"Where are we going and why am I in this handbasket?"

The title of today's blog comes from another of the t-shirts in the catalogue that my parents used to order the t-shirt I got for Christmas (see yesterday's entry). But it pretty much sums up what's going on. I need to get organized. I've been sloughing off lately, I think just the let down of so much activity all at once in the fall. I don't have anything out there to agents or publishers and yet I have three, count them three, manuscripts sitting at home. None of them are the final, finished product, but close enough that I should be thinking about making final edits and getting them out there!!! If I'm going to make this my career, I need to start treating certain aspects of it in a more career-like way. Like setting actual deadlines. I don't do that for writing. That stresses me out. But for sending out queries and such. Otherwise, because I don't like that aspect of the business, I tend to put it off and do the fun stuff instead, writing!

So, my goal for tomorrow is to come up with a list of activities outside of writing but associated with it and get some deadlines set for them. Doing this is actually the only way I ever got motivated to start sending out letters for The Silver Spoon. My husband, tired of hearing me talk about how the book wasn't ready yet, suggested that I set a date and try to reach it. And yeah, there was a bet involved. I won : ) The Silver Spoon went out to my first readers in October of that year.

Okay, whew. Deep breath. I have a feeling I'm going to have to talk myself through this one : )