I've been Tagged

I was originally going to give you a sneak preview of my current WIP, Tinsel Time. But, instead, I get to bore you with eight things about me (bleh) ...

This weekend, I've also been thinking alot about story ideas for the BIAW challenge coming up July 9th. It's to be about "Ships that Pass in the Night". . . which then led to me thoughts of the Rascall Flatts song, Bless the Broken Road, which then led me to thoughts of how I got "here". Amazingly, I've had eight jobs (well, actually nine, but I dont' know if being a Kelly Girl counts) that led up to writing romantic suspense...

1) As soon as I was sixteen, I got a job working nights and weekends at Taco Gringo. It was an expanding chain in Illinois back in the late 70's and early 80's, but I think the only stores left are a few scattered around Southern Illinois. I'll just say I can roll a really mean burrito! The only writing-related duties I had was to replace the little push letters on the menu board!

2) While I was in college, I worked spring breaks and summer vacations at a warehouse place that assembled sandwiches to sell at 7/11 stores. I stood on an assembly line (kid you not) and plonked lunch meat, frozen patties, etc. onto bread for 8-9 hours a day in 55-degree temperatures while my classmates splashed at the pool and sunbathed. . .Nothing writing related here. . .except to note that there were LOTS of typos on those sandwich labels!

3) After college, I got a really glamourous job working for Frito-Lay. I examined corn kernels and tested grain for pesticides at a grain elevator out in the middle of nowhere. No free chips for us! However, I began writing up procedures for a test manual. Kind-of like cookbook chemistry. Take 1 cup corn...

4) After I got married, we needed money. But, I was in a new city and didn't know where to apply. So. . .I did the next best thing, I was a Kelly girl! I worked temporary jobs all over the city. I didn't make much money, but I learned my way around...fast! Now here, I got to type, enter data, and even worked for a paint company.

5) My next job gets really spicy. I worked at the University of Louisville KY Eye Research Lab. . .I was a lab tech in charge of doing vile things to bunnies' eyeballs. I did just a tiny bit of writing here. Mostly documenting all the vile things I'd done to the bunnies' eyeballs!

6) Still at the UofL, but at the Brown Cancer Center, I did cancer research trial data gathering. Still no dedicated writing, but I did learn more than I ever wanted to know about cancer, cancer treatments, and medical billing. Bleh.

7)Still at the Brown Cancer Center, my next job was in a laboratory working with rats. Step one, induce tumors. Step two, treat tumors. Step three, write up results. Yep, here I got my first REAL writing credit on a technical paper along with my boss and all the lab employees. I wrote the background and introduction!

8)I moved with my then-husband to California where I worked for a local Air Force contractor as a technical editor. I learned lots about the history of the area, how airplanes work, and learned to run a Docutech. If I needed to, I could work at Kinkos!

9) My last job before I decided to take up fiction writing full-time was as a technical writer. Now, I don't have an engineering degree. . . so, I would write a up template for the engineers to fill in. I'd use their test plans to write up everything except the results. Then. . .once they were done, I got to turn it over to the technical editor to polish.

So....that's the story of MY broken road that led me to where I am today.

What's yours?

Oh. . . and I'm tagging Lacey, Jacqueline, TJ, Debra, Lady Leigh, Lenora Bell, and Maggie, and CM.