Scooping the poop

I'm trying to learn how to scoop the poop in my life more effectively. I really need to and here's why:

I'm trying to write both my second novel (March Storm, the sequel to January Moon) and a non-fiction work (a history book for grown-ups titled Daylight & Deja vu), and of course I blog here and at The Pragmatic Progressive Forum and sometimes I do laundry and scoop cat poop (actually, I always scoop cat poop because I have 4 very healthy cats).

I also maintain a website, answer a LOT of email, and sometimes write book reviews... I just jumped into the waters in Twitter and am learning about tweeting and have been maintaining a presence and finding wonderful people on Facebook. Learning all about social networking has been fun (but sometimes exhausting).

What else? Oh yeah, and I have my own press now (Black Dog Communications to publish my own works and, I suppose, anyone else's) and I'm also learning how to use my experience as a 100-year old fat white woman novelist, blogger, educator and historian to do some guest speaking... well, actually, that's not really new. I've done some of that before (the guest speaking) but this time I'm viewing it differently (as in marketing and promoting myself more seriously than I did before). This, my lawyer tells, me will fall under Black Dog Communications.

I had my first radio interview last week and am getting ready for my first big store book signing and two book clubs have invited me to speak.

But I've gotten so broad in the beam from sitting at this desk all day I can't fit it into any of the really nice clothes I have hanging in the closet and I'm wondering what the hell I should wear to a book signing or public speaking gig and know, damnit, that I used to have a nice pair of "fat slacks" in the closet somewhere... and did I mention I could seriously use a day at a salon... and what the hell did I do with those nice patent leather flats that didn't give me blisters?

I want to make a promotional video for January Moon and I like the idea about a podcast on my website and I want to also write about the characters in my book and their favorite Chicago restaurants and recipes and there are just all these neat things to do...

Did I mention it's probably time to scoop some poop?

The poop scooping is morphing into a metaphor for learning the ropes about being a newbie novelist and indie publisher and everything else that falls under those umbrellas... as well as being very, very disciplined and focused... which I always thought I was but now seem morbidly "focus-challenged."

There's just so much that falls under those umbrellas!

Which, I realize now, is the hard part about being an indie novelist... writing and publishing books is relatively easy in comparison... it's hoisting those umbrellas and trying to figure out what to put under them that's the hard part... and not getting derailed.

If life were only as easy as Tidy Cats' Scoopable Brand Litter... it sifts the poop from the sand for you; it's "clumpable." It makes the decision what stays and what goes.

I wish it were so easy to sort the poop from the necessary litter in life. But there's no magic scoop that can be waived over my desk that will clump together what I should toss (abandon) from what should stay (and I should develop).

Screw it. I really need to find those @#$#%^%$ patent leather flats...