Anti-Resistance Thursday

Brought to you today by way too much sugar from yesterday's festivities.

Resistance is fear. But Resistance is too cunning to show itself naked in this form. Why? Because if Resistance lets us see clearly that our own fear is preventing us from doing our work, we may feel shame at this. And shame may drive us to act in the face of fear.

Resistance doesn't want us to do this. So it brings in rationalization. Rationalization is Resistance's spin doctor. It's Resistance's way of hiding the Big Stick behind its back. Instead of showing us our fear (which might shame us and impel us to do our work), Resistance presents us with a series of plausible, rational justifications for why we shouldn't do our work.

Get ready, get set, go NanoWrimo!

Thus why this is short. I'm writing.

Now playing on the iPod: Teardrop (Massive Attack)

Happy Halloween!

This day is going to be so much fun! We're both working from home today, and eating candy. I'm working hard with job stuff because we have a huge deadline on Friday. Plus, I'm writing! Today is the final day of my first novel writing contest and tomorrow starts Nano! So nothing much in my schedule will change.

I also need to run to the store and pick up some fresh dinner rolls because I figure that tonight is the night we also need a huge roast/potatoes dinner. So we invited a buddy of ours over to help eat it.

Just a quick thought from my writing today. I got going on a scene yesterday that involves the main character and her coworker eating an entire cake during their work shift. The scene was supposed to be a light-hearted look at their friendship and a turning point to the affect of their fathers' friendship on their lives (their fathers knew each other since childhood).

I had an idea of what I wanted to say and how I was going to say it when suddenly the entire scene changed. I often hear writers say their characters take control and do their own thing, but what really happens is that the story opens up to the writer in a new way and it's totally obvious that the character has to go there. A flexible writer trashes her original plans and follows the story opening. This can be done when the story is planned well and has good structure.

Often times, however, I have to control my whim to follow a story as it opens up in order to make sure it's really the right way. It's a delicate process and one that I'm enjoying learning very much.

Have a great day with your family and friends!

Playing on the iPod: Thriller (Michael Jackson) (yes, I'm a child of the 80s and this is the quintessential Halloween song)

Gadget Girl Tuesday

I'm a bit late updating this blog today because I babysat for my neighbors overnight and we got to telling knock-knock jokes over breakfast. :) I love kids telling jokes. Cracks me up!

In today's Gadget Girl update, I thought everyone would like to get a great refresher for Microsoft Outlook: Erik Sherman's Blog.

Two other items of note are that if you don't use QUICKSILVER on a Mac or Easy Reach finder (formerly Enfish) on your PC, you are missing out. These programs index everything on your computers for easy retrieval. QUICKSILVER has changed my life. And it's free! (Yet another reason to just buy the Mac.)

I am going to keep this post short as I am off to finish up several projects for my job and later, to write, write, write!

Playing on the iPod: In My Arms (Plumb)

Monday Fiction Book Rec

So, while browsing at the bookstore last week, I remembered I had a reading list from some author buddies of mine and on the list and on the table in front of me was Irene Nemirosky's Suite Francaise, a literary novel telling the events of Nazi-occupied France in 1940 and 1941. However, this novel was written by a woman who actually lived there during those years and who later died in Auschwitz. This novel, handwritten in a notebook, was in the possession of her daughter for over 50 years before being published to great acclaim in France in 2004.

According to Wikipedia,

"Némirovsky's surviving notes sketch a general outline of a story arc that was intended to include the two existing novellas, as well as three more to take place later during the war and at its end. She wrote that the rest of the work was "in limbo, and what limbo! It's really in the lap of the gods since it depends on what happens."

In a January 2006 interview with the BBC, her daughter, Denise, said, "For me, the greatest joy is knowing that the book is being read. It is an extraordinary feeling to have brought my mother back to life. It shows that the Nazis did not truly succeed in killing her. It is not vengeance, but it is a victory."

I have only just begun Suite Francaise, but I'm excited to read the book and I plan to pick up the other novel by Nemirovsky that was recently translated and published earlier this year, Fire in the Blood.

I'll let you know what I think.

Playing on the iPod: City (Sara Bareilles)