Hi you!
Here’s my 4-pronged update:
Writing
All the major rewrites on my book are done! I ended up rewriting 4 chapters from scratch. There are a total of 15 chapters, so I essentially rewrote a quarter of the book. I really think it was worth it. Even before acknowledging the rewrites, those were my least favorite chapters anyway. Now they’re among my favorite.
Which one is my favorite? I can’t do that! It would be like asking me to pick my favorite child. Stephanie. Oh, well, that was easier than I thought. OK I think chapter 3 is my favorite. I wouldn’t necessarily say it’s the most well-written. But there’s a scene in it that made me think “OK I can do this.” And the two people who have read some of the book singled out that scene.
Now that the rewrites are out of the way, I’m moving on to the smaller stuff. That means going through each chapter and addressing the awkward sentences and inconsistencies one by one. I’m hoping hoping hoping to be done with the second draft by June 15th. Why? Because my twin sister is coming to visit for a week. Yeah!!
When the second draft is done, I’m hoping to have a small group of people read the book. I’m already making a list of people to ask. But if you’re interested, please let me know. And realize the book is about 500 pages so it will require some time commitment. But hopefully it won’t all be miserable.
Singing
We recorded the third part of my video last week, yay! I’m learning the fourth and final part today. It’s the easiest one so I should have it down in no time. We should have it recorded this week then I’m sending it off to a video editor. I am hella nervous but can’t wait to share it with everyone!
Enjoying the Area
Yesterday (Sunday) I went boating with some of Windy’s coworkers.
It was a really nice day. We launched and drove around the lake for awhile. Then, we stopped at a beach where one of their friends was camping for the weekend. We picked her up and continued boating. Then we anchored at the beach, ate sandwiches, and basked in the sun. The tops of my feet are almost blistered. I always forget to put sunscreen on them.
The whole day was great but here were my favorite moments:
1. The lady who owns the boat also has a two-person tube so, after we picked their friend up, we decided to do some tubin’! Me and the friend volunteered, so we basically introduced ourselves and climbed into the tube. What a great way to meet someone, lol! The boat took off and we zipped around the lake for awhile. And by zipped, I mean crawled. The lady was being extra careful, which was not what we wanted. Finally, my tube partner started in with those giant fake yawns. Suddenly we were all over the place! The driver was throwing us over the wake and zooming back and forth. It was awesome! After several minutes, I tried riding with my hands in the air. We hit a wave and I went FLYING. They said I did 1 ½ cartwheels in the air before smashing into the water. Here’s the best part: I lost my sunglasses when I collided with the water. Apparently, it happens all the time. The bottom of the lake is like a giant Sunglass Hut. When I came up, I admit I was cussing about losing them. Then, my toe kicked something as I was treading water. I managed to seize it with my foot and brought it up. It was my sunglasses! Bam!
2. The lady who drove the boat loves to swim. I swam a TON in college at Texas Tech so we talked about forming a swimming group. I’m not sure how that will go, but we are going to meet Wednesday afternoon to take the inaugural swim across a channel of the lake.
Random Learnings or Stories
OK I want to talk to everyone about a plague that’s sweeping the nation. It’s the scorn of our age and keeps scores of people awake at night. Millions have suffered from it. Thousands of therapists are making a fortune off it.
I’m talking, of course, about heterophobia.
Doesn’t that sound ridiculous? I heard an amazingly awful story over the last week that I wanted to share with everyone:
A woman here is married to a great man. I’ve met him once and he’s super nice and friendly.
It turns out that both of his parents are gay. They hooked up in high school because they were in denial and what-not. Even though they only got together a couple times, she ended up getting pregnant.
Shortly after, they came out to each other, he left, and the woman raised him alone.
He basically grew up the typical male. He’s very athletic and played sports and chased girls, yadda, yadda, yadda.
Well, his father hate him, they have nothing to do with each other… Primarily because he’s straight. I was told the father has always been horrible to him because of it. Seriously.
I found about this because his wife approached me with questions. I may end up talking to him about it and I hope I get the chance to learn more.
Either way, isn’t that insane? It’s like society flipped on its head. Frankly, I’m utterly disgusted. What kind of person does that? It’s got to be the most hypocritical thing I’ve ever heard in my life. Here we are fighting for love and equal rights when one of us hates his child because he’s straight.
I’m seriously making vomiting noises right now.