Diana Rowland — Writing, Life, and the Stuff in between

I actually did something halfway resembling christmas shopping today after work. Okay, so it was just the “going to the bookstore” phase of my shopping, but I did manage to pick up a few gifts. We’ve cut back on how much gifting we do for the grown kids in the family–mostly because there are a LOT of grown kids, and we were going totally frickin’ broke, so now the grownups get a book and a nominal gift card. We do get more substantial gifts for all of the younger kids, but with five grandkids that gets to be a lot as well! Tomorrow I’m going to have to bite the bullet and dive into Target to hopefully get the bulk of the shopping finished up.

Anyway, it’s going to be a weenie entry again tonight, because–once again–it’s late, and my stomach is still bugging me. Sigh. I’ll try and deliver something more substantial tomorrow.

I’m tired and my stomach is not feeling awesome about my dinner, and so you will have to be satisfied with this picture of Anna’s gingerbread cookies. She decorated them all by herself.

Jack and I went out to dinner with another couple tonight, and then had the unenviable experience of driving home while utterly exhausted. Neither of us were intoxicated, but we were tired which can be just as bad, so we had lots of loud conversation and occasional bouts of driving with the window open. Ugh. Hate that. Fortunately we made it home without any issues.

The awesomeness continues on the house front: we just found out that the house we want is in pre-foreclosure, which means we stand a good chance of getting it at the awesome price, and also means that it’s worth far more. However, it’s going to take a bit longer to find out what the final deal will be since we have to go through the bank.

Okay, paltry entry tonight. I’m whupped. Catch y’all on the flip side.

We found an awesome house. Seriously awesome. It’s at an awesome price. It’s just chock full of awesome renovations and awesome hardwood floors and awesome fixtures and awesome GE Profile stainless appliances. It has an exceedingly awesome clawfoot tub in one of the upstairs bathrooms. It has an awesome backyard and it’s in an awesome neighborhood. We put in an awesome offer.

I will be very not full of awesomeness if we don’t get this house.

I’ve been mulling over whether to plan on going to Worldcon in Denver this year. I haven’t been to a Worldcon in… a long time, probably close to ten years. In the past few years my available time has been limited, and thus I’ve been forced to essentially pick THE best con for my wants/needs, which has ended up being World Fantasy Con. However, I’m sorely tempted to shoot for Worldcon and WFC this year, especially if my book sells.

Anyway, I went to the Denver Worldcon website and looked around at membership cost and hotel information, and then came across this nugget of information.

We will, however, be sharing facilities with the John Deere convention and the American Statistical Association.

I have this incredible mental image of a con-goer in full Klingon regalia standing next to a redneck in a flannel shirt and a ballcap.

Oh yeah, I have got to see this. I’m definitely going.

Dear Santa,

I changed my mind. To hell with all of that Christmas cheer crap that I asked for in the last letter. I don’t really care if people hate Christmas or not. All I want is for this frickin’ house stuff to be over. Get me my financing. Get me a nice house in a nice neighborhood. I’m really sick of this entire process. It’s been six months now. I’m over it.

Best wishes,

Diana

Knees: What the hell?
Hips: Oh no… she isn’t…
Knees: She is! She’s running! It’s been over a month. I thought we were done with that crap!
Hips: Dear god, doesn’t she know she’s over 40? Oh, ow. Why? Why!?
Brain: Hey, guys. Sorry about this, but she’s put a few pounds on, and Ass is filling out her jeans a bit too much.
Ass: Oh, that is SO not fair to put all the blame on me.
Knees: Well you like to collect the fat the most!
Ass: Not just me! Boobs do too, and Arms have a pretty healthy jiggle on their upper portion.
Boobs: No one complains when I get big though.
Arms: It’s winter. I’m cool with long sleeves.
Knees: Yeah, whatever. Hey, stomach! What the hell has she been eating?
Stomach: Well, she finished off that pumpkin pie last night. And there’ve been a lot of frozen pizzas.
Liver: And beer! Don’t forget the beer!
Hips: Okay, this is starting to really hurt. Brain, you’ve got to stop this.
Brain: Sorry, guys. She told me she wanted to do two miles.
Knees: Well, how far have we gone? I’ve got a sharp pain going on down here.
Brain: We just hit a mile.
Hips: Oh, you have GOT to be kidding.
Knees: Holy crap, this is a lot harder than it was a month ago.
Stomach: Yeah, that would be Ass weighing you down.
Ass: Not Fair!
Heart: If it’s any consolation, I’m holding up just fine.
Lungs: Same here. She still has her wind, at least.
Knees: Well, Hips and I are feeling the pain for all of us. This sucks ass.
Ass: Hey!
Knees: Oh, for the love of god, it’s a figure of speech.
Hips: Brain, how much farther?!
Brain: Jeez, you guys are a bunch of weenies. We’re a little over a mile and a half.
Abs: Wow, we haven’t done this in a while. I’m just going to hold on really tight to this right side.
Brain: Abs, you’re just looking for attention. Let go of the cramp.
Abs: Not until she stops. I’m sympathizing with Knees and Hips.
Knees: At least someone in this damn body understands. Brain, you’ve got to make this stop.
Brain: Okay, okay. Look, I’ll ask her to stop at that next stop sign. That’s almost two miles. Close enough. Oh, wait, there’s a car coming, and she doesn’t want to look silly for stopping to walk.
Face: She’s afraid of looking silly? Has she seen how red I am?
Knees: You have GOT to be kidding me! Brain, make her stop, or by god I’m pulling the meniscus!
Brain: All RIGHT! What a bunch of weenies! Fine, she’s walking now. Happy?
Hips: Much better. Ow.
Knees: What do I have to do to get some frickin’ endorphins?
Ass: Hey, that was pretty cool. Let’s go eat some chocolate!

Today I’ve been:

-waiting to hear back on the offer we made on the house.
-waiting to hear back from the lender.
-waiting to hear from some lucky editor who has finally realized what a gem my novel is.
-waiting for the holidays.
-wading through laundry.
-wading through rewrites and edits.
-waging the never-ending battle against clutter
-waylaying my husband and making him put Anna to bed
-waning in my ability to write interesting posts
-waiving, yet again, my self-imposed challenge to write interesting and/or meaningful entries
-wasting too much time on teh intarnets

Last night Jack and I watched the 1938 version of A Christmas Carol, which happens to be my very most favorite version. I like this one because it shows Scrooge changing as the movie goes along, recapturing the charm and joy of his youth, and feeling true shame in how his actions have affected others. It also shows him as being more terrified and shamed at how his death is received by those who knew him (either with celebration or indifference) than at the actual thought of his eventual death. He’s a normal, lonely man who has grown cold and defensive, who just needed to be drawn out of his shell.

It seems to me that the more modern versions love to paint Scrooge as an unmitigated asshole until the very last scene where he sees his tombstone and then voila, he is a changed man because he fears death. Come on, he changes because he sees that he’s going to die? What, he really thinks that he’ll never die? That has never rung true with me, and I find Scrooge to be a far more interesting and sympathetic character when he cares about what people think.

Anyway, near the end, in the scene where Bob Cratchit and his family are talking about the death of Tiny Tim, I–of course–got a tear or three in my eye, because I AM a huge weenie and cry at damn near anything sad or emotional in a movie. But then I looked over at my husband, who was sitting with his head leaned back and his arms up by his head in a manner that was probably meant to look “casual” but instead looked just a bit too much like “hiding my face.”

“You big weenie!” I accused. “You’re crying too!”

He lowered his arms and grinned sheepishly at me. “Well, of course. It’s Tiny Tim! Yes, I’m a weenie.”

And that is yet another reason why I put up with the man–because he cries at movies darn near as much as I do.

“Weekends like these, I feel like the time has been stolen from us.”

That was my husband’s comment when we finally got home tonight. It wasn’t wasted time, by any stretch, but it was one of those insanely packed-full-busy-as-hell weekends where we had every minute planned from the time we woke up until well after dark in the evening. There sure as heck wasn’t a second of relaxing, and even though it was productive and worthwhile, there’s still that part of us that really aches for time to just… chill.

Yesterday was spent looking at houses. All. Day. Long. As soon as we were cleaned up and fed after waking we headed off to do drive-bys on the list of houses that our new real estate agent emailed to me on Friday. After an hour of this we went off to meet my sister who had VERY kindly agreed to watch Anna for the day, which was very much appreciated since looking at houses with a three-year-old in tow would have been nightmarish. Anna was duly delivered, and then we went back to doing drive-bys until the time to meet our agent.

Despite the fact that we were able to eliminate a good number of houses just from exterior inspection, it still took most of the day to see the ones we wanted to see. However! We found two houses that are very appealing (in extremely different ways, oddly enough.) We certainly had our wish list or everything we wanted in a house and neighborhood, and we had to compromise on a certain number of things, but at the end of the day we went ahead and made an offer on one of the houses. To be honest, I don’t hold out high hopes of actually getting that house for what we can afford, but if we don’t get it, we’ll be more than happy to go for the other house, which we definitely can get in our price range.

Finally, at the end of the day I made it over to my sister’s house to pick up my darling child. Little did I know that my sister had done her best to corrupt her pure innocent heart during the day. You see, my niece takes belly-dancing lessons, and had brought home a belly-dancing video. During the watching of this, my darling, pure, unsullied daughter got up and started copying the moves on the video. Extremely well, I might add. (I wish, how I WISH that I’d had a video camera, because it was utterly priceless!!!) Then, Anna asked me if I “had a babysitter.” I told her no, at which time she poked my tummy and said, “You have a babysitter in your belly!” (Hey, I was slouching, and.. and there might have been a slight roll of fat.)

Anyway, after my sister stopped laughing hysterically I managed to collect my child and return to my own abode.

Then today was no less busy, though in a different way. Jack had to go into the office for a couple of hours, and when he returned we went out to grab breakfast, then headed across the lake to go to the zoo for the birthday party of one of the grandkids. This was supposed to be from 1 to 3. I also had the party for my writers group at 2, so at about 2:30 we excused ourselves from party #1, raced down to Whole Foods to grab something suitable to bring to Party #2 (since I didn’t think anyone would want food that had been sitting in a warm car for a few hours,) and made our way to Gentilly. We lasted there less than two hours… or rather, Anna lasted less than two hours, at which time we made our excuses and headed back to the northshore.

We’re now at home, it’s fast approaching the time to put the kid to bed, Anna’s running a low-grade fever, and we’re all exhausted.

Happy Weekend!