I have been doing stuff, and not really feeling up to posting.

One of the things I have been doing is transcribing a mondo interview with Daniel Abraham and Ty Franck, who write as James S. A. Corey. The first book of their new trilogy, LeviathanWakes, is coming out this month from Orbit.

I interviewed them, like, months ago. I had intended to record it via Skype, but they didn't want to be on video. So I recorded the audio and had to transcribe it. I suck at transcription. That is part of why I didn't post for a few days. I was a) transcribing and b)trying to sleep off transcription-induced migraines. :P

So, finishing the transcription of the interview is Thing Eleven. WOOT!

***

Thing Ten was a lovely trip to the Hong Kong Market. It is an Asian grocery and collection of Asian food places that bought out the old Wall-Mart building on the West Bank. If you live in New Orleans, the West Bank is like Siberia -- stray too far and you might end up eating your dogs. But really, my oldest's orthodontist is over there. He had an appointment, so we packed everyone up with the intention of going to the Asian market after the appointment.

( Pictures and such below the cut )

Thing Nine wasn't really anything. I was proud of myself for going to gym and for opening up the file to start the transcription, but I ended up with a headache with nausea (which narniadear informs me is a migraine -- I had thought I'd had migraines before, when I was on the pill. Horrible light sensitivity and sort of ripples in my vision, couldn't do anything but lie there and twitch. Those went away when I gave up hormonal birth control for good, but I guess all migraines are not created equal.)

In any case, just getting to spend a little quiet time with my family was so delicious after all that. I couldn't do my bedtime reading with the boys (we're reading LOTR), but the hubby read. I got to sit in the dark and listen, and it was very good. :)

Today at GC we have an article by Nightsky, The Chicas' Guide to Comic-Con Part 2: The Sequelling. I wish I could hit a Comic-Con just once, because that looks like fun. Have not had much of a budget for travel here lately, though. Maybe soon.

***

On my plate today is a some critiquing for the writing group. We have a meeting this Friday, but my plans are still so iffy that I can't be sure I can make it. It is a holiday weekend.

Most of my time has been taken up this week with kidstuffs. Boy the Elder had testing for math placement yesterday morning. I dropped him off and too Boy the Younger with me to get our Louisiana inspection tag and a few bits of groceries we missed on our last visit. Then the hubby called to say that Big Boy's dentist had called to say they had an appointment open up if he could come in that afternoon instead of Wednesday. So, we did it, and scheduled his orthodontic lab for Thursday. Whee! That ate up most of Monday, minus some serious cleaning and the next chapter in our read-aloud of The Hobbit.

Today the hubby, thinking we had another gallon of milk in the fridge, put it all in his morning smoothie. He apologized, but I still ended up walking to the store in the rain to get milk. Oh, well.

This afternoon, if the rain goes away, we are scheduled for the Park Day swim at teh Whitney-Young pool. I kind of hope the rain holds out, even though it would be unusual for it to rain all day. It rains almost every day, sometimes twice, but it never rains for long.

Tomorrow, laser tag with the Janowskys. Thursday, an early-morning orthodontist appointment for Big Boy. Friday is another meeting for the writing group. Though I'd rather be on the road to visit friends and family, it doesn't seem to be happening.

Yesterday was easily one of my best birthdays ever, despite being pretty normal in most respcts.

The hubby made me a special smoothie for breakfast, and the kids were most solicitous. I think this may have been my first birthday ever on Facebook, because WOW. Folks popped up with felicitations all over there.

An old friend from college even posted this for me:



That cracked me up, so much. This guy is one of two of my Beloved's friends from college who was also a full-fledged friend of mine as well. (Oh, the stories I could tell on him!) Anyway, that was a laugh.

Then there was LJ, which also seemed to be over-flowing with birthday wishes (and one super-cool virtual gift from the incomparable lotusice WOOT!)

Add to that phone calls from my buddies Teresa, Ben, hominysnark, my sister and a singing birthday message from my Papa and I just felt swathed in love from head to toe. My sons sang and danced , followed by their famous amoeba hug (it absorbs all in its path)They even refused to let me do anything around the house. They swept and made their own food and snuggled with me to watch some X-Files during the usual afternoon thunderstorms (got to keep up their geek education).

Then I got to wear one of my new sun dresses to Crazy Johnny's Steakhouse, a restaurant I requested for my birthday dinner, even though I hadn't eaten there before. The menu is limited, but they get the same cuts of meat as Brennan's at a much more reasonable price. Plus it was noisy and dress-code-less, so the boys could enjoy their meal without an etiquette refresher. The food was SO GOOD and carried no sticker shock.

So. Much. Fun.

I don't talk about it much, but my kids are amazingly funny and smart. They never fail to make me laugh. I totally lucked up in the family department. My friend department is none too shabby as well.

You guys rock.

First things first. Last week we had an update from Amalia the Savage on the Thor movie, in Thor Concept Art. Pretty cool. I know jack about Thor, but this is starting to look fun.

Today we have Pearce's take on Splice - Not a Fish Rabbit Human Frog Chicken Horror Movie, which is just as much fun as it sounds like it might be. *chuckle* I'm not huge into the horror genre, but Pearce always makes it sound fun.

***

My overly ambitious weekend went like this. Got up Saturday and gutted the middle third of my novel, slashing and re-writing sections of it. I was in the zone, I think. A slightly altered state of consciousness, anyway. So focused that I had no concept of time passing, except that I occasionally needed to use the bathroom. I didn't eat or drink, and long about 5pm I realized that I was developing a distinct stutter in my typing, especially with verb forms ending in 'ing'. Like, "dividing" became "divididiing". Thank Microsoft for the wee little red squiggly lines to tell me I was messing up, because after the third of fourth time I realized I was very thirsty, my head hurt and my belly was making unusual noises.

Also, I saw a roach and had a full-scale freak out. Most bugs don't bother me, but roaches? *shudder* Besides that, what the heck was it doing in my bedroom? There is no food in here! My Beloved killed it, picked it up on the edge of a paper and chased me out the door with it, saying, "Gonna put it on you."

Of course he didn't, and we all had a good laugh. :) I am so seldom in hysterics that my family found my reaction very amusing, and I can't really blame them.

***

Sunday we hit the zoo, and got caught out in the rain, which was warm and pleasant. Bought groceries. Then I had to prepare for my first New Orleans Writers Circle meeting. There was no reading or critiquing, so I still don't know how tough it's going to be. But the host for the meeting is in UNO's MFA writing program (and got blasted for writing a story they considered 'genre') so I have a feeling I will have a real opportunity to grow here.

There was a filmmaker, a military baker with a few sales under his belt (literary and genre), two awesome school teachers (one was the MFA student), one retired English teacher, one college student, the organizer and me. I wasn't the oldest one there, even -- most of them were in their 30s and 40s.

I'm hopeful, and a little afraid to hope. Then again, so much has come together for me since I've been here, why shouldn't this?

***

After all that with the novel, though, I'm still not caught up with the end of what I already had written. The gap is less than 100 pages, though, so that's pretty good. I have almost 76,000 words, now, but I'll be doing more slash and burn/re-writing, so heaven only knows what I'll end up with.

But, I still got my words in. I think they were even very good words, full of lovely things going on and only one really lovely thing I didn't expect. So that's pretty good.



and overall:



***

We had a good visit with the in-laws. We ate out a lot more than I would have liked, and did lots of fun, touristy things. I couldn't get them to Big Boy's school's Crawfish Boil, but we went to Middendorf's. There are shrimp boats that dock right next to the place, so I ordered the peal and eat boiled shrimp, which was incredible. So, I still got to rip the head off something and eat it. ;)

This is shaping up to be a busy week for all of us, but I'm going to do my best to get everything done, for everyone. Oy.

We had unexpected plans pop up yesterday, and today we had actual plans that went poof, but in a good way.

It opened up our time for a walk through the park, across St. Charles and up to The Maple Street Book Shop, which is actually two houses, side by side. One sells used and rare books and the other new books. We went in both, and it was lovely. I bought four books (including one for the kiddies) and ordered one. I know where I am going for books from now on. Sure, I might have to order genre titles specially, but Amazon continues to piss me off and this book shop is a dream.

On the way home we passed three nice places with For Rent signs, and hope for larger digs swelled within me. Then, my phone rang and it was my dear friend Andrea (whom some of you know as Jenny Gardener). I haven't seen her in years, though she's still someone I consider a close friend. We talk about once or twice a year, but I'm going to change that. It was so awesome to hear from her. She was the first one to expose me the whole "Follow Your Bliss" thing, which seems to be working out pretty well for both of us.

Seriously, a week doesn't pass that I don't think about her. The giant live oaks in the park remind me of her workshop story tentatively titled "Naked Man Falls from Tree." Which, yeah, maybe you had to be there. But she's awesome - take my word for it.

Then we made chicken for dinner, and Big Boy filmed me cutting up chicken breasts his next short film project, which seems like it should be pretty funny.

***

Got my words in, too:



For a total of:

Great day yesterday. Went to the library and the zoo and out to eat. Nice long walks through the neighborhood for most of it. Temp was in the 60s and sunny. So nice.

Watched A Night at the Opera with the boys. Ah, the Marx Brothers. Quite fun.

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Also, I realized that the thing I was complaining about missing out on for the boys would actually have prevented Big Boy from interviewing to be a Junior Zookeeper (a volunteer program at the zoo that he has been angling to get in since we got here). They would have required him to be there all day on the day of the interviews, and that is something I know he's really passionate about. He got the application and filled it out himself, and delivered it by hand.

So, it was a lucky break I didn't commit him to something else. He would have been so mad at me. :)

***


Writing stats for this morning:



And overall:



I could have done more, but the family is waiting on me. Maybe more tonight. :)

So, what with all the moving and stuff, we were all way over due for check ups. Since our pre-tax medical savings account is use it or lose it, we all had dental appointments today. We all did very well with the exception of Wee Boy. Like myself and his big brother before him, he has very porous baby teeth, but his permanent teeth, like mine and his big brother's, are quite strong.



I have a tiny little chip on my front tooth, right where the orthodontist decided to file mine down years ago. See, my front teeth naturally had a bit of a serrated look along the edge of the incisors. He ground them off smooth, then for some reason, ground in a slight serration (I have no idea what the right word is for that type of thing, but 'serration' will do) on each near the mid line. He didn't ask, he just did it.

Anyhoo, the kids both have my giant, carnivorous front teeth. Big Boy was even teased about them once upon a time, because when they first came in they were huge compared to his little six-year-old's head.

But anyway, I am grateful for my huge, strong teeth, and pledge to take good care of them. Wee Boy will need fillings in a couple of his baby teeth, because they're due to hang around a couple more years, but keeping the teeth could save us on braces down the road. Also, maybe some hours in the dental chair will make him more careful about flossing (he thinks if the floss goes straight down, he's done - despite careful coaching from both parents). Oy!

I'm getting comment notices on LJ either very, very late or not at all, but I will catch up. :)

Big Boy's orthodontist had good news - He won't be in braces for as long as we had feared, and it won't even be very expensive (we DID win $2,000.00 worth of orthodontia for $10.00 at a silent auction, so our final cost is ridiculously reasonable).

Also, we found him a good math tutor, whom we will meet with today. I am relieved.

I'm still not physically up to speed, and it's beginning to wear on me. I'm so tired of being sickly, even though it isn't very bad. We had temps in the 70s yesterday, and I wanted to be able to enjoy it! Plus, I've let things at the website slip, which I should not have done. *grump*

***

Today at GC, we have a chance to geek out with the lovely Amalia the Savage again, with A Geeky Norse Mythology Moment. I've always loved Norse Mythology, so I found it quite fun.

***

I let the boys watch The Hound of the Baskervilles last night (Jeremy Brett). It was enjoyable, though I don't think they got it quite as well as I had hoped. Wee Boy has been reading the novel for Reading, and decided after he started that it was 'boring'. *sniffle* The again, he's only ten. I might well be the only English Classics - loving aberration in my family, which makes me a little sad.

I paused it to explain the phrenology references at the beginning, so when they got to that bit they found it properly amusing - laughed out loud, in fact. If they hadn't, I'd have had to consider the prospect of having more children. They have generally good geeky taste, but if they couldn't appreciate Jeremy Brett's performance, I might've had to start fresh with a new litter. ;)g

Because, as Beatrice Blythe tells us, Resistance is Futile: I Belong to Muse.

I myself do not belong to Muse, probably because my life has a profound lack of music, these days. From what I've listened to online, though, I really like them.

***

My sister called to say that she's severely anemic and there is blood in her urine. That is really, really not good. She called me feeling rather horrible and I couldn't talk because the kids were bickering. I called her back, but she was about to go help her daughter pick out a class ring.

***

I'm still going around and around about the school stuff. I think there is a good chance that my eldest has not been doing the assignments set by the teachers in the group sessions. Fortunately, those have only been happening for two weeks, so maybe there won't be much to catch up on. I sent an email to his teacher to find out, but haven't heard back.

***

I've managed to get a surprising amount of writing done recently, so that's good. It's just taken me time to get the hang of keeping all the balls in the air.