Friday, December 2, 2016

Celebrate The Small Things - December 2, 2016



I started off the week to a leaky tube underneath my bathroom sink. For those of you who have read my other blog posts, you know that I've had a lot of plumbing problems. I couldn't believe the plumbing problems were starting again. My husband thinks it's because I listen to paranormal and sasquatch podcasts. It's funny, but when I was listening to writing podcasts, I didn't have the plumbing problems, but last week I started listening to Sasquatch Chronicles and the plumbing problems began. LOL! My husband thinks that since Native Americans lived here before this area was settled and they believe in Sasquatch, that can amp up the activity. Some people think Sasquatch is paranormal because UFOs and mysterious lights are seen sometimes when Sasquatch is around. Or Sasquatch disappears mysteriously. My husband said not to play the podcasts out loud, so I bought wireless headphones.

Looking on the bright side, I have learned a lot about plumbing. Nevertheless, I still needed help. I tried to fix this problem on my own and as usual, it didn't work out. I turned the water off to the house, tightened the nut, then went outside to turn the water back on. I heard gushing water when I got back in the house. I ran down the hall as fast as I could to the bathroom. The water was shooting out of the side of the tube and the bathroom was flooding. This time I just turned the water off under the sink. If I was watching myself from outside my body, I would've been laughing my ass off. My uncle came over to help and I learned more about plumbing. Thank God this time the part was only $4.99 and the problem was fixed quickly and easily. I need to get myself a basin wrench one of these days. Yeah, I know what that is now. Ha ha ha!

I went to the CTN Animation Expo with my husband because he was working the Animation Mentor booth there. I like to go there and look at the artist booths. This time, however, I decided to talk to the artists and introduce myself. I normally don't do that when I go to conventions, but something compelled me to do that this time. I met a couple of people that I follow on Instagram and talked to the artists that do comic books, graphic novels, and children's books. One of them told me that Scholastic is having a graphic novel contest for their middle grade and teen Graphix line. The deadline is April 1! I already had an idea and partial outline worked out on my computer from an idea that had come to me about 2 weeks prior to hearing about the contest. I finished the outline in a day and have done 16 pages of roughs so far. The book is going to be a partial memoir about when I was a kid and went to Hawaii to visit relatives. It's going to center around my aunt's passing. There's going to be drama, humor, and some paranormal elements in it. My family is Japanese from Hawaii, but I was born and raised in California. It sounds unusual, but most of my friends at school were California-born Japanese whose parents are from Hawaii. I think readers will get a glimpse into our culture that has never been written about before. I never saw myself as an "ethnic" writer or felt compelled to write something ethnic just to fit a genre or need, but I was telling my kids about the funny things that happened to me when I was a kid visiting Hawaii and decided to do a graphic novel about it. Since I had the idea 2 weeks prior, I had asked my mom for old photo albums. She gave me 7 albums, so when I started working on the graphic novel seriously for the contest, I already had the albums on hand for reference. At a restaurant a few weeks ago, I doodled characters of my best friend and myself the way we looked when we were kids. I drew them on the paper tablecloth and my husband took a picture of it to save it even though I was going to leave it to be thrown out. I guess I had an inkling of the idea in my head for longer than 2 weeks because she is in the book as well.

The contest started in July, so I'm a little late in the game, but if I'm diligent, I can do the required 12 finished pages before the deadline. I'm so excited!

This week, my oldest son asked me for a blank sketchbook so he can start his own comic. I didn't push him into it and he hasn't shown an interest to draw in the past couple of years at least, but he wants to write about how messed up things are in his life. He's going to be a teenager in a few weeks so the teenage angst is creeping in. (rolling my eyes) I told my husband about it and he said, "We're all gonna be poor." Who knows? Maybe he'll have a bestseller and rub shoulders with Lincoln Peirce and Jeff Kinney!

What are you celebrating?
Check out the blogs below for your reading pleasure and please visit our hosts' blogs:
Lexa Cain: http://lexacain.blogspot.com/
L.G. Keltner http://lgkeltner.blogspot.co.uk/
Tonja Drecker http://tonjadrecker.blogspot.com/
If you would like to join our blog hop, visit Lexa Cain's blog for info.

1.

Lexa Cain2.Fiction and Film
3.Writing Off the Edge4.Kidbits
5.TheCyborgMom6.Thoughts and Ideas from Deanie Humphrys-Dunne
7.My Inner Geek8.Intentional Insights with S. Kelley Harrell
9.Constantine10.My Miracle Life
11.Writing, Reading, and the Pursuit of Dreams12.Lara Lacombe
13.TF Walsh14.Life, Yoga and Other Adventures
15.About myself, by myself16.Suzanne Furness
17.Elizabeth Seckman18.Avalon
19.My Baffling Brain20.Planet Kimberly
21.Shah Wharton22.Victorian Scribbles
23.Tanya Miranda24.Ann - A Friend of Jesus 2013
25.Special Teaching At Pempi's Palace26.Square Pegs
27.Patricia's Place28.Yvonne Van Dalen
29.Anne Higa30.My Antimatter Life
31.Bouquet of Books32.Lightravellerkate
33.Curious As A Cathy34.Julie Flanders
35.Crazy Old Lady36.In My Own Words
37.Allison Bruning38.Tamara Narayan, Author
39.My Creatively Random Life40.Yvonne Ventresca
41.Two Book Minimum42.On Becoming a Writer