I saw this on Jenny Rappaport's blog earlier today. I have to say Dr Horrible's Sing-along blog is well worth the watch. I am officially hooked and must tune in tomorrow to see how it turns out. You won't want to miss this; appparently they'll take it down on the 20th.
PS.(PG material in Act II)
I've been busy cleaning house this week--tackling jobs I've been avoiding, and rearranging furniture, and bugging my husband to help with the jobs I can't reach. For this to happen, there's either got be some huge event on the horizon, like either the rapture or my mother coming for a visit. Or I've simply reach the limit of my tolerance. This week, it's the latter.
A long time ago I concluded my life as a wife and mother would be about more than cleaning, that I wanted to do more than worry about ring around the toilet (or was that collar?). So I tend to ignore dust unless we have company coming or I have a kid wandering around with nothing to do (and is foolish enough to say so). I'm pretty uptight about the kitchen and bathroom being clean for obvious reasons. I don't want animals in bedrooms (though, in truth, they wind up there sometimes despite my efforts). There is zen in the midst of clutter, you just have to know how to not look at it (or trip over it).
My other goal is to teach the boys to do for themselves. Here's why: When the boys were little, our minister stated in a sermon on parenting that mothers should stop themselves before they pick up behind their small children and ask the question, "Do I want to be right here doing this same thing again tomorrow?" If the answer is no, the mother should go get the child (and this may mean calling them in from play) and have them do it for themselves. He went on to point out how life lessons begin with small gestures such as cleaning up one's own messes. I agree.
The other thing driving me is living with a man whose mother did everything for him while he was growing up, up to and including picking out his clothes for him until he was a junior in high school. He never washed a dish, made a bed, did laundry, or swept a floor. Fortunately the Marines got to him before I did, so most of the groundwork was laid for me by the time we got married, but afterwards, he made it clear through gestures (or lack thereof) that he expected what his mother had done for him to continue.
He should have picked door number two. This model came with a word processor, not a vacuum.
Fortunately, he caught on fast. And the good news is, he doesn't much care how I keep house, so if I want to write all day, or play in the garden, or simply hang out with the boys, he's good with that. The bad news is he doesn't care if he adds to the mess or not and he's totally oblivious to the messes the boys make unless I complain. To his credit, he has learned to cook which is great, but now I live with a food critic. (More on that another time)
So for lots of psychological and physiological reasons, housekeeping and cooking are a community affair here. The boys more or less clean their own rooms twice a week--with a lot of nagging from me and an occasional deep cleaning. They have a bathroom of their own that I only venture into when I have to, but once a week I send someone in with a mop and cleaning supplies to clean it up (They prefer "my" bathroom--gee I wonder why?). Everybody takes turns doing dishes, helps with laundry, sweeping, and vacuuming, mowing the lawn, and caring for the animals. This means that I get to settle for less than perfect until they master how to do it right or until I decide that it needs more attention than they've given it.
What I'm hoping for is men who are good roommates and husbands, who don't see housekeeping as women's work, who are more aware of living in their own filth than many of the guys they'll be going to college with. I want my daughter-in-laws to tell me "Thank you for making this easier." (Instead of what I wanted to say to my mother-in-law)
But I'm also hoping the message will extend itself to other parts of their lives. That they'll be more inclined to contribute to society, to do their part of the "housekeeping" as it were, more or less as that minister said.
I'll let you know in ten years whether it works or not.
It's moving along well, though the word count is lower than I care for at this stage (just past 30,000). My daily average is down at the moment, but it's steady and moving forward.
My ongoing concern has been that it's moving along too fast and that the word count won't be high enough. Willows Blood has been more action-packed than the first book was, probably because I know the characters so well. Gary sneaked in and read it the other day when I wandered away to make coffee and he said that he likes the way I've taken my foot off the brakes. His biggest complaint has always been that I'm too restrained as a writer. Literary roots showing, I suppose.
The villain has been a lot of fun to write. There's no secret about who she is, just whether or not she'll be thwarted in time to save the victim(s). So painting her in all her evil shades of nastiness has allowed me to unleash my gift for writing about creepy things. Supernatural bad guys--or gals in this case--are fun.
No word from agents, by the way. I'm beginning to wonder if they even got my e-mails or (worse) they sent responses and I didn't get them. I'm hesitant to contact them this soon so I guess I'll be a good girl and sit tight a little longer. I did send a follow up on one that's been out since early March. Meanwhile I did find another agent that I'm going to contact by mail this week. This waiting part of being a writer really, really sucks, by the way. In case I haven't mentioned it before.
