Better when I'm busy

I've Canary:  DD pulled up on my other monitor and will hop right on that forthwith.  Haven't touched it since the last time I blogged.

But what have I been DOING???

Well.  My short overachieving ass decided to buy 45 yards of fleece and make the family fleece blankets.  The only truly creative thing I can do besides write. 😊  I can also freehand cross-stitch, but that's been a long minute, and I would certainly need a magnifying glass now.  Hard pass.  

Acquired an air fryer, and I MUST play with the new toy which means:  Scouring the Internet for recipes I will actually eat I can pop in there and admire.  Take food porn pictures for Facebook.  Feel some sense of accomplishment for eating semi-healthy.  Rinse.  Repeat.  heh

Took youngest baby child for gallbladder surgery.  Not a good scene.  My poor baby.  She said she hurt worse over this than her C-sections.  I felt awful for her. 😭  

Flu shot.  Bivariant booster.  

But...the writing.

Woke up a little before 2 last night.  Bathroom.  Bed.  Wrote on my book.  In my head.  But it was vivid enough I remember the details, and it was a great scene and then some.  I knew I'd be writing today because you don't ever say "no" to the book.  Dialogue and scenes are a gift.  I'll raise my bleary-ass head, no matter the time, and jot down notes on my phone about my books.  

My Mercenary Girl is fighting another uphill battle or three.  Several beings have taken an interest in her movements and actions.  She's been marked by an ancient deity.  She owes a debt her mother should have paid.  Not easy trying to survive in this world or any other.  They don't know my girl.  But they soon will.

Always writing*

It's been a week

 Last two days=hell.

I've been trying to take Mercenary Girl over 60,000 words since Monday.  Finally stumbled over, barely, yesterday.  I'm now looking at finishing around 75,000 words total.  I've a major scene to write today with a twist.  Love those.  👀  I'd like to finish at 65,000 today, if my everything can keep up.  

Starting earlier than usual.  Sipping on my energizing smoothie.  Already have both fans on.  Going to be another hot one.  Rather looking forward to the actual cool down.  Sunday looks quite lovely.

Here's my view when I'm writing:

I love it beyond words.  💖

Always writing*

Feeling accomplished

 Wanted to write two major scenes on Mercenary Girl.  Wrote one.  BUT...wrote 5,091 words.

🥳🎉

Feeling pretty damn froggy, my friends.  Makes for an incredibly happy Sunday and happy me.

Hope yours has gone good, as well.

Always writing*

Busy Sunday

 Been awake since six.  Up since six-thirty.  That's borderline heinous in my world.  Not a morning person, but I've roughly a million things to do today, and I'm excited about all of it.

Two major scenes for Mercenary Girl.  One will gut me.  The other will soothe my soul.  Such is the way of the writing world.  

Sundays have always been productive writing days for me.  Something about the low-key pace, I think.  Drinking my smoothie with energizer powder.  Let's be realistic here.  I'll need all the help I can get.  But I feel it's going to be a good one.

My desk is lit up.  Fans blowing.  Desktop covered with pastel post-it notes.  Feels like home.

Always writing*

...when the smoothie kicks in

Empathy

I'm an empath.  It's the reason I can't watch game shows or reality TV.  My stress and anxiety is palpable because I absorb what the people are feeling.  I didn't last one season of "Grey's Anatomy" because I sobbed every damn episode, and it wore me down.  The episode Bailey cried?  Yep.  Color me done.

Would love to watch "John Wick" because I love action movies and Keanu Reeves is brilliant.  But...*spoiler*...they kill the dog.  I never got over that.  I would have to skip over that part.  Can't seem to make myself watch it.

However...it helps me as an author.

I'm in each scene.  I AM the scene.  Every action and reaction.  Each character's happiness, fear, hope, and uncertainty.  I need to feel it to make the reader feel it.  Sometimes I need to step away from the laptop.  Push back away from the heavier emotions.  I've made myself cry more than once.  Laugh more than once.  Been so mad at a character I wanted to meet them outside to throw hands.  😑 😄  

That's the life.  The investment.  I can't imagine wanting to do anything else.  I don't want to.  

Going to sit down with my Mercenary Girl this morning.  Writing a scene that occurs later in the book.  Not pretty.  But we'll make it.

Always writing*      

Saturday Saturday

 I am, once again, scantily clad with two fans blowing on me.  Believe me, nothing about this is remotely sexy.  I'd rather have pajama pants, my Kermit slippers, and a T-shirt on.  😑

Writing is the only item on the agenda today! *dancing*  

Okay.  While I was writing yesterday, the key to the entire series came to me.  Three beautiful lines that will dictate every action made.  Now.  I know what my trilogies are about.  I don't throw out a number and then frantically scramble around and try to make it work.  That's called being short-sighted, and I have enough shit going on without stressing myself out.  

But this clarity in these few words?  I literally pushed back from my desk and wallowed in the rightness of it.  Basked in the clarity.

Writers like to label themselves.  I don't like to label anything, and I sure as hell do NOT like to be labeled.  I both plot and freestyle.  I loathe the word "pantster."  I do NOT write by the seat of my pants.  Mad love to those who do.  I'm not knocking anyone.  Nor do I jot down the minutiae.

I use OneNote.  I have different tabs for characters and locations.  I can paste in pictures and type in dialogue as it comes to me.  

For example:  The Rivers Sisters Series has their own notebook.  Each book has their own tab.  Then underneath each tab are pages.  Megan's story, "Fascination", has a page where I posted visuals to represent the wild child's stories.

Here we have Megan, quite young, completely done with her red curly hair.  She decides to try a spell to straighten it.  And she does.  Into sticks.  I love her so much.

I'm a visual person, and I enjoy being able to use this tool to enrich my storytelling.  When my brain meanders, and I pick up a scene or dialogue from another story, I open the tab and jot it down so it's not lost.  That is one of the worst feelings in a writer's life.  Losing a piece of a tale that you swore you would remember.  Aches like a bad memory.

Now that I've prattled on a bit, I really AM off to weave words and let my mercenary girl have an extraordinarily unpleasant day.  😣

Always writing!

Mercenary Girl

This will be the public working title for my dark trilogy.  I'm superstitious about throwing the title out there with too much information.  It's simply how I am.  And while she is not strictly mercenary, it fits.

I'm averaging 3500-4500 words a day I spend working on it.  As soon as I'm done blogging, I'm back at it.  Little over 25,000 words now.  When I need a breather, I'll pop over to "Incantation", or possibly an erotic short story.  Man, I love the words. 😍   

It's hotter than the devil's hemorrhoid here in Oklahoma.  I'm sitting in my office with a ceiling fan, a floor fan, and not a lot of clothes on.  Give it a couple of hours, and I'll be sweating, no matter what effort the central heat/air is putting out.

It's funny, I'd stepped away from my laptop the other day.  Walked into the kitchen for a drink.  I'm mid-pour into my little mug, and a scene pops into my head.  And the dual  process delights the hell out of me.  What're you doing, Crystal?  Drinking milk and writing.  But you're simply standing there.

I said what I said. 😎

Down the rabbit hole I went.  Apparently your brain has a two-task limit.  If you add another task, your prefrontal cortex will discard one.  Utterly fascinating.  Love learning new things.  Off to weave worlds and words.

Always writing!