Byron Bay Writers Festival pt 1

We set off on our annual pilgrimage to Byron Bay Writers Festival on Thursday at noon. I didn't envy Roby's task of driving through the relentless rain, but we stayed optimistic that the weather would be on our side and the sky would clear.

It was not to be...

We burrowed in the cabin for the rest of the afternoon, and as soon as we stepped out of the car in the main drag of Byron, the rain poured down once more. So we stepped into the nearest eatery Fresh and were pleased with our dining experience.

Jen and I tackled the collage poetry on our first evening back in the cabin, and we all tried to chase the rain away with the power of our minds.

Not powerful enough...

The next morning after we'd showered and breakfasted and filled ourselves with caffeine, Lyn turned up on the doorstep as we were about to leave the cabin and walk over to the Festival site and told us that the Festival had been cancelled. We reacted with despair and gloom. How dare the gods be so unkind!

Roby and Caz drove over to the site to assess the damage and check out the water-logging, while Jen and I stayed in the cabin to wallow in collage.

When the troops returned, we debated what we were going to do to fill in the day. We rejected the possibility of getting cabin fever while surrouned by pouring rain, and opted for a quick lunch, followed by op-shopping and a trip to the cinema to see Mama Mia.

In town, we almost walked past Vinnies before we realised that it was Vinnies. As Jen had infected me with the collage bug again, I was itching to get my hands on more magazines and more glossy raw words to recycle and transform. The magazine shelf held the usual suspects - the Who Weeklys, the New Weeklys: all the glossy gossip garbage. New Scientist attracts my eye but there is no decent size text, and I finally settle on a couple of New Women magazines and a 'Real Living' magazine.

I scanned the bookshelf - I cannot resist checking out second hand books. The typical tired and wretched paberbacks toppled over each other but nestled amongst them was a copy of Gregory Maguire's 'Mirror Mirror' (the retelling of Snow White). Score! I grabbed it - it's meant to be mine.

The second op shop is too tiny to have a book section but I buy a purple scarf to keep my neck warm for the rest of the weekend.

It seems that many of the misplaced festival attendees have decided to spend the rainy afternoon at Mama Mia -- the foyer is filled with patrons waiting for the cinema to open. This is my second time seeing the musical after seeing it on Cheap Tuesday in Coffs Harbour with a group of work colleagues. The second time is different - perhaps they're more reverential in Byron Bay. The Coffs audience was in hysterics every time James Bond (Pierce Brosnan) opened his mouth to sing but Byron Bay accepts his singing without a titter.

We decide to eat at the Curry House that evening, and are given the room upstairs, all to ourselves except the couple who are stuck in the room next door (it seems more like a store room than an eating area). Thrilled by the tiny enclave to ourselves we dance and talk and chat and feast.

And hope that the rain will go away....

A long weekend

Today is Leap Day, a bonus day for the year and the best thing is I don't have to be at work! Yes, it's a three day weekend for me and another weekend of solitude so I hope to achieve a lot.

One of the good things about today and the rest of the weekend is the ability to control my auditory environment. I haven't been kidding lately when I've told people I want to go to a convent so I can take a vow of silence. The day job has times when fifty voices or so just build up on top of each other and I feel like my head is going to explode with all the noise. The voices rise and fall, but when everything is talking at once, it can be absolutely pandemonium. At the moment, all I can hear is the clock ticking, the rush of the wind, the birds singing, the house creaking and the occasional car driving by. It is so peaceful. I can invite extra noise in when I want to - music, television, telephone - but for now I am revelling in the relative sounds of silence. And also enjoying not having to speak.

I've updated the blog for Nambucca Valley Writers Group, added a couple of slides shows, a section for our accolades (we're a talented bunch), and the previous winners of our writing competition.

I finished my short story and entered it in the Writers Group contest. The trophy spent the first year in my home, displayed proudly after I won the inaugural contest in 2006 with a collage poem. But then last year I had to give it back. I wonder if it will make its way home to me this time. (I know - the competition is tough!)

I'm still toying with the story about the mobile phones so I may end up with a collection of futuristic stories, nightmare scenarios of the future when we are taken over by technology.

I'm considering signing up for the RWA BIAW (Book in a Week) which commences on Monday, just to get my butt kicked a bit and finally finish the first draft of 'I'm with the Band'. I'm hoping that another 10,000 words will see the first draft complete. (Current word count is 89,597)

I am definitely signing up for 100 words for 100 days through my teenlit list. I really want to instill the writing every day habit. It's almost there but I do miss the occasional day. And I guess the days where I spend time processing ideas in my head but don't commit anything to paper don't count. But they should! Because sometimes it means that the story or scene will come out of my head and onto paper almost fully formed.

Shirt and other writer products available at my Chickollage store.

I've been neglecting my collage poetry and as I want to put together an anthology, I need to spend more time than that.







As they say, so many words, too little time! Now to make time stretch....

Holidays, Writing Festivals and Conferences

Yeehah! I'm on holidays for a week!

I've been working really hard so these holidays seem more of a luxury than before, and well-deserved.

On Thursday, I go to the Byron Bay Writers Festival for my yearly pilgrimage of stocking up on writing mojo. Four days listening to writers, talking about writing, eating out every night, and sharing writing camaraderie. Twelve of us are going, sharing two cabins and there's a mixture of the usual faces who have trekked to Byron every year and then number of Writers Festival versions. Should be a great time.

But in the meantime, I have four days off and much to do. I'm reading my friend Roby's fantasy trilogy to be published with Pan McMillan next year and the writing is beautifully evocative. I don't usually read fantasy as a rule because of all the description necessary in world-building but this could just about turn me on to the genre. I finished book one last night, and will start book 2 today.

I also have the final three episodes of series 2 of Hex to watch. A very likeable British series - not many out there that can boast having lesbian ghosts.

After Byron Bay, I go back to work for a week of working hard, with a couple of twelve hours days packed in there....and then I go to Sydney to meet new nephews, to catch up with family, and to attend the Romance Writers of Australia conference. I joined Romance Writers after the Cinderella story won 2nd prize in the Mid North Coast Writers Association short story competition. I will be attending a full day workshop with Jennifer Cruisie and four other workshops over the weekend. Really looking forward to immersing myself in learning about the craft of writing.

On the Friday evening, is a masquerade cocktail party, so I got all inspired and decided to create a collage mask. Here are the raw ingredients.

I will bewearing a black dress with embroidered roses, so I decided the colours needed to be black and red to complement the dress, and have rose details, and fit in with the theme of romance.

Because I do collage poetry, I thought that incorporating collaged words would make the mask uniquely 'me'.

I love the result: there's a few more bead strands to add, and I will probably lacquer it to give it a shine, but the process has already sparked a few more 3-D ideas to play around with Chickollage Decoupage.

Speaking of Chickollage, Cafepress is currently having a special promotion: buy 3 t-shirts and get one free. So head on over to the Chickollage shop and while you're there take the time to browse our new section devoted entirely to greeting cards - you now have the option of buying one card, a pack of 10 or a pack of 20, as well as notecards and my Chickollage partner Jennifer Gordaon has come up with some stunning new photo collage designs.

Blog-Off Number 3: PRIVACY

Blog-off Post Number 3 - We are blogging to raise money for the 3 Day Walk for Breast Cancer, with the blog-off initiated by Courtney of Five Second Dance Party. All the participants are in my special blog-roll on my sidebar and I have enjoyed reading their posts to date.Each week we have a one-word topic to blog about, and then we vote for each other's posts. The person with the least number of votes is eliminated from the competition and the blog-off continues. Last week, we said goodbye Yellow and Orange . This week?

Everyone is entitled to privacy. Including Nicole and Keith. Paris? Maybe not.

I don't know about you but my life isn't so vacuous and empty that I have to hang onto every image and rumour that the gossip magazines can churn out on a weekly basis. Why is celebrity such a commodity? Why do we need pictures of film star’s private vacations? Why do we need blurry out of range shots taken surreptitiously by wedding guests instead of the official released photographs? And who asked the glossy mags to pay stars exclusive rights for their honeymoon photos?

I’d hate to be a celebrity. Who made the price of fame forfeiting privacy? When you decide that you want to be a great actor, do you also decide that you want every minute that you step out in public photographed, reproduced in millions of magazines across the globe, dissected by a hungry public?

Even celebrities are entitled to privacy. They may be public figures, but this does not mean that we are entitled to own them, to stalk them every moment that they are in public.

In the golden years of Hollywood, the stars' public appearances were carefully stage managed and orchestrated by the studios to present the best public image. Today’s celebrities don’t know where the paparazzi may be lurking, or if Joe Citizen may decide to snap them with his hot new mobile phone camera and email the photos to a tabloid.

I no longer actively support the gossip magazine industry. Although I need magazines to create my collage poems, I buy them second-hand, compensating the poor sucker who paid full price for them. The stories are ludicrous and I’m not sure anyone with a shred of integrity can write the stories unless they are deluded to the truth. I’ve lost count of the number of times that Nicole has been pregnant (article complete with baby bump photos) since she married Keith, and the number of times have Angelina and Brad’s relationship has been on the rocks.

I’m pleased that my teenage dreams of being an actress did not come true. I’m happy that I can visit the supermarket without having to slap on the full dash of make-up for fear my face may be plastered over a magazine. I’m happy that I can live my life without feeling that I’m living inside a goldfish bowl. I’m happy that I have my privacy.

On my Chickollage blog, I have set myself a challenge of creating a collage poem every day for a year. So today's collage poem is an illustration of the above article.

March was a write-off (pardon the pun)

Okay, March is over and I failed Nanoedmo badly. March was not the month for me to commit to 50 hours of editing. No way! March, and probably only March, was the month that I had a life! Writing retreats, book launches and the usual work, work, work.

However, this week I'm on holidays so this week I will be tackling the editing again.

I have also introduced my writers' group to Club 100, writing a minimum of 100 words a day for 100 days, so that needs to be fitted into my day as well. And then I decided that the 100 word challenge is not a huge challenge for me at all - I do that most days without thinking about it. So I have also challenged myself to create a collage poem every day for a year, starting April 1st. (and it wasn't an April Fool's joke, I just needed a definitive date to start and I didn't want to wait another month). Each day the collage poem will be posted on my Chickollage blog. (There will be a break over Easter while I'm away, but I will still create the collage poems, and post them when I get back to my internet connection)

Here is one I prepared earlier:

Copyright 2006 Diane Curran

I love hanging out with writers. They speak a different language to the ordinary non-creative person. They understand the excitement of creativity. They understand what it means to be in the zone. They know what you mean when you say that the character took on a life of their own and did something completely unexpected.



On Friday evening I attended a book launch for a friend's book of poetry, aptly called Poet Tree. It was a good turn-out and I was able to speak to one of the judges of the short story competition in which I won second prize and reveal myself as the author of Beyond Happily Ever After. So we chatted about how the story came about and where I'm going with my writing. And I became the evening's official photographer, but I was using my film SLR (my digital is sucking the life out of the batteries as soon as I put them in, or maybe the batteries are not recharging properly) so it will be a few days before I have photos, as I need to finish off the film.



Now I'm doing my homework for the writers' group (and that is a rare occurrence, I'm usually too busy writing other stuff). The homework is the 'Writer's Journey' so I am writing about my own journey as a writer so far. Will post to the blog when it is finished.

Happy New Year

Happy New Year Comment Graphics

So, it's 2007 and I'm awake.

A quiet celebration last night. Dinner at the local pub. Listening to a local singer. And then home in time to watch the fireworks on Sydney Harbour on television.

No New Year resolutions. They will only be broken and forgotten.

Seriously, I think the last time I wrote down resolutions on New Years Day was 1984. And the final one was 'to expand my horizons, form new friendships, renew old and precious friendships and have a completely fulfilling, rewarding and successful year in everything I do...'

Ah! The idealism of youth.

The dreams of a 16 year old.

And I must add, that for the previous resolutions written in that diary, I've added 'HA!' in red pen following each of them.

I'm thinking about writing a Things to Do before I'm 40 list. Up the ante on the 'Things to do before I die' because the clock is ticking.

Can you believe it's 2007? No. Neither can I. It seems like only yesterday I was running around in a millenium bug costume, New Year's Eve 1999. Sorry, I don't think I have any photos of the bug moment.

But apparently it's now 2007. The clock is ticking.

So, a few time specific goals for 2007.

By January 16, I will have done a simple edit on Diary of the Future, designed a cover and uploaded to lulu.com to take advantage of the free printed copy.

By January 27, I will have written an essay for my writers' group's annual competition. (I don't really want to hand that trophy back).

By February 28th, I will have completed editing Making the Cut, and sent out a cover letter, synopsis and three chapters to an Australian publisher.

That's enough for now! I can't think beyond the first two months of the year. I need to leave some room in the calendar for new creations, revision and submission and the ongoing updating of the Chickollage shop.

Speaking of Chickollage, we have added the Baby Boutique, which features cute collage designs by Jennifer Gordon on bibs, bodysuits and kid's t-shirts.

And the clock is ticking on the Ransom Notes Collage Poetry 2007 Diary ebay auctions. Less than 24 hours to go: black and green.

Here is a leaf from the diary, an attitude for the New Year, my collage poem, New Beginning.

I hope 2007 will be your Best Year Ever too.

How's the Christmas shopping?

Ok so the Christmas shopping is done, just one or two more presents to buy, and then food to buy. No relatives for Christmas this year - we're just going to stay at home and enjoy the peaceful surroundings of our lovely home.

Last night I watched the final four episodes of Six Feet Under. Very impressive, great writing, and the way it was wrapped up was very fitting. I discovered the first season DVD set on special on Thursday night so I bought it and it is now wrapped up under the Christmas tree from Dorkus the cat, much to his disgust.

He wasn't impressed with his new Santa hat and scarf either.

This morning I woke to no electricity. So I couldn't jump onto the net and check my email as I normally do. When I went shopping on Thursday night, I had no idea what to buy my brother for Christmas and came home with nothing for him. So this was playing on my mind, and I was considering venturing into town again to find something. Instead, I started sorting out through some boxes in my study, and found the perfect book for him that I had bought several months ago, and forgotten. Duh! So, he's now set. And I also went to the local occasional market and bought a bag of tomatos - everything else was just junk. No inspiration there. When I arrived home, electricity was restored and was swiftly followed with a courtesy call from the power company to ensure everything was okay.

So while I have almost completed my Christmas shopping, I'm wondering if everyone else has.

I have uploaded a heap of Jennifer's new designs to the Chickollage store.

Here is just a small sample available on t-shirts, journals etc. Face it, Jen has the bug:

And here is the Queen of Collage Poetry herself, Ms Jennifer Gordon, launching the Nambucca Valley Writers Group 2007 Collage Poetry Diary.