LifePundit

How to Increase Writing Productivity

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One reason I've really enjoyed The Biggest Loser is because I'm part of a team and I've made a commitment to show up. Nothing too remarkable about that while you have it and it's working for you. A really big deal, though, when you don't have it and you need it.

So somebody challenged me to use those same principles in my novel writing. Get a team going and make sure that I show up. Believe it or not, I've figured out a way.

Here's how it works: you probably forgot (and maybe I never wrote about) my accountability partner, a freelance writer who lives in the country in circumstances similar to mine out in Oklahoma. For two years this coming January, she and I have e-mailed each other every morning with our plans and goals for the workday, primarily to hold each other accountable in our fiction writing. We've only spoken twice and have never met, yet we know almost everything about each other and have become close friends. I think she has seen my photo but I've never seen hers. 

So we've tried a daring experiment. We have an appointed time every morning, which we call our Sacred Time, when we show up at our desks and do nothing but write fiction. Together. Usually with our cats. Except we've entered a strange new level: we have Skype video calls going while we writ. Yes, she can see me working and I can see her working, and nobody better get up from that chair until our two hours are over. (Though sometimes we have to excuse ourselves to let the cats in and out. That's the only allowed excuse. That and answering the door for people bringing checks, which has only happened once and unfortunately it wasn't for me.)

It felt very awkward at first. We don't talk to each other, we e-mail. So we didn't really know how to carry on a conversation, made worse by the fact that talking on Skype is like talking on a walkie-talkie. We've almost started to end our sentences with radio jargon so the other person will know it's okay to talk, but we don't know radio jargon.

I no longer feel like I'm here working by myself (unless you count the cat). Somebody notices if I goof off or my butt doesn't stay in chair, and I'm really enjoying the silent companionship. At the end of the session we tell how many words we have written and whether it was easy or hard.

Sometimes we'll follow up with an e-mail, which is useful because we now use our regular e-mails to each other as ways to answer our own questions by writing them down. I've learned so much from her and rely on her to help prop me up when I need propping, and I hope I do the same for her.

Everywhere I Look, There's a Waist

A little more than a month to go in my gym's Biggest Loser competition, and I saw something today I haven't seen before:

My teammates all have waists! They didn't have them last week. And they're wearing skimpier (but not skimpy) clothing, as if they no longer need to hide under baggy stuff.

Very exciting. 

I have yet to watch the Biggest Loser on TV. It couldn't possibly be as good as seeing women I've come to know doing their best and getting results. I think we should all go bench press a Volkswagen to celebrate. Then have a cookie.

When You Diet, Your Brain is the First Place to Lose Weight

I'd have blogged more lately but I didn't have enough brain cells left to do it. When you diet, your brain is the first place where you'll lose weight. Mine's now down to the size of a cat's.

The rest of me looks the same, and I figure when the rest of my brain is gone, maybe I'll start to lose weight in visible places. 

The honeymoon with my gym's Biggest Loser competition is over, but I'm still showing up and doing my best. And I'm still feeling very much the winner. 

No matter what my outsides look like, I had a great moment three weeks into this that will keep me going until the end. And maybe even beyond.

Here's what happened: I'd picked up two 50-lb. bags of horse feed and had them in my car for Paul to take to the barn. He forgot to do it so they were still in my car the next morning. It had rained overnight, the horses were hungry and the wheelbarrow was too wet to use (horse feed grows toxins when it gets wet). Groan! How was I going to get the food to the barn?

Horse feed is heavy, there's no where to grab it and if you're not careful it gets out of balance and goes where it wants, usually as I'm struggling to pour it into the feed bin so it goes all over the floor. 

I thought about wrangling a bag into the house and using it from there, but there are many reasons that's not a great idea. So I picked up a bag, not really knowing what I was going to do with it. It wasn't as heavy as I remembered. So I started walking toward the barn. It wasn't really heavy at all, and I easily controlled it. Hot dog! I have super powers! I even dumped it in the feed bin with no trouble.

The horses were happy. And I was even happier. 

So what if I'm too tired to do anything and I hurt all the time? So what if I'm eating eggs whites for breakfast (is there anything less appetizing?). I can do more than I used to do. And that is an awesome new development. 

But don't tell Paul. No reason he shouldn't get a little exercise hauling feed bags around. 

There is Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough in the House!

Going into my third week of the Biggest Loser. It turns out it's a full-time job. First, there's the turning up at the gym at the appointed time. Always a challenge. Our trainers are so serious they've added a half-hour to our workout so we have to turn up a half-hour early three days a week. That makes for three 90-minute workouts.

Then there's the homework. We're supposed to be working up to 90 minutes of aerobic activity each day that we don't train with as a team. I have not succeeded at this but have worked up to an hour.

Worst of all is the eating. There are more bad things about eating -- or not eating -- than I can count. One is that you have to do it six times a day, so you're faced with making good choices all day long. (Surely it is easier to quit smoking where you can just avoid cigarettes and eat chocolate chip cookie dough all day instead.)

Then there are other bad things about eating: planning, going grocery shopping and cooking. Yesterday I was so sick of thinking about food that I handed Lily my official Biggest Loser cookbook and told her to pick out three meals. So we're having Italian, Italian and Mexican this week. (Italian with whole wheat and protein noodles and probably not many of them.)

My poor family. I needed to make up for this, so now there is chocolate chip cookie dough in the house. So far I haven't touched it other than to pay for it. Chocolate chip cookies, whether cooked or raw, are my favorite thing. Yes, I know somebody died from raw cookie dough. At least then I wouldn't have to work out anymore. If I ever get suicidal, that's my weapon of choice.

Everything hurts. I have to use the handrail to walk down stairs. My behind hurts from the spin class, where I'm glad we weren't going anywhere or they would have left me on the side of the road. No, excuse me. At the bottom of the mountain.

Then they took us outside and made us run up and down an actual hill. A big hill with a lot of history, where Sherman's troops came to burn down a powerful Confederate general's mansion. Of course I wasn't thinking about that. I was thinking about how I had chocolate chip cookie dough at home in the refrigerator.

I'm feeling better and I'm proud of how hard I'm working. But my schedule is completely out of whack. No time for paying work. No time for writing the novel. No time for anything but working hard, planning meals with little food involved and driving carpool and to various after-school lessons. I think even the horses are losing weight (just kidding -- they have giant hay bellies because nobody has time to ride).

I can do anything for ten more weeks. With joy and gratitude.

But somebody had better go eat that cookie dough soon or it might be me.

Only Eleven Weeks Left

In spite of the fact that today is a holiday, our Biggest Loser coaches expected us to show up for our team workout. This meant that I missed the barbecue and dessert party at the pool. She busted our behinds and did it with a lovely smile and a great deal of passion. I doubt I could work my jaws to eat barbecue and dessert right now.

I couldn't be having more fun and had a very happy weigh-in. My team members are interesting, my coaches are great and this all feels shiny and new.

I'm writing this before I collapse in a heap. First off, there's a great free web site for exercise and diet information that I've started using. Lance Armstrong's Livestrong. Makes it easier to keep my exercise and nutrition diary, which I have to show to my leader every time I see her. She's very kind about it and makes suggestions that sometimes make me very happy, such as that I'm not eating often enough. I'm to eat every 2.5 hours and never go beyond 3 hours before eating. No pie or cake was mentioned, however.

I'm learning about perspective, too. Before she released us and I got to crawl out of the door to finally leave, she gave us a pep talk. She said, "Ladies, we've only got 11 weeks left so you really have to start working hard."

A short time to her. A lifetime for those of us dead on the floor.

The Biggest Loser Turns Out to be Fun

It's either go tackle Paul's leftover birthday cake (which I have resisted), eat those cookies I bought for Lily and her friends' after school snack, go crazy or blog.

I know I've been missing, and if there's anyone who missed me, I'm grateful for you. Lily has started high school and I have so very much I could say but since she reads my blog I'll just say...nothing.

No, I'll say this: thank God she went to the single-gender middle school and got her confidence, sense of self and a strengthened sense of independence from peer pressure built up. I'm not sure that sentence says what I want it to say but I need a cookie. Maybe the whole bag. Maybe I'll go trick-or-treating in my neighborhood this very night and see what I can beg from my friends. 

I am hungry. Starved. I hurt all over. And I'm on the first week of The Biggest Loser at my local gym. 

No, we're not on TV. I wouldn't do that. Blogging about it is as far as I'll go. I'm not the size I like me to be, I'm not fit and my blood work at my last appointment could have been better. So, after much belly-button gazing -- combined with the realization that my belly button could use some buttoning up -- I cautiously signed up for the Biggest Loser. I didn't want to tell anyone. I'm not Big Big. I may not even be Medium Big. I might be Small Big. But I'm bigger than I ought to be and too big to be happy about my bigness. 

Did I say that I'm really hungry and that I hurt all over? I haven't been hungry before today, but I spent my calories foolishly earlier in the day so I'm paying for it now. I could eat, but where's the fun in that?

(I know all about the fun in that. I'm trying to persuade myself.) I'm a team player and I'm not going to eat because my team wants to win.

And I hurt, how I hurt. I've been told I will hurt for the next three weeks. Then I'll hurt less. This kind of hurting almost feels good. At least until I try to stand up or do anything that involves more than blinking my eyelids.

I get plenty of food in theory. It's balanced and not some crazy diet, and I'm supposed to eat six meals a day, which is a lot harder than you might think to squeeze in. I'm a little shocked that I'm not supposed to have watermelon. During the summer I cut up watermelon and keep chunks in a container for what I thought was healthy snacking. But I'm following the rules. No watermelon means no watermelon. I'm dying for watermelon. They're in season. The diet is supposed to keep your blood sugar even so you don't have peaks and valleys and watermelon has too much sugar.  Okay. I'll play. I can do anything for 12 weeks. But watermelon? I'll miss you. 

We're the purple team. Our reasons for being there are all different. Some people don't really need to be there, some are trying to get off that last 60 pounds, and some have serious health issues that run in their families and they're trying to outrun them. Good for all of us. 

Each team leader has what must be a serious incentive to have his or her team win. It must be a ticket to heaven, because these people are motivated motivators. For my leader, that means we're supposed to come 30 minutes earlier and work our butts off past quitting time. She even is throwing in extra workouts every week, beyond what I thought I was getting. It sounded expensive when I signed up -- about $37 per week for 12 weeks (on top of monthly membership fees), but I'm getting at least three personal training sessions (though in a small group setting), nutritional help and guidance and lots of pep talks, friendly e-mail reminders and a phone number I can call anytime for moral support. 

Paul says I'm the most excited he's ever seen me. It feels good to be a part of a winning team -- no matter where we end up.

And it's funny, too. I know I'm competitive (as in, "I want to win") when it comes to horse back riding, but I didn't think I was that competitive otherwise. Wrong. Two team members came to the workout late yesterday. I realized I was pissed at them. I can't believe this is me. 

I'd tell you more but I'd have to have a cookie to go on any longer, so I think I'll just go to bed. Hungry. And be grateful that this is a hunger I chose.

How a Passion for Global Warming will Help My Child Make the Right Decisions in High School

Here comes a rant. But first, a little background. Lily starts high school a week from today. She's going to be slammed with difficult courses (and some easy ones), a monstrously big new school, the need to make new friends since none from her middle school are going to this school, and the difficult choices that face our teenagers.

Already she's feeling the pressure to join a high school sorority. They have lots of parties and underage drinking. (The answer is "no" on the sororities until I find out better things than I have already heard.) Whether she joins a sorority or not, she'll have many opportunities to make good and bad choices.

She was supposed to go on a Presbyterian-sponsored high school retreat for all of last week, but came down with a stomach bug and couldn't go. The kids that went had a great time and I'm sorry she missed out.

Or I was sorry, until I got an e-mail about the retreat encouraging us parents to follow up on the things that they learned about at this "World on Fire" retreat, such as global warming.

No matter what you think about global warming, is this the biggest danger facing my teenager? Will it keep her from getting pregnant or contracting an STD? Will it help her evaluate her choices in light of what she believes and the potential consequences of those choices? Will knowledge of global warming, which is now the spiritual center of our secular society, draw her closer to the real God who created her?

I am a global warming skeptic who believes that it is our Christian duty to be good stewards of the earth. But even if I thought global warming was something other than iffy science that makes Al Gore rich, I'd still be dumbfounded that with all the challenges our teenagers face that they are asking us parents to help our children decide how they are going to change their lives based on what they learned about global warming at the church conference.

I chose became a member of the Presbyterian denomination because it has an intellectual tradition and tries to educate its members on how to think for themselves. I love it that I can ask my minister a question and get told six possible ways of looking at multiple answers without getting told what "the answer" is. I do hope we haven't fallen into group-think.

So the retreat prepared the kids for high school by trying to get them motivated to do something about global warming. Last week Lily was home throwing up. After hearing this, I think I'll do the same.

But maybe Lily will find her knowledge of global warming useful. "No thank you. No ecstasy for me. It's too hot in here. Global warming, you know."

Or, "I'd love to sit out here in the car and have sex with you, but we need to watch our carbon footprint and it's too hot to turn the air conditioning off. Global warming, you know"

Or, "No, I won't text you the answers. Uses too much energy. We have to be careful of global warming, you know."

Better go before I throw off enough steam to raise the atmosphere by several degrees.

Purring vs. Snoring

I had an epiphany last night. Somebody snores and I find it very difficult to sleep for the racket. There may be a CPAP machine in somebody's future. (Either that or I may move to the guest room.)

But last night Dylan, our new kitten, got in bed with us and snuggled up next to my ear. He purred so loudly that it drowned out the snoring. It was such a happy, comforting sound -- perhaps better than listening to the ocean. I went back to sleep soaked in happy purring.

So, why not, instead of a CPAP machine or other device, they figure out a way to turn human snoring into human purring? (Photo of Lily wearing Dylan as a purr hat.)

Survivors

Today is my father's 97th birthday. My mother is also 97. Today is their 73rd anniversary. They each had serious cancers decades ago. My father spent five years in the army during WWII. They survived the 1918 flu pandemic, the Great Depression, poverty, prosperity, three kids and living under Jimmy Carter, though I doubt they'll survive Obama. 

They've both been "kicked out" of hospice care for failing to die. 

My mother has Alzheimer's. He believes she knows what's going on around her. I do not. My father has a cracked pelvis. He's going to therapy and is determined to walk again. The Lowman Home is trying to get them a room together.

Attitude is everything. 

Duty to Die

I've said it myself walking the halls of my parents' nursing home: shoot me before I get like this.

I've told Lily that when I turn 92 to get me a green Thoroughbred colt to ride -- a 2-year-old who hasn't yet been raced -- and I'll ride him in a lightning storm. She noted that the this plan wasn't fair to the horse, who would also die from the lightning strike. I figure I wouldn't get that far before I would be up in the clouds myself. My doctor has already recommended I switch from Thoroughbreds to Quarter Horses. A 2-year-old Thoroughbred ought to work very nicely, thank you.

My father has told me that something bad happens to you between age 92 and 94. Yes, getting old isn't for sissies. But that doesn't mean that those of us who make it that far have a duty to die.

I normally like to be comfortably informed about what I write about here, but since Obama has lowered that standard by speaking about the Gates' affair ("I don't know all the facts BUT...."), I can say it right here:

We are all going to die, and it is not a duty to our country to do so.

My mother has Alzheimer's and has had it for 11 years. Now she doesn't know us and sleeps most of the time. When she leaves this earth, she will surely go to a better place than the hell she has been in for 11 years. But she doesn't have a duty to die, and I sure as hell have no right to play God and make sure she does.

She is serene and pain-free. She is well cared for. And when God decides her time is up, her spirit will be released. But that's God's job. Not some bureaucrat's. Not Obama's.

Fred Thompson has an interview here with one of the few people in America who has read the healthcare bill, Betsy McCaughey. Listen to it here.

Back from Holden Beach, North Carolina

You probably figured it out, but I've been on vacation. This required a flurry beforehand as I prepared for vacation, then the vacation itself, then the flurry afterwards as I tried to remember what I do when I'm either not in a flurry or on vacation.

We went to Holden Beach, N.C., and stayed at The Barnacle, my favorite place. I was a little girl when Jak Smyrl, my cousin and idol, carved this sea captain's head on a support beam of the house. I think I'd gotten into trouble the week before for writing on the walls, so seeing Jak carve up part of his house left quite an impression. I'd like to go to the house every year, but we don't seem to make it that often. When I see the crusty old sea captain's face, I feel like I'm visiting an old friend.

Here's my favorite reading place. I love the beach but sunburn easily. Holden Beach has a rough, challenging ocean and is often windy. Here are the before and after pictures. As you can see, I was blown out of my reading spot.

Aren't There Any Grown Ups Left? (Shut Up, Mark Sanford!)

This could be a long and thoughtful post about love, soul-mates and the precious shortness of life. But it's not going to be.I'm too busy gagging.

I got a text alert on my cell phone that Governor Sanford told the AP that his Argentinian mistress is his soul-mate and that he's going to try to fall back in love with his wife.

Isn't that just the sweetest thing?

Now, if I were his wife, if I had any love left for him, that little statement would certainly make it evaporate. Let their boys watch Sponge Bob or find some other role model for them who is at least a grown up. Their father sounds like he's 14. 

Here's a link but I'm not reading the story. I have had enough.

I hope his wife has put his things on the curb. Then, somebody neeeds to put duct tape over his mouth and leave him sitting in the governor's chair. He can just sit there quietly until it's time to elect somebody else. I'm still not ready for Andre Bauer.

Why Sanford Shouldn't Resign

Ordinarily, I would call for the resignation of a governor who let the state go to voicemail and snuck off to Argentina to dally with his mistress. But at least he's more of an adult than our lt. governor, Andre Bauer.

On the other hand, if Sanford resigned, maybe the media would lose interest in him and focus on Cap and Tax, Iran, North Korea and the debt that's going to make us a third-world country.

What to do When Your Governor Goes Missing

I stole this from a friend:

SOUTH CAROLINA: Too small to be its own nation, Too large to be an insane asylum. Please remember that politics in SOUTH CAROLINA are for entertainment purposes only!!!

Y'all enjoy. I'm personally embarrassed by the craziness and feel sorry for Jenny Sanford and their four boys.

No doubt I'll know more about Governor Sanford's affair than I want to know eventually, but I do wonder how you sneak off to Argentina to "carry on" as my mother might say.

At least we don't have to worry about him running for president.

I Would Rather be Hot than Cold

I just got back from Pony Club camp in Tryon, N.C. It's the kind of camp where you don't drop off your kids and their ponies/horses and head off for some fun, and parents do the work. I'm a parent. This is bad news.

And if that isn't gruesome enough, it was so very, very hot. I found myself texting Paul, "I wanna come home." I felt like I was back at camp in sixth grade sending homesick letters to my mother.

We were there over 12 hours a day and it was brutally hot. I wondered how I could stand it. Then I would remember Philadelphia, and try not to complain. I would rather be hot than cold. That's one of the few things I am certain is true about me.

Beyond the heat, and the heat, and did I mention it was terribly hot? I'm also so very glad we went, because it was a great experience (almost) all the way around. Here's a great photo of one of the campers. Probably the best photo I've ever taken.

At least I wasn't cold, so I have no reason to complain or whine. My first job was in construction in Philadelphia. I got "put outside," kind of like the cat at night, on a high-rise project in Center City, in the middle of the winter. I stood on the frozen concrete floors, the building wide open to the wind. My job was to follow the plumber and be sure that he put insulation around the bathtub pipes. He was slippery, fast and knew how to dress for the weather. I was 23 or 24, from South Carolina, innocent and unsuspecting, and completely unable to dress for the weather. They were pouring the concrete floors above me, and they had the salamanders fired up to keep the floors warm (or at least not frozen) while the concrete set. Nothing else was warm. No, make that nothing else was thawed out. The winds and snow blew through the open building. The winds and snow seemed to aim for me.

I have never been so miserable, and that was a formative moment in my life.

Because no matter how hot and miserable I am here in S.C. or even in the Caribbean in July, I think back to sitting on the side of my bathtub in my Philadelphia apartment after a frozen, long day at work, holding my numb feet under the hot tap trying to get the feeling back. I almost cried when the alarm went off in the morning, not because of the job, but because no matter what I wore, I couldn't stay warm. I couldn't even get to be merely very cold. I was so cold I couldn't even think.

I can't stand to be cold. So that means that I will tolerate the heat though I will whine about the heat like my mother-in-law whines when we are five minutes late, yet I will remember: I would rather be hot than cold.

I wish other things were as easy to put in perspective. Or maybe I don't. That was a very painful lesson I learned and I'd rather be ignorant than suffer something like cold. Or worse things that life can throw at you.

If I could only be grateful for what I have. At least I wasn't cold. But I do believe there is a reason that hell is depicted as hot, not cold.

I didn't just say that.

Here's what I really meant to post about. If you're looking for some summer reading, here are a few books I've enjoyed over the last few months or maybe it was several years ago. Whatever. My brain doesn't work if it's too hot, either.

Right now I'm enjoying The Help. I loved The Story of Edgar Sawtelle and discovered it before Oprah. Nyah nyah nyah. And I tried my first Stephen King this past year and thought it was extraordinary -- Duma Key. That's all I can remember for now. In fact, that's more than I can remember about my own novel(s) right now, which I didn't even take with me to Pony Club camp because I knew I wouldn't be doing that kind of work -- and I was more right about that than I could ever imagine.

But at least I wasn't cold.