The cutest baby in the whole wide world

ouch

just got my 3rd rejection in 2 days

yes, I'm blogging a lot today. . .

it's because I'm supposed to be working on a story;-)

The Best of 2007

Short story collections (that I read):

1-- Mothers & Sons by Colm Toibin

2-- Brownsville by Oscar Casares

3-- Working Men by Michael Dorris

artistic quote for January 22, 2008

The artist is a receptacle for emotions that come from all over the place; from the sky, from the earth, from a scrap of paper, from a passing shape, from a spider’s web.


--Pablo Picasso

quote for January 22, 2008

God is the experience of looking at a tree and saying, "Ah!"


--Joseph Campbell

a possible NYC reading

Yay! Details when/if it happens. Seriously working on the one in Canada.

creative quote for January 21, 2008

If I love something I do it, and if I don't, I don't.

I think that this is the most important choice that any of us can make in life, in art, in history; to do the thing you love.

If you love it then while you are doing it you are a true expresison of yourself and your time and your story. You are authentic.

--Lina Wertmuller

quote for January 21, 2008

What most people need to learn in life is how to love people and use things instead of using people and loving things.

--unknown

Writing quote for January 18, 2008

Write to be understood, speak to be heard, read to grow...


--Lawrence Clark Powell

Quote for January 18, 2008

To live happily is an inward power of the soul.


--Marcus Aurelius

Knitting for Dummies

Got that book and I'm trying to understand. I am, but perhaps, as my daughter said, I'm not meant to be a knitter.

"I can't sew very well although I try," she commented.

Whatever.

Knit one, purl two. . .

hurl. . .

I'm reading in San Francisco (again) because (again) I WON!I WON! I WON!

Okay, I wasn't first place this time; I was third (short story) and another honorable mention (flash fiction) but I still get money and get to read in San Fran.

Yes, I know I still owe you the story of my first adventure. Maybe I'll wait till I go this second time and I'll compare the experiences!

Well, let's get that over with

-- the first rejection of the year.

Creativity quote for January 10, 2008

Imagination is the beginning of creation. You imagine what you desire, you will what you imagine and at last you create what you will.

-- George Bernard Shaw

Quote for January 10, 2008

. . . courage is not the absence of despair; it is, rather, the capacity to move ahead in spite of despair.

--Rollo May

Okay, I know I said. . .

I'd be photographing less trees this year, but I NEVER said I'd be blogging less trees;-)


I have this thing for trains too. Headed back to both Tempe and Nashville to photograph the trains/tracks I never got to, but wanted to.

And to get my stuff left behind!

Up to eight

submissions for photographs.

Fiction subs, same as before. No nays but no yays(!) either:(

Poetry. . . working to get a poem done--then I'll think submission(ha!) You don't use it, well you do lose it, at least for awhile.

Quote for January 5, 2008

There is no comparison between that which is lost by not succeeding and that lost by not trying.


--Francis Bacon, Sr.

Creative quote for January 5, 2008

Most people die before they are fully born. Creativeness means to be born before one dies.


--Erich Fromm

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

B.B. King in Nashville in March!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Now, what's next on that list of things I've-ABSOLUTELY-gotta-do/see/be. . .

Make that 6 places

Another group of photos out.

I have 5 new stories out and 5 reprints. Hope to get two flashes done this week and submitted somewhere.

No more creativeness today. Laundry and sleep 'cause it's work in the morning.

Creative quote for January 2, 2008

What we call creative work, ought not to be called work at all, because it isn't. I imagine that Thomas Edison never did a day's work in his last fifty years.

--Stephen B. Leacock

Quote for January 2, 2008

There are two things to aim at in life: first, to get what you want; and, after that, to enjoy it. Only the wisest of mankind achieve the second.


--Logan Pearsall Smith

So how's 2008 going so far?

So far, so very good. Created a new bear pattern, got a go-ahead from a buyer for a gift shop here to bring in some bears.

Writing, submitting photos (three of which have been accepted for this writer's newsletter--yay!). Photos out to 5 other places. Waiting and seeing, as always. Working on a poem 'cause I want to get back to writing poems; I haven't written a new work in years.

Working on that list so if I'm indebted to you, know that I'm getting there:)

Busy trying to get my daughter moved on-campus and getting a son to finish things so he can too will be enrolled in college this Spring.

Will be volunteering at the tv station at the university so I can relearn those production skills. Talked to this man from Ghana about my desire to go to Africa and he let me know how misguided (though well-intentioned) I am, as are most Westerners he said. But he still encouraged me to go to Africa. Had I mentioned that I had found a fit with an organization that Delano Lewis (the former U.S. Ambassador to Africa) suggested to me? Seems the organization wants someone to film the work they do in South Africa. So that's what I'm working toward!!!!!!!!!!!!

Have not had a day off since before Christmas and won't have one 'til next week.

Kind of tired.

Sometimes this Superwoman thing gets to me.