Thursday, September 30, 2010

Concert Adventures

Two years ago, I asked my husband to attend an event in New Orleans called Jazzfest. My favorite band was slated to play on a Saturday night. If you've ever been to or heard about Jazzfest, you know there are many bands playing for several days on end. I was only interested in one band, Kings of Leon (KOL). Before making the decision to drive for an entire day just to attend a concert, my husband made quite a few jokes about us being too old to attend concerts. Phooey, I said. I'm going...get your walker ready.

When we arrived at Jazzfest, we were expecting a younger crowd. To our surprise, there were quite a few attendees who may have actually needed a walker. At Jazzfest, there are stages set up around a huge fairground and you can enter with your ticket and then choose your stage. We arrived early to get a good spot in the stage area for KOL. In walking to the appropriate stage area, we noticed a HUGE crowd at the stage waiting for Bon Jovi's performance. The crowd consisted of a lot of women my age. I love Bon Jovi, but I was not to be sidetracked.

This was an outdoor concert with standing room on the grass. I was smashed between about 5,000 teenagers, but I had vowed to ignore them. I had a right to be there. And I wasn't about to give my husband the pleasure of an "I told you so". I held onto this thought while the young man next to me urinated into a soda bottle to avoid losing his spot in the crowd.

A couple of weeks ago, I discovered that KOL would be doing a concert in St. Louis. That's a 6 hour drive for us. AND there were seats available. So, I bought tickets for seats in Row N at the Verizon Wireless Amphitheater. I didn't take my purse with a camera or my iphone with me to the concert. I figured I'd be lucky to see them, much less take pictures. We had seats at ROW N, lower center. The seats were great. I was kicking my camera-less self the entire time. AND people my age were there. The teenagers were also well represented.

Upon arriving home, I noticed that my back was hurting. Heck. My entire body hurt. The following day, I visited the chiropractor. And again on Wednesday. And another visit planned for Friday. The dentist visit this week revealed a need for a root canal (had that on Wed) and a new crown on that same tooth. My memories of the fun concert are a blur. I may need a walker for that next concert.

Sunday, September 19, 2010

Glutton for Punishment

I wonder sometimes if I've gone mental. I just joined the NaNoWriMo challenge (National Novel Writing Month). I would hear writer friends talk about this activity, and I was curious enough to check out the website a few months ago. Basically, a person accepts the challenge to write a complete novel in one month. So, this November, I will be holed up in my dining room typing as fast as possible during the wee hours of the night. And weekends. And mornings.

The novel must be at least 50,000 words long to be considered, well, a novel. Let's do the math. That means it will be necessary to log 1,666 words a day. **whistle** I normally do most of my writing on the weekends, but I can see that two days a week won't cut it.

You might think, hmmm... what about the quality of this piece of work? Here's the amazing thing. Some writers have published some pretty good works from engaging in this challenge. Sara Gruen wrote Water for Elephants during NaNoWriMo. That alone is enough to inspire me since I loved that book.

The rules say that you cannot begin writing before November 1, but you can have your plot ideas ready. The website says that you get support from other participants in your area. For the piece de resistence, you get a web badge when you finish. We all love to get a memento that says, "Yes, I did it!" Let's also not forget that you end with A COMPLETED NOVEL. I'm ready.

Wednesday, September 15, 2010

Reuniting with My Husband

It's official. We're getting back together for the fall season of television. After a couple of months of HBO and reruns for me and golf and fishing for him, we will be reuniting for television. Well, we weren't really separated. It's just that the summer takes us in different directions. But this is a sport pasttime we can share. I'm happy to say that we'll be watching Survivor tonight. I may need to cheat and bring my laptop along. Are there any shows that you are excited about seeing when September rolls around?

(Writing update: still making edits to the manuscript and sent out three queries this month. Received two rejections so far... more queries planned.)

Saturday, September 4, 2010

Trailer Time

Last month, I was able to take an online course on making book trailers. The course was great for the beginner. I'm not a newbie when it comes to Movie Maker, and I'm excited about working on a book trailer for The Waiting Booth. One class participant asked if an author should develop a trailer for an unpublished manuscript. The response was that it might be better to focus on other activities to get that book deal before spending time on a trailer. Oh well. I did get a swift rejection this week from the query I sent out. I guess I don't need to start a trailer yet. In the meantime, here is a trailer for one of my favorite reads from this summer. Beautiful Creatures is from the YA genre. I think they did a great job!