Hope everyone had a good Valentine's Day :D Danny and I celebrated Saturday. Just stayed in with alcohol, video games, Magic: the Gathering, and movies.

I've made lame money the last few shifts at work. Here's hoping the weekend will be better, because we'll need the money. Haven't heard back from Baka, our real estate agent, in a few days. Last we heard, the bank's figuring out the amount left due on the loan for the place so they can come back with a counter offer. I hope they get to it very soon. We need to get the heck out of this place.

School is hectic. Well, life in general. Internship 8-4 Monday through Friday, with an hour-long commute--though I do tend to leave around 3 fairly often to get to work/uni class/mandatory seminars. Three days a week at Hard Times--generally Monday and Friday evening, plus either Saturday or Sunday. Tuesday evening class at the university. Tutoring Shane on Wednesday. And a seminar about every other week on Thursday in a random location.

Teaching is good. I vastly prefer math and reading to science or social studies. I look at science and I'm just kind of like... "What am I going to do, exactly?" There's so much to choose from, but so little time to teach it. I'm taking over science now (slowly), so it's... blah. But reading is really good. It's so freeform you can do almost anything. And the kids are really taking to their writing journals. They love getting feedback.

I had to leave early today for my IUD appointment. I am the proud owner of a Mirena IUD that cramped like a bitch for the first couple hours. It wasn't super painful, just like really heavy duty menstrual cramps. But really gross since they had me come in and get it done on my period; apparently it hurts less then. I guess it's nice of them to consider my pain over their probable preference to not have to stick their hands in a bleeding vagina. For the next week I have to use backup protection, but then I'm good for five years. What what.

Also, I'm getting published. Alt Hist picked up Death in Theatre for its second issue. It's a new magazine, but it's been reviewed by Locus, among others, so it's getting good press. So that's looking up. Not that I've been writing. I'm really busy lately and feel pretty drained, and I'd rather not write unless I really feel like it because forcing myself to in the midst of all my other crap would just not be pleasant.

And I thought I did terribly on my Praxis II tests for Middle School Math and English, but I passed with flying colors. So I'll be qualified to teach middle school, either math or English--in theory at least. I'll be applying everywhere in Montgomery County (and possibly Howard too... or maybe Anne Arundel... depends on where we're living and such...) and then weeding through my options to figure out what I want to do. Because I really don't have any desire to teach science or social studies, but I want to teach math AND reading, so... blah. Makes a choice between middle and elementary school complicated.

Guess that's it for now? I mean, I've been reading--the Uglies series by Scott Westerfeld and now I'm working on the Mortal Instruments series by Cassandra Clare--but eh. That's it. Overall life's good, just hectic and somewhat stressful.

Oh wait! Mirage Games accepted my response to the first work order they sent me and sent me confirmation of the credits earned, but I haven't heard about anything else forthcoming. So that's kind of sad.

I'm thinking I should rewrite "Unjoined" and try submitting it to WotF again. I believe I've heard of revised entries winning in subsequent years... but it would have to be notably different, I'm sure. Well, of course I can't find anything about it now. But it's worth trying. The worst they can do is reject it, and then I can try it elsewhere.

I'm really excited about Rebel Tales, Holly Lisle's new writing ezine project. It sounds really great--she's building it from the ground up on her own money so it'll be debt-free once it opens for submissions. It'll have six-month "seasons," of which the first issue will be free and subsequent issues will cost money. There will be a regular pass and a Back Stage Pass, the latter allowing access to just about everything you could ever want to know about the process that goes into writing, submitting, and accepting the stories in the zine--great for aspiring writers to see. Seasons stay "in print" until they stop being profitable, and writers keep making money as long as their season is "in print." There's no advance, just a percentage of sales the whole way through. It goes based on the six-month season; there are 60 "credits" in a season, and submitting one story for one issue earns you one point, but that's 1/60th of the total gross profit of the ezine over the six-month season. If you write a six-episode serial for the season, that's 1/10th of the gross profit. Even the editors and publisher (Lisle herself) only make 1/10th of the profit each starting out, although Lisle has admitted that she will increase it if she needs to because her share goes toward funding things like author interviews and cover art, and she has to meet costs.

Anyway, it sounds like a truly worthwhile project, and I'll definitely be subscribing when it opens and spreading it by word of mouth. And if a revised Unjoined doesn't place in WotF, then I'll try it at Rebel Tales once it opens its doors to submissions. Waiting on a response from WotF would give plenty of time for RT to open up and maybe even get some steam behind it before I try submitting.

Umm. Uni classes are annoying as ever. But tomorrow is the internship, so yay. ALSO. Danny got approved for a home loan with zero down. Well, technically closing costs aren't covered, but apparently it's not uncommon practice to make an agreement with the seller that they increase the cost of the home by the amount of the closing costs so that your loan covers the costs over time, but the seller pays the immediate costs knowing that they'll be paid back for it. So. We're looking at a home in Columbia. There was a nice one pretty nearby, but it went into contract very recently, and anyway apparently it turned out as having some sort of mold problem. (Yes, we will check out any house and have it inspected before we buy.) Cousin Justin and his girlfriend are down for moving in and paying rent (which is the only way we'll be able to afford the place this early since I don't have a full-time job yet).

Erm, I guess that's it for now.

Okay so.

I submitted Unjoined to Clarkesworld Magazine. The queue moves quickly; when I submitted a few days ago I my submission was listed somewhere above 100, and at the moment it's at 15. But the magazine has limited space. Only two stories a month, and of these only one is from new talent/the submissions system. Sooo, I'm hoping.

I'm rereading Orson Scott Card's How to Write Science Fiction and Fantasy, and it's giving me a lot of food for thought. Right now I'm struggling with the MICE quotient--the idea that your story is either a Milieu, Idea, Character, or Event story. Obviously any one story can have components of more than one of these, but the beginning and end of the story is determined by which one of these ultimately fits your story. If it's a Milieu story, it starts with an outsider arriving in a novel land, and ends with him either leaving or choosing to stay. If it's an Idea story, it starts with a question or problems that needs to be solved, and ends with it being answered. If it's a Character story, it starts with a character beginning to change and grow from the place they are now, and ends when they've completed the change/found an acceptable place for themselves. If it's an Event story, it begins with the main character in a world that's been disturbed/wronged in some way, and ends with this character fixing the disturbance and setting the world to rights.

Soooo, I'm having trouble not just determining which one of these I need for my story, but also which one some other stories fit into. Like I suppose... Mistborn is an Event story. That's easy enough, I think; Vin and the other characters are the crew that will finally "fix" the world from the way the Lord Ruler and Ruin left it. But the one I just read, The Dead-Tossed Waves (which was really good by the way)? I'm not so sure. It starts with Gabry's world changing, being placed into upheaval, when she's finally convinced to leave the safety of her town and it goes all wrong when she and her friends are attacked by a Breaker--a super-fast zombie. But it doesn't end with her righting her world. There are still zombies, and she leaves the safety of home behind, probably permanently. She certainly grows up, though... so perhaps it's a Character story, except she doesn't precisely choose the change she goes through. It's kind of forced on her.

I'm being hopeless and rethinking Blood and Heat again. Kind of... seeing what would change if I focused on making it an Event or Idea or Character story. (It's definitely not Milieu.) Hm. It's in a state of flux right now. We'll see how it settles. Maybe nothing will change. No idea yet.

Blah.

Okay so. I'll try to make this a long update post. I'll also try to separate it into sections of, you know, interest. So if you feel like reading something in particular, you know where to go. Lol.

Outside the cut: bigger events. Such as.

Job Interview: I have a casual interview on Monday at noon (on campus) for a tutoring position that starts at $12/hour. I'm excited about it. They got back to me right away after I submitted my info. I figured I was a ringer for the position; it required a 3.5 or higher, and I have a 3.633, plus I'm an Elementary Education major. Despite that, I wasn't really expecting to hear back. I am always suspicious of online applications. ( Continuing this, plus other work crap. )

Writers of the Future: No big news. I submitted, though, to the quarter ending September 30th. I submitted an edited version of Unjoined. I'm having all these doubts about it now, but I'm also very hopeful. I think in a lot of ways it's better than Moonfall, and that one got Honorable Mention. To be honest, I'd be pleased with semi-finalist or finalist (whichever one gets their manuscripts edited by the judges), though of course I'm really hoping to win overall. Who isn't? I just found out that in addition to the prize money, they pay you a pro rate for being published in the anthology! How nice is that? Even being a published finalist would be nice. No prize money, but you get paid the pro rate and they fly you out to the weeklong workshop in August. ( more writing hullabaloo )

( school )

I think that's it, and good thing because Dennis and Heather are here to get their party on. Lol.