Howdy, howdy!  Apparently, May decided to arrive when I wasn’t looking.  I don’t really have anything worth talking about this week (feel free to send me suggestions for topics), so I’ve decided to make my goals for the month public again.  Motivation has been really hard to find lately.  I have no idea why.  But, hopefully this will help!

Here are my May goals, in no particular order:

1. Submit stuff 8 times (2 every Monday).  This is the one goal that I haven’t failed at yet this year.  I’ve gotten a bunch of rejections.  One of my stories has been shortlisted, so I’ve got my fingers crossed for that one.  And I have a bunch still floating in the slush pile limbo.  Hopefully, I can keep up the submissions this month!

2. Write 1 flash piece OR short story.  I’m super behind on this one.  So far this year, I’ve only written one short story and revised a couple of flash pieces.  I was hoping to have at least three new pieces to shop around by this point, but I don’t.  Soon, though.  I hope.

3. Read 2 books.  I’m currently reading an ARC of The Oddling Prince by Nancy Springer to review this month.  The book club I’m in will be reading The Wicked Deep by Shea Earnshaw, so I’ll probably also read that.  If I have time, I also want to read the third book in the Howl’s Moving Castle trilogy, but I don’t know if I will or not.

4. Make time for people.  My recluse skills have been on point lately.  I avoid chatting on Facebook.  I only text one person regularly.  Can’t remember the last time I talked to someone on the phone.  And I really shouldn’t be that way.  I should randomly message people and try to make new friends.  The problem is, I’m comfortable not bothering people.  That’s a hard habit to break.  I’m trying, though.  I sent a few messages out yesterday.  I’ll try to send out a few each week.  We’ll see how it goes.

5. Finish revising short story.  I’m still working on fleshing out and revising the short story I wrote a couple of months ago.  It’s a bit more sci-fi than I’m comfortable writing, but I’m enjoying it.  I actually took a character from a novel I haven’t finished and threw her in a new world as a younger version of herself.  I think this world might be the key to all the problems that made me quit that novel.  But that’ll have to wait until I finish everything else I want to do this year.  For now, the short story comes first.

6. Submit story to critique group.  It’s been a while since I’ve submitted anything to my critique group, so hopefully some of them will be up to checking the story out when I finish revising it.

7. Begin revisions on LR.  I decided to go back to the second novel attempt and work on revising it first.  I miss my dragons and shifters and everyone else in that book.  It’ll be nice to get back to them.

Those are my goals for the month!  What about you?  Feel free to share your goals here or on my social media pages!