I’ve finally been having some sustained success in journaling! And all it took was (1) making my son write in a journal every night as part of his homeschool curriculum (2) which he absolutely refused to do unless I journaled right along beside him (3) so I sat down reluctantly that very first night and that’s when I discovered it’s really easy if I just list in point form things and thoughts from my day.

Ahhhh. What a relief! So I thought I’d try the same thing with a blog post!

1.  I love smaller handbags these days. We walk everywhere now and guess what? That huge handbag filled with half my life for those just-in-case moments is, well, really really heavy. I never realized how heavy it was before because back in the suburbs, whenever I went out armed with everything but the kitchen sink, I was usually in a car, the handbag at my feet. A few months back I swapped it out for a much smaller handbag. I feel kind of naked not carting around all the things I might need in an emergency (flashlight, Chinese fortune cookies from our latest foray at a buffet restaurant, colouring books for the little one, headset in case I get bored at the doctor’s office, doodle pad, lined notebook, index cards, gum, pens in very colour of the rainbow, nail file, mints – you know, that kind of stuff) but I sure do walk a whole lot quicker.

2. Bad copyediting. There’s a lot of talk about bad editing these days, most of which is aimed at self-published books, but I’m sad to say I recently read a book by a much loved author – The Vault, by Ruth Rendell, the latest Wexford instalment – and I don’t think this book, published by a traditional publisher, was copyedited at all. Many of the mistakes were minor, but there were a few that took me right out of the story, mainly because I just had to look back at previous chapters to check previously stated facts. I even thought one of the mistakes was a plot point that I’d caught! A character was described as having parents in their seventies who were clueless about his life, so when we “met” these parents chapters later and they were middle aged and knew everything that was going on, I was sure they were imposters, and a part of a plot. But no, it was just a mistake that hadn’t been caught.

3. Another love: snail mail. I’m just loving my mail these days. Back in February, inspired by Carrie, I sent out a bunch of letters and notecards, and the end result is, I’m still sending and receiving snail mail now! And to top things off, I decided to sign up for Letters in the Mail at The Rumpus and it’s been so much fun getting mail from various authors as well.

4. Reading, reviews and sketchnotes. I’ve been doing a fair bit of reading lately, and I’ve been finding myself doing sketchnote reviews. (If you’re not familiar with sketchnoting, check out Sketchnote Army. To see a previous sketchnote review of mine – well, okay, the only sketchnote review I’ve posted so far – check out my review of Gilda Joyce, Psychic Investigator, by Jennifer Allison) Luckily, we finally bought a new printer, the really fabulous Epson Artisan 837 (and all I can say about this printer is, omg, I can now print from anywhere in the house and even from outside of my house via email), and it has a scanner, too! So if I can get my butt in gear, hopefully I’ll be posting sketchnote reviews of what I’m reading.

5. Navel gazing. Cause I always need to do some. I had a bit of an ergo-mishap about three weeks ago (some gremlin messed with the height of my typing chair and what chaos ensued!). Arm pain has finally subsided and I am starting to feel back in form. Three weeks of drooping around the house listlessly does not make for a very happy Belle, but hopefully I’ll be able to re-activate my recessive “doing” gene now.

I love lists! So, what have you all been up to lately?

No related posts.

So now that I’m doing the big city living thing, I’ve been discovering something interesting: time flies when you’re doing nothing more than going through your day.

That sounds a bit strange, doesn’t it? I mean, time flew for me back in the suburbs, too. But it’s a very different feeling in my new “city life”.

Back at our old place, time flew, yes – time always flies, except, of course, when you most want it to – but it flew very predictably. Every day saw the same old, same old and so time flew over very familiar terrain.

And before you start thinking, wow, Belle, you must be so busy running about now, doing stuff, LIVING LIFE TO THE FULLEST … Um, no, I’m not.

It’s that whole “potential” thing.

Moon shining on Lake Ontario

(Disclaimer: This picture has absolutely NOTHING to do with anything in this post. I took it sometime last week or the week before that. The moon shining down on the lake was just so pretty. Unfortunately, my iPhone camera simply didn’t do it justice. But I’m sharing it with you all anyway!

Now back to my post …)

To be honest, I haven’t yet fully clicked into full-on city living. Not yet. And at the pace I’m going, by the time I’ve truly thrown myself into doing and living all the amazing events and experiences Toronto has to offer – BAM! – I’m going to be knee deep in deadlines again.

(Well, there you go. That’s motivation enough to start living more fully, isn’t it?)

But you see,  every day here there’s the potential of doing something different, something new. And up until our move, I’ve had such an isolated, hermit-like existence, even this potential is like a breath of fresh air.

And I’m realizing, I really must get a grip on things. Savour the potential, sure. But I really don’t want to let that put me off-track. Potential is fun. It’s enticing. But there’s more to life than just savouring the potential while time flies right by you.

(OMG, Belle, is this your long-winded, very strange way of explaining your recent blogging absences?

Why yes. Yes it is. Is it that obvious?

Yes.)

In other, more exciting (to me) news: I have my writing mojo back!

Yes, that bit of news deserves bolding …

And all it took was recognizing that my habits have changed. Where I once was that bright and sparkly night owl, ready to tackle huge manuscripts late into the night, I’m now that sleepy, tired is-it-time-for-bed-yet owl who wakes up (those who know me well won’t believe this, but it’s true) at the ungodly hour of 8:00 a.m. Yes, you read that right. Ever since our move, I’ve been waking up around 8:00 – without even trying!

This has had a major effect on my nightly activities. So in recognition of this, I changed things around. My writing time is now in the mornings (or close to it).

I have somehow managed to become a morning person. Well, okay, maybe “morning person” is a bit of an exaggeration.

How about mid-morning person? And some days, an early afternoon person.

Because it does take me that long (after my mandatory two cups of coffee) to get going some days.

And in the reading department … I finished Stephen King’s 11/22/63 the other day. I will probably post a review, but here’s my super-micro review:

(Photo credit)

Related posts:

1. Saturday Links: Stephen King, Charlaine Harris and Book Gifts for Twilighters
2. Why I Like On Writing
3. On Writing: Surprises

Last night I finished up a work deadline with a huge sigh of relief and anticipation – relief, because I’ve been busier than normal for this time of year this past month and anticipation because my next deadline isn’t until May (celebration time!).

But this morning I found myself doing some navel-gazing. Found lots of fluff, so to speak. The one big thing that’s been on my mind is this:

Why am I always bursting with ideas but never DOING much of anything with them?

You see, this is what my brain looks like every single second of the day:

That’s just each second. Imagine all those thoughts wiped out and replaced by an entire slew of new ones, and you’ll have a good idea of my thought stream throughout the day. (The image of my brain drunk on ideas is courtesy of doodling on the awesome, free Paper by Fifty Three  iPad app, by the way.)

I love coming up with ideas. I love playing with ideas, growing them, becoming very excited by them.

But the problem is, you wouldn’t know this to look at DONE side of my to-do/to-try list.

I get awfully mired in “non-doing”.

This is a serious, cyclical problem for me. I have a slow season every year work-wise (you’re looking at it right now) and really, that should be the perfect time for me to make all my ideas come alive. There are books to be written, posts to be blogged, artsy stuff to try out, new skills to be learned, blogs to be created, social media sites to investigate, apps to test out, information to be learned.

Why am I not doing any of these things?

So I was doing some serious soul searching this morning.

And then the answer came to me.

I’m getting overwhelmed with my ideas.

It happens all the time with my writing. I’ll be in the middle of a great story, when out of the blue, a character for another different, great story will come to me. And suddenly I’m torn.

Which do I work on now?

It’s clear to me now that I do this with everything, not just my writing. My enthusiasm for a new idea knows no bounds, but when you multiply that by ten or a hundred (usually a hundred), It’s like I suddenly run into a force field that reduces me to non-doingness. I’ll have a 101 things on my I-want-to-do list (this is all stuff I want to do, not things I’m trying to avoid doing) – and I’ll be at a total loss.

Basically, this is usually what I end up doing:

And, mind you, I think I do it awfully well.

Not that there’s anything wrong with Plants vs. Zombies. It’s my latest addiction and I find it to be a real stress reliever.

It’s just that I’m not really stressed these days. Except by the fact that I’m NOT DOING the things I want to do.

So yes, I have the “I Want To Do It All” syndrome. And it’s really bogging me down.

I’ve always found the best way to tackle problems is to just ask the Universe for an answer.

Universe? I’m asking! I’m even blogging about my asking! Please, send me an answer quickly. And if you could give me an answer that’s about a realistic way to actually do all the stuff I want to do, and not just tell me to pick one thing and stick to it until it’s done (aka “the stock answer”), that would be really fabulous …

Do you suffer from the “I Want To Do It All” syndrome too? Have you got any advice on how to cope?

Related posts:

1. Focus, Focus, Focus

So I was reading feeds on Google Reader this morning (aka The New Morning Ritual, And Yes, One That Has Somewhat Replaced Meditation, Much to My Dismay) and I came across this post on author Jeffrey Brown’s blog announcing the trailer for his upcoming book, Darth Vader and Son.

Doesn’t Darth Vader and Son look like such fun?

No related posts.

I’m on a campaign to strip the guilt out of all my guilty pleasures. Needless to say, it’s not easy going (have you noticed, we humans seem to be hardwired for guilt?). But in the meantime, I thought I’d share my top ten guilty pleasures with you. You probably won’t be surprised that my list contains quite a few bookish things …

1. The Snacking Reader

Anyone else do this? I LOVE to eat while I’m reading. The habit started when I was a kid; put a book in my hands and I’d automagically reach for an apple. I remember the first time I read a Hercule Poirot mystery that featured Ariadne Oliver, I was so happy: here was a fictional mystery writer who loved to eat apples all the time (presumably, then, while she was reading, too).

If I didn’t have kids, you’d probably find me sitting at the dinner table every night with a book propped on the salt and pepper shakers, long-suffering spouse by my side. However, once you have kids, you find you have to do that role-modelling stuff. So usually I just eat much slower than everyone else, then when everyone’s all done and hopping mad to leave the table, I graciously give them my leave and then surreptitiously whip out the latest read.

2. Red Wine and um, Salami

[I was going to upload a picture of a salami

but then thought better of it. You’re very welcome.]

The secret’s out! I like to have a glass of red wine every night (purely for medicinal purposes, of course). Since it’s for medicinal purposes, the wine itself doesn’t qualify as a guilty pleasure (don’t you just love how that works?!)

My problem? I like my wine with food, but since I usually relax with a glass of wine late at night, I’m not about to haul out the grill and cook up a rib steak (much as I’d like to). I’ve found that salami (the dry cured kind) works just as well with red wine. It’s not particularly healthy for you, true – but the way I look at it, it surely must be healthier than an 8 oz rib steak, right? When, that is, I can stay disciplined and only have a few slices (and that, my friends, is a battle to be saved for another post).

3. Plants vs. Zombies

Lest you start thinking all my guilt comes from food (although, now that I think about it, there’s a very clear association there …), let me introduce you to my current addiction: Plants vs. Zombies. I love my iPad version, which I bought for a whopping $2.99, and which has given me much gaming pleasure. I’ve defeated the adventure mode level three times now, and am trying to accumulate enough to purchase the final bonus game pack.

My eight-year-old has it on his PC and loves the game, too, so lately a lot of our dinner conversation has centered on PvZ strategies (accompanied by a lot of eye-rolling from Ward, who refuses to go near the game. But that’s just because he’s an Angry Birds aficionado).

4. Cracked.com

I don’t really know why I feel somewhat guilty about having the Cracked.com feed in my Google Reader, but I do – just a little bit of guilt. But I grew up reading MAD and Cracked magazines, you know. Not that it’s nostalgia that has me reading Cracked.com these days. I just find a lot of the posts quite fun – and I especially like the posts they do on conspiracy theories and hoaxes. I love the snarky humor, and of course, there are quite a lot of bookish and film topics. But I always have this funny feeling while I’m reading a Cracked.com post that surely, I’m a little bit old for this kind of thing now …?

5. Britain’s Got Talent on Youtube at 2 a.m.

It’s not that I feel guilty about watching Britain’s Got Talent on Youtube. I don’t – everyone knows how much I LOVE this kind of TV talent show, and Britain’s Got Talent is one of my favorites. No, it’s the fact that I always seem to get a hankering to watch it at 2 in the morning, right around when I really should be falling asleep. One thing always leads to another (aka searching out old favorite clips) and before I know it, it’s 3 a.m.. Which, at my age, is most certainly Not a Good Thing.

6. Magazines

I admit it. I’m a magazine junkie. Just ask Ward – he’ll give you all the confirmation you might need. When we made the big move to the city (trading down about 2000 sq. ft. in the process), I had to face the big question: what to do with all the magazines I’d accumulated over the years? Sadly, there was only one answer. I just hope they all found good homes with good people who will, at the very least, create cool artsy collages with them.

Where’s the guilt in being a magazine junkie, you might ask? Here’s the thing: most of the magazines in my stash were still unread. Yup. Of course, things are a little bit better now, because I’ve gone digital with almost all of my magazine subscriptions, so at least they’re not physically piling up taunting me with all of their naked unreadness.

7. Blank Notebooks and Journals

I simply cannot resist a blank notebook. I’ve amassed boxes and boxes of these over the years, many of which sport a line or two I jotted down in some fit of motivation (I’m rather prone to these short spurts of motivation which quickly peter out to nothingness, I’m afraid). My absolute favorites are Moleskines, which, as it turns out, is actually a good thing, because it’s rare to find a Moleskine on sale, and my accumulation habit usually has a lot to do with bargain bins.

This is what happens when I pick up a brand new blank journal at a store (usually nicely marked down): I hold it in my hot little hands and dream about all the creative nuggets that I’ll write into the beautiful blank pages … Alas, you all know the end of this particular story, no?

8. Browsing the Kindle Bestselling Freebie Lists

I know. You’re asking yourself, “why on earth does this count as a guilty pleasure?” But it does. You see, my TBR pile is ginormous. It really and truly is. And every day I’m online, I come across yet another great title to add to the title, courtesy of all the wonderful book bloggers I know who post such fabulous reviews. I have holds galore at the library, and honestly, am never at a loss when it comes to reading material these days.

But does that stop me from browsing the free lists? Nah. Not at all. So I stuff my Kindle full of free books, and feel such guilt because I’m actively growing this TBR pile when I should really be trying to reduce its size. To make matters worse, I’ve found quite a few treasures in the bestselling freebie lists on Amazon (probably because my “secret weapon” is scanning the sample chapters first before I’ll even consider downloading a a book, free or otherwise), which, of course, means more authors to put on my “to watch out for” list. It’s a vicious cycle, folks.

9. Gel Pens

I actually DO use all the gel pens I buy, but that doesn’t stop me from feeling guilty about it. Probably because I buy them every chance I get. There are gel pens in every corner of our place, and I know Ward’s eyebrows always go up a fraction of an inch (or centimetre, as we say here in Canada. No, actually, we don’t. We still say inch. Which is kind of funny, when you think about it) whenever I get another fresh new batch of pens. Not that he ever says anything. But still, I feel the guilt.

In other words, gel pens are another thing I can’t resist, and I love nothing better than shopping for them at the art supply store, where you can buy them INDIVIDUALLY! (Seriously, I can spend days standing in front of those little pads they mount to the shelves so you can test out the gel-ness of the pens.) These Sarasa gel pens by Zebra are my go-to pens; I use them for writing in my notebooks (you know, the ones in point no. 7 above, whenever I feel that short spurt of motivation). But I also love the more colorful pens, too. Guilt, guilt, guilt. Yes.

10. Deep Fried Anything [Well, Almost Anything]

Onion Rings

Here we go, back to food again. I do draw the line somewhere when it comes to deep fried foods, though. The 75 deep fried foods here, for example – probably not my kind of thing. But I do tend to gravitate toward deep-fried deliciousness. I discovered this when I first started on Pinterest and realized I pinned an awful lot of pictures of yummy deep fried foods. And not only was I pinning them, I was also sending the links to Ward, with the endearing line “Make this, pretty please?”

So, needless to say, our deep fryer has been getting quite a workout lately. Which ultimately means I am now in need of a workout (or ten) myself. Ahhh, guilt, you are such an easy thing to spawn …

So there you have it – my top ten list of guilty pleasures. What about you? Any of my guilty pleasures fit the bill for you? What guilty pleasures do you indulge in every now and then?

No related posts.

I wasn’t sure what to expect when I began reading A Study in Sherlock. The tagline is “stories inspired by the Holmes Canon”, so I was thinking the stories would be about Sherlock Holmes.

Which would have been fine. It’s been a while since I read one of the original Holmes stories, but I quite enjoyed them when I did. Whether anyone could write a Holmes story that way Arthur Conan Doyle could – well, that I wasn’t too sure about. Still, I was willing to find out.

I was pleasantly surprised, though, to discover that while the stories in A Study in Sherlock have to do with Sherlock Holmes, very few of them actually had Holmes as a character in the story. And those that did feature Holmes himself were written in a different style than the original Holmes stories.

Since my latest, greatest media indulgence is the BBC series Sherlock, it was also refreshing to find that several of the stories were set in the present day. (But no, not with Holmes as an actual character … )

I didn’t like every story in the anthology, but really, that’s the nature of an anthology, isn’t it? With all the different writing styles showcased, there are bound to be a few that you might not like. Since I have no problems with not finishing something that doesn’t catch my attention, when I came across one that didn’t really suit me as a reader, I just quickly flipped over to the next story.

There were also a few stories in which the whole Holmes connection rather escaped me, but on reading the little author blurb at the end of the story, usually there was reference to how the story was very similar to one of the original Holmes stories.

I did enjoy most of the stories, though. When I finished the last one, it was with regret that there weren’t a few more to read.

My favorites? It’s hard to choose, but I’d have to say:

“As to ‘An Exact Knowledge of London”’” by Tony Broadbent. Broadbent is a new-to-me author, but after reading this story, I’ve put his novel The Smoke (about a roguish Cockney cat burglar in postwar London who gets blackmailed into working for M15 and is then trained by Ian Fleming) on my to-read list. I think the thing that appealed to me most about this story was how Broadbent integrated the pop culture aspect of Holmes into the narrative.

“The Case of Death and Honey” by Neil Gaiman. Gaiman’s tale was one of the few in the book that actually featured Holmes as a character, but it’s not told in the style of Doyle. It is pure Gaiman – imaginative and thought provoking. Very enjoyable.

“A Triumph of Logic” by Galey Lynds and John Sheldon. I admit, I figured out whodunnit soon after we visited the scene of the crime, but what I liked about this one were the main characters, Judge Boothby and Artie. Sheldon is working on his first suspense novel which will feature these two characters, so I’m adding this to my to-watch-for list (or rather, I would, if I kept such a list. Which I really should.)

“The Eyak Interpreter”, by Dana Stabenow. This story features Stabenow’s Kate Shugak. The first Kate Shugak mystery, A Cold Day for Murder, has been sitting in my TBR pile for a while. After reading this story, I’m definitely moving it up near the top of the file. (By the way, the Kindle version of A Cold Day for Murder I’ve linked to above is currently free.) The short story is told from the perspective of Johnny (I’m not sure what relation he is to Kate), a teenager who’s in Anchorage and blogging about it as part of a school assignment. A fun way to structure a story.

I liked several of the other stories too. For example, Jacqueline Winspear’s “A Spot of Detection” had a nice, unexpected twist at the end that made me smile. Charles Todd’s “The Case That Holmes Lost” has a very fun premise – someone is suing Sherlock Holmes, the fictional character.

All in all, this was a great read. And it’s resparked my interest in reading mystery short stories; when I was in my 20s, I read a lot of mystery and science fiction short stories, and reading this anthology I was reminded how really nice it is to sit down with a well-written short story.

I’ve also decided to reread the original Holmes stories. I put a hold on Leslie Klinger’s The New Annotated Sherlock Holmes, so hopefully I’ll be able to get a start on that soon!

Related posts:

1. The Boy Sherlock Holmes: Eye of the Crow, by Shane Peacock
2. The Lineup, edited by Otto Penzler
3. Review: Death Perception, by Victoria Laurie
4. Review: The Case of the Missing Marquess, by Nancy Springer
5. Review: The Mysterious Mr. Quin, by Agatha Christie

Pinterest has really changed the way we eat around here. Now that it’s so handy – and visually appealing! – for me to bookmark a recipe, I’m not just reading through various food blogs and occasionally hollering to Ward (wherever he might be), “What do you think about this dish?”.

No, not at all. Now I have a routine. I pin all the recipes that entice me to Pinterest, and I email the ones I really, really want to try to Ward.

It’s been working out so well. I’d say at least two out of the four to five meals Ward cooks each week have been influenced by Pinterest (the other two nights he teaches, which means I haul out the ramen noodle packets).

Here’s a sampling of some of the lovely dishes I’ve had the chance to taste the past couple of weeks because of my new Pinterest routine. (Click on the image if you’d like to repin the recipe, and click on the link to get to the recipe itself.)

Dark Chocolate Guinness Cupcakes with Bailey’s Buttercream

Can you say, ooh la la? That’s right. Bailey’s buttercream. Yum!

This was yesterday’s lucky find – I was simply delighted when I saw that Megan had shared her recipe for Dark Chocolate Guinness Cupcakes with Bailey’s Buttercream. I was even happier when Ward came back from shopping yesterday afternoon and pulled out a small bottle of Bailey’s and a six-pack of Guinness.

He whipped a batch of these up last night after dinner; the whole place smelled just divine. Chocolate and Bailey’s. What a wonderful combination! And the taste? Delightful!

Braised Tofu and Radish

I really like tofu, so when I came across this recipe for Braised Tofu and Radish at Beyond Kimchee I knew it would be perfect for our table – I’m constantly on the lookout for recipes that Ward can veganize but which I’d still enjoy after the veganization process (which usually means either tofu or mushrooms are involved).

This dish did not disappoint. In fact, it was one of this past week’s hits. It’s a simple dish that’s so very tasty. Ward omitted the shrimp and used vegetarian oyster sauce, but the veganizing substitutions didn’t hurt the recipe at all. We had no leftovers that night!

Manhattan Clam Chowder

Clams are one of my favourite foods – I have very fond childhood memories of driving up to Seattle, walking on the beach and snacking on steamed clams with melted butter. Manhattan clam chowder is one of my favourite clam dishes, but around here it’s very difficult to find a restaurant that serves it; most of them serve Boston clam chowder, which I find just a little too creamy (I like my soups on the lighter, brothier side).

So I was thrilled when I came across this recipe for Manhattan clam chowder. Our grocery store didn’t have any fresh clams that day, so Ward bought a bag of frozen (in-shell) clams as a substitute, along with the cans of baby clams and clam juice. He made a big pot of chowder for me, so I was set for lunch for the rest of this week. This version was actually better than any I’ve had in a restaurant, because it is simply filled to the brim with clams!

Curried Chicken Pot Pie

I’m not really much of a curry person, but both Ward and our older son Sean enjoy curry. So last weekend Ward made a veganized version of this Curried Chicken Pot Pie for himself, along with the regular version for Sean. I got a cute little version, so I could have a taste (Ward made me something else that night, but for the life of me, I can’t remember what it was.).

Both of them really enjoyed it, so I’m sure it will be on the menu again soon!

Mini Fish Tacos

These delightful Mini Fish Tacos from Very Culinary were delicious: chunks of lightly spiced white fish mixed with a cooling slaw. So tasty! We had some egg roll wrappers on hand so Ward used them instead of wonton wrappers; next time around, we’ll go with the wonton wrappers the recipe calls for, because the egg roll wrappers were a bit too big and the result was on the doughy side.

But that didn’t detract from the delicious filling! I had seconds, just minus the fun little cups. Lovely!

I’ve been loving all these new food adventures showing up on our table because of Pinterest. What about you? Have you tried recipes you’ve pinned on Pinterest? Are you finding a greater variety of dishes as a result?

Enjoy this foodie post? For more food-related fun, check out this week’s Weekend Cooking, hosted each week by Candace at Beth Fish Reads!

Related posts:

1. Pinning My TBR (And Other Fun Bookish Ways to Use Pinterest)
2. Weekend Cooking: The Best Roast Chicken
3. Addictive! Maple Bacon Cupcakes
4. Saturday Ramblings: Hollywood, Tosca, and Americas Test Kitchen
5. Weekend Cooking: What We’ve Been Up To in the Kitchen This Week

It’s Wednesday, and I can’t think of a thing to blog about – so I’m falling back on the old tried and true. Random!

I’m a Happy Information Junkie This Week.

I finally figured out a way to keep an eye on all the links and fun things I find interesting online, without feeling information overload! And it’s all due to my iPad. Last week I spent a bit of time testing out various apps and I’ve now settled on some essential ones that have made my info-surfing life so much easier.

On the agenda: I’ll be writing up a post about the apps I’m now using. (Always nice to know what I’ll be writing about!).

And I’m Sharing My Finds on Twitter.

Those of you who follow me on Twitter (and … ahem … if you’re not, here’s the link to my Twitter profile) might have noticed I’m doing something a little differently these days. I’ve been tweeting links to all the stuff I find terribly amusing or interesting or just plain mind-boggling.

I can’t help it. Seriously, some of this stuff is just too good not to share!

Sniff … Reamde Has to Go Back to the Library.

So I’ve had that big brick of a book, Reamde, by Neal Stephenson, for almost three weeks now. And I haven’t touched it. It’s just such a BIG book, so every time I look at it, I think to myself, I really need to make sure I have a nice chunk of time to curl up with it.

And of course, that never happened. And since this is a relatively new book, I can’t renew it, because there are lots of other eager readers just waiting to get their hot little hands on it.

Sigh. I hate when this kind of thing happens. I actually have it in audio, too, but I already know it will take me even longer to listen to it than it would for me to read it so I might as well just add myself back to the “hold” queue at the library.

The Art of Letter Writing

Okay, so no-one’s going to be too surprised that I wasn’t able to stick to writing a letter a day last month. No, not even though it was a short month (although with that leap day, it really wasn’t that much shorter …).

But I had some good excuses. Like the flu going through the family, which just about wiped out two weeks of the month.

Despite not writing a letter a day last month, I’ve been well and truly bitten by the handwritten letter bug. I’ve enjoyed getting letters from people, and I’ve enjoyed writing the letters I did write. So I’ve decided to just keep on doing this indefinitely.

Not, of course, a letter a day. But several a month. It’s going to be fun!

The Everyday Writer

Last bit of random for now. I’ve been having a hard time getting back into a writing routine. And then yesterday, I came across this blog post by Seth Godin.

Writer’s block isn’t hard to cure.

Just write poorly. Continue to write poorly, in public, until you can write better.

(The emphasis is mine.)

I decided to take this advice to heart, and last night, I created The Everyday Writer. And this morning, I wrote my first post. My plan is to choose a different writing prompt generator every day (if you click through, you’ll see I have several of them in the sidebar), and then write a little something. Something short, that’s fictional, but Not of the Utmost Importance (the very opposite of the way I think of my writing-in-progress as Being of the Utmost Importance – which, by the way, is one sure-fire way to drum up a bad case of writer’s block).

And I’m adding this into my Wednesday Random because I’ve got to fulfill the “in public” part of the whole shebang.

So those are my latest bits of random! What random bits and pieces do you have going on these days?

Related posts:

1. Saturday Random
2. Some Thursday Random
3. Some Twitter/post glitches …

I was doing so well with my DIY planner. I really, really was.

And then the flu hit our household.

I suddenly found myself three weeks behind. And since my planner is a DIY one, this meant totally blank pages in my Moleskine. Because, you see, the planner-plan-of-attack requires me to create a new weekly page every Sunday.

It’s that weekly page that I fill in every week. Only, I can’t fill it in if I haven’t taken the time to draw in the actual weekly slots.

Some things I’m realizing:

1. I’m not a monthly calendar type of person.

When I first began planning out my planner, I decided I’d start with twelve two-page spreads, each spread displaying a monthly calendar. Here’s my calendar for March:

Do you see the problem here?

Yes, I hand-drew twelve calendar spreads. Yes, this is the one for March. The problem is, today is February 29 (happy leap day, by the way!). Which means tomorrow it will be March.

And my March calendar page is BLANK.

That’s not because I don’t have stuff going on. I’ve got deadlines, appointments, activities and even a couple of days away in Niagara Falls scheduled for March. They’re just not mentioned on my calendar, that’s all.

2. I may/may not be a weekly agenda kind of person.

The jury’s still out on this one. First, I need to actually draw out my weekly calendar page. Which I haven’t done for the past three weeks.

But when I do draw out my weekly calendar spread, I don’t do too badly with it – as long as I remember to take a moment each day to record something in the day’s designated space. Anything will do.

Here’s my first week of the year:

I didn’t do such a great job of recording a bit of something about each day, but I did remember to circle any daily goals that I’d met. This first week, I had five daily goals listed at the top of each day’s box:  write, create, meditate, exercise and read. In the lower right-hand box, I listed my weekly goals. I circled each day in which I met a goal.

Three weeks into the whole “I’m using a planner!” thing, I’d gotten better at remembering to jot something down each week:

I also realized I was going to be recording a big FAIL when it came to daily exercise as a goal, so I stuck exercise into the weekly goal area instead. My daily goals were now: write, create, read and meditate. Much, much better.

3. But when I hit a glitch, the whole planning thing falls apart.

So things were going pretty well. And then the inevitable happened. One Sunday night (February 3, actually), I forgot to draw out the next week’s spread.

Later that week, my oldest came home from university, sick with the flu. That weekend, I forgot to draw out the next week’s spread again.

And then I got sick with the flu. Followed by Dylan. Then Ward. Then I got sick again. By then we were into my older son’s Reading Week at university. He came back home, and was sick again.

So here we were. On Monday, I opened up my planner, after three weeks of non-use, and thought: “This is not working …”

But the blank, gridded page looked SO enticing.

And I found myself madly jotting things down. Ideas, connections between ideas, more ideas, quotes, little doodles. It was like a mini-explosion.

4. The Everything Book: in which I do a little bit of everything

I think this will work.

I’m going to try to remember to draw in my weekly spread on the weekend – mainly because I do like being able to look back and see a little note about what I did on any given day. It’s a bit like capturing a daily memory, and I like that.

But mostly I’m going to jot down ideas, doodle, write in reminders, and just fill all the other blank pages with all the stuff in my life.

Not quite a smashbook, but almost. But with a planner element to it all.

5. The whole goals thing.

I was doing well. And then I wasn’t. So it’s time to get back on the saddle again. Now I’m thinking about trying Seinfeld’s productivity secret (Don’t Break the Chain).

I figure, it should be easy enough to give each daily goal a spread in my planner – a spread that will cover the entire year. And I’ll set my intention: Don’t break the chain.

That way, even if I get lazy and decide not to do a weekly spread one week, I can still track my goals.

Mind you, it’s usually when I get lazy that my goals fall to the wayside …

Do you use a planner? What type of planner do you use? Do you write in it every day? Do you take it everywhere with you, or does it sometimes sit around gathering dust? And how are you doing with your 2012 goals?

Related posts:

1. My Mid-January Goals Update
2. Welcome, 2012!

There’s one side benefit of the flu – there’s lots of time for reading. As a result, I had a marvelous reading week last week – it’s amazing how many books you can read while soothing your child’s fevered brow!

The Snowman, by Jo Nesbo

I’m pleased that I finally got around to reading Jo Nesbo’s The Snowman. It’s been on my TBR list for a while, and I’ve read so many reviews raving about it. What a great read – so many twists!

Oslo in November. The first snow of the season has fallen. A boy named Jonas wakes in the night to find his mother gone. Out his window, in the cold moonlight, he sees the snowman that inexplicably appeared in the yard earlier in the day. Around its neck is his mother’s pink scarf.

Hole suspects a link between a menacing letter he’s received and the disappearance of Jonas’s mother—and of perhaps a dozen other women, all of whom went missing on the day of a first snowfall. As his investigation deepens, something else emerges: he is becoming a pawn in an increasingly terrifying game whose rules are devised—and constantly revised—by the killer.

I did have my suspicions about who the murderer was, but they were just mild suspicions; I was never sure. There were so many questions I didn’t have answers for. I like reading mysteries where I feel this way – at the end, there’s a sense of “aha! I was on the right track”, but you don’t lose any of the enjoyment of the read the way you do if the solution is so obvious to everyone but the main detective character. Very enjoyable read.

The Elvis Cole Series, by Robert Crais

I’ve also seen a lot of reviews recently raving about Taken, by Robert Crais. Taken is the latest book in the Elvis Cole series, and while the reviews had me eager to read the book, many of the reviewers talked about how the book was very much about the relationship between Elvis Cole and Joe Pike.

Since I’d never read any of the books in the series, I thought it might be a good idea to read some of the earlier books first; it just seemed to me that Taken would have even more impact if I was already familiar with the characters.

So last week I read:

And I’m very glad I did. The series reminds me a little of Robert Parker’s Spencer series, but grittier, with harder, darker edges.

I started with Stalking the Angel, the second book in the series, and enjoyed it thoroughly; it was a little slow to start but Elvis Cole is such an engaging character I found myself willing to put up with the slow start.

Bradley Warren has lost a very valuable thirteenth-century Japanese manuscript, the Hagakure, and hires Elvis Cole to recover it. Elvis and Joe Pike search through Los Angeles’ Little Tokyo and the nest of the notorious Japanese mafia, known as the yakuza.

Next up was The Last Detective, which definitely started off with a bang. It was an intriguing storyline, and even though I figured out what was happening before Cole and Pike did, that didn’t make the read any less enjoyable.

P.I. Elvis Cole’s relationship with attorney Lucy Chenier is strained. Then the unthinkable happens. While Lucy is away on business and her ten-year-old son Ben is staying with Elvis, the boy vanishes without a trace. When the kidnappers call, it’s not for ransom, but for a promise to punish Cole for past sins he claims he didn’t commit. With the LAPD wrestling over the case, and the boy’s estranged father attempting to take control of the investigation, Cole vows to find Ben first. But Cole’s partner, Joe Pike, knows more about this case than he has said. Pike lives in a world where dangerous men commit crimes beyond all reckoning. Now, one of those men is alive and well in L.A.—and calling Elvis Cole to war. . . .

From there I read The Monkey’s Raincoat, the first book in the series (as you can see, I have no problems reading a series out of order …!). Another very enjoyable read. I particularly liked witnessing Ellen Lang’s transformation.

Ellen Lang walks into Cole’s Disney-Deco office and hires Elvis to find her husband and son. Elvis and Joe search through Hollywood leads them to a world of drugs, sex and murder.

The best thing about coming in on a long-running series late in the game is having a whole lot of good reading ahead of you. Right now, Lullaby Town, L.A. Requiem and Free Fall are waiting for me on the Overdrive app on my iPad.

The Duncan Kincaid/Gemma James Series, by Deborah Crombie

All that downtime also gave me a chance to catch up on the Duncan Kincaid/Gemma James Scotland Yard series by Deborah Crombie.

In No Mark Upon Her, the latest in the series, the victim is Rebecca Meredith, a high-ranking Met officer who’s also making a comeback as a rower in contention for the next Olympic games. As always in this series, there are several enjoyable twists, and the secondary characters are as fully fleshed as the main series characters.

I then turned to Water Like a Stone, an older book in the series, in which Kincaid and James take their blended family to spend Christmas with Kincaid’s parents, in the town of Nantwich. The mystery begins with the discovery of an infant’s mummified corpse within the walls of a building that Kincaid’s sister is renovating. Another murder occurs, and Kincaid and James find themselves assisting the local police in putting together all the pieces.

Both reads were very satisfactory, and I’m looking forward to reading the other books in the series that are still on my TBR.

So that was my “mysterious week” (of reading) (well, actually, it was more like ten days). Not that I’d welcome the flu again, but at least there was a silver lining!

Related posts:

1. Book Review: In a Dark House, by Deborah Crombie
2. Review: Kissed a Sad Goodbye, by Deborah Crombie
3. Book Review: Rough Weather, by Robert B. Parker
4. Review: The Mysterious Mr. Quin, by Agatha Christie
5. Friday Finds: A Fantastical Week