New Ulm Public Library July 15

Tomorrow, July 15! New Ulm, here we come!

Sadie, Allie, Joe, and I (well, they're alive and well on the pages of Chasing AllieCat, so they're certainly coming with me) will be at the New Ulm Public Library on July 15.

At 3 p.m., I'm meeting the teen reading group.

Public reading and book signing 5:15-6:15.

Check out the cool New Ulm Public Library website.

Everybody's welcome.

Books available for purchase, of course.

And, um, bicycles are welcome, too, of course!

Riding, writing

Yesterday, my friend's dog peed on my living room carpet--quite out of character, but enough to push me over the edge: YES, I need to rip up the carpet NOW, and have a nice wooden floor--or at least a clean wooden floor--with rug(s) before Alec comes to visit and crawl around on it.

So, in the next days: I need to mow (before the next rains come), finish second and third drafts of Slider's Son (the pen and paper version is second, translated into computer for third), rip up carpet (doesn't that sound fun?), do a reading/signing at the New Ulm Public Library (5:15 Friday the 15th if you're interested and that will be fun), ride every day (finally feeling almost like my old self on the bike--why does it take half the summer!?), and watch the Tour (cause I'm addicted). Good news: I can watch the Tour and rip up carpet at the same time!

Oh, I have been riding in the mornings or mid-day most of the summer. Yesterday, I stole a 20-mile ride right before dusk, and saw two deer (in my path on the downhill--had to brake to avoid them) and a raccoon (on my path on an uphill so he saw me in plenty of time). Might need to ride later in the day more often to check the wildlife! Not sure if the raccoon's extra time to get out of the way was an indication of his speed or mine uphill. Ha.

Oh, and my man Voeckler is still riding in the yellow jersey today. Haven't seen the results today yet.

Back to work.

More summer stuff

When I planted "Mini Bell" peppers, I wasn't expecting this! Barely bite-size, but sweet and good. The hot banana peppers have heat this year. Eight varieties of peppers are growing and blooming and starting to produce. Tomatoes are blooming to beat the band; onions and garlic are prolific; cilantro exploding....hopefully that means a giant batch of salsa and then pepper jelly later this summer.

Yesterday--I bought worms. Meal worms. Never in my wildest dreams thought I would purchase worms. But the bluebird babies are growing and bluebirds supposedly love meal worms. So I put some out. Opened the box, and jumped. Had to put on latex gloves to touch them. Couldn't bring myself to pick one up with bare fingers.

For now: I HAVE to stay in and edit like a S.O.B. all week. And try to resist the pull of being outside more than in.

I also have to sneak peeks at the Tour de France. Thomas Voeckler is in Yellow now and on my TDF fantasy team. Whooee!

I also have to ride. And get the rest of the matts out of Freya's fur.

Better get crackin'. Over and out.

Saturday, July 9

Some happinesses of July: sunshine, long bike rides, ripe raspberries, and blooming hollyhocks.

Today was supposed to be our annual canoe trip down the Blue Earth River, but due to 1. thunderstorm warnings and 2. Tom being on call 24-7 because of the state shut-down, we're not going. Postponed until August sometime. Much of the Compound population is still going, though.

Got the galleys for Girl Meets Boy. I'm proud of my story in there, "Mars at Night," and happy to be included in that anthology! Pub date: January 2012. Now I have to sell something more so I have something coming out in 2013. I finished the first draft of Slider's Son. Editing, editing, editing. I wish I could just write a story right the first or second time.

So shut up, quit blogging, and edit. Okay.

Balance and living in the moment

Yesterday was a strange mixture of joy and trauma.

Got up and volunteered at the North Mankato Triathlon with my friend Barb. We had fun, cheered on the cyclists (many of them good friends) from our appointed spot on Judson Bottom Road, and then I went to the finish and saw lots more friends I hadn't even recognized as they zipped past us in their aero tucks.

It made me miss running, but made me glad that I can ride hard and sometimes fast.

Wrote for awhile, and then mowed and trimmed and weed-ate and had an idea for one of my characters, so I sat down at the kitchen table and wrote some more.

I was putting everything away, all cleaned up, and when I pulled the garage door shut, a big piece of the door fell off (the door is old and has been falling apart since I bought the place), and one big window came crashing out, and splintered into a million pieces on the cement. There I stood, surrounded by glass.

Here's where balance comes in: I can be disgruntled by the broken door (which I am), I can be frustrated by the mess of broken glass (which I am), because I'm tired from all the mowing and trimming, or I can be happy that the glass shooting out of the door in a sheet didn't hit me in the jugular or the shin or even a toe. I can be glad one pane of glass is still hanging there, to be removed without shattering. I can be glad Freya was up by the deck, watching. I can be highly irritated that the slivers of glass even bounced into her wading pool (because they did) and that I need to clean about 32 square feet of glass shards (which I do) or I can be grateful that Freya is pooped, too, and is showing no interest in trying to get into her wading pool at this moment (which she could be doing). I can also be irritated that now I can't close what's left of the door (which I am), or I can assess it (which I do) and climb up to figure out a way to get it to stay in its tracks so I can shut enough to keep most animals out over night (which I do and which takes some careful figuring and a big of hammering and longer than I had anticipated but it works).

Here's the balance: it's easy to fly off the handle (which I do often enough), but when I'm all alone at my own home and some small disaster like this happens, I know I have reliable Tom whom I can call, who can fix anything. OR I can look at the problem and figure out my own solution. After all, it was my own choice to buy an old farm place and live here alone with my dog. I'm not stupid. I can figure stuff out if I don't get too frustrated and just take time to look at how things work. And it feels good in the long run to feel somewhat or mostly self-reliant.

I closed the garage door, and when I turned around, fireflies filled the corn field. It seemed as if they turned their lights on while I was messing with the garage door, as if to say, see, even in the disasters, there's beauty when you look for it. Now, a garage door drama is not much of a disaster. It's small in the scope of the world's pain. SMALL. But when stuff like that happens, it's our world. It's what we're doing at the moment and it feels big. It's good to remember that it's not.

So as I tried to snap a picture of the sunset (and this is what I got), I thought about how the key is always to do what you're doing, even when it's an interruption, and not always what you want to be doing--it's what is right in front of you at this moment, and if you focus on that task, you live in the present, and that's what makes life a good place to live.

Okoboji

Great ride yesterday--"University of Okoboji Cycling Classic." Rode the 50-mile route around the lakes, and after the jammed-10-mile-an-hour start on a clogged bike trail, we broke into the open and flew along the roads and trails--gently rolling hills and curves. It rained for awhile, but still, the route was beautiful.

Then this morning, I volunteered for the North Mankato Triathlon. That's a great, well-organized event. Several of my friends had a great race--and everybody seemed to have fun. YAY!

Good week

Gearing up for some book events in July. New Ulm Public Library has a cool website. I'm there on July 15.

This is my birthday week, so on my birthday yesterday, I rode 55 miles -- Eeek. That's a mile for every year. Muddy, wet, rainy, windy, puddles, grit, but I did it.

Wrote all morning, then rode, then met my writing group for a birthday party/goodbye party for dear friend Jann who is moving to Fargo-Moorhead this weekend. Then Tom took me out. What a great birthday.

Now: back to writing.