Which book do I write next? (and answers about the Alpha Smart)

I stayed home from work ill today. I'm feeling quite a bit better, but am still relaxing. Actually, I'm blog hopping again. I'll start editing in a few minutes and do some writing later if I still feel okay.

For those of you who are writers, how many stories do you have running around in your head right now? How many do you have started that you have to finish?

I have approximately twenty stories started that I need to finish. There's at least ten more that I'm itching to write. I'm not sure which one to finish or start next.

It's a real dilemma. Help me out here.

Of course I have to do my edits on the book scheduled to come out April 7th at www.total-e-bound.com. That's a given.

But then what?

I'm going to Lori Foster's Readers N Writers' Get Together in Cincinnati this summer where I have one editor and one agent appointment set up. I still have some polishing to do for that manuscript so it will be ready. Right? Of course! It's almost done - I hope. That depends on what my critique partners tell me about the last few chapters. It's a sweet Harlequin-Silhouette contemporary type novel, and I hope "the one" to break me into the big time publishers and round me up an agent.

Then, however, is the sequel for an Ellora's Cave book - to Make-Believe Lover.

Then there's other sweet Harlequin-Silhouette books that are sequels to the one I'm going to pitch in June.

Then there's a sequel to a story I wrote for NCP that I'm dying to write.

Oh! There's another sequel almost done for an Ellora's Cave book also, that I need to finish and spice up. I've only been working on this one going on ten years. That's all. It's about time I finish this one.

But then there's also the erotic romance stories for TEB which I'm on a roll with. I hate to slow down my momentum there, either, but I need to speed up my momentum again with Ellora's Cave and NCP.

What to do?

I have vacation scheduled from the day job next week. I hope to get some quality writing time in (and not blog hop all day long every day). Of course, if things go right, I will get my hearing implant next Wednesday so I won't be in any shape to write, edit, or play on the Internet (at least I doubt it) for the rest of my week's vacation. By next Wednesday night, I hope to be part Borg. :)

By that for you non-Trekkies and/or who haven't seen my earlier post about the BAHA hearing implant, there will be a metal post sticking out the back of my head about the size of a hearing aid battery. Since I'm a woman and wear my hair long, it probably won't be discernible once my hair grows back. I'm sure they'll have to shave a bit of it to do the surgery. Waaa! I finally get my hair the way I like it and it'll get ruined. But it's a small price to pay.

So pray for the insurance company to get their head out of their asses and approve my surgery. They denied it three years ago because they thought it sounded like a hearing aid. It's not a hearing aid. I didn't fight it last time. This time, I'm fighting it. I could kick myself for not fighting it before - but I'm older and wiser now. As I mentioned, they denied it again, but I'm fighting.

Back to yesterday's discussion so I can answer your questions.

For those of you who wonder what an alpha smart is, here's a pic. I found it at: www.alphasmart.com. This model goes for $350. They have more expensive models.



This model of the Alpha Smart includes:

•	Rechargeable battery pack
•	AC adapter
•	Documents To Go Professional (Provides compatibility with Microsoft Word, Excel and Powerpoint®)
•	USB cable
•	Getting Started Guide
•	Palm™ Desktop Software
•	Additional applications, fonts, and other bonus software
•	Stylus

Baha

I'm having Baha dreams.

No, not the tropical vacation spot. And no, I don't mean not some obscure religion.

The Baha I'm speaking of is a surgically implantable system for treatment of hearing loss that works through direct bone conduction. Specifically, it stands for: bone anchored hearing aids.

Supposedly it works miracles for the hearing impaired like myself. When I was given an evaluation this morning, I fell in love with it. I'm a candidate. Woohoo!



Unfortunately, when my surgeon approached my insurance company three years ago, they denied the surgery and I couldn't afford to pay for it. Hopefully, United has moved out of the dark ages and will approve it now.

I lost my hearing when I was 21, thus I've been hard of hearing all my adult life.

I was in the Air Force and I worked in an extremely noisy shop with inadequate ear protection. To top it off, when I began to have excruciating pain, I was pregnant with my first child and the AF base hospital OB/GYN clinic didn't believe I was having a serious problem. They insisted that it's normal for expectant women to have earaches and headaches. Thus, they allowed the tumor to grow in my ear for many months. The day the OB clinic finally sent me to ENT, I overheard the doctor saying that "I'll stop her malingering once and for all. We're going to prove nothing's wrong." Instead, the ENT doctor found my tumor. I wish I could have seen the OB's face when she got the news. I never saw her again, however. That's how the Air Force medicine worked - I rarely saw the same doctor twice. After Luke was born, I had a radical left mastoidectomy (ear surgery). The pain went away, but so did much of the hearing. This morning, the audiologist said I have "severe to profound" hearing loss.

Unfortunately, no hearing aids have been able to help much. I wear an over-the-ear model on my left ear. See the diagram left. My aid is similar to the one pictured on the bottom middle. It helps a little. If someone stands next to my left ear and speaks, I can't understand them. However, it seems to help my overall hearing. I don't ask "what" as often and I don't have to turn the radio up as loud as when I'm not wearing it.

So wish me luck. I would love to be able to hear conversations without missing half of what is said, or misunderstanding so much.

This wasn't much of a Valentine's Day post. Of course, I was at a softball game all evening and haven't celebrated yet. Hubby and I plan to celebrate Saturday night. I hope you all had a very happy Valentine's Day!