Uncreated Conscience

I’ve been thinking a lot about romance lately, for no particular reason, but partly due to the fact that I have a strange relationship with the romance genre. I adore love stories, admire the readership, but have not yet read a romance novel I’ve liked. In fact, I haven’t read too many love stories I’ve liked either.

Photo credit to Color Me Katie, whose blog you should all put on your readers immediately.

I am, at heart, an incurable romantic, although it may not be very obvious to those who don’t know me well. I am moved to emotion quite easily and often cry at movies. You wouldn’t believe how much I SOBBED during Wall·E. SOBBED. And the first 10 minutes of Up. Hell, I think every Pixar film has made me cry at some point. But I digress.

I’m less sentimental when it comes to books, but it’s not like they won’t bring tears to my eyes. It’s just that I think it’s a little harder to portray earnest emotion with words than in images. Not impossible, but it’s harder for me to buy it.

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Once more med school prom has come and gone I have the photographic evidence in my nail-polish stained fingers. There needs to be more (semi)formal events in my life so I can indulge my inner princess by wearing pretty, pretty dresses and makeup.

From a mask and makeup test a few weeks ago.

My mother once accused me of living in a made-up world of stories and fairytales. Of course, I found this vastly complimentary, but Mum actually intended it as a criticism of how I dress. I stand convicted. As you might recall, last year Bear and I went as a gangster and moll from the 1930s. This year the med school itself gave me a theme: masquerade ball.

Photos from the night (and the process of getting ready) below the cut.

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New post at Running Roommates!

Don't be fooled; this is not snow. It's ice.

Things I Learned This Past Weekend

• Running on ice works all the small muscle groups in your legs.
• Running on ice when you have one flat foot also causes blisters.
• You should always live with a tall roommate so she can do things like change your lightbulbs for you.

I’ve read MAGIC UNDER GLASS and I’m itching to discuss it, but I shall postpone that blog post for another day when I have more time. Things are picking up around here–good for business, bad for my sanity. Also, this Friday is Masquerade Prom and I have to figure out how I’m going to get ready for it when I have a full work day. Can I curl my hair on the New Jersey Transit, do you think?

Mum is in town and I’ve subjected her to a healthy dose of icky snow. Too bad she couldn’t bring southern Californian sunshine with her. I am so over February. Hell, I’m so over winter it’s not even funny.

Because I am sappy and because I have the most adorable Teddy Bear in the world who needs to be told he’s loved with similar levels of cuteness.

I love you, Teddy Bear.

In a completely unrelated note to what I’m about to discuss: Happy 25th birthday to my darling Teddy Bear! White-Harp wishes him a happy berfday too. *\(^.^)/*

Summer: Your typical Manic Pixie Dream Girl

Lately I’ve come across something in all my work reading that has become common enough to warrant a blog post. Her name Quirky McSprite and she is a Manic Pixie Dream Girl.

You are all familiar with Manic Pixie Dream Girls–they exist everywhere, both in real life and in various forms of media. Take a walk down any street in Greenpoint or Williamsburg and you’ll meet 8 million hipster girls who fit the criteria. The Manic Pixie Dream Girl seems to be the most prevalent onscreen these days, starting with Annie Hall and tracing her path from Penny Lane to Sam from Garden State and most recently ending with Summer from 500 Days of Summer.

This, my friends, is a big problem.

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I am dire need of a divan, a fainting couch, a sofa, a futon–anything. When I first signed on for this gig, I knew there would be a lot of reading involved, but I didn’t quite factor in the occupational hazards. The volume of reading I can deal with, but it’s how I read that’s starting to catch up to me. Reading while sitting at my desk wreaks havoc on my neck and shoulders. At the moment I’ve jerry-rigged an arrangement where I lean the back of my desk chair against one angle of my desk while I prop my feet up on the opposite angle. This sort of approximates a reclining angle, but any sudden movement and I’m head over heels on the floor.

White-Harp Brrrrito! Also doubles as a neck pillow.

White-Harp often comes to work with me now to double as a neck pillow. Finally found a way to earn her keep, oh that Lazy Harp.

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Looking back on some of my blog posts since starting work here at St. Martin’s Press, I’ve become slightly baffled by how much I talk about work. It’s like I have no life, you guys! How horrifying! It’s time I return to a self-centered, narcissistic monologue about my life.

(Not really. Except kind of really.)

Masquerade! Paper faces on parade!

I started this blog long before I was ever in publishing, but slowly and insidiously, the industry has infiltrated my entire existence–including social media. Cap’n Sweet Valley has me tweeting and Facebook-ing as part of my job description (not that I mind) and when I come home, it seems that all I can discuss/think/eat/breathe are books. I used to have hobbies! What happened to them?

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Even if walking about in the city after it’s snowed is a dirty, slushy, wet, and disgusting slog, there’s something magical about the first real snowfall of the season.

A snowy day in New Jersey.

There’s something lovely about a world blanketed in white, hushed and quiet. I always think of snowfall as silent even when it’s not, even when little tinkling bits of ice gather musically on the windowpanes. I watched the sun rise over the city as I left a warm, sleepy Bear behind in New Jersey, the sky a brilliant rosy-orange fading into a muted lavender-pink. It’s the shortest day of the year and soon I can celebrate the return of the sun, but reflected in my mind’s eye are scenes of play: me dressed as Lyra Belacqua with a faux fur-lined hood, me with a daemon White-Harp tucked in my coat, stealing piggy back rides from a Bear in the snow–my Iorek Byrnison, my Will Parry.

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Thanksgiving dinner!

As I have for the past three years, I am spending Thanksgiving with Bear and his family because New Jersey is a lot closer to New York City than California. Thanksgiving at Chez Sacramento Joneses (my branch of the Jones family broke with tradition to settle in southern California instead of NorCal) was very traditionally American–turkey (tofurkey for me), mashed potatoes, gravy, cranberry sauce, stuffing, sweet potatoes baked with brown sugar and cinnamon, etc.–but not so Bear’s family.

Bear comes from a mixed racial background, the same as me, but his Thanksgiving dinners reflect a bit of his heritage: Indian-Portuguese (Goan)/Slovak. This year we have paneer, chicken curry, and pilau rice in addition to turkey and all its accoutrements. Bear’s younger brother is vegetarian like me, so the Indian food is for us.

Things I Am Thankful For

• A warm Bear and a fuzzy White-Harp
• A job I love
• My family (nuclear, extended, forged, and found)
• The winners of St. Martin’s “New Adult” contest

The winners follow below the cut, including the winners of TEMPTED by P.C. and Kristin Cast! Also below the cut are instructions for what to do next.

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A reminder: Submissions for the St. Martin’s “New Adult” Contest are now closed. Any submissions received after 12:00 midnight Friday, November 20 will not be considered. Thank you to YAlitchat for all their support and especially to Georgia McBride for being a wonderful, wonderful person and helping me organize and implement this contest. Close to 400 entries in two weeks! Phew, I have my work cut out for me.

Winners will announced on Wednesday, November 25. Yes, just in time for the holidays! I don’t have a predetermined number of “winners”–just those I find intriguing enough to ask for more. The top 3 entrants whose pitches I feel closely match Dan and my “mission statement” will receive a copy of TEMPTED by P.C. and Kristin Cast.

Brownies from Willow

Being deathly ill takes a toll on your productivity. Who knew? I hope to God I’m never that sick again–fever, chills, hallucinations, bronchial coughing, etc. The good news? It wasn’t swine flu. The bad news? I think I have bronchitis. The hallucinations were worst part about being sick; the brownies from the movie Willow were prancing about my bed, crawling out from the woodwork, and singing, “We have-a da cookies! Eat-a da cookies, yum yum!”

It’s amazing how being sick can turn me back into a child. I knew I had to drink fluids, take my temperature, take some medication, but all I could do was wrap myself up in my covers, shivering hard enough to rattle my teeth, and whimper and moan and wish that Mummy or my Teddy Bear could come take care of me. But no, I had to be an adult (not to mention Mum is in California and Bear in New Jersey busy with med school), so I dragged myself out of bed, shaking and crying, to take my temperature. 101.2 and climbing. For someone whose body temperature is about a degree or two lower than average, that was pretty damn high.

And then I just climbed back into bed and watched the Doorway of Infinite Knowledge grow larger and larger before my very eyes. My hallucinations are very much like a Kubrick film. Or an 80s childhood favourite.

I feel infinitely better than I did Thursday, but I’m still saddled with Cough of Doom. My poor Teddy Bear, finally in town for the weekend and he has to deal with a sick JJ. At least he had a White-Harp to help him out. As I lay my head against Bear’s shoulder with a White-Harp tucked between us, I thought, This pretty much sums up our relationship. I love my Teddy Bear. And my White-Harp.

Good luck on all those who entered the contest, and remember submissions received after 12:00 midnight Friday, November 20 will not be considered. Thanks!