Working Wednesday, June 26, 2019

~ Jenny

So you may have noticed that most of the blog disappeared.  It’s actually still here, it’s just all in draft form now.  There was so much miscellaneous stuff on here, much of it interesting-in-the-moment and then not so much, and all of it needing organized and tagged and linked.  So I put it all back into draft form with the idea of slowly cleaning it up and putting only some of it back. A cleaner, better organized archive, if you will.   If there’s anything you particularly want. to see reinstated, let me know, but since I highly doubt anybody spends much time reading blog posts from 2005, I’m assuming most of you don’t care. 

So how did you work this week?

66 thoughts on “Working Wednesday, June 26, 2019”

  1. I’ve actually been going back over a lot of earlier posts recently. I’ve found the ones on writing the various books you’ve been working on, particularly going back to the inception of Nita, to be fascinating. It’s been really interesting to see where stuff came from, knowing where it’s going to.

    1. So much of that is just disorganized. I’ll do a search for each book and see if I can get that stuff linked/tagged/organized so it’s easier to get to.

      Of course, a lot of it is just me bitching, too. Nobody needs that. Considering there are over 200 Nita posts, organization is key.

  2. I’ve been working on multiple projects, although none are anywhere near finished. Saturday, I helped with a charity event, using a long arm and quilting 6 quilts in three hours. Afterwards, I spent some time on making pices for my nephew’s big boy quilt. There is a new baby coming. His mom sent a picture of him in his favorite outfit of spiderman pjs and yellow rainbows, so I’m making a spiderman quilt for him.

    The trio blanket is coming along. But I couldn’t take it with me on the plane so I started a shawl. No pictures of either.

    I do have a picture of the passion flower vine. It is a close up of one flower, covered in bumblebees. They love that thing.

  3. (I’m new to blog so ‘Hi!’)

    Editing photos. I haven’t edited any since my fourth was born. And she’s now nine. Taking one photo where all four kids look at the camera takes about fifty shots so…
    Managed to get from over 10,000 down to 4,000 which is about 400/ year now on file. I can live with that.
    Now to do the littlest’s baby book before she develops Fourth Child Complex!
    Karen (Scotland)

    2. Hi, Karen (Scotland)! Our son is the last of three. His baby book is so skinny compared to his sisters! I always feel bad about that. Too late to fix it though – he’s 21! 🙂

    3. Welcome! I have three younger brothers, and there are about a gazillion pix of me (mostly taken by my grandparents of the first grandkid), then a few hundred of my next two brothers (after my grandparents passed on), and I think exactly three of my youngest brother, when my parents were just exhausted from three baby boys under age four. They’re all pre-digital, so my mother eventually made albums with them, and mine was encyclopedia sized, while my youngest bro was basically a tri-fold pamphlet.

      1. My Dad shipped out (WWII) shortly after my oldest brother was born so my Mom sent wads of pictures chasing after him throughout the South Pacific. For those of us born after he returned, there are fewer pictures with every kid. Then I decided I didn’t like having my picture taken (it would take forever to wrangle the 5 of us) and refused to participate. So there aren’t many pictures of me after third or fourth grade.

      2. We probably have many more pics of our older than our younger. Fortunately for me my husband took so many pics in general that I don’t think he has any way to compare.

        But I really should organize them.

    4. Same here-I’m the eldest so mine’s pretty thorough, my tw younger sisters’ not so much!

      1. I’m the eldest, so there are more pictures of me, but sadly, many of them are…unfortunate. (I apparently went through a stage when I wouldn’t let my mother comb my hair. Which led to the stage where my hair got completely chopped off. Neither of which were good looks for me.)

  4. I’m good, thanks. Any posts way back in the past that I found particularly useful and informative, I downloaded and saved to my Writing Advice files.

  5. Organized is good as long as everything is still there (in an archive for example). I do occasionally search for things I remember reading, so I may in fact sometimes read posts from 2005.

  6. I reread a lot of writing craft. I know I’ve gone back to the turning points one from somewhere in 2010 a lot. Any of the house renovation /cleanup posts. Animal posts and Random Sundays for the laughs.

  8. I love anything on how to write. I’ve been meaning to start making a “Jenny Says” file, but have been lazy, so that might just have bitten me in the butt.

    I like the analyses of things like Leverage. The way you pick apart the story is helpful, interesting and illuminating.

    I love any with story snippets. I rememeber the post you did where it was some of every WIP you had. That was great!

    Beyond that, sometimes I fall behind and go back a month and read what I missed, so maybe recent blog posts just for being recent.

    And in working news, just got back from the official vacation. Chilling at home a bit before returning to work. I scanned about 3/4 of grandma’s pics and returned the lot. That was a fabulous thing to get off my chest. I’m going to finish a border on a blanket, and that’ll be done – about 10 months of work since I’m a slow crocheter. I just bought the pattern I’m going to start for my momma, https://www.hookedcreation.com/Safe-in-my-Trunk-SC-Single-Crochet-Twin-Blanket-Graphghan-Crochet-Pattern–PDF-Download_p_559.html and that will take bloody forever. She thankfully decided on the twin size over king, since she ultimately wanted a throw. Otherwise, I’m doing two stash busters, one of which is simple but I keep accidentally pulling out stitches when I move the project, so no progress, and the other I need to figure out how to do. I shall perhaps throw pictures up somewhere soon, since I don’t have an instagram account.

    And thassit! I really wanna start recording audiobooks and the like, and I have the basic equipment. The original plan was to start the steps this week since vacation, but I’m feeling like crafting… and maybe working with pastels. It’s so nice to have a staycation!

    1. He’s lovely, Sure Thing! I always thought agility would be so much fun to do, so when we got our pup three years ago I started taking classes. We’re just hobbyists, though – she likes to do the tricks but has no real drive to compete. And neither do I! 🙂

  10. I find the problem with being a reader and developing a love for a particular author’s style and stories is this: I can read a book faster than anyone can write one. So this blog has been useful to me as a Jenny fix; I’ve recently reread everything. The craft essays are especially helpful as I struggle with the albatross that I’ve had around my neck for nearly three years. So please keep those! Thanks for this site, and all of you for commenting.

  11. I am Dealing With It. But enough about me.

    Take your years of blogging exactly as they are and Publish Them. I don’t know how many times or how many people to whom I have said, “Jennifer Crusie? If she published her shopping list, I’d buy it!” I’m willing to bet I’m not the only one.

    I understand that there might be copyright concerns with using other people’s comments. I don’t recall there being a notice that any comments become the property of the author (better add one now, if not). In any case, you are welcome to use anything I’ve typed.

    Think about it.

    1. Gary, I like your thinking!

      One of my favourite “how to write” manuals is Lawrence Block’s “Telling Lies for Fun and Profit.” He had a column for Writer’s Digest in the 70’s and 80’s and basically collected them all, put them in a logical order, and sold it to a publisher. This would be the same sort of idea. 🙂

      1. For that level of complexity, she’d need to hire an editor or ghost writer to do what she’s doing anyway without remuner… renumbera… pay. What I mean is to keep everything except other people’s comments. She would still have to put in a lot of “A commenter addressed this… I replied:”

        Most comments would just go away.

  12. Lol! A few years a go, I actually WAS working my way through your blog and reading posts from ten years ago or more, when they all disappeared. Wah! Such is life.
    I would love it if you put them back up, and I’d love it if you published them in a book, but I understand it’s a lot of work and you have other things going on. Better things, too! Like a new book. 🙂

  14. I’m working on my yarn stash. I have *a lot* of yarn I purchased and put in a bin without photographing/stashing (Container Store Sweater bins are the perfect size for me, and it amuses me to have what are essentially pre-constructed sweaters stored in them 🙂 ), so I’m going back and adding it all on Ravelry, and organizing in the process. I’ve found some gems I forgot I had, and seeing some combos for future projects. Through two bins, with only 8 more to go!

  15. The Questionables are one of my favorite parts. Would love to be able to click on that as a category or tag and see all of them. If that’s the kind of archiving you mean.

  16. Yesterday I did 3.5 hours of yard work which was penance for the 3.5 weeks in which I did sod all.

    Otherwise this week I am continuing to clean up my backlist, making notes for a new thing I want to write sometime, and working on gamma draft of the new novel following excellent comments (as usual) from my beta reader. Oh yes and continuing my desultory job search. There is not much out there unless I want to make $15/hr.

    Also went with DH to see stream of filmed ‘Kinky Boots’ musical from London with Matt Henry as Lola. He is INCREDIBLE.

  17. I’ve been weeding out my paperbacks for donation. I started with the picture books when I had to make room for the 6 new books I bought, but now I am starting on mass market romances. I only work on them for a short time every other day because I’ve found that if I go faster I just alternate between keeping everything and donating everything.

    I’m also trying to actually send the notes that I thought out, but never actually sent. Since I have a bad habit of planning emails after I’ve put the computer away, it feels like I’ve already sent the reply. It’s especially bad with my brother in France because I can’t call him up and ask. Fortunately, he’s better at emailing than I am.

  18. I definitely want all of the writing posts, questionables, TV plot analysis posts (never watched an episode of Arrow, always read the posts about it at least once–same with Legends of Tomorrow) for future reference.

    I’ve been working on finishing my summer job (observing beginning teachers & giving feedback – last day is tomorrow) and need to motivate myself to go prepare dinner and put away laundry and be productive while my husband’s out with the kids. But the bed where I’m lying to type this is just so comfortable….

  19. There’s a post about making a friend a wedding cake. I cried with laughter. I’ve no idea how old that one was, but there are some gems back there.

  20. Like many others here I love your craft-of-writing posts. I copy and paste some of them, when I remember. But I also hunt them down every now and again, going back years.

  21. Printed off a stack of Jenny’s writing blogs from years past. Found them this week while sorting papers.

    Garden was finished yesterday. Of course the weeds are showing up now.

    Finished a list of questions for the valuation of the company this morning. Now back to regularly scheduled work. Plus dog walks. Watching son and DIL’s dog while they are in Italy. Lucky them!

  22. I had always intended to reorganize the content here but I was getting nowhere on it, so this way, I can re-tag and link related posts in related batches. All the writing stuff will go back up, but better organized with links to related posts. I can put the personal stuff back up, too. I think it’s stuff like Happiness Sunday and Cherry Saturday that don’t need to stay. They’re really just meetings in the moment, not much there to re-read. Probably the same with Working Wednesdays: leave them up for a couple of months and then delete. Good Book Thursdays should probably. stay though because those recommendations work forever.

    We’re talking about 2500 posts, by the way. And you guys haven’t. been any slouches, either: there are over 110,000 comments on here.

    1. Oh yes please! I go back frequently through the Good Book Thursday posts, and would hate to see them dwindle away. I’ve discovered so many wonderful things to read from Thursdays. 🙂

      1. They are especially useful when my book group is trying to set a reading list for the coming year.

  23. Sounds like a major job. Good luck.

    After finally getting the garden straight, I went back to my accounts and triumphantly posted my tax return today. Just got to do the books for April to June now. And this afternoon I was finally offered some proofs to read, due to me in a week. So I’ve time to enjoy a long weekend with my two close friends from university, starting tomorrow.

  24. I love the old posts, especially about person of interest, leverage and sense8 and your collages and soundtracks and your house. The writing stuff was very useful too.

    Also what people were working on, some people are so talented and good books.

  25. As long as you are keeping all the writing stuff, it’s all good. I especially love Jane – did she ever work out her karma with the Barbie-beheader? I still wonder about it.

  27. I am not very organized – I wasn’t before the squishing but I could manifest organization in a crunch and now there is neither organization nor the (wholly deceptive) manifestation thereof – but the iterations of this blog (I was not a cherry) have always felt like being in the antechamber of someone else’s very effective brain – not always comprehensible but steadily interesting and thought provoking Which is a very long way of saying that I think that the most important thing is that this work for you – to your purposes, in whatever the most satisfying way is, which you are the only person who can know that, and it’s inevitably fluid because people, especially their minds, literally electrical, are not static.

    And what I have been doing is writing thank you letters to people I do not know. People in the world who are doing things that I somehow become aware of and the things are good or kind or beautiful or distracting or decent or hard. People ought to be acknowledged, I think, and writing a thank you note is within my powers. I am managing two a week and it kind of clobbers me.

    2. You know, that’s an excellent idea, the thank you notes. It’s a Bill-and-Ted idea: Be excellent to each other.

  28. I have some of Your words of wisdom on paper, Jenny. Lost others when buying new computers, switching from PC to Mac, so, I’d love to browse updated links. Thank you.

    Today, I helped daughter sort out her office and shred what was no longer needed. We found many amusing birthday cards from her brother. Some saved from when he was a kid. He’s always been the funny one in the family and it was fun to read those cards.

  29. Looks like my work this week is to either figure out how I’m going to pay for thousands of dollars worth of work on my car (more than it’s worth really) or how to buy another car.

    Excuse me while I go find some alcohol now. Sigh.

    1. The very first car I was able to buy with my own money (brand new with new car smell) I felt so grand driving it even years in when all the repairs starting happening. Up to and including a new transmission. After all it was my baby. That’s when I learned it’s just a thing to get you from here to there.

  30. Is this your version of “avoidance by neatening”? (I just reorganized and cleaned my entire mudroom so I could avoid working on the book that is killing me. On the bright side, that space looks amazing. On the down side, I’m not getting much done on the book. Oh, and look, now I’m here, also avoiding!)

    Which is just my gentle way of asking if this reorganization thing is important enough to be a good use of your time and energy at this point. I’d much rather have a book than a neat blog.

    That being said, the only things I go back to look for are the craft blogs, like Turning Points.

    1. The reorganization is medium important, but there were other things at work, too, and it was just easier to take it all down. It was a lousy time to do it because Krissie arrived Tuesday-we’re having a wonderful time–and my house is a disaster, so I was cleaning up. the guest room as I was cleaning up the blog. Got a little hectic. Fortunately, Krissie is VERY easy going.

      And of course this is also the time I started to connect with the book again. OTOH, we really are having a wonderful time and I really needed a break. Today I take her to meet my therapist, Jamie. I told her I thought Jamie thought I’d made her up, my imaginary friend. She really is kind of a unicorn of a friend. Without the virgin stipulation.

  31. I loved the he said/she said posts, any post about a book you were writing, and your 12 days of anything posts. But I probably won’t re-read them. I would love to keep the Book Thursday ones, they’re my main source of reading material at the moment.

    I’ve been tidying up our house, which is a challenge given DH is quite the hoarder. Progress is being made, which feels great.

  32. Oddly, I’d sometimes go looking for some of your old personal stories about your home and life stuff that had made me laugh. But, of course, it’s your blog, you have a to run it how it works best for you!

  33. And I’m working on actual work, instead of being on vacation. I was dog/house sitting for friends and my husband called to let me know he’d gotten injured, been to the ER, and needed me to come home early, if at all possible. He’ll be fine, but he’s in pain. And so I cancelled the rest of my vacation, changed my flight, and flew home. I figure I’ll save those days for later in the year and if everything goes well, take a vacation trip with my husband. And without pets. Heh.

      1. Luckily, I started out dog sitting for two households, my friend and her sister. Her sister came home and was able to take over dog-sitting. Otherwise, I couldn’t have come back early.

  34. Hi I loved your earlier posts! Especially the ones where you do like 13 days of office or any progress ones. Anything with collage photos or book wip or writing stuff. Also your recipes or hobbies or collabs. Thank you!

  35. Please bring back the ‘Person of Interest’ blog posts. Those were some of the best tv analyses I’ve ever had the pleasure of reading. I love ‘Person of Interest’, and reading about how well crafted it was from a literary perspective was a very enlightening and enjoyable experience.

  36. I just got back from an across country trip, driving 2400 miles one way and 2450 miles back. Went through 6 states on my own. Only got really nervous once in New Mexico at a truck stop where I pulled in to take a whizz and my eyes land on a bald man in black tshirt, hard boots and a glock on his pants, escorting another man who’s hands were cuffed in front of him to a leather belt as he took small steps since his feet were bound in chains too. As I’m taking in the situation the 2nd guy looks up and catches my eye before being hussled into the food mart. I took about 5 seconds to weigh in my mind “potential for drama? vs whizz holding ability”. I climbed back into my large SUV and got back on the road. 45 minutes later I was able to use the woman’s facilities, gas up, get a coffee and an egg mcmuffin sandwich to go. Opting for no drama got me a 75% better return. When I got home I pulled out Anyone But You and read about Fred. All my other reading material I’d already been through on the road. I was hungry for a good book to go to sleep in my own bed with.

    1. I think Mollie dismantled that because of the person who signed up, forgot she signed up, and reported the blog as spam. It took Mollie a couple of days to straighten that out, and she just said, “Nope, not again.”

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