Happy Monday- John Green

Things that make me happy

Topic :JOHN GREEN
Genre: General Awesomness

Every YA writer loves John Green.  I will willingly admit I am nerdfighter and john green fangirl.  Back in August when John announced The Fault in our Stars was up for preorder, I had my copy pre-ordered BEFORE the video was over.

Then he announced he was going on tour, when he listed the locations I said, “WAIT I LIVE NEAR DC.”  I canceled my preorder and bought myself a ticket to meet him.  

HERE ARE MY PICTURES:



When I first got there I saw this!!!







See the Washington DC--- that's where I was!


Shortly after taking this picture, I burst into tears.  There was a nerdfighter gathering and a bunch of kids were singing a song about puppy sized elephants.  I couldn't help it.  I've said it time and time again, but I am so insanely grateful for the internet.  I was a nerdy kid who had to hide it.  It was a lonely time growing up.  But seeing all these smart, well meaning, hopeful kids kids gather together without fear of bullies and wearing doctor who shirts, it was amazing.  Crying was the only way I could express it. 


Good news, that was the only time I cried!




John and Hank on ONE BOOK






Check out all my swag!  I also bought a poster and two Hank Green CDs.



John comes to greet the crowd.



Hank greets the crowd and sings a song.





300 nerds singing and dancing to Shake Your Booty.






The girl in the picture had my favorite Doctor Who tee shirt on, it was very cool, little TARDIS everywhere.

I waited for 2 hours after a book reading, concert and Q&A. 100% worth it. While waiting in line I finally got to meet SARAH ENNI in person!   WIN FOR LIFE



Reflection:
I have blogged many times about how much I love John Green as a writer.  I walked up to him and said, "Thank you.  Out of every author I have the biggest love/hate relationship."
He blinked, "Why did you read the book?"
Me, "not yet, every time I read one of your books I love it so much and yet I know I'll never be able to write as well as you do."
He laughed, "I have the same feeling whenever I write books."
"You stole one of my jokes and wrote it better." I said.
He smiled, "Just keep writing."


John Green told me to keep writing.


JOHN GREEN TO ME TO KEEP WRITING.


HE SAID HE HAD THE SAME FEARS I DO AND HE TOLD ME TO KEEP WRITING.


Then I walked over to Hank and thanked him for Project for Awesome and creating Nerdfighter community.  He thanked me for being apart of it.


And for a brief day, the community I always felt like I was apart of but watching from a distance, welcomed me.


And I cried.




Full disclosure--- I'm tearing up right now as I write this.
Although by the time you read it, the tears will be LONG dried.

Totally my whole belief system

Thank you Hank Green.  Thank you.

No matter HOW badly I screw up-- and I've been known to screw up pretty bad, my fails will NEVER match up to these fails. 

Real life FAIL

My biggest fail was when I locked my two year old in the car, with my keys in the front seat. We had to wait around for ten minutes for Hubby to come unlock the car.
Hubby was awesome about it and daughter didn't seem to be too fazed by it. Although she did look a little confused.

Writing FAIL
I queried a 135K chicklit book. 535 pages! WHAT! HUH? Why didn't anyone tell me I was the dumbest person alive. The title of the book "Love Wears a Suicidal Fish Hat."  Strangely enough, I sent out 20 queries and got 4 requests for material.   WHAT! HUH! SERIOUSLY? Everyone passed on it, and rightly so, because you know, it sucked.

Anyone wanna share their biggest fail?

Happy Monday everyone.

Blogging to avoid life and deadlines

You may know this about me, but I write. My current WIP has a deadline, not a deadline imposed by an editor or agent or even a loved one, but by me. June 23 I need to have the first draft finished. My plan is to sit in Starbucks while my daughter is in daycare and finish it on Monday. (Today) You will be updated on how well the planned worked.

I will tell you at this moment, my daughter is asleep, my husband is out of the house, my laundry is done (almost) and this is the perfect moment to be writing. But I am not. Why? Because of the aforementioned plan. I will be away from the internet for a little while but I want to make sure I have my blog updated and ready to go.

So here is what today's entry is all about. THE GAME! Watch this video and then come back to me.




If you can't watch the video because you're firewall at work won't let you, (for shame for blogging at work--- totally kidding) I will recap. Hank Green tells his viewers about this game called The Game. If you think about The Game, then you lose The Game. All desire ends in lose. The only way to win The Game is not to know about The Game. The Game can be anything. If you're living for it, you'll never win.

Wow depressing right?

Sort of.

Is he right? Yeah.

Right now on my hard drive there are 3 (almost 4) manuscripts. How many of them have been published? None. How many of them will I try to get published? Don't know. See for writers The Game is publication. But then there's all this crap after publication. Let's say you're lucky/talented enough to get an agent and that agent sells your book. Now the real work begins. You have to face the public, criticism (worst then anything you think about your book, because we are our own worst critics-- nope there are people out there who get paid to read books and write their comments on them) Then there's the internet trolls who get off by being mean.
Then you have to face your fans. If you're lucky enough to have any.

Then your book gets moved from the new release section to the shelves and before long it in the bargain bin, where books go to be forgotten and die.

Now your agent and your publisher and your fans want a follow up. Pressure is mounting and this wasn't why you got into writing in the first place. Was it? Did you just lose The Game?

For the record, my heart goes out to any writer who's book explodes over night and Hollywood comes calling for a movie that goes to number 1 and breaks box office records. Worst of all when Hollywood remakes you book and does it better then you could. (True Blood I'm looking in your direction) The fame might be nice but the pressure has got to SUCK. <-that was NOT meant to be a vampire joke.

Writers, readers, friends, family, I ask you this, are you playing The Game? What are you playing The Game for? Are you willing to lost The Game? Winning does not mean happiness. Happiness does not mean winning.

Two Posts in one day- Good New / Horrible news

Good news

I won a contest back in May from Kathleen Ortiz. You can find the link here.

Anyway today my package came. YAY!!!!





How awesome! Seriously. I've been wanting to read Gone for a while, but I haven't gotten around to it and it's really fraking expensive. I read Wicked Lovely A few years ago and it's a solid read. I still think about it now and then.

But I'm most excited for Vordak--- its a super villain guide to over taking the world, but it's written like the wimpy kid books.

YAY


Also two pretty amazing videos are on youtube right now that I wanted to point out:

Hank Green of the vlog brothers does his BEST video ever.




Charlie from Charlie is so cool like, has a new musical project. Charlie is one of many reasons why I like England so much.



Bad news:

Its that time of year. UOMAMWNSATS.

What is UOMAMWNSATS you ask?

Ugly Overweight Middle Aged Men Wearing No Shirts and Tight Shorts time in my neighborhood. Yes, enter June and all the shirts come off. No man wears a shirt. Men with better boobs than me are walking their dogs, squeezing themselves into the tiniest shorts known to science.

It's not just one guy who does this, but like 70% of the overweight middle aged men in my neighborhood. I don't really mind the Russian guy who does it because a) he is in shape and b) he's from Russia there's a big climate change for him. But no one else has an excuse.

I will not include any picture of that, its bad enough I have to see it, why force it on other people.


That's all for now, good night all.