Monday, August 9, 2010

On The Road Monday


Okay, today I am on the road coming home from my visit to my Dad. We had a great time and I enjoyed my visit with my family immensely. We weren’t able to get up there the whole year. We’d tried at Christmas but the snow storms heading in made us rethink our decision.

Now a friend and I had managed to breeze through in June when we took some things up to her son in Montana. That was a trip as we did 2300 miles in three days. Yeah, we basically started at around noon on a Friday and was home by Monday late evening. We had a great time but the whole thing was very, very rushed.

I was wonderfully surprised by the weather this time in Idaho. We had a wonderful cool streak which is apparently rare for Idaho Falls and August. My husband and I got to do morning walks though he added a run to his exercise as well. The only bad thing about the trip has been the fact we had to leave our puppy home. But he needs more socialization as well as training before we make the family deal with him on anywhere but his own home turf.


Today, I had originally planned to have a wonderful steampunk excerpt for you from a great new author. Unfortunately, it’s at home on my other computer. When I went to look for it, I was severely bummed as I had really wanted to post it. Have you ever had that moment right before you realize you’ve forgotten something very important? I got that this morning as I ran through all the spots I might have saved it on my travel machine. Ugh, it wasn’t there and I just had to come up with something new and fresh.

Now, I have a lot of fresh ideas but most of them have to do with my writing. Again, I have been pleasantly surprised as my idea file filled up even more and stories I’d been plotting on for months, who had run into dead ends, have gotten some new life after this trip. Yeah, team Lynn! One of the hardest things a writer can do is to not come up with new and fresh ideas. This can be frustrating and downright disheartening for those who need the ideas to flow so they can be creative.

I will never have the idea problem as I’ve said before. Maybe I should auction some of those ideas off as I have way too many to ever write. And that would include me being able to do a short every couple of days to finish all those ideas. I usually go sifting through those ideas once a month or so to see if something is calling me as I do finish a story once a month. It’s the editing and fixing and cleaning up that’s the problem.

I write fast and I write ugly but when I edit I am through. I try to get everything my critique partners tell me is wrong fixed then I run it through my own special brand of cleaning. This involves a whole set of rules and highlights and other things I run the finished product through. I can take almost a week, sometimes more to get the work into shape for me to turn into my publisher. Then there is their rounds of edits. It’s a thorough process which produces some good work.


Again, I’ve put in pictures throughout this blog of Idaho and the places I’ve been on this and precious trips. What are some of your best memories of vacations? Long or short…a vacation should be a restful experience…LOL! Have you ever had those trips where you need a vacation from the vacation? Let me know some of those and the one who gives me the best story will get an extra five entries into this month’s drawing!

See you all tomorrow with that steampunk excerpt. Have a great Monday!


Lynn

2 comments:

  1. I went to Seattle on vacation once and spent the entire time with the flu. When I got back I was magically cured! Needless to say my vacation sucked and I wanted a do-over.

    yadkny@hotmail.com

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  2. Lynn,
    These pictures are beautiful.
    Only vacation I ever wanted a vacation from was while visiting my son in Minnesota. My daughter and I went by Greyhound bus.My son is in Special Forces and the military in him comes across constantly. Everything is done in precision time, showers, meals, dressing and especially time slots. Two days in I told him he was nuts if he thought I was going to vacay on Military time or orders and I was the Mother and to knock it off. He did after opening his mouth in shock and then laughed and apologized. Then on the way home it was a hell. We had to get our luggage and change buses 4 times and missed our food stops. To make a long story short I wouldn't go on a Greyhound bus if I were dying. lol lol I wrote and told them about the return trip from hell and they sent me a letter thanking me because it was info liked that that helped them better their business. Nuts..
    We actually collapsed for two days when we got home. lol
    Carol L.
    Lucky4750@aol.com

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