Thursday, August 20, 2009

Fresh New Notebooks and Inky Pens

By Nichole Giles

Don’t you just love school supplies? For me, there’s nothing quite like the feeling of filling a shopping cart with notebooks, pens, glue, paperclips, and…well, all of it. I walk down the store aisles taking the time to look in every bin, to consider every deal, weigh the pros and cons of name brand versus generic markers/crayons/pens, and then I pile my cart high, buzzing with excitement over the amazing sale prices.

Being that I’m a summer girl—meaning summer is my season of choice—I have issues with back to school. It basically symbolizes the end of my warm season, and the beginning of the cold one. Besides that, it’s a sad thing to know our schedule will change and solidify, that we’ll have to deal with homework, teachers, and extracurricular activities. Oh, and the dreaded carpools. I’ll have three this year.

But there a lot of good things that come with the beginning of the school year. The kids are looking forward to spending time with other kids their ages—especially my older ones. They’ll be learning new things, moving forward by filling their sponge-like brains with information and knowledge. And me? I will finally have my days to myself again.

Oh, to have those precious few hours of time when I can ignore the messy house, pile of laundry, shopping list, and other important mom duties to sit down with my trusty computer and write. Aaahhh.

While the dog-days of summer will forever be my most enjoyed, I will happily fall into autumn this time around. Maybe, just maybe, I’ll finish the rough draft of my WIP, and outline a sequel for my other series. Of course, I’ll be using a fresh new notebook and a package of inky pens. Oh, it’s going to be a great year!

(Now...get to work!)

Nichole

6 comments:

Karlene said...

I love new notebooks and inky pens. :)

Heather Justesen said...

I love inky pens too--if they aren't inky, it's hard to write!

But seriously, I didn't need to buy any school supplies and I still had to wander down the aisles just to check out the new offerings. And I had to hold myself back from picking up some of the cute new notebooks--even though I have scads of them strewn around my place! =)

Nichole Giles said...

It's a hard thing to resist, huh? I generally buy a year's worth of notebooks and things during these sales. That way, I'm getting the most for my money and don't usually need to buy more in between.

Plus, it just makes me happy to spend $5 and get 50 notebooks. =)

Nichole

Evelyn Curtis said...

I had to laugh at this. I don't know very many writers, but it is good to see something in common. I have always been a collector of sorts of notebooks and pens. I could tell you which pens write the best, and which notebooks are my favorite... etc.

Thanks for sharing!

Nichole Giles said...

You're right, Evelyn. If there's one thing all writers have in common, it's an intense love of office supplies. Even brass paperclips get oohed and ahhed over at my critique group meetings.

We may be a strange bunch, but at least we're all strange together.

Nichole

Keith N Fisher said...

Its like an AA meeting. Hi, I'm Insert name here and I'm an Inky pen-a-holic. I took my daughter to buy what the teacher requires . . . well It's embarrassing to argue in the store.

Meantime I oogled over the new binders at staples. I bet those things will last forever. THey aren't, however, Cool.