Hallow-losses and Well Wishes

First I believe that I must formally concede to the champions of the 4th Annual Pumpkin Carving Competition.

Congratulations Blake and Bekah, your pumpkin was great. I never would have thought of hacking my pumpkin into cross sections.

Actually, there were a lot of really cool pumpkins. I'm feeling a little outclassed and will have to start researching my pumpkin designs for next year soon just to stay in the game.

Fortunately this was a busy week, and I was not left with the luxury to nurse my loss for days on end.

My life has fallen into a repeating pattern of "on" and "off" weeks.

I have two lectures every week, the workshop and the context module. My workshop is structured around writing and receiving criticism for my novel that is still in its very fetal stages. My context module (entitled The Love Story) is a class where we study literature of a specific genre and focus our writing on that genre. So I find that I write a lot of short stories for that class on the theme o' luv.

I'm required to turn in work for both classes every other week. That means that nothing is due during week one and in week two EVERYTHING IS DUE. Last week, everything was due. This week I'm on easy street.

So all that to say, I was too busy trying to think of a synonym for "handsome" to mourn my near victory too much.

I also received some great mail this week, in honor of the Halloween season, which lifted my spirits.

You may not know this, and I in fact was not aware until I made the plunge across the pond, that Oreos are not as ubiquitous a food item as many Americans presume. In fact, they are well-nigh impossible to find in Bath, England.

So the present of Oreos and Ramen and vampire ears from Laurilee and Sarah was very, very welcome.

And the hand-painted pumpkin from Callie Jane was the best ever.