Not Writing But Drowning!

So my first book is out in July and I am so excited. After working on Fat Girls and Fairy Cakes for ages I finally finished the hundredth edit in December and gave myself a Christmas break. Well, I deserved it - I’d already made a start (sort of) on Book Two. I was utterly exhausted from the whole process of sitting in front of my pink laptop, drinking coffee, eating cake and mixing pre-Christmas cocktails (all at the same time, it’s a talent).

But I was ready for 2011 and in January I would diet like a supermodel and slave over that lap top, stopping only to consume celery and black coffee. I'd soon complete novel two and be a size ten, but hey, it was January, the sales were on and the girls were texting and calling for me to join them at the sales in retail establishments throughout the West Midlands. “There’s 50% off those shoes you wanted,” they screamed down the phone. I tried hard not to think about discounted shoes and Starbucks’ fixes of cake and cappuccino. I hid my phone and hoped the crunching of celery would drown out their incessant textual demands but after two whole hours they couldn’t be ignored and – call me weak - but I did it for them. I shopped long and hard with the girls, without a thought for myself. Consequently, time and cake were eaten up and writing was out of the window as was a size ten body. Boy was I glad to see the back of January and all that exhausting non-dieting/writing-blue-cross-half-price-cake-consuming-retail-hell!

February arrived with a bump and it’s Valentine’s Day so I start planning luscious cupid cakes for the love of my life - oh and my husband! Forensic fairy cake planning takes several weeks of research. It was tough and writing sadly had to take a back seat once more – but I persevered and produced the lightest red velvet sponge with big sugar heart decorations – delicious! Then, one evening as I neared the pink laptop with an overwhelming urge to write, the doorbell went. It was the girls popping round to drink wine and sample my lovelorn fairies. This left me with no choice but to spend the following few days nursing a hangover and baking (the cure all for everything). This obviously took up most of February - so through no fault of my own once more my writing was thwarted....

You Can't Get the Staff!

I haven’t posted a blog for a couple of days due to technical issues. Well, to be honest I don’t actually have technical issues as such because I’m technologically challenged. So imagine my deep joy at discovering a brilliant ‘Blog Manager,’ last week.
She's cool, knows all about computers and social networking sites, she can poke, Twitter, blog and text all at the same time (while singing along to the latest Jessie J.) My Blog Manager adds pictures, links, posts and even turns my little blog different shades and even makes cute little designy add-on bits when she’s in the mood.
This is all utterly gorgeous and leaves me free to be a creative literary type and eat cake all day - as God and Mr Kipling intended.
However, there's trouble in Paradise and i hate to say it but there are a couple of areas we need to address if our working relationship is to continue. Last Tuesday, I was in desperate need of my Blog Manager’s profound knowledge regarding gadgets, widgets and blogrolls (yummy sounds like Sushi) when she announces she's ‘busy.’ Then, on Wednesday as I struggle with HTML and blogger edit layouts she skips off to her Gymnastics Class without a thought for me sweating and swearing over my laptop, cake crumbs and coffee stains littering my path. But today took the biscuit - when I needed an expert to translate the dreaded dashboard and post something impulsive and fabulous on my blog page she had selfishly taken herself off to school!
Oh well I suppose that’s what happens when you employ your 11 –year-old daughter to manage your blog.

Thanks Eve x

Fat Girls and Creme Eggs

You don’t have to be fat, write or like cakes to read this – but it helps!

So this is the first day of the rest of my blog, but where to begin? The diet, the writing or the cakes?

But how can I even begin to ponder these things when there’s a Malteser Bunny in the fridge and a Creme Egg on the table? I really planned to write today, I have made a start on my second book, honestly - but it’s an uphill climb and the constant presence of shaped seasonal chocolate is giving me writer’s block. I sit in front of my flamingo pink laptop longing to fly but can think of little else but biting off the chunky malted chocolate ears and thrusting my tongue into thick, sweet eggy fondant.

The problem with pre-Easterness is that you HAVE to eat Malteser Bunnies and Creme Eggs because they’re not available after Easter. How twisted is that? When the clock strikes midnight on Easter Sunday, Creme Eggs and Malteser Bunnies everywhere are ripped from their shelves leaving girls like me bereft, Cinderella-like on the steps of the chocolate palace of Easter. And the pain from this abrupt termination of malted bunnies and cream eggs is anaesthetised only by the fact that Easter Sunday brings bigger egg-shaped chocolate gorgeousness to obliterate the bunny and his kin. However, this is short lived and waking with a chocolate hangover the day after that special Sunday cold turkey will surely set in. Oh yes, on Monday 25th April we’ll wake to remember with a pain in our hearts that the pre-Easter hiatus of malted chocolate bunny ears and rich cream fondant encased in a small chocolate egg will be lost for another year.

Take my advice, forget about the diet and the writing (and even the cake for a while) and trolley dash as many cream eggs and Malteser bunnies as you can, while you can. It’s later than you think!

If you want to know about more cake keep reading my blog - oh and my book Fat Girls and Fairy Cakes published by Rickshaw Publishing is out on July 8th.

On a serious note, I’m sure we are all deeply concerned for those people in Japan whose lives have been ruined by recent events. If you would like to donate or bid for a signed copy of Fat Girls and Fairy Cakes and the chance to be a named character in my second novel please go to Authors for japan.

So today is the first day of the rest of my blog – I have been thinking about blogging for some time and though I cannot even begin to compare myself with the hilarious Barrow Boy in London and don’t have the gravitas of Morton Gray – well one has to start somewhere, and every journey starts with the first step.