Day 308

So, I eat my feelings. I feel like by admitting that I'm one step away from the biggest loser or a 1800 Get Thin Commercial, but I'm not. But I will tell you want I am. I am technically obese. It's a dirty word, but going by scales and charts, that's what I am. I'm what I like to call a Functioning Fatty, which I think a lot of people are. My weight has only made me more social, but my social skills don't stop me from breathing heavy as I walk up stairs or sweating whenever I hear the word hot. 

It's Tuesday, which is the perfect day to write this. Sunday I go to weight watchers. Monday I work out and eat healthy. Tuesday I fall off the wagon. I blame this on my short term memory loss, but the truth is, I eat my feelings. All the emotions you have to dig up to create a story worth telling make me impossible to live with. I have no idea how most writers don't suffer from severe depression. I do and that's coupled with the ADHD I think I've mentioned a few times here and there.  And with that comes the need to eat my way through ups and downs. Again I share this because my life affects my writing life. I'll tell you how.


While waiting to hear back on the submission of Better Off Red, I gained 30 lbs. It was a relatively short period of time. I have been a  varying weight on the curvy to heavy meter since I was 6, but this was first time in my life I noticed the weight gain. My dude noticed too. Don't worry he was nice about it, but when I screamed "30 fucking pounds" he didn't do that annoying "What are you talking about?" thing which I appreciated. This big girl hates sugar coating (get it). I have been this heavy before. When I first moved to LA and discovered the magic that is Craft Service, I climbed to my all time max weight. I am 2 pounds away from that now.

I see a lot of girls and women my size, every day and many of them are very beautiful. I do not see this when I see myself at a distance. Up close in that avatar sized box that is my face, I know I'm not unfortunate. I'm not Paula Patton (Paula Patton is fine), but I know I'm not a troll. I hate my body. My dude loves it, but knowing that I hate it he does almost as well as my father does at never mentioning my weight ever. I see bulges and rolls and I hate them.

The vanity is one issue, but here's the other. I have gained 5 pounds since I started writing The Fling, which is HILARIOUS because the love interest is a trainer. I have to write more books and I have to spend MANY more hours sitting on my ass. If I gain 30lbs per book which is very very possible, I will be in big trouble in short order. For in the first time in my life I have to lose weight so I don't eat myself into a heart attack. This is sobering, but then there's that short term memory loss and that hilarious depression...

So it's Tuesday. I read a book that ripped my heart out last night and had me up to 3 this morning. I have to write today and of course I don't want to work out. Plus Dude is working from home and Chinese food is like a chaser to burgers for him. Luckily I'm meeting with my bestie's trainer today ask her some questions for The Fling. Hopefully that will keep me on the wagon for a few more hours. We'll see.

(Read this last night and another part of me will never be the same. I HIGHLY recommend. )

Day 281

New Book. New Router. A new reason to gain another 30 pounds.

So my publisher tells me (im making the wording up) "Yes, write this new book, young one. Tell your light-hearted romantic comedy tale. Meet your deadline and if it doesn't BLOW, we'll put it out in a timely fashion." And them the universe blesses me with sciatica.* Now I have a decent tolerance for pain, but suffering from "Sciatica (or sciatic neuritis)^, a set of symptoms including pain that may be caused by general compression and/or irritation of one of five spinal nerve roots that give rise to each sciatic nerve, or by compression or irritation of the left or right or both sciatic nerves, is one of the most awful things I've experienced in my entire life.

I f-ed my back last year, had the same problem, but it when away. AND THEN IT CAME BACK. I was out of work for a week, on my back most of that time. Some of the time, on my back crying, literally. I had to crawl to the bathroom. Sitting up felt like my bones were literally grinding together. My poor boyfriend had to put on my socks for me for our trip to the doctor.

The up-shot: I caught up on so much cable ondemand.

The bull@#$ other side: crippling pain doesn't really make for a happy writer. I was blocked like crazy.

Thankfully the blockage is gone and so is the majority of the pain. It still hurts like crazy to sit in certain chairs for long periods of time, but I've written a good chunk this week. A chunk I'm pretty happy with.

In other news, I've started a tumblr account to share x-rated visual aids to my stories.  http://rebekahloves.tumblr.com/ PLEASE click with caution. I mean it when I say x-rated. I write erotica after all. :) There's also funny stuff and really cute pictures of puppies and kittens and Wonder Woman.

A search for a new router derailed my writing plans for tonight, but I'm back on the nets now with access to my completely writing life. Happy as an almost-walking normal clam.

*i dont know what adam is and my butt doesn't look like that.

Day 263

I'm awful at updating this blog, but here I am with news and pictures and news and videos.

A few weeks ago at the 5th Annual Lesbian Book Festival, I had my first reading, which may have been one of the scariest things I've ever experienced that didn't require a trip to the ER. There are no videos of the reading, but here is an interview I did with fellow BSB author Carsen Taite. This was a good thirty minutes before my reading. Needless to say, I was nervous as hell.



Fellow BSB author Kim Baldwin was also nice enough to put together a slide show of our weekend. It was pretty awesome.

Annie

Oksana

I'm starting a new book, working title, The Fling

Meet your leading ladies. 

I'm really looking forward to writing it. It should be very sexy and fun. And I should get started now. Until next time, which I hope isn't a month from now.

Day 228

I think having a facebook author page is taking away my drive to blog. That and I did't have too much to say.

BUT!! Now I have plenty.

I have cover art that I LOVE.

 

I've submitted my first round of revisions of my edit to my editor. It's also pretty amazing to say that I have an editor.

My book is up on Amazon for pre-sale which is also blowing my mind.

I'll be participating in the 5th Annual Bold Strokes Books Palm Springs Lesbian Book Festival, March 3-6, where I'll be reading a selection from Better Off Red and praying I don't barf on myself at the podium.

I've also found another artist to obsess over. You can find the work of Jace Wallace here. 

Day 195

I haven't updated in a while because I've been busy blowing time/self-promoting/ forging lifelong friendships on facebook and twitter, but I'm back and in a SUPER MOOD! I've also gotten some great research field trips in for this series and the Were-boys I want to write at some point.

Over the past few days, I've come to the upside of revisions. Usually I write something and once it's done I never want to look at it again, but I don't think anyone involved in getting this book out to the public wants it out exactly the way it is now, with typos and such.

I was dreading having to rework a few scenes when a flash of positive energy smacked me up side the head. This is my chance to do completely right by any future readers, to look very closely a the tiny things I may have missed and fixed them. Also its a great chance to extend a few sex scenes :)

Now I'm really excited to work through my edits, almost as excited as I am to some day get my cover art. I'm really excited about the cover art.

In other news I all I want for my birthday is a kitten. I wont get one. So sad.

Day 175

Those of you who have been following this blog may have noticed that from time to time its more about my life than my writing. Well my life impacts my writing A LOT. This is more of a "life" post.
--

I have a problem. ("A" problem I know most of you will say). Okay I have several problems that often make me wonder what it's like to be normal, but this particular problem is screwing with me right now.

There are a several things I need to do:

• Renew my drivers license
• Sort through and shred at least 4 years worth of settled bills and statements
• Clean out our one closet
• Call my grandmother
• Take my car into the shop
• Finish work on the preliminary edits for my manuscript
• Stop eating my weight in pizza, snickers, cookies and burgers at every possible moment
• Search for some cheap round trip flights to the east coast. 
• Vacuum
• Fold a serious mountain of clothes
• Take a serious mountain of clothes and shoes to Goodwill
  

And the responsible adult in me is wondering why all of these things aren't done yet.

My bill paying job was really crazy between the months of September and last week ( i know last week isnt a month.), my dude changed jobs twice and then the holidays set in. I'm exhausted, my weight is all over the place and mostly heading upwards and I'm stressed about four trips I would like to take in the first half of 2011 which I may not have the funds to do.


NOW, I'm on vacation. My brother comes into town tomorrow just for a day, but after that I still have four days of vacation and I cannot make myself relax. I've been staying up late, getting up early and all but pacing around my apartment giving my manuscript the side eye. I do this all the time. Deny myself rest, while also putting off the things I need to do. Then I look at the clock and the anxiety starts to kick in F-ing up my ability to be productive or sleep even more.


Both of my parents have an insane work ethics. I grew up watching my father sleep a few hours a night, grabbing odd bits of shut eye here and there in the car while waiting for my mother to come out of the bank or in his leather recliner on the odd occasions that our house was quiet. I like being busy and I like working hard, but I have the hardest time shutting it off. Even as I type this I'm dreading just how late I'm going to be up tonight because I wont be able to sleep.


Is part of it the ADHD? Yeah. Is part of it the marathon of the First 48 that is more interesting than ANYTHING I could possibly be doing at the moment? Hells yeah. But most of it I feel is guilt. I know it sounds crazy, but I feel guilty when I'm doing nothing. Even when I catch up on much needed sleep and am grateful to feel rejuvenated, there's always this tiny or sometimes thunderously loud voice in the back of my head saying "Ya know, you could have gotten a lot done in those 8 hours."

The most annoying part is all of these things will get done. I'm not about to look at my publisher and say "Oops didn't do my edits." and I will vacuum because our carpet is kinda gross, but I would LOVED to avoid the stress and anxiety during it all.

I know what I need to do. I need to eat better, because heartburn and gluten bloat have been known to wake me up at 2 am. I need to exercise more because that always seems to knock me out at the end of the day and I need to stop beating myself up. I'm on vacation. I have no kids. My bills are paid. My boyfriend is deep in the world of WoW. I'm allowed to relax. Now I just need to do it.

When all of my problems are solved, I'd love to get a tattoo of either Tsuru. ♥

Day 167

So I say things and very rarely they work out the way I want them to, but in this case things worked up pretty damn good.


A few weeks ago I signed a contract with Bold Strokes Books, the company I have been waiting to work with. Please see the awesomeness below.


"Bold Strokes Books is pleased to announce the acquisition of Rebekah Weatherspoon’s new erotic paranormal romance, Better Off Red: Vampire Sorority Sisters Book 1, scheduled for release in 2011 from Bold Strokes Books..."

You can read more about my awesome book and the awesomeness to come here. (I don't actually think I'm all that awesome)

My boyfriend thought I had somehow backdated the future and past, or something like that, so that this announcement would actually line up with my previous comment about "hopefully knowing something by Dec 20th". Pure coincidence. Sweet, glorious coincidence. I'm really excited and humbled by this opportunity and beyond psyched to work with this team.

Now I'll be blogging what I can about edits and promotion, my nights up crying as I stress over my edits and promotion. If you couldn't tell already, I'm a big stresser. In the meantime, please do check out the other authors Bold Strokes Books represents. Of course I haven't read every single titles, but I have LOVED the ones I have been able to get my hands on.

I will end by saying, I was able to find these sneakers, in my size. I bought them as a Christmas gift to myself and they should arrive by Wednesday. HOOORAY!

Happy Holidays Everyone.