My curse upon thy venom'd stang,
That shoots my tortur'd gums alang;
And thro' my lugs gies mony a twang,
Wi' gnawing vengeance;
Tearing my nerves wi' bitter pang,
Like racking engines!
— Robert Burns, "Address to the Tooth-ache," 1789
Be true to your teeth and they won't be false to you.
— Soupy Sales
"I think," said the dentist, stepping outside again, "I'd better give you gas." Then he moved aside and hummed an air from a light opera, while he mixed up cement.
I sat up in my shroud. "Gas!" I said. "Yes," he repeated, "gas or else ether or a sulphuric anæsthetic or else beat you into insensibility with a club or give you three thousand volts of electricity."
These may not have been his exact words. But they convey the feeling of them very nicely.
— Stephen Leacock
I guess since it’s the reason I’ve been gone so long, we’ll start with the ‘ow!’ Not ‘owe’, although I definitely owe on my credit card, but ‘ow’, as in the pain in my jaw.
The dentist had booked a consultation with a dental surgeon and I was told that with any luck he’d be able to pull the offending tooth at the same time. Well, if you’ve been reading this blog for any length of time, you’ll know I don’t have that kind of luck.
Apparently the root had grown into the jaw bone, plus it was sandwiched in between two nerves, plus it was a very brittle tooth so there was no way he’d be able to extract it with just a local anesthetic. His next available appointment for the extraction was January 7.
I may have freaked out a bit at that point. :-)
Fortunately, there was another dental surgeon at that office who could take me the following weekend. It meant another week of escalating pain, but it was better than January 7.
Anyway, the tooth is gone and they sent me home antibiotics and two different pain killers that are great for the pain but make me super sleepy. It’s a trade off, but I’ll take it.
The bottom line is, I’m not allowed to spit or drink out of a straw, and it hurts to open my mouth too wide or to chew, and my lower jaw and neck are still swollen, but I’m getting better. And at least I know this pain is eventually going to go away.
As for Writersfest . . . Stuart Ross (from the last post) was pretty much the highlight. The next day was Sunday, and there were two masterclasses, both at the hotel I was staying at, which made it very convenient.
The first was How to Get Published, which was presented by Scott Fraser from Dundurn Press. Needless to say, this was a standing room only event. Scott was accompanied by a couple of authors who’ve been published by Dundurn Press who shared their publishing experience with us.
It was a great talk, and they were all super friendly, and they had a lot of great advice if you’re looking for traditional publishing. However, I didn’t take any notes, mainly because they don’t publish my kind of writing. To be honest, they don’t really publish much of what I like to read, either.
And (to me anyway) that’s the thing, isn’t it? If you’re wanting to go through the traditional channels to publish, you should focus your market research on markets that publish the kinds of things you write. It saves everyone a lot of time (and rejection slips) if you don’t send your historical romance to a publisher who specializes in erotica, or your sci-fi thriller to one who publishes chick lit. Common sense, people.
The final masterclass of the festival was Blogging and Social: Finding Your Focus. This was presented by Tianna Edwards, who runs, Keep Up With Kingston, a blog devoted to promoting the city of Kingston, where to find the best food, things to do . . .
This is another one where I didn’t take any notes. Not that she didn’t offer a lot of great advice for setting up and maintaining a blog, but because she gave us all the information on handouts. Plus, I already have two blogs I’ve been maintaining, so (not to brag or anything) I was already aware of a lot of her advice.
But there was still a couple of things that stuck with me that I’ll try to apply to future posting. Like, for anyone who’s thinking about starting a blog but doesn’t know where to start, you can’t go wrong if you focus on what’s passionate to you. Your passion for the subject – books, clothes, food, whatever – will fire the passion in others.
For myself, the one piece of advice that stuck with me is, put content that doesn’t belong into another bucket. I try to do that with this blog – stuff I want to talk about that isn’t really writing related (like the kittens, or my houseplants) I put on my other blog, which is more just general interest. The tooth thing is an exception because it did have an impact on my writing. :-)
One more thing she suggested was to consider a newsletter. Maybe. Someday. I think I need to build a following first. And you know, maybe write something newsworthy once in a while. But it’s definitely something to think about in the New Year.
* ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ *
WORDAGE REPORT
First of all, I need to repeat my big news. Thanks to the diligent efforts of my editor, formator, publisher, and bestie, Magical Mayhem is a go! It is ready to be launched on December 7, just in time for Christmas.
Despite not having to worry about blog posts for the last couple of weeks, writing has been a bit of a struggle. The pain in my face got steadily worse, and was a wee bit distracting. Okay, it was a lot distracting. And the thing about pain killers, even ones like Advil, is that they make you sleepy. So I was spending a lot of time sleeping.
However, the good news is, I have somehow managed to keep up with NaNo and I have every confidence I’ll be reaching my 50,000 words by the end of Wednesday (knock on wood). Go me!
As for this Wordage Report, since I haven’t written anything the last couple of weeks, you’re getting the words from the week of November 6th through 13th – I skipped that Sunday post because of my tooth.
NEW WORDS:
Blog Posts – 2202+749+328+707=3,986
UP 508 words from last week
Goals For Next Week:
Finish NaNo, get blog posts done.
NANO
I gotta tell you, I never really got into the spirit of NaNo this year. I’m still enjoying working on something new though. It’s a nice change from all that editing I was doing. And I’m enjoying the story. It’s taken a few unexpected twists, but it’s NaNo, so that’s to be expected.
If I were to describe the story in one sentence, it would be: Little House on the Prairie in space meets the wolfman. It’s got settlers, albeit on a different planet, and there’s a paranormal element with the shifters I’ve introduced. Now the hero just has to rescue the heroine from the space pirates and we’re done. :-D
I started this NaNo section at the beginning of the month, thinking I’d be able to keep a running tab so you could follow my progress. And lucky for you (or unlucky, depending on your point of view) I keep a spread sheet, so I’m just going to include my progress up until now.
Week One: 1415+2097+1526+1677+1694=8,409
Week Two: 1385+2033+940+1252+1870+1303+175=8,783
Week Three: 1429+1258+3053+953+1034+2088+2064=11,879
Week Four: 3352+2674+2267+1585+2062+890+1226=14,056
Week Five: 1418
Total NaNo words – 44,545
Expected Goal – 45,009
I’m down by 434 words, but I only have 5,455 words to go by the end of Wednesday. Place your bets now as to whether I’ll make it or not. :-D
EDITING:
X pages
Seriously, did you really expect me to do any editing? That’s one of the beauties of NaNo – you just write and you don’t look back. If I changed or rewrote a scene, I just highlighted the old one to be deleted later.
Goal For Next Week:
After Wednesday (when NaNo ends) I will be starting work on An Elemental Spirit.
MARKETING:
On suspension until after Christmas
TECH & TRAINING:
I’d still like to figure out Dropbox. At the very least I want to be able to backup to it automatically like I did before Staples got a hold of my laptop. Man, I’m still mad at Staples. Never again! And for extra back up protection, I’d like to unbox my external hard drive and start backing up to it as well.
Goal For Next Week:
Figure out how to set up the automatic back up for Dropbox. Set up external hard drive.
POETRY WEDNESDAY:
I’d planned on recycling some old forms for the month, but I ended up doing a new form – the Katauta – on November 9th. It was a short, Japanese form with a 5, 7, 7 format.
Goal For Next Week:
Share a new poetry form. Or an old one – we’ll see how NaNo’s going
CRAFTING:
I attended two Guild meetings, and worked on my afghan during both meetings. That’s the beauty about crocheting, I can talk and work at the same time.
It’s that time of year again, time to pull out the Christmas crafts for the granddaughter and I to work on.
Goal For Next Week:
Figure out what Christmas crafts to do this year.
WHAT I’M READING:
I read The Bookshop of Secrets, by Mollie Rushmeyer – what is it with me and books about bookshops lately? And I’m just about finished Angels Fall, by Nora Roberts.
Goal For Next Week:
Dive into my après NaNo book!
GOAL REVIEW:
Well, the goals are a little redundant, considering they were made a couple of weeks ago. But I kept up with my NaNo at least, and surprised myself by not doing more reading.
The files are all ready to go for Magical Mayhem, I just have to get them uploaded to the proper sites. But look for it in your favorite E-store on December 7th!
The kittens have not been helpful during this stressful month. When they get the zoomies, they have no respect for the laptop, so they often race across it causing havoc with whatever I’m working on.
I’m not sure if it was them or something I accidentally pressed, but I couldn’t help but notice that the sidebar on this blog went missing. Turns out it’s not missing, it just ended up below my posts. I checked the settings, I checked the settings against my other blog, and everything looks normal. I’m hoping that when I put this post up everything will return to normal.
The medications I’m on have been making me kind of queasy, and a lot sleepy, so here’s hoping I can pull things together for a productive week.
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