I've been spending the last two weeks being very techy. When I got the contract from WD for The Critiquer's Survival Guide and knew I'd be writing full-time, I decided my website needed a serious upgrade. So (during the evenings--daytime is for writing!), I got onto wordpress and started building. Wordpress.com, not Wordpress.org, because I know less than nothing about actual HTML code.

Anyway, I chose pictures, thought about themes, added text and links, and voila...the site is done. I feel a little like Dr. Frankenstein, except I'm pretty sure the end result is not monstrous.  Hopefully, far from it! :)

If you'd like, come take a look: www.beckylevine.com. I'd love to hear from you all!

A couple of weeks ago, I found out that I was going to get to write a book for Writer's Digest--tentatively titled The Critiquer's Survival Guide. Then I talked to my new agent, then I got the contract. And I've gotten started with the real job--putting words on the page. Obviously, very exciting.

As I get going, I've also been starting plans for putting myself "out there" on the web, to get people more aquainted with me and to, eventually, help sell the book. I've been working on a new website, I've been playing in Facebook and here, and I've been trying to explore the whole social networking,  online community thing. It's been fun, and I feel like I"m getting somewhere. Not sure where exactly, but somewhere.

That not-sure-where part seems to be slipping into my subconscious, though. For the past few nights, I've been dreaming. About what? About multi-tasking. About organization. About figuring out what to do and how to do it. Two nights ago, it was all about hiking. I had all the maps in my head (which if you knew me, you'd be aware is totally laughable), and all the trails were flitting around in my brain, while I figured out the right route to take. Last night, it was packing. My family and I were staying in some hotel/hostel type place. We hadn't been there long, but somehow we'd managed to really  unpack--our stuff was scattered through all the rooms--especially our books. I was overseeing it--sending one person here to get the clothes, another to get the bike, and--yes, everybody to get the books. Almost everything fit--it was clear that the lamp didn't have a place, and I was going to have to really fold up my old Raggedy Andy doll to get him a spot. But it was all happening.

Thank goodness these weren't nightmares. It was chaos, but a chaos I was in charge of, was managing. It was all going to come together.

But maybe, just maybe, I should be spending a little less time on Facebook? :)

Two of the favorite books around our house the past few months are The True Meaning of Smekday, by Adam Rex, and The Mysterious Benedict Society (the first and second books in the series), by Trenton Lee Stewart. For his English class, my son is writing an essay about the second book by Stewart. In it, he compares the bucket of...stuff carried by one of the character's, Kate, to the toolbox carried by J. Lo (an alien Boov) in Smekday.

Basically, if you haven't read the books (and why haven't you?!), both the bucket and the toolbox contain anything and everything their owners could possibly  need to fix an engine, rescue a cat, or escape any bad guys. Think, as the post title says, Mary Poppins suitcase.

We were on a relatively long drive back home today, from a weekend away, and we got started talking. What ELSE is like the bucket, or the toolbox, or Mary's bag? We came up with a few.

-Elmer's backpack in My Father's Dragon (by Ruth Stiles Gannett and Ruth Chrisman Gannett)
-Q's lab in the James Bond books/movies
-MacGyver's pockets

Obviously, it's a great construct and has its roots in something way back when--Aladdin's lamp? A fairy godmother's wand? Here's the thing, though. I KNOW there are more examples "out there," in books I've read, or fairy tales I've heard, or even Disney movies I've watched a hundred times. And I can't think of them. It's like that patch of poison oak rash on your back, just past the point you can reach.

Any thoughts or memories to help fill in my blanks?
 

It's very cool to be in on this community from the start. And the timing is perfect--I'm just starting to get into the whole social networking thing. The hills we live in are not very tall, and we're less than five minutes from the nearest town, and less than ten minutes from Silicon Valley, but we just got high-speed internet last week.

We were sad, now we're happy.

Welcome to everybody who got here before me and to everybody who shows up after!