A power outage yesterday morning brought home just how dependent I am on technology. Not just my computer and Internet service. Without power, I had to light candles because the day was overcast and rainy. I couldn’t bathe or flush a toilet because the pump that draws water from the well didn’t operate. It was too dark to read, too cool and nasty to be outside, the heat didn’t run and I couldn’t open the fridge for fear of warming up the food stored there.
My daughter lives in a rural area—even more isolated than my own home. And when her power goes out, it can last for days. Last year during an ice storm, it took the power company nine days to restore electricity. By then she’d had to toss out all the food in the fridge and freezer. She and her husband had to cook on camp stoves, use a camp toilet, and heat water for “bird” baths over the Coleman. Thank goodness yesterday’s outage lasted only five hours.
My home in South Texas was rural as well, but power lines were strung on tall steel poles far above any trees. In nine years, we only had two power outages that lasted a few hours. Here in Arkansas, the trees loom over the treetrunk power poles, and it takes only one tall, spindly pine snapping and folding over a line to take you out. No way could they afford to replace those old poles with something stronger. I think of the years I lived in Europe. There everything was protected in conduits underground.
I’m rambling again. My EC editor sent me the first round edits of Raw Silk last night. She loved the story and had minimal nits for me to fix (mostly commas!). I should have dates soon for the releases of Knight of My Dreams and Raw Silk.
I’m trying to get my mind in gear for November 1st. Anyone ever do NaNoWriMo? It’s National Novel Writing Month, and the folks who run the site host an annual challenge for writers to complete 50,000 words on a novel during the month of November. I met the challenge last year. I like having to post my progress daily on the site and commiserate with other writers whose fingers are bleeding all over their keyboards. Let me know if you’re taking the challenge and I’ll add you to my list of friends on the site. Maybe we can spur each other on with a “word war”!
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I read that you are going on a cruise in December. How Long are you going to be gone?
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It’s a nine day cruise, but figure in travel time…
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😀 I think Colorado sounds beautiful so voted for that one. Maybe one day I will be able to go there to see the views.
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Rachel! Well reading about those views will be a nice substitute, I hope!
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I’m doing NaNo…my fourth year. This year, straight contemporary romance. I actually have a storyboard and everything!
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MJ! I’ve never had the patience for a storyboard. Did you use any method in particular to put yours together?
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I just got one of those display boards, divided it into chapters, and slapped sticky notes on it–timelines, things to derail them, stuff like that. I don’t have the romance plotted too much, but I’m hoping that comes.
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MJ! I like that idea. I bought a book about building vision boards, and now I want to create one for my next big book and my career.
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I did a collage, too. Is that what a vision board is?
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Sort of, but with snippets of words—maybe a quote from your book, an inspirational quote, or if you’re working on a career vision board, a sample bio of what you want to say about yourself five years from now. If you’re working on a story vision board, you’ll want pics of scenery, maybe a line from a movie that inspires your hero, that sort of thing.