Random Thoughts More Random on Friday

Since yesterday was Thanksgiving and I had a post planned , I thought I would post my Thursday randomness on Friday instead. Hopefully my Friday thoughts aren't too random since I'm writing them after a VERY tasty turkey dinner - Thank you, Steven! - and an early evening tryptophan-induced nap.

• You may have noticed that I've taken down my NaNo countdown. Yes, I've decided to throw in the towel on that one. It was just getting to be too much. Instead of being a challenge I just got more and more frustrated everyday as I continued to fall further and further behind on my word count. I realized that I didn't know my main characters well enough, so all I was writing was meandering crap. Which isn't totally worthless, but I didn't really want to write 50,000 words of it. So instead, I'm going to put the novel aside and do some free writing solely about my characters. And since the holidays are coming up, it will probably be slow going there, too. But I'm going to try and get as much as I can done and get a restart in January for, as my writing friend has suggested, JaNo.
  

• Tomorrow is the official start of the holiday shopping season - known around these parts as "Black Friday." While I'm not brave enough to run with the overwhelming crowds, I have put two new links on my sidebar I wish you would take note of. I have become part of the Amazon Associates program and if you plan on making any purchases on Amazon.com this holiday season, please use these links to shop through. By clicking through my site to Amazon, I will receive a percentage of your final purchase in the form of gift certificates. (I LOVE Amazon.com and couldn't pass up the opportunity to make free money for future purchases.) The links will be up year round, so you can use them anytime. Thank you in advance for your participation.


• My husband and I are now house hunting. It's so exciting! We currently live in an apartment and can't wait to have a space we can call our own and a back yard and a dishwasher and a new queen size bed and . . . you can see why we're excited. I've been scouring the net at all the online listings (another distraction that affected NaNo) and we're going to look at our first house this weekend! While I'm nervous about all the financial stuff, I know that it will all work out. It always does. And like someone has recently reminded me, if everyone else has a house, why can't we? So keep positive thoughts in your minds for me :)
  

• And last but not least, I feel it necessary to announce that I went out on Thanksgiving Eve - a great tradition in my pre-kid days. Usually when I go out I'm the cautious one; the one who has a few beers and stops; the one responsible for getting my (drunk) husband home. Well, last night I went WILD! I was drunk. I admit it. And I had a great time! We went out to eat, saw a great band and I enjoyed several beers with great friends and I'm so glad I did. In fact, I outlasted my husband. He went home a full hour and a half before I did (the bar was down the street and therefore we could walk home) and I heard "Drink it up! It's time to go!" for the first time in I don't know how long. I mean, I have NO idea when the last time I closed a bar was. It's definitely been years. And to top it off, I woke up this morning with NO HANGOVER! I don't know how, but I did. I did need a little extra sleep (and I had no voice for quite some time), but my husband politely obliged while he slaved away in the kitchen early this morning. Isn't he the greatest?!

So Happy Day-After-Thanksgiving!

One Planet No Longer Enough

I doubled my word count yesterday for NaNo (but I'm still well behind pace since I haven't done any writing today) and my brain is fried, so I decided to do some blogging to break things up a bit. During my "light" reading break, I ran across this article and felt compelled to share it.

According to a report put together by the environmental group WWF, "the Earth's natural resources are being used 25 per cent faster than the planet can renew them." And at that rate, and the anticipated rate of human population growth, the report predicts that "large-scale ecosystem collapse" is likely by the middle of this century.

The two biggest contributing factors to ecological destruction by human beings has been our propensity to consume natural resources faster than Mother Nature can replenish them and in consuming so much so fast, carbon-dioxide emissions are at their highest and account for 48 percent of the damage humans have had on the environment since 2003.

The WWF also noted a decline in biodiversity across the board and around the world with animal species suffering an overall 27 percent decline. Tropical land species suffered the biggest hit with a 55 percent decrease in population among the 695 species monitored.

So let me spell it out for you - Human beings suck when it comes to taking care of the environment that surrounds us. If we drive too many plant and animal species to extinction, if we continue to release unprecedented amounts of carbon-dioxide into the atmosphere, if we continue to ignore that our gluttony is killing the Earth - we won't have an Earth to abuse anymore.

When you think about it, it isn't about politics, or money, or jobs - it's about survival; and human beings MUST change if they wish to stick around.

Ladies, It's Time to Stand Up & Be Counted

Yes, today is November 1st. And yes, I should be adding to my word count (which currently sits at 0 as you can see by the meter to the right) for NaNo. And yes, my blog will probably suffer this month because I won't be able to keep up with both (plus the website I'm working on, the novel writing class I'm taking, oh and my kids and husband, housework, etc.), but this issue is just to important to ignore.

I subscribe to the Moms Rising email list and I was sent an email yesterday regarding the upcoming midterm elections on Tuesday. Are you ready for this?

"Women are the largest group of non-voters in America. Nearly 20 million women didn't vote in 2004, and they are therefore "The Deciders" in election outcomes. They could not only alter the political playing field, but could make an entire new field all together."

Go ahead. Read it again. That's right. Twenty million women DIDN'T vote in 2004.

Of course there are a thousand reasons why they didn't ranging from "I didn't have time that day," to "I forgot," to "One vote doesn't matter anyway." But as you can see, one vote times millions of other women who thought the same thing ABSOLUTELY made a difference in 2004.

So I am asking all you female registered voters out there - and I mean ALL OF YOU - to make a point of going out and voting on November 7th. And while you're at it, encourage the women in your life to vote as well. We can complain all we want about lack of availability of quality child care, we can complain about the gender wage gap, we can complain until we're blue in the face that the wealthy (mostly male) representatives in Congress don't give a damn about you and me - but the only way any of that will change is with your vote. It's one of only two languages (the other being $$$$$) politicians understand.

So get out and vote, ladies!! This is important. This is worth putting on the calendar. This is worth making time for. If we don't help ourselves, certainly no one else will volunteer.

Crazy Days of Autumn

I've been selfish lately. And I'm not sure how I feel about it.

Lately I've been very focused on my own needs - and tonight was a perfect example. Yet my conflict stems from my not feeling conflicted enough - I mean I'm not mad at myself for being selfish, I'm more upset about not being more upset regarding the lack of time I've been spending with my children . . . Let me try to explain.

Over the last six months or so I have rediscovered the writer inside me that has been dormant for years. I've been writing short stories, blogging (obviously), journaling and now I'm thinking about writing a novel - something I have been thinking about doing since I was a teenager. I've always had this feeling inside that I have something to offer the world of publishing. I just always felt that it was meant to be, but like many things in my life, I've had trouble putting in the work and have struggled with the follow through.

But over the last six to eight weeks my desire to write a novel has grown and with NaNo coming up in a little over two weeks, my drive and focus has intensified. I've got an outline going, I've got characters running around inside my head, random scenes written on notecards (I've even color coded them and for anyone who knows me they know that I've never color coded anything). I've purchased a couple of How-To books and I'm currently reading some non-fiction regarding the topic of my novel.

This is where the selfishness comes in.

I worked at my "day job" today, then came home and hung around with my boys. My youngest was in desperate need of a nap (read whining incessantly) and my oldest son was doing anything he could to increase the volume of his brother's whining. So I laid down on the couch with my little one and he quickly fell asleep on my chest.

After a while, I gently moved my precious sleeper off of me and headed to the computer. I checked my email, I checked my myspace page, my writing group forums . . . Meanwhile, my older son was watching tv. I know, I know - Motherly sin of all sins; letting the television babysit my own child. There's guilty seed number one.

I continued to work on a short story I'm trying to finish before NaNo until my son woke up. I went back to the couch to hang out and then my sister called. I knew what she was calling about, I had left a couple of messages for her, so I figured it would be a quick call. Well, I started talking and couldn't stop. I just started going on and on about her wedding, an aerobics class we want to start taking, family stuff, relationship stuff, my writing stuff . . . an hour, and several attempts by my children to get my attention later, I realized it was getting late. Guilty seed number two.

It was dinner time - past what would usually be referred to as "early bird" dinner and our usual mealtime, so I made some chicken nuggets and the two boys sat down to eat. I wasn't very hungry and so I skipped eating (until I had some cereal, alone, about an hour ago) and started reading a book. When the boys were done I was still reading, so I let them play together for a bit. There was some friction (probably because they were trying to get my attention) and finally I exploded about all the fighting and the yelling and the running in the house . . . Guilty seed number three.

I sent them into the bathroom for baths, got them dressed for bed and did our nightly bedtime ritual of reading books and tucking in - too bad I was putting them to bed 45 minutes late. Perfect for my older son who has to wake up and go to school tomorrow morning. Guilty seed number four.

But while I feel guilty for taking time out to do what I want, when I want, too, I don't feel that guilty and I feel worse about not feeling guilty enough. Does that make any sense?

I know that I am a person and not only a mother and therefore have the right to do my own thing. I'm a strong proponent of that very mantra in fact. But I know that between work and my own timeouts I'm not giving my children the best of what I have to give. In fact, I'm short with them and lax in keeping their routine. Yet, I don't want to give up the time I take throughout the day.

And that's even before I start thinking about the state of my relationship with my husband. We work opposite schedules. We watch a lot of tv and spend plenty of individual time on the computer. We read. Basically the time we have together is spent doing individual activities - kind of like what's referred to as "parallel play" with toddlers. And so when I devote large chunks of time to my writing when the boys are asleep and my husband is home - there's guilty seed number five.

So I think that while we have been taught we can have it all - we can't. There are always sacrifices that must be made and things we will miss out on. The question is how do you balance it so that one person isn't always making the sacrifices, the same person isn't missing your presence in their life and the guilt doesn't eat away at you?

I don't think that I need more hours in the day (I'm exhausted enough as it is), but better management of my time - Something else to think about I guess.