My Planner

I've probably mentioned it before, but I made myself a planner a few months ago. And then yesterday, I spent THREE HOURS sprucing it up. I pasted a green sheet of paper to the ugly brown cardboard of the cover, then sealed it off in plastic so that it wouldn't get stained when I inevitably spill something on it. I manually poked holes in about 60 pages (I didn't want holes as big as a regular hole punch). Since I don't have any fancy binding equipment, I was binding the original version with ribbon - Maroon ribbon that didn't even remotely match the colors I had put on my new covers. So I went to the store and bought black ribbon (I figure back is neutral enough that I can find other uses for it. a 10 yard spool for only 33 cents. I didn't realize ribbon was that cheap!) and then I had to sit a while and think about another way of threading the ribbon so that it wasn't as ugly as my old version. The binding on v1 was pretty ugly, stuck up in weird lumps and got tangled and all sorts of stuff. This is what I ended up with.  Isn't it lovely? I'm super proud of it. Which is silly because it's just a simple craft project, but whatever. It's great. YAY!






PS: I promise to stop being a neglectful blogger. The end of semester (which I'm still not ready to talk about) was a bit of a disaster, but I made it out okay, and I think my grades did too. Regardless, It was miserable and I didn't want to talk about it, and.... that's it really.

K is for Krayzee

What? You think I spelled it wrong? Nope. That's exactly how it's spelled, or at least, I find that people are so nuts that even spelling "crazy" seems too normal for them.

I got to work two minutes late at 4:02. I get my drawer counted and set up, and I'm taking my first order. We're about halfway through when a blond woman walks past the line, and SHOVES my customer aside. She throws an open burger at me, but I try to catch it, miss, and it lands on the counter. "I just came through drive-thru and every fucking time I come in here its like this. Why the hell can't you get my order right, bitch?" she doesn't stop talking but I inturrupt her. "I'm sorry, what's wrong with it, and I'll make you a new one."
"Onions! You didn't put enough damn onions on it. I asked for extra onions, and you're ripping me off. I paid for extra onions."

Now, first of all, extra onions are free, so you didn't pay for extras. Second of all, small sandwiches come with two rings of onion. I'm looking at at least 6. I didn't say that though. Instead I said "alright, extra onions. What sort of sandwich was it?"
"A fucking cheeseburger. I'll have you shut down if you don't make me a new one right now."
"A single or a double cheeseburger?"
"Just a cheeseburger! You know what? I want my money back."
"Alright let me get my manager."
"What are you calling me a liar? I work in law enforcement. I'm a cop. I can get you shut down like THAT!"
"I can't open my drawer without my managers key. If you want your money back, I need to get him."
"Well then tell one of these other idiots to make me my fucking sandwich."

I get my manager, and wait while this is sorted out. Once she finally leaves (oddly enough, without her money OR her sandwich.) I finish taking the order I had stated already. "Sorry about that." I said. and he said "What are you sorry for? You weren't the one who shoved me. Crazy people."

The whole night went on like that. She was not the only person to threaten to shut us down. I also had one customer threaten to have me fired because it took too long (about a minute) to get her drinks done (4 sprites and a shake) and I had one threaten to hit me because I wouldn't give her free food/pay for it myself.

The whole night was ridiculous, or rather Krayzee.

Note: there were some good things. One of my regular customers (who I had previously just thought was overweight because I couldn't really see her figure in her clothes. Turns out she was pregnant) came in with her new baby girl. So tiny and beautiful

Name That Computer!

Both of my previous laptops had names. Of course, at the time, I thought I was the only one nutty enough to actually name my laptop, so I gave them laptop-related names. (I mean, they had those required names for networking "ERIN-PC" but I gave them their own personal names, which I used when talking to and about them.) The first one was called Toppy, and he was a good computer. I loved him, and even now I miss him. In the end, he died with very wet innards (my dad borrowed him and left him running overnight on a table below a leak in our roof) and with some melted innards (because his fan broke and he overheated rather often) I'm not sure which ended his life, but it was a good one, while he still had it.

My second one was called Craptop, because on the day I got him, less than 10 minutes out of its box he froze and I had to restart. No matter what I did, he just wasn't functional. I ran several different virus scans. No, he's clean. I added RAM. No go. I deleted every useless program. Didn't help at all. I reformatted, back to XP, and even that didn't do me any good. It had to have been a hardware issue. ANYWAYS......

Turns out I'm not the only one crazy enough to name my laptop. I now know several people who have named their computers... with actual names, not just variations of "laptop". That makes me feel better, both about my sanity, and about my current laptop. At one year old, it's still nameless. I think she's a girl. My other two were both definitely not, but this one seems rather feminine.

Anyways, I'm going to name her. Feel free to suggest something, if you want.
That's all.

I know I owe you an update on my trip down to Virginia. I'll get around to it. Things here are still a little overwhelming and I'm not quite sure what's going on. I am feeling fine about it, good even. Just confused.

Busy Weekend

It's been a busy busy busy weekend. I did that one update on my blog, and that took up almost all my free time this entire weekend.

Saturday morning I got a sunburn! No, actually saturday morning was my wonderful fiance Jeffrey's graduation. I'm super proud of him. He was recognized separately from the rest of the students graduating in his major, because he was named Deans Scholar, among other honors. Meanwhile, my sunscreen apparently was faulty. Brand new that morning, applied twice in 6 hours, and yet I still got a KILLER sunburn. It still hurts terribly.

My mother and one of my sisters came down for his graduation and stayed around Sunday. I'm not sure my mom had a good time. She seemed to be enjoying herself but every now and then she'd get really quiet and look annoyed. I wonder if its because we were always in a big crowd, and she and I got no one-on-one time. I guess that's my fault, for suggesting she stay at Jeffrey's grandma's house. It was nice though. I had a great weekend with my sister and mom, and mothers day was fun.

Today though, today was a scary day for me. I am (was?) taking four classes. Three of my final exams were scheduled for today. History, which I was not worried about. English, which I was mostly not worrysome, but my teacher is a grammar-lover, and she has all sorts of fancy grammar terms which I never knew. I knew how to use proper grammar, and I knew what was wrong and why, but I never knew things had fancy names. I was afraid I'd forget some of those. Then I had Physics, which SCARED THT CRAP OUT OF ME! I was sure I was going to fail it. I didn't know electricity. I barely knew waves. Lenses? Mirrors? GAH!  On top of all I had no sleep for two days (the sunburn is all over my back and shoulders. I am one of those toss-in-your-sleep types, and each time I'd try to roll I'd wake myself up in pain. Not fun!) I had no time to study over the weekend, because of all the events and familyness. I was sure I was going to fail everything.

But it turns out, the history test was as easy as I predicted. The English test was better than I thought (mostly she asked us about how the rules worked, and not what they were called. yay!) and the physics test. Oh boy. It was crazy. And by crazy, I mean EASY! It was the easiest test I had taken in that class all semester. I was so relieved.

After doing so well on my exams, while being tired and in sunburn pain, I feel like I can do anything! So what am I going to do now? Now I have made an official statement to write 500-1000 words of The Circle before bedtime. And not just any words, but good words. Ones that make sense. I feel like I can do anything!

New Projects

Remember how I posted a few days ago about how springtime makes me extra-creative?

I've found myself two new projects today.

The first was this morning. My aunt is pregnant. I was looking through pictures of her baby shower, and saw that while she had a picture with each gift she opened, she had FIVE pictures with Goodnight Moon. And the look on her face in the pictures was happier than in any of the other pictures of baby-gifts. This aunt of mine also happens to be a writer. I wasn't too surprised to see that a book made her glow.

So I was thinking, I haven't gotten her a gift yet. What if I wrote her baby girl a book, and illustrated it myself? I could get just one copy printed for her off Lulu, and maybe she'd love it. I really want her book to be something she'll love forever. After a whiel I decided to make ti for a SLIGHTLY older audience. By I that I mean geared more towards a four year old, than an infant, so that she might read it when she's a little older, too. I'm 19 and can still happily sit down for a few minutes of Dr. Suess. It brings back a lot of memories, and the stories don't totally bore me. I can't sit through Goodnight Moon. Every page is the same. That's not enough for me. ANYWAYS!

I'm second guessing myself now. Another aunt recently had a baby (she'll turn 1 this summer!) and I didn't make her a book. Those particular aunts live close together, adn the families see each other often. If the girls are close, I don't want to inspire any jealousy there. That means I will need to make two baby/small child books, and now I dont know whether to make two of the same book, or one for each.

And I've never even tried to write a story for a kid that little. I used to tell stories to my sisters when they were little, but I cant remember what I ever told them. I don't know many kids that young anymore either. It's been just a little too long for me to remember what a 4 year old reads, and I have no one to ask. All I remember from books when I was little are the pictures. But at the time, I loved the stories too. Maybe I'll go to the book store one day and talk to someone who works there. Or the library. Something.

But what if Rebekah and Emmy don't like the books I give their girls? Or what if the girls don't like the books? And my drawing skills aren't much. At the same time, if I were a little girl, I'd love a personalized book. Even now, I'd love someone to write a book just for me.

I've also started looking into an opportunity to write DIY/Home Improvement articles at $50 each. I'm a little bit scared because it's such a high paying market, but it's for a topic I actually KNOW! I know home improvement. I grew up on a construction site. I have helped with hundreds of houses, additions, and remodelings. Granted, when I was 5 helping consisted of bringing my dad another clip of nails for his finish gun, but when I was older it was actual helping. Installing windows, putting in recessed lighting (up until I fell through the ceiling. I got in a bit of trouble with that one....) installing toilets. Okay, a lot of it's baby stuff still, but I know how to do the heavier stuff. I just haven't had the chance. The jobs were mostly my fathers, so he was the one doing most of the work. Usually, if I wasn't busy doing something else, he'd talk me through it as he did it.

I should be focusing on The Circle. I know that. So let's do that. The Circle, here I come! DIY and PICTURE BOOKS, I'll attack you in a few hours.

Creation

Spring is such a great time of year for creating. I just changed a huge part of my book, because I realized it wasn't a hugely important part, and my characters were far too focused on it. I realized I needed to re-write the last few pages, because the story was feeling really rushed. I realized that I absolutely love the way its coming out, besides that rushed section.

Remember when I said I wasn't sure if I was making progress? Well, in the past few days I've written 500 brand new words. I've re-written 3 scenes so far, and even though I cut a lot out, that part is about 1000 words longer than it was before, too. I'm going to call it progress.

I had fallen into the "telling, not showing" trap. I fixed that mess up a lot.

I've been doing other kinds of creating too. I recently designed the layout and photshopped a banner for a friend's blog. I'm thinking about re-doing my own blog from scratch too. Maybe not. I am sorta in love with this layout. Maybe I'll take on a big project and do a desktop background for myself. Or maybe not.

I've started DRAWING again. I'm not the best with a pencil, but it's nice. The only thing I'm even moderately good at are people. Faces, actually. I can't draw bodies at all. But I can sketch a decent portrait, and I'm enjoying it.

I've been dying to get my hands on some beads, wire, and various other jewelry-making things. Somehow, my sisters managed to steal all that stuff before I moved, and now I have nothing. I want to get back into that.

This creative energy makes me feel SO good. And each time I do something nice, I get all happy. This happens every spring, but I can never get sick of this rush. :D