Katykins Weblog

I’ve been thinking a lot lately of what jobs I will be able to get with my creative and professional writing major. One career that seems to be getting more popular is grant writing, which got me thinking, does my major cover grant writing?

I am not entirely sure of the answer. I need to set up an appointment with my adviser to figure out what my option are. I did talk to my dads fiance, who writes grants, and she told me that they offer the courses at B.S.U. She didn’t really elaborate on how long the courses take, and if they are for a license or degree, all she said is that they are very hard(possibly hinting that they are too hard for me).

I guess I’ll just have to prove her wrong. I think that if I set my mind to it I would be great at it.
I think that grant writing would be the right direction to go in, because there are jobs popping up all over the area. Matt(my fiance) works for a non-profit organization, and they rely on grants to survive. This is the case for many organizations in the area, so there must be a substantial need for grant writers.

Hopefully by the time I get my degree this will all still be true. I don’t want to have to move too far away from the area. I think that Matt would love to pick up and move to Texas, but I can’t honestly see myself living that far away from home, not to mention acclimatizing to the hot weather.

These are the things that I’ve been thinking about, but I’m sure by next week I’ll be on to my next new career idea.

Tomorrow we are meeting for the first time in my weblogs and wiki’s class since about a month ago. I’m excited, but nervous to hear my professors feedback. I know that I didn’t quite meet my goal for the number of blog postings, but over all I think I did well.

I think that the purpose of us meeting again tomorrow is just to check in and to make sure that everyone is on the same page as far as goals are concerned. I’m not sure if he is going to give us any advice, or instructions on things to change in our project. The advice will be good, but I hope it doesn’t entail too terribly much added work.

 I’ve been putting off incorporating my blog roll in my blog. I have a few blogs added, but I don’t really know where to go from there. I’m sure that Professor Morgan will probably mention this tomorrow, so hopefully I’ll understand, and will be able to figure out how to relate a blog roll to my project.

So as April is getting closer I am becoming more anxious for summer. I love being outdoors, and I love the feeling of melting snow and changing weather.

I want the semester to be over. I scored a really bad grade on my Science Exam, and am now pretty discouraged that I won’t make the Dean’s List. Granted that one of the exams scores will be dropped, I was just hoping for better.

In less than two months it will be over. I think that this year went pretty well. It was better than last years anyways. Last year I was going to college at the U of M Morris. It’s a good school, but I hated it there. I hated being away from home. I hated not knowing anyone. I got decent enough grades, but felt completely unmotivated.

This year I am motivated but am working 20 hours a week at JC. Penney’s. It’s not a whole lot, but still this leaves me feeling run down with the 16 credits I am taking. I don’t have time to do a whole lot. I would like to join extra-curriculars, but still want time for friends and family.

I’m excited and yet nervous for the work shop on Tuesday. I’m excited for the feedback, but in the back of my head I know that the ending of my story wasn’t that great. I think that I may have rushed it too much. My class is right, it is really hard to write good endings. The rest of the story was going fine, but I had no idea how to end it. I think it needs more.

In my story the main character Scott has met up again with his high-school sweet-heart, Hailey, about a decade after high-school. During high-school, a football injury caused Scott to lose his college scholarship, as well as Hailey who went on to become a successful lawyer. Scott on the other hand stayed in Benton, the small town they grew up in. Scott is now married with three children, working at the local saw mill, and living in a trailer court.

Scott accepts Hailey’s offer to go out for drinks. During the next couple days Scott becomes once again obsessed with Hailey, and dissatisfied with his life. Once at the bar, Scott is turned off by Hailey’s new personality when she presents herself as promiscuous and bitchy.

In the end, Scott realizes what he has with his wife Tina isn’t bad after all, but it is too late for Tina leaves him.

The story is only twelve pages double spaced(the requirement for the class) so this may be why it is not very developed. I don’t really want to write a novel, or do I think that I am ready to write one(even if I was ready I certainly don’t have the time). I just want to finish the story and be satisfied with the ending.

Any suggestions?

I got a letter yesterday from the B.S.U. Rivers Meeting, which is the campus art and poetry festival. Two of my poems got accepted for their poetry book! They accepted my poems “The Shadow”, and “The Family”. I am really excited, and it makes me feel more a part of the writing community on campus. Aside from classses, I haven’t gotten involved at all on campus. Since I am from the area I just do the regular things that I did before going to college, which I guess in some ways has hindered me from being engaged with campus activities.

They also invite the submitters to read their work, which I might do, although I usually tend to get stage fright when reading my work, especially if there are a lot of eyes on you. I think it might be fun to read though.

If I had to choose between the two I would probably choose to read “The Family.”

My daughter enters
the haze clears
She beckons
mom I’m here
No tears
only stares
she reaches
stops herself
“Yes dear”
My voice trails
stale bitter
raspy slurred
She frowns
clenches
tries to say
I love you
turns around
shuts the door.

So I have just finished my work for writing fiction and I already have another thing to do on my plate: Studying for Physical Science Exam 3. Which is tommorow at 9 AM.

Whoa is me.

I have printed off all the PDF notes for the lectures, and written down all the answers to the online review test. All I can do now is study. The last Exam I scored a 93 on the in class and a 73 on the online, so hopefully I can improve both scores(mainly the online).

This all wouldn’t be such a big deal if I didn’t have to work until nearly 10 tonight. I guess I am just going to have to cut back on my sleep tonight, something I already did last night in order to complete my story.

This is going to be a long next few days, so bare with me.

So I finally finished my short story for my Fiction class last night. I stayed up late, got up early, and put in a lot of effort. I am not satisfied with the ending, but it being my first “long” short story I am trying not to be too hard on myself. The characterization turned out pretty well, but I am going to work on it more after it had been work shopped. I am hoping to receive constructive criticism from the work shop, but don’t exactly want my story to be town apart. With that being said, I bet that my peers will be able to find both positives and negatives in my story.

Before this year I had never done work shops. I have grown a lot this year in that I feel a lot more comfortable with myself and my work, and the criticism of others doesn’t hurt my feelings as much as it used to. If anything, I have become not only stronger, but also a better writer from people’s comments and suggestions.

I have one more short story to write for this semester, which is already almost over, how exciting is that?! Less than two months to go and I will have completed my sophomore year. Not only have I declared my major, but I am finding out more things about myself as I learn the ins and outs of writing.

My ten page story for my fiction class is due on Tuesday! Don’t worry, I have started it. I have about three pages done, and plan on working on it for a few hours tonight.

The reason I haven’t gotten more done it because it took so long to decide on a topic. I tried writing different things, but everything felt too bland and cliche. I felt that I should write about something that I know, or can atleast relate to. This is hard to do without writing about myself, or a situation that I’ve been in, which is not what I am going for at all.

I decided that my main character would be a male, which is a great way of detatching my own personal experiences from the character. However, I put him in a town that is much like the one I grew up in. The man is in is later twenties, and is unhappy with the path that he went down after highschool. He’s married with three children, which he having a hard time supporting. He does not love his wife, nor has he ever really, and in the story he makes realizations about himself, and eventually his own selfishness.

I still have a lot more work to put into it, so the plot may change some, but the characters and themes are pretty much set.

Wish me luck..

Happy Easter fellow bloggers. Hope everyone had a nice holiday, whether they spent it at church or watching sports. I actually made it to church today, the first time in a couple months. Then I ate an Easter meal with Matt and his family. Matt’s family is very traditional, and it’s really cute. We had ham and all the fixings, easter candy, and played scrabble.

It was a very busy weekend for me. Matt’s family came up from Worthington, so we visited with them. It was Matt and I’s two year anniversary this weekend, and I had to work two shifts. I didn’t find much time for homework, so I am hoping to catch up tonight and tommorow. Luckily I don’t work tommorow, so I have more time to accomplish things.

So I got back into the normal sway of things. I missed my lab yesterday, but went to today’s section to make it up. I’ve been working on more poetry for class. Most of my poems are rather depressing, so I want to try to work on poems that are uplifting, or atleast hopeful. I tried writing a haiku today, but I am not very good. I think that you need to be philisophical in order to write haikus, and I am just not in the mood to contemplate things that deeply. I attempted to write a haiku about a nutri-grain bar that I was eating this morning. I am not sure if it is a haiku though.

One thing that has been frustrating me is that I don’t really know what a hykoo is. I though that I knew the definition, but all the one that have been read in class don’t seem to follow the definition. Maybe it’s just because poetry is a pretty class, or maybe I was just wrong about what a haiku is.

After failing at haiku, I wrote the following poem to distribute for the workshop on Tuesday.

Untitled

A six year old blond girl was held up so she could reach the handles of the fooseball table. With each block she was praised by the bellowing voice above her. She came out a champion, and was hoisted through the air around the crowd of friends and relatives.

Soon afterwards the man that held her up passed away, leaving the family broken and confused. The girl now had to reach the handles on her own. One day she would learn how to fly without the help from spirits.