Shortly before we moved house (and moved provinces), our dear Boo passed away. She was with us for ten years and warmed our house in Calgary, warmed our laps on those cold winter days, and warmed our hearts with her inability to properly meow.
Me & the Boo. (photo: Rissa Renae)
I think the loss of Boo affected Mochi the most. Although they weren’t the best of friends, Boo was a companion and kept Mochi company. Throw in a pandemic move to another province and nine months in a tiny apartment, Mochi needed a friend.
Be it ever so tiny, it was home for nine months. (photo: Rissa Renae)
Enter: the local SPCA and two adorable furballs. Ramen and Udon (as named by the foster mum, so the names just stuck) caught our eyes and captured our hearts. Not much is known about them other than that they’re part of a bigger litter.
Udon front & centre, with “big” brother Ramen in the background (photo: Rissa Renae)
Ramen is the bigger cat and has a white stripe down his nose. As cats go, he’s normal on the surface. However, he seems to either get lost often, or he can’t find his brother, and he’ll start howling. It’s awesome at 3AM, and by awesome I mean annoying af.
Ramen takes over Mochi’s bed. (photo: Rissa Renae)
Then there’s Udon. My suspicion is he was the last kitten born, and perhaps had a bit of a difficult birth. He’s small compared to his brother, and he’s . . . well . . . let’s just say he’s special.
He sleeps sitting up, he tries to fight his own reflection, patio doors are magical barriers that he constantly runs into, and bathroom rugs are the most amazing playtoys. Not to mention no toes are safe in his presence. Also awesome at 3AM.
Udon is . . . ‘special’. (photo: Rissa Renae)
Ramen cuddles, Udon doesn’t. Ramen hates kisses, Udon gives kitty kisses like they’re going out of style. Ramen doesn’t like Mochi, but Udon sees Mochi as his best friend. The two couldn’t be more different.
They may be weird but they sure are cute. (photo: Rissa Renae)
The house somehow feels complete now–three humans, three furbabies.
Here’s to the next ten years, and hopefully more, of a house full of hair, toys, and lots of love.
In early June this year, we finally moved into our home. We’re situated near the base of one of the mountains here in the Lower Mainland with a nice view of the river valley and the occasional sighting of Mt. Baker in Washington State.
I didn’t realize how much my living arrangements impacted my mental health. Although I knew our small city apartment that sat along a busy racetrack–I mean roadway–was temporary, those early morning engine revving and the constant parade of emergency vehicles with sirens blaring really got to me.
Despite the traffic cones, this stretch is a magnet for jerkass drivers (photo: Rissa Renae)
My writing suffered more than I cared to imagine. Just opening a Word doc in order to spark some creative juices ended up sparking panic attacks instead. I joked at first thinking I was just having an adult temper tantrum. But as the months wore on and the word count kept dwindling, I got worried. Was I losing my creativity? Do I no longer enjoy writing? What’s going on?
I think Mochi also lost some of her mojo in the apartment (photo: Rissa Renae)
I developed problems with food. I developed problems with alcohol. The last straw came when I absolutely lost my sh*t over the shower drain not being clean. This was right around the time our developer told us our house would be delayed by about two months.
A Hobbit hole at Lafarge Lake, Coquitlam (photo: Rissa Renae)
Not to bore you with that. Really, the apartment wasn’t THAT bad. The location was close to amenities and great places to walk, but the constant noise and close quarters did me in.
My “home office” and writing space–a corner of the couch (photo: Rissa Renae)
Thankfully in June, our house was completed and we moved in. It took me 2-3 weeks to “calm down”. I also restarted my anxiety medication, so that helped as well. The ideas started coming back. The urge to write slowly bubbled to the surface. It was that one morning lying in bed, listening to the birds chirping instead of the teenagers and their screaming car engines that it all finally made sense. It was the location that was stealing my creativity, not some loss of desire to write.
(photo: Rissa Renae)
The nature in this area of the city is amazing. I drag my poor dog out multiple times a day for hour-long walks along the many trails and foliage-covered sidewalks.
The views are amazing.
The Pitt River valley (photo: Rissa Renae)
Sure, we have almost daily bear sightings, and I’ve stumbled to within metres of a juvenile black bear foraging for berries. They’re not the vicious murder machines Hollywood makes them out to be, as long as you steer clear of the mama with her cubs.
Bear prints on the sidewalk (photo: Rissa Renae)
But bears aside, mountain life agrees with me far more than city life did. I thought I’d miss my walks to the coffee shop, or the fact I could just walk to the grocery store to pick up milk should we run low. “Whatever am I going to do!” I thought to myself. “We’ll have to stock the fridge and freezer, I’ll have to make my own coffee, I can’t just walk to the mall during my lunch break.”
Downtown Coquitlam from Lafarge Lake (photo: Rissa Renae)
Psht! I don’t miss any of that!
Give me a gently babbling brook, or the scent of wild clover on the wind any day over the so-called convenience of the city.
As I finish writing this post, it’s almost time for Walkie #2 for Mochi. There are days I literally have to drag her out of the house. She’s the only dog who doesn’t like walkies, it seems. No amount of squirrels to chase and deer to bark at will get her off the couch some days. But too bad! This girl needs to get outside and be one with nature!
Cloud-making fog coming off a neighbouring mountain (photo: Rissa Renae)
So, now it’s time to go breathe some fresh air and soak up that sun. For tonight, we write.
There’s only so much upheaval, change, and spur-of-the-moment this Gold, chaotic-good, INTJ-Architect can handle before she blows her top. And said top t’was blown.
It took me about two weeks to settle in mentally to the new house. It wasn’t the constant beep-beep-beep of construction vehicles, nor the endless boxes, or the equally endless bear sightings that did me in. Nope. It was the fact that I couldn’t (and still can’t) find my UV nail polish.
Well #$%^! How am I supposed to get home now? (photo: author)
I know, right? Even I think it sounds silly to blame my mental health on nail polish. But here we are.
A sample of my nail polish collection. (photo: author)
A long time ago, in a province far, far away, I discovered that the key to wicking away my anxiety was to focus on doing my nails.
Again, I know, right? Anxiety is weird that way.
Not being able to sit down and focus on the one thing I knew could keep my anxiety at bay made me even more anxious. I won’t bore you with the details, but as mentioned earlier, it took me almost two weeks to settle in once we moved summer of 2021.
Truer words have never been spoken. . . or written in chalk. (photo: author)
Once the ‘settle in’ took hold, the writing bug came back. You see, I typically thrive off my daydreaming and imagination to figure out plot points, character development, and world-building. However, mundane tasks such as cleaning or organizing produced nothing during those two weeks. Like, a literal black hole. Even at night when I’d try to dream, I’d be able to focus for a minute or two, then… nothing. It was so frustrating. I wanted to write but I couldn’t.
I knew what was getting in the way, so out of desperation, I went online and bought some nail polish. It took two days to arrive, but once I did, I sat down, did my thing, and came back with a fresh manicure. It mani-cured what blocked my writing.
You don’t actually want to see a picture of my nails, do you? (photo: author)
Here I sit, shaking my head. My mental health is all in my head, and I know what, but what’s even worse, is that my brain is more stubborn than I am. Who knew. Paint nails equals creative block lifted.
Camp NaNoWriMo is just around the corner, and what better way to firm up that writing need with a goal to meet. I tend to work best when there’s a goal to hit, rather than just sitting at my computer and pounding away at the keys like some deranged woodpecker until a story comes out. Although I don’t plan to work on a single novel, I do plan to crank out another 50,000 words to make up for writing almost nothing for June.
The urge to write is once again coming out of hiding. The ideas are flowing. Between the boxes and the mess, I’m carving out my writing time and creating a few new habits and routines. Being in my own place and having my own space definitely put a cramp in my writing style. I look forward to pounding away at the keyboard again!
This past weekend marked the last step in a long chain of events in our move from the province of Alberta to British Columbia. We finally moved into our house!
Our journey started in the summer of 2021 when we packed (and I mean literally packed) the SUV and drove up, over, and around the Rocky Mountains to get to the Lower Mainland of British Columbia.
The urban assault vehicle, packed to overflowing in Alberta. (photo: author)
We moved during COVID lockdowns . . .
Yup. (photo: author)
. . . and during the height of wildfire season . . .
Wildfire smoke turns the sun red in Kamloops, BC. (photo: author)
Oh, and then there was the “atmospheric river” event that caused massive flooding.
Flooded beach along the river. (photo: author)
It seemed the universe was trying to keep us from our dream of living in the Lower Mainland. But we did it anyway.
For close to a year, we cuddled together in a tiny apartment in the suburbs. 900 square feet next to a busy road after living in an estate home on a nature reserve. It was tough, it was stressful, but it was a roof over our heads and a place to sleep. Between loud cars reenacting The Fast and the Furious franchise outside our window to the faulty fire alarm that went off multiple times a day when it was on the fritz, moving day couldn’t come soon enough.
Be it ever so humble . . . (photo: author)
When finally it came time to pack what we could and make a run for it, the days couldn’t go by fast enough. We counted the sleeps, we jammed the boxes, we hauled the goods. It took 2 days to move–once from our multiple storage lockers, then from the apartment to the house. After a gruelling 48-hour moving marathon, we spent our first night in our actual house in the mountains. Granted, it was a mattress on the floor amidst a sea of boxes, but we were finally home!
The kitchen is the heart of the home and ground zero for junk! (photo: author)
The dream of leaving prairie life, with its monstrous hail storms and tornadoes, to the calm serenity of mountain life came with some adjustments. For one, taking Mochi for a walk is now a hike since we live on a mountain. With that walk, we carry bells as almost once a day one of the members of our household spots a bear. From juveniles to the big mama, bears are more common than deer. Instead of looking both ways for cars, we look left, right, up, and down for bears.
A juvenile black bear wandering by my retaining wall. (photo: author)
According to Google, we’re about 50m (165 -ish feet) above sea level here. We look out over a river valley and the sloughs that feed into it. Mornings are filled with bird song, although punctuated by the occasional piece of machinery since the area is still under construction.
The view from our neighbourhood. That’s Mt. Baker in WA in the distance. (photo: author)
It’s been almost a year in the making, but I can finally call someplace “home”. Be it ever so humble (and cluttered with boxes), there’s no place like home.
Even Mochi thinks so.
Mochi’s first nap in the new house. (photo: author)
Now, somewhere in all these boxes are my writing journals. I guess it’s time to start unpacking!
Life gets in the way, at least, it did for me during the pandemic lockdowns. I suffered a roller coaster of anxiety and panic attacks at being stuck in my house (I’m an introvert and I couldn’t stand to be in my own house!). I also have the a-cursed “underlying medical conditions”, and I was certain COVID-19 would mean my demise should I catch it.
During those long days of ‘can’t stand my house but too afraid to go outside’, I also didn’t write.
We also chose to move house across the country.
We were crazy!
When the dust settled and I was back at the keyboard, I logged into my KDP account, all excited to publish the 4th Book in my Rose Cross Academy series. Upon clearing the dust off my KDP account, I came to a horrific discovery.
I couldn’t access my KDP account anymore.
After we moved, my phone number changed. Thanks to that villainous beast called Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA), any attempts to log into my old KDP account required a verification code to be texted to my old number. A call to Support told me that after a year of no account activity, the Amazon side of my account had been terminated and could not be retrieved.
Keep in mind that there is zero public-facing information on how to contact KDP Support without logging into a KDP account (which I couldn’t do since KDP wanted to send an MFA code to my old phone). All links redirect to Amazon customer support. So I racked my brain at what to do about my lost books and KDP account.
Important Note: Online KDP Support will point you towards forms to fill out to prove your identity in order to change the phone number for MFA. Unfortunately, those forms require you to log into your KDP account that, in my case, wanted to send MFA to the old phone, thus providing no help to me. All civilian links for KDP Support redirect to Amazon Support, and Amazon Support is not equipped to deal with KDP issues. (It took me 5 different Amazon Support team members before I finally gave up).
Long-story-short, after trying many different things over the course of a month, I finally regained control of my previously published novels. Here’s how I did it.
Prerequisites:
An error-free formatted manuscript ready to be published to physical media (not an eBook), complete with cover matter. This is a must.
A separate email account other than the one used for the locked/lost KDP account. One can easily be obtained from Google.
An ISBN number of a published book in the old account.
Banking account info used in the old account.
Mailing address used in the old account.
Step 1: Create a new Amazon KPD account
It is true that Amazon will delete “duplicate” accounts. I’m not sure what kicks off that process on the Amazon side. What we’re going to do is create a new account, then have KDP Support merge the old account into this new account. I thought I heard a rumour there was a one-month grace period to do so, but don’t quote me on this!
Set up this new KDP account as if you were a new author just starting out, using a different email address than that used in the old account. Make sure to enter tax and banking info, and set up the account as directed.
Step 2: Publish a physical book
This is an essential step. KDP will only merge into an account with an active, published book. Yes, this can be an eBook, but the physical book is required in order to hook up the Amazon Marketplace portion of the KDP account. You can simply publish a rough draft manuscript formatted into a book template or old CreateSpace template, then bring that through to being ‘Live’ if a final draft is unavailable. The important point is to have a physical book live for the next step.
Step 3: Set up the Amazon account
Once the physical version of the book is ‘Live’, order an author copy. No worries, you don’t actually have to order the copy in the end. The point of this activity will be to get the Amazon Marketplace account set up and linked to the KDP account. I chose Amazon.com as the marketplace as the U.S. was my largest market even though I am a Canadian author.
Go through the motions of setting up the Amazon account, including adding a credit card and mailing address. Once set up, if you don’t want to purchase the author copy, simply remove the book from the cart.
Step 4: Request a call from KDP Support
Go back to the KDP Bookshelf, scroll all the way to the bottom of the page, and click the “Contact Us” link.
Under “Account, taxes, and getting started”, choose “Close or merge accounts”.
Choose to be contacted by phone. Fill in the form as needed, then wait for the call back. I receive the return call in about 10 minutes.
Step 5: KDP Support will help you merge accounts
The KDP Support person will ask questions about books in the old account. They will ask for information that can personally identify the old account as yours. This verification process took about 5 minutes.
Once that has been completed, the Support person will email the address on file for the old account to seek permission to merge. At this point, the Support call will likely end. Login to the email account associated with the old KDP account. Once you receive that email from Support, simply reply to that email stating that you approve of the merge.
I waited until the next morning and found all my old books now popped up in my new account! I was so happy.
Step 6: Clean up
Whether there have been changes to the way the physical books and eBooks are linked, I wouldn’t know since I hadn’t logged into my account in about two years. I did have to re-link my eBooks to my paperbacks. This took about 24-hours to sort itself out as the eBooks stuck around individually even after I linked them.
As of writing this, all my books are back under my control, complete with all the ratings and reviews I had received. All my original short links still work as well.
What did I learn?
So the moral of this story, I guess, is to log into both the KDP and Amazon Marketplace accounts at least once a year. This is to approve or acknowledge any changes to the functionality of your books, or agree to changes in terms and conditions that may happen on either site.
When I was going through the motions of trying to reclaim my previous works, it helped that I had my copyright notice from the United States Copyright Office. I know registered copyrights are a polarizing topic to some indie authors, as your work is technically copyright as soon as you write it. My case may be different, but I was told I needed to seek permission from “the original publisher” (aka myself) in order to claim the novels in my own account. Having that physical copyright proof saved me the step of having to write and certify a publishing release statement from myself to myself, and got me immediate help with KPD during the process.
This piece of paper (redacted and cropped) saved my sanity. (photo: Author)
All in all, I’m glad to have my novels back in my control, and I’m more than happy that all the reviews and ratings came with them. I’m not as prolific at writing as I’d like to be, so I’ve set myself up a reminder to log into my accounts at least every six months to keep them active, and tend to any updates in terms of service that may be pending.
This year is going well for writing, and I’ve published 1 of 2 scheduled books already. I may not be as prolific as some of my favourite authors (Sanderson, I’m looking at you!), but I’m honing my craft to become more prolific than I have been.
Here in the Lower Mainland, it’s also cherry blossom time.
Sakura trees line a small park in Burnaby (Photo: Author)
If I were to tell you that self-publishing my 4th novel, Blood & Water, book #4 in my Rose Cross Academy series, was a slog, it would be an understatement. Although enormous self-publishing success stories can give us indie authors hope, the process is unnecessarily complicated, riddled with pitfalls, and stacked against us smaller indie authors.
Amazon and KDP. I’m looking at you.
But that’s for another post.
This post is all about prepping for Camp NaNoWriMo under the canopy of sakura that’s currently covering my new home-city.
If you’re unfamiliar with either NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month) or Camp NaNo, think of it as an online community for indie writers and those looking to publish their first or next novel. NaNo offers a place to connect with fellow writers, discover local or online writing communities, and find the motivation you need to write and grow your novels and writing habits.
Fallen cherry blossoms on a brick sidewalk. (Photo: Author)
Camp NaNo is a less structured and more open version of NaNoWriMo. Think of Camp as a place for you to set your own goals and work towards them at your own pace without the stress of meeting a daily word count goal.
I use Camp NaNo as another tool in my motivational toolbox, aside from my Discord groups (which I discovered during NaNoWriMo 2021), and my Zoom group.
For April, I’m aiming to flesh out a gaslamp/low-steampunk fantasy I’m just calling “Four Crows” right now. For this story, I have a beginning, middle, and end figured out, but I haven’t decided if this will be a stand-alone or a series yet.
Morning raindrops clinging to blossoms. (Photo: Author)
Now, I’m a pantser, 100%. Sure, I can create a novel plan, but heck if I can stick with it. I’ve tried. Oh, I’ve tried to stick to an outline. The writing comes out forced, boring, and reads like I’m just going through the motions of moving characters through a story line. My pantsing brain knows that Character A needs to escape City A, hide in the forest, then travel to City B, but if I have to constrain myself to the how’s and why’s of that journey, my writing and my creativity suffers.
That being said, when I say I’m ‘prepping’ for Camp NaNo, what I mean is that I’m developing a writing strategy similar to that which I’d follow during November’s NaNoWriMo. I have a list of scenes I’d like to write in order to connect parts I’ve already written. I don’t always know how those scenes will go, but this is part of my creative process.
The tools I use may seem very rudimentary for prepping–my writing notebook and several coloured pens. I have notes on ideas, what scenes need to be written, bullet points of what I think should happen, and a list of transitions between scenes I need to figure out. During Camp NaNo, I’ll go through my notebook and check off items as they grab my interest.
A typical page in my novel notebook, blurred since all my projects are listed. (Photo: Author)
As for my other projects, I mentioned earlier I managed to self-publish my 4th novel, after much hair pulling and spew-age of expletives. That’s one book down of two I plan to publish this year! For the remainder of this year, I’m thinking three projects will be occupying my writing time.
Project #1 – This is the second book I’m planning to publish, and it is tickling the 200K word mark. Ouch. The complete manuscript is about 85% done, and I may end up splitting this book into Part 1 and Part 2, then publishing them with months of each other. I’m still going to count this as a single release since this is a single, yet massive, story. And as per my brain (since I can’t seem to write in stand-alone novel mode), I’ve already written a good amount of a sequel to this novel.
This will be in the LitRPG genre as it follows a group of people stranded inside a virtual reality RPG game after the virtual reality gear suffers a failure. Think of this as the world of online RPG’s meets Battle Royale or The Hunger Games.
Project #2 – I’ve briefly mentioned my gaslamp/low-steampunk fantasy. This is my focus for April and Camp NaNo. This story follows a young girl navigating an 1800’s-esque North America after a war over magic tore it apart. Magic has always been commonplace here. As the industrial revolution looms and people begin relying more on technology instead of magic, war breaks out. Technology and innovationare wiped out along with books and the world’s knowledge.
I’m planning some interesting villains for this novel/series–one which we’ll kinda be able to figure out early on. This antagonist will suffer a nearly fatal injury early on in the novel, but recover in time to start laying waste to the world. The other villain will be a “slow burn” villain, meaning they’ll start out as a protagonist, then as things happen to them throughout the story, will start turning evil. This character in particular has been fun to write!
The frog guardian of Cherry Blossom Garden, Burnaby. (Photo: Author)
Project #3 – Other than finishing my current YA series, The Rose Cross Academy, I’ve been shying away from YA as I haven’t been liking where the genre has been going in recent years. Many of the novel’s I’ve thumbed through rely on the same tired and unhealthy tropes, all the while still romanticizing toxic relationships, especially when it comes to female main characters. I’ve had an idea for a YA novel in the back of my mind, but have left it on the side due to the above reasons.
I am fascinated by the paranormal, so this will be another novel where ghosts and demons provide the underlying conflict. This will be an end-of-days type of novel leaning heavily on the ideas of the Biblical Apocalypse. Since I grew up in the 80’s and 90’s and gobbled up anything manga studio CLAMP put out, I’ve always had a Tokyo Babylon/X1999 tale rolling around in my head–two factions facing off over the fate of humanity: one that thinks humanity is too far gone and must be purged from the Earth, and one that thinks humanity may still have hope.
I plan to be busy this year, and I’ve already kept my fingers moving quite briskly. If Brandon Sanderson can produce four extra novels in a couple years while still cranking out best seller after best seller, I think I can at least make a sizeable dent in my “creative debt” of novel ideals.
Well, if you’re thinking the TL;DR of this post is that writing a chapter a week all month produced four chapters, well, you’d be half-right.
One of my New Years Resolutions was to work every day, in some fashion, on one or more of my writing projects. That includes everything from pounding out 10,000 words a day, to simply opening a wiki file and reading through my notes. I find that if I do something as simple as read back what I wrote previously (something older than a week), that this triggers my creativity and I’m able to write more than I set out to.
Wild crocuses blooming by the tennis court
In February, I set aside an hour in the evening every day to do “something” writing related. While all through January, the “Do Something Everyday” exercise produced good results, I thought if I could up my game to at least a brand new chapter every week, I’d be able to start a healthier writing habit than just writing something random every day.
In my January experiment, I found that I COULD NOT…
Write to a To-Do list (e.g. Finish Chapter 7, Write Chapter 10), and
Keep to a schedule of social media posts (blog, Twitter, etc)
… but I found that I COULD
Keep a running list of scenes or transitions to write, and then pick-and-choose what I wanted to write,
Write nearly full chapters if I allowed myself to bullet-point slower points (scenes or transitions), and
Use my wiki to inspire scenes or transitions.
What blog post would be complete without my goodest girl, Mochi!
So for February, I threw out what didn’t work for me, and added one more goal:
Finish one chapter a week.
That chapter could be for any writing project (I currently have four on the go. I know, bad author!). The chapter did not have to be perfect. The prose did not have to be publish-worthy. As long as said chapter was all words and no bullet points, I would consider that chapter “finished” in terms of rough draft-land.
February came to an end, and I had finished the aforementioned 4 chapters. But something pretty cool also happened. On the side as I completed a chapter and still had the writing bug in me, I continued to write. I managed to final-draft one whole novel, final-draft Part 1 of a 2nd novel, I came up with an idea for a 3rd novel (maybe/maybe not it will be a series… cuz I love my series’), and put a good dent in my high fantasy series.
A walk along the seawall in Stanley Park, downtown Vancouver
As for word count, I didn’t really blow any of my old records out of the water. I’d say I was writing NaNoWriMo-level word counts every day.
Round about the time I was writing this post, one of my favourite authors, Brandon Sanderson, announced his next Kickstarter–because somehow he found time to write four “extra” novels (aside from the million-other novels he wrote)–and pretty much broke the internet when it comes to the self-publishing sphere. I think as authors, we all strive to be as prolific as authors such as Sanderson, Koontz, and King who can crank out multiple novels in a year. It’s impressive when one of these prolific authors pops up one day and goes “Hey guys, guess what I did?” Needless to say, several of us are very jealous.
I think that also lit a bit of a fire under my bum as well. I’ve mentioned before I was hoping to make a “big leap” from self-publishing one novel a year to a whole TWO NOVELS A YEAR, but now I’m wondering if I can step up a little more. (High fantasy series, I’m looking at you!)
A view off the edge of the world from Grouse Mountain, Vancouver
Now it’s March and I’m heading into the month with a new passion, a new determination, and a hotter flame under my bum. Formatting the eBook for my next release is slowly sucking the life out of me (seriously, who thought it would take this LONG!), and I’m acquiring ISBN numbers like Pokemon. The keyboard is calling me, and the muses are coming out of their winter hiding. This spring is looking promising.
I know some say it’s not necessarily a good thing to have multiple projects on the go, but my brain doesn’t think linearly, nor does it think in-universe. So, we’ll see what I can crank out for March. At least another 5 chapters. Hopefully all in the same novel.
Being an author, a love of old books comes with the territory. The yellowing pages, the artwork on the covers, the smell of old print. And there’s something odd about holding a thing in your hands that’s older than you are.
Spring is springing in the Lower Mainland. This is usually the time of year when I get the itch to not only rearrange, but to go expanding on my collections (aka time to buy books!).
Moss grows all year round here.
I’ve picked through the used bookstores in Calgary, so now it was time to begin the invasion of local used bookstores in our new hometown. Metro-Vancouver had a ton of them to choose from, and I had a long weekend calling my name.
Used books are like a treasure hunt for me. I have my collections that I always strive to add to, although they’re all in storage at the moment. I have pictures on my phone to reference, that way I can still collect even if I don’t have shelves to fill (yet).
The first book I found was a missing volume in my Time Life Books: The Enchanted World collection. They’re not necessarily rare or old (late 1980’s), I just like them. I collect them because of the fairy tales and mythology theme of the series. Of the 21-book series, I have 18. And today I got to add a 19th book to that collection: Spells and Bindings.
Mochi is not too happy about being used as a book prop.
In addition to finding neat books, when in used bookstores I have a handful of authors I look for to see if I can add some old editions of their novels: Jordan, McCaffrey (specifically the Pern series), Williams, and Tolkien.
This time around, I found a paperback version of The Hobbit I didn’t have!
Here it is, in all it’s … glory?
The cover is–let’s be honest–hideous. But that’s kinda what I liked about it. Unique doesn’t always mean good, but I didn’t have this version, so I was willing to look past the my-five-year-old-drew-this cover. For $6, what did I have to lose?
Once we move (which is hopefully in 2 months), I’ll be able to unite this guy with the other old paperback Tolkien books I have from the 60’s and 70’s.
What is this, and why is it touching me?
I was a bit surprised to see this version was from the early 70’s, and the more research I did, the more I found this version is considered rare due to the *ahem* unique cover, which was drawn by Tolkien himself.
The 1974 version is the 3rd Edition (and last edition) of this cover art, which began printing in 1966. I’m somewhat surprised the cover design held on that long!
For now, these two treasures will be packed safely in an old delivery box for transportation to it’s new home. I’m counting the sleeps until we get to start packing for that move. Although moving is such a pain, I’m more excited to get into our forever home.
This view is why we moved here (downtown Vancouver from the Shipyards District)
Until we move, I’m going to spend my nights designing my bookshelves for the new house, and maybe I’ll acquire a few more books along the way.
I’m late to the game on the whole New Year’s Resolutions thing, but I have a good excuse. With this most recent variant, the probability of catching the virus went up a substantial amount. Going by numbers in my city, it appears to be about a 20%-25% jump.
But more on that in a minute.
Story Time
For Christmas, we packed our bags, put the puppers up with a boarder, and hopped a flight (with a couple lay-overs) to Houston. Now that we’re east coasters, there are no direct flights, so we still have to transit through Calgary. It seems we still can’t escape that city!
Good ‘ol Calgary Airport
With our pre-flight COVID-19 negative tests secured, we took the plunge. Christmas Eve was spent cooking and wrapping last minute gifts. Christmas Day was spent with my not-so-little little bro & his family, tearing into gifts, eating way too much food, and polishing off several bottles of champagne. This was a Christmas we have missed for two years. Thanks, ‘rona.
All was going well, until one morning I woke up with a scratch in my throat and a cough. I thought nothing of it. Our pre-flight tests were all negative, and we hadn’t been anywhere other than my parents house after arriving.
The day came to take our COVID tests in order to get back to Canada. And who should test positive? Me! Long-story-short, I had to stay back for a week (with a wicked stuffy nose) before being able to come home. You might think that was a perfect time to write, but when you’re suddenly away from your family, it’s super stressful. So, very littler writing was had.
D’oh!
Luckily about 10 days later, my PCR came back negative, and I rescheduled my flight home. I’ve been home for a week now, being a good little girl and sticking close to home unless I need to walk Mochi. It took me a few days to calm down and catch up to the fact that I was actually home before I could start writing again.
From the plane – Mt. Rainier, an active volcano in Washington state.
What I did for 2021
This year, I’m going to do things a bit differently. For 2021, I tried to stick to the mantra “Write Every Day.” Long-story-short, I couldn’t stick to that for more than a few weeks at a time. My anxiety would flare up to the point where thinking about opening a document to write triggered panic attacks.
My goals changed at the beginning quarter of the year to hit an easy target: 5,000 words a week. That seemed to work pretty well, and there were weeks where I blew my target out of the water.
NaNoWriMo rolled around and I told myself to commit. Write every day in November, even if it’s junk, even if it’s gibberish. Just write. I didn’t have to stick to a single project, I could write whatever the heck I wanted.
And it worked! I slammed back NaNo in about 20 days. As December started, I was able to keep the momentum going. I think I had found my magic bullet.
Resolutions for 2022
This year, starting in February, I’m aiming for 10,000 words a week. That’s only 2,000 words a day for 5 of the 7 days. At my writing speed (or word vomit speed) I can crank out 2,000 words in about an hour. That’s not a big commitment at all. This is me writing while the evening news runs in the background.
I am also going to try to keep a separate writing journal aside from my bullet journal. I’m able to stick to my bullet journal, but the contents are all over the place. I’m going to separate writing completely, and leave my bullet journal for day-to-day and personal goals only.
And that works out perfectly. For Christmas, my journaling-writer mum got me one of her favourite planner notebooks to try out. It’s called the Go Girl Planner , available also on Amazon. It’s built with three sections: Month-at-a-glance, week-at-a-glance, and free-form bullet journaling for jotting down ideas, maps, and anything else that comes about.
I set up my month-at-a-glance for now with things that are happening through the month. Come February, I will shift to only writing-related items, such as social media, targets for self-edits, and planning out timelines for my writing projects. More on that in another post.
My week-at-a-glance will be used to record and track specific goals that week. For instance, now that I’ve finished the first draft of my fourth novel in the Rose Cross Academy series, I need to self-edit the manuscript before sending it to my editor for her to chop to pieces. I will see if giving myself a goal every day or every other day to self-edit a chapter will help me through the process, or if I need less structured goals such as ‘self-edit 10 chapters this week.’
Writing Goals for 2022
As mentioned, I’ve finished the rough draft of my fourth book. By March/April, I want to have this book edited and ready for publishing.
Book #5 in my Rose Cross Academy series will need some work. I have a framework, I know the beginning, middle, and end, and I’ve written about 30%-40% of the novel. I’d like to work on this novel with the most focus.
I’d like to get my publishing schedule up to at least two books a year, instead of one.
My laptop keyboard, rainbow mode.
I have (what I thought was) a just-for-fun WIP that has grown into a monstrous novel nearing 150K words (code name GM). I think this novel has potential, and I’d like to clean it up and send it out for beta reading. Part One of this novel is complete and self-edited. Part two is 75-80% done. Whether I split the manuscript into two is still up for debate. This work deviates from my previous YA novels and comes in as New Adult LitRPG.
And finally, I have my 2021 brainstorm-turned-novel-series-idea I’m calling “Four Crows”. This is becoming New Adult as well—a pistol-and-petticoat Steampunk fantasy set in a post-apocalyptic late 1800’s North America. The premise is right before the 1890’s industrial revolution of North America, an apocalypse occurs which wipes out a chunk of the population, destroys emerging technology (such as the motor vehicle and industrial machinery), and replaces it with a watered-down form of magic. One hundred years later, as society has recovered and is gearing up for a second industrial revolution, events leading to the original apocalypse are rearing their ugly heads again.
To Wrap It Up . . .
I plan on 2022 being busy with ideas and finalizing drafts. Two of my projects are close to publishing, so I’m well on way to hitting my two-novel-a-year plan. And since loose daily writing goals worked well for me in the latter half of 2021, I’ll be experimenting on what goals I can set for myself that don’t feel like work. Life is stressful enough, I don’t want my writing to become one of them.
Sunrise touching the Coast Mountains.
As spring peaks over the mountains here on the east coast, I have high hopes and good spirits heading into the year. It’s a bit disappointing that COVID gobbled up half of January, but I have a whole year to make up for it.
How are your New Year’s goals looking? If you have them planned out, are you sticking to them?
To add a bit of background, we made a snap decision in April 2021 that we were going to pull up roots from Calgary, Alberta and drop them in Vancouver, British Columbia. With the world pivoting to a mainly online society in order to avoid COVID, the pandemic allowed us to not only move to a place we’ve always wanted, but to keep our jobs at the same time.
In the span of Spring Break 2021, we scouted locations in the greater Vancouver area, chose our desired location, and put our first deposit on what would eventually be our new home. Housing in this area of Canada is nuts–not only is it twice the price of Calgary, but there is a negative supply of housing. Anything available often goes through bidding wars, wait lists, and lotteries just to get the chance to make an offer. We lucked out in that literally hours before we were to hop on our flight back to Calgary we managed to secure a new build and lay down a deposit.
Our new abode would be ready early summer 2022.
Someplace amongst all that construction is where we will live. Eventually.
As circumstances would have it, we needed to move before then. So in July, we secured a rental, packed a moving truck, crammed into the hybrid, and hauled bum to the west coast. We knew things would be tight, space-wise, for about 9 months, but I didn’t expect this.
We went from a modest estate home in Calgary at just under 3,000 sq ft . . .
A hike above the coulée in the old ‘hood. One of those is our old home.
… to a 900 sq ft apartment.
Be it ever so humble, there’s no place like home.
Three storage units later, we were still swimming in boxes, and this was after we sold a good majority of our furniture and Goodwill-ed much of our belongings.
Somewhere in our apartment, I had to find room for my creativity–my writing and my crafts.
When we were packing, I allowed myself one craft for the apartment. That would be my diamond painting. Supplies could live in a box, the painting could take up an IKEA table, and a cutting mat would allow me to cover the painting and use the table for other purposes.
Is the addition of a candle to a table full of chaos considered zen?
The couch (one of the only pieces of furniture we kept) became my home office/writing space. A plastic container from Daiso became my desk/office supply/coffee caddy.
As I edit my 4th book, portions of the novel live in various corners of the apartment. I have repurposed a wine box as a hard copy storage/bedside table. The TV stand holds my current editing binder. The copier lives in a corner, hidden under boxes, grocery bags, and the occasional snack bag.
Mochi has claimed one corner of the couch as her own, even though her enormous dog bed and favourite stuffy are literally steps away.
Does the clutter drive me nuts? A little.
Does the lack of space make me crazy? Surprisingly not so much.
Yes, I miss having a quiet space alone where I could be with my thoughts. And it did take me several months to get back into the groove of writing on a regular basis.
Even though the apartment is our in-between for the moment, the surroundings are starting to feel like home. Daily walkies to the river are something to look forward to. The colours remind me of my childhood home in Ohio.
We’re counting down the months until summer. Then we can move into your permanent home on the mountain.
Maybe I’ll see a bear, too (hopefully from the safety of my balcony as I enjoy my morning coffee).
The new view, under construction.
For now, I will watch the squirrels bury their acorns (and drive Mochi crazy), and dream of an office table or even a kitchen island where I may write.
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