sometimes daily musings on writing..

The Atlanta Writer's Club annual picnic was today, and we honored one of Georgia's most famous, fabulous, prolific, and insightful authors, Mr. Terry Kay. His acceptance speech was short and to the point, and he said something close to this: "Writing is easy; you just put one word after the other." (The crowd of nearly 100 writers laughed at this.) He went on: "Writing well is a little harder. Writing brilliantly is damn near impossible." He also said, "Keep putting words on the page" and "Never forget: Writing isn't about you. It's about what you've put down on paper." Great words from a truly great writer.

David Fulmer was also there, along with Emily Lupita Plum.
Mitchell Graham was there, too. Wow. The amazing thing about being around all of these famous (or soon to be) people is that they don't mind sharing information, being helpful, and encouraging writers like me that are still wet behind the ears.

How did I get so lucky, being surrounded by so many awesome writers? I must have been in the right place at the right time.

Ich bin sehr müde.

I am going to bed now. Well, okay, right after the Britcoms.

I received my Flannery O'Connor books in the mail the other day, so I have been reading one of them a little on my lunch hour for the last couple of days. I me some Mary Flannery O'Connor.

I had Mutter Paneer with roti for lunch.



I know that is pretty much TMI, but it was really, really good. I am feeling pretty decent today, this third day of watching what I eat/drink/do/don't do. The air is still working in the building, so that's awesome. Still and !!

I think I'll write some haikus today, with the remainder of my lunch hour, and post them later. I am almost finished with my kitty haiku book. I'll most likely publish it on createspace.com because it's non-fiction and it'll be hard to sell something like that, I think, to a publishing house.

I love kitties, and I love haiku. So, a natural progression for me is to love kitty haiku. Makes sense to me...Okay; I just wrote one:

When the clock strikes one
I'll wake, stretching and yawning
My next nap's at two

Almost time to go back to work.

I Traveled Last Night


In my dream, I visited your country

Not-so-distant smoke (or is it steam?) rises, curls up,
and slithers into the clear air
Making it shimmer in a silvery fog between me and the horizon

I can’t see the hills, but somehow know they exist
The roots of nearby trees spell out something I can’t read
Because I don’t speak the language that they do

It reminds me of Arizona, but the dirt is not red
I cannot count the alien colors, smells and textures
Not known to me, tapping my senses on the shoulder
Wanting attention, all of them at once, like children

I can’t focus because of the mist, but a clock strikes; time runs out
And I’m awake but still standing on that foreign beach
Driftwood comes in on a wave and rests at my bare feet

When I open my eyes, the smell of the slow, growling ocean
is still around me
But I see only my silent room of familiar, aging furniture

And my carpet the color of sand

It's a pretty cool site where you can write book reviews, read what others have reviewed, add books to your "shelf" that you've read, plan to read, etc.

I've started my new novel. Well, I've actually started two of them. One is a sequel (or a prequel? haven't decided) to the first, and the other one is a murder mystery set in the small townships in and around the banks of the Tombigbee River. In it, a series of 8 unsolved murders comes back to haunt the area when a new body surfaces, carrying the 30-year-old identification of one of the prior victims. The case is reopened, and DNA testing on all of the murdered women is planned, but all of the coffins are empty. Amid the conspiracies of a small community and ghost tours that interfere with the investigation, Police must work quickly to find the killer to prevent another murder. Or three...