Music Monday: Ludovico Einaudi - Nuvole Bianche + Blog Awards!

The first thing on the agenda is to thank Alexis for the awesomesauce blog awards below:



Now I'm supposed to find seven interesting facts about me, so here goes. Bear with my sleep deprived brain for a sec. *laughs*

1) My coffee drink of choice generally includes five, that's right - FIVE, shots of espresso. Usually peppermint white mocha or hazelnut. I actually have one in my hand at this very moment. *grins*

2) I am a complete night owl. Unless I'm severely exhausted, I can't seem to get myself in bed before midnight. I give new meaning to the term "burning the midnight oil". *laughs*

3) I have recently finished my first full length manuscript, which in a few weeks' time, will hopefully be turned from the vortex-inducing pile of heartfail to something shiny and pretty for eventual submission to agents.

4) Music is my soul. No, literally. I can't do ANYTHING without it. Write, work, drive, eat, even watch TV. I know, strange being I am. *laughs*

5) I have two of the awesomest critique partners and one very irreplaceable BFF/beta reader who are solely responsible for getting me to pull my shit together when I thought I couldn't write anymore.

6) I've recently become obsessed with zombies. I drop everything I'm doing just to watch an episode of The Walking Dead. #truestory I blame my husband. *laughs*

7) I can fully and efficiently function on two hours of sleep. How's that for insomniac power? *grins*

Passing this along to seven of my favorite blogs in no particular order:

1) Lori - You Are The Unicorn Of My Dreams
2) Corinne - Ode To Blogging
3) Sophia - Sophia The Writer
4) Krispy and Alz - A Nudge In The Right Direction
5) Jess - Jest Kept Secret
6) Jon - JonYang.org
7) Jeigh - WriterBrained

Go stalk, *ahem* I mean, visit them and see what makes them so stalkable awesome!

Our music selection for this week is a new favorite of mine. No lyrics; just a full 5 minutes and 59 seconds of piano lovefest. Enjoy!

Ludovico Einaudi - Nuvole Bianche


And now for our regularly scheduled pretty...

Fun Friday: The Liebster Blog Award

It's a blog award kinda day! *grins*

I just got this frawesomesauce award from my original gal-boyfriend, Sophia. *squee and gives many thanks*



This award is intended to connect bloggers, specifically those with less than 200 followers. In accepting the award, I must:

- Show my thanks to the blogger who gave me the award by linking back to them.
- Reveal my top 5 picks and let them know by leaving a comment on their blog.
- Post the award on my blog.
- Bask in the love from the most supportive people on the internet —other writers.
- And best of all – have fun and spread the karma.

So here are five of my favorite blogs EVAR:

1) You Are the Unicorn of My Dreams - Lori M. Lee

2) JonYang.org - Jon Yang

3) All About Mom Sense - Christine Marie

4) Sirra Girl - Sirra

5) A Nudge in the Right Direction - Alz and Krispy

And now for our regularly-scheduled PRETTY...

Z is for amaZing

Oh Z...LOL Better late than never, right...? *nods and pretends to believe this is true* Okay, so the title's cheating just a little, but hey...what can I say? The A to Z blogging challenge WAS ZamaZing amaZing! I even got this nifty little award from the ever fab Elizabeth Mueller:




I have met so many amazing new people and have reconnected with old ones and I'd like to thank my frawesomesauce CP Corinne O'Flynn for giving me the little nudge to get my ass in blogging gear!

Now if only that would work better so I can get going on Chapter 10 of my WIP! LOL Anyway, I'm so sad to see the fantastic journey end, but I'm sure new ones will be a'comin'! Next up...the May Blog Tour! *throws pinkish gold confetti and squees* Thanks to everyone who has made the A to Z blogging challenge SO much fun! #heartschoos

R is for Random Facts

Someone of frawesomesauceness has bequeathed me something of equal frawesomesauceness in the form of a blog award. :D *insert squee here*

Thanks to my new gal-boyfriend Sophia for the award! #heartchoo



The rules for this award are:

* Thank and link to the person who nominated me.
* Share seven random facts about myself.
* Pass the award along to 15 new-found blogging buddies.
* Contact those buddies to congratulate them.

7 Random Facts About Ani
1) I am a total, perpetual pantser. And not the kind that involves pulling someone's pants down to their knees. LOL I cannot plot to save my life, though I did find this awesome post from one of my former CPs that may have lit a fire under my bum about it.

2) I love, love, LOVE The Last Airbender series, but wanted to throw my popcorn and cherry coke at the IMAX screen when I watched the live-action film. *thinks that M. Night Shyamalan may need to pick better battles*

3) I cannot get anywhere on time to save my life. I even have a license plate holder that reads "Always Late But Worth The Wait" because I like to make myself feel better about it. *shifty eyes*

4) I listen to all kinds of music, including Korean and Japanese. Oddly enough, I can't understand any of it because I speak neither language. But the melodies are nice. :D

5) I can't watch movies or TV shows without subtitles. It had started out as a "thing" because the action scenes in a movie were always way louder than the spoken parts and we got tired of flipping the volume up and down. But now, it's stuck and I twitch if I can't have subtitles on.

6) I can't watch English dubbed anime unless it was supposed to originally be made that way. Or hot voices like Christian Bale is voicing the character *thinks of Howl in Howl's Moving Castle and swoons*. I tried to watch the English dubbed version of Naruto and wanted to throw things at my TV. Suffice to say, I did not get through an episode. LOL

7) Before I started writing or working in finance, I was a bartender. A whole bunch of useful skills were acquired during my 3 year tenure... (i.e. learning the perfect amounts to mix for a long island iced tea and making a dirty martini the perfect amount of dirty...)

15 People to Stalk Awesome Blogging Buddies

1) Jeigh Meredith

2) Lori M. Lee

3) Corinne O'Flynn

4) Ginger Snaps

5) Wendy aka Mrs. Pickle

6) Jess Byam

7) Karen

8) Brenda Drake

9) Mason Bundschuh

10) Cheree Smith

11) Brea

12) Charli Mac

13) Lydia Kang

14) Paula McLaughlin

15) Shannon Lawrence

So there you have it...the list of stalkable people frawesomesauceness. Go visit them and become stalkers friends and I promise you won't regret it. ;)

The Artist's Way - Purging

So, first off, one of the gems that I met whilst attempting to be a blogger/writer/twitterer (-er? LOL) was none other than the awesomesauce unicorn extraordinaire aka Lori M. Lee. To prove her awesomesauceness (Yes, that is now a word. I am willing it directly into Merriam Webster's next edition. Ha!), she has given me this rockin' award (for reasons that continue to elude me):



Um, I do believe that it's impossible to measure just how much she rocks. I tried to, but failed. Thanks for the love Lori! #hearts

The rules for accepting this award:
1. Thank and link back to the person who gave the award
2. State seven things about yourself
3. Pass the award on to any recently discovered great bloggers

So here goes:
Seven Things About Moi

1) Numbers are my job, but words are my life.
2) I am obsessed with the Naruto anime series (Datebayo!!! LOL).
3) I was born on Christmas Eve.
4) Linkin Park makes me an uber happy gal.
5) Celine Dion also makes me an uber happy gal. (of *course* Celine vibes with Linkin Park... #confidentnod)
6) I was born in the Philippines.
7) When I was younger, I wanted to be Ariel from The Little Mermaid. (and may or may not have been in love with Prince Eric... ::shifty eyes::)

So, now it is my turn to pass the torch of awesomesauceness to Corinne O'Flynn! Also, she has this on her blog:

'Nuff said.

Okay, moving on...

Last night, I attended the first ever SCBWI Hollywood Schmooze just to see what all the schmoozing was about. Met an awesome group of people, ironed out deets about meeting times, topics to be discussed, intro rounds, etc. One thing that stayed with me was when the topic of conversation turned to this little ol' book called The Artist's Way. In this little ol' book, techniques are discussed on how to help someone become a better writer. There are tips, exercises, and advice and the one discussed last night was something that everyone called "purging" (I say "something" because I have yet to read the book, so I don't know if that's the official title of the exercise. LOL).

With purging, the mind releases all of its negative and errant thoughts, helping the writer to focus on what they need to in order to write. The idea behind it is to write 3 longhand pages of stuff. Any and all kinds of stuff. If you have nothing to write, write "I have nothing to write." and eventually, your mind will work into this automatic stream of consciousness and purge out things that can potentially block you from finishing a writing goal.

Needless to say, with my insomnia and occasional writer's block, I hopped right on that train and tried it before I went to bed last night. The WIP ideas have been coming at me all morning. I shit you not.

Long story short, I totally recommend this. Also, I'm uber excited about the SCBWI now having a Hollywood/West Hollywood sector! Excitement all around people! ::squeeee::

Until next blogging time... #peaceout