Weekend Warrior. That’s me.

I have three birthday parties coming up, all at my house, over the next three weekends.  Things need doing.  A lot of things.  All now. (MUST DO ALL THE THINGS!)

I worked this morning, came home and ate, checked email (aka “screwed around online”), then jumped in.  I was planning a 20/10 but it became a 45/15 instead.  I went up to my older daughter H’s room, she of the birthday party with a bunch of 12-year-old girls tomorrow, which she had cleaned up this morning.  She has a full-size keyboard (all 88 keys, a pedal, a bench, the works) that needed to go live on its stand instead of on her dusty, and often cat-infested, floor.  So I did it.  WITHOUT the directions, which she had apparently cleaned up and put away before leaving for the afternoon.  It’s together, and it’s right.

Next, she had a table that she got for Christmas.  It’s a night-stand size table and the sides are peace signs.  We tried to put it together a month ago, but being fairly cheaply made the screws didn’t fit far enough through to actually be useful at holding things together, so I needed to find my box-o-screws (thank you Dad!) which took no time at all actually.  What took so long was finding time to put the thing together.  Today, I brought my screws up with my screwdriver set, and put that sucker together.

Then I rearranged her room a bit.  It wasn’t in my job description, but to fit the keyboard in against a wall instead of the middle of the rug where it had been squatting, it was necessary.  If she doesn’t like it, she can always move it back if she can figure out a better way (one that doesn’t involve putting the keyboard by the heaters).

Next, I’m on to either the library or a combination of that and M’s room, since most of the stuff that doesn’t belong in the library migrated there from M’s room.  And by most I mean all.  Updates later, if I’m still alive and not buried under a pile of stuffed animals.

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• Organizing Plans (famelessramblings.wordpress.com)

 

What you’ve missed

 

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St. Patrick’s Day was M.’s 3rd birthday.  The two older kids and I ate dinner with her and sang her Happy Birthday again over a cake made in a ladybug mold but colored green in honor of the holiday.  S. said it looked like a turtle, and M. agreed so instead of being a St. Patrick’s Day ladybug, it was a turtle cake.  There was frosting, there were sprinkles, M. was happy.

I have sent out a story to two different magazines and a poem to another in the last week.  All three have months-long wait periods before you hear anything at all, and since they are only first submissions I’m not expecting much, but I had to at least get the process started.  I wanted to get used to the idea of contributing so that it will be a more regular occurrence.

I saw over the weekend that there is a short-story writing contest in my area and I’m trying to put something decent together to submit.  Submissions are accepted until April 22, so I still have time.  I just need to make sure I can get one of my preliminary ideas to work out as a story.  It’s sponsored by the Mark Twain House and the Harriet Beecher Stowe House, both in Hartford right next door to each other.  If you’re ever in the area and get to visit, you should.  They are very cool houses in their own rights just because they are fine examples of architecture and decor, but that they were the homes of such great authors makes them twice as interesting.  I’ve always been partial to the Twain house, partly because I’m a bigger fan of his writing than of Stowe’s and partly because there are some great stories/facts that are part of the tour of his house.  When I was a kid (8 or 9) I used to imagine living there or at Gillette’s Castle (in East Lyme…or is it Old Lyme?) which was another of our vacation haunts.

I had two court appointments having to do with the house (one with the bank, one with the ex) scheduled for the same day, which I thought was very efficient of me.  The 9:30 appt. got messed up on my end by a lack of a phone call that I was unaware I had to make and had to be rescheduled.  The noon appt. was rescheduled by the bank because they’re still waiting on paperwork on their end before they have any info for me at all.  Basically, I wasted the better part of the day not dealing with things that ultimately were both rescheduled, or at least will be once all the paperwork has processed.  So much for efficiency.

I have done exactly zero work on my book.  I have been tied up with household finances and cleaning and other mundane but necessary tasks, and really have just been dicking around not doing anything productive other than the bare minimum.  That is going to have to stop.  Tomorrow I’m starting to work with a time log.  It’s more to force me to admit to myself that I waste a LOT of time doing nothing (email, Twitter, iPod, etc) than to show me where my time is going.  I’m not asking myself what is happening to all my time.  I know it’s being pissed away on crap.  I just need to force myself to be a grown up and get back to work.

Do you find yourself wondering where your day has gone?  If you were brutally honest with yourself, would you really need to ask?  Would you like the answer?

 

Weekend Updated

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I realize it’s been a couple of days since I posted, and I do actually have two book reviews in the works that will be coming up soon.   Things have just been very busy in my non-writing life so I’ve been caught up with that.  As I mentioned before, Monday was H.’s 11th birthday.  Yesterday (Sunday) was M.’s birthday party for her 3rd birthday, which is actually on St. Patrick’s Day.  I’ve spent the last couple of weeks getting the house ready and getting all the necessary decorations and favors.  It’s been exhausting, but also good because it’s progress I can actually see.

Friday I decided to rip the carpet out of the downstairs hallway, an area not much bigger than a stair landing.  The carpet predates our buying the house by quite a bit, and was a disaster.  Cleaning it would have had no real effect, and our former dog (now living with my ex) destroyed areas of it around the doors trying to dig her way into/out of the rooms.  The floor underneath is the same wood as the living room, not just plywood.  Even though the floor is not in good shape cosmetically, it’s still a lot better than the carpet was.  I want to do the hall stairs too, because they’re also real wood, but not until M. is done with the stage where she still could potentially fall down them.  No need to make them slippery.

Sunday’s party went very well.  All of my in-laws came as well as my mom and Cliff, and M. had a blast with her cousin, C.  C. is three months older than M. and they play as well together as can be expected of two girls their age.  They had a great time, the food was good (with Chris’s help) and the house isn’t totally destroyed.

I’m still recovering from all the work, and there is a little more cleanup to do, but I’ll be posting at least one of the reviews either today or tomorrow. I broke my writing chain on Friday, and haven’t picked it up yet.  I decided since I had already missed a day I’d take the weekend off instead of driving myself crazy trying to find time.  I’ll restart today though.  I’ve decided I really want to spend more time now on rewriting and editing than on new work, unless I think of a great idea that can’t wait.

How did everyone else’s weekend go?

 

Happy Birthday, my eleven-year old girl!

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Today was H.’s 11th birthday.  We went out to dinner at the restaurant of her choice, which is actually one all of us like that serves awesome Mexican.  We had our own room because it’s shaped like a barn and the silo part has one large round table in it.  The lower part is off of the bar downstairs, and upstairs it’s off of the dining room.  That’s where we were, and we needed the space.  There are five of us, plus my mom and my stepfather.  We all had a good time, and H. loved her gifts and her dinner.  We had already given her the present from us.  I picked up the new Pokémon Black for her yesterday, so it was waiting for her when she got out of school today.  Her brother bought Pokémon White for himself.

I’m still having a hard time coming up with ideas. This hasn’t been a terrific writing week for me because I’ve been tied up with H.’s birthday planning and getting the house ready for M.’s party on Sunday.  M.’s 3rd birthday is on St. Patrick‘s Day.  Chris and I always joke that she wanted to be like her siblings so she was born on St. Patrick’s Day.  She’s the only one of them with no Irish blood.  The other two are part Irish on their father’s side.  In any case, I’m hoping that after her party on Sunday I’ll be able to get back to some semblance of a writing schedule.  I’ve kept up on 750words.com, but other than that I haven’t done anything.

The rewrite of my book was going well last week.  I’m hoping to pick that up again soon.  I also started looking through my Writer’s Market book to see what kinds of markets are out there in the magazine world and see if I have any ideas that fit in with some of them.  I’m already feeling better about things because I’ve seen a few that I could already send things in to and I’m only a little way into the magazine section.

That’s about where things stand now.  I’ll probably be a little light on the posts this week because of all the party prep, but I’ll be back in full force next week.  I hope.  How productive is everyone else being this week?

 

An Unfocused Day

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“Professionalism is knowing how to do it, when to do it, and doing it.”  ~ from a fortune cookie.

“The Constitution only gives people the right to pursue happiness.  You have to catch it yourself.”  ~ Benjamin Franklin

“Buy me stuff and I’ll be nicer.” ~ Happy Bunny

The first quote sounds like good business advice to me.  If you want to be professional, to present a professional face to the business world, it is certainly important to know how to do your job and when to do it.  But I think the most important part is “doing it.”  So many people, myself included, know what they should be doing, know that they should be doing it, but never follow through.  I know I have shown a remarkable lack of follow-through lately given the importance of the tasks I keep avoiding.  I’m trying to change that, but some days go better than others.

Ben Franklin about summed it up here.  Everyone has the right to pursue happiness.  But it isn’t owed to anyone, it isn’t guaranteed.  If you’re not willing to go out and get it, to chase after it, to work for it, then you’re just wasting your time.  Complaining about the unfairness of things does not change them.  I remind myself of that daily.

I love Happy Bunny.  I love the sarcastic, bitchy attitude.  I don’t really need people to buy me stuff in order for me to be nice to them, but it still cracks me up.  Most of the Happy Bunny things do.  Not that I would ever really want to be that mean or self-centered.  It’s not a mindset to aspire to, it’s just silliness and shouldn’t be taken seriously.

I’ve been working all day on finances.  I filed our 2010 taxes electronically, and I’ve been working on some other finance-related paperwork that I need to get done ASAP.  My brain is friend and I am exhausted.  I’m ready for bed and I haven’t finished what I need to get done for the day.

I’m not complaining, just stating facts.  It was a busy, somewhat stressful day.  I have more of it to look forward to tomorrow.  I’m pretty sure I’m doing ok in getting everything together.  I just wish I could be more organized.  I know, I know, I could be more organized, I just haven’t been working at it enough.  I’ve started though.  I really want to straighten out my house.  I want a place that isn’t cluttered, isn’t disorganized, isn’t generally a huge pain in my ass.  I’m getting there.  Slowly.  Right now, my upstairs bathroom is nearly perfect.  I’m not going for perfection, so what I mean by that is that it is exactly as I want it to be.  Things are put away.  Everything is clean, even the floor.  The cabinets are organized.  I can find any bathroom-related thing anyone could ask me for as long as we’re not out of it.  And I would know if we’re out of it because I know what we have.  It’s a good feeling, and I want it to spread to the rest of the house.

I’m so glad February is nearly over.  I’ve had about enough of this winter.  Plus, both of my daughters have March birthdays, 10 days (and 8 years) apart, one on St. Patrick‘s Day.  My older daughter is having a sleepover at her dad’s house because she won’t have an annoying little sister there to barge in on the party.  My younger daughter will be having her birthday party here, so I need to get the place in order!  She hasn’t decided what kind of birthday party she wants yet.  I’ll be helping her decide.  I am, however, cooking food for everyone with the new Philly Cooking Cream from the cream cheese people.  I’m getting supplies from HouseParty.com for throwing the party, and “demonstrating” it (by using it in my dishes) to all the grown-up party-goers.  I’m looking forward to it, but I’m also really nervous about being ready on time.

Do you write better in a more organized/less cluttered environment?