January 26, 2012, Location: 37,000 feet

Yes, I'm blogging from an airplane on my way to my first SCBWI conference. If any of you will be at the conference, contact me, because I love meeting fellow writers. If you aren't attending conference, you can follow the fun at: http://scbwiconference.blogspot.com/

Please excuse me if you use the word "excited" more that once in this post... I'm so excited to attend a conference about writing. It's almost a relief to know that I will be spending the next three days in a building with people who love spending as much time in imagination land as I do. Friday is the round table writer's intensive. I can't wait to meet other writers that are probably as nervous/excited about sharing the first 250 words of their novel and learning through group critique how to make it better with the help of an agent or an editor.

There are a list of fantastic talks that will be given this weekend, but I am uber anticipating Cassandra Care's talk on love triangles. She is one of my absolute favorite authors. And you can bet I'll be stalking her for an autograph at the signing session on Sunday.

After the conference is over, I get to meet one of my good friends and critique partners. Even though this will be the first time we meet, and our relationship has consisted of emails and phone calls over the years, there is a special friendship that forms when two people weather the journey of writing a novel together. Have a great weekend!

The Story Behind the Story

That deserves a chest pound.
That's what my physical trainer said when I'd told him I'd finished writing a book. That phrase rang through my mind for quite some time.
It's true--anyone out there who's written a book, whether it's a first novel tucked away in a drawer or a NYT Best Seller, give yourself a chest pound and be proud.
Writing a book takes courage, heart, and dedication.

I finished writing Anomaly three days ago and part of me wanted to jump on the Edge and share the news, but the other part of me was very tired. I felt like the creative side of my brain had run a marathon. Anomaly is the third book I've written and you'd think that things would be easier the third time around.

Nope.

Fortunately and unfortunately, writing is a continuous learning process. It's unfortunately because the more you learn, the more you realize how little you know. The more I read. The more I learn. The more I write, the more convinced I become that the newer pages are better than the older pages.

Writing Anomaly was a journey riddled with self doubt and sickness. If it wasn't for my amazing critique partners Diane, Liz, and Clare, and thought provoking notes from an old friend, Shane, I would have stopped believing in myself and never finished the darn thing. And if there ever was an award for the human being with the most jacked up sinuses and allergies, I can assure you that I'd be a strong contender. I started writing Anomaly about four months after having sinus surgery. The surgery helped, but I still had horrible infections and headaches, after that came the giant pancake size hives. There were some days I didn't want to write, but I made myself. Eventually I got better, but then ten months later (after several rewrites and revisions) my immune system decided I needed to finish out this novel with a bang. So sick in bed with bronchitis, coughing up a storm, I penned the last words to Anomaly. It was only fitting.

There is still some polishing to do, but at least this phase is complete. Many thanks to critique partners, friends, cousins, and Sarcastically Delicious for supporting me up to this point. You guys deserve a chest pound!

First Double Toe Loop Since ACL Reconstruction

Doing these jumps again is like finding treasures I thought I lost forever...
Took me a little over 21 months to find this one.

Weird Cold Virus Induced Dreams

So do you know what Sarcastically Delicious gave me for Christmas?

Yup, this pretty fella. Look at that toxic turquoise and the lovely mucous inducing purples. I like to call him Snot Monster, but the technical name for him is the Cold Virus.

Other than the snot, and the coughing, and hacking, and the general I-want-to-crawl-under-the-bed-and-die-malaise, Mr. Snot Monster also caused some seriously weird dreams during my afternoon nap.

I was in California, driving a rental car deciding which friend I should surprise visit. Then I get stuck in typical bumper to bumper traffic. I'm the first car in line at a crosswalk and the red light is taking forever. To my right there must be a gym because I see all these cute senior citizens suited up in their shorts and tank tops crossing the street. I wait and wait at this red light and I guess the old folks are getting tired crossing the street because they start climbing in my car.

"Sweetie, is it all right if I rest here a bit?" a wrinkled woman with an electric pink sweat bank across her forehead asks.

Not wanting to be rude I say it's ok, all the while wondering how quickly these old folks can get out of my car when the light turns green.

The light turns green.
I turn in my seat waiting for the gramps and grams crew to jump out of my car, but they're fumbling at their seat belts, and their shaking hands can't seem to find the door handle, and someone else is complaining about their arthritis. Then all these cars start honking their horns behind me, so I hit the gas and go.

The old people in the back are spouting off Oh, deary me and Hold up there whipper snapper.
I tell them not to worry, that I'm going to turn around and take them back. But, right as I say it I enter this giant traffic intersection maze. Like you can't even tell which way your lane is going, and there are so many cars, and lights, and signs, and it's just a huge jumbled mess. And everyone is driving so fast! I careen through some awful tight turns and manage to turn around. By the time I drop the old folks off at the gym I'm so exhausted and relieved from getting out of the giant traffic maze, I'm like screw visiting my friends, I'm not driving in that mess again, and then I wake up.

Now, for those of you who like to analyze dreams, what could that one possibly mean?!?