This isn’t a long book. I read it in two days, and it’s leaving an impression. While we’re thinking about AI and the impact on our lives, this book attempts to think about what we choose to do with that information, rather than simply what AI is capable of.

Yes, there are studies about AI being able to make humans dumber. There are increasing abilities to try to take on our creative tasks. Plus a seeming effect to make humans into the product of whatever is most predictable. This book is not to discredit the long distance that AI has come in the previous years, but also to talk about our choices.

I found the quizzes at the end of each chapter engaging. Patience and narcissism, distractions and bias all flavor our contact with AI. The algorithms are meant to predict better things to claim our distraction. We fall into it by allowing our time to be taken up by social media, movies, music, and anything else that can be predicted by such things.

While I have cultivated patience as an author, with knowledge that novels are long endeavors and possibly longer response times if I send them out to slush piles, I see my children and my peers who have not worked through such difficult things as very relatable. Digital narcissism is hard for me, as one who isn’t good at promoting myself (hand me someone else’s book that I love and I’ll pitch it to anyone gladly instead of my own), yet I can understand how to fall prey to that one, too. The bias that humans have is baked into our creations with AI, and we can find ways to rise above it or to fall into the trap of believing that there’s no way to get better.

I read a lot about AI. I like learning, I’m curious, and I have no one telling me what to research or try to understand on any given day. I struggle with using AI because of the environmental effects, and how much a person can stop thinking critically (like not double-checking for AI hallucinations?) by using social media, the algorithms, and simply getting by. However, I’m also an artist, and the promise of AI is to connect to data sets that are beyond my own collecting, and to somehow harness learning that it would take more than a lifetime to accumulate on my own. I do not want AI to create my art, though I would love to find a way to make it do all the mundane tasks for me instead, especially if we could make it environmentally friendly. (Who said AI could have clean water but humans can’t?)

Sometimes reading a book like this can make me feel alone- I am always trying to learn more, to figure out how the world works or what I/we can do to be better. The idea that this makes humans unique, and that we should lean into what we’re doing well is refreshing. It can be heavy knowledge to think that kids in school aren’t learning critical thinking because they’re using too many digital devices, that the algorithms never let them be bored to find out their own passions, and that the damage cannot be undone.

I’m curious about the idea that we’re all digital narcissists, though. At least, heavy users of social media seem to be, by giving out more information than most of us might usually be privy to, by accessing their page. This is tough, because at some point we want to have some privacy and yet we need to share information so that we can stop the stigma of many conditions. Maybe that’s what we hope to achieve by oversharing our life details.

The author wants humans to be more what makes humans great – using ingenuity, creativity, and cohesion to do marvelous things. We went to the moon with when computers were less advanced than our current calculators. A woman who began programming had printed out her code and it stood taller than her head – I think it was for the lunar module. We created so many things, and yet we also created AI, algorithms, and the digital landscape that we can lose ourselves in if we’re not careful. This book makes me think about how not just I, but also the we in humanity, can decide whether to allow ourselves to become more human or more predictable by how we interact with digital devices and their AI and algorithmic cohort. I’m ready for this kind of hope.

My full-time job took a lot of adjustments, and I’m getting used to the fourth position and the fourth timespan of the past year. Luckily I like the one I’m on. I think I might have this spot for a while. It’s gotten in the way of my daily writing habit, and I’ve been giving myself grace to get used to it, and working to write some short stories and not pressure myself into novels at the moment.

I did try a novel in October/November. But it didn’t catch this time. Maybe next time. Next time might happen in the next couple months. I might also be finding a new house, so don’t hold your breath. I’m not. Taking the yoga advice- breathe.

Last fall also marked my yoga teaching for 20 years. Feels like a long time, but maybe that’s just because I have taken yoga through many changes in my life. It’s been with me through 4 houses in 4 cities/towns. So if you see me adjusting more to finding what works in life, it’s because I threw myself a huge turn-everything-upside-down party and I’m still finding which way is up.

I’m still lucky though. I’ve never felt compelled to keep doing something just because that’s the way it’s always been done. I still prefer to share joy but I’m not afraid of awkward or difficult conversations. May you be so lucky in your life, too.

It’s not really a trilogy, or I would be happy. And then my scope creep friend enters the conversation, and I’m done for. Really. Truly. Done for.

Because tonight I realized I needed an extra book. It’s not that I need another book. But I desperately want to write it. And I think I need to level up again.

I think a couple of my characters, Audrey in particular, want to be activists. Audrey wants to run around the galaxy freeing the oppressed and creating new havens for the displaced. Audrey finds more trouble to get into than I can keep her out of, and I’m worried she’s going to drag her friends into scary stuff they might not survive. Maybe I should say they won’t all survive. I already knew that, though, but this escalates it.

Isn’t it fun to write? Isn’t it fun to have bigger and better ideas as you go, and trying to keep up with all of them while also doing the other things life demands?

I also figure if Audrey’s getting into trouble, Ichek is not far behind. I’m almost positive I’m going to have an entire Zoo War book on my hands and be helplessly blocking all those movements. Must be time to ask all those veterans I work with how that might go down. Call it a group project and don’t mention aliens… I can’t see how that can go badly. (Ahahahaha they already think I’m weird.)

Sometimes I think of how some male writers in the past had wives or mothers to make them food and to take care of the chores, and I imagine what I could do with that kind of time. Pardon me, but it’s time to rescue the poor kitty from my son again, referee yet another disagreement between the kids, and somehow make sure everyone eats enough before we try to sleep. Is it time to sleep yet? If it isn’t, please lie to me.

I’ve been noticing it, so it might also be changing. Change is like that. You see it, you decide whether or not to keep it. Self-awareness can be that trigger for a new habit, or to break an old one.

Not everyone works that way. I notice, and I watch them. I was gifted Harriet the Spy when I was about seven years old, and I loved that book. I think that might have been a reason why I couldn’t be found without a notebook for, like, well, all my life. Paper and a pen are usually at hand, even when I have moved many of my writing activities into more digital formats.

That, at least, is not a habit I’m trying to break. Paper and pen are useful, even though we have hand-held computing devices barely imaginable in my childhood. A smart phone is one thing, and paper allows imagination in an entirely different way.

I read this meme on Holly Jahangiri’s FB page, and it’s spot-on. And then I wonder, we take away the humanity of so many people through stereotypes, slurs, and villainization. Yet we give it to Alix AI as if it deserves it when other humans don’t. There’s a story in this for me somewhere, but it hasn’t come out yet.

Do you wonder where chaos comes from? I do. Often, but I’m also wondering where order erupts from and why so many people think it’s better. Maybe the reason lies with logic and that they think they can deduce what’s coming.

Maybe the cleanliness idea to find things is just too ingrained.

While I’ve been merrily turning my life upside down this year, I’ve struggled to keep up things like my blog. That’s a thing most of you have witnessed before, and thanks for sticking with me.

I’ve been listening to the audio version of the October Daye series by Seanan McGuire, performed by Mary Robinette Kowal. A great thing about October Daye is she changes through the series, she finds her limits in the books, and they change as she does.

I was also listening to some of the novellas that were nominated for the Nebulas, and I hope to get to the novels, too.

One of my great struggles in this time of chaos is the charging cord for my tablet, already replaced once. There are specific positions where it charges, partially charges, or just decides to not charge at all. Finally broke down and ordered a new one, since there’s nothing else wrong with the tablet at all. Plus- my kid keeps borrowing it when she leaves her charging cable for her school chromebook somewhere else.

I started reading Book 2 (the last novel I drafted) but I haven’t started editing it yet. It’s on my horizon, though, as well as a new short story that keeps buzzing in my head during my new job. Other changes include two lovely cats to share my space and make me laugh. Yes, their names together are Q&A and I adore them both. Pretty sure Q thought I was completely nuts when I told him I brought him a new friend home last week but he’s come around to my point of view.

For those of you who’ve known me for a while, yes – cats were exactly what’s been missing from my life. I’ve always been fond of void kitties and I’m intent to spoil these two. I should add pictures of them to my Patreon for good measure.

I’ve had a lot of thoughts about resolutions. I haven’t put many of them down on paper yet, and that’s because I’m just ready for chaotic changes. That sounds a little crazy, and that’s going to be just fine. It means I have ideas and it’ll take multiple steps to get there, but I need to keep my eyes forward.

Stay tuned for the ensuing chaos. It’s going to be a wild ride.

I’ve been writing a lot of words over the years. I started working on novels almost as soon as I got out of college (and of course there were pieces of novels before, but I’d never finished a longer work before The Art of Science).

One of the bad habits I got into was not finishing them at the time I wrote them. Maybe it was neurodivergence, and maybe it was just not understanding how the editing process worked.

Don’t Tell Your Mother was originally written in 2009, the year my daughter was born. I took time to edit, to send to different readers (and I also read for them), and eventually I had a book.

My step-dad told me when I was young that nobody writes anything worth reading until they’re fifty, or maybe (strongly stressed maybe) forty. I was published for the first time at thirty – and I wanted to prove him wrong. That I wrote things worth reading. At least I did prove it to myself and others along the way.

However, there are a lot of things I understand better now. So many authors can’t support themselves on their writing because the world is tough and a steady income is needed. So many authors are busy with children and writing is very time consuming and we can’t all make that time on top of a family and a full-time job. So many of us need health benefits so we can’t just quit a full-time job with insurance and hope our written words will carry us through.

While it feels like this book took me a very long time, it also sat for long periods where I didn’t touch it. Some projects are like that – and we don’t always have time to confront a project day after day when we’re so busy with the rest of our lives. Plus, I had this idea that I needed to get out – and I’m also working on it now – that had my attention from the beginning (2006). The problem was I knew I wasn’t a good enough writer to tackle it then, but I think I am now. The multitude of years behind that project shows how time changes the project, and how I look at it now isn’t how I imagined it in the beginning.

I’ve had a few of these ideas over the years that just stick with me, and I’m cleaning them up and doing my best to get them out now. Waiting isn’t making them better, but it does make me want to rewrite the entire thing again. One problem is the next few in the queue are SFF and in my own created worlds – problem only because they’re involved projects and I need to keep them all clear in my head. But also – it just means every project I am bringing out only makes me more excited to share the next one. Stay tuned.

Amazon has a ‘temporarily out of print’ on the Don’t Tell Your Mother page- try Barnes and Noble or BAM. Or send me a message- I am due to buy more books and I could sign and send them direct.

You’re wondering how I know I made two mistakes? One’s easy, I had a character interacting with the crew and then said she didn’t come out of her quarters until the third day. OOPS! That seems easily fixed, except that I had my characters focusing on the wrong thing during the two days before that.

Also, I had carefully mapped out my stars and the time it would take to visit each destination in this book, and I flipped the two at the end, which gave them a lot longer to focus on the wrong thing- and not enough time to struggle home by the deadline.

It’s funnier because I had a friend read (listen in her car) an earlier version and she didn’t catch it, either, which just goes to remind me why we need more sets of eyes (and often a cooling-off period) to create an amazing book.

As I’m changing these bits, I’m thinking a lot about what I know will happen as well as what the characters are experiencing at the time. I’m reminded of all the role-playing games where players don’t get to see what the DM has going on behind the screen – surprises happen despite our best efforts. I’m hoping that final piece comes together this week. I know I’m close but it’s not close enough!

I’m glad I tailored this first book the way I did, and took away a bit of the complexity. Sadly I love big complex story lines. I love the struggle of getting the pieces together in an outline and then on the draft pages. I do not love how long it takes me to get a finished project. What I tell myself is that if I keep working on it, I’ll find the process – and I know it is getting better.

In the first book, the mechanic (Uehe) keeps upgrading the ship and causing delays. Lorelei (captain) asks. “Uehe, how much time do you need by for the life support? Best and worst case?”

Uehe smoothed his fur. “Best case, end of the day. Worst case never.”

“Never?” Lorelei sat down on the bench behind her.

While she takes this pretty well, the mechanic gets everyone off the ship until he fixes it. It gives them time to see this planet (or at least the city they landed in) before they’re back to their breakneck pace. There’s nothing quite like a deadline that you’re not sure you can make but you need to or everything gets much worse.

Even the NaNoWriMo site has a link that says, “Now What?”

For me, I know what I’m going to be doing. I’m translating this into a workable schedule. I spent an amount of time that I felt I could continue into December. I’ve been working to update my media presence and I have one more book in the queue to be available in December. I averaged about 4000 words per day during NaNo, plus I was working to preplan the next stage.

As for the series I’m working on, I have Book One, Novella, Book Two, and where it ends I have to think. I had Book Two taking on several things that didn’t actually happen as I thought it would, and so Book Three may be on the horizon, and it might have a few other things happening in the middle. I need to add at least one more novella to the saga because the villains of Book One changed, and they give another layer to where the book actually ended up. I also have several other pieces I could write, and from here I’d need to take a few minutes and write out the parts I want to write at the moment. Book Two was supposed to have a brilliant mad scientist involved, and so far he’s been absent. The other thing I need to remember is that a bunch of relationships changed during this project and that will shape how the next piece falls out. Mr. Mad Scientist Dude might just get his own novella/novel alongside his hero, who came up more often because of his own great and terrible creations.

This is the joy of writing, editing, and discovering. This is also one reason I’m so happy running around the galaxy with these not-so-intrepid adventurers. There’s simply no end. Maybe because I don’t want it to end. I just can’t wait to share all of this with you!

It’s weird to have an outline that I’m following and still discover so much in my draft. Isn’t it? The passengers have a party of ten and outnumber the crew. It’s gonna be a long ride, folks. Here’s hoping we come out the other side without my MC ordering all the passengers murdered. That would definitely put a kink in her plans to get paid.

She replied immediately that she wished she could create worlds.

That left me thoughtful. I’ve created many worlds. Some overlap part of this world, but many are second-world type settings that have little in common with our ‘real’ world. I’ve gone on stellar and planetary math quests, researched deep rabbit holes about life and items like it, and often find myself having to make up entire swaths of items to answer a question or to allow a character to do what I know they require for that story.

My first second-world fantasy idea came in high school. I never did write that series, but I had ideas about it. Eventually I abandoned it because high school is full of people who will listen about your ideas even if you overtalk it and then don’t spend that time writing it, and I did high school and college for a semester – and in the margins you could find my notes for this novel that hasn’t ever become more than ruminations in my head.

I’d say maybe one day, but I’ve created so many others that I may never get back to it.

I looked at a list today, of created projects that are in limbo for the moment since I’ve been working so hard on this Space Western that I am determined to get out and publish. That list doesn’t include the novel I thought I was going to write in high school/college, and it already had 9 projects listed. I didn’t even look that hard, just to projects that had been drafted or mostly fleshed out and ready to draft.

Ransom, Creator of Worlds But They Might Not Be Funny Ones.

What’s your writer tag? What’s the tag you wish you could write? I do believe that most of these great things are like muscles that can be strengthened or atrophied over time whether we use them or not, but there are many pieces that come naturally or they don’t.

The good news for novels is that the one I’ve been struggling with my antagonists is maybe, finally, coming into line with what I want and need it to be. Then it’ll be on to the next one. The really good news is that I feel after all of these acts of creation- the characters, the plots, the settings, and the themes- that I am getting much better at this than I used to be. It’s a tough road, but I still enjoy it.

https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/paradise-icon-anthology-2023-ransom-noble/1144201572?ean=9781088258385

Big Sigh. I managed. I’ll have another one out next month, I think. After that, time to wait and see. I’ve said before that the Art of Science had a big learning curve for me. It was the first novel, so that was bound to happen. However, the Paradise Icon Anthology has just as much to teach me because I keep trying to do different things in the formatting. It feels great to have accomplished this much, though.

Can’t wait to see what else is in store. You remember how I repeat that phrase sometimes, “All knowledge is worth having”? (Jacqueline Carey) It’s true, and I appreciate the times when a project culminates into something tangible. I feel like that’s difficult for a lot of writing projects.

ICON was last weekend, and it was fun. Never turn down an opportunity to hang with your writing people, and it’s definitely a bonus when they feel the same about me. If only the novel I’m working on would come together as well as the con did. Just keep writing…

It’s a beautiful bit of text, and I’m going to hope I get it right enough. It’s tough to think that I am going to be needing one of these for every book. Marketing and sales are not my strong suit, so this is all a learning experience.

I remembered my synopsis that I crafted so carefully when I thought I would send this book to publishers, and the key to that back text is in there. I took the previously published one in a new direction because I think it’ll be a better representation of what’s inside.

Will it work for me? Fingers crossed. Some of these front and back matter parts of a book aren’t the most fun to assemble, but it gives me the feeling that I am accomplishing good things and when I look at it now I’m better able to craft them into what I think they should be.

And my random doomscrolling habit paused, and I got out the story I’ve not managed to finish for a bit. After that, I chose another. It got me through most of the school day with a lot more focus intact.

It’s Thursday, and I’ve listened to most of the symphonies of Beethoven this week. It’s like a reminder starts in my head that I have things to do (it might be laundry) and suddenly I have more of an ability to start those tasks, and a much better chance to finish them (ignore the laundry, it’s never done).

Today I found the end of the story that’s been haunting me for a few months. My brain turned over the parts that weren’t working until finally the story did work. It wasn’t as I originally intended, but I think it’s much closer to where it needs to be as a story.

There will be more change to come, but these things make me thoughtful.

I don’t know why I feel like I don’t fit in at WisCon. I stick mostly with my small group, and I see others getting along easily with new groups. I haven’t figured out my struggle. I think it has more to do with me than WisCon, and I’ve noticed I’m a bit quieter in other places as well.

I ran one event this weekend – the SignOut Party. Many authors come together and sign their books and it’s a good place to say good-bye. I got asked to help last year, and along with the biggest reason for WisCon not happening next year, no one wanted to help (or they do, but are unable because of Life). I’m okay running it by myself, especially after getting the hang of most of it last year, so all went decently. I changed one thing because of information I’d learned during the convention, and the authors impacted appreciated it a great deal.

Plans can change and it can be a good thing. Sometimes, like Saturday, I hold too much to a plan that cannot happen. It felt like everything that could go wrong, did, just for me. I need to remember more of that yoga that I teach, because being flexible isn’t just about bending into a pretzel. It’s also about rolling with whatever comes your way.

I was lucky, Saturday, that more than one friend reached out a hand (and one person I’d never met before) to remind me that changes can be better than the original idea. It’s a good thing to remember that the world can give you what you need even if you didn’t know what it was until it smacked you in the face.

(I missed my reading with my Paradise ICON people Friday night because I was under the weather Thursday night. I’m glad to recover to make it to the rest of the Con.)

Tonight I find myself back in my office, trying a new idea that occurs to me in snippets. It might be a book for my kids, or for their friends, or just that ideas that need to be in the world that weren’t when I was a kid. I have new signed books across my desk, and a fun hand lettered nameplate that I took home instead of recycling. I haven’t pinned down the main character yet, but I do hope to. Maybe it’ll be a short story instead of another novel.

Tomorrow, I have a short story and a couple other things to finish, then back to whatever this new thing is. Wish me luck.

I often stick to writing panels, but we (because nearly every panel I attended had another ICON friend with me) also attended several more metaphysical panels. Maybe every con has them.

However, this time I went, and I was between the ideas from yoga conferences past and science fiction conventions present. One of them allows a lot of latitude for not believing in the thing even if you go, and one of my writer friends realized his character would be very into what the panelist shared. The experience also made me question credentials. How do you get credentials in metaphysical pursuits? Also, what do those credentials mean?

Those are deep questions. It’s not just about metaphysical pursuits, either. All of my physical teaching modalities might fall under this, as well as all of my artistic ideas.

In engineering, a degree is necessary. There’s also a professional licensing board to stay current with your specialty. That was not always true – my father in law once practiced engineering from the school of hard knocks, but he started work in 1963 I think, so times do change.

When I started teaching yoga, I wasn’t certified. I was recommended by the current teacher, who had been through training. I was practicing every day and I was the most flexible person in the room, and I didn’t feel qualified at all. I took a training to learn more, and I studied hard. I taught while I did this, starting with what I had learned in the books I had purchased to create my home practice, and adding in the details from the training. I’ve gone through the same level of training at another time, and I may do it again. It seems redundant, but each time is a different experience and it covers new areas – even though the base material is supposed to be the same.

Writing has always been a passion. I’ve learned far more outside of school than I did in it, partly because I didn’t take that many writing classes. Not that I didn’t want to, but I didn’t often get the opportunity. I can’t tell you how many writing books I’ve read, how many sit on the shelf near my desk, nor how many times I’ve asked and received assistance on my creations. I’ve grown and changed over the years, and it’s amazing to see how my stories have transformed. I won’t say a degree on my wall wouldn’t have changed my progress, but I’d still be pursuing more.

Metaphysical things I have had interests in for years. Partly I find myself trying to ground things in science, and partly I know there are simply concepts which we cannot prove or disprove. I can take an introductory course or find a book in almost anything, though the practice of it day to day will teach me more. To what degree do we hold those who create the books? What about those who teach the courses?

As far as opinions, we’re allowed to disagree. One of the books I’m reading (Body Work by Melissa Febos) talks about how her wife allows more than one version of the truth in their home. Fascinating, since my house is often rooted in science and there are mathematical and scientific proofs running around. Yet human experience doesn’t follow that way, and our brains are far from perfect. We do remember things differently. What we mark in our journals may not be the experience that we speak of as the one that moved us years later. Those experiences are what make us who we are, and having an allowance for a memory to be different in two (or more) minds is a good one, if a difficult one to hold. It reminds me so much of one yoga teacher I had, and he often said, “The truth of the situation ends at our senses.” Our senses perceive something and our brain wants it to be a story. We look for patterns to match with the input we receive. Our brains lie to us. I feel that so keenly when I share something that my brain tells me even though I know it is false. (Depression sucks.)

So often in childhood, and in scientific pursuits, we call for proof, we want see credentials, and we want to trust in an entity to be able to certify or register professionals. There are many places where these things are mandatory, though there’s also the idea that some humans don’t mesh so you still need to search for a professional to work with. Not just anyone will do. And very lately I’ve been reminding myself, and finding comfort in the idea, that there is no proof. Maybe that is also the human experience, and something I should write about.

Something I will write about. Soon.

Each time these days become unscheduled blocks of time with chaotic family.

I have a book, and I’m somewhere in Chapter 3. I have a short story due soon, and my draft is open. I looked at it yesterday, and will again today. (Yesterday had two sick kids, but not sick enough for doctors?)

(okay, that was last Wednesday… We had Friday and Monday scheduled off, and we ended up with a weather day Thursday. Welcome to my six-day weekend of interruptions and forgetting what I was doing.)

I’m still writing. I did miss a couple days on my 750words, and my draft is still open for that short story. Life provides obstacles, and I keep going back to it. That’s the path of the writer. Wish me luck today, I got my pomodoro timer back out and I’m doing my best to focus in increments. It’s supposed to be very helpful with my ADHD brain. Brain might be resistant today, but if I get the ball rolling with it today it’s very likely the rest of the week will be more focused.

Now breathe with me. Inhale, exhale, repeat. Whatever else I am, yoga has made me focus on breathing. It helps, too.

My kids have been struggling with a couple things, and so I’ve been working to keep them in good places. Invisible illnesses are plaguing them, but I’m glad Wisconsin treats them as if they’re real. Iowa always felt like I had to fight whomever I was speaking with to be believed that this was a problem that I couldn’t handle alone – often even in my own struggle for mental health. I find myself calmer here, knowing that when I call and explain a problem I get someone who works to help me, rather than just making us wait for months (we’ve waited up to 5 before) to talk to someone.

Today I wrote a little bit. It wasn’t a lot, but it’s better than nothing. My 750words project didn’t count – that was me worrying about what’s to come from my children’s current struggles. It was letting out my fears and letting them go.

Then I just had to remind myself that I am a creative. While I am crocheting a project (or five, depending on how you look at it), I’m also writing. It doesn’t need to be all of the time, but I do need to focus occasionally to keep my goals in check. I have a lot of goals, and I’m slowly getting them organized for how I work.

I feel like I didn’t start off correctly this year. My family was sick last week (each of them had something different, and somehow I escaped without catching anything). Then I lost my story binder, found my story binder, and my son’s birthday is Friday. (He was also born on Friday the 13th, so this is a huge to-do in my home. We find these days quite lucky.)

Yesterday I finally put my fingers to the keyboard to start Book 2. I’m excited, but also keeping my sights on the coherent draft, rather than a completely perfect one. Coherent for me is the characters, settings, plots are in order, and not with all the extraneous things. Description is often an issue that I have to get later, but as much as I can I’m working to weave them together. It’s hard looking at these character names that I’ve already done an entire book with and remembering to describe them as if they haven’t met the reader, just in case they jump into the wrong book first. (Something my dad usually does. I am a completionist for book series, but he recently borrowed just Bk 2 of a trilogy from my bookshelf without ever having read the rest. That author has 4 series within that world, too. So I don’t know why just that one book seemed readable to him.)

It doesn’t matter that I didn’t get very far. I’m excited to start. I’m keen to make all the happenings and characters fit in with Book 1 and be sure that it makes sense. I know that like Book 1, Book 2 will have several places where it is more polished and less polished, depending on whether I had to draft it from scratch. I’m starting the very first page from scratch, since the draft I’m following had the plots of books 1 and 2 mixed together so completely it tried to masquerade as just one novel. Silly books. I will finish you properly.

Oddly, something told me I needed a quick project to finish, too, so I have a silk ribbon scarf crochet project I also started yesterday. I’m hoping it’ll get me through the cool 9th grade orientation we have tonight at the high school.

The result is that my bedroom has clothing everywhere in different piles- give away, modify, and keep. Then I also decided to rearrange where everything goes, because 1. my life has changed a lot since I decided those were the best places for things and 2. my style is still trending to something different than it was when I set it all up. Yes, those are two different things.

I did stop myself from removing everything from the third huge drawer in favor of making decisions on what was already out. I used to do yoga, martial arts, and other fitness classes six days a week. I knew which classes I would sweat through and I had everything at hand to come home, shower, change, and repeat. It was harder to change three times a day to fit that than to simply plan on activewear most days. Now I teach once a week for yoga, my martial arts classes are limited to three times a week, and I coach gymnastics on one night. It’s a much different pace than before, and I’m finding my stride with that.

With the bedroom completely torn up, I couldn’t remember where I’d stashed my binder, and when I was ready to start book 2 last night – I panicked. This morning, I found it. Bonus, I found a great place to stash things when I need them stashed. Just gotta remember where I put it next time.

Bring on book 2.

There’s a quiet time for me between Winter Solstice and the new calendar year. I often choose a new notebook and find some goals I’m ready to work on, whether they’re new or not. Writing always makes that list, no matter what I did the year before.

I joined 750words in 2011. In the last 12 years, I’ve written over 4 million words, and that’s just what was tracked on the site. There are usually blog posts, handwritten ideas, and all sorts of rewrites that aren’t tracked. I learned a lot. For 2022, it was around 252,000 words, and I didn’t write in March. (Mom died, and before that I traveled a lot to see her in hospice. It’s very difficult to give myself permission not to do my words, but this was the time it was appropriate.)

Within my projects during 2022, I had a story published. I have a couple stories out for consideration, and I managed a decent rewrite of the first book in the space western series. I also had a couple other ideas for extended series or novella length works. I’m hoping to continue the series and see how many others I can develop.

While I’m still working on my revised goals for the year, I’m going to start the second book rewrite as well as a short story this week (the one I didn’t finish by the 31 Dec deadline). I have my new notebook lined up, and I’m excited to see what happens with both of the projects. By the time I finish one of them, I’ll have another to work on. Some of you know my love of paper – so my project binder as well as this year’s notebook are below.

If he’d shown up tomorrow, husband was on track to work from home and be on top of everything he was doing. Instead, I got to sit in the mechanical room and chat with him. Most of these guys are good-natured. I learned a lot about them during my internship in college, where I worked for an HVAC controls company, so he’s literally the kind of guy I worked with back then, except it’s no longer the 90s and stuff.

So I ask him about what else he’s doing, and we commiserate about how birds get in the way. He’s never quite sure how a job will go. My husband prepped the water line that goes into the humidifier, and he had a large mechanical room to work in. The next job he’s going to today is in a closet, in a condo, and he’s not even sure water is hooked up in there. His height is another barrier – closets are not made for men over 6′ to comfortably work in generally. I hope he has good luck, but often not so much.

His manager called, and he forgot to tell that dude that he was expected tomorrow. I told him that was very important to express to the managers. While the service guy laughed, I know he understood my point. However, I think my tomorrow will run smoother despite the mix-up, and today I am working with a short time to do a few things. Luckily I’m flexible.

One of my favorite parts of listening to him today was how he didn’t have “real” tools. He even had to borrow my broom to clean up after himself. I wish I could write a note to those managers: He needs all the tools. They send him into all the jobs, and sometimes he has to call someone else to show up at a job. Every job brings something unexpected, and sometimes they’re good things- like the waterline this morning- but most often the other way. Be kind to any service people who come into your home. They most want the job to go smoothly and everything to work when they’re finished.

Have you ever tried to write a novel in a month? It’s not necessarily impossible, especially for a zero draft. The fun part for me this month, I didn’t try to write a zero draft. I aimed at a better one. However, I didn’t take into account how much I had to write from scratch to make this novel work.

So, I have a draft that is better in some places than others (especially the middle needs attention). The part I’m really proud of is that this draft is all Book 1 and not with Book 2 mixed in of my Space Western. I have a beginning, middle, and end, and my plot and characters are pretty much where they need to be. I only have chaptered it up to 9, and I am starting to go through to find the rest.

Also, I wrote/edited about four short stories this month. Two have been sent out, one is finished this morning (that few paragraphs were haunting me), and I’ll start the rewrite on the next soon.

Finished four books this month, and I was surprised they were all #2 in series:
Narwhal I’m Around (The Incredibly Dead Pets of Rex Dexter #2) by Aaron Reynolds
Storm of Locusts (The Sixth World #2) by Rebecca Roanhorse
In Over Their Heads (Under Their Skin 2 of 2) by Margaret Peterson Haddix
Merger of Evil (Sequel to Minion of Evil) by Shannon Ryan

What’s gotten into me? Who knows, but it’s fun. Life feels great when you’re accomplishing the things you know you need to do.

Happy Thanksgiving.