Rain, more rain and brain drain

It's easy to blame everything on the weather.  Especially in rainy season when there're torrential downpours that knock over trees which fall on power lines and cut out the power.  Heavy rain on a tin roof is deafening.  It's hard to hear yourself think.  But it doesn't rain all the time, and most of the rain comes during the night when you are trying to sleep.  So it would be unfair to say it's because of the rain and blame it on the weather.
Maybe it's age that's making my brain foggy.  Or maybe it's the high moisture levels in the air from the rain that's making some brain cells go mouldy.  You see, it really is the weather!  I knew it, it couldn't be me!
Actually, I think it is because as a part-time writer you have to juggle so many things that it's easy to allow yourself to be distracted.  You have a demanding full-time job, a home to run, children to manage, strange diseases to cope with, and on top of all that you have to keep on writing and still find time to do your own marketing.  Seriously, there are only so many hours in the day.
Maybe I should blame it on my Kindle.  Since I got that damn thing I can't stop reading.  Books are so easily available and so cheap.  Goodness, some are even free!  When I have the time to write, I'm reading.  The Kindle should take all the blame.

But I guess sending the wrong books to the winners of my Goodreads Giveaway was all me.  I had run two Giveaways simultaneously.  One for Defective the book I published last year to give it a bit of a push; and the other for C U @ 8 the book I have just released.  Stupid me sent all winners C U @ 8!  I felt like such a fool.

I have three books waiting to be worked on.  Two still in the research stage, but one ready to be written.  But for some reason the spikes on my running shoes seemed to have got stuck in the starting blocks, and instead of racing to the finish line I am struggling to get started.  Maybe I need to just step out of the shoes and run barefoot!

Why I can't write

This seems to be the year of distractions.
I don't know what it is that some years you can achieve so much and other years it's just one distraction after another that blocks your vision, hampers your creativity and manages to force one's writing onto the back burner. 
I love writing.  Stories, relationship advice, I love it.  But this year it is a struggle and just isn't happening for me.
My youngest daughter will tell you, I'm addicted to research.  Mention something I don't know and I have an obsessive compulsion to find out all I can about it.  This means that my time on my laptop is ill-spent researching trivial bits and pieces that mean nothing to anybody just to satisfy some weird urge I have to acquire useless knowledge about random subjects.  It's a huge time-waster that I can't get control of.  An addiction I don't seem quite ready to give up.
During my recovery time after another bout with breast cancer, I should have been able to use that time to write.  Instead, I became completely obsessed with researching my roots.  I did find out some scandalous stuff but seriously, what can I actually do with that information?  How useful is it?  If I am honest with myself then it is just another waste of my time and time is very precious to me.

Being an armchair sports fanatic, a year of world cups is the worst possible thing for me.  First the cricket world cup consumed my weekends and killed my writing.  Now it's the rugby world cup and as a die-hard Springbok supporter I find it of the utmost importance to my sanity and psyche to compulsively read every bit of news about the Springboks and their world cup bid written in every blog and newspaper around the world.  Weekends are taken up with rugby-watching and it's very hard to focus on anything else.  Even planning an October getaway and December holiday has been pushed aside.  I have a one-track mind and it's not about sex.  Rugby, that's all I can think about at present.  I try and avoid conversations with people as I instinctively try and turn the conversations around to rugby and the Springboks chances in this world cup.  This is sad.

I have two books I should be working on.  Redesigning yourself for the multi-tasking generation which I'm co-writing with Jeremy Sherr, and C U @ 8, a novel I'm quite excited about.  I've promised myself that after the world cup, these books will get my full attention.  But there's always something else, isn't there?

Marketing.  The bain of my life.  Indie authors have to spend a lot of time marketing, especially if you want to enjoy the successes which come with increased sales.  Marketing is time-consuming, and at the moment is compartmentalised with watching E!  I can do both at the same time.  However, I do not spend nearly enough time on marketing.

Parenting takes time if you are a single-parent.  Your children expect you to talk and interact with them, fetch and carry them, all of which makes inroads on your time.  And if you just agree with them or pretend to listen, they have this nasty habit of taking your inattention personally, and throwing it back at you when you need their support.

And last of all is my job.  A huge distraction as I have to go to work during the week.  Because you receive a salary, the expectation is that you'll put in the hours and do the work.  Unfortunately, I do love my job so feel this compulsion to do the extra yards and go the extra mile.  If only I had a horrible job and didn't have to work.  Now if I could just make the time for marketing, to get the sales to supplement my income, then maybe...?  With one more child to go to university and finish school, retiring to write is not an option for a good few years.

My goal for this week is to manage my time and make the time to write.  It's what I'm passionate about (besides the rugby) so it stands to reason that I should make the time to follow my passion.

Have a good week.

Cindy