McNuggets and Mid-July

Hey, Everyone!

I had chicken McNuggets for lunch today. We ran out of food to have for lunch and my paycheck hasn't come yet, so we thought to ourselves "What's something SUPER CHEAP that we could eat..." As it turned out, McNuggets were a "safe" fast food option. I was excited. I hadn't had a McNugget since A Bug's Life was in theaters! (Don't ask me how I remember that). Not exactly a "healthy" choice (especially since I'm trying to lose weight!), but it was cheap and it did the trick.

Anyway, moving past what I had for lunch today...

I interviewed Paul Grimshaw of House of Secrets and Art of Fiction fame(?) last Friday. Here's a blooper pic from our interview session:

Paul started cracking up when Amy (HoS worker) wouldn't stop taking pictures of us

Paul's going to be my "Mr. September" for my "People I Know" interview series on my Official Website. For those of you who don't know, the "People I Know" series is a collection of mini-interviews (5 questions each!) with various amazing writers, freelancers, and entrepreneurs I've met over the years. I post these interviews on the first Wednesday of every month. So be sure to keep an eye out for those!

I've also been very busy with my job at WebTalk Radio. And I'm still writing dog-related articles for Sarasota Dog, Bradenton Dog, and New York City Dog. Annnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnd... I've been working on a couple writing projects of my own. One of which should be ready to show off/sell by the middle of next month. I'll keep you posted!

That's all for now!

--Lauren*
http://littlezotz.com

Yard Work & Other Things

Hey, Everyone!

I'm back. :)

Things have been going really well for me lately. KNOCK WOOD.

I've gotten several writing assignments done lately and I seem to be getting noticed more and more. Hopefully I'll have some "big" news for you soon, but we'll see. Cross fingers!

In other news, I've been helping my parents a lot with their yard work lately. You know, raking leaves, trimming back overgrown plants; stuff like that. Sometimes Ramiro comes too, but today he stayed home to work on other things. Which left me to tackle the left side of their house on my own. Here's a "Before" picture of that:See all those leaves on the ground? All that needed to go. You can sort of see that they have some fancy stepping stones on the ground on that side of the house, but they had been completely buried. I also needed to hack back a lot of overgrowth, particularly their bougainvillea. Did you know that bougainvillea plants have lots and lots of thorns? They totally do! My arms got torn to shreds. haha. I was actually inside applying Bactine when I got a phone call from a potential employer.

You'll notice that I have no "After" picture of the left side of their house. Funny/Sad story. I actually had to stop halfway through because my parents' next door neighbour (a very senile old man) came up to me and accused me of stealing his "piles." He was very very confused. He thought that the piles of yard waste I had made and was picking up and putting into the green waste barrel were his and that I was taking them from him. :( He really needs to be in a home. I feel so bad for him. He used to be a very nice man (when I was a child growing up there), but now he didn't even seem to know who I was. This same old man sometimes steals the decorative rocks from my parents yard and puts them in a pile in front of his house. Anyway, my picking up the leaves agitated him so much, I stopped halfway through. I even left one pile there for him to look at. He seemed so attached to it. I'm going to finish the job next week.

My mom used to work at an Old Folk's Home. She said that the senile patients got a lot worse in the hot weather. If something like this happens to you--if an elderly person dotters up to you and is horribly confused--please, just be patient with them. They're not doing it on purpose to annoy you or to be mean to you. Just stay calm, and try to be as nice as you can.

Hmmmmmmmmmmmmm... What else...

Ramiro and I found this in the corn field in our back yard:
I thought since a few of you have been writing about all the UFO stuff that's been in the news the past few days, you'd get a kick out of that. It's an alien!

In other news, I'm going to be going to the Montrose Oktoberfest on Saturday. I've been asked to man the camera while my pals at the dojo do their yearly demonstration. :)

Ramiro's fine. He's been working on a new comic called Dollworld. The cats are doing pretty well too. Ringo (the old man) has been cranky in the heat, but we've been doing our best to keep them all comfortable.

I'll probably be making an update again pretty soon.

Until then...

--Lauren*
http://littlezotz.webs.com

EDIT: I have a big job interview tomorrow. Wish me luck, Everyone!! <3

Quick Update

Hey, Everyone!

Just wanted to give you all a quick update on a few things:

1.) We were unable to catch Robert's Mom with the laundry basket trick. FixNation has now told us to try securely tying a chicken drumstick to the very back of the trap and see if that works. We'll be trying that Tuesday night.

2.) A while back I mentioned I was doing a "creepy" black and white 5-page comic? Well, I finished it, and I was invited to have it published in a zine called Hello World. Here's a panel from it:
That's all my own work. However, Ramiro has been going over the comic adding "additional inks" to make it look EXTRA nice. I'll be sure to post the whole thing once he's done sprucing it up.

3.) I have an interview at Macy's tomorrow! I'm not pinning all my hopes on it, but it's super nice to have someone call for an interview. It's hard not to get discouraged sometimes, sending out application after application and then not hearing anything back. Just the fact that I got another interview makes me really happy.

4.) I've been making steps toward starting up my own writing company, just like my (now very successful!) friend Danielle did. And a few hours ago, I just got my first job offer. I'll be writing an article. I'm far from being rich & famous (I'll be making enough to buy Ramiro & me a dinner at IHOP, pretty much); but it's a good first step and I'm extremely happy/excited! Working as an illustrator was nice, but I really do prefer writing. :)

5.) Yes, there are still 3 kittens available for adoption if you or anyone you know is interested. My e-mail address is littlezotz@gmail.com

Until next time!

--Lauren*
PS: It's now officially Tuesday! Be sure to check out The Greener Side.