I'm awake. Sort of. I wrote last night, and fell into bed.

Sleep makes all the difference.

No time again. Still, the good news: one very nice review a few years late, and more wordage.

The not-so-good news? Oh. The 100th day of school.

I don't know about you, but we're eating 100 doughnuts today.

Reprieve!

(But only for another thirty minutes. Type fast, fingers.)

Slept in, yay! Drank a vat of coffee, yay! The backs of my eyes are almost functioning now, and alleluia, amen, to that.

Next on the list? Ugh. The bathroom remodel. Starting with the cleaning and organizing and measuring of the area in question. While I promise to love the end result, whatever it is, I am not as hopeful about nailing the beginning. For anyone on my f'list who has done a bathroom remodel, any pertinent suggestions, warnings, notes to add to our concerns list?

(We actually have three, and we are killing two, so this is not doom as we know it, like a friend of mine who only had her one bathroom at the time of the remodel.)

The writing proceeds apace. I do not mind stopping after a hundred or so, knowing that there are some nights where I'm getting to four hundred before running out of brains/energy/imagination. It all works out in the end, and I just figure I'm allowing my hind brain the time to puzzle out what should logically follow.

We had a discussion in chat last night on clichés, and what purpose they serve in writing. I brought up China's discussion on second-order clichés in his week at Clarion. For me, the takeaway was avoiding the lazy practice of putting words together in a too-predictable way. Frex, if you have a page that ends on diaphanous, your brain is going to supply that automatic wings/gown before you even get the page turned. The use of second-order clichés dulls your writing, subtracts the sparkle, removes that sense of freshness. As a writer, you should be attempting to do something new on all levels. Fresh-something about the plot, fresh-something about the characters and the setting, fresh-something about the prose. Clichés speed the prose, allow the reader to fill in predictable words and skim.

I'm sure there's a time and place for that, too, just like there's a time and place for the use of passive voice. But relying on clichés all the time leads you to writing that is proficient without possessing the spark that editors and publishers desire.

Okay, and I'm off the soapbox. Too much to do and never enough time.

Oh, and by the way? I'm a second-order cliché-er in my journal. All the time.

(Don't think of it as lazy here. Try not-awake.)

I was semi-successful last night in that I did nail down words. We spent fifty minutes on the phone with retrobabble discussing bathroom issues, and I came away feeling far more secure that we had enough organized to contact a designer and we have the appropriate order of most critical components. I would not have guessed plumbing, but it makes sense in retrospect.

Plus this morning I have links to explore! Yay!

There there was Harry Potter on television, and I finally watched more than a bit of the Quidditch match, although I arrived at the end of it and thought oh no, not again.

(This is my typical movie-viewing strategy: walk in on a middle scene that I have seen two to five times previously, and leave before it goes anywhere else, because I'm bored.)

There's a reason why I like books.

Some Ideo work last night, and there will be more during the game. I hope. Or housework, seeing that I didn't get that far yesterday. (I was interrupted by a four-hour nap, and neither man nor beast disturbed me. The beast made up for it at 5A this morning, however.)

Meanwhile, the family is up and moving. It's time I was also. Unfortunately.

Because I'm ready for a nap.

I did write, and pats on the back for it, seeing that I looked at the clock about 8:52P and realized I hadn't.

Half an hour later, I had words, though.

Sucky words. I'm already tallying the things I'll have to fix on the next go-around. Throw in more characters that Nelson can talk to. Yeah, he's a loner, but this is ridiculous. You get him up close to someone and his mouth slams shut. Nods are his favorite means of communication.

Well, except for talking to Karma, the dog, his substitute child, who has not given him nearly enough grief.

That's something else I have to fix.

And then there's the sheer laggardlyness of this story. Nelson's on a cross-country trip, so guess what? The story is taking its sweet time, too. It's not like it has anywhere to go until it hits Annapolis, so hey. Take it easy. No need to work.

I could go on. I'm not even looking at the sentence structure right now. I'm dwelling more on the scene and balancing the pacing, what little there is.

Wah.

I was horrified to discover that my theme of abandonment works quite well with Buddhism. Too well. In fact, Nelson's abandonment of his children reflects Siddhartha's abandonment of wife and family.

Eeeeeee. I hate discovering a story's meant to have dEEEEEEEEEper significance than I first thought. That means... gulp... writing up to its potential.

I don't know about you, but my quivering forebrain gibbers and makes feeble attempts to convince me not to face it.

So yeah, there were words, but it took quite a long time researching Buddhism before I could just write.

Plus, I'm still cranky that I don't know why these other people turned up, then disappeared, without saying much of anything.

They should abandon something to his care, but I don't know what it would be. I mean, he's already acquired a dog. What more do I need?

The end result is that between the story and the kind of day I had today (my special child yelled, "I'm heeeeeeeeeeeeeere!" upon entering, the first time, and every time thereafter, a new student, the Valentine crafts, the homework prep for next week, the "Oh, you didn't know you were principal today? Well, you are. Here, deal with this kid." and the after school meeting to listen to the union's stance on negotiations, plus a quick run over to admin after that for a peek at one of the new social studies texts we'll be piloting this year and next), I am one cranky person.

Don't mess with me.

If this story is smart, it will take heed.

Another reject (BFoD! Woo! Go, me!) to throw into the pile, and I have to work the remaining month to get a few out. Again. It's so much easier to sit and wait for the rejections to come back than it is to actually prep and mail them out.

Actually, it's the deciding of which market to hit that messes my resolve up every time.

Yesterday was all about bathroom redoings. We spent time at Home Depot and Tile City looking. I'm still caught between tile's durability versus the need for grout, and something else. Like slate. (Too dark.) Or travertine, (not sure, but there's got to be a drawback somewhere.)

Then I found Trikeenan Tiles. I would have said the Prairie Windows design (second row, second from the right, and click) was too dark, but I love it. So. I foresee a trip into Malibu or LA tomorrow.

Today there is cleaning and work on Ideo and, perhaps, a quick trip to Ventura to Lakeshore, the money sinkhole lately.

And maybe writing. I'd like that. And more Olympics, if I don't collapse in the middle of my bed in a puddle first.

ETA:We spent over $100 yesterday on the inset doggie door.

Guess who is terrified of the plastic flap?

Oh, and yes, one can get a head through the thing. Extracting said head with ears attached is somewhat more difficult. (No, it wasn't me. Or the kids, for that matter. Or the dog. So....)

The weird dreams continue: last night, in the lost in San-Francisco-looking-for-a-map/directions/way-to-find-the-freeway-onramp scenario, someone mentioned a scientific article where researchers had been able to hop fifteen minutes into the future.

Of course, I grabbed for the paper and read the article.

And no, I never did find the freeway onramp. I did, however, receive many conflicting directions that began with, "See that restaurant over there? *pointing ensues* Go there and you'll see it." Unfortunately, none of the direction-givers agreed on the restaurant.

I'm pretty sure I could resolve many of my personal issues if I just had decent directions.

The children are gone: Drew to Davis, Alix to a friend's house. The spousling is asleep, with the dog curled up beside him. This is the most alone I have been in a week.

School stuff? Two log cabin crafts, one directed draw of George Washington, a Valentine's Day party and sugar enough to kill an adult. (Candy handed out with a lecture culminating with a stern "No candy for breakfast!" warning. Next day, when I asked, "Who had candy for breakfast?", two hands shot up. Oops. The Um... no, I didn't!s weren't particularly convincing.)

I bought new glue lids for my glue bottles. A simple press, and the glue is dispensed in the form of one perfect dot. More than half the class got the concept. One child, frustrated by his inability to shake out the glue, decided to loosen the cap, and taught the trick to two friends. End result: Artistic renditions of Mount Vesuvius in glue and glue bottles times three .

There is no writing this week. Zip, zero, zilch. However, there has been much editing and htmling for Ideomancer. The entire issue will be ready for Lisa's magic touch by Monday night. It's scary to be done this early.

Today, there is more bathroom stuff. We are heading over to Pasadena this morning to look at tile, and then I should be playing with patterns of laying the dang the stuff. This part is just like quilting, and it is the piece that does not concern me. (Well, except for the part where I get the spousling to agree with my design vision. And good luck there. A lost snowball stands a better chance of survival in the Gobi Desert.)

Another cup of coffee, and then I wake everyone up. (Well, everyone... the two sleeping beasts, and one's a dog.)

So, the last week was all about the new Ideomancer issue. For the most part, it's all together. I'm waiting for the actual date and the .pdf files to put everything live. And go, me. This one got put together in two weeks. I'm slowly improving. Plus, not only that, I fixed the archives so they actually work! (Little steps for the rest of humanity, seven league boots for me. Yay, me!)

After that, I promptly took my life in my hands and sent my ded Charley story to Baen's Universe.

They haven't rejected me yet.

I guess I'll give them a bit more time to think over which rejection version they should send. Chances are they don't have a standard one that rejects penii stories.

(Oh, and this week, I got the welcome news that while the Middle Child considers me 'weird', his friends consider me 'cool'. I have my penii kidnapped (hrm... can one kidnap them?) by aliens story to thank for that little mercy.)

When I wasn't Ideoing, I was working on the bathrooms project. We have some first sketches, sample tiles ordered, (and once I got over the shock of having my $25/tile guess confirmed, ohmigod! that's $300 a sq. ft., breathe! breathe!) and I haven't changed my mind. Just the lighter tiles, which, thankfully, are significantly cheaper.

There will be more bathroom running around today. We still have lighting decisions and plumbing fixtures. Woo! Go us!

And there was much rejoicing. Not. Although there is rejoicing at the fact that I have a completely empty house to myself. Even the dog, in a borrowed Webelos scarf, went out Scouting for Food.

To celebrate, I am draining another cup of coffee.

One must be properly fortified for Teh Cleaning.

So, life is good. I'm managing to keep up with most of my obligations, even if I'm not talking much. I did manage to find an ever-so-early version of a story and post it on my lj account. Should you need blinding, go here.

(First, I'd have to be able to drag myself up at 5:45A. I haven't successfully changed my time of day in terms of blogging. Oh, well.)