Monday Report

Hello, everyone.  It’s the start of a new week.  It’s also very cold.  I’m sure it’s also very cold where you live, unless you’re a lucky duck Australian, in which case, I envy you a great deal.

I feel like I have a lot to talk about, but nothing so pressing that I’d dedicate an entire post to it, so I figured I’d give you a few tidbits of what’s been floating around in my mind all weekend.

1) I saw Catching Fire for the fourth time this weekend.  I’m relatively open about my outstanding nerdiness, but in case you’re new to the blog, I’ll say it again.  I am a huge geek, and one of my favorite things to geek out over is The Hunger Games.

I could go on and on about everything that I love about the books, and the movies, for that matter (Jennifer Lawrence!), but I won’t because I would literally be typing until my fingers fell off.  So, I’ll try to stick to the point I originally set out to make.

*WARNING: Possible Spoilers Ahead*

As with any franchise I find myself fawning over, I desperately want to know more about the other characters and what was going on behind the scenes of Katniss’ point of view.  One of the reasons I love the movies so much is that they give us a glimpse at the other characters and what they’re doing while Katniss is in the arena.  The books are told entirely from her perspective, so we only get what we’re told her shown through her experience, but in the movies, we get to see a little more, like the game makers who control what happens in the Arena during the games.  I LOVED seeing how they did that!  I also really love any scene with President Snow.  Seriously, he gets the best lines in the entire franchise!

“Hope.  It is the only thing stronger than fear.”

“Because of her, they all pose a threat.  Because of her, they all think they’re invincible.”

And that moment at the end of the first one where he just turns and walks away all dark and creepy?  Or how about in the second one when he realizes that Plutarch has deceived him?  I LOVE THOSE MOMENTS.

Speaking of Plutarch, he’s who I’d really want a separate book about.  Well, him, Haymitch, and the tributes like Johanna and Finnick who were in on the plot to break Katniss out of the Arena during the Second Quarter Quell.  How long had they been communicating?  How did they get the others in on it?  I am DYING to know.  I’m also dying to know more about Finnick and Annie and their love story.  All we got from Finnick in Mockingjay was, “She crept up on me.”

Seriously?  That’s it?  NO!  That is NOT COOL, Suzanne Collins!

2) Today, one of my coworkers at my job that’s not writing came into where I was filing and handed me an envelope.  Then she said something like, “It’s your 10.60” (I don’t remember the actual number).  For some reason, I really thought it was money, so I got really excited.  But then I opened it and realized it was just a bunch of tax crap.  I have finally and begrudgingly come to accept that people will not just walk up to me and give me money.  That is not the way life works.

3) I also went to the post office today to renew my P.O. Box, so that was fun.  And $30.  But hey, it made me feel like a real responsible adult, which you know, really isn’t that great a feeling, but everyone seems to think it’s something to which we should all aspire, so whatever.

4) Cemetery Tours received another amazing review from Paul Ruddock at http://echoesofthepen.com.  Thank you so much, Paul!  Your review almost brought tears to my eyes!

5) Last night, as I was writing, I was watching The Walking Dead (again), and I’m beginning to think that maybe I really just can’t handle that show.  I always feel like I end up writing about the horrific experiences I’ve had while trying to enjoy a show while simultaneously ignoring my natural instincts to avoid all things zombie.  I’ve finally reached the point where I’m almost totally immune to blood and guts (though there’s still one scene in the second one that just… ugh…).  I’m still NOT okay with puke, but that’s something I’ve lived with my entire life and will probably never overcome.  Last night, however, I discovered that there is one thing in the zombie universe (or probably any sort of disgusting universe) that I absolutely can not handle.

Maggots.

Oh my gosh.  I don’t know how I never noticed them before, but there is one scene with a corpse in a tent and its nasty forehead is crawling with MAGGOTS.  One even falls off his forehead and onto his ear where it wriggles around until it finds its way back to the flesh.

EWWWWWW.

Now, I’ve always been pretty girly, but I usually can watch just about anything (except puke) and not get grossed out.  Those maggots grossed me out so much that I thought I was going to gag.  I even had a minor meltdown on Twitter because it was 2 AM and I had no one else to talk to.

So yeah, you get the picture.  It was horrible.  Thankfully, my brain spared me further trauma in my dreams.

Well, that’s not entirely accurate.  I actually dreamt that my friend became a plastic surgeon and decided that I needed plastic surgery to make my hands more feminine (they’re kind of manly) and so she cut up my hands and wrists, but I kept telling her I didn’t have health insurance, so instead of stitching me up, she just put band-aids on my wounds!  I was so scared that my hand was going to fall off, but she assured me that probably wouldn’t happen.

But at least I didn’t dream about maggots.

Have a good week, y’all!

So… How was YOUR Christmas?

The day after Christmas.

I only had one glass of wine yesterday, but I definitely have a Christmas hangover.  Way too much food, fun, and laughter.  Not that that’s a bad thing.

The holiday festivities began with our annual Christmas Eve trip to Santa’s Village.  Santa’s Village is a fun little thing that the Public Library does every year.  They set up a bunch of little fun houses for kids to go in and get cookies, Christmas ornaments, write letters to Santa, etc…  My sister and I have outgrown the actual houses, but it’s still fun to walk around and look at lights.

Funny story real quick… One year, my sister and I took our little cousins around.  Our oldest cousin was probably about nine or so.  Anyway, we took her and her little sister into Mrs. Claus’ house, where she was handing out Christmas cookies.  As expected, she smiled, wished us a Merry Christmas, and handed each of my cousins a sugar cookie.  Upon receiving her cookie, my cousin looks her straight in the eye and says, “Thank you.  I’m just getting over strep throat.”

I’m sure the look of sheer alarm and panic that poor Mrs. Claus sent me at that moment mirrored my own stunned expression.  It only took me about half a second to recover.  “Okay, then, thank you, Mrs. Claus!”  I said and quickly ushered my cousins out of her house.

After we met up with their father, my older cousin, he asked how it had gone and I told him the story.  He gives me this bewildered expression and goes, “No she isn’t!”

Anyway, that’s one of my favorite Santa’s Village stories.  This year’s trip wasn’t quite as eventful.

Although, my sister almost did get run over by a reindeer.

Afterword, we went to Midnight Mass.  It’s a beautiful service.  We sang my favorite Christmas Carol, “A Stable Lamp is Lighted.”  However, being the High Church Episcopalians that we are, we had incense that not only stinks up the entire church, but also stinks up your hair and your clothes.  Seriously, that smell sticks with you.  I also happened to be acolyting, so I had to stand right behind the thurifer (or the guy who swings the incense).  At one point, I took a deep breath because we were singing “O Come All Ye Faithful” and I inhaled a mouthful of that holy smoke and started choking in front of the entire church.  Fortunately, Episcopalians are really into their Christmas music, so no one noticed.

After the service, we headed home to wait for Santa.

Midnight was excited for Santa also, even though she knows climbing up on the table might land her on the naughty list.

After about three and a half viewings of A Christmas Story (“Agggggghhhhhh I can’t put my arms down aaaaghhhh!”), we finally headed to bed to wait for Christmas morning.

We had a lot of surprises waiting for us!

For example, I got a whole elliptical!  I love it!  I only hope it isn’t my parents’ way of telling me I need to work out more.

I also got Monsters University and Allegiant, so I’m a pretty happy camper.

My sister on the other hand…

She told my parents that she wanted checks for Christmas.  Well, they delivered.  (She actually got some really great presents.  This photo was just too funny to pass up).

After a morning of Christmasy goodness, we headed back to our friends the Kisers’ place (In case you don’t remember them, they’re the ones we spend every Thanksgiving and Christmas with… https://jackiesmith114.wordpress.com/2013/11/29/its-the-holiday-season/).  I’m not even sure how the tradition began.  We’ve all just been friends forever.  The stories I could tell… maybe one day I’ll write a book.  The Annual Kiser-Smith Holiday Shindigs.

Mr. Kiser always has a fun new holiday toy for us to play with.  Last year, it was Robot Fighter Bugs.  I named mine Horatio.

This year, it was Robot Fighter Spiders.  Remote controlled and slightly bigger and creepier, because they actually walk on creepy little robot legs.

Just like any good Christmas gathering, there were Christmas cookies.

However, if you look closely, you’ll notice that someone ate the head off of one of the gingerbread men and then put him back.  Morbid.  And a little gross.

We (the “kids”) took a Christmas walk to the park.

December Skies in Texas are actually very beautiful.

We’re all adults, so naturally, we played on the swing set.

This is Bobby, my brother for all intents and purposes.

While we were at the park, we met the absolute cutest little boy named Keegan.  He came right up to us, with his dad looking on, and began patting our friend Ashwin on the leg and saying, “Buddy… buddy.”  Then, he walked over to Bobby’s little sister, Jenny, and said, “What a mess!”  His dad explained that he’d had a lot of health problems, and that he really liked playing with big kids.  I got a high five from him.  So, so, so cute.   I hope he had the best Christmas ever.

After that, it started getting really cold, so we scurried back to the Kiser home, where we engaged in another holiday tradition: Mario Kart.

I’m not going to sugarcoat it.  I’m not very good at Mario Kart, but my sister is absolutely disgraceful.  This year, however…

She came in third place!!!  It’s actually a Christmas Miracle!

I don’t know how to bring up the highlight of our Yuletide Celebration, so I’ll just say it.  There was a toilet.

Yes, you read that correctly.  Jenny got a toilet for Christmas.  It actually wasn’t the first Christmas toilet in the family.  Bobby got one when he and I were still in high school.  Let me tell you, he was not amused.  His mom (and the rest of us) thought it was hilarious, but he was so angry.  It was just about the funniest thing.  Now that we’re older though, we know how to appreciate the value of a good Christmas toilet.

He’s over 21, I swear.

You can use it as a wine table.

Or a gaming seat.

And of course, you should never pass up the opportunity to take an Awkward Family Christmas Photo around the toilet.

The evening ended with a delightful chocolate cheesecake dessert.

Good thing I got that elliptical, because I’m not letting this beauty go to waste!!!

Dessert and more battle bugs.

I hope everyone had the most delightful and merry of Christmases!

Now onto 2014!

Writing Lessons Learned

Last night, I went to my first local writer’s group meeting.  I had a lot of fun and met some really nice people.  I talked with one girl, who was from Barcelona, for hours about Harry Potter.  She asked me if it was true that American girls like British guys.  I told her that all a lonely British guy has to do is come to America, say “Hello,” and he’ll never be lonely again.

She also asked me how I learned how to write, and to be honest, I really didn’t have a great answer for her.  I’ve been thinking about it, and although I did take short story, poetry, and even screen-writing classes in college and grad school, I’m not sure it’s really something that can be learned.  Writing is just one of those things that has always come naturally to me.  Like my sister and singing.  I had to work and train and listen really hard just to learn how to carry a tune.  My sister has a natural ear and quite near perfect pitch.  She’s taken lessons, but she’s never really had to work at it like I did.  As far as writing goes, however, I just decided that I wanted to write a book one day and that was it.

That’s not to say I haven’t taken advice from other authors.  I read Stephen King’s entire book On Writing and it had some great pointers (Duh, he’s Stephen King).  One of them was to use adverbs sparingly.  I like adverbs.  I use them all the time.  But any writer will tell you that it’s better to show than to tell.  It’s something that my high school English teacher called “pics.”  Paint me a picture with words.  Don’t tell me.  Show me.  That was honestly some of the best advice I ever received on writing.

Another bit of good advice that I’ve tried to keep with me, I learned from an author I met at the Renaissance Faire of all places.  She was there, signing books, and I told her that I was working on my first novel (this was at least a few years ago), but that I couldn’t seem to get past the first couple of chapters because I kept going back, rereading, and changing them.  She told me to stop doing that immediately, or else I would never move forward.  This may have been the best piece of advice I could have received.  I’m by no means a perfectionist, but I do want my work to be the best it can be.  However, it won’t matter how good it is if I never finish it.

For me, the creative process has always seemed like a leak in a dam.  I believe everyone has creativity and stories and paintings and music all stored up in their brain, but sometimes, it gets trapped.  For those of us who write and paint and compose in our day-to-day lives, that little bit of creativity that leaks out is like a trickle in a dam, and if we keep working at it, eventually a trickle becomes a wave until the entire dam bursts.

One of the guys was asking how another author and I keep going through writer’s block.  The only answer either of us had was “keep writing.”  Make something up.  Do something you had no idea you were going to do.  It always amazes me how, when I sit down to write, I’m never 100% sure what’s going to happen.  The other night, I was working on one of the stories, and one of my characters just kept spouting out stuff that I’d never even considered before.  It’s amazing how the words and thoughts and emotions that you never knew you had inside of you flow so freely and so honestly through your fingertips, and often times, spoken through the mouths of others.  That’s one of my favorite parts of writing.  I can have an idea of where I want the story to go, but deep down, I’m not totally in control.  In writing, you have to be determined, but you also have to keep an open mind and be willing to make changes, because you never know where the story will take you.

Finally, the last piece of great advice I received was from Josh Groban.  Sadly, he was not talking to me one on one.  My sister and I were at his concert a few years back (Fantastic, by the way.  He sounds better live than he does recorded!) and he started talking about his training and everything he learned.  He said, “The only advice I can give, and it’s the best piece of advice I ever got, was to never stop learning.  Always be a student.  Be humble.  Be thankful.”  In other words, don’t get too big for your britches.  Unless you’re JK Rowling, in which case, the size of your britches don’t matter one bit because you created Harry Potter.  But for most of us, it rings true, no matter what line of work you’re in.

As for me, I need to just sit my butt down and write.  This is the busiest time of the year, and I’m thankful that I have stuff to do!  But I really want to finish my first draft of the Cemetery Tours sequel by the end of the year.  I think I’ll make it.  I just have to sit down, concentrate, and write.  It’s not that hard, but at the same time, it is so incredibly easy for the creative mind to get distracted.  To be honest, I blame my  mother.  She brags all the time about how she gorged herself on Twinkies and Ding-Dongs when she was pregnant with me.  I’m like, “Well, that’s great for you, but did you ever think about the effect all that sugar had on my brain while it was still developing?”  Clearly, it was not a positive one.

And with that, I’m off.  Please enjoy my feeble attempt at holiday humor/shameless self-promotion.

My cover designer is going to kill me.

A Funny Story and A Poem

I realize that my last few posts have not been all that interesting.  So as far as my book is concerned, all I will say is that I finished revising and it ended up being 78,626 words.  Woo-hoo.

Okay, so here’s the story.  Yes, it is a true story.  I hope it’s as funny in writing as it was in person.

Once upon a time, a group of friends and I decided to take a trip down to Schlitterbahn in New Braunfels.  Instead of staying in a hotel, one of the guys’ parents arranged for us to stay at a campsite in these really nice little cabins, complete with refrigerators, air conditioning, and indoor plumbing (and yes, that is my definition of “roughing it”).  We spent two nights in the cabins.  The first night, all of us girls stayed up talking all night, much to the chagrin of my friend, Brittany.  We all got about two hours of sleep that night, but we were so excited to go to Schlitterbahn that we didn’t care.  It ended up being a fantastic day, full of tubing, sliding, and surfing the wave pool, and by the time we returned to the cabins, we were all chlorinated, sunburned, and exhausted.  I was so tired that I didn’t even care that a grasshopper hopped onto my leg while I was out taking pictures of the campsite.

After we were settled in the cabins for the evening, I hopped in the shower.  Now, the bathroom was designed so that the wall that separated it from the main cabin didn’t reach the ceiling.  That meant that you could hear everything that your cabin mates said and/or did while you were in the shower.  It also meant that your cabin mates could throw things like red gummy worms over the top of the wall and into the shower with you.

I was in the middle of rinsing out my hair when all of a sudden, one of the girls screamed.  It wasn’t an ordinary scream.  It was a scream of pure terror; of someone who had just looked into the deepest circle of hell and seen all of their most vivid and traumatizing nightmares staring back at them.  I knew immediately what that scream meant.

There was a cockroach in the cabin.

I, like every rational human being, am terrified of cockroaches.  I was even more terrified of them then, back before I trained myself how to slaughter them from a distance.  I immediately began formulating an escape strategy.  How was I going to get from the bathroom to the metaphoric safety of my bunk bed if I had to cross a room with a rampaging cockroach on the loose?

Before I could come up with a plan, my friend, Kara, screeched, “OH MY GOD IT’S FLYING!”    That was it.  I had to get out of there.  Some may argue that I was foolish to leave the refuge shower, but keep in mind that the roach had wings, and the wall to the restroom was open.  I would have rather been in the cabin and able to see the beast with my own eyes than to have him surprise me in a dark and enclosed space.  I leapt out of the shower, threw on my pajamas, and bolted for the main cabin, where all of my friends were curled up on their beds.  I scampered up to the top bunk with Kara and Brittany.

“Where is it?” I breathed, feeling like a soldier hiding in a ditch from an enemy that was about to open fire.

“I don’t know.  We lost it,” Brittany explained, sounding tired and slightly irritated.

Knowing that none of us would be able to relax, or get down from the bed for that matter, we called one of the guys we were with to come over and kill it for us.  As he searched through the mess of food that was stacked up against the wall, we watched on, admiring him for his chivalry.  Unfortunately, he couldn’t find it, so after wishing us good luck, he headed back to his own cabin.

The five of us sort of looked around at each other, wondering what to do next.  Poor Kara was about to have a panic attack.  Roaches are her Kryptonite.  She hates them more than anyone I’ve ever met.  Meanwhile, Brittany could barely keep her eyes open.  I was right there with her.  I desperately wanted to sleep, but that wasn’t going to happen as long as the roach was running free.  I realized then that my desire for sleep outweighed my crippling fear of that stupid bug.  Summoning up every ounce of courage that I possessed, I hopped off the bunk bed, grabbed a broom, and began poking around the room for the roach.

No luck.

“I’m telling you, it’s waiting for me,” Kara said.  “As soon as I go over there, it’s going to come out and kill me.”

I didn’t doubt it.  I wholeheartedly believe that roaches can smell fear and that they attack those that smell weak or vulnerable.

“Maybe if we name it, we won’t be as scared of it,” I said.  Naming things usually creates some sense of endearment.

“Demon From Hell.  How about that?” Kara seethed.

“How about… Cuddly?” Our friend, Kaitie, suggested.  So our little friend became Cuddly the Cockroach.

It turns out that naming things you find disgusting and horrifying does not make them any less so.  We were all still just as terrified by the idea of Cuddly crawling on us as we were when he was just another nasty roach.

After we named him, Kaitie hopped down off her bed and helped me search for Cuddly.  Still no luck.

Then, taking a deep breath, Kara announced, “Okay.  I’m going to help.  You watch.  As soon as I get down there, it’s gonna come out.”

Sure enough, less than two minutes later, “OH I KNEW I’D BE THE ONE TO FIND YOU, YOU LITTLE S**T!  OH YOU LITTLE S**T!”

I turned just in time to see her grab a dustpan off the wall and bring it down on that poor roach with what I can only call all the wrath of Heaven and Hell combined.  Over and over, she whacked the life out of Cuddly the Cockroach, with every separate blow accompanied by some sort of expletive, some of which I’m not even sure were actual words.

“Kara, Kara, it’s okay!  It’s dead!” someone assured her.

“NOT.  DEAD.  ENOUGH.”  Whack!  Whack!  Whack!  “IT NEEDS TO BE IMPALED AND DISEMBOWELED AND BURNED!”

After Cuddly was finally dead enough, we swept his poor, flattened carcass out onto our front porch as warning to all other bugs who might have considered dropping in unexpectedly.

A few years later, I was in a poetry class and our assignment was to write a ballad.  Now, I have mentioned before that I am pretty much the worst poet ever, but this is the one poem that I’m actually proud to share.  As you may have guessed, it was inspired by our poor, dearly departed Cuddly.

The Ballad of Sir Cuddly B. Cockroach
An original poem by Jacqueline E. Smith

Life in New Braunfels suited one
Sir Cuddly Cockroach fine.
Fresh country air, tall fields of grass
And campsites full of grime.

He lived life as a happy bug,
Full of stress-free, sunshine days.
By moonlit nights he searched for food
Through cabins’ muddled maze.

Then one day in Cuddly’s realm
Arrived five human girls.
Two were tall, two were short,
One wore a head of curls.

Now these girls seemed nice enough,
No motives to attack.
Cuddly stepped out to say hello,
A scream, a swear, a WHACK!

Sir Cuddly’s blood was shed that night.
Just what was his offense?
Being born a lowly little roach,
Devoid of common sense.

Poor departed Cuddly B.
The life he loved so well
Was ended by the vicious girls
Who bid him, “Rot in hell!”