Editing Eating Blackbirds

Hello! Firstly apologies for the delays in posting recently - but I do have a genuine excuse...

I have finally had the Editor's notes for Eating Blackbirds which is out in July. Before Christmas I spoke to the Editor and she gave me her initial thoughts about the story. One of the characters had to be younger, another a bit more adventurous and I really couldn't get away with chopping that one's arm off: he really didn't deserve that...

So I have been thinking about it since then, trying to work out how I could do those things, but knowing that there was no point in starting until I got the full notes, as I would probably have to change lots of other things too. She needed to read it again and then think it over, so I was to wait until I got the full list.

And last weekend I got them... 108 points!

Some are things like, "didn't she have long hair in the first chapter and now she has short curls," and these are easy to sort. Others make me a little sadder - ie "that's not funny" when I really thought it was, and some are more far-reaching - making him a little younger makes her need to be that age, so her daughter can't be doing that and then she needs to think back to her youth and have done THAT. And so it goes on - one little change means it has to be followed through the rest of the book.

So far, I have added about 20,000 words, have gone blind and had to get my first pair of glasses, have worn out my laptop (until I realised that there were at least 400 photos on it that was grinding it to a standstill) and given myself tea-poisoning.

I have another three weeks before it needs to be finished, so until then, it is every evening and every spare moment. Luckily I can let the housework go, as I am quite used to that and so is everyone else. I now just need to work out how I can to my adventure's climax without chopping that poor bloke's arm off...

Community Plays and Toad Avoidance

Morning!
After a brief period of non-blogging, I am back and bursting with enthusiasm about the Builth Wells Community Play, to which I went on Saturday evening.

The drive down on a wet Saturday night was fraught with toad avoidance as our slimy little friends are hacking across the roads as slowly as they possibly can - mainly because they are horrified at the amount of their dead pals that already haven't made it. A road by a lake has been closed in Powys as so many of the squelchy things are crossing it and boy-racers think it's great to go Toad Skidding in their XR3s (I may be a little behind the times with regard to the make of boy-racer cars, but you get the picture?) However, I think I made it without splatting too many of them, but only because I went at five miles per hour. Although I hate toads and frogs with a passion, I still don't like the idea of squashing them, mainly because the thought of them going pop sends me into even more shudders of horror.

I met my friend at her house and we walked to the show only to find that on the way back the little blighters had made it to her road and they were everywhere. My friend's partner is all countryside and he was looking at them and I was trying so hard to not show my fear as I was sure he would have flipped them at me - and he probably would have, had he not just been playing guitar at a Commmunity Play as was feeling all benevolent towards his neighbours.

I made it into the car with only a few squelches beneath my feet and thought I was safe, but then sat on a burger that Huw had left there a few days before... (damn those slimy gherkins)

Oh, and the show was great - I didn't understand all the jokes, unlike the clever bloke in front of me, but it was great.

Lastly, a Well Done to my little sister Abby who has apparently just clinched a first class degree in Engineering. Well done you swot. (I could have got a first class degree if I had wanted one, if I had done a bit more work and had a slightly different genetic make up...)

Do as I say...

Hello!

After doing a little marketing work for a local business, I decided to review what marketing I have been doing for my own - of course, the answer is none of that which I have been advising as essential.

I had a quick peek at Amazon to see how Chocolate Mousse and Two Spoons is doing in the ratings and saw that it has rocketed to 351,000th best selling position. This is good news as at one point there were over a million other books stashed in Amazon's damp warehouses that were selling better than mine. So that was good to see. What was not so good to see is that the related items that are on the "People who bought this book also bought..." section included Sleeping Beauty (I bet I know who that was) and Only Men Aloud. Come on people, if you buy the next one, please can you buy it at the same time as you are buying a Dickens?

It does remind me of the time that Huw bought my mum a couple of Lace Making books for Christmas and kept getting emails from Amazon about whether he fancied going for a special offer on Knitting Rabbits for Easter Hats or Making Vests Even Scratchier With Unwashed Yarn books.

My favourite thing of the week was finding our girls bouncing on the bed playing the Grandpa Game - which is basically jumping up and down with their trousers pulled up to their chests. I dread to think what the Mother Game consists of...

Life and Garage Laundry

Nights out - but at what cost?

Last night, I went out for about the second time in six months. The occasion - the local Motorclub's 40th anniversery. Huw used to do rally driving and spent his weekends putting knackered old Fords back together. Personally, I hate anything to do with motor sports, avoiding cars whenever I can and using them simply for A to B journeys and storing apple cores and lollipop wrappers. Therefore, the evening wasn't one I was presuming to enjoy.

The first problem came in the form of a little text from the babysitter that had been booked for four weeks, saying that something (i.e something better) had come up and that she couldn't make it - perhaps she'd come round again when the weather was better. A mate was hurriedly roped in.

We were anticipating leaving at seven p.m, so at fourish, I thought I'd sneak off for a half an hour's snooze to set me up for the night. I woke at half six. The children had not been fed or watered and no copius notes written about what they might want / do.

Our mate arrived amongst a frantic hunt for my shrug, in the same monster truck that was featured in the blog of 5th Oct. I found a pair of trousers that would allow me to sit down and we sprinted for the car.

A friend was also dragged along by her husband who used to shout "litter!" as he drove round corners. The friend and I decided that we couldn't allow it to be a completely wasted evening and so ordered cranberry juice all night so that at least we could flush out our urinery tracts.

Despite all that, it was actually good fun, although the three hours of amusing speeches could perhaps have been squeezed into two, the mash could have had a little less glue in it and it would have been nice if they'd turned the heating on. I won a box of chocolates in the raffle and am sat here now with them being thrown across the room into my open mouth, each with a request for another cup of tea.

By midnight I was getting a little figety, as the nominated driver I was getting tired and a little worn by conversations about the gear box on a series 47. By 1.30, I was yawning as loud as I could whilst lying on the carpet next to the dance floor. Luckily another little text saved the day:

"Some tw*t has driven into the back of my truck" it read.

With relief in my heart, we went home to find the monster truck surrounded by broken glass with a dent in the back big enough to hide a sheep. The friend, who sometimes phones just to tell Huw how much he loves his truck, was sad, but pragmatic, having rolled it himself in the snow earier in the week.

To put the tin hat on his night, we have now leant him our car so he has to drive around in something that has so much litter in, it makes people feel sick.

A good night all round I think.