April was rough. On the First, my daughter suffered a concussion (no, not related to failed April Fool's prank). We ended up in the hospital emergency room all weekend, from which she picked up a nasty stomach flu. The flu proceeded to work its way through our house, and took us two whole weeks before everyone was back on their feet (we completely missed Easter). We got better for one day, met with in-laws for dinner, and then they got sick for two weeks.
Through this, my kids have been seriously stressed out. I don't know if it's recovering from the illness or growing pains or what, but their mood and mental resilience have been terrible. Meanwhile, my union went on strike and I was walking the picket line for ten days. There's just no end to it.
The strike is over and I'm back to work. Everyone seems to be healthy and the kids are coming around. May is always an exciting month - my birthday, my wife's birthday, Mother's Day and our anniversary all fall within a ten-day period (we did not plan that well). So hopefully life will improve.
Oh, and did I mention that I kept up with the A-to-Z Blogging Challenge through all this, and didn't miss a day? Still don't know what I was thinking with that.
Somehow, through all of this, I actually wrote several chapters for the next Gale Harbour book. I don't know if they're any good yet, and I know they don't have any of my regular humour. I guess I just wasn't feeling very funny. I'm going to have to go back and put jokes in during the revising phase.
How was your month?
May Question - When you are working on a story, what inspires you?
This is interesting, because it doesn't say what inspires you to write the story, but "when you are" working on a story. I get ideas to start stories from lots of different places, but the inspiration to keep working on it, that's something else.
Sometimes I write because I want to see how it ends. Sometimes I genuinely don't know. Sometimes I'm trying a new idea or writing style and I want to see how it turns out. Sometimes I have a deadline, for a contest or submission. But most often my biggest inspiration is just wanting to see it done. I hate having unfinished projects (and I have so, so, so many of them), so being able to add something to the finished pile is just satisfying.
Is that a good reason to write? Maybe, maybe not. But if it gets me to finish writing, then I'm not going to complain.
That's it for another month!
Hugs & Kisses,
-CDGK
P.S. Seriously, check out my A-to-Z Blog Posts. If you're interested in miniature painting, wargaming, model building, crafting... there's a little bit of something in here for you. He's the full list of topics I covered, from A-to-Z:
A is for The Army Painter
B is for Basecoat
C is for Contrast
D is for Dry Brushing
E is for Edge Highlighting
F is for Feathering
G is for Games Workshop
H is for 'eavy Metal
I is for Inks
J is for Jokaero Orange (paint)
K is for Kolinsky Sable Brushes
L is for Layering
M is for Masking
N is for NMM (Non-Metallic Metal)
O is for OSL (Object-Source Lighting)
P is for Primer
Q is for Quality
R is for Resin Printing
S is for... (Stippling, Shading, Scatter Terrain, Sprue)
T is for Terrain
U is for Undercoat, UV Resin
V is for Vallejo
W is for... Washes, Weathering, Wet Blending, Wet Palette, Warhammer
X is for XPS Foam
Y is for... (Flash, Kitbashing, Varnish)
Z is for Zenithal Priming
