Month: March 2009

This morning I slept until I was completely done with sleeping. Five days per week I am the first person out of bed; the one who makes everyone else get up. So I figure two days per week everyone can just muddle along without me until I am good and ready to be awake. Sometimes the ratio is 6 days to 1 because of early church, but this year we have church in the afternoons, so I sleep on Sunday too. The extra sleep is necessary since I tend to run on a sleep deficit most of the time.

Not surprisingly the remainder of today has been pretty effective. I mentally scheduled myself for a bunch of house/family stuff and it is all done now. Well, not laundry. Laundry is never truly done. I should probably do some more today. Also left to do is making all the kids bathe. The influx of spring weather has been accompanied by increasingly dirty kids as they spend hours playing outside. Not today though. Today they’ve spent most of the day at the kitchen table constructing Pikmin characters out of Crayola Model Magic clay. Each of them has a small army of figures now and the game spans three territories spread across the entire table. This burst of creative energy was begun by the fact that I said they had to clean their rooms before playing video games. But they are having so much fun that they’re still playing with their figures even though I made them stop to clean their rooms. They’d rather play their own game than be hemmed in by the restrictions of the game itself.

After the rooms were clean, I spontaneously decided that we should all head over to the grocery store to use the coupons for free ice cream cones. It was a fun little mini-outing. I need to do more just-because fun things with the kids. Saturdays may be a good space for that. Weekdays tend to be all scheduled.

Yesterday I wandered out front and ended up talking with some neighbors for an hour or so. As I walked out I had a head full of publishing/writing concerns and the knowledge that Howard had been nominated for a Hugo. But within minutes of starting the conversation I realized that my head was full of things which had no relevance at all to my neighbors. Their days do not include contracts or printers or shipping. Instead the conversation revolved around community affairs in our neighborhood; concerns about a neighbor who is having a rough time; discussion of things at the school where all our kids attend; that sort of thing. It would be very easy for me to develop a feeling of alienation. There is this whole huge section of my life that is outside my neighbors’ experience. Instead the conversation was refreshing and good. Such conversations bring me back to ground and remind me that there is a community here that needs my attention just as much as the communities online.

My attention is so fractured these days. I do not pay as much attention to local things as I used to. These wonderful neighbors of mine are why I don’t have to. You see I know that they are all paying attention. I trust them to keep tabs on the school and the neighborhood. This frees me to put much of my attention elsewhere. However like any good community member, I also need to take time to come back and really contribute. After talking with these women I have an idea of where my contributions are needed most. Communities thrive best when there are lots of people paying attention and really devoting themselves to making the community work. Often these devoted people are the quiet ones who work behind the scenes. I used to be a person like that. Increasingly I am becoming more visible. Having visible people is also necessary. All the different people with different interests and specialties working together is what makes a community strong.

So I was staring at the list of Hugo Nominees (this is something you do when you can hardly believe your husband’s name is there and so you have to check just to make sure. Again. For about the 57th time) and I noticed something. All the other nominated works in the Graphic Story category have two to six creators attached to them as well as a publisher. For Schlock Mercenary there is just Howard, and I am his publisher. Somehow this really underlines for me the sheer crazy impossibility of what we have undertaken. It really should not be succeeding, and yet somehow through hard work, and scrambling, and more hard work, and lots of help from friends, and encouragement from fans, and even more hard work, and some kind of a miracle, we keep going. The scary bit is that so much depends upon Howard and upon me. If either of us fails, it will all fall apart. We must be crazy to undertake this challenge…and yet, there is his name on that list with people who have been creating graphic stories for far longer than we have. This blows me away.

Schlock Mercenary: The Body Politic was nominated for a Hugo award in the “Best Graphic Story” category! We are thrilled. I look at the list of other nominees in the same category and I’m not sure how we sneaked on there. We’re up against
Girl Genius Volume 8 Agatha Heterodyne and the Chapel of Bones by Phil and Kaja Foglio and Cheyenne Wright (Airship Entertainment)
The Dresden Files: Welcome to the Jungle by Jim Butcher (Del Rey, DaBel Bros)
Fables: War and Pieces by Bill Willingham, Mark Buckingham, Steve Leialoha, Andrew Pepoy, Lee Loughridge, and Todd Klein (DC/Vertigo)
Serenity: Better Days by Joss Whedon, Brett Matthews, Will Conrad, Michelle Madsen, and Jo (Dark Horse)
Y: The last man vol 10: Whys and Wherefores by Brian K. Vaughan, Pia Guerra, and Jose Marzan, Jr (DC/Vertigo)

So we’re pretty sure that Howard won’t be bringing home a shiny rocket ship, but honestly we do not even care. Just making the list is amazing.

Now I really want to go to Montreal with Howard. I already wanted to go, but now the want has been trebled. So now I have to go see what financial and childcare machinations are necessary to free me up for a week in August. Also, I need to renew my passport. And maybe buy a dress.

When Howard and I first released Under New Management (four years ago now) we did some math and figured out that if we could just sell 10 books per day, that would cover all our bills. It seemed an impossibly high number. Fortunately the huge pile of sales which occurred when we first released new title allowed us to bank money against the months when sales were much slower.

Today was not a special day in terms of sales or publicity. Howard made no announcements, we didn’t mention books in our blogs, we did not do anything to draw attention to the fact that there are Schlock books available, and yet we sold 9 books today. Yesterday we sold 8 books. There are still days when no one stops by our online store, but more and more often we are seeing the days when store sales are sufficient to pay for that day’s worth of bills. This is good news. The difference is not in the total number of sales, but in the fact that we have multiple titles available. This is why we are pushing hard to get more books into print. We want to reach a point where Schlock Mercenary can not only pay our bills, but also provide jobs to other people.

It is amazing how getting to take a shower first thing transforms the day’s tasks from impossible to possible. I got all the critical tasks done with dispatch, then discovered a small pile of routine tasks which I also got done. Then in the afternoon I stepped away from everything to walk over to the school to meet up with my kids and walk them home. The exercise was good. The fresh air was marvelous. And I got to observe first hand why my kids always come home with pockets full of rocks and odd bits of metal. Yes, my children scrounge in the gutters for “cool stuff.” This could also explain why a 10 minute walk can take as long as 40 minutes.

I’m still very tired because of the not sleeping well, so I’m afraid I am short on insightful thoughts. Instead I will send you over to Mental Tesserae where my friend has a very nice post about happiness and the randomness of life.

I think the most annoying thing about being wide awake at 2:30 AM is the awareness that I will be much better equipped to handle the things I am fretting about if I could just get some sleep first.

The alarm rang this morning after I’d had only 5 hours of sleep. I was up late last night providing morale support for Kiki who was scrambling to get a project done, and who did not really need my help, but who devolved in to over-stressed tears if I was not sitting near her radiating calm. It is exhausting to radiate calm for several hours in a row late at night. Kiki finished her project, but morning came at the same time as usual.

Fortunately today is St. Patrick’s Day. This meant that getting ready for school was made more interesting by the search for green clothing. Woe betide the grade school child who shows up without green on this very important day. Because of the holiday the kids were speedier than usual about getting dressed, which was nice. Also the possibility of leprechaun adventures at school helped. I hear that Patch’s class was particularly hard hit by a leprechaun who played many tricks, but who also left treats. Once the kids were at school I went back to bed for 40 minutes. I knew that the rest of the day was going to be exhausting. I was right.

Link had Moms and Muffins, which is when I spend an hour in his classroom listening to him read and eating a muffin. This is an enjoyable event for both the child and me. They even give each child a book to take home. It was a time for me to consider again how the books that adults think kids (particularly boys) ought to like do not always intersect with the books that kids actually like. I looked at the book selection and thought “Oooh!” Link looked at the exact same books and thought “meh.” Most of the kids were excited to get the books they picked, so the selection really was appropriate, just not to Link’s taste. We had him pick a book that his sisters will like and then he read to me from his library book.

Next came The Cleaning of the Kitchen. This was in preparation for the two hour long Business Meeting. We figure we look a lot more professional when meeting with partners if the papers don’t stick to syrup puddles on the table. The business meeting was very good, but two hours of focused attention is tiring. And the brain spinning on Tasks Which I Now Have To Do is also tiring.

The meeting finished up only minutes before kids arrived home from school, so I headed straight into Mommy mode. Fortunately the kids scattered to friends’ houses, then Kiki called for me to pick her up. She’d stayed after school to meet with her math teacher to get a better explanation of an assignment. She did this voluntarily even though she is already earning an A in the class. I have an awesome daughter. I decided that my awesome daughter and I had both earned a trip to Wendy’s so we went to get food. For the next 90 minutes she and I had one of those conversations which wander everywhere and where she opens up about social situations at school. When one of these conversations starts, I have to clear everything out of the way and let it just flow because this will be my only chance to hear about Kiki’s life as it is right now. I have to encourage the conversation and participate even though I am tired and my brain really wants to shut down. So Kiki and I discussed fast food, SuperSize Me, lunch at school, the funny thing that happened in German class, that boy who likes her, that other boy who likes her, how she can make the boys stop being idiots, why the boys are idiots, when they are likely to stop being idiots, the boy she kind of likes, the fact that attractions make life difficult, and, coolest of all, how Kiki stood up for someone who was being picked on even though it required her to confront a peer in front of lots of other people. If I’d cut the conversation short I would have missed all of that and I would have missed the all too rare moments when my teenage daughter is actively seeking my advice about her life. It was a wonderful conversation even though I was tired.

Then my brain melted and an hour or more disappeared into the internet. If you find it laying around, feel free to send it back.

Then there was Link’s Gymnastics class, and grocery shopping, and frozen burritos for dinner fed to kids in front of a video, and delivering Link to scouts. After all that I should have made the movie stop so kids could do homework, snack, and bed. Instead I popped popcorn and sat with Gleek and Patch for the last 30 minutes of Angels in the Outfield. It isn’t a movie I like, but the kids do. It was so nice to just sit. It was even mildly interesting that the DVD was glitching, randomly skipping seconds and turning the subtitles on and off. It says something that I did not even care.

I love my kids. They did not argue or fight about going directly to bed when the movie was over. I feel better for the brain-dead movie time. Not ready to accomplish stuff, but less zombie like. I think I shall have an early bedtime now.

Last fall I chronicled my challenges in finding books that Link could love reading. The wealth of suggestions lead to a list of books for 5th Grade boys. I would now like to praise to high heavens a couple of books in particular. They are books filled with words that Link will choose over video games.

Diary of a Wimpy Kid by Jeff Kinney This book bridges the gap between comics and novels. Most of the story is told in words, but every single page has an amusing cartoon on it. Link was a little doubtful when I first handed him the book, but within minutes he was laughing out loud. As soon as he finished it, he asked for me to get him the next one. In fact he was so desperate for the next book that he spent his own money to buy it. So that’s how we got Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Roderick Rules. Now Link has finished that one and is begging for the next one Diary of a Wimpy Kid: The Last Straw. I’ve put it on the wishlist to wait for a time when either Link or I have some spare money. In the meantime we’re on the waiting list at the library. These books are going over really well with lots of boys. I’ll also need to get him the Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Do It Yourself Book which looks like an ideal way to encourage Link to do some writing as well.

The other book I’d like to praise is 15 Minutes by Steve Young. Link read part of this book to me out loud. It is wonderful. The narrator has a great sense of humor and explains stuff so that the reader just feels like he is hanging out with a friend. Link laughed several times while reading and was happy to struggle through some of the challenging vocabulary. One of the nicest things is that the chapters are all really short. This prevents Link from feeling overwhelmed by endless pages of words. 15 minutes also goes on the wishlist so we can acquire it. It may even go on the bedtime story list because I think Gleek and Patch might enjoy it too. I know it amused me. It does for middle school boys what Junie B Jones does for first graders, amuses parents as well as kids with witty observations and very real situations.

Yup. I was right. As soon as I reached the clear space in the schedule, things arrived to fill it with busy. Good thing I like busy.

Unfortunately the busy sometimes has collateral damage. I nearly forgot Gleek’s gymnastics class this afternoon. It was already 15 minutes past time for the class to start, but I could tell from Gleek’s face that missing it would be the end of the world. So we dashed to the car and managed to get her there for the last 30 minutes. Thus the end of the world was averted. Family home evening was also a bit scattered. Patch was in charge of the lesson and I could not get him to pay attention long enough to decide on a topic. He was too busy creating a story book. He’d carefully folded and cut a piece of paper so that he had an eight page booklet. He’d drawn pictures for every page and was carefully sounding out the words. This is the kindergarten equivalent of drafting a complete novel. I was loathe to interrupt, but everyone else was waiting on him. In the end Kiki saved the day. She planned and executed a lesson in such a way that Patch felt like he had done it. I was so pleased with them both. Then Link decided that for our activity we would begin watching the first Narnia movie. He had never watched the whole thing. I realized that neither have I. I’ve seen lots of bits and pieces, but never sat down to watch from the beginning. I was surprised to discover that the film is far more compelling and enjoyable when I watch it in order. I shouldn’t be surprised about that, but I was. We didn’t get to finish tonight. It is a long movie and the kids had to go to bed.

So tomorrow I need to help Patch finish his book and sit down with Link to finish watching Narnia. Also tomorrow is the Moms and Muffins event in Link’s classroom, a business meeting, some writing to do, and Link’s gymnastics class. I’ve written it all down in my planner, so hopefully I’ll be able to track it all.