Okay, it’s not been a horrible week. I don’t want you to imagine me in the hospital. But it’s not been a good week, either. No, Ric’s death wasn’t wholly unexpected, nor was I his closest friend, but to hear someone you traded joking emails with a couple of weeks ago is gone is a bit… shocking.
The other stuff has been piddly. Literally. The cats didn’t like our being gone. Let’s say I had to wash EVERY bed covering. And there have been minor things, some of them good things I can’t talk about yet, but all rather startling or at least unexpected. Then there was the 27th anniversary of our civil ceremony yesterday. We don’t do a really big celebration — we save that for the “real” (religious) anniversary. BUT we do celebrate this celebration usually involves a big family dinner to which the kids contribute (usually desert) and wine and talk into the late hours. So — good stuff and stuff I needed after the week — but not conducive to hitting the ground running early morning.
The end result is that this is the end of Saturday and I’m still trying to WRITE the chapters for witchfinder — not revise, mind, which I’m usually doing by this point — but write. And I feel as though I’m pulling from empty. It’s made worse by the fact that these particular chapters are the action leading up to the climax. It’s d*mn hard to write action (or denouement) when you feel like your head is empty and it echoes.
Part of it might also be because since we arrived from Liberty con, I’ve not had time to do my regular exercise, and after your body is used to it, it resents more than one day’s break.
I’m not even going to pretend a good part of this is not because I broke the “work habit.” I’m pretty much puttering on Noah’s Boy too. Cons are bad this way.
I think I’ve only done this once — but I’m not posting Witchfinder this weekend. I might or might not post it Monday. Meanwhile, I’m going to take some time off, do some reading, then ease into work again tomorrow with some editing (which is always easier to get into!) And hopefully the feeling of being elsewhere altogether will pass.
I apologize to the people who are following the novel in progress, but please believe me that it will better for my waiting. It’s not that “forced” work is not often very good, it’s that work when I’m in this mood is often incoherent.
It will come. But not today and probably not tomorrow.
According To Hoyt 
Every now and again you have to hit life’s reset button, stop everything and start up anew. This does not, of course, apply to writers who are expected to be able to turn on creativity at will and churn out copy on demand.
Or at least, so I’ve been told.
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Post: “BUT we do celebrate this celebration usually involves a big family dinner to which the kids contribute (usually desert)”
Your kids put sand in your food? :)
[hiding]
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Better than cacti I guess
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No, they go over the hill to give Mom & Pop some private time. Quite a thoughtful contribution.
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We’re now returning to picking on my spelling? PFUI.
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I like desert better than dessert myself. A personal preference
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I feel deserted!
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Making fun of your spelling?? I thought we were supposed to be making fun of your typing!!!
Did I miss the conference call?????
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I think you guys have an intercom in your house “hey, hey, let’s pile on her spelling now. NEXT her shocking lack of general culture. Next…” :-P Considering how I felt yesterday, it’s a miracle I wrote anything.
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and for the record, I am just being silly. It’s endearing actually how you guys try to be nice about correcting me.
There’s a supermarket in the area that is, at random times, flooded with senior citizens. I always imagine they have an intercom in their houses “Sarah Hoyt is going shopping in a hurry. Quick, we need a hundred senior shoppers, so we can block ever isle and counter.”
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You mean as if you’re a character in a story like, “They”?
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No problem. Excuses accepted ;-)
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Haha, yeah. xD I got off schedule when I went to my last convention and I just have tripped over one thing after another ever since. Getting back on track and it usually doesn’t take me this long to get back on it – it’s just finding things to trip over more easily than usual right now. Get yourself squared away soon, I hope!
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I have two cats…one on either side of the fireplace. :-D
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Had to go in the ditch for the Saimese, they’re QUIIIICK!
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I find that cons tend to disrupt my production too. I can be really in the swing of writing and go to a con – and I’m usually doggone busy at a con – and I come back and all I wanna do is sleep awhile. After LibertyCon, which was especially stressful with the release party and Darrell not being there to help for the first half of the con, we convoyed home, unloaded, went to our local restaurant hangout for a nice healthy sort of dinner (as opposed to fast food, which was our other option), then came home and I fell asleep in the recliner. I proceeded to sleep 28 out of the ensuing 48 hours. I’m still not quite up to snuff, energy-wise. But I’ve been editing some books, so I’m being reasonably productive, I guess. I feel for ya, though. Been there, done that, don’t want the t-shirt.
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It’s d*mn hard to write action (or denouement) when you feel like your head is empty and it echoes.
Stars, yes.
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RE: Cats disliking having their people travel:
Clyde, the cat that claimed The Spouse as her pet had two kittens. The eldest we called Imp (Imperious Primo, reference to the opening poem in Alice’s Adventures In Wonderland: Imperious Prima flashes forth Her edict “to begin it”–)
Imp was as close to a perfect cat as I have ever known, and I miss him. He was a huge cat, gorgeous, resembling a pure bread charcoal and silver tabby Maine Coon. In relationship to his own people he was an absolute charmer, having a few cat quirks, but all entirely us-compatible. There is only once that he managed to express himself in a truly distressing manner.
The Spouse and I were finishing packing in preparation to go visit Daddy, a drive of eight hours if you managed it to miss rush hour traffic jams or other mishaps. I had my clothes sorted and laid out on a large chair where the suitcase laid open for filling. Imp climbed up to the back of the chair and proceeded to throw-up. He managed it quite carefully, so as to hit every single item of the clothing.
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