Though they do both end in Y.

Apologies to my scores of fans! I meant to post Tuesday, but after a long week of Real Work (you know – the stuff that I get paid for), I let my goal slide. But I’m making it up today. However, lack of real energy means that all I’m going to talk about today is pens, pencils, highlighters, and all sort of writing equipment. Including font.

When I was teen, I loved to type in fancy fonts. I would write entire novels in fancy colours. I would write in script so cursive that I had to squint to see what it said. But my goal was to make it beautiful no matter what. OR interesting. Or creative.

And I did the same thing with pens. One of my favorite notebooks had black paper. So I had to write in it with these colourful, merky-inked pens that made the entire thing look something like a chalkboard. Though a whole lot neater.

But nowadays, my style has changed and I find that I like writing in PERFECTLY NORMAL FONT and in PERFECTLY NORMAL COLOURS. Unless I have writers block, because then a little pink goes a long way toward encouraging me to write down some new words.

How do you like to write?

Big news in the writing world was released today: the title of J.K Rowlings next book. Since this fits in so well with what I blogged yesterday, I knew I just had to continue. The title – for anyone who hasn’t heard – is “The Casual Vacancy”.
I’m thumbs down on this one. First, I had to look it up multiple times to remember what it was, which to me means it’s not memorable. Second, why use a word like casual in the TITLE of a book? Casual implies laid back, slow, khakis, beige, vanilla, and worst of all B-O-R-I-N-G. And Vacancy, the second word in the title: absent, empty, void, available, unwanted, and worst of all B-L-A-N-K.
This book could have otherwise been titled The Boring Blank.
The Beige Void
Khakis Unwanted.
It doesn’t sound like it is going to be interesting at all.
Now this isn’t to say the book will be bad, I love J.K. Rowling’s writing and I love Harry Potter – but at least Harry Potter was about something and not nothing. So, disappointment in title aside, I’m crossing my fingers and hoping that there is tangible goodness in this novel to be released in September. And I’m wishing that they decide to change the name.

It’s Tuesday and I’m blogging! For the first time since I’ve set my goal, I’ve met my goal. I feel that this a time for trumpets, for celebration and crumpets…wait…does anyone know what a crumpet is? (Look up – apparently a cake) Do people still eat crumpets? I’m pretty sure we don’t in Canada, so maybe I will settle for an extra piece of dark chocolate instead. But still – celebration all around.

On the weekend I walked downtown to do some banking. As I was walking, I came across this pair of shoes below. I had to take a picture of them, the poor lost shoes, as I wondered just how they had gotten here, who had left them, and why. Then I began to wonder if perhaps they were magic shoes with some evil power (like the Red Shoes), only these were blue. I was tempted for a moment to take my shoes off and put these shoes on, just to see if anything were to happen. Maybe they would teleport me to Hawaii, or the large hadron collider, or the moon…that’s where the fantasy’s stopped: when I realized the moon has no oxygen and I would end up D-E-A-D. Where do these shoes take you?

Trying to be published means many quiet weeks when you hear absolutely nothing from potential agents, publishers, editors. It means a lot of time in my head wondering if I’m doing the right thing or if perhaps I should focus all my time and attention saving the world from potential environment disaster as I already do in my day job. (BTW – potentially is the word of the day). To distact myself from the quietness, I went on an epic roadtrip last weekend with my husband. We drove over 3000 km down to Rapid City and I saw Mount Rushmore for the first time. The best part of the trip was staying in hotels which had waterparks. The best of which was Wa-tiki in RC, where they have two tube slides, one which races down into a big toilet bowl and the other which passes under mini-waterfalls and pitchblack tunnels. The second best part was seeing Devil’s Tower in Wyoming – so beautiful. And third it was just amazing to get out and GO SOMEWHERE I’VE NEVER GONE BEFORE. The other good thing was that it got me to NOT think about writing – something I think I was in desperate need of taking a break from. But now I’m ready to go back, to dive in and work on whatever takes my fancy instead of working on what I think may earn me some money in the future. I have a day job, it pays well. Today I saved a city from a diesel spill (well not really but at least I was there). So I’m ready to go back to writing just for fun, beginning with four dragons, three old crows, and maybe some turn of the century gothic adventure.