I'd forgotten how much it sucks to be at work this week.

Yes, I am at work. *sigh* I've done this to myself several times now. I think, "Hey, it'll be kind of cool because no one will be here, so why waste the vacation day?" But here's the thing: I'm always, always WRONG when I think this. There are just enough people to call/email you with questions and set up meetings. Just enough people to annoy you by trying to shove difficult projects through before the end of the year. ARRRGGHH! Kick me next year, if I say that I'm going to work this week.

So, the end of another year. I'm always very anxious round about this time. I liked this current year, wouldn't mind doing it over again, especially with the foreknowledge of events to make it even better. 2005 looms unknown, unpredictable and SCARY. However, this year my age is an odd number so that usually seems to work out okay for me. Don't ask. I don't know why I think this. Actually, maybe I do. I was seventeen the year that the torture known as high school ended. I met some of my dearest friends when I was seventeen. Met my husband and had the best year of college when I was nineteen. I completed four of them, years of college, I mean. My sophomore year was just the best one. When I turned twenty one, I got to go to bars legally and I got a job (okay, so maybe not such a hot year that one). Twenty three, I got married : ) Twenty five...I can't even remember. Isn't that sad? Twenty seven, I started sending out The Silver Spoon to agents and publishers. Getting published (year 28) was a whole separate dream coming true. Just getting it to the point where I felt brave enough to send out was huge for me.

It's weird for me to think that just last year at this time, I was on pins and needles because two, count them two, publishers had asked for a full of my manuscript. One of them even emailing me on New Year's Eve to ask for it. : ) Wow. How much has happened in a year!

No such luck this year. I don't have any queries out there as I don't have anything that's quite ready yet. Mainly because instead of going back and fixing things, I keep starting new stuff. Yeah, not the brightest thing to do. But I'm working on it -- trying to figure out how to revise Bitter Pill and writing the outline/synopsis for the sequel to The Silver Spoon.

Hope you all had a wonderful Christmas! Among my gifts, a book about debunking linguistic urban legends (so cool!), a t-shirt that says, "So many books, so little time" (so true!) and a beautiful, engraved picture frame with my name and "author" beneath it for book signings and such (so needed!)