Tuesday 19 May 2009

Reasons to be cheerful:

  • I've finished my OU course! I braved the queues at the only Post Office left in a 50 mile radius and sent my 5000 words of blood, sweat and tears off to Milton Keynes.
  • My great friend is coming to see me today. He's making an exception for me and is heading north of the Watford Gap. I hope he's prepared for the provinces...
  • We're going out for lunch, and wine will be involved, I'm sure of it...
  • My kids are both at school till 3.30 - freedom!
  • My husband should be making a guest appearance at home later today - feels like he's been away forever...
  • I've got a shelf of tasty novels lined up waiting to be read - summertime's for reading, don't you think?
  • I can't take any more doom and gloom!! So. No TV news or newspapers for me today - what you don't know can't hurt you!

Have a great day everyone!

Monday 18 May 2009

The end in sight

Firstly, many apologies for my lack of blog in the last few weeks. Have been working on my long project for the OU Creative Writing course I have been doing this year.

It has been an interesting process. This is my second year of study with the OU and I can really see an improvement and development in my writing. In particular, this year has really seen my drafting and critical skills come along, and I can now see more clearly where I go wrong, even if I don't quite know yet how to make it right again!

So I have worked on and polished the piece of writing for my final assessment and, although I feel like I could go on forever tinkering with it, I am quite pleased that I have managed to sustain my concentration and focus to produce a more developed piece of writing.

Where to go from here? After tomorrow, when this is posted off to the OU, I am officially On My Own... My tutor this year has recommended an MA for further study, but it's a lot of money to spend.... About £4000. Seems a lot for something that may go no further than a 'hobby'.

But, writing is an increasingly 'professionalised' activity, like so many others, and if I ever wanted to teach Creative Writing, I would really need to have an MA. So maybe I'll consider it.

As for this week, once this is in the post, I'm going to go and have a massage and then a large gin and tonic! Cheers!

Tuesday 5 May 2009

Not enough hours...

I have precisely 3 weeks to finish my final project for my Creative Writing course. If I complete it and pass, I'll get my Diploma from the Open University, so it's the last hurdle (this year anyway). I have also promised myself that I will blog on my 'work days' before I sit down to write - to kind of get the writing juices flowing if you know what I mean... Tuesdays are my free day - both kids out of the way until 3.30pm. And so of course in usual fashion, I have volunteered to help at the school library, and have a meeting about that at lunchtime. And two friends have just texted seeing if I want to have coffee!!! Aaaarghh! There just aren't enough hours in the day! This story is never going to get finished. Maybe that wouldn't be such a bad thing as I'm severely lacking in enthusiasm for it today!