irrelevant (and sometimes questionable) ramblings

Some days I can’t wait for the start of school, in the vain hopes that life will slow down a little. But then I remember that that’s just a myth. *sigh*

So. Today involves cleaning the house, dyeing my hair (W00!), deciding on tonight’s menu, and pressing clothes that are to be worn to the family wedding tomorrow. (I wonder if my cousin survived his stag last night…? ) I’d like to get all of that done before lunch, that way I could also write in some form (WiP or synop/outlines) this afternoon. We shall see. Not an impossible task, for sure. I’m itching slightly to get back to work. This para/urban fantasy thing that’s in my head is driving me crazy, so I think I need to make some notes on it, at least. I am not allowed to start it, because I’ve got three other projects that need attention first. Once those are done, then I can focus my attention on that one.

At least until something else pops into my head and screams, “Write me!!”

*insert hysterical laughter here*

Ah, well. It’s a writer’s life, yes?

ps. dress from closet fit, so I have something to wear tomorrow. Yeah!

AUGUST 12, 2009!

Mark your calendars and make room on your credit cards, folks! Sweet Tart will be available for download on that day from Ellora’s Cave!

I also have my cover image which I shall post before long — and man, is it cool! I am one happy camper, boys and girls!

ps. In the meantime, however, I can’t figure out why I have this non-erotic vampire/urban fantasy story idea floating around in my head. I don’t mean to be on the coattails of Twilight, et al, but I just can’t seem to help it. I’ll have to sit down and put together a proper outline one of these days, I think.

I have one.

An alien butt, that is.

I spent a large chunk of yesterday attempting to find a dress to wear to a wedding this weekend, with zero success. I even determined not to be distressed by the size on the tag. That wasn’t going to matter to me. What mattered was finding something that fit nicely and looked good.

Ri-i-i-i-i-ight.

Nothing fit. Nothing. I even went up sizes, to no avail. The bodices were too loose, and the butt and hips were too tight.

Bloody stupid alien butts. *growl*

However, my redemption arrived in the reminder that I have two dresses tucked away in the back of my closet that might just fit. I haven’t tried them yet, so there is no rejoicing in the streets at this point, but I *think* it’ll be okay. The only thing I’ll need to do is pick up some new underthings for underneath. But that shouldn’t take too much effort. I hope. As long as I can find something to beat the alien butt into submission.

Dammit.

Stupid food. Stupid laziness tendencies. Blargh.

A few nights ago I had a wacky dream where I had written some sort of fluffy rom-com novel and had it published. All fine and dandy.

But then, actor Gary Sinise decides he wants to make it into a feature film. And he wants to cast yours truly as the lead.

Crazy? Yeah, I know.

This dream was epic, dudes. I remember meeting the other cast members (nobody I recognized, I thought they were all unknowns) and rehearsing and filming scenes. And the director coming up to me to give … well… direction. Weirdly enough, too, while I was supposed to be the “lead”, I remember one scene where I was a third wheel — watching the “couple” get all mushy with each other. All the while sandpapering the wood of a sailboat.

I kid you not.

I just wish I could remember what the book was actually about. Because if it was good enough to ping ol’ Gary’s interest, it might be a worthwhile story.

But then again, maybe not. Because it was dreamworld after all…

Technically, they’re not blues. I am, however, sitting smack in the middle of post-travel detritus, surrounded by To-Be-Completed paperwork, with only the barest modicum of energy.

Not the best combination. Especially when one would much rather be curled up with Julie Cohen’s latest, Girl From Mars, which is most excellent — and which sucked me in last night, causing me to stay up later than intended! Curses!
However, Clan Starr did have a fabu time over the weekend, going to the zoo and a major league baseball game. Tres fun.

This week, we’re back in the grind. I’ve got a house to tidy, a book to get back to work on, a wedding to attend next weekend (and therefore a new dress to shop for!), and company coming for said wedding. The whip has been cracked.

Owie.

ps. If you happen to see Summer anywhere, would you give it a poke and ask it to visit Northern Canuckland for at least a couple of weeks?? This wearing of jeans and sweatshirts in July SUCKS. :p

For the month of July I have been taking part in an early-morning, thrice-weekly fitness Boot Camp at the gym. The “getting up” part has been a challenge (the world shouldn’t exist at 5:20 in the morning!) but otherwise I’ve enjoyed it (once the pain subsides and I can breathe again).

Something interesting struck me the other day, though. Looking around at the group of us (15 registered, but I think only 10 or so seem to be regularly attending) it occurred to me that none of the highly female-centric group could be classed as overweight.

You would think that people would sign up for Boot Camps to lose weight (among other things, of course, but I’m generalizing here) — and that was partly my reason, as well as jump-starting a fitness routine — but I would honestly say that in my opinion, none of the people there really need to do that.

Sure, a couple of the girls are curvier than others, but I would never classify them as “heavy”, let alone “overweight”. Which made me wonder — do they see themselves as chubby? Are their self-perceptions skewed by whichever influences such that they look in the mirror and fret to some degree about their looks? I’d be willing to put money down on that.
Everyone has their own reasons for signing up with something like this, and perhaps there are medical or other motives behind it. I don’t know. I just wish those girls knew that from a physical standpoint, they didn’t seem to need to be there.

Me on the other hand? I know that when my clothes start getting too tight, there’s a problem. :p I just wish I didn’t love food *quite* so much…

…For you, Gentle Readers.

I know, I’ve been about as exciting as a sack of wet socks lately, and I apologize for that. As B.E. pointed out to me the other day, I’ve been directing my creative energies (or most of them, anyway) toward the WiPs and edits — which doesn’t leave me a whole lot to razzle-dazzle you guys with.

I hope to give you more of the Kris you know and love soon, but for now it’s edits, writing, and more of enjoying summer/being “mom” to now three kidlets (two related, one not. I tells ya, our house is very busy at the moment… I guess this is a bit of an example of what life would be like with three kids — except two of them are on very good behaviour, so it’s not really an accurate sample. *snort*)

Anyhoo. That’s all the news that’s fit to print here at the moment. I will return anon to hopefully spice things up soon.

*smooches*

…a thing so lovely as a tree.

Our neighbor a couple of doors down has a hugely beautiful rustling beauty. The picture doesn’t do it justice, because you don’t get a sense of the real height of the thing. I realize in the grand scheme of things, it’s not huge (hello, California redwoods??) but it’s bigger than I’ve lived with in a long while.

I notice it every time I’m in our backyard, like yesterday when I was hanging laundry. There was a reasonable breeze outside, and the rustling of the leaves was musical. It could never sound ominous or unfriendly to me.

It’s most certain that in another time or place I would have definitely been a dryad. Hey, why not?

I just can’t wait for the weather to clear up again so I can go back outside and enjoy that tall, leafy beauty.

I have been remiss in posting. However, in my defense, I have been busy being “mom” to both Offspring and Step-Offspring.

In writing news, I am currently on round #2 of edits, with the end somewhat in sight, so that’s good.

I do have some random thoughts that I will attempt to post soon.

Thanks fer stoppin’ by, though. It’s nice to know yer thinkin’ of me.

One of the best things about being under the weather is that one gets a chance to lie down a lot and spend a good chunk of time reading. I just finished Relentless (linked somewhere below)– in what, three days? fewer? — and it was a damned fine book.

Honestly, I had begun to lose faith in Koontz. I’ve loved his books for ages, but in the last few years, he’d started to become more than a little pedantic and ponderous — moving from the delicious action-packed tomes of the early days to self-important sermons that reached hard for literary pompousness. Oh, the books were still fairly good, but I’d find myself skimming his long, wordy, descriptive paragraphs in favor of the snappy dialogue and action scenes.

Anyway. I’m thrilled to say that the old Koontz is back! Boom, baby — this book was very much like the old stuff — action-packed from the first page, with sharp dialogue and edge-of-your-seat action. I’d tell myself I had to stop, and then I simply had to know what happened next, and next thing, it’d be fifty pages later. Not conducive to getting a good night’s sleep, you know.

Probably my only complaint here was a rather anti-climactic ending, and a few plot points that weren’t explained to my satisfaction. Otherwise, very satisfying.

I wanna write like ol’ Deano when I grow up.