Monday 1 June 2009

Singing A Happy Song

So far, the month of June has been a good one. The sun is shining, the (paid) workload has diminished, and life is thoroughly congenial.

I met most of my writing goals in May: all the short story ones (yay!) and three-quarters of the novel ones (not bad). I was well on track to meet all the novel goals, then work went ballistic last week, with a deadline on Friday that turned into a monster, and an out-of-the-office working day on Saturday. Which involved playing with lots of children, chatting with lots of adults, sampling mocktails and making friends with a barn owl, so it was a good day (I love my job!) but still a long and knackering one.

When my alarm went off on Saturday morning, I was not impressed. It was lovely and comfy in my bed snuggled up with my Paramour - who opened his eyes briefly, grinned a wicked grin and said 'oh do you have to get up now? how sad for you', closed his eyes again and made contented sleepy noises. I resisted the temptation to thwack him over the head with my pillow and stomped off for a shower instead. Then I came to my computer, thinking about the eight scenes and one short story I had to write over the weekend, wrote half a scene, and went on strike. I've only had one real day off in May, and I was reeeeeeeeally tired.

So I decided to take the pressure off. I've given myself a month's break from short story writing, and I gave myself a proper day off yesterday. It was so lovely! In fact it started when I got home on Saturday afternoon, the sun was still hot at 4ish so I had a blissful hour flopped out in the garden with the cats while my Paramour atoned for his sins by doing my business accounts and making pizzas. Then yesterday I did some lazy emailing, a bit of holiday research, got my new garden furniture set up (which I love - there will be photos in due course - and I was very pleased to get it sorted as it's been languishing in the shed for the last two months), did some tidying and cleaning and recycling and weeding, and made a yummy dinner which we ate while sitting on new garden chairs at the new garden table in the shade of the new garden parasol.

Now it's June, the month of my birth, my favourite month of the year. I still have 7.5 scenes to write, and my aim is to get those done this week, then spend the following four weeks (to Friday 3rd July) doing the sorting, tidying, polishing etc to pull the whole story together. I have very little paid work to do this month, so I'll have plenty of time to write. At least, I will if I don't spend too long blogging!

11 comments:

Jenny Beattie said...

Flopping about with cats in the late afternoon heat sounds delicious. Well done on meeting so many of your writing goals. Now it's time to continue mine...

Carol said...

It sounds like you well and truly deserved your day off!! Congratulations on achieving so much in May...you should be very proud of yourself!!

C x

HelenMWalters said...

Good idea to have a break - especially if it gives you more quality cat time!

Lane Mathias said...

Well done on making all those targets. A lounging around day was rightly deserved!

Good luck for June. My favourite month too:-)

Queenie said...

JJ, it is delicious (did it again yesterday) and you're doing brilliantly with your writing goals, keep it up!
Carol, thank you!
Helen, quality cat time is irreplaceable, isn't it?
Lane, I think it should be June all year, shall we start a political party with that as our manifesto? The way things are right now, we'd probably get voted in!

Kirsty said...

Wow - how productive! And well done for giving yourself time out.

Karen said...

Sounds like you've been a proper busy bee! I love June too :o)

You've reminded me, we need some new garden furniture. What's the betting it starts pouring down the minute we get some??

Pat said...

Sometimes as you get older you get a little wiser and learn to temper the strict goals you set for yourself with welcome breaks. Once you get the balance right life is more enjoyable. I'm still getting there but find I am more sympathetic and understanding with myself nowadays.

Queenie said...

Kirsty, thank you!
Karen, I wouldn't be taking that bet myself.
PI, that's good to know, makes me feel there's hope for me yet!

Debi said...

Ah but writing is so much more than just words on the page and anything that nourishes you - cats, gardening, recycling, eating, cuddling - is all a part of the process too.

My birthday this month too BTW. Hope it's a good' un for both of us. xxx

Queenie said...

Ooh, Debi, you too? All the best people, eh? Yep, happy birthday to us!