A to Z Theme Reveal and Self-Lovin' Hop

Hello, all! As you can tell by the title of this post, I have VIS (Very Important Stuff) to talk about today! That is, if you translate VIS to mean "bloghops", which I course do: the A to Z Theme Reveal bloghop, and the Self-Lovin' bloghop!

Except... All right. I'm sort of lying to you. Ok, I am lying, because while there really is an A to Z Theme Reveal bloghop, I didn't sign up for it, and...well, they're officially doing it on Friday. But I decided to post as if I'm participating, anyway!

Let me start making sense, here. The A to Z Challenge is a twisted modern form of torture a great challenge for all bloggers, to see if we can post every single day in April, except for Sundays. That translates to 26 days, so we post each day thematically from A to Z (and hence the name). Because, as we've repeatedly established on this blog, I'm a crazy masochist, I thought I would go ahead and sign up for it! So I did!!!!

And today, the totally unofficial day of the A to Z Theme Reveal that I have arbitrarily chosen for myself, I am revealing my theme:

I shall blog each day in April about my Work In Progress (WIP).

Bet you never saw that one coming, huh? TOTAL SURPRISE, since the tag line of this blog is "an inside look into the process of writing a novel", right??

Yeah, so I can be a little predictable sometimes. But in all honesty, and to be serious for a moment, I was trying to find a way to make the challenge something that would help with my writing, instead of something that would take time away from it. Like all of us, I have a day job and family and friends and commitments, and finding time to write can be very challenging. I try to protect that time like a ferocious mother bear. And with this theme, I think I may be able to do that.

One more little note about the A to Z: I am planning, of course, on visiting as many participating blogs as possible, and leaving comments there, but the sheer number of blogs (that sign-up list is up to 1,322 blogs!!!!) means that I'm going to have to cut something else: I decided that I'm not going to respond to comments here, on my own blog, in April. So, know that I will read every single one (I always do), and that I love comments, and that my lack of response has no relationship at all to how happy it makes me when people take the time to drop a line.

Now on the Self-Love! I really DID sign up for this bloghop. According the wonderful Tara Watson, who created it, I'm supposed to talk about something that I'm good at. I was totally on board with this idea - we writers do tend to be an insecure bunch, and I suppose it's possible that my posts have a slight tendency towards self-deprecation - until I went to a writing class a couple of days ago. It was an amazing class, and I learned a ton (which I will share with you, but not 'til next week. Because this post is a wee full already), but I also realized a) how very long it's been since I was in a writing class, b) how very much I needed to be in the class, because c) I came across as a MORON in said class whenever I tried to answer the teacher's questions.

Ok, maybe "moron" is a bit strong, but you get the general idea - the class made me feel VERY VERY INSECURE, so now it's a little difficult to stop obsessively listing and categorizing all of my weaknesses, and focus instead on my strengths. Which, it occurs to me, is probably the entire point of this bloghop in the first place (Tara, you smart lady, you!)

So, self-love: I am a fast reader. Yup. It's a simple thing, but I value it. I don't really know how I picked up the skill, but I can read a book in a day - if that given day doesn't involve anything else. If I'm sick in bed with a good novel, I can tear through it. I fully recognize that I am lucky to have this skill, and therefore I value it even more.

Hmm. I do feel a little better.

I guess it worked.

Thanks, Tara! Everyone else, go check out the linky and visit a few of the other blogs in this hop!