Don't bother me I'm writing

You know as a writer you're desperate when you start quoting prostitutes. Not the gritty, toothless variety you find near the airport; but the fairy-tail hookers depicted in misguided 90's-era chick flicks like Pretty Woman. Kit DeLuca : "You just can't turn tricks forever. You gotta have a goal. Do you have a goal?" Angel : "Well, I always wanted to be in the Ice Capades." I'm not sure why the lines popped in my head this morning -- I haven't seen the movie in years -- but there they were like catchy lyrics playing in my brain all day -- "You gotta have a goal. Do you have a goal?" I went with it, because I'm not on speaking terms with Inspiration, and I've already said I'm desperate. I have lots of goals or impossible wishes that I file under "goals" for lack of a better lable. They hit me throughout the day, and I share them without considering if they're appropriate or not -- or crazy or not -- an

Should the world end on Dec. 21 as predicted by the usual crazies; I'll at least be satisfied that my final year here was anything but boring -- "Hoo-yeah, Master Chief." It's actually been well more than a year since my life was last boring. I'm not sure it's ever been really boring by normal people's standards, but according to my scale things were pretty dull five years ago.  I was a journalist. My husband was an engineer. Our daughter, Lily, was a quiet, somewhat sociopath-like child who pooped on the potty at school but refused our potty at home. We fretted stupid things like furniture and televisions; year-end bonuses and vacation time ... Life was comfortably stale, or it seems so looking back.  Now I've got two kids and a job that has nothing to do with journalism that doesn't pay the bills. Jerod's a general contractor, which looks good on paper. The hangup is a lot of people are deadbeats, and contractors can't afford

I've got some brilliant ideas for side gigs to help support my writing; let me tell you. They're all things I came up with at work, which should tell you right away they're completely mental, because I  judge Internet search queries for *BLEEEEEEP*. That being said My first idea snowballed out of a query for a terrible STD -- I'm not going to name it, because none of you want to see it. But the idea is -- since I've judged countless pictures of countless diseases (CONDOMS are your friends, people) -- I could be the underground icky-bumps-and-scabs analyst helping sex addicts avoid embarrassing trips to the doctor. All I need is a lifetime supply of antibiotics ...  Next up -- penis-shaped packing peanuts. There's a market for them. SERIOUSLY. People look for penis-shaped everything -- cake pans, dog toys, slippers, thermoses, pillows and more. If I have my way everyone will pack their valuables in cushiony biodegradable tally whackers.   What I&

A funny thing happens when I get in a writing groove. I begin taking on little pieces of my characters and their lives. I couldn't figure out this morning why I felt so depressed. Then it dawned on me half way through the day I was in character. It makes sense I guess -- you invent these people out of bits of your reality and perhaps the realities of people close to you You destroy their lives as you must to make their stories compelling. You speak for them. You think for them. And sometimes you kills them. It's easy then to forget sometimes that you AREN'T them. I might say to myself -- out loud when I'm in the zone -- "you didn't shoot so-and-so in the stomach." Or, "Your husband didn't cheat on you with your sister, because you don't have a sister." (Rest assured I'm not writing a cheesy romance novel. The previous scenarios are illustrative only.) I lose track of reality sometimes. I'll be talking to myself about somethi

Here's what happens when I go on vacation thinking "Yippy skippy -- I'll finally have some time to write." It's 110 degrees; herds of giant ants erupt from the earth to feed on my face and limbs; my husband suffers a food coma and wakes up believing he's God's gift to everything; the Internet disappears; a gypsy peers into her crystal ball and tells a nasty troll that I'm to blame for all his sorrows; the troll hounds me mercilessly, nipping at my heals, berating me at every turn; my children inject themselves with copious amounts of sugar and caffeine and spin about like tiny tornadoes; and before I've recorded a single word in my notebook the vacation is over. It's suspicious -- like a twisted, menacing writer sicked the hounds of hell on me to sabotage my productivity. It sounds like something a character from Stephen King would do -- make a pact with the devil to usurp all the words from the pens and fingertips of all the writers in