How to use up a weekend, but fast

I'm frittering my day. I wrote a blog post and that felt good. And I talked with both my sister and my mother about scaling back the gift giving between the adults in the family and redirecting that energy/cash towards planning a vacation at the beach or at a lake in the mountains sometime next summer. (Both agreed, by the way, so that was very relieving.)

Lila's been sick for 3 days with a stomach bug (both ends, poor dear) and so far I've just had a lot of queasy, thank goodness. I'm grateful for the sick right now though, because our social plans for the weekend are so easily canceled. I hated to pull out just because I'm feeling overwhelmed. It was much easier to say our house has the plague.

I need to focus on getting the writing and designing finished for my friend's website/store. She wants it live by the end of the month and somehow my responsibilities with the project (unpaid) have been apparently doinking like rabbits and multiplying in the dark. It's a lesson...no more freebies. Every time we talk she has yet more she needs help with and so far the only compensation even mentioned is the "piece for my portfolio". Great, but damn. I've already put in 30 hours and we're looking towards at least that many more. Christmas month. And you know, I have a full-time job and a family. So yeah. My own damn fault and never again and all that. I got it.

I also need to get cracking on writing this essay I want to submit to an anthology that's in the works about learning how to eat. Three different well-published writers I know sent me the call for submissions. If that's not a nudge in the right direction, I don't know what is. But that was in August and the finals are due at the end of this month. I haven't even started. Or decided what exactly I plan to write about. Tonight I'd like to sit and do some free-writing about food and family to see where it takes me. There's an essay in here just waiting to unfold. I'm sure of it.

But first, lunch and this website work. Time to get it done.