S#63/6: Live Music at an Irish Pub
Today was an out-and-out awesome fail. The pub itself (King O’Malley’s in Civic, Canberra, Australia) is awesome (I even wrote about it here). CJ was awesome, smiling tolerantly as I fished ice cubes out of my Baileys and spat them into someone’s discarded Guiness (because no-one, NO-ONE, dilutes my Baileys). There were fire twirlers outside, and a random person complimented me on my boots through a loudspeaker poked out the window of their car (and why not?) That was all pretty awesome, but I was not.
No-one can sustain awesomeness forever. (Okay, some people can. I hope they get eaten by iguanas.) I have an anxiety disorder, and every so often I freak out for no reason and all the colour falls out of the sky and the air sours in my lungs and existence isn’t worth the souls it’s written on.
Today’s emotional crash was relatively rational, since a few bad things happened (the car had more stuff wrong with it, so it cost twice as much as expected; one of my books has a serious flaw that may involve rewriting huge chunks that I thought were finished; I’m dieting, so a chocolate binge is out despite how fat and angry I feel; my phone is out of credit four days earlier than it should be so I’m trying to go without until then; someone I know is suicidal but not considered sick enough to live in a place that will look after him).
Tomorrow will most likely be a good day. All the things that really matter are okay – CJ and I still like each other, my family is safe and happy, and we still have money in the bank.
But I feel awful. So today’s real awesomeness is to accept that emotions happen.
Play along at home: Eat too much (for me). Write the emoest emo poem ever. Hit something. Whine to a friend. Cancel your plans and watch TV instead. Do something ridiculously indulgent from Steff Metal’s list. Spend too much. Insult a cat/dog/fish with great cruelty. Swear. Exercise too much. Refuse to snap out of it until you feel like snapping out of it. Play depressing music. Cut off your hair. Go to sleep. Stay up late. Cut up your school/uni books into tiny pieces. Take photos of your toes. Leave your heater on all night. Chuck a sickie. Play with matches. Cry. Give it time. (I’ve done six of these, mostly in the last hour. Seven, if you count paragraph 2 as poetic.)
Today’s photo is of yours truly clutching my single glass of Baileys while sitting in the dark:
Tomorrow: Sunday Live – a cello performance. And most likely a better mood.
PS: Have decided the scratch on my leg from “Frolic in a Fountain” is probably shark bite.
PPS: Wrote the above entry last night. Feel worse this morning (apparently I gained a kilo this week, despite not eating chocolate. Epic angry fail). I still reckon tomorrow will be better, but today’s probably a write-off. Some days are. It’s 10:00am and I’m going back to bed until further notice. What are you doing today? Or not doing?
Friday Afternoon
It’s Friday afternoon, which means two things: excitement, and depression. The excitement is because I know that publishing execs have meetings to make the final decisions on whether to publish books or not, and it seems to me they’d have those meetings on Friday – and then call the authors they’d chosen to accept. The depression is because the weekend comes next, where there’s a guaranteed lack of answer for two days before the mail starts up again.
I’ve done very little writing the last few weeks, due to the Daily Awesomeness Plan (new obsessions take a lot of brain space that’s usually occupied by writing), being sick last week, and spending time exercising (half an hour every day). But I wrote for seven hours yesterday (finishing the first draft of next month’s twittertale – a post-apocalyptic tale inspired by a TV show I won’t mention by name because if I don’t mention it the spoilers won’t be noticed) and I’ve spent three hours writing so far today.
I’m perilously close to finishing my final solo edit of last year’s “National Novel Writing Month” book. One of my friends is already helping me edit it. After that I’ll most likely enlist a professional editor, then send the book to its first rejection. Oh! I mean its first possible-publisher. Excuse me.
I’m not sure what to think of the book’s chances. It has more of an action focus than my other books (generally people say I need more action) and the beginning and end are rather good (in my opinion) but the rest of the book can be summed up as, “Hero runs away a lot.” Still, it’s a plot that has worked for many others before me. Who knows? Maybe this is what readers want.
I am a little excited, I confess. It’s a new book, after all!
Maybe I’ll be twelth time lucky. Apparently people who write books sometimes do publish them.
#7: Look after your car (and twitter)
For today’s daily awesomeness, I got a full service for our car. That’s $400 BEFORE they find anything else wrong. So it’s a horrifying sort of awesomeness. But the constant nagging fear of, “I bet there’s something wrong with the car” is, for the moment, gone. Today’s service was particularly awesome because I lost control of the car on a turn last month, and it seemed likely that something somewhere would be damaged.
Play along at home: Fix something that, in your heart of hearts, you know needs attention.
Tomorrow S#63/6: Live Music at an Irish Pub (King O’Malley’s)
Hi to the staggering number of newbies this week. Each Friday, in addition to awesomeness, I post the current twitter story-so-far. This month it’s “Bridezilla”. If you want to follow it in real time, you can join it at either http://twitter.com/Louise_Curtis_ (manually add the second underline) or http://www.facebook.com/pages/Louise-Curtis-Books/287050773170?ref=nf.
“BRIDEZILLA” so far:
1.
It’s pay day, so I buy pillows. Luckily my wedding dress makes a good maternity dress. I hope this plan works. Tomorrow, here I come.
2.
I dress as a VERY expectant bride and go to the bakery store. As I order a huge pile of hot cross buns, I put one hand to my giant stomach.
*
“Oh you poor dear!” says the matronly type I’ve been observing for days. “Don’t bother paying for those buns.”
*
She winks, “And may I STRONGLY recommend entering our restaurant-dinner-for-two competition?”
I obey her while silently applauding my act.
3.
Today I’m a goth bride with heavy eye-makeup and blood-red feathers on my neckline. I mingle in the bar before Amanda Palmer’s concert.
*
Amanda comes out, hugs me, then takes in my full outfit. “Congrats,” she says – “And you’re NOT paying – or your fiancé, wherever he is.”
*
Being a goth bride rocks. It’s even better than yesterday’s pregnancy. I’ve never enjoyed a concert so much – or been given so much beer.
4.
I promised my daughter a huge pile of Easter eggs – but I also promised she could continue at her school. So I dress her as my flower girl.
*
Easter eggs: Check. Nausea: check. Chocolate smears on May’s face: check. Getting chocolate for a flower girl at Easter is almost too easy.
*
A shrill voice cuts through my pleasure – my ex-bridesmaid, Cherie. “Anna! Did Rob come back and marry you after all?”
“Uh. . . sure. Yep.”
5.
I’m embarrassed after lying to Cherie, so today I go for the dumped bride look. My mascara runs beautifully, and I get more hot cross buns.
*
As I’m lugging a garbage bag of buns to my car, one of the bakery girls comes and helps me. She says, “Wait a second, do I recognise you?”
*
I shake my head, but she says, “Yes! I saw you dumped on YouTube. . . but that was a month ago. What the. . .?”
I flee.
6.
Today I dress as a mum. An emotionally and financially stable mum. I try to arrange my stockings so the holes are hidden inside my shoes.
*
“We’ve been making allowances because of your. . . incident. . . a month ago. But we must have next term’s fee by the end of this month.”
*
After the meeting, I go give May a hug. Her teacher stops me and asks for my number.
“Oh no! What did May –”
“Nothing. I want to call YOU.”
7.
I eat hot cross buns, and ask my boss for a raise. Neither goes down well.
*
When May gets home, I interrogate her about her dark-haired, dark-eyed teacher.
She says, “He’s nice. I got to be the queen in story time.”
8.
I get the card for the free dinner for two at a real restaurant. Yay! Less than an hour later my landlord “drops by”. Uh-oh.
*
May’s teacher calls, and arranges to pick me up on Saturday. My heart’s fluttering so hard, I can’t eat my dinner (of hot cross buns).
9.
May dresses in her best dress for our dinner of Real Food. I wear a skirt. They greet us with champagne. “Where’s the other newlywed?”
*
“Uh. . . he had to work,” I say. They hustle us to our highly beflowered table and tell us to order anything we want. We do.
*
May gets them to make her a hamburger. I have a huge pile of meat and a giant salad. Neither of us eats our bread rolls.
10.
I re-use my pillows to make myself an overweight bride, and take May with me with only an hour to spare before Jack comes to fetch me.
*
We go to a child care centre. I ask, “Can you fit her in? The reception’s about to start and my normal babysitter quit. Today!”
*
“Of course we can,” the staff say, “and don’t you dare pay!”
My date is wonderful. Jack is good company and the food is DIVINE.
11.
I shave my eyebrows to become a more lucrative faux bride, and go shopping. I’m about to graciously accept free Docs when I see Jack!
*
Jack! Shopping as I scam! Disaster! I duck behind the nice lady’s desk, biting my nails in terror. Has he already seen me?
*
The lady gives a commentary on Jack’s passing. “The hot guy’s trying on sunglasses. . . now he’s going away. He’s gone!”
I flee the scene.
12.
My landlord says, “Pay your rent by Wednesday, or I’ll have you evicted.”
I flaunt my Doc Martens and say breezily, “No prob. See you then.”
13.
May and I spend the first day of her holidays sorting our possessions into “Sell” and “Keep”. I get $3 for four books.
*
We’ve tried ebay and twelve different friends, but oddly no-one will buy May’s lifesize poster of Edward Cullen. Go figure.
*
I eat lunch with Jack. He doesn’t mock my eyebrows, but says, “Can we have dinner Friday – with May?”
“YES! Er, that’d be nice.”
14.
I fake receiving an SMS break-up at the service station and get a free tank of petrol. Nice. My eyes are getting tired from fake crying.
*
May and I put everything we can’t live without into our car and go camping. I don’t think she believes it’s really a holiday.
*
We go swimming in the creek and May finally relaxes and starts to laugh. For dinner, we roast our hot cross buns over the fire.
15.
Pay day. I’d need three more to pay school fees, and there’s only one more this month. But I have a plan. Today we buy food – sort of.
*
Eggs for protein and zucchini for vegetable matter. Somehow, toasting zucchini isn’t the same as toasting marshmallows.
16.
For our dinner date with Jack we eat roast lamb with gravy and pumpkin and potatoes. May doesn’t eat the zucchini, and neither do I.
*
The night is perfect. It’s even kind of fun to pretend to go into our old house before sneaking around the corner to our car.
17.
I dress as a harassed bride and May hides behind a column while I claim a fictional honeymoon booking at a nice hotel – prepaid, of course.
*
May jumps on the bed while I boil eggs. She says, “This is your best idea ever!”
“Wait and see.”
She eats the minibar peanuts, grinning.
18.
I dress as a just-awoken newlywed and score free breakfast. Fortunately for May, they’re willing to deliver my “fiancé’s” meal to our room.
19.
May’s friend Sara calls to ask if May can sleep over next Friday.
I say, “Definitely. How about two nights?”
*
Jack calls and we talk for three hours. Mmm. . . school holidays. When the call ends, I can’t remember a single thing we talked about.
20.
Jack and I meet for lunch again. He admires my new Docs. I can’t tell if he’s messing with me or not, but he’s smiling. Is that bad?
21.
I go to a new shopping centre and run into Rob. (Did I mention my ex-fiancé is a cop?) “Are you going to give me my ring back?” he says.
*
I say, “Are you going to pay me for our reception?”
“We didn’t have one – why should I pay?”
“Because when you cancel on the day, you pay!”
*
“Give me the ring!” he says.
I say, “Give me the six thousand you owe me – and one seriously impressive apology.”
“Get lost!”
“You too!”
22.
I’m having lunch at the hotel when one of the staff asks why they haven’t seen my new husband all week. So much for being a newlywed.
*
My throat tightens. I feel my face flush with humiliation. The waitress blushes back at me and hurries away. Ah. Still a newlywed then!
23.
The hotel is too risky. May has one last jump on the bed, and we pack sadly.
I say, “Don’t worry. My big plan is for Saturday.”
*
I drop her at her friend’s house and prepare to spend my night in the park. All at once, I begin to hate ducks. Pompous freaks.
Foetal
I forgot to mention in the baby-related posts that it’s apparently okay to take zoloft (my anti-depressant of choice) while breastfeeding. That is FABULOUS news. I’m very fond of Zoloft, but I mostly like to take it during periods when life is especially exciting. Even just the knowledge that I’ll have that choice is very comforting.
I find it so hard to believe that publishers take so long to make their acquisitions decisions (even as I am the proof). Whenever I begin a new book, I can predict that I’ll spend at least a year editing, then have to wait six months to a year before I get a SINGLE response. So that blank page won’t pay me back for literally years (I wrote “Stormhunter” six years ago).
That’s horrifying.
It’s moments like these – when I appear to be on the brink of success – that I want to curl into the foetal position until somebody offers me a contract.
Of course, I also know that I’d starve before I got a reply.
In other news, here’s a rare picture of my two cats within a metre of each other. You can sense the ambiance rather clearly.
#95: aka SECRET NUMBER FOUR
#95 is “Give away money”. Is there anything more fun (well okay, probably spending it yourself, but that’s covered in SO many other posts)?
Pick an amount of money that you can live without, and give it away. You can give it to a charity, put it in a Salvos box, take a homeless person to Subway for lunch (or let them choose where to eat), drop it in a stranger’s mailbox (with an explanatory note), or find a uni student and give it to them. Or, if you’re lucky (by some definitions of the word) you have a pov family member.
My sister and brother-in-law are BOTH at uni, AND they’re pregnant, AND she’s my sister. So she was a pretty obvious choice. I called her last night to check it was okay to give her money and blog about it (it so abundantly was), and gave it to her today.
So now she looks a little like this:
Play along at home: $20 can really make someone’s day – and let them do one of the semi-expensive items of awesomeness, should they so choose.
Tomorrow: Fix the car.
#56: Spread Good News
Some of you already knew (the secret’s officially out), but here’s some good news I’ve been bursting to share for quite a while now. . . my sister is pregnant!
Now obviously, I’m delighted for her, her husband, and their child, whose life is pretty sweet so far. But there’s another side to my delight, which I shall explain in these three pictures.
My sister looks pretty much like this:
. . . I look pretty much like this:
But for most of this year, my sister will look like this:
You go, girl!
Play along at home: Get pregnant, and tell people (not recommended for all players). Find some good news – even if it’s just a friend’s birthday coming up – and share it with the world.
In other news, today I discovered http://emmylennevald.blogspot.com/ who is also doing everything on Steff Metal’s awesome list – http://steffmetal.com/101-ways-to-cheer-yourself-up/. Who knew there were two of us?
3, 2, 1. . .
I weighed 80.9 this morning. That “0” was a delight to see. I’ll be smart and not weigh myself for a few days, because there’s no way I’ll continue losing .2 every day. Once I’m under 80, I’ll chill for a bit (without going back to a daily binge). Hopefully that day will be next Wednesday.
Gandalf lives, and I’ve released him into the main tank now, but decided to wait another week before getting more fish. You may recall the point of starting over was to get it right and not kill any more living creatures.
I had the water tested for ammonia, nitrate, and a few other things, and it was fine. So it was probably the lack of the blue crystals that was my only issue.
If you’ve been reading this blog and not the other one, you’ve missed some fun. Yesterday’s entry (“Frolic in a Fountain”) was especially enjoyable. I do recommend you go look at it: http://twittertales.wordpress.com/2010/04/20/124-frolic-in-a-fountain/
#123: Yum Cha
This is another idea from the sweetness that is http://the-creamy-middles.blogspot.com.
I moved the article here, for money 🙂
Play along at home: Go to yum cha (I went to Ginseng in the Hellenic Club) but remember it’s usually a lunch thing, and not happening all the time. Alternatively, you can make your own by buying the dumpling wrappers at an Asian grocer and filling them with whatever seems good to you (I recommend a mix of pork and chicken mince, with soy sauce). Then steam or fry them, and eat!
I haven’t forgotten Secret # 6, don’t worry.
Also coming soon – a guest post from Emmy Lennevald.
So. . . that reverse burglary thing. . . here’s another, better clue:
#124: Frolic in a Fountain
This is inspired by http://the-creamy-middles.blogspot.com. Thank you!
At the beginning of the day, I was scared the cops would take me down and/or put me in the slammer/big house/bad man can for today’s dastardly deed. When I looked at the colour of the water (and saw no glimpse of the bottom) my fears changed.
I had thought ahead and invited Canberra’s Master of Sarcasm, Ben. I told him to wear his most frolicsome attire. He did.
As you may have noticed, it’s raining. The day went from sunny to a thunderstorm (during exactly this period of time), then sunny again (immediately afterwards, although parts of the road were flooded). In this pic, you can see it’s a sunny day, with rain in the middle – and only in the middle.
When we reached the fountain, I passed the camera to the faithful Ben and headed bravely into battle. (Please note: I’m usually much manlier than I may appear in this clip. And I really was concerned that there might be some form of marine life lurking beneath the surface. I have frog fear.)
Pausing only to pay tribute to “La Dolce Vita”. . .
(http://www.independent.co.uk/multimedia/archive/00088/9295098_88665t.jpg)
I stepped under the spray for a properly frolicsome picture.
Shortly afterward, we fled the scene. I noticed as we walked away that I’d injured myself in the pursuit of awesomeness. My leg was cut, and I had a long trail of blood running down my leg and pooling in my left shoe.
Did I mention the water was green?
My skin, hair and clothes became increasingly itchy and flollopy on the way home, but it was DEFINITELY worth it. I was wet through and smelly, but exhilarated.
Play along at home: Find a fountain, and go frolic in it!
Tomorrow’s awesomeness plan: Share good news.
Fart Fail
I’ve heard back from the “Farting my ABCs” possible-publisher. . . here’s what happened.
As usual, my ears pricked at the sound of a low-grade motorbike. I was near the front door, so I opened it, and actually saw the postman at our neighbour’s mailbox (which is good, because it means that even if there’s nothing in the box, I know the postie has already been). I emptied the hoover bag, and went to the letterbox. There was an envelope. A big one. For me. From that publisher. I could feel that it had about twenty pages in it, which is another Bad Sign. It meant they’d returned the manuscript.
I walked inside, put the vacuum cleaner away, and sat down at my computer, ready to immediately document the results.
It was a rejection, and very clearly a form letter (always disappointing to get no feedback, even though feedback is EXTREMELY rare – in my case, I only get it when I have a contact in the company). I sighed and opened up the blog ready to write.
Then my eye fell on the manuscript itself. It isn’t “Farting my ABCs” after all. It’s the first few chapters of a different book (one I sent to them in November, and which wasn’t written specifically for them – so not something I was holding my breath about).
So I’m still waiting. I’ll let you know when “Farting my ABCs” gets an answer. It’s still probably a “no”. Even “Stormhunter” (best chance this year) is probably a “no.”
Following on from yesterdays blog. . .
Probably the most useful things I discovered from the baby book were:
1. Colick isn’t hereditary (CJ and a cousin of his were both very colicky babies, so that lessened my sheer abject terror slightly).
2. Roughly when to start on solid food, and when kids are old enough to begin destroying things.
3. You need to change nappies 5-10 times a day for the first little while after getting home from hospital (that would have freaked me out).
Felicity Banks 