Friday Fun

We've reached Friday which means we're almost into the weekend!

Yes! Carry me off into the weekend!

Woo!

Let's get it started with our usual fun!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Awesome dollhouse

 

 

 

Thanks to Michael Offut for the video

Insecure Writer's Support Group

First Wednesday of the month, which means it's time for Insecure Writer's Support Group.

So.  Last week I finished my final revisions on my YA fantasy WIP ALL THAT REMAINS.

It was a straight push through to finish them up and I'd say it took a good five hours to finish them. But I did.

Part of what motivated me to get them all done in one day was that I told myself I was allowed to send out a test query if I finished them.

And I did. I actually sent out two test queries, because why not? I'd been good.

So as of last week I officially started querying ATR. And as of last week querying has officially been going well.

It's funny. I've queried two other novels before. And you'd think by this point it'd be easier. And it really is in some ways, but writing up that first query, throwing in the sample pages, checking the sub guidelines one more time and then hovering over the SEND button--well, that apparently doesn't get easier. At least, not for the first couple of queries, anyway.

I try not to get anxious or nervous about it. I know once I start working on my next WIP (which is in the planning stage. Hopefully won't be too long before I can break it out) it will get a lot easier. But until that happens I'm just as anxious as I was during my first querying journey. Maybe more so, because the first time, you don't really know how long replies take. And the third time, you know which agents are likely to request from you, or to reject you, and how long it often takes.

Which means a lot of checking Gmail. Over and over and over again. Even on weekends, when it's rare to get a query response.

So, yeah. Turns out that even when you're an old hand at it, querying can still dredge up emotions. Even unexpectedly.

How about you? Any of you in the query boat?

In Which I Got Book Happy... Or Something

So as I briefly mentioned last Thursday, my laptop is busted (has a virus or something). And until I can afford to get it fixed (hopefully my next paycheck) I'm stuck working on my netbook. Which normally wouldn't be a problem, except that my stupid MS Office starter stopped working so I had to shell out the cash for MS Office for my netbook (which further delayed the laptop fix)

Anyway, I normally do a lot of my blog surfing and all my blog writing with my laptop, so being forced to do it on my netbook is a pain in the ass.

But here I am, carving out some time, trying to catch up on writing some posts.

But, if I'm behind on your blogs, please know that that's the reason why, and not because I'm ignoring you or anything. I actually miss you quite a bit. You know who you are.

On a completely unrelated note, I saw that Allie Brosh's, from Hyperbole and a Half, book: Hyperbole and a Half: Unfortunate Situations, Flawed Coping Mechanisms, Mayhem, and Other Things That Happened released on Tuesday. I was so excited that I went and ordered it right away.

The email said it would arrive on Friday, so I was patiently waiting when, TADA! It actually showed up on Thursday, a day early.

Nice.

But, imagine my surprise when I got a package in the mail on... Friday. And it was the same book.

Conclusion: I guess I preordered the book way back when, forgot I had done so, and then ordered a new copy. So now I have two.

Luckily the Bro said he would pay for the second copy, which is good.


Am I the only one who's ever done this? I hope not... Please tell me I'm not alone in this...

In Which It's Halloween!

Hi all! Laptop is busted right now, which means blog posts are a bit of a PITA to write, but here's a little Halloween video to cheer you up on this spookiest of holidays.

 

In Which I'm On Vacay

Hey all! I'm on vacay this week, so no posts!

See you all when I get back (and get down to some serious work).

Until then, imagine me like this:

Friday Fun

Hi ape-friends!

Baby picture of meeee!

Yvie here to launch you into the weekend with a dose of Friday fun!

Let's get this weekend started!



 

  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Wednesday Weird: The Sunken Skulls

In 2009 archaeologists were excavating the dry bed of a prehistoric lake in Motala, Sweden. And because this is Wednesday Weird you know that had to find something. And they did. The foundation of a mysterious stone structure.

Okay, so not too crazy. They are archaeologists, after all. They had to be digging for something.
So they kept digging and began to unearth even more finds: stone tools and animal bones.

Oh, also, the skulls of 10 people.

Ranging in age from small children to the elderly, the 8,000 year old skulls were an anomaly.

Oh, and did I say 10 skulls? I actually meant 11, because they found another one buried deep in the mud. And buried in that skull was pieces of one of the other skulls, deliberately embedded inside the head of the 11th skull.

So, either someone put pieces of a head inside another head, or someone used a head to bash in someone else's head. Neither option sounds, you know, great.

But that wasn't all. Some of the skulls had had stakes driven through them before they were set on fire. Two of the skulls were actually found with the stakes still embedded in (or in one case, melted to) the bone.

There are multiple theories for this find, from war trophies to strange funerary practices, and each one holds as much weight as the next because no one really knows what the structure was, or what the deal is with the skulls.