OK so here's my problem. I have agreed to write a retelling of Beauty and the Beast and am feeling some pressure to finish. That's partly because I don't really find much time to write. I sit down, turn on this old clunker of a computer, which is actually better than the one I used to use, and sometimes by the time I have it even on and set up to write, I am interrupted to do something or other or drive someone somewhere. It turns out that if you deal in teenagers, you have many many places to go long before they have the capability of actually getting there themselves legally.

Well anyway I have to get my mind in the mood for fantasy and folk tales, which used to be easy; I'd read folk tales all the time back when I was teaching. Now it's much harder. For one thing I read the news and the news has a way of hitting me with a sledgehammer over reality. But even Facebook is doing that. It draws my eyes down to Reels and the reels are all of torrential water shooting the banks of various Texas and New Mexico rivers. I know some of these rivers, especially the Rio Ruidoso in New Mexico, so sometimes it's a matter of seeing if I can find places I know getting inundated with water.

So I'm horrified but also dulled into clicking on reel after reel and these days for me almost two thirds of them are one flood or another. By the time I'm done I've had a tour of swollen rivers all over the place.

Now of course I can't do folk tales so I play the bog for a while. My sister and I occasionally play web boggle (here), one of the three best things about the internet (which are: Google, Blogger, Boggle). It's fantastic! And addictive! And though I limit myself to three at least after ten minutes my mind is clear.

But alas, I get interrupted again. Happens every time.