One step closer to the weekend...

Still only Tuesday.....f**k it!!

The power of acute observation is commonly called cynicism by those who have not got it--George Bernard Shaw

Well, I feel just terrible. I got my MasterCard bill and for the third consecutive month they have not charged me for about $400 worth of purchases. Golly…should I tell them or do you think it would embarrass them if I pointed out their mistake? It might make

them feel incompetent and then I would feel bad about hurting them. No, I won’t tell them. It’s for their own good. ‘Can’t have them doubting themselves and their ability to produce accurate bills. Yes, maybe somewhere down the track I’ll get hit with the charges but maybe not…I’ll let fate decide.

Reasons not to exercise…I was doing stomach crunches this morning – yes, how wrong is that? But I aspire to a flat stomach although I know it isn’t going to happen but hope always springs eternal and my delusions are grand. Anyway, I managed to pull a muscle in my shoulder and now I am in agony…I tell you – all exercise is wrong and as part of my campaign platform to run the world one day, see yesterday’s blog, I will abolish all thought or need for exercise and all women will be encouraged to aspire to be shaped like the ancient fertility figures – in fact they will get paid extra to do so….and showered with chocolate – yes that’s it.

I got a new mobile (cell) phone today. As part of the mobile plan I selected I got a new, free phone. It’s very whiz bang with all sorts of bells and whistles which to be honest are completely lost of me. I purely want to make and receives calls, collect messages and sms(text) friends. I don’t need cameras or music being
played or games or the internet and I always think people walking around with the headset thing in their ear look like they’re out of Star Trek. Besides who has time for gadgetry?

‘Agonized over whether to name 3-4 Ellora’s Cave books of mine, due to come out soon, under a series title all day at work. It wasted the day very nicely indeed. My wise, stoic editor – she with the dints in her head from slamming it on her desk as she edits my work - made the suggestion of the series name. Her suggestions are always good and I always take them on board seriously. When I set out to write Anyone But You, Penned Again and Tantalizing Tilly I had no plans to turn them into a series but characters from one book wandered into the next one and well, what can you do with them but write them a story because otherwise they’re just standing there and readers wonder what the hell they’re doing there. So, I asked the legendary Frogspond – a group of amazing writers that I know – what their thoughts were on a series name and should I have one. My very first, gut instinct was no. I always follow

that instinct but I thought I would see what others of the writing sorority thought. They all believed it a good idea – and most likely they are correct. However, after much discussion and thought, I reverted back to first instinct and decided on no series name. Isn’t it amazing how such a small thing can consume your time? If I had of been home doing personal stuff I would have sorted the matter out very quickly. But work time means time to waste so I let it drag on most of the day as any practised half-arsed worker does.

I also got my FLEs – front line edits or final line edits or whatever they are called - for Unbreakable. This is the last check of your book before it goes to be published. As always, I got a slap on the wrist for speaking in Australian in my writing. The thing is being an Aussie for such a long time it’s hard to snap out of that habit and I’d like to point out that English is from England and not America. Okay – hissy fit had – I move on. There were not many things that needed to be changed and those that were questioned were to do with sex. Now, I don’t

know about you but having to deal with sex as soon as you walk in the door after a day at work is not easy. I’m so not in the mood – but I changed what I had to. I pointed out to my editor that ‘we’re really not normal people’ – and by this I mean analysing the specifics of sex….well, we’re probably not normal in other ways but I’ll restrict it to the writing sex thing for the moment. Let’s face it, normally sex just happens without all the specifics of whether he can really do this or that and what about a fresh condom and can she really bend that far over backwards without crippling herself? Imagine someone critiquing sex as you do it and maybe holding up score cards and that is sort of what a FLE does. But they are necessary to the whole process as they are the last line of defence to stopping you looking like a idiot when your book comes out.

As I write this, Mervina, the urban possum, is, I believe, putting together Scandinavia furniture under my house. She is making a hell of a racket and I keep thinking I have to trap her and let her be put out into the wild with the other possums but I also don’t think she would be good at camping out like they do. What to do? I guess I’ll have to keep jumping up and down on the floorboards to shut her up. Imagine having a normal life?

That’s it – Tuesday done and dusted. What fresh hell will Wednesday bring?

As always please check out the words of wisdom for Anny and Kelly on their blogs as well as the intensely smart and attractive people listed on the left.

www.freewebs.com/amarindajones/
Go ahead: Live with abandon. Be outrageous at any age. What are you saving your best self for?