My Room With a View

I had to borrow liberally from Virginia Woolf for this title -- one of my favorite authors.  People have asked me where I write and it's not very glamorous, really.  A writing office is on my wish list in the next few years.  Currently, I work downstairs in my open concept townhome, which is nice, but sometimes distracting when others are watching T.V., etc.  Thankfully, I own an iPod which helps filter out noise and am not easily distracted.  I write at my dining room table -- the black hole for mail, books, and ongoing art/crafting projects in the house.  If there isn't clutter there, it doesn't feel like home. 

This is my view outside as I write:

It looks kind of barren now, but its winter.  What can I do?  I wish I had a lush, green pic to share with you, but when I moved in it was winter as well and shortly thereafter my tree was struck by lightning.  The tree promised to be amazing in spring when we moved in on New Year's Eve 2007.  It had a gorgeous structure and towered over the three story building in front of my townhouse.  Its limbs covered the entire balcony from view until calamity hit about two months later.  It was struck by lightning in the middle of a tornado!  I hadn't even been in Dallas but a few months when this giant tree limb fell on top of my car.  Gone was the promise of a shady, regal tree and left was the smaller version you now see in the previous picture above.

I am glad the tree was salvaged, though.  I like to watch the birds and squirrels while I write.

I have various writing toys that hopefully, will find their way to my dream writing office, when I move and have room for one.  My two favorites to bring out are the 1985 Godzilla action figure and the Creature from the Black Lagoon that I acquired used at a comic book shop in New Mexico.  You can see them looming tall in the background.

The following picture shows what I have to contend with on a daily basis while writing. 

This is my breditor, Toshio.  Now I realize this nickname warrants some explaining, so here goes:  I got Toshio, my adopted Bombay, from this wonderful no-kill cat shelter, Texas Cares.  He was already eight months old and responded to his name, so I thought it would be confusing to rename him, but if I had, it would have been Bradbury after Ray Bradbury, one of my all-time favorite authors, who has also owned a black cat.  Toshio quickly took an interest in my writing, as you can see from the pic above.  He seems to think my laptop case is his office.  One day my husband and I were joking around about Toshio being my editor -- thus, the nickname "Breditor", a combination of Bradbury and editor.  So really, I don't have an editor at the moment, but a "Breditor".

This is a more regal photo of the laptop bandit:

So there you have it -- my crazy room with a view!  Now, if you'll excuse me, I have some more writing to do.

As always, happy writing and happy reading to all!  (And if you happen to enjoy what you're reading, feel free to become a follower below).