Leaving Town

You can always tell it's a special occasion when I floss my teeth. Only on the rare, monumental, once-in-a-lifetime chances do I actually observe proper dental care. It's sad but funny at the same time because now when I floss my teeth I know something good is going on. Way to go, conditioning!

Now to work for the morning before traveling hours home to my home away from home. Five days of freedom here I come!

I Can Only Laugh

I haven't paid much attention to my house the last few weeks because of how busy I've been with work and school. Today was the first day I've actually gotten around my house without being rushed and I was able to finally realize how much I truly hate it.

For example, here's a cool story from my childhood. My church used to have a little room where you could go and pick up cheap, old food for free (I think) on Sundays. It was probably food meant for poor folk like my family in order to keep us kicking a few more weeks so we could make more tithes the next day. Well, I used to take a sandwich and hide it under the seat in our van and check on it the following week to see how much mold had grown. It looked like a giant fuzzy guinea pig in a box each week. It was epic.

That's how my bathroom looks. It's a mold haven. There's more species of mold on my shower curtain alone than in that old sandwich box. It's gotten to the point that I just imagine I'm bathing in a forest...of mold. Even the floor is moldy. I think I used a gallon of bleach to clean that bathroom today.

Next, I hate my basement. When I was a little girl, my family would go to caves for vacations. It was dark, dingy, mysterious, and eerie. That's how I feel about my basement. It's a cramped, quiet, musky cavern beneath the world, out of sight and out of mind until you need your laundry. The basement still isn't the worse thing. The rugs are centuries old and cover the floors from wall to wall, every room and crevice. They have cool little stains on them. It looks like a dog went around and piddled everywhere. My kitchen is covered in hard-water stains. My house is amazing.

There are also bars on the windows. In order to secure the house from any possible Anderson killers, my roommate walked around when she first moved in and placed pieces of two-by-fours on every window and door. Now there are boards keeping the windows from opening. I feel like I'm in prison, figuratively and literally. On the bright side, I know I'll never get killed.

Unless the killer just decides to pick the one door handle lock on our door and walk in...

This Block Stinks

I started Book 3 what, maybe a month ago, and I have only achieved 4 pages. Granted, it was finals time and I was cramming in all my end of the year projects in but still, 4 pages isn't much. I guess I also did a few extra Book Bits and exercises in writing but I feel so... Unaccomplished.

The most frustrating thing as a writer is to not be able to write. There have been a few days where I'm excited to write and can't wait to get home and have the chance to sit down with my book. But by the time I get home from work I'm exhausted and just want to sleep. So I don't write and just increase my frustration.

It wasn't until a couple days ago that I decided to go for a Scatterfield drive (the first in months actually) and had one of those all-too-common revelations. I listened to some music I wrote Book 2 to and had a flashback to the summer when I was working on my desert book. The music put me back in the mindset of a laid-back, content period where I didn't have much to worry about besides work and 2 classes. When I jumped over to music I planned Book 3 to I was taken back to the fall where I would plan my book around the rainstorms that drifted in while green trees rattled over my porch.

These memories were so vividly tied to those songs that I realized I wasn't so much lacking my writing motivation or skill but just waiting for the right time to write. As a veteran writer, I know it's best to avoid writing when you aren't in the mood because all it makes is really poor material. Since I'm not surrounded by a happy environment, schedule, or mindset during the school term, I'm not writing. I don't want to associate Book 3 with being stressed and exhausted and overwhelmed.

This made me feel better for not writing this semester but it also broke my heart. Realistically, my schedule won't slow down until May. So I have to spend another semester reading and editing books instead of writing. This is hard for me to accept. I don't want to admit that I have to put off writing for another semester but I really do. For the sake of my books and my own overwhelmed mindset I have to set the books aside and focus on getting out of school.

But it still doesn't make it any easier to accept...

Double Post: The Writer is an Artist

I finally got that giddy feeling from writing today. I decided to write a Book Bits- what I like to call little pieces about my characters and stories. These things may not ever make it into a book (I don't intend for half of them to) but they help me familiarize myself with my characters and get excited about writing. I haven't been able to overcome a slight writer's block for about 3 weeks now so this was the best method to move on.

This Book Bit was amazing! It was bumpy at first because it was supposed to be a suspenseful one and I rarely write those. But it turned out excellent. It was so interesting and the characters just seemed to flow onto the pages. It was supposed to be a scene from the book I'll write after I finish this series (an entirely new book whose plot is still forming) so I was unfamiliar with where it would go.

While writing this four page bit that I totally miss my writing adventures. I was able to recall those moments where I get so wrapped up in the writing that I can't type fast enough to keep up with my mind. My palms were sweaty, my mind racing a million thoughts a minute, the music blaring in my mind. It was pure suspense. Even I didn't know what was going to happen.

Now that I'm done with that bit, I now know where I'm going and I'm going right back to the books. I'm leaping into those pages, rediscovering my love for the legends, and enveloping myself in the vocabulary, syntax, and plot. I'm building stories from threads, stringing them together to create a tapestry of art and words. This is what a writer is; an artist who feeds on their creations.

Leather Comes From Animals?

A customer was trying on a boot today when they asked me if it was made out of real leather. When I told them the manufacturer was an environmentally-friendly company they asked why that would make a difference. I stared at them for a moment, shook my head, and explained it to them.

Oy vey!

Christmas Song 2010

Every Christmas, I somehow find a Christmas song that I listen to over and over. This one is by far the funniest and cutest one I've heard in a long time.

Home Sweet Home

I've only stayed in the new house two nights but I've already developed a very strong memory of getting up early in the morning and watching the Today show with my sister while we sip coffee. Now when I watch the Today show at my house it feels wrong.

Only two weeks until I go home again!

Nice Things That Happened Today

1. Met with my adviser about my student teaching. When I walked in, everyone instantly asked me if I passed my Praxis. When I said yes, all these older women started cheering and giving me high-fives. It was so cute.
2. To top it off, my adviser showed me my interview critiques from student teaching and I got proficient ratings and was highly recommended to teach!
3. I did a nice deed at work and helped a couple air up the tires in their baby's stroller. It made me feel warm and fuzzy.
4. Chatted for a good while with employees around the mall. Laughed and joked with them.
5. Watched the carolers on campus.

In all, it was a good day :)

I'm Failing

Last week lesson plans were easy for me to do. This week I can barely make an outline and I teach tomorrow. I think I just might be screwed.

Things I'm Sick Of

- Talk shows, music shows, and television that sits around and gripes about these stupid little celebrities.
- Women who focus on their hair, face, boyfriend, and husband so much that they forget their own identities.
- Obnoxious people who give you a dirty look because you're tired of listening to them talk about who kissed who on the latest episode of Soap Operas International.
- The sense of righteousness some folks have.
- People who say their kid is the cutest one in the world. It's not. It's ugly. It's beautiful to only you so shut it.
- Ridiculous landlords who don't let you pay out leases so you can move out of a crappy house.
- School
- People without real dreams, goals, and hopes for the future.
- People who have too much money for their own good and buy superfluous stuff. It's sickening really.

Days like these really make me want to crawl under my blankets and forget the world. And I still haven't had a chance to pee today because of how ridiculously hectic it's been.

I Finally Read a Book

I should confess that it only took me eight months to read it but I did get it done. It's The Devil in the White City, a book by Erik Larson.


I will also confess that it's a nonfiction book, which is probably the only reason I read it. It's about Chicago in the Guilded Age, circa 1880-1890's, when Chicago won the bid to host the World's Fair. The fair was going to be the biggest event in the US and the country was relying on Chicago to prove how grand and powerful they were after they were shamed by the rest of the world's great leaps in technology and grandeur. The book follows the architects who built the fair in a matter of months and their struggles to overcome the hasty deadline.

While that plot certainly was interesting, I found the counter storyline to be more captivating. The book also followed H. H. Holmes, one of the most heartless serial killers of his day. I'd be willing to claim that he was even more deadly than Jack the Ripper. Holmes built his own 'castle' on the edge of Chicago, right across the street from the World's Fair. This castle had dozens of secret chambers, hallways that would suddenly bank strange directions, rooms without windows, and closets and doors that seemed to have no purpose. As he was building the three story hotel that took up an entire block, he constantly fired and hired different construction workers so no one would be aware of his demented intentions and chambers.

Over time, he lured women, their children, and their unfortunate husbands into the hotel with promises of wealth and jobs. The husbands would eventually disappear and the women were oftentimes killed in the secret chambers. Holmes prepared a vat of chemicals where he threw bodies in order to quickly discard of them, an airtight vault where he could gas victims or strangle them to death, and furnaces where he could burn them. He even stretched a few victims until their bodies broke apart. Others he dissected alive.

Holmes' victim count was confessed to be 28 but up to 200 more disappearances were accredited to him. Holmes is definitely a chilling character. There were parts in the book where I would shudder because of the acts he committed. However, he was also brilliant and that's what interested me. He was an amazing scientist, doctor, and businessman. Even though he wasn't born in wealth and had an abusive father, he managed to find wealth on his own terms.

Even though I liked this book I don't think I'll be reading anymore books about serial killers. I think it's time to move on to more positive things. I now have a book I want to start that follows an infantry through Normandy in World War II. Here goes another 6 months of reading one book!