Stupidity is Catching up to me! and other stuff

Okay, I KNOW y'all are dying to hear what stupid stuff I've been up to recently.  It's not totally stupid--like those teenagers in scary movies--"Oh, let me turn off ALL the lights and then walk into the dark, dark basement to see what's knocking" stupid.  More of a proverbial shot in the foot stupid. 

Writer friends: If you aren't aware of this, then this is your one and only posting I'll be doing of this--Penguin currently is accepting slush.  Yes, my friends, open submissions until the end of this month.  So polish up your synopses and send away!  And no, they never stated what types of books they are looking for, so in my mind it's a free-for-all.  Onward ho!  (uhm, the western slang, not the modern day 'ho'). 

Oh, the stupid thing I did?  Well, I subbed a synopsis for a partially written book, DEMON.  12K isn't a full 90K manuscript.  So if I DO manage to generate some interest, well, I'll be typing like a fiend!  I've written fast before and can do it again. Well, I'll be typing like a fiend anyway, since I'd like to enter this story in RWA's Golden Heart contest, deadline 12/3 . . . or is that 12/5?  Guess, I'd better check that out.

I also subbed my two middle grade stories, GNOME and FAERIE.  Those are complete and highly polished.  I'm currently querying FAERIE with various agents.  I'll let you know if there is any news other than the 'not right for me'.  And yes, out of 14 queries I've already secured 5 Rejections. Rejections bite, but they are a part of the biz so get used to them.

What else is new?

Were busy getting my kidlet's costume ready for Halloween.  We started working on it in late September--it's going to look wicked!  This year, she's a headless bride and I must say that we've had fun working on the infrastructure and now we are working on the blood.  In the recent past, she's been a robot (w/flashing LED's that read 'FEED ME', a mummy (tearing up strips of tea-dyed muslin and spray gluing them on, hubster made cobra crown, scepter and ankh), a pumpkin-headed scarecrow.  I'll post pictures next week.

Tomorrow is my mom's 89th birthday.  She's a pretty remarkable woman.  She raised 9 of us and we've all graduated from college, many of my sibs have advanced degrees.  Not too shabby considering there were some seriously hard times along the way.  We're taking her to P. F. Chang's for dinner.  One of my bros is driving in, but he probably won't make it on her birthday. 

I'm working on a Halloween blog.  I'm pre-writing it, unlike the other two that I had put up.  There's a little less pressure on me, especially with Fall break next week.  This time around instead of posting on my regular M-W-F schedule, I'll post it everyday until finished.  I'm shooting for 6-7 installments and plan to have it finished on Saturday, 10/30.   

Oh, and I'm also starting to plan my Christmas candy making.  Grand Marnier has a vanilla liqueur that's new this year and I realized I didn't have any vanilla truffles in my recipe file.  I'll post a list of my truffle guts after Thanksgiving, post-kidlet's birthday, post-Halloween, post-finishing DEMON . . .

Hm, I'd better get my fat ass in gear if I want to get all this stuff done before the end of the year!

That's it for now.  Today, I'd like to finish a rough draft if the Halloween blog (@ 2000 words to write).  And I need to do some cutting and rewriting on DEMON to get it ready for me to charge ahead writing it on Monday.

Write on!