The Bubonic Plague (not really, I'm being facetious...Or am I?), Me Before You and Pretentious Posturing

Last Thursday I came home from work utterly exhausted. I'm talking dead on my feet, could pass out if I closed my eyes for longer than a blink, exhausted.

Brushing it off, thinking it was because I worked all day (I typically only work a few four hour shifts a week...if I'm lucky) and that I'd been pushing myself too hard trying to write my story and staying up way too late and not sleeping more than three or four hours a night.

Friday comes, still tired. Now I've got a headache.

Saturday. Migraine status and exhausted. Came home from work and went to bed at 10.30.

I never do that.

Sunday.

Okay. I feel like shit. Throat is sore, I'm still tired even though I slept for ten hours and my freaking head is killing me. What. The. Hell?

Came home from work. Went to bed at 9.30.

Woke up Monday morning feeling like I got hit by a truck. Sore throat, congestion, super awesome tickle in the back of my throat.

Went to bed early again. Tuesday, the plague struck. I was sore everywhere. I tried rolling out of bed and I liken it to a car crash victim rolling out of bed. When every bone in their body is broken.

I don't know what the hell I had, but it was terrible and it snuck up on me out of no where. I figured I'd been working too hard and not sleeping enough and that it was finally catching up to me. Then a figurative flea bit me and gave me the plague. For seven days (repeats it in the creepy voice a la The Ring...seeevvveeen daaaaysssss) I would have gladly spent in a coma. Body aches and a bitchin' 102 degree fever that wouldn't break for anything. Then an eleven hour nap on the couch wrapped in my very lovely knit blanket that I made for myself. A week later I finally feel human again.

Be glad we ain't friends in real life cause you'd be hating me right now for infecting you.

Over the last seven days when I didn't want to die, I would read (for like five minutes until I passed out again)

I'm not a fan of aliens. I don't think they exist, I think people who do might want to get their heads looked at it, and yeah...just not a fan. Space freaks me out. Too much open-ness. Then there's that lack of breathable air thing too...so that being said, my online book club decided to read The 5th Wave.

I was not a happy reader. It's about aliens and I was kind of like, eff this, I am not reading it.

Then the catholic school girl in my head said I had to. I'd committed to reading it so I had to. So I did.

And for the first, I dunno, half of the book, I freaking hated it. I wanted to punch Cassie in the face because.

Yeah, just because.

Because I can't tell you because I don't want to spoilerize you. Yeah I know, spoilerize isn't a word. Guess what? It is now. You know why? Because.

Anywhoooo....I hated her. Legitly hated her. She was a whiner. It drove me nutso.

But I kept reading because that's the kind of person I am. I am a hoper. I hoped it would get better. That she'd die and someone else would tell me what happened.

She didn't die. But another character did take up the story. Then another and another. At one point I was so confused about who was speaking and what was going on, i was like screw it.

But I kept reading.

And I effing loved it. So much so that when I got to the end, I got the second book and jumped right in and now I'm stuck in the middle of the waiting game for the last book to come out in May. So if any of you know Rick Yancey, tell him to hook a sister up cause I NEED to know what happens. I need it.

Ok, moving on. I finished The Infinite Sea (book after The 5th Wave) and started Me Before You by Jojo Moyes. I saw the trailer for the movie based on the book and was like heck yeah. Then Book Club decided it was March's book.

Watch the trailer tell me you either a. don't want to read this, or b. don't want to see it and I'll tell you you're full of it, cause come on...the MOTHER OF DRAGONS and FINNICK good god look at that smile ODAIR!!!!

And Mr. Bates...dear Lord I love me some Mr. Bates and Downton Abbey.

So far the book is good. Like really good. I struggle a bit reading it because of some of the phrases and words...the author is from London and I guess they spell some words differently there (tire/tyre) and there are some other phrases I wasn't familiar with, but aside from that, it is a wonderfully written story and I absolutely cannot wait to finish it, though I may hate myself for writing that in a few days.

I'm part of an anthology writing group where we write different themed stories for different months and then the admins self publish it. I was asked to write an author bio and can I just tell you I hated it? It felt like the most pretentious, self posturing thing I've ever had to do. I sat at the computer last week going, I'm not a real writer, I just doodle for fun. I can't write an author bio if I'm not a "real" author.

So I read some other people's and I just kind of rolled my eyes, like, really? I even turned to my best friend Google for advice. Basically it said to tell the truth. Who I am, where I'm from and then brag. Brag if you've been published. Go on, it's okay. Google said so.

So I came up with the most honest, modest and true thing I could think of.

Cate Anderson is a full time photographer, part time writer from Jacksonville, Florida. A married mother of two, she is fluent in teenager, toddler and strange noises that sound oddly like that hairy Star Wars fella. Cate has been writing romance stories in earnest for seven years and will have a short story, Rise Up, published later this year by Rambunctious Ramblings Publishing Inc in the anthology Collective Ramblings Volume Two. 

Cate, (me, not my first name, it's actually my middle  name shortened, my mother would be so proud, I hate my middle name...Catherine...bleck). My job and my hobby and the crap hole I hail from. Wife, check. Mom, check. I'm oddly proud of the wooki noise. It makes kids smile....and yeah, I bragged..because I earned that junk. I rocked that contest and I'm gonna own that shit. Because I don't care if anyone else is proud of me. I'm proud of me.

So on that note, I'm off to dive back into the world of Me Before You. Please read it..so we can talk about it..and maybe gush over how awesome the movie looks!