Dear Diary

A 3685-post collection

Yoiks and Away, I guess.

Before I wanted to write a draft of the very polite letter I sent to the most recent A2B, I thought I'd check in on their website to see what their responses were likely to be like in the first place.

if we are interested in discussing possible representation, we will contact you by email or phone—typically within 6 weeks.

The time limit has run out. They haven't contacted me. So...

I pick another A2B and try again. At least the next one I have lined up promises to get back to me inside of a month. So less time in torture, I guess. They're also the first agency I've seen who specifically requests that I don't send an exclusive query. The others, for the record, leave any indication of desired exclusivity out. Therefore, I'm going to have to search my little list for anyone else who states they don't mind a non-exclusive query.

If I'm plumb out of luck, I'm plumb out of luck and they have to get an exclusive query because nobody else does what they do. Bleh.

Today, after I do my Instant, I will shop for a few presents. One for Chaos' friends, who's having a birthday party next week, and one for my friendo. If I can find anything good, of course. And maybe a little something-something to help me feel better.

And sometime during the weekend, I'll get KFZ ready to fly out to possible, multiple A2B's.

Yoiks and a-firkin-way.

After some significant research, it's turned out that this A2B is the ONLY ONE that I know of who is at all interested in being competitive with another A2B. There's even one that insists on a (shudder) postal submission. That one's going to take six firkin months to get back to me (also by snail mail) plus whatever time it takes for said mail to get back to me.

You can bet that one's going out by registered post. There will be much wailing and gnashing of teeth with that particular effort. Which I will be saving for dead last because I abhor using snail mail for this shit.

There's just three agents to go on this A2B list. Three more chances to get my money's worth out of this $400 list of people. Then I shall complain to AR&E and demand a refund.

I'm getting faster on my turn-around, but the way. From acceptance of rejection to sending it out again in the same morning. No hiding under the pillow-fort, today!

I also have plans to read through Beauties so I can send it off to my Beta readers. I'm going to use the text-to-speech feature so, theoretically, I can listen to my book as I do other stuff.

That's for the afternoons. When I'm done with my work.

Welp. That worked.

I scanned for news about the International Women's day and the global women's strike that was supposed to happen, yesterday. Not a sausage, as Bluebottle would say.

Hopefully, things are better in other places. Maybe some certain people will see the advantages of paying people equally for all the invisible work that gets done.

It could turn out two ways, really. The whiter percentage of the population could be just fine with a 27% pay gap, think they have enough rights already,

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Closed for Today

There once was a man in the late 50's who would come home from work to find his wife exhausted and not "in the mood". Everything else was picture perfect. The house looked like it came out of a catalogue, the kids were clean and picturesque. Dinner was a dream... it was just the little lady who was constantly out of sorts.

Every evening, he had the same complaint. "I don't know why you're so tired, you just do nothing all day.

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::William Tell Overture at 75rpm::

[AN: IDEK when this should have posted, but you can assume I was very distracted]

Okay, so today is busy and I only have myself to blame. I had scheduled an appointment for Chaos to get her shrinky paperwork in order for yesterday afternoon, but because of a sick Mayhem, I completely forgot about it.

Derp.

Now I have one this morning, but with squeaking room to actually get to the shrink on time. AND I have paperwork to hand in to

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Urgh...

So we finally edited Adapting, yesterday. And it was a slog. One of my dear Betas did not like the way I introduced all the concepts in the first chapter. I'm halfway compelled to start every single one of the first five Amalgam books in the exact same way.

I mean, sir Pterry started all of his earliest books by yatting on about A'Tuin for about three pages and nobody complained. It's setting the scene. It's a small amount of showing exactly

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Statistics Sunday, exercise, and other impediments

We're still not exercising regularly. Alas, alack. It's just not going to happen, what with Beloved going to work at Sparrow Fart in the morning. Morning was our best window for working out. And when Beloved comes home, tired from all the nonse they had to do during the day, they're hard pressed to have a conversation.

But we're both making sure we at least walk every day. I remember the old tricks I used when I was suffering under the high-carb

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Happy anniversary, babe

It's almost been twenty years of togetherness for Beloved and I. Twenty years of them putting up with my crap. Plus all the time we had as mere cuddle-buddies, which doesn't count apparently. Otherwise, it'd be twenty-two.

We have plans to go see Logan in a Gold Class cinema, which means I pretty much have to hurry up and do this thing as fast as I can.

No sign of rejection from A2B.

Chaos is officially critter-free, and I owe the school

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F-O-C-U-S

Today's my last day for writing Beauties and the Beastly so of course I'm procrastinating harder than ever. With all good luck, Beloved and I will be editing Adapting and then I'll be sending out Beauties to my lovely beta readers.

All of whom, I sincerely hope, will get back to me promptly about the contents of said novel. Instead of taking most of this novel's writing to do so.

Yes, I am still salty about that.

When I am of a

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Finding that new swing

Okay. So I no longer really have free time in the mornings. I have my alarm set at 5AM so that I have time to bathe before Beloved racks off to work. Then it's pretty much pure chasing my little darlings until it's time to go to school. And each little darling has a different delivery time.

Mornings after dropping off Mayhem are the best time to go shopping for fresh veggie matter so I can have dinner be all delicious and

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Small Progress

It's the first of March, and that means that I have seven more days to live through whilst simultaneously fearing acceptance and rejection. Acceptance means I get money, but I also have the possibility of going on book tours and talking at conventions and meeting fans.

And I have social anxiety.

If I am rejected... well, I have to go through all this AGAIN, and with a different Agent-to-be. Or, as I've been starting to shorten it, A2B. Which means another three

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Average, ordinary, everyday... disorder

So here's how things are going for me...

  • Shitty time getting to sleep, because:
  • Anxiety over the book being accepted
  • Anxiety over the animation/animatic I'm planning
  • Anxiety over whether or not the finished thing will get me hated and exiled over the fandom because someone thinks I want to make money about the thing
  • I have a tablet glove on the way and NOT being tracked by the Australian postal system
  • I have a neat fan-comic on the way that has
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...uuuuuuurrrrrgh...

Bad things I did, yesterday:

  • Talk up a big game about eating food but not actually make any
  • Consume half a packet of sugarless caramels
  • Stay up 'till eleven because laundry

The results from those bad things:

  • I'm frelling tired
  • I'm feeling a little weak [A bout of artificial sweetener-induced intestinal issues will do that to you]
  • I am not fully functioning

Worry not, dear readers, I did actually get two actual meals in. Breakfast care of the Coffee club, and bunless

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Statistics Sunday

I forgot about gathering my statistics, yesterday. And I'd eaten a rough quarter of a packet of salted macadamias before I remembered.

To quote Homer Simpson: D'oh!

So, with last week as a reference. This week's stats are:

Weight: 77.2
Fat Weight: 29.6
Waist/Height: 0.547
Blood sugar: 2.8
Blood Ketones: 5.8
Breath Ketones: 18.9

The blood sugar and blood ketones are slightly in the danger zone. I forgot to eat, yesterday, and ended up with

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Scary stuff

I'm going to spend some time every weekday learning a little about how to animate. Starting with sourcing the best, cheapest, dummins-proof animation software and learning how do deal with that.

Recommendations are welcome, by the way.

This is as well as spending some time every day doing all my writing projects, the daily doodle, and squeezing in a little good old-fashioned fun.

I'm also pondering going to Lulu to print some hardcopies of some of my eBooks. Legal obligations prevent me

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::Yakety Sax at 10rpm::

There's a party to go to in scenic Coominya tonight. There's cleaners coming today. I have to shop for nice clothes [I've shrunk and the kids have grown] and help clean the house.

Somehow, I have to fit in my Instant, my novel (1000 words on Fridays!) and a doodle to up my leet art skillz sometime this afternoon.

Update: I got an email from the cleaners saying they can't come and clean. FUN.

On the plus side, I have the free

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