Back to work

I gave up trying to motivate myself into writing a blog post in August.  I know a losing battle when I see one.  This was probably a very bad, lazy decision on my part but I went with the option that had a great chance of success - namely, waiting until September, when I would go back to work and would therefore be able to compose my posts during my breaks without the oh-so-dangerous distractions of the internet, books and DVDs.

And so here we are.  I've returned to work after my long summer break, of which everyone is very jealous (although they wouldn't be if they saw the resulting paycheck).

Despite my horrendous inability to run my blog during the summer, though, I have at least been able to accomplish others things over the past few weeks.

I did a complete redraft of my book 2 (tentatively titled The Hunters and the Hidden), which I now, hesitantly, fearfully, think is ready for a beta reader.

I also prepared my entry for the Mslexia novel competition (deadline later this month), which is pretty much ready to go.  Hopefully I'll print it off this weekend and send it off next week.  I think I've formatted it correctly.  The whole thing gave me vivid flashbacks to uni, picking my way through submission guidelines in terror that one tiny mistake would lose me precious marks.  It's rather hard to convince myself it's finished.  I'm trying to tell myself it's now ready, that I don't need to do anything else to it.  The truth is I probably could've sent it off a week ago.

A fair amount of my summer was spent reading as well.  As bizarre as it sounds, I don't have much time to read during the weeks I'm working, despite the fact that I'm a librarian.  Surrounded by books for eight hours a day and very little time to open the darn things.

But I managed to storm through around ten during July and August, which was lovely and - I like to remind myself - beneficial in a more 'professional', writing-as-a-career kind of way.  So many times I've been told that a writer must read.

Strangely enough, I find myself more than happy to oblige.