Random Ramblings

Of Ideas and Common Courtesy

So . . . as I type this, it's 2:30 a.m. and I've been wracking my brains for the last couple of days trying to come up with an idea for my Ramble for this post.

I've pretty much used up my quota of material on visiting critters - unless you'd like to know that the ducks have pretty much given up on the pool finally. Well, except for one of the drakes. He's pretty persistent although he doesn't swim in the pool, just roosts on the edge. He was there the entire day yesterday, just huddled on the rail. And the blue jays and squirrel still visit if I leave peanuts out for them. Actually, one of the jays perched on the back of the chair right next to me a couple of days ago. And the squirrel comes right to the back door to see if I'm around - although he might just be there to tease the cats who are on the other side of the door.

And I think we're pretty much done with the garden stuff - unless you're interested in the fact that the pineapple mint is dying off in my mint garden, and so is the spearmint, but I have no idea why. And although the dill sprouted, the other seeds I planted did not. While outside the garden around the fountain looks beautiful - the pansies are blooming, as are the porculaca, and the snapdragons made a comeback. As for my terrarium . . . it's turning into a jungle.

The really sad part about not being able to come up with a decent idea for this post is that I've had a lot of story ideas lately.

Now you may think that this shouldn't be a problem for a writer, but you'd be wrong thinking that. These ideas come out of no where, usually when I'm trying to write something else. And they won't leave me alone. Like when I was trying to get some editing done on Magical Misfire. I suddenly got an idea for a sequel to a trilogy that I only have one book written in. The main character just popped into my head and wouldn't go away. I finally broke down and wrote out the bare bones of the idea, but then he was back again when I was trying to write this week's installment for Water, trying to entice me away by describing whole scenes and conversations.

AND to make matters worse, when I do get the opportunity to write some of these scenes down, there's some kind of blockage between my head and my hands. Usually this means the idea isn't ready yet, but meantime there's another story idea tickling at the back of my mind.

Enough with the new ideas! Give me some space to finish some of the gazillion ideas I'm working on already!

And no, I don't think I'm tempting fate by saying that. Because I have enough ideas already in the works that I probably won't finish them all before I die of old age! I think I need to start typing faster.

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The common courtesy portion of this ramble is courtesy of my husband. He asked me earlier if I was working on my ramble and I confessed that I didn't know what to ramble about and he said: "Rant about people who go down to the beach ten minutes before the fireworks start and set up their chairs right in front of people who've been sitting there for over an hour and a half." Or something like that. I can't remember his exact words.

But that's exactly what happened. We walked down to the beach and got there about an hour and a half before the fireworks were supposed to start, and set our chairs up in a likely spot and sat down to wait. Then about ten minutes before the show started, this family of like 6 adults and a couple of kids, waltzed onto the sand in front of us and proceeded to set up their chairs. It wasn't so dark that they couldn't see us sitting there, and even if they were blind they would have heard us because we were not quiet when mentioned the rudeness of certain people, but they acted like they were the only ones on the beach.

Yeah, I know it was fireworks and in the grand scheme of things it didn't matter where anyone was sitting 'cause the show was up in the sky, but the point is, these people were totally rude. And it wasn't like the beach was so crowded there was no place else to sit. The weather was windy and overcast so there was only about half the crowd there usually is, which meant there was plenty of space on the beach.

And to top it off - it started to rain as soon as the show was over, so we were drenched by the time we got home.