write like you need it to survive

So the main thing about the two days I just spent at my grandmother's funeral observances is that it was the first big family gathering I was present for after telling my parents and siblings that I'm quitting my job this spring to write full time and relocating to Chicagoland to be closer to my family (Iulia, mainly, but it does also shave an hour or two off the drive to Michigan).

So this made the "So what's new with you?" conversations REALLY fun.

Guy Cousin R (Late 30s, good friend of Brother #2):

Me: Well, I'm moving to Chicago. No, not for a library job, I'm quitting my library job and I'll be writing full time.
R: Oh, wow! What do you write?
Me (having considered the simplest way to explain this without encouraging anyone to actually read them): Trashy romance novels, self-published on Amazon.
R (grinning, entertained): So, smut?
Me: Yeah, pretty much. It's surprisingly lucrative!

Uncle D (R's stepfather, who married my aunt when I was a teenager):

Uncle D: Hey, come here! (Tows me into the hall; this is to my knowledge possibly the second actual conversation I have ever had just with him.) I hear you're a writer!
Me: Uh, yeah, as a hobby for a long time, and I just started self-publishing last year.
Uncle D: That is so great! I had no idea you were a writer, I've never known a writer before!
Me: (Briefly contemplates the fact that Uncle D is himself a working artist and the only creative professional I knew of when I was a kid, and when I was in grade school I interviewed him for a "what I want to be when I grow up" report because 'artist' was the closest I could get to 'writer' and maybe I should tell him all of that. Total fail in the face of his slightly terrifying earnest enthusiasm.)
Uncle D: So where is your stuff, how can I buy it?
Me: Uh, well, it's on Amazon, but it's... romance...
Uncle D: Oh, wow! How does that work?
Me: (Starts to explain the mechanics of self-publishing)
Uncle D: Oh, so you don't go through a publisher or anything? Wow, I had no idea that was possible! You know, that's how that Martian guy got started--
Me: YES, ISN'T THE MARTIAN GREAT? LET'S TALK ABOUT THE MARTIAN

Uncle D (After we have exhausted the topic of The Martian and how great it is): So you really don't want me to read your stuff?
Me: It's, uh, it's just not your genre. But with writing full time, maybe I'll be able to also write some stuff that would be a little more... mainstream.
Uncle D: Yeah! Let me know! That's so great!
Me: (finally flees to bathroom)

Cousin J (Early 40s, engineer married to an engineer, mother of three):

Me: ("moving to Chicago" "writing full time" "trashy romances")
Cousin J: Wow, that's cool! You know, K (her 11-year-old daughter) likes to write. She wrote this whole thing in notebooks and she's just started typing it up, and--I don't know anything, it's, uh--it's called--
Me: (Aww, K writes fanfic that's adorable)
Cousin J: Fanfiction? Is that...?
Me: Yeah, yeah, I've written my fair share of that. (Trying to think of what fandom is probably big with tweens) Is there are thing she writes it about?
Cousin J: Harry Potter...?
Me: Yep, yeah, there's a lot of that.
Cousin J: And there's something else... Hey, K! (Beckons 11-year-old over to us) Hey, Cousin Dira writes books, and I was just telling her you do too.
K: I don't write books.
Me: No, no, fanfic.
K: (blank look, then) Fan fiction.
Cousin J (still cheerfully enthusiastic): Yeah, you have that thing you write--you showed me that website where you upload--
Me: (Aww, I hope K's on the AO3 and not...)
K: fanfiction dot net.
Me: (Oh, kids. Bless.)

Brother #2 (in the car on the way to the actual funeral):

Me: ...So there's no cover art or anything yet, but the vampire book is coming out July 20. The ebook is actually available for pre-order, but the paperback isn't yet.
Brother #2: Well, I don't think I'm gonna read it, but I'll definitely buy a copy and display it proudly.
Me: (<3)

Swiped from a bunch of people on my flist, and I figure I didn't quite go anywhere but other than fic updates I've been pretty quiet, so...

So what have you been up to?

I'm just about three months into being on the Adderall, which has been super helpful although not miraculous and not, like, magically removing all constraints on my ability to accomplish things. ALAS.

So: I've been up to writing, mostly, a lot by any sane standard but still not as much as I'd like given how many irons I have in the fire.

Also, thanks to the slow accumulation of flist people's mentions of using treadmill desks to knock some of the sedentary rust off, I finally accepted that my preferred mode of exercise is Pretending I'm Still On My Couch. I can't actually manage a treadmill desk right now--shared apartment, logistics, etc.--but I got myself a gym membership and have started popping over there about six mornings a week to walk briskly while playing games on my phone or reading ebooks or fic, etc. And, hey! That whole "excercising gives you more energy" thing turns out to be true! I just... had to be on Adderall for a month before I had the starting energy/general wherewithal to find that out.

Oh and I joined OKCupid. I have this sort of baseline desire to get into some sort of romantic relationship, but I hate Going Out And Doing Things With Strangers, and I kept feeling bad about failing at that part and finally realized that I don't like going out and doing things with strangers and there are, theoretically, other more efficient ways to meet compatible people who want to do dating-type things.

Mostly this has demonstrated to me that I am already operating at full capacity to deal with other human beings. *eyes unanswered OKC messages* So... that's good to know?

Oh and there was VividCon! ...which also demonstrated to me that I am already operating at full capacity to deal with other human beings. I had been feeling vaguely anxious and stressed about the con beforehand, which is... not usually how I feel about VVC, and then I got to the con and felt stressed and overwhelmed and signally failed to hang out with all the people I wanted to hang out with, and finally wound up hitting the Introvert Wall late Saturday/early Sunday and bailing out early (after iulia took charge of my Sunday afternoon volunteer shift and told me to just go home).

Oh also I tested positive for strep throat on Wednesday and had a couple of days off work. Hooray antibiotics!

Major life changes? Same old same old?

Writing for money! Writing for money has been kind of a large feature of the last few months, coinciding pretty strongly with the arrival of my constant sense of being overwhelmed and operating at full capacity for dealing with other human beings. The extra disposable income is really nice, but it turns out that having what amounts to a second job takes up time/energy/spoons/writing brain. WHO KNEW.

There are further major life changes on the horizon--Iulia is expecting her first child in October, which means I will be a godmother! And also the only vaguely local extended-family-ish person my godchild has around, so I expect some delightful life upheaval there.

And not unrelatedly, I am at long last getting Really Quite Serious about relocating to the greater Chicagoland area, hopefully in the first half of 2016.

With all of that going on/on the horizon it is... perhaps less surprising that the new Cap 3 promos were legitimately upsetting to me this week as a reminder that my fannish territory is also going to be undergoing an upheaval soon.

What fandom are you in/do you spend most of your time in?

Marvel/Cap 2! I have fallen especially into the Hydra Trash Party corner of the fandom. Content aside, it's one of the most old-school-fan friendly parts of the fandom in terms of being able to connect with a community of fans--there's a chat room, a DW kinkmeme with a chat post, and an identifiable group of writers and artists who are pretty reachable via Tumblr.

But, you know, also making Bucky cry is fun, even if it leads to things like, "Man, I am eventually going to post 25k of male lactation fic with a complicated pairings situation and alarming set of warnings to the AO3." Could've been worse, really.

Where do you hang out online?

Twitter, Tumblr, trash chat, that other chat room I've been hanging out in since 2005, Skype IM which is apparently a thing (I'm dsudis on there), and AIM/YM/etc.

What are you reading?

One of the exciting things about extra disposable income is that I feel okay casually buying ebooks--I use the Kindle Cloud Reader & Kindle phone app, and virtually the only books I've finished since May have been short-ish romances: Sarina Bowen, K. J. Charles, Alexis Hall. Right now I'm reading Courtney Milan's The Duchess War, and then I need to read a book that was made into a movie for my staff summer reading competition at work. I might just read The Martian for the third time.

And also fic? I haven't been reading huge quantities, but there's a pretty steady accumulation in my AO3 bookmarks.

What are you watching?

Every scrap of promo media related to The Martian! :D :D :D

Oh and I just started on Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries which is DELIGHTFUL and reminding me that I am 100% an easy mark for canon het. Phryne/Jack!!!!!

What are you making?

My desktop note that I use to track WIPs currently has ten items on it:

Original/for money: Vampire novel that I am waiting for edits on from Less than Three (Dira Lewis); ridiculous tropey gay werewolf ebook (Dessa Lux); sequel to vampire novel (Dira Lewis); tropey het ebook (redacted).

Fanfic: Aluminum Bastard/broken dick epic; Babyfic prequel to the trash kidfic; trash kinkmeme fic; more different trash kinkmeme fic; Spy Game post-movie fic; sequel to that fic I wrote where Steve's wearing a pink silk chemise.

So... I need to write faster. In conclusion.

What are you squeeing about today?

Well, literally today is Iulia's baby shower, so: impending godchild!

A little more generally: The Martian, Miss Fisher, Chris Evans and Anthony Mackie's most recent press appearances (THEIR FACES. THE BELT GRAB.)

If you could rope old fandom friends into a new fandom, it would be...

THE MARTIAN!!! READ IT. JOIN ME IN BEING EXCITED FOR THIS MOVIE FOR ENTIRELY NON-SEBASTIAN-STAN-RELATED REASONS. JOIN ME IN JUDGING PEOPLE WHO INTEND TO SEE THIS MOVIE FOR SEBASTIAN STAN.

I should really watch/read/dive into _______ and then come talk to you about it!

THE MARTIAN. It's a quick read! There are adorable/hilarious promo videos!! I CAN TALK ABOUT THE MARTIAN FOREVER.

What else is on your mind?

I really need to trim and file my nails. And also I need to see if I can lure Iulia and her husband to the Original Pancake House for giant apple pancake breakfast tomorrow morning before we trek back to our side of the Lake with all the baby shower loot. Hmmmm.