Apparently, Marie and I were a bit on the tired side last night after getting back from Nevada.  Asleep by 8:00.  Up at 5:30 with more than nine hours of shuteye resulting in a very perky day for both of us.

Beautiful sunrise this morning.  I love to wake up in  time to see the sunrise, although during the winter here in Oregon (on the west side of the mountains) being able to see the sun come up is rare because of the cloud cover.

I was supposed to be flying to Baltimore today for a school visit tomorrow, but I got a “snow day” due to all the snow they’ve had there in the past few weeks. The visit was moved to later this spring so they can make up for the days they lost.

Working on I,Q2.  Then a morning Skype visit with a group of students that had read “Peak” at Messalonskee Middle School and their librarian, Liz McMahon in Oakland, Maine.  Good group of students with good questions.

Back to I,Q2 until 4:00.  Another Skype visit with students at Dr. Phillips High School and librarian Jenny Beyer in Orlando Florida.  This was an evening Skype with students and parents.  Large crowd.  Again, great fun with great questions.  I’m looking into other web cast programs that should make these online visits more effective, interactive, and secure.  If any of you have a experience with the software and/or web casts please leave a comment here.  Before I sign up for one of them I want to see what’s out there and experiment.

After the visit I’m back to I,Q2.  I’m wondering if this novel should be called “I,Q Book Two: The Leopard” rather than “I,Q Book Two: The White House” because in it you are going to learn a great deal about Angela’s mom, Malak, and what it’s like to be in her nerve racking shoes.

Up at 4AM and on the 5AM airport shuttle to catch an early flight which (we find out at the airport) is delayed until 8:30. Lost some sleep with that glitch. I had to wait to creep through TSA before I got my first cup of coffee. Tip for you younger readers: Don’t start drinking coffee. It’s just one more thing you have to do in the morning before you can become yourself. Because of the delay we will have approximately 30 seconds to catch our connecting flight in Seattle. Shouldn’t be a problem. Ha.

But if you’re a writer (or a reader) delays can turn into opportunities. If you’re not too annoyed to think you can take advantage of the situation by pushing some words across a page (or reading a few pages) turning the wait to your advantage.  I actually manged to get in several hours on I,Q2, not as much as I would have in my farm office, but it was a relatively good day of writing.

One perk of conferences is that you get to see old author friends and meet authors you haven’t met. We had the pleasure of hanging out and having dinner last night with Marc Nobleman.  Wonderful fellow who has written over 70 books. We found out that he’ll be joining Marie and I in a couple of weeks at “The Childrens Literature Festival” in Warrensburg, MO. If you’re going to the festival, and you should (Where else can you meet 40 of your favorite authors?) go to one of Marc’s sessions. You’ll enjoy what he has to say.

#20? I thought I’d be finished by now. But I’m crawling closer. Up at 5:30, shower, Starbucks in the lobby, back in the room writing, suspecting I won’t get very far because I’m heading over to The Nevada Reading Week Conference for the day.

As we pull up we get word from our daughter that she and our son in-law and grandsons 3 and 4 were evacuated from their hotel in Kona in their PJ’s and bussed to a shopping center on highground. Yikes! Kind of a tense day, but you all know how it turned out

Spent the time in between sessions texting and watching CNN. 8 hours later they were taken back to the hotel. Safe! Yahoo!

Now back to the conference.

First task: Help Marie set up the first of her two sessions.

Second task: sign 250 copies of “Elelphant Run” which they are giving away (I told you this was a good conference) in the library with our old friend librarian, Barbara Talbot.

Third Task: Q&A. I’m doing two of these sessions. I love Q&A sessions after giving a keynote the night before. It helps clarify what I was trying to say and allows me to go into the detail I couldn’t during the keynote. And Q&As are never the same because the group drives the session.

I did manage to get a little bit in on I,Q2 today in between. At some point in this journal I’ll leave a long post on my “Writing in Between” therory.

Thanks for inviting us to “The Nevada Reading Week Conference.” The best part? Getting to see and visit with all the wonderful friends we have down here. I can’t thank you enough for all the things you’ve done for us over the years. I wouldn’t be me if it weren’t for you.

Images:

View from the 14th floor of Grand Sierra Resort and Casino with a storm brewing.

Books to sign.

I,Q2 inching along.

2:30AM Rise and shine! Little plane to Seattle, headed the wrong direction, to hop on another little plane to Reno.

I managed to get in a few pages of IQ on both flights, and during the short layover at SEA-TAC.

We were met in Reno by our lovely host, and good friend, Ellen Fockler, who whisked us to the hotel after a stop at an Apple store for Marie to pick up a video adapter for her laptop.

I’ve actually stayed at this casino/hotel and didn’t realize it until I saw the bronze mustangs outside. I was here last year. Arrived around midnight, felt my way to the room, collapsed into an exhausted stupper, and woke up early to visit a school.

After a nice lunch with Ellen and Sharon Levin it was naptime before heading over to speak at dinner.

Marie and I are both speaking at the “Nevada Reading Week Conference.” If you ever get a chance to go to this coference don’t miss it. It’s well organized with great speakers. One very cool thing they did was to give everyone a flash drive with all the presenters handouts loaded inside. This saves trees and space. Great idea.

Still a bit under the weather, but functioning and writing in slooooow motion, which is better than not functioning and writing at all I suppose.

I’ve now left the laptop and switched back to the Moleskine as I will be on the road for the next few days.  I know myself well enough to know that I’m more likely to open the Moleskine at an airport, or during a flight, if I’m working in the journal.

A couple of interesting distractions today.  Here’s a copy of the German edition of my novel “Peak.”  I always love getting these translations.  Can’t read it of course, but it’s a nice edition of the book.

And the final piece of furniture was put back into place this afternoon by three guys who were a lot stronger than they look.  They made it look easy, but I wasn’t fooled.  There is no way we would have been able to get this piano back where it belonged without mangling the newly finished floors.

Marie and I head to airport at 3:30AM tomorrow for Reno.  Prepping and packing tonight for the trip.

Up early again this morning to get some I,Q2 writing in before two virtual web visits with the student at Buda Elementary School in Buda, Texas and their very cool librarian, Jeanne Ditta.  The students were great readers and had wonderful questions about Sasquatch, I,Q, Elephant Run and my other novels. Thank you for joining me in my office this morning.  It was fun having you over for a visit!

A couple days ago I posted something about how to keep track of  how many words you write when you’re working on a book.  A teacher emailed me today and said that her students were speculating as to whether I count the words in this journal.  The is answer: NO.   I wish I could, but that wouldn’t be honest.  And if I could count these words I would make these posts a lot longer.

Some nasty little bug has crept its way into my system and I’m not feeling too well.  The only reason I mention this is to keep up with my theme that authors are no different than anyone else.  Once in a while we even get sick. The good news is that we also get better.  And believe me,  I’m looking forward to that.

This slowed down work on I,Q2 today considerably, although I still manged to get in a few hours of writing.

Then I took a nap…if you call three hours of sleep a nap.  My favorite place to do this is in the recliner (it’s the only one we own) squeezed into the corner of my tiny office.  I’ve had this black leather beauty almost twenty years.  Awhile back Marie took me out to get a new one, but I couldn’t find a recliner I like as well.   I guess it’s like out 1996 Four Torus.  I’ll keep it until it can no longer keep me.

It feels almost like a school visit day… Up at 4 writing waiting for a Skype visit with my friends at Eubanks Intermediate School in Southlake, Texas with librarian Lucy Drenka.  I was at Eubanks a few years ago and had a wonderful time.  I think this Skype makes my third visit with Lucy.  It was great to talk to her and her students again from my office.

I had to spent a bit of time (in the background as I wrote) putting Windows 7 on my road laptop and getting it up to date.  I’ve gotten a bit smarter about this over the years.  I know longer sit like a zombie watching software load.  I turn my back on it and continuing doing something productive.

In spite of all of this, the writing went well today on I,Q2 today.  Inching closer to the end of the story.

I’ll confess (just so you know I’m reasonably normal) that I did take a little break this evening and watched American Idol with Marie.  But as I listened to the girls sing I worked on my Power Point program for Reno this coming weekend.

A lot of flights booked today.  Marie’s been busy.  Those little white squares on my calender are just about all filled up, or so I hear.  Not very many blank squares until June. Looks like I’ll be seeing some of you very soon.

As alluded in yesterday’s post the day started out briskly by dealing with, let’s say…a creative difference of opinion. By the end of the day the difference was on it’s way to being resolved one way or another…

A beautiful day on the farm, although I missed most of it here in the office working on I,Q2. Got a nice call from my firstborn grandson, JR, who is (and this is not a grandfather’s pride speaking…it’s the truth) a phenomenal reader. Over the weekend I emailed him a copy of “Beneath” which he loved. We got into quite a discussion about the plot and the pacing of the book. I only wish that in sixth grade I’d known 10% of what he already knows about how a story is put together.

My webmaster, Daniel Payne, dropped by to figure out how to hook up our printer to our network. It took him about five minutes. Of course we didn’t call him until we’d spent several hours trying to figure out how to get it working.

Didn’t leave the farm today. Straightened my office up as I am doing some Skype visits tomorrow and the next day. I’ll have hundreds of students in here. I can’t remember if I’ve mentioned this, but my office is the smallest room in our house, but there’s plenty of room for me. There was six months of run and dump clutter, making it difficult to maneuver, and almost impossible to find anything. If the students got a glimpse of them it would scare them. It was starting to scare me.

This evening Marie and I tried this Skype “like” program called WebEx, which I guess I’m using on Wednesday for the Skype visit (which I guess isn’t technically a Skype visit…it’s a WebEx visit). It worked pretty well. It’s easy to share your desktop, and you can do a PowerPoint. But we heard a rumor that there was an even better program. Welcome to the world of virtual school visits. No airplanes. No cabs. No hotel. Shazam! I’m at you school. Not as good as a real author visit, but a pretty good substitute.

I’m going to stay up late again tonight working on I,Q2 even though I have to wake up early tomorrow for the Skype two timezones away. Shazam!

Not many chores before settling down to work on I,Q2…  Moved a few more pieces of furniture back where they belong, hooked up the TiVo and picked several old films for it to record, which is about the only thing I watch on TV anymore. And now I’m at the desk, wondering how I’m going to get this book finished by this time next week.  Don’t let this worry you.  I always  get a little neurotic when I get this close to finishing a book.  This was not been helped by some distracting news, which I can’t share with you.  Again, don’t worry.  Nobody I know  is sick, injured, bankrupt, etc.  It’s of a business nature and it will take some time, which I don’t have, this week.  (I know it’s probably a little annoying for me to mention this, then not tell you what it’s all about,  but I’m trying to shed as much light as I can on my writing life without crossing the thin line of  privacy, or boring you to death).

Pulled a late shift at the desk on I,Q2.  Stumbled off to bed about 11PM.  But I’m hoping for another early start tomorrow and another full day of work on the story.  It’s coming along.  That light at the end of tunnel is getting a little brighter, but it’s not a straight shot.   There are twists and turns and sometimes the light goes out until I get around the corner.

The now famous 1996 Ford Taurus, our only so-you-want- to-be-an-author car was dead in the driveway when we got home from Mexico yesterday.  Not too surprising as it has been sitting in the driveway  for months.  I charged the battery yesterday.  Started fine, but the poor old thing was dead again this morning.

Took my dry cleaning in, picked up 400 pounds of mail to add to the 1000 pounds S&K have been picking up while we were gone  (looking at the piles I felt like Santa), and I had a new battery put in.  We’re hoping the new battery will be enough for the Taurus to forgive us for our neglect.  The house is now only a semi-disaster.  Marie has manged to get some of the essentials back in their places, but it will be several days until things are back together.

Those pitiful errands taken care of I am now squeezed into the clutter called my office working on I,Q2.  Back on the computer transcribing what I’ve managed to scratch into the Moleskine the past few days.  And here I will stay for the next 6 days trying to get this draft finished before we take off for Reno on Friday morning.  No, we are  not going down there to gamble.  Marie and I are both speaking at a conference in Nevada.

All I need to do now it string together about seven full days of writing and I,Q2 will be on it’s way.