Busy/Not Busy

New responsibilities at work

I’ve been moving into a period of more responsibilities at work, probably because I’m seeming more stable lately. I don’t mind, but I have to make sure I don’t a) procrastinate; b) overwork myself.

Balance

Work is a balancing game for me because of my bipolar disorder and because of my writing. I have office work to do today. And a meeting with a therapist. And part of my outline for It Takes Two to Kringle. Luckily I’m working at home today and I can get the work stuff done before I do personal stuff in the late afternoon.

The work unnerves me when I look at it all in one piece. Which, I guess, is a good reason not to look at it all at once.

Time for rest

I have to work on this one. I get plenty of sleep (this is necessary with bipolar) but I don’t always feel rested. I think a lot of this is psychological — when I’m faced with a pile of work, I fret about whether I’ll get it done, and that makes me tired.

I need to work on resting my mind, which comes from things like meditation, time management that includes free time, and sleep without dwelling on things. Empty mind, in other words.

Time to quit writing and do something

Yeah.

I guess I’m busy.

I ordered eight paperback copies of The Kringle Conspiracy to sell after my book signing party requested copies. And do you know what? I lost the list! AAAAAAAGH someone threw out the piece of paper I’d written them on. I can’t believe it!

So now I’m asking my Facebook friends again who ordered copies. I think I’ve found most of them anyhow. Just missing two or three.

I feel like such a flake sometimes! Maybe most of the time, but with all the stuff going on (teaching, grading, writing, rewriting, emotional meltdown over Trump’s scary refusal to concede the election.) maybe I can’t be blamed for being a bit flaky.

What is left to do before January 1st:

Grade Case Management final case files
Grade exams in Case Management and People Money and Psych (in a couple weeks)
Meet with classes Monday via Zoom
Edit (first round) Kringle in the Night
Set up my pitches for PitMad December 3
Narrate 8 presentations for Personal Adjustment (i.e. Positive Psychology)
Finish setting up Personal Adjustment, Case Management, and People Money and Psych for spring classes
Get those books out
Rest (I don’t do that very well)

I guess I am busy. Busy is not necessarily a good thing if it stands in the way of accomplishment. Perhaps I need to learn to do things more efficiently. If I had time, I’d study that.

But today is Sunday, and I’ve finished grading a major assignment. Now to edit another chapter of Kringle. Ahh…

DIscombobulated

I really want to write today.

But so far, my calendar seems to thwart me from all directions. I have (another!) dental appointment* this morning, followed by a meeting with the outfit that is sponsoring the National Guard training which my husband and I will be doing moulage** for. And, depending on how long that will take (too long, I suspect; I have no patience with dawdling) maybe then I’ll have time to write.

I had great ideas last night for my rewrite/character development of Gaia’s Hands, and of course I forgot some of it and I’m trying to piece the rest of it together with Richard***. I need a good stretch of time to write with more coffee to fuel me****.

I’ve written today’s blog and I have promised myself at least an hour on Gaia’s Hands. Hopefully, I will feel inspired.

* I was born with an enamel deficiency and rather soft teeth; I have all my teeth crowned, but one or two of my teeth have broken off and require further work.

** Casualty simulation; making up volunteers to look like victims for training purposes. This run-through is an earthquake simulation to train the local National Guardsmen. For the first time ever, we’re getting paid for it. Woo hoo!

*** Richard is the husband previously mentioned.

**** We’re currently drinking our way through a coffee blend that is supposed to taste like chocolate; no matter how we roast it, we aren’t getting any chocolate notes, just something that tastes like really good commercial coffee. Sigh.

The Very Busy Caterpillar

I’m at the annual Association for Psychological Sciences conference in Washington, DC. It’s a huge, busy conference, but it’s also a huge, busy venue especially during Memorial Day weekend. And I want some writing time, and I want to go to the zoo, and the botanical garden (I’m saving the Mall for another administration) and I have homework to do.

I’m beginning to long for a staycation.

Honestly, my summers aren’t usually this busy. I still have to (religiously) schedule my one hour writing/editing daily just for the discipline.

But look at this presentation panel title!
“Tension, Conflict, and Paradox: The Science Behind Creativity”. Talk about dovetailing two interests — psychology and creativity!

Well, off to — well, one of the gazillion things that’s on my calendar.

Discipline in a time of busyness

I might write irregularly over the next few days, as I am traveling to a conference in Washington DC to present a poster. This is for my day job, being a professor of human services and the internship coordinator for the department.

This summer is proving busier than I had counted on. Evidence:

Richard and I have two moulage gigs this summer, one in August and one right around the corner on June 4-5th.
I have twenty interns to supervise; next week I’m spending an overnight in Kansas City to visit two or four of them.
The garden! It’s not quite done yet; I’ll be spending next Tuesday finalizing it.
The summer class I’m taking (Management of Disaster Mental Health, which is more interesting than I thought) rolls right along like a Mack truck, and I’m working hard to keep it from rolling over me.

Writing? Writing! I almost forgot about that! I will write any chance I get — if nothing else, I’ll write in the blog at least once.

It’s all about discipline. I am a writer because I keep the discipline to write. I write at least the half-hour a day it takes to maintain this blog, and hopefully at least an hour of writing/revising a day.

I notice myself improving, and that’s a good thing.

My Brain is FULL!

I need to get back to regular journaling. It’s been tough lately, what with planting the garden (Asian vegetables! Weeding! Cherokee purple tomato and lots of basil!), editing Apocalypse to make my dev editor proud (and to be ready for another edit), taking my online class (with a 187-page reading for the first assignment), getting ready for professional conference travel, fielding emails from interns …

My brain has been quite full. And it’s summer! It’s not supposed to be this full!

It’s a good thing. I don’t like sitting still. I like making things happen. And I have time to do it. Do I have the energy? Not so sure, but …

I have edited Apocalypse down to 70k words. Not that I want it to have fewer words, but I did have to cut out things that meandered (and as this document had been written five-six years ago and squished together from two different novels and — you get it. I will try to add some back.

I go from feeling really good about the document to wallowing in despair. I wish I could get more words in it, but I (and my dev editor) would rather it be tight than verbose (and I excel at verbose, my friends.)

So today’s tasks: I’ve already written a response to Assignment #1 (#2 is due Thursday) and written this blog entry; other tasks include writing for a while (starting at 11) and a little planting (this evening).

Wheeeeeee!

Another detour

Note — this is finals week at Northwest Missouri State University, where I finish out the school year by giving final exams and hearing last-minute entreaties from students who forgot to turn in 50% of the assignments. I feel for the students — there were classes I missed 40% of when I was a student, but I didn’t ignore due dates in a class and ask for mercy on the last day of class.

Poor Prodigies — it may be the novel that never gets written at this rate. After editing Gaia’s Hands into a novella — the best decision I’ve made thus far — I’m doing what needs to be done with Mythos and Apocalypse given the time frames and moods — splitting them up into a novella and one novel. I think my instincts are right here.

I’ll get back to Prodigies. And Whose Hearts are Mountains. Sometime this summer. In-between intern visits, writing on one of two non-fiction books, working in the garden, and maybe some sleep somewhere. Oh, and exercise. I promised myself some exercise.