As some of you probably know, I crochet. A lot. And in the last two months I started doing design work, which before then I thought I kind of hated. Because it was hard and I wasn’t passionate about anything enough to *want* to put in the work to get past that stage. And then along came My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic. I LOVE this show! I’m a proud brony. Or, well, pegasister. I’d been obsessed with this show for some time, and then a friend showed me some pics of crocheted ponies on eBay. And at first I was like, “It would be cool to make stuff like that, but I don’t like designing things.” But I couldn’t stop thinking about them and got really excited about trying my hand at it.

And I did! And it’s been going really well! Designing was hard at first, but now that I’ve learned the basics it’s become super addicting. I’m at the point now where I can sit down with and idea and start making it and have it actually turn out how I pictured. I even made sea ponies from the old 80s show (which I also LOVED, even if, sadly, it doesn’t hold up for me as an adult).

I also got over my laziness/annoyance about uploading and posting pictures, so here are some of my creations (you can see the rest at DeviantArt).

My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic characters Rainbow Dash, Pinky Pie, and Rarity as sea ponies:

Fluttershy in her gala dress:

And my newest creations, baby versions of Rainbow Dash and Fluttershy:

And I promise I’m still writing, even if ponies have kind of taken over my brain, or at least my apartment, which is now full of pony-colored yarn.

Current Mood:  accomplished

2011 was a pretty crazy year. It feels like it dragged on forever and at the same time was a huge whirlwind of hectic chaos that flew right by. I started grad school (a master’s program in Library and Information Science) and spent a week in Syracuse, NY hanging out with other people in the program, who were all amazingly awesome. I had jury duty the day I got back (again!), but thankfully I didn’t actually have to go in.

Writing wise, it’s felt like a pretty slow year, but maybe that’s just the last couple of months talking. I wrote about 90k over three books (not including notes and throwaway material). One of the books I finished, one of them I put on hold indefinitely, and the other is going out on proposal. And while I sold Russian rights for Renegade X–not sure if I ever announced that–and Disney renewed their movie option, I didn’t sell anything new in 2011, just like I didn’t in 2010. In 2010, that was devastating. In 2011, it was frustrating and sometimes discouraging, but I’ve more or less come to terms with it and learned a lot about myself in the process.

Actually, I learned a lot about myself in 2011 and about what makes me happy. I discovered I like having a variety of odd jobs. And I like jobs you sign up for and test into rather than interviewing for. I suck at interviews, but I’m great with tests. I don’t want writing to be the only focus in my life, but I do want to be able to focus on it when I choose to. So I like having my own schedule.

And I never thought self-publishing would make me happy, but in fact I’m ecstatic about it! (In case you missed it, I recently announced that I’m going to be self-pubbing a sequel to Renegade X.) Everyone’s been super supportive of it, and while I still want to be traditionally published as well, getting to work at my own pace and keeping myself as busy as I want to will be a nice complement to traditional pubbing.

I also finally started crocheting plushies for my Etsy shop. which I’d always sort of wanted to do but never really thought I would. And it turns out it’s wonderfully fulfilling. So between the Etsy shop and the self-publishing epiphany, I’ve been really taken by surprise about what makes me happy. I always thought I’d *know* ahead of time what would make me happy, and it’s kind of pleasantly surprising that I was wrong.

So that was my year in a nutshell. I hate making New Year’s resolutions, plus if this year’s taught me anything, it’s that I don’t always know what my goals are, so I won’t make any. But I can tell you I’m looking forward to the new year. I’ll be turning 30 in March and starting a new decade of my life, and I’m ready to embrace it.

I announced some exclusive information about the Renegade X sequel over at Laura’s Review Bookshelf, mainly that there WILL be one. Head over and check out my post to find out what this means for readers and what the book’s about.

Also head over there to enter to win a special annotated copy of The Rise of Renegade X! I’ve gone through a copy of the book and scribbled behind the scenes notes and drawn pictures all over it. It’s the perfect Christmas gift for the Renegade X lover or aspiring writer in your life, if you, you know, aren’t selfish like me and wouldn’t want it for yourself. Three runners up will also win swag packs. The contest runs from now until December 11th, so go check it out!

Here are a few teaser pics of the annotated book:

The first page.

A close-up of the cake building.

Don’t cry, PB&J, you’ll taste even worse if you’re soggy!

Three winners will also win a swag pack like this one!

I was watching my two cats fight yesterday. Teisel, the big one that looks like an ocelot, refuses to attack unless he’s *perfectly* calculated exactly how he’s going to do it. When he’s going to pounce, where he’s going to bite, and, most importantly, whether or not he thinks he’ll be successful. He only wants to attack if he’s going to win. But he loses every fight.

Kitten (the black one in the pic–you can see his eyes–who isn’t actually a kitten anymore, but the name totally stuck), on the other hand, has a completely different fighting style. He’s quick and bold. He makes lots of frequent attacks, even if a good percentage of them never make contact. He tackles and lunges and snaps his jaws at Teisel, not bothering to calculate whether he’ll actually hit him or not. Like I said, a lot of them don’t actually find their mark. You could say his attacks fail a lot, though it’s obvious he doesn’t see it that way. And yet, he kicks Teisel’s ass every time.

I think you can see where I’m going with this, because it applies not just to cat fights, but to writing. When writing a book, a lot of writers subscribe to Teisel’s methods. They don’t want to fail or be embarrassed or have anything go wrong so badly that they meticulously plan, and calculate, and make sure their attempt is going to be *perfect,* whether that means taking years to painstakingly craft their first book – because they want their first book to be good enough to get published, so they won’t have any “failures” – or if it means never submitting any books until they think it’s a “sure thing.” But Teisel hardly ever gets any attacks in. And when he does, no matter how perfectly he thinks he’s calculated everything, it’s never a sure thing. Sometimes he makes contact, sure, but never as much as Kitten does, and he always loses. And it’s obvious he always feels embarrassed and angry and like a failure.

Kitten’s method takes more guts. His first attempt might not be successful, and even if it is, it takes more than one attack to win a fight. But he doesn’t waste time worrying about failure–I don’t think Kitten even has a concept of what failure is (though Teisel is very conscious of it). Kitten attacks often, not waiting for the right time or calculating how to win without making any mistakes. In fact, technically he makes lots of mistakes, but never as big of a mistake as Teisel, who’s too cautious to make a move. Kitten wins every fight (seriously, EVERY fight, and they tackle each other pretty often), not just because he’s not afraid to make mistakes or fail, but because he doesn’t even see his mistakes as being mistakes.

They’re just part of the process of kicking ass.

And so, if mistakes are necessary to win, does that really make them mistakes? At the end of a fight, Teisel’s attacks might have made 100% contact, whereas Kitten’s are more like 50%, and yet it’s clear who feels like a loser. I’m not even saying that Kitten feels like a winner, because he doesn’t really care. He just wants to have fun. It’s Teisel, the one who cares so much about failing that he’ll never take a chance, who sets himself up for disappointment

I have to preface this post with a little story. Once upon a time, about 6 years and 6 books ago, I read Donald Maass’ Writing the Breakout Novel, and it changed my life. No, seriously, it did. And I’m not big on how-to books when it comes to writing. But that’s a post for a different day. Anyway, I read that book, and it’s companion workbook, and did all the exercises. And the book I was working on was SO much better than anything I’d written before, and I loved it SO hard.

So, so hard, you guys.

And I even sent in the first page to Miss Snark’s first page critique, and, while it wasn’t her genre, she thought it was good. I did not get Snarked, I got approval. And when I finished the book and sent it out, I got my first ever requests from agents. One for a partial, and one for a partial and THEN for a full! This was it. I was so in love with that book and its characters, and it was much better than anything else I’d ever written, and it was actually getting requests, which no book of mine had ever done before. It was definitely The One.

But you can probably guess how this story ends, since the book in question is not the one that got published. No, the partial and the full got rejected. With form rejections. And more form rejections came in from agent after agent, until I had about 50 of them. I revised my query letter a million times and drove everyone nuts with it. Eventually, I had to admit that this book was not going to be The One, and it broke my freakin’ heart.

It took a long time to get over it. I know because even after publishing another book, I’m still not over it. Not completely. Obviously, I’ve moved on, but there is still a tiny sliver of me that holds me back from ever loving a book so wholeheartedly again. Because I believed in it, and I was stupid. And it messed me up.

But that’s not the end of the story either, so bear with me. Because, you see, I have this tendency when a book “fails” to tell myself that book is dumb and not any good, so I can let go and move on. And since I’m never exactly sure what it was about the book that supposedly failed, the types of characters and the things that happened in the book become unofficially off-limits. What. this book was fantasy and it sucked? Don’t write fantasy anymore, duh! And this character you loved that had X, Y, and Z qualities? Don’t write about X, Y, and Z qualities, obviously.

Kids, don’t be like me. Because lately I’ve been rethinking this policy, and of course it is stupid, not my ideas. And the book that was supposed to be The One and turned out to be The One that sucked and betrayed me and broke my heart? Well, it was flawed, but maybe it was my writing that was so flawed, and the only reason it got any requests at all was because of how great the characters and ideas were. Or at least how passionate I was about them.

I don’t make a habit of resurrecting old books, because they’re hard enough to let go of as it is, and I’ve found it usually better to move on and not look back. But the other day–okay, maybe more like a month or so ago–this book popped into my head again, and I just knew how I would rewrite it if I was working on it again. The words for the new opening filled my head, and I started writing. And it was good. Really good. My critique partner thinks it’s awesome, and hopefully my agent will, too. And hopefully somewhere down the line a publisher will love it, and then maybe lots of people will have the chance t

Hi, my name is Chelsea, and I write boy books. Even though I’m a girl and even though boy books aren’t necessarily flying off the shelves. But you knew that already.

There was a big kerfluffle lately, as a lot of you probably heard about, started when the NYT posted this article, about the lack of YA boy books out there and, consequently, the lack of boy readers. There have been a lot of good posts made by other authors about this, so I don’t want to get into the article so much as I want to talk about boy books in general. Especially since I’m a girl and I write them and that’s not exactly the norm.

I don’t really think of my books as boy books or girl books. They’re just, you know, MY BOOKS, and the ones I actually enjoy writing tend to have 1st person guy narrators. I don’t sit down and think, “Ah, I’m going to write a boy book! For boys! Now, what do they need to read about? What would I want to read if I was a boy?” Psh. Seriously, I write what *I* like reading. I’ve actually been surprised at how many girls have thought they wouldn’t like Renegade X–but totally loved it once they started reading–because it’s got a male protagonist. O__o I mean, I’m a girl, so I tend to write about guys that girls will love, while still being real boys. I write stories that I hope resonate with both genders, that are full of adventure and romance and snappy dialogue.

I can’t say how many boys are reading YA or not, but I can say most of my fan mail and reader comments are from boys, usually teenagers, while most of the public reviews are written by girls. I don’t know if this means girls are just more public about their opinions, or if it means boys don’t have enough books to bother making a review site. That’s not to say that girls don’t write to me, or that guys never write reviews, because they do. But girls have told me that they relate to Damien and his dilemmas in the book, and guys have told me they saw my book at the store and grabbed it off the shelf. So, yes, girls can relate to male protagonists (while also finding them swoon worthy), and guys are going to the book store, even to the YA section. They’re also going to the library.

It would be cool if there were more boy books out there, because I’d like to read them. (And I wouldn’t mind if I never got another rejection letter stating that a male protagonist makes a book unsaleable.) I’d also like if there were more dystopians (yes, really, especially actiony ones like The Maze Runner), and more horror. Definitely more horror. Double points for a dystopian horror with a male MC, plenty of action, and a romantic subplot.

Or at least it’s almost over. I have ONE MORE DAY of my temporary day job, and then I’m finished. I survived all the craziness of starting grad school, going to the week long summer residency at Syracuse (and almost not being able to get my plane ticket because financial aid took so long to come), coming home to jury duty (thankfully I never got called in), working a full time job while finishing up classes, and dealing with a tax issue that almost prevented me from getting financial aid. *PHEW*

And did I mention finding out that the Renegade X paperback got cancelled? There was that, too. And then there was also a brief scare where I thought there weren’t going to be any more Monstrumologist books, but luckily they came through!

So there were good things this summer, too, like Disney renewing the film option. And I got a new critique partner, who’s been giving me wonderful feedback and also giving me the swift kick in the pants I needed to get back on track and start writing every day. I’ve been putting in two hours a day five days a week (though I’ll admit to slacking during the past two weeks of day job exhaustion), and that’s worked wonders on my productivity levels. I have a book out on sub, and I’ve got two more that I’m working on. And the residency at Syracuse was amazing. It was one of the best experiences of my life! I made a ton of new friends, got inspired by teachers passionate about their work, and visited their special collections section of the library. Which was, ZOMG, the best thing ever.

I specifically signed up for a distance program so I wouldn’t have to move, but then they went and showed me their collection of 4,000 year old clay tablets, and an old map book written in Latin where what would eventually be the U.S. is a giant blob, and a piece of papyrus from Cleopatra’s time, and many more amazing artifacts, most of them written in either Latin or French (when they weren’t in English). Um, dude, I totally have a background in that. And the school totally has a certificate option where you combine library classes with museum classes and get qualified to work with these objects. There’s just one catch–most of the classes are only available at the school.

You can guess what I’m thinking about doing next year.

And as for the cancellation of the Renegade X paperback, it’s unfortunate, obviously, but I’d like to say that I have the best fans ever. The responses I’ve gotten to this book have been SO wonderful, whether it’s been through positive reviews or from readers emailing me to tell me how much they loved Damien’s story. And having that kind of support makes this business so much easier to deal with, so if you love a book, tell the author.

And if you love Renegade X and want to help spread the word, you can blog about it, post a review on Amazon, or even just tell your friends. And you know what else? Tell your library, especially if they don’t already have a copy. You don’t have to spend money to support a book. Obviously sales are awesome, but spreading information is just as important, and it’s free.

So if you loved the book, tell your friends. And if you hated it, tell your enemies. ;)

I leave for Syracuse, NY TOMORROW night. I’m flying through the night and getting there in the morning–fun, I know–and then I have the rest of the day to rest and get settled before classes start on Saturday. I’m going to be there for a week long residency, with 8 hours of class a day, plus homework in the evenings. O__o I’ll be staying in the dorms, which I’ve never done before, so that will be a new experience. (You never what experiences will matter later or be helpful…)

I’ve loaded up my Nook with lots of library books, some rereads, and a bunch of samples from B&N. This will be my first time travelling with my Nook, and I’ve got an 8 hour trip on the way there and 12 hours on the way back, so I’m thankful I can carry enough reading material to cover that! I know last year when I was coming back from BEA, where I got a bunch of free books, I brought three or four with me on the plane and still had to scramble during a layover in SF to find another one. Which turned out to be a good thing because I found the 2nd Dexter book and bought it and got hooked. I’d seen the show, but didn’t know what to expect from the books. But they’re AWESOME. And they go in different directions than the show. I won’t spoil anything, but I will say that the show doesn’t parallel the books all that much (though I can’t speak for the first one because I still haven’t read it yet–I get the impression it’s pretty similar to the first season, though there are some big differences) and they have their own story lines and a great voice–well worth reading.

Did you know that Chameleon Circuit released a new album yesterday? If you haven’t heard of them, they write songs about Dr. Who and they’re amazing. Their first album was good, and their new one, Still Got Legs, just blows me away. I can’t stop listening to it. You can listen to the whole thing for free here.

So you might notice I changed WP themes. I feel like this one’s easier to read and more pleasing to the eye. And it looks like a notebook!!! What is it about website themes that look like notebooks being so appealing? If I handed you a real notebook and was like, “Here, this is my journal, you want to read it?” you’d probably go O__o and run the other way. But anyhow, I’ve been so frustrated by WordPress lately, but I think I’ve got everything updated now and maybe stuff will actually work, like automatically posting to twitter when there’s a new blog post. And maybe accepting it when I try and install new themes.

I’m taking a break from rereading the Percy Jackson books to reread the Pretty Little Liars series, since the new book is coming out, like, on TUESDAY. OMG. I am so excited for these new books, you don’t even know. And yeah, I know the books could have ended after the 8th one and been done, but I can’t get enough of Sara Shepard’s writing, and I am so addicted to these books. If you haven’t read them, the description that got my interest was that it’s like Desperate Housewives for teens. And it is.

Today I went for a walk and found a giant middle school that was actually half middle school, half high school. Facing one way, it’s a middle school, and facing the other way, it’s a high school. They both have different names and seem to be separate entities that meet in the middle, like CatDog. And speaking of things that are half one thing and half another, I also saw a cat whose front half was short haired and whose back half was long haired. We stared for a while, each of us perplexed by the other, no doubt.

So it's been a little while since I posted. Real Life sort of kidnapped me and locked me up in a cage dangling above an oversized cauldron and I only just now escaped. *phew* It's been a busy sprummer, and I think it's only going to continue to get busier until fall. (In the NW, we have winter, sprinter, mud, a short spring, and a long sprummer, followed up by a few days of real summer, and then fall.)

But anyway, here's what's been going on with me. I started grad school, which at first was underwhelming and now is totally overwhelming and I have to go to Syracuse for a one week residency in only a little over TWO WEEKS and I have to get all the work done for two classes first and agghhh!!

Ahem. Grad school has made this a pretty crazy sprummer, especially since it took over a month for financial aid to go through, due to me taking different amounts of credits during different sessions. (I've never had financial aid in time to buy books and stuff before the beginning of school, but this takes the cake and eats it too.) And then I have the two classes I'll be attending during my residency, but I have to get all the work and reading done for them ahead of time. Plus keep up with my regular class that spans the whole semester. Hopefully in the fall things will calm down a bit, especially since I'll only be taking two (hopefully evenly spaced) classes.

Oh, and as soon as I get back from my residency, I have jury duty. -__-

In more exciting news--I know it's going to be hard to top the excitement of jury duty, but I have to try--my film option with Disney was almost up, and they decided to renew!!! Huge W00T!! I know very little about this project, but I do know that the writers are making good progress and that Disney liked their revisions to the script.

The paperback version of The Rise of Renegade X is out on August 23rd, if my current info is correct. I don't remember if I posted about it here or not, but it was supposed to be out in May, BUT the sales reps liked the blurb on the cover from the awesome Julie Kagawa and wanted more time to pitch it to bookstores and stuff. (Or whatever sales reps do.) It will be much cheaper than the hardback, but just as cool! And I'm planning to have a contest to go with it, where I'll be giving away a behind-the-scenes annotated copy of the hardback.

I also have a new book going out on sub soon that I think you guys are going to love.

And that's all for now because my five page paper isn't going to write itself... by Friday.

Since I finished a book last week and am picking up another one I started on a couple months ago, I decided to share some thoughts.

Some of you might not have written a book before but are thinking about it or are busy on your first. And it's terrifying and you're biting your nails and thinking, "OMG, I have NO IDEA what I'm doing!" And you know what? Don't let that feeling discourage you, because you will pretty much always feel that way when you start a new project. I've finished eleven books over the past eighteen years, and I'm starting my twelfth now, and I still have no idea how to write books.

Okay, that's not exactly true. Obviously I've learned a lot and improved my skills and all, including my discipline and perseverance (I highly recommend getting some levels in those two, because they will be invaluable if you want to write novels). But novels are big and messy and complicated and there's no magic step-by-step formula for figuring everything out. And the methods I use to figure out who my characters are and what they're going to do in one book won't work at all for another book, and I have to muddle through the confusion with no real map. In short, there's nothing scarier than a blank page. It strikes terror in the hearts of millions.

The scary never goes away, and every time I start something new, I find myself going, "Uh, wait, how did I do this before? Was I possessed by wizards all those other times I made this happen, because I don't even know how to get started, and obviously if I'd really done this so many times before, I'd know what I was doing by now." I look at the book on the shelf with my name on it and think, "How exactly did that get there?"

I don't remember who, but someone once said that you can't learn to write books, you can only learn to write the book you're working on. It's so true.

Finishing a book is much less scary than starting one (or at least it's scary in a different way), but it's hard to get there. I think for every book I've written, there've been times when I thought I was really never going to finish. Some of them I *knew* I would finish, but there were still extreme moments (read: days, weeks, months) of doubt. Doubt that even if I finished it, it was going to be stupid. Doubt that the whole premise was stupid. There was a time when I was writing Renegade X, about 1/3 of the way through (that's where I ALWAYS have my freak out--I've learned now to ignore any doubts I have at the 1/3 mark), where I started questioning everything. My scenes started to unravel until I was worrying that this book I was loving working on and writing in like mad was completely stupid. Too stupid to exist, really, and here I'd written so much of it and I should probably toss it all and start over on something new.

NO! Thankfully, I didn't. And you can convince yourself that *any* book is too stupid to exist, or that no one will love it. Your brain will set traps for you while you're writing. No matter how much fun you're having, no matter how in love with your characters you are, some part of your brain is sitting there rubbing its hands together and going, "Now, what lies can I spread to sabotage this?" There is unfortunately no cure for this, but the good news is it can be treated with discipline and perseverance.

The more books you write, the more you learn to ignore the lies your brain tries to tell you. Doubts go with the territory, but you can learn to ignore them and keep going. And frankly, if writing wasn't scary, it wouldn't be exciting either.

I claimed I was going to do a post about writing today, but I had trouble deciding on a topic, so I procrastinated until now. And even now I'm still not sure what this post is about, but as I type this, some ideas are forming because, well, butt in chair, fingers on keyboard kind of puts you in the hot seat, and then you either get up and walk away, or you make the magic happen.

Which is writing--and being a writer--in a nutshell. (Probably a largish shell, like a walnut, with twisty spaces and maybe a few walnut crumbs inside.) It's really easy to say, "Eh, well, I don't know what happens in the next scene, so... Ooh, look, the kitchen needs cleaning and there's yarn shopping I could be doing because several hundred skeins just isn't enough!" And yeah, sometimes I sit down and I really don't know what happens next and my brain just isn't on the right track and I can't find the right word thread to get me going on a scene. And I sit there until my eyes get blurry and there are STRESS chemicals raging in my chest and I have to stop and do something else for awhile. But I try not to let that be the norm, and I always try to come back to it as soon as I'm feeling better.

I guess you could call that writer's block (or writer's wrage), though I'm never sure what people mean by "writer's block" because it could mean a couple of things, ranging from not knowing what scene comes next to not knowing what book to write next or even knowing what happens but the words for it are being elusive. So basically writer's block could mean technical problems with the book, or it could mean a lack of enthusiasm from the writer.

And you know what?

I have these problems all the time.

I'll tell you lack of enthusiasm is definitely the hardest to deal with, because the reasoning behind it is usually hard to diagnose. Fear and stress can dry up your creativity like nobody's business. Or sometimes it turns out to be some kind of health problem like not having enough vitamin D or not getting enough exercise. And sure, if you know you're having creative problems because you're not getting enough exercise, then the answer is pretty straight forward. But sometimes you don't know why you hate your book or why you love reading your book but hate working on it.

But the lack of enthusiasm problem can also come up because writers sometimes feel like they need "filler" scenes. And this can creep up on you, especially if you find yourself going, "AGH, I really don't want to write this boring scene that I hate, but I NEED it for the story." Forcing yourself to slog through scenes you don't like can make you, you know, not want to work on them. And the truth is? No matter how much you think you *need* that boring filler scene, if it's boring, then you don't need it. It's like saying you need ugly weeds in your garden so your flowers can feel extra pretty.

So cut it and figure out something else that can go there. Don't waste your garden space on weeds, because you're going to need all the flowers you can get. And if you really don't want to cut it? Add something that makes you love it. If you're like, "It's really important that the scullery maid washes all these dishes in this scene because that's how she cuts her hand and gets it infected and loses it later on, and we HAVE to see it happen, so it has to stay!" then add something to it that makes it cool. Like while the scullery maid is washing these boring old dishes, someone comes in and says, "Hey, the prince you're not-so-secretly in love with is getting married to your worst enemy! Oops, didn't mean to startle you and make you drop a dish and cut yourself on it." Now this boring old scene has stuff that makes you squee inside and go, "OMG, I can't wait for that to happen!" It could be anything, really, as long as it gives you that scene-crush feeling.

You should have a scene-crush on every scene! Isn't that awesome? Isn't it awesome and liberating and exciting t

It's Valentine's Day! And one of the cats chewed on our Valentines roses we got and now it looks like we have slugs... in the house. O__O

The last week has been bad for my right leg. First, I jammed my big toe and now the joint aches a lot, especially when it's raining, which is all the time. Then I slipped in the rain while putting groceries in the car and banged my shin really hard on the car door and there was this lump that swelled up and is super tender. And THEN because I was being careful getting into the car a few days later, I was too slow getting my leg into the car and the door tried to fall closed and smashed into my ankle. Gah. Nothing serious or anything, but still.

As you might guess, it's gray here in Seattle. Gray all the time, except when it's night out and then it's pitch black. It's so gray these days, you can't tell what time of day it is, only that it's not night time. And I have a vitamin D deficiency, which I take supplements for, but it never feels like enough. So I asked for an early birthday present and got this amazing sun lamp!



The picture doesn't do it justice as far as how bright it is. It's REALLY bright--I have to have it angled away from me so I don't end up looking directly at it. The cats love lounging under it, and the roses sitting in a vase on my table seem to think it's the real thing and have been blooming for it. I got it on Wednesday and set it up and my mood was INSTANTLY kicked up a notch or two. (Or three or... ten.) I didn't realize how big a difference sunlight makes. I feel way happier with it, I don't get down about the grayness outside, or about my horrible sleeping schedule which is currently so off-kilter I don't even want to tell you what time I eat dinner. I'm much more productive at night and feel more awake, but the time when I end up pretty much only being awake at night, like some kind of vampire, can be really depressing. But now, with my sun lamp, it doesn't bother me! And I have a lot more energy and actually *want* to be awake all day. And get work done (even chores). I feel fuller longer and don't feel like I need to overeat. I feel like it's summer, only without the heat. And I no longer spend hours every day desperately longing to be somewhere sunnier.

I've been distracted a lot lately with grad school stuff. I've been trying to find scholarships, but it seems like there's a technicality on all of them that disqualifies me. >:/ So far I've gotten into Syracuse University and Rutger's distance programs for library and information science (in case you missed my OMG, GRAD SCHOOL! tweets), and while I'm still waiting to hear from the UW, I'm falling in love with Syracuse SO HARD. I've already been invited to join a group for new students, and when I asked questions about a scholarship and was totally expecting to get a snippy response, the response I got was actually really encouraging and informative. I love the classes they offer and they're big on entrepreneurship and supporting student projects, and their students have done some really amazing things. I kind of wish I'd gone there for undergrad, but that's a different topic altogether. As is, I'm itching to send them my intent to enroll card, but I have to wait and see what financial aid packages I get, because while they're at the top of my list, they're also the most expensive.

Book wise, I've got two projects going. I made a wild claim on twitter that I was going to finish a draft of the new book by my birthday, which is in 16 days, and... Yeah, no. Not going to happen. But I've ended up getting stuff done on the not-so-new MG book I've been picking away at, so that one's u

So, I'm working on a big overhaul of the site that hopefully I'll be able to share with everyone soon-ish. If everything goes according to plan, I'm going to be getting rid of Wordpress and exclusively using the LJ (but you won't have to go to a separate site to view it). I'm also developing a plan for blogging regularly, possibly with TOPICS.

My big news at the moment is that I got into grad school at Syracuse University, for their library and information science distance learning program! I'm still waiting to hear from the University of Washington and Rutgers, but, hey, I got in, and all three schools sound amazing. If I get into all of them, it will be hard to choose (unless one of them comes with major funding, and then it'll be a lot easier). I wasn't expecting to hear back yet, so it came as a big surprise. Each school starts in a different month, ranging from July to September, so I'm not even sure when I'll be doing what, but at least now I have an idea of what I'll be doing next year.

The Rise of Renegade X comes out in paperback in only a little over three months, which I'm getting pretty excited about. I mean, yeah, I know the book's already out, but now it will be out again (and only $8.99) and sitting on shelves next to other paperbacks. I've got some ideas for some new RRX swag and maybe some contests in the near future, so stay tuned for that.

I was using the Neti Pot just now and Teisel, the 20lb Bengal, decided the saline solution flowing out my nose was the best thing ever. :/ I was like, "GO AWAY!" and he was like, "OM NOM NOM" and wouldn't go away. I tried letting the solution drip on him, but that didn't faze him, he just flicked his ear a little. So he's there, crowding the sink, while The Kitten is off in the corner, mewling and making noise, and I'm still like, "OMG, GO AWAY!" and nobody was going away. Teisel wasn't going to leave his wonderful new fountain that was COMING OUT OF MY NOSE. :/ And then I was like snorting out the excess solution in between pourings, and Teisel was still cool with that (OM NOM NOM), and then Kitten came over to watch and was all fascinated, like me using Neti Pot was even more interesting than watching the toilet flush, and meanwhile Teisel's still crowding the sink and refusing to be pushed away. At that point the Neti Pot was mostly empty anyway and I gave up. Once I turned the water on to rinse everything out, Teisel bolted, though Kitten stayed, so as not to miss out on any more fascinating water movements. These cats, I tell you!

P.S. Just so everybody knows, he didn't really drink very much of the saline solution, and I totally rinsed out the sink afterwards so he can't go back for more.

Since I started my yarn diet, I've been buying more books instead of yarn. I suspect at the end of the yarn diet I will need a book diet, but there are worse things to need a diet from. *glances accusingly at fridge* Anyway, here's what I've got to read right now.

Bought from my trip to B&N last night:

Red Riding Hood - yeah, like the movie. It's not exactly a tie-in, because while the director was working on the movie, she asked her friend to write a novel version, so they're kind of simultaneous. Or something like that. Anyway, the writing is decent enough, though there's some head hopping. I'm only a couple chapters in, so hopefully it will deliver on being dark and scary and maybe sexay.

Mr. Monk is Cleaned Out by Lee Goldberg - Number 10 in the Monk series (based on the TV show). This series is amazing. I was skeptical the first time I picked one up, but it's just as funny and well done as the show.

Library (all ebooks):

Mr. Monk is in Trouble and Mr. Monk and the Dirty Cop by Lee Goldberg - books 8 and 9 in the series, which I haven't read yet but thought I would before reading 10. It turns out the library had them on ebook so I snatched them up.

Dust City by Robert Paul Weston - I don't know much about this book, other than it's about a teen werewolf trying to solve a mystery and prove his dad was framed for the murder of Little Red Riding Hood. (And now I have one of those moments where I go, "Huh... am I, like, into werewolf books?? Or just little red riding hood books?") This book could be awesome or it could be awful, or it could be awful in an awesome way, which is sometimes my kind of awesome.

Borrowed:

Anna and the French Kiss by Stephanie Perkins - I've been hearing SO MANY good things about this book. I read a sample on my nook and loved it, so I don't doubt that I'll become a member of the Anna fan club. (Or is it a St. Clair fan club?)

Want want want:

Warped by Maurissa Guibord - I like to refer for Maurissa as "My Elevensie" because she was the Elevensie who interviewed me about Renegade X. And her book is about a UNICORN TAPESTRY and VERY OLD BOOKS and there might even be a HOT BOY. *ahem* Anyway, I read the ebook sample on my nook and I am in lurve. Will buy as soon as I get through some of the above books and don't feel overwhelmed.

As for my yarn diet... I had 199 skeins, BUT that's not including the skeins that are still supposedly on their way to me in the mail. (And there's also the skein I need to finish up the commission I'm working on, but that doesn't count.) Which will bring it up to 204. And then I finished the hat I was making, and since I didn't count any skeins that were literally attached to working projects, but then had leftover yarn when I cut the strings... that adds another three to my list. So, my real total is 207. O__o (Remind me not to finish any more projects...) BUT I used up one giant skein of peach, so I'm at 206. I'm making a lace blanket that was in Vogue's knit.1 last summer. It looks good in pastels and uses giant needles, so I used up my peach skein (which *might* smell kind of like bug spray from sitting at my parents' house, soaking in cigarette smoke, for 30 years) and now am using two pink skeins at once. I haven't done a lot of knitting with two strands at the same time, but I figured now was a good time to experiment, especially since my goal is to use up yarn, not save it for later. I kind of like it. Next I'm hoping to do something with crochet.

is really hard! That's why I'm blogging about it instead of actually working on it. It's middle grade, and those are always really hard for me. (I say "always" as if I've written a lot of them. This will only be my second.) The last one I wrote took me several years--working off and on--and my YA books usually only take a few months, if that. I'd work on it, get a few k in, and then feel like I couldn't go on and give up, only to reread it a few months later and be like, "What was I thinking? This is AWESOME!" And it's not like it was an emotional book or anything--it was hilarious.

This one I'm working on now is also awesome. Possibly one of the most awesome projects I've worked on. And I keep thinking, "If it's so good, why can't I just get obsessed with working on it already and zoom through it?" That's my normal MO, and it's just not happening. It's tough. I started this book last June, maybe? And I've got almost 9k. I've taken breaks. I haven't given up on this one (mostly because The Spouse is in love with it and that makes me feel a little more validated), but I've put it aside multiple times. Sometimes to work on other projects, sometimes just because it was hard.

This month I'm doing Jano (fake Nano in January) and trying to finish it, because I really love this book and I don't want it to take several years to hit "the end." Last year I killed at Jano, churning out 60k and finishing up my first draft of Shades of Rome. This year... it's slow going. I don't get words every day. And no matter how many words I get the day before, the next day feels just as hard, like Sisyphus rolling a giant boulder up a hill. I mean, in a way that's always how novel writing feels--you hit your word goal, feel great, and then in the morning you start over. You're only as good as the words you've written TODAY. But usually if I've gotten words down the day before, if I get my butt in the chair the next morning, it's not too hard to get the words flowing again.

This book? This book is slow going. And it doesn't help that when I wrote slowly, I start to agonize. I tend to believe/feel like fast writing is better writing. So if I'm writing slowly, something must be wrong. I must be sucking or this book must not really be that cool, because if it was actually cool and if I actually loved it enough, I'd be speeding right along. But I think I have to face the facts that this book is just hard for me. With both middle grade books I've worked on, I've felt like I loved reading the end product more than I loved working on it. It's not something I'd want to do all the time, but sometimes the right book comes along that's worth the effort. I'm always hopeful that I'll hit my stride and everything will fall into place and speed up, but even if I don't? Maybe that's okay sometimes.

Last night I took pics and documented all of my yarn as part of the Yarn Diet. In the past 5 years or so I've accumulated 199 skeins of yarn. O__o Some of them are quite hideous. I've bought bundles of cheap yarn at thrift stores and stashed them away, I've inherited stashes from friends and relatives who didn't want theirs anymore, and I've bought tons of new yarns for projects that I may not have started or finished.

The first step (besides admitting I have a problem) is counting out all the skeins and taking pics. I did mine by drawer, which is why most of them are sorted by color. Here goes:


The first drawer is the variegated yarns drawer. These are kinda hideous, except for that one in the middle that reminds me of birthday cake but that I have yet to figure out what to do with. Also the three skeins in the top left are pretty, but, again, no idea what to do with them.


Lots of pinks, reds, and purples! I think a giant ugly blanket may be in order. That I will then pick an unsuspecting relative to send to. P.S. Do you see that little ball of purple at the top under the fuzzy red yarn? I dyed that myself with Kool-Aid!


Ah, yes, the drawer of yarns that are currently part of projects I'm actively working on. Like, a year or so ago... The red, black, and blue yarns are for a gigantic Kingdom Hearts blanket I'm slowly working on. Each row takes me about an hour and a half, but one of these days I hope to make some serious progress on it. It will be amazing when it's finally finished.


The greens. Note the cone on the side there--it's got A LOT of fingering weight yarn on it. Also note the giant skein of sparkly green Christmas yarn at the bottom. It seemed like a good idea when I saw it at the thrift store.


Blues. I like most of these, and I have plans already for the three at the top. Also, you can't tell from this pic, but the one in the center is sparkly. I've already used quite a bit of it, but it's still giant.


Why is there so much peach and orange? Who thought that was a good idea?


The off whites! I actually like most of these, though I don't know what to make with them. My only regrets are the two fuzzy spools on the left. They're kind of coarse, despite being so fuzzy.

I have trouble starting blog posts. I start writing them in my head, no problem, and then I decide to sit down and actually type one out, and... my mind blanks on how to start. Which is weird because once upon a time I knew how to start blog posts just fine. And then I forgot, I guess.

Anyway, it's time to reflect back on 2010 and think about what's to come in 2011. I love this. I love looking back and counting up my accomplishments (and, er, failure-ish things) and imagining how awesome beginning a new year will be. That's probably why I love the beginning of the submission process, when your shiny new book that might be full of accomplishments first goes out into the world and you imagine how much opportunity and success you might have. You know, that moment right before all the rejections come rolling in.

2010 was a strange year. My horoscope said it was going to be my golden epoch year, or something like that. Either way, it certainly didn't turn out like I expected. I'll be honest with you. I thought I would sell books this year. I thought I would be under contract again by now, and I'm not. Not being under contract kind of makes the day your book comes out feel like the day you officially become unemployed, or at least it did for me. And it wasn't for lack of trying or hard work or submitting. Sometimes thems are just the breaks! So, not the year I expected, but one full of changes, hurdles jumped, and accomplishments accomplished.

This year I:

1. Wrote a book. It was historical. And 1st person. And that person was someone famous. NEVER thought I could write historical books, or especially one about someone real who everybody knows about, and especially not in 1st person. And, yeah, it's more like Xena than it is HBO's Rome or whatever, but still.

2. I got glasses. I've been avoiding glasses for years, and it turns out they're not so bad. And mine look awesome, thanks to my friend Matthew who helped me pick them out.

3. I sold movie option rights for Renegade X to Disney Channel Movies.

4. My book came out! It was not the grand explosion I pictured it to be when I first sold. Selling the book was an amazing moment, definitely the high point, and then by the time it comes out you've already used up all your excitement energy. Imagine waiting to open your Christmas presents for two years. Even though one of them is obviously shaped like the bicycle you wanted, after staring at that bicycle shaped wrapping paper for two years, some of the thrill has faded. But still--book came out! Awesomesauce! Random people I've never met have read my book! Words that I have written have been to places I haven't.

5. I went to NYC for the first time ever, to go to BEA. (Hopefully not the last!) I was terrified to go, but it ended up being AMAZING. One of my best adventures.

6. I went to CA to visit relatives and ended up at a Roman Villa. (I know, right?)

7. I moved to a new city. Moving was absolute hell, but I LOVE it here!

8. I applied to grad schools. Three of them. I've been thinking about it for years, but this time I finally did it, even though it was hard and complicated. Or at least seemed that way in the beginning. But I took a big long test I spent weeks studying for, I asked people for (and got) letters of recommendation, and I even wrote an essay about myself. (About going to NYC despite being terrified of it and then having the time of my life.)

9. I made huge revisions to aforementioned book, even though there were times when I didn't think I'd be able to figure out the new ending and get it back on submission.

Oh, yeah, and I got a Nook, which is one of my favorite things EVER. I went from a hardcopies-forever book snob to a die hard convert, once I

I'm taking a break from working on my statement of purpose letter for grad school apps and thinking about making fudge. I have these peppermint bark chips that I'm going to put in it and maybe sprinkle on the top (I have a dream of this coming out super beautiful and Christmasy, but it might instead be more of a blobby mass in a pan with peppermint chunks sticking out of it). Part of me wants to savor the idea of making the fudge, and part of me just wants to make it. After all, I've been savoring this idea since I got the stuff to make it last weekend, and after a while savoring loses its appeal if you feel like you'll never actually do the thing. Or at least it does to me.

But anyway. One time I was in line at the store, and I was probably buying fudge supplies, and the cashier started telling me about her family's tradition where they can't make fudge until after the first snowfall. !!!! And I thought, "Wow, what a wonderful, magical tradition!" Can you imagine all the joy of wanting to make fudge but having to wait until it snowed? And then it snows and you're stuck inside making warm nummy fudge and you feel SUPER festive because you didn't make the fudge until it was for sure winter outside and because having to wait like that is kind of like waiting for Christmas to open your presents, and I imagine it makes the fudge that much more fun to make and it probably tastes better, too, since it's full of anticipation.

But I can't actually imagine having to wait until it snowed, because sometimes it doesn't snow here until after Christmas, and sometimes it doesn't snow at all. I don't know if I have that kind of patience, especially without it being a tradition I was brought up with that I'd share with other people. But it doesn't really matter because now every year when it starts to get cold and when I want to make fudge, I think of that lady and her family's tradition and how awesome it must feel every year when it finally snows and they can make fudge. And that is enough magical fun time for me. (Imagining other people having to wait for treats is my idea of a good time, oh yeah.) (Also, you might think from this post that I'm obsessed with making fudge or something, but I'm really not. I like thinking about making it more than I actually like cooking it, and eating it gets old, especially if it turns out no one else wants any and you're stuck with a giant pan full of rich candy that you can't possibly eat before it gets all dry and gross, even though you cover it meticulously.)

So anyway, that is my story of winter noms as I sit here not working on my SOP. And of course now I'm thinking about how super magical it would be if it was snowing outside and I could see the snowflakes coming down on my balcony and the fireplace was lit and I was cooking up noms, and I think cooking up noms right now doesn't compare. But on the other hand, working on all the things I need to get done might require chocolate. Mixed with marshmallow creme and heated on the stove and then covered in peppermint bark.

So I'd promised myself I'd finish my Shades of Rome revisions before Monday, and when I'd only written 700 words over a period of three days, I was kind of doubting that it was going to happen. But I was DETERMINED, and so Sunday--thanks to copious amounts of chocolate and naps--I pulled off another 7k, and that, combined with recycling a scene or two from the old version, got me to the end. *WHEW* And OMG, it's done!!! And I'll be sending it to my agent very soon!!!! And then after the holidays it will go back on submission!!!!!!

The book is a lot better this time around (The Spouse has confirmed it, so I know it's not just me). It's also not the most historically accurate historical fiction ever made (it's kind of like Xena, except more like Supernatural), but I stayed as accurate as I could, plus it's based on stuff that really did happen, even if the parts about ghosts and stuff maybe didn't so much happen. (If you're just tuning in, or, like me, you can't always remember what everybody's book is about, Shades of Rome is a paranormal YA about Julius Caesar, age 16, having to team up with Cicero to save Rome from an army of ghosts. There's also some feisty romance, though not between those guys.) It's a fun book and I kind of thought I'd never get through revisions, but, lo and behold, it is DONE.

I have to say, there are a lot of things that you "get over" in the world of book publishing, but finishing a book (or even hefty revisions of a book) NEVER gets old. It's always the most awesome feeling in the world.

Now I'm onto my middle grade detective book, which doesn't have a title. Except I'm kind of scared to work on it, and even though this is November and is nano month and avoiding writing because I'm scared is really lame and goes against the spirit of nano, it is, nevertheless, still hard. I have 5600 words in it so far, which is about 1100 words more than I remembered having, so helpful writing elves must have taken pity on me and stuck an extra scene in there one night, but however it happened it's good to have accomplished more than I thought. I mean, I thought I had 4500 words, and since it turned out I had more than that, it's *like* I wrote those 1100 words, so I might as well pat myself on the back and close up the file for the night.

Um, yeah, no. (Kids, don't be like me. Or at least don't be like me when I'm pretending finding 1100 words is the same as writing them. I mean, I did write them, just not recently.) I don't know why I'm scared to work on this book. Mostly I think because it still feels like a new project, and it's awesome.

But on the bright side, I must actually think I'll get to work on it soon, otherwise I wouldn't be blogging about it. Instead I'd be all, "Oh, guys, I'm TOTALLY working on this book. I'm, like, going to make so much progress on it. Progress like YOU WOULDN'T (read: shouldn't) BELIEVE!" So the fact that I'm like, "Waaah! Book scary!" is probably a good sign.

So yesterday (well, technically the day before yesterday, since it's after midnight) I got my first ever royalty statement.

*le gasp!*

But before you break out the streamers and cake, I have to tell you that a royalty statement is not the same thing as a royalty check. Everyone gets royalty statements twice a year, whether they've earned out their advance or not. The only thing is that now when people ask me how the book is doing, I can tell them how it was doing through June, which was only six weeks out from release date. If you want to know how the book's doing right now, I won't know until April when the next statement comes.

My statement only represented a six week window (though usually it would show six months), but if we assumed that those numbers were representative of how sales will go forever, it would still take me two years to earn out my advance. (And they are probably not representative of forever.) So, I've still got a ways to go before breaking out that cake. (But I might as well bake it now and save it until then, because it will totally keep, RIGHT? Or will it be reminiscent of that time I found out I'd been eating rancid butter and that's why everything tasted so weird?)

(Parenthetical P.S. I *didn't* just tell you about the time I was eating rancid butter over a period of SEVERAL DAYS without realizing it, even though it tasted really bad. Only, like, someone really dumb would do that.)

So, um, yeah, that's about all I have to say about royalty statements, other than that my royalties on ebooks are way higher than on hardbacks, even though the list price is the same. That is, I get my royalty percentages from the $17.99 cover price, for both hardback and ebooks, regardless of what price the book is actually sold at. So, go ebooks!

Yesterday I participated in a book discussion and signing with fellow Washington Tenners, Karen Kincy, Denise Jaden, Mindi Scott, and Kimberly Derting. We all had a great time, answered questions for over an hour, and signed some books.



Ignore how weird I look in this pic. I do not photograph well, nor can I smile on cue. And that's Karen's pooka sitting on my shoulder. (Though in the picture it's kind of hard to see and could maybe be mistaken for a clawed hand or something. But I assure you, it's a cute little pooka.)

I don't know how well you can see the hat I'm wearing in the picture, so here's a close-up. It was really easy to make and think it turned out pretty good:



I got lazy after I made the first leaf and looked up how to make vines, but I'm glad I did because vines are awesome and vines hanging off of hats are extra awesome.

Not just October, but almost the middle of October. Definitely past the 1/4 point at any rate.

You know what I didn't realize until just the other day? That fall smell--the kind of weird sweetish smell that smells really good--is actually the leaves that have fallen to the ground. Who knew? Okay, everyone knew but me because I know I've read books where the characters will mention the smell of the leaves, and I was always like, "Wha? The leaves have a smell? Why have I never smelled this?" At the same time, I've been wondering for over a decade what kind of plant made that wonderful smell in the fall and why I could never actually *find* it. Well, now the mystery is solved.

Occasionally I dream that my pets that have died over the years are still alive and it turns out I've been not feeding them for years (since I haven't been in real life, since they're, you know, dead). Last night was a double whammy because I dreamed both the dog and all the fish were still alive and I was so horrified to find out I'd been neglecting all of them for so long.

Also I discovered that students can get a year's subscription to Amazon Prime for FREE. Which is awesome because I happen to be a student right now and because students really need that free two day shipping. I don't think I've ever had the money to buy books before financial aid or loans or whatever shows up, and that's never until after school's started (sometimes several days after). So yay for that!

I watched a trailer for Diablo III last night. There were copious amounts of drool. I'd pre-order it if it had an actual release date (maybe it does, but I didn't see one on Amazon). What I am thinking about pre-ordering (and by "thinking about" I mean "totally going to") is Epic Mickey. It looks so awesome and creepy.

Yep, it's that time again! Back to school, and today was my first day at the University of Washington.

But, Chelsea, didn't you claim you were NEVER GOING TO SCHOOL AGAIN?

Ha... ha... Did I say that? I might have maybe said something like that once or... lots of times. Ahem. But nevertheless I am back in school, taking more Latin classes to improve my language skills while I apply to grad school for next fall.

The UW campus, it turns out, is freaking gorgeous! It was so beautiful. All the buildings are very majestic and look like castles and cathedrals. It was a nice sunny day while also smelling crisp like fall, and there were orange and red autumn leaves drifting off the trees. It was amazing, and at first I was worried I wouldn't have anything to do, since I got there an hour early, but I was more than happy to wander around campus, checking out the scenery and my new academic digs, so to speak.

Latin class was fun. Though I think I may have made the Roman Drama teacher think I'm an idiot, because after class I stopped to ask her if we really *needed* to buy the books or if we could just print off the texts from the internet (the beauty of reading thousands of year old texts--no copyrights), and she explained how useful the comments in the books were and how the editor put in all the meter marks in the text. I wanted to mention that I had a degree and had taken poetry composition classes and knew how to read meter, and had also read comedy before, and that I wasn't trying to get out of learning, just save money, but I couldn't think of a good way to say it, so I figured I'd better keep my mouth shut. But then I had to go and ask how the class works and if we read through the lines on our own and then come to class and read together, and at that point I think she thought I was a complete noob instead of someone trying to make sure they weren't going to embarrass themselves by not knowing this particular school's routine. Ah, well.

I've also been chipping away at my self-imposed Shades of Rome revisions. I put this book down a couple months ago because I couldn't stand to look at it anymore and I was *sure* that all my revisions were stupid and just mucking everything up instead of helping. Well, okay, I wasn't *sure*, but that was the problem, not being sure. Maybe they were awesome or maybe they sucked and I just couldn't tell anymore. So I had to set it aside, and then it was like eating too much of something where later you can't stand to even look at that food without wanting to barf. But, um, a few weeks ago I started reading it again and it turns out the revisions I made are leaning much more towards the "this is awesome!" side than the sucks side. I was actually really happy with them--I couldn't put it down--so now I just need to finish putting an ending on it, since the old one had to go.

Oh, yeah, and since the last time I blogged (note to self: blog more, for reals this time) I took the GRE! I'd been studying for it for about six weeks, and after a while I realized I was treating it as if I was preparing for battle. Which I guess I was, but still. It was pretty grueling and took me three and a half hours. But I think I did a decent job on the essay section, and I got a 700 on the verbal and 610 on the math sections. Not bad, I say, and it put me a little over my goal. *phew* So now I just have to write a kick-ass personal statement, get recommendation letters, and, oh yeah, figure out which schools I want to apply to besides the University of Washington.