(Yeah, yeah, most of you never even noticed I was gone…)

So, we decided to take advantage of Presidents Day weekend, tacking on a Friday before, and heading down to the Outer Banks for an escape weekend (yay!)  Our trip was almost derailed by Car Disaster (power steering belts failed from dry rot – not yay.)  But we persevered, got the car repaired in time to depart (yay!), loaded up said car with more junk than any two people should need for a four-day excursion (er, yay?), and then hit the worst traffic I have ever seen on my way out of town (distinctly not yay.)

It’s always strange to go to the beach out of season.  There are so many restaurants and shops, all boarded up, with cheerful signs saying things like “See you next summer!”  The handful of places that are open get *mobbed*, with more people than they possibly see during season.

But the beach is nearly deserted.  And the streets are quiet and empty.  And there is tons of time to walk on the sand, and to read, and to think about writing (but not get any done), and to watch movies, and to knit…  (Yeah, the knitting store is one that is open year-round, with special Monday hours for the holiday!)

On Friday, we had a pleasant winter day, with some errands (the house belongs to a relative who had some furnishings to update).  On Saturday, we had *gorgeous* weather – I sat on the deck to eat breakfast, and to read for several hours.  On Sunday, a classic nor’easter blew through, rattling the (generally quite solid!) window panes, brightening the night sky with lightning, and making us very grateful for sturdy shelter.  On Monday, it was very, very windy and quite cold (that nor’easter having been the leading edge of a cold front).

And all of it was fantastic.  And I’m almost back into “writer” mode, taking care of a *huge* to-do list yesterday and today.

And I’m astonished that it will be March next week.  Really.  Someone has stolen two months of my year.  To whom do I complain?

Mindy, back to the real world

In any case, we got to the hotel a little early, and we hung out in the lobby waiting for our family to join us.  There were lots of people in the lobby, almost all of them wearing tuxedos or fancy dresses.  As we edged toward a banquette, Mark said to me, “Isn’t that John Lithgow?”

I looked quickly, confirmed that it looked like him, thought, “what are the chances, and then I heard him speak.  It was definitely John Lithgow.

Once we sat down, Mark said, “And oh, there’s Sarah Jessica Parker.”  And sure enough, she was there as well, petite as ever, in highest heels as ever, wearing a party dress with fun flounces.

We didn’t recognize the other people, although several were obviously Someones.  They were “handled” out to a shuttle bus, which had “Archives” in the window, so they were clearly in town for some event being held in close proximity to the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence.

In D.C. we see a lot of “celebrities”, but our famous folks are usually politicians.  It was fun to glimpse another bit of glamor for the night.

(And I was relieved when my relatives showed up in slacks and sweaters, not tuxes and party dresses!)

I found my own reaction to being ten feet away from movie stars very interesting — I made it a point not to look at them directly, at all, even a little, lest I invade their privacy

Mindy, wondering what the event was…

The reality is, the last novel that I sold on the basis of a synopsis was Girl’s Guide to Witchcraft, and that was almost ten years ago.  Nevertheless, I have needed to write synopses for every book in between — either as a contract payment point, or to educate the art department, or to provide shortcuts for editors in sales meetings.

And I’ve always hated writing synopses.  They’re boring.  They don’t convey the excitement of the story, the unfolding sense of the narrative.

But I’ve (finally!  Better late than never!) figured out some tricks for making synopses work.  (In one sentence:  Focus on the emotion of the characters, not the mechanics of the plot.)

I hope to pull together my ideas into a presentation for RWA Nationals (not in this year’s Anaheim Convention – those slots are long filled) and/or for an article in Romance Writers Report.  Which reminds me, I really should post those older articles here online…

So?  If you’re a writer, how do you feel about synopses?  What would you most like to learn about them?

Mindy, off to work, for another busy week…

One of our assignments in Acting and Stagecraft was to create a “lip-synch”, a music-video-before-video(-and-without-video), where we played a song from an album (yes, we brought vinyl in, and we told the teacher upon which track to drop the needle), while we performed choreography of our own crafting while lip-synching to the song.

I chose “With Me, It’s All Or Nothing”, from Oklahoma.  It worked *beautifully* for the project – it was big and brassy, and I could match motions to words with relative ease.

Little did I know, I was crafting my own anthem for my life as a writer.

Last week, I finished drafting the manuscript for DARKBEAST REBELLION.  It took a lot of effort to finish — especially the last six chapters, which blossomed from two.  (Elizabeth Bear referred to one of her manuscripts recently as “Zeno’s book” and I laughed heartily because the description was so apt.)  REBELLION is marinating right now, and I’ll get back to it in a week or so.

This past week, I have done all the things I didn’t get done during my all-or-nothing writing marathon.  I’ve done tons of laundry and household chores and shopping and reading.  When I worked an office job full time and wrote close-to-full-time, I needed to blend my life better.  Now, I can indulge in these rich streaks of activity…  (And I do consider it an indulgence.  And I consider myself lucky.)

And who knows what next week’s “all or nothing” list will include?

Mindy, wishing everyone a good weekend

I first discovered John Christopher when I was in elementary school.  One summer, I decided to read all the books on the wall of “Young Adult Fiction” (or whatever it was called back then), starting with A and going through to Z.  Except I didn’t re-read books I’d previously read.  And I didn’t read books that looked boring from their covers.  And I didn’t make any attempt to go back and read books that hadn’t been on the shelves when I looked the first time.

In any case, I discovered John Christopher completely by chance — his science fictional Tripods series.

I was the only person I knew who had read those books.  I pushed them on multiple friends but no one was as charmed by them as I was.  (Likely, that was because they were “boy” books, not “girl” books.)

I read everything by John Christopher that I could get my hands on.  And I remember the day when I found a new book by him, WILD JACK, in the “new books” bin, and I was overjoyed (although, ultimately, disappointed because that book was left to stand alone…)  And I recall my repeated disappointment when I browsed the shelves, thinking that I had discovered a new John Christopher book, only to realize that I was looking at a *Matt* Christopher book (PITCHER WITH A GLASS ARM, anyone?)

In any case, the John Christopher books were a vital part of my growing into genre literature.  They made me think about writing, and about what actions children could take in frightening, unjust worlds.  Some of my earliest attempts at writing included “Christopher-esque” characters.  And Keara, in DARKBEAST, is a descendant of those characters.

So, rest in peace, Mr. Christopher.  And thank you.

Which, one would think, would make tracking health care payments a breeze.

Yeah.  Right.

Let me make one thing clear:  I have a pretty simple health care situation.  I have insurance, and it provides coverage for (most) pharmaceuticals.  I don’t have any major chronic health problem, and I have avoided substantial acute issues in the past year.  I don’t have any “para-medical” needs, such as physical therapy, chiropractic care, acupuncture, etc.

And it took me almost an entire work day to develop a system to track my health care expenses.

Mind you, I wasn’t trying to enter data from an entire year of health care.  I wasn’t trying to deal with the flurry of papers resulting from acute crises.  I wasn’t trying to cope with having changed physicians.

I just wanted a system that would let me see what my doctors required me to pay and whether I had paid it.  Along the way, I decided it would be a good idea to fold in tracking of my Health Care Spending Account (that pre-tax money that I set aside for certain health expenses), to see how and when it is being used.

Wow.

The problem, of course, is that there is zero standardization in the bills received from doctors.  Some require me to pay up front.  Some put everything through to insurance, to see what my insurer will pay.  Some split, requiring up front payment on some things, submission to insurers on others.  Primary care is treated differently from well-woman care, and both are treated differently from specialist care.  Pharmaceuticals are treated completely separately from all that, as are dentists and optometrists.  In some instances, I receive the insurance company’s laughingly-named Explanation of Benefits (“EOB”) as the first paperwork associated with a health care event; other times, the precipitating paperwork is payment from my health care spending account, or a bill from the doctor.

And that doesn’t even get to the problems of mistakes (intentional or otherwise) — a doctor who records a five-minute “office visit” checkup preparatory to refilling a prescription as a “surgery”.

I wanted to get this done now, when I don’t have any crisis in process, so that I can use the system if/when I have major, complicated medical care to track.  I built the system using three months of data from the end of last year, and I tested it with one month of data from this year.  (That test proved to be … amusing, because it included an EOB received in January 2012 for services rendered in May 2011, the first time I officially received paperwork on that particular expense…)  I am certain that my system will be tweaked throughout this year.

But I’m left wondering how other people handle this stuff.  What happens if you don’t have a working knowledge of Excel (or familiarity with paper-based bookkeeping)?  What happens if you don’t have the reading skills to parse the EOBs?  What happens if you’re sick or old or exhausted?

What happens if you’re not a stubborn, over-educated professional manager of information with the time to devote to doing this?

(I know.  You pay what they tell you to pay, and you hope it’s right.  That’s entirely separate from whether it’s fair and whether you have the money – those are other rants.)

(And I also know that there are services out there that do this.  Simplee is free and has great buzz, but it doesn’t cover my insurance plan.  Other services are expensive — several hundreds of dollars to clear backlogs of paperwork and maintenance fees of several hundreds of dollars a year.)

There’s got to be a better way.

Mindy, bemused that the best advice she found was on a support site for ovarian cancer patients…

$1520.54

Wow.  All I can say is, wow.  Thank you so much for your support, as this important story unfolded last week, with slippery public relations stories often obscuring one basic fact:  Planned Parenthood provides valuable cancer screening for people who would otherwise not be able to afford that basic health care.

Mindy, off to write a check

I’m pleased by the immediate result.

I’m wary of the future.

And I still intend to donate all proceeds from Mindy Klasky Res Ipsa Press ebooks, from 1/29/12 – 2/5/12.

Thanks, as always, for your support!

Mindy, checking in between final edits to several chapters…

Today, Komen has “clarified” that they didn’t pull Planned Parenthood funding because of abortion, and they didn’t pull it because Planned Parenthood was under investigation by a Republican congressman from Florida.  Instead, they pulled funding because Planned Parenthood does not perform mammograms on site; instead, they make “pass through” patients, making referrals to other facilities. Komen, through its founder Nancy Brinker, says they “Don’t like to do pass-through grants any more.”

Brinker seems unaware that virtually every gynecologist in the country passes through patients in the same way.  When I go to my gynecologist for my annual exam, she writes a prescription for a mammogram, which I take to a separate facility.

I would love to see a listing of non-PP recipients of Komen grants.  Are they all direct-care providers, such as the radiology department of my local hospital?  (And while I’m questioning, have any of them ever been under investigation by any government agent for any reason?)

I’m not likely to see that listing soon.  And so I’ll repeat my offer:  I’ll be donating all proceeds from all Mindy Klasky Res Ipsa Press ebooks from January 29 through February 5.  Here are the links:

• GIRL’S GUIDE TO WITCHCRAFT (Amazon Kindle | B&N Nook | Smashwords)
• SORCERY AND THE SINGLE GIRL (Amazon Kindle | B&N Nook | Smashwords)
• MAGIC AND THE MODERN GIRL (Amazon Kindle | B&N Nook | Smashwords)

• HOW NOT TO MAKE A WISH (Amazon Kindle |  B&N Nook | Smashwords)
• WHEN GOOD WISHES GO BAD (Amazon Kindle | B&N Nook | Smashwords)
• TO WISH OR NOT TO WISH (Amazon Kindle |  B&N Nook | Smashwords)

• FRIGHT COURT (Amazon Kindle | B & N Nook | Smashwords)

Thank you, to everyone who has made a purchase so far!

Mindy, who understands that similar donations are being made by John Scalzi (who started this movement), Alma Alexander, and Sharon Lee and Steve Miller, among others…

OK, Scalzi is wise and wonderful for a lot of reasons.  But most recently, he is wise and wonderful because of his response to the Susan G. Komen/Planned Parenthood debacle.  Here.  You can read what he says here:

http://whatever.scalzi.com/2012/02/01/ebooks-for-breast-cancer-screening-and-education/

(If you don’t take the time to click on the link:  Scalzi is donating the income from his Subterranean Press ebooks, for this week, to Planned Parenthood, earmarking that donation to be used for breast cancer screening and education.  Subterranean is matching the donation.)

I don’t have any books published by Subterranean (but, reading Scalzi’s post, I sort of wish I did.)  I do, though, have seven ebooks published by Res Ipsa Press.  And I can donate the income from sales of those books for a week.

Due to the vagaries of income reporting, my week has to start on January 29. So, here’s the deal:  I will donate to Planned Parenthood the income I receive from all Mindy Klasky Res Ipsa Press books sold from January 29 to February 5.

Want to increase that donation?  Then click on one of the links below:

• GIRL’S GUIDE TO WITCHCRAFT (Amazon Kindle | B&N Nook | Smashwords)
• SORCERY AND THE SINGLE GIRL (Amazon Kindle | B&N Nook | Smashwords)
• MAGIC AND THE MODERN GIRL (Amazon Kindle | B&N Nook | Smashwords)

• HOW NOT TO MAKE A WISH (Amazon Kindle |  B&N Nook | Smashwords)
• WHEN GOOD WISHES GO BAD (Amazon Kindle | B&N Nook | Smashwords)
• TO WISH OR NOT TO WISH (Amazon Kindle |  B&N Nook | Smashwords)

• FRIGHT COURT (Amazon Kindle | B & N Nook | Smashwords)

Mindy, looking forward to seeing the numbers add up – quickly!