…And Then the Coke Exploded

~ Kiki Writes ~ Leave a comment

Soda explosionFor those of you playing the home game, one of my day jobs involves minding the neighbor’s grandson before and after school on the days that she works. Last week, he had a rough couple of days.

Tuesday, he accidentally spilled a glass of grape juice on the only carpeted portion of the entire living room. It was a real fluke, too. He’d set the glass on the floor next to the couch like he’d done countless other mornings and the remote control slipped off the couch, hit the glass, and knocked it over.

So we had a nice little bonding time before and after school learning how to properly clean up grape juice.

The next day, he didn’t even bother bringing his juice into the living room. Lesson learned.

That afternoon, he got a plastic bottle of soda from the fridge. The Coke was frozen so he opened it over the sink, underestimating the hidden volatility of a frozen soda.

It exploded.

He yells for help and I hurry into the kitchen to find chunks of frozen Coke dripping from the ceiling. It was everywhere. It covered the curtains and the windows above the sink, dripped down the cabinets, somehow sprayed INSIDE the cabinets, covered the countertop and everything on it.

The boy looked like he was going to cry.

I laughed.

He was not pleased with this.

I told him not to freak out, grab some paper towels and get the ceiling first. We mopped up all of the soda we could find, all the while him saying that that his grandma was going to kill him and me repeatedly telling him that she wouldn’t. I made him take down the curtains and throw them in the washer before the soda had a chance to stain them and then we spent some time going over everything to make sure we de-stickied what had been splattered.

The poor kid couldn’t understand why I kept laughing every time we found soda in a new, hidden place. He didn’t see any humor in the situation.

I explained to him that it was all a matter of experience. He’s young. To him the mess is huge and the consequences are dire. I’m old. I’ve experienced worse. Sure, it’s a big mess, but it can be cleaned. And there’s chunks of Coke dripping from the CEILING. That’s pretty hilarious.

Also, it wasn’t my neck on the line.

He was so traumatized, that when he got a second soda, he took it outside to the very edge of the patio to open it, even though it wasn’t frozen.

Our second day of mess-cleaning quality time ended with twenty minutes of us wrestling the curtains back onto their rods and hanging them up again. I’m happy to report that all of the soda came out of the curtains.

I’m also happy to report that the boy was not killed by his grandmother, just like I said he wouldn’t be.

Rerun Junkie–Following the Stars

~ Kiki Writes ~ 2 Comments
Ross Martin not being Artemus Gordon.
Ross Martin not being Artemus Gordon.

I like to follow the stars of my reruns. Call it a symptom of my rerun junkie habit. Call it lazy, harmless stalking. Whatever you call it, I do it.

Once I get hooked into a show, I’ll start looking for its stars in other things when I go through the TV schedule for the week. It doesn’t matter what it is, new or old, movie or TV show, I’m just looking for the face.

To me, it’s neat. Here’s someone’s first TV appearance. Here’s their most recent movie. Here’s that same face that you love on this TV show that was made before you were born, the person that plays this character that you adore, doing something totally different.

And I have little to no shame in regards to this TV stalking. If I have taken an interest in you, then I will look for you. And if I see you are going to be on my TV this week, I’ll make a note of it on my phone so I don’t miss it (not kidding; I set an alarm and everything).

Randolph Mantooth not being Johnny Gage, but doing it with a fantastic mustache.
Randolph Mantooth not being Johnny Gage, but doing it with a fantastic mustache.

Because of this peculiar habit, I’ve seen Johnny Crawford on Little House on the Prairie and Hawaii Five-O; Randolph Mantooth on Charlie’s Angels (with a fabulous mustache) and Criminal Minds; Larry Storch on Love, American Style and Gilligan’s Island; Forrest Tucker on Bionic Woman and Marcus Welby, MD; Ross Martin on The Bold Ones and The Return of the Mod Squad (honestly, my Ross Marin fixation deserves its own post); Kevin Tighe on Law and Order: SVU and Leverage; Kent McCord on Ironside and JAG; and Martin Milner on The Millionaire and The Virginian.

(I don’t think I have to tell you that I’m not listing ALL of them.)

Larry Storch not being Randolphy Agarn.
Larry Storch not being Randolphy Agarn.

It’s because of this peculiar habit that I realize how many of these people I’ve seen dozens of times BEFORE I found them on my reruns. Do you know how many times I’ve seen Kevin Tighe in Roadhouse and Kent McCord in Airplane II? Well, let’s not discuss it. I’ve seen those flicks an embarrassing number of times. The same goes for anyone that’s been on Murder, She Wrote, because I’ve seen all of those episodes ten times at least. I’ve seen Martin Milner be the hero and Randolph Mantooth get killed sooooo many times.

The point I’m trying to make is that there are so many faces I’ve seen multiple times BEFORE they became significant faces to me. It’s fun to go back and see them again now knowing them.

And you thought I couldn’t have any more fun with my reruns.

Writing–March Projects

~ Kiki Writes ~ Leave a comment

cloverThe main project for March is to finish writing the first draft of The Timeless Man. It’s more than half-way done and boring as hell, but I can fix that later. I just need to get it done. This is a project that I want to have completely done by the end of the year and the way I’m struggling with the first draft, I might already be in trouble.

The other novella that I’m working on, remember it? The one that was so insistent on my brain last month? Well, it’s not as insistent now. I’ll still be working on it throughout the month, but more as a distraction from The Timeless Man, a break from the blahs I’m having about that first draft.

So, The Timeless Man is the biggest priority this month.

However, I’ve been trying to come up with story for a contest open to various genres and essays. I think I’ve actually hit on an essay idea that might work for it and I think I’m going to give it a go and see what I can make of it. I’ve only written one other and it was pretty much garbage, but I’d like give it a go so I can feel like I’m doing something towards this deadline.

Last month I read through A Tale of Two Lady Killers, but didn’t get around to doing any of the little revisions that need to be done. I also realized that if I want to self-publish The World (Saving) Series, as I’ve been thinking about doing, then I’m going to make some changes to the manuscript. Maybe this month I’ll get around to doing those two things.

But like I said, first draft’s first.

Writing–Sophomore Slump?

~ Kiki Writes ~ Leave a comment

Rainbow paperI’ve spent the month working on the next Ivy Russell novella, The Timeless Man. It’s been sort of a slow-go due to a bit of a crazy work schedule. Most days I can only get a page or two done, though I try to get more than that in on the weekends and the days I’m only working one job.

But the day jobs aren’t the only thing slowing me up.

So far I’ve spent the entire first draft (which isn’t yet finished) comparing The Timeless Man to Cheaters and Chupacabras. It’s an unfair comparison because I’m comparing a finished project with a first draft. That’s like comparing a gold medal skier to a guy who just put on skis for the first time. It’s not right.

But I’m doing it anyway.

Every time I pull up the first draft to work on it and start typing, in my head I’m asking myself, “Does it have the same tone as the first one? Is it as much fun? Are the characters consistent? Is it enough like the first one?”

The only valid question is about the characters. They should be consistent at their core from novella to novella, and since I have two more novellas in the idea stage, that’s pretty important. It’s something I should definitely keep in mind for the first draft, but I don’t have to be a nag about it.

The rest of it, I can’t ask those questions now. I’m not even sure if I should ask those questions at all. Since this is going to be a series of novellas, I realize there should be a certain feel to the stories that is similar between novellas, but that’s really something I shouldn’t be thinking about in the first draft stage.

I’m hoping I can file those questions for later. I can look at them again when I get to revising.

Right now, I just need to be writing.

I won’t be able to answer them if I don’t get this first draft done.

I Colored My Hair

~ Kiki Writes ~ Leave a comment
Kiki's red hairOkay, I didn’t color my hair myself, but I had it colored by my stylist. Yes, I have a stylist. I’m hip.
I used to color my hair often, as I’ve posted about before. But once I got my hair back to its original color some ten plus years ago, laziness set in. Though I thought about coloring my hair again, I remembered the upkeep it took and quickly dismissed taking that trip back down the rabbit hole. I also remember the damage I did to it coloring it so often. I didn’t want to fall down that rabbit hole either.

Besides, my natural color is actually quite nice and once my hair recovered from all of the damage I did to it, it only got better. Sure it’s only brown, but I’ve got some spiffy natural coppery sort of highlights in there. Hell, even the gray hair I have scattered about gives it a little something extra.

But recently I decided I wanted to put something extra in the extra.

I decided to get some chunky red lowlights put in.

I know, hardly something to blog about, but when you’re as lazy as I am, any sort of change like this is noteworthy. Besides, I feel like this is actually related to something a little bigger in my world, but this isn’t the post for that.

This is just the vanity post. See my new hair! See how pretty! See what I’ve committed myself to!

Okay, not much of a commitment since it won’t take much to grow it out and get rid of it.

But it’s still pretty.

Writing–Redoing Rejected

~ Kiki Writes ~ Leave a comment

RejectedNow that I’ve released my second self-published anthology, I guess I should point out that my first self-published anthology is no longer for sale (so if you managed to be one of the six people that bought it, congratulations, you got yourself a collector’s item now).

I made the executive decision to pull Rejected. I actually did it late last year. I didn’t think anyone would notice.

It was my first go in self-publishing and I’m still proud of it. It helped me get over my self-publishing fears and take the plunge, and I’m glad for that. And it felt good to get those stories off my board and out to be read. It was a real accomplishment on several levels.

But.

It definitely shows that it was my first shot at not only putting together an anthology, but also doing a self-published project. I’m not a pro at this now or anything, but I feel like I’ve improved. And I want that anthology to reflect it.

You see, I still love the stories and I want them to be read, but they deserve better presentation.

I plan on redoing the anthology. Maybe not as a redux of Rejected, exactly (which makes the title of this post somewhat misleading), but definitely as something better, maybe with a few new stories thrown in. I’ve been thinking about it for a while now. By taking it off the market, I’ve kind of taken that first step.

If I don’t eventually follow through, I’m gonna look like a dick.

And the stories deserve better than a trip to oblivion because I’m a dick.

That’s what started this in the first place.

Writing–The Battle of the Ideas

~ Kiki Writes ~ Leave a comment

Rainbow paperI spent some time last month thinking about and sketching out the next Ivy novella. I need an idea of where the road goes before I start driving it, you know. And I admit that it didn’t come as quickly as I’d have liked. I had the basic idea, the very basic story. But the certain details I was needing, the points on the road that I needed to stop and visit, weren’t as immediate and clear as I would have liked.

All well and good. No need to rush. No need to panic. Plenty of time to let the idea boil a bit longer on the back burner.

So while I was letting this bit simmer, I got a sudden rush of an idea that needed to be written now. Here are the characters, here is the story, here is the dilly-yo, so let’s get to it.

Such is one of my biggest annoyances as a writer.

You’ve got your schedule. You are going to work on this. Everything is all nice and neat. And then BAM! Here’s this new, insistent, sparkly idea that looks so much better than the idea you’re working on, that you need to work on, that you should be working on, and wouldn’t you rather work on it?

Like a siren leading my deadlines and plans to the rocks.

Sometimes, when this happens, all I have to do is sketch it out a bit and the sparkly idea falls apart and I can move on with my original project without any guilt.

But sometimes, the sparkly idea doesn’t burst into a cloud of glitter. Sometimes it’s more than just pretty. There’s some real substance there. I can’t just ignore it. I’ve tried and it always ends up badly.

I don’t know what other writers do about this problem, but if I feel compelled to work on it, then I work on it. It’s my second project and it gets my attention as soon as I’m done with the primary project, the one with a deadline and schedule, is finished for the day.

It works out better for me that way.

Working on the second project doesn’t distract me from working on the first project and probably actually helps my focus on the first project because I want to get it done so I can move on to the second project.

And at the end of all things, I end up with the first drafts of not one, but two novellas (or short stories or novels or any combination of those), which gives me more to revise and polish, and more choices at the end of it all. It’s actually a good thing for me in the long run, these surprise ideas that end up doing battle in my head.

It’s still annoying, though.

Writing–February Projects

~ Kiki Writes ~ Leave a comment

purpleflowersHaving done a whole bunch of revisions, both hard and easy, this month I’m looking to write something new.

It’s time to get the new Ivy novella down on paper. That is for sure. I’ve got it all sketched out. Okay, I’ve got it as sketched out as I need it to be. Good enough, time to go.

I also got an idea for another, unrelated novella that has been rather persistent and so I think I’m going to explore it as well. I’ve sketched it a bit. I think I can write it. I think I’m going to.

And finally, I got slapped with a short story idea that won’t take me but a couple of days to write, so I think I’m going to do that as well. I’ve actually had the idea for a while, but I couldn’t figure out just how to work it until recently. Now that I know, I want to get a draft done.

So, I’m looking forward to a lot of writing this month.

But, since Spirited in Spite didn’t take that much work to revise, I started reading A Tale of Two Lady Killers in preparation to revise it to completion, too, and I’m realizing that it’s not going to need a whole lot of work either. So it’s entirely possible that I might do some of the nitpicky revisions on it this month, too.

Short month doesn’t meant I’m short on work.

Fashion Advice From a Fat Girl

~ Kiki Writes ~ Leave a comment

Kiki in red flannelYou may think that someone of my size couldn’t possibly know anything about fashion, let alone be in the position to give out advice, but let me assure you, I’m quite qualified.

Think about it.

I’m a person that society doesn’t want to even look at it. I’m not supposed to even leave the house and inflict my fat self upon them. But if I have to leave to do things, could I at least cover up in some sort of burka type ensemble so they can just see me as the shapeless blob we all know I am. (This is not a slight on those who wear burkas, by the way; just the only example of head-to-toe clothing I could think of at the moment.)

The fashion rules aren’t written for a person of my size.

But since the fashion “rules” are a made-up, bullshit concept to begin with, don’t you think you should be taking advice from someone who makes up her own? Damn skippy.

Lucky for you, I only have two rules to follow.

Rule #1-Dress for yourself

To head off any “buts” right at the beginning, I understand that sometimes you will want to dress for a partner or to attract the attention of a certain someone. Wearing your husband’s favorite outfit or wearing a shirt you look dynamite in to attract the attention of a cute girl is fine. So long as you are also dressing for yourself.

What I mean by that is wearing what you want to wear. That’s it. You feel more confident in clothes that you like, that you’re comfortable in, that you want to be sporting. And because you’re rocking out your way, you automatically look better than you would if you tried to wear stuff that society’s fashion rules tell you to wear.

Red BlackWhen I was in my early twenties, I wore purple lipstick, pro-wrestling t-shirts over prom dresses, combat boots, had my eyebrows pierced, and colored my hair all sorts of colors. People said I did it to get attention and didn’t believe me when I said that I didn’t. No doubt I attracted attention. When you look like that, people notice. But I looked that way because that’s the way I wanted to look. I thought I looked good like that. It was the look I wanted to rock.

The picture at the top of the post? That’s what I look like today, right now, as I’m typing (okay, not as I’m typing as it is obviously a bathroom selfie, but you get the point). I’m wearing a bright red and orange flannel over a black cami, dark wash bootcut jeans, and combat boots (I love combat boots; it is a pure love). Yesterday I wore a blue cableknit poncho over a white longsleeved t-shirt (both of which my youngest niece picked out for me for Christmas).

I will wear skinny jeans. I will wear boots with my denim pencil skirt and tights. I will wear a bright purple scarf with my olive shirt dress. I will wear red owl socks with my gray owl sweater over a blue buttoned down shirt.

I wear it because I like it and that’s what I want to wear that day. I dress for myself.

Rule #2- Wear clothes that fit

I cannot stress this rule enough because it’s very important.

I’m not just talking about clothes that are too tight either. Honestly, I don’t know how that’s comfortable for anyone when their t-shirts are constricting movement and their pants are cutting off their circulation. This isn’t just for the big folks either. Just because you’re skinny doesn’t mean you get a free pass to look like you’ve swaddled yourself in a boa constrictor going in for the kill.

Kiki DressOn the flip side, don’t wear clothes that are too big. I realize, particularly for big girls, people do this to hide their bodies because society has shamed them for their size. Well, let me put this in bold print and all caps: YOU ARE FOOLING NO ONE. You can throw a circus tent over an elephant, but baby, there’s still an elephant in that tent and everybody knows it.

Clothing should fit. Even if you’re just doing a t-shirt and jeans, they should FIT.

The ass of your jeans shouldn’t be sagging, they shouldn’t be dragging the ground, you shouldn’t be hiking them up all the time. They shouldn’t be so tight that you can’t sit down without unbuttoning them, that every ounce of fat from below the waist is spilling out over the top because it has no place else to go. You shouldn’t be in danger of your skirt falling down or hiking up.

Your shirt shouldn’t be so tight that it’s a twenty minute wrestling match to get it on and then you spend the rest of the day pulling it down. It shouldn’t be so big that a family of four could camp in it either.

Think skim. Your clothing should skim your body. Loose enough to be comfortable, but tight enough so you don’t look like a slob. Even if you’re slumming it in a ratty t-shirt and jeans that have more holes than a prairie dog village and stains from unidentified sources on them, you automatically look less like a lazy, dirty grub if they fit.

Denim Pencil SkirtSo if you weight 300 pounds and want to rock a belly shirt, by all means, do so, just make sure that shirt is the right size. Jeans, too. A good bra is also a must, but that’s another post (it’s a Holy Grail quest, fellas). All about the booty shorts? Terrific. Make sure that those booty shorts aren’t so tight that they’re squeezing the booty out of the top.

Remember the rules.

And don’t let anyone shame you for what you wear.

Those folks should be ashamed for being such assholes in the first place.