So, I suppose it’s the end of the month.  Maybe I should be doing updates for May?  But I don’t really know what’s in store for next month.  I suppose, in a lot of ways, I live my life day to day.  A lot of the time I think it’d be better if I could plan for the future a bit more.  But, I guess there’s something to be said for living in the moment.  Right?

I still haven’t been taking the bus much.  That’ll probably change next week, since my guy and I have opposite schedules.  He’s working mornings, so he’ll need the car.  I don’t mind taking the bus to work that much.  But the ride home, when it’s around midnight, and I have to wait 20 minutes at a stop for the next bus, alone, with a pocket full of tips (hopefully).  It’s a little scary.

Sometimes just walking to my car at night is a bit unnerving.  Tonight, I gave a homeless man my left over Chipotle.  But the next homeless guy was peeing on a wall, yelling to somehow who walked by telling him not to look at his junk, among other things, then proceeded to yell at me as I walked by until I was out of range.  At least he was yelling nice things at me?  Like saying “I love you, baby!”  But… not a super comfortable situation.

Of course, without my bus blogging, I’m not great with keeping you all updated on what’s going on in my life.  So, bus = good in some ways.

Still working at a restaurant in Santa Monica.  They literally cannot keep any staff there.  I started in Jan, maybe Feb, and I’m not a veteran server.  I have more seniority then 80% of the wait/bar staff.  Sad.  If that wasn’t bad enough, this past week they decided they were going to cut hours.  They started with the kitchen staff, who thus rebelled by making everything come out of the kitchen slow or wrong, in an effort to  suggest that we need more people working.  After we all felt the brunt of that, they decided to cut server shifts, too.  So, now, not only do I work in a super complicated, physically demanding, barely bill paying job, but now I have less hours.

On the up side, I’ll get to write more.  On the down side, if it doesn’t get better quick, I’m going to have to go back in to job hunting mode.  And I really don’t want to have to find another new job.  I had 7 jobs last year.  7!  Too many!  I want to settle in a bit.  Get to a place where I can work without fear of being homeless until such time as I am a superstar writing success.  It’ll happen.  Eventually.

I added a new weekly feature this month.  It’s called Mention Monday.  I’ve actually wanted to add it for a long time, but couldn’t think of a good name.  Basically, I wanted to start doing reviews.  I’m excited about it.

Serial Sunday has proven to be a challenge.  Mostly, I think, because I work Friday, Saturday, and Sunday most weeks (usually Tuesday and Wednesday, too.  Sometimes more days.  But now, who knows?).  Anyway, today I woke up, ate pancakes, went to work, and then got home and, whoops, it wasn’t Sunday anymore by the clock.  To be fair, I got up at noon.  But I worked last night, and it was a super rough one.  I don’t even know what time I got to bed.  But my alarm was set for noon.

I’m working on my other serial project.  Skyland, the first draft, is done and edited.  Now, I just need to revise it.  I think I’m going to wait until I finish the other books to do this.  But I’ve got a lot of expansion to do on it.  It’s going to end up being a lot bigger.  I still think I’ll keep it as the first book in the series, instead of breaking it into two, because I’m really trying to make them stand alone books in addition to fitting in the bigger picture.

I’m getting closer to being done with Wind Chasers, book two in the series.  (names of books will likely change).  I hit a snag because I couldn’t find my theme, and I didn’t know my character.  After some soul searching, and a little tweaking what I had already written, I found her voice.  I like her much better now, and the story has more structure.  It’s coming together.  When I can find the time to write, that is.

I’ve started reading a few new books.  One of them is Physics of the Future.  (I really thought it was The Future of Physics for a moment. Thanks Dyslexia! the real title makes a lot more sense.)  The book has already spawned a few new novel ideas.

I’ve struggled a lot with time management this past month.  Work is just so hard.  Not trying to complain, but geez, it’s draining.  I get so tired.  The house was a mess all month, the dog is half, no, all the way crazy now.  I was for a while too.   I was getting really anxious.  I feared it would take over me.

But, I started taking a new medication.  It’s Buspar.  It’s made life so much better.  I can focus again.  I get up in the almost morning and do some chores.  It’s helping me make better decisions.  I did stop at the grocery store and buy a whole cake tonight (only ate a piece), but hey, I earned it! lol  I also got some Valium, which helps me when I’m super stressed.  If you have chronic anxiety, you know how difficult it can be to get to the doctor and/or ask for medicine.  Bonus if you’re broke and uninsured.  But it’s so great when get over that hump and get the help.  It’s amazing how different, how much in general better, I feel.  I feel functional again.

With that, hopefully I can get back on track.  And, with my job giving me a little unasked for, possibly scare money wise, free time, I can put more time into writing.

My goals for the immediate future include:

Getting Otherworlders released this summer.  I’m 80% sure I’m going to self-publish.  It’s getting a final spelling/grammar scrub from a third party right now.  I still entertain ideas of shopping it to agents, but we’ll see if I have the time.  I struggle with it, though.  I think it’s good.  The story, premise, and all is great.  But I’ve grown so much as a writer since I finished it.   I know it’s not my best work.  But is anything that isn’t the most current thing ever any of our best work?  The goal is to get better, to evolve, to find a voice and a style.  If everything I write is the best thing I’ve ever written, then by definition, anything that came before isn’t as good.  So, I’m going to put it out into the world, and hope that it is good.  Just, different then what I do now.

Flash Fictions:  I want to compile 50 of my flash fictions into an ebook.  Mostly, so I can release it as an Audible book.  I have to go through them, edit, arrange, audition… so it’ll be a little while before it comes out.  Hopefully not too long.

Skyland:  Still trying to work out a title for the series.  I want this out by the end of summer.  Ambitious.  But that pretty much sums me up.

That is all the updates I can think of at the moment.  Thanks for reading.  I know it was a lot of words, and probably a bit of rambling.