I've been googling Office spoilers trying to find some glimmer of hope for the future, but the well has run dry. In fact, I found a site that looked promising, but when I clicked on the link I saw that they linked to MY last post. So. Not. Helpful.
I suppose I'll have to just watch the show, one week at a time, like everyone else. My patience, again, is put to the test.
On a happier note, today is Reformation Day - oh yeah, and Halloween. My oldest - the one for whom I frantically ordered a princess costume on ebay and then stalked the mailbox till it got here - came home today and said, "Do you know that Reformation Day and Halloween are two *totally* seperate holidays?!" Well, yes, I did. 
Ironically, the boy who won the costume contest at school was dressed as the pope. I love that! So, she got to play "pin the theses on the Wittenburg door" as well as bobbing for apples and sword play. She also feasted on turkey legs, but, being her mother's daughter she's not a fan of meat on the bone. "Once a year is enough for me!" she reported tonight.
ARGH! People in my house are rewatching The Office. Have they no consideration for my fragile emotional state?! Apparently not.
And I hear the door popping open again upstairs. My little mouse loves Halloween. She was dismayed that her little three (I mean two) year old legs couldn't keep up with her seven year old sister who was leading the charge like lives were at stake. "Why am I so slow?! Why am I so small?!"
Also, she loves candy. And she's a little sneaky. She's bounced downstairs once to ask if she could have more of her Winnie the Pooh lollypop. No. Well, could her sister have some? No. Well, she already told her sister she could have just three bites if she brushed her teeth afterward. Really? Or maybe she had three bites then brushed her teeth. Really? Ok, well, she was going to go brush her teeth now...
And then I went up to check on her and her face was covered in chocolate.
Did she have some chocolate? No.
Lying is a sin.
Well, maybe her sister had some chocolate.
Lying is still a sin.
Well, she guesses she maybe had some chocolate.
Now she's got glo sticks. It's gonna be a looooong night....
***Office Spoiler Alert***
ARGH!!!!! Are they trying to kill me?! Why not let us be happy? Why? I think dramatic tension is dramatically overrated.
It's Luke and Lorelai and the stupid wedding day blues episode all over again! And I saw it coming, even!! ARGH!!!!!
Plus, now the little guy is throwing up. And now I'm gonna have to rent (or rather pull off the shelf) Dan in Real Life and The 40 Year Old Virgin and try to exorcise The Office from my mind. Except Amy Ryan is in Dan in Real Life - so I'm just going to get sad all over again. For crying out loud. Which, by the way, I've been hearing a lot of today - the crying out loud - from vomiting children.
At least, I won Miami Solitaire...
How is it possible that I still have people throwing up here?! This is my current biggest mystery. My poor little three year old (two, if you ask her) was sick all night and is still sick. She's lying in bed watching tv and holding a towel - not bouncing off the walls in any way shape or form, so I know it's bad. She's wearing her little pink tank top because "Pink is for love".
Sigh.
I'll check back in and hopefully be able to tell you that we're all well. Tomorrow's Halloween for crying out loud! I have a mouse, a princess, and a Red Baron to take trick or treating!
Well, we seem to have hit a wall. The Mystery Man sleeps great for half the night - which is something. I mean, he used to only sleep when I was holding him - so any time without a baby in my arms at the end of the night is fantastic. But at some point - maybe midnight, maybe 3 am - he gets up and will NOT go back to his crib for anything. 
I'm combing The Baby Whisperer for what we're doing wrong. I think maybe my little guy is not listed in her five types of babies. There is no type for Incredible Hulk, which is what he sounds like when he's really angry. RAH!
So, um, that's what I've been doing during this blog silence. I was hoping to report greater victory.
On the upside, we went to the pumpkin patch and harvest festival last weekend and it was a blast. There was some consternation (by the biggest one of us, not the children) that our regular patch was closing down and the tradition was taking a turn, but all in all we had a really good time.
The hour and a half it took us to get home due to the accident on the freeway - and the ill-fated detour - notwithstanding.
And my sister had motion sickness.
And she really had to pee.
And we handed her an empty soda bottle, ala Dwight Schrute, but it didn't get to that point. 
And then there was the debate about how far you can really go when the car says 9 miles to empty. They don't really tick off at every mile, it's more like every 10 feet, and the patch was really remote... but I swear you can go FAR on 0 miles to empty. And this was referred to as Robin's Way of Life. I like my way. It's a lot less stressful than thinking you really need to get to a gas station. I have AAA - and a cell phone, that's sometimes charged...
But hey, I'm happy. 
I'm ESPECIALLY happy having seen last week's The Office 4 times now. Wow. Yay for Michael and Holly. Why am I so happy for fictional people, I don't know. Maybe it goes to my Way of Life. I was depressed for a good 3 weeks after Luke and Lorelai broke up the first time. I know that it plays into my wanting to write - I can make MY characters do whatever I want. Bwa ha ha! If I want them to live happily ever after - they will!!!
So let's all hope Amy Ryan does not get a movie gig anytime soon and can come back for lots of guest roles to make Michael's life happy. :)
He slept in his crib all night. There were many bouts of my husband or I getting him up, comforting him, and putting him back down, but nevertheless, I did not fold. Hooray for me! Hooray for Hubby! Hooray for little man!
As a reward for not folding, I bought The Orkney Skull by Lyn Hamilton - I've been wanting to try out these "archeological mysteries". I'll let you know. ;) I also bought two extra cute shirts for the little guy. I'm sure he appreciates it.
Night number two going on right now. I can hear him protesting, but hubby is on shift.
Sigh.
The flu has now gone through 4 of us. I'm not sure that it's done with it's swath of destruction, but at least no one is currently throwing up. I thought I was all clear on Wednesday, and then got the call from my daughter's teacher that she, too, was now throwing up.
Seriously, people, it's a whole lotta sick. I'm just coming up for air.
Secondly, check out www.crimespace.ning.com. It's a social networking site for authors, agents, readers - anyone into crime fiction and I love it! Go friend me! I've found lots of good books that way.
Thirdly, we're teaching the mystery man to sleep in his crib tonight. He used to. Then he didn't. He thinks he should be glued to my body at all times. I'm exhausted and will be till this little process is finished. Thank God for husbands who say "I'll take the next shift." Of course, if he didn't, I'd probably never do this thing.
I'll be back when I can form coherant thoughts again.
Over and out.
Just a quick post to say I'm sorry for the blog silence. I am very sick. We are all very sick. This is possibly the worst flu I have every experienced. I feel fortunate to be alive. Not that I'm at all dramatic. A big shout out to my parents for helping with the three monkeys - one of which was throwing up herself for three days - while I've been down and out. And also to my lovely aunt for keeping two monkeys while I rushed the sick one to the doctor thinking she had appendicitis, that's how acute this has been.
Regular blogging to resume once regular eating, drinking, and breathing resumes here at the house of mystery.
I'm at Old Navy with my little imp and just ahead of us in line is a little boy - probably four or five. This is prime time for her. Typically, she would be all over introducing herself and facillitating a long conversation and playtime.
Instead, she observed, and declined.
Then, while we are actually checking out and his parents were on their way out of the store, they had to bring him back so he could say hello to my little siren. She stood behind my legs and hid. My little girl doesn't hide, but they didn't know that, so I just asked her to say hello. And she did. Then goodbye, and she did.
When we got to the car, I said: That little boy liked you. He came all the way back to say hello!
Her: I did not like that little boy, he was fweaky!
Me: What?! Why was he freaky?
Her: He just stood there staring at me, saying hello (shudder).
Me: Well, was he just not your type of boy?
Her: No! I like boys like Ava likes (her best friend) and I like boys that June likes (June is on the Little Einsteins), and I like boys made of gold. And one day, when I find a boy made of gold, I will make that golden boy my boyfriend.
Sounds like a good plan to me!
Riddle me this batman, I can't keep my eyes open all day, and now, at 12:30, I'm wide awake. ARGH!!! So, I'm fiddling with plotting, and I wanted to leave you with a snippet of dialogue from my life before I get back to deciding if a particular scene is a point of no return or a major setback. ;) This is a cheaper way to procrastinate than ordering the new BADGal Plum Mascara which I can apparently get with free shipping according to my inbox. And it *would* really bring out the green in my eyes...
So, speaking of eyes, my little three year old with the Betty Boop voice and the Bette Davis eyes who still won't cop to being three was mumbling something about friends in her top bunk...
Me: What about friends?
Her: Mama! (derisive tone) I'm not talking about *friends*, I'm talking about *boyfriends*!!
Me: Oh, OH! What about boyfriends?
Her: I would like to have a boyfriend.
Me: And what would you do with this boyfriend?
Her: (smiling to herself) We would cook together... we would read together... we would play together... and we would sleep together.
Me: You can cook with a boy, you can read with a boy, you can play *some* things with a boy, but you may never under any circumstances sleep with a boy.
Her: Why not?!
Me: I'm going to go get your father...
I hightailed it downstairs, related the incident to my DH, who then hightailed it upstairs and on his return I asked what he said.
Him: I told her that I am her boyfriend until further notice!
He also promised her lots of daddy dates and one on one time, so hopefully she'll get over this new obsession with having a boyfriend... except she hasn't and I'll have more for you on the next post.
OK, back to plot structure...
I was up before the little racoons at the top of my igoogle page this morning. That's early! I'm still feeling a little frustrated at having to do everything with one hand tied behind my back - nearly literally - but I'm trying to see it as a reminder of how good I normally have it with two functioning hands. Let's just hope the right hand returns to being fully functional eventually.
Also, I'm taking an online class from RWA (Romance Writers of America) through their Kiss of Death division - apparently for Romantic Suspense writers, but we have many different genres represented in the class. I write more straight mystery, but I can't conceive of a story without some romance, so it fits me just fine. So far, I love it! It's supposed to help with pacing which is so, so important in mysteries.
An interesting thing has come up - she talks about pacing as having as much to do with characters as plot. I love this idea, because many of my favorite books are favorites because I just love being with the characters, not just endlessly moving forward. I feel like a really good book can make scenes with their characters fun in and of themselves - yet a lot of writing advice says you have to move forward or die, like a shark. What do you all think?
Some examples for me are: Harry Potter - honestly, it's most fun for me when they're in class just being wizards at Hogwarts, Pride and Prejudice, Anne of Green Gables, Gone With the Wind, the Amelia Peabody books - I'd love to hear your thoughts on pacing and characters.
OK, off to ice my wrist!
Just a quick update to say that I have tendonitis - really painful tendonitis that made me think I broke my wrist. So it's ridiculously hard to type. I have a few blog posts in my head, so if I can peck them out with my left hand in the next few days, I will.
I'll just say that my Suzanne Aruda book arrived - The Serpant's Daughter - so far so good!
And now my baby is awake and I have to run upstairs. More later!
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