Halloween--Life in a Dead Neighborhood

So we are living in a dead neighborhood. They are all so "religious" here that they do not celebrate Halloween (but, ironically, they do celebrate Christmas, also a pagan holiday that's been watered down/Christianized). They don't dress up their kids or let them out to beg for candy or give out candy or anything. We sent the kids to the fun neighborhood across the street.

Our decorations, the only ones in our neighborhood. And our hams. I was not responsible for the decorating--my Little Bear (the first two pics) did it all himself, except the last few photos--those were all hubby.

The boys, but are they dressed for Halloween or just the usual week-end warrior stuff going air-softing? Two shots of my youngest--I don't have twins.

The front of the house--you can't see it too well, but there are ghost clings in the little window and bloody claw prints on the door, as well as spider web stuff. The orange mat makes a hideous cackling sound when you step on it that just makes me giggle every time. 

The ghost tree--the little ghosts blink in different colors! :-)

The graveyard--my Little Bear was inordinately proud of this!

 

Even hubby's car got involved in the playing!

Weight Loss, Word Counts and Weather

I know y'all were expecting a Halloween post, but I like to do the unexpected. So, I shall save Halloween for you tomorrow. Or Friday, since I may be too busy tomorrow.

Weight Loss:

Last month, I decided to buy myself tickets to the Chicago Stargate Convention. A short while later, I remembered that there will be photo ops, and my friends who are also attending will not let me out of them. Normally, I hate having my picture taken, but this is one of those once in a lifetime things, so I figure I'll suck it up. Now, one of the reasons I hate having my picture taken is because I think I'm pretty darned good-looking, or at least not unattractive, until I see myself in photos, which is when I realize that I weigh A LOT.

In order to try to NOT look like a moose in the photos, I've decided to lose weight. I am doing this by counting calories on a cool website called My Fitness Pal and combining that with regular exercise. So far, I am down by a total of three pounds from where I was hovering, one pound from where I started, after gaining back a couple of pounds due to monthly cravings. My measurements remain the same, although my flexibility has improved noticeably. I am not as stiff as I was before and I have a bit more energy already.

Word Counts:

This one will likely share space on my NaNoWriMo page, as I plan to check in weekly with my word counts during the challenge. After a loooonnnnggg dry spell, I am clocking in this week with a total of 5,768 words, not including this blog entry (new total 6214). Those words include a fan fiction one-shot (short story) of just shy of 1100 words, almost 900 words in scenes for a new story that might wind up being my NaNo project (see my NaNo page for an explanation), and the rest in blog ideas for the future.

Weather:

The weather outside, as they say, is frightful. For Florida, at least. Yesterday morning, before the sun came up, when I brought my son to school, it was 50F; at 9:00, when my youngest left, it was 49F. Monday, it was around 52F in the morning and went up to the mid-70s before falling back down. Yesterday it only went up to 68. I AM LOVING IT! As is my family. We are not Florida natives (well, three of us aren't, although the other one was born in Texas), and, when circumstances allow, will be running back north. It is actually be good trick-or-treating weather for a change. 

Changed Look

My blog needed to change its look a bit. No worries--it's still me! I just wanted to "decorate" as it were. I thought something darker for this time of year might be nice. And I really like the world map in the background, since I'm writing a historical for my NaNo project this year. Anyway, carry on!

Chicon 2013

Happy birthday to me, happy birthday to me, happy birthday dear me-ee…happy birthday to me!

So in case I was being subtle, today’s my birthday. I’m probably not getting too much this year, but I didn’t ask for much. However…

What I’m getting for my birthday. Next year. Don’t care if I don’t get anything this year or anything else next year or any Christmas gifts (all right, I’ll kick up a fuss if I don’t get some small gifts to show me that hubby and the boys care and remembered).

I've heard from a lot of people that these Stargate conventions are a blast and I've been wanting to go to one for a couple of years now. This is probably the only time I’ll ever go, my first and last convention of this sort. Not that I think I’ll have a bad time, it’s just that unless I hit the lottery, there are other things I want to do—people to see, places to go, etc. But I simply could not pass up this opportunity. LOOK who’s going to be there:

And some other people, too. I can’t wait to meet Kavan, though. I’m only six rows back from the front and sitting on the aisle directly in front of the stage! Maybe I can write a story about a lovesick fan meeting her soul mate at one of these events and write it off my taxes…

The Haunting of the South Creek Post Office

The other day, I was needing to go the post office to mail some invitations. I brought along my son's girlfriend, who was helping me prepare the invitations. It was around 8 at night on a Saturday, so naturally, the place was empty. One man was at the automatic mailing station. As N and I stood waiting our turn, the automatic doors opened and closed. No one was there. We thought nothing of it--a simple glitch.

The man at the kiosk left and we stepped up to take our turn. A minute later, the doors opened and closed again. We looked at each other, eyebrows raised in surprise. Again, no one was there. We finished our purchase and turned to the table to begin affixing the stamps.

We were nearly halfway through when the door opened and closed again. No one there. N and I began stamping faster. A minute later, I looked up when I went to grab another card and out of the corner of my eye, I saw a figure. It was a young woman with long brown hair.

Mind, the doors hadn't let anyone in when it had opened before. And as I watched, she passed between N & the door toward the back of the post office and just...disappeared. I told N and we finished the last invitations. As we stamped the last one, the doors opened and closed again and then they opened to admit a middle-aged woman with short blonde hair. N & I ran out the door, leaving her to her fate.

I'd say we were cowards, but for two facts:

A) She likely wouldn't have believed us if she even understood us (English is not spoken by everyone here).
B) She walked out before N & I got to the car.

Needless to say, I won't be going back to that post office after hours. Unless I want to encounter the ghost. How about you? If you saw something that couldn't be, would you believe it or would you find some other explanation, no matter how far-fetched? If you saw a ghost, would you go back to try to find it again or avoid the situation that led to the sighting?

Happy Horoscope

My horoscope yesterday, when I attended my local RWA meeting.

Some additional income could be brought your way today through use of computers or other forms of modern technology, Lynne. You should have a very busy day, but you'll like what you're doing and be excited about the prospect of some extra money to spend. Though you might not be thinking this way now, what you're doing now could develop into a lucrative business, eventually bringing you to a question: what do you really want to do with your life?

I was super-excited because yesterday was also my most productive day, writing-wise, in months. Not only did I get some blog ideas written down, but I also wrote a blog entry—nothing big, but an entry. And when I look to see when my last entry was, I cringe. Sorry, guys.

Back to the horoscope. Let’s dissect it line by line, shall we?

Some additional income could be brought your way today through use of computers or other forms of modern technology, Lynne.

I work on my computer every day—I run a sales business as my “real job”. I received a new recruit, and responses to an invitation I’d sent out to my group that will help them increase their earnings, thereby increasing mine.

You should have a very busy day, but you'll like what you're doing and be excited about the prospect of some extra money to spend.

I was on the run from early in the morning until bedtime yesterday. We’d heard an author speak about what she wrote and it was very similar to a genre that I write well, but have been afraid to “come out of the closet” about—erotica. For some reason, I write that pretty well, at least according to reviews I’ve received, and it flows very well for me also. This author gave us a rough idea of what she earns (she told us how many copies she sells in a month and her percentage) for writing novella-length stories of 40-50,000 words. The number is staggering.  

Though you might not be thinking this way now, what you're doing now could develop into a lucrative business, eventually bringing you to a question: what do you really want to do with your life?

My current day job is something I would quit in a heartbeat if I won the lottery. However, if I won the lottery today, I would want to buy a nice quiet house in the mountains where I could ride horses, hang with the hubster, and…write.

Now, sometimes, my horoscope is so off-center that I wonder if they were reading the correct stars or even reading stars from this galaxy, but this one was right on. What about you? Do you believe that horoscopes can predict your future? Or is it all just hooey to you?

Music and Muses

So yesterday, at my CFRWA meeting, we had a guest speaker whose topic was “Getting your Muse on Speed Dial”. Basically, the talk was about kick-starting your creativity. One of the ideas she put forth was using music or photos to get your imagination rolling.

First, she played a selection of 30 second bursts of different instrumental songs and told us to write whatever came to mind—a scene, a dialogue, a character description, whatever. Five selections of music later, I had five scenes written down.

Next, she put a picture up on the projector screen and had us write something about it. I didn’t get one word down. First of all, it took me most of our five minutes allotted time to figure out that the couple in the picture was holding wine glasses, not microphones. Then, I could not for the life of me figure out why the blonde guy in the background, who appeared to be injured, was making his way down the hill toward them. Turns out he was a zombie. It was, of course, a staged picture that has apparently been making its way around Twitter. It didn’t help that my eyes were killing me yesterday.

That exercise brought me to the stunning conclusion—well, stunning for me, because I forget things that I hear almost immediately, most notably and lamentably, names—that I am more auditory than visual. I may be incorrect in that evaluation. It may be that I am simply bored by things contemporary and/or zombie (sorry, but these two things are true, with the notable exception of soldiers). Perhaps a picture of a Navy SEAL coming out of the water... 

Where was I? Oh, yes, pictures. Maybe a picture of an archer lining up a shot in the forest or a spaceship hurtling toward a super-nova would have sparked me more. 

One thing she was very clear about—the music, for her, anyway, had to be without words. I cannot write when I’m hearing words with music, either, as I tend to sing along. Which got me to thinking; I’ve been using a lot of pagan metal to get me into the mood for a new story that’s come to my mind. Some of the music has words, but they are in languages that I don’t understand. At all. Languages like Irish, Russian, Swedish, Finnish. So, I’m going to try a little experiment. One day (this week, I hope), I am going to sit down for a writing sprint with my music. I will do this twice: once with instrumental only and once with the singers I don’t understand. I’m going to see if one or the other is easier or more difficult to write with.

What about you? Does your writing have a soundtrack? If so, do you prefer instrumental music only or do you prefer words?