Grand Central Station

I need to work on communication in my house.

We need a large whiteboard, or pagers, or something, so that I can know for absolute certain that if I tell someone something, they will remember it.

For instance:

"Hey boys, I have plans early tomorrow morning, my friend is coming over, and then again that evening."

This somehow translates to

"Do whatever you want, I don't need the living room, ever."

Because I was supposed to (emphasis on supposed) have my friend over for breakfast this fine morning. I was supposed to get my writing done first, have some coffee.

What is actually happening is something else entirely.

The boys came home at 6am. (Which is normal and totally fine.)
They brought a friend from out of town with them. (Which is more than totally fine, I enjoy this kid.)
That friend is sleeping on my couch. (Normally, totally fine. Today, not so much.)

So I am creeping around my house, typing on my laptop in the bedroom, and silently texting my friend to see if he wants to go out to breakfast so we can actually speak to each other and not have to hide in the bedroom or garage.

See, normally, this would SO not be an issue. SO. This friend of the boys knows he is always welcome in our house, and he is. But there have been multiple, and by multiple I mean A HELL OF A LOT of instances when T and I had plans or friends over or something and the boys determined that their wants and needs were more important. I am never going to tell someone they have to sleep in the car, or need to find somewhere else to go, so we wind up with 4 people sleeping, unhappily, in my living room.

It's irritating. I'm not being very eloquent about it. I'm mostly just pissed that yet again I can't be comfortable in my own home, that I have to change my plans last minute because the boys listened to what I told them and then immediately did whatever the hell they wanted.

And now I'm off to shower.

Cranky, Tired, and Ice Skating Uphill

I cannot seem to sleep enough.

Also, I seem to be having a raging (far worse than normal) case of PMS, which is doing great things for my home life. T is so very patient with me. I am a lucky girl.

Now let me go snap at him about nothing and then sob uncontrollably for a while. It's been working the last few days, why not?

We cleaned out our closets today, which made me want to start drinking about 9 am. But it's done.

Doing NaNoWriMo, which would be a hell of a lot cooler and more productive if you could navigate their site with any real semblance of ease. I understand that the servers are under tremendous pressure, but it's not like they didn't see this shit coming.

Uhm....Other, exciting things in the works that I will post about when they come to fruition.

Happy Halloween

T's youngest brother ate our Halloween candy. We have to go buy more. Sigh.

I haven't really done anything interesting this week....Our roomie has been given 30 days notice (the one non-family member living here) and he seems to be taking it just as we expected--Like a pussy. He seems to think that he is ENTITLED to a lot more from us than he actually is--this is and has been a theme with this kid for as long as he has lived here. It makes me really mad and upset to think about it. (He hates women, and therefore doesn't respect anything I say or do. Which enrages everyone in the house. But he will only listen if T tells him to do something....UGH! I can't talk about this any more.)

Also, spent two days openly weeping (well, kinda) about some of the stuff that T and I have to do in order to get married. Again, I don't really want to go there.

I made pumpkin and butternut squash puree and froze it, so we can have real pumpkin pie (GROSS), pumpkin bread, cookies, pancakes and so on, none of which I will eat, and curried butternut squash soup, which I will definitely eat.

I got nothin, dude. I was so upset last night I called my mom at 11:00 at night--that should tell you something.

Then I watched Ravenous and went to bed. (Seen this movie? It's funny. Shouldn't be funny, not trying to be funny, its gross, and creepy, but parts of it are funny. The music. {And when the dude starts screaming 'HE'S LICKING ME!!!!', that's pretty hilarious too.})

Alrighty.

Ok. As much as I am totally sure you have all been waiting with baited breath to hear about my writers conference, I am going to tell you about it.

However.

I am not really going to give any specifics (email me and ask, if you like) because one of the topics that was heavily discussed in several of my workshops was blogging.

Most authors are quite anti-blog. Also, when you are an up-and-comer, you will be googled, you will be researched, and if you have a blog or a my*space or a face*book, it will be looked at.

So you either have to be careful what you post and where, or not do it at all.

I have some strong opinions about some of the speakers that were in attendance, but I am not going to share them here. Ask, and ye shall receive, my friends.

Anyway, it was flippin intense. Not a lot of sleep was had, the food was not so great, and the coffee was even worse. Lots of sitting, lots of note taking, lots of smiling and talking and stressing and travelling. (We also left on Thursday, which was the plan all along, yet I had convinced myself that we weren't leaving until Friday, so that threw a whole new stressful spin on things. I rock.)

Anyway, all in all it was a good experience. I learned a lot, and it motivated me a bit. Also, my opinion of myself and my writing was boosted as I saw that I am...well, better than I thought I was. And I am not a crazy cat lady. (Quite a few of those around.)

And those Canadians! They rock. They drive like maniacs, but they were so nice, and very into American politics. (I guess our bail out trashed their dollar. I hear that this is happening around the globe--Australia was hit pretty hard too.) So there was plenty to talk about, aside from writing.

Well, there you go. I have been up since 4:30am, and this whole 'Fuck a sleep schedule' thing is getting old. (But I did go to bed at like, 7:30 last night, and had a nap.....I suppose I was tired.)

In the Mean Time

Here are some photos of T and me before we went out to dinner tonight. (He missed me! Took me to a huge, wildly decadent meal that is now causing me a horrid amount of bloat and discomfort. Hooray.)

And please enjoy T's new goatee--he is Freddy Mercury for Halloween (It pains me how many people don't know who that is....) and doesn't want to just grow the 'stache.

I kinda like it, actually....





(yes, they both look startlingly the same. J took them for us on the iPhone and was making noises like they were drastically different. But whatever, I'm tired. Also, that goatee of T's was known as the 'Evil Spock Beard' in HS, when he grew it to play Jesus in the 'Stations of the Cross' play at the church. Holy, holy, holy are we.) (It also pains me how many people don't get the Evil Spock Beard reference.)

Americas Hat

I have returned from Canada.

It was a very good, interesting experience.

I am completely exhausted.

I will write more about it when I have slept.

Met famous people (some of whom were nice, some were bitchy, some were really awesome.)

I will get there. Later.

Off to nap.

Flat Iron Seal

I sent my friend a text message today asking him if he wanted to have dinner at my house--That we were having 'Flat Iron Seal' tacos. (I typed 'steak'. My phone regularly changes the words for me....and I don't notice.)

He wrote me back wanting to know if I had clubbed the seal myself, and that he was concerned that they would be tough if I had.

I laughed my ass off.

Anyway, that's essentially the only funny thing that has happened today. I'm really, really starting to freak out about Canada....and I am doing load after load after load of laundry in preparation. (I know the house will be destroyed when I get back anyway....I don't know why I even try. Maybe to justify my rage.)