Thursday, January 13, 2011

Excuse #100 for why I'm not writing

Because I'm getting married.

I know, I know. Excuses, excuses. I know I have to make time and after talking to a supermom who schedules her writing time around her 3-year-old - I know anything's possible.

But sometimes, planning a wedding feels impossible. Girls in serious relationships [mayhaps of a certain age] daydream about The Dress, The Colors, The Location, The Food, so on and so forth. Don't get me wrong - all that stuff is still really, really fun, but, well, there's also:

* The Budget
* The Picking-A-Venue
* The Who's-Gonna-Rent-And-Clean-The-Forks
* The What-Do-You-Mean-I-Have-To-Order-Water-Pitchers?
* The I-Have-To-Buy-A-Ton-Of-Ice
* The I-Wonder-If-I'm-Grown-Up-Enough-To-Handle-Dry-Ice [or any of this for that matter]
* The Cancelling-That-Venue-And-Picking-Another-More-Inclusive-One
* The Restaurant-I-Love-Increasing-Their-Price-To-20k
* The Going-Over-The-Budget, and
* The I-Have-To-Now-Get-A-New-Caterer

Stuff I never daydreamed about. Who knew wedding planning could be so ... not fun?

*breathes*

I am happy to say that after researching over 100 locations and one cancellation, we have a gorgeous venue that me, fiance, and parental units are over-the-moon happy with!! And I don't have to worry about forks and water pitchers anymore!!!! And, after all that was said and done, I got what I wanted all along: a wedding reception at a Sonoma winery.

Next on the list: trying to find a caterer who will make something other than dry chicken with dark brown mushroom sauce.

The fiance and I adore Mexican food, but the taco truck idea was a tad too informal for my mom. Problem is: I can't quite figure out how to make Mexican fancy enough for a sit-down plated menu. Italian is another option, with duck and mastutake ragu raviolis and wild mushroom risotto in small plate form. Then, there's paella.



Visually stunning, comfort-food-like, but also [with seafood] possibly fancy enough.

So this is what I'm doing instead of writing. Reading very many menus and funny words like:

* cambozola mousse
* toybox basil
* chiogga beets

Tuesday, January 11, 2011

1-11-11 ACROSS THE UNIVERSE Release Day!!

I was LUCKY enough to tag along on the ACROSS THE UNIVERSE Arc train (where it got passed from Authoress to Jodi Meadows to me and then to Corinne Duyvis) so I got a sneak-peek of what all the confetti was about.

Today, you can go to your local bookstore and see for yourself.

It's a BIG DEAL. I mean, just look at this site. This isn't just a YA book launch. This is THE book launch. And all I have to say is:

1. THANK GOODNESS someone did a YA that brings to mind the "final frontier-ness" of Star Trek and the doomed romance of ROMEO AND JULIET.

2. Congratulations, Beth!!!!

Sunday, January 2, 2011

2011 = New Stuff

What I'm eating: My boyfriend fiance (dude, before I'm used to the word, I'm going to be calling him husband) bought me fancy, New York, "it"-restaurant-of-the-moment cookies. They're the Compost cookies from Momofuku and they're really unique. They taste like chocolate, salty pretzels, and coffee grounds. They also have potato chips, oats, and butterscotch in them. Unique may be an understatement.

What I'm doing: Not writing. I'm thinking about writing, though. I guess as writers, we never stop. I spent the last 3 months of 2010 revising my middle-grade science fantasy for Authoress' genius Baker's Dozen Auction. The work paid off and I received 3 full requests from it. When Christmas break came around, I worked on FRIENDS WITH DEATH a little - re-writing certain parts and switching 3rd person to first (yes, again). I'm hankering to write something new, though. I have a couple ideas tickling my brain, but nothing's grabbed me yet. I keep waiting ... and hoping.

So that's the goal this year: a new YA.

And planning a wedding ...

Talk about new experiences.

I'm going dress shopping for the first time tomorrow! I'm really excited and a little nervous (not sure why). After boy proposed in August, I couldn't wait to try on dresses, but my mom was out of the country and I didn't want to go without her, so I waited. When my mom returned from her vacation, she had to jump right back into work (the holidays are the busiest time of year for her line of work) (and no, she's not an elf), so I had to wait some more.

You would think that during this period of waiting I would have collected examples of dresses I want to try on, huh? Yeah. Probably should've done that.

Which is why I'm sitting here, not writing, eating a cookie, and ripping out photographs of dresses from a stack of wedding magazines.