This is the face of someone who is now on vacation.

And that’s my cool new t-shirt.

This weekend marks eleven years of wedded bliss (stop laughing, that’s a mostly serious comment) so The Hubs and I are, eventually, on our way to Gettysburg for our first reenacting event of the season/anniversary bonanza.  Until then, we’re slumming around the house.  Well, I’m slumming.  He’s out mowing the lawn.

And because we live in the wilderness, the first thing we did on vacation was pull a tick off The Toddler’s eyelid.  Yay.  Nothing goes well with going out for ice cream like, “Hold still.  Hold still.  Okay, don’t move while I get this.  Okay…where’d it go?”

Awesome.

I never get things accomplished on vacation, namely, because I spend most of my time wearing pants with elastic waistbands and shirking responsibility.  In fact, last night when we took The Rowdy Boys out for ice cream, I forgot to put my legit shorts back on and ended up hopping out of the car in a Victoria’s Secret t-shirt that says “Best Kisser,” hot pink flip-flops, and reeeeeeally short white cloth shorts I had to pull down on my hips so my cheeks didn’t scandalize any youth wandering past.  Whatever.

There are two things I’d like to accomplish while on vacation this week:

1. Lace up my reenacting corset to the point where my dress fits because, let’s be honest, I haven’t worn it since last summer, and
2. Write.

I’m a tad bit apprehensive about the reenacting dress fitting.  But that’s okay.  That’s what corsets are for and, as long as Gettysburg isn’t as hot as it was during the 150th last year, I should be fine.  Right?

Sure.

As for the writing, for those keeping score the historical is now at 89 pages and Random Contemporary II is at 56 pages.  I’m back on a historical kick this week after spending a week and a half not wanting to write at all.  I think I needed a break.  The Hubs said, “Well, of course you needed a break.  If you’re not eating, sleeping, or working, you’re writing.  It’s okay to stop for a bit.”

So I did.  And now I’m back to writing.

Then….then this accidental thing happened.

I started a third novel.

I know, I know, I need to stop adding projects in my “Work in progress” pile.  But, my work in progress pile reads more like a “work in progress!” pile.  It’s like Jeopardy.  You don’t say, “This is Jeopardy.”  You scream, “This.  Is.  JEOPARDY!!!!”  My works in progress pile(!) is super exciting.  We have historical A.  We have Random Contemporary II.  And now we have historical B.

Just as fast as my mother can say, “If you don’t start concentrating on one, you’re not going to finish any of them,” the one I started is more like jotting down a few quick scenes and character descriptions.  And a little bit of research.  And the whole of Chapter One that will probably end up getting trashed because I’m not sure I like it all that much because it’s one of those “present day” chapters with the rest of the book in the past.  Ehhhhhh….I don’t know.  But I dig the idea.  And I dig the characters.  It will eventually happen, but for now, I’m going to stick with the dueling novels (historical A and Random Contemporary II) and see where they go.  Okay, that last part is kind of a lie.  I’ve actually written the endings to both of them.  So, I know where they’re both going.  It’s just a matter of getting there.

Needless to say, they probably won’t get there this week.  I’ll be wriggling around in the 1860s and trying to hide my purple hair under a hat and distracting people with my wit and charm.  Or, it’ll be 90 degrees and I’ll be sitting around in the shade, wearing inappropriately short white shorts and scribbling in a notebook while The Hubs wriggles in the 1860s and impresses people with his historical knowledge and tolerance of wearing wool in the heat.  Either way, it’ll be fun.

If you’re in Gettysburg June 7 and 8, come on down to Pitzer’s Woods and hang out with the Baltimore Light Artillery.  And, if you’re not, stay tuned because I’ll post pictures.  I roll like that.