Reinvention

As I ponder the reinvention of this blog, I have been submitting manuscripts: short stories, novels, and poetry. The later triggered a thought.

Over the years I have written lots of poetry, mostly for person reflection, and most I wouldn't ever bother submitting to a publisher. Yet, it might be fun to share it here. So enjoy the reading.

"Brain Sculpture"
by Heather Hobson


The brain is like a sculpture
in need of careful carving.
Each new experience
is another chiseled line.
Every learned fact,
be it names of planets
or simple math equations,
creates a painstakingly planned detail,
forever engraved upon the sculpture of the mind,
which is only finished
when the sculptor no longer breathes.
The question then remains,
will it be an artistic masterpiece
or the feeble doings of a lunatic?

Contests and Submissions

Another afternoon has been spent researching publishers accepting work and contests. This research is almost a full-time job in itself. I remember when one only had the Writer's Market Guide in hand and that was your guide to the publishing world.

For those interested I have entered a flash fiction story titled "Ancestor Fish" with authorstand.com.  If you sign up, you can read my story and vote on it. This is a new venture for my writing, and I must confess, that "Ancestor Fish" is one of my older stories and I have done nothing with it in more than a decade.  I felt it fair to give it a little fresh air, while at the same time not "risking" my more valuable stories.

Also, this website is free to enter stories and there is a cash prize, so those of you with stories might want to consider it.

I am trying hard in my research to find contests with out fees and paying publishers.  Right now it appears most contests want money and most publishers aren't paying.  At least submitting through the internet means I don't have to pay for stamps and envelopes any more.

P.S. Thank you commenter of my last blog!  I really appreciate some else struggling with blogging too.

Worst Blogger ever and great writing website

I think I'm coming close to being the worst blogger ever. Besides only remembering to blog every three months or so, I don't think I'm blogging about anything terribly interesting, especially since I don't have a fan base yet.

Thus, I'm considering how to reinvent this blog.

Meanwhile, anyone who does stumble on to this page might want to check out www.duotrope.com. This is a free website with great listings of places that are currently accepting submissions in all genres, including fiction, children's, nonfiction, and poetry.  I've started submitting a few manuscripts to the publishers they have listed.  I will let you know what happens.

Blogging and Wedding

My best intentions for being faithful to a blog have not pained out. I'm certainly not one who will be every able to make money writing blogs. I'm just not that attached to blogging, though I love writing.

I survived all the wedding plan.  I'm relieved all the grand event is over, yet I would love to plan a wedding again without all the pressure.

One advice to anyone planning a wedding, do not ask bitter, single friends to do anything at all! That was my husband's and my biggest mistake.  Our saboteur took off with the bridal and bridesmaid's bouquets and we didn't have the flower for our formal shots. We ended up making due with the flowers off the pews.  The person was only supposed to take the tossing bouquet.

This same person also tried to end our wedding early by passing out the bubbles more than 30 minutes before she was supposed to. All of a sudden I found people blowing bubbles at me. I was aghast. They weren't suppose to be doing that until we were actually leaving.

To stop people from leaving and thinking things were over (after all we had the place for the party for 45 for minutes and had paid for an additional hour afterward for clean up), I grabbed my brother on to the dance floor to dance. As I past the Man of Honor, I told him he was next. That halted everyone. 

Other little hiccups happened, such as the groom stepped on the hum of my dress and popped the bustle button off. Of course that is why you pack the sewing kit.

Looking back, I really wish I had been a guest at my own wedding. That photos turned out great and everyone looked happy.

Again, my big advice, don't have single bitter friends (especially those who have any reason to be jealous) to do anything.

I do hope to write more sooner than later.

writing life on hold-wedding and day job have taken over

Sigh . . .my writing life is on hold. That's not the way I want it to be.  Now that my day job has started up again, my days are eaten away.  The evenings are dominated by the wedding.

I did originally suggest to my fiance that we elope and get married in this great old castle in Scotland.  I'm wishing we did that.  Every day we have one to five glitches with the wedding.  Today my seamstress canceled my dress fitting for the third time in four weeks and the replacement batch of bubbles came half-evaporated like the last batch.

Of course, at least this isn't as bad as two weeks ago.  The day was my first one back to full day working and on that day my matron of honor resigned her post via a note in the mail, an ex-boyfriend e-mailed, and my wedding band was screwed up three ways by the jeweler.  Since then utter chaos has surrounded the wedding.  I'm not sure if I will replace my matron. I'm thinking I just may go with my two bridesmaids and be done with it.  It's not like my matron helped me with a single thing.  She resigned because she didn't know she had to come to a rehearsal.  Ugh.  She's married and been a matron before.  You would think she would know this.

I won't even get into the catering and baker issues. That is an epic in itself.

My fiance said the other night that wedding planning is made so hard because it tests the relationship. I guess, but some of what is going on is beyond what I think should be happening.

Wish me luck for the next coming weeks of planning please.

Writing and Wedding

My life has become consumed by the wedding.  I'm still deciding on wedding colors. Since a shortage of formal gloves exists where I live, I have ordered three pairs on-line. When they arrive, I will pick the color I like for my bridesmaids and order more.

My crinoline arrived yesterday.  Now I can properly try on my wedding gown, then take it to a seamstress for the final alterations.

The venue is secure.

My mind now races with thoughts of securing a baker, a florist, and a caterer.  I feel like I should be singing "Rub a dub dub, three men in a tub . . ."

The writing life has slowed a bit. I did work on my church article today. Yesterday I wrote in my journal and edited a friend's piece.  Deep inside I hunger to get back to the Conrads and science fiction writing.

I am glad to notice someone is reading my blog. That is better than my poor friend Echo Ryan.  Nobody has touched her blog in several weeks.

Wedding plans!

I'm feeling the urge to write about more than my novels.  After all, my life is more than my books and writing. One things currently on my mind is my wedding. I'm in the process of planning it.

The wonderful part is the church and priest are all settled.  My fiancee and I have picked out a venue. We are going to solidify it this week.  We have narrowed down the wedding invitations to four designs.

I have purchased a dress (for a stellar price that was too good to pass up), but it isn't my dream dress. My dream dress does not seem to exist. I was looking for something with a high back, lace up, long sleeves that are tight fighting and flare out.  I wanted a bodice top with beads and "jewels" that flared out around the hips.  I came close. I just couldn't find any gowns with high backs and long sleeves.

On the market I found only two types of long sleeve dresses: those with high collars to the throat and those with high fronts, but no backs.  I searched hard. I looked at over 10,000 dresses on-line and tried on more than 40. This has been a real quest.

I am going to try to work with the dress I have. I'm going to see if I can at least get capped sleeves added (it does have spaghetti straps).  I also need to be able to bustle up the train. Right now all it has is the string for holding it around my finger.

Wish me luck.