rainydaynews

The northern edge of what used to be Ike ran into my neighborhood this morning. The wind force was about a third of what hit houston, but it knocked out power to my side of town. So, for about six hours now, my home has been powerless…whcih means no phone, no internet, no lights, no refrigerator, etc.

Thankfully, it’s cool enough outside that I am not missing the air conditioning and not cold enough that I am missing the heater, but I am still whining about it—a lot. See, I write for a living and most of my work is done on line. When I don’t have power and internet I am losing money, sometimes large amounts. Today, I had just a couple little assignments to do, so I am sitting here in Burger King, trying to work amongst all the other people who sought out a cold drink or a hot meal. Now that I know the people I know in Texas are safe from Ike, I am really pissed about this stupid storm.

I live in tornado country, not hurricane territory. The nearest ocean is 500 miles from me and yet I have no power because of this stupid storm. Worse yet, some of my trees were seriously damaged in the wind storm.  The dogwood tree in my front yard lost two small branches, one of them containing the nest that my cardinals lived in. The locust tree by the driveway rained down branches, most of them about an inch or two in diameter, on my car. The big tree in the backyard, I’m not even sure what kind it is, left a branch about 8 inches in diameter on my back porch.

By the Catholic church downtown, a tree closer to a foot in diameter broke off two feet above ground leaving a jagged stump. Downtown, one of the trees the city planted to beautify the downtown also broke off at ground level. Two blocks away, a telephone pole was broke in half.

As I drove to the gas station, there were live wires down several place in town and the firefighters were all over town trying to cut power to the broken lines…Since many of the linemen were deployed south to clean up after Gustav and now Ike, there seems to be a very good chance, I’ll be spending my Sunday night by candlelight and not for happy reasons.

I hate you Ike.

A few months ago, some of the writers over at the Accentuate writers’ forum decided to issue monthly challenges to ourselves to track the things that we do and encourage ourselves to do more.

To be honest, it hasn’t worked very well for me. In two months I have failed to meet my goal both times. But, at the same time, I am very glad that I have participated in the challenge. Now, I ahve a better feel for what I do and do not accomplish in a month or even in a day. I know what distracts me from work and I know that I have accomplished more writing in last year than in the last 30 years.

So, not that I am starting a new season 9fall starts on Labor Day, right?), I am adding a bit more to my challenge. This month, I want to finish three short stories and ahve them ready for editing in october. Sounds easy, right?

Ha. Until a little over two eyars ago, I had never written a short story and now I have accomplished a grand total of six. Each has, in my opinion, been better than its predecessors, but they still need a lot of work. So, to keep getting better, this is my new challenge.

Wish me luck!

In an effort to fight the housing market and offload a house with incomplete renovations, a couple now living in Florida are sponsoring an essay contest to get their money back out of a failed renovation effort in Danville, Illinois.

That’s right, for the cost of $100 and a 500 word essay, you can have a chance to win this four bedroom, two bath house.  The contest details are here: http://winourdanvillehome.googlepages.com/

The couple claims to have made $50,000 in renovations and the house looks beautiful, so I believe it. They admit there is work still to be done and the house needs a new roof, but theya re even willing to pay closing costs to get this gorgeous and historical house off their hands.

One of the owners said they came up with the idea after looking at different ways to market the house in a poor economy. If they get 750 entries, they will give the house away. If not, they will return the money of everyone who entered.

That’s only $75,000 for the house. So, ever mindful for the scam, I started wondering if this wasn’t just a great marketing ploy. Get a bunch of free publicity and people looking at the house and then say they didn’t get enough entries and turn around and sell the house to one of the many people who looked at it because of the contest.

Yes, that might be what they are up to, but they might really also be going to give the house away. After all, you could be suspicious of all giveaways, right?

I don’t know if they will get the 750 entries that they are looking for, but I am certainly considering sending them one. Even assuming that there is $10,000 work that needs to be done on the house, the return for my $100 and entry would be well worth it. Should I waste my money on this kind of a gamble?

Probably not. But really, isn’t life always a bit of a gamble?

Have you ever noticed the split personalities of most women’s magazines? 

I’m not talking about Cosmo  where we all get to dream abut being young and single in a manner that we never were. You know, the single girl who lives a glamourous life and has satisfying six on a nightly basis with the hunk of her choice. Oh, and has an unlimited budget for clothes and shoes.

The truth is we all know that Cosmo is all about fantasy and not real life. so we’re not talking about Cosmo. We’re talking about magazines like Woman’s Day  and  Woman’s World, magazines that are purported to be for the average American woman.

Sadly, these magazines have a split personality. On the cover, there is almost always at lease one story promising a new way to lose 20 pounds without dieting or walkoff your excess weight and then in aother part of the cover is a lovely food dresser experiment that looks better in a glossy magazine than it will ever look in you home.

Yup, it’s the double barrel shotgun, split persoanlity approach to magazines: here’s the fat-filled gourmet meal of the month and then some fad diet to get rid of the excess fat that we just told you to eat.

I am not saying anything about the women who read these magazines other than the idea that we, like our magazines have split personalities. We all want to eat the rich, yummy desserts and somehow remain (or get) thin without working at it.

It’s a lie that we tell ourselves that we can have it all and it will be easy.

I should be more worried about that, but I’m not. Right now, I’m more interested in how to make guilt free chocoloate bon bons and lose weight while sleeping.

Okay, this blog is part of an effort to keep my word. Once upon a time,  I said that if my fiction were ever going to be published, I would tell everyone I had ever met about it. You are now officially among the first!

A few days ago I mentioned the Accentuate Services Writer’s Forum and their monthly writing contests.  I knew at the time I was a finalist. Last night, I found out that I tied for second place with my lovely Californian friend Laure Darroch-Meekis. Jennifer Walker took first place and M. Lori Motley took third.

I can’t begin to tell you how surprised I was, because honestly, I liked a few of the other stories better than my own (Rissa’s springs to mind). But with the prizes is the option to be included in the first ever Accentuate anthology due out next spring.

Personally this is exciting for two reasons. First, this will be my first published work of fiction–I’ve written for newspapers and magazines and the web, but this will be my first fiction work that is widely available. Second, my husband, who is also a writer, won the contest last month and will also be included in the same book!

The contests are growing every month and forum owner Michelle L. Devon has already announced the theme of the July/August competition as “Winds of Change”. To compete there is a small ($5) entry fee and you must sign up for a free membership at the forum.

For me, this forum has meant the chance to meet other wonderful writers and make good friends, a place to whine and to find support, btu more importantly, now, this forum is fulfilling a dream!