Easter newsflush...

Just a bit of an update. There must be more to it than simply Not Blogging, but I’m totally in The Zone on the novel front. I expect to break 50,000 words in the next couple of days. It’s been tricky to stay motivated, because almost all of what I’m writing is too sketchy, clumsy, and abysmally poor to stay in anything resembling a final draft. But every day I’m learning something new about my characters, or adding a little something to the plot, so I’m hoping I’m doing something towards the end product. Sigh... Shouldn’t be grumbling really though – 50k words *huzzah!*

In case you missed it when I blogged about it a while ago, I should probably say that this isn’t the same novel that I was working on last year. I wrote a rough first draft for that and ended up shelving it. I do intend to return to it after I finish this one, but I got so low on momentum with it after all my Procrastination Issues, what with The Media/Society/Everyone Else/Modern Stuff and everything, and decided a fresh new project might be the thing. It is the thing. I think.

I’m not saying much about the plot because I think I talked all my excitement out of the last one - but it’s a revenge story and is kind of dark. Juicy stuff. I hope.

Obviously then, I have been spending a lot of time with bessie mate Microsoft Word lately and very little with anyone else. This is probably not good news for any social skills I may once have managed to build up. I did spend yesterday hanging out with several thousand other people though because I ran the Hastings Half Marathon. I finished in 2hrs 13secs, which I think is OK considering it was my first proper race, and the killer hills on that course. I mostly managed to do this without putting my foot in my mouth. Mostly. No details supplied.

And next week I’m off on my holidays to Devon, which will be a lovely break. Lovely Easter holidays – I might actually get to see the boyf for the first time in ages. I have already eaten an Easter egg this year, so there. Hotel Chocolate sent me one like last year. I don’t want to make you hate me here, but it was reeeally nice. Even nicer than last year’s one. It was dark chocolate this time, which is my favourite kind. It was all thick and chunky and had yummy individual choccies inside.

I decided not to run the comp this year because of the blog being (mostly) on hiatus, but if you google it you’ll probably find other blogs running it where you can get a chance to win some Easter choco-goodness for yourself.

That’s about it really. A girl can only stand so much excitement after all. I hope you are well too. Stay in touch won’t you? Facebook me or something. Don’t expect me to play zombies, or vampires, or whatever with you on there though. I am an adult. And will be much too busy thinking about how cool superheros are or what it will be like when I become a rock star.

It's not you, it's me

It’s about time I posted something isn’t it? The thing is, I haven’t felt like blogging much lately. This has been going on for a few months now, which is weird because I used to love writing posts and blogged nearly every day. I haven’t been reading other people’s blogs either. Sorry. I guess I’ve just lost interest in the whole thing.

So I guess this is goodbye. For a while at least. If the urge returns, which I suspect it will, I’ll be back. Here or somewhere new. Who knows? Not me.

For now though, please do have a squiz at the archives. Here are some of the posts I most enjoyed writing.

Pigeon plot

Graphic Proposal

Allegory of allegories

Bubble thought

Google's Bday

Proper way

Sprinkles universe

Office party

Baby Jesus is force-feeding me beanburgers

Crumblies of today

Ooh ah kid knocky stay thin

Toilet art

Mad as a fish

If you’ve been a regular visitor, I really can’t thank you enough. It’s been ace. I’ve loved writing on here and seeing the stats rise, it’s done wonders for my confidence in my writing. Perhaps that’s why I don’t feel like doing it anymore. Maybe I’ve got what I came for. I don’t know. But it’s been massive fun, so ta.

I hope you’ll stay in touch, feel free to email or Facebook me. I am still alive. Honest. In fact my life has been enhanced somewhat lately with the advent of sugar-free Wether's Originals. Oh yeah, and I'm actually making progress with the novel. It's about time really. I guess when it's finished, that's when I'll be back.

On tour

Sorry I haven't been on the blog much lately. My absence will have to continue for a bit longer as I'm going on holiday until Saturday.

Promise to post more when I get back.

Julia
x

Not Sure Alan

Lovely Tracy has sent me a shopping list. She found it in a Sainsbury’s shopping trolley in Northwich, Cheshire and, as you can see, it is a real gem.


Tracy's favourite bit is the 'Fries to go' and I like the 'Deodorant Alan - not Sure'.


Ahh. Life is good.




Thanks Tracy.

I am a quitter... Now dig my hair.

NaNoWriMo hasn’t worked for me this year. I think it’s because I didn’t do enough plotting and planning beforehand. I could make excuses about all the other things that have come up, but I had other things to do last year as well and still got to 50k words.

The fact is though, it’s just not happening for me this year. I only have 10,000 words, so I’m stepping down. Of course I’ll still keep the blogroll up to the end of November and I promise to try my best to feel happy for everyone who completes rather than sad for my rubbish quitting.

Anyway, mustn’t dwell on that kind of thing. I still rock. For example, I was interviewed by Writers News the other week, this is because I am so interesting and famous and ace. And also because I told them my novel would be finished this year and they were wondering where it is...

They needed a photo, so the boyf has snapped me with my sub-standard camera. I know a few of you have been gagging for a gander at my WAG-tastic hair extensions, so here you go.

As in all photos I look like a complete mental, but at least I look like a complete mental with glam hair in this pic.

*NEWSFLUSH*
I have just been informed by the boyf that this picture does not look like me. It looks, he said, more like Joan Rivers. I do not think this is a very flattering comment. If this ribbing continues I might have to remove it soon.

Could you be an Ex-File?

If you'd like to get a plug for your website or blog in a national newspaper, and don't mind dishing a few details on a past relationship, give me a shout. I’m looking for ex-couples to interview for the Observer Woman’s Ex-Files column....

I’d just need a chat about a previous relationship and the lessons you learnt from it, nothing salacious or bitchy, just an overview - how you got together, what went wrong, and how you’ve moved on, that kind of thing. I need both partners’ perspectives, so I'd be speaking to your ex about it too. But interviews will take place separately and can be by phone, email, or in person if you live in or around London – whatever you prefer.

Apparently the ex-couples who take part usually find it quite therapeutic and interesting to hear what their ex has to say.

The paper is happy to plug interviewees’ websites, businesses, books, charities, etc. and they would probably want to photograph you for the article.

There are lots of examples of previous Ex-Files here.

You don’t have to contact your ex yourself if you don’t want to, just let me know their email address and I’ll get in touch and find out if they’d like to be interviewed.

Drop me an email if you fancy it.

It's a UK paper, so you'd at least need to have some kind of British connection.


....OK call-out over. (Hope some interesting people get in touch!)

Would you mind giving this a mention for me on your own blog? I'd reeeally appreciate it.

Budget Brite

My gosh, have I really not posted since Monday? I don't know where the days are going lately and it is really quite frightening.

My NaNoWriMo efforts so far this year have been quite rubbish and I am still only on just over 8000 words. This is very crap as the halfway point was yesterday and you're supposed to be on 25k by then. I can only hope to pull a couple of writing-marathons out of the bag and try to catch up that way. But I'm thinking I'll keep ploughing on, I'm writing much more than I normally do anyway, so shouldn't really grumble.

I do have two bits of good news though. The first is that I have been asked to write for the Observer Woman. How cool is that? Very. I'll tell you more about that in another post, because I'm going to put a call-out on here for interviews.

Also, and this is even cooler... The other night someone said that with my new hair I look like Rainbow Brite. I was quite moved. I do not believe I've ever received such an amazing compliment. Clearly I have achieved brilliance. In every sense of the word. I love Rainbow Brite.

You know how that Chanelle bird who was in Big Brother is kind of famous for trying to emulate Victoria Beckham? Almost like a cheapo version of her? Well maybe I could be that to Rainbow Brite. Sort of a Budget Brite.

...Or maybe I could just stop messing around get some work done for once.

Writing, replacing, and remuneration

Cool, cool, cool. It's all back on.

I've finally started NaNoWriMo in earnest. I only have 3000 words, but I've got that NaNo feeling, like last year, so I feel like I'm finally in it. I have a lot of catching up to do, but I'm going to stay positive and do my best, you never know, I might just make it.

And the girl who did my hair extensions is going to replace all the bits that have fallen out, which is brilliant, because I have decided that I like them and they are not that much of a pain now I'm getting used to them.

It also looks like I might get paid soon for the first time in a couple of months, so Christmas might not be cancelled after all.

Cool, cool, cool. Anyway, best get back to the typing.

Sleeping, eating, aching, shedding, but not writing

I haven’t posted for a while because I have been busy being in pain and eating and sleeping. I did my 20 mile run on Sunday and so I spent the last couple of days aching in the most unexpected places, stuffing myself with bread, potatoes, and sweeties, and dropping off to sleep.

I’m feeling a bit better today though and may even experiment with leaving the house later.

NaNoWriMo isn’t going very well so far, I’ve hardly written anything because I keep changing the start and I just can’t seem to get into a rhythm. It’s a shame because I was really looking forward to it. I’ll give it a few more days and see how I get on, but I’m afraid if I fall much further behind I might be lost cause.

These hair extensions are annoying me as well. The look lovely, but take ages to wash and dry and they keep falling out. Honestly, they’re all over the house and the vacuum doesn’t suck them up. Hmm. They were only supposed to be a bit of fun, but I’m not really enjoying them right now. So I might end up giving up on those too.

I wonder what else I may find to quit to this week? Being a quitter hopefully.

NaNoWriMo Brits Blogroll - update

Just added a bunch of new folks, hope I haven't missed anyone - give me a shout if I have.
Please add the blogroll to your own blogs too, the code is:







Copy-paste:

tscript language="javascript" src="http://rpc.blogrolling.com/display.php?r=d1728f23405f6fc536ea16434082f2d1" type="text/javascript"/script

And then add all the <>.

Or, if you know how I can post the code without blogger showing it as the actual blogroll in the post, let me know and I'll make this less confusing!