My Enemy, the Horsefly

If you're like me, projects around the house seem to take on a life of their own. I headed outside at 10:00 this morning, ready to scrape decrepit, unsightly paint from the ceiling of my huge wraparound front porch. I thought an hour, maybe two for the job. Then I could come back inside and work on my newest romance novel manuscript, which I've been looking forward to. But Five hours later, I'm questioning the sanity of this particular job. I mean, the paint ceiling-peelings in an icky shade of green (who paints a porch ceiling green anyway?) seemed to mutate and propagate the more I scraped.

While I scraped, flicked, and basically made a big mess, a stupid horsefly the size of an eagle, zipped and buzzed around my head. I hate those things! Having been bitten by them before, I don't recommend the experience. It buzzed my head. I swatted at it with my hand. It buzzed my left ear. I tried to smack it with a broom. Thankfully, I didn't hit my ear. That would have given the horsefly a good laugh, I'm sure. But all I touched was air, which probably looked kind of insane to my neighbor who happened to be looking in my direction right about then.

It flew around, staying just far enough away so I couldn't hit it. But then the stupid bug had the audacity to land on the back of my leg. My leg! That fly got what was coming to him. I smacked my calf, which of course hurt me, but I also stunned him, it, or whatever. The fly lay groaning on the cement floor of the porch. It gasped, begged, and made its last will and testament. With no second thought, I swished its dying body into the mulch under the bushes surrounding the porch. Mission accomplished.

Later, I looked out our backroom window to watch our hummingbirds at the feeder. I looked closer. That's no hummingbird. It's a horsefly! It couldn't be the same one, could it? It landed on the outside of the screen I happened to be looking through. I honestly think it was mocking me. Giving me the wing, if you will. When I head back out to the porch tomorrow to begin re-painting it, I'm sure that resurrected fly will be waiting. Hmmm. Maybe my husband would like to paint the porch.

11,000 and Counting...

To recap, my former computer died a slow, violent death. In its demise, it took with it most of my written work to date. It took me quite a while to get over that. I'd see a publisher's guidelines and I'd think "Great! I've got just the short story to submit to them!" Then the ugly truth would knock me in the head. Nope. Not gonna happen. Your stories are no more.

Thankfully, with the help of wonderful, caring publishers, I was able to recoup some of my work. Two novels were e-mailed back to me so I could have them for my records. And a few short stories have also trickled back. To all of you who took the time to do that for me, I'm very grateful.

But the one that really got to me, stuck in my craw, shall we say, was my current work in progress. I was 11,000 words into the novel when my computer came down with an incurable virus. I'd kept written notes for my work, but most of that was just in idea form, jotted down in a hurry. If I was lucky, sometimes I could even read my own chicken-scratch.

But, as of last evening, I am once again over 11,000 words! The story has many of the same elements, but has changed somewhat. Some parts I remembered word for word, while others were just a cloudy concept stuck somewhere in my brain. I'm very happy to say, I like the story that's emerging even better than the previous one. A blessing in disguise? Yes, I believe it is.

Searching for Hummy

Our resident hummingbird, or "Hummy" as we've named him, hasn't made an appearance yet. I've had two feeders out for over a month. I've changed the water mixture at least four times. Where is he? We keep watch. Staring out our windows. At times, we thought we'd had a Hummy sighting.

"Was that him? Something just zipped by the window," said my husband.

 I watched for a minute and saw the impostor. "Nope, just an angry dragon fly."

Two days ago, I went out and bought a red geranium to replace to purple one, hoping to further entice our no-show friend. I also invested in a brand new hummingbird feeder. What does this bird want, food served on a tiny silver platter the size of a nickel?

That's what happens with my writing sometimes. I do everything right. I work on my story when I have a couple of hours. I work on it when I only have a few minutes. I change my scenery, like maybe taking a walk, hoping that will stir up something in my imagination. But sometimes, that's not enough. Oh, I can still write, but it may not be the heart-stirring, funny-bone tickling, sigh-provoking words I'm looking for.

Maybe it's just like looking for Hummy. We can do all the work, all the right things, and yet, nothing happens when we want it to. As far as hummingbirds and writing inspiration go, sometimes, all we can do is...wait.

Coffee Time Romance Chat

Join me and the other authors from Class Act Books tonight at 9:00 p.m. est. You can chat with us here:


http://www.coffeetimeromance.com/Chat2.html

What If I Forget How?

That's the question I asked my husband today. That actual full question was "What if I forget how to write?" My computer has been comatose for a couple of weeks now. I'm typing this on the aforementioned husband's laptop. We're trying to figure out what ails it, but so far my PC has us stumped. In the meantime, I'm going crazy not being able to write. Sure, I could do it longhand, but I've found that for me, I'm better when I'm typing. My brain often works faster than I can write with a pen, and I don't want to lose momentum or the story idea in my head. And I can only use his laptop when he gets home from work, as he needs to use it there. At work. His company is kind of funny about an employee only pretending to type on their table top, instead of using an actual computer. Weird huh?

And I'll admit it, I'm a dunce. No...don't try to argue with me. I'm an actual dunce. You see, I haven't been backing up my stuff on a memory stick like I'm supposed to, so if we're not able to save what I've already written, I'm toast. My first three books are safe, I have a hard copy of them, but all of my short stories, as well as the 11,000 words I was into my newest romance novel, are well, really burnt toast.

Back to my original question. What if I really do forget how to write?

My husband assured me my imagination is too vivid, and my strange sense of humor so warped, he has no doubt I'll remember how.

Change Your Perspective to Improve Your Writing

I've just returned from visiting family in Arizona. My Indiana trees and grass were replaced with cactus and sand. My temperatures in the teens were upped to the forties. And my surrounding farmland morphed into small distant mountain ranges.

Sometimes if I'm stuck in a writing rut, it helps to change my perspective by changing my location for a while. Talking to different people, admiring various landscapes, and experiencing new things all force my mind to entertain new thoughts.  Thoughts that, although initially not geared toward story ideas, end up that way none the less. And I found that being away from my computer and in essence, my work in progress romance novel, has given me fresh story ideas and a renewed energy to kick myself out of my writing rut.

Guess a vacation turned out to be more than just a vacation after all.