Do What You Love and The Money Will Drain out of Your Bank Account

Well I have to say being unemployed is totally the bomb. All except for the lack of money part. But who needs money when you can go around doing good deeds for humanity with all your spare time?

Like volunteering to teach creative writing to high school kids (which I did earlier today) and being a volunteer tutor and going on "ski patrol" at Mt. Rainier where I will get to wear a radio and feel super important as I ski around sticking poles in the ground (or some such thing) meanwhile getting whipped around by 100-mile an hour winds. Oh yes, and sitting in a sunny cafe, which I am doing at this very moment.

My volunteering has centered around kids and writing because I desperately want to get a job as a "Writer in the School" next year."

I think it's because I was so encouraged and inspired by my teachers when I was young and writing masterpieces like "The Man Who Paid Only In change" (a story you're familiar with if you've read my novel, and if you haven't well, they might be publishing "The Man Who Paid Only in Change" someday if they can ever find the original manuscript which is buried deeply somehwere in my old closet at the family home, which is now blocked by my mother's file cabinets, which is rather annoying as it prevents access to the work of the "young genius" that was me. But I digress.)

I've been enjoying my work with kids so far. I was suprised today by how quiet the high school class was at first. They did not want to speak. I expected they would be boisterous and throwing stuff and saying things like "Up your nose with a rubber hose!" You know, like in Welcome Back Kotter. But no, they were shy and reticent, perhaps dazzled by my glamor or some such thing. Or perhaps they were thinking "What an idiot." In any case, my first question to them -- a cheery "What novels have you read where you really like the character's voice?" went over with a resounding thud when not a single one of them would answer.

They warmed up a bit later of course. But still, it was a good reminder of how shy high-schoolers can be. I also had a tendency to feed them answers to questions because I got nervous that they wouldn't answer and there would be a horrible, awkward silence. I got a little better at it as the class went on.

To conclude, it is a great feeling to be doing things I love rather than sitting in a sterile office, wishing I was anywhere else, editing documents I could care less about (although occasionally there is something soothing in this, it's true.)

They say "do what you love and the money will follow." Ha ha ha. It's more like "Do what you love and drain all the money in your bank account and then start drawing on your credit card until it's finally time check back into to Hotel Californiasoft so you don't go to debtor's prison." (Is there really such a thing as "debtor's prison" anymore? I guess I might find out.)


xoxo

Money. Ha. Who Needs It?

Greetings from unemploymentland! Since my paychecks are still coming in from my last job, I'm in denial -- doing all sorts of things that are fun and enriching and which earn me no money whatsoever! For example:

Working on my Nanowrimo novel. Oh maybe someday in a perfect world this will earn me some money. But for now, it's a great way to avoid doing... -

Freelance work. Oh yes, this is the one thing I'm doing that is paying me. So of course I avoid it like the plague. The job involves writing marketing copy for GUESS-WHICH-GIANT-SOFTWARE-COMPANY? Yes, that's right, Hotel Californiasoft!

Tutoring at 826Seattle. Get this. Last week I actually tutored in math. Ha ha ha! Like the charming, rambunctious child I tutored I was also counting on my fingers. Luckily it was only addition.

More volunteering. I'm about to start working for a literacy organization called Page Ahead wherein I will read stories to small children, sing songs, and do crafts. Now if I could only get paid $80 bucks and hour for that gig, I could check out of Hotel California AND leave.

Playing with my band. We earned a six whole bucks apiece the other night at our first gig at *Jimmy Z's* in *Everett*, during which I only horribly messed up two songs and wore a very cute sexy new dress that made up for my lack of ability to actually play keyboards.

Going to the gym. I've developed a taste for exercise classes lately wherein loud music is cranked, we dance around with barbells, and buff teachers wearing headsets yell out "work your butt, warm it up!"

Claiming unemployment. This is marginally profitable but lemme tell you, it ain't gonna pay the mortgage.

xo,

Rebecca

I'm Baack!

I believe I have finally snapped out of my post-Thanksgiving I-am-about-to-be-unemployed-on-top-of-that-I-am-a-loser-self-pitying slugfest. Numerous hours have been spent on the couch; abundant fatty coconut-milk laden dishes have been consumed; and all the routines that kept me sane and happy got left behind on a beach in Zihautanejo where they are currently enjoying margaritas, fiery salsas, and bathtub-warm waters without me.

However! I am now back in a functioning and energetic state. Perhaps it was due to the raw food lunch I had yesterday, which prompted a frenzy of post-office-going, sexy-dress-buying, car-cleaning, grocery-shopping, and, get this, cookie baking, that hasn't been seen since the likes of oh, early November.

OK, so the cookies were made from the Pilsbury dough that comes in a log and all you have to do is break of the pieces and throw them in the oven. But still. It's a far cry from the me who lay unmoving on the couch on Monday while the northwest threatened to float away.

Me. Back. Vacation. Ugh.

Hola! I returned from my Mexican vacation in body if not spirit and promptly became a hibernating creature: eating too much, sleeping too much, and covering my beautiful tan in layers of wool clothing.

Whine. Whine. Yes, you know me, I always fall into a funk after vacation when I must deal with the mundane details of life after losing myself in adventure, or, in this case, sitting on a beach, snorkeling, sleeping, drinking margaritas, and eating deliciously spicy moles and salsas that makes our food here seem so blah and band and pale (which is why in my post-vacation-face-stuffing-phase, I am eating the spiciest foods I can get my hands on: Indian, Thai, and of course, more Mexican).

I am also about to enter what is certain to be a most busy and creative and financially remunerative time: unemployment. Oh yes, I have many projects in mind, such as getting two-pack abs, creating a filing system for my home (ha ha), cleaning out my storage locker (ha ha ha), and revising the 50,000-word federal disaster zone that is my is my Nanowrimo novel.

Meanwhile, as my current tenure at Geeksoft comes to an end, I look around its sterile hallways and long - slightly - for the security I once had there. The money that flowed in, the ESPP plan, the health benefits handed down directly from God.

I look at the Geeksoft job listings and think: Maybe. Maybe I could do it again. But it is like a port in a storm that I must pass by as I complete my lonely voyage to God-knows-where.

Alas. That is the idealistic view. I'll probably be back. If not as a full-time-employee with the handcuffs of gold then as a contractor with manacles of silver. 'Cause that place is like the Hotel F*cking California. Let's sing it all together now: You can check out any time you like but...

Amazon Ranking Through the Roof! Sort of.

Well! I am happy to report that my novel has catapulted from its 700,000-something ranking on Amazon to --- ok, are you sitting down? -- to the 100,000's. Whoohoo! I'm raising my empty grande latte glass as we speak (which inspired yet another unpleasant episode at the coffee shop this morning but never mind about that!)

This, I'm deducing is all thanks to my inclusion in the National Novel Writing Month FAQ - in particular the question - "Has anyone had their novel published?

And there, shining like a brass ring for all those thousands of hungry would-be novelists, is the name of my book and a link to Amazon. (I am by no means the most glamorous example of a published NaNoWriMo author - Sara Gruen wrote a first draft of the wonderful and bestselling "Water for Elephants" during National Novel Writing Month).

Now I'm laboring away at yet another crappy first draft, full of gaping plot holes thousands of feet deep, shadowy corners where once-lively characters and plot lines die an obscure death, and questions that refused to be answered, like what does my main character want anyway?

But NaNoWriMo is all about not looking back. And my greatest challenge lies ahead, anyway, when I go to Mexico for five days next week and must continue to write every day -- under a palapa with a Corona in hand and bathtub-warm water only feet away!

So Many Blogs, So Little Time

I'm up to my ears in freelance assignments and Nanowrimo but I have posted over on my author blog today!

xo,
Rebecca

What Do Mermaids Eat?

If your life as a regular old human being working a 9-5 job for the man is getting you down, the "Character and Plot Realism Q&A" forum on the National Novel Writing Month Web might cheer you up. This the place where writers who are frantically working away on their novels this month can ask questions of other writers and self-proclaimed "experts" for advice about how to make their own stories more realistic. Recent threads include:

• Things (other than arson) that could set fire to a house?
• What would make a god want to have a child?
• Reason for having two different eye-colors?
• If you drop something down a grate on an NYC street, how do you get it out?
• Mistakes a time-travelling Japanese American would make in feudal Japan?
• Bounty hunters - how does it work?
• Is this band name too emo?
• What do you do with a dead dog?
• Private detective's choice in cigarettes?
• What do mermaids eat?