batting an eye.

And this is why you don't let your kids choose their own nicknames.

The publishing mayhem is just about over, and I almost have what sort of resembles a life again! YES. I'm sighing with relief so hard that I'm getting lightheaded.

Our Big Fancy Hole

Too many of my recent posts have been about writing...I need to take a break from that theme before I render my "This is Not a Writing Blog" tab a big fat lie.

So how about this? Last week we broke ground on our pool! The workers showed up at our house on Wednesday at 7 a.m., and it was utter chaos. Suddenly my yard was crowded with trucks and tractors, with all sorts of buzzing and activity going on. 

The dogs couldn't be in the back yard with the tractor and the open fence, so we had a pack of dogs running around the house. Not to mention the workers had to do some trenching in the petting zoo, so we had to temporarily relocate the chickens and the rabbits. It was so much fun...all the whirlwind and excitement. By the time I got to work that morning, I was still hot from all my running around, and my skirt was coated in dog fur (luckily I keep a lint roller in my classroom). I was on a complete high.

By 3:30 that afternoon, I came home to this:

I'm still stunned that our entire pool was dug out in eight hours! In the book Holes, it takes Stanley and the other boys a full work day just to dig one 6'x6' hole. But these guys dug a 16'x30' hole in that same time. Granted these guys have a tractor, while Stanley and Co only had a shovel, but still.

By day 2, most of the rebar was installed, not to mention the underground plumbing/electric/etc. By day 3, the rebar was finished, including the spa's, and we passed inspection. So either Tuesday or Wednesday of next week, we get concrete.

Here is what the pool looks like right now:

As you can see, the spa is attached to the pool, but set a tier above, that way the warm spa water can tumble down to heat the pool.

I walked all the way into the deep end yesterday. I couldn't resist. I had to avoid stepping on all those metal bars, but I still ended up scraping/stabbing myself a few times. Totally worth it. 

Yesterday Elijah asked, "When the pool is done, who gets to jump in first?" We debated the issue for some time, and then Elijah finally said that we would all jump in together. All four of us, at the same time.  LOVE it. But then they all balked at me when I said maybe we could hold hands. I guess I pushed the corniness boundary. 

One more thing. When the workers were trenching the petting zoo, one of them found this:

Baby bunnies. Six of them, actually. They're much smaller than they look in this picture, but they are very lively/healthy. Every single one of them is a spitting image of Pumpkin. Seeing them made my giddy-o-meter spike to ridiculous levels. Baby bunnies and the makings of a pool in one day was more than I could take.

By the looks of it, these little guys were inspired by the elaborate hole in our backyard and are now digging up their own little pool. 

Missing the Birthdays of Yore

I came across this on Pinterest:

This a birthday party for Max (whoever Max is). I have to admit, it sort of creeps me out. Maybe it's because this looks more like a memorial to me than a birthday. But I think it's more the fanciness of the whole thing. The giant wooden name, the flowers, the framed picture (just in case you forget what Max looks like)...wow.

Once I stumbled upon Max's party, I started noticing them all over the place. These super-fancy parties. And we're talking KIDS birthday parties. Which begs the question: When did children's birthday parties become so formal and glamorous? I mean, these are very pretty. Hats off to the parents who deemed their child worthy of such extravagance--that is one very valued kid. But there seems to be a trend now to design parties that are geared more to impressing the adults than entertaining the kids. Some might argue that stuff like this only exists on Pinterest--"It's just to oogle over, but no one actually does this in real life." Or maybe it's only wealthy parents throwing such parties. But I have to say that I'm actually seeing this trend out in the middle-class world. With a few exceptions, the birthday parties I have been to in the past few years have been pretty excessive. One party I went to awhile ago, for example, was done in a "Vintage Barbie" theme, with themed food, coordinating colors (even the marshmallows were died to match), and an extravagant display of goodies spread along a buffet-style table. Kind of like this, but done in greens and blacks and much prettier:

The little girl being celebrated by this party was turning two years old, so she will have no memory of all this awesomeness other than the album her mom posted on Facebook.

I don't know...I think these kinds of parties are sort of tragic. For my childhood birthdays, my parents would throw out some pizza, blast the music, and us kids would dance and play like wild little banshees. It was unadulterated, unscripted fun. But guests today have to tiptoe through modern-day kids' birthday parties. It's all "Okay boys and girls, now it's time to play pin the curls on Barbie" and "Now let's all open our glitter-fashion bags." Can kids still have fun at these events? Sure. But it's very staged, temperate fun. They'll never get that adrenaline rush that comes with "just letting go."

Maybe I'm just a lazy mom trying to justify her reasons for NOT putting more effort into her kids' birthday parties. That's definitely a possibility. But it honestly seems like these kinds of parties are designed by moms for the explicit purpose of getting their guests to ooh and awww over their creativity and brilliance. They're designed more for Pinterest and Facebook than the child herself. The irony? All that time and money invested in putting together a picture-perfect party, and here's all a kid really wants:

Seriously. Just order them some pizza, blast some music, and let them make some real memories.

Scrivener and Other Stuff

I usually thrive on Saturdays, but this one's kind of a bummer because Elijah is sooooo very grounded. I found out on Thursday night he had a science fair project due the next day (yesterday), and he never told me. Now he's spending today doing a science fair project that he probably won't even get credit for. I still need to run out at some point today and buy him his board and supplies and all that.

Plus my coffee machine broke. To not have my coffee on a Saturday morning is immediately starting my weekend off with a...okay, I wrote myself into a corner there. Let's just go with "It sucks."

I have a student teacher for the rest of the school year (I do realize I'm subject-jumping). I love having even a mediocre student teacher because it's a refreshing change of pace to have another adult to share ideas and lessons with, not to mention that two adults in the classroom lighten up the workload. But in this case, I was fortunate enough to get a pretty great student teacher. He's very proactive. In the two weeks we've been working together he already has a great grip on my students and has just about adopted 3rd and 4th period as his own. Plus he makes us COFFEE every afternoon just in time to get past the 6th/7th period lull...

We found PJ a home! (subject-jumping again). Shannon has a perfect fenced in area where Charlotte (her pig) lives, and she has agreed to take him in. PJ's new future home is lush and green, with overhangs to provide protection during bad weather. There's also a spicket of water, so he'll never go thirsty. He'll have freedom to hop around freely, but in a protected space, which he seems to crave.

Have I told you about my deaf dog yet? I'll save that one for a future entry.

In manuscript news, I had to adjust my word count goal for DoT, because it occurred to me that 100K is the maximum suggested word count for a young adult novel. To leave my goal untouched means that in order to reach 100% on my word meter, I'm guaranteed to have to go over the maximum, forcing me to make cuts. Unless by some miracle I end up with exactly 100,000 words, and what are the chances of that? So I brought my goal down to 90,000, just to give some 10K wiggle room. But now I'm about to have an anxiety attack because there is no way I can wrap this story up in 11,000 words. I'm screwed. I'm just going to write the thing and make lots of cuts when I go to revise.

I found an amazing program for writers called Scrivener. Although 'found' is a misnomer because it was actually recommended to me by a twitter friend/fellow writer, @_RScottWhitley (he and I were both part of the #WorldsEnd project). This program is designed for people who are writing a book, unlike Word, which is geared toward people writing an essay or a report. The program took me two days and several tutorials to learn, but now that I have it figured out, I was hooked. My favorite thing about it (although it's hard to choose one because there are so many cool features) is it allows you to save/print your book in ANY format, including paperback novel format, eBook format for Kindle, etc. You could literally skip the middle man with this program and create your own eBook with little to no outside assistance.

I might write another entry today because I'm feeling all blabbery.

An Unsolicited Visitor

Elijah was playing outside when he came running in the house to announce "There's a bunny in our front yard!" I was pretty underwhelmed because, well, it's a bunny. The occasional rabbit isn't anything out of the ordinary in our neighborhood. But Elijah informed me that this particular rabbit seemed friendlier than normal, so I went outside to check it out.

The rabbit was sitting right in front of our side yard, hanging out with Pumpkin (our flemish giant) through the fence. He seemed pretty comfortable with our presence, so Trinity ran back in the house to get some rabbit food, wanting to see if she could feed him. We were all surprised when the rabbit ate right out of her hand. But then...she picked him up! I was standing there, stunned, thinking, "Wait, you can't do that! You can't pick up a wild rabbit!" But the guy didn't mind at all. He never kicked or protested in any way, acting like being picked up by humans was an every day thing.

So it became clear to me that this was a domestic rabbit. We brought him in the house so he wouldn't get caught by a stray dog (he already had scratches on his face as if he had scrapped with a cat that morning), and we gave him some more food and water.

Here he is, chilling under our coffee table.

The kids named him PJ. He's in our giant outdoor rabbit hutch right now, but I need to come up with a more permanent situation for him. He has zero interest in being a wild rabbit and has seemed to claim our home as his own.

Let the record show that I have put forth an exerted effort to downsize my pets. It's hardly my fault though when they deliver themselves to my doorstep.

Resolutions, Black Fish, & British Relatives

I'm a little late with this, but here's our New Year's resolutions. I say "ours" because I decided to post my family's resolutions too. After I forced them to make some up, that is. Okay, here we go:

Trinity

"My New Year's resolution is to stop biting my nails and to like hot tea."

The hot tea thing is because she's a total Whovian who loves all things British. She even found out that her grandpa (Clint's dad) is 80% British. He himself just discovered this fact through Ancestry.com (more about that another time). So she wants to liken herself to her British roots by forcing herself to choke down a beverage she normally can't stand. She is now drinking about three cups a day, so I think it's working.

Elijah

"My resolution is to convince Dad to download Minecraft mods onto my computer." 

He's ten. His life is pretty simple. And I have no idea what "mods" are. 

Clinton

"My resolution is to restore my Nova, and to go to the gym three times a week."*

*(It's possible that Clint's resolutions may have been completely fabricated by me due to his lack of playing-alongness. To my credit, I kept 50 % of his resolutions practical and relevant to his interests, when what I wanted to say was My resolution is to treat my wife like a princess and make her chocolate chip pancakes and rub her feet on a daily basis).

Mine

"My resolution is to finish my manuscript and to get a literary agent."

That would be awesome. I'll be thrilled if I can make that happen. The first half of that WILL happen, but that second half is...scary and partly out of my hands.

Changing the subject, we took Elijah to Sea World for his birthday yesterday. Before you decide to boycott my blog over this fact, I had NO IDEA about the whole Blackfish documentary and all that. I was off Facebook for a period of time, and I guess that's where I would have heard about it. But I have to say, ignorance is bliss, because the park was dead. We had free reign over the place. Shan's family went with us, and we made the mistake of sitting in the soak zone for the Shamu show where we got utterly destroyed. Like, not splashed a bit, but destroyed. I have never been that drenched in my life. Well, except for every time I take a bath or shower. Or when I get into a swimming pool, or a spa. Or the beach. Or...uh, I guess I have been that drenched before, so let's just let that hyperbole die now. But this was my UNDIES that were soaked, people. I mean, COME ON.

Changing the subject again, my husband is 40% British! Now if Ancestry.com could only get him to talk in that accent....

Frolicking Fairy

Trinity finished painting this last night for her great-Granny B (my grandma) for Christmas.

Not too shabby for a 13 year old!  We're still debating the title of the painting.  I said "Frolicking Fairy" (can you tell I'm a sucker for alliteration?), Trin said "Fairy" (try not to be overwhelmed by her cleverness), and Clint said "This Fairy Blows".  Um, bubbles.  Since all of our ideas suck (or blow), any suggestions you might have are welcomed.

Oh, I finished my peacock painting, which I'm giving to Teri now because she really wants it and I don't really have any connection with it.  It came out pretty, but the peacock is just standing there, posed on the canvas, when I'd like to have something with a little more energy or motion displayed in my home (like the one illustrated above).  I'll post a picture of it on my other blog later once I've recovered from the holidays.

Speaking of, I hope you and yours have a wonderful Christmas tomorrow!  Sorry for this very un-Christmasy post.

Pepper for Breakfast

I'm feeling pretty moody with blogger.  Last night I wrote a big, beautiful post, but for some reason there were inordinately large spaces in-between paragraphs and I couldn't get rid of them.  So I switched over to HTML.  I successfully deleted most of the spaces, but then accidentally deleted the closing tag for a certain section.  When I hit the "undo" arrow, my ENTIRE post disappeared, along with the "redo" option.  I thought, "No big deal, I'll just go to the previous page before my changes are saved."  But the second I went to back out of the page, it auto-saved my blank blog.  Ughhhh.

Okay, that was a long-winded way of saying I lost yesterday's post (by the way, it's only a "big, beautiful" post because there's no evidence to the contrary).  I'll never recreate it, so that's that.

So new stuff.  Yesterday I was at a training with the rest of my department, when we got the news that there had been an incident at school.  It happened in my friend Jen's class (Niecy's former classroom).  Jen was sitting at the same table with me at the training when she got the news.   A student brought in a pepper bomb, which is basically pepper spray in powder form, compressed into a ball.  He never intended to use it; he just brought it to show his friends.  He had procured it from his dad, who's a correctional officer.  But it accidentally came apart when he was rolling it around on his desk (the sub either didn't see it, or thought it was a red toy ball).  Three girls who were sitting directly next to this student immediately ran out of the room, unable to breathe.  The rest of the class followed soon after.  Eight students were treated by ambulance before being released, and a correspondent from Channel 2 News interviewed our school about the incident.  Poor Jen had to relocate to a different classroom today so that her room could be deep-cleaned and her filters replaced with new ones.  Several kids left their backpacks, and they weren't even allowed to retrieve them.  RMS Cafe was supposed to be held in Jen's room this morning, but it was relocated to Naomi's room (my other language arts colleague/friend).  In addition to the usual splay of donuts, fruit, and coffee, Naomi supplied a plate of...peppers.  

One thing that stands out in my mind was a few hours before the incident, Jen was expressing her nervousness over having a sub in her classroom for two days.  But then she comforted herself by saying, "I have really good kids this year, so I really have nothing to worry about."  That right there is why I'm a strong advocate of KNOCKING ON WOOD.

Clint's schedule is brutal this month.  He's driving a train from Needles, CA, to Winslow, AZ, so he's gone for six days at a time.  Poor guy; he comes home with enough time to mow the lawn and repair things that need to be repaired, and then he's gone again.  And there is always something that needs to be repaired.  I swear this house very calculatingly waits for him to leave, and then decides to dump problems on me.  Like the smoke detectors that went all manic a few weeks ago.  Or the ice-maker last week, which would do nothing but growl every time I pushed the button, but then the second I opened the freezer, ice would explode on me.  On the plus side, I was showered with the specific ice I had requested, whether it was cubed or crushed.  So ten points for accuracy there.  Now our latest problem is the voltage on our electric fence around the petting zoo...it's too high.  I'm not sure what changed...maybe the fact that the ground has been moister than usual lately?  But on top of zapping two sparrows, the fence fried one of our hens.  Now I have more unfortunate critters to add to the ever-growing Why You Don't Want to be a Bird in Our House list.  So Clint will have to tweak that on Monday, plus get rid of the dead chicken that no one wants to touch.  Thankfully by next week he should be back to shorter routes, where he is gone for only 2-3 days at a time.

Clint's parents are taking the kids to an insect fair tomorrow.  Trin is all sorts of excited because there are supposed to be a few entomologist there from UCR, and she plans to pick their brains about the world of entomology.  Right now she's torn about what she wants to be when she grows up; either an entomologist or an aviary veterinarian.  The aviary vet idea has me laughing my head off.  How great would it be for a child whose family has a history of unwittingly massacring winged creatures to become a veterinarian of BIRDS?

Teri invited me to go along to the insect fair with them, to which I gave her a very polite hell no.  With Clint gone all the time, I'm saturated with kids 24/7.  The thought of some peace and quiet (aka: uninterrupted writing time) sounds like pure bliss.  I'm hoping to go to Starbucks tomorrow and make my word-meter bar grow.

Oh, I wrote a vignette (exactly 500 words in length) on my other blog, but I'm not crazy about it.  It was in response to another end-of-the-world-type writing prompt that one of my twitter followers mentioned me in.  I love creating short stories...they make for fun little interludes between chapter revisions.  But for some reason I only like to write them when I get a prompt of some kind.  Same for painting--I like being given some direction, like "paint an angel or paint a willow tree"--I feel too aimless if I'm just supposed to "paint".  Anyway, I failed a little on this one.  500 words was too shrimpy of a word count for me to flesh the exposition out, or to get the reader to care about the character or her plight.  I guess this highlights my shortcomings as a writer.  Although Apathetics is a flash fiction of sorts, and I managed to pull that one off in 440-some words.  So I don't know.  Maybe the repetitiveness of the topic was a problem too.  I do love the concept of vignettes--and flash fiction--so I might look for some more prompts here and there when I'm feeling ready to take breaks from DoT.

Enchanted Forest

I don't have any writerly juices tonight, so here's Family Theme Night, Picture Edition:

Teri did a beautiful job decorating

 These lights were stunning in the dark

 Carey and Teri dining

 Getting ready for appetizers

The kids ready to eat

 One-eyed, one horned, flying purple...diva?

 Me and Clint (the tiny blue fairy)

 Full after dinner

 Mike and Moo (she's a dragonfly princess, we don't know what he is)

 The kids--a fairy, Tardis, flying squirrel, and troll

(don't ask me what a Tardis has to do with an Enchanted Forest)

 Trin and Elijah

Moo made Trin's costume and Teri made Elijah's.
I helped by oohing and ahhing over them.

 Teri and Carey (Mother Nature and a garden gnome)

 Family Photo

 Sweet Pea with her amazing birthday cake
(yes, that's a cake, courtesy of Teri)

 Trinity preparing Sweet Pea for a skit

 Releasing a Chinese sky lantern into the air

 Sweet Pea's dream cake again

The fam was celebrating my birthday too,

so Teri made me my own chocolate "villain's" cake

to go with Sweet's.  Holy cow was it delicious.

The only other thing worth mentioning is when we released our Chinese sky lantern, it went straight into a gigantic car-sized bush.  That was a fun little moment of panic as everyone lunged for the lantern, trying to grab it before the bush caught on fire. 

Oh, and our skits.  We had a target on the wall with character's names and random settings/activities.  Each one of us threw a velcro ball against the target until we hit one character's name and one setting.  For example, I got "Ariel singing rock karaoke."  Then we had to act it out in front of everyone, and see if they could guess who we were and what we were doing.  It was super fun.  My favorite was Mike's skit, and Clint's.  Mike had to pretend to be a scared camper jumping from flower to flower.  It was really cute.  Clint, on the other hand, had to act out "Big Bad Wolf in a hair salon."  So he sits down in a fake barber chair and starts saying, "My, what BIG SCISSORS you have.  My, what a BIG HAIRBRUSH you have."  It was hilarious.

One more thing. I got an old-fashioned gumball machine for my birthday.  I've wanted one ever since I wrote my "Gumball" story.  Although ironically my new gumball machine is full of peanut M&Ms right now.

Okay, now I'm done for real.