Miscellany of a Cheshire Cat

I finally hit the halfway point in my writing for Nanowrimo. This is farther than I’ve ever gotten before! YAY!

However, I’m behind. I’m also starting to not like the plot and how it’s developing, or not developing as the case may be. I didn’t get a lot of writing done today but I did do some outlining in the hopes that it will help me fly through the rest of the week. My original plan had me not writing on Thanksgiving but I think I’m going to try to write that day anyway in the interest of actually finishing. It’s definitely an interesting and productive experience - I’ve learned a lot having gotten this far finally, despite no longer liking my own book. Hopefully that will change by the end of the week so I can finish this with a bang!

tags: nanowrimo, writing

This weekend I took a bunch of photos that are quintessential "November" to me. November is that time after the splendor of Autumn is gone and before the wonder of Winter begins. It’s gray, dreary and kind of dead. It’s that ugly time before the snow comes and covers all the brown and kills whatever remains of the green. And I love it.

The color palate in November is limited but still very strong - rich browns, strong reds and a few remaining dark greens. All of which will fade in December then disappear under bright white snow. November is underrated!

This photo is one I took somewhere in my parents’ yard. The red berries are such a great punctuation for the browning ground foliage. Bits of green are still here and there but already pretty frost-bitten. Click on the thumbnail for a bigger, more detailed version. If you want to get up close and personal with these little red berries, the original size is here.

tags: autumn, berries, colors, fall, november, transitions

Beware the Random Butternut Squash!

In other news, the day is crazy. My brain is starting to melt and it’s only Tuesday.

Right, back to work!

tags: random, squash, work

Sometimes I get up in the morning and the cats ignore me. They’re no where to be found and I’m left in peace to do my pre-coffee routine.

This is not one of those mornings. One of them followed me to the bathroom. Both of them have been sitting and staring at me as I do the pre-coffee e-mail check. Evil, in particular, has a mean stare perfected over the eons to be quite effective on humans.

I’m guessing the food bowls are empty. I’m going to go try to negotiate the stairs without tripping over two eager fat cats who are rushing to the kitchen to be fed.

tags: cats

It’s been a very gray Monday here so I am combating the drear with a very orange pumpkin! It’s a proper November day though - dim, threatening to be damp and generally conducive to naps, hot soup and building fires. Of course, I haven’t been able to do any of these things since I’m working today.

I had a most excellent and very busy weekend! Here’s the summary of my whirlwind tour for those of you interested:

• Thursday night I flew up to New Hampshire. Jon picked me up and we hauled K out to dinner at a fabulous Mexican restaurant in Concord.
• Friday morning, my mom picked me up for our adventures in Portland. I spent a lot of money on an embroidery sewing machine. I’ll be picking it up when I drive up for the holidays in December. Lunch Friday consisted of Maine Italians which made me really, really happy. Friday afternoon, I had a conference call that I couldn’t really miss, unfortunately. Friday night was spent hanging with the parental units and eating yummy hamburgers.



• Saturday morning we went back into Portland to go to an Italian grocery we hadn’t had time to go to the day before. Lunch Saturday was fresh mozzarella, Italian bread and bits of prosciutto. We made some really tasty cookies and fiddled about with my mom’s embroidery machine for a bit in the afternoon. The marvelous slyppi whisked me off to her brother’s house for a birthday party for her nephew (who is now 4!). We had a lovely time - much wine was had by all and I enjoyed meeting more of her brother’s in-laws. They are a fun family. We spent the night at slyppi’s dad’s condo in the Old Port.
• Sunday morning we wandered about a few shops in the Old Port then had brunch with our hosts. The Porthole makes awesome breakfast. We hung out with slyppi’s dad and M a little longer then headed towards Manchester to drop me off at the airport… of course, we had to stop along the way for a little, very successful shopping!

So all in all it was an excellent weekend. The weather up north was mild yet chilly - just biting enough to remind us that it was November. I took some photos in Windham and the Old Port that I’ll post eventually too.

Somewhere in there I found time to write about 1000 words for Nanowrimo. I’m about 2000 words behind now, but my plan is to make that up this week, hopefully by the weekend. If not, the weekend will be a big word-count push. I’m getting really excited about the world I’m creating as well as the story that’s wrapping around it. I still have no idea about a couple of key plot points, but they’ll come eventually… I hope!

tags: maine, nanowrimo, new hampshire, old port, photographs, photography, sewing, travel, weather, weekend, writing

So I have found a new and exciting way to be completely graceless. Today I tripped myself while putting on my socks. Actually, it may have been more of a throw given that the cuff of my jeans caught the ring on my thumb when I was straightening up after putting on a sock. I got a full 3 steps in trying to recover before a hit the floor. You know, being graceless didn’t use to hurt so much.

Right after this lovely crash, the Fop handed off things from fencing practice. Thank you so much, violet_amy!!!! I am now the happy wearer of gorgeous green, wool fingerless gloves! They really are fantastic! And they match my outfit today perfectly.

I also have a Pampered Chef catalog and I know how to use it! If anyone wants to participate in a catalog show I’m doing with the newly-minted Pampered Chef Consultant ownedbytwins, let me know and I’ll e-mail you the info. Some of you have no escape because I’ll be e-mailing you anyway! The rest of you are probably going to her open house this weekend anyway, so I’ll try not to bug you too much.

I’m headed up to New Hampshire tonight then Maine tomorrow to visit sewing machines this weekend. Hurray for free flights on Southwest! I finally remembered to look at the Awards section.

And that’s all I have time for! I’m off!

When we were up in New England, we got to Maine after dusk and as such I only took a few photos and I like … 2 of them. I’m not a big fan of flash but I kind of like how this photo came out though the center leaves have a little too much light.

Remember to turn your clocks back tonight and be careful in the evenings this week! Daylight savings time always screws people up - auto and pedestrian fatalities go up significantly around the changing of the clocks. There’s nothing like artificially shifting our day by an hour to muck everything up.

I’ve been writing a lot today… I’m up to 6092 words so I’m currently on pace. I’m hoping to get 10k done by the end of this weekend so I have a little bit of a margin of error in case of writer’s block. So far I’m amused by the little world I’m building. The nanowrimo web site is slow as molasses going up hill in Maine in January, but my profile is here - drop me a comment or e-mail with your profile info if you’re also doing the race.

tags: autumn, daylight savings time, fall back, leaves, maine, nanowrimo

After a week of Starbucks coffee, I love to come home to my own tasty coffee… Freshly ground Armeno beans, french pressed brew, a cup with whole milk instead of my usual low-fat milk because I used up my milk on my cereal. It is bliss. This is not to say that Starbucks coffee sucks… I do enjoy it. But mine is much, much better. And cheaper. And easily acquired without needing to get dressed or leaving the house. Which is good since it has finally turned into a comfortably cool fall out here and running to Starbucks in my pjs would be chilly.

Another bit of Fall for you all… The farm stand Jon took us to had something called The Observatory. It was a raised deck about 15 feet off the ground that you could climb up and take in the scene. It may not sound like much, but it got us off the ground just far enough to take in the full, breath-taking views of the valley and mountains and fall colors. We went up there first, before the sun came out, so the foliage colors are even more intense in the photos. Gray days really are the best for fall colors.

My kitchen is littered with junk food, much of which I hope the Fop will be taking on his road trip to Crown this weekend.

I started writing for Nanowrimo this morning. I broke one of the usual recommendations. Usually it’s recommended that one not build on a previous short story or world because the writer will end up being too careful and too invested in the content to push out the 50,000 words as slap-dash as necessary. I’m hoping to avoid this problem through the sheer desire to get this world built and some actual plot into the world. I started to sketch an outline for some scene progressions yesterday as well as started to evolve the world around the events of the short story. I got down 732 words this morning before work and I have some time planned later today for writing. I can’t count the short story as part of my word count, which is fine, but I’ve incorporated part of what I wanted to add to the end of the short story from last set of editing notes.

Yes, I got up this morning and was awake enough to write. I got productive things done before 9 a.m. I know that this comes as a shock to those of you who have known me for a long time. Hey, I figure if this stupid allergy medicine is going to make me not get enough sleep, I should take advantage of the extra time!

tags: allergies, autumn, coffee, fall, foliage, nanowrimo, new hampshire, sleep, travel, weather