We moved on Saturday. Chaos, of course. Boxes still hide half my stuff from me.

We have no phone or internet at the new house because Verizon was on strike. That makes online life very hard to maintain. Thankfully, we have cell phones, so at least we can make and get calls.

I had (minor) surgery on Tuesday. Told not to lift anything for 48 hours. Two days of unpacking lost. Plus, have you ever tried NOT lifting a toddler who is still in diapers, high chairs, and cribs? Yeah, that worked out well.

Then there was the earthquake. I don’t live near the epicenter in VA, but I was scared enough here in NJ. No way am I ever moving to CA. The whole house shook, everything rattled, I could feel the ground rolling under my feet! The funny thing was, I thought for a moment I had hallucinated it. I had a contractor out back working on my deck, and he didn’t even pause or look up while I was hanging onto the sofa for dear life. As soon as it stopped, I ran to the front door, but no one else was coming out of their houses. I had almost convinced myself I had imagined it, that it was some sort of side effect from the surgery, when I heard the water sloshing in the toilet bowls. I knew then it was real, because I would never have thought to imagine that detail. Besides, my daughter was upstairs in her crib screaming her head off.

So that all explains why the post is a day late.

I felt like I was living in a novel this past week – it seemed like one thing just piled on top of another, each complicating the earlier ones. Which is exactly what we want to do to our characters – pile on the problems so they don’t get a chance to breathe. If you’re at a loss as to how to up the ante, toss in an earthquake—it can happen!

And now Hurricane Irene is set to batter us. An earthquake and a hurricane in one week. Crazy stuff.

I want to know who’s writing this book I’m stuck in—I’d like to tell the author that I quit!

I should have Internet next week, and be back to business as usual. I hope you all weather Irene safely!