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Hacking, typing, howling

OK, one more dash from the Cave of Revision, this time to pick up medicine, dump the tissue-filled trash basket, and proclaim thanks and celebration throughout the Forest because my fundraising goal for the Team in Training Half Marathon has been met. Karen McQuestion, a Wisconsin journalist now working on a novel, put me over the top, and is the happy winner of the audio version of TWISTED. Thank you, Karen! Thank you, everyone who contributed! Because of you, the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society can save lives.

But….

…. it’s not over. You see, it’s called the Team in Training. My teammate is my best friend and Beloved Husband, Scot. Since my name is on the books, it’s easy for me to beg for donations. Trust me, my friends, if it were not for this guy, the books would not get written. He keeps me going in more ways than I can count.

Scot is 29% of the way to his goal. Please donate to the hottest bald guy in running shorts! He makes the world a better place.

New Topic: Attention teachers of FEVER 1793! There is a terrible outbreak of yellow fever in Paraguay right now.

One more thing: I stayed up last night to watch the eclipse. We had a foot of snow the night before so the the back meadow was hushed and brilliant with a million moon-filled diamonds sparkling. As the dragon ate the moon, the snow dimmed and fell into shadow. Then the stars came out, exuberantly, like a chorus that’s been impatiently waiting its cue. BH stood with me as the dragon swallowed the moon and her belly lit up red. A dog down the road couldn’t stop howling. We understood what he felt.

I woke up early this morning and watched the moon set, and am now watching a beautiful sunrise. In the middle of all these revisions, with kids home on vacation, plus the hacking, disgusting cough, having these still moments in the real world of moon and stars and sleeping meadows is quite nice.

Back to the Cave. Miles to go before I sleep.

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quick breath

I am dashing outside the Cave of Revision for a quick breath of fresh air. All is going fairly well. I am working long days, but love being so submerged in my story. One of the characters is now found only on the cutting room floor. Eliminating her cleared up all kinds of structural problems in the text.

Now if I could just get rid of the hamsters who have taken up residence in my lungs, life would be peachy. I am coughing like a seal with a three-pack a day habit, a seal who hangs out under the dock and steals French fries from unsuspecting tourists, a seal who works as a carnie with a traveling fair and writes rambling screeds about walrus conspiracy theories. I sound like a Seal Gone Bad.

Thanks to a generous contribution from Mary Pearson and Aliya, who contributed from England (!), I am 94% on the way to making my Team in Training fund raising goal. All I need is another $150. Will you put me over the top?

OK, the fresh air is killing me. Back into the cave I go.

2008 Resolution Tracker
Week 7 – Miles Run: 22, YTD: 146.75
Week 7 – Days Written: 7, YTD: 49

45 weeks left this year.

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Officially crawling into cave

Yesterday was amazing: our Number One Son qualified for the New York State boy’s swimming meet by taking third place in the 100-meter breast in the preliminary heat at yesterday’s Section III championships.

That is a mouthful for an early-morning post. Boiled down to its essence, it translates into: My kid is going to States!!!! Yeah, we are just a wee bit excited about this here.

Good thing we did all of the hooting and hollering yesterday. Today marks the beginning of the period known as Laurie Is Crawling Into Her Cave To Work on Her Book. I won’t be posted much, if any, over the next two weeks. I will be writing, writing, throwing out the pages that don’t work, then writing some more.

This is the part of revision that I love the most. It’s like going crazy studying for finals – very long, intense days (and sometimes nights) spent wrapped in all the story threads. In college, my fuel of choice was late-night doughnuts and very bad coffee. I’ve exchanged the doughnuts for salads and the bad coffee for wonderful coffee, but the game is the same: work to exhaustion, sleep, eat, work some more, exercise, eat, work to exhaustion, start again the next morning. I hit this phase with all of my books. Remember the scary scene in TWISTED with the gun? That came to me during this phase. These intense days and nights bring the characters to life – they truly incarnate for me. This is a Good Thing.

Before I grab my pens and scuttle deep into the cave, let me give a last shout out to the 28 Days Later project. Today’s featured author is one of my favorite guys in the whole world, Walter Dean Myers. I think Walter should get his own month. He was born in August. Let’s rename it as “The Month of Walter.”

Thanks to my friend Jerry from high school, and my fellow author buddy Ellen, I am 88% of the way to my fundraising goal for the Lymphoma & Leukemia Society’s Team in Training Half marathon. I am still offering a free audio version of TWISTED to the nice person who puts me over the top. You can donate here. If you want to cheer on my husband (who has to put up with my craziness for the next two weeks) donate to him – he’s logging just as many training miles as I am, and he keeps the coffee hot for me.

ETA I didn’t watch any news yesterday, so I am just catching the news about the horrible campus shooting at Northern Illinois University. This is the fourth school shooting in America this week. Dear God in heaven, how do we keep all of our kids whole in body and mind?

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Huzzahs and magnifying glasses

We got about 18 inches of snow yesterday. The Forest looks like someone painted it with thick fondant icing. I drove through a white-out down to Syracuse (where they didn’t get any of the storm at all, not even a flake) so I could talk about writing historical fiction to a group of teachers.

Image and video hosting by TinyPic These weary warriors had worked all day, then came to the OCM BOCES for my talk, which is part of an ongoing series for history teachers. Thank you all for your kind attention and for the pickles.

Today is a spinning plate day. I have to go over the page proofs for Independent Dames with magnifying glasses and a fine-toothed comb, work on my WIP draft, send more content to Theo for the website update, deal with old email and sneak in a run.

Speaking of running (yeah, you knew that was coming, didn’t you?)…. I am 81% of the way to reaching my fundraising goal for the the Team in Training Half Marathon. (The money goes to fund cancer research, which pretty much affects everyone, so share some love. Please.) I will send a copy of the TWISTED audio version to whomever puts me over the top!

And thank you, kmessner for the shout-out!

Last but not least, my daughter Stef sent along a link to an article about the increasing number of women facing sexual assault on college campuses after drinking alcohol. The article slams the researchers for their approach to the issue. Comments, anyone?

2008 Resolution Tracker
Week 6 – Miles Run: 20 (3.1 of which were rather chilly), YTD: 124.75
Week 6 – Days Written: 7, YTD: 42

46 weeks left this year.

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the proper name for this draft

This is the dopeslap draft. I have a headache from hitting myself upside the head every time I figure something out that has probably been obvious for months, only I just realized it for the first time. “Duh! Of course that’s where her father works! Duuuuh, of course she’s going to do that!”

I need to reserve my words for my story today, so here are some links to keep you happy:

Continuing with this week’s “grande dame of children’s literature” theme, I present a new interview with the creator of Ramona, Beverly Cleary.

Today’s featured author at 28 Days Later is Eleanora E. Tate, who wrote Celeste’s Harlem Renaissance. Be sure to read the powerful bio on her website.

Join the most exclusive club in all of children’s literature! Low membership fee, everlasting gratitude! Earn bragging rights!

Lake Placid Half-Marathon countdown: 130 days. Seems like it’s a million years away.

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