Hello, Spring, Glad to Finally See You

I don’t call this past weekend ‘spring cleaning’.  I call it more like a process of reclamation.  After my Saturday hair cut, I came home to begin cleaning off my dining room table. Sunday I tackled the dining room, living room, and laundry.  I did some spot cleaning in between, as in I see a spot that’s dirty and I clean it.  The bathroom was a prime example.

All through the process the windows remained open, and I stepped out with a sponge and soapy water to clean off my balcony furniture.  Seriously, I thought my heart would sing as the wind carried the fresh, clean smell of spring.  While I enjoy fall, love or hate winter depending on my mood, it’s spring with all its possibilities I enjoy the most.

Looks like Mother Nature has also engaged in some spring cleaning of her own.  It’s called a down pour.  We finally got April showers with one day left in the month.  I guess better late than never.

After last weekend’s C4 Lit Fest, cleaning also meant a tidy-ish writer’s space helps a writer’s mind.  I also played around with a new program called ‘Scrivener‘ thanks Kelly Armstrong‘s endorsement.  Armstrong, the writer best known for her ‘Women of the Other World’ series, kindly showed what the program does from her laptop.  She writes on a Mac and warned me about some features not shared on a Window-based laptop.

When I downloaded the 30 day trial version, it shared the features I wanted, therefore I committed to it.  I need something structured, and this fits my needs.  When I sit down to write, even this blog post, things get a little scattered.  I can’t outline in great detail, but a few lines can give me an idea what to to write, acting like a direction arrow in a draft.  (Yet another lesson learned from C4.)

From writing to reading…

While I read my share of smutty books, I managed to get the e-book version of 50 Shades of Grey from the library.  I dared myself to read it.  After reading bits and pieces on the web, I figured it’s high time to read the phenomenon.  I transferred the book to my old Kobo, it appears the app on my Samsung tab isn’t good enough for Overdrive, and started to read it yesterday.

It’s not a good sign if I start laughing right after the first paragraph.  Egads!  This will be a lesson in horrible writing.  I decided to the way to deal with the book is pretend it’s a chick lit comedy novel.  A few people I know may think it’s quite masochistic of me to read this book.  On the other hand it’s hit a nerve with women, and I want to know why.  I especially want to know why with all sorts of better, sexier, page turners this one has captured captured imaginations.  I just have to stop giggling at the awful prose while I am at it.