Change... know when to hold 'em... when to fold 'em

My last post was about a piece of writing submitted to an online community that was rejected.  Further changes are happening in that community and I am questioning whether I will remain a part of it or let it go. 

My first thought is that if the people who run the community knew I was contemplating leaving they would probably say "Don't let the door hit you in the @$$ on the way out!"  Maybe I am wrong, but I am really not part of the "core" crowd in that community so I would likely not be a big loss.  Additionally, there is only so much fresh content one person can come up with, so not belonging to that community would give me one less place I need to wrack my brain for "what to write" ideas.

The flip side of this is that I feel more and more that the only way I am going to grow stronger as a writer is to belong to writing communities where I don't have to be on the hunt for good writing, I can just log in and there will be a plethora of writers whose prose I can read and maybe I can start to pick out what elements are getting comments and which writers seem to have a large, strong following.  Although, for the life of me, I cannot fathom why some bloggers have huge audiences and others have 2 or 3 (it seems) readers.  I've read some incredibly wonderful blogs that have very, very few comments... so maybe I just know what *I* like and not what appeals to the masses.

So, I am still pondering the correct course of action.  Any thoughts?

Rejected

One of the things I like about blogging is that I can come here to my blog and write anything I want to and people may comment on it but no one will tell me "your writing isn't good enough" and refuse to publish what I've written.

Every now and then, though, I go to one of the writing communities I belong to and submit something.  Up until now, I've never had a problem and everything I have submitted has been accepted.  I wrote something last night (Ironically, about how I struggle to hit "publish" sometimes, due to a fear of rejection) and this morning, in my email box, was a note rejecting my submission.

And I understand the reason and everything but have to admit that it still kindve stung and I am now going to be very hesitant to submit anything in that community again.  Oh, I'll still write in the blog I have there, I just won't ever submit anything for publication there.  And yes, I know that part of being a writer is that you have things you submit for publication rejected ALL THE TIME but I guess that's why I prefer blogging... sure, people can comment that what I wrote was awful and that I should give up writing, but it's my blog, my forum and I can (within reason) publish anything I like here.

On a positive (non-writing relate) note...I spent most of yesterday working on the Closet From H3LL and it's now downgraded to the Closet From H3ck.  It needs more work, but at least it can be used as a place to hang clothes again. So... yay for that!

Have a wonderful Sunday and a great week!

Hand me a paper bag....

I read this morning that The Bloggess is doing a book tour and she's going to be in the city I live in and I am pretty sure that I made some unnatural sounding happy noise because meeting The Bloggess is pretty much the number one thing on my list of "Things That Will Probably Never Happen But I Might Die Of Excitement If They Do And It Would Be Totally Worth It"....

I've already let my boss know that I will be taking that day off of work. I am looking online for a sleeping bag so I can camp out wherever she will be so I can be first in line. I am contemplating just spending from now until the date she's here camping at random bookstores on the off chance I will pick the right one.

And yes, I realize that she's probably drafting the restraining order right now... because I know I sound completely insane but if you had asked me a few years ago who my hero was, I would have drawn a blank and now I can, without hesitation, tell you that my hero(ine) is Jenny Lawson, The Bloggess.  And I don't even say that in a 'fangirl' way.  She does so many things to help people and she is hysterically funny but more than all of that she is so very REAL.

So, even if the restraining order says I have to stay 500 feet away, I'll still be happy to have gotten that close.  And I have a whole month to try to train myself to not burst into tears of sheer joy at the mere thought of being in the same zip code as The Bloggess.   I think this will make my postal carrier happy, too, as I am pretty sure that she's tired of me asking every day if my book has come yet (yes, I know it isn't being released until next month but I am just making sure that there wasn't an early release or something...)  I'm a little afraid my postal carrier will smack me upside the head with the book when it DOES come... or spray me with her pepper spray (usually reserved for unruly dogs) just on general principle for being such a pain in the posterior about this.

I suppose I'd best get to work, though... on the theory that much like Christmas, The Bloggess Book Tour will get here faster if I distract myself from counting the seconds... ummm, not that I would do something like that... (1 month, 4 days, and approximately 22 hours... not that I'm counting...)

So, yes, I'm excited.  Have a stellar day!

Blame it on the rain...

I have two cats. They don't get along so I have a gate up between my livingroom and the rest of my apartment. One cat on each side of the gate. One cat is scared of thunderstorms. It is storming tonight. He is hiding in the bathroom (I won't tell you exactly where because he's TRYING to hide... not exactly helpful for me to give away his location, right?)

Earlier this evening, I was passing through the gate and the Scaredy Cat came slinking down the hall. Lil Bit was waiting eagerly to dart into the "forbidden" part of the apartment.  They passed each other without growling. This is unusual.  As I write this, scaredy cat is back in the bathroom, Lil Bit is curled up under my desk. The gate remains open.  I am thinking that I will just leave it that way unless there is a throwdown during the nighttime hours (which, knowing my luck, will take place ON MY FACE).  Then, in the morning, I will put them back on their respective sides of the fence and let them ponder whether, after nearly 6 months, maybe they can live a peaceful life together (or at least not smack the crap out of each other) which would make my life infinitely easier.

I am, once again, miffed at Panda Express because they are not carrying the Peppercorn Shrimp at the location near work which I didn't find out until AFTER I was in line and so I settled for a much less satisfying than anticipated lunch and I wish they'd just bring back the Golden Treasure Shrimp because that was really good but, of course, since I liked it they don't have it anymore.

That's all I've got for tonight. Hopefully when I go out to go to work in the morning I won't need a jet ski to get to my car.  I tell you, the weather has been BIZARRE lately.

Evaded The Grim Reaper Yet Again!

I have managed to evade The Grim Reaper for yet another year and had a very nice birthday in spite of the fact that The Bloggess still doesn't know I exist and Lisa & I didn't hang out at Teavana sipping tea and plotting how to get into the room where they keep all of the tea monkeys.  Sometimes you just have to settle for spending a nice day with friends and family (not that I am, at all, complaining about having done that!)

Tomorrow I go back to work after having been off work for several days (because I like to drag out my birthday celebration... a multi-day excuse to eat cake should always take place around one's birthday!)  Since there are only three work days left this week, it will be exceptionally busy.

I should try to get to bed early tonight because I have been averaging 4 hours of sleep for the past several days and it is not going to work well to try and go to work tomorrow if I can't stay awake.

I don't make resolutions at New Year's but I sometimes set some goals around my birthday (see, that gives me additional time to come up with a list of things I will probably not follow through on!)  I hope to get to meet The Bloggess and/or Lisa this coming year.   If I could have lunch with both of them I would probably die of happiness which would be bad because I know The Bloggess doesn't want to have to bury another body in her backyard  (to clarify, she buried a pet, not a human.. well, at least, not that we know of.... but that isn't the sort of thing someone would blog about... burying humans in your yard is generally considered to be illegal).

Also, by my next birthday (assuming that the latest Doomsday prophecy predicted does not turn out to be true), I hope to have written something (a novel) worth reading.  Of course, if Doomsday happens, I suppose it won't matter.

I should be around more now that my birthday has come and gone and the company has gone home and everything will return to what passes for normal.  Possible changes (not in a bad way) on the horizon.  But nothing I can talk about yet (no, I am not pregnant.  I shudder to even THINK of that).

Have a stellar week!

Tiaras &Teavana

Ended up at the Galleria today.  Went to Teavana where they still don't seem to have monkeys available (but still sell monkey-picked Oolong which I am starting to doubt is picked by actual monkeys due to the lack of monkeys for sale at Teavana).  I mean, they have everything else tea-related, it seems, so I don't understand the lack of monkeys.  Maybe I've just got overly high expectations, though.

I've written here before about tiaras and how much I want one.  Well, I happened to find & purchase a couple this afternoon and while I love them (yes, I got two) I feel weird having had to buy my own tiara.  Tiaras are bestowed, they are not bought by oneself. *sigh

I am suddenly exhausted... I don't know if it was the nearly three miles I walked today or if fighting oxidants was harder than I thought...

(since apparently BLOGGER was feeling lazy and didn't actually post this when I WROTE it)

Saturday we went to the Art Museum where we walked and walked and walked some more. We had a simply lovely lunch in the atrium where my friends gave me very lovely gifts and then we went and got cupcakes and then came home.  Between late lunch and cupcakes, we decided to skip dinner and plan on lunch on Sunday which will likely be a very late lunch since I am not setting an alarm clock and we are "sleeping in".

Monday... well, I am not ready to start thinking about that yet....

But I do need to think about getting some sleep.

A Couple of Days off of Work

It's my birthday this weekend and my Mom and my Daughter are coming to visit me (assuming all goes as planned).  My mom still uses DIAL UP AOL and complains about how expensive it is ($9.99 a month, I think). So, she does not understand my "addiction" to the Internet and will be less than happy that I do things like check email whilst she is visiting. She cannot fathom why I cannot go 4 days without checking email.  She does not have The Facebook (her term) or That Tweety Nonsense (her term) and so she gets a little put out by the fact that my Daughter (who is 17) text messages almost constantly (I figure she will be first in line if they ever come up with the technology for direct human interface with the 'Net...)

I hadn't really considered until today what a bummer of a "vacation" this is for my Daughter... She "gets" to spend time with her (to her) old Mother and her even OLDER Gramma.  And there is really nowhere for her to escape to because I live in a teeny, tiny apartment (ok, it's not a STUDIO, but it's not huge).  So, yeah.  Gotta sortve be a bummer for her but she's coming and I hope we will have a good time.

The weather is going to be less than optimal.  It's been gorgeous lately but this weekend is scheduled to be cold and rainy.  Not cool.

I am hoping I will get the chance to solve a mystery today... there was a FedEx slip on my door last night and I am not expecting anything... They are supposed to reattempt delivery today so I hope they don't do it whilst I am vacuuming or something because I'd like to get my package.

I've also discovered, via the amount of noise that my neighbors make, that apparently NO ONE who lives here except me has a job.   Or, at least, not a job where they work during the day. Because it is NOISY and sounds like a big ol' social club around here during the day. Exactly like it sounds on the weekend.

I need to get back to vacuuming!  Have a fabulous weekend, y'all.  I'll check back in as soon as I can.

Wedding Officiant Heartbreak

I have a friend who is getting married in June, near Boston.  Due to unforseen circumstances, her wedding officiant has had to drop out of the wedding.  The first line replacement also cannot make the journey. I, being a clergy member + friend of the Bride was asked if I could step in.

No, they are not getting married in a church. No, they are not members of an organized religious group. No, they don't want a Judge or JP to do the ceremony, they want someone who means something to them to officiate.

My reality, at the moment, is that I live paycheck to paycheck.  I don't say that seeking pity, it's my reality right now and there is a light at the end of that tunnel (a major expense is going away probably this year, certainly next year).  But I don't have money sitting around nor do I have sufficient available credit to be able to plop it onto a credit card  (Yes, I know that is totally fiscally irresponsible).

I cried as I wrote the email telling her I can't do it. Not little tears... a big, ugly cry.

I want so much for some miracle to occur that would make it possible for me to be able to do this. I know that it isn't forthcoming, but it doesn't stop me from wanting to be able to write her back and tell her the situation has changed and I can and will be there.

They say if your problems can be solved with money, that you really have no problems. Again I say that apparently the people who say that never have any money-related issues.