When life attacks

I know everyone else who posts here is at minimum very busy, with frequent excursions into Chinese curse interesting territory, and I suspect most of our readers are the same. Most of you have probably worked out I'm now into week three of Chinese curse territory, and my writing output has suffered rather a lot.

My usual methods of dealing with an overload of life, the universe and everything involve computer games with much smashing of stuff, mindless puzzle games (yes, I know that's technically contradictory, but for me, they are), reading if there's a good book or I'm catching up on a new webcomic (lately Girl Genius has been getting the treatment) - anything that I don't have to actively think about but takes all my attention. The thing is, the more interesting life gets, the more of this I need to do before I'm able to write - and then I run into the narcolepsy wall and have to go fall over because the damned alarm goes off way too early on work days. What writing is happening is getting slid between the spaces early in the morning at work, before everyone else gets in and things go crazy again.

Right now, my methods of clearing the mental plate so that writing can happen aren't working too well - what works for everyone else? How do you tell life to take a hike (with or without the one-fingered salute) when it starts getting way too busy and entirely too "interesting" for your sanity?

Life and Writing

Museum, by RD Studio.

My husband is the D part of R & D Studios. He hopes to retire at the end of this year and dedicate himself to artwork and animation.

He squeezes his art around work . I squeeze my writing around my family.

I figure as long as the children have clean clothes, food on the table and they get to school and Uni on time, we're doing OK. But I must admit I resent doing the shopping and the driving.

My days are filled with juggling family, stealing time to go to the gym and read books, stealing time to go the movies with my patient husband and meeting deadlines. Yet I still get a thrill when I find an author who makes me forget I'm reading a book. I still get a thrill when I write a scene that pulls together narrative threads and explores character and Works!

I wouldn't be doing anything else.