Apple Update

It was rather disappointingly warm yesterday.  I mean, it was still chilly enough to wear a hoodie but I would have liked just a bit more crisp in the air.  And our favorite orchard wasn't picking at trees close up; you had to get on the wagon attached to the tractor and ride down the field.  Sis has an unnatural aversion to these things.  I'm pretty sure it's because she's terrified of falling off and getting injured.  So, instead of actually picking our own apples we just picked some up.  They have a bunch of already picked and bagged apples at their little store.  I got a half bushel of Cortlands (because they are my favorite to bake and cook with) and a peck of Jonna Gold, a peck of Crispins (my very favorite to eat) and peck of Honeycrisps.  I don't know if they grow Honeycrisps elsewhere in the country but they are so very delicious.  If it weren't for my unnatural love of the Crispin, it would probably be my favorite.  

Then I came home and took a nap.  

Then I woke up from my napping desperately needing to bake.  So, I settled on apple bread and whipped up a couple of loaves.  I had a little extra left over so I put some in muffin form.  Very delicious.  And I drank a glass of apple strawberry wine.  It wasn't too bad but not my favorite.  Some sips had a weird sort of after taste.  Maybe the apple cherry will be better?  Oh, yeah.  They sold wine too.  I couldn't pass up a couple of bottles!

And of course, my brain started thinking of characters who work at an orchard.  I told my muse to shut the hell up.    

Autumn

I love the Fall.  I love everything about the season with the passion of a thousand fiery suns.

I love the way the leaves on the trees turn such gorgeous colors and I love the way they fall to the ground.  I love crunching through the leaves while walking.  I love the smells in the crisp air and even the ones that come from crunching through those leaves.  I love the weather, how its cool and maybe even chilly but not really cold.  I love the clothes; hooded sweatshirts and jeans and sweaters with delicious cable patterns on them.  I love everything about this time of year.

But one of the things I love the most?  Apple picking!

Here in New York, apples are a really big deal.  I mean a really big deal.  NY is the largest exporter of apples in the entire United States.  And there are orchards absolutely everywhere.  And there is something satisfying about going to one of these orchards and picking your favorite kinds of apples right off the trees and filling up a bag and carting it home...

Love.  It.

That's what we're doing today.  Mom and the siblings and I are going to our favorite orchard and we're going to pick apples.

I'm so excited about it, I can hardly sit still.     

Imagination

My very active imagination sometimes runs away with me.  While it's incredibly helpful when the muse is constructing a story in my brain or the other muse is planning a pattern, it can also be exceedingly detrimental to my wellfare when it goes haywire in my real life.  When I've blown a look or a silence way out of proportion and I've convinced myself it meant way more than it actually did.  This happens a lot to me at work...when I've decided that the contemplative silence of my co-worker means that she's actually pissed at me because she had to answer the phone when it was my turn because I was away from my desk making a copy...

You see how I can get?

Of course, it then turns into a vicious cycle of me trying to be good and stay at my desk, even when I actually need to get up and do something.  And then I think, "She's not really mad, I answer the phone when it's her turn and she's away from her desk." And I've got myself convinced that it's all in my brain and then next thing I know, I'm all upset because I think she's mad again. 

Anyway, it really is all in my head and I just need to let it go. 

And I really need to figure out a pattern for that baby blanket because that baby is almost two months old.  But it has to be something that I don't hate with a vengence because if it is I'll just keep frogging it. 

And I need to stop complaining about it and just get it done. 

Maybe I'll be able to refocus my imagination into a fruitful endeavor.

More Angst

I was actually able to write some this weekend on the supernatural world I've been building for years.  In accordance with the theme, this chapter was chock full of angst.  Max and Riley had a a major issue due to some fundamental differences that heretofore have been avoided between them.  I'm not sure if the boys can repair their relationship and the thought of them breaking up for good breaks my heart into tiny pieces.  I hadn't intended it to go quite this far when I first conceived of the plot line but it's the way it needs to go for the story.  I might never forgive myself if they break up and never reconcile.  Right now they aren't officially apart, but they aren't actually speaking to each other either.

And Sadie got her magic taken from her.  I had not intended that at all.  It just happened.  I was just as shocked as everyone else.  I have a vague idea as to where it's going but we'll see how it all ends up.

And there's personal angst too.  Because this baby blanket I need to make?  I think I've started and frogged about 12 different blankets.  I hate everything I've done.  Every idea I've had.  Every pattern I've tried.  I'm at a loss.  I'm desperate for the yarn muse to make an appearance.  She's been absent lately.  

I think the writing muse has locked her in a closet.  

Good and Angsty

I like good angst in my books.  Most people in my life don't understand why.  The BFF gets it but she and I really have the same brain so it's not surprising.  I can't explain it.  When something hits me right in the gut, when there's torment and misery, when there is so much emotion it's overwhelming...ahhh.  that is what I love.

Let me be clear.  It's not Schadenfreude.  I don't get joy from other people's suffering and I don't like suffering just for suffering's sake.  No, that is badness and I veto.

But good angst?  Angst where there is a purpose and where, in the end, everyone grows and learns and overcomes?  That's good angst.  That's the fullfilling angst.  So maybe it's not the angst that I like but rather the overcoming it?  Perhaps.  But really, I love actually feeling what the characters do when I read.

Of couse, the problem is that even though I love angst and I love to read it, I seem to be horrible at writing it.  And yet, I try anyway.

Ben's in the middle of reliving some big angst right now.  I'm trying to make it feel real.

You'll Never Guess!

I actually finished baby blanket number 1!

*throws confetti*

I know, I bet you didn't think I did any actual yarning anymore!  But I do.  And I did.  And it's done.  Though I did fail in the "take a picture for posterity" department.  I mean, I have one on my phone (only because The BFF wanted to see and I snapped a quick pic before I got out of the car this morning) but I'm hopelessly dumb when it comes to things like taking pictures from my cellular device and making them appear like magic on the blog.  You'll just have to take my word for it that it's sweet and lovely.  And finished!

I, of course, still have a bunch of other projects in various states of completedness.  I'm not entirely sure what's wrong with me and my lack of ambition in that department lately.  Only that I sometimes get like this...the yarn and I have to take a break or else we would come to resent each other.  But it also unsettles me not to work on projects so before too long I always go back to my first love.  

And, also of course, I am writing like crazy.  Toby is up for reading the new stuff and I think secretly happy that the other story is on indefinite hiatus.  I really believed he liked it, but he saw the mammoth-sized plot holes too.  I'm not giving up on it completely but I will say that some stories were never meant to be.   

I...Don't..Understand...

I don't get my muse.  At all.  Not even a little bit.

I've been writing this series for years now, years, and I sort of have to go with the flow and write when the muse lets me or when she fills my head with thoughts and ideas and words.  And it's worked, mostly, even if The BFF is a little impatient for the next installment sometimes.  Okay, all the time.  But whatever. I've grown used to that.  Even if I spend time doing things that are other, her and I? We always go back to our first love.  It just takes time.  I'm not worried about that.

And then the Muse?  She plants this whole other idea in my head and I write like crazy and I lined up a beta reader this time and I think, this, this is it.   This is what I'm supposed to be doing at this moment in my life.

And then the fickle bitch of a muse cuts me off at the knees and I'm lying on the ground bleeding from my leg stumps and screaming "It's just a flesh wound!" and she says, "Too bad, so sad, baby girl.  This is not what you were meant to write.  I have this whole other thing in mind."

And I'm still lying on the ground, bleeding out, and whining that I love Jamie and Shane and please, please, please, can't I just write them?  

The muse's answer?  A big, fat, resounding no.

She gives me Nathaniel and Ben instead.  And I've been unable to silence them for days now.  And I just love them. I do.  Ben is way stronger than he thinks he is and Nathaniel is trying to get a gold medal for determination.  I'm enjoying the hell out of telling their story.  

I'm not worried about Sadie and her world.  That is something that will never die.  But I don't know what this means for Jamie and Shane.  And that breaks my heart a little bit.  

I don't know why the muse is so mean.  But I suppose I have to trust her right?

September, When it Comes

It's September.  Is everybody aware of that?!  Summer is over, for all intents and purposes, and although that doesn't mean the same thing as it did when I was a kid, there still a sort of sadness about it.  Nostalgia, I think, left over from childhood.  

I have big plans to be extra lazy today.  And then tomorrow and Monday, to really get some work done on the projects that I have going.  Well...at least the baby blankets.  I'm hoping to get one done tomorrow and the other done on Monday because I'm tired of looking at them.  I've reached that point in both projects where I'm totally over working on it.  I always inevitably reach that point with everything I make.  Even though they are super sweet, I wanna be done.  And because of that, I have a distinct apathy when it comes to actually working on them.  I'm well aware of this flaw.  I'm just not sure how to get past it.  Other than to just do it and get it done, of course.  

Got a new cell phone yesterday, an iPhone.  It's fun.  I'm still figuring stuff out and I'm terrified that I didn't put in people's numbers correctly.  I triple checked them but still...oh well.  And I will say this: it's a hell of a lot better at surfing the webz than my Blackberry was.  That will make my wait time so very much better.  

Oh!  I also wrote more than 3,000 words in the new world.  Because I don't actually plot out my books, I have a rough idea and an end result I want to reach but that's it, I'm not sure if this is going to be novella length or novel length.  I guess I will see how long it takes me to get where I need to go.  

If I get really ambitious, I'll weed and clean up the garden.  The petunias still look beautiful but the gladiolas are out of hand.  Somehow I think I won't get that ambitious ;) 
 

So anyway, long weekend filled with copious amounts of reading, writing, and yarning.  Sounds like a pretty good deal to me!