pjthompson (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
pjthompson) wrote2006-11-26 02:49 pm
pjthompson) wrote2006-11-26 02:49 pm
Miscellanea
Writing: I dreamed Friday night that I was having a conversation with another writer and talking about how in my first drafts I have the bad habit of beginning sentences with "And." I way overuse it, and it's one of those things I'm constantly hacking out of second drafts. I woke up Saturday morning and logged on to the Online Writing Workshop to find I had a review of Charged with Folly which told me I began too many sentences with "And," and I should really work on that. I had to laugh. It must have bugged her so much she tunneled into my dreams. And I agree with her. ☺
Families: Technically speaking, I misspoke yesterday in my gratitude post when I said my mom was about the only family I have left. I should have said significant family, because I've got gallons and gallons of cousins out there. Almost all are strangers to me who live in other states (my mom and Aunt Maxine were the rebels who moved from the encrusted enclave in Utah to California). Of the two cousins I was ever close to, I'm only still in touch with one, and even she lives quite a ways away. With her mom, Maxine, gone, we hardly ever see each other.
I also have some nieces and a nephew out there somewhere. All but one of them were older than me (my half-brother was only two years younger than my mother) and their mother didn't approve of my family—we were the poor relations she didn't wish to expose her children to. I saw them semi-frequently when I was a kid, at my brother Jack's insistence, but once he and his wife divorced in my early teens, the kids and wife disappeared from my life (and, I suspect, largely from Jack's). He's passed on now. I have no idea where any of them are. I didn't even know Jack had died until years after the fact.
Families. Messy.
Fortunately, I have good "family of choice," some of whom have been my friends three-quarters of my life.
Vacation: I finally feel like I've gotten my energy back. The first couple of days, even before I'd eaten turkey, I sat down in the chair to read and promptly fell asleep—in the middle of the day, something that's extremely atypical of me. It reaffirmed my decision to take some serious downtime this weekend. I've gotten some things done, but mostly I've perfected the art of sloth.
And I hope you all had the weekends you wished for!
ETA: For those of you who love the Geico Cavemen as much as I do, something more on vacations:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6j9U0qP7H3g
And this one, my favorite in the series. The expression on the actor's face at the end is just priceless.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zZrjr4A-ASQ
Families: Technically speaking, I misspoke yesterday in my gratitude post when I said my mom was about the only family I have left. I should have said significant family, because I've got gallons and gallons of cousins out there. Almost all are strangers to me who live in other states (my mom and Aunt Maxine were the rebels who moved from the encrusted enclave in Utah to California). Of the two cousins I was ever close to, I'm only still in touch with one, and even she lives quite a ways away. With her mom, Maxine, gone, we hardly ever see each other.
I also have some nieces and a nephew out there somewhere. All but one of them were older than me (my half-brother was only two years younger than my mother) and their mother didn't approve of my family—we were the poor relations she didn't wish to expose her children to. I saw them semi-frequently when I was a kid, at my brother Jack's insistence, but once he and his wife divorced in my early teens, the kids and wife disappeared from my life (and, I suspect, largely from Jack's). He's passed on now. I have no idea where any of them are. I didn't even know Jack had died until years after the fact.
Families. Messy.
Fortunately, I have good "family of choice," some of whom have been my friends three-quarters of my life.
Vacation: I finally feel like I've gotten my energy back. The first couple of days, even before I'd eaten turkey, I sat down in the chair to read and promptly fell asleep—in the middle of the day, something that's extremely atypical of me. It reaffirmed my decision to take some serious downtime this weekend. I've gotten some things done, but mostly I've perfected the art of sloth.
And I hope you all had the weekends you wished for!
ETA: For those of you who love the Geico Cavemen as much as I do, something more on vacations:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6j9U0qP7H3g
And this one, my favorite in the series. The expression on the actor's face at the end is just priceless.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zZrjr4A-ASQ
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Spend your whole life there, and it does something to ya. I think it would make people better people if they spent some time not living in Utah.
All my friends who still live in Utah and are okay people once lived somewhere else.
It's odd.
It's not like Utah's a bad place. Just a little much.
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That decompression-from-vacation time is an absolute must. Glad you had good vacation and good sloth-time.
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That decompression-from-vacation time is an absolute must. Glad you had good vacation and good sloth-time.
It was absolutely fabulous. :-)
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And I totally know what you mean about writing crutches. :D
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Have you seen the one where he's being interviewed on one of those Faux-News like talking heads shows? Hilarious.
And I totally know what you mean about writing crutches. :D
And I've got plenny more where that came from. :-)
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(Anonymous) 2006-11-28 05:47 pm (UTC)(link)no subject