Monthly Recap: February

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Hey folks! It’s officially March, which means it is time for my February recap! This month was a total whirlwind of crazy high emotions. Lots of highlights, but I ended the month feeling pretty low. I’m looking forward to getting back on track in March, but for now, here’s the happs from February:

On the goals front: My goals for the month were to make my Avengers ears and scarf; read four books; post four selfies; book one wedding; write my romance query. I did not finish my Avengers scarf (which is a bummer since it’s actually cold enough for a scarf this week!) and I only posted three selfies. Boo. But I did accomplish all of my other goals so also yay.

On the writing front: So here’s where things get a little interesting. On Valentine’s Day, I decided to enter a Twitter pitch contest specifically for romance writers (love day, makes sense). It was the first pitch party just for us sappy folks and it was a big success. In my mind, I knew I was not ready (or rather, my manuscript was not ready) for this contest, but I entered anyway because I am a masochist. And lo and behold, I received requests from three agents and two publishers. Holy shit. That was great news, except I then had to send out a manuscript I knew wasn’t my strongest. And I am feeling super frustrated with my first chapter because I just can’t seem to get it right. I’ve only heard back from one agent so far (rejection, obvs) but I don’t have a great feeling about the others. The whole thing kind of threw my motivation totally out of whack and I have basically not written anything since then. No bueno. I need to refocus in March and really buckle down with the editing and get my manuscript in querying shape.

On the reading front: This is the one area I kicked some serious ass in this month. I read SEVEN books in the shortest month of the year. Booyah. I read: Since You’ve Been Gone, I Heart London, Turtles All the Way Down, Everything Leads to You, The Hating Game, Bone Music, and A Wrinkle in Time. My two highest rated reads for the month were Hating Game and Everything Leads to You, but I also loved Bone Music and Since You’ve Been Gone.

On the movie front: I saw some awesome movies this month, including the world premiere of Annihilation. I also saw Shape of Water, Black Panther (twice), and 50 Shades Freed (I know, I know, but I write romances). Black Panther was the clear top film this month (we discussed it at length in this week’s podcast), but I also mostly enjoyed Shape of Water. 50 Shades was….well, you know.

On the MCU front: I’m making progress, but as of yesterday, I have one week less to knock out my list because the Avenger Infinity War release date just got bumped up to April 27th. So basically, I need to get my ass in gear. But check in here for the latest update.

On the yearly goals front: I’m making progress on reading the books I already own and most of my monthly goals.Thanks to the Twitter pitch contest, I sent out three queries this month, so that’s also a little progress made. I’ve definitely fallen off the healthy wagon, so it will be one of my goals for March to get a handle on that.

Overall: I had some really awesome moments this month, starting with our girls trip to San Francisco, but I ended February feeling blah and unmotivated. I need to find a little creative spark in March so I can get back on track! What do you do to kick up the motivation factor? Help a sista out!

Thank you for sharing!

Monthly Recap: January 2018

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You know what I definitely don’t have enough of in my life right now? Blog post series! Bahahaha! Hope you heard that sarcasm. Well, this series is kicking off because one of my 18 things to accomplish in 2018 is journal, and well, more than thirty days into the year and I am already sucking hard core at that one. BUT…these monthly recap posts can totes serve as a journal of sorts. Plus, it might make me feel like I actually got some shit done this month. So here’s what happened in January!

On the goals front: My goals for January were to set up a writing schedule, make my iPhone case, read four books, update the podcast webpage, book one wedding, post four selfies, and journal. No bueno on the journaling or updating the podcast webpage, but other than that, I can check off all the goal boxes. I’ll take it.

On the wedding planning front: I booked a wedding and a half (it happened at the end of the month so it was an in-betweener), which is great because I had a serious dry spell in December that carried into January and was starting to scare the shit out of me.

On the writing front: Not only did I set up a writing schedule, I mostly stuck to it! In January, I wrote 11k words in romance #1, 3.7k words in romance #2, and published ten blog posts. Go me.

On the reading front: I knocked out six books in January. I read Outlander, Foolish Hearts, Heartless, One and Only, Cruel Prince, and Genuine Fraud. Foolish Hearts was my highest rated read of the month, at five stars. One and Only was my lowest at three stars. Overall, a great month of reading! Plus, I only bought two books, and they were purchased with a gift card I received for Christmas so that means they don’t count against my no book buying in 2018 rule.

On the movie front: Taking full advantage of Movie Pass, I saw four films this month. I saw Thor Ragnarok for the third time; I, Tonya; Greatest Showman for the third time; and Phantom Thread. I loved all of them, and clearly Thor and Greatest Showman have special places in my heart. I, Tonya was my favorite of the two new movies I watched.

On the MCU front: I knocked out a huge chunk of my list. See the latest updates here.

On the podcast front: We recorded and released three new episodes in January. We would so love for you to check out Drink Talk Fangirl and leave us some love!

On the yearly goals front: I made some good progress on a couple of my writing projects, but can’t say I did much more than that. I need to refocus efforts on the getting healthy deal, plus start looking at doing some cleaning and organizing around the house. I did set monthly goals, post my selfies, and craft once this month, so one month down and eleven to go for those year-long goals!

Overall: I’ve hit a bit of an inspiration wall in the past couple of days, so it’s actually nice to sit and look back at everything I’ve done so far in 2018. Even though it might not feel like huge strides, I got a lot of shit done. And I’m going to continue to focus and try to stay on track.

Thank you for sharing!

18 Things to Accomplish in 2018

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Hello friends! It’s hard to believe, but we are already in the middle of January. It’s that time when everyone makes their resolutions and sets goals for the year, and this year I wanted to try something different. I often set goals at the beginning of the year that are vague and unspecific, and also many times are not totally within my control. This year I decided to come up with some more concrete actions to take throughout the year. Things that I can measure and actually check off my list as I accomplish them. I think accomplish is the important word. These are all things I have full control over, it’s just a matter of me actually getting off my ass and doing them. So that’s the plan! Get off my ass and do it! Here is my list!

I think most of these bad boys are pretty self-explanatory, but some of the ones I want to focus on are reading all the books I own, and finishing revising/writing my manuscripts. I probably own at least thirty books that I haven’t read yet, and right now, I am broke as a joke, so no more buying new books allowed! Making this one of my things to accomplish will hopefully help me control my book spending. Now, I will receive at least one new book a month from Owl Crate, plus any more that I am offered in exchange for reviews. Those will get added to the list. I also really want to focus on finishing my writing works in progress because I am really looking to grow my income (see broke as a joke, above) and this could be one possible way to do that.

In addition to focusing on work tasks, I also have some home organization goals to complete. I started a mini makeover on our living room and kitchen last year, but I still have a few projects to finish to complete the look. I also really need to do some serious organization in my office so that I have a functional space. Along with that, I need to dedicate some more time to crafting this year as I hardly did any last year. Not only does crafting relax me, but my DIY posts continue to be some of my most popular, so I need to come up with more!

I want to post at least one selfie or video a week to one of my (too many) Instagram accounts for a couple of reasons. Mainly, I just want to become more comfortable with putting myself out there and speaking in front of people. Even though it’s not actually speaking to people, it still kind of counts. I also know that when I make the time to do these videos or photos, I make sure to take care of myself a little better, and that’s always a bonus.

I’m looking forward to some new adventures, and really looking forward to accomplishing some major goals! Here’s to making 2018 a productive year! What are you hoping to accomplish this year?

Thank you for sharing!

Embracing My Inner Nerd

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If you’ve been coming around the blog at all over the past year or so, or even if you’ve been an avid reader from the beginning (hi Mom!) you may have noticed a recent shift in my nerdiness. And by shift, I mean I have fully embraced the nerd life and the nerd life has embraced me. To be totally clear, I have never been cool. I have been a nerd for my whole life. I was the kid who spent her birthday money on books and stayed up late reading under the covers with my flashlight. I will also fully admit to “begrudgingly” watching my brother’s TV shows and movies with him, because I secretly loved every second of MMPR (and if you don’t know what that stands for….well, you might not be a true nerd). But I have always been an internal nerd, hiding those nerd tendencies as best I could.

There has been a bit of a nerd revolution in the past few years, that has made nerd-dom cool. But perhaps the biggest shift in this new nerd perspective has been our attitude toward the female nerd. If I had worn a Star Wars shirt to school when I was a kid, I would have been ridiculed. I now probably own ten Star Wars shirts and I wear them all the time. Part of this is because of me not giving a fuck any more, but most of this is because it’s now fashionable to be a nerd. Which is awesome. It does make shopping a hell of a lot more dangerous because I want to buy all the nerd things, but how amazing that there are so many cool things to buy. And not just for boys. There is nerd stuff in the girls’ section, and the women’s section, and the toddlers’ section, and even the pets’ section. Everyone now has equal nerd opportunity. What a time to be alive!

I honestly feel like I missed out on so much in my younger years because I never felt like I could fully embrace my nerd-dom. It wasn’t that I wasn’t interested, it was that my self-esteem (or lack thereof) would not allow me to to explore those interests. Even when I shifted my high school world from the cool (cheerleading) to the nerdy (theater), I still held back on my nerdiness. And this hold back went on for some time. When the Lord of the Rings movies came out, I saw them all multiple times in the theaters. A friend once asked me why I was going to see Two Towers again, and I told him I liked the movies because of all the cute actors. Now don’t get me wrong, that is 100% true. My love for Orlando Bloom runs deep to this day. But I didn’t love those movies just for the eye candy. I mean there are wizards and elves and trees that can talk! That shit is awesome!

Part of embracing my nerdiness and bringing it all out for the world to see has actually been a challenge because I now don’t know if I am nerdy enough. I mean, can I still love Star Wars as an adult even if I wasn’t an avid fan when I was a kid? Can I become a Marvel diehard through movies and TV shows, even if I never read the comics? The short answer is yes, yes I can. When The Force Awakens came out, I wrote this blog post about drinking the Star Wars Koolaid, and that may have been the trigger that released the torrents of my inner nerd-dom. Since then I have read Star Wars books, bought all the Star Wars merch, started a bookstagram, gotten two Harry Potter tattoos, co-hosted a fangirl podcast, and most recently, embarked on a challenge to watch the entire Marvel Cinematic Universe before the release of Avengers: Infinity War next May.

There is no denying my true self now. I am a nerd. And as time goes on, my nerdiness will continue to grow. And to that I say, fuck yeah. And if you want to embrace your inner nerd, I say fuck yeah to that too. Let’s get together and talk about our fandoms.

Thank you for sharing!

I Had a Shitty Day and Was Reminded I Am #Blessed

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A couple of Fridays ago, I just had one of those days. At my wedding rehearsal, the mother of the groom was, to put it nicely, a bitch to me for no reason. I left Malibu at 5:00 on a Friday night. The Dodgers were playing in the World Series and I was stuck in my car.

It sucked. So I decided to pull off the parking lot that is the 101 on a Friday evening and find a bar with a TV and beer. Islands was the closest thing I could find, and though I mostly try to stay away from chain restaurants, I figured I might as well park it for an hour or two and let traffic die down (haha). I walked into the bar, found a table with a perfect view of the game, and ordered myself a beer. The waitress carded me, which was ridiculously unnecessary. I am 34. I do not look under thirty. And I was dressed for a rehearsal, which means I actually did my hair and make-up and was wearing something other than jeans and a T-shirt. I showed her my license, and she informed me it was expired. I told her I know, I already paid the fee, I just haven’t gotten my new one yet, but here is the paper that says I paid it and it’s renewed. She then told me she couldn’t serve me a beer because it was illegal. First of all, no, it’s not. Second of all, you didn’t need to card me in the first place, you were just trying to suck up. And now, I’m leaving. And also, I would have been the easiest $5 you made all night. And when I left the restaurant, it was 0-0; mere minutes later the Astros scored four runs and won the game. So basically this dumb waitress is the reason we lost the World Series.

But I digress (shocker). All in all, it was a shitty day. I was talked down to, denied my beer, missed my Dodgers, and sat in traffic for two hours. But by the time I got home, I was over it. I drank some wine, watched some crappy TV, and moved on with my life. As I’m writing this post, weeks later, I am totally detached from the events of the evening. In the grand scheme of life, it was all a bunch of petty bull.

And that’s when I realized (or remembered really, not like it’s the first time I’ve figured this out) that I am hashtag blessed. When I was teaching, I had more than one day that ended with me pulled over on the side of the road, hysterically crying to the point where I was unable to drive home. The bitchy parents and administrators I dealt with on a daily basis made the bitchy mother of the groom look like a saint. And how lucky am I that I was able to walk away from that situation? I now have a career I love, one that allows me the freedom to enjoy my son, enjoy flexibility with my time, and enjoy the people I work with. A career that stokes and inspires my creativity instead of crushing it.

So even though I had a shitty day, it was one of few these days. And I didn’t end up huddled in my car sobbing, so it really wasn’t all that bad. It didn’t leave me emotionally scarred, and by the next day (even with MOG continuing to be a bitch) it was over and done with and I was perfectly happy.

So thanks shitty day, for reminding me of all that I have, and how great my shitty days of present are compared to the shitty days of the past. I really am #blessed.

Thank you for sharing!