A Working Vacation

Yay! I’m on holidays for two weeks in Maui! I’ve always wanted to visit Hawaii, so now that I’m finally here, why am I spending my time writing blogs?

Don’t get me wrong. We’re definitely doing the tourist thing and enjoying the glorious weather. But for me, this is also an opportunity to catch my breath, to take a step back, and figure out where I go from here in my writing career.

This past winter has not only been long and cold, it’s also been very busy, and in some ways, quite difficult. From November until the end of February, my part-time day job was pretty much full-time. We moved to a new office on the other side of town and my ten minute commute has tripled to about thirty minutes. Not a big deal in good weather, but the weather this winter has been less then ideal, and just added to the stress.

I’ve got two new books being released this year. That’s the good news. The not so good news is that I had to do edits on both of them in January and February. I spent most of my weekends working on these edits and also on a book that I hope will be the third in a series I’m working on. I managed to finish it and send it to my editor a couple of days before we left on holidays, so I’m keeping my fingers crossed and hoping she likes it.

Anyway, with everything that was going on over the winter, I didn’t have time or energy to blog, or update my website. I haven’t figured out what I’m going to do to celebrate the release of my book in May. I don’t even know what I want to write next. So this two week vacation is going to be a little about doing some planning. I finally have a little time to think.

Have you ever taken a step back to plan your next move in your writing career? Or are you one of those lucky people who keeps it all together – day job, family, writing? I’d love to hear how you do it!

I'm on Vacation!

The view from my front window in January.

So here I am on vacation in beautiful Maui. Yay! I’m enjoying seeing the sights and soaking up the sun. It’s been a long, cold winter with plenty of challenges and I’m just glad to be here.

Unfortunately, getting here wasn’t so easy. I should have realized the day would not go well when first thing at the Winnipeg airport, the self-serve kiosk wouldn’t print our boarding passes and luggage tags. Instead it said we had to see a ticket agent. Imagine my surprise when she told us the reason we couldn’t check ourselves in was because my name, or a name similar to mine, is on a no-fly list! What? Thankfully, the ticket agent made a phone call and was able to straighten things out. We were on our way. Whew!

The flight to Maui was never going to be a direct one. We were scheduled to go to Calgary, change planes, fly to Vancouver, change planes, and then fly to Maui. The plane was about to land in Calgary (the pilot had even announced he was beginning his descent) when I noticed that instead of going down, the plane was beginning to gain altitude. After a long delay, the pilot came on the intercom again to tell us that a snowstorm in Calgary, coupled with a power outage at the Calgary airport, prevented us from landing there. We were being diverted to Edmonton.

Bird of Paradise flower

So we landed in Edmonton, and waited on the tarmac. The crew was really great and came around with drinks and snacks, and told us everything they knew, which wasn’t much. We just had to wait until the power was back on in Calgary. It wasn’t safe to land in a snowstorm without help from air traffic control. We waited about an hour there, until finally the pilot said we were being refueled and de-iced and would soon be on our way. And eventually we were.

 

The biggest concern for my husband and me was making our connection to Vancouver and finally to Maui. But since none of the flights had been able to leave Calgary, our flight was waiting for us when we got there. We hustled to our gate and got onboard. Unfortunately, the backlog meant we had to wait a long time till it was our turn to take off. As I watched the snow fall, I worried that they would suddenly cancel our flight, deciding it was too stormy. I breathed a sigh of relief when our plane finally lifted into the sky.

 

We safely got to Vancouver and it looked like our flight would leave on time at 6:15 pm. At least it looked that way until there was a sudden message on the board saying it wouldn’t leave until 7:15 pm. This whole day had been about hurry up and wait. I decided there wasn’t anything I could do about it so I might as well chill. I reached into my bag for my ereader and – nothing. It wasn’t there! I panicked. I’d been reading on the previous flight, and when we were told we had to power down all electronics, I guess I stuck it into the pocket on the back of the seat and forgot it.

I was devastated, thinking it was lost forever. Fortunately, my husband isn’t the panicky type. He talked to the guy at our gate, who contacted his people, who found the ereader. That was the good news. The bad news was that it was on the other side of customs, and we had to go back and retrieve it ourselves, rather than have someone from the airlines bring it over. My husband told me to wait with our stuff and he’d run back for it. I was worried that our flight would be called before he got back, but I needn’t have worried. He was back with my ereader in plenty of time. There were still more delays. We didn’t leave Vancouver until 8 pm.

The flight into Maui from Vancouver took six hours. I’ve never been able to sleep on a plane and this time wasn’t any different. So I was beyond tired when we landed. Because we were so late, we were concerned that the car rental place would be closed, but for the first time this day, something went right. The car rental place was open. But first we had to get our luggage. One of our suitcases dropped from the baggage carousel, and then the thing abruptly stopped. Staff at the airport tried to fix it, but apparently it was well and truly dead, because after another long delay, they finally diverted the rest of the luggage from our flight to another baggage carousel. Eventually, we found our stuff and dragged ourselves to the car rental place.

We managed to get our car without too much difficulty, but we were still presented with the problem of having to drive to our resort, a place we’d never been before, in complete darkness. The Ford Explorer we rented has GPS, but as of this writing, we still haven’t figured out how to use the stupid thing. We got some basic directions from the guy at the rental place and we took off, hoping we were going in the right direction. We drove for nearly an hour and were starting to get a little nervous. Had we taken a wrong turn somewhere? When we finally saw the sign pointing to the resort, we were giddy with relief. We felt even better when the lady at the resort called one of the security guys to take us to our condo, because it was 3 in the morning, and finding anything was beyond us at this point. With the time differences, we’d been awake for 24 hours. After a quick perusal of our one bedroom condo, we fell into bed, exhausted.

The next morning when we woke and looked outside in the daylight, we were stunned to see the gorgeous view. When I read ‘partial ocean view’ in the online description, I assumed it meant that if I squinted just so, I might be able to see a tiny sliver of ocean from our condo. Instead we have a glorious view. It made the whole hellish trip worthwhile!

 Do you have a flight from Hell story? I’d love to commiserate with you!

Breaking Up Is Hard To Do

I finally did it. I finally gave my notice at the day job.

I’ve been thinking about quitting work for a while. I first wrote about it in June 2009 at Prairie Chicks Write Romance, a group blog I once belonged to. I now have eight published novels with 2 more - so far - being released this year. I feel I barely have time, or energy, to write. When you add in the time required for promotional efforts – blogging, using Facebook and Twitter, plus learning to use Goodreads and other social media – there aren’t enough hours. There have been callouts for submissions, that I’d wanted to try for, or guest blogging opportunities that I couldn’t take advantage of simply because of lack of time. And it’s not just the time. It’s the mental energy and focus. I feel like I’m giving the best of myself to the day job. It’s time to transfer that energy to my writing and to the promotion of my books.

This is not a decision I made lightly. I’ve enjoyed my job, and I like the people I work with. But the time is right to leave. My daughters are both grown up and away from home. My husband is retiring after 30 years at his job, and we want to be free to do some travelling. The office where I work was moved to a different part of the city last summer, and I went from a commute of 5 minutes to one of 30 minutes, when the weather is good. When it’s not so good, like during the snowstorm we had the other day, it can take an hour and a half. I’m so over it.

But nobody likes to give up a steady paycheck, however humble it may be. I’ve worried about that a lot, and that has kept me at the day job until now. I wish I could say I could make just as much from selling my books as I do from my job, but so far that hasn’t happened. I’m hoping that with more time, I’ll have more opportunity to get myself known, and even more important, I’ll be able to write that big, break-out book.

But before I make too many plans, I have some hurdles to jump. Like finding and training my replacement.

Normally, finding your own replacement isn’t something an employee is expected to do. But I work for a small professional association, and they rely on me to help with all kinds of things. Before Christmas I wrote the help wanted ad, put it in the newspaper, went through the resumes, composed the interview questions, and picked what I thought were the best candidates. I also helped interview several people for my position. We came up with our first, second and third choices. We offered #1 the job and she accepted.

Unfortunately, by the end of the first day of training, she decided the job wasn’t for her. It had more to do with her own family/work situation then with the job, but in any event she left. So we decided to contact our two other choices. Number two already had another job. I started thinking I was going to be at my job forever. The thought of going through the whole interview process again nauseated me.

Fortunately, number three was available and happy to take the job. Hallelujah!  After just a few days of training, things seem to working out fine. I can finally see the end of the tunnel!

So, I’m looking forward to devoting myself more fully to writing and to see where I can go from here. Wish me luck!

If you're a writer, have you ever thought of leaving the day job to write full-time? If you're a reader, have you ever fantasized about saying goodbye to the 9 to 5? What would you do if money were no object and you could do anything you wanted?

Fifteen Minutes for the New Year

Soon it will be a new year. And as usual, I will take a few minutes to think about what I want to accomplish in this new year. Some years I set out elaborate goals, but this year, I'm going to try to keep it simple.

Recently I read an article that said the reason most New Year's resolutions are not kept is because they're too big. For instance, maybe I want to lose fifty pounds. If I make losing fifty pounds my goal, it's very overwhelming, and so big that it's feels impossible to accomplish, or to even begin. But if I break it down, if I say my goal is to lose five pounds at a time, that's a much more doable goal. Instead of looking ahead a whole year, maybe we should only look ahead to the next fifteen minutes. We can only really control our actions for the next fifteen minutes. After that it's a crap shoot. So I'm going to try to break up my goals into smaller, more managable pieces, goals I can keep fifteen minutes at a time.

So when I'm tempted to eat something I shouldn't, I'll try to wait fifteen minutes. Perhaps the temptation will pass.

And as far as my writing goes, I have many projects I want to complete, but the writing of a book, or a series of books, is a huge undertaking. So my goal is to think only about what I can accomplish in the next fifteen minutes, and then the next fifteen minutes, and so on.

Do you have any resolutions for 2013? Happy New Year!

The Chocolate Thief

Merry Christmas to all! We've been celebrating the holidays the last few days with plenty of food (the diet starts next week!) and just being together. It's been wonderful to have both of my daughters home this year.

Last night we decided to go out to see "Les Miserables" which opened yesterday in movie theatres. Great show! Loved the acting and the singing. I remembered the songs from seeing the theatre production many years ago. "Les Miserables" remains one of my top favorite musicals of all time.

Returning home after three hours (yes, the show is that long), we were greeted by a scene of devastation in our living room. Ripped wrapping paper and torn boxes once containing chocolates were strewn over the floor. The culprit - our dog Lou, a notorious chocoholic. In our rush to get to the movie, we'd neglected to put the opened chocolate up high where she couldn't get at it, and left it instead on the coffee table. She cleaned out two chocolate boxes that were almost empty, one box we'd just opened, and an unopened 'chocolate orange' (a solid ball of orange flavored milk chocolate the size of an orange). All that was left were the empty boxes and a dog with a guilty expression.

We really should have known better. The same thing occurred a few Christmases back when the dog ate an entire box of expensive Belgian chocolates given to us by a friend. Back then I'd phoned our veterinary clinic and was advised that chocolate could be toxic to dogs. I was told to give Lou a teaspoon of hydrogen peroxide to make her throw up.

So guess what I was doing last night? Cleaning up after the dog. Merry Christmas to me.

On the bright side, this morning I found the chocolate orange that we thought she'd eaten yesterday. She'd taken it out of the box and then carried it into my office where she'd hidden it behind a box, presumably to finish later. Aside from a couple of teeth marks on the foil wrapper, it was totally intact.



Lou, the notorious chocolate thief

Note to self: next Christmas hide all the chocolate. Otherwise, make sure to have plenty of hydrogen peroxide on hand.

LASR Stuff Your Stocking with Books Blogfest!

Long and Short Reviews is once again sponsoring the Stuff Your Stocking with Books Blogfest from December 17 to 21, 2012. My post, a Christmas short story called "The Christmas Wish", will go live at 2:00 pm on December 17. Here's the link:

http://lasrguest.blogspot.com/2012/12/stuff-your-stocking-blogfest-jana.html

One random commentor on the post will win a PDF copy of my contemporary romantic comedy "Rescue Me". I'd love to see you there so comment away!

Please remember the post won't go live until 2 in the afternoon. I hope you enjoy my story!

Secret Santa Blog Hop!

My Dog Loves Winter!

My dog is a winter dog. Lou is a Pug/Terrier cross, and like other Pugs (or part Pugs), she tends to overheat. In the summer, we have to make sure to take her out for her walks early in the morning before it gets too hot, or late at night after it cools down. If she gets too hot, she'll pant, stop numerous times in the shade, roll around in the cool grass. Eventually, she'll just stop walking, too hot to move another inch. I've found myself carrying her home before I figured out that she didn't do well in the heat. Trust me, twenty-five pounds of overheated dog is really heavy when you have carry her home several blocks!

So Lou loves cold weather, probably much more than I do. Luckily for her we live in Winnipeg, Canada and have many days of cold weather and plenty of snow. It's funny to watch her jump through the snow with her short little legs. She's so short, and sometimes the snow in our back yard is so deep, that we have to break trail for her so she can do her business, either by walking through the snow ourselves, or by blowing a path with the snowblower.

It's ironic that in summer she meanders along, stopping to sniff everything, and taking her sweet time getting anywhere, while in the winter she pulls me down the icy streets at breakneck speed. I'm barely able to keep upright. But Lou is always up for a walk, so I've learned to put cleats on my winter boots and keep on going.

If it gets too cold, like minus 15 Celius or colder, Lou has trouble walking. Hey, if you had to walk around barefoot in the snow at that temperature you'd have trouble too! So we put on her boots and her coat. She's not crazy about getting dressed up, but once she gets outside, she happily frolics in the snow wearing her ensemble!

This winter promises to be a cold one, but Lou and I will dress up warm and brave the weather together. And together this Christmas we'll greet our guests and enjoy a wonderful Christmas dinner. Lou especially likes the turkey innerds (gizzards, hearts, livers), which I am more than happy to part with!

I haven't decided what to put in Lou's Christmas stocking this year. Maybe it will be a chew toy or maybe she'll get dog treats. She doesn't really care as long as her people are around her giving her lots of love. Which is exactly the way it should be.

All the best this Christmas from Jana and Lou. Stay warm and enjoy the snow!

Here's my question about my post:  What's Lou's favorite Christmas treat?
To be eligible to win my prize, a PDF copy of my latest release, "Home Fires", please comment  on this post. Winner of prize will be chosen at random from all comments received.

And don't forget about at the grand prize being awarded at the Secret Santa Blog Hop - a Kindle Fire HD to be given away December 20! Remember, you've got three ways to get entries to win the Kindle Fire; answer my question, follow my blog, or comment on my post. You don't have to do all of these things, but each one gets you an entry. Make sure you let Carey know what you've done in order to win. Contact Carey at careydoucet@yahoo.com

Here's a blurb from my prize, "Home Fires":

Anne Wakefield travels halfway around the world for love. But when she arrives in Canada from England at the end of World War Two, she discovers the handsome Canadian pilot she’d fallen in love with has married someone else. Heartbroken, she prepares to return to London, though she has nothing left there to return to. Her former fiancé’s mother makes a suggestion: marriage to her other son.

Badly wounded and scarred during the war, Erik Gustafson thinks he’s a poor substitute for his brother. Although he loves Anne almost from the first time he sees her, he cannot believe she would ever be able to love him as he is – especially as he might be after another operation on his bad leg.  Anne sees the beauty of his heart. The cold prairie winter may test her courage, but can she prove to Erik that her love for him is real?

To read an excerpt from "Home Fires", please go to my website. "Home Fires" can be purchased from my publisher, The Wild Rose Press.

So tell Carey whether you've commented, followed my blog or answered my question at careydoucet@yahoo.com To do some more blog hopping, hop on back to Tabby's Nocternal Nights. Happy Hopping!