Plague and Procrastination...#covid #writing #amwriting #WritingCommunity #Readers #Reading #ReadingCommunity

 

Blank Pages Mocking Me

Well it happened, Dear Reader. The plague has struck our house in the form of two wee boys. The youngest turned 8 on Friday and had a positive test on Monday. What a way to celebrate! The 11 yr old promptly joined in the fun. Symptoms ranged from sick tummies to hacking coughs with a few brief periods between where they felt ok. Thankfully both have had one vaccination so far which seems to mitigate the affliction. 
The adults, including my 89 year old mother remain clear, so far. Antigen tests are being done with what we Irish all a "Flaithulach" attitude, meaning extravagant. I can't wait two days to test, it's every morning and just be grateful I'm not making ye do it every afternoon too. To add to my misery, I have a raging sore throat which is either the dreaded Covid or the antigen test has pushed my general sinus lurgy into my throat. Take your pick,
Of course enforced isolation should mean that I've got lots done. Hah! Goes to show what you know. OF COURSE I've procrastinated like a dithering hen. I find the fact of covid in the house stressful, and 90% of my brain is engaged in resolutely not thinking about all the horror stories of kids in hospital on ventilators. I have two books to work on right now, fiction and non-fiction, and what do I go and do? Start writing a Caroline Jordan Short Story for Valentine's Day. The Case of the Spearheaded Bog Spider is coming soon, unless I test positive in which case I'll be too busy cursing and wailing in the back garden. Fun, either way,
To inspire me I've been playing around with Doodly, a gift from my beloved Mr. I panicked a bit at first, I just couldn't see past the initial learning curve, but thanks to his calm explanation, I have managed to create a rough but not-too-bad video. I'll share it on here later. I'd work on the podcast/vlog but the STATE of me today, no one wants to see this level of swamp-witch. This isn't procrastination, it's an act of charity.
Hope this finds you all plague free and productive but for those who are neither, you are my people. I salute you. 

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So what's New for 22? My plans for the coming year, including new #books and #podcast

The Year Ahead...
Well I hope we all survived the festivities, or lack of them. Ours was a mixed bag - sadness because one family member wasn't with us for xmas, and although he's safe and in the best care, it was upsetting versus the joy of being home with the boys for pretty much two solid weeks, broken only by a trip to visit family or visits from family.

 Conscious of the rising Covid cases here in Ireland, we made a decision to cut contacts as much as possible (and even then Omicron crept closer and closer to our circle.) This made for a bit of a flat run up to xmas but a really nice chilled family oriented break over the new year. There'll be many years ahead hopefully, where we can socialize and make pieces of ourselves running from household to household; this was a year we'll remember for board games, family movies, minding Granny and lots of cuddles. 
So as the dust settled on the boys going back to school (I have an entire rant on that subject but I'll spare ye...) I began to plan out 2022. And I thought I'd keep it simple, but then a few amazing opportunities presented themselves on top of the projects to which I had already committed myself. So here is the amended plan for 2022, wish me luck!

JANUARY 2022

New for 22 -
1. The Body Beautiful, book three of the Caroline Jordan Mystery Series will be out later this year: catch up on the previous books HERE

2. Draíocht Ceoil, The Sound of Magic in Irish Tradition, a non fiction work that will explore the practice of Irish traditions using sound and music will be out later this year, and will have additional online recordings and help to supplement the book. Pre-orders will open in Autumn. This book can be read alone or use it to supplement the classes on Rosc or Draíocht Ceoil at the IPS. 

3.There are exciting plans afoot to host a podcast, featuring both Irish Crime Fiction and additionally the Poetry Series on Alzheimer and the family carer, in two separate blocks. This will require a commitment of time and effort on my part but I'm really excited by this new opportunity and hope to have it up and running in late Spring.

TEACHING
 I will be teaching two brand new classes in 2022 on the  Irish Pagan School (May and October) and you access my previous classes there too. The IPS promotes Indigenous Irish education on folk magic, folk lore, Old Irish and Modern Irish practices and Irish Spirituality. It offers a huge range of free material, affordable packages, scholarships and quality live and recorded classes. Details of the new classes to be announced, so keep an eye out.

As ever, always delighted to hear from you at Author@celebratingwords.com - If you would like to participate in the PODCAST either as a Family Carer or a Crime Fiction Writer or reviewer, please do contact me.

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Aisling (competition poem)

To read the poem from the John Murray poetry competition, check out HERE

To listen to it being read by Pat Boran, and hear the other excellent entries and the winners check out HERE (the poetry competition is 6th down the page)

Many thanks to everyone who emailed or twittered how much they enjoyed the poem and thanks for all the extremely kind comments. I think you'll really enjoy the standard of poems read out on air; from junior level upwards the winners are so impressive. Please listen and let the show know how much you enjoyed the poetry competition. Poetry needs your support. Don't forget to twitter using the hash key #writingcommunity

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