*cricket, cricket*

So...I haven't posted on this particular blog in forever. I left Blogger in favor of LiveJournal, but even that blogging site has lost a bit of its "magic" in the last few months.

As followers of this blog will notice, I have removed what chapters I had posted of my older story, "The Dreamer and the Harp." This was due to the fact that, since they were up here on a public blog, anyone could take them and claim them as their own writing. For this reason, I won't be posting any of my writings directly to this blog anymore. Instead, I will provide little summaries of some of the things I have written lately, and if you'd like to read them, you can email me and I'll send them to you for critiques and criticisms.

I don't know how much I will be using this blog in the near future, but I do plan to keep it updated later on this year during NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month). This way, those who are interested in the progress of my novel during November can get more detailed updates than what a simple status update on Facebook can provide.

So what exactly have I been up to all this time? 2007 to 2010 is an awfully big gap! Well, I've since graduated from high school, as well as from our local community college. I am currently attending a four-year university, keeping busy with English classes mostly. My major is English with an Emphasis on Creative Writing, which is more for my personal edification than towards a specific career path (as it is difficult to be published these days unless you know someone in the business or are already an established author).

I will be using my major as a springboard into a Master's Program to become a Children's Librarian. The idea of having to go through several more years of school to achieve my goal is not the most exciting thought, but I do want this very much. I am currently near completion of our local community college's Library Media Technology Program, which I know will be a HUGE help to me once I reach the Master's Program level courses.

Since 2007, I have been hired by two different libraries, with two completely different patron bases. I worked for over a year with the County of Los Angeles Public Library, as a Page, and it was a very enjoyable experience. The library I had the opportunity to work at has been my "home library" since I was five years old, so it was an extremely special opportunity to actually work there alongside some of the staff I'd come to know and recognize over the years.

I am now currently employed by our local community college, at their library. It is a wholely different experience from the public library, as my role within the library is quite different. I not only shelve books, but check books out to patrons, help with our yearly inventory of the stacks and collections, as well as work in Technical Services, processing books and making them ready to go out on the shelves for others to enjoy. I get to work with a typewriter to type out call number labels for the book spines, which is probably one of the best parts of working in Technical Services. I have always loved typewriters and hope to own one of my own someday.

I won't bore you with too many more details of what's been going on, but suffice it to say, I've been fairly occupied. My writing has suffered a little for it, since I do not have as much free time as I did in high school to devote to my many stories. "The Dreamer and the Harp" has not been revised yet, nor has my original, 5-"book" fantasy series. And I currently have two NaNoWriMo novels which are incomplete. Besides that, I have two stories (which I used as writing exercises for a class I'm currently taking this semester) which I want to expand and explore. Too much to write, not enough time to write it all.

...not to mention all the books I want to read. Let me tell you, the social networking site Shelfari has been an ENORMOUS help to me in keeping track of all the books I want to read. I still religiously request books in bulk from the library (there are currently three stacks of mostly unread books from three different libraries piled in front of my closet right now).

Well, unfortunately, my time is up. There is a short story due tomorrow that is demanding my attention. But I hope you have enjoyed this not-so-short update from crazy little me, and I hope to do a little more posting to this blog in the future. Until then, God bless!