Bribery

I used my January writer's retreat to encourage (cough cough force cough cough) myself to finish revisions on Titus and Annie.  If I finished the revisions before the retreat, then I could spend four days working on a new project.

Now its time to write a new synopsis and summary for Titus and Annie so I can get some irons back in the fire.  This was supposed to happen in February.  Meh.  Reality happens.  Even if you are writing fiction.

So . . . .

Dear Self,
If you are a good little writer and chain yourself to the desk, summing up a 100 page book into a clear erudite 1 page synopsis, you can have that nice new book you want to read with your daughter.
You can do it,
Love
Self 

Thanks to Molly O'Neil at her blog Ten Block Walk for making me drool over Destiny, Rewritten by Kathryn Fitzmaurice.  Here is the link:  http://10blockwalk.blogspot.com/

My eight year old daughter doesn't like fantasy, likes mystery and is starting to write poetry.  What better book to read aloud with her than one built around Emily Dickinson's poetry.  Plus, the summary of the book is great.  I need to learn to write summaries like this: 

Eleven-year-old Emily Elizabeth Davis has been told for her entire life that her destiny is to become a poet, just like her famous namesake, Emily Dickinson. But Emily doesn't even really like poetry, and she has a secret career ambition that she suspects her English-professor mother will frown on. Then, just after discovering that it contains an important family secret, she loses the special volume of Emily Dickinson's poetry that was given to her at birth. As Emily and her friends search for the lost book in used bookstores and thrift shops all across town, Emily's understanding of destiny begins to unravel and then rewrite itself in a marvelous new way.

Science Time: Crickets

Here is the promotional "verbiage" Peggy and I sent out for Sciene Time this week:  

The Science Time trunk is hopping with crickets, packed in soda bottle observation jars and ready for tomorrow.  The children will get to observe these members of the orthoptera family and learn what makes them different their cousins the grasshoppers.  We will talk about habitats and habits of crickets, look at pictures of the giant weta from New Zeland and make a model of a cricket to take home.  No live bugs will be sent home with the children.  Honest.  Cross our hearts.

Science Time supports my writer's vices:  books, paper, sharpie pens and the occasional conference.  But it also brings wonderful research tangents into my life.  This week it was the wetas from New Zealand. These crickets can be weighed in ounces!  That's a lot of bug.  With eggs, a female can weigh up to 2.5 ounces.  

Even their common name provided a fun tangent.  Weta is short for Wetapunga which means God of Ugly Things in Maori.  

Hopefully I have enough fun Orthoptera information and buggy activities to override the effects of a rainy day and indoor recess.