Vicarious Rocky

There comes a time in the life of a Yuppie where they're supposed to move. It's sometime before their 1st kid starts Kindergarten. You have been working for over 10 years, make more than your age, and it's time to move from that "starter" home in the city (or borderline not fabulous town) out to the burbs or country.

In my area it's Bath, Medina, Revere, Fairlawn and Stow. You sell your 3 bedroom place and choose a "neighborhood" with good schools where the kids can play and you can "stop worrying." I hear this story over and over and over. It's SO boring.

My street is brick and tree lined and there are 8 neighbor kids that come play together, often ball in the street. Our houses are all old, so we all sit on each other's porches and watch the kids -- keep the little ones safe, yell "CAR!" and mediate big kid disputes.

The best part about my street is the demographics. There are 13 houses - 3 are rentals and the rest are owner occupied. We have, in order, down and up street:
Evangelical Christian couple (Their house/yard is 2nd nicest)
College kid house
Single Mom College Professor w/ 2 kids and 4 outdoor cats
Lesbian Elementary School Teacher
Single Grandma w/ 4 dogs
Corporate Rich Couple w/ disabled daughter
3 apartment rental with 1) quiet hippe college girls 2) single divorced guy 3) hairdresser and friendly Christian ex-con boyfriend (former drug dealer (not sex offender, I checked).
Business Owners (us)
Grumpy 80-yr-old street veteran couple
Appliance repair guy and wife
Lawyer in DA's office
Web developer, hippe wife, 2 kids, 19 indoor pets
Gay elementary art teacher
Gay corporate executive (His house/yard is the nicest)

Anyway, how can you beat this? I can walk to Chipotle and the coffee shop and drug store. I am 5 minutes from the MetroParks. Can someone tell me why people want to live in a new development going up on Rt. 3 in Medina? Is it fear? Schools? New houses? If you live in a place like this, tell me why you chose it.

I once read an article in a writing magazine about how contests were simply preying on writer's hope, collecting the submission fees, and then . . . I don't know, going on a cruise? I forget what this person's point was, but I have determined they were completely retarded or jaded, or both. I cannot believe people give up the kind of time that must be necessary to read and judge piles of marginal work from would-be writers. Whatever they get paid, it's not enough.

I have submitted my novice manuscript to 2 contests thus far and also a synopsis of it to another. 2 of my "results" are back via mail and email, and I honestly didn't expect feedback from either. I cannot believe they take time to tell me anything beyond, "Thank you, you are not the winner."

In the Romance contest, I was disqualified, as I expected, for the book not being a Romance. It was a bit off the formula, and I knew this was a formula driven industry, but it was only $50 bucks, so I figured what the hell. However, even though it wasn't a romance, they still read the first 15 pages and judged it and returned the scores to me. Crazy, eh? My averaged score was 6.5 on a scale of 1 of 10. I am thinking, that's what? A C+? I'll take it! But more encouraging than my slightly above average nod from judges was the score from Judge #5 - a 9. This means the world to me because even if this person was drunk when reading they liked it. And if one person (who doesn't know me) likes it, well, I am on my way. :-)

The other contest was for a one sheet (for agents I might meet at a conference) that summarizes the book. For this I was told:

"Your one sheet represents a compelling story idea. There is a nice balance between text and white space on the page, making it very easy to read. You also organized the information in a way that helps editors and agents quickly learn what they need to know about your book.

The only improvements the judges recommended were:
- Consider adding more color and graphical elements to the page in order to set it apart.
- Consider replacing the current picture you have with something more contemporary. At first glance, they thought it was a historical novel.
- Consider setting your bio and headshot apart in a side column so that it doesn't distract from the summary of your story."

So my take away from that was that the writing on the one sheet was viable, but I need to work on formatting. No sweat. Incidentally, that feedback was given for a submission fee of $15. I mean, seriously. In my old job, I wouldn't answer the phone for $15. Anyway. That's the update. I should have feedback from contest 3 in July and then deadline for submission to contest #4 is in August. Then the last contest I am entering (for this manuscript) has an October deadline. This is all very fun for me! Yeah me!

This is pretty much what the news always sounds like when I watch it.



Breaking News: Some Bullshit Happening Somewhere

I love that city. And we had a blast. When Sage asked if I wanted to join him on his latest business trip out there, I thought, "Ah, nah, I got stuff to do." Then I remembered Indy is in Preschool and I do NOT have stuff to do, so we promptly piled in the car and headed out. We took our Grammy. Fun was had by all.

We did the CityPass, which is a pack of tickets for 5 attractions. We did 3 of them and saved about $20 a piece on admission costs. If you did all five, you'd really clean up. Pictures!

Today is Easter and more pictures from that soon, but the big news of Spring Break this year is Castaway Bay! May I never travel with Indy again without bringing a playmate. Holy Cow, does that make it easier. Cousin Alex was a Doll the whole time. They both had like one pouty moment in the three day trip and otherwise happily played together . . . constantly. I'm not sure why they still like each other really. Here are the picture highlights: