#49 Blow off work, ignore family, basically devour Mockingjay in about 7 hours.

Don’t worry, I won’t give away what happens in the finale of The Hunger Games Trilogy. Suffice it to say that if you’ve read the first two books, the third is a fitting conclusion. Violent. Heartbreaking. With, I must say, a somewhat surprising turn of events in the end. Anyway…I’ll let you judge for yourself, if you happen to be a fan of the books.

I wasn’t a fan, as a matter of fact, for a long time. I resisted reading them because the subject matter just didn’t appeal to me. Future, dystopian settings where children are forced to fight to the death in arena-style games…it’s just not the type of book I pick up.

Yet, I fully admit that my resistance is weak when it comes to popular culture, especially of the literary type. If everyone is reading a popular book or series of books, you can bet I’m going to read it. In a way, it is only because I like to gauge my own interests against the rest of the reading world, but mostly I just love books so much, I can’t resist one, especially when everyone else is talking about it. (Case in point: I even plodded through all four of those inane Twilight books.)

So yes, I suppose this is somewhat of a confession. I am a person who, at times, has spent over half of her waking hours reading a book. And yesterday, I did just that, foregoing my own writing in order to enjoy the work of another author.

This morning, I wrote a review of the book at Associated Content.

And now I return to my own writing—inspired, and more than a bit humbled. The perfect mind-set for a writer.

#48 Fight off constant urge to vomit.

I may as well confess, I am a complete whimp when it comes to being sick. Even if it's just a little cold, at the first sign that I'm not 100%, my instinct is to change into even more comfortable sweatpants (as opposed to my "good" sweatpants for daily wear in the event of possible contact with other human beings), curl up in a dark room, and read until I feel normal again. I shun most attempts by my family to take care of me when I'm sick, really preferring to just be alone and unwilling to let anyone see me in my hideousness.

And the last thing I want to do is sit in front of a computer, making up stories. Not much writing (i.e., none at all) gets done when I'm sick.

Thankfully, I don't get sick all that often. Not so thankfully, I've felt like complete crud for the last three of four weeks. We're expecting a new Laatsch in the family, and even though I was never once, for one single moment, sick to my stomach when I had my first baby (ahem...nine years ago), this time around has been a completely different experience.

Commence sweatpants, curling up in a ball, sticking nose in a book--except that this gets really old after a few days. So I drag myself through a semblance of my normal routine, even propping myself up in front of the computer and writing a few incoherent words.

Because I will not be so easily defeated. I shall persist, using every means of resourcefulness known to me, including sniffing ginger (which I'm doing now as I type this), eating crackers, whining a whole helluva lot (see every word theretofore), and repeating to myself "this will not last forever."

For now, though, my production is not at its greatest. ("This will not last forever. This will not last forever. This will not last forever...")

Photo credit: Melchoir, Wikimedia Commons