Tag Archives: writing

The 2021 (What a) Year In Review

Posted in Year In Review by

“I can’t wait to see 2021 gone. Next year – “
“Don’t you say it!” I screamed. “Do not say anything about 2022! I don’t want to hear that it’s going to be better. I don’t want to hear to watch out because it’s twenty-twenty, too.” I made contemptuous air quotes to emphasize that I did not appreciate the pun at all. “I don’t want to hear want to hear one word about the new year! We’re just going to sit here quietly, and hope it doesn’t notice us.”

My coworker chuckled with the kind of laughter that wavered between genuine amusement and hysterical terror. Her smile became strained as she realized what a number of other people had already agreed:

2021 was much harder than 2020.

Pandemic aside – and I cannot believe that I’m brushing a frigging pandemic aside, but I am – 2021 was an intense tornado of events and emotions for not only myself, but for quite a few members of my framily*. I mentioned in the beginning of 2020 that I felt the weight of all the work I had to do. 2021 was the year I did it. That’s not to say that I didn’t work hard in 2020 because I did – if I hadn’t busted my ass for the latter half of 2020 I wouldn’t have been able to accomplish what I did this year – but that was more part of my health journey, which is a post in itself. I touch on my health in this YIR of course, but this is more about the many things that happened around it because 2021 felt like it was three years.

January

I returned to school full-time which was terrifying. Up until this point, I had been taking one course at a time – sometimes none – because my health was so precarious. Also, the prior courses had been prerequisites, and though I still pushed myself to get A’s, I didn’t feel the need to distinguish myself. The courses this semester were in “my” field, so I didn’t want to just do well, I wanted to excel.

I updated my physical therapy to build muscle. Here again, this wasn’t something that I was doing new, but something that I was finally building on. I’d been doing physical therapy since July, but I started adding more resistance with tighter bands and weights in January.

About half of my hair, which was nearly as long as my waist, broke.

February

I made a few more adjustments to my physical therapy in February, but for the most part, this month was spent doing homework, and constantly looking in the mirror to figure out if I should just cut my remaining hair immediately, or wait until it grew a little more.

March

I got vaccinated against COVID. There were a lot of emotions attached to this, and sadly some of the darker things I’d been feeling, things that I thought I was finished feeling now that I was protected against dying from the virus, have become valid again. I never fully worked through them, and now I’m glad that I didn’t waste the time trying.

I cut my hair. The reason I had considered waiting was because I grow my hair out to donate it. I like to donate 12 inches because most kids request longer wigs, and chopping that much now meant that my hair would be shorter than I’d ever had it. I finally just did it. The chop might have been less traumatic if I’d tried to have it cut into some kind of style, but I was already feeling ugly and frankly did not give a f*** at that point.

April

There were some familial changes that I don’t want to examine in public, but they were pretty cataclysmic.

I started an autoimmune flare that would last about six weeks. Not only was it the longest flare I’ve ever experienced, it was the most painful because my kidneys became inflamed twice during it.

May

I finished my first full-time semester of school. It was the first time in twenty years.

My GPA became 4.00. Long story short, I’d been carrying 5 F’s in my GPA because I didn’t formally withdraw from classes over twenty years ago, when I was an 18 year old who was recovering from brain damage. I’ve achieved A’s in all my classes since then, but it was not reflected in my GPA. The school finally approved expunging the F’s from my transcript.

The company I work for moved the office for the first time. Renovations in the new office wouldn’t be finished until September, but the executives were dead-set against renting a few additional months at our current office, so they rented a temporary space in the new building.

My company hired another person to do the brunt of the work in my former position, and I began training in earnest to help/cover for my coworker in Finance.

I managed to sell off about 500 trade gallon-sized plants of my nursery stock. I’ve had to accept that even a small nursery is too much for me, so I had my first open sale since COVID, and thank God for my mother’s help because we sold that many in about five hours.

The flare continued…

June

  • My fuchsia Aster baby.
  • My coral Daylily baby.
A couple of flower variations that I’ve bred.

I had another plant sale that moved about another hundred plants. (My plants really are bomb, and I do it without chemicals because I’m really a witch.)

The first Summer semester began. A fun note here is that I did not realize these were six-week accelerated courses.

I completed my 100th documented physical therapy session. I shared this on Twitter, and everyone was very sweet about it, but I had to delete the tweet. Ironically, it was because I was receiving compliments about my weight, and they were putting me in an unhealthy mental state. I’ll just leave it at that.

I got two bathing suits. Yes, this is big news for me.

July

My coworker went on vacation and I covered for her. I had been seriously sweating this for over a year, so much so that I put off re-piercing my bellybutton because I didn’t want to worry about soaking it while covering for her.

Summer classes session one ended making it the first time I had completed two semesters of school in a row.

Summer classes session two began.

August

I had a lot of support, but I chose this text because this person NEVER curses lol.

The mental crash that started in June picked up speed.

I was in limbo at work. After my coworker came back from vacation, no one could decide how much of whose work I should do. I really didn’t know what to do with myself.

COVID numbers began to rise. I’d spent months buried in schoolwork and learning someone else’s job, just waiting to get through to spend a day at the shore, and when I looked up, the Delta variant and the likelihood that immunocompromised people needed a third vaccine meant it wasn’t safe for me. I had a difficult time with this.

My healthcare provider said some pretty fucked up shit that I’m still processing.

Summer classes session two ended.

September

The Fall semester began. My advisor assured me that taking three English course wouldn’t be more than I could handle.

A company’s finances are somewhere in there.

My coworker gave her two week notice, it was a given that I would stop doing anything related to my former position, and pick up her work. I had been taught just the basics of her job to keep the office running while she was on vacation, and I now had less than two weeks to learn what she did as full-time employee, who had been there for years, and had a degree in Accounting. I was assured that I wasn’t expected to do that much.

My company’s office moved for the second time. Not only was the furniture not installed yet, but the move happened during the last three days my coworker had with the company. You know the expression “you don’t know what you don’t know”? Well, I didn’t know anything, and I didn’t know which box it was packed in either.

I randomly mentioned making ghosts out of chicken wire in a Twitter response, and it exploded. That goofy tweet is probably the only thing I’ll ever write that will achieve some measure of success, and I alternately laugh and cry when I think about the reality of that. There was enough interest that I created a TikTok account to show how I make them.

I got my COVID booster.

October/November/December

(I’m lumping these three months together because they were so hectic that I never had time to look up to see what week it was. October 1st was my coworker’s last day and the date that I had three papers due, and the next thing I knew it was Christmas Eve.)

The assurance of my advisor that three writing courses wasn’t more than I could handle was wrong.

Tell me you’re stressed without telling me you’re stressed. (My cardiologist is pissed.)

The assurance of my employer that my coworker’s job wasn’t more than I could handle was wrong.

I learned that somehow people who have actually conversed with me, still vastly overestimate my intelligence.

I somehow became responsible for the finances of a million dollar company when I don’t have my associates degree in anything much less Finance, have never done any accounting, and barely knew the financial software. That said I learned Quickbooks desktop, then I learned Quickbooks online. I learned how to process contractor payments, pay taxes, calculate IRA contributions, do international wire transfers, S corporation shareholder distributions (kind of), business expense, employee reimbursements, and a whole bunch of other stuff that I’m guessing I did correctly since the Feds haven’t smashed through the doors. Yet.

I completed a semester with three writing courses. Never again. At least not until I’m able to compose a two page essay without agonizing for hours over word I type.

I wrote a poem that my professor loved. She asked if she could forward it to the head of the Literature department because he is part of some publishing group in Boston, and she believes he would be interested in my work. So there’s a teeny-tiny possibility that I could get published, through my poetry of all things. I haven’t heard anything more though, so I’m still banking on that Tweet being the highlight of my literary career.

You can see how much of my hair broke now that it’s growing back.

For the first time ever, I made it through my first full year of school. Though it was Spring into Fall, I completed two regular full-time school semesters in a row. I’m sure that’s nothing for most people, but last year at this time I was terrified and looking for an excuse to not return to school again, and here I am on the other side. I still choke up when I actually think about that because I can’t believe I did it.

My hair has grown back about eight inches.

And that was 2021.

As much as I don’t like to admit it, there have been times in my life that I’ve given up. There were moments in 2021 when I felt like doing it again, and I’m so thankful for the loved ones I have who told me to keep going, and for God pushing me through when I didn’t have the strength to do it myself. I love you all so much.

I don’t really have many expectations for 2022. I meant it when I said that I’m not attaching anything to the coming year. For starters, I don’t think I could accomplish more than I did in 2021, and I’m still too tired from it all to try. But I know that I want to finish my first “normal” school year with a Fall and then a Spring. I want to write more poetry**. I want my hair to keep growing. I want to pitch somewhere to write an article how to help hair regrow quickly – I actually wrote those kinds of articles once. I want to sell the rest of my plants. I want to make my abdominal and glute muscles stronger to take more pressure off of my back. I want to go to the shore.

I think that’s a good start.

*Framily – The family you choose, and the ones who chose you
**This link might be dead because I’d unpublished the poetry I shared on here before, but if anyone wants to read them, I’ll retry to resurrect the posts.

Letting Go

Posted in The Heaviness, When You're Wrong You Write by

I’ve had an epiphantic weekend.

(I know that’s not a word but it should be.)

For example, I sometimes feel like the Past is unfairly vilified. There are so many memes spouting to “not let your past define you” and “you can’t look forward if you’re still looking back” and “blah blah fucking blah blah”. While I don’t deny that these sentiments are in fact correct, I feel like sometimes we can’t go forward until we do look back and see how much that past defined us. It just sucks because it’s never a simple analysis with an obvious answer and the time that we take to get the message into our thick heads is indeed time taken away from the move forward. And it just sometimes happens that the moment when our eyes are blurry from a combination of sweat and tears, when we blink furiously and only see the bottom of the toilet for a brief moment until the sweaty tears drop from our chin and shatter the water surface in jagged circles, that we see the clearest.

At about 3 am last Sunday I began throwing up more violently than I had thrown up in years. I initially chalked it up to food poisoning but even as I heard myself reciting that reason the next morning when I called my office manager to explain why I wouldn’t be in work I knew that bad food wasn’t to blame. I was to blame. Myself and my psychotic need to not only do everything myself but to do it and understand it perfectly…to stand in the middle of a furiously rushing river, holding on to broken tree branch because fuck you river, I am not finished analyzing what is on the bank right there yet.

On the most basic level I was overexhausted from staying awake at all hours due to frustration over this migration. While I managed to do the migration, I did it without fully understanding the internet protocol and how it actually worked. Do I really need to know the ins and outs of IPS? Probably not because I sure as hell am never doing a migration again, but it still pissed me off that I had to just accept that something worked the way that it did because that’s how it does. (And in a related note I was really fucking pissed that I couldn’t get the feed to work for blogger reader. I think I might have fixed it but I won’t know until I publish this.)

humans fuck up, letting go

I bitched about memes and then made one. GO HYPOCRITICAL ME!

On the deeper level though, I realized that the reason I was so stressed about having this site be perfect is because *deep breath* I’m insecure about my writing. All writers are insecure, and I’ve even admitted as much before, but I didn’t realize just how much until I had made myself sick over it. It was on my third day of lying on the couch in a fevered and dehydrated state was that it dawned on me that I was putting a shit-ton of work into my site because I felt like my writing alone wasn’t good enough to stand on its own. I felt like I needed a massive platform to tempt an agent into trying to market my novels and that my Alexa rating would be the thing to sell me instead of my ability. I know now that I can’t think like that anymore. I’m sure that I’m still making grave webmaster errors but I have to accept that they don’t matter.

This entry is so disjointed since you’re probably wondering what the hell this has to do with that spew in the beginning about the past and analysis and shit, but what else I realized is that I have made a lot of mistakes in my life and, much like my irrational need to understand the mechanics of internet protocol, I’ve spent time analyzing those mistakes to ensure that I don’t repeat them and have wasted attention where it’s not needed. They were just mistakes. I’m not going to make them again because I’m not a moron. I do stand by my statement that you should learn from your past but sometimes you just do stupid shit and there isn’t any deeper meaning other than you’re a human and we fuck up.

And on another note there is some random shit that happens for no other reason than shitty things sometimes happen to good people.

I’m never going to be one to accept things at face value–it’s just not who I am–but I’m trying to entertain the possibility that the answers might not be complicated, that sometimes understanding comes with letting go.

Not Really a Post But More of a HA HA! Moment I Decided To Share

Posted in When You're Wrong You Write by

If you are my fraynd on the Facebook then you will see that my current status is that today’s originally scheduled post was not finished due to a visiting puppy. Puppy trumps all work. This is a fact.

However as I was perusing the Interbutz wasting time, I came across this cartoon and it made me snicker and I had to share it because I’m obligated to share amusing shit and also it explains my recent lapse in posting.

writers procrastinate funny

This is almost exactly what I have been doing for the past week and a half only instead of chopping wood I’ve been gardening. And while most people would yell at me for procrastinating on work that needs to be done on the novel (and rightly so but that’s an entirely different egg), I say that I had a legitimate excuse for all of this gardening. Namely that my mother saw a Hummingbird in the backyard and in my world this executes into tearing a part a Bonsai tree that has been growing wild for nearly two decades. (Don’t ask, just accept that this logic is normal for the circus that is my life.)

The hours of slaving in the sun and mosquito bites aside (and oh do I have one motherfucking spectacular rage-filled post about those assholes in the works) I actually think that I did a nice job in creating “Hummingbird Garden”. Mostly it seems to have made my mother happy and she puts up with a fuckton of my *ahem* eccentricity so it was worth it.

Bonsai tree garden before

BEFORE

bonsai tree garden after

AFTER

That is all one tree that I had to tame and you would not believe the shit I found while taming it. Aside from the dude buried amongst the branches who thought that Reagan was still president, it was like an entomologist’s dream of freaky fucking insects that were jumping out of me. It was seriously like being in bloody Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom. Not cool since I’m still traumatized from my battle with the Carpenter Ants from Hell.

*Sorry about the picture being the wrong way. I’m still trying to remember that I can actually turn my phone.

That Noise You Heard Was Just Me Screaming My Face Off

Posted in Epic Awesomeness by

I’ve had a number of different jobs throughout my life but there has never been one as difficult as being a writer. I’m not exaggerating when I say that I work at least 100 hours a week. Seriously the only breaks that I take are when I go to the gym for half an hour or when I’m at my part-time-get-me-out-of-the-house-so-I’m-not-a-recluse job. Some people would argue that this isn’t healthy but welcome to a writer’s life. It’s long hours of work coupled with even longer hours of waiting. I truly believe that writing is a calling where you either are a writer or you’re not because no sane person would choose this career. Hell there have been many times when I myself have questioned if I’m making the right decision to pursue this dream and if I shouldn’t just get a comfy 9 to 5 job with health benefits, vacation time and a 401K.

Then something brilliant happens.

Your work is published.
steaming into a victorian future, steampunk
“Steaming into a Victorian Future” is the textbook used in the University of Maryland Alternate History course.

And my work is referenced in it.

I’m referenced in it.

Four. Fucking. Times
steaming into a victorian future, steampunk, calen spindler

I did not even know that “Alternate History” was a legit course but apparently it’s more popular than I thought, in fact it’s a course in universities all over the world. Guess which textbook is the new “go to” book used for all of those course.

Yup.

I’m being read in universities all the way down in New Zealand and Australia.
steaming into a victorian future, steampunk, alternative history college course
I want to cry and laugh and scream and throw up at the same time whenever I think about it.

I’m published.
In academia.

Me.

The dumb broad who has always been recognized for her chest rather than any so-called talent…

…who was encouraged to marry rather than pursue a career…

…who didn’t even go to college herself…

…is being read in universities all over the world.

And that’s why I screamed my face off.
im so happy, happy screaming

Let’s party, peeps.
Thank you so much for believing in me.

An Abundance of Smart Ass(terisks)

Posted in Randomness is Random by

I’m a bit MIA.*

*Again.

*sobs*

And what’s worse is that my superstition about announcing-something-until-it-has-already-happened-in-case-something-fucks-it-up keeps me from disclosing everything that has kept me from interacting with my kickass peeps on here. Just take my word for it (for now since I can’t wait until I can scream my face off) that I’ve been working like a bitch on the down and dirty aspect of being a writer–aka the business aspect of writer–and it’s extremely time expensive and about as much fun as going through your recently deceased great-aunt’s belongings and finding her collection of foot long dildos.**

**Though not nearly as awkward, so there’s that.

s hi t, shitThis business-y type work is of course in addition to recovering from the trauma of nearly losing my beloved Eskie at the beginning of the month–which a normal person would be over by now but I, on the other hand, have anxiety issues and thus continue to have spazz attacks and feel the need to stop what I’m doing and cuddle her.***

***Kira, being fully recovered, isn’t too happy when I do this since it usually disturbs her from a nap.

In the meantime I did make a video in reference to the two cases that the Supreme Court is hearing about same sex marriage this week.****

****Some of you are probably thinking that a video would take longer than actually writing a post but not for me; as much as I enjoy “vlogging” I don’t worry over it as much as I do about my written words and so I can do a vlog in a fourth of the time that I do a written blog post.

Some people will hate this video because they are stupidasses who won’t get the tongue-in-cheekiness of it*****, and some people will hate it because they disagree, but that’s their prerogative. All I ask is that if anyone feels the need to express that they disagree that they do it with respect.

*****I already have one of these and for the record, I am pro-marriage and said commenter is a moron.

In closing, it’s after 1am as I write this and I’m really bloody tired, but thank you so much for being here, my dear peeps.*******

*******Also, I know I say “thank you” a lot, but I truly mean it. I’ve had to deal with a lot of shit in my life and I just want it known how grateful I am for the support that you all have given me.

You Say Goodbye, and I Say Hello: The 2012 Year in Review!

Posted in Year In Review by

So 2012…

you say goodbye I say hello, statler and waldorf

January

The year started with a trip to Boston, and in typical Kat fashion I arrived late, damp, cold, drunk and having locked myself in the train station bathroom at one point.

February

February was a weird month, and it culminated in the decsion to move out of my apartment and crash at my mother’s place for the time being. In hindsight I can tell you that, true to what I had mused in the post where I announced my decision to move, this choice fit the mold in that it was extremely difficult at the time but ended up being the right one. And of course since once I’ve made a decision to do something I have to do it immediately and by the end of the February I was packed, ready to move and leaning on Bestie and my brother to help me get my shit out of my old place and into my mother’s. Naturally the move was done with the usual fanfare that erupts around me and so it included my mother smashing apart an entertainment center with a hammer and me nearly knocking myself unconscious. All in all though I accepted that I had closed a chapter but that something better was coming.

March

Less than a week after I moved I broke my hand in a most spectacular fashion and was subjected to the world’s shittiest doctor (whose time will come when the new doctor’s office down the road from him opens and takes his patients). I was still adjusting to living with my family on top of being in pain and it inspired this short story which I wouldn’t usually included in a Year in Review except that it becomes important in another moment this year. I also got a kick in the chest with some personal shit that I didn’t talk about on here and though I realize now that I kicked ass through it, March was a difficult month.

April

you said what

“You said what?”
“I forget but it probably inappropriate.”

For a number of reasons, not the least of which is that I just like to torture myself, I did a Seven Day Detox “diet”. I’d probably list this event anyway because this was not an easy task and I still feel a bit gloaty that I made the week, but this is something else that plays a more significant role in a later month. While my paw was still healing I somehow managed to design the Writes Like a Slut logo that I had been talking about doing for over a year. I finished the month by sharing one of the wrongest stories ever which has resulted in some really, really fucked up search results landing here.

May

May was a huge month. Not only did I receive my “Writes Like a Slut” shirt, and my dear Jewels receive her shirt and become the first member of the WLAS Posse, but I also gave you some kick ass zombie survival advice all month long, and became a contributer to the new site The Indie Chicks. The hilarious thing is that my first article was about makeup, and somehow the beauty section has since become my li’l niche there. Despite all of this brilliance though, there was a dark moment in May with the passing of M.C.A of the Beastie Boys and how that much affected me.

June

For the halfway point of the year I did some more graphic designing including the “Tequila is Cheap” and the “Dirty Stay Out”. I also did a rare serious, activist type post where I threw a holy fit at Urban Decay for deciding to allow animal testing on their products. The month concluded with a post on cell phone etiquette and a link to my newest article at The Indie Chicks on what to expect during that Seven Day Detox I did in April. The article received 10,000 hits within the first week and remains (I believe) the most popular article on the site. To date I know that it’s been stumbled over 63,000 times and thus is the most widely read piece of my work (so far).

July

grumpy hug

And then there’s this.

I got my first professional Brazilian bikini wax…at a Jewish Community Center because that’s how I roll. I also created Facebook Fan Page for this site because I’m so hilarious. Finally I did something rather bitchy, wrote about it, and it has since because one of my most popular stories because everyone has had a guy or girl treat them like shit and my act of nastiness was for us all.

August

I let the ocean water touch me for the first time since I was eighteen years old and I did it even before I was given a watermelon full of Everclear. This was a major accomplishment for me even if I haven’t actually made it into the water again yet. I also met a Tolkien character at Home Depot which is another incident that comes back later in the year. Finally I followed up on the wrongest story post because one wrong turn deserves another.

September

I got a wretched eye infection thanks to eye strain that resulted in my dog taking over the blog for me, and then I celebrated the year anniversary of my getting BONed and held my first giveaway.

October

somebody i used to know, gotye

How many times did you hear this song this year?

This month saw my first (and relatively minor in the big picture especially since it won’t be my last) disappointment as a writer. The story that I had mentioned writing back in March had not won either of the contests that I had entered, but this is another blessing in disguise since it was a serious piece and probably not the best representation of my usual style. The East Coast was then attacked by Frankenstorm aka Hurricane Sandy, however we were very lucky and did not sustain any damage. I also created a youtube channel where you all got to hear my muddled accent in my first Birchbox video. (And yes I have noticed that you all watch the bloopers reel more than the legit product and no, it honestly doesn’t surprise me since I’ve build a readership based on WTF so of course the popularity of videos would reflect this.)

November

I had a bout of depression because… it happens. And tat’s the beauty of depression is that it often comes for no fucking reason just to rattle my monkey tree. I do know that part of my problem was that my formerly broken hand which never healed properly was feeling the ache of the cold weather and I was having some particularly exhausting cardiac flares. Luckily God sent a door-to-door meat saleman to my house and since traumatizing others always makes me feel better it helped to snap me back to my so-called normal self.

December

elf on the shelf, iron throne, game of thrones

He made his own Iron Throne.

I held my second giveaway and the prize didn’t even require crossing dressing on the part of the guys if one of them won. I also developed an obsession with Elf on the Shelf which you have to be on Facebook to fully appreciate. My mother, brother and I went to the Show of Lights together for the first time in years and it was pretty brilliant to revive this tradition that spanned back to when I was a kid. I was the honored as the Featured Writer at Studio 30+ where that trip to Home Depot when I met Gollum came in handy since for my article I wrote about how to Blog Like a Bitchin’ Rockstar from Mars. (That’s not exactly the title but it’s what I would have used if I wasn’t trying to censor myself somewhat.) Finally I announced that “Writes Like a Slut” is now on over half of the continents in the world. Not a bad way to finish out what was a pretty fucking amazing year in writing for me.

The really, really final major event of 2012 though?

Writing this year in review and for the first time since 2007 not looking back at the previous twelve months and feeling that I was leaving with a deficit.

I’ve a vlog I’ll be posting later hopefully, but in closing I just want to say thank you all so much for reading and supporting me this year. Right before I started this entry I looked at my stats of visits, retweets, links in, ect and I am touched beyond words at how much you all have helped me grow this year. I seriously could not be doing now–writing, which has and always will be my true love–if it were not for you guys. You’re amazing. From the bottom of my heart, thank you!

~Kxxoo

Best wishes for a Happy, Healthy, Prosperous and Kickass 2013!

PS-There were a few other major events that I didn’t mention, but that’s because they are actually precursors to really major events and I don’t want to jinx it. Don’t worry, as soon as it feels solid I will be screaming my face off about it.

A Drunk Unicorn

Posted in When You're Wrong You Write by

Why is the unicorn drunk? Because it drank half of my Tequila.

The question is: Is this a good thing?

Well, on one hand you have an intoxicated equine with a long, sharp protrusion stumbling around and at some point I’m sure that someone is going to get stabbed. Also, the brat stole half of my damn Tequila.

On the other hand, it’s a fucking unicorn! If I was going to share any of my precious Tequila it would definitely be with a unicorn. I wouldn’t even mind any unicorn slobber that got in my glass. As for the inevitable stabbing, yeah that would rather suck. But again I must point out that it’s a fucking unicorn, and if you have the choice between never seeing a unicorn and being stabbed by one, I’m going to go with stab away.

The point of this bit of what-the-fuck-is-Kat-talking-about?

go home unicorn you're drunk, drunk unicorn, tequilaThis is my own version of the glass half-full versus the glass half-empty scenario.

Last week I had my first two disappointments as a writer. (Truth be told, last week was psycho crazy or I would have updated sooner.) One of the disappointments was that I found out that I’d lost a writing contest that I had entered. It’s really not a big deal, but the magazine took six months to pick winners and after such a long wait (I’m very fucking impatient) I felt the punch harder than I usually would have. This is the nature of the beast though. Waiting six months for anything is not unusual, and disappointment is the rule rather than the exception, so you suck it up and work harder. The good news is that I can post the short story that I had submitted on here again for ya’all to read! *throws confetti* The other good news is that submitted this story forced me into finally coming up with a title for it. So here is Borne of Armour. For new readers, a quick warning that this is one of my rare “heavy” stories.

Another good news/bad news bit to mention is that I never heard from the winner of my first giveaway. It sucks for them to miss out on an awesome shirt, but the good news is that I’d picked a runner up who will be getting an awesome shirt and ad space on the sidebar. Congratulations to the incredibly lovely, Michael from Crazy Tragic Almost Magic! Her blog is both funny and touching so make sure to check her out!

On a final note, if you’ve been in the tales for a while then you know that I love October and I love, love, love Halloween. I have some really nifty stuff planned for this month to celebrate, and even if my current health status (which is unfortunately subpar thanks to the old ticker being a grab) keeps me from doing half of it (I’ve lots in mind) there will still be a shit ton of fun to be had up in here! I’M FUCKING EXCITED!

*gallops away on my unicorn laughing manically *

(This entry is also No. 28 on my 30 Posts of Shameless Shit, “Discuss a failure.” However I’m galloping off on a unicorn and drinking Tequila while failing so it’s pretty cool.)

Gas, Grass and Gollum

Posted in So That Happened by

So my mother and I went to buy a lawn mower yesterday and we met Gollum from “Lord of the Rings”.

Alright, I’ll back up a bit.

I came home from work on Saturday night to find the mangled remains of my mother’s lawn mower upside down and in the middle of the front yard.  Apparently my brother and the lawn mower had a disagreement and it came to blows.  The only winners in this battle though were my neighbours who got to witness the spectacular display of Irish tempertantrics.  The final result was that the lawn mower was retired, my brother was exhausted from flinging it around in an effort to make it work (no comment), and my mother and I had to pick up a new lawn mower on Sunday.

gollum, lowesWe walked into Loews and were making our way to the mowers when I heard a scratchy voice ask my mother if she needed any help.  I turned around to chide my mother for talking to strangers and nearly fell over a display of Tiki torches. The person who was helping her – and I don’t mean this as a slam because the gentleman was a very sweet grandfather of ten – but he was small and thin and, to me, looked almost exactly like Smeagol. It made the shopping trip more bearable since we all know how I loathe shopping.

Unless it’s at Victoria Secret, in which case, I’m the one who turns in Gollum.

“Do you want a mower that is self-propelled?” “Smeagol” asked us as we walked over to the display of mowers.

“That would make it easier to push, wouldn’t it?” I asked back.

“Oh definitely,” he laughed.

“Then we don’t want that.  My brother is the one who does the mowing and there’s no reason to make things easier for that butthead,” I told him. “In fact do you have any of those old fashioned push ones?”

“We don’t need it to be self-propelled,” my mother cut in, “but is gas or electric better?”

“The electric works well if you have a small yard, but otherwise a gas one would be best.”

“I think we can all agree that what would be best is whichever one makes my brother work the hardest,” I said. “Now where are those old push mowers?”

To my delight, they do still make the old-fashioned, non-gas push mowers and Smeagol escorted us to where we could find one.

“There ya go,” Smeagol grinned. “And the push ones leave no carbon footprint!”

“No carbon footprint!” I repeated to my mother. “You see what a brilliant idea this is?”

“It cuts sixteen inches across at a time so it might take him a while,” Smeagol added.

“I will seriously pay for the lawn mower if you buy this one,” I told my mother.

My mother, from whom I get my short attention span, had already been distracted the display of shiny weed whackers behind us though.

“We should probably get a new weed whacker, too,” she said. “The old one has been sitting outside and rusting since Dad died.”

“Now weed whackers are another ballgame,” Smeagol began.

“The thing that you have to remember though,” I waved my hands to get Mumma’s attention from the wall of garden toys, “is that I want goats, and–”

My mother began to rudely laugh, however I continued.

“–they should be able to handle a bit of edging.”

“With goats you would only need to buy a little hand shovel.  And you would get milk!” Smeagol added.

“I knew I liked this guy!” I exclaimed. “So we’re agreed on the goats?”

In the end, my mother bought a gas lawn mower, though not a self-propelled, and decided to wait on the weed whacker.  And I didn’t get my goats yet.  The day would have been a complete disappointment for me except that thanks to the trip I have since decided to refer to the woman who does my Brazilian waxing as a “weed whacker”.

***

A quick end note here, I have some potentially fucking awesome news about my long-awaited book.  I am a big believer in not counting my goats before they are hatched though, so I’m not showing my hand just yet.  The only thing is that you may notice is that I’ve started to update the format this blog and make it at least look more like an actual writer’s website.  Believe me, content will stay the same because I am what I am–and that is to say that I’m a fucking lunatic and I like telling you about it.  In addition to being a lunatic though, I am very serious when it comes to my writing, so I’ve added a new About Me section that sounds a little more professional than my original one.

(However, I’m still keeping the old one because, like I said, I am what I am and that that About Me probably illustrates who I am more than any actual paragraphs ever could.)

The Past Eight Days In 27 Sentences (Or So)

Posted in Randomness is Random by

What do you do when you are pressed for time and your eyes are strained, but you haven’t done a blog post in over a week?

DO A LIST!

  1. This is the ultimate blog post cheat since I make lists all the time anyway.
  2. I worked ALL. DAY. YESTERDAY. on finishing the book I’ve been writing procrastinating about for years because I’ve had it, and this fucker is getting finished within six months.
  3. I have eye strain from this.
  4. The irony of being an optometry tech yet suffering from eye strain is not lost on me.
  5. The irony of being a part-time optometry tech yet working 40+ a week is not lost on me either.
  6. The irony of the term “fresh frozen” is a little lost on me.
  7. If the Zombie Apocalypse comes before I’m finished writing my book, I will postpone kicking zombie ass and feeding hipsters to them until after I’m done this book.
  8. That is remarkable because I’ve been training for the Zombie Apocalypse my entire life and I really hate hipsters.
  9. I am a Twittering MASTER!
  10. I’ve decided to use the word “twittering” as a synonym for “using a vibrator” from now on.
  11. Number 9 is still accurate.
  12. In related news, my dear sweet friend, Jewels, reposted one of my smut pieces on her Naughty Nothings blog.
  13. You are welcome, from both of us.
  14. I (← Hey kids! This is a link to Kat’s Twitter account because she’s an attention whore!) share credit for the best hashtags ever ie: #hecklingbuildscharacter with my loves, Nicki and Celia and #randomsnugglepunch with darling RandyGirl.
  15. My most retweeted tweet was “Was a Republican 4 Halloween. Gave all the candy 2 the big kids & told the small ones that they could have candy if the big kids dropped it.”
  16. My second most retweeted tweet is “I’m later than Odysseus returning from Troy”. #speakingonlyinnerdyanalogies
  17. Conclusion: I think about twittering too much lately.
  18. Heh heh heh.
  19. Baked ziti and coffee taste horrible together.
  20. I want both baked ziti and coffee right now so I’m consuming them together anyway.
  21. My eyes really fucking hurt, but I’m writing this because I love you guys!
  22. Random dildo statement.
  23. I probably didn’t need number 22. since I only say “dildo” when my entry is becoming disturbingly coherent and I don’t think that “coherent” accurately describes this post.
  24. I’ve been engaged in psychological warfare with my upstairs neighbor where he screams like a fucking banshee during football games and I belt out ABBA karaoke.
  25. We’re probably both going to get evicted for disturbing the peace before it’s over.
  26. I get more immature than usual when I’m tired.
  27. Uranus has 27 moons. *snickers*

We will return to your regularly scheduled what-the-fuckery as soon as it doesn’t feel like I soaked my contacts in lemon juice.

The Year in Review 2011 Post

Posted in Year In Review by

I usually avoid writing about events that I know every other writer is talking about on their blogs, but I’ve been doing the Year in Review thing for many a New Year’s now, so I’m making an exception.  I’m actually happy that this is a blogging trend and would probably follow it even if I had not been doing it for years because I’ve really loved reading everyone’s reflections on the past year.  This Year in Review is a little different than the previous years though because it was it was one year ago today, I started seriously blogging.   As a result, I don’t need to chronicle the events of 2011 in detail since most of the major ones are listed in the archives, that thing to the left that I call the “Athenæum” because I love ridiculously obscure words.  Instead I’m going to reflect a bit on how those events affected me.

Oh dear God she’s going to get introspective.

Yeah, this is likely gonna be one of those entirely skippable entries since I’ll babble and emote to the point that the entry will be just a squishy mess of fucking-feely-mushy-mush that will make your teeth hurt.  Don’t worry, the next entry will be back to WTF that is my life as usual.  To those wise peeps who are jumping off at this point of the entry, I just want to say Happy New Year!  Thank you for helping make my year rock outlaid.

Now on with the mushy-mush, heavy, thinky shit.

WARNING:  LAST CHANCE TO RUN BEFORE I START SENTIMENTAL BABBLING!

Writing has always been a huge part of me.  I was about four years old when I began drawing pictures and making up stories to go along with them.  Unfortunately, since I seemed to have a natural gift for writing pretty well, I took the skill for granted and never pushed myself to become better.  I think this had to do with my most hated emotion and the one that I seem to be fucking constantly battling: fear.  I was afraid to find out that “pretty well” was the best that I could do.  I was afraid that, while I might be a star in the Little League, that I could never compete in the Majors.  I’d done too much stagnating during the past five years though, and it was time to either face the truth if I sucked, or to stop making excuses and write like I’ve always wanted to do.  For whatever reason, I chose to blog as a means to figure out if my writing was shit or not, and it’s one of the best things I have ever done.

I’ve experienced several devastating losses in 2011, the first and the one with the largest impact was losing the job I had held for nearly ten years.  To fully appreciate what a loss this was you would have to know how impossible it is for me to stay in one place for very long, let alone ten years.  That alone is indication of how much the place meant to me, but also, losing my job resulted in the loss of many things such as a steady income, health insurance, several friends who I would no longer see every day, and just security in general.

2011 also saw the loss of a dear friend, one whom I still go to text when I have an urge to say something stupid and be called mental.  I could say more about her loss, but honestly it’s one that I’m still dealing with and don’t want to talk about.  Suffice to say it’s been pretty shitty.

If I had experienced either of these losses in the previous year, they probably would have been enough to send me spiraling back down into the Walking Ghost Phase that I had been living for the previous three years, but fortunately this year had been enriched in ways that I could have never imagined.

What I’m getting to in a much longer route than I had anticipated was that this blog has made the difference for me this year.  Oh my God that sounds so fucking sappy.  On a writing level, it helped me to maintain a better–though still not brilliant–writing schedule.  It’s also given me some confidence that my writing might not be completely crappy given the amount of positive feedback that I’ve received about it.  My writing even led to my blog getting BONed, a honour that I’m still reeling over.  And if someone had told me that by the end of the year that I would have 800 people following my writing, I would have called them a filthy name.  It makes me think that perhaps my writing doesn’t suck.

On a more personal level, I have formed some brilliant relationships, and that is amazing because my guarded nature unfortunately applies to not only my writing, but also to how close I let people get to me.  Jewels, Randy, Nicki, even S.O., and quite a few others that I’ve mentioned in past entries (see my Blog roll for more), were all people that I did not know a year ago, and cannot imagine not having in my life now.  They, and all of you dear readers, are a blessing that I never, ever saw coming.

I’ll wrap this squishy package up by saying that while 2011 punched with some heavy fists, I was also held by some gentle hands.  The glass of Tequila is always half full.

Unless it’s my glass, in which case it’s empty.

Not because I’m a pessimist, I just love Tequila.

Best Wishes for Happiness, Health and Kicking ass for you all!

Slàinte! (<—Scots Gaelic spelling, as opposed to my usual Irish version, in honour of Auld Lang Syne)