Spin

Some days I do not want to leave my bed. I love my bed. Very old, wrought iron "campaign" bed. (I do not know why they call it that, but I saw a picture of one like it in Arch. Digest and it had a bunch of weird chains on it and said it folded and was a civil war campaign bed.  Strange, since it is very pretty.) Any way, all cotton blankets, sheets and quilts. Favorite stuff that I indulge myself in.  Little enough of that going on, guys.  But, as usual, I digress.  (I will have to find a phrase to replace that.  It is getting very old, even to me.)

Sometimes I can let the littlest thing get me down so  bad, so far down, definitely inordinately so. Other days, like the second half of yesterday, and so far, all of today, I am kind of high. And the tiniest thing can get me so high, no, not ALWAYS a pill, guys.   I am being a bit figurative here.  I know it is my nature, and sometimes I hate it, but usually I enjoy it.  It is like Chicago.  Chicagoans are rabid in their love for their city, but it is never the same for very long.  They say if you don't like the weather in Chicago, just wait a minute cuz it will change.  Maybe that is why they love it.  So I am at peace with the way I am.  Good thing cuz it is way too late to alter it.

Anyway, one thing I notice is that, more and more, I am able to mentally adjust my take on things to feed a certain mood. I wonder if I have always done this and everyone else knows it, but I am just now noticing it.  The first time someone said something negative about my writing I felt so weird, like a little bit sick with that hot forehead thing. You would not think at my age I would have a fragile ego, and it is a damn shame that I do.  So, it took a while to see that the person was not criticizing my writing or even my choices.  He was criticizing the lifestyle of the characters which means I created characters.  It was the first time I realized that and it was a watershed moment.  Now you couldn't stop me if you wanted to.  I have had enough said at this point that I am totally able to be perfectly at ease with what I say and how I say it. So I poke around looking for reviews, but mostly looking for sales and perusing reviews if they are present.  Barnes and Noble, for some reason, gets me the most readership.  I have a strange feeling it is because of this interesting interaction I had with a gentleman that works at Barnes and Noble, but I may be wrong. It may just be part of the natural order of things and beyond my control.  So I got a pretty nice review from someone on B&N and felt good and was glad someone "got" me.  My only requirement.  Steal the book out of the back of my car as long as you read it and "get" it.

Then, this morning, my daughter was taking a terribly long time in the Sprint store getting a replacement phone.  In unexpected idle moments such as this I like to go up to any device in the store (Best Buy is fun.) that has browser access and look up my books and leave the picture of my cover on display.  Sometimes I even say to whomever is nearby, "This is my book," but Francesca gets put off when I talk to strangers. (Loony mom syndrome.)  I booted up B&N and there was a new review.  One star.  Very long.  He was furious with Jenny.  He offered all kinds of recommendations about how she could improve the moral quality of her life and how the gentlemen involved were nuts to put up with it and it could never happen (which I adamantly counter with "Oh, yes it can") and immediately I noticed that he said nothing about my style and was so invested in my characters it had strongly affected him  He said he read it in six  hours  and wished he had the six hours back.  Um. . . You could have put it down after twenty minutes or so. Why didn't you?

I found the whole one star review immensely flattering and gave it a five star rating. Still waiting for that "right" person to read it, though.

Today's CTA: what do you think about this whole cell phone, iPad, computer, TV morphing thing?