If you do what you have always done, you will get what you have always had.

Thursday, August 05, 2004

We fly tomorrow. Our ride to the airport will leave our hotel at 6:30. Ick. Totally ick. I hate early.

The up-side is that Scott and I will be in the same time zone again, even if we are just about at opposite sides of it! He's making progress on Book 2, and as I said earlier, I'm working on the Rogue Pawn edit. It's about time to get a query letter going, too, and research of publishers. We want to do Rogue Pawn as a related stand-alone now. I just want to sit down with Scott and Eric and hash out the series once and for all. This hodge-podge method is NOT working. Looking forward to getting some work done.

Wednesday, August 04, 2004

I just got this joke in the e-mail and had to post it! Thanks, Aunt Judy!

She spent the first day packing her belongings into boxes, crates and suitcases.

On the second day, she had the movers come and collect her things. On the third day, she sat down for the last time at their beautiful dining room table by candlelight, put on some soft background music, and feasted on a pound of shrimp, a jar of caviar, and a bottle of Chardonnay. When she had finished, she went into each and every room and deposited a few half-eaten shrimp shells, dipped in caviar, into the hollow of the curtain rods. She then cleaned up the kitchen and left.

When the husband returned with his new girlfriend, all was bliss for the first few days. Then slowly, the house began to smell. They tried everything; cleaning and mopping and airing the place out. Vents were checked for dead rodents, and carpets were steam cleaned. Air fresheners were hung everywhere. Exterminators were brought in to set off gas canisters, during which they had to move out for a few days, and in the end they even paid to replace the expensive wool carpeting. Nothing worked.

People stopped coming over to visit... Repairmen refused to work in the house...The maid quit... Finally, they could not take the stench any longer and decided to move. A month later, even though they had cut their price in half, they could not find a buyer for their stinky house. Word got out, and eventually, even the local realtors refused to return their calls. Finally, they had to borrow a huge sum of money from the bank to purchase a new place.

The ex-wife called the man, and asked how things were going. He told her the saga of the rotting house. She listened politely, and said that she missed her old home terribly, and would be willing to reduce her divorce settlement in exchange for getting the house back...

Knowing his ex-wife had no idea how bad the smell was, he agreed on price that was about 1/10th of what the house had been worth...But only if she were to sign the papers that very day. She agreed, and within the hour, his lawyers delivered the paperwork. A week later, the man and his new girlfriend stood smirking as they watched the moving company pack everything to take to their new home... ..including the curtain rods.

I LOVE A HAPPY ENDING, DON'T YOU????

Tuesday, August 03, 2004

We took the cats for their health check this morning and wrapped up the last of our Vicenza errands. Tess was a yowling ball of fur and claws in the car, but when we took the carrier out of the car she was perfectly calm. I suspect the drive to Venice Friday might prove to be interesting! We got kitty downers for the flight, thank goodness.

On the business front, I've finished the first edit of Rogue Pawn. Feels good to have it done. Not that the work is done by any means. I had to edit on hard copy because my time on the laptop is so limited right now. It's rather bulky so I'm glad not to have to take it in carry-on! If I had to guess, I'd say I've cut about 2,000 words. Not too bad for the first edit, I guess, but it's still going to be a little long I think. The other caveat right now is that the transformer we had the laptop on keeps eating fuses, so I don't think I'll be able to start the electronic copy until this weekend when, in theory, I'll be up late at night from jet lag. Yeah, maybe. Now that I've had time to work on it I want to keep going and it's frustrating not to be able to.

It's also frustrating to try to type ' and get à. Flipping European keyboards! I had no idea they were different until I came here. *sigh*