Doing your research pays off

Sorry I haven't been posting as regularly.  Starting a new job is a little time consuming and I haven't really had any good writing news lately, so it's been kind of hard to talk about it.

But today I'm finally going to talk!  (And YES, I am relating to something with Olivia).

On the 15th the pediatrician gave me the go-ahead to start giving Olivia baby cereal.  I was so excited that I went to Wal-mart right after the appointment and picked up two differant kinds of cereal, bibs, spoons, and bowls.  I came home and put Olivia in her bumbo with her bib on, mixed the cereal up and she screamed.  There was no way she was going to eat it.

I was upset.  My husband tried to take pictures and record it, but all we got was a screaming baby.

So then I decided to try again, but before trying I did some research on the best way to get your baby to eat cereal.  I scoped out differant forums and Googled differant things, so by Wednesday I was ready to try again. 

Olivia was less grumpy because she didn't just have shots and after playing with the spoon with her for thirty minutes, when she went into her high chair this happened.

Research pays off!


What does this have to do with writing?

Uh...

No, seriously, it has a lot to do with writing.

We research to write elements of our story,

We research to find the right agents to query

What else do we research?  What happens if you don't research?  (Well for one you end up with a lot of rejections...or alot of wasted baby cereal)

Friday Five

I'm still here and still pregnant, so I guess I should do some sort of a Friday Five update?  Perhaps?  We'll go with it.

1.)  In blogging news, I have two reviews and TWO contests coming up.  Bwahahahahaha.  Teasing isn't it?  The contests don't have to do with me getting an agent, but they do include some great books.  (One is an ARC that I'm sure many of you have been waiting for by a certain lady with the initials EJ and the other is a book from a wonderful lady who writes about ghosts...and goths...).  I'm hoping to get the interviews and contests up by May, so you may just have to hold still for awhile.

2.)  How am I going to do all these contests with a baby in one hand and my computer in the other?  I don't have to...I picked my Ereader/Tablet.  Yes, I'll probably do a post on this, but after doing some more of my own research my husband bought me the Ipad2 as a mother's day gift.  It's still going to be at least another two weeks before it gets here, but you can except some wonderful 2 am tweets!

3.) In writing news, I decided to put aside my "for fun" novel and start on another project.  It's very gritty, very dystopian and it's a love story.  My original idea ended up sounding like everyone's dystopian project, so actually after reading a review of MEMENTO NORA I thought of how to make mine different.  For now it's a secret and only my critique partners know, but maybe I'll share something someday :)

4.)  When I decided to start doing book reviews, I didn't realize how many of them I would actually get.  It's definitely not a bad thing, but man I feel like I'm giving you all a review a week.  Are you okay with all of these reviews loyal blog readers?  I still have four more books to read before June and if you are tired of my reviews I'm willing to bow out.  I don't want to have a complete review blog, but I actually kind of enjoy reading books and figuring out what I like and dislike about certain writing.  The more you read, the more you realize what you like.

5.)  The hiatus is still coming and I'm sorry for being so grumpy and not posting regularly.  I've realized that there are a lot of ups and downs to late pregnancy and have even been comparing it with querying.  You know how you work for months, years, whatever on a novel and you get out to query and you think your so close to getting that agent and only end up with rejections?  Yeah pregnancy false alarms are like that...  But in the end I know that someday I will have an agent and someday I will have a baby (even those women with the stone babies for 60 years eventually have theres!).  And I actually haven't received a rejection lately, so at least I have something going for me...right?

How is everyone doing?  Did you miss me?

The silver lining

There is always a silver lining. Sometimes it’s hard to see it at first, but it’s always there.

No, I didn’t get the job in Washington. I interviewed to be a speech writer in the executive branch of a major insurance company, and sadly though they said my writing skills were fantastic, they just didn’t think I knew enough about the area to be qualified for the position.

Yeah, I’m upset. I mean I was really looking foreward to having a job that I could just write all day in, but I guess this just means it wasn’t meant to be. In hindsight it would have been hard to come back from my honeymoon then have to turn around and start packing to move to Washington.


So instead of worrying about a new job I’m happy to report that the querying process has started again and once the honeymoon is over (Juen 14th) I will be back to keeping up with this blog!

So though there will not be a contest for a new job (someday there will be, I’m still on the hunt.) I will be having a contest once I get 100 Twitter followers, I am still nineteen away, so very close!

The contest will include things that I blog about with a few winners.

1.) Writing- (I do have an award winning author who will be more than happy to donate an autographed book and one more that I’m trying to get under my belt.)
2.) Glee (Oh yeah my mom works for a FOX affiliate so there will be Glee merch).
3.) Boxing. One of my favorite movies was also a book first and it has to do with boxing, so there may be a Blu-Ray movie up for grabs!
Till then I must pack for the honeymoon, but will get back to this whole blogging and keeping you all posted thing!

XoXo
The punching bag