Alison Kent

If you haven’t visited my message board lately, you might want to. ;)

Broken again, sigh. :doze:

I promise. Another day or two and we’ll be up and running again!

Today is novella wrap up and updating 5 or 6 of the sites I maintain. No time for fixing my own. The cobbler’s kids and all that.

:rolleyes:

But at least I have auto-smilies now!!

I’m going to pull an allnighter. I haven’t done so since . . . well, ever! I just don’t DO allnighters! Mostly because in the past I’ve had to get up and go to work in the morning. Now allnightering *g* is my work. I officially need 28 more pages to be done with my novella. Once I write those, I’ll go back through to edit and revise and expand. I will finish this month *g* so I can get into writing the next one asap!

So, while the espresso was brewing, I did a stats check on my server and found SEVEN recent links to my site from a theses & dissertations site!! But it’s one of those ‘ya-gotta-pay’ for the term paper places and I get a redirect when I look for it but now I’m DYING to know who wrote a paper and linked to me!!!!!

It’s May 30th on the Texas Gulf Coast and I’m still doing most of my writing outside. Unbelievable. Of course after starting around 9:00, I only last until 2:00 or so before moving inside until I can return at 7:00ish for another hour. If I’m inside, I’m too tempted by the internet and my web design work and, yes, chores needing to be done! Being outside in primitive conditions *g* means I have to focus on the work in progress. And the birds. And the squirrels. And the insects that seem to think I’m sweeter than I really am. I don’t think we’ve broken 90 degrees yet this year, but it’s getting close.

Just a few more days till the launch of my updated site! Whoo-hoo! Be sure and sign up for my newsletter if you want to get the annoucement when I go live. The problem with doing web design is the same as that of the cobbler whose children have no shoes. I tend to leave my own updates for last and run out of time. (Then again, the really cool thing about doing my own website is that I don’t have to be ? to a designer’s schedule!!)

But no more! I have too many exciting things upcoming to let that happen now. Launching the revamped site is the first in a long list of the fun I have planned. Right now, in fact, sitting outside with my Alphasmart, typing this entry while thinking on the scene I’m writing, I’m trying to decide on a really cool prize for my relaunch contest.

A busy weekend here, though not in the fun Memorial Day sort of way I wish! I’m finishing my novella come hell or high water which means missing Jeremy’s band Dilate headlining Sunday night’s Texas Buzz. The preparations have been intense as this is one of the coolest shows they’ll have done before the Vans Warped Tour in June. I might also have to bow out of a fish fry at the home of my son Casey’s girlfriend’s Casey’s parents. *g* This is also my stepson’s graduation weekend so we do have a lot going on!

I’d better get back to it but thought I’d leave you with this for fun!

Could I snark for a moment? I’m so tired of being told someone can’t do something and I need to and this thing has been delayed or forgotten or can’t be done because, “You know how busy we all are.” Uh, no. Don’t talk to me about being busy until you’ve worked a full-time job, managed a household with you, your husband, and two to three college students, designed and maintained numerous websites, AND written twelve-hundred and fifty manuscript pages in a year. Yes, we’re all busy. But I don’t have a lot of sympathy for the excuse considering I don’t know many people as busy as me. Okay. That’s that. *g* (UPDATE: Because silly paranoid people are asking me if I’m talking about them and what did they forget, let me say NO. It’s not you! The ONE person that annoyed me enough to write this would never read it, LOL!)

Now on to television. American Idol. I watched most of the finale and simply enjoyed it as a variety show. Camille still can’t carry a tune and Jasmine wasn’t exactly wowing me. Gotta love George and Matt, tho. I didn’t even care who won because I enjoyed both finalists for who they were, but wasn’t emotionally connected to either. This season was just sorta meh for me. I know the judges were all over Fantasia, as was Clive Davis which says a hell of a lot. But in a lot of ways she was too over the top for my tastes!

Alias has just dropped to my second fave show. Again, a meh season finale - compared to the rockin’ kick ass writing, plotting, and characterization that is Navy N.C.I.S. Wowza! That last scene with Gibbs (Mark Harmon) and Ari Haswari (Rudolf Martin) was, quoting my husband, better written and better acted than anything on the big screen we’ve seen in ages. Just incredible. I’m amazed this show hasn’t gotten more buzz - but hopefully next year will remedy that. This final episode needs to be watched by anyone wanting to write spot-on dialogue, suspense, twists, tension, surprises - yet have every last detail tied up in a package to make Santa proud. Not a ball was dropped. Unbelievable. The episode is called Reveille. Watch for it in reruns.

Now, onto the mess my blog has been this last week. Word to the wise. Never update your own site files when you’re loopy and braindead and exhausted beyond human belief! *g*

I’d been needing to upgrade my blogging software anyway, but hadn’t intended it to be an emergency or to be done in incremental steps. It hasn’t been a case of the repair being an experiment as much as a case of the dh having to fit it in between umpty billion other site tasks of his own because I’ve had Julian and Katrina naked now for days and was more frustrated than either of them in trying to get them together! He’s still cleaning it up, but we’re much better now!! My sidebar has to be returned to the most recent version, but soon!!

In other words, the books come first. The site must wait - tho, if all the stars align, and the dh quits getting called out to troubleshoot computer issues at his main client’s office, the updated version will launch 06/01!

BTW, everyone likes the Swordfish Hugh Jackman best. I took off the poll as it’s creating too many pop-ups!

Shhh! Be vewy vewy quiet! DH is hunting for bugs in the upgrade!

I’ve screwed up, and what’s worse, I have to finish my book!

I’ll be back later!

I’ve messed up. I’ll be back to fix it. Right now I have a book to write!!

I’m not going to have time to do any blogging the rest of the week, so a couple of things.

First, I plan to launch my updated site on June 1st. To that end, I could use a few more questions for my new Q & A section. I have a forum set up on my message board (which is sadly lacking in visitors these days *sob*) for you to susbmit Q’s for me to A! Go and do!

Next, I thought I’d leave you with a bit of fun - and the chance to get your hands on a few good books! I’ve cleaned these off my shelves and instead of selling them on Half.com or trading them in at my local used book store, I thought it would be fun to give them away as a contest prize! The lot of ten includes TAKING THE HEAT by Brenda Novak, DON’T TELL by Karen Rose, INTO DANGER by Gennita Low, EVERY MOVE SHE MAKES by Beverly Barton, FAIR PLAY by Deirdre Martin, THE SEA WIFE by Holly Cook, LETTERS TO KELLY by Suzanne Brockmann, GRACE UNDER FIRE by Beverly Barton, ROUGHING IT WITH RYAN by Jill Shalvis, and ALL THROUGH THE NIGHT by Forster, Foster, McKenna & Devine.