It's official - it's GONE!!

Yup, that's right, everything is completely and utterly gone from my flash drive. Not only my novels, but my short stories, all my freelance articles from years past, my Resume (both for jobs and writing), everything ... and all the photos I took between Easter and the beginning of September. Plus, other things, like our youngest daughter's first steps and her second birthday (which was this July) and her best present - the big girl bed!

Do I feel like a big, fat doofus?? You betcha. Am I PO'd? Not really, what's the point? But I tell you, I'm massively disappointed.

So guess who's off to Staples tomorrow to lay in a huge stock of CDs to put all this stuff on in the future? Yeah, me. I can recreate my resume, that's not a biggie, I have a hard copy here someplace. But the 4-page writing resume, with the list off all the freelance articles I ever wrote? I highly doubt that. Like a ninny, I put it all in one place.

What lesson have I learned from this experience? Don't put all your eggs in one basket - well, at least not all on one USB flash drive.

If you don't believe in making copies of your stuff, or backing up your computer - take it from me, it's a supremely bad idea not to.

I am now the voice of experience. Unfortunately.

Variations on "the dog ate my homework"

Variations on "the dog ate my homework" . . . also known as . . . the memory stick ate both my novels!!! Argh!

Seriously. I put in my flash drive/memory stick this afternoon, which I've been using to store my books ever since the CD drive cratered in the old computer. Hadn't yet gotten around to transferring the thing either into the new computer or onto a CD. And now I'm paying for it. Right now, it's at the computer place, hopefully being retrieved. Okay, they won't be working on it at 10 o'clock at night, but you know what I mean.

Fortunately, I'd had the foresight to print out my latest WIP as I went, so I have a hard copy of all of that. And Cold Cuts was already printed out - and needing a rewrite anyhow. So all that can be recreated if necessary.

What can't be recreated, unfortunately, are all the photos I also had on the stick. It's one of those big 4 GB suckers. So now, if they can't retrieve the files, I have lost all the photos I've taken between Easter and last week. Camping trips, weekends at the farm, my garden . . . and our youngest daughter's second birthday. If only I'd scrapbooked that day already, at least I would have that. There's also a bunch of photos of my mother on there, but I can get those again from Dad.

But the idea of losing the birthday shots is just awful. I'm the photographer in the family, so I was the only person taking photos.

Please cross your fingers for me people, that the photos aren't irretrievable, and even if I have to rewrite my books, that at least our big girl's birthday was saved.

No more work avoidance ... just doing what needs to be done

That's right, I've given up work avoidance in favour of writing - I finished Chapter 8 of my WIP, which is great - and in doing ALL that other stuff around our home which needs to be done.

But the writing fairy, if there is such a thing, must be on my side, because when I went out to cut the grass, the lawn mower wouldn't start. The weed whacker won't start either (it hates me), so until my hubby comes home from work to pull start these things for me, our lovely green grass will have to stay 5 inches too long for another day. Which means I can write ... as long as the kiddos stop fighting long enough for me to compose a coherent sentence or two!

Of course, that would be in between taking our two-year old to the toilet 700 times a day. I've decided it is time for the diapers and pull-ups to leave our house forever, and so have broken out the training pants, plastic pants and diaper bucket for ye olde intensive toilet-training. Which, of course, will mean more laundry every night, but it'll be good for her. She doesn't like being "poobie", and is seemingly obsessed with being "keen", so, it is time.

Meanwhile, for your reading pleasure, I've added a list of writing related sites to this blog. Some are blogs of other writers, one is a site full of book reviews, and others are just sites of general writing interest. I quite enjoy reading other writers' blogs, they're often quite entertaining! Much more so than mine, but of course, that's just my opinon.

Must go now and get back to the laundry, toilet-training, lunch-making and writing. Wonder which task will be the most successful today? Most likely lunch and laundry.

Work avoidance tactic #38 ... Blog

I've got all my stuff out, notes etc. I've got a coffee and most of my housework is done, so I have no reason not to start writing ... but I seem to have fallen into the abyss of work avoidance. First I spent some time on Facebook, playing Wordscraper - waking up my brain for the day's slog. But now, instead of opening the Word document containing my WIP, I'm here - blathering.

And no, I'm not rewriting Cold Cuts. I thought about it, what to change and all that ... but then I got out the ms and started reading it. I found one spelling mistake (oops!), but decided that other than fixing that one thing, I can't bring myself to hack, chop, slice and dice the book just yet. Instead, I'm thinking of changing its title, something I'm still working on, after spending most of yesterday afternoon trying to come up with something reasonable. Something that doesn't sound like food, you know? But it's not happening.

So, when all else fails, grab a Timmy's and head to Facebook. Or get out my WIP and get a move on with it.

At one o'clock this afternoon, I'm supposed to be at the kids' school for their concert with Paul Hann, who comes to the school every year and writes goofy songs with the kids. I've heard Brenden's song a couple of times - its about the joys of reading! - but Amie's is a secret. She won't tell me a thing about it. Except that it's NOT Meatballs and Spaghetti. Bummer, I like that song.

Back to work, now that I've blogged for the day, heehee. Oh yeah, I think I'm sending Cold Cuts (hopefully with its NEW title) to the Arthur Ellis Awards again this year - category of Best Unpublished First Novel. It got an honourable mention in 2007, so maybe this year, it'll do a little better. Or way better. But first, I'd better fix that typo!

Rewrites R Us

Yes, after humming and haaing about whether to rewrite Cold Cuts in the face of my latest "turn down", I have decided that a rewrite is definitely in order.

Argh!

So, I went right back to square one and re-read the evaluation I had done back in 2005, to see if I had missed anything, and for an idea of where I might begin. Cheryl was most wise, and I was not, because I didn't quite make all the changes she suggested. Admittedly, initially it was difficult to "get" exactly what I should change to improve my bad guy (make him badder and more plausible) . . . but now I get it. And in getting it, an enormous amount of slicing and dicing is required to get my story to where it should be. I think I'm going to start with cutting the number of corpses in half, and revising the killer's motive somewhat. Not to mention, overhauling the foreshadowing I did, and the glimpses inside the killer's mind.

All this, and I haven't even re-read the ms yet!

Which reminds me, I better dig out the box with the hard copy in it, and get after it. I have many reams of paper, and fresh ink, so there's no excuse for avoiding this rewrite.

While I'm doing that, you should check out the new links I posted on the left, to some blogs of my fellow crime writers. Definitely some interesting reading there.

Rejected again . . . but you know, it doesn't really hurt.

That's right, I got a rejection letter yesterday . . . from Insomniac Press--the one I really had my hopes pinned on, since they actually asked to see my mss, after reading my letter and synopsis. But apparently, my book is not "outsider" enough for them. Not that I'm complaining, exactly, it was a very nice rejection letter, as far as rejection letters go . . . but its still a rejection. And I really would like to know what "outsider" means.

Does it mean my novel is too mainstream for them, or Canadian publishers in general? Or have I simply been too technical, put too much "stuff" in my novel, rather than letting the story flow, however it will? Not that I gave the plot a huge amount of direction . . . if my characters insisted on doing something I hadn't previously plotted or outlined, but it was good/fun/interesting, I let it happen.

Regardless of what "outsider" means, a review of my mss and some rewriting is certainly in the cards. Like starting tomorrow.

Luckily for me, my fellow CWC members have been most generous with their support and advice on moving past this latest rejection. Writing is fun, although rejection is not, so I shall persevere and hopefully, one day, this will become an AUTHOR's blog!!

Anyhow, enough drivel from me. Back to the drawing board.

New Computer ... new chapters

At long last, I upgraded and got a new computer, one which actually operates as fast I type!! No more plodding along with 320MB of RAM, no siree! I cannot believe I put up with that for so long ... and way back when we got it, when Y2K compatibility was the "in" thing, I thought it was fast!!

So, the words are flowing a touch faster ... and deviating from the outline once again. Oh well, technically, the outline is just a guide anyhow, an idea of how I'd thought the story would unfold. The killer hasn't changed, the protagonist hasn't changed, so I know where I'm going with that, lol.

I might post the first chapter here, sometime to see how you all like it. Personally, I think it's awesome, but then again, I'm a touch biased.