I SURRENDER!

I am waving a white flag! I give in.

I can't write this blog regularly as I want to, continue writing the book I'm loving, make a few changes to the book I'm submitting (Note to self - this should NOT need to happen), plan for Christmas and have a bloody cold.

So. It is from my snotty rag ridden lap, I'm writing a plan. Yay! Back to lists and stuff! Organising myself. Hello organisation, I've missed you. Welcome back. As some wise man somewhere once said "FAIL TO PLAN, YOU PLAN TO FAIL..."

This is what this week looks like in the notes on my lap:

Monday: Tesco run(buy box of tissues), Write 3000 words, Put washing on. Now that doesn't sound too taxing does it?

Tuesday : Ironing, make healthy dinner as you won' have eaten properly on Monday as it wasn't in the plan. Write 3000 words.

Wednesday : Print off complete copy of 'PLUMB CRAZY' and read through it (again) before sending out a few submissions. Update submission plan! Make any necessary changes and send it by email to... I could tell you but I'd have to kill you. Write blog post for Strictly Writing.

Thursday : Travel home from London. Dentist 12:30. Maybe cancel dentist?! Afternoon - catch up on home housework and write 1000 words.

Friday : Submit PC to two agents, blog here and write 2000 words. Do shopping for book club dinner tomorrow.

In short the plan is, in between imitating Bree VAn De Kamp, I'm going to imitate Marion Keyes.

Great.

White flag is folded and put away. I've blogged already and will do so again on Wednesday and Friday. I will have enough tissues to deal with cold following Tesco run later today. And apparently I'll have added 9000 words to the word count of my WIP by Friday.

Right. Christmas planning, it seems, may have to wait until next week?

I'm Nanowrimo-ing

Yes, there is a verb 'to nanowrimo'...

And I'm doing it - just to get me into the throes of another project so I may be rather eratic with blog posts. Apologies. Wait for me? Promise to be back if you'll have me.

Where's The Motivation?

Just before the wonderful and addictive 'Flash Forward' last night, I found myself watching the 'Tonight' programme titled 'Make me an Apprentice' - nothing to do with the other 'Apprentice' programme, although Alan Sugar and Ruth Badger did offer pearls of wisdom to the unemployed youth of today.

As the mother of a graduate who, having worked for free interning for the year following graduation, has now just got her first job, I hoped the programme would bring ..er, hope. Hope to the masses of young people unable to obtain paid work despite every effort. Alas, it wasn't to be. With Ruth Badger badgering some irrelevant point home to those who can't pay their rent and have interest accruing every day on their student loans, I was left cold as to how useful this programme actually was. A wasted opportunity, because even if the economic climate is destined to be in the mire for the foreseeable future, we have to keep these young people motivated. They ARE the future.
Is Alan Sugar waxing lyrical from his ivory tower (yeah, I know he hasn't always had one and I'm normally a fan) helpful? I mean how is this comment supposed to inspire?

“It’s their own determination that's going to get them a job, right. Employers are going to look at them, not necessarily for their skills that they may have but for the passion that they may express, across the counter and across the desk. It is very much down to the individual”

YADA, YADA, YADA...

For the facts remain that nowadays most employers know they can 'hire' graduates for up to a year without paying them a penny. And I do mean that. Some of them won't even pay travel/lunch expenses. How are these young people who have gained a third level education, gotten themselves into student loan debt on the strenth of potential future earnings supposed to feel? And yes, of course, it's down to the individual to sell themselves accordingly, but it's a tough world out there. Dogs are eating dogs in order to get unpaid intern roles.

Moral of the story?
I wouldn't be in my early twenties again for all the tea in China.
No. I'm a forty something writer determined to succeed in the almost impossible world that is commercial women's fiction. Dogs eating dogs come to mind again...
But I've had a previous career. The Man and I have raised a family and can pay the bills. I can watch the Tonight show with a glass of good wine in my hand. And I choose to put myself in the firing line of the competitive commercial world of publishing.

Younger people don't have that degree of choice and I hope and pray that a working life, something if they're prepared to work, they should all be entitled to, is theirs soon for the taking.

Gorgeous...

Today is a beautiful day.

The sun is low in the sky, but shining bright. I'm looking out over a water view, thinking I am indeed a lucky girl. I even slept though the Man's snoring last night. Happy days.

Needless to say, I have a 'To Do' list as long as my arm but somehow...it doesn't matter. I'll get to it. Right now, as I can feel actual warmth on my face through the window, returning the wonky DIY cabinet that wouldn't DIY to B&Q doesn't seem important. Nor does the sorting of the menu for my daughter's twenty first at home next week, or working out where I'm going to put everyone. Writing a short story for Cally's competition, or the notation 'Manuscript?' - meaning how am I going to deliver it during a postal strike, can wait just a bit. This is a nice feeling, one I'm going to try and hang onto because I'm normally a bit of a worry wart.

Right now, I have a cup of tea in my hand and I've just received this note from the Universe

"Shall I remind you, dearest Fionnuala, that the reason you care so much, sometimes even worry so much, is because there still exists between you and life, a passionate love affair. And because of this, everything's going to be just fine.
xxoo, The Universe"

To my knowledge, all my loved ones are, safe and sound. I'm breathing in the day and yes, it's a beautiful one.

Sleep Deprived

I am SOOOOO tired...

You know when you have a thought along the lines of 'I wish I could invent something - something really useful that hasn't been done before' ?

I want to invent an anti snoring device so I can sleep. I'm fast morphing into a sleep deprived fishwife rather than a calm, loving wife. He can't help it, but it IS keeping me awake and I don't do well on little sleep. I am no Margaret Thatcher, who apparently only ever needed three hours a night. I bet she was crabby.

I am. I'm in a crabby mood today. I seriously think hubby and I are going to end up in separate bedrooms, which is a worry because I swore we'd never turn into my parents and...

Plus I have to wait in for an a.m. delivery which will no doubt turn up at five minutes to midday.

Plus I've got the wrong size envelopes for the submissions and the frigging post people are on strike - just as I get my act together.

Hardly serious illness or life changing events just crabby moans because I'm tired. But I am writing in the bedroom and looking at the bed.

I can feel a Goldilocks moment coming on.

Let There Be...er, Light?

So... I decided to set up a printer where I'm staying in London. This does imply that I intend/hope to use the printer at some stage in the near future. I'm choosing to see this as a good sign, as I've just spent four days labouring over an ideal cover letter, which may actually get printed and sent off to an agent?

Four days - honestly. If I were Anneka Rice, I'd have built a Community Centre in the Sahara.

But it's a tough one. This is the piece of paper that anyone I approach will definitely read. I will be judged on this single sheet of A4 before they even glance at a word of the first three chapters, or the synopsis. I'm supposed to sell myself, show that I can write and assure them I've used my talents in writing a commercial novel, hint at my 'voice', re-assure them I'm not a one trick pony and novel number two is under way. Be different, maybe add a touch of humour but never be cocky or arrogant or plain unfunny. No pressure then.

So day one was spent researching the web. Lots of 'do' and 'don't' examples were found. Notes were taken. Day two was spent with my fingers in my ears chanting 'la la la' and reassuring myself that I do indeed have a 'voice' and that somehow I can include it in my letter. Trouble is day two, I had writer's laryngitus. Day three was spent mourning day two and actually starting a real example of what should go out. Day four was spent honing and polishing it. Day five is so far being spent blogging about it and thinking about printing it off.

I'm hoping that like God himself (allegedly - before you write in...), I may perfect this creation within seven days. I may move from 'Let there be light' (in my case a one page letter I'm happy does all of the above and more)to having a rest on the final day.

Hoping that this will help bag me an agent. ..

Oops! They Did It Again...

No. I'm not going to post a cute utube link to John and Edward singing Britney last Saturday night. And I use the word 'singing' in the loosest sense. I think my shower efforts are more tuneful. In fact, I'm thinking of applying to this 'singing' competition next year on the basis that there are obviously exceptions to the singing rule. Hell, I can be entertaining if that's what they want and I'd be even more entertaining dressed in red patent swinging from the ceiling wailing in bad Britney.

Thankfully we live in a democracy allowing everyone freedom of speech, enabling whoever wants to vote for this pair to do so. The same democracy that allows me the right to suggest that they have all perhaps been kidnapped by aliens? John and Edward cannot sing. So what are they doing on a 'singing' competition designed to find a 'recording' artist? Would the people who are voting for them really buy their album? And if not, why keep them in there at the expense of someone else's dreams - someone who CAN sing perhaps.

Grrr...Makes me cross...

Mainly because I swore if they got through I wouldn't watch the show next year. And now I'll have to stick to that or enter myself.