I refuse to die (literally).

Monday afternoon my oldest daughter came home with a note from school. 

A project was due the next day.

A project she should have been working on for two weeks, yet I knew nothing about.

A project she would be presenting, from memory, to her class.

My daughter is seven.

I called the teacher immediately for details and sure enough, my daughter had failed to give me the initial FIVE page packet explaining said project, along with the additional TWO reminder notes sent home about said project.

I did not have time for a freak out. We plunged in head first, churning out notecards, internet pages, and everything we could find about Giraffes that could be rubber cemented to a poster board. She presented it yesterday and all went smoothly. 

I would even dare say, better than if we had all of the two weeks to prepare.

I work well on a deadline.

For those of you that may have missed me mentioning it in previous posts, I am a runner.

I am a runner that hates to run.

Running falls into the category of things I wish I could do asleep. Then running would just be a nightmare, instead of my dreaded reality three times a week. Because I absolutely hate to run and it’s really good for me, I schedule three or four races a year to keep me training.

There is absolutely nothing more motivating than an impending deadline, especially when you have a team of girls counting on you to be at the starting line with them.  

I feel this way about writing.  Half the time I wake up and write because I see the impending deadline in the future, the goal to finish my next book looming.

Sometimes I hate the writing process, especially when I feel myself tapping out words I know I will erase a week or two later.

I’ve been in a a bit of a slump recently, writing and erasing, writing and erasing.

Until I installed a new program into my computer to “encourage” my writing.

Write or Die. 

Have you heard of it?  It’s my newest obsession.  It combines the panic of finishing a school assignment the day before it’s due, with the pressure of training for a race.

There is nothing like the power you feel when finishing something that demands everything of yourself.

Use Write or Die in your next word war and prepare to be amazed at what you can accomplish.

-Laura

Grandmothers are Important

I am visiting my daughter and son-in-law this week to watch my two very active granddaughters, 5 and 3.  They are a hand full to be sure, especially without their parents here.  They are the lucky ones who are away for the week.  I am also the lucky one who is watching over them trying to find some bonding time.


Unfortunately, my daughter had a flu bug when I got here on Sunday and she was quickly trying to recover.  Fortunately, she did recover and they are now on the road to their destination.  Unfortunately, I now have this 24-hour flu bug and I'm waiting it out till it is done.  Fortunately, I was able to get the two girls to bed by 8pm so I can write this blog and try to recover.  Unfortunately, it took them over an hour to settle down and go to sleep.  Fortunately, they are now asleep and I can do some writing.


Amazingly enough, I had a weekly column to finish, a public relations article to write about an eagle scout project that happened over the weekend and this blog.  I was able to do all three without mistake.....hopefully.  But a writer's call comes and writers must do their duty to finish by a dead line; even with two granddaughters and the flu.


One of my duties as caretaker of the two girls is to keep a watchful eye over my daughter's four chickens that just started to lay.  There are only two of them that have laid eggs so far which is an interesting phenomenon but I think I figured out why the other two haven't laid yet....... they are both roosters.  A rooster expert ( a friend of theirs) came by to help me reprogram the entertainment center since I really messed it up.  She took one look at them and said "those two are roosters". I suppose that solves that mystery.


Now all I need is to not puke and keep from messing up the entertainment center again..  Hopefully tomorrow will be a better day, I still have five days left.......