Monday, October 15, 2012

Wrangling Teenagers

What did you do last weekend?  I took five teen aged girls to a Boy Scout jamboree.  I win.

Actually, it was a lot of fun, and there was minimal drama, but I did come back with a fair amount of plot fodder, should I decide to start writing YA. 

First some background:  I am an associate advisor for a Venture Crew, which is a division of Boy Scouts for older teens, and is Co-Ed.  We do high adventure stuff like whitewater rafting, climbing and rappelling, backpacking...none of which are things that I'm really geared towards, but I'm trying to get in touch with my inner badass and get my 14 YO daughter off the couch, so there you go. 

Anyway.

The Troop that we're associated with graciously allowed us to bulldoze our way along to Peterloon, which means...I don't know what the heck Peterloon means.  But it's an event where 6100 scouts and a few adults go and spend the weekend doing scouty things. 

I ran into exactly two other crews that had girls, and there were only 2-3 girls per crew, so we had the most girls there.  I was a little nervous about keeping track of my girls, so I went a little Victorian Nanny on them, not letting anyone out of my sight without another girl in tow, but I needn't have worried.  The boys in our Crew peed in circles around them, so they were safe, at least from outside attack. 

I did run into a few things that I need to remind them of before the next trip:

1) The cool trick where you can change your bra under your t-shirt is indeed cool, but it still should be done out of the view of 60 boys. 

2) It's never a good idea to put the flashlight down in the middle of the tent before you change clothes, as there is a silhouette thing that happens.

3) You may not sit on the lap of any boy in camp, even if he's not your boyfriend and you don't like him that way.  Really.  And using his knees as a back rest when you aren't sitting on his lap is a no-go, too. 

I can't wait to be briefed on back country feminine hygeine before our next trip...

Wednesday, October 10, 2012

How Many Swords Can I Throw Myself On Today?

ARGH! 

So, I got to work this morning and realized I've made a huge, expensive, too late to change it MISTAKE.  I ordered the wrong stuff for an experiment, and it's a no-refund kind of a thing.  I said some bad words, then went to fess up to my boss.  Who is a saint.  She is really, really mad at me, but she didn't throw anything at me or fire me, or curse at me (at least not in front of me). 

BUT BEFORE I REALIZED THIS MISTAKE, I did some laundry at home.  Before I was down to my last pair of panties without holes in them.  I thought I was really being a good kid.  Then I took the wet stuff out of the washer, and this is how it went:

Me:  Hey, what's that in the little groove inside the door?
 
Other Me:  Huh.  Looks like you left your lip balm in your pants.
 
Me:  Crap! 
 
Other Me: That's okay, the lid's still on it.  No harm, no foul. But look, there's something else in there.
 
Me:  Crap!  It's my flash drive, which contains the semi-revised first draft of my first ever completed first draft. 
 
Other Me:  Well, that's okay, it's your back up, right?  Right?
 
Me:  Ummm.  Well, yes, but it's the back up for my laptop, which, as we know, erased itself the other day.
 
Other Me:  It might be time to rethink that whole sobriety thing. 
 
So that's how my day is going.  How are things in your neck of the woods? 
 
(The good news is, I just plugged the flash drive into my desktop at work, and my files are still there, and I re-backed them up!)

Thursday, October 4, 2012

Getting Geared Up

Hey!  I know, you prolly aren't out there any more, since my brilliant and relevant posts have dropped off so dramatically, but whatevah, here I am today!

I'm getting fired up for this year's NaNoWriMo.  I'm outlining. I joined a Bootcamp group over at Savvy Authors.

 I'm exploring writing software.  Not neccessarily because I think it's gonna make me a more organized, productive writer as such, but like a diet, if I invest money in something and master the learning curve, I'm more likely to power through.  Okay, it doesn't usually work for diets, but it worked for my computerized sewing machine and my iPhone.

Do any of you use special writing software?  If so, what kind and what do you like and dislike about it?

Bueller? Bueller?