A website I did the writing for — the Hong Kong Disneyland 2008 Chinese New Year: Year of the Mouse — won a Web Marketing Award.
Faboo!
Although, I’m looking at the copy and it appears that they totally butchered parts of it after I turned it over. Alas! At least the Hui Chun (lucky greetings) and Ticket copy is intact. 🙂
I’ve hit my stride here at Uncle Walt’s. My brain is flying from the pixie dust, yo.
The Frenchman left this morning before 5:00am to go to the East Coast. After he kissed me goodbye, I fell back asleep sometime after I heard the garage door close. I slept well, yes.
Now it’s just me and the Kitten kickin’ it at home. I bet as soon as I pick up my project again, my agent will have feedback. The irksome inevitability!
Meanwhile, I wrote to Carolyn See and told her how wonderful THERE WILL NEVER BE ANOTHER YOU was. I also just received in the mail her daughter’s book, PEONY IN LOVE, which I can’t wait to read. However, I’m going to finish the Rita Williams memoir first.
I want to tell you all rumors I’ve heard here at Uncle Walt’s, but that’s enough for now.
So, you wanna know what I was doing recently for Uncle Walt? The work I just did has gone up on the Adventures by Disney website.
Check out the Paris & Provence trip. I wrote everything, with some (occasionally dubious) edits from the business unit. One guy from the business unit went into the copy at one point and rewrote broad swaths of it. I pushed back and salvaged much of it. However, they might have done some editing after I left, as they were having space issues. From what I’ve perused so far, it looks kosher. (Although, they’re still having problems on Day 2 and a few problems still with the HTML for foreign characters.)
I also wrote the Daily Itinerary for the Germany trip. My apologies to anyone who is German or has been there. Another trip I wrote — Holland & Paris — was pushed back to 2009. So you won’t see any of my gilded prose for that until then. Maybe.
I even wrote a draft of the newest E-cards, but I didn’t have the photos at the time. A lot of the text was rewritten later without me once they knew which photos they were using. You can tell I didn’t write them because I would never have used the word “soar,” especially not for the zillionth effing time, in my the Paris E-card copy. What I didn’t like about some of the other copy was that it could be highly repetitive in word choice. The word “enjoy” appears enough times to make Strunk & White wheeze into an asthmatic stupor. I tried to avoid it when possible.
My Germany E-card seems to be intact, though, as well as Peru (the only place I felt “soar” was appropriate) and the first photo of Spain. Check it out!
I have a move date.
I have a phone line.
I even have a phone! (Found in Mr. Box at the storage unit.)
Have had untold insanity with the phone/DSL people, the power and water people, and, well, everything. I’ve done every single thing you’re not supposed to do under Mercury Retrograde and, so far, the results do not disappoint. Although I’m sure much of this is just part of the natural chaos of moving.
Tomorrow, I sign paperwork in Burbank for a contract with Uncle Walt. I’m not counting this against the Mercury Rx because I’m literally “re-turning.”
Meanwhile, this is my new love, Miru.
He belongs to the people I’m staying with. It turns out T is no longer allergic to kitties, so they’ve taken in Miru from outside, where he was dumped by his asshole former owners who had him declawed. Miru has adopted me as his second mommy. We spend much time snorgling and cuddling. The Frenchman approves of the affair. I’ve even sent him pictures. Meanwhile, workers are using jackhammers to tear up E/T’s patio. I might be on a morphine drip by Thursday.
I signed the lease today for a house. The Frenchman and I shall be nesting there shortly. Me first, then him when he returns in August. It’s rather pretty inside, although not much to see from the outside. Our neighbor on one side writes for Adult Swim and the neighbors on the other side work for the FBI. A lovey-dovey pair of perverts just makes that row complete, don’t you think?
Now if only Uncle Walt would get on the stick and foist upon me all this darned work they said they were about to foist upon me. Dammit.
I’m going to need this new place to recuperate. Everyone’s been asking about my transition. So far, it’s a mixed bag. Where I am staying now with E/T helps, but I need a more comfortable place to write. That, I think, will make all the difference in the world. Little things are hitting me, like realizing I won’t see The Frenchman’s family for a while, nor the friends I made there. That chokes me up at unexpected moments. Things like food and climate are definitely impacting me, not to mention scenery. I badly miss seeing vineyards from the freeway. But food definitely has my system upside down at the moment. I’m walking every day and lifting free weights to combat stress. My vocabulary is weird. I’ve got French words stuck where English words should be, but thankfully not too many. My brain is still not functioning properly. Certain words in English lag behind by about a minute. Like the word “driveway” or even “boilerplate.” Why? I have no idea. I don’t even know the word in French for either. Mostly, I just feel soggy between the ears and given to moments of intense longing. The Frenchman being away doesn’t help.
And now I’m going to think about either falling asleep or writing. Let’s see which one wins…
