Sunrise At The Beach

What a glorious start to the day! I woke up at twenty of six (one of my roommates was snoring--names omitted to protect the innocent) and hurriedly dressed, grabbed my room key, banana, notebook and pen and slipped out.  I walked out to the beach and was the ONLY person out there.  I was both thrilled and saddened. I loved having the beach and the sunrise to myself, but felt sad that there was a whole town of people who had the beauty of the beach and sunrise at their disposal but chose not to be there.  Maybe every day is so beautiful they just get used to it.

Or it could be the cold.  It was just warm enough that you couldn't see your breath--just barely. But I stood on the beach and looked from one pier far down the beach on my left to the other pier far down the beach on my right, and I was the only person. The surf crashed and foamed and flocks of sea birds circled the water. Every now and then one of them would dive bomb the water and come up with a small fish.

There was a quarter moon high in the sky and then the sun appeared at the far edge of the ocean.

It was this beautiful neon-pink color. As it rose (which was rapid -- maybe a minute before it appeared as a full round circle above the ocean) it turned to a neon-pink/red, then a neon-pink-orange. The light reflected on the surface of the water, the birds called to each other, the water crept nearer where I stood.  Just a wonderful start to the day.

So far it's been a great weekend. We wrote for hours yesterday in our room, taking a 30-minute break at one point to watch a pod(?) of dolphins feeding and playing in the water.  They were close to shore and from our 5th floor room we had a perfect view of them. We could see their tail fins as they dove and one time 3 of them rode in toward us on a wave. They were stunning. And, as Maggie said, good luck. We all three had a strong writing day.

I'm a little nervous about keeping up today.  It's exhausting to write and write and write. Yesterday I free-wrote on my story.  Not trying to write scenes in order, but rather just writing scenes as they occurred to me. They may or may not make it in the final book, but it's a way of staying in touch with your characters and exploring their personalities and seeing what they do in various situations. Also, it keeps my pen moving.  It's more important to just keep writing then it is to write "good." Writing good is what the editing process is about.

Okay, it's 7:20 AM and I'm hungry. I'll go see if there's any sign of life from Bernie and Maggie and if not, eat breakfast on my own.

Photos of Lucy Cat

Is there anyone more beautiful than my Lucy? She was curled up on the library couch today, snoozing in the sun and I couldn't resist snapping a few pictures.  Looking at them, is it any wonder why I love my cats the way I do?

I call this, "Trying not to glare at Mommy for waking me up from my nap with the stupid camera" pose.

"I rule all" pose.

"You bore me and now I will bathe myself" pose

"It's time for me to go back to sleep now" pose.

Half a Shower Door - Decorating Diaries

It just keeps building.  I wrote in my last Decorating Diaries entry that the bathroom gods hate me and while I wrote it at the time as a joke, I'm really starting to believe it.  I don't know what god of dung I've p---ed off, but he's out there (I'm sure it's a "he.").

Here's today's saga: I love our shower door people.  We ordered the door for our last bathroom remodel from them and they're great. They call when they say they will, show up on time, are unfailingly polite.  Lovely people. So Rodney calls me this morning and asks if they can come by at 9:30 to install the door.  Yes, great, I say, c'mon down!

He calls back 30 minutes later.  Our door had to be ordered because we wanted a burnished bronze finish which is a special order. So the door comes to the company all wrapped up. Normally they'll just bring the wrapped door to the site and unwrap and install it there. But Rodney's installer, just on a hunch, unwrapped the door to check it before they left. Turns out one half of the door is burnished bronze, but the other half is polished silver.

Uh-huh.

Like I said, this company is great and Rodney is on it. I expect I'll have a new--all burnished bronze--door installed next week. But what's going on?  NOTHING is going according to plan. Frankly, I'm almost leery of blogging about it any longer. Maybe I'm jinxing it.

I've got a good title for my next non-fiction book though: How to Remodel Your Bathroom In Less Than A Year--Maybe. 

Bestseller list for sure.

Attending to Details

Since I leave tomorrow morning for the beach for my writing weekend with the girls, today is "clean-up" day.  I have about 6 phone calls I've been putting off that need to be made, I need to make a poster for a book signing I'm doing on Monday night, I've got the ever present pile of "I'll get to it when I have more time" papers piled by the side of my desk that need to be sorted through and either acted upon or thrown out, and I've got work to turn in and appointments to set up for next week. Also need to do laundry, pack, and practice my speech.

One thing I also have to do is send a letter to a magazine that's published my work for years and threaten to sue them if they don't pay me money owed. I'm hesitant to enter into the fighting ring on this one just because I don't want another battle in life, but they owe me over $1,000 and the publisher won't return my calls or answer my e-mails and they are several months behind on payments.

People like this irritate me. I've always had payment issues with these people but I would eventually get my money (usually 3 months late). But I'm tired of having to beg and plead for money that is legally owed me. And I have bent over backwards to be nice--I've offered to have them set up a payment plan and told them if you can't pay me one month and have to wait a month, that's fine.  Just pick up the phone and let me know.  Nothing. No response.

I will take them to small claims court if I have to.  I'd prefer not to as what a waste of time, money and energy to have to go fight about something about which there can be no dispute.  I have a signed contract and the articles have already been published in their magazine.  It's a no-brainer. 

The downside is I have several articles into them that I've already written and I'm guessing once I send this letter they won't run those and so I'm out my time and effort for those pieces. But considering I'm not being paid anyway, there's no real difference right?

I'm trying not to think ahead.  One step at a time. Today is pulling together the documentation and the letter.

I'm feeling sluggish.  I slept until 6 today and feel like I've wasted the morning. I know that's silly and 6 is still early by most people's standards, but when you live with the God of Dawn who is up at 4:30 AM every day you do feel a bit useless when you don't pull yourself out of bed until 6.  I'll make a to-do list.  That always perks me up and gets me motivated.  Is there anything more fun in life than crossing completed items off a to-do list???

I'm such a geek.... =)