Timmy would know!!!Timmy is MADE OF AWESOME!

I just had to post this because well, you know how I feel about Tim Tebow. Look at him. I just LOOOOOOVE him. he is on the cover of Madden '11 NCAA and I'm buying it. of course that means I'll have to buy a ps3 too but that's okay.
anyway, this is the easiest decision I've made today. right now I'm wrestling with some serious decisions re: LIM. I'm leaning toward giving up on it. it might be temporary but it might not. I think I've written a book that doesn't really fit anywhere. it's good but not  easily categorized. if I do, it will be disheartening but not the end of the world. I'm kind of used to events like that so I'll be able to deal. FUNdraiser will probably be an easier sale anyway. I've gotten some super advice but this is the direction I'm leaning / <--get it?
I wish I could channel Timmy. he makes awesome decisions. he decided to play harder than any other player and then he won the national championship.

happy birthday blog! and a giveaway!!!

okay so it's not a birthday cake per se but it's a frigging sweet cake! zombie hello kitty. and it's still cool even though zombies scare me.
I missed my own blog's birthday. LOL. for some reason I thought it was more toward the middle of the month but apparently it was the 8th. So in honor (belated of course) I am having a giveaway!!!
I'm giving away a 25 dollar iTunes gift card to one lucky blog follower as a thank you for following me! Just leave me a comment and be a follower and you will be entered.
I really am blessed by my awesome followers! thank y'all for everything!!

meanwhile...stuck at home

isn't that lovely? I absolutely LOVE LOVE LOVE old (17th to early 18th c.) gravestones. I have a book about them and I have just about worn it out because I am constantly looking through it. I love the primitive art and decoration of them and the symbology of the motifs. sigh. one day I am going to the north east and making my own gravestone rubbings of these treasures so I can frame them and display them. I'm drawn to this angel in particular. don't know why but I am.
last night I must have looked through databases of old gravestones for hours. I am coming down with a dreaded summer cold and am kind of stuck at home. 2 of my friends are at conventions and loving them so I am sending happy karma their way. each deserves the awesome time they are having. hearing their stories made me want to go to dragon con again but alas it is the weekend of the triathlon in september and since I am registered, I am committed to swim, bike and run. which will be equally awesome but in a different way.

Kiwis and chalk at the gym

I had a blog visitor from New Zealand!!!the magical land where I want to run away to and live. In my Samolicious fantasy mind I wish it was Mr Central Otago Winemaker himself but sigh it probably was just a  fun kiwi blog surfer. I hope my friend comes back! I heart NZ!
Happy Birthday Cori! one day late. I love you!!
now that all my randomness is out of the way...or is it? if you don't hang around very often, you might not know I am training for a triathlon. it's a sprint distance so you can tone your laughing down some. it's in september but it has been kind of funny so far. when people hear I'm doing this, first they look at me like "you're joking, right?" then they look me over head to foot. LOL. I think that's funny. underneath this insulating layer of pudge are some awesome muscles. anyway, yesterday while doing my bike workout, I looked around the gym and discovered that I was the palest person in the joint. by a long shot. I'm talking I looked like chalk compared to these people. so then I thought I'd share my pale weirdness with my friend  Suzannah and sent her a text message. however it went astray to someone else. lol. then I resent it and it made it's way to the right person. I'm still trying to talk her into doing the tri with me but so far nothing. oh well. yesterday I rode about 14 miles in 50 minutes which isn't bad. thank goodness for my ipod. I was fading fast until planet rock and the spice girls came on.
p.s. the person who got the stray text message thought it was funny and had a very helpful suggestion.

this post is brought to you by the letter E...for eccentric

this apparently has something to do with geometry and ellipses but I want nothing to do with geometry so I am just taking it for face value. I enjoy eccentric people. I consider myself to be one. although sometimes I have to rein it in because in our small town if you are eccentric you get socially shunned. meh. I wouldn't care but since I fear for my child's social acceptance I play along. most of the time.  like I said, I enjoy eccentrics. usually they are the most creative and interesting people. Issac Newton was known to be an eccentric. so was albert einstein. go eccentrics.
one of the characters in my WIP is an eccentric. she's quickly becoming my favorite. I identify with her. I'm going to have to be careful not to like her enough to let her take over the story. she dresses fun, has a lot of snappy sayings and really is just her own person despite social dictates. maybe she is me. who knows?
so I'll just run along now. by the way, I'm wearing shortalls with an orange tank top. I also have my purple hair extensions in. hey, I'm at home and free to be me.

what do you do...Pentagon City edition

this is a picture of pentagon city in arlington. the mall is in the background. what does this have to do with anything you ask? well, I'll tell you and thanks for asking. but I'm irritated right now. big time. so I am looking for things that put me in a nicer state of mind. this is the mall across from the apartment that numero uno lived in. I associate it with happy memories i.e. my first trip ever to D.C and to visit him. we had a bunch of fun that week. and in retrospect I realize what awesome powers I had back then. I suppose you could file this under the think happy thoughts category. I'm pushing out my bad feelings and replacing them with this. if I concentrate, I can smell body shop banana shampoo and smell campfire smoke from mt. vernon. memories of good times with mr on a pedestal numero uno. (I know I said I wasn't posting any more about him but memories of him are like ativan) cosmic good thoughts to him and his family.
I feel extra guilty for being irritated on H.H. The Dalai Lama's 75th birthday. it's probably more bad karma for me on top of the bad karma for smashing a HUGE ASS spider with a broom this morning. it's compounded by the fact that we had coexisted peacefully because I walked right past it 4 times. I didn't have my glasses on so I thought it was either a hairball or something Maddy drew. but when it crawled I panicked.so the wheel turns and I owe more.
but back to my original thoughts...what do you do when you are having bad thoughts or a bad day that's escalating irrationally? just curious.

flag waving bears!

Happy 4th everyone. I hope everyone enjoyed food, festivities and fireworks but took a moment to remember what today is all about.
spent the day cooking and letting my mind wander, which is a good thing. cleared out some things that had been bothering me and recommitted to the triathlon in september. spending time resting was not doing me any good. so back to the gym I'll go tomorrow. also was able to think some more about my WIP. more plot holes got plugged up. it's funny to me how ideas come at odd times.usually they are times that I don't have a way to write them down. amazingly enough I managed to remember what I thought of. now if they work remains to be seen. like I said, since this isn't paranormal it's proving to be a challenge. I wish I could throw in a vampire or at least a ghost. but I guess you can't do that in real life. also I came up with another idea but it will have to germinate a bit more. it might only be suitable for a short story, which I have never written.

a kiss is just a kiss...or is it.

I love this pic. The nurse in the pic passed away recently but the legacy of this picture will live on. I've been giving a lot of thoughts to kisses in novels. there are so many different types of kisses. social kisses, air kisses, grandma kisses, first kisses(those ROCK) and so on. kisses are important. they convey so much and to me they are the closest and most intimate form of contact. it seems like all of your senses are funneled into that one act. you even close your eyes to experience it. I wonder where that came from. and the first time your lips meet your intended, you brain goes wild and showers of sparks begin. they can also be deal breakers. if you get a bad kisser you are in big trouble. i.e too wet, too stiff, tonsil swabbers and the list goes on. lots of times in novels kisses are severely neglected.and they can add so much to the depth of a character. think about it... weren't your opinions of a date shaped by their kissing ability? I went back and paid special attention to first kisses in Life in Moonlight. I mean, kisses are important. even to vampires.

you'd think

I am not able to settle my mind enough to write. I am flush with opportunities but I really haven't written squat. part of the problem is whenever my daughter is gone, I am out of sorts. I need to channel all that free energy into writing but so far I haven't been very successful. the foil hat is looking pretty good. does anyone have any good ideas or tricks on how to focus your energy. I'm open for suggestions!

dinner with Sam and doing the best thing

I was going to post a pic of Lovely Alan because I felt so bad for poor Snape in Half Blood Prince but apparently I moved most of my AR pics to a jump drive so you get Sam noshing. my poor busy brain. my mind has so many things that it's trying to sort through that I am pretty sure that I am going to have to write them all down. although I think I solved my problem with LIM. so now I can put a giant check mark next to that when I write my list. it wasn't what I initially wanted but sometimes what we want is the right thing and you do what is best. :) then that lets you free up your mind to worry about other things.

pea pickin and the flow

check out cake wrecks if you haven't. the pic has nothing to do with my post but that should come as no surprise to you. I had a great day of writing! I wrote almost 1k words. for me that's awesome. my characters were talking to me big time. they started last night while I was picking peas. I shouldn't have been doing that because I'm supposed to be off my feet for my knee but I guess my karmic reward was my peeps started talking. my writing took my mind off the fact that Maddy is gone for two weeks :( I'm really excited about this WIP. it's so opposite of what I usually write but it is just flowing. I hope I can keep the momentum going. my goal is to have it finished by the end of the summer and maybe ready to query by Halloween. I'm trying to think positive and keep my mind off of not being able to train for the sprint triathlon I planned on doing in september. if my knee is jacked up like I think it is, I'll be sidetracked for like 3 weeks. I was never much of a hardcore athlete but I am major bummed about this. I suppose I could still do the swim and bike training but I'll know more after my mri. but at least my story is coming together!!!

the ol WIP

 so my knee is bad and keeping me off my feet...I have more time to work on FUNdraiser, which I need. I seem to only work on it in spurts. And I doubt I'll get much done on it until I find out how bad my knee is. I am worried because after july first I won't have any short term disability insurance and if I have to have surgery, I will be out without any pay. isn't that nice? isn't the company who bought our hospital a real gem to take away that benefit from us? yeah. so it might be nice to have the time to write but my full attention won't be on it. figuring out how to sell a kidney to survive if I need to have surgery will be instead.

I'm pretty pissed right now

yeah you read it right. today has been a perfect storm of pissed off culminating at my doorstep. first was the creepy guy who showed up wanting to know if we had a school age child and could he see her. turns out he had done this at multiple houses. I called the sheriff and they sent a deputy. that just sent me over the edge. so now my daughter cannot go out by herself on our property and I hate that.
next is there was some sand raising event at maddy's daycare that got my dander up. it turned out okay but up went my blood pressure.
then my email was full of bad news. the highlights of said bad news were a rejection on a full and the results of a contest. I didn't win. the feed back was good and the scores were good and close. seems the judges saw the same flaws. meh. easy to fix I guess.
finally all of this fun was heaped on the fact that I have carpal tunnel in my left wrist and my wrist is swollen to where my watch is tight(it's a link bracelet Tag Heuer that is usually so loose they face is to my inner wrist) and my left knee is swollen. I have nothing on that. it started hurting at the gym yesterday and now feels like a marshmallow.
I'm hoping tomorrow will be better.