Apparently I can't help staying up until two a.m. -- more on that in a moment. Today was my "first day at my new job", and so I did what anyone else would do on their first day -- agonized over my outfit and dressed up more than I should have. Granted, I lazed about in bed until almost eleven, but after I dragged myself out of the warmth of my down comforter, I showered, dried my hair, and eventually settled on a grey wool skirt with ivory lace at the bottom (one of the last items of clothing I purchased at Anthropologie before freezing my clothing budget, sniff), a grey shirt, a long black cardigan, purple tights, and a pair of 4" heels. It was pretty kicking, if I do say so myself, although I should have worn my boots instead, partially because my left foot is too fragile to wear such ridiculous shoes, and partially because I snagged the hell out of my tights on a splinter in my chair at Starbucks.
But before I went to Starbucks, I talked to Katie for around an hour; she had the day off and texted me in the middle of a "Walker, Texas Ranger" marathon to tell me to call her when I woke up. The silly girl texted me at 9:20am here, which was hours before I was ready to call her back, but I finally did -- and it was absolutely lovely to catch up. I'm hoping that we talk more now that she knows that I'm unemployed, since we talked more when I was back in Iowa for my sabbatical a couple of years ago. But I'm realizing that I'm going to have to be careful about overscheduling my days, since I could easily accomplish nothing if I just socialize all the time, so I'll need to check myself.
After wrapping up with Katie, I ate some leftover Thai food and went to Starbucks, where I spent an hour trying to get back into the story after a week's hiatus. I only wrote ~300 words, which wasn't nearly enough, but then I had to take a break from the romance novel to work on a post for the group blog that I'm part of with the other Golden Heart finalists from my year. I haven't blogged there very much because I've been so busy with life, but I decided to jump back in this week, and I needed to finish a post for it by 9pm (it goes live at midnight EDT). I ended up writing about my decision to quit my day job and trying to determine whether the reasons holding you back are rational, or just fear disguised as rationality. You can read it here; if you still have no idea how I brought myself to do this, perhaps the post will help.
So I finished the post just in time, then filled out a form to volunteer to help plan the awards ceremony at next year's romance convention, and then met John and Jess for sushi in Sunnyvale. At this point, I had switched into jeans and a sweatshirt, since I had changed into pajamas when I got home from Starbucks (which means I dressed up for my 'new job' for all of four hours, which was fine by me). It was fun to see them; we're trying to make a ritual Monday night supper, although Jessica asked us too late to include Vidya, who declined and left us heartbroken. We didn't have as much fun without her, but we were able to eat a lot of meat (such as eel) to make up for it.
When I got home, I checked the blog to make sure it had posted correctly, and dealt with some email that had come in while I was out. Then, I debated writing -- and instead picked up the book that was delivered to my doorstep today. It's called THE BROKEN KINGDOMS, and it's the sequel to THE HUNDRED THOUSAND KINGDOMS, which I read while I was dying of my strange lung ailment in Paris this spring. I usually don't read whole books while on vacation, but I was so sick that the only energy I could muster one night was to find a cafe and sit with my Kindle and eat some soup (and drink a glass of wine, little caring at the time whether the alcohol affected my cold medicine of unclear provenance, since I was desperate for some sleep). But just as that night, it was a mistake to pick up a book tonight; even when I'm exhausted and intent on doing other things, it's really hard for me to put a book done when I've started it. So even though I'd set an alarm and kept resetting it to try to stop myself from continuing to red, I ended up plowing through it in about 4.5 hours.
Katie would hate this book as much as she would hate everything else I've been reading lately -- it's fantasy, but of the gods-and-magic variety rather than steampunk or the vampires/werewolves type that has been so popular the past few years. Katie was somewhat mollified to learn the other night in one of my posts that I'm going on a bender of fantasy/young adult paranormal because I'm researching for a future young adult paranormal book -- although why she was mollified, I do not know, since she's going to have an epic moral dilemma on her hands. Will she support me and read whatever I write, or will she stay true to her assertion that fantasy/paranormal is weird and unenjoyable? I suspect that this will be the moment when we discover that she does not love me enough to overcome her hatred of the genre, but time will tell.
Anyway, THE BROKEN KINGDOMS was excellent, particularly in terms of the language and the v. interesting world the writer has created. But now, I should go to bed -- I've overscheduled my day tomorrow, and now have lunch plans, happy hour plans, and dinner plans, which means I have to squeeze writing into the cracks between those events. I also have to check in on the group blog that I wrote for, since I'm supposed to answer comments and interact with the community -- so I can't sleep too late, or I will miss all the action from the east coast. Goodnight!
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