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I made it through school, through tutoring, went to Blockbuster and got Across the Universe, Elizabeth and Jane Austen Book Club. Came home, opened email. Almost cried when I saw another edit of Hot Shot sitting in my inbox. Did edit in an hour, sent it back, made supper, showered, collapsed on couch, made it through an hour of Elizabeth before I couldn't keep my eyes open anymore. I didn't even READ last night, and the book I'm reading is awesome.

Woke up this AM to ANOTHER edit for Hot Shot, which took only a few minutes. Now it goes to a copy editor. I really need to make a top ten list of signs you've worked on the same book for too long....

I need to get something together for that promo opportunity. Maybe when I get home today I'll be more lucid.

The Magic Moment Contest

Sponsored by The San Antonio Romance Authors

We want to see the pivotal, breakthrough moment from your manuscript.
Entries will be in electronic format and should be no more than 20 pages in
length; entries should also include a 1-2 page set-up to explain the context
of the scene.

Eligibility:

Entrants may be published or unpublished, but manuscript cannot be
contracted for publication at the time of entry.

Entry Fees:

$20 per entry for San Antonio Romance Authors members; $25 for nonmembers.

Entry Deadline:

All entries and payments must be received by March 1, 2008, 12pm CST.

Judging:

Three published and/or trained unpublished authors. All contestants will
receive a score sheet from each judge. In addition, judges are encouraged
to write comments on the manuscript.

Categories and Final Judges:

. Short/Long Contemporary - Susan Litman, Harlequin
. Single Title - TBA
. Paranormal - Hilary Sares, Editor, Kensington Books
. Historical - TBA, Avon
. Erotica - Raelene Gorlinski, Editor-in-Chief, Ellora's Cave

Awards:

All finalists will receive a certificate and be listed in the RWR. Winners
for each category will receive a plaque and a year's electronic subscription
to the San Antonio Romance Author's The Love Letter.

Questions and Entry Information: Please visit our website at www.sararwa.net
, or contact the Contest Chairs, Beckie Ugolini
and Margaret Batschelet, at merrittcontest@sararwa.net

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A LOT of good movies are coming out on DVD today, movies I’ve been looking forward to. So after tutoring, I’m swinging by Blockbuster and trading my 3 DVDs for 3 of the following:

The Aristocats – my favorite Disney movie when I was a kid. I had a Marie doll from Disneyland.

The Assassination of Jesse James

Elizabeth: The Golden Age

The Jane Austen Book Club

Across the Universe

Any of those exciting to you?

I finally found a song I liked yesterday on the radio. Garth Brooks, who knew? Ignore the video, though.



The boy is indeed going to the Journalism conference at Columbia. GULP. He’s never been from home more than a night, and that’s usually just been down the street. I’m excited for him and jealous of him and just plain freaking out.

I finished Hot Shot and sent it back to my editor. I’m working on another book for her – boy is it a mess. Sigh. I don’t think it’s been revised at all. Most of my notes to myself are EMOTION and REACTION. Sheesh. Again, this story was written in 2004.

I didn’t get to work on my Wayback story at all.

Okay, I got an email on the Samhain loop about a cool promo opportunity, but I need to email the lady from Coffee Time with my blurb and a prize.

WHAT PRIZE? I don't know what to offer readers.....what do you think? A gift cert to Samhain? Help!

And I found out this morning An Accidental Husband isn't coming out till AUGUST! NOOOOOOOO!!!!!

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Yesterday I listened to one of the local country stations for an hour on the way to and from critique. Honestly, I'd heard all but one of the songs before (and it's been awhile since I've listened to country) and the only one they touted as new was an exact replica of a Charlie Rich song.

Nonetheless, I started my Wayback story last night, on the AlphaSmart. I am seriously considering getting a refurbished Dell or something. I hate the keys on that thing.

My goals this week are simple.

1) Finish Hot Shot edits (I'm just going through the pronouns now)
2) work on Vanished revisions - 50 pages
3) work on Wayback story
4) maybe go to rodeo with cps for research ;)
5) keep up with grades (progress reports go out next week)
6) get ready for chapter BIAW, which I'm hosting
7) keep up house

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I took a personal day yesterday to get SOME of my stuff taken care of. I knew today was shot because it's critique, and Sundays aren't usually very productive for me. So I worked on Hot Shot from 5-7, cleaned the kitchen, took the boy to school, went to Lowe's and got a lamp, went to the grocery store, cleaned the guest room, worked on Hot Shot from 10-12:30, slept (those 4 AM wake-ups are getting to me), watered my plants (and discovered I have NO grass left in the backyard), worked on Hot Shot from 3-5:30, made dinner, went to the Apple Store with the dh, got gas in the car, then vegged on the couch watching Friday Night Lights and Monk, wanting to work on my small town story but not having it in me.

But there's a whole SLEW of things I should have done but didn't.

1) finish sweeping
2) water my plants in the front
3) get a haircut (it is in BAD shape, too long and heavy)
4) color my roots (I have hag hair.)
5) go get lunch (I had a wrap from the grocery store. Yum. But I always go get a burger as a treat.)
6) laundry (so the hampers were stuffed when I sorted clothes this AM)
7) go to post office (I sold a CD on half.com - must do this before critique)
8) go to library (can probably do this before critique, too)
9) work on anything new

I didn't even turn on the TV till I was making dinner, and the house wasn't really in that bad of shape. I told my guys they HAVE to start helping me. Apparently it fell on deaf ears because there are still dirty dishes in odd places.

BUT I did address all my editor's comments in Hot Shot. I want to go through one more time before I send it back to her. She needs it by next Saturday.

I'm having real trouble getting back into my small town story. I think I need to start all over from the beginning, and it feels like it needs to be typed. I'm seriously considering getting a refurbished Dell laptop or something. But I may just set it aside while I write my rodeo book (only 100 pages, remember?) because that world is building up pretty fast. My cps are talking about their books today. I sent 30 pages of Breaking Daylight :( I want to talk about my story, too!

Oh, and the dh got a $700 bonus yesterday. The boy came home with info on a Spring Break trip to NYC through journalism. Guess how much it costs? Yup, $700. We're considering sending him, though, you know, we have no grass because our sprinklers are broken again.

Here's a sneak preview of my rodeo cowboy. Yes, I know he's young, but he's older than Jared!

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I am having a very strange reaction to my cover. I love it, don't get me wrong. But now I'm having trouble revising the story now that I have someone else's vision of Gabe in my head. I keep writing the story and seeing this stranger doing the actions. It's very weird.

I will post it as soon as I have permission.

I did print it out and take it to school yesterday. I showed some teachers at lunch, and I said that the cover model was "follicly challenged." (He had a serious receding hairline, which my cover artist fixed, bless her!) One of the teachers misheard me and said, "He's PHALLICLY challenged?" I protested and they asked how I knew he wasn't. Um, because I CREATED him? I told Cindi and she didn't get it...she didn't know the meaning of either word! Bad, Cindi!

I had strange dreams. I dreamed it was my birthday and just my mom and I were going to dinner at Gristmill, when suddenly the dh and ds show up with my grandmother (the one who died). The dh made a huge deal out of it, and even had a Tim Riggins lookalike (from Friday Night Lights) come eat with us. It was weird. Then later, some reporters were coming to school to talk to us about guns in schools (apparently they found some, in my dream. IRL, other stuff is happening in my district.) and some lady was telling us what to say. It was weird.

My room was 86 degrees yesterday. We couldn't get the AC men to come out until we got a parent to call Main Office. How sad is that?

LOST was awesome last night - the SIX? Supernatural was just okay.


Oops, it's below freezing and I didn't cover my plants!

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All new Supernatural on tonight, about witches! The ds wanted to go to a friend's to watch LOST, but we vetoed it - the kid lives 20 minutes away, which means we wouldn't get back home till nearly 10. I feel bad, because the kid's in mourning over John Edwards dropping out of the race, but man! I am worthless on Thursday nights.

Yesterday was chilly, in the 50s. I noticed the heater was on. I was okay, but a little irritated.

Then I started teaching division for the first time and apparently the heater kicked on full blast. I felt like I was in one of those experiments to gauge how temperature affects a teacher's mood when she's teaching a subject for the first time to kids who don't know their facts....and to top it off, the special ed teacher was just standing around not helping. Grrr. He's in there to give me a hand and he didn't help one kid.

By the afternoon, it was 84 degrees in my class. We'd called maintenance and been ignored. See, this "fancy" AC/heating unit cannot be turned on and off by mere school personnel. SUPPOSEDLY it monitors itself. Ha. When it doesn't, they have to call maintenance. I think it's just an effort to keep those guys employed.

I got my Hot Shot cover last night, and it's great, perfect pose, perfect background, perfect heroine....except my hero is follicly challenged. Trish says he looks like Daniel Day Lewis. My son said Dresden. I'm fine with both those guys, but this is GABE. He's been in my head for 8 years. I don't know if it's something that can be fixed. I'm thinking of Waterworld, where Kevin Costner had artists add hair to each frame of the movie so he wouldn't look old.

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Today it's 36 but feels like 33. Glad I got the clothes from the dry cleaners last night! And I'll wear one of my new tops from Academy.

This getting up at 4 AM is taking its toll. I'm so tired! But after 2 days, I'm waking up automatically! I stayed in bed a little longer this AM because, you know, cold, but I'll be glad to hand this book in.

Have you guys been watching Jane Austen on Masterpiece Theater? I've seen Northanger Abbey and Mansfield Park and both were excellent.

I think I'm going to start physically rewriting StTA from the beginning. Some stuff I can keep, but I'm a little more focused now, and I think it needs to be done that way. I'm not sure of my priorities, other than Hot Shot, though. I want to get another book into Samhain, and it needs editing, if not revision, and I want to get a story into Wayback, before the town gets too built up, and there's too much stuff to worry about including. Maybe once I get Hot Shot turned in, we could do a writing challenge.

Honestly, I don't see how people work on more than one book at a time. It's making me a little crazy.

Okay, crazier.

Yesterday on the way to the dry cleaners, I was listening to Agnes and the Hitman by Jennifer Crusie and Bob Mayer. End of the third disc, and a sizzling love scene. I'd forgotten she could write them like that, then I remembered Welcome to Temptation. Anyway, it's very hard to concentrate on driving when you're listening to that. The reader presented it in breathless run-on sentences, and DANG. Dang. I wish I could have held onto some of that energy for my own writing last night, 'cause that's where I'm at in StTA. Actually, it's where I am in Hot Shot edits, too.

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It is 66 degrees at 4:30 in the AM in JANUARY. Bleh! A cool front is coming, but now - bleh!

I've read 7 books in January and started number 8. Good start! I was right about the end of PS I LOVE YOU - didn't like it as well as the movie ;)

Trish is coming to visit at the end of February and I'm cleaning up the guest room, which gets dumped on a lot. I needed some storage so I went to Lowe's and got this cool fabric covered box that makes an ottoman! I may go get another...it was only $10. We also looked at floor lamps and saw one we liked, but the box was all messed up, so may try another Lowe's. Also, I have a $30 gift card from Home Depot, so may try there.

Lowe's had a BUNCH of geraniums and the weather was so nice I was tempted. But again, JANUARY.

I wrote a little on my rodeo story and started to fix my small town story and edited 25 pages of Hot Shot yesterday. Waking up at 4 makes me productive, but cranky along about 6 PM ;)

Tutoring today, first time since 2 weeks before Christmas. BLEH!

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So I'm up at 4 after not sleeping well...I'll get some work done on Hot Shot since I'm up. I'm a day ahead of schedule on that, and on the Vanished revisions. At about 8 last night, at Baby Brother's bday, I started jonesing to write on StTA, but was too tired when I finally got home. I haven't worked on it in DAYS.

I should have gone to the grocery store yesterday but I didn't want to so now I have to stop this AM. I did go to Academy to get the boy new shoes and found 3 new blouses. The most expensive one was $13! So my last SIX tops have come from Academy, because that's the only clothing store I go to!

I'm almost done with PS I LOVE YOU and it's REALLY good, more like the movie than I thought, though Daniel and William seem to be the same person in the book. I have a feeling I won't like the end as well, though.

Okay, the dh is in a country/punk band, which means they take country drinking songs and play them like punk songs. So the dh is listening to Outlaw Radio for "homework." Now that I'm going to write a rodeo story, I need to start doing "homework," too. Sadly, I don't have much reference for country music. (SAD for a girl who grew up in San Antonio!) I've heard the Third Coast radio show is good, but the dh suggested my hero might be more of a Red Dirt music fan, which is more country/rock. Neither of these things mean anything to me.

I'm thinking my 25-26 year old hero might be into more modern country music and maybe my heroine, a kindergarten teacher, isn't into country music at all. She's older than him by about 10 years (maybe 8). But they will be going dancing, and I need some good dance music. I should just hang out a day at YouTube, see what pops. Got any names for me to try?

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Wow, I got a lot done yesterday – cleaned the showers, straightened the back patio, cleaned the bedroom, did 3 loads of laundry, went to the cleaners, the post office, the library, took the dh’s jeans back, got Baby Brother’s bday present (HAPPY BIRTHDAY, BABY BROTHER!) and took the ds to UIL.

I got my second round of edits for Hot Shot. I have 2 weeks. That’s 25 pages a day. So, my goals for this week:

1) 25 pages a day on Hot Shot edits (you have NO idea how happy I'll be not to look at this one again)
2) fix Something to Talk About
3) Vanished revisions
4) Dinner with Baby Brother and family
5) Resume tutoring
6) Get ready for critique on Saturday
7) Keep up house

That’s PLENTY.

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So, like I said, when I was writing the synopsis, I found a serious flaw in my heroine. I have her breaking up with her boyfriend at the beginning to find herself, then she doesn't do anything else about that throughout the book. And it seems that her main issue is presenting a good face to the town.

Maybe if I change that to her allowing the town opinion influence her decisions....no, still sounds wimpy.

Part of her issue is that she's in love with her deceased best friend's husband, my hero. And she worries the town will think she has always loved him, when she hasn't.

Trish says she needs good motivation to be caring so much what the town thinks. I was thinking perhaps she did something in her youth, with her HS boyfriend, that humiliated her and she never got past it. What would be something really good? Would anything be good ENOUGH to motivate her? Am I going with the wrong conflict here, and why didn't I think this through 200 pages ago????

Okay, gotta do some errands, then maybe work in the back yard. I'm still scared to go outside after I fell, isn't that weird?

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My printer isn't working. The computer tells me it's offline. I don't know what that means, but it DOESN'T make me happy. And the dh hasn't been around to fix it. He got in from his gig last night at 1, and has another tonight.

I was working on the synopsis for Something to Talk About Last night, looking for that missed step. I have a bigger problem than I thought (which will be fixable, but for now, a problem.) I started off with the heroine breaking off with her boyfriend because she wanted her own identity, other than coach's girlfriend. Well, she hasn't done anything about finding her own way at all. She's still bullied by her parents to work in their diner every morning (which isn't too much of a hardship, because my hero's there to see her every morning) and she's still bullied by what the town thinks of her. I need to find SOME way for this girl to assert herself. But I did find the missing step, I think.

And...it's time to shop for my charm for this story.

I could be obvious and get this charm.



He has a dog, so I could get this charm.



They go on a camping trip that leads to the discovery of their relationship, so I could get this charm. Isn't it cute?



She works in a diner, where he comes in for breakfast every morning, so I could get one of these. I'm partial to the pancakes.







I saw a kissing booth one, and though there's a church festival, there's no kissing booth. Still, how cute is this?



And you should see the choices I have once I finish my rodeo story!!!! For that matter, you should see the pictures I have waiting for you when I start my rodeo story!!

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I dreamed Gerry was my boyfriend. I was still married and my dh knew, but Gerry was my boyfriend. He'd come over to the house early in the AM, we'd meet for dinner....weird. I also dreamed the dh's band was two girls. Hmmmm....

Man, I snoozed the alarm TWICE today! I woke up at 3, started worrying, but wouldn't let myself get out of bed till 4, and was asleep by then.

I realized last night I've missed a step with my WIP. I need to synopsize it and rearrange a few things (one of the downsides of working in spirals.)

Elizabeth tagged me last week with 7 things you don't know about me. This is getting harder every time ;)

1) I'm very cheap. I don't mind spending money initially, but I'm going to use every smidgen of whatever it is I buy.

2) I'm 2 degrees away from JDM. The dh met Kyle Chandler, and Kyle and JDM worked together on Grey's.

3) I love to work in my backyard but don't like to work in my front.

4) I have a very sensitive sense of smell. Last night, all night, there was an unpleasant scent, and I couldn't rest till I figured out it was the dog's bed. P-U! Couldn't exactly wash it last night, either, because it's too cold!

5) Of the 8 cars I've owned, only 2 have been new.

6) I'm one of the few teachers at school who wears skirts. (Not today, though! COLD!)

7) I used to love to cross stitch. I even have my Baby Brother's baby announcement half done, but my eyes got so bad.

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More weird dreams last night, including that it was the last day of school, my aunt and uncle had a mansion and my VP came over to the mansion and brought grapes. Who knows.

Last year I said I wouldn't do a writing schedule. This year I'm feeling overwhelmed, and I'd made one, but yesterday I revised it AGAIN. (Actually, this can be more fun than actually writing, ya know?)

See, I want to get something else to Samhain, because my editor says she has only a few fall dates open. So I'm revising a romantic suspense for that.

And I'm working on the story that I love. Though I'm stumped right now. And I have writer's cramp.

And I want to get my Wayback story written because the earlier I get it accepted, the less I have to worry about all the other people added in the town by the other books that are contracted, see? The series doesn't have a bible to start out, they're building it as they go.

So my plan is to have Vanished revisions finished by the end of February, Something to Talk About finished by mid-February and Wayback finished by the end of March (only 100 pages.)

Do you give yourself deadlines?

Elizabeth Mahon and Maureen McGowan are semi finalists in the Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award. Go vote!

How sad is the news about Heath Ledger? He was only 28 and had a 2 year old daughter!

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Back to work today, with no more holidays till Spring Break. At least today is a workday, if people will leave me alone. I don't know if I mentioned we got a coffee/cappuccino machine at work and I bought a bunch of coffee accessories to take to work. We've been having the most fun with that thing!

It's warm this AM but will get cold again tonight. Yesterday was cool and wet, and neither the boy nor I got out of our PJs all day. I did do laundry and straighten the living room, as well as finished up one notebook of my story, put up my MJ Fredrick website, designed bookmarks, printed out TAKS practice sheets for my class and watched White Noise 2 (Nathan Fillion and Starbuck, but still not so good) and Metropolis.

Today I'm blogging at Wet Noodle Posse about ideas, again. If only I would stop getting them!

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Trish is in the FINAL FOUR of the American Title contest! Go vote now!



Michele was right - PARADE had a 2 page spread with JDM, including a picture I don't have!!! Of course, the ds and dh thought it odd I was buying a paper.....

We went to breakfast, went to the grocery store and raced to unload so we could go see Cloverfield.

I've never been so sick watching anything. All of it is done with a handheld camera, which is Never Still. I didn't realize what was making me sick at first, but the constant motion.....ugh. I ended up only seeing about 1/4 of the movie. I can't watch video games, either, and I think it didn't help that we sat so close. Thankfully the movie is Very Short, less than 90 minutes.

Today I should have my website up and should get my bookmarks ordered.

I've been wanting to do this post since I saw it on Jill's blog, but honestly had trouble coming up with ten things I've never written about. I mean, after twenty books, I've written about single moms, single dads, love triangles, explosions, shoot outs, diving, firefighting, May-December, you name it.

So, ten things you WON'T find in my books:

1) historical settings
2) teenage offspring of the hero or heroine - way to leech out the romance
3) death of any of the following - the hero or heroine, a child, a grandmother or a pet
4) a toilet scene (I can't STAND bathroom scenes in TV shows or movies, and there ALWAYS seems to be one)
5) talky love scenes
6) a hero with a full beard
7) hm, how to put this...love scenes that are...hm....out of the ordinary, like, say, you'd find in EC books
8) a waif heroine
9) the wedding of the main characters, and I don't know why
10) angels (though I've loved the 2 angel books I've read)

What don't you write about?

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Wow, it is COLD! I don't usually wear a robe, but I sure wish I had one right now!

Yesterday was not quite as uneventful as I hoped. By the time we got done running to the boy's 2 gigs, I was too tired to write. Sigh.

I dreamed I went to a plotting retreat at Jennifer Crusie's house and it was SO COOL.

This week I NEED to:

1) get my website up
2) get my new email working
3) get my bookmarks ordered
4) work on Something to Talk About
5) do a blog for the WNP
6) work on revisions for Vanished, so I can have a second book for Samhain
7) go see CLOVERFIELD before someone ruins it for me
8) get to the grocery store, post office and Academy
9) get Baby Brother's bday present
10) keep up house/yard

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Today I am going to read and write and that is all, till the boy has his TWO gigs tonight!

Hot Shot is back with my editor. Fingers crossed she likes it.

My Wayback story hit a snag in that I was making my cowboy a foster kid, and I realized the hero in the first book in the series is a foster kid. Hmph.

I watched 3:10 to Yuma the other night. Good movie. I didn't think I'd like it as much as I did.

I was thinking last weekend that a LOT of my stories come from dreams. A LOT. Just this week I had 2 more!

Beneath the Surface was a dream about archaeologists getting kidnapped by a group of rebels in South America. I kept the archaeologist part.

My very first book, with a title too dumb to name here, was a dream about 2 cops, divorced, who were kidnapped and their kids had to try to rescue them (this was way before Spy Kids, too.) I kept the 2 divorced cops part.

The story I sent to SHOMI, Eden's Promise, was a dream about these man-like creatures taking over the world and capturing humans. (Okay, maybe I had seen Planet of the Apes before I went to sleep that time....)

Ghost Hunters was a dream about Dean Winchester running a ghost tour.

Spy Girl was a dream about Sydney Bristow having quit, having a kid and having to go back into the spy game to rescue her husband, and having to work with a man in love with her. I added the bad guy she falls in love with.

I have three more dream ideas I'm playing with....the one I dreamed this week, one I dreamed a couple of weeks ago, and an assassin story I dreamed probably a year ago.

Do you ever dream story ideas?

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I'd call in today, but I didn't plan anything.

I'm ALMOST done with Hot Shot. I wanted to finish last night, but by the time I got home from taking the boy to Borders (twice, because as soon as we exited the highway, he realized he'd forgotten his coupon and Borders bucks so I turned around to get them), eating dinner (Firehouse Subs...mmmm), nearly getting creamed on the way home by a kid in a Bronco talking on the phone and changing lanes without looking, and talking to my mom on the phone, it was almost 8. Then the boy decided to plink on his mandolin while watching Stephen Colbert. I put on headphones but they were wonky. So I decided to wake up early to finish. Behold my success.

And I dreamed the GREATEST line last night....but have no time to write a story around it!!!

Oh, and my Supernatural magazine came Tuesday, FINALLY. I opened it yesterday and it has an interview with JDM and a POSTER!!!! Where I'll put it, I don't know.....

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So yesterday, during testing, one of my students had to leave the classroom. He comes back in and says, "Miss, there's a cat." Sure I misunderstood him, I asked him to repeat, and then followed him into the hall. Sure enough, a little orange tabby was stretched out in front of my door!

Okay, my classroom is in a long hallway, separate from the main building. There are 12 other classrooms and the library besides. WHY did this cat know that I am a cat person? Why did it choose MY door?

The kids freaked like they'd never seen a cat before. When I scolded them, they said, "But we've never seen a cat in SCHOOL." Clearly they have not been my students long enough.

Anyway, the coaches took it and fed it and made it a little bed. Another kid took it home, which is good, because when I called the dh to tell him, he groaned and said, "So we have another *expletive deleted* cat?"

No, we don't. But I still want to know how it knew where to find me.

One major plot point remaining. I think I have an idea. And I wrote 4 pages on the Wayback story yesterday.

No more testing - I actually have to teach today ;) We're doing Social Studies all day because I need GRADES!

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I have an ISBN!!!

Three more plot points to get through. I should be able to get one this AM, maybe two, if the ds doesn't wake up early to finish his physics review.

Oh, and my cps were tossing around the idea of writing for The Wild Rose Press's Wayback series and I may have come up with an idea. Will try to flesh it out while the kids are taking the writing test today.

My dh's cousin found my email through The Wet Noodle Posse and emailed. Cool, huh?