You Can't Be Serious

As for the 25 Reason's Why BET Is Trippin, I'll have that up a little later. My cat walked over my computer and I don't know how, but he turned it off. I lost the entire list I had been working on for over twenty minutes. I was really ready to donate him to the nearest chinese food spot. I swear I could have killed him.
Ain't he precious? This picture was taken after I caught him red handed knocking over the garbage can. You see all the stuff behind him? He's in the garbage on a regular basis. It doesn't matter how much trash is in there, I have to take it out every night so he won't knock it over. It's a full time job raising a healthy successful cat.

I like to think of myself as a pretty good businesswoman.
I've had to evolve and learn things about myself in order to make that kind of assesment and I think I can safely say that I have never been bamboozeled. Now I have made bad business decisions but nothing that could maim my career beyond repair.
I made a business decision a little while ago. I chose to send in my work to a relatively unknown publisher. He was very interested in signing me, as he thought I had phenomenal talent and would do well carrying a novel. The one thing that kept this from going horribly wrong was the fact that I have not signed a contract. Had I done that, my ass would have been in the wash.
We had a power lunch to discuss the direction my book would be taking, what audience I wanted to cater to, how long it should be, blah blah blah. At the time of this conference, I was more than halfway done with the book. Now since his company was just starting out, he could only afford to print between 40, 000 and 65, 000 words. For me, 55, 000+ (which is where my second novel stands) was just not enough to tell this girls story the way I wanted it told. I feel my work suffered in not being able to communicate to my readers exactly what I wanted to communicate.
Now I was supposed to receive my contract's a few days after my 18th birthday. I eagerly awaited them and still, three weeks later, they hadn't come. Now everyone tried to call me on my birthday and none of them got through. I figured the same had been true for him. I call him up to see how everything is going. Let me paraphrase this conversation:
Jacki: Hey just calling to see how everything is coming.
Publisher: Oh I haven't heard from you in so long. I assumed you went to another publisher.
J: Have you tried to call?
P: No one has answered.
Nothing of any importance......and then
P: I need to go see my distributor. They've been taking my books and sending me checks that are bouncing.
J: Word? Damn.
P: Yeah. Right now I have no money in the bank and.......
At that point I was finished with the conversation. If you have no money in the bank, you are Baroque which means you are out of Monet. You can't finance your own project let alone someone else's. He told me to give him two weeks to get it together and then feel free to shop around. Don't worry, I will. It has now been two weeks and I am definitely shopping. Add to that, I sent an email to check on things again. It still goes unanswered. Hmm.
Now I cannot blame this on anyone but myself. I was so damn happy to have someone say wow your work is great here's a contract that I didn't bother to do the research or the math. I never had any questions for him, which was unusual for me because I am usually bursting with things that need to be clarified. Now next time around, I am going to have a gaggle of questions.
I finished the chapters I am planning to submit. Now the only thing I need to do is figure out who I want to submit to. I was leaning towards Teri Woods and then I found out she doesn't write her own work. That hurt me. I always thought ole girl had it going on wit a sick pen game. Come to find out it isn't even hers! I'm also leaning on Q-Boro. That is until Batman gets his thing going and hands me that contract. No way am I submitting to Triple Crown. Reasons why I will keep to myself. I saw Black Pearl books website and I knew I wouldn't fit in there. I don't write like their authors. Urban Books...don't know. I might. If their freakin website would load, maybe I could get their information.
I'm slowly coming to realize that the writing is the easiest part of getting and being published. Once the writing is done, it's nothing left but a lot of blood sweat and tears. I'm no stranger to hard work. I've been busting my ass for most of my life. I think I deserve to be pampered for a little while, don't you?