Since my last post, I have managed to do a great deal of writing. And I've enjoyed it. All of it was for a Literature class I've been taking at the Community College of Aurora just for grins. The instructor, Wayne Gilbert, was wonderfully inspirational. I'm a timid writer, afraid to show my work to many people, but he has always been open, honest and encouraging. 

This summer, I'm attempting to make a turn toward an larger writing project. My husband and I are working on several ideas for short science fiction stories in our own universe. We thought that might be a good approach starting out as opposed to writing within a specific licensed series. At this point, there's no way to know if it will be publishable, but that's not really the focus I'm taking with this project. For me, it's more an exercise to see how well Ken and I can work together on a project and how well we can structure a series of short stories over time. We both learn by doing, so we're finally doing and not talking. I'm very excited.

I haven't yet come across someone with my name. It's surprising, really, as I don't think my name is all that uncommon. Now, my husband's name is everywhere.  There are three with his name in our office email directory and I can't tell you how many times that has gotten me into trouble.

Wow, it's a different experience writing something that I mean to be published as opposed to just sitting down and banging on keys on the computer.  I found a publisher that will pay $100 - $300 for 1,000 words.  Seems like it might be a good place to start with a piece themed for Mother's Day.  At least I'll be writing about one of my favorite things in the whole world, my daughter!  I started a bit on it this evening, and it feels very different.  I suppose that is because I am writing it with the thought of someone else reading it.  Not like this, where I seem to just type out what's in my head at the particular moment.

Any way ... wish me luck. 

I’m trying a new method for putting entries on here.  After losing two rather lengthy attempts yesterday, I decided it would probably work better if I wrote the entries in my word processor first, then uploaded them later.  Yes, it really does sometimes take me a while to figure this crap out.  I think I’m losing my techie brain or something.

 

Stuff I’m dealing with…

 

o            A good friend of mine has been trying to get me to go for a new job.  It sounds like a great job, really.  More pay, work from home, and travel… all the things I have been thinking would be wonderful.  Thing is, I really do hate big changes like that. I really, REALLY do hate going for new jobs. And besides, even with some of the crappy parts that go with working at my office, fact is I *love* my job. And I’m learning new stuff all the time.  I really do think I’m an asset to the organization, and I like feeling that way!

 

o            My four year-old daughter stepped on a roly-poly bug today and now things it’s family is going to be mad and come after her.  Later, we saw a GIANT spider (it really was surprisingly large) in one of my shoes, and she was sure the bugs had sent the spider for her.  I don’t think I was really able to convince her otherwise.  L  She’s finally in bed now, but I can hear her walking around her room.  No doubt she’s looking around for all manner of beasties!

 

o            My father-in-law is moving in with us next month.  I’m actually looking forward to this.  I don’t know him very well.  Heck, my husband doesn’t know him very well.  He and Ken’s Mom divorced when Ken was about 7. Harry (the dad) moved out to California and started a whole new life. He’s in his 80’s now.  His wife passed away about a month ago. He’s come out for a couple of visits in the ten years Ken and I have been married.  I think it will be a wonderful chance for all of us to get to know the man.  My Mom and I are flying out to Sacramento mid-May and will be driving back his RV while he drives his truck.  Hopefully, the trip will go well.

 

o            I set up a vacation for a year from now for my family and our friend’s family.  Ken and I have a timeshare and we’ll use our points to get a week at a resort in Oceanside.  I’m hoping that our friends can come along for the entire week, but it isn’t likely since Kirsten is a teacher and school will still be in session.  We’ll have to see.  I’m going to set up a little account somewhere to save up for airfare, car rental, Disneyland, Sea World and (hopefully) numerous trips to the local beach.  I love California and haven’t been there in a very long time.

 

o            I can’t find my writing notebook.  I don’t write full stories. I just write down scenes- little snippets of conversations or moments between characters.  That is my way of getting thoughts down.  But I have put my notebook somewhere and have no idea where.

 

            I find that my own blog is very boring.  Problem is, I’m very boring as well, so there’s little hope.  :P

Well, another Starfest is in the books and I'm finally starting to come out of my post-con daze. This one was CRAZY! I can't even tell you why, exactly. Each convention has a personality, and this one was definitely a Type A! Maybe it was the 6,000+ people running around all weekend to all the amazing panels and activities. Maybe it was seeing some of the stars just walking around like they weren't, well, a STAR. Maybe it was that I bit off just about more than I could chew this time around. Yeah, I think that's it. Remember that procrastination post? It always comes back to bite, doesn't it.

See, when you're young, you can procrastinate then pull those all-nighters to catch up. It's how I spent my teens ... and twenties ... and thirties, come to think about it. But now I'm beyond all that. Only my BRAIN hasn't figured it out yet. I apparently now, after all these many years need my sleep. And, it couldn't happen at a worse time. There's so much more for me to do at this stage in my life ... and less time to do it in!

Remember the cake I mentioned? It was going to look like the Starship Enterprise. Well, after fighting with the various pans and trying to visualize how I was going to transport that danged thing, I decided instead to do a large sheet cake and I would whip up some chocolate frosting and BLACK fondant. For those not intimately familiar with cake-speak fondant is a sweet, play dough-like substance that can be rolled out and molded into different shapes. I decided that I get some dark chocolate fondant, color it black and use it as a starfield. That would be a background for the artwork that would go on top of the cake. The fondant took the black food color very well. Of course, so did my fingernails and the countertop in my kitchen! Everything was black. It looked like a halloween joke gone bad. After getting FIVE POUNDS of the stuff rolled out and realizing that I didn't have enough (!!!!) I decided that everyone was just going to have to be happy with a large chocolate frosted sheet cake. And they were. I should have known. These volunteers aren't exactly picky eaters!

I *am* going to do that Enterprise cake next year.

I also tried my hand at another trivia contest this year. It amazes me how differently things turn out compared to how I envision them. I thought I was going to struggle for time. I thought I was going to get a lot of brainiac contestants who would know way more than me about the stuff I was quizzing them on. I thought it was going to be FUNNY! Oh...just how wrong can a girl get? Dayton Ward saved the day with his clever one-liners ...

Contestant acting as Stella Mudd (strangely, I might add...)	"What does *she* have that I don't?"
Dayton	"900 twin sisters!"

They were ROLLING in the aisles. Hmmm...maybe you had to be there.

Leonard Nimoy was there. I didn't even lay eyes on him. My favorite guests were Oded Fehr, who is undoubtedly THE most gorgeous man alive, and Kate Vernon. I have to say ... she's kinda shaggadelic, too! She's definitely going on the 'Celebrities I'd Shag If I Was a Lesbian' list.

But all that aside, it was a TOUGH weekend. I owe props to my staff for pulling it out on Saturday despite a crippling AV problem. Why aren't there buttons on DVD players that allow you to go through DVD menus if you happen to have 'misplaced' the remote??? It's asinine!

I'm already revving up for next year's Fan Film Festival. It's going to be bigger and better, and I hope to get entries from up and down the budget spectrum. I'm going to try to gather up some fan-produced films in the Horror and Sci Fi genres, and I'd really like to focus on local (to Denver) productions. That being said, if you run across anything, LET ME KNOW!!

I'm trying to think up some prize categories, like maybe a youth category to encourage kids to go out and play with Mom's video camera! :-)

All right...this has turned into a stream-of-consciousness post, so I'm going to shut up and go to bed. I gotta get some SLEEP! Ugh, I hate this. Where are my up-til-2am days? I miss them!

An anchor on the local afternoon news said that for years to come, people will talk about where they were when they heard the news about the killings at Virginia Tech. 

I was in DAZ BOG, a coffee shop on the 1st floor of my office building.  I was waiting for my chai, trying to figure out what the silly song was playing through the speaker system.  High above the pick-up window, there was a large flat screen TV showing CNN. No sound, just the graphics and closed captioning. It was difficult to tell exactly what was going on - one person was dead and the shooter was on the loose.  Apparently, something similar had happened on the campus before.

I'm sorry to say that I didn't take much stock in the story.  See, in Colorado, school shootings happen to a younger crowd ... and at times, in much larger numbers.

I did think to mention it to a co-worker when I got back to my desk.

About an hour later, I got one of those 'Breaking News' e-mails from USAToday.com.  Not one ... twenty-one.  I actually felt a little panic at that moment and forwarded the e-mail to the friend and co-worker I had mentioned the shooting to earlier.  She came by my desk a few moments later, clearly upset.  The realization hit me then...her son attends the school in Bailey, Colorado, where a gunman held hostages and killed a student. Fortunately, my friend's son was in a separate part of the school - the attached middle school. I kicked myself for having dredged up those feelings for her again.  But we did take a moment to sit and talk. She's seen and felt what many in the Virginia Tech community will be going through. Now that the event has passed, the Aftermath begins. Tough times. Very tough. 

For Bailey, she explained, the Aftermath has included a sharp increase in insubordinate and risky behavoir from many students at the school, and an increase in attempted suicides.

And then later, another breaking news story and the number climbed.

There is no understanding it. There is only surviving it.

I fall into that category ... People who THINK they can write, but rarely do it.  

I'm fascinated by writers.  I ask them all those inane questions - How do you get your ideas? How do you get published? How much money do you make?  Just about every writer has told me the same thing - "Writers write". I guess that's why I'm here. 

Why do I think I can do this, but never actually do it?  Well, like most people, I probably do have a somewhat over-inflated opinion of myself.  Nothing wrong with that, mind you.  But you probably should follow up on that from time to time.  I am a procrastinator, though. And that is a huge hurdle to overcome.  Like many people I have that litany of tired excuses that I fall back on all the time.  "I'm too busy" is the one most often used.  Strange, though, that I have a couple of hours to kill every other night or so on pogo.com playing mahjong.  Too busy, my ass.

In my case, it's probably FEAR (the emotion, not the game) that keeps me from doing the things I think I want to do.  See, as long as I just THINK about doing something, as long as I tell folks around me that I think I would do well at something, then I'm not actually failing at it.  I'm not sure where that fear of failure comes from in my life.  I fail at things all the time - mostly small, inconsequential things that have little effect on me or those I love.  Writing really isn't anything different than that, right? I mean this doesn't have to be the sum of my existence, and so failure can be an option. But it still seems a little scary.

Procrastination does affect other aspects of my life as well.  Next weekend, I will be attending a science fiction convention here in Denver.  I've been attending as a volunteer for years.  I run a video room.  I set up a DVD player, sound system, projector and screen and run television episodes or movies for two and a half days. As I said, I've been doing this for many years, probably about 12. And yet, I still wait until the very last minute to pull together a schedule. It's a pretty stressful time, too.  The first day, in particular, is crazy. But this year, instead of just dealing with video, I decided to also run a trivia game show, help with the costume contest, AND bake a cake for about 100 people. Taking on all that, and STILL waiting to the last minute to do things?  Yeah, that's my MO. 

Then begin the distractions.  

Today, for example, I had planned to bake the several smaller cakes that would be needed to make one large cake shaped like a Starship Enterprise. (Think view from above looking down - circle saucer section, oblong body, thin oblong nacelles.) When I got to the kitchen this morning, I decided that I really couldn't do anything until I put away all the dishes in the dishwasher and put the ones in the sink in the dishwasher.  Then I had to completely clean all the counter tops. Then I decided, I had to rearrange the placement of the various small appliances. Then I noticed all the finger-prints on the frig door. And the water dispenser area was covered in white junk, had to clean that.  I did find some time to arrange my cake pans so I had a visual aid on how I was going to build this monster. But, oh, how am I going to transport this beast? Anyway, by the time I was ready just to take an INVENTORY of the SUPPLIES I was going to need, it was time to leave for a late afternoon meeting followed by dinner with the parents.  I wasn't going to be home again until late evening.  No baking today!  The bizarre part?  I HATE housecleaning.  I avoid it at all cost. But today, it was like my brain had been inhabited by Martha effin' Stewart. Actually, I wish it HAD been.  She'd have figured out a way to do all that AND bake a cake.

About three hours ago, I came upstairs to begin working again on the trivia game.  Instead, I distracted myself by finding a friend's LJ Blog.  Having spent some time reading that then deciding to create my own, I've not only managed to lose three hours of time I should have been spending on the game, but I'm up so late that my 7:00 wake up call is bound to make me somewhat disgruntled tomorrow morning.

But why am I bitching about it?  It's my fault.  It's not like I don't have control over all this? It's a good thing I work best under pressure.  Sure, it takes ten years off my life span, but crisis management is my life...even when they are crises of my own making.

A little introduction to me - 
 My name is Kelley and I'm a working wife and mother. I love my family and I love my job. I have great friends and a wonderful extended family. Things are good.  In fact, things are pretty great. Well, we have the usual struggles that American families go through... saving money versus spending money, working long hours and raising a child, watching parents go through some big bad health events. We do have those 'normal stressors' in our lives. But DH and I are both roll-with-the-punches types.