It’s been a crazy week or so in the publishing world. Things have been tense. Things are changing on the business end. I’ve put back a lot of illegal Diet Dr. Pepper over it. But now that it’s pretty much settled down, I got a happy ending, and a big surprise.

So I’m pretty much ignorant on all things publishing. I know I write a book. And I turn this book in. And at some point, if I’m lucky, it shows up on the shelves. That’s about the extent of it. I like to lay low and avoid all the rest. But “the rest” came and found me yesterday.

The Christy Award is kind of like the Emmy’s of Christian fiction. Minus the cool swag. It happens once a year. In Between is a finalist in the YA category, along with two other titles. So I guess in July I’ll go to Orlando and go to the ceremony and see if the dessert is any good.

Apparently this event is like semi-formal to formal. SIGHHHHHHHHH. This is soooo not me. If I ever get to be more of “the thing” in Christian fiction, I’m going to throw my weight around and tell them to make the dress code sweats. And flip flops. And head bands. And no make-up. Anyway, I’m not totally sure I’m going, as this will surely rank off the charts in terms of personal comfort level violation, but if I do. . . I need a dress.

But, you know, why BUY a dress? I still have my old prom dress. And if we let it out about ten inches, it might still fit. That got me to thinking about some other old dresses that I might be able to dig up and use.

I LOVED this outfit. This was my Halloween outfit when I was in fourth grade or something. I think I was supposed to be a punk rocker, but I looked more like a midget hooker. But I LOVED those yellow jelly shoes. And that is not a Diana Ross wig. That’s all mine.

“Can we hurry this thing up? I have to get home and watch some Dynasty.” This was my sixth grade graduation. My BFF Denise and I had matching dresses. Next to me was my good friend Leyla, who had a very grown up dress on and looked glamorous as always. This is a girl who knew how to put her panty hose on without cutting off her circulation or getting a world class wedgie.

This is in junior high on a school trip to San Antonio, I think. Notice how my collar DOMINATES the picture. The kid in the red is about to fall off the couch. And the kid in the white is like, “WOW! You could land a 747 on that collar!” My two BFFs are on my other side. I don’t know where their gigantic collars are, but at the time I pitied them.

Late Eighties. Band days. I was like 44th chair in trumpet. I thought I could go dig this up and go for the manly, military look. If I remember correctly, there’s a huge bucket that goes on the head with accompanying plumes. And plumes is a nice word for giant, monstrous feathers taken from really angry ostriches.

Homecoming my junior year. Two things to know–this was a chubby stage and I borrowed this dress. See all those awards behind me? All mine. I won awards like Best Boufy dress. Most sparkles. Worst case of red-nervous-splotches-that-looks-like-a-contagious-rash.

Here’s another shot of that day with my escorts–studly boys who couldn’t even hold their eyes open.

“AH! The sparkles–it’s too much!  We can’t see! We’re blind! Make all the shiny things go away!”

I could pull out this dress. I wore this to Homecoming too. The sky was so sad at my shellacked hair and puffy sleeves that it cried all night.

Here’s one of my many bridesmaid dresses. LOVE those, right?

I was nineteen there, I think. I remember that moment. I was JUST showing my friends how I had so much room in my dress that I could stuff the entire bouquet down my top when someone snapped a picture. Maturity, thy name is Jennifer. The hair has changed, but the attitude has not.

So I guess I have a few outfits to consider. But since I’m all out of Aqua Net and blue eye shadow, maybe I should go another route.

Have a good week. I’m off to watch American Idol and wonder why Neil Diamond is on there. It’s been a bad season for guest musicians. Poor idols.

Jen

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Boys are so funny.

So Daniel “Harry Potter” Radcliffe saw this girl at a film party, they made a deep, spiritual connection via eyeballs, but he didn’t jump on his Nimbus 2000 and go talk to her and now he regrets it. Once upon a time, when Lance Bass was still straight and all was right in my N*Sync lovin’ world, they made a movie about this very thing.

Anyway, Potter said this:

“She stared at me all night and I was going to get her number and then I couldn’t find her.”

Um, Harry, she was probably staring at you thinking, “Where do I know this guy?” but didn’t recognize you without your specs. But on the other hand, most gentlemen know to run the other way when someone of the opposite sex stares at them ALL NIGHT. So what you consider hot and alluring, I call CREEPY!! Sydney’s Daily Telegraph initially launched a search for the mystery girl, but they feel only phonies have shown up. And now Daniel/Harry is retracting his statements (maybe he realized she was just looking at his pizza roll hors d’oeuvres), so the deal is off. SO… this is my second Public Service Announcement for the Week: If you are the girl who was looking at Harry Potter like you wanted him to cast a few spells your way, call the Sydney Daily Telegraph. I could make other Potter references, but they all come out sounding dirty.

In other news, under the category of “boys acting all romantic and stuff,” Prince William landed a helicopter on Kate Middleton’s lawn during a military training activity. While the military is thoroughly ticked off, you know Katie was not. How cool is THAT to say, “Yeah, my boyfriend –the future King—stopped by for a little visit. In a helicopter. On my lawn.” Though the wind velocity would totally jazz up a girl’s hair.

And speaking of love, EVERYONE seems to love Miley Cyrus. I’m not in that league, but whatever. Miley announced she would be penning her autobiography. Um, okay, you’re FIFTEEN!!! That might account for two chapters. Okay, maybe three if you want to include Jonas Brothers details, but an ENTIRE BOOK? Whatever!

On a totally different note, in doing research for my next series, A Charmed Life, I’ve had to watch some wrestling (or wrasslin’ if you’re from the south). In fact, I might actually have to go IN PERSON to see a match or two. (I’ve been putting this off and trying to make do with things on TV called Friday Night Smackdown and Monday Night Raw.) But enough about my personal tortures. Anyway, I was kind of excited to see that the presidential candidates were going to give a little spoofy schpiel on Monday Night Raw. It was SUCH a letdown!

Barack—what the heck? Look lively! He acts like he’s reading a grocery list. Hills did okay, but McCain is actually my pick for best performance. That’s a Hulk Hogan reference, by the way. He’s totally down with some Hogan. Though why he refers to Obama as BARRUCK, I have no idea.

My brother and my two cousins watched wrestling ALL the time when we were growing up. And it takes four to tag team, so guess who got drafted (beaten to a pulp) a LOT? Me. And I have the scars to prove it. But at least I went to high school equipped with the knowledge of a pile driver, steam roller, and a DDT. I kind of needed it on a few dates.

Have a great weekend! I’m going to break my diet and face-plant in some pasta.

Jen

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So last Saturday was the Komen Race for the Cure here in Northwest Arkansas. I had a great day with my mom Bev (a survivor, on the far right) and my aunt Judy (middle).

I have to admit, this race came right after the Bon Jovi concert in which I crawled into bed at four a.m., so I wasn’t at my perky best. (Not that anyone’s ever seen that condition…) But pretty soon the enthusiasm of the event catches up with you, and you’re wide awake! Everyone is just so excited there. Lots of pink. LOTS of pink. In fact, my friend Heather got a shot of a pink DOG.

You know he’s hating life.

Lots of funny t-shirts at the event. I walked with a school group, so they felt the t-shirts had to be rated G. Honestly, it hurt my heart to let an opportunity slide to make some good, inappropriate boob references. But I got to be entertained by the shirts of others. Like these:

Or this one:

Komen Security, there is some perv taking a picture of my chest. Please come at once. I’m next to the vendor giving out tampons and key chains.

And if there’s anyone who has a right to be at the Race for the Cure, it’s these next girls. Has anyone done more to promote boob awareness…

…than the Hooters girls? I don’t think so.

After a hard day at the race, a girl just needs a good massage. The folks from Energizer totally provided that. Here’s Bev, talking to the masseuse (the masseuse who told her within the first 60 seconds that she was afraid her postal carrier was gonna go…um, postal).

The boys will want to tune out at this point (not that you didn’t check out at the first paragraph…). But ladies, this is my PSA telling you to go get those mammograms, do those BSEs, and um…whatever else you’re supposed to do. If you have BC in your family, then you’re supposed to get your mammogram AT LEAST ten years before the age of your family member when she got the big C. And you know what? Mammograms…not so bad! For real. I got the supreme joy of having one myself this year (right up there with the supreme joy of the butt shots), and all those horrible things people tell you–not true! It was no biggee! So if you’ve been putting it off, go get squished and that way you, too, will have a war story. Because scheduling and going through with a mammogram totally gives you some bragging rights. For more info, check out the Komen website.

Finally, It was Andrew Lloyd Webber night on American Idol. And while I’m a HUGE fan of his and all things Broadway, I don’t know that I like ALW + AI. My pick David Cook did pretty well with Music of the Night. But honestly, there is just no replacing my all time favorite performance of that song.

Happy Wednesday!

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Last Thursday as soon as I got out of school, I met some friends and my sister-in-law, and we hit the road for Kansas City. This is about 3.5 hours away. But we didn’t care–we were seeing Daughtry and Bon Jovi.

This is my “I’m too cool to cross my legs, and my feet don’t touch the ground anyway” pose. It’s very attractive.

You know what else is attactive?  How HIGH up we were. Ugh, seriously, this wasn’t the nose bleed section, this was the cerebral hemmorage from alititude  section.

They didn’t turn the big screens on for Daughtry, which TOTALLY ticked me off. So because I forgot my bionic eye, I couldn’t see him. But if you squint really hard, I think he’s the second one from the left. I like Daughtry a lot. He was my pick for Idol ‘06. And he has an interesting range–power ballads to Screamo.

So some of Bon Jovi’s outfits (okay, ALL of them) were strange. This one was not a favorite.

Hey, Jon. The Village People called–they want their costume back.  I wish I had a pic of the yoga shirt he finished the show in, but honestly I thought I was protecting him by not capturing it and displaying the image for all the world to see. But I’m pretty sure JBJ knows a downward facing dog from a sun salutation.

The keyboardist impressed me. Dude could play TWO keyboards at once. I took lessons for five years and can’t even play two KEYS at once.

Richie Sambora (on the left) also played one of those double guitar thingies. (Those of us familiar with the music biz just call them DGTs.) I don’t know how in the world these guys could have two things going on. I can’t do anything simultaneously like that. Let me think about what I”m good at…okay, emailing. I’m a fierce emailer. But can I email two different emails at once? Nope. I think I might be able to eat two candy bars at once though. I’m gonna work on that tonight.

“Where’s Jennifer? I can’t see her. My concert is not complete without making eye contact–even though I’m disgustingly sweaty and she thinks my outfit makes me look like I’ve watched too much Will and Grace. Could someone please call NASA and get me a high powered telescope so I can look up at the top and find her?”

How do you know you’ve watched too many Will Ferrell movies? When you keep referring to Bon Jovi’s number one song as “Blades of Glory.”

Well, I’m still tired from getting back home at 4 a.m. Friday, so I am going to hang out on the couch and watch THIS mature piece of cinema. Have a great Monday!

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The comment I get the most about writing is “How do you write AND work full time?” This question is usually followed by a look that says, “You are so ambitiously energetic!”

Oh, if only they knew… Here’s the cold truth: I’M LAZY. Any energy you see is a total flim flam. A fantastical facade. A big chunk of chicanery.

Let me share a few examples.

Last week I shared how I found 3000 or so plastic bags. Previously instead of recycling them, I burrowed them away in a cabinet until it finally exploded in Poltergeist fashion, and I realized that I had been reduced to hoarding like an OCD chipmunk.

Now that I have dedicated myself to recycling those bags, I’m too lazy to drive them to the drop-off center, so they’ve merely been moved from my kitchen to my trunk. (In my defense, there’s no curb-side recycling pick-up in my town. Living in a retirement village, there probably won’t be for a long while. Many retirees do not give two tiddly winks about melting polar ice caps and Dasani bottles that take more than 1000 years to decompose.)

And I have a giant to-do list of things I can’t seem to conquer. Like my Wal-Mart returns. No, I don’t have my receipt for the hundred dollar automatic litter box that makes my cat howl like a jackal. Lost it. Strangely enough I saved the one for my sole purchase of toothpicks. Will you take that instead?

I never called Lowe’s within the 30 day time period to tell them I hate my new dishwasher, and I don’t see how it could accommodate a 16 piece place setting when all I can cram in there are two Cool-Whip bowls and a spatula.

I have recorded episdoes of Gilmore Girls I’ve yet to watch. The show ended a year ago.

My insurance guy has been sending me letters for six months, saying we need to meet and discuss my policy. But I have no time or interest, so until he writes that there will be plates of cookies involved, he’s wasting his stationery.

My new ceiling fan already needs to be fixed. It now only runs on warp speed and sounds like a chopper is about to descend any moment and decapitate me and my mentally retarded cat.

I’ve been meaning to buy a new car for the last two years, but I could write a series in the time it would take me to get tags and a license, so I don’t even bother.

I have enough towels, wash cloths, and underwear that I don’t have to do laundry for 25.5 days. Don’t ask about the .5. You don’t want to know.

I have yet to reschedule the orthodontist appointment I missed. In January.

On the rare occasions I go to Wal-Mart (where the laws of time are suspended and you walk out and somehow 12 hours have elapsed), I buy like 10 of everything. Makes deodorant and bra purchasing a little awkward.

And since I normally don’t have time to go to Wal-Mart, I sometimes buy necessary things in strange, yet convenient places. Like toilet paper at gas stations. And Christmas presents from the guy who sells random things from his trunk at the stop light.

I have no time to read, so for appearance’s sake, I buy the latest books and arrange them on my coffee table next to an issue of the NY Times and hope no one asks me about the foreign policy in Taipei. Or who our governor is.

The threat of a late fee is a huge motivator, but since my local library doesn’t believe in them, it’s just easier to keep the books. But I’ve promised myself not to let one more decade pass without returning the complete collection of Sweet Valley High.

In my effort to multi-task, I began doing squats while blow-drying my hair, but I keep getting distracted. I now have one thigh bigger than the other and last week I burned my ear.

I’ve decided folding laundry is just a pointless and vicious cycle. I will not be a part of the societal brain washing that says it’s a necessary step. If I fell for that I might be sucked into other traps. Like Scientology. Or flossing.

So sometimes I forego minor things.

Like sleep.

Such as now.

It’s 1:30 a.m.

And I’m posting here.

All because I couldn’t sleep.

And then I got hot.

Remembered my ceiling fan.

Recalled I never phoned the electrician last summer.

Turned on my bedside lamp.

And wrote this blog.

; )

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