A Bookish Sort of Update

 before all the christmas business starts up, i wanted to post a few updates about a few sorts of booky information.

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1) after a whole lot of personal upheaval/stress/development type stuff, i will be back to editing my novel after this weekend. the goal is to get through it and start querying in january 2013. (if you're reading this, and you read the rough draft of my manuscript, and you're interested in reading the more finessed variation of the book, let me know.) i'm really excited to get back to it and i hope that 2013 is the Year in Which Ang Acquires an Agent as well as the Year in Which Ang Obtains a Publishing Deal.

2) furthermore, but along those same lines, i'll be outlining books 2 and 3 in the series betwixt editing. i'm really excited to get back to my characters, guys. like, really, really.

3) also, i think i'll be back to writing My Beautiful Disaster (tentative title) instead of my murder mystery book once querying begins.

moving on to something a bit different:

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4) i hit my reading stretch goal for the year. as of today, i've read 105 books, which is crazy and awesome. i'll probably read a good bit less next year, as i'll be writing and editing and querying (oh my!) throughout 2013, but i'm still going to aim for 60 books, or 5ish a month.

that's all for now.

:)

in which my heart hurts

this week, a newtown, connecticut elementary school became a site of unnecessary violence and pain, loss and suffering. i won't get into my personal, detailed thoughts, as a mother and human, regarding this terrible thing. i won't talk about gun control or mental health care or anything else you'll hear about from a talking head on one of the television or radio networks of mainstream america.

what i will say is that this shouldn't have happened.

what i will say is that this has happened too much in relatively recent american history.

what i will say is that it rips me to shreds.

what i will say is that these children should not have died, and it's these children who deserve to be remembered, not the killer, or the talking heads, or the rhetoric surrounding the situation.

this is a beautiful tribute. "hallelujah" is one of my favorite songs, ever, and this brought tears to my eyes. thank you to NBC and the voice for putting this together.



we will never forget you, sweet babies. never, ever. not in a million years.

Finally Feeling Like Christmas

i won't lie: the weeks leading up to our move back to austin and since our arrival were very difficult. finally, this week, there was a break through of sorts, and things feel like they are more back to normal.

of course, thanks to all the stress, we were sorely lacking in christmas spirit around these parts, and now that we're breathing a little easier, we've finally put up our tree, stockings, and our little christmas countdown, too. additionally, i transcribed my daughter's letter to santa today - in which she asked for nothing crazy! i sort of hoped that she'd ask for something crazy, like a unicorn, but she asked for lalaloopsy dolls, dress up clothes, and books - all pretty standard fare for a girly girl like we've been blessed with.

the hubs and i aren't really going to do christmas this year, given that he's not working yet, and operating on one income is tough, but i thought i'd post a few examples of my favorite kind of christmas decor.

what i really require from holiday decor is for it to feel "home-y". i love this simple color scheme,a nd the fact that the items they chose to decorate with aren't overly flashy (not that I don't love a good sparkle!). 

truthfully, this would never really be an option for me, with a wee one at home, but i think it's stunning and really, quite inventive. i love this mix of media. 

i love love love this idea! so simple and chic.

and, as for a few things that are definitely on my wish list this year?

we don't really have much in the way of christmas traditions, but we do buy new pajamas every year and sleep in them, and this year will be no exception.

do you have any christmas eve/holiday traditions you keep up with every year?

Happy Birthday to Me!

hey-o! 

for my birthday, i thought i'd make a hodgepodge post in which i shoe you a few of my favorite things. so, here we go!

in no particular order:

chuck taylors, because duh.

ben whishaw as Q in skyfall. OHAI BOY.

lattes (particularly with fun foam designs)

Daryl fucking Dixon, yo. Obviously.

Foo. Dave Grohl is cooler than you.

Mumford & Sons.

books.

Ten. (and the TARDIS, i suppose)

Marcus Mumford's lyrics.

and last, but definitely not least:

Cupcakes. Because of reasons.

anyhoo. there's obviously more where that came from, and i forgot to link to the original files, and for that i apologize, but: 

happy birthday to me!

hope you all have a fab day.

Becoming a Master

last saturday, i got together with a group of friends i haven't seen in nearly a year, and it was super fun. all we did was sit around and drink wine and talk smack and laugh, and it was just a blast. at one point, though, my friend asked the group of us that were all seated at the table in the kitchen, "if you could do anything for work what would you do?"

and it got me thinking. 

my immediate answer is "be a writer." 

someone responded, "but you are a writer," which is a valid point, but i suppose i was meaning the sort of writer who actually gets paid for stringing all those words together. 

however, then i thought, aside from writing, what would i want to do? 

the answer was very clear to me - i'd want to work with teenagers. i realize that probably a large percentage of you guys reading this are thinking, 'lady, you must be out of your mind,' but the fact is that they don't drive me insane the way they do most people. and in fact, kids in that age bracket are in such a vulnerable place - their entire lives are spread out before them, this million mile road map with no real key provided to give direction - and we expect them to just get it done. 

it's stressful and difficult and crazy, and i'm convinced that they just need someone - maybe even just one person - to show them that they are actually cared about. that they're important. that their thoughts are worthwhile, and they can be somebody. 

basically, they need somebody to convey this message to them, and to make them believe it: 

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i've always loved that movie. side note: there's very little that makes me happier than this scene (ohai, professor mcgonagall and lauryn hill and that dude from city high!). but anyway, back on track: 

life's been stressful for me lately, to say the least. i'm emotionally drained, seemingly perpetually in need of a nap, and having a hard time focusing on  much of anything. but in my conversation with my friend, i realized that, although i generally dislike school to an inordinate degree, i could go back to get a master's degree if i knew it would get me into a place where i'd be working with kids on a full time basis. thankfully, texas state university has a program where they'll allow you to take courses for shortage areas (subjects that are in desperate need of teachers to fill positions) in which they'll pay you 35K for "living expenses" while you're completing the 36 hours they require to award that degree, provided you work in AISD when you're done. 

it's a viable option. 

i'm pretty excited about the idea, and i'm going to make some phone calls this week to get some further detail, because if i'm not writing, i simply can't bear the thought of sitting around in corporate america forever (although there is one company i wouldn't mind working for - more on that later). 

what do you want to do with your life? 

I WANNA ROCK!

2012: 12 things.

with my 30th birthday approaching rather quickly, i thought i'd make a list of things i did in 2012, if only for my memory. in no particular order:

1) i lost 25 pounds, making me the thinnest i've been in over a decade.
2) i became a Whovian, because life is simply better with The Doctor.
3) i wrote a book. it's 74K of YA fantasy, and i'll be querying it in the new year.
4) i lived in nashville for the majority of the year, and loved every second.
5) i saw mumford live, finally.
6) i made a handful of new friends, whom i am convinced will be around for the long haul.
7) I (am on track to) read 104 books. holy awesome, batman.
8) i stopped drinking soda, finally, and for real.
9) i ran a 5K.
10) i grew my inner-book nerd to an exponential degree.
11) i loved fiercely.
12) i learned that i'm stronger than i think i am.

on december 8th, i will officially begin my 30s, and while there's quite a bit in my life that is in flux right now, i refuse to let it get me down. i got this.

thanks for being mostly awesome, 2012, but onward and upward, i say. happy birthday to me, y'all.

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