Friday Morning

Greetings and salutations, blog readers!

Today is Friday, and I can’t quite find the words to describe how very excited I am about it.

I have blogs already scheduled for this weekend, and I think tonight I may put on sweat pants and play video games. Nothing productive. Except maybe some writing, if I feel so inclined, on Flake City, after said video games.

Just do stuff I want. I have snacks and frozen dinner options including decent frozen lasagna and frozen pizza, so I can easily make dinner a breeze, and then turn all my attention to killing digital zombies after the very long week I have had. I am approaching overtime, so once I hit that point I will likely head home and get started on my highly chill relaxing time, so I can be better rested and better suited for a nice long writing session or two this weekend, and possibly some time socializing with friends.

I am hoping to see my friends Tina, Kaynell, and if possible, Amber. Bret will be prepping for his show this week, and I have several short stories, the end of this section of Flake City, and the blog to write, plus about 200,000 words of Flake City left to do my first edit read through on.

My weekend looks to be full of relaxing and creating, hopefully not too much cleaning, as I have been trying to be better about doing stuff all week, so I am not stuck doing it all on the weekend.

I once saw a picture of a guy on a hill on a bike, and the idea was you push uphill on a bike all week just to coast on the weekends, and then you are stuck pushing from the bottom of the hill again, having coasted to the bottom. I don’t know if one should eschew every chance at relaxing or coasting, but I do want to avoid losing momentum I build all week.

I have been trying to not sleep in as much on the weekends, sleeping until nine, no later, so waking up at six on Monday isn’t as hard. I try to clean during the week, so on the weekend I am not stuck cleaning every single thing. I try to tackle a project or two in my spare time during the week, so I have more time for larger projects on the weekends, and I am not stuck spending all my time doing things i probably should have done after work during the week.

Much of my problem has been, in the past, if I work, I don’t want to go home and be productive, and the past two years has been me trying to train myself to keep working and being productive even if I have put in a full day of work.

Every day I get home from work and I make an effort to always do a few small things, like dishes, litter box, sweeping, always leaving a clean sink before bed, with cleaned off counters, to keep a cleaner, neater, home. This not only keeps the home cleaner, it makes cleaning on the weekend easier.

Doing this, plus not wasting half my day laying around in bed, I am able to really attack Mondays and not be behind, but sometimes this leads me feeling tired and like I didn’t get enough rest, so I am trying to also add enough leisure activity to make it feel like I have also fit in plenty of relaxing time.

To trick myself into thinking it is much more time than it is, I think it may help to play the video games and other chill activities in spurts, so it feels like I played several times, and therefore plenty of times, versus “only” playing or relaxing once.

I think this will help me from feeling so drained on Thursdays.

For now, I am watching some Left 4 Dead videos on YouTube and trying to stay awake. Also working.

But in a few short hours? Abbi gonna be up out of here.

And Abbi can’t wait for the weekend to begin!

Saturday Night

Well, Bret just left to go to the venue he is playing at next week, and now I am at home. I think I will toss on Zomboat and do some more writing, having spent much of last night writing in Flake City.

Last night I was working on a mini story, about a character who worked in the hospital of Flake City as a general practitioner. When things start to happen, she puts her and her dog first and hightails it out of the city, away from the action, hence, she will have a short story, with some other information about Flake City presented.

My goal is to have so much content on Flake City that it is truly immersive, because hey, I like this stuff a whole bunch and would love for you all to join me in Flake City.

I also just got a lovely phone call from my friend Brooklyn, which was lovely, we talked briefly, and made plans to talk later in the week. She is preaching for the first time at her church, which I love, and I am working on my writing, which is also awesome. We also talked about release dates for Flake City, and she contributed her thoughts, which were very valued because I adore Brooklyn’s mind and consider her to be a very intelligent woman.

It was nice to hear from a friend this evening, because my day was spent talking to a friend about her divorce from another friend, and it was actually exhausting and very depressing.

So, it was wonderful to hear from a friend, and to hear her input on when to release. I hope her preaching tomorrow goes well, and I can’t wait to catch up with her later this week. I’m contemplating making some spicy ramen to go with these red lobster biscuits I made, or just snacking on some snacks a bit, but I think ramen sounds better…I want some spicy shrimpy goodness with my red lobster biscuits.

My goal is to try and finish off the Krista and Jasper bit, if not today, within a week or two, so I can then get to work on editing it. I will also be writing a few other short stories, some of which end with people dying, to release and build the main story of Flake City.

Anyways, it is already 9, and I don’t know how long Bret will be at the club, so I am going to get to work on Flake City, because it will likely be a very long “short” story, which means I need to get into it.

So, I am off to get some writing done. This blog will likely go up Monday morning, so I will probably update tomorrow to finish this off, if I don’t tonight.

Until then!

Sunday Afternoon- Just after 4:20

Greetings and Salutations once again, my blog readers.

Today has been a nice chill day. I did a bunch of writing last night and then got really sleepy. Bret came home late from Notsuoh (the club he is playing later this week), so I was already in and out of sleep, but he had a good time, and we both slept in this morning.

I managed to get all my cleaning goals done, minus the laundry, and now that I have imported my last two blogs to Medium, I am working on this blog and one of my Flake City stories.

I lost much of yesterday worried about some friends, and while that worry is there, I am trying to get back on track, like I did last night. I need to still do some prep for the week, like cleaning some pieces and washing my makeup brushes, and maybe schedule some blogs this week.

Not going to lie folks, I loved not having to worry about my blogs going up, and freeing up my time to write on new blogs or creative stuff.

So, I have a few more prewritten blogs that need a little attention, and I think I may make a master list of everything I want to blog about, and maybe write those blogs when I have time, so I can have some scheduled, and give myself a bit of a break some days, to free up brain power for creation, not worried about if I got my content up that day.

Because I also don’t like when the blog feels like a “job” in that overwhelming burden kind of way, you know?

I prefer when it feels like that amazing job I am lucky enough to workout that dream gig.

cut to me sitting at some posh desk, in a slick, comfortable, decked out office, a beautiful view of both mountains AND city, somehow, with some sick voiceover that makes me sound and look much more posh than I really am…

I want to feel like that version of myself every single time I sit down to blog and write, so maybe prewriting some blogs will help me retain some of that magic.

In the meantime, some of yesterdays drama has found me, so I am going to go indulge in a cigarette so I don’t grind on the annoyance all damn day, and just let it go, and then I will get back to my Flake City writing, I think. I may not even smoke that cigarette, but I need to walk away for a minute before I scream at how awful humans can be to each other in divorce.

And how much it sucks for friends around them, even though divorce is already so nasty none of us friends deserve to complain ABOUT the shittiness, we still feel it so ARGH.

Later

Well, it is later, and now I am knee deep in writing. It is getting late, and I am getting ready to eat some dinner and then write deep into the night while I do the laundry I need to do, then go to bed to get up for work tomorrow, which means I should focus on getting this blog finished and scheduled for tomorrow, and then really dive into this writing.

This Monday marks the start of what looks to be a very busy week for me, with my writing, blogging, and work, plus Bret having a live performance on Thursday. I will be taking Friday off, because we will be at the venue so late, and that means I need to work a little bit each day to make sure I have enough done to be good to leave on Thursday for a three day weekend and not be fucked over the following Monday.

I also want to prewrite some blogs this week, like I have mentioned, and I have quite a few side stories in Flake City to work on in addition to the editing of the main part of Flake City and wrapping up that section, before launching into the second portion, which will of course, be written while I do phases two through final of section one of Flake City edits.

One woman publishing machine, trying to get my art out into the world.

I don’t want to have to charge a lot for my art, because while I know I need to value my art more, I do also want it to be accessible, so I want to do all I can in house and locally to keep costs down, so what I charge goes to me, the one who created it, and the handful of people who may end up helping me create something.

Of course, that is just a goal, and with this kind of thing, you can’t really predict anything. I can hope for what I want, but in the end, the creation of art and process of bringing that art to the world to see it and enjoy it, means plenty of things can change. For all I know, I may have some big philosophical change about what I want to charge for my art, hell, I may know how I want to exhibit my art, at the moment, I still don’t even know what format I want Flake City in, not really, so I am doing what feels best and natural for the story to at least get out there.

#DontForgetFlakeCity and all.

Talking to Brooklyn last night really did help me see that it was okay to try and build hype for Flake City, and it was okay to have lots of stuff to kind of hype it up…more so because my original vision was an immersive world where one could get cost in the story, in any number of stories, and have their favorite parts of the city, and the stories within.

I feel as though I spent my weekend prepping for the week but mostly writing, so I feel like I spent much of the weekend in Flake City. I liked it, but, for me, and other writers from what I understand, it creates a bit of writers jet lag where you think you are one place where you aren’t.

Am I saying I forget that outside we don’t have zombies? No, but also yes.

It has been fun, however, writing, and I love the story so much. I look forward to being able to release each of these stories, and I plan on actually illustrating and creating some nice art for Flake City, to really make something for anyone who wants to enjoy, to enjoy.

Of course now it is hours before I need to go to bed, I still need to do laundry, and all I want to do is sip this here beer (Root beer), and eat this here salad, and write all about the crazy stuff happening in Flake City.

Because let me tell you…

This shit is about a lot more than zombies.

But for now, I think I need to finish this salad, toss some laundry in the dryer, roll some blunts, and get to writing.

It is nearly nine, and if I budget my time carefully, I can squeeze in a a little more writing without destroying my day tomorrow, and allowing me to get into work on time, or even early, to get ready for my day off on Friday.

Life is a balance, more so when creating, and I am glad I get to share this process with you all. To those of you who have reached out about how inspiring it is to see, or even just useful, thank you so much, I really appreciate you saying that, and I hope I encourage you to also find your own creative balance, and find time to make and create your art.

Your art matters.

Go create it.

Thanks for reading.

❤️

Abbi