Work

Preparing for a Local Convention

By / February 8, 2012 / 7 Comments

The other day Howard was talking to me and interrupted himself mid-sentence three times in a row to change the subject. It was amusing and fascinating to listen to him close off these nesting topics one by one. My day today is going to be a lot like that. I have lots of tasks ahead. Many of them are going to interrupt each other and I’ll just have to hope that I’ve placed enough memory triggers either in my house or in my brain so that I can come back and complete the interrupted tasks. A day like today requires lists.

Most of today’s work can be summed up in a single sentence: I am preparing for LTUE. That statement can be broken down into three basic categories: arranging for the kids, booth preparation, and preparation for a professional appearance. From there the tasks fracture into dozens of small details, which I am now going to list so that at 2 o’clock this afternoon when I’m standing in my front room with the feeling that there is something important I should be doing, I will be able to look at the list and think “Oh yeah, right, THAT.”

Arranging for the Kids:

  • Most important here is arranging for adequate supervision. This used to mean negotiation with friends, relatives, or neighbors for babysitting. Now it means sitting my children down and reviewing exactly how we treat each other when mom is unavailable to mediate conflicts. House rules will also be reviewed.
  • Planning their travel to and from school when I can’t help carpool — Done
  • Food. I need to buy microwavable food so that they don’t go hungry in the mid afternoon. I’ll actually be here for most of the dinner times. However I will also be brain dead, so I will be grateful to be able to shove frozen things in the microwave and push a button.
  • Bedtime. This only matters on Thursday. The other nights they can stay up late. I just need to plan incentives and review normal procedures with the kids so that they are prepared for things to be a little different than usual. It saves us from upsets when everyone knows the plan.

Booth Preparation:

  • In theory LTUE is the convention when we test out new booth set ups and displays. Every fall we say “we should do A, B, C next year. We’ll test that at LTUE.” Then every February I realize that it is time to prep for LTUE and I don’t have A, B, C ready to go. sigh.
  • Making bundles — We sell our books in discounted bundles. These must be assembled and shrink wrapped. Fortunately Kiki was in need of funds and happily took the job for me. — Done
  • Packing merchandise — The first and hardest step of this is deciding how much to bring. Fortunately we’re coming home every night so I can re-stock as necessary, but we still don’t want to run out of anything when a customer is standing right there. Everything we decide to bring must be packed into boxes for easy hauling by dolly. Loose merchandise gets lost or damaged.
  • Display stands and booth dressing — These are the A, B, C which I never get around to until almost show time. Today it means buying a foam core board so that I can make a vertical display for our t-shirt, grocery bags, and magnets. We also need to get our book stands and table cloths out of the storage unit. Also our table leg extenders so that we can raise the tables.
  • Planning where to park for easiest hauling of stuff into and out of the dealer’s room. It never works exactly as we expect.
  • Cash for change — means a trip to the bank.
  • Post-convention accounting, inventory counting, and unpacking — none of this happens today, but for everything I prepare today, part of my brain is sadly looking ahead to when I’ll have to clean up after it.

Preparing for a professional appearance:

  • I write notes out for all the panels in which I participate. Often I don’t even use the notes, but the process jiggles loose thoughts and stories which could be relevant to the topic. It means that my brain is primed to say useful things when I’m up in front of a room full of people. I list things I feel strongly need to be said about the topic. I list things which might be relevant or reminders of amusing anecdotes which fit the topic. I bring the notes to the panel and then I take notes as the panel progresses. My panel notes form the basis of a blog post later. Taking notes mid-panel means that when someone says a thing that triggers a thought, I am less likely to lose track of that thought before it is my turn to speak again. I’m pretty sure that I over-think this. Most professionals I know just show up with the knowledge in their heads and do fine. I just enjoy the advance planning. It is part of the fun for me.
  • I plan clothes and hairstyles. I don’t do this in detail, but I think generally about what I want to wear. Then I make sure that I do laundry so that those things are actually clean and ready for me.

There’s my list. Ready. Set. Go.

Life the Universe and Everything Symposium at UVU

By / January 19, 2012 / 4 Comments

Life the Universe and Everything Symposium (LTUE) at UVU has released a schedule and opened registration. This is an amazing local event for people who want to be writers or who love discussing or learning about Science Fiction and Fantasy. If you’re free February 9-11 then you should register. Prices will go up on Monday.

I always love LTUE and come away feeling energized. This year I’m particularly excited. I have four panels and presentations, all of which are topics which excite me.

Thurs Noon
Collaborating With a Family Member
Howard and I collaborate to get the work done every day. There are some specific challenges involved with being both business partners and spouses. Sometimes stress and conflict from one role can spill into the other. The other panelists are also very familiar with both the benefits and challenges of working with family members. I expect us to have a fascinating discussion. (Panelists: Sandra Tayler, Karen Evans, Kevin Evans, and Michaelbrent Collings.)

Thurs 2pm
Feeling Fake: What to do about that pervasive feeling that everyone belongs in the publishing world except you
This feeling of being fake is called Imposter Syndrome and every creator I have known feels it at one time or another. We’ll talk about the causes of this feeling and some things you can do to quell it or at least not let it hurt your professional life. Again I’m with excellent co-panelists. (Panelists: Sandra Tayler, Jason Alexander, Ami Chopine, Stacy Whitman)

Saturday 11am
Little Stories Everywhere: using blogging as practice for writing fiction
I’ve been wanting the chance to talk about blogging at LTUE for years. I’m thrilled to finally get the chance. I love blogging. I love it for itself and not just as a means to an end. I’ll be talking about that and how I blog in ways that are directly relevant to the writing of fiction. A blog can be more than just a promotional tool. (Panelists: Sandra Tayler, Jessica Harmon, Peggy Edelman, Robin Weeks)

Saturday 3pm- 5pm (2 hours)
The Author’s Toolbox: Learning skills for networking, blogging, social media, and self-promotion.
I’m thrilled that this workshop made the schedule. Mary and I plan to pack the two hours full of useful information and specific skill acquisition tools. Self-promotion does not have to be awkward and uncomfortable. Instead it can flow naturally from who you are and what you do. We’re going to talk in detail about how that works. We may even outline exercises and concrete skills that you can practice on your own. Seating is limited to 140 people. Come ready to learn and be prepared to stay for both hours. (Presenters: Mary Robinette Kowal, Sandra Tayler)

For those of you not in Utah, I’ll try to keep good notes and write them up after LTUE is over. I don’t know if there will be any official recordings.

In addition to my events, there are lots of other amazing panels and presentations. E-publishing is featured in discussions and how-to presentations, Writing Excuses will be recording, Topics such as cultural sensitivity, creating dynamic characters, analyzing symbolism in extant works, promoting on Amazon.com, and laying out pages of graphic novels will all be discussed. Click here to see the full schedule. LTUE is a fantastic event. I’m hopeful that the move to UVU will allow it to grow and thrive so that some of you who do live far away will be able to plan ahead and make pilgrimages here for another year.

Crisis, Stress, and Being a Frog

By / January 19, 2012 / 2 Comments

When Howard and I were first married, we moved into a new home. It didn’t take us long to meet the neighbors. We quickly became friends with a family in crisis. They needed our help and we gladly gave it. But over the course of four years that same family was always in crisis. Not the same crisis, it was a revolving parade of feuds with neighbors, tight money, rebellious teenager, and quarrels with coworkers. While it was possible that they were just being slammed with a series of bad luck, I slowly realized that no amount of help from me would move them out of the constant crisis zone in which they lived. Somehow the patterns of their lives created the crises through which they swam like fish in water. I began to believe that they simply didn’t know how to live without crisis. If it was removed, they gasped and flailed like a fish out of water until the flailing landed them in crisis again. I sometimes hoped that they could learn a different way of living. I’m not sure that they ever did. I moved away and lost contact in that pre-facebook era.

My life this week has been crazy. Nothing has been a big crisis, just a hundred small things, most of which popped up unexpectedly despite my efforts to plan ahead. The sad thing is that this crazy week was normal. Most of my weeks are filled to overflowing with a hundred small tasks. I try to simplify and reduce, yet still end up feeling overwhelmed. When I visit with my friends, I have an ever evolving list of things I am managing. I get really tired. Often. I have to wonder how I am creating this insanity for myself. I say I want calmness and quiet, but my decisions keep landing me back in busy-land. On energetic days I love busy-land. On tired days, I don’t know how I do it and I have to believe in miracles. If I want to come up and breath calmer air rather than swimming in stress. However in order to do that I have to transform myself like a tadpole transforms into a frog. In theory being a frog is better, but transformation is always scary and frequently frightening.

The good news is that it feels like we’re poised for a period of calm. The things I managed this week were structural things which should make the rest of the year easier. I hope. Perhaps I don’t need to transform. Perhaps I’m already a frog and I’ve just been swimming up from the bottom of a deep lake after a winter’s hibernation. Surely I’ll surface soon.

The Pounding has Begun

By / January 7, 2012 / 1 Comment

The house is filled with the sounds of pounding. Kiki and Link are deconstructing the shelves in the pantry which is destined to become part of my office. The shelves were made of chip board and 2x4s, so at first we were a bit daunted. Once I gave them permission to destroy the chip board things progressed much more gleefully. I’d love to help. I planned to help, but my wrist has been hurting of late. It is the kind of little hurt which isn’t actually a hurt. Instead it is a pre-hurt, a sensation that if I’m not carefully I’ll acquire a truly painful injury. I don’t want a painfully injured right wrist, so I’m standing back and letting my teenagers wield the hammers. They’re doing a pretty good job too. I’m impressed. Hopefully they’ll be just as enthusiastic about helping me clean up this glorious mess we’ve made. Next Saturday we hope to knock out the drywall and then I’ll have before and after photographs worth sharing.

Last night I was telling some friends that I am puzzled by this drive I feel to re-create my office. Somehow I know that it is the most important professional development thing I’m doing during the first half of this year. But it feels anti-logical. If I profess to be a writer, then I should be focusing my energies on writing. My friends assured me that organizing my work space makes perfect sense. Howard agrees with them. Yet it still seems selfish, turned inward, and somehow profoundly healthy. I need the reminder that common logic about how writing careers should be managed can be wrong for an individual. I must trust my inspiration and intuition, both of which tell me that remodeling my office is important. So we proceed.

Assigning My Days

By / January 4, 2012

Amazing how much blogging clears my head. By the time I’d finished yesterday’s post, I already felt better and more focused. I then proceeded to have a day in which I was able to complete tasks without interruption. Instead of having a head filled with little “must go back to” memory tags, I was able to finish thoughts and fold them away neatly. Space began to open up. I’ve decided that my first attack on keeping space open is to containerize. I have lots of jobs: Mother, Accountant, Book Keeper, Inventory Manager, Writer, Chauffeur, Cook, Laundress, Graphic Designer, Shipper, Business Manager, etc. I often refer to these jobs as hats that I wear. Most days I swap hats a dozen times or more. This is fine and will probably continue. However I’ve decided to assign days to all my business hats. On the assigned day that hat gets worn first. For example: On Mondays I am an accountant first. All non-urgent accounting tasks which come up on other days will be assigned to the following Monday. I write down the task and forget about it until I unfold my accounting thoughts on Monday morning. So here is my planned schedule:
Monday: Accounting
Tuesday: Mailing & Graphic Design
Wednesday: Inventory Management & Business Management
Thursday: Mailing & Writer
Friday: Mailing & Graphic Design
Saturday: House & Family
Sunday: Church

The schedule is graphic design heavy for the next few months. When I’m prepping for a shipping, then some of those Graphic Design slots will get re-assigned as shipper slots. When conventions are imminent then more slots will go to Business Management. The most important thing is that when I get a new task instead of just putting it on today’s list, I can tell myself “I’ll handle that on Wednesday.”

The schedule is going to be messed up, of course. It already has been. A sick child at 4 am this morning means that today I’m wearing the Nurse hat instead of the Business Manager hat. But many of the Business Manager tasks I’d assigned for this week will not be hurt by waiting another week. The few that can’t wait, I’ll sneak around the edges of taking care of my child.

I like this plan. Hopefully it will help me keep my head clear.

Event List for 2012

By / December 28, 2011 / 6 Comments

Naturally, the minute I admit to myself that I’m not quite ready to face next year’s schedule, part of my brain does exactly that. So here is a listing of my currently scheduled public events. There are some additional events which may pop up, but they’re tentative, so I’ll not list them yet.

LTUE Life the Universe and Everything Symposium at UVU (Orem, UT) February 9-11
This one is only about five weeks away. The LTUE crew had to switch venues at the last minute, so they’re still scrambling to get everything arranged. However I have never been disappointed by LTUE as an event, and this year is going to be great. As soon as I know details on registration or panel scheduling, I’ll pass them along.

LDStorymakers Conference (Provo, UT) May 4-5
I’ll be teaching a class on Finances for Creative people and co-teaching a class on cover design. Howard will be teaching World building and Talent vs. Practice.

Deep South Con (Huntsville, AL) June 15-17
This is a relatively small and low-key convention, but I’m really looking forward to the chance to go and just hang out with Howard. He’s a guest of honor and will be on programming. I’ll probably just be hanging out and visiting. We can probably arrange for away from the convention lunches and meetups if there are folks interested. I also want to see some of the southern landscape. I’ve passed through Atlanta before, but all I saw was the airport.

Additional events to which I will NOT be going:
LunaCon March 16-18 –Howard is a Guest of Honor there. New York area folks don’t want to miss him.
GenCon Indy August 16-19 –Howard will be running a booth there again.

And in the tentative category I have:
Chicon (WorldCon, Chicago) August 30-Sept 3 –This one I have mixed feelings about missing. I love attending WorldCons, but the timing on this one is bad. My kids will have just started school. I just have to get closer before deciding.

Announcements and Updates

By / December 4, 2011

Announcements:
Looking for a picture book to give as a gift? Take a look at Hold on to Your Horses. You can get a free pdf of the entire book either by clicking the image or the link. If you want the book on paper. It is available in our store. This book is a story I wrote for Gleek when she was in kindergarten because she needed a story to help her be able to manage her impulsive creativity. I worked with an artist, Angela Call, to bring the story to life. I still love this book and am always glad to see it go out where the story can be loved by others too. It made me happy to see several copies go into packages during our shipping event on Saturday.

Another thing I am excited about is that the LDStorymakers Conference has opened for registration. This is a Utah writer’s conference for those who are interested in writing genre fiction. Both Howard and I have been invited to present at the conference. Howard will be giving his inspiring Talent Vs. Practice presentation and also one on world building. I have a solo presentation on structuring finances to support a creative career. Then I’m team teaching with Crystal Liechty for a two hour master class on book covers. We’re aiming to make the class useful to people who will need to work with publishers and those who want to create covers themselves. I love teaching and so I’ll probably talk more about these presentations as I plan them. Along with classes, the conference offers pitch sessions, work shops, a boot camp, and a couple of banquets. The conference is in May, but there are only 450 memberships available. If you’re interested, sign up now.

Updates:
All the calendar packages were assembled on Saturday thanks to a marvelous crew of 8 people who donated their time. Unfortunately I neglected to remember that the post office closes early on Saturdays. So all the packages are still here. Mailing them will be the first task of Monday morning. It will take two van loads. Calendars are thin, but not when they’re in the same package as a mug.

Today’s energy crash is proceeding at a nice leisurely pace. I’m doing a whole lot of not much. I keep having a vague feeling that there are things I should be tracking and planning for, but not really remembering what they are. Occasionally I’ll remember something and write it down. On other occasions I’ll discover written notes about what I should do next. Then I do those things. Thus I’m wending my way through the day.

Pears, guilt, and cooking during shipping week

By / November 29, 2011

There were pears on my front porch; the last fruits from our tree which we’d not given away. They sat there in a row where we’d placed them to ripen. They’d ripened fine, but they continued to sit while we all walked past them off to school, back from school, running errands, shipping packages, fetching mail, or hauling garbage. The pears witnessed it all and they gradually shifted toward the place beyond ripe. My occasional pauses to glance guiltily at the pears changed from “I really ought to can those” into “I really ought to throw those away.” One morning we finally did. Howard and I dumped all the porch pears unceremoniously into the garbage can. I breathed relief. Pears were no longer a little nagging item on my list of things to do.

The back lawn was blanketed with a layer of leaves. This is the natural result of having planted trees a decade ago. If the leaves were left all winter the grass would die. I sent kids out to rake one afternoon and they made leaf houses, outlining imaginary walls with long sinuous piles of leaves. On a different day I sent them out to rake again and told them they were required to fill up six garbage bags with leaves. They did as they were told and the lawn was still dotted with large grass-killing leaf piles. Howard surveyed the leaves and declared a family leaf raking hour. We armed ourselves with gloves, rakes, and a box full of garbage bags. In the course of one hour, our two teams of baggers and one team of rakers relocated all the leaves into bags. From there the leaves could be transported to the green waste station or offered to neighbors for mulch.

Our pear tree had a surprise for us. Protected under the layer of fallen leaves were several dozen pears. Many of them were the sort of rotten fruit one expects to find a month past the end of bearing season, but some of them were perfect. Ripe. Crisp. Ready to eat or cook. We took a break from raking and gathered up the still-good pears. We had almost two grocery sacks full. I looked at them on my kitchen counter. Pears were back on my list. I really did not want to spend another month feeling guilty about wasting pears. I also did not feel excited about canning pears. This was when I remembered apple butter.

Apple butter is a spread, like peanut butter, only it is made of apples, sugar, cinnamon, cloves, nutmeg, and ginger. It is like distilled apple pie that you can spread on toast. I’d had some years ago and the memory stuck with me. Another thing which stuck in my memory is that pears can be substituted for apples in almost any recipe. I googled and had a recipe in minutes. I don’t know why smashing pears into a pulp through a strainer is more fun to me than peeling them and putting them into jars, but it is. The pulp cooked for over an hour, spreading the smell of apple pie through the house. Two batches resulted in 9 pints of pear butter. More importantly, it turned guilty pears into delicious spread.

Making pear butter is not what I ought to have done today. I’m not sorry for it though. Tomorrow I will find high gear and do all the shipping preparation things which need to be done. The calendars arrived and all the pieces are in hand. Now we just need to do the work.

Monday of shipping week

By / November 28, 2011 / 6 Comments

Returning to a school routine after five days of break was easier than I expected. Everyone rolled out of bed as usual and the morning proceeded as normal. My work day was far from normal. It was all focused on preparing for invoice sorting, which is hours of shuffling papers around until they are sorted by shipping method, contents, and alphabetized by last name. I’ve gotten really good at alphabetizing over the last few years. As usual, Janci and I had many moments where we pondered things like: should we sort for sketches before or after sorting for shipping method? The general shape of this process stays the same from release to release, but there are six months in between when the details fall out of our brains. There is also the fact that each release brings some new and interesting challenge for which we must adjust. This time there were four different categories of sketched options: sketched calendars, sketched TBB reprints, sketched reprint bundles, and sketched emperor bundles. Mostly the various merchandise did not add too much complexity, the only thing which kept throwing me off was mugs. I had to add in a sort where I went through the flat rate box invoices to make sure that the ordered items would indeed fit into a flat rate box.

If most of the above paragraph read like gibberish to you, then you have a good feel for the state of my brain when the invoice sorting was done. I was exhausted by all the thinking. Then I had to go back through all the piles and guesstimate the numbers of boxes we’ll need in all the various types. We’ve got 770 packages which will go into 5 types of mailing boxes and envelopes. In the end I made an educated guess on the high side. We’ll use the boxes eventually, I’m sure.

It is a good thing I had Howard pick up frozen pizza from the grocery store this morning. That was dinner. Now I need to muster the energy to make the kids turn off Phineas and Ferb to do homework. They are not going to be pleased with the switch.

I’ll Think About Christmas Later

By / November 22, 2011 / 1 Comment

Last year I was in charge of our church Christmas party. This was a dinner for 300 people with decorations and a program. I had a committee whose help was invaluable, but I did not spread out the work nearly as much as I should have. The party was declared a success by all those who attended. I’m glad they told me, because I was far too frazzled to be able to tell if any of it was working. This year I’ve been assigned to order and prepare 120 lbs of ham to be served as the main course. (This is 14 whole hams.) In comparison to last year, this sounds easy. Oh I’ll still be part of the set up and clean up crew. I’ll still be busy all day long on the day of the party (Dec 10). I suspect that my skills and knowledge will be thoroughly tapped to help resolve crises. An event this size always has a crisis of some kind, no matter how well the committee plans. Already we are all glad for the notes I took last year. I wish I’d taken more. I’m going to be quite tired when the party is done, but there is a chance that I’ll actually be able to experience some of the party rather than running it the entire time.

It would seem that this Christmas season will be easier than the last, but life doesn’t tend to lower the difficulty rating. If the party were all, that would be easy. However I’m also the Scout advancement chair and I’ve been informed that we will be holding a Scout court of honor three days before the Christmas party (Dec 7). It is my job to do all the reports and paperwork in advance of this event. It is also my job to organize a Board of Review for the scouts who are advancing (On Dec 4). These arrangements are not all that difficult, in theory. I’ve never done them before and experience tells me that any job I’ve never done before will present me with unforeseen complications. Naturally I’m feeling a little stressed about it because part of my brain is trying to foresee those complications and prevent them. Only to foresee the unforeseeable is a bit of a paradox. Whee.

This is not all. One day prior to the Boards of Review which are mine to arrange, we’ll be hosting a shipping party to send out the calendars (Dec 3). That day will be completely consumed by the shipping of packages. We’ll be hosting this event in our house since Dragon’s Keep is unavailable on Saturday. This will require a smaller volunteer crew, longer hours, and a complete cleaning of my house in advance of the event. The two days prior to the shipping event (Dec 1 & 2) will be consumed by printing postage and the aforementioned housecleaning. The days prior to that will be focused on helping Howard do all the necessary sketching. Monday November 28 will be the day that Janci and I sort all the invoices, figure out what sorts of boxes we need and then place the order. Before that I need to go into the store reports and make sure I have enough dice sets, Emperor Bundles, and magnet sets assembled. If not, then we’ll be using our Thanksgiving weekend to make more. I’ve run lots of shipping events. It is routine, more or less. Of course each one presents it’s very own unforeseen challenges. (See earlier note on the unforeseen.)

On top of all of that, we’re cooking pies and rolls for Thanksgiving dinner, one son needs a hair cut, three children need new pants, the leaves need to be raked, there are non-calendar orders to be shipped daily, three pallets of books need to be relocated from our garage to the storage unit, the kids are going to want to put up the Christmas tree, and I want to put up the shelving in the garage so that the food storage can be moved out of my office.

When I line it up, all of it fits. In theory. If I’m working at top efficiency. But if I seem flaky or distracted in the next three weeks, now you know why.