no one else can save me now but you

I need to get away from my laptop immediately - I've been sitting here for the past seven hours, which is not really pleasant. It's particularly unpleasant because I didn't write again today; instead, I spent that time working on that stupid promo ting and then sending a few emails related to my other romance volunteer activities, all of which were quite pressing.

But first things first. I woke up in Heather and Salim's guest room at eight a.m., and I intended to go back to sleep, but I checked my email (never a good idea) and ended up working for an hour and a half. Then I went downstairs to find my lovely hosts, who were up and about, and they encouraged me to get dressed so we could go out for dim sum. I knew this was a bad idea, since Claude had told me ages ago that dim sum is really difficult for gluten-free, but I hadn't had dim sum in many months, and I thought I could avoid the gluten. Foolish. Salim and I ate a ton of dim sum (Heather doesn't like the stuff, so she had cereal before we left and a couple of barbecue pork buns while we were there), and while I tried to stick with rice noodles and bean curds, etc., I'm sure I ingested gluten because I had a headache/stomachache/general malaise the rest of the afternoon. But it was fun to hang out with them, and I'm glad I went down for the sleepover even if I have barely been home.

I was going to go to the library and write this afternoon, but my rebellious stomach wouldn't let me, so I came home and took a nap instead. Then I talked to my parents in our usual Sunday ritual, although they didn't have much to report since I just saw them on Thursday (although my dad did lease a miniature bull, which is exciting). And then I was going to work on this promo ting for an hour or so before writing -- and ended up spending five hours on it. The main issue is that I'm an extreme perfectionist, but I'm also a novice with this design software, and that's a dangerously time-consuming combination. The project is making an excerpt booklet with six other romance writers (one of whom is a big name) that we can give out at conferences for the rest of the year, which is a great idea -- but it's taken me way, way longer than I thought it would when I naively volunteered to format it. I'll be glad to be part of it once the memories of formatting it wear off, but right now I want to stab my laptop in the face.

Anyway, it's basically done now -- we're waiting on one cover from some chick's publisher, and then I can be done with it (until I have to pick up 2500 copies of this booklet in Oakland in a couple of weeks, but that's another story). And now I really need to go to bed; I've decided to write 4000 words tomorrow and 4000 on Tuesday to make up for the weekend, so I should get some sleep. Goodnight!