The Big DumpTruck

Man, this was a hard year for me. I really strongly disliked my novel, and I did not have the heart to just sort of start into a new novel halfway through. Although to get me through the final burst of words I needed today to get past the 50k mark I decided to make one of my main characters a prostitute that nobody knew was a prostitute (including me prior to today) and I was able to zoom up and over the 50k mark. Okay, bummer that it's over, because this is really the only month of the year that I get anything written, but I am kind of glad to have some of my time free to do other things without feeling guilty that I'm not writing.

In conclusion, I actually think I might pick up my 2006 Nano novel and start editing it and maybe work on an ending. I think of all the Nanonovels I've written, that's the only one that has any kind of potential because it actually has a plot.

Labels: nanowrimo

I have to tell you, my husband must be sucking up or something. Because I got home and there was a fake log burning in the fireplace. Now I will not admit to myself or anyone else that this is because the fake logs REEK and he wants to burn them all to get them out of the house. I think they smell like liquid smoke, which stinks. And it stinks when you have a fake log that smells like liquid smoke.

No, I like to think he did it because he knows I like fires and he's just being a nice guy. I'm sticking with that.

Labels: fun

Because nobody is checking in over on my Nano blog, I figured I'd do a Nano update here. We're in the final stretch. My novel is horrific. The Nano slogan "No Plot, No Problem" has never been put to better use than my novel, which, while it hints slightly at a plot in the first 8000 words or so, never actually comes around and has one. It is so far from being a finished novel that it makes last year's look like a Pulitzer Prize Winner. I'm stunned at the difference, actually. I think last year I thought my plot idea was pretty cool and it was very workable (it was about a compulsive shopper) and this one (about a guy who finds out his parents were circus freaks but then doesn't do anything about it, based on what I've written so far) stinks.

There are only 11k words left, and I really want to just finish the danged thing so I can do other stuff.

Labels: nanowrimo

Mr Dump and Junior are painting the downstairs bathroom right now. I wonder who will be alive at the end of the day?

The reason for the painting? Well, it's tied to the living room, if you can believe it. We bought a couch yesterday (what, you didn't spend black Friday looking for a couch?) and the color they are painting the bathroom is the test for the color we eventually want to paint the living room and this is sort of a test of the color. That room needed painting anyway (the whole house does) so this is a good test. It's a kind of almond color - I think this means I get to go shopping for new curtains, don't you think?

We got a couch because the old one is just beat to hell. The arm is broken, the cushions have lost their cush, and the whole thing is just starting to look ratty. It is 9 years old - we bought it when Junior turned one, and we decided to just get something relatively inexpensive given that a toddler would be destroying it. And it lived through Phantom's puppy years, too. I think we're lucky it lasted as long as it did, to be honest.

So anyway, we have not put up the tree yet because the guys deliver the couch on Tuesday and that will be one less thing they have to work around. In the meantime, we are trying to clean the hell out of the downstairs, which should take the rest of the weekend given my complete disinterest in cleaning right now. In fact, to avoid having to clean the downstairs, I actually was cleaning upstairs. I have two garbage bags full of clothes to donate the Ginny's, a garbage bag of clothes to throw away, and I put away all my shorts and summer pants. And that is just my stuff. I will maybe think about doing Junior's stuff in the next few days or weeks. It's not like his stuff will fit next summer anyway. I probably need to locate all the shoes he's outgrown too.

Oh, so as for Black Friday, I was very proud of myself. We did not leave the house until almost noon. We went and grabbed a bite to eat and then went to Target to buy stuff we needed. I got some new socks, replenished my vitamin collection, got mouthwash, and bought a big snowflake to hang on the front door (I need to figure out the best way to plug it in, and then I'll take a photo for you). I think the only impulse buy, other than the snowflake which wasn't completely an impulse buy) was a small sewing machine. I have never owned one. I don't know if that's because I don't need one, or if I think I don't need one because I don't own one. But this was one of those "hey, if you need to sew a quick hem, you can do it" kind of sewing machine, and it was on sale for $10. I think for ten dollars I will attempt to sew something with it. I am wearing a pair of my new socks right now and they are delightful. For the record, ladies, if you have trouble finding socks that don't cut off the circulation because your lower legs aren't stick thin, Target has a whole line of very cool socks that fit wonderfully. I will try to take a photo of those, too, so that you will know what kind of socks I'm talking about. I love them.

Labels: chores, house, shopping, socks

I am still going through the 900 or so photos we took when we were in Disney last month. It's slow going. I have picked few more to post on flickr, but this is my favorite one from the batch.

I would just like to point out that my family was basically trying to run their little feet off back to the hotel while I was attempting to take a decent photo of Spaceship Earth, my favorite "thing" in all of Walt Disney World. Sure, Cinderella's Castle is great, but if I could put Spaceship Earth in my front yard I would so do it. I think I'd need a bigger front yard, however.

Have I mentioned recently how much I absolutely love the lens I got (as a very early Christmas present) to take with me to Florida? It's fantastic. I love it. I wish I'd gotten it the day I got the camera.

Labels: Disney, photos, Vacation

Last night I passed the 25k mark. Now I only have to hit 50k before the clock strikes midnight and November turns into December. I think maybe I can do it. I had a really good rush of pointless prose last night, so that's nice.

Mike Lowell is staying in Boston, so you'll have to excuse me if I'm giddy for a few. He's my favorite player (Papi has a special place in my heart forever, but Mike Lowell is my boyfriend). In fact, that's how I refer to him. It's always "My boyfriend Mike Lowell." I saw a photo of my boyfriend Mike Lowell down at Disney the other day. I was pretty sad that he didn't do that the day after they won the World Series, but I would never question my boyfriend Mike Lowell's decisions.

Let's see, what else is going on? Oh, I was going to ask if anyone here owned one of those digital photo frames, and if you do, do you like it and would you recommend it? I am trying to write a Christmas list for Santa, you see, and I want one of those but I don't want Santa to spend a lot of money on it. It's not like I can't just pull photos up on my computer if I really need to see them. I just like the idea of having a photo frame on my desk so that I can just swap out the pictures with the weather.

Speaking of which, we're on snow alert. We may get [breathlessly] a snowflake or two. Junior is doing the happy 4th Grade dance. I tried to explain that the snow isn't going to stick, and that we don't have to track down his boots just yet. But damn, I had better track down his boots. I wonder if they still fit? Doubt it.

(Christine and Nicholle, you pay attention, okay? Nothing you buy will ever fit a whole year later, and you can't buy stuff on sale at the end of the season because you don't know what size they will be when it's time to wear it. This is the most ANNOYING thing about kids. They just outgrow stuff constantly. Sometimes, within days of you buying it, I kid you not. Always make sure you have at least ONE pair of shorts or one sweater that's a size larger than your kid currently wears because it's a sad day when you wake up and it's 90 degrees and they suddenly don't have any shorts to wear to camp. Ahem.)

Labels: clothing, junior, kids, Mike Lowell, nanowrimo, Red_Sox

Okay, I'm all Christmassed up now. Junior bought two presents to give to his cousins (without any input from us) so we are officially shopping for Christmas, baby! We went to Cataldos on the way home from Burlington (Mr. Dump needed to go to the Apple Store for work purposes. Really.) And boy howdy if that doesn't make you feel Christmassy, nothing will. They are already selling trees so we got our first "whiff of the holidays".

I think it's time to have the annual viewing of Little Women.

And you?

Labels: christmas, shopping, Xmas

But I'll probably do it again. Last night, I, um. Well, rip it off like a bandaid, right? Last night I listened to a Christmas song on 103.3.

There. I said it. I'm sorry.

I learned from Universal Hub that they had stated their 24/7 Christmas music thing the other day, and I held off over 24 hours. But I gave in to the dark side on the drive home last night. Two songs, and one of them was "Do They Know It's Christmas" which, let's be frank, is more of an 80's "Where are they now" game than a Christmas Carol.

I changed it back to WBCN after that, but I think the damage was done, because when I got home I ripped the cellophane off Josh Groban's "Noel" and ripped it to iTunes. I assume I'm going to give it a look-see at work today.

So Happy Holidays, everyone!

Labels: Christmas_music

The kids did great on Saturday - they ended up placing 5th out of 36 teams (they were in 3rd after the qualifying rounds - simply amazing to me). What got me excited is that the team I wanted to win if we couldn't was the Pink Flamingos from Fall Brook School, and THEY DID IT! This was the team that we beat in the finals last week - they only lost to us by 5 points. I would say that placing 2nd last week and 1st this week makes them the team to beat!

The kids are all bummed that we hadn't signed them up for more tournaments, but back during signups, we didn't even think we'd be able to score for more than 2 challenges, so we signed up for the 2 closest tournaments just to give them a taste of it. We had no idea they would be winners/contenders.

This gives them plenty of time to work on additional challenges and the "presentation" requirement. They have to come up with some kind of project on renewable energy. Knowing these guys, it will probably be a good one.

Labels: Lego

Competition # 2 is tomorrow, so we need to carbo load, right? Right? Cause that's what you do before the big competition, right? You eat carbs because of some kind of thing your body does and it needs it, I guess.

I haven't figured that out because I was on South Beach and they said [bad] carbs are bad because they peak and drop really quickly. Oh, and then they stick to your hips and throw spitballs at you. So even assuming you carbo loaded whole wheat pasta (Ya, right), how is that going to help you 12 hours later? Wouldn't you be better off having a pancake breakfast that morning?

Also (as we cover a lot of important questions today), in the movie Shrek, don't Shrek and Fiona torture some frogs, by turning them into balloons? Minimally, that is because I can't remember what they ate roasted over the fire.

So when it turns out her father John Cleese was really a frog - where was the continuity person? I'm distressed.

Labels: food, legos, movies

I think I ate too much sugar today. I was eating gumballs. Ya, you know you wish you had a box of gumballs! But I've had about 10 of them and they are not playing nice with my lunch. Well, not the gumballs themselves, I throw that out when they flavor is gone. The sugar though. Or maybe it's just my lunch. Damned cafeteria food. Always attacking delicate little me.

I'm several thousand words behind on NaNoWriMo and I've only processed Disney photos from a single day of vacation.

I'm such a slacker.

The good news is that I didn't have an cavities Tuesday night, in spite of my gumball addiction, and my annual boob-squishing went off without a hitch and the radiologist said I'm good to go for another year. So that's a dental visit and a mammogram in the same week. Oh, and I need to see the eye doctor tonight for my contact lens fitting.

I should have scheduled a pap smear and had my taxes done. Sheesh.

Labels: gumballs, health, too_much_info

Labels: award, Lego, Leominster, photos, Robots

Okay, maybe not the world, but they are invading my life. You see, I signed on to coach Junior's FIRST LEGO League Robotics team. They started a league at his elementary school this year (and one other in town - it will expand out next year) and he's on team Funny Bones. Our team, plus the 4 others from our school and the 4 teams from the other elementary school attended the Mindstorm Madness tournament in Shrewsbury yesterday, 6 weeks or so after our team formed. We were up against 17 other teams, some of them middle school teams who had better robots and competition experience. Our plucky little robot soldiers, after 9 challenge rounds, were seeded FIRST(!!) for the playoff rounds. FIRST! Our average score over the nine rounds was the highest! Was that even possible? I can tell you, I almost cried I was so proud of these kids, and so shocked. When I went into the gym during the break and saw the list of teams, and saw #7 listed first, I refused to believe it was a ranking. But it was.

So we explained to the kids that really, that was the highlight of the tournament, because that's the REAL show of who did the best. Anyone could get knocked out of the semi-finals by just having a robot malfunction.

Except they didn't have a robot malfunction. They won each of their semi-final rounds, and won the final against a team from the other Leominster elementary school by a mere 5 points. We won the tournament, the whole thing. And we also got the robot performance award. Our simple little last-generation robot was a tireless little engine that could.

To say I was beside myself about the whole day is an understatement. 7 of the 9 Leominster teams made the elite 8, and 3 of the final 4 and both of the finalists were from our schools. I don't think I'll ever see such a thing again, and I will be happy HOWEVER they do at the Leominster Tournament this week. Funny Bones rule!

Labels: Lego, Leominster, Robots, school

So far one of last year's Nano-ers has joined up to contribute over at the new and improved Nano Blog (2007 NaNoWriMo Rest Area). So what about the rest of you? Or some new people? I'll just yammer like a crazy person with or without you, you know?

In other news, it is FREEZING OUTSIDE! Oh man, it might not have been the best weather in Florida ("sunshine state" my large white arse) but at least it wasn't 30 degrees when I left the hotel in the morning!

Still no pictures for you. I'm guessing it might be Sunday before I have some. I'm very sorry about that, but that's just the way it's been going this week. If someone figures out how to slow down time a bit, I may get to it Saturday, or even do a little tonight, but I still have to get the pictures off Mr. Dump's laptop (we took his old PC with us) and onto my Mac, where my editing software lives. What, you think this stuff just magically happens?

Labels: nanowrimo, weather

It's that time of year again! NaNoWriMo 2007 is upon us, and if you haven't signed up yet, go sign up and then join us on the Nano blog I'm setting up for more detailed posting and sharing. Last year 5 of us contributed to that blog, and we were all happy and sad to see December arrive. (You don't have to sign up to just read, but if you want to contribute, sign up and then let me know to "upgrade" you.)

So I woke up this morning, declared the word "The" to be the first word of my novel and dozed off for another 10 minutes. Writing is hard work. Since then I have decided that "The" is probably not going to be the first word, but no editing allowed when you're trying to write 50,000 words in a month, so I'll just write around the "the" and use it later.

For those waiting for Disney pictures, I have to work my way through about 5 gig worth of them. For those of you not waiting for Disney pictures, be happy, I haven't gone through them all yet.

Labels: fun, nanowrimo, writing