Plenty of people have stuff I don’t have–big houses, expensive cars, jewelry, and whatever else excessive disposable income buys. My budget has more limits.

But I’m no saint. I’m not immune to the cult of buying. Plastic picture frames, cheap throw rugs, and other unnecessary hoarder-in-training debris are scattered about my house.

Believe me,

I just read my last post about creating quirky characters and groaned. Out loud. And made that hideous pig-snorting face reserved for people who have just done something stupid.

What kind of an idiot makes herself into a cutsie fake character on a blog? To make matters worse, I read this

This week I’m reading  Stephen Chbosky’s The Perks of Being a Wallflower and, of course, now I’m thinking about how I like quirky, distinct characters in writing.

Also I’m wondering how best to create my own characters like Charlie, the book’s first-person narrator.

If you haven’t read the book, it’s worth the read. Unless

That’s what it feels like, this writing insanity: exposing yourself, then begging people to distribute the evidence.

The recent news that I’ve actually had my work accepted by a journal is bittersweet.

I’m completely neurotic about what my bio should say, my head shot, if my mother will disown me for the

Five hours ago I received an email from Narrative magazine congratulating me on having my teensy story accepted for publication. I’m so happy that I  feel like puking.

Narrative magazine! How I love that publication.

If you don’t already have the phone app, you really should, because it’s rad.

So what, you might ask, would anyone want to read

I got home late last night from a super rad evening of music and spoken word (thanks Gray Skies Reading Series) and noticed a sour, gross smell in my office as I was checking my email. I thought maybe it was my own sweat I was smelling, which has a

Gardening isn’t my thing. Not because I don’t like it, but because I forget to do important tending activities. Watering, for example.

In my house, only plants like spider plants survive because they can live on air for weeks.

But every spring I get the same itch that the rest of you

I know what the Bean is now. The Sears Tower is the tallest building in North America and has, I found out, been called the Willis Tower since 2009.

This is me feeling very afraid to step out into glass boxes hanging on the sides of Willis Tower (formerly

My last post was about my choice to pursue on MFA in creative writing. This one’s about which MFA program I chose and how I chose it.

But first I’d like to echo the article Poets & Writers wrote on the topic this past fall and say that my decision to

Two more months and I’ll have completed my first year in Pacific Lutheran University’s low-res MFA program in Creative Writing (fiction). Super excited.

I often get asked about the program–What’s it like? Why’d you choose it? Why low-residency?–all the questions I asked when I was trying to decide 1.) if I

Diagram of Joseph Campbell’s Hero’s Journey

This week I’ve been obsessively searching for the magical ingredients of successful story writing. Not like the obvious stuff that we always talk about–character, theme, plot, blah, blah. And please don’t suggest I go read Joseph Campbell.

I’m talking about the magic! Secret somethings that