meadow of dry grass in front of forested hills

Lockett Meadow, writing news, memes, and more

June 25, 2022 /

Good afternoon, and happy Saturday! It’s a balmy 100F here in Satan’s Anus, which is a helluva lot better than the 108 we endured yesterday. In this week’s missive, I bring you some pretty pictures of Lockett Meadow in the San Francisco Peaks near Flagstaff, my writing progress (such as it is), a few interesting dribs and drabs I found on the internet when I should have been writing, and a fresh batch of memes I also found on the internet when I should have been writing.

But first: Welcome to the Weekend Coffee Share, hosted by Natalie the Explorer! Grab a treat, pull up a seat, and let’s get this party started.

Writing news

I now have a completed draft of the short story I plan to submit for the Left Coast Crime Trouble in Tucson anthology! I’m currently revising to get the word count under the limit of 5000 words and filling in all the details I skipped over while drafting. When I draft, if I get stuck on a detail, I flag it and keep going, because I don’t want to lose momentum by trying to decide what to name a character or going down the internet rabbit hole known as, “research.” Which is why I spent about 45 minutes this morning poring over the org chart for the Tucson Police Department and playing with Scrivener’s Name Generator. I’m happy to report that I now know what division my main character works in, and his boss has a name.

Small victories.

And speaking of small victories, the poem I’m planning to submit for the Arizona Authors Association annual literary contest now has a title–“Our Future Held in Store.” I’m not thrilled with it, so it might change between now and the submission deadline (Friday), but at least it isn’t hanging around with my Tucson police detective’s boss in The Purgatory of the Nameless.

Lockett Meadow in the San Francisco Peaks

Last week I shared a little of my old neighborhood in Flagstaff, which was threatened by the Pipeline Fire. I’m happy to report that the fire is now 70% contained, and my old neighborhood is still standing. I’m also happy to report that the Inner Basin and Lockett Meadow, beautiful areas in the San Francisco Peaks, were largely spared. I never managed to hike into the Inner Basin, but Long-Suffering Husband and I visited Lockett Meadow in fall 2020, right before we moved to Tucson. We missed peak leaf color by about a week, but the aspens were still lovely.

I’m so grateful this area didn’t burn.

Interesting bits that crossed my path this week

I read a couple of blog posts this week that seem worth sharing:

And finally….

The Memery

No theme this week, but there’s some funny stuff in this batch.

This one’s especially for my Pacific Northwest friends:

When I lived up there, I firmly believed that the first sunny day of every calendar year should have been an automatic holiday.

  1. No one knows what they’re getting into when they have children. I don’t care how many parenting books you read or how much you babysat, you. don’t. know.
  2. I once strolled through the living room, casually said to my son, “Please don’t eat the remote,” and kept on walking. I got a few steps further, stopped, muttered some euphemism for, “WTF,” and realized I’d reached a new level of parenting.

Then when they get older:

My son is 24 and still develops a case of ebola every time I ask him to empty the dishwasher. I’m amazed he isn’t dead yet.

Long-Suffering Husband isn’t dead yet either, because he knows better than to do this:

I’m a gentle soul… right up till you mess with my chocolate.

And speaking of marriage:

Speaking of mariticide (yes, it’s a word; Wikipedia says so):

As long as we’re building our vocabularies:

Back to male-female relations:

Some variation of this conversation takes place at our house at least a few times a year:

Long-Suffering Husband: [gags] Oh, fuuuuuccccck. [retches, then holds out container containing several refrigerator-based life forms]. SMELL THIS!

Me:

I am 55 years old, and I would totally take a picture of that.

And then post it on my blog.

On that note… What’s happening in your life?

Have a great week!

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18 Comments

  • trentpmcd

    June 25, 2022 at 5:49 pm

    For some reason all I can think of is Roseanne Roseannadanna (Gilda Radner) having a fit about political erections and… never mind.

    • Janet Alcorn

      July 1, 2022 at 10:56 am

      Ahahahahaha!

      Sorry for the late reply. For some reason, WordPress flagged your comment as spam, and I just now saw it and un-spammed it.

  • Natalie

    June 25, 2022 at 7:18 pm

    I’m glad the fire is contained and the beautiful trees are still there. Thank you for your weekend coffee share and memes.

    • Janet Alcorn

      July 1, 2022 at 10:56 am

      Thanks! And sorry for the late reply. WordPress stuck your comment in spam for some reason, and I just saw it and liberated it.

  • Bobbiem91

    June 26, 2022 at 7:35 am

    I liked Lockett Meadow. Miss those beeches and oaks and maple trees. Now the Thesaurus meme was a riot. I actually read a person’s work with words that I know they had no clue as to what it meant since they were being used in correctly.

    As to what I’m doing, I just finished and online intensive with Donald Maass. A week of information overload. I’m now processing and putting a lot of it together. The one thing he said that really made me think was..”90% of all the manuscripts I get do not have enough emotion. All genres need that emotional component but very few have enough. Write emotion over the top. You can always cut back later, but add more than you think you need and you might actually have enough.” That from a person who owns his own literary agency and handles many best sellers. You’ll also love this–bodily responses to stress need to be kept in line with what would actually be physically felt and experienced. A heart will not gallop abut the room. It never actually stops or you’re dead.

    Needless to say, I’m still processing and have one more editor who will be looking at my first two chapters of the novel I used for the class.

    • Janet Alcorn

      June 26, 2022 at 5:15 pm

      Interesting! Did he say much about how best to show emotion (did he have a preference among dialogue, visceral response, internal monologue, action)? I really appreciate what he said about bodily responses. I’m OK with a little metaphor, but I really struggled with the Margie Lawson Visceral Response course, because some of the examples she recommended seemed so over the top. There are only so many ways to say someone’s heart beats fast before it starts sounding ridiculous.

  • leannelc

    June 27, 2022 at 6:11 am

    Hi Janet – so glad those lovely areas were spared from the fire and that things are getting under control again. Good that your short story and poem are coming together too and not dwelling in nameless land still.

    • Janet Alcorn

      June 27, 2022 at 6:37 am

      Thanks! Flagstaff got some rain over the weekend, so hopefully their fire season will end for this year.

  • Gary A Wilson

    June 29, 2022 at 7:44 am

    Hi Janet,
    Sorry for being so late this week. I had – distractions.
    I’m not claiming they were good distractions, but that they distracted. . .
    Minimal writing done, lots of work stuff.
    One day I started with a simple todo list of three items.
    Each of them blew up into full grown messes and now, 5 days later only one of them got done, one I still don’t even understand and the third, umm, I may have lost that one when each day a new list of todos arrived.
    damn!

    • Janet Alcorn

      July 1, 2022 at 7:30 am

      Oh, yes, the simple to-do list of 3 items. That’s right up there with these words that slip out of my mouth every now and then: Today looks like an easy day.

      Uh huh. Sure.

      Last Friday I looked at my schedule for this week and said–you guessed it–“Next week should be an easy week.” Spoiler alert: it was not.

      Glad you were able to stop by! I hope next week is better.