All A Mistake

I spent a lot of time running around but even more time at home alone with my ghosts. But only had two episodes where I fell apart, well, three if you count the one in the middle of this post. I'm rather tiresome that way but they were not long in duration nor violent in nature.

I have had the worst headache today. The first in months actually. It just won't quit. Short of an imitrex, which I am always afraid to take when I am alone, I see no end in site. I'm going to bed soon and hope that sleep will cure it.

I didn't go to church this morning. I did go get stationery to make wedding invitations. And while I was out, I went to the Mid-month NaNo Party/Write-In. I had lunch with the writers there and I thought that might make the headache better since I had not eaten much. It got better briefly but came back with a vengance. I came home half an hour early and made the invitations and sent them to church with Mike for Sis. V. I am quite proud of them if I do say so. They looked really pretty. After he left, I had a brief meltdown. Altogether, not really a very good week.

I'm just so tired of all this pain. Jerry never understood it and wanted me to find a pill to help me and I couldn't. Some days he couldn't even hug me. I couldn't hold hands because my hands hurt most of the time.

Now, I am just very tired of it. It has done nothing but wreck my whole life. Everything decision I make has to be checked by what hurts. Can I do that? Will I be able to participate? Will I be able to be civil? Will that hurt me tomorrow? And usually, the answer is no, I can't. And if I ignore that, I pay a high price. I have to go to work tomorrow, no matter how badly this hurts because there is no one to take care of me.

Tonight, I just want it to all go away. I want to wake up in October 2008 and everything since not to have happened. I want Jerry to be in the next room getting ready for bed and I'm sitting here getting ready for NaNo 2008. I want to wake up and it all be a bad dream that I can put in a book that will end up a best seller and I won't ever have to work again.

Mostly, I want my life back. I want my husband back. I want time to back up one whole year and let me try and stop this nightmare from happening. I want God to say he made a mistake.

And fix it.

Ouch! Did I Say Ouch!

I did. I woke up with a pounding head, terrible pain in my left upper arm so bad I couldn't move it, joints on both hands hurting and my neck hurting. I was nearly crying it all hurt so bad. I think my bp may have been up too but I didn't even get up to check it. Pain will do that to you anyway. The head still hurts even after I took my meds. I realized my back is also hurting.

Mike called about church but I could not get up. Dave and Becca told me they were going to come here and go with me. They never showed up or I'd have let them take my car and take Mike. Mike couldn't get over here to take the car or I'd have let him go alone. I'm going to try and go tonight.

David leaves for the truck driving school today so he won't have to pretend he is going to go to church anymore. Don't know why folks don't just say, "I don't want to go to church." Save me a lot of hassle. I prefer that to excuses and lies.

There is NaNo Half-way Party today at Panera Bread at 1 p.m. I'm not halfway but I'd like to go if I can get to feeling better. I'm barely over 15,000. I"m writing here and there. I just have no real story here. At least, I haven't found the story. It is just a bunch of stuff.

I have to make some announcements for a lady in my church. I need to get those made this afternoon and get them to her tonight. Her granddaughter is getting married to one of the boys in our church and he is shipping out to Iraq Dec. 5. I think this is a hurried thing and I hope it goes well for them. He is 19 and she is 18. I hope they have a long and happy life.

Katey, sorry about no picture. I forgot! Imagine that. And your hair sounds as if it is naturally curly so I'm guessing you don't roll it. You might try some kind of hot rollers sometime as an experiment with a heat conditioner. My guess is it would tame the frizz for you. Bet is is very dry, too. I had a friend with hair like that. Try some super-duper hot oil treatments. I don't advocate perms because it damages hair but they do work for some folks, particularly if you have curly hair. Just find someone who actually knows what they are doing. Perms could damage dry hair terribly.

At any rate, I could fix hair like that in a snap! This straight as a board stuff requires tons of curlers, tons of pins, and tons of hair spray! By the time I'm done with this style I've been practicing, I'm afraid I'll set off the metal detectors in airports. Bit it is simple.

Should I do a video of how to put it up? That might be fun. I'll have to have Becca come over and do it for me.

Grammy, in my faith we don't usually cut our hair. I've always kept mine trimmed to keep the ends from becoming so ragged but it has always been about hip length. Breaks off bad if it goes longer. A few times, my husband messed up and it was shorter but not many. I am about to get a trim again. I'm having a hard time putting it up with my arms so sore and my neck bothering me. I really don't want it short but I have to take some length off so I can manage it better.

It is cold in here today and I'm going to bump the heat up. I was sweating when I woke up and that's odd. Not sure why. Maybe the blanket got too hot or I was having a hot flash. I did forget to put on my patch last night so it is possible. Oh, and the headache might be from that. Hmmm, better go get that on.

I'm closing for now. I want to get warm.

They're Off!

And it is Dixiegirl coming up on the outside.....

Just got my hair done. Tried something new today. I bought some bendable rollers at Sally's and dry rolled my hair last night. I thought if I could cut the setting time in any way, it will help. I'm not terribly pleased with the result but it isn't bad. It still took an hour to fix but I think if I just keep practicing like this it will get better. Maybe Friday nights should be my practice nights. I do need another set of the bendable rollers, and I think the next size up for one section. But, overall, it worked well.

My hair is really in terrible shape. I'm so thin on top that it is not easy to work with. You can see through it in some places. I do have a lot of hair coming in at the top sides of my head. All gray, thank you very much. But the top front still doesn't seem to be improving. The ends are really jagged and I need a trim so that's next on the agenda. I don't care much yet about the gray but I may get there. My hair is not the kind that looks good with a lot of gray. I either have to decide to go all gray or I have to get something that will give me something close to my own color. My color will be hard as I had a lot of blond, red highlights in my hair. I always liked the way it looked in certain lights cause it glinted nicely. All that is left these days is a mousy brown base color that appears very dull and boring to me.

I'm wayyyyy behind in NaNo. I am supposed to be at 25, 000 tomorrow. That is the halfway point. I'm oh, about 5000 behind. Story stinks. I'm tired of it already.

Burial At Sea

Bubbles and Barbie, two blonde sisters, had promised their uncle, who had been a seafaring gentleman all his life, to bury him at sea when he died.

In due time, he did pass away, and the two blondes kept their promise. They set off from Clearwater Beach with their uncle all stitched up in a burial bag and loaded him onto their rowboat.

After a while Bubbles said, "Do you think we're out far enough, Barbie?"

Barbie slipped over the side. Finding the water only knee deep, she said, "Nope, not yet, Bubbles." So they rowed a little farther out.

Again Bubbles asked Barbie, "Do you think we're out far enough now?"

Once again Barbie slipped over the side and almost immediately said, "No, this will never do; the water is only up to my chest."

So on they rowed and rowed and rowed, and finally Barbie slipped over the side and disappeared. Quite a bit of time went by, and poor Bubbles was really getting worried when suddenly Barbie broke the surface, gasping for breath.

"Well, is it deep enough yet, sis?"

"Yes, finally. Hand me the shovel."

Writing Groups and Such

Grammy Blick asked me a pertinent question. How do you find writing groups in an area. Oddly enough, this is not as easy as it would seem. They don't tend to advertise... at least if they did, I'd have known of them before now.

Actually, libraries may have this information about local writing groups. If you are from a fairly large, as in larger than Mayberry, city your library may host writing events. The local community colleges may also. Doing NaNo is a great way to meet local writers or people in your general area. There are over 100,000 people registered to participate this year alone. Go to the NaNo website and check the board for your region. My guess is that you will find someone who is participating within a short distance. Last year there were six of us who got together. This year, there are 20 who attended the first Write-in. There are 52 registered writers in my region. A good example for Grammy is the Dallas/Ft Worth area. There are 1028 pariticpants writing! They've logged in over a million words already!

The writing group I am in is comprised of five souls, one male and four females. We were thrown together by fate. I swear, it was just that. We vary in age from 53 to 30, with most of them in their mid to late 30's. We've discovered we actually like each other and for people who were total strangers when me met, that is astounding.

We met through our NaNoWriMo region forum I mentioned above. Sarah and I met in our regional forum when talking about upcoming Nano and she knew Kathy. I knew Doug from last year's NaNo write-in. We emailed one another and somewhere in there someone suggested meeting to talk writing and critique each other's work. I do not know where Katie came from but I think she was floating around somewhere in the group. We met the first time at Barnes and Noble and in the process of trying to find other places to meet, we decided I was in the middle and now we meet at my house.

It is working quite well I think. Most of us have NO experience professionally except maybe Sarah. Her book is with an agent. She said she has three rejections. I have had one article published in the early 90's in a defunct local Parents magazine. I've had one rejection from a submitted article. They say once you get a rejection, you are a writer. I can't tell you what makes one. I just know I write.

I guess the best advice is to look around. Find other people who share your interest in writing. Suggest getting together over coffee, at a bookstore or library to discuss writing and come right out and say you want to form a writer's group. Believe it or not, there are probably a lot of people wanting the same thing. Not all of them can write. . . or should, but if you find more than three, you're bound to get some talent.

It doesn't matter if you like the same kinds of writing. Doug does a specialized fantasy like Lord of the Rings without all the creatures. Katie writes romance. Sarah writes what she calls Urban Fantasy and that I've come to understand is like the Twilight series but she is into werewolves at the moment. Kathy like romantic suspense. I love mysteries. Five different writing styles and genres. We each bring something different to our critiques. Our discussions are focused around the work in question but we venture out on what makes a story work for each person, how to fix a certain problem. We all know something about what we are doing. We are all learning how to improve our own writing. We make suggestions, share ideas, and sometimes we talk about food! And we have a lot of fun in the process. It is sort of a win-win situation.

Grammy also pointed out that her local college didn't offer a writing course. This is sadly also a common finding. Larger universities tend to have special courses designed to focus on journalism or creative writing. Most colleges will have some kind of writing class but it you are looking just for a way to learn something new and enjoyable and polish a skill, well, those types of classes may not fit the bill.

I never took a single writing class until college. But I read everything I could on writing. The University of Southern Indiana had both creative writing classes and journalism classes. I took one creative writing class my last year. All other classes fell under the title of journalism. Journalism in most programs will fall under the Mass Communications label so if you don't find anything listed specifically under writing, look there.

Writer's Digest is a font of information on all kinds of writing stuff. You'll find creditable writing programs mentioned in their magazine and online. They have their own, I believe.

Finally, and again, read books about writing.

No... finally, write. Just write.