Author's Nightmare

I wake up from a dream about holding my first published book and breathe a huge sigh of relief. Thank goodness it was just a dream! My subconscious is completely weird. For one thing, I'm holding the book and making all kinds of edits to it--needed edits--then realize I'm screwed because this is the real thing, the published book. The cover gives me a co-author. Now, I co-authored a book with my critique partner years ago, but my CP has a normal, English-sounding name, not a name out of the Prague telephone book, all consonants and diacritical marks. To top it all off, my author bio was for someone else. So not only is the story bad and the book's parentage in question, no reader who likes it will have any idea what I'm actually like.

Please tell me real publishing is not at all like this...

What Bug Did I Kill in a Previous Life? or, Why I Still Don't Have Hot Water

Today, DH and I get cranky with the Home Depot install crew that was supposed to install our new hot water heater "same day" yesterday. They claim they called yesterday before lunch to apprise us of some City code-upgrade requirements, blah blah blah. Whatever, doofuses. Explain to me how calling the manager of our local Home Depot store qualifies as contacting us?

So this morning I call and chew out the installers. They promise to call DH and have it in this evening. That is, they'll have it in this evening as long as we rip the utility sink or the storage cabinet off the wall, otherwise it'll cost us $70 more than the estimate (and that's on top of the surprise $70 it'll take to bring the sucker up to City code). Fine, I say, deal with the husband. Just don't act surprised when he excavates a new orifice in your body.

Call DH after my workshop ends, he says installers will be here this evening between 5 and 9. Hot water is apparently in my future! Huzzah!

Oh, how easily led I am. This evening shows up. So does an installer. Installer claims we have a bad valve letting water into the water heater. Won't go near it with the torch unless we can cut the water off to the house entirely. DH and installer go outside. Cannot cut off water. Cannot locate valve to cut off water, despite several whacks at various water-looking pieces of equipment. Installer says, "Sorry, Charlie, call the installers again. See ya!" Packs new water heater back onto truck, heads into sunset.

I now have the following:

1. Busted water heater that's still leaking all over the floor
2. Washing machine in the middle of my laundry room
3. Utility sink in the middle of my garage
4. No hot water
5. A serious case of the red ass, as I must wash my hair tomorrow morning and despise cold showers
   

I take kids to have dinner with a friend of mine. When I get back, DH informs me that valve to turn off water to house is right where Installer Man was fiddling, claiming he couldn't find valve to turn off water to house. I would find this funny, except that I'm looking down the barrel of a freezing cold shower in the morning and no guarantee that the installer men will finally finish climbing out of their clown car and install the damned thing tomorrow.

I am repaying some bizarro karmic debt, I just know. I'd better get my behind to yoga class on Sunday, or something in my house might explode. Please, God, don't let it be the A/C...

Insult Added to Injury

Day 2 of workshop. Same as Day 1, different presenter. I have now heard the same information FOUR TIMES. I think I get it. I do have a college degree. Two, in fact.

Grr.

Our hot water heater is peeing all over our laundry room floor. It's been like this for a while, and we can't do much about it, since teachers have NO money at the end of the summer. So we slog through wet, do lots of mopping, and forget to turn the hot water back on so we can shower with some temperature. It will cost in excess of $500 to put a new water heater in, what with installation and permitting. Permitting?! Yes. Apparently, a water heater requires a permit. Installation and permitting cost more than the freakin' heater itself.

Double grr.

I am so going to need Happy Hour on Friday.

I Suck Redux

Today I spent yet another day out of the classroom at a State workshop on how to do my job better. According to the official line, if I don't have student achievement at 98% on our state test or higher for every kid in every class, I am ineffective.

I would rant about the overall injustice of such an approach--I am, after all, human, as are the children in my classroom--but doing so just makes me look bad. Therefore, I sucketh.

*sigh*

I'm ready to go back to my classroom. At least there I get the feeling I'm doing something right.

The Bed List/The Dinner List

One superhero and one spy. Of sorts.

BED LIST: CHRISTIAN BALE



If I knew how to type out a growling noise, I would type out a growling noise. Dang, that's pretty. It's also talented and the latest to fill out the Batsuit (and quite well, I might add). This guy's a real chameleon, going from Little Women to American Psycho to A Midsummer Night's Dream to The Machinist, and getting us to buy all of those roles. And he's hot. And check out that six pack! Unfortunately, scrunching down to the bottom of the picture won't show you anything else. I know. I tried.

DINNER LIST: MIKE MYERS



Austin Powers is not my idea of a dream date, but I'd love to spend an evening with Mike Myers. He's goofy (Wayne's World, anyone?), very smart, does a wicked Scottish accent thanks to growing up with a Scottish father, and nice. He is, after all, Canadian. Yeah, baby!!

One Down, 179 to Go

First day of school today. Took the traditional first day picture of my gorgeous kids in their first day outfits, packed them in the car at the ungodly hour of 6:30 am, trundled them (and dumped them) to the elementary school, then hightailed it to my school for the 7:20 bell.

Bad news--the air's not working. I cannot stress enough the vital importance of air conditioning at a Florida school in August. Hey, if I'd wanted a facial, I'd have made an appointment. My makeup was history by the end of second period. You should have heard the sigh when I got in the car and its A/C was working. Ran the sucker full blast all the way home.

Good news--lots of kids showed up. First day attendance was much better than last year's. Admin's taking a hard line on kids who have hardly any GPA and fewer credits--no matter how bad they want to graduate with our school's name on their diploma or certificate of completion (hey, don't pass FCAT in Florida, don't even think about a diploma), they won't be doing it with us. Especially if they're, say, 19 or 20. Good for admin!

Kids were nice. The usual first day "deer in the headlights" look, of course. I talked and talked and talked and talked. I usually run my mouth a lot during the first week. After that, things calm down and we can have a normal class.

Get home, kids had a good day. I have a splitting headache. My feet hurt. My head hurts. I get the kids in the bed at 9:30 and crash myself. I am so lame.

Then the dog wakes me up at 3:24 am, but that's another story...

Marianne's Fire Fund

Marianne Mancusi, all-around fun gal and the author of A Connecticut Fashionista in King Arthur's Court, came home from the RWA Conference to discover that the cottage where she was living was struck by lightning and burned to the ground. Completely. As in, everything she owned that wasn't in her conference luggage is gone.

Some writers from the various chick lit loops are offering some great items on eBay to help Marianne. I'm donating a complete copyedit of a proposal, so check it out. Lots of fun stuff to bid on, including critiques from top agents and authors like Michelle Cunnah, Suzanne Brockmann, Jenny Crusie, Melissa Senate, Diedre Knight, Steve Axelrod, and more. Go ye forth and bid generously here.

The Bed List/The Dinner List

Have you missed me? Couldn't post this from Reno last week, so no bed or dinner companions for me. Boo, hiss. I'm trying to get back in the groove this week, so bear with me here...

BED LIST: RICK ROSSOVICH



Some friends and I were dissecting Tom Cruise and his recent swerve to the weird side of the road during the RWA Conference, when someone mentioned Top Gun and we all went crazy. Ah, yes, Top Gun--especially the beach volleyball scene. The second I laid eyes on Rick Rossovich, aka "Slider," toothy Tom got kicked off the libido wagon. Rick played the buff boyfriend who took on the Terminator and lost, and also played Tag, the cute doctor Julianna Margulies ditched for Dr. Ross on ER all those years ago. My favorite role of Rick's, though, is the eye candy fireman in Roxanne, one of the best romantic comedies ever. "Because I was afraid of worms, Roxanne, worms!!" Get it from Netflix. You'll see.

DINNER LIST: PETER BOYLE



Four words: "Puttin' on da Riiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiitz!!!"
If you've ever seen Young Frankenstein, you're laughing your butt off right now. Peter Boyle is a comic genius, not to mention a very smart man with hidden depths. Did you know he once planned to be a monk? Seems a bit of a shift to go from a vow of poverty and celibacy to playing Frank Barone in Everybody Loves Raymond, but there you have it. Peter Boyle, man of many faces. As Frank would say, "Holy crap!!"

Priorities, Schmiorities

Today I have a long talk with a parent who's concerned that Darling Dearest may have bitten off more than could be chewed with two AP courses and a spot on a varsity team. Is thinking of dropping AP. We talk, I pitch, parent agrees to keep kid in class. Good for kid. Good for parent.

I relate the saga to a colleague and she says, "So why wasn't parent in the coach's office saying 'Basketball may interfere with my kid's two AP courses'?"

Good point.

Back to School

Back to school today. Totally different atmosphere from the RWA Conference. I'm feeling a tad schizophrenic right now. Am I writer? Teacher? Harried mom? Whatever the case, I'm busy as hell and realizing that my bad summer habit of staying up late and sleeping in is going to bite me in the ass for the next couple of weeks, especially considering that my school district has moved the start times for high school back 25 minutes. Kids need more time in class, dontcha know.

I'm starting the year with no roommate--my beloved Mel gave birth to twins over the summer and won't be coming back, sob!--and praying my new officemate is cool, or at least workable. I'm back to an AP/senior class schedule again, which is less stress on me (good, as I need to kick the writing into a higher gear). Lots of organizing and decorating this week.

I love the first week of school. The floors are so shiny. Everyone's energized. The year is perched on the lip of Plato's Cave, all perfect in its anticipatory state (I haven't had time to screw it up yet). This will be fun.