I haven’t talked about it here lately, I’ve been too busy discussing fixtures, and paint, and boxes, and—zzzzzz.

Sorry, was that me?

Anyway, as always, I fret about my weight. And I do do something about it; I work out, I eat many, many whole-ish of grains, I try not to scarf down my son’s leftovers, blah, blah, blah.

BUT with all the house reno stuff, I haven’t been able to make it to the gym as frequently. And I find, if I skip more than one day, it is crazy hard to get myself to resume going. So much so, in fact, that I have an unwritten rule (as in, written inside my head, which is where you’ll find my rants against the Pythagorean Theorem and heroines who don’t ask simple questions before rushing into danger) that I have to go to the gym if I haven’t gone the day before. Except for now.

So tomorrow is Friday, my worst day of the week, and I haven’t been to the gym since Tuesday. And it’s supposed to rain, and I walk 13 blocks to get there. How do I get myself to go?

Having outed myself here, I will have to, or risk mockage (if not by you, then by my own outed self). But–any suggestions?

Renovating a house, as Cindy knows, is a big TIME-SUCK, even if you’re not the one wielding the hammer.

Yesterday, for example, I had to go lay down some serious cash for bathroom tile. Plus the whole decision-making thing. Today we went to a paint store, only open Sundays 9:30-12:30 (closed Saturdays; run by Orthodox Jews) to choose paint. Spent a long time there, and no real decisions were made.

But this week I am determined to finish editing the first three chapters of Road To Passion, and send it to the three most enthusiastic agents from last time around.

And I really have to get better at being a friend; I’ve let calls and emails go unreturned, which isn’t cool unless you are ill or insanely depressed. I am neither.

So this is the backyard of our new house. We are currently living in our rental, waiting for construction to be done. We had to remove the illegal one-story addition and deck, and are replacing it with a legal two-story addition and porch. Since the NYC Dept. of Buildings is as slow as me writing a book, it looks as though it will take awhile.

I can see why people do illegal work; it took us four months to get the permits, then the permit expired because of our contractor’s insurance. Now we’re waiting for the newly-issued permits, only the DOB needed proof the illegal addition was removed. So I took pix of stuff that wasn’t there. Oy.

I will update the news when I can, but meanwhile–just don’t ask. Not for awhile.

Two words that describe me right now: “Worn” and “Out.” I’ll be posting an update to the Favorites Meme later (maybe not later today), but this week, we’ve got:

-Closing on a house, our first real estate venture.

-A 40th Birthday Party (not mine; been there, done that, 2 1/2 years ago).

-An Important Discussion with Someone Integral To The Career (later this week. Conflict-averse? Moi? Bien sur!)

-Wicked Back Spasms (see above items).

-Reading Laura Kinsale’s For My Lady’s Heart, feeling like a doofus (I’m reading it ’cause Amanda McCabe said it was her favorite, and I thought I’d give it another try. Amanda is way, way smarter than I am).

More later–

Megan

I have had more than eight hours’ sleep for THREE DAYS IN A ROW. Do you feel the excitement?

I have an Action Plan for the next few days, sans son*:

Clean house
Work on freelance stuff
Work on house-planning (we are officially in contract, as of today)
Work out every day
Edit first half of book
Plot second half of book
Worry about future

And the Freelancing Husband will be away for a day also, leaving me ALONE! Again, excitement in the air? You betcha.

Can you even guess how much coffee will be drunk over the next few days? The mind boggles.

Wish me luck, but not too much, or I’ll procrastinate.

Megan

*He is at the MIL’s, having attention lavished on him like me at a Sexy Librarian convention.

To clarify: I haven’t taken on a real freelance job in real estate, but the Working Stiff Spouse and I have been looking for property to buy. We’ve been renting all these years, and we figured it was finally time.

So we found something. It needs work, but it has a backyard, and a big basement, and an open kitchen/living room, which was a deal-breaker for us (right now, we are in a railroad, so when I am cooking dinner, I have no idea what the Only Child Son is up to in the living room. Now I’ll know). And today I wrote a check for a portion of the down payment. But since the Spouse is working hard (see above), it’s my job to deal with all the minutiae of house-buying and construction and stuff. Hence the new job crack.

I didn’t end up editing last night, but I did print stuff out. Baby steps.

The Son heads to the in-laws for Spring Break, so I should get a chance to write–my job description next week will be write, worry, panic. Repeat.

Megan