Summer, Swimming, Sickness and Other News

Tada. Behold. I have created a post for y'all.

Oh, LO freakin' L

Those of you hanging on the fringe and seeing this post pop up, I appreciate your loyalty. I have been buried in the silence for six months. Yep. Six months, people. I looked at my last post, idly curious as to the amount of time I'd let pass since my last post, and had a little sad all to myself.

Six months is a long time to quit the cybersphere. Sorries all 'round.

Anyhoozle, I've done many, many reviews at Compass Book Ratings since last I posted. Check it out:

             

 

I don't know why blogger can't freakin' format, but it apparently cannot, which is why all the books are wonky up there. But look at all the books I've reviewed! (Actually, I did review a fifteenth book, but since I threw up my hands about three chapters in, thinking, "Watch, I bet you anything the next character introduced is ALSO going to be exploring gender identity," I'm not posting that review here. I wouldn't recommend it anyway. To paraphrase Buzz Lightyear: "Gays. Gays everywhere.")

But see. I have been busy, contrary to what my visible life on this blog might say.

In other news, HAPPY FIRST DAY OF SUMMER!

I love Google's doodles. They're always so adorable. Did y'all see the one where you could play cricket? That was fun! I really like the interactive ones. I literally waste so much time.

Fun news: I got pink eye over the last week. That crap sucks, man! It started developing Friday evening, and it wasn't toooo too bad until later that evening, when my eyes got pretty weepy and freakin' itched and burned.

I went to the doctor promptly the next morning, because it hurt, and am now on medication and doing much better, thanks for asking. I had originally thought it was just allergies, because our pollen is coming down with vengeance (thank you, pine trees), and my throat has been a little sore anyway, and I've been congested and watery-eyed. But when the itch turned into horrific burning and go-away-give-me-a-cold-towel-take-away-the-lights, I figured it was no longer allergies.

We had breakthrough hot weather end of May/beginning of June, which degenerated into really foul weather over the weekend that my sister (whom I haven't seen for...hmmm... four years?) came up for a visit. Once she and her family left, the weather popped back up into the upper 70s/low 80s, with a bold foray into the 90s. So, it is about swimming weather, which we will likely attempt tonight. I will swim, but I may not dunk. Protecting my precious eyes, see?

A few of us are going to a civil war reenactment this weekend. I'm not 100% sure where it is, but I do know the weather is going to be very HOT, and we are camping near a beach. So you can be sure I'm packing my swimsuit. But the reenactment itself should be fun. I'm looking forward to it.

I have been reading bucketloads of manga. Bucket. Loads. Manga is actually rather lovely. I mean, yeah, you get the shapeless wonders once in awhile, but can you imagine drawing an entire story in pictures? That's crazy talented.

 

 

I currently own all of Fullmental Alchemist, all that is available of D.Gray-Man, and I have about half of Pandora Hearts. The wrong kind of half, though. Like, Barnes and Nobles has a bad habit of chronically having the first seven books in that series, and the last five, but totally ignoring books 8-19. Apparently, those twelve are only purchasable online and never in-store. Lame-oh. (Also, I would like to point out that there is a serious lack of Xerxes Break collectibles. What's up with that, manga world? I bet you can't take a walk in freakin' Japan without stumbling over some action figure or another!) I did get my sticky mitts on some pretty cool Fullmetal Alchemist figures, which are proudly on display with my manga collection. I have also come to the conclusion that I think I like the Noragami manga slightly better than the anime. So I can see myself eventually collecting the manga of that. Perhaps not the anime, but the manga has beautiful art and a great main character.

But that is currently all for now. So, without further eloquence...

God bless!

Cat

The Countdown has started...

Tomorrow it will be officially a month since I was first contacted by *my* agent requesting to read my full manuscript. Which means...

Duuuh-duh-duh-DUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUH!!!

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ONLY 30 MORE DAYS UNTIL I HEAR FROM HER!

You don't understand how hard it is waiting to hear a "Yea" or "Nay" on something quite so important and exciting as this. On the one hand, I really, REALLY, REALLY like this agent. I would drop dead with joy (well, okay, maybe not DEAD, but I'd DROP! Realio trulio, I would!) if she wanted to by my agent. But I'm also playing the cautionary game with myself, anticipating a "No" so I will *hopefully* not be too sad when/if I get rejected. Buuuut... only 30 more days!

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Tra-la, onto more good news. It's summer. As I'm a sun goddess, I adore summer months. I love swimming, I love going outside and feeling the sun cutting into my skin. I love lying on the grass and staring up at the blue, blue sky against the green, green pine needles. I love kicking the soccer ball for my dog, Sam. Summer is the BEST, you guys! Yes, I do have a few sisters who beg to differ, but I give them the winter months. They may have them. Me, I'm living the life now.

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I was tagged on Facebook for the 777 challenge. I'm going to post on Facebook as well, but I'm also going to do the tag here. The 777 challenge means I have to post seven lines from page seven of my current work-in-progress. For those of you who have read the first/second/third drafts of DragonFire (which, by the way is now complete and lacks only a query letter), you will be stoked to see I'm using sentences from DragonShadow. (Some of you, I hear, are going, "Yay! Yay! It's ONLY BEEN THREE YEARS SINCE WE LAST READ ABOUT DRAGON!!!)

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So, without further ado, the 777 Challenge Sentences:

“You are alive," the creature said, "but you are dead.”

He reeled back as though from a blow, the words opening a memory in his mind.

He saw a knife, fragmenting time, flipping hilt over handle. It was beautiful, more a long dagger, well-crafted and balanced out of a blue and incandescent steel. He heard the thud of it glancing off his breastbone. His hands rose, curled around his heart. He felt the wrapped hilt, the little jewel in the pommel stone.

Hope y'all enjoyed that.

Have you ever wondered what your life would sound like as a book? I feel like mine would be very boring. It would go something like this:

The medical transcriptionist roared out of the parking lot. On days she didn't medically transcribe, she delivered flowers. The trick was getting them there on time and in one majestic piece. She flicked on her blinker, made a hard right and was nearly run off the road by a pale grey Prius, who had decided her blinker was a mistake and it was his right to merge in front of her. She managed not to swear and occupied her time wondering how cricket it would be to lean on her horn at him, now that he was doing 30 in the 40 mph zone.

Yeah, kinda boring. It's the exaggeration that makes it exciting. :-)

Now I'm going to drink some lemonade (the strong stuff):

Leave the bag in.

 
...and I'm going to read Book One of LOCKWOOD & CO., The Screaming Staircase by Jonathan Stroud (yes, THAT Jonathan Stroud, the Bartimaeus Trilogy Jonathan Stroud) because I went to the library today, and checked out BOOKS! I haven't been to the library in ages, and new books make me feel so happy.

Oh, and I got this fabulous Iron Man Manual about a week ago! See, I won this $50 Amazon gift card, so I got this great manual. If you are an Iron Man fan at all I heartily recommend you check it out. It's way cool!

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Kay, that's all from me for now. This is the Cat signing off.

WHEEEEEE!

No longer sprummer!!

I love summer. It is by far my absolutely favourite season.

Sure, I love autumn when the trees seem to burn beneath their flaming-bright leaves, and I love spring when the green and growing earth begins to waken. Winter I like up until January 6th, and then I've looked forward to and celebrated all the best holidays that winter can offer, and I start looking forward to spring.

But summer is the best, to me.

There's swimming, for one thing. Who loves to swim? Raise your hand. Yep, me too. There's something about the cool green light within the lake and the utter tranquility that comes over you when you're swimming. I love lying beneath the waves, holding myself down on the golden sand, and listening to the heartbeat of the water. LOVE that.

There's also amateur soccer. Our little dog is a soccer fiend. We use him as the goalie, 'cause he's really good at blocking our goals. Wicked dog! LOL. I can be a tad aggressive when it comes to that sport, and my attitude, when one of the little girls falls down and makes a rumpus, is "Suck it up. Get up, walk it off, be tough! C'MON! No one CARES about your scuffed-up shins!"

There's badminton, too. Such fun! In fact, we spent quite a while outside today playing in teams of two, and there is an enormous feeling of satisfaction when you whack that little birdie into the sky. I have a particularly favourite technique that I employ when I'm feeling particularly competitive. My sisters call it the wasp, 'cause I whack the birdie in such a way that it comes whizzing down at a rough speed of 60-70 mph. Usually I'm quite good at sending it buzzing over my opponents shoulder, and I'll have to say the whistle it makes as it speeds past your ear is something else.

Oh, and there's also Camp NaNoWriMo. I know, right? I thought NaNoWriMo only ever occurred in November, but there's also a July NaNoWriMo being hosted. Since I'm not insane enough, I am participating in this crazy ordeal. Currently I'm on about 3600 words, and since there's an extra day in July (31 days instead of November's 30) there's a slightly lesser word count needed to be met each day. In November, average word count per day in order to reach the required 50,000 is about 1,667 words. In July, the average word count per day is about 1,613 words. Since this is the second day, and the amount I should be at is 3226, I'm quite pleased with my word count right now. Yay, camp!!

Well, that's all for now. Have a lovely Saturday! God bless.
Cat