I explain a few things

I do apologise for my absence. I miss blogging desperately but life has been insane the past few weeks. 
-work is really busy. 
-Uni has started back up again two nights a week after work,
-assignments are piling up
-mum is away and suddenly it's a lot harder for the house to stay clean, and
-I'm going overseas next week and have lots of preparing to do. 


BUT
I do have a list of the blog posts I want to write, and the list is building, which is a good thing. 
I want to get some writing and blogging done while I'm away - I'm going skiing in NZ. Yay!


In other news, I won a blogging award! Julie's blog From Pen to Paper is such a creative, thoughtful and inspiring blog about writing, reading, life and the industry. 


Anyway, I love the website postsecret.com and thought I'd post some of my favourite postcards. They're great story inspirations, too. 

June shenanigans

Alright alright, I'm just going to come out and say it. I didn't complete all my June goals. 
My excuses are: 
-getting my wisdom teeth out and feeling mindless
-unexpectedly starting full-time work. 


What I did manage to do though, I'm pretty happy with. I finished editing my new short story called Co-painicitis Syndrome which ended up being around 1500 words. It's quite different to my usual writing - it's a mix between Raymond Carver and Etgar Keret (my favourite short story writers) - because it's a surrealist piece (which I've never done before) and just a totally different writing style that I'm used to. It was a bit of an experiment for me and I gotta say, I think it turned out better than expected. 
I haven't had a chance to start my other short story idea (I'm writing it for a competition though so will be working on it hardcore for the next 2 weeks) but it will also be that same writing style, although not surrealist. 


How did everyone go with their June goals?


In June I read:
-Anne Brashares - the 3rd Summer of the Sisterhood (reread)
-Anne Brashares - Forever in Blue
-Liane Moriarty - What Alice Forgot
-Courtney Summers - Fall for Anything
-Elizabeth Scott - Perfect You
-Patrick Jones - Things Change


And I went crazy on book depository so I have heaps of books to read in July.


I had a scary thought, too. I was thinking of giving myself a $50-$60 book allowance a month. Which is do-able since I get a lot out from the library, and I already have a huge TBR pile at home. Then I added it up and that's over $600 a year. And in all honesty, seeing as though I usually end up spending more like $70 a month on books, that adds up to WAY more. Kind of a scary thought. Considering I'm also addicted to coffee ($3 a pop, around $21 a week), Zumba ($10 a class) and Artichoke hearts ($3 average).  Well, at least I'm not a smoker. That's all I can say. Because adding cigarets and gum in there would pretty much make me hopeless. 


How much do you spend on books a month? Any other addictions we should know about?


Anyway, this was posted on twitter and I thought it was pretty cool. Oh, did I mention I got twitter? 

My weekly musings

I just love these lyrics

you've got a lovely way with words 

must be the way you see the world 

by The Virgins, in Rich Girls. 

So my week hasn't been too busy. I got my wisdom teeth out, which has resulted in lots of sleep and ice cream (including the Carousel ice cream cake - pictured above - in honour of my extracted wisdom). So I'm a bit behind on my June goals. 

I've been reading lots, and planning out a new story, so will hopefully get to writing it this weekend.  I think I will submit it to Geek Mook.

Here is a photo of me and crime writer, Michael Connelly, that I took about 2 weeks ago when I heard him speak at the Wheeler Centre in Melbourne. 

I thought it was interesting that for a crime writer whose novels are so dense and convoluted with plot tags and foreshadowing, that he never plans his work. He said he knows the start and end, and that's all. He goes in writing blind. 

He also said that everyday, he rewriters everything that he wrote the day before. 

Does anyone else do that?

 

He signed two of my books, but unfortunately, I couldn't read his handwriting so I have no idea what he wrote. 

Note to self: when famous author signing books for fans, ALWAYS write legibly. 

Anyway, I'm off to do some writing. I'm finally going to get twitter this weekend.