Let Me Be Random

I'm ba-ack! Yay.

So I've traveled a lot this summer. Tennessee for a week, Maryland for a soccer game, DC two days in a row for a booksigning and then professional meetings, New York and back, and then Myrtle Beach. The longer trips put us through West Virginia, Virginia, and North Carolina. That's a lot of states in 7 weeks.

What I've found really interesting is that gas prices have been essentially the same everywhere I went, even New York City. I've been amazed by that. Of course, I made that observation, then got home and gas here in Podunkville, PA, is 20 cents a gallon higher than it was yesterday in Myrtle Beach, Ultra-Commercial Vacationville. That's, like, opposite how things usually are.

Most of you probably don't pay attention, but if you look, you'll see this post was put up around 2:30 a.m.-ish. I got up this morning, did some chores, and spent several hours working (both household and professional stuff). I didn't do the four most important things on my list before the family talked me into a movie, and I had to do grocery shopping (yes, I live in the freakin' grocery store!!!). Then I made dinner. I came back and did two of the important things, but it was 10:30 and my brain was fogged, so doing the other two important things would be stupid. They need a sharp brain. So I brainstormed with a friend who's writing proposals for her publisher, and started catching up on blog reading. Which I've just completed (almost), and it inspired me to blog.

But now I feel I wasted four hours of what could have been productive time. It wouldn't have been. Revisions and critiques are a lot harder than reading blogs. Especially when I don't comment.

Then I felt guilty, because Jessica/jade_kadir did a meme that said I was one of the three people she talks to most online, and with vacation and busyness that led to late reading, I've been very silent lately. And Gail/un_conscience said no one seemed interested in her SPN recaps, and I totally am, but never commented on them...ref. vacation and busyness and reading several days after the post went up.

But even when I'm not busy, I don't comment much, on any of the blogs I read. Sometimes it's because I tend to read them late at night, like I did tonight, and that generally means tired brain = can't think of pithy comments. Sometimes I don't even need that excuse, I just don't have anything to contribute. But it doesn't mean the people I'm reading are shouting into the wilderness. I'm always entertained and they are always making a connection, even if they don't know it.

I need to become better about telling them.

I saw two movies this weekend. Friday, while J and Number One saw GI Joe, Number Two and I saw Aliens in the Attic. I was pleasantly surprised. It was funny, and decently acted, and far, far better than, say, the Hannah Montana movie. Today Number Two talked Daddy into seeing that with her, and Number One and I went to (500) Days of Summer. I knew it was one of those typically downer-topiced indies, but I've loved Joseph Gordon-Levitt since Third Rock from the Sun and Zooey Deschanel is decent. I found the movie delightful, because it did three things:

1. Used a non-linear timeline to break up the downer stuff with happy stuff.

2. Made the downer stuff funny, even while it was tragic.

3. Ended on a high note.

So definitely worth the price of a ticket.

The downside to taking vacation at the beginning of August is that when you get back, the month is nearly half gone. I know, the math doesn't compute, we were only gone 8 days, but yeah. I have 22 days to my deadline, and must finish the paid critique before then, too, and the schedule is full of soccer and back-to-school stuff, and if I have time to blog at all, it will probably be at 2:42 a.m. every time.

I know. I can see you wincing. Me, too.