Public Transporation

In case you didn't read about that time I got lost in Seattle, on foot, for three hours in the sketchy side of town, here's another reminder of why I drive everywhere rather than taking public transportation:

The view from the train

Damien drove Laura and me to AWP where we registered and ate dinner and checked into my hostel (which ended up being this God-awful place, and I ended up not even staying there because we were all so creeped out by it. But that's another blog post).

By the end of the night he returned home to Maine and Baxter, while I stayed with my twitter friend's friend (you'll remember her from the time everyone said I was going to get murdered in Boston). It was the first time I'd slept on a real bed in well over a month, and when my head hit the very fluffy, very clean, pillow, I was out.

The following morning Veronika drove me to the bus station with a handy-dandy print out of directions. I should have been able to get to AWP just fine, but instead, I arrived nearly 45 minutes AFTER the first panel started. (Meaning I was lost for about 1.5-2 hours.)

First, I took the OUTBOUND when I was supposed to take the INBOUND. Second, the GREENLINE was WAY above my head. I may have gotten a little over emotional and overdramatic, but hey, I missed the first panel. I was allowed to. When I finally arrived at the Hyne's Convention Center stop, I couldn't figure out which direction to walk to actually get to the Convention Center. (Thankfully, I am NOT above talking to strangers.)

Rather than barging in all sorts of late, I arrived, covered in snow, wet feet, and soaked pants, and promptly found The Rumpus table. Remember how I told you guys that sometimes you need to buy new gear to get yourselves inspired? I forgot to mention that coffee cups can also do the trick, and can cheer you up in seconds. When I got to the table I said, "Please for the love of God tell me you have the Write like a mother fucker mugs!"

The gentlemen there said, "Yes we do."

"You're damn right you do!" I shouted and forked over the money. I've wanted this cup for YEARS now. Last year they sold out. At long last it's mine:

So for a time, I was happy. The conference was amazing (stay tuned, I'll have more posts of the awesomeness), and then came time to take the bus home. Only, the bus I was supposed to take wasn't the bus I was supposed to take.

It's 3am, and he's still happy to see me :)

Long story short (because I can see your eyes glaze over already) Damien had to drive down from Maine at midnight and drive back as daylight savings hit and he had to work at 9am. Needless to say, I am less than impressed.

Moral of the story is....well, I'm not that sure. Maybe I'm just grateful to have my car back, and that Damien was willing to pick me up. Oh, and I missed Baxter :)


Happy Monday.

The Longest Week

Later today I'll be travelling approximately two hours to an airport to pick her up:

My sister, my sister!

 From there, we will drive home where we will maybe make some food. Maybe shower (separately, that's weird). And then very early in the morning we will rise and do this:

Snowboard!

After we beat ourselves up on the mountain, and she re-learns how to snowboard, it's time for home, and tacos, and sleep because the following morning, we're off to do this:

AWP 2013
Boston

Perhaps this year, I may actually have a planned place to stay...

...Then again, maybe not

Falling in Love

I've had a lot of time alone to dissect what draws me to people/what repels me from people.

During my stay in Seattle, I met a boy the night Jen and I went to celebrate. I'd been brave and talked to not only agents, but editors as well. Thus, Jen and I put on dresses, and make up, and hit the town.

When I'd ordered a drink, a lovely gentleman with an OK GO t-shirt on called to our waitress, "I'll buy those drinks, actually." What could we do? Of course we asked him to sit with us.

This picture makes me laugh, so hard

After a few minutes of gushing thank yous from both Jen and me (as we're super broke), the drinks (Irish Car Bombs) arrived.

I looked to Jen, and looked to the cute Irish stranger sitting near me. "I'm going to drool all over the table, don't judge."

His response? "I don't judge, I work with drool all day."

I stopped. Jen stopped. Immediately I was attracted (I come from a long line of droolers. It always makes an appearance in my novels.) "What do you do?" I asked.

"I'm a veterinarian." There are two types of people I love in this world. 1) Writers, because we're all batshit crazy. 2) Veterinarians, because they're pet people. (I actually got a degree in Medical Biology for Pre-Vet)

And like that, Jen and I dropped the shot into the mug and chugged. Sure enough, I drooled all over the table. He handed me a napkin and bought the following round. Early in the night he took me and Jen out on the dance floor (allowing us to share him equally).

18 Second Video. Highly recommend watching it
(It is kind of dark though, sorry!)

It was then I knew I loved this stranger. Not only was he a vet (we talked quite a bit about my dog and his work), but he knew how to dance, RESPECTFULLY. He wasn't feeling me up, or groping me, or grinding on me. Instead, he would twirl me, and spin me, and dip me, and lead me the way the guys do in movies.

During one of our magical dances, he dipped me and proceeded to kiss me, which caused heat flashes in every part of my body. He was thirty something, I was twenty something, and in the hours I spent with him, I planned out the rest of my life.

But all fairy tales come to an end, and like Cinderella, my prince had other plans and left the bar around midnight, taking my phone number and never calling again. (In all fairness, by the end of the night, I found another boy to dance with, and when the vet returned, new boy had his arm around me, and he just stood, suddenly very uncomfortable. I excused myself from the table to talk to him, and do you know what he said? DO YOU? "I just came to make sure you guys were okay." And my heart died. I wanted to tell him that I'd leave new boy for him, that I should shoo away the other person, but the damage had been done. He left again, and my little heart went with him.)

So why am I blogging about this?

When I read a book, I want to fall in love with characters. I want to see the things that draw me to them. Sure, tall, dark, and handsome rocks (you know the kind, dark hair, jet blue eyes). But tall, dark, and handsome can have a collection of dead babies in his closet. I need more, I need the flawed, the intense, the spontaneous, or whatever else. This lovely gentleman made this night in Seattle memorable, and now, nearly a year later, I still think of him (and regret not being able to spend more time with him). I knew him for maybe four hours, and his presence resides in my heart.

The question for you, writers, is:

Will your characters steal my heart, too?

Occupational Hazard

Writing comes with an occupational hazard. We're not well. I don't know a single writer who says, "I am mentally stable," unless of course, they're seeing a head shrink. I'm not saying we don't have good days, because those do exist. But I am saying that many of us are plagued by self destruction, alcoholism, drug abuse, and a healthy dose of self loathing....which usually leads to suicide, and if not suicide, then missing ears, eyes, body parts, etc. Janet Reid recently posted THIS video. If you're a writer and you haven't seen it, watch it. (It's slightly less than 20 minutes, but it's incredible.)

Yes, this was a pitcher of beer

For a long time, I figured I would be like Sylvia Plath. She was a poet, and a writer. She was brilliant, and haunting, and I can't find any of her writing that is terribly happy. Her voice sounded like cigarettes (in my poetry class in college we listened to her read). My entire life I've had friends ask me to write something with a happy ending. Well, I didn't want a happy ending because I wasn't a happy person. I can't tell you how many times I've tried to kill myself. It's not because I've lost count, but because the lines of self destruction and actual attempts blur together for me now. I wanted to follow Sylvia. I wanted to hold her hand as the ocean waves carried me out, and have people say, "She was brilliant, and she (finally) killed herself." I wanted my writing to affect people the way hers affected me. 

And then this year, I attended AWP in Chicago. Margaret Atwood was a keynote speaker. She made a joke something along the lines of:

I've been around so long people are starting to question whether or not I'm still alive.

Brilliant woman. Still alive.

She was clever, and old, and humble, and funny. She had a spark in her eyes. She had wrinkles on her face. For the first time in my life, rather than wanting to die young, and beautiful, and fast...I wondered what it would be like to live to be 80 or 90, or like my granddad, 100 (he celebrated his 100th birthday this year!). Imagine the connections you could make with people, the lives you could help save. Imagine how many more novels you could write!

A few months after this I was invited to a middle school in Maine to talk about depression, cutting, eating disorders, etc. During my three week invasion, the option to kill myself became revoked. I fell in love with the students there. I told them they could have a future, and each day by querying, by putting myself out there, I am trying to prove to them that you can grow up in a shitty environment and come out swinging.

I'm not saying that every day it's easy to drive my car to work without the urge to veer it into oncoming traffic or off the cliff I drive by. (I actually had this conversation with one of my managers the other day.) Some days it's harder than others. But I don't do it, because I can no longer do it. I have something to prove to those students.

I may not live to make it to thirty. I may not make it to see 25. Who knows? But every day, I am alive, I fight the burden that many of the creative minds have. I am not mentally well, I've known this since I was in sixth grade. But as I said earlier, there are happy days. If live long enough for people to question my existence, I hope it will be a life well lived. I pray that I'll be able to stand in front of a room full of strangers and make fun of my age and the things I've been through.

The moral of all this is that as writers, we have an occupational hazard. We feel more than most people, and sadly those feelings aren't usually happy ones.

Don't give in to it. Don't die from your own hand. Seek help; support groups, therapy, psychiatric wards, friends, family. Live to joke about paramedics coming to your house and asking if you're still alive. Live to tell youngsters about paper back books when they existed.

Just. Live.

That's all.

Happy Monday :) (I know it's not Monday, but I didn't say Happy Monday yesterday, and this is how I roll)

Breaking Points

Last August I went to Seattle to attend PNWA, and it was one of the highlights of my life. Every day at the conference was amazing, my friend who housed me, rocked.

Daylight in Seattle...no rain, just sun

But the second morning there, Jen walked me to the bus stop and asked if I'd be okay getting home that night because she would be at a friend's function. "Yep!" I said with full confidence, "I'll be fine!" (Famous last words, right?)

The panels were great, and dinner was yummy, but a full day of sessions started wearing on me, and I felt the way I do when I stay up writing til 3am and just need to sleep. Right now. I texted Jen to tell her I was on my way home and walked out of the keynote speaker I'd been waiting for.

When I got off the bus, it was about 9pm. It was dark. When I'd walked here this morning, it was bright enough to merit sunglasses. Now in the darkness, nothing looked familiar, and so I had to trust my instincts. (For those of you who don't know me, my instincts are wrong, 99% of the time....thus begins our story.)

I took a left, and started walking on what I thought was a somewhat familiar bike path. Jen said she was still with some friends, and I told her I thought I knew where I was going. Then came a fork in the path. I didn't recognize it at all. I looked left, didn't recognize the walk. I looked right, and nothing looked right, either. I started walking anyway.

Then my phone beeped to tell me my battery was dying. Time was rapidly becoming a factor. I needed to get home, now.

It gets so dark there!

I walked, and walked. Each step caused my one strap messenger bag to weigh more and more. I constantly transferred the bag from one shoulder to the other in the hopes I'd even out the back pain, but it didn't work.  It was the first time I asked myself, Why the hell did I buy so many books today?

I continued on the path. Everything was looking more and more foreign. I started questioning if I'd even gotten off at the correct bus stop. I called Jen when I reached a sign that mentioned some sort of a park. "I don't recognize that name at all," she told me. A sinking feeling took hold, but I refused to cry.  I can do this, I just have to keep walking.

She suggested getting off the path and walking on the road so I could at least read road signs. My battery light flashed at me, time was running out. "I'll try to start looking for you," she said, and gave up going to her friend's function because I was an idiot and bad with directions.

The high heels I'd been wearing
(Don't worry, I was wearing
dress clothes for the conference)

I got off the bike path and onto the road, and called Patrick who was in California at the time. Whenever I've been in a jam, or gotten lost before, he'd always bailed me out. He said he'd map quest me some directions, and there was a ray of hope.

I took off my high heels and we found a cross intersection. My heels now felt like a pummeled pumpkin, but I continued on after he told me which way to go.  Low and behold, the next street sign matched up to what he was seeing. He'd found me!

It was so dark outside and lamposts were few and far between. The neighborhood looked like I was going to get jumped at any time. Because I'm a writer, I imagined every worst case scenario possible, but reassured myself that it would make for a good memoir.

"I don't get it," Patrick said. "The road you're looking for should be right there."

"There's just what looks like an elementary school!" I cried into the phone. Just as Jen's phone number flashed across my screen, my phone gave one last valiant vibration and went black. I was cut off from the world.

Now, completely alone, and walking in the wrong direction, I checked my watch. It was 11:30pm, I'd been walking for 2.5 hours. I was lost, cranky, tired, and sore. My arthritic knees hated me and begged to stop moving. They were ready to give out at any moment, and so walking was rapidly becoming a factor now. I wanted to cuddle Baxter, to be home, to be at Jen's and drink some soy milk. Instead, I continued walking the same stupid streets I'd passed sixteen other times.

I passed an older looking man, dressed completely in black in this ghetto neighborhood, and asked, "Do you know where (name a street) is?" He pointed in the direction I'd just come from, "Are you walking honey?" Me, "Yes." "It's about ten blocks that way. About two miles...." he looked apologetic, and I wanted to scream.

Please no, I prayed. Please just let me be home. 

Jen, my lovely host, and wonderful friend

Instead, when the man was out of sight, I sat on the curb and cried. I stopped caring if I was going to get raped or murdered. I didn't care if I got shot. I was lost, Jen would never be able to find me. And the worst part was that I was going to miss the rest of the conference.

I'd reached the breaking point.

Out of some run down driveway, a small pure white cat emerged and crawled onto my lap. It wasn't Baxter, but I still spoke to it anyway. "Hello little friend," I sobbed. "I'm so lost, and I don't know where I am, and I hate this stupid city and buses." I whined to the cat for a long while while my aching feet and knees rested. Finally, I told my small friend I had to leave, and that I couldn't take it home, and resumed walking, taking sketchy streets with bars on windows, and found an open door.

Still hysterical, I stumbled in and rambled, "I'm lost, and I don't know where I'm going, and my phone died..."

The man behind the counter looked at me, and said, "Ma'am, I can't understand you. Take a seat, calm down, and we'll try to help you."

I sat in a seat, and cried more. An old man who smelled like he hadn't showered for the last few years sat beside me and asked, "You lost little girl?" and I cried harder and nodded my head. When the tears started to subside and I could breathe again, I looked around me. The man appeared to be missing some teeth and I wasn't sure that you could even consider what he was wearing to be clothing anymore. Meanwhile I was in a new dress I'd bought the day I'd arrived, and my new shoes. I'd even gotten ambitious and put make up on, which was now probably smeared all over my face.

To my right was what resembled a soup kitchen or pantry, at least the way they look on TV shows. To the left were stairs and empty chairs.

I'm in a shelter, I concluded.

Finally, I approached the desk, and explained the situation. They asked me if I knew of anywhere, and I didn't. Did I know Jen's phone number? No, and my phone was dead. Was I alone and on foot? Yes. Did you know it's not safe for a girl to be lost around here? I had a feeling, which has been solidified, thank you.

It took me a solid five minutes before I could even remember the name of the road where Jen lived. They informed me that I was on the other side of town, and the bus stop where I'd been dropped off at has a split where the roads all match each other. I should have crossed the road to get on the other bike path.

Just as I'd started to cry again, one of the men offered to give me a ride. Because I was still in the mindset of not caring whether or not I died, I took a risk and got in his small car.

Soon enough, I got to Jen's found the spare key, and went in. I dug out my phone charger, and called her to tell her to come home, I was safe. It was now after midnight. I called Patrick, who had left me several worried voicemails, and let him know I was alive.

When Jen came into the apartment, we both burst into tears and hugged. "I'm so glad you're safe!" she told me.

Eventually, I was reunited with my little man :)

So, why am I telling this story?

Because, this kind of thing happens to me a lot. That moment where you reach the breaking point and have to live in a friend's basement because you got fucked over on your living situation, or getting lost in Seattle, on foot, with no cell phone.

Submissions are a lot like this. Query letters, partial requests. All of those things are like this. We get rejected. We all reach the point where we sit on the curb and cry, and are completely ready to get shot in the face and die. (A little dramatic, but you know what I mean :) ). But then there's a little white kitten who crawls into our laps and whispers, Keep writing, keep editing, keep going. And so we get up, brush ourselves off, and stumble into something we never knew existed.

I believe that things work out. I also believe that things can get hard beyond belief. But if you reach your breaking point, keep pushing. You may still make it home.

AWP Follow Up

I am now sitting in a panel titled, 'Keeping Your Debut Alive'. I have registered for the conference by sheer luck. My sister and I stumbled upon a hostle. I was paid today from both jobs. This morning in my one strap messenger bag I found old buisness cards!

And the best part of all of this?

I have TONS to blog about this month because I'm learning so much!

Also, please keep my car in your thoughts. He may still get towed...

Reality Check

Being a writer is a costly endeavor. First, there's the computer, the software. After you get there, there's the hours you devote a day to writing a novel, a story, whatever. If you're one of the rarities (that I'm not sure really exist) that manage to get published in their first shot, then you don't really need to listen to my rant. But even if you are, you may want to. Because even after you get published, it's still about getting your name out there and spreading your fan base.

So let's take a reality check here. Here are some costs of writing conferences and memberships that help boost your bio section of the query letter, help you network, and let you meet agents and editors:

SCBWI Winter Conference:
(Registration is still open to those of you who can afford it!)
Early Registration:   Members- $360
                                 NonMembers-$450
Regular Registration:  Members- $385
                                    Nonmembers-$485
SCBWI Membership:
1st Year: $85
Renewal Cost: $70

AWP Conference:
(This year it's in Chicago! See you there!)

Attendee Categories	Pre-registration Nov. 1 - Jan. 23	On-site Registration Feb. 29 - Mar. 3
Member	$155	$190
Non-member	$225	$265
Member + 1-Year AWP Membership	$220	$255
Student	$40	$60

I love this conference because of their student price. This is one of the only conferences I've found that offer this option. It is the first conference I was ever able to go to, and the one I will go to probably the rest of my life.

LeakyCon Lit Day:
(Also in Chicago this year. Woot!)
Okay, If you want Leaky Con it's $200. They don't have the price up for just the lit day portion yet.

PNWA Membership:

• $65 Regular Dues
• $25 Full-time Student

I did not know that these guys offered a student discount. I will have to pass this information along. Either way, I belong to this program because, although I live across the country, I saved close to $100 by being a member. Plus, like I previously stated, it's a nice thing to add to your query bio.

PNWA Conference:

They're posting the information, but if I remember correctly, it was like $300-$400. This conference to me rocked my work, and somehow I was able to afford it. 

But look at these costs. I'm a recent college graduate. I own a dog. I work a minimum wage job. Even if I'm able to afford the conferences, if I don't have friends who reside in the cities these things take place, that's an additional $200ish/per night, as well as the cost to get there (depending on location $400+). 

So, another reality check:

*My rent is $425/month

*Car payment is $300ish (somewhat flexible)/month

*Two credit cards: $200/month

*Baxter (without Vet visit): ~$40/month

*Food: Too much, though I tend to stick with Beefaroni, Raeman, and RiceaRoni

Those costs alone make me kind of want to...curl in the fetal position...like this:

In all fairness, this was taken after my first 2,000 ft tandem hang gliding flight

Bottom line: Money is a significantly limiting factor for me, what about you?

So some FREE advice because I like to ramble anyway:

Research the conferences. Find agents you would tear our your kidney and sell it on the black market for. Save up your money and go to those conferences. My college professor is the one who told me to go to AWP, and I am eternally thankful to her. Because of that conference, I started saving up money to go to more. I started writing again. 

If you have the money, they're so, so worth it. Not only for the agent-to-face time, but also for the panels, the authors, the networking, the free pens! 

It's a hard game. Money is just a piece we all play with, so play wisely.

Good luck!

Thank You Janet Reid

I'm not sure if any of you follow Janet Reid's blog, but you should if you don't. Go back through her archives and find this:

BE READY

So, after this advice and changing my intentions of conference attending, I am ready. I have pages printed, I have queries printed, I have business cards. I am ready for this, if anyone is willing to look at anything or critique anything. Even if they tell me what I wrote sucks, it's a starting point.

Be better, get better.

I'm ready.

(And off I go. No...but really, I probably won't blog until I come back. Tomorrow I work all day *I'm actually writing this at work* and then I'm powerkiting, buying clothes for the conference, and then packing, doing laundry, and cleaning out my car. Then I'm off!!)

Conference Prep

The LeakyCon Lit Day is rapidly approaching and while I feel unprepared something inside me tells me I'm ready. It's weird because I've never really been nervous about a conference. But...this round of conferences is different.

Why?

Because the previous times I've been to conferences it was for educational purposes. I wasn't pitching; I was finding out about the dynamics of the publishing world. I was seeing what people had to say. And now, with three and a half novels under my belt, I at last feel like I'm ready for this.

And so, I'm nervous. My intentions have changed. I'm not attending this conference purely for educational purposes. Ideally, I'll walk away with an agent, but if not, that's okay. I'll at least learn and maybe get critiqued on my pitching.

In all honesty, I need to work on my pitch. I need to do what Janet Reid has told her follows and Be Prepared. I need to print off x-amount of pages, query letters, whatever else I can do that may help show an agent that I'm ready and I'm willing to work for this.

Why?

Because I'm ready for this.

Preparing For A Conference

The schedule for LeakyCon's Lit Day has been posted HERE. I'm going to first talk a little bit about the first conference I went to, and what I experienced.

In 2010, I was still in college and my sister invited me to the AWP conference. At the time, I was really just writing short stories (yea, I had a novel written, but I had pretty much given up on it), and didn't really think it was for me. I spoke about it with a few teachers and they asked the price. It was $40 for a student, and they told me I'd be stupid not to go, so I went.

A few thousand miles later, registration was a mess. There were a million booths with the first letters of the last names, book booths, literary magazine booths, and people EVERYWHERE. It took me a few minutes to figure out where I was supposed to be and that I didn't really have time to follow the masses. Soon enough, I received THE BOOK, also known as the schedule, information, guide, table layout information...basically it's THE BOOK. My sister, Aimee, and I went through our books and started mapping out which panels we'd like to attend the following day.

When I checked in, I didn't realize how large the conference center was. After walking by myself the mile to the center, I had my first problem; Where the hell was the panel room? Thankfully, there were a million helpful people directing me around. Each day got easier, and I was blown away at each panel (hands down, my favorite was still Kerry Cohen's).

When the conference ended, I was sad because there was just so much there. This year, I attended again, and I had a much better grasp of what was going on though I didn't have my sister with me. I attended more social meetings, met an agent (just to talk), and had an amazing experience, but it wouldn't have happened if people hadn't talked me into going...if I hadn't talked myself into going.

The first step is being brave, and actually attending. The second step, is being brave and TALKING. Talk to everyone you meet at conferences, they will help you along your journey.

Now I'll tell you what I'm looking forward to the most:

9am-Agents
This one is fairly obvious as to why I'd want to be there. I'm an unpublished author, I want to break into the writing industry. Agents are step one in this process (well, actually, writing the novel is, then the query letter, then seeking out the agents). I'm expecting it to be like a live version #yalitchat

10am-Editors
For the same reason as above. I've also never seen a real life editor and I think I'll have one of those "OMG, OMG, OMG" fangirl moments.

11am-Either the writing workshop or The Relationship Panel, I'm not sure which because they both sound awesome. I'll probably have a follow up blog after the conference so you'll know which I attended (it may be the writing workshop, though an agent I follow on Twitter will be at the panel...I JUST DON'T KNOW! I DON'T!)

Lunch. I'll eat.

12:30-Either Book Basics or Romance--Again, lots of agents to listen to, or to understand more about the query process. I'm so bad at making decisions!

1:30-Probably the Teenage Author panel, just because it may give me some hope :)

2:30--BOOK SIGNINGS!!!! I can't wait!! (Someday, I hope to have a book that people want signed :) )

There is a reception later, and a keynote address, and then it's just resting before the very long drive home. But I am soooo excited!!!

It's Monday

It's Monday and I've finished Character Defects....I just need to go through and actually merge the two (because it got so large my google docs stopped letting me edit it and for some reason my Microsoft Word lost its spell check. Not sure why). Once this is done, I'm sending the super rough draft to a friend before I even go through and edit it because I feel like I need some distance.

Right now I'm feeling really proud of my story, and I'm really excited to have others read it. I feel like this is the novel I'll go to conferences with and pitch. Why? Because I feel like it's the strongest thing I have in my hand. Next is Firestarters, which I also love.

When I go to the conferences I intend on having manila envelopes, just in case so if asked, I can say "Why yes, I have some pages if you'd like to see them." LeakyCon LitDay is a little more than a month away. I need to buy a plane ticket for PNWA but I'm ready for both.

After the chapters of Character defects get merged, I'm going to start pitching practice. I'm going to talk to myself, in the mirror and say "This is what my novel is about" or "This is why it's interesting". I'm going to know my story inside and out so I can answer any questions about it. I am ready for my break. I am ready, I am ready, I am ready.

It's Official...

As of yesterday, I am a member of PNWA (Pacific Northwest Writers Association). I'm pretty excited for a couple reasons: 1) It's saving me $40 on the cost of admittance 2) At the conference, I'll be able to put out my business cards ***WHICH CAME IN THE MAIL AND LOOK AWESOME***(and try to promote this here blog until I possibly land an agent) 3) I can now write that on the bottom of query letters 4) At this conference, I'll be able to speak with agents and editors!!

It's sort of lame because I don't live near Seattle, or Washington....but there are a few of their perks I'll be able to indulge in. I'll take what I can get. :)

Some more competitions are coming up on March 31st, and for my birthday Mike is footing the bill for one and loaning me money for the others, so I'm pretty excited about that. I CANNOT wait for my income taxes to come back!

Things I Am Looking Forward To:

Usually, my days tend to be kind of bllllaaaahhhh. Work 9-5, clean the warehouse on my days off, ogle agents and people who are published. Write..edit...read....play with my sister or my dog...or the Wii Fit

But, these days, I'm constantly finding myself jumping up and down (no, I have not yet landed an agent, nor have I heard word back from the magazine competitions...which reply closer to April or May)

Early April:
The lovely agents at FinePrint Lit will be announcing their winner for the Backspace Query Competition, also Burnside Review and various other magazines/competitions will be announcing their winners.

April 12: Rebecca Rasmussen's novel, The Bird Sisters is released!

April 19: My birthday!!!!

April 26--Take Action Tour:
Silverstein and Bayside concerts in Raleigh!

July 13--LeakyCon 2011, LitDay
John Green, Scott Westerfeld, Kate Schafer Testerman, plus other awesome people and agents, and publishers (I'm swooning right now!)

August 4-7--PNWA Conference!!
You get to speed pitch, listen to speakers, meet agents, SOCIALIZE, make friends....I cannot wait. I cannot wait. Not only this, but I will be staying with my lovely friend, Jennifer Olson who I have not seen in far, far too long. (Yay!!!)

Things I will need for the writing conferences:

• My voice recorder cleared out (currently has battery acid) so I can have fresh batteries and record notes people say to me. Also so I can be all Dirty Work and say "Note to self..." (Or so I won't have to call my voicemail and say "Steph, this is Steph. This is the idea for a story/novel/portion of your memoir I was thinking of while stuck in stop-and-go traffic." Driving a stick is hazardous (sp?), talking is not.
• Business cards (awaiting them, any day now!)
• Pages of two FINISHED and EDITED novels: Confessions of an Immortal Heart and Igniting a Firestarter
• Speed pitch--written, practiced, verbalized (at PNWA it's 3 minute sessions. Gotta talk quick! Be ready to provide pages. This is what I learned from Janet Reid's blog).
• Confidence
• A good hook
• Nice clothing (thank you tax refund!)
• Money to buy books! And apparel! And awesomeness!