@#%%$# Camera Cord

I actually HAVE pictures of the kids, being fricking ADORABLE, but since I can’t find the camera cord, and I’ve been editing not one but THREE Green’s Hill novellas for production (okay– only Little Goddess fans buy these, right? NO one else will understand them! Just saying!) I thought I’d give you a picture of my yummy yummy sexy immortal Green before I commenced:

Okay– so Chicken is enrolled in tap-dancing now, which makes us almost as busy as soccer season, since she’s got dance three nights a week, Squish has it one, and Squish and Zoomboy have gymnastics on Saturday mornings. Big T’s job is to get his shit together, study for his driver’s test, and figure out how to be independent without constantly bumming rides from us. I’d give him a monster sized hint,–it involves getting a frickin’ driver’s license!–but for some reason telling him that he’s shooting himself in the foot by putting it off only seems to make him resentful.

*sigh* He’s going to be living with us until he’s thirty-five. You mark my words–Mate and I are going to have to start staging kinky sex shit, complete with costumes and whips and chains in the living room to get him to move the hell out. I can see it now. I’m just preparing–because when he turns thirty and still doesn’t have a driver’s license, it’s either scar him for life or buy an apartment and move out and just start sending him house payments.

The good news is that he had this sort of red-furred critter camping out on his face for the last three months, and he apparently held it down and skinned it or something, because he looks less like a hippy-viking, and there’s red fuzz all over our bathroom. He promised me he’d kill that thing for graduation–bless him, I think this was his way of doing it in baby steps. I’m not sure if it’s occurred to him that it’s gonna grow again.

In other news, Zoomboy has lost a tooth–Hooray! And then he lost the tooth–Aww. So I told him to write the Tooth Fairy a note, explaining how he lost the lost tooth, and that the Tooth Fairy might have some pity on him, since this is the THIRD (out of five mind you) tooth that he’s lost and lost. I wonder if the other ADD odd-ducks have this sort of problem with the Tooth Fairy–I’m betting they probably do, because I think between the “Hooray, I lost a tooth!” and the “Aww, where’d it go?” I would lay down pretty heavy odds that there’s a “Squirrel!” or a “Oooh, shiny!” in there somewhere. Maybe even both.

And Squish? Squish is… Well, let’s make a list:

* Is heavily interested in sparkly hair bling–most particularly a big red bow that came off a Mini-Mouse Christmas hat that we’ve been pinning on her pony tail.
* Insists that two hours is NOT too long per day to sit on my lap, which would be fine, but I’m not allowed to sleep during this time, nor knit, nor, unless I’m crafty, read.
* Enjoys it when I go to the gym, because then she can entertain her court with stories of her big brother and the six million birthdays she’s going to have.
* Is incredibly disappointed when I explain that her birthday will only happen once, we can’t invite the entire world, and will NOT happen simultaneously at Build-a-Bear and Chuck-E-Cheese!
* Is completely into my plan to buy actual flowers to replace the bulbs that have probably rotted in the savage rains we had during the last two weeks.
* Does NOT see the difference between mommy freezing her plentiful pale posterior off at water aerobics as a work-out and Squish, swimming with impunity, the way she does when it’s 105 outside!
* Keeps coloring in the workbooks we use to prep her for Kindergarten, regardless of what the real instructions are, using pretty color combinations and a really impressive skill. (For me, anyway– I can’t draw for shit and neither can Mate.)
* Wants to sit in my lap at night, or have me lay down with her, because, well, this is a stretch, I think we’re pretty well attached. I am forever grateful that I had some time to get this attached. When Chicken was this age, I didn’t realize how girls did that with their mothers–I was honestly surprised when she wasn’t ready to be a teenager at six. I had forgotten that just because my own mom split when I was that age didn’t mean I was truly grown up. With Squish, not only have I been prepared, but I’ve been given the gift of some time and space to really appreciate having her with me. Even when I’m impatient, because she NEVER STOPS TALKING, I am, as I’ve said, forever grateful. She really is my dessert baby. I hope that never changes.

And in other news?

I’ve been editing– Waiting, Reaching, & I Love You, Asshole have all been edited in the last week, and I’m so thoroughly immersed in the world of the LG that I think I’m going to celebrate by finishing a chapter in Quickening. I’m almost 65K into Alpha, and I’m SO proud of it so far–I think that this one’s going to surprise folks. It’s dark, gritty, twisty and painful. *blink* Okay, maybe not surprise them THAT much.

Oh yeah– and I thought this was funny.

When I was editing Truth in the Dark, Lynn, my editor, had to go through and point out all my Em-dashes. They’re a dirty little literary habit that I was sort of addicted to, and the number of them in that particular manuscript was truly appalling. Well, the lesson stuck, and I’ve been pretty good (I hope–Lynn, if you’re out there, don’t laugh at me!) at minimizing my nasty little addiction ever since.

Enter: The Green’s Hill Werewolf novellas. Now see-some of you know that these were written before I leaned down my writing style a little in KPR and some of my other work for Dreamspinner. Well, the Green’s Hill Werewolves are being put out by another publisher–one that hasn’t seen my gradual weening from the ubiquitous Em-dash, and has been, well, surprised (i.e. shocked and appalled) at the number of them I’ve used.

They seem to want me to minimize that.

I’ve thought about telling Lynn–I really have–but I’m afraid she’d actually crawl through cyber-space to laugh at me and then tickle me until I pee. Because, it really is sort of funny, and, well, I really do sort of deserve it:-)