Tag: Contracted

Week Five (Saturday)

Posted on by Aya DeAniege

I’m in one of those weird states where I don’t quite have a project started but I also don’t necessarily have the get up and go to start a new project. It happens sometimes, and passes within a week so I don’t push myself anymore. I just try to view it as my brain doing a disc defragmentation and a cleanup before it gets back to work. So, instead of fighting it now, I just kind of lean into it and play video games more than usual.

Of course, over the summer and before school, video games were about the last thing on my mind. Besides these little stolen moments between work and school, and the days at home when I needed a distraction to keep me busy, I don’t normally play games this much in such a short span of time.

I might have actually played more in the last two months than I did in the three years previous.

I’m not counting running Sims in the background while I edit to keep me off the internet as playing a game, as that was more of me being passive aggressive with myself.

Being in that weird, in-between place, I booted up No Man’s Sky on the desktop, just for giggles, it never works on the desktop anymore but I’m giving it a shot. It’s been running some ten minutes, still loading. But it didn’t crash upon load up… wait.

No, I think I deleted the shader cache after I played last so of course it’s going to work. Well, I’m this far in, might as well keep going with it.

I like the bigger screen, but the desktop is slow as could be, it’s getting slower and is even slow doing Paintshop Pro, which I use for my covers. It sucks, but it still works. It’s just that I don’t want to have that patience. I want my bloody computer to work like it’s just under two years old, not like it’s five years old and my brothers have been downloading porn onto it.

Next desktop, I want to be a solid state drive. But that’s a save up for sure. Need a car first, unless this one breaks on me, in which case I’ll have to settle for whatever is on sale as long as it’s not another bloody Acer.

Wow, I really rambled for a while there, didn’t I?

Your hypergraphia is acting up.

Yesterday, I started writing Shade’s story by hand. I don’t expect it to go anywhere on paper, but at least I have something there I can add to when I need to and just keep going. And if it does happen to go someplace, well, I can practice my transcription skills and get it onto the computer.

So, while sitting, waiting for the game to load, you watch this rather peaceful screen that’s stars flying by, as if you were going faster than lightspeed in space, I guess is the idea. Me sitting there with my coffee, started thinking.

Now I’ve got this weird plan, but I’m going to give it a go.

For indie publishing, it’s suggested you don’t go more than 90 days without a new book. The closer together, the better. Okay, whatever, that was kind of my publishing schedule before. Some authors have had great success by publishing once a month.

Don’t worry, I’m not full on crazy just yet.

Harvest is still partly with the beta and I don’t want her to feel like I’m rushing her. Now, my beta is my aunt who lives upstairs and does a ton for me, but I don’t talk about it because I want to respect her privacy. She does a fantastic job and gives a bit of a different perspective on stories… and is to blame for Scottish vampires that will be happening sometime next year.

But I feel like I’m reaching a point in No Man’s Sky where I need a break. I love the planets and wandering about, but I’ve devoted almost the same amount of time to it as I usually do in writing a book. I may need a break.

However, my iddy biddy mind can’t handle just wandering the internet. I’ve got school and the paying job, and writing, I can’t focus on just wandering about. It’s a desire to achieve, or… what the heck do the call it? I don’t remember.

The internet wandering is wasted time. Reading someone else’s book doesn’t do it for me, so while sitting with my coffee, my brain started tossing ideas back and forth on what could be done.

We’ve got Seed in October, just a few days away. Crop in November, on Thanksgiving day for Americans (why did I not think of that before? Bad Aya). And Harvest in December, right near the end giving me time because I have a two week winter break before the book goes live. Lots of time, right?

In theory on that one. But we’re almost 160 pages in, which is halfway or so, so yeah, I think it’s safe to say there’s lots of time to get that one done.

Come January, I’m going to do the box set of Wraith’s Rebellion, the first of the Coffee and Blood series. In February, I’m going to release the box set of The Reaping.

See? Easy work come January and February. Except the inner table of contents. Damn, do I regret naming each chapter and replacing chapter heads with images when I do this. It’s a lot of scrolling and then I feel woozy because I get motion sick and then I get to the end and find out I missed one and there’s a scrambling to figure out what I did wrong.

And Smashwords always finds a fractured image in my Coffee and Blood books, because somehow it happens. It’s a process but I suppose I’ll have those two weeks of winter break to figure it out.

So… where’s the crazy come in?

I am going to take the second trilogy of Contracted, which is written already, put it on my kindle and read it start to finish. Then? Well, then I’m going to take notes on it and start putting in edits. I’m going to write out the plot basically, then fix the bloody thing. Then I’m going to do the basic edits. Then I’m going to use my editing programs to find the problems rather than struggle through to find them myself. Then I’m going to edit it again.

Then I’m going to publish them in March, April, and May. Then the box set in June. With any luck, the complete edits will be done before the first launches, leaving March, April, May, and June to work on Hera.

Because editing one book is relatively simple when I’m not freaking out about work. I do it over coffee, I do it on commutes (until I start driving myself) I do it between school and work, one these Saturday mornings and Sunday nights. Until my homework and studying ramps up, I do it Monday and Tuesday evenings and on lunch breaks at school.

Some people knit, or play mobile games. I edit. It’s a very weird thing, but anyone can train themselves to do it.

So, I want to edit three and a half books between now and June. I want to publish seven books, but of those seven books, three of them are just about formatting as long as I get the edits done.

Mildly crazy plan, but for the first time in weeks, I feel excited and ready to go. I feel like I have a direction and a plan and I don’t feel like I’m giving up something I love to be paid an hourly wage and be screamed at.

And, usually, once I have a plan, I set about and do it.

This is awesome.

Oh, someone might ask about Contract Claimed, when that’s actually coming out? It has no release date because it needs to be re-written and expanded at least to two books total, maybe three. So it’s likely my project for next summer.

And Awakened needs additions that I’m slowly picking away at. So if there’s a day I can’t edit, that’s what I’ll be doing.

And The Others? Well, it is an ongoing project, I’ve updated several times over the past couple of weeks so now might be a good time to go back and re-read. Though, to be fair, the updates are easy to write and I can add a little here and a little there. I just need to put a little work into the site to update the characters and add a glossary for Todd’s dictionary.

Week Five (Day Four)

Posted on by Aya DeAniege

This week has been weird for me. Maybe it’s because my stress level has dropped, or because it’s a short week? I dunno. Not much into writing or anything besides school work.

In my defense, I have school work to do. Like reading that book for Interpersonal Communication. But I’m also in a mood and my notes are crabby. Basically, the book tells you to tap into the narcissistic nature of humans.

That makes me crabby, but what can you do about it? Not much at all. It’s play that game or hide in the corner your whole life. And some people you don’t feel like you’re inflating their already enormous egos. It’s just that I’m in some kind of “angry at humanity” mood.

Maybe it’s the announcements about climate change. Maybe it’s the rumour I saw about a certain president saying our climate is actually good or better than ever or… whatever terminology he used.

It is not, it is not better than ever.

Or maybe it’s this pressure to dress up for Halloween when we’re grown adults and Halloween no longer means candy and disposable culture and capitalism to me, the… theist?

I’m probably just in a mood. I know a few people who would tell me I’m tired and need to keep my thoughts to myself. Those people never seem to realize that I always feel that way. When I get in these moods, it just reduces the likelihood of not telling people they’re stupid or wrong. The rest of the time I resist because I know that telling people they’re stupid doesn’t change how stupid they are.

It usually makes them dig in their heels.

Now I feel like I sound like my mother.

Ah, well.

I did some writing in The Others but didn’t finish the post. No editing on Harvest which reminds me, once I do start that again, it’ll be a day or two until I need more pages.

Seed launches in four days, Contract Taken goes back up in price on most markets, along with all the Contracted books going up to the same pricing as the other books (3.99). Then next Wednesday or so, after the pre-orders are downloaded, Seed also goes up in price.

Amazon finally has Seed and Crop linked but haven’t linked Harvest yet which is really annoying. Do they know how many pre-orders I’m losing out on because their bots aren’t doing their jobs anymore? It’s really making it seem like you need to contact them now for each book to be added to a series, which is ridiculous.

It’s a waste of time and money on their part, the amount they’d have to spend just to keep up with the books. Some of the writers in one of my groups seem like they release a book every two weeks.

Wouldn’t that be fabulous?

But for a company to do that, it’s a waste of time. They could better spend their money ramping up and re-training their customer service, providing a better experience to the customers, thus fewer complaints which mean less loss of income.

I don’t even know why I was thinking of it like that. I’m scatterbrained today. So very scatterbrained. Just here and there and all over the place.

We have a test in keyboarding, but it’s a theoretical proofreading test, which was fine until I discovered that she wanted us to memorize all the marks, which no one in class knew. At least, no one seems to have known. Sucks, but at least I found out beforehand and somehow I got it right on the pretest.

Though, to be fair, that was because I looked at the page as an editor and asked myself what I’d do in that case.

Thank goodness I’ve edited before.

There’s currently a debate going on about what that assignment meant, as there were four lines we had to type out and do the marks in there. Half the class say it’s one paragraph, half that they’re new lines.

I’m in the new line camp because if that’s a paragraph, someone needs to take a writing course. Oh my, it’s more all over the place than I am. Talking about an address, then a donation, and … instructions for work, I think?

She had the answer key up for about ten minutes on the e-learning thing and I’m almost certain I’m right, but because so many people are debating it, I’m questioning myself now. Kind of sucks to do as you go into a test, especially since you can’t just turn on marks like you can in a word document.

Ah, well, I’ve already passed this course so if I fail the test because I did the wrong thing, not that big a deal.

Especially since I just discovered it’s worth 5% and I already have a final grade that’s higher than any of my grades from high school. So I need to stop over thinking that.

Week Four (Day Five)

Posted on by Aya DeAniege

Wrote almost 5000 words yesterday on Mr. Wrightworth’s novella.

I went looking through available movies this morning and there are actually a couple I’d want to watch so that’s what I’m doing Sunday.

Movies, writing, bath, and wine. Not all four at the same time, but a combination of them throughout the day.

Yesterday during work I ached again. It’s this weird all over tenderness. Like I got super drunk, that’s what the feeling is.

Like I drank way too much and now my whole body is protesting. Haven’t had wine in weeks.

… Haven’t had stronger alcohol in months.

This morning my throat is scratchy again, but it has been for two weeks. I’ve been fighting off this cold and fighting off this cold. Maybe that’s why my body aches.

I assume it’s stress and fighting off a cold that’s making me ache. Growing up I was told emotions are just in my head. Like we should all strive to be Vulcan or something, but let’s admit that they do alter our body chemistry. I’m almost certain I’ve seen studies on it.

So my body is in permanent hang over mode. Don’t worry, I don’t plan on making it worse this weekend. A couple of glasses of wine and then early to bed.

Unless I’m almost finished the novella. We all know I can’t sleep with a project almost finished.

Forgot to eat this morning, ishk. Except not eating in time makes me sick, but eating too much also makes me sick. The school has a little cafe, but the only things my diet allows is fruit (ish) except they only had apples.

Because everyone loves apples, right?

They make me physically ill unless I’m in the mood for an apple. Way too sweet too.

So I had a ‘fuck it’ moment and grabbed a jumbo double chocolate muffin. I’m severely going to regret that about… oh… five  tonight, you know, when I clock in. But that’s kind of what happens when you toss your hands up in the air and just do something stupid.

Suppose it’s about time for the weekly review.

Writing (class) is about on par. I seem to struggle with the odd spellings, but I knew that before. There’s these lovely things called word check and Google. I use them, though I only normally need them for the first three uses of the word. Then I get frustrated with the ‘waste of time’ and commit the spelling to memory. I don’t use the words she wants us spelling so …. there’s that.

Math, we had a test on Tuesday. The second class is today. It didn’t take me long at all.

Keyboarding there’s two tests or something of that sort next week. We’ve not really covered the one, for proofreading marks. I think I got it down, though, so long as she doesn’t expect me to draw them out. If she just gives them to us and is like “what do you use this for?” I’ll be good. I know we’ll be using those going forth (in class) so I know I’ll get it down within a couple of weeks.

Computer skills has still been file organization. It’s all pretty standard (for me) and I keep chastising myself into paying attention, as I drift off in a daydream.

Pay attention, stupid.

Accounting I had about a third of the classes? Half? Think it’s half. Technically we have six classes a week. I missed one on Tuesday because of the road test and two yesterday afternoon because she had an appointment. With no place else to go, I settled in the classroom, determined to get some of the book read for Interpersonal Communication.

And then I remembered the new assignment for Accounting was up. The assignments are online like so many are, and the software is simple, but it doesn’t let you bring up the numbers and information you need along with the answer slot at the same time, this is a frustration. Also, if you make a mistake, you have to go through the entire question before you can try again.

But it takes the highest score so you can just keep redoing it until you get 100.

Well… it was a long question and I was tired, I couldn’t keep my information straight. I did it three times, got grumpy, and printed off the numbers from the secondary window and everything went swimmingly. But it took two hours to do.

I was also frustrated when I was done, because I wasn’t making mistakes because I didn’t get it. I made them because the date or the cost of a transaction slipped from my mind after a second. So, I switched over to Mr. Wrightworth’s novella and finished up the chapter just to relieve some stress.

Except he’s a little stress ball because he’s not allowed to beat on his slave, which I kind of wanted to watch given my recent mood, but that wasn’t what we agreed to write.

Once that was done, I went to work and was asked to start right away. By 6pm I was done, shuffling around and having to lean on things when I came to a stop because my back and legs are aching that much. I don’t even know why, they just are.

Last is Interpersonal Communication. There was a quote assignment due today which I’ll submit on lunch. We had to choose an inspirational quote and write up a blurb on why we chose it, how it’s personal. There’s an informal sharing in class today.

I dun wanna share. I just wanna sit in the back corner under the desk and sleep.

Just today and tomorrow, then I have two days off. I’m almost through, but my body was done a couple weeks ago and has just basically been limping on through.

Heaven help anything that wakes me Sunday morning if the house isn’t on fire.

I’m, of course, referencing cats who turn into wanks whenever they want something. Darius, the youngest, keeps body checking me in my sleep and I don’t know why. Not on my body, no, he body checks my face and neck, and he weighs about five pounds now. He didn’t do it last night, but that’s because I wound up curled around the oldest, who actually got up and smacked Darius away.

Just two more days.

Oh, and I can sleep in tomorrow since I don’t work until 1pm… 1:30? Ah crap, now I can’t remember my own schedule.

 

Week Four (Day Four)

Posted on by Aya DeAniege

This morning, I finished writing up the plot for Mr. Wrightworth’s novella. It’s the first one from his point of view and could end up ten chapters long. I’ve decided to spend my Sunday curled up on the couch with his story, watching movies and drinking wine. Not all day, obviously I’m going to wait for the afternoon at least for the wine, but I suspect I won’t have more than a glass or two.

Which reminds me, I have to drink more water…

I’m hoping (that’s a big hope) to get the novella done Sunday or Monday. It’s only supposed to be about 23k words, which I can definitely do in a day without breaking my brain. Especially when I’m involved in a story, but writing smut has always taken me longer than regular stuff.

I’m also hoping that keyboarding will help me with that. Because dang it, I’d love to be able to type 78wpm on a story.

My calculator claims I could write the novel in five hours if I wrote at that speed. I think it’s lying. It must be. Bad calculator.

That would be fantastic. Imagine the possibilities!

I’m trying to figure out what movies to watch on Sunday. Normally I  put on Netflix and go, which reminds me, I have to cancel my Netflix subscription. They aren’t getting in movies or shows I want to watch besides some original content but I don’t want to pay that amount for one show every two months. I might as well just buy the show when it comes out on DVD, same price and I don’t have to worry about being connected to the internet.

I could marathon through the Riddick Chronicles but… not sure I want to. My biggest trouble over the next couple of days might just be deciding what to watch.

The boss is back in town, she arrived in time to walk with the president guy. The other managers were also there. He didn’t say hello or anything to me, which normally he does, makes an effort to greet everyone. Maybe he was having an off day.

We talked very briefly about the weekend of doom. I said I was still upset because she dismissed what I was saying based on the fact that I was tired. And that I never want to do that again. Like. Ever. But I didn’t get into detail, since she’s still on vacation until Friday or Saturday. I can talk to her then and explain the garbled mess and how, apparently, I had someone from the store on my friends list on Facebook, she violated my consent, and the co-worker appeared to take that as my threatening her but bee-tee-dubs, here’s the post in question because while it’s locked, I have nothing to hide.

I have my personal Facebook under friends-only lock because I know sometimes I’m a wank. I say stupid things etc, welcome to being human. But I also have it locked because back in high school I had a stalker and she… appeared at one point to be haunting my Facebook and doing things. So… I locked her out.

I worry about that, but I also know that I was pushed to my end/extreme. I am good at a lot of things. Heck, I might even be considered great at a lot of things. Working constantly of thirty-seven days straight while dealing with stress is not one of those things. That doesn’t put me in the wrong, it just shows a limit that no one has tested before.

The schedule was also posted, I obviously have Sunday and Monday off. Thank goodness.

Just three more days.

Except… issues. I was called back from break yesterday because the doors were broken. When I got up front, there were six or so customers standing in our vestibule, about to push the doors off the tracks. It is an escape method, but the issue is, unless you have the strength and know-how, they’re almost impossible to put back on the track. One person needs both of those things because you kind of need to feel it out and you can’t lock up for the night unless it is back in place.

My body is not doing that. It’s barely upright. The other person I normally rely on for that sort of thing bruised her rib a few days ago and there’s no way I’d ask that of her just because my body isn’t doing that. Her body shouldn’t do that, even if it can.

So, I might have shouted a little.

“No!”

One customer was pushing on the door, a man was reaching up to the knobs, touching all the things. I told him to shut the doors off and he said that didn’t work. I repeated it and then made a motion away, like do it or get the fuck out the way and I’ll do it. So he scowled at me, but shut off the power to the doors and said it wouldn’t do anything.

I grabbed the doors and pushed them open. Because once the power is off, the doors move just fine which is how I know it’s not a problem with the tracks of the doors like we keep getting told. It’s the motor or has to do with problem number two.

The ceiling was dripping water about every ten seconds.

The cashier told the customers waiting that I was on my way up, but could they please move to the side, because the ceiling appears to be leaking (we had a heavy rain) she then watched the people under the leak, look up and stare.

As the water fell on their faces.

The leak has been there there a while. I think it’s three times now, it was supposed to have been fixed. It winds around electrical stuff, a motion detector and what kind of looks like an air conditioner. This store is the only one which seems to air condition their vestibule which I always thought odd until I actually looked up. So… we’ve got water leaking around electrical stuff.

Each time the ceiling leaks, I realized, we have issues with the door.

Tada, water is leaking into the wires of the door, creating hazards. Our doors will snap shut on customers, but also not open. Let’s not forget our basic math water + electricity = bad.

We put a bucket under the drip with a wet floor sign. You could hear it dripping into the bucket.

Customers dropped garbage into the bucket.

Thanks, guys.

After we closed up, the cashier related the story once more about customers looking up, so I looked up. It’s a weird, weird thing. But it’s a good thing I did because the leak has spread, so we put another bucket out there. The new one is directly over the path of the customer. Yay.

All I can do is call them in again, except I’m tired of them sending people who don’t know what’s going on, so I linked it all back into the comments and suggested the two might be connected.

Oh, right. Passed the driving test. I got the one the driving instructor refers to as the strict one. She’s quite a happy person, I never would have suspected she was strict at all. She kept saying good and I kept thinking she has to say that. At the end she said she had nothing else to say and I passed.

Just need to wait to be on insurance for someone before I can take a car out. If I had a car I could go home on days like today, where I have the afternoon off due to an instructor being out, and nap before work. Nap, like a person with time or something.

I’m now trying to figure out how to save up enough for a car. The fact that I can’t go to Mexico again for two years because of school means I’ll have a little from that, but it’ll take something like six trips to pay for a car and that means I’d have to save for six years to get a car and I don’t have that kind of time.

So, I’m basically batting around ideas on finances and trying not to feel overwhelmed over the fact that I can’t afford it right now. I can’t afford to buy a new car, because I can’t afford the monthly payments, not on what I’m currently being paid. Maybe once I graduate and have a job. Even if I had to keep the retail job for a little while to help things out. It’d drive me crazy, but at least then I’d have a car.

Why can’t money grow on trees?

Ah well. One thing down. A couple more to go.

Week Four (Day One)

Posted on by Aya DeAniege

Writing first: the edits of Crop are in. I’m just waiting for the preorder of Harvest to go up before uploading the final copy.

Got a novella of Mr. Wrightworth. Wish he couldn’t push my buttons the way he does. Ah well. I’ll be writing up the outline tomorrow, maybe.

Two weeks to the launch of Seed.

Think that’s it…

The everything else: besides Mr. Wrightworth catching me off guard at work, yesterday was a good day. I didn’t end up stressing out or anything.

Hairdresser I work with found a grey hair and then plucked it from my head. That kind of hurt.

I did sleep good Friday to last night, but I’ve been exhausted all day. Can’t tell if it’s because I’m fighting off a cold, or stress, or a combination of that and early mornings.

I spaced on my driving lesson tonight, so I didn’t make my lunches last night. I spent an hour finishing up Harvest instead. So now between school and driving I have to make lunches as well as after lesson.

Another lesson tomorrow night and then the driving test tomorrow morning.

I also have to email the other instructor. Shoot. I thought I did!

I updated The Others as well today. Uh. I suppose I just really want to play my game and watch some tv at this point but I can’t because I chose sleep and finishing a project yesterday. It would have worked out very well if not for the driving lesson.

Can’t believe I forgot about that.

Need to pull some address information and extra identification for Wednesday just in case.

I’m definitely overwhelmed. Five more days and I have two off. A bath and a bottle of wine is definitely in my future.

If I could drive myself, I would be home by now.

Boo.

I think I’m so tired even my emotions are asleep. Is that even a thing? Dunno. But I need sleep.

Week Three (Day Five)

Posted on by Aya DeAniege

Writing:

How do I put this…? My muses have been tossing about ideas for a new Contracted trilogy?

I know, I’m world and story creating like crazy and not getting on with the writing of anything yet. It’s all the clickity clack from keyboarding school driving me to it, but I’m making and keeping notes on OneNote so that it’s all there and available for when I can write again.

A Kaz/Balor story is started but put off because the content is not work or school safe so I can’t work on it anywhere. Not until either tomorrow or Sunday but I’ve allotted for edits for Crop to get that done.

Have I talked about The Others? It’s almost entirely unedited, which is stated in the first post there. It’s an ongoing project that I update in between other things, or pick away at between classes and such. So, if you’ve got an itch, head on over. Just realize it is m/m.

The idea is to pull it later on to edit and do additions, then publish it as a series. I think I’ve decided I’m writing out as much as I have/can, as far as it goes, then pulling the whole thing and editing it.

But if you do go, you’ll notice I’m not rushing any with that.

Other:

Work moving stuff last night definitely tired me out. I’m not necessarily sore, though. Just… tired.

I went to brush my teeth this morning and had immediate fatigue, so… you know, the writing class is going to be fun since she has us hand-write notes.

We had an accounting quiz yesterday and I looked around after I finished and realized everyone was still writing. Cue me panicking because I must have missed something. If they’re still writing, it must mean I did something wrong, skipped at least one part. So, I checked it again and again, even put the alphabet beside the transactions, worried I had just skipped one.

No, it just happens that I have managed a good understanding of the first two chapters. Because I read them ahead and took my own notes (this is how I learn better) but now I worry because chapter three, I read it and I couldn’t find anything to make a note about. Just, yup, that all makes sense.

Writing, the instructor was sick but assigned some homework in place of her being here because we still have to keep up on work, right? Your boss calls out sick, do you just skip out  home and do nothing?

If  I’m being honest, I’d work from home if I could get away with it.  Well, it sounds like a few people didn’t hand anything in because they didn’t read the full announcement. Oh, geez.

Keyboarding! Keyboarding is the one I constantly feel like I’m struggling with. My hands are starting to move a little better but I still have to make exceptions to their rules. My knuckles don’t move like that and as much as I’ve forced the new motions, the fingers just kind of shoot out and start hitting all the buttons. So, I guess you could say that I’ve adapted the method because of my arthritis. I’m sure my method wouldn’t pass for others, because the damage to the joints is different.

However, my word count and accuracy have begun to go up. Yesterday I did a two-minute timing without a single error, not even one I deleted. Though… it was weird. I did several two-minute timings. I think five in total? On one they kept wanting ‘exam’ someone wrote and exam and didn’t tell this other person when the exam was.

Yeah, for some reason my brain insists there’s an ‘e’ on the end of ‘exam’ but not all the time just every third or fourth time I write exam. My fingers hit the ‘e’ at the end and my brain, reading it out goes, “Yup, that looks right.”

Math, I worry I’m so lost that I think I’ve made it. Like I aimed for the Pacific Ocean and ended up in the Atlantic instead and just can’t tell the difference, that kind of lost. It both seems too easy, and they ask me things that I was never taught in school.

Rounding and estimating, what is this? Math of lazy people?

Yet, I use rounding and estimating when I’m doing math at work, but because I’m in a school setting my brain stutters and I think I must not know how to do it right.

Have I hit them all? No. Computers. I need to pay more active attention but I think he thinks I’m writing in class because now he’s wanting us to focus forward. If I don’t take notes, it doesn’t stick. Writing notes by hand gets it out of my head so I just never remember. But if I type it, thanks to all the writing, my brain logs it all down.

All, like, “Oh, gonna need this in edits, I just know it.”

So on breaks and as he was dismissing us, I scrambled to get notes into my note page to remember it this time. He’s teaching us file sorting. I like to think I’ve got that down. But then I tried to find things in my OneDrive and it seems I bungled something, so I need to revisit my system. Which is fine, it’s new. Sometimes it takes me some time to figure out the easiest way to set up a new system.

Oh, and Interpersonal Communication. I started reading the book, think I’m about halfway through. Need to read more, obviously. Need to take notes in that class, it’s after lunch and that’s definitely going to be brain death time.

I am trying to interact with my fellow students more. Soft skills, you know?

Work last night, besides the exhaustion, went all right. The co-worker was happy she hasn’t been happy in a long time. She also sported a new look. Looked like half her hair disappeared, since she flattened it. But the happy scared the shit out of me. I’ve had people get happy like that when they’re about to attack me.

I thought it was maybe just my perspective too, until someone else saw her walk by and their eyebrows raised.

“Whole new person this week.”

Hey, if she stays happy and isn’t mean to anyone, whatever and good for her. If she’s planning something, ugh. For about a second, I thought she was gloating and then I realized I didn’t care what she was doing. I was tired, I wasn’t working.

I played my game between school and work. When I started, a man I hadn’t met properly came and acted like the MOD. It took a second for the voice in the back of my head to kick me and remind me of interpersonal communication.

He’s good people. He’s in training for a boss position and I like him. I’ve never met an boss-in-training who I thought was good people. People, yes, but normally they’re just not great people. Oh, I’ve met plenty of bosses who are good people too, including my current one, it’s just I never meet good boss-in-trainings.

He was nice, he tried to help, he communicated, he introduced himself. There’s nothing threatening about him in the least.

Good.

Truth be told, it was his presence that calmed me around the co-worker being happy and the assistant asking (per her job) about the weekend. She says she has to talk to the boss about it, again that’s her job. I told her I wrote it all up and she seemed surprised.

Well, writer. Hypergraphic. Super upset. Also I have a bad memory. I cannot for the life of me remember anything beyond I don’t do my job and her invalidating all of my feelings by blaming me being tired.

Good thing I wrote it down.

At the end of the day, what was said doesn’t matter as much as the outcome. Of me bawling my eyes out and feeling like she was manipulating me into quitting and whatever she took from the conversation.

Which, I have to say, from my view is smug assuredness.

Oh well. There are other jobs. I’m told they’re a dime a dozen.

I can sleep in tomorrow, I’m so flipping excited. Nine more days. Just nine more days.

Week Three (Day Four)

Posted on by Aya DeAniege

Writing first: Suppose I should officially say this as well.

I am looking for a new set of characters within the Contracted world, or a similar sort of story set in another world. I had a flash of one, quite liked it. Then I lost it. Problem being, I can’t remember when, or much beyond his cold eyes. If it could come back to me (but not in school) that would be great.

The forerunner of an idea is barely more than a fragment. For starters, I need names for these countries I’d be dealing with. But Mr. Wrightworth’s country basically takes over old France (it’s mention in Izzy’s story, then again in Will’s that they won) except they aren’t going down quietly and no conquering country is free of sin.

So, upon catching a rebel, probably needing information, they tie her up with this general or something and he’s had a taste for the lifestyle but is also a douche. Thing is, I’m not feeling the ‘fall for the douche and stay’ plot. Maybe there should be a second guy in there.

Huh, maybe that’s why it feels incomplete. I’ll have to consider that.

Still no Crop work. Ugh. So… Saturday morning I’ll be pounding that out, along with Sunday. Putting in edits isn’t really work for me, especially since I can put on a show or movie in the background.

Other stuff:

Work with the co-worker today, well, not really with, around, near, kind of in passing. I’m currently trying to convince my stomach that I’m not dying and my brain that it’s not too bright in here, that everyone else isn’t louder than usual. I can hear them over my music and it’s at the highest volume I can manage without being in pain.

That volume always cuts them out, so I know it’s just because of a me issue, not a them issue.

I hurt and I’m tired. Work is doing a strip and wax, which is where we move all the things except, like, the aisles themselves, and then a crew comes in and strips the wax off the floor and puts down new wax.

Yesterday we had lots of… we didn’t prepare at all. But. I wasn’t the closing manager, I shut up and did it her way. It wasn’t painful until this morning. Oosh.

So, moving all the stuff, the closer walked up and pushed on one of the mobile things and commented on how it wouldn’t move. She’s a foot or more taller than I am and frankly, I think she has more muscle to her. I frowned, set my hands on the mobile and just leaned.

A body in motion will stay in motion. So the trouble is always getting them moving in the first place, but once they’re moving, they’re good. Well, we moved a third of the mobiles together and then I realized we had ten minutes before the end of shift and I didn’t want to stay later when I was already later than usual and hurting. Leg acting up last night, today my back would like me to know I suck.

But, already hurting and want to go home… I left them, walked to the other side and moved a third of the mobiles by myself while they moved the other third. I’m not super strong, I just know about leverage, motion, and that the mobiles have no option but to move. Once you tell them that, they tend to move.

Today we have to move a bunch of what are called bunkers. Sort of like plastic boxes a foot and a half by a foot by two and a half feet… full, mainly. The items vary in weight to feeling empty to… what was that the one year… sixty pounds? Then lift them onto a stack of somehow organized bunkers on another big thing and push the big thing into another area.

(To hear the next morning about how you didn’t do it properly no matter how you line them up)

Look, I get it, putting them back is an inconvenience.

So is moving them when they weigh half as much as you, when the capable bodies around you aren’t moving or helping because they’re ‘tired.’ It won’t wait until tomorrow, or until you’re rested unless you want to stay for another four hours. Just rip the bandaid off.

This all means I’m sore and tired today, but it’s not the exhaustion of last week, I’m not on the point of tears. I almost feel like I’m wrapped up in a blanket, like besides the anxiety, a calm has come over me.

In school, the ‘bad’ grades are coming in. They were 100s at the beginning, now they’ve dropped as low as 70. But this isn’t my total grade, this is individual grades on assignments and the 70 was because of the missed assignment. The others are between 83 and 95, which, as they’ve said a multitude of time, doesn’t matter to employers. I need to hit their passing percentage of 60. My concern is as we advance toward Christmas, life at work sucks.

Could we de-commercialize Christmas? That would make me so happy.

Ain’t no body need the items we sell at 10pm at night.

Or 11pm.

So, I desperately want 100s as buffers.

The schedule that loads with my days off appear on Sunday. Sweet babies. When the boss gets back, we need to have a sit down conversation.

About more than the co-worker.

I need a day off to myself at least every two weeks. That was what was promised to me at the beginning. I went into this still in my position because that was what was promised. If the promise can’t be met… well.

You’re going to see me cry a lot more.

No, I would have to step down or full on quit. School has to come before work. Anyone would pay me low wages to be walked over, to do the same work. It’s just other companies would be like, “yeah, Aya is in school, we can’t have her work outside her schedule.” or “Yeah, Aya asked for this day off, but what do I care? She’s not as capable as this person I have who’s worked for us for twelve years.”

I wouldn’t have as much to pay down debt, which is key to full on quitting and living off the writing. I’d also have to cut back on what I’m paying in board because I might not be making enough in a paycheck to pay the full board. It’s super irritating to me, but getting through school and into a type of office job would be better for stress, better for my bank account and, depending on the boss, maybe better for writing.

I’ve heard a lot of stories of office workers/desk workers (especially in the almost-secretary position I’m aiming for) to do their own thing between clients. I would love one of those jobs. Writing makes it look like I’m working on something super important too!

I also have to drive sales, obviously. And obviously I’m having a little trouble. I know there are readers out there for me. I know they exist, it’s just finding them. And not finding the people who wouldn’t like my books.

Or…

I could win the lottery. But I hear you have to actually buy a ticket to win?

12-in-12 Challenge

Posted on by Aya DeAniege

Okay. I haven’t really bitten off more than I can chew, but I took on the 12-in-12 challenge last November to give myself a goal because I wasn’t quite certain where my writing was going besides into The Reaping trilogy. Now I’ve got that and the second Contracted trilogy done as well as one one-off.

The challenge seems to have boot-kicked my creative world building up into a higher gear which is fantastic and I love it.

Over the months I have learned more about editing and graphic design and now want to revamp all my backlog of books and update the covers for the Coffee and Blood series. I may have to revisit the Contract series as well, though I do like the style.

Coffee and Blood would likely follow the same style as the Seed cover. I like how that looks and the background colours for each trilogy will be the same colour and texture while the character changes. That’ll make it easier for readers to find the trilogies by glance alone, no?

There are… eleven books to re-edit and six or so more to edit.

I’m still waiting for an acceptance/rejection letter but I do want to go back to school. I want to do the editing. I want to get the graphic design up and running for real. Except the 12-in-12 is always there. And if I get into school, I can’t do the last two books of the year.

Basically, I’m considering ending my 12-in-12 because it served out a purpose and has jump started all sorts for my writing, editing, and goals for the coming years. Except now it’s taking up so much time that I can’t get anything done until November. I can’t re-edit until November, or re-brand until November. I don’t feel that would be a good fit to wait until November to start all this when I need Wraith’s Rebellion done for October, before Seed goes live.

So, I suppose this is now a to-do list:

-Rebrand website: I said I’d do this, what, back in November?

-Edit, in this order: Seed, Wraith’s Rebellion, Crop, Harvest, Contracted, D.o.t.A.

-Rebrand Covers: Wraith’s Rebellion.

-Get on with the Covers already.

-Blog tours?

-Revisit Blurbs of all the books.

-Adjust room/office area to actually allow for doing work.

-Update The Others.

Ark is still active, but I am dragging my feet because of the to-do list. Ark doesn’t have a due date, it’s not up for pre-order anywhere, I don’t have to rush through it. I’m kind of enjoying dragging my feet, though. Ark is set in a tropical biodome and is kind of giving me flashbacks of vacations but in a good way.

I’ve got a direction now, I know where I’m going and what I’m doing. It’s time to take off the blinders and make changes to further my writing rather continuing to do what isn’t getting books out until probably spring of next year. That’s too long.

April: Contract Delivered

Posted on by Aya DeAniege

Three days in and I’m already having issues. This sucks because I’m pretty certain this isn’t the same issue that I had with His Wings.

My pain returned yesterday, but no anxiety accompanying it. By the time I got home, because I worked through it all, the knuckles on my right hand were bright red against my pale skin. The index and middle finger of the left were the same thing. It utterly drained me.

Today the pain seems manageable. As in not really existing. My knuckles are stuffy but I feel exhausted to the point that I can’t focus on my writing.

The plus side of that all is that the last time my knuckles looked like that, I had to call into work because the pain made me physically ill. This time around it just sapped my energy.

To complicate my project schedule, I have a social event to go to tonight. I don’t regret going at all, but that means I probably won’t get work done until Thursday, which is my next day off. There’s a part of me that’s about ready to stomp her feet and throw a little tantrum over that, which is how I know this isn’t the same as His Grace.

I knew April would be challenging because my move happens during it. I knew that would interfere, that the anxiety would be high and I’d have a lot to do. That was one of the reasons I chose Contract Delivered.

After working with him for… what is, three years now? Mr. Wrightworth is practically a comfort when I’m sick or unwell in some way. Yeah, I’m team Mr. Wrightworth, but I’ve never had a proper, healthy relationship and have been known to be a masochist both emotionally and physically.

Contract Delivered is meant to be the end of the second year of Nathaniel and Mr. Wrightworth’s contract with Albert. In the original introduction, Nathaniel promised it would cover some of his time with Isabella. So the original plan was to have Contract Signed cover the year of servitude, Contract Sealed to be the years in between, and then Contract Delivered to cover the time where Isabella and Nathaniel were apart. Then four chapters into Contract Signed, Nathaniel changed it all.

He was all, “No, this should all be about Him.”

And I just sighed and shook my head but gave in and let him go with it.

In the meantime, I’m doing a read-edit of Contract Gifted, a novella that is like as not going to be expanded at some point in the future into a novel. That’s fine by me. I’ve got the cover done for it and have to work on the description. Once I’m done the read-edit, I can write up the description.

Both the edit and the description would be done on my phone. Since the read-edit actually involves reading it and making notes, then making changes on a computer.

See, for the next week, I can’t take my netbook to work. I’m worried I will forget it. Or be mugged… I’ve lived in this city for like four years and I’ve never been concerned that someone will notice what’s in my bag until now. Because that’s just my freaking luck. So, rather than risk the netbook being stolen, I’m leaving it at home. That also, of course, bites into my writing time.

So be it.

Four more work days, nine days until my move. Oh, which I probably won’t be able to write Contract Delivered during. I suspect typing on a computer would be super distracting to a driver so instead I’m going to have my phone with all the background stuff shut down, a traveling battery thing (I can’t seem to recall the word, so it’s probably best that I’m not writing this morning), and an MP3 player separate. I’ll work on Harvest instead.

For like… fifteen hours or so. Three hours is usually one chapter for that, so I could be about a quarter of the way done by the time I arrive.

Plans, etc.

If only my head was able to focus on writing a story today.

Awakened Week Two

Posted on by Aya DeAniege

I’ve written about ten thousand words in the last week and I hate the struggle. I came up with the loose plot four days ago and then forgot it all. It’s like hitting a wall.

My sleep patterns have changed because the noisy neighbour moved out. Today I realized it’s been a year since I slept properly. No wonder I’m now struggling.

This morning I sat down and wrote out a rough geustimate of the plot. I started at the end and worked my way back because there was this little gap I was struggling with and working backward was definitely the way to go.

I’m hoping I can get a move on again. It’s about nine more chapters or about another 35k words. I’ll get about 23k this weekend but I do believe Awakened will be my longest project to date. I think even Contract Claimed was shorter.

I found and joined a high word count group and they think I’m burnt out.

I mean… Full-time job and the move and the life changes and trying to meet a project, okay. I guess they’re right but that’s not a great thing. I’ve been doing so good! I’m halfway there. May is supposed to be when I struggle.

When I’m going to Mexico the first week, and flying out for a wedding the the third week. Second week? Something like that.

I will have to just take it as it comes. This isn’t like the struggle with His Wings, I want to finish Awakened and I’m enjoying writing it.

All told so far, between writing and editing the books I’ve wrtten, I’ve clocked about 80k words a month.

Or about 320k from November until the beginning of Marcg. That’s still pretty darn good.

Oh, in other news. I’m about to finish the read edit for His Wings. The final draft will be up sometime this weekend. That’s another project down to bed.

If I can finish Awakened, I’m going to edit Contract Gifted again and hopefully get that up. Maybe get it up the first week of April. That’d be fantastic.