Laurie writes a blog

Fun sentence

nobody@vox.com(Laurie) — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 11:03:17 -0800

Maybe tonight I'll post an FSotD or two from what I wrote very late last night. But I have to share this sentence I just read in a book called The Ghost Map, about a cholera outbreak in London in the 19th century:

"But reports had surfaced of some customers discovering live eels in their drinking water, which suggested that the filters were not perhaps working optimally."

I love the British way of understatement.

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Done!

nobody@vox.com(Laurie) — Sun, 22 Nov 2009 15:35:14 -0800

I've finished my edits and e-mailed the new draft off to my agent.

And I'm already uneasy that she won't think I made the changes she wanted the way she wanted.

That feeling should fade once I start doing all the fun things I've been putting off while writing this book. And if she sells it, some publisher is probably going to want more (or different) changes, anyway.

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Help please -- I need a word!

nobody@vox.com(Laurie) — Sun, 22 Nov 2009 09:29:27 -0800

It's the last day I'm editing this novel manuscript and I'm still not happy with the way I've named this one secondary character's job. He works in a children's wish charity. There are other employees who do the fundraising and the communications, IT, administration and accounting. He's the guy who is the one general laborer. He goes and actually gets the stuff they give the kids. He delivers it. He modifies it, if the kid's needs require it. He deals with anything hands-on. But I can't think of an atual job title -- Operations something-or-other? Anybody got a thought? I'm not trying to make him sound high-falutin', just want to be accurate.

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How to start off a Sunday

nobody@vox.com(Laurie) — Sun, 15 Nov 2009 06:50:53 -0800

Breakfast of champions

Cinnabon Minibon and crispy bacon. Last time I was decadent, I just had the Minibon, but I got logey in the mid-morning because I hadn't had any protein. Problem solved this time.

I'm now fueled to start another day of writing. 25 minutes on, 5 minutes break.

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FSotD

nobody@vox.com(Laurie) — Sat, 14 Nov 2009 12:59:35 -0800

I'm taking an extended break in my 25 minutes-on 5 minutes-off schedule today to post an FSotD to prove that I have been writing today!

With the goatee grown in, David now looked like his own evil twin.

(I stole this from real life -- the same is true of Cappy when he has one.)

Okay, break over, back to it.

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Vaccination Day

nobody@vox.com(Laurie) — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 07:15:26 -0700

A week or so ago I decided to get the H1N1 vaccine. I have asthma and I'd been reading that of the people who wind up in ICUs with this flu, the worst hit are people with asthma. I live alone and I don't want to be sick and miserable and alone, plus, I have a lot of travel (next weekend to see Cappy, plus US Thanksgiving and Christmas trips down there, too, plus some business travel) and I don't want to A) get sick from other people in airports and planes and large meetings, or B) be sick and potentially miss any of my Philadelphia visits. No fucking way. I'd rather spend a day in line than a week sick in bed, or in ICU.

The vaccine wasn't out yet in Ontario when I decided, it's doing a very slow rollout, but they'd posted the upcoming hours of some vaccination centres and one was a couple of blocks from my office at a municipal centre call Metro Hall, starting next week. Then, they moved up the date and planned one for yesterday at the same place. From 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. People in high-risk groups (including asthmatics) have been encouraged to get the vaccine, well, in fact, everyone has by the various government health bodies, but people NOT in high-risk groups have only been "encouraged" to let the high-risk people go first. (Until a new bottleneck in production and distribution was revealed yesterday, now, as of today, vaccination clinics are only doing high-risk people.

I got to Metro Hall about 8:35 a.m. I imagined I'd spend half the day there. It turned out people were in line from about 5 a.m. There were already about 650 people ahead of me. If I'd walked over instead of taking the streetcar, there might have been 100 more in that 15 minutes I saved. Here's what it looked like from my vantage point, the line snaking back and forth across a courtyard.

845 am

Being Canadians, the line was orderly and polite. The luckiest people (aside from the ones inside) were the ones closest to the building. Because it rained. Showers on and off, and then a couple of right downpours over the morning. At 11 a.m. Public Health officials finally came down the line handing out colored tickets for a particular time. I got 1:00.

Purple ticket

That's the book I'm reading, Where Men Win Glory about NFLer Pat Tillman going to Iraq and the cover up over his death from friendly fire. I didn't get a ton of it read in line, though, because in the rain, it was hard to juggle it and the umbrella in such a way that the book didn't get water dripped on it.

With the timed tickets in hand, some people left to come back. I was among the first to get the 1:00 ticket, so I stayed in line, even though it was two hours (and likely longer) away. I didn't want to come back and find 400 other 1:00 had come back to the line ahead of me. What bugged me though, was that people could ask for as many tickets as they wanted (i.e. for family members at home who hadn't come to the line). So one person who was ahead of me could get three tickets, and jump 2 additional people ahead of me, because the 1:00 people had to let anyone with a 12:00 ticket ahead of them, even if they hadn't been in line before. That sucked.

It was about 1:00 before I got to the envied under-the-overhang spot.

Shelter

Sweet, because it poured rain again by then. It was 1:45 before I got inside, then 2:45 by the time I got my shot. I was owed some lieu time from work, anyway, so it didn't matter that I didn't get to work before 3:15.

My arm now feels like it's been punched, hard, but at least I got mine. And the nurse, when I told her I wanted photos for my blog, let me hold up the process to get a good shot of the needle, and offered to take a shot of my arm after. What a champ for a woman who'd been dealing with the flow of humanity all day, in the vaccination zone, also known as Screaming Baby Central. These are good people working with far too few resources.

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Some cat problems

nobody@vox.com(Laurie) — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 09:34:05 -0700

Here's a cat with a problem:

Josephine

Her name is Josephine, she's a sweet six-month old feral who was trapped for spaying and now turns out to be tame. She loves to have her head patted and rolls around on the floor of the recovery cage in bliss when you do it. I even had her in my lap for a few pats this morning. Her problem? Once again, there's no foster space and she may have to go back out on the street. In a neighborhood where the kids are mean to the cats, and even threw glass at the cat trapper.

Here's a problem caused by a cat.

Gaaah!

Same thing different date

This carpet damage was done by Macaroon, who can shred this much in mere moments. The top example is in front of the sliding door to my bedroom, where Sodapop was eating crunchies (Macaroon had finished hers) and she wanted in there. The bottom damage was done outside my bathroom, where Chester stayed with me temporarily. (Through a minor oversight, I had all but those two inches of the threshold barricaded, because I know she's capable of this.) I live in a rental place. These bits of damage are in opposite ends of the fully-broadloomed apartment. Help! Is there anyway to fix this kind of thing without me having to pay the landlord for all new carpeting when I move out? Do any of my home-handy Vox neighbors have a suggestion?

Who me?

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FSotDs

nobody@vox.com(Laurie) — Sun, 18 Oct 2009 13:33:54 -0700

A couple of hours in a coffee shop this afternoon got my mojo going on these polishes to my current novel manuscript (especially by having no free wireless internet accessible -- boy, does that help my productivity). Here's my first FSotD I had this afternoon:

Jane being crushed low was like the felling of a great redwood.

Then there's one that's an in-joke. I have a pitcher character (as I commented to cranky this week), and my agent wants me to put more physical descriptions of characters in the book (something I'm remiss on), so here's a line about him:

Stash was too busy checking his ego in a mirror, along with the progress of his most current misguided facial hair configuration—a straight stripe of goatee down the middle of his chin.

Yes, cranks, I decided in my mind's eye that this character, even though he's a pitcher, looks like Jayson Werth. I was inspired after reading today that Werth has recently changed his walk-up to at-bat song from "Heavy Metal" by Sammy Hagar to "Sex on Fire" by Kings of Leon. Very much aware of our pull with the ladeez, aren't we Jayson? I couldn't resist, because I agree he's hot -- all except the facial hair. All the Phillies except Chan Ho Park have very bad beardage and should shave them off now.

By the way, when I was checking the available networks on my laptop (a girl can hope), there was one labelled CrankyPants. But it was secured, so I couldn't snoop and see who in downtown Toronto has stolen our cranky's handle.

Okay, back to it. Gotta get more done before game time. Go Phillies!

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I can't resist

nobody@vox.com(Laurie) — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 12:13:51 -0700

Team Vox just posted:

Today is Blog Action Day! Blog for Climate Change.

If it would change the weather where I am today, I'd blog till my fingers were bloody. Oh, is that not what they meant?

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How sweet is this cat?

nobody@vox.com(Laurie) — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 10:50:19 -0700

Her name is Cole. She's adolescent kitten sized, but she's 2 or 3 years old. Look at that face!

Cole cat

She came to me (trapped by another trapper) a couple of nights ago. She was spayed about a week ago and has turned out to be well on her way to socialization. She lies in my lap and PURRS REAL LOUD. She loves to be patted and squirms this way and that to enjoy it more. She LOOOVES head rubs. She is too sweet to be put back out to her colony, where apparently, kids in the neighborhood are mean to the cats.

When she came to me from another trapper to finish up her recovery, there was no foster space for her. It was killing her trapper to contemplate putting her back out on the street. Today, though, a spot has opened up. Yay!

I just had to share her picture with you.

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