lydamorehouse: (Default)
 With my new book out, I decided to dust off my ancient website and update the information on it. What I SHOULD do at some point, is update the whole thing, but instead I am a stubborn old coot and have hung on to something I personally hand coded in 1999 or thereabouts. I mean, part of me, at this point, feels like the creakiness of it is perfect for a bunch of cyberpunk books?  But, it's not the best if a person is looking for information about...oh, I dunno, Tate's subsequent career in the modern era? 

I've had dozens of offers to upgrade and update. Feel free to offer your two cents, as well. After all, I think, since I lost Tate's domain, I will finally do something more modern for her.  Maybe a Word Press site or some such. Who knows, I might even hire someone to design something truly lovely.  

In the meantime, though, I spent the morning trying to remember how to do file transfers with CuteFTP.... which, I mean... yeah, wow. It was very 1999 here for a moment.

So, let's see, other news...  

It's sunny today and is supposed to eventually warm up into the 50s (approximately 10 C).  I'm hoping Shawn won't be too busy today with meetings and we can go for our semi-traditional, daily walk. If not, I may go on my own after 1:00 pm. I am going to have to brave the pet store (or Target) today because our eldest cat has decided that she no longer likes the seafood pate. Being 19, skipping meals is not the option it once was (or would still be for our 25 pound orange boy). Plus, I should buy another bag or two of kitty litter for the continued stay-at-home order.

Otherwise, I just have to make some bread for tonight's dinner. Vera is not quite ready for us to harvest, I don't think. But, my family is actually only so-so on sour dough, anyway, and I traditionally make my French loaves to go with something like the lasagna we're having. 

I've been thinking a lot about my inability to write and I had an epiphany when talking to my writers' group, Wyrdsmiths, last night on video chat.  Obviously, the majority of it is existential anxiety, no question. But, I think there's another factor that I hadn't really considered. There's, of course, a lot of talk about the hassles of having your office suddenly become your living room. No one is much discussing the fact that *my* office has now been invaded by my family, whom I love and get along with famously, BUT, with that has come additional pressure to provide.

It's no longer just, "Ima, what's for dinner?" It's become, "Ima, what's for dinner? What's for lunch? What's for breakfast? Are we out of x? Are you making bread/cake/cookies today? When should we go for a walk?" And, so on.  One of my love languages is feeding people, so, again, this isn't about feeling necessarily overwhelmed or resentful of all of this--in fact, I take a HUGE amount of pride in the fact that we are going on a month of stay-at-home and we have yet to repeat a single meal.

But.

I used to have several hours a day to write.

Alone. By myself.

With no thought about lunch, unless I was hungry or I knew a friend was dropping by.  

Also, with Shawn occupying the living room, even though we have the luxury of a lot of space to spread out, it's funny the extent to which her office stress gets filtered out into the rest of the family. So, that's new and different, too. And part of why I've shifted to doing things like quilting, because physical activity, for me, shaves off all that stress and puts it to use in something. 

Anyway, I didn't say it was a brilliant thought, but it was new to me. It's funny because our house doesn't really have the usual division of labor that comes with gender, but, since making the choice to be the stay-at-home parent, I have often ended up with the lion's share of the emotional labor of keeping a household together.  When everyone is home all the time, that increases exponentially. 

Again, I feel fortunate in that none of this is really anything I hate or find particularly onerous. I've just suddenly realized that these duties, if you will, now occupy the majority of the time that I used to set aside for writing. I'm going to have to go back to how I used to write when I had a full-time job... oh, wait, I used to just shirk.

Damn it.

;-)

Well, honestly? I can do that with this job a little, too. 
lydamorehouse: (crazy eyed Renji)
Or something like that.  

I just spent two hours on my yard. Can you tell that I just spent two hours on my yard? Probably not.  Though, you might be able to tell that I mowed the boulevard, if only because the grass had gotten long enough to start to sprout seed heads. But, really, now our boulevard basically looks like everyone else's boulevard, so maybe not?

Sometimes I feel like I'm the only person in the world that struggles with basic yard work. 

Though, last night, Shawn and I took a walk around the neighborhood and I noticed that my immediate neighbors seemed to have as many bare patches and rough sections as I do. I do wonder that, given the shift in how my generation feels about going organic and chemical free, if we're going to see a lot more crappy lawns in general.  We're certainly not the only people in our immediate neighborhood to plant front yard gardens.  Several folks a block or so east have entirely shade/natural flower gardens for "lawns."

But, back to my original point, I also have to wonder if some of my frustration with yard work is that I'm kind a clumsy nerd at heart.  Just pulling out the lawn mower was a huge hassle of untangling the electric cord and hauling it around to the boulevard and THE WHOLE THING WAS JUST SO HARD.  Probably other people don't trip over the cords they're carrying. Gods, I do. And, then, like Pig Pen from "Peanuts" I end up tangled in the cords and completely immobilized. (At least that's how I feel.)

On the other hand, it's done now and the yard looks fairly passable. 

At least where most people can see it.


lydamorehouse: (Default)
Because I've just finished revisions and am in between contracts (as I like to say,) I'm in that very weird place I find myself from time to time. I have no writing that I HAVE to do. Thus, I've been flitting between the Gaylaxicon story, brainstorming new series ideas, and re-formatting Archangel Protocol. (I'm on Chapter 12. Go me.)

Similarly, there's a lot that needs doing around the house (see yesterday's busy-day post, and all the things I left undone consequentally.) I don't feel like doing those thing either. That "meh-"ness I blame on the weater. It's snowing. (Horray!) But, the world is covered in that gray blanket of clouds, and the dim, hushed quality of light just makes me feel like snuggling deeper under the blankets and doing nothing for the rest of the day.

I suppose what I should do is get up and do the dishes.

Yep, any minute now.

Did I tell you fine folks that I'm planning on making it to at least part of WorldCON this year? It seems silly not to go since it's in Chicago (and not, say Tokoyo). Plus, erm, I got an invite to do programming from the con com folks, and I have to say that made me feel incredibly flattered. I'm not sure that RESURRECTION CODE is selling particularly well, but I do think that having a new science fiction book out this last year has caused a lot of people to say to themselves, "Hey, Lyda Morehouse... she's someone we can invite to our convention...." which is worth a lot more to me than royalties, honestly.

Oh, all right then. I guess I should go be "productive."
lydamorehouse: (Default)
I have a new book to write (Tate's YA book #3), and I've been having a hell of a time getting motivated (or, as my family likes to say "motor-vated") to write it. I think the truth is that I've fallen out of the habit. [livejournal.com profile] naomikritzer and I have talked about this before. Even after however many years publishing books, it's still easier for me to write if I DO IT EVERY DAY. Writing *isn't* like riding a bicycle. I seem to totally forget how to write/have discpline if I take too long a vacation from it.

One of my big goals today is to actually put words on screen.

The weirdest part of this fallow period is that, although I have been doing quite a bit of "in-take" as I talked about before, I'm actually kind of excited about the proposal that I sent in. Book #3 should be fun to write. I just have to start it.

The weekend was busy. Friday was Mason's half-day, and we had a lovely fire and Mason read a lot in front of it. I did some more yard work, because we as many trees as we have, the raking is never done. I managed to put the herb garden to bed, which is a big project.

On Saturday was Mason's continuing swim class. He's still having a great deal of fun with it, and really seems to be on the brink of really, for real swimming on his own. Saturday, despite the wind, I did a little raking -- though the front could use another pass, since our really-late to change maple finally dumped most of its leaves. (With the early winters we have been having lately, this tree usually sheds onto snow.) I must have bagged about a dozen bags. Can I just say the compostable bags SUCK. It takes almost no pressure to rip them to shreds, so all I can say to the St. Paul garbage folks who will be picking them up: "sorry! But, dude, you brought this on yourself!" (The compostable bags are required now, or they won't pick up at all. It's awesome that the city picks up our lawn waste, but, man, the bags are whimpy.)

Saturday afternoon we did an exchange of junk with Shawn's brother Keven, with whom we've been estranged for two years. We reached a kind of truce via e-mail, which is... good? It's all very complicated and not something I really want to go into with great detail, because, honestly, the various problems we've had with Keven have spanned the entire twenty-five years Shawn and I have been together. Still, that first meeting in two years was nicely anticlimatic, but it still left Shawn and I exhausted. I think we'd had a lot of anxiety leading up to it, so we crashed hard afterwards. We ended up watching BBC's "Planet Earth" (a small bit of the several disc set) and eating Red Savoy's pizza in a daze.

Sunday we spent more time in the attic, which we are still trying to clear of roofing detrius. Not exactly a fun-filled weekend, and it was made somewhat less pleasant by the fact that the sudden change in barometric pressure gave me a sinus headache most of Sunday.

But tonight should be fun. Mason has an afterschool class called "staying safe at home." And, then, if we're not too pooped after that, we're going to try and hit the later kuk sool wan class for white belts/kids (we usually do the 5:00 pm class, but I don't think we can make that one with Mason's schedule tonight.) I feel badly that we haven't quite settled into a routine with karate yet, but I have faith that we will.

Okay. No more stalling. Off to write and then excercise.
lydamorehouse: (Default)
This morning, it seems, is about putting my house in order -- in all senses of that phrase. In the literal sense, I took a broken porch window to the hardware store to get it repaired. Our porch windows are rickity, and the other day I slammed the door too hard and down came the storm window and shattered into bits. Luckily, the S&S Hardware store on Fairview still repairs screens and windows, so I took it there and paid a whopping $40 to get it fixed (in about six days. Our porch windows are HUGE.)

Now I need to compose an email to my estranged brother-"in-law." We fell out several years ago over my right to parent my son. As in, he thought I didn't have any, and, well, the law (and more importantly the love that cements my family) says I do. I need to compose this email because I promised that as the holiday season approached, I would make a salvo, so that, at the very least, if we pass each other at a family gathering I won't be tempted to blurt out something out-of-contex and hurtful because so much has gone unsaid between us for so long. Also, he may show up in our backyard to pick up stuff of his that had been stored in our attic, which is now in our garage.

Oh, yeah, and I should probably mow, since the grass in the backyard is about a foot long thanks to the rain and the roofers.
lydamorehouse: (Default)
The rain is helping me catch up on all the rest of my life. As the world's laziest neighbor, I've been painting the neighbor's side of our fence in TINY increments. Yesterday, I had time for about three or four slats. Today, as long as it keeps raining, NONE!

Today, I need to read. I've got a ton of Wyrdsmiths critiquing to do before the meeting tonight. Unfortunately, I fell behind on Kelly's stuff, and Kelly writes so fast that means that I'm now in possession of a small ton. But, once I stretch out on my couch with a cat on my knees, it will be a quick, fun read.

Yesterday was another one of those ridiculously busy days. I had gutter installers coming at some point (you know, the whole between noon and midnight,) and a staff photographer from the Pioneer Press at 3:00 PM. And guess when the gutter guys came? That's right! 3:00 PM! But, as it happens our house is such a mess, I decided that I'd offer to go to some other location with the photographer. We ended up at that cemetery on Front, Calvary? He offered to go to a place featured in the book, but I didn't think I could get onto the roof of the Saint Paul Farmer's Market or into any house in Cathedral Hill. Anyway, I think the cemetery will be fine. People expect cemeteries and vampires, and I did NOT dress goth, so it might make a fun juxaposition. We'll have to wait and see. The article is supposed to come out Sunday, August 1.

I will also be busy doing a few other things today. It's fish tank changing day, folder volunteering at Mason's school, AND recycling. (Recycling is kind of a big deal at our house, since somehow we always manage to accumulate a LOT. And, if I miss it, the house is taken over by bags of recycling.)

Sometimes I wonder how we ever got stuff done around the house when I worked a full-time job AND wrote novels.

Dancemania

Jun. 15th, 2010 09:56 am
lydamorehouse: (Default)
When Shawn and I picked Mason up after dance class last night it was evident he'd been crying. Shawn stayed behind to talk to the community education assistant, while I took Mason to the car. All he told me, of course, was that he didn't want to do dance class any more. What Shawn found out was that he seemed to have had a great time (particpating, etc.,) until the end when she said "he just seemed done" and got very nervous about whether or not we'd remember to pick him up.

Shawn and I both agreed that Mason should give it one more day before we make any kind of decision about quitting. Shawn also found out from the community education assistant that there is a scheduled time for snack (a big concern because Mason usually eats an early dinner/4:30 or 5:00 and the class goes until 5:00) so today I packed him an extra snack to have (full of lots of good protein -- a chocolate milk and trail mix as well as some fun stuff.) We also promised to show up early so that he could see that we were waiting to pick him up. I also put a lot of notes of encouragement in his lunch box and snack bag.

Hopefully today will go better.

The funny part of this is that I think he really just hit a wall or something at the end of the day, because as soon as we got home he saw his neighborhood friends were out playing and he ran off to join them. So it's not like he was having some kind of regressive clinginess, I don't think. We had to call him back once dinner was on the table.

Out of curiosity, I asked him how many boys were in the Dancemania class and he shrugged and said, "Lots. Why?" I should have known better than to think that was part of the problem. He PREFERS the company of girls still.

Having enough protien can really be a mood-saver. I'm really hopeful that will help.

I managed to get my 2,000 words written yesterday, and, after trying to tell Shawn the scenes I had left to write, I realized I need to review my proposal. It's not that I think I'm too far off track, it's just that I don't quite remember how I'd planned to lead up to the big final scene. Sometimes my proposals are pretty clever. I should see what I'd been thinking. :-)

Lately I've had the most vivid dreams. I don't know if it's because I sleep more soundly in the cool, rainy weather or if the new 40+ women's vitamins I'm taking are charging up my brain, but it's been great fun. Last night involved running for office -- or maybe helping someone else's campaign, I'm no longer sure. But I can still picture some scenes, you know?

Anyway, I have to run home and get started writing. I also have to tackle a few dishes too or we're going to be like the guy in the picture book who never washed his dishes... and have to leave piles of them out in the rain.
lydamorehouse: (Default)
This morning I volunteered to be a chaperone for a trip to the Dodge Nature Center. Here in Minnesota the sap has started to run (finally! We cracked 50F ABOVE this weekend, and it's already 60F today), and the Center gives kids a chance to identify a Maple tree in situ (in the wild!) and tap it. Then they showed us how the Maple sap is turned into syrup (lots of boiling), and they let us taste maple syrup, maple sugar, and maple sap -- the last, one child apply described as tasting a bit like a wet stick. I had to try it too, of course, and I'd have to agree. It tasted VERY green, almost like grass.

It was a lot of fun. I love going on these kinds of adventures because, as most of you who know me already realize, I'm a bit of a big kid, myself. I have to bite my tongue to keep from raising my hand and joining in when they ask questions like: "What signs of spring have YOU seen?" Oh! Oh! I know!

But the bus ride home was... exuberant.

Plus there's something about me (maybe that kid in a big person's body thing) that attracts small children. They want to tell me about the cool rocket ships on their underwear, what their little sister eats for breakfast, and how their mom won $300 playing pool. I'm sure this is pretty common when there's ANY guest in the classroom, but I think I encourage it because 1) I like kids, 2) I look kids in the eye, and 3) I often initate discussion with kids. It's the old I-used-to-teach-cartooning-in-afterschool/weekend-programs part of me. And, I think, I tend to be genuinely fascinated with what children have to say. I love how their minds work, and how they can find a story in the most mundane things. You know, everything is new when you're five... and that's awesome. (I think they can tell *I* think it's awesome too.)

Despite the awesome, I'm pooped and, more than that, I feel overwhelmed with things that haven't gotten done yet today. Somehow, yesterday, we managed to use every single dish in the house... and they're _all_ in the dirty pile near the sink. My tetras' tank needs changing. The book(s) aren't writing themselves. I need to transfer the video of the concert to CD/thumb drive for a friend. My .mp3 player needs loading before I go work out tomorrow morning. The kitty litter needs changing. It's my turn to write on the group blog where they think I'm boring (and today I am.)

And I want to nap.

Tomorrow is Saint Patrick's day. I know many of you out there have already celebrated it, but here in St. Paul things start at tomorrow's Mass at the Cathedral. I'm going to have to check the paper for the time of the parade, as I'm thinking about checking it out. I wish I'd have thought ahead, because I would have taken Mason out of school. His mom is Irish and I like to pretend I am, but it really doesn't get much more British than MOREHOUSE (outside of my cousin, whose surname is BRAITHEWAITE.) My heritage is actually very south eastern European: Czech (my great-grandmother's naturalization papers list her country of origin as Bohemia!), Polish, and German being the strongest bits. But I probably know more about Irish history than your average American. I can sing nearly every Irish rebel song ever written, and I know at least two words in Irish (and one of them is probably even repeatable.) Why the fascination with Ireland and the Irish? Past life? Celtic ancestors who settled on the Danube? Too much Renaissance Festival? Who knows.

Anyway, I should off to try to salvage part of the day. Maybe I can get a couple dishes done before it's time to pick up Mason.

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