The Power of Christ Compels you

I don’t understand the expression “sick as a dog.” I was sick as hell for Christmas, as well as the days before and after, and my dogs were just fine. On more than one occasion, I had a hard time getting to the toilet to vomit because I had a dog sitting on me. At one point, I was laying face down on the couch and Bartleby had nested on the backs of my legs. “Bartleby, I need to puke,” I told him. He was unaffected by this revelation, and fortunately it was just water that I puked up into the air, being pinned down by forty-five pounds of canine. The clear emesis went splat on the carpet, and Saffron wasn’t far behind ready to lick up the mess. A day later, I was sitting in a chair thinking I was just fine, having a conversation with my parents, with Bartleby curled up in the chair with me. I was seized with the sudden urge to upchuck, and Bartleby was again indifferent to the announcement. I had to push him off of me, but it was too late. Exorcist pea soup green projectile vomit spewed forth, not getting the chair, fortunately, but getting all up in my hair and on the carpet. Saffron didn’t get to eat any this time. My dad restrained him, spoiling all the Christmas fun.

My Uninteresting Life

When I started this blog at the beginning of Nano, it gave the writing here a certain focus. But now that it’s the middle of December, I’m running out of material. On the reg, my life isn’t that interesting. I mean, it is to me, but when I excitedly tell my Life Stories to people, I quickly realize how uninteresting they are.

Allow me to give you some examples. The Big News of my Life in the past two weeks are as such:

• The Mormons still haven’t come back to trim my cat’s nails (this is what I get for saying, “No, thank you.”)
• I think my work stopped carrying Coconut Cherry Bomb cookies, which is infuriating but it might be in my favor because if I kept buying them, I would eventually have had to buy bigger clothes.
• I discovered the taste of Licorice Mint tea is reminiscent of Coca Cola.
• I meant it when I tweeted that Drunk Kathryn was on a time-out until Mercury was no longer retrograde, but she managed to get out anyway. Which turned out to be fine, because she tried to start a mosh pit while a folk band was playing, and I think this is my new proudest moment. Thanks, Drunk Kathryn.
• Saffron pulled off Bartleby’s collar while I was asleep in my Papasan chair, and I still can’t find it.

Camp Nano starts April first. I’m planning to take a whack at it (Sophia might be joining me). Therefore, if Nano is what makes me life interesting, I have about fifteen weeks to pretend like my life is interesting enough to write about. I may dredge my memory for shit that happened in the past that’s Actually Interesting, but it might be a stretch. Then again, if I keep it up, the stretching will come in handy while I’m trying to make a 50,000 word count during the month of April.

The Good News of Jesus Christ

A few mornings ago, I was sitting in my front room in my Hello Kitty pajamas when my Kelpie mix, Saffron, fired off in a succession of barking. Bartleby, the Pit mix, barked in turn, climbing up on a piece of furniture, maybe the give the illusion to whoever was behind the door that he and Saffron were a force to be reckoned with (a fancy term which here means, be given belly rubs). I slightly parted the slats in the blinds to see who was on the porch. They had nametags and Books of Mormon. They looked over and saw me. They saw me see them. There was no going back. I didn’t want to seem rude.

My front door consists of a basic wooden door and a storm door, and after I opened the wooden door, I had to brace Bartleby because the storm door isn’t particularly sturdy and Bartleby will bound through just about any obstacle if it means he can make new friends. Bartleby had stopped barking at this point, but Saffron had not. I stood there, standing over Bartleby with his upper body in my arms, while Saffron locked eyes with the women on the other side, barking continuously.

I could hear maybe 70% of what the Mormons said. It was a good thing they had name tags, because I missed most of their introduction. During the whole time they stood there talking to me, Saffron just barked over and over. I heard enough to hear them say that I have a cute house and beautiful dogs and would I like to hear the good news of Jesus Christ. “No thanks,” I said. Saffron’s about ready to herd you. I’m not saying Mormons are sheep, by the way, I’m saying Saffron wants to herd everyone. Saffron once tried to herd my boss.

The Mormons seemed completely unphased by Saffron barking at them. He’s only like 45 pounds, he doesn’t really phase me either. The Mormons said that part of what they do is provide service to people, and did I or someone I know need any service? I declined, but after the Mormons left and Saffron recovered from their presence, I walked into my kitchen and saw the 2+ weeks’ worth of dishes rotting in my kitchen, and it occurred to me that I could have used their service.

After a few days of thinking about it, the list got longer. I would go to perform a chore, and I’d think, Why am I doing this? I could have had the Mormons do this.

So, be warned, Mormons of the world, if another pair of you come to my door, I’ll be asking y’all to do the following:

• Wash my dishes
• Clip Edgar’s nails
• Steam clean the front room carpet
• Change the oil in my car

Because, the good news of Jesus Christ (in theory anyway), is that you can convince unassuming strangers to clip your cat’s nails.

Cleaning the refrigerator will not be on the list. Edgar has that covered.

I didn't win.

I didn’t win NaNoWriMo. I really wanted to. It crossed my mind to copy and paste words like “meow” and “woof” 14,000 times at the bottom of my document just to get my word count to winner-status, but that felt too much like cheating, and there was no point if I couldn’t enjoy the victory.

I spent most of the third week of NaNo with my family, not writing. This may have been my downfall. I entered the fourth week with only 30,000 words and girded myself for a series of writing binges. But knowing how many words I had to write was kind of a creativity buzzkill. That made it feel more like a paper to write than a novel, and if I was the kind of high-functioning individual who thrived on that kind of stress, I would have gone to grad school. Or taken up an instrument and become a travelling musician. Or something.

But I’m not that kind of individual. I think it was when my boss asked if I wanted to pick up some extra shifts that I came to terms with losing NaNo. I wasn’t about to stress myself out trying to get to the deadline and start my work week totally exhausted, immune system lowered, and ready to get the flu and be really miserable for my extended work week.

But did I lose NaNo? I may not have 50,000 words, but I have a story and characters and something to show my writing group. When December 1 came around, my “novel” clocked in at 36,148 words, and that’s a lot of progress for someone who’s been struggling to get her writing mojo back. My new goal is to flesh it out into a respectable, chronologically logical draft by the end of February. If my first blogpost in March begins with, “So I abandoned my novel…” I’ll make sure to link back to this post.

36,148 words ain’t too shabby, though.