we used to kiss all night, now it's just a bar fight

Man, I'm sleepy - I intended to go to bed ages ago. Instead, I finally wrote a blog post (on grieving and the Regency) for zee romance blog. I've been sitting on the topic for months and couldn't let it go, and for some reason it stalled all posting because I couldn't get it out of my head.

I'm glad I finally wrote it, though. After training with Alyssa this morning (which was good - she gave me some silicone egg poaching thingies, which was super nice of her), I went to Joanie's and made some notes while eating a cobb salad. The notes were an initial list of all the things I would need to do to self-publish Madeleine and Ferguson (and Amelia and Malcolm, although that book (my first) will require rewrites). We're still waiting to hear back from several publishers, any one of whom might make an offer -- but it's been five months, and if I'm going to self-publish, I want to get at least one of the books out before the holiday season. In that event, though, I'll need to work my ass off the next few months to do all the technical elements (formatting, editing, getting cover art, cover copy, blurbs, etc.), and I'll also need to write and implement a hardcore marketing plan to drive sales. That means things like zee romance blog can no longer sit off on the sidelines, and I need to get cracking if I'm going to do this.

Post-glorious-south-bay, I drove back to the city of sin, where it was almost ninety degrees (shocking). Luckily my living room was relatively cool, so I made some chai (not cool, but maybe the heat was making me miss India) and alternated between procrastinating and writing some more of the rough draft of Nick and Ellie's story. I netted close to four pages - not a bounteous number, but given how hard this story has been, I'll take it. Terry eventually got home and we watched some fine CBS programming (yes, I'm turning into my parents). I was tivo'ing the season premiere of "How I Met Your Mother", and then we watched the season premiere of "Two and a Half Men" out of morbid curiosity to see how they incorporated Ashton Kutcher. I was pretty unimpressed; I actually liked Ashton Kutcher, but I'm about five seasons past the point where I got tired of Alan (Jon Cryer's character) being such a money-obsessed sadsack, so I doubt I'll watch (until I go home for Thanksgiving and happen to catch it with my parents, of course). We also watched part of "Two Broke Girls" (my jury is out on that one, but it's more promising than I expected), and the first five minutes of "The Playboy Club" on NBC (I predict it will die a quick, unlamented death).

All of that was procrastination from finishing the contest I'm supposed to be judging, and I continued to procrastinate by writing a blog post. Maybe I should judge contests all the time, since I get so much other stuff done when I'm avoiding the entries. That just means I'll have to finish tomorrow (the absolute deadline day), in addition to the other stuff I want to accomplish in the morning. C'est la vie, I suppose. Goodnight!