A Merry Heart

Jezebel

2012-02-01T08:14:00.001-05:00

I am an animal person. Not the sort who kisses theirdog or shares a bed with them. (Cal and I have had too many babies/sick toddlersshare our bed over the years, so there’s no way we’re sharing the bed with ananimal.) And I’m allergic to most animals. But I am an animal person.

I’venever owned a cat, but from what I’ve observed they do their thing and let youthink you own them. They deign to grace you with their presence, and you’resupposed to be grateful. And that obviously works for cats and their owners.

Dogsare different. They’re pack animals and they want to be part of the family. Theyhave emotional needs. Sometimes it’s getting their ears scratched. Sometimes it’sattention, which may be by demanding water for their water bowl. And if thatmeans tipping over their full bowl of water, so they can “make” it empty anddemand water, so be it. Sometimes they just want to be near “The Master.”Calvin is the master. And our dog Jezebel will do anything/everything necessaryto be with The Master. Even if it means being naughty.

Normally,Jezebel sleeps on a big blanket in the boys’ room. But she’d rather sleep inthe master’s room. So she made plans.

Iwoke up during the middle of the night to strange noises. I had the inevitablethought: Burglars. But then, it didn’t sound like people. And no hooded figurewalked in our dark room. So I thought I was dreaming and went back to sleep. AndI woke up later. Noises again. Fromunderneath the bed. And I knew. Jez’d surreptitiously snuck out of the boys’room. Crossed the house. Crept through Ariel’s room. Slunk across our bedroomand buried herself under our bed—that way no one would see her and banish herto the boys’ room.

Inthe morning we couldn’t quite figure out how she did it. There were threeclosed doors between where Jez was sleeping and where we sleep. But Labs arequite handy with their noses and very persevering. (Our previous Lab Jill couldopen the backdoor, which, like the rest of our doors, has a knob and not ahandle. Though she did it through brute force. If you apply enough pressure atjust the right spot, a door knob will “pop” open.)

In the morning, Jez was rebuked and madeappropriate gestures of shame, i.e. sad eyes. Though secretly she was giddy. And now, she’s carrying her tail a bit morearrogantly, and I know she’s thinking, “I’ve done it once, you silly humans. I’lldo it again.”

Yesterday I posted "Ten Things You'd Probably Rather Not Know About Me" on my book blog.

I also did a guess post on the challenges and rewards of writing historical fiction on Word for Words blog.

Here are some photos of Jezebel.

Shakespeare and the Three Little Pigs

2012-01-30T08:20:00.002-05:00

As many of you know, I love Shakespeare. (Despite the PG Wodehouse quote that says about Shakespeare, "It sounds well enough, but it doesn't actually mean anything.") And I love teaching Shakespeare. I've taught Hamlet, The Scottish play, i.e., Macbeth, Julius Caesar, The Tempest, and soon Henry V. The words, the meter, the depth, the allusions... Okay, you get it.

Recently, some friends shared this YouTube video with me. (Thanks, Darren & Maggie!) So I'm going to share it with you all because we all need a smile in the morning. Think of it as Shakespeare meets The Three Little Pigs meets a Redneck. Enjoy!

Friday Five

2012-01-27T08:10:00.000-05:00

FavoriteFive Ways to Pass Rainy Days

It’sbeen raining here almost all month. And, while I actually love rainy days andthunderstorms, it’s getting old. So for all of you who are dealing with drearyweather, here are some of our favorite ways to pass the days and nights.

1.Play games.

Ofcourse, this leads to long discussions and negotiations because we have lots ofgames and lots of opinions. For example, the guys favorite game is Killer Bunnies.But I hate a game whose point is to kill the other players’ bunnies and get themagic carrot. But the boys love the cards, which read “chocolate-coveredanti-matter raisins.” “Quite irascible refractable cheese balls.” “Highlyexplosive missile package.” Etc. But before you think I’ve taken the moral highground, my favorite game is Guillotine, where you collect the heads of executednobles.

2.Read aloud.

We’recurrently reading aloud P. G. Wodehouse. There’s nothing like reading Wodehouseto make you smile. For example:

“I'm not absolutely certain of the facts, but Irather fancy it's Shakespeare who says that it's always just when a fellow isfeeling particularly braced with things in general that Fate sneaks up behindhim with the bit of lead piping.”
― P.G. Wodehouse, Carry On, Jeeves

“She looked as if she had been poured into herclothes and had forgotten to say "when". ”
― P.G. Wodehouse

“Freddie experienced the sort of abysmalsoul-sadness which afflicts one of Tolstoy's Russian peasants when, afterputting in a heavy day's work strangling his father, beating his wife, anddropping the baby into the city's reservoir, he turns to the cupboards, only tofind the vodka bottle empty.”
― P.G. Wodehouse

3.Stream Masterpiece Theater

We’vewatched Downton Abbey, Sherlock, and now we’re watching Island At War.

4.Hide under the table/bed/desk.

Thisis what our tough black Lab Jezebel does. She’s terrified of thunder andlightning. In fact, she won’t even come out of her hiding place to eat. So she’slost a few pounds. Hmm. I wonder if we can market this as a diet plan—TheFabulous Lab Fear Diet. I’m sure there’s a book deal in there somewhere.

5.Hydraulic Cement Your Basement

Whenit rains this much, the water table rises above the level of the ground. So everycrack in your basement begins to seep/trickle/fountain water. But good olehydraulic cement will cure it. My thought is that it would be quicker andeasier to give the whole basement a coat of hydraulic cement, but no one elseseems to agree.

Ifyou have any rainy day ideas, I’d love to hear about them.

And now for your Friday fun (which is number 6 on my fun-things-to-do-on-rainy-days list--watch YouTube videos).

Hacked Again

2012-01-25T08:08:00.002-05:00

It wasn’t enough that my Twitter account got hacked. Nope. My Gmail account washacked too. (Thankfully, it doesn’t appear that any emails were sent outadvertizing products whose uses are a mystery to me.) But my Gmail account didn’teven have the same password as my Twitter account. (In fact, my passwords werelisted as “strong.” Now they’re a random assortment of letters and symbols,which I’m sure I’ll forget.) GRRR. The good news is that Gmail sent me a noticeimmediately, told me where the account was hacked from (Singapore), and gave mestep-by-step instructions to limited the damage, which included changing thepassword, shutting down any account access not from my laptop, running virusscans, and checking my contacts list for people I don’t know. My account shouldnow be safe.

Buthere’s the thing. Why would anyone want to hack my account? I am not a drugdealer masquerading as a pastor’s wife. I am not an art thief posing as themother of four children. I am not a wealthy benefactress pretending to be apoor writer. And unless the hacker knows something I don’t, I’m pretty sure Ihaven’t written the next New York Times best seller. So why hack my accounts?The only thing exciting in my computer, besides my novels, are my Facebook Scrabblegames with my daughter. Aside from increasing the hacker’s vocabulary—yes,jarl, qi, za, qat are all real words—there’s not much point in hacking myScrabble games.

Oh,wait, I know what it is. It’s my secret identity. I’m really an internationalspy involved in the corporate espionage of all the really high tech companiesthat call Chattanooga home. Phew! Now I understand it. Hmm. I guess I need tonotify my clients.

BTW, a copy of my novel, Screwing Up Time, is available as a prize at the new blog Novel d'Tales. Click here if you'd like to enter the contest.

A Winter Without Snow

2012-01-23T08:19:00.001-05:00

Theend of January is quickly approaching. And I’ve come to the realization that we’regoing to have a winter without snow. What’s the point of cold, gray days if youdon’t have snow? I realize that the city of Chattanooga has only one snow plowand two sanders, but still...

Instead,we’ve had day after night after day of rain. And the high today is 65. It’slike we hit the fast forward button to spring. Now don’t get me wrong, springis my favorite time of year in the South. So that’s good. But there’s aproblem. A big problem.

Withouta heavy ground freeze, none of my late summer weeds died. I blew off weeding in the fall (whileI worked on my novel) and cursed the weeds, “Die in the winter freeze.” Only itdidn’t happen. And now those weeds are mocking me—they’re huge. They’redropping seeds. If they had faces, they’d be laughing.

Itry not to take stock of my yard and garden when I go outside. But wearingsunglasses doesn’t help much. The massive green patch of clover in the midst ofdormant lawn is hard to miss. Strands of Bermuda grass poking out of my liriopeborders mean hours of work. And those areas that I didn’t get around tomulching...well, at least there’s Round-up.

WhatI needed was a good dose of snow—nothing like a clean white blanket to makeeverything look tidy. Then, I could pretend that my only chore for the spring isenjoying the daffodils, tulips, and hellebores. But it’s not. I guess it’s timeto buy a new pair of gardening gloves... Besides a new gardening catalogue cameand there’s a gorgeous hardy orchid. And the daffs have buds. And the hyacinthsare up. I love spring.

Diversity

2012-01-20T08:15:00.002-05:00

Mydaughter is a junior in college. (She’s in class right now and won’t read thisblog post until later. So if you come back in a couple of hours and this postis radically different, you’ll know she said, “Hey, you can’t say that!”)Anyway, more to the point, she has only a few units left until her major, mathematics,is completed. But she still had quite a few units she needed in order tograduate. So she decided that instead of taking random classes, she’d add asecond minor. One in computer science. It’s been an eye-opener for her. Let’sjust say...computer science majors are different than math majors. (ThoughAriel says that the personal hygiene issues are about the same.)

WhenAriel goes to a computer science class, she doesn’t have to open a door. Some young man rushes to open it for her. You see, at this university there arealmost no girls in computer science. The other day some guy asked her out, beforehe knew her name. If there is another girl in theclass, she skips across the room and introduces herself to Ariel.

She’seven had a professor say, “Look, we have a girl in our class. Diversity!” Beingthat Ariel is quiet, this is an experience for her. In math, names are allill-understood social niceties. If the professor knows your name, it usuallymeans that you’ve been at his office hours three times a week for the entiresemester. In comp sci, they listen attentively to make sure they master theenunciation of Ariel’s name properly. This is especially important in the Southwhere, for reasons unknown to me, they miss the final “L” in her name and callher Aria. (Or maybe we bite off theend with our clipped New England pronunciations.)

Anyway,now that she’s a comp sci minor, I’m really glad she’s got her mace—she can fendoff those hordes of girl-deprived computer geeks.

Why I Need A Second Cup of Coffee

2012-01-18T08:20:00.000-05:00

Iam not an early bird. But I get up early and make a pot of coffee. And not anypot—a pot of freshly ground French roasted beans in a stainless steel BodumFrench press. And as wonderful as that is, I wouldn’t get up early just to makeit for myself. I get up to make it for my kids—would you want to go to Biochem withouta cup of coffee to warm your body and soul?

Myhusband says that I should let them make their own coffee. I probably should.But I love watching the sun rise and being greeted by my son’s hamster, who spendsthe night in the dining room because he’s so noisy. When I turn on the diningroom light, Rumplestiltskin leaves his wheel and runs to the cage door to greetme. After I say “Good Morning,” he goes back to his wheel.

AndI love reading blogs while I eat my toast with cheese, watching various familymembers stumble out of bed to their cups of coffee. Sometimes they give me the “you-are-a-blessed-saint”look and sometimes I get the “you-are-a-crazed-earlybird” look. But I’mthankful to have them around. I know a lot of kids go off to college and that’sa wonderful opportunity. But we also know lots of people saddled with undergradand grad school debt, who make life choices based on their debt. Scholarshipsand living at home during their undergrad years should free our kids of thatburden, especially since there’s a major university a couple of miles from ourhome.

Ofcourse, it does make our house crowded, noisy, and opinionated to have fouradults and two near adults living in one home. But I get to be a part of theirlives for a while longer and hear about their professors and classes and learnabout physical chemistry and partial differential equations. And in themeantime, if I have to get up early and watch the sunrise for time alone andquiet, I think I can manage that.

Timefor a second cup of coffee.

Cockroach Criminals

2012-01-16T08:42:00.001-05:00

Crimecan be categorized in many ways. Felony vs. Misdemeanor. Violent vs.Non-Violent. Personal vs. Impersonal. I’d like to add another to the list.Cockroach vs. Light-of-day.

ALight-of-Day crime is a crime where the criminal shows his face. For example,when my mom was young, she worked in a bank, and on several occasions a manpulled a gun on her and demanded cash. (One bank robber was on a successfulspree after he robbed my mom and returned to rob her bank several months later.While he was in line, he made eye contact with my mom and panicked. He hadn’tkept good records of which banks he’d previously robbed. Even successfulcriminals are brought down by bad record keeping.) But that’s what I call aLight-of-Day crime. The criminal shows his face.

Butthere are crimes where the criminal doesn’t show his face. I call thosecockroach crimes because like cockroaches they commit crimes in the dark,hiding and pretending to be good citizens. (Like the person who stole myhusband’s identity and committed fraud—you’ll find that the bank thinks you’reguilty until you prove yourself innocent. Or the scum-of-the-earth man whostalked me in college and knew the minutiae of my life and eagerly called meduring the middle of the night to share it with me.)

Youmay know what inspired this post if you follow me on Twitter. Yesterday myaccount got hacked. A friend’s account got hacked in the early morning, so Ichecked my account when I found out several hours later. My account was clean,so I shut down my computer and snuggled up with The Unbecoming of Mara Dyer, which my daughter had asked me toread. Big mistake. Not the book. The mistake was assuming that my account wasokay. Six hours later when I checked my account again, I had scads of noticesfrom friends telling me that my account had been hacked. GRRR. (Hopefully, it’sall been rectified.)

Ofcourse, other than some embarrassment on my part and some hacker harassment ofmy friends, the hacker didn’t get much. (At least, I hope not.) Not like ablogger friend who had her account hacked and had years’ worth of blog postsdeleted. And her email address book gutted. And the emails to and from heragent and editor deleted. That’s nasty.

Itgets worse. I’ve received notice of a writer whose e-books have been stolen andrepublished—with new titles. Interestingly, the thief kept her name on thebooks (you need the name recognition to sell), but the money is funneled intoanother account.

Hacking writers. Seriously. That’s pretty muchtaking candy from a baby or stealing an old lady’s purse. Most writers I knowhave a hard time converting files from Word to PDF, let alone setting uphack-proof systems. So I have a word for you cockroaches out there. There’s noglory hacking a writer (and almost no money in it either). But watch out, wewriters will get more savy—at least, our kids, friends and spouses will help us be more savy. Thelight will shine on you sooner or later. And you will get crunched under foot.Plus, my son is teaching me that you can kill a cockroach by banking a shotwith an airsoft pellet, so that it ricochets and hits the soft underbelly.Watch out, I’m locked and loaded.

Hate is a strong word, but I really hate cleaning the bathroom.

2012-01-13T08:36:00.000-05:00

Iwoke up crabby today. The snow that floated in the air last night dried up and theflakes that actually touched the ground, didn’t stick. Okay, maybe I’m justreally crabby because I woke up with a sinus headache—only I don’t have frontalsinuses so it’s one deep in my head and if gets infected, my brain will rot. AndI can’t take decongestants—they make my heart beat way too fast. So I’m goingto spend the day in front of a vaporizer, trying to melt scum out of my sinus.

Fridayis also Clean the Bathroom Day. Which I hate. Does anyone know how to make bathroomcleaning fun? I make ironing, which also hate, fun by streaming a Netflix. Yesterday,I watched the first episode of Island atWar. It was really good. But bathroom cleaning...the only thing good aboutit afterwards it smells like lemons. Maybe I need a soundtrack. A lot ofwriters have soundtracks for their novels—music that puts them in the mood towrite or reminds them of their characters. Yeah, that’s it. I need a bathroomcleaning soundtrack. For the shower Icould play “Raindrops keep falling on my head.” Especially for the times, thatI’m thinking about my novel and turn on the shower spigot instead of the bath spigotand get totally soaked. Yes, it has happened on more than one occasion.

For the tub, I could listen to “Splish, splash.”For the sink, How about the "Happy Working Song." Although rats and cockroaches aren't my usual cleaning buddies--I'll stick to my minions. Maybe I should try singing the "Happy Working Song" to them. Or not.

For the toilet, which I really, really hate cleaning, I couldplay “Hate” by the Plain White Ts.

Anyway, I hope these make your weekend cleaning more fun! I know they bring a smile to my face.

Book Marketing Tribulations

2012-01-11T08:23:00.002-05:00

Lastnight, I screwed my courage to the sticking place and went to a marketingseminar for writers. The speaker was amazing. He makes his living writing and songwriting.He gave examples on how he learned about marketing in elementary school—he hada bullet lodged under his armpit (true story) and he charged kids their milk moneyto feel the bullet. He told us how he got a $50K deal for a song he wrote onthe way to a meeting (he’d told them he had a song just for them—he didn’t, hewrote it on the way).

Buthere’s my problem. I’m so NOT the kind of person who says, “For 50 cents youcan feel the hollowpoint rifle bullet my brother shot me with and is now lodgedin my armpit because it would do too much damage to surgically remove.” Nope.So not me. I’m more like, “I don’t know what you’re talking about—my brotherwould never accidently shoot me with a gun—that gauze hanging out of sleeve isfor sweat. I, uh, sweat a lot.” Of course, afterwards I’d have a crisis ofconscience for lying.

Butshyness isn’t my only problem. And I have serious spending money issues. Severalyears ago went we had to buy a new couch (our former one broke into twopieces), Cal actually made the purchase while I did deep breathing exercisesand calming self-talk—“We need a place for people to park their heineys whenthey visit. This purchase cannot be avoided.”

Theproblem with my spending issues is that I apply them to everyone. This is why Inever worked in retail during the summer. This is me working at Belk/Gottchalks/Talbots/etc.“Um, are you sure you can afford the shoes and purse that match that outrageouslyoverpriced dress? Besides, it’ll be out of style in six months.” So I havetrouble asking people to pay for my book. Even if it’s only 99 cents. Okay, Idon’t feel bad asking for 99 cents.

WhatI need is a version of the Dummies book, only this one would be “Book Marketingfor Shy People Who Are Paranoid of Asking People to Spend Their Money onAnything, even on something so valuable that they’ve invested two years of theirlife into it.” Does anyone know about a book like that? And if you have any shy,non-aggressive person suggestions, I’m all over that.

N.B.For other who are in the same boat as I am. Here’s what I’ve done so far: book blogreviews, author interviews, book features, submitted my book to differente-book review sites, posters, GoodReads, Shelfari, Twitter, Facebook, inkPageant,and I run two blogs. I’d love to hear what you’ve done. I’m actually joining awriters’ marketing group associated with a local writers’ guild. So check backbecause I’ll share what I learn—we’re all in this together.

The Disappeared

2012-01-09T08:11:00.003-05:00

Everyoneknows that socks disappear. You can fight it, and for a while I did. I found it an affront to myideals of frugality and housekeeping. Eventually, I realized that sock loss isnot a reflection on me personally, but the result of theft by the sock gnome.What a relief.

However,it didn't end with socks. The gnome moved on to pillowcases. At first,it was one embroidered pillowcase. Not one I embroidered by hand, but a machineembroidered one that came with our sheets. Of course, this wasn’t just any sheetset. This set was a gift. The uber expensive kind made of long cotton fiberswith thread counts in the thousands. The kind of fabric that when your facetouches the pillowcase and is nestled by cloud of fabric perfection, you’resure your wrinkles will disappear over night. At any rate, when that pillowcasedisappeared, I dug one out of the linen cupboard and gave it to Calvin. (Helooks great with wrinkles.)

Ifthe pillowcase theft had ended there, I would’ve let things be. But it didn’t. A plaid flannel case from our winter sheets turned up missing. I assumedit would show up. After all, we have six people folding laundry, so things get mixed up. Some of it purposely. I’ve heard one son yell at another, “Haha, notfunny. Come and get this bra thing and put it in the right bedroom.”

Butthen, came the final affront. Two pillowcases disappeared in the same day. Onewas plaid flannel and the other a gorgeous hand-embroidered one. I’d put themin the washer. I did not, however, take them out of the dryer—some minion did. Andthe minion disavowed all knowledge of them.

Thiscalled for war. I scoured the house looking for them. I moved furniture. Ichecked dresser drawers. I hunted through linen cupboards and bathroom cabinets. I checked behind and underthe washer and dryer. I interrogated each and every member of the Kellerfamily. All to no avail. Though Ariel suggested that I’m the real culprit.I have a history of sleep walking, and she decided that I’m so stressed aboutthe pillowcases that I get up during the night and hide them. But thatI can’t remember in the morning. I pondered that cheeky suggestion for half asecond, pronounced it, “Rubbish.”

It’s been two weeks and the pillowcases have notshown up. I’ve concluded that sock gnome has moved to a whole new level ofevil. Hand-embroidered pillowcases. Maybe it’s a sign of the economy—socks aren’tworth what they used to be. Has anyone else noticed sock gnomes stealing abovetheir station? And does anyone know where I can get a good gnome trap?

Having A Writing Affair

2012-01-06T08:42:00.002-05:00

WhenI was studying fiction writing with Mary Morris, she said, “Writing a shortstory is like having an affair. Writing a novel is a marriage.”

It’san interesting analogy. A novel is a huge commitment is terms of time—at least,a year. (Unless you’re a speed writer—if you are, I hate you. Sorry. It’snothing personal.) Writing a novel is a promise to be there and deal with thegood, the bad, and downright ugly. It’s reaching down inside yourself even whenyou want to have a pity party because you’re blocked/tired/afraid/hate yourcharacters/etc. On the other hand, the pay-off is amazing. To complete a novelis a feat in itself. Most people who begin never finish because it’s reallyhard to organize/balance plots, subplots, character development, themes, etc.It can be demoralizing and exhausting.

That’swhere the short story comes in. The short is all the passion of writing andediting in a hot and heavy couple of months. (Okay, I have a couple of shortsthat I’ve been working on for years, but mostly they don’t take too long.) Youget to love ’em and leave ’em. “It was nice while it lasted, baby.”

WhenI finished an edit of the Screwing UpTime sequel and gave it to my first beta, I decided I needed a writingaffair. So I’m writing a short story that occurs between books one and two ofthe series. And I’m having a great time. I needed this writing fling. When it’sover, I’m getting back to the novel marriage.

Sohow many of you writers out there have had a writing fling? It might be justwhat you need to get you through the novel you’re working on.

Don't Take the Ambulance

2012-01-04T09:16:00.000-05:00

It’sa little late, but Happy New Year. I’d planned to post on Monday, but I was atthe hospital Sunday night through Monday morning with an elderly family memberwho is fine now.

Idid learn one very important thing Sunday night. Don’t take the ambulance. Whenwe called 911, the fire fighters arrived first. They were courteous, eager tohelp, and professional. Then the EMS people came. Actually, they didn’t. Wewaited and waited and waited. (The fire fighters were volunteers, who were homewith their families, got the call, met at the station, and came out. So a chunkof time was involved.) And still we waited for the ambulance. Turns out thatthey got lost. M’kay...this does not bode well.

Myrelative needed to be carried to the stretcher. EMS1 told the fire fighters tohelp his partner—he didn’t want to get dirty. His partner EMS2 was not happy,and yelled. (The fire fighters picked up the patient without rolling theireyes. Very impressive.)

EMS1mumbled that he needed to check the patient’s blood glucose, but he couldn’tfind his glucometer. He checked every cupboard in the ambulance. But it wasn’t there.He asked the fire fighters if he can borrow theirs. They told him that they don’tcarry one. (I’m not sure why he thought they would—fires don’t usually needtheir glucose levels monitored.)

Iwas asked to ride in the ambulance because my relative doesn’t speak Englishvery well anymore. That was fine. Then, EMS2 asked the fire fighters if shecould follow them, so she wouldn’t get lost. The fire fighters said, “Okay.”

Onthe drive, the ambulance driver EMS2 picked up her cellphone and made a phone call.EMS1 rebuked her—they could get in a lot of trouble for that. EMS1 got hot andturned on the air conditioning. My relative complained that she was very cold.I told the EMS guy, who put a thin blanket on her. It didn’t help. After I toldEMS1 three times that she was very cold, he finally sighed and turned off theAC. Then my relative complained of nausea. EMS1 handed me a barf bag and toldme to take care of her—he didn’t like vomit. At this point, I consideredadvising him to find a new job. But I didn’t.

Thankfully,we made it to the hospital. Though things didn’t fair much better there. Whilemy relative did receive very good medical care at the hospital, they lost herglasses, hearing aids, dentures, and medications (all things that they told uswe had to leave with my relative when she was admitted).

The morale of the story is don’t call theambulance, get someone to drive you to the hospital. Okay, that’s probably notwise. I’m sure that most EMS workers are conscientious, knowledgeable, and competent.Here’s a better morale: If the ambulance takes more than thirty minutes to showup, it’s probably better if you don’t wait any longer and drive yourself.

Grammar Wars

2011-12-30T09:17:00.001-05:00

Grammaris changing. And it’s not just the Oxford comma (which you can pry from my workover my cold dead body). Scads of commas are disappearing from usage. Lately, I’veseen Saturday December 31 everywhere. (It makes me want to grab a sharpie and addthe comma between Saturday and December.) And then there are dialogue commas: “Aren’tyou hungry Bob?” (Beep! Noun of direct address alert.) And what aboutinterrupters like “however, of course, etc.” that aren’t offset with commas? Iwant to smack the advertisers/writers over the head with The Chicago Manual of Style.

Inthe last year or so, I started seeing these grammar faux pas more and more, even in books published by the big threehouses. And a niggling suspicion started. So I asked a fellow grammar lover whoalso has been writing for a big six publisher for years about the grammar “mistakes.”She confirmed my suspicions, style sheets* were changing.

Iwant to rage against texting and ignorance, and I want to extol the importanceof semi-colons. And not because I’m some Luddite grammar freak (which may betrue, but isn’t the point). Good grammar promotes readability. And clarity. Andshades of meaning. And will keep the zombie apocalypse at bay. (Oops, that wasa little over the top. Sorry.)

Anyway,I’m thinking of starting The Grammar Board. It’ll be like the languageacademies that promote linguistic purity, but we’ll guard grammar purity...Except part of the reason I like English is its fluidity of expression, the wayit responds to culture and change. Hmm. Maybe I’ll just stick to writing whineyblog posts.

*If you’re not familiar with style sheets, they’re “sheets”(booklets) that many publishers/newspapers/magazines give to their authors tokeep the grammar (sometimes even politically charged word choice) consistent throughouttheir publication.

Writer's Fix

2011-12-28T08:26:00.000-05:00

I don't have a real post for you today. I'm staring down the end of the first big edit to the sequel of Screwing Up Time. Nineteen single-spaced pages left. My goal is to get this edit finished before the new year. I'm not sure if I can do it because we're actually on vacation. And today is my birthday. But I'm still planning to edit--I'm a writer, it's what I do. Besides if I don't get some writing done, I develop a nervous tick. So, back away from the writer in the bubble and let her get her editing fix.

The Mystery of Reading

2011-12-26T09:01:00.000-05:00

Inour house, we have readers. They fall into two categories. First, we have the I’ll-read-books-in-any-format-currently available—iPod, Kindle, hardback, or loose leafpaper. And we have the you-can-have-my-hardbacks-when-you-pry-them-from-my-cold-dead-fingers readers. I used to be the latter. I love to hear the crack of aspine when a book is opened for the first time. I love the scent of the bindingglue. And I love the feel of crisp paper under my fingertips. I love all those sensory experiences. A lot of people do, which is why hardbacks will never die.

Bute-readers have a mystique that can’t be denied. There’s no sensory attraction;no bookish smell, no crisp feel, no sounds. But I can carry a whole library inmy purse. I can still underline and take notes. I can adjust the font for myaging eyes. I can read on the treadmill without using rubberbands andpaperclips. (Yes, I used to attract stares at the gym.) I can read books byauthors whose novels are great, but couldn’t find a home with the big three houses(publishers).

However,none of those things are really the point. The reason I love my e-reader is thesame reason I love printed books. It’s not the medium. About thirty secondsinto reading, I don’t even know whether I’m turning a pages or pressing abutton. Instead, I’m fencing a rogue, hunting a killer, or flirting with Mr.Darcy. (Sorry, Cal, but every woman flirts with Mr. Darcy.) And that’s one ofthe real reasons that people read. We travel through time and space to beanother person, to think other thoughts, to be brave against all odds, and to feelother people’s pain and joy. That’s the part of reading that will never change.It’s why reading and writing will never die.

Rumpelstiltskin

2011-12-23T10:55:00.002-05:00

Earlier this week my son Matthew got a Winter White hamster, whom he named Rumpelstiltskin. He's the cutest, friendliest ball of white fur. He has one fault. He's an escape artist.

He escaped from his cage early this week. And while we weren't able to find him, it was okay because he got bored and climbed back into his cage while we were searching for him.

This morning he disappeared again. And so we built a cute ramp leading up to his cage with raisins on it. But he hasn't turned up yet. Thankfully, we don't have to worry about Jezebel (our black Lab)--she doesn't like hamster snacks. Though I do wish she'd sniff him out for us, but she's already met Rumpel and thinks he's beneath her attention.

So our wish for Christmas is to find Rumpelstiltskin.

Baking Day?

2011-12-21T08:31:00.000-05:00

AsI troll my favorite blogs, I see beautiful photos of Christmas cookies. Exoticethnic cookies. Decorated gingerbread men. Or cookies filled with nuts or jam.

Ilook at the cookies and feel guilty. I haven’t baked a single cookie. I don’tfeel sorry for myself, I don’t really like cookies. (I know, everyone tells meI’m crazed.) But I only eat cookies to be polite. The only sweet I eat withregularity is dark chocolate—but that’s not really a sweet, it’s a fourth foodgroup.

ButI feel guilty because my kids have no cookies. Shouldn’t they be indulging incookies during Christmas break?

Ican make ethnic cookies. I have a stroopwaffle-izer. Of course, the last time Iused it, I had to reset the circuit breakers for the entire house. The electriccookie press was from the Netherlands and the person who rewired it for UScurrent obviously made a mistake.

Iwon’t be making gingerbread because I hate it. It tastes too much likemolasses.

That leaves the cookies filled with nuts or jam.I don’t understand the jam thing. I mean, the bright red jam makes the cookielook pretty, but then it tastes like toast. No jam cookies. Nut cookies. Yeah,I could do those. When I was a kid my mom used to make Russian teacakes everyChristmas. I suppose I could do those. Or I could assign one of my four minionsto make them. Yeah, I could get “good mom” points without having to bake. Timeto rally the minions!

Did I feed the dog?

2011-12-19T07:00:00.000-05:00

Justso you know, never plan family surgeries back to back to back. And never dothem just after you finish several weeks of chicken pox. Because if you didthat, afterwards you’d be drooling on yourself.

Inall fairness, I didn’t plan them. They were scheduled for me. But I was sillyenough to think, “At least, we’ll get it all taken care of all at once.” Afterall, it’s just some down time and TLC afterwards. We could handle that.

ButI forgot to consider that there might be the possibility of multiple specialdiets. I already have a child with a gluten-free, casein-free diet. Then addliquid diet. And a high fiber diet. And you end up with three people, none ofwhom can eat the same food. I spent a lot of time cooking. And I was tired, sothings got confused. Like the blender whose motor I almost burned out makingthe smoothies with too many frozen strawberries. Or that batch of homemadecream of potato soup that I put in Tupperware and left on a hot stove. Itdidn’t fair well.

ButI was over tired for a reason. Both post-surgical sufferees were on heavy dutynarcotics, but not on the same dosage schedule. It wasn’t a big deal during theday, but nighttime was a different story. Especially when I realized that heavynarcotics don’t allow the proper decision making capabilities.

Me:Okay, here’s a list of your medicines and when you have to take them. See? Soyou need to take the Vicodin now.

Sufferee:Uh, did I just take it? Or do I still need to take it?

Me(realizing sufferee had narcotics brain): Right. Why don’t I be in charge ofyour meds?

SoCal and I are tired from getting up during the middle of the night for thefirst couple of days to prevent the sufferees from overdosing on narcotics. Ofcourse, I realized the kids would have medicines, but I didn’t think one wouldhave six and the other four. Managing ten medicines takes a spread sheet. (Anotherreason the person on Vicodin could not figure out what to take when.)

But I think we’re through the worst of it now.And no one has any lasting damage. Except maybe the dog. Though she’s notcomplaining. I suspect she whined her way into multiple meals—when you’retired, you can’t remember if you fed the dog.

Mason-Dixon Shopping Redux

2011-12-16T08:47:00.000-05:00

Today I's participating in Blog Deja Vu. (We repost a blog from years ago.) I've decided to repost a blog I wrote it almost three years ago because it's gotten a tons of pageviews over the last couple of years. I hope you enjoy it.

Last night at a New Year’s Party, one of the guests was from Scotland. And since it’s always fun to listen to someone with a cool accent, lots of discussion ensued. At one point, someone marveled to me about how large the United States is and how similar the people of each state are to each other. That got me to thinking. Granted the difference between each state is minimal compared to say the difference between Germany and France, especially in language. (Though I will point out that when I was a child living in a small town in Georgia and then moved to Hawaii where some people spoke pidgin English, I could've been in a foreign country—I couldn’t understand a word some of my classmates said. That’s where I developed a “polite I-have-no-idea-what-you-are-talking-about smile,” which has served me well as a pastor’s wife.) But, back to the issue. In order for someone to say there isn’t too much difference between states, they clearly have not recently moved from New England to the South.

There are so many differences that this might be a recurring blog theme. But the first topic is: Shopping. When we first moved here and walked in to the local grocery store, the cashier called out, “Good Morning!” My son Luke turned to me and said, “Why is that lady talking to us—we don’t know her.” I said, “I think she’s being friendly.” Luke looked suspicious; he didn’t believe me.

But it’s not just the friendliness. Once when I was in the local Connecticut Walmart, I found a coffee maker that had all the important features—it could make coffee and wasn’t too expensive. But, there weren’t any coffee makers in boxes, only the model on the shelf. So, I tracked down a saleswoman and asked her if she could find out if there were any extras “in the back” or if I could buy the floor model. She nodded and made other noises and gestures to indicate she understood my request. Then, we waited. We contemplated the floor. We studied the other coffee makers, toasters, waffle irons, and long metal sticks with whips on the end whose function we didn’t quite fathom. Then, the kids decided that since there was nothing better to do, they’d play tag. Not good. So Cal took them on a tour of the store. By the way, if you don’t already know, kids do not enjoy a tour of Walmart. And still, I waited.

After the tour was finished, I decided to “find” the salesgirl. I was a woman with a mission. I drew up my mental picture and hunted her down. And I found her. Before I came in for the kill, she must have had some primal instinct to turn and she did. She saw me—and took off running. Yes, as my kids can verify, the salesgirl ran away from me. Foolish girl. I’ve been running since I was 14, which is many, many years ago. If I’ve been running through four kids and a fortieth birthday, I can catch anything. When I had her cornered, she shrugged, gesticulated, and made vaguely hostile guttural noises that meant, “This is a bad day for me, go find your own stupid coffee maker.”

Fast forward to the South. I’m at BiLo, the local grocery store that (despite the “lo” in their name) charges way too much but is close to my house so I shop there anyway. I am buying yogurt-vanilla handsoap for the church bathrooms.
The cashier, handling the soap container, says: “Umm, umm, I love the smell of vanilla. Honey, does this soap smell good?”
Me: “Uh, I don’t know.” So, I unscrew the top and take a deep whiff. “Yeah, it does.” I hand the open bottle to the cashier. (Don’t forget there’s a long line of people behind me with whom I am trying very hard not to make eye contact.)
Cashier: “Oh, this does smell good.”
Me: “And it’s on sale.” Oops, I’ve now involved her in conversation—this is going to take a while. The people behind me now hate me.
Cashier: “How much is it?”
Me: “Uh, I don’t know.” She takes the receipt.
Cashier: “That is a good price. I’m gonna have to get me some of that.”
Me: Trying to avoid the gaze of people behind me who surely must be wishing instant death on me for taking so much time, “Yeah, that would be a great idea.”
Cashier: “Y’all have a great day, baby.”
Me: Though I am sure there’s only one of me and that I am not her infant, I say, “Thanks. You too.” At this point, as I gather up my things, I cast a furtive glance over my shoulder at the long line. Each and every person is completely unconcerned by my long conversation with the cashier. They are in contemplation mode, and even one lady may be vaguely irritated that she now can’t finish the People magazine article on Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie.

On my way to the car, I ponder their patience. If I’d been in line behind a chatty soap buyer I would have been tapping my foot, making guttural noises and thinking, “Buy your soap and get on with it. I have things to do.” And Ariel would have said her standard, “Be patient, Mom. This is the South.”

I guess I’ve got a lot more New England (or maybe it’s the Dutch “use each and every minute effectively”) in me than I thought.

So it's been three years. And do I like shopping in the South? Ninety percent of the time, yes. I love that the pharmacist knows me by name and asks about the kids. I love that he looks over the prescription and says, "Honey, you don't want to be spending $350 on this prescription. You call your doctor back and tell him you want a prescription for medicine A and medicine B--they'll do the same thing and only cost you $18." And he's right.

And the other 10% of the time when I'm in a big hurry and the person ahead of me in line is recounting her third cousin's surgery for a hangnail...then I take a deep breath and try to avoid muttering imprecations. I tell myself that it's a good time to work on the plot of my next book. And if that doesn't work, I can always try to cultivate an interest in the latest People magazine. Now I finally understand why the magazine are in the checkout line. I thought it was for impulse buys, but they're really for Southerns who are waiting in line.

A Weird Al Treat

2011-12-14T07:00:00.000-05:00

Today's the last surgery day this week. (My mom's surgery went well. And Ariel's recovering--though pain management issues made multiple trips to the pharmacy necessary.) We have to be at the hospital at 5:30am for Luke, so once again I don't have an exciting blog post. But I do have a treat. If you're my age, you may remember Weird Al. If you don't, you're in for a treat. Enjoy!

Cello Wars

2011-12-12T09:16:00.001-05:00

With the surgeries all starting today (we found out that two friends in the area are also having surgery this week), I don't have time to write a regular blog post. But I did want to leave you with something to enjoy.

Embroidery

2011-12-09T08:40:00.001-05:00

Today's blog post is short. I have one million and one things to do today. And I can't really procrastinate on any of them because next week is really crazy. Next Monday my mom (who lives in the area) is having part of her spine fused. On Tuesday my daughter is having all four of her wisdom teeth removed. On Wednesday my son is having surgery on his tailbone to remove a cyst.

The most exciting thing today is that it's my grandmother her 93rd birthday. I embroidered pillowcases for her.

Okay, so the lighting's not great--the pillowcases do match. As I was working on these, my daughter fell in love with embroidered pillowcase when she saw these. I let her pick out a set that I'll make for her birthday. After I bought the set she liked, I noticed that they were really complicated. I've never even heard of some of the stitches involved. I guess it's a good thing that her birthday is in April.

Milk Cartons & the End of Western Civilization

2011-12-07T08:41:00.001-05:00

Ithink there’s a serious flaw in our college system. Especially in engineeringdepartments. I think the accreditation boards need to get involved. Where arethe good old days when engineers knew how to design a functional Christmas treestand that didn’t need a dipstick (see here)? Or city storm drains that don’tflood our street? I could see an occasional design flaw. But lately everything hasthem. Even milk jugs. It used to be that milk came in waxed cardboardcontainers with spouts that folded out. You could pour milk without spilling asingle droplet. Then, came the big plastic gallon containers. They weren’tquite as good, but with a little care in pouring—no problem. Now my milk comesin plastic rectangles with a rounded opening on a recessed end on the top. And theydon’t work.

Ifyou’ve ever poured milk from one of these monstrosities, you know that it “blubs”milk. No matter where you position your cereal bowl, when you tilt the carton, themilk will splat on the tablecloth. At first, I thought it was me. You know,pre-coffee and pre-cereal I don’t have the best mental function. Then a friendwas at the house and I tipped a new milk carton to fill my creamer—the milkblubbed all over the counter. The woman said, “Don’t you hate that.” And inthat moment, I knew it wasn’t just me.

SoI complained at the Costco where I buy my six gallons of milk a week. (Thecheckout person always asks me if I’m a cheese maker. I say, “I have fouradult/teenage kids.”) Anyway, the Costco manager explained that the weirdcontainers save money because they ship better. He seems to be missing thepoint that at my house they lose my money—every time I open a container, 20cents of milk ends up wasted and I have to wash a tablecloth. He didn’t seem tobe concerned.

Butthis is my worry, a culture who can’t engineer a working milk container willprobably never be able to put a man on the moon again. Sigh. The end of Westerncivilization as we know it.

But maybe this post will make a difference andengineering schools will teach their students “Milk Carton Design.” In themeantime, I take off the tablecloth for breakfast.

A Dray of Walters

2011-12-05T07:45:00.001-05:00

Youmay remember Walter (here and here), the brilliant squirrel who lived in the attic and eluded capturefor weeks. But after great gnashing of teeth, we caught him and dropped him offin the wilds of Georgia. In fact whenever we pass the huge oak tree where Cal droppedWalter off, we shout, “Hey, Walter!” That should be the end of the story. Butit’s not.

Theother day Cal and I heard a party going on in the attic. Not just a squirrel runningalong the rafters. We heard a squirrel rave going on. I’m pretty sure they evenhad a mosh pit. Cal sighed heavily and went up to take a look. After he pulledhimself into the attic (remember we have no ladder, it’s just an angledpassageway that looks exactly like a laundry chute), Cal discovered a dray ofsquirrels. (Yes, I looked “dray” up.) They were partying. Cal yelled at them.They scampered, mocking him with their squeaks. He drove them from the attic.They jumped from the attic vent onto the garden window and to the ground. I wasin the kitchen at the time, not realizing what was going on, and it seemed likeit was raining squirrels.

Ofcourse, chasing out squirrels in an attic with no subflooring of any kindcarries some risk—those two by fours are only two inches wide. Cal fell.Thankfully, he only got a face-full of cellulose insulation. One of mynightmares is that Cal falls through the ceiling and takes the ten foot plungeto the floor. That didn’t happen, but we do have a convex handprint in my officenow.

Calfinally solved the problem by covering the attic vents with plywood screwedinto the frame of the vents. (We have peak vents now, so the old ones aren’t necessary).Cal discovered that Walter’s buddies had cleverly chewed the vent edges in waysthat weren’t visible unless you knew where they were.

Problem solved. Except not. There’s anothersquirrel in the attic. We don’t know if he’s stuck in there or if there’sanother entrance. So Cal will put the trap up there today. Hopefully we’llcatch Walter’s friend and then drop him off at the old oak tree. Of course, ifthat doesn’t work and there’s another entrance, we could cede the attic to thesquirrels and make an Allstate commercial.

Spreading Immunity to the Community

2011-12-02T07:00:00.000-05:00

December 3 is a highlighted day on my calendar. First, because it’s my son Luke’s 21^st birthday. Yay, Luke! *Throws confetti* But the third is also special because it’s the very last day of the incubation period for chicken pox. Our youngest Matthew had chicken pox a couple of weeks ago.

December 3 was so near that I stopped thinking of chicken pox as a possibility. After all, all the kids had the CP vaccine and all four had CP about 12 years ago. Then, yesterday Ariel showed me her arm. And I saw the spots. Then, she showed me her stomach and her back. And I couldn’t deny it. MORE POX. And then Jacob showed me his stomach and his back. EVEN MORE POX.

When I announced the scourge, Luke fogged the house with Lysol (he’s now the only one of the kids who’s still CP-free). Matthew is concerned that he’s going to get shingles, I’ve explained that having had CP two weeks ago probably would protect him from shingles, but he still carries the bottle of Lysol and sprays every surface that comes into contact with Jacob or Ariel. The scent of Lysol is so strong in the house that I can taste it. Ugh.

What makes this even worse is that both Jacob and Ariel have finals next week. Jake went to class today—he had an assignment due. Ariel emailed her prof and mentioned the CP. I was sure the prof would say, “Don’t come to class.” But her prof emailed back, “I hope you feel better soon. I’ll see you tomorrow at class for the exam.” Um, hello? Can you say contagious disease? I’m sure Ariel’s fellow students were not pleased to see her spotted face. Personally, I belong to the quarantine school of CP containment. But I have a pediatrician whose motto was “You’re just spreading immunity to the community.” Yeah, us and Typhoid Mary.

Medusa's Come to Call

2011-11-30T08:24:00.001-05:00

Todayis the last day of November. How did that happen? November can’t be over. Allof the things that have to get done before Christmas aren’t.

Ido have the Christmas photo done. But my Christmas letter sucks. I have threedecent paragraphs in the whole letter. I’ve been waiting for the beautiful museof writerly inspiration—her name is Calliope. I think she's visiting Steven King. So the only Greek available to help me was Medusa—and she turned my prose into stone.

Ihaven’t bought Christmas presents for anyone. My daughter is almost done withher Christmas shopping. Even my husband is done with his shopping—though thathardly counts—he buys one gift, mine. And I buy the gifts for everyone else.

Nowbefore you remind me that there are twenty-five days left until Christmas, Ihave to tell you that we have three surgeries before X-mas. My mom’s, my son’s,and my daughter’s. And don’t forget the pre-op visits. So my days are limited.

Andeven worse, I promised my kids that I’d have the first draft of my sequel to Screwing Up Time ready to be read byX-mas break. Break starts next week Friday and I’m only halfway. Plus, I’m notone of those writers who can work for 48 hours straight, surviving on coffee,Red Bull, and M&Ms. I’m usually drooling after I finish editing onechapter. (I think this makes me really bad, but I’m figuring that I can editwhile I do my motherly post-operative comforting.)

Oh, well, time to pour some brandy on the fruitcake. And spike the eggnog.

Holiday Overview

2011-11-28T08:29:00.001-05:00

Thanksgiving didn't happen quite like we planned. My mom ended up with a badly pinched nerve in her neck, so we hosted Thanksgiving dinner at our house. The kids all pitched in, and it was wonderful. (Can you believe that while I was at the gym on Wednesday, the kids started doing the things on my To-Do List?) First, thing they did was straighten the Christmas tree.

Ariel got out all the linens, china, crystal and silver. Here's a photo of the table she set.

Then on Friday after everything was put away, and Ariel and I finished shopping. (I got a beautiful pair of $70 black leather pumps for $19--now I don't have to wear the hand-me-downs that are a half size too small. That's really my own fault, I'm too cheap to buy anything not drastically reduced and I haven't been able to find anything at the thrift store.) Anyway, after all that, the kids decorated the Christmas tree. Matt made spiced cider from scratch, it even had thin slices of lemon floating on top. Jacob did the lights--the tree looks like it's light from inside. Ariel sort and organized all the ornaments. And then the kids put them on. Cal and I sat on the couch and sipped cider. (Though he did make comments asking why it took them so long to do it--he's not used to sitting down and doing nothing.)

Here's the finished product. (And we didn't have to buy garland or ornaments despite the tree's 9+ height. Yay!)

I'm trying not to ponder the fact that in a couple of years, Cal and I will be doing all this alone again. Why is it that when kids finally become useful, they grow and move away?

Early Christmas "Cheer"

2011-11-21T07:32:00.001-05:00

OnSaturday we got our Christmas tree. (We bought a tree early because it was afundraising event for a crisis pregnancy center.) The tree was supposed to be 6ft. tall. I would’ve been happy with a 5 ft. tree, but with ten footceilings...it looks kind of dumb. So we ordered the 6 ft. tree. They must’verun out of 6 ft. trees. This tree is at least 9 feet tall, maybe more. It takesup half our living room. Okay, a quarter. And it didn’t fit into our old treestand. So we bought a new tree stand. Old stand was easy to fill with water,new stand is not. New stand was created by an engineer who was a Grinch andhe’s laughing all the way to the bank. With new stand, you can’t tell how muchwater is in the stand because the stand is so deep. It should have come with adipstick. Instead, you fill up the stand and water drips out the screwholes—there are eight screw holes. I’ve tried sticking my hand into the treestand and feeling where the water is, but the girth of the tree forbids access.Not to mention that it’s just too deep—my hands are long and skinny, so if Ican’t get my hands in there, no one is. So I mop up the dripping water everyfifteen minutes.

Ofcourse, the tree itself is gorgeous. It looks like something out of a movieset—full, perfectly balanced. (It’s leaning a bit, but that’s because we’re abit frustrated with the stand and the eight adjustable screws.) Eventually, thetree will be fixed. We have too many “picture straighteners” living in our homefor the tree to stay tilted.

Theother problem with the tree is that Luke started sneezing when we brought ithome. He’s kind of been sneezing non-stop since Saturday. Yesterday when he wasplaying piano he was rubbing his eyes between verses. But before you say treeallergy, I don’t think it’s the tree. Luke doesn’t have pollen allergies. He’sallergic to molds. I’m sure the tree is covered with molds (most trees are).This means that today I get to spray the tree down with Lysol. I wonder if theymake Christmas tree scented Lysol.

Thetree is still undecorated. I am not an eager decorator. It’s even worse becausethere’s no way we have enough lights, garland, balls to cover a tree of thismagnitude. Even if we don’t decorate the back side.

I’mbeginning to think that maybe I’ll drop the hint that we should skip the tree thingnext year. But then I’d be known as a Grinch for the rest of my natural life.

Child1: “Do you remember back in 2012 when Mom didn’t want to put up a tree?”

Child2: “Sad, really. She’d been such a nice mother up to that point.”

Child3: “Though there was the time when she made us scrub the sidewalk...”

Butthat’s another story.

Chicken Pox

2011-11-18T08:01:00.001-05:00

WednesdayMatthew said to me, “Mom, would you look at my back. I’ve got all these itchypimples.” At the words “itchy pimples,” a muscle in my face twitched. A shudderwent down my spine. And a voice in my head said, “Oh, no.”

Isaid, “Let me see, Matt.” So he lifted up his shirt. And my suspicions wereconfirmed. “Matt, sweetie, those aren’t itchy pimples. Those are chicken pox.”My fifteen year old son, who has had the chicken pox vaccine AND who hadchicken pox twelve years ago, has CP again! This is NOT supposed to happen.

Luke,Ariel, and Jacob all expressed their disapprobation in varying ways as theycontemplated the possibility of getting chicken pox before/during finals. Tokeep the peace, every surface of the house has been sanitized and Matt has beenbanished to our bedroom though everyone realizes that they’ve already beenexposed.

Matt, who now has pox everywhere, is getting by on Benadryl, oatmeal baths, hydrocortisone, books and movies. Hisplan is to watch the entire extended version of the Lord of the Rings. In the meantime, we’re all scrutinizing everyred dot/spot that shows up on our skin.

Incubationis 10 to 21 days. So if we don’t get the pox by December 8, the last day of finals,we should be good to go for the rest of the holidays. If I don’t comment on alot of your blogs in the next month or so, you’ll know why—we’ll be having aJolly Spotted Christmas.

(Note:If you’ve been waiting to buy Screwing UpTime, now’s the time. I’ve put it on sale for 99 cents for the holidays.)

And here’s something fun. "Christmas Can-Can." Give it a moment--it starts kind of slow.

Monsters

2011-11-16T08:43:00.001-05:00

Yesterdaywe were streaming a tv show and a Lady Gaga advertisement came up. Now I don’tknow much about Lady Gaga other than her meat dress, which was really gross andmortally offended all my veggie friends. I mean seriously—wearing meat? Nowonder no one wanted to sit next to her. Anyway, this isn’t about her clothing.She had some kind of Tweet going about all her little monsters and she was Mamamonster, etc. It was a Gaga celebration of life thing, but it got me thinkingabout monsters, especially since the show we were streaming was Grimm.

Oneof the things I like about Grimm isthat the monsters are really monster-y. Monsters should be scary. That’s kindof the point. In Grimm, even thebeautiful women who turn out to be monsters are hideous looking—the prettyblonde is an uber-creepy hexabeast. Have you ever noticed that many times gorgeousmen/women become attractive monsters? A kind of that Disney Beauty and the Beast approach. The beastisn’t ugly; his only negative features are his animal ears (which are cute in apuppyish way) and long fingernails. His grotesquery is something that a goodshave, mani/pedi, and, okay, a nose/snout plastic surgery session could cure.

Maybehandsome/beautiful monsters are supposed to appeal to the rebel in us, whowants to fall in love with the bad boy/bad girl monster. (The bad boy neverappealed to me, I’m too much of a realist—can you see a bad boy rocking apuking baby at 2am?) At any rate, the handsome bad boy could be a marketingthing, or maybe it’s a vanity thing and the actor/actress said, “I’m not goingon stage looking like that.” In any case, I prefer my monsters scary. Whatabout you?

Allergies

2011-11-14T08:41:00.001-05:00

I’vedecided that allergies are a hoax. They’re real enough—just ask Calvin. Thispast week, I’ve been waking up sneezing during the middle of the night. I sneezefor about an hour, then sniffle for thirty minutes more before I can go back tosleep. Of course, this isn’t a new experience for me—I’ve been doing theallergy merry-go-round for years. It started with the fun allergy tests. Whichconsisted of “Excuse me, nurse, um, that little red mark has now spread up myforearm past my elbow and is heading for my shoulder.” The nurse made a squeakynoise and slathered me in Benadryl. Afterwards my allergist has explained thatI’m allergic to dust mites, birds, cats, dogs, horses, mold, mildew, kapok, etc.,etc. (Kapok? Really?)

Myallergist gave me all kinds of meds. BTW, I can’t take decongestants. (Thedoctor discovered this when my heart was beating so fast it couldn’t get enoughoxygen—who knew that could happen?) Then he prescribed the inevitable topical steroids.After a couple of weeks, he said, “Why aren’t these working?” I was thinking,silly me, “You graduated from Yale Medical School, so maybe you should know.”My allergist visits were also punctuated by the allergist pressing on my faceor thwunking it with his finger and saying, “Aren’t you sure this doesn’t hurt?”Yep—no pain. (Unless you count the bruises from the thwunking.) After multiple painlessthwunkings, he ordered a CT scan. Guess what? No frontal sinuses, whichexplained the painless face issue.

Thenwe did allergy shots for a year. After the 365 days, the allergist said, “Thisisn’t working.” Yeah, I sort of guessed that since I was still sneezing all thetime. Eventually, he gave me more meds and called me “the walking sedated.” Healso told me that I should avoid all allergy triggers from dust mites to moldto birds—basically, I need to live in a sterile bubble.

But I’m beginning to think that contrary to allmedical knowledge, allergies aren’t really the body’s immunologicaloverreaction to stimuli. Nope. I’ve narrowed it down to two possibilities. One,a hybrid virus developed by pharmaceutical companies to increase their profitmargins. Or two, my favorite explanation for unexplainable things, allergiesare a sign of the coming zombie apocalypse. I’m pretty sure it’s number two. (I'm pretty sure the CDC would agree. Check their website for their zombie apocalypse preparedness novella.)

Head in a Bag Plot Device

2011-11-11T08:32:00.001-05:00

Didthe title get you? Yes, this blog post is about the infamous head-in-a-bag plotdevice. But first, a foray into literary theory. (Sorry, I have to find somekind of use for those college classes. But I promise it will be brief and fun—whichis not a use of irony.)

Anyway,lit crit folks have an idea that only a handful of stories exist and moststories, no matter how dissimilar, can be boiled down to one of these “genres.”Allow me to oversimplify with a couple of examples. Greeks thought stories wereeither comedies (ends in a wedding) or tragedy (ends in a death). HenceShakespeare’s works are divided into Comedy and Tragedy (and, of course, “histories,”but if Richard the Third isn’t atragedy, what is?) Detective/murder mysteries are viewed as modern versions ofthe quest epic.

Soif all stories fit into just a couple of categories, how do we keep itinteresting? That is in the telling. (Enter head-in-a-bag plot device.) JasperFforde writes the Thursday Next “mysteries.” Thursday is a literarydetective/fixer. (According to Thursday, she actually “repaired” Jane Eyre. In the “original” version,Jane and Mr. Rochester never got together. Thursday almost lost her job overthat fix.) Anyway in Mr. Fforde’s world, characters often try to improve theirnovels by buying plot devices. One character, who is afraid that his novel maybe shredded, goes to the plot device store to buy a plot device.The-head-in-bag device is on sale because, you know, it’s been so overdone, sothere’s not a lot of demand. A couple of months ago, I saw an episode of Castle. Guess what? It had the head-in-bag.But the writers made it fresh. (It was a mediocre episode, but still it was thehead-in-a-bag. And my kids yelled, “No way, the head-in-bag plot device!”) Inthe episode, the dead man had his head stolen and stuffed in “cryogenic headcontainer.” The “bad guy” claimed it was for cryogenic purposes. But the truthwas that the brain contained evidence of experimental cancer drugs ineffectiveness—whichis a totally overdone plot device—the writers need to go back to the plotdevice store.

Allthat to say, even if there aren’t any new stories, all you need to do is find afresh way of writing it—and avoid the head-in-bag plot device. After all, you canonly toss the bag through the air and say “Heads up” once or twice before isgets lame.

Advertising

2011-11-09T08:49:00.000-05:00

WhenI was in college, class titles were kind of self-explanatory. I took stuff likeRestoration Literature, which was literature of the Restoration period.(Surprise, surprise.) And World Lit was literature of...wait for it...theworld.

Mydaughter (the math major) is registering for classes in spring semester. Andshe’s getting emails from professors about their classes. They explain theclasses they’re teaching. For example, “Non-Linear Operations Research.” The blurb is “using scientific methods to determinethe best way to analyze, operate, and predict (yada, yada, yada).” Then theprofessor listed “celebrated applications” of this type of math study. Celebrated? Really? Does anyonecelebrate math?

Butthere’s more behind these emails. They’re worded like advertisements. Hey, takemy math class, you’ll love it. It’s “celebrated.” I suspect the profs are tryingto make sure that they have enough students for the class. You see, thedepartment rotates professors through the classes that no one wants to teach. Andwho wants to teach remedial math? (Though most of those are taught by gradstudents; Ariel’s friend had a student whine, “You want us to memorize threeformulas?! But that’s too hard.”)

Orperhaps it’s to combat RateMyProfessor.com. Here is a sample of an averageentry of a math professor: Nice guy, who’s really good at math. However, he hasonly a nodding acquaintance with English. The average grade in his class is a30, but it’s okay because at the end he distributes a few good grades just forthe heck of it.

SoI can understand why they’ve resorted to advertising (i.e., propaganda). Maybethe lit departments should consider doing something similar. I can imagine howthey’d advertise Restoration Lit. Instead of “obscure literature written bygiddy royalists who never met a clause they didn’t love,” it would read “forgottenplays and essays by writers who are thrilled to be rid of Milton/Cromwell andare pre-modern precursors to the bawdy situation comedy.” Literature studieswould never be the same.

Let the Holiday Season Begin

2011-11-07T08:28:00.000-05:00

For me the holiday season begins at the end of October when I bake my fruitcake. Before you groan or crack a joke, this is not the doorstop brick that your grandmother used to buy. This is an old Southern Living fruitcake, which is actually called "light." Not because it's low calorie, but because it's less dense--leaving more more for the brandy to soak in. YUM.

I start with this:

And end up with this:

Notice the white cheesecloth, it's there to keep the fruitcake damp with brandy. And it's sealed in a Tupperware container.

In early celebration of the holidays, here a Straight No Chaser song. Who knew that a'capella could be cool?

Writing Style

2011-11-04T10:15:00.002-04:00

Severalwriting friends and I have been discussing writing style. What it is, how itworks, its difference from voice, etc. What precipitated the discussion was I’venoticed that agents who have asked for fulls of my current novel are oftenthose who have asked for fulls of my earlier novels. That might not sound unusual,but the genres I’ve submitted to these agents are very different—young adult,murder mystery, and literary fiction. And it’s over a long period of time, so it’s not as if they remember myname. I’ve been pondering what it is that makes some literary agents consistentlyask for my work and others not. (Note: And these agents are not those who askfor lots of submissions.)

Onewriting friend (Adele) mentioned that she’s always been taught that while voicecan/should change from book to book, style does not. I think she’s right. Maybethat’s how computers identify the authors of those “anonymous” books—they analyzefor style. According to M.H. Abrams (you know you’re a lit fantatic when his Glossary of Literary Terms is at yourfingertips):

“Styleis the manner of linguistic expression in prose or verse—it is how a speaker or writer says whatever itis that he says. The characteristic style of a work or a writer may be analyzedin term of its diction...its sentencestructure and syntax; density and types of its figurative language; pattern ofits rhythm, component sounds, and other formal features, and its rhetoricalaims and devices.”

Isuspect that the reason I’m more “successful” with certain agents is that, likeall readers, agents have certain styles they enjoy reading. And certain onesthat they don’t. That may explain why agents often turn down books that laterend up on the NY Times best seller list. The style just didn’t work for them. AndI guess that’s not surprising since we see this in classics all the time. Some peoplelove James Joyce—though why they do is a mystery to me—and some people love F.Scott Fitzgerald.

Oneof the lessons to take from this (besides that you should query widely) is tokeep records of which agents requested your work—they may be more likely toconsider your next book. It also explains why query letters are so important. I’veheard a lot of writers gripe that query letters are archaic and hard to write.But query letters are an opportunity too. A query letter is your chance tointroduce an agent to your style. It’s a chance to see if your styles willmesh. And you really don’t want an agent who doesn’t “get” your style.

Whatabout you all? What are your thoughts on style? What are your experiencesquerying multiple books—are they similar to mine?

College Football and Embroidery

2011-11-02T09:16:00.002-04:00

Baseballseason is over! Yay! I’m doing the happy dance. Except...now it’s collegefootball season. I really don’t get the whole crazed sports thing. I don’t mindwatching a baseball game now and then. As long as I know a bit about the team.But college football is another beast altogether.

Forexample, last night he watched the last quarter (thankfully, he’s not one ofthose, I have to watch the entire game people—he’s too busy for that) of theNorthern Illinois vs. Toledo game. (It’s not like Cal actually cares abouteither team.)

I asked, “Why are you streaming this game?”

Calsaid, “Because this is the highest scoring game ever in this division.”

Me:“And you care about that?”

Cal:“Yeah, because neither team has a defense to speak of.”

Me:“So you want to watch a lot of losers play football?” Okay, I didn’t actually say that—I thoughtit.

Watchinga game for no reason other than a statistical anomaly, only shows how statisticsobsessed sports is. And obscure stats can make any game seem special. Forexample, “This game has the most punts by a left-footed kicker who’s blind inone eye.” (And yet the earth keeps spinning. Imagine that.)

Caland I have been married 23 years, and I knew this college football thing wascoming. I’ve tried “getting into the game.” I assumed that if I knew enoughabout the game, I’d get involved and interested. Nope. It’s still mind numbing—thoughI did enjoy watching Colt McCoy a season or two back.

I’vetried writing while Cal watches the game, but it’s hard for me to mumbleappropriate words of encouragement/agreement while I’m writing. Cal: “Check outthat running back—both blockers missed him.” Me: (In the midst of rescuing acharacter from destruction) “Oh, that’s too bad. Maybe next time.” Cal: “No,our team just scored.” Me: “What?”

Thisyear I’m doing something different. I bought pillowcases and I’m embroideringthem. (Yes, mom, your years of torture are paying off. My mom was a firmbeliever in the old European training of daughters. I can sew, cross-stitch,embroider, etc. And I know that the tidiness of the back side of the embroideryis as important as the front. My aunt Louisa, who’s a Swiss boarding schoolteacher, used to grade her students on the back of their embroidery as well ason the front. She once gave me a “C.” That’s the last time I ever showed her myembroidery.) Sorry, back to football. Anyway, I’m embroidering.

NowCal and I have the following conversations.

Cal:That coach should’ve called for a time out—that’s rotten clock management.

Me:Yes. I agree. (Holding up my embroidery to his face.) Does that row of satinstitches look even to you?

Cal:Looks great.

Me:You give it an “A,” right?

Cal:Absolutely.

Me (smiling like a Cheshire cat): I love collegefootball.

p.s. Check out this great post on self-promotion by Stina Lindenblatt.

Zombie Pandemic

2011-10-31T09:00:00.003-04:00

Idon’t get the whole zombie fascination. What is it about bloody semi-deadhumans? I mean they’re not really scary—they seem incapable of rationalthought. So even if there was a zombie apocalypse, it doesn’t seem like itwould be too hard to defeat them. Of course, the whole undead-so-you-can’t-kill-themthing does make it a bit hard. But it seems to me that it wouldn’t be too hardto round them up a la the Pied Piper routine and take them out. I’m guessingthat zombies are susceptible to RPGs. Once they are separated from theirentrails, I’m guessing they’re a done deal. (That might be too gory, but I’vegot boys in the house so entrails are a hot topic.)

Jake and Matt are fascinated by zombies. Jakehas made a zombie game, which is actually pretty fun since it’s acompetitive/cooperative game and the only way you can survive the zombieonslaught is to work together. Matt draws murals on our big white board of thezombie apocalypse. Just when I thought my boys were getting too obsessed, the CDC(Centers for Disease Control) put out a Preparedness 101 novella, Zombie Pandemic. Yep, find out how youtoo can survive the Zombie Pandemic. Click here. The art is pretty impressive.

Bomb Threat

2011-10-28T08:48:00.001-04:00

Yesterday,Luke called me from campus and said, “Uh, I don’t know if you’ve heard, but sirensare going off and students are being escorted out of Grote Hall.” It’s the endof midterms, and a midterm cycle can’t be complete without a bomb threat.

Asidefrom the very remote possibility of an actual bomb, the threat is a massive hassle.Grote Hall is the chemistry building, which explains why bomb threats are almostalways centered at Grote. If I were a freshman, I’d want to get out of a chemistryexam too. But the threats play merry heck with our schedules. Luke is afull-time chemistry major with two jobs and research. Ariel is a full-time mathstudent with a job. Jacob is a dual enrollment student taking Calc 2 lectureand lab. For everyone’s schedule to work together, it takes a spreadsheet and acareful car usage study. Thus, when everyone’s schedule gets whacked (they emptybuildings one at a time, and some buildings not all, and no one knows which/when)and the parking lot is off-limits because the bomb dogs are sniffing the cars,it makes my spread sheet irrelevant.

Iget phone calls. “Uh, could you pick me up?” I say, “Sure.” (I think, “Ack! Iwas editing—I’m not going to get this chapter done.”) “Where shall I pick youup?” Adult child, “They’ve closed the road. So I’ll try to get to the corner ofX and Y streets.” After I got to campusand passed the fire trucks, etc., and picked up said child. The child said, “I’mso glad to have a mom who can pick me up. Most students are sitting on thesidewalk, missing work. Thanks.” And then, I remember that editing isn’t themost important thing in my life.

Books On Writing

2011-10-26T09:02:00.000-04:00

I’mjust getting over a bad cold. I spent yesterday evening going over edits withmy husband as his second set of eyes (He’s been asked to write material for awebsite and heard back from his editor.) I’ve also been editing the first draftof the sequel to Screwing Up Time. AndI’m up to my neck in winter clothes that need to be washed. So instead of writing a long post, I thought I’d do a list of books on creative writing. Please feelfree to add your favorites—I love reading new books and discovering new ways oflooking at the process.

Hereare my favorites:

1.On Writing by Stephen King

2.Self-Editing for Fiction Writers byBrowne and King

3.How to Write a Damn Good Novel 2 byJames N. Frey

4.Pen on Fire by BarbaraDeMarco-Barrett

5.The Art of War for Writers by JamesScott Bell

Twomore notes of interest.

Abig shout of “Congratulations!” to Lydia Kang on the sale of her novel The Fountain to Kathy Dawson at Dial/Penguin.

Ifyou didn’t see it yesterday, check out the Internet Book Fair.

Hoarding

2011-10-24T08:55:00.002-04:00

I’mnot a hoarder. My husband and I belong to the if-you-haven’t-used-it-in-six-months-give-it-to-Goodwillclub. But I’m seriously considering setting aside an area in the basement forincandescent bulbs, which are being phased out by the government. I know compactfluorescent bulbs save lots of energy. But, setting aside the fact that I havemercury concerns, and that CF bulbs are really ugly, I don’t want them becausethey flicker and flickering lights give me migraines. Even watching a movie onthe new TV with their LEDs, which have much less flicker, can give me migraines.

So I investigated CFBs. I’ve read reputablereports—not just scare websites. Some say “Technology has improved. The new CFBswon’t cause migraines.” Though I can’t find any research that supports thisclaim. But other websites, also reputable, say “danger: CFB may cause migraines.”A WebMD website recommends that people with flicker-induced migraines wearblue-green tinted glasses when they’re around CFB. Right. I can just see myselfwearing Jackie O-type glasses with blue-green lenses. Everyone will look likeMartians. On the other hand, they might give me the eccentric-writer look. Andeveryone knows that makes you more successful. And I could write by candlelight.Except...candles flicker too. Time to buy up those incandescent bulbs.

Friday Five

2011-10-21T08:47:00.001-04:00

TopFive Ways You Know That Autumn Has Begun

1.The smell of burnt dust is in the air from all the heaters and fireplaces thathave been turned on.

2.We’ve shivering and it’s only 60 degrees. (When it’s that temperature in thespring, we wear shorts.)

3.I have mountains of laundry—all the winter clothes that need to be washed andironed before they can be worn.

4.I sweep multiple times a day. Jezebel’s winter coat is coming in so she’sshedding her summer fur.

5.You don’t need rose-colored glasses. Sunlight reflects off the fallen leaves and gives the world apink glow.

I Love Autumn.

What about you all? How do you know it's autumn?

Good News

2011-10-19T11:17:00.002-04:00

Two blog posts in one day?! That means I have some good news to share. This morning, we caught Walter! (If you've missed the Walter sage, click here and here.) He is even now being released into the wild to carry on his squirrely life.

It's kind of sad now that he's gone--hygienic, but sad. No longer will I hear the patter of his feet in the attic. Unless, of course, Wanda lives there too. I guess we'll find out.

Here are some photos of Walter. Note the intelligent eyes and beautifully bushy tail. Have a good life, Walter!

I'm a Realistic Cynic

2011-10-19T08:32:00.001-04:00

I’vealways thought of myself as a positive individual. But Cal says that I’m a glass ishalf-empty kind of person. So I re-christened myself a “realist.” But with thelatest election stuff swamping the newspapers, my response has been to misquoteBertie Wooster, “It all sounds well enough, but it doesn’t actually meananything.” Which makes me a cynic. And I wondered, “Have I always been a cynicor did it crept up on me slowly?” Then, I remembered elementary school.

WhenI was in elementary school, the teachers would occasionally have days when theywere sick of the kids. On those days, they’d herd us into the big multi-purposeroom, plop us on the indoor/outdoor carpet, and turn on an educational movie.Usually, the girls all sat together and braided each other’s hair. I was neverbig into hair braiding—I’m not sure how the other girls made the braiding taketwo hours.

Normally,we watched some kind of Mutual of Omaha flick where a cheetah stalked and ate agazelle—I think they got these movies to keep the boys quiet. After all, theydidn’t spend the time braiding each other’s hair. (I found out later theseepisodes were staged!) But one day, we had something different. A kind of weirdcultural oddities movie. My teacher must have been late to the library and theywere out of mayhem movies. Anyway, one of the oddities was a house without aroof. I think the house was in Southern Egypt. The voiceover announced that thehouse was cool because it had no roof. The people who lived in the house didn’tneed a roof because it hardly ever rained in this area of the world. This wouldbe believable if people were actually living in the house and it hadn’t beenabandoned. But no one lived there (except jackals) and there wasn’t a stick offurniture in the house. And judging from the sand and dirt, no one had livedthere in quite some time. Maybe the reason they weren’t living there...was thelack of roof!?

Evenif you lived somewhere without a lot of rain, it seemed to me that you’d stillneed a roof to protect you from the heat of the desert during the day. Not tomention the wild animals at night. Or the sand storms that plague desert areas.But apparently, those considerations weren’t vital. At least not to theproducers of the educational film.

Soto answer my own question...yeah, I was born a cynic.

BTW, if you’re interested, I posted on my bookblog about the physical tools I use for editing. Click here.

Walter Update

2011-10-17T08:41:00.002-04:00

Todaymy chances of coming up with a creative post on something new and delightfulare almost nil because I have post-migraine brain. Late Saturday night (i.e.,early Sunday morning) a sort of neighbor called. She was upset about something.She didn’t want comfort or encouragement. She wanted to whine. Now if she werea friend, I’d have listened semi-patiently to her whine (even though it was themiddle of the night). But I barely know this woman. If that wasn’t bad enough,she called back a second time to whine. It was the second call that gave me theprickle in my brain, which said, “Migraine.”

Anywayall that to say that today is a Walter update. (Click here if you don’t know/rememberwho Walter is.) In the last Walter post,Cal had gotten a humane trap to put up in the attic for Walter. Ariel was veryconcerned because the trap had been in the attic for several days and she was worriedthat Walter was starving to death in the trap. Cal reminded her that we couldstill hear Walter playing in the attic so he wasn’t “caught.” But he went tocheck.

Gettinginto our attic is an athletic acheievment. There is no pull down ladder.Instead a wall in the pantry has a small “door in the wall.” You open the door,hoist yourself into opening, which doesn’t have a flat bottom but slopes towardthe ceiling. Then you grab the ceiling rafters and pull yourself up. (Thisbecomes important later on.)

SoCal went to check the trap. When we’d tried the humand trap the first time, wediscovered that Walter had bumped the trap enough that the bait dish moved andhe could pick it clean from outside the trap. This time, Cal wedged the trap sothat Walter couldn’t bump it. (Yes, Walter has a very high IQ. We grow smartsquirrels in Tennesssee.) Since Walter couldn’t bump the trap, he ignored it.The trap bait was untouched. So Cal moved the trap closer to Walter’s nest.Maybe the smell would overwhelm his squirrely wisdom.

When Cal was finished, he decided to leave theattic. Except there was a problem. Even though Cal told me that he was going intothe attic, I forgot. In the meanwhile, I saw the open “door in the wall,”decided that one of the kids must have left it open (shame on them), and I shutit. And locked it. Fifteen minutes later, Cal was stuck in the netherworld ofthe attic chute. Eventually, I heard him kicking the door—he couldn’t reach itwith his hands. He was very nice about it. He even smiled. But the smile wasone of you-see-I’m-right-about-you and added weight to hisYou-clean-up-before-I-even-start complaint—I’ve been known to put his toolsaway before he starts a project. I’m very blessed in my choice of spouse. Heeven talked to crazed, whiney woman the second time she called. He was verynice, but I don’t think she’ll be calling to whine during the middle of thenight any time soon.

My Week Of Relaxation

2011-10-14T08:35:00.000-04:00

LastFriday I finished the first draft of the sequel to Screwing Up Time. This week was supposed to be my week ofrelaxation. Week of Relaxation. I may have said those words, but I didn’treally mean them. What I meant was “my week to catch up on all the things thatI slacked off on when I was writing.” (See this post.)

Sodid I get the yard work done? No, I didn’t even get Round-up sprayed. Instead,precious child number three, Jake, had a midterm in Calculus 2 (he’s taking adual enrollment class—college and high school credits at the same time). Nowyou’d think that child one, Luke, and child two, Ariel, who are fulltimestudents at the university would be able to squeeze Jake into their scheduleand transport him to review sessions/office hours. You’d be wrong. Luke andAriel have jobs with weird hours. I drove Jake back and forth, even one timewhen guess what—the prof wasn’t available. I just love those car trips with nopurpose.

DidI get the ironing done? Sort of. I got a pile finished, but not the one Iwanted. I wanted to get Cal’s winter dress pants/shirts out of storage, washed,and ironed. (Our old house has miniscule closets.) I didn’t even get theclothes out of the basement. Child four, Matt, was taking the PSAT this weekand needed help with the bizarre writing section—I had to explain that “B” wasthe right answer because the clause was modifying the correct noun even thoughit broke a grammar rule. I hate defending bad writing.

DidI get the refrigerator cleaned and washed? No. (Though I did throw out thescary food.) Instead, I helped Ariel get information sent off for a summerinternship. You’d think that getting a transcript would be easy. At UTC, shejust walks into the records office and they print one up. At Chatt State, shehad to submit a request form and wait up to TEN days. And they don’t allow youto call and ask if it’s ready. And you actually have to drive down to the campusto find out. Seriously. When it was finally done, we had to fax everything.Except the fax machine was down at the site Ariel had to fax it to. It wasfinally back up five minutes before Ariel and Jake had to leave for class—Jake hadhis midterm waiting. He was doing the “I’d better not be late to my midterm.” Iwas promising, “You won’t be late. You won’t be late.”

So I’m looking forward to next week and gettingback to writing. I never get anything done when I’m “relaxing.”

N.B. If you're interested in discovering which character you're most like in Screwing Up Time, click here.

Lying About Writing

2011-10-12T08:34:00.000-04:00

Mybaby is taking the PSAT today. For those of you who aren’t Americans, PSATstands for Preliminary Scholastic Aptitude Test. Of course, he’s not reallypreliminary yet—that would be next year when he’s a junior. So this is a practicepreliminary SAT. Which seems kind of redundant to me. But we take testing veryseriously in the US. Though not as seriously as Europe.

Matt’sspent the last two weeks preparing for the PPSAT. (Not to be confused with theSSAT—secondary scholastic aptitude test, which is given to junior high studentshoping to get into very academic high schools. Or at least it was when I wasyoung.) Anyway, Matt was preparing by taking a PSAT prep writing quiz. He gotan answer wrong and called me over.

Basically,he was supposed to read a sentence and then decide whether the sentence was correctas is, or if one of four other sentences presented the same information but ina better way. I read the sentence. I paused. What?? I re-read the sentence. Ipaused again. It was a piece of crap sentence with more clauses than Santa.Hmm. At least I knew it wasn’t “correct as is.” Then I read the four othersentences. Whoa. They were worse. Misplaced clauses. Weird verb issues. Parentheticaltripe.

Me:Uh, Matt, the right answer was “correct as is.”

Matt:But it doesn’t even make sense.

Me:It sort of does.

Matt:scowling and thinking “If I wrote that, you’d lecture me and make me rewriteit.”

Me:Okay, you’re right. The sentence is terrible, but it’s better than the otherchoices.

Matt:These tests are stupid.

Me:Yeah.

Partof me understands why they test the kids on these kinds of sentences. If you’veever read a college textbook, you know too. Academic writing isn’t tooconcerned with clean writing. (I know, I worked in the Academic Press divisionof Harcourt.) For example, Luke is taking Scientific Writing for Chemists thissemester, and all he does is give Powerpoint lectures on really exciting stufflike Acid-Base Theory. I understand that they’re preparing him to be aprofessor or a researcher because unless he was forced, Luke would never learn touse Powerpoint. But maybe, writing classes should encourage clean writing.Crisp sentences communicate clearly. Stuffy, pedantic writing isn’t smarter. It’sjust stuffy.

If they did that, then the PSAT could have examplesof good writing. And Matt would be happy. And I wouldn’t have to explain why aterrible sentence was really not terrible. I hate lying.

Top Ten Reasons You Know Your First Draft is Done

2011-10-10T08:49:00.001-04:00

OnFriday I finished the first draft of my sequel to Screwing Up Time. (Confetti and cheers.) Though, of course, after Iwrote the final word, I thought, “Oh, dear, maybe it’s not really done. Maybemy readers will be disappointed. Or, maybe I’ve written too much andover-gilded the lily.

Ifigured that other writers must have the same problem. And while I can’t readyour manuscript and tell you if it’s done, I think there are outside factorsthat may strongly indicate when a first draft is complete. So I’ve come up witha checklist.

“How to Know When Your First Draft isComplete.”

1.Your beautiful flower garden is now being considered for a filming of Tarzan.

2.Your pile of ironing has collected dust.

3.You look in the mirror and discover your eyebrows resemble hedgerows—and theeighties look is not in. (Why can’t that come back?)

4.You’ve emailed your latest WIP (work-in-progress) to yourself, at least twohundred times—after all, you never know when your computer will die. (BTW, in the old days, writers used to storehard copies in the freezer.)

5.The printed letters on your computer keyboard have worn off. My space bar isactually “grooved.”

6.When your children need you, they IM you.

7.You are adept at writing while cooking, which explains the spaghetti saucesmears across the laptop screen.

8.Your dog throws her water bowl into your lap.

9.Your refrigerator has Tupperware cartons of leftovers that are unrecognizableand move under their own power.

10.Your husband bites your neck and complains that he’s a book widower.

Borrowing Library E-books

2011-10-07T08:46:00.000-04:00

Verycool, exciting tech news for me. I borrowed an e-book from the library whilewearing my jammies and eating breakfast!

I’vebeen waiting since December when I got my Kindle, hoping that libraries andAmazon could reach an agreement. They finally did. I don’t know how many booksare currently available. But the book I looked for, which is a new release, waslendable through the library. Interestingly, my library had the hardback versionof the book and I could have borrowed it, but they charge a fee for newreleases and they don’t for e-books. Yay!

Itwas pretty easy to download—of course, tech-daughter has already done it so shesaid, “Click there, click here, click that. Now turn on your Kindle so it candownload the book.” Voilà. Now I have the latest Daniel Silva book to readwhile I run the treadmill this afternoon.

Abrave new reader’s world. No more driving to the library, trying to rememberwhich days they are open. No more overdue fees. I’m loving it.

As for Walter the squirrel, someone gave us a humane trap (Thanks, Ken) so we're going to try catching him again. In the meantime, Walter has been a busy boy. Here he is attending a Cardinals game this week. Click here to take you to MLB and watch the video.

Squirrel in the Attic

2011-10-05T08:43:00.001-04:00

Wehave a new pet. Okay, not really a “pet” per se. Pets are cute, cuddly, and youactually want them. This creature, who I’ll call Walter (after the uber-bizarrecharacter on Fringe, which I sometimeswatch because I love my son though I despise the show.) lives in the attic.

Walteris a squirrel. We know Walter lives up there because we’ve seen his beady eyeballs glowing red in the flashlight beams. We would LOVE to get rid of Walterbecause he’s a danger to our house. Imagine chewing through electrical wire—my hopeis the power would short before the cellulose insulation caught fire.

Thebig problem is we can’t figure out how Walter gets into the attic. We’ve walkedthe outside of the house looking for gaps. Nothing. The attic vents are secure.(When Cal was in grad school, he worked for a pest control company doing thissort of thing. But Walter is good and sneaky.) So Walter still lives in theattic and presumably gets out to gather food.

Oneday, we decided to track Walter in the attic. That idea had one great flaw—Walteris nimble as a squirrel and we are not. Other flaws: Our attic is huge so evenfinding Walter is a chore. Our attic has no lighting so you have to hold aflashlight in your mouth as you grab beams. Our attic has no flooring sowould-be squirrel trackers must hop from rafter to rafter, hoping to avoidfalling through the ceiling and hitting the wooden flooring after a 12 footdrop. Let’s just say that my college ballet instructor would be pleased at my leaps,balance and pirouettes. And before you get the false impression that I wasactually a good squirrel tracker, let me explain that I ended up sitting on abeam while Calvin “danced” around the attic, chasing Walter.

In spite of Cal’s dancing prowess, Walter outsmartedus. And we’ve given up, at least for now. When Cal and I lay in bed at night,we listen to Walter jump around the attic—squirrel partytime. And I feel proudof Walter, which is kind of pathetic. But then I have an odd sense of humor andthink that Allstate’s raccoon commercial is the funniest thing I’ve seen in along time, especially because it reminds me of Walter.

Here's the raccoon commercial. Enjoy.

Parakeet vs. Canada Goose

2011-10-03T08:51:00.000-04:00

Ihave a lot of respect for birds (except for the ones that nest in our atticvents and break the venting mesh). And I have a special place in my heart forthe monk parakeets of Connecticut. Though their beginnings are a bit sketchy—somesay they’re from a PT Barnum show, and others say they’re from an overturned exoticpet truck. In either case, these green and white parakeets got free in CT.Everyone assumed that a New England winter would kill them off. It didn’t. Theparakeets build their nests around the transformers on high power lines—lots ofwarmth. The problem is their nests can cause fires and power outages. So thepower companies are fighting the birds. (I’m rooting for the birds.)

ButI don’t respect Canada geese. They plop their big feathered rears right in themiddle of the road. I’ve been known to honk and yell. They just stare me downwith their black-ringed eyes. Daring me to hit them. Which I haven’t, thoughthe thought has occurred to me.

Theother day I was driving home from WalMart when a flock of them were coming infor a landing at a fake pond. Now this pond is very small and the flock wasbig. And they were coming in too fast, their angle was all wrong, and they werewingtip to wingtip. And I waited for the fiasco. At the last second, the bigflock all baffled their wings at the exact same second and settled theirderrieres perfectly on the pond, whose surface was now solid Canada goose. And,of course, they gave me their standard I’m-so-superior-to-you Canada goosestares. I smiled. Touché.

I just hope they continue their journey south—maybethey could go to Brazil or Peru. I’m sure there’s a WalMart pond there somewhere.Though maybe the parakeets will fight them for space. I’d love to see that.

Encouragement

2011-09-30T08:07:00.000-04:00

Theother day I read a blog post that gave me pause. A writer had been castigatedby another writer because she was looking for an agent instead of self-pubbing.Now given all the changes in Amazon’s algorithms and how that’s radicallyaffecting indie e-books, it’s pretty foolish to think e-pubbing is the answerto everything. Click here to learn more.

Regardlessof what path or paths you decide to choose in presenting your work to the worldor even if you write in a notebook and never show it to a living soul, we oughtto be encouraging one another.

AsI was mulling over the whole situation, I realized how rare it is for someoneto encourage someone else. I don’t know if it’s our culture or if it’s humannature, but real encouragement is rare. And I’m not talking about the cheappolitically correct “everyone is special” mumbo-jumbo, but real, thoughtfulencouragement. Can you remember the last time you encouraged someone else? Whatabout the last time someone encouraged you?

Iremember a professor I had in college. Dr. Brown. He was an elderly man whosmoked way too much, but he had two rare gifts. First, he was a true genius.The only one I have ever met. Two, he knew how to encourage. He encouraged me.He wrote insightful comments on my papers and exams. He called on me in classand complimented what I had to say. And guess what? I never worked as hard forany literature class, ever. I spent every free hour learning everything I couldabout critical theory and Restoration Literature, which I hate (except for Tristram Shandy—a marvel of wit thatbreaks every rule of writing and does it with style). I was ready should Dr.Brown say, “Connie, give me a Hegelian reading of Dryden’s ‘Ode for St.Cecilia’s Day.’” And I would have been able to do it, even though I hate Hegel,dislike Dryden, and the ode—meh. I became a Pamelaexpert, despite that fact that Samuel Richardson poured every ounce of hisprodigious tediousness into the novel. And I did that all because this manencouraged me.

Canyou imagine what we could do if we encouraged each other? What about you all? Anystories of encouragement you’d like to share?

Click here to read this week's post on the Screwing Up Time blog.

Click here to read A.B. Keuser's interview of me.

DIY

2011-09-28T07:00:00.000-04:00

Areall indie novelists do-it-yourselfers? I am. Maybe I got it from my immigrantmother or my I-can-fix-that father, but I always want to give something a trymyself.

Whenthe lawnmower stopped working, I took it apart and moved some wires and pieces around.It worked. My son, who was probably hoping to get out of mowing the lawn asked,“What did you do?” I said, “I’m not really sure, but it works now.”

Igot into gardening that way. It seemed to me that if you stuck plants in dirt andwatered them, they should grow. It was a little more complicated, but mydendrobium orchid has been blooming since March. (BTW, orchids are so easy to grow. Give them good light,occasional water, and ignore them. They’ll bloom. Then you can pretend they’rea lot of work.)

Brewingbeer was a similar thing. Apparently, my great grandmother used to throw a hugepot on her stove and brew. I bought a huge pot and a brewer’s book, and I discoveredthat homebrew tastes really good.

Recently,I decided to make yogurt. The good stuff is too expensive. So I heated 8 cupsof milk to 180, cooled it to 112, mixed in a few tablespoons of plain Greekyogurt with active cultures, and cooked it for nine hours. Afterwards, I refrigeratedit. (If you don’t have a yogurt maker, wrap your Dutch oven in towels and letit set for a day or so.) Season as desired. (For a sweet tooth, try sugar andpreserves. If you like savory, sprinkle the yogurt with Greek seasoning. YUM.)

Nextup, cheese. I want to make Brie and blue cheese.

Tellme, are you a do-it-youselfer? If so, what have you done?

Here’s a photo of me making yogurt.

Author Photo

2011-09-26T08:33:00.000-04:00

Oncein my life I’ve done a photo shoot. It was for a modeling portfolio—but that isanother story and a boring one to boot. Okay, I did do one other shot for my veryfirst author photo, but those photos were taken by my daughter’s friend who wassixteen at the time so it wasn’t intimidating (Thanks, Rebekah, you did awonderful job.) However, the time had come for a new photo.

Wehave a friend who’s a photographer. And she was having a special sale on photoshoots. It seemed like a great way to get an author photo and family Christmas picture.(I usually take the family Christmas photo with a cheap camera on a tripod anda timer amid grumbling and gnashing of teeth. And the lighting is always weirdwith half of us in the shade and half in the sun.)

Havinga real photographer sounded great until I discovered an hour before the shoot,that the six of us don’t own clothes in the same color family. Ariel prefersmuted colors—greys and browns. I like brighter colors—oranges, greens, and reds.The boys generally have whatever colors were on sale that their grandmotherliked and bought them for their birthdays. My bed was covered with clothes noneof which worked together. I was nearly panicked, telling myself that I was anidiot for not making clothes decisions earlier in the day/week.

Arielsaid, “Let Dad do it when he comes home.” Now don’t cringe. I know most men don’tknow a teal from a Prussian blue. But most men aren’t gifted artists. Calvinis. And his specialty is color. He can look at a beige wall, go to the paintstore, and bring home the identical color. (Apparently, he “paints” the colorin his mind—all he has to do is match it at the store.)

WhenCal got home, he glanced at the piles of clothes on the bed and said, “Lukewears this, Matt this, Jake that, Ariel this, you this, and I’ll wear that.”

And..itworked!

Here are a couple of photos. They were taken bythe amazing Rachael Venema of Raeven Photography. You should check out herwebsite.

Book Reviews

2011-09-23T08:14:00.002-04:00

Oneof the scariest things about being an author is book reviews. I had no idea.

Alot of reviews are unanticipated—the ones that show up on Amazon. Of those,there are the fun reviews, written by friends who aren’t writers, but read yourbook and loved it. Of course, an odd moment inevitably follows when you realizethat they’re shocked that you couldhave written it and you wonder how much of a loser they think you are. But youlet it go because you realize that they loved you even though they thought youwere a loser, which is very cool.

Backto reviews. There are reviews written by strangers—they are the ultimateauthorial experience. A complete stranger falls in love with your novel. Totalrush. And, of course, there are the total loon reviews (thankfully, I’ve beenspared these so far), where someone, who is most likely a sadist, decides youand your book are an appropriate punching bag. Not much you can do about thosereviews except hope said person gets struck by lightning—just kidding, sort of.

Thenthere are the reviews you anticipate. Where either you ask a reviewer toconsider your book or a reviewer contacts you and says they will be reviewingyour book. These are wonderful opportunities. But too scary. (Talk about stressdreams.) You can’t help but wonder, what if my novel has spinach between itsfront teeth. Just because no one has noticed it thus far doesn’t mean it’s notthere. Or what if this reviewer doesn’t connect to my main character or my plotor my voice? Those things happen.

Aweek or two ago a reviewer told me that she’d be reviewing Screwing Up Time. Yesterday, I got an email saying that she reallyenjoyed it. PHEW! I wanted to throw a party and dance around the house. Instead,I emailed my writing buddies, told my husband and sons (“That’s nice, Mom”),and made my daughter read the email on my laptop screen. So my blood pressurehas returned to normal, that nervous twitch near my eye has disappeared, and I’mbecoming more certain that my novel doesn’t have spinach between its teeth. Atleast, I’ll be convinced until I’m waiting for the next review.

TwoNotes:

1.When the review and an author interview come out at the end of the month, I’llpost a link.

2. A big congratulations to Lydia and KO, whoboth signed with literary agents!!!

Benadryl Dreams

2011-09-21T08:26:00.000-04:00

Yesterdaymorning I decided to do some weeding. The ground was soft from rain and theweather was cool. So I weeded. Then I came inside. And washed up. I noticed ared mark on my temple. It itched a bit so I slopped some Benadryl cream on itand got on with the rest of my day.

Inthe afternoon when child number three got home from class and saw me, he said,“Wow. That’s interesting.” I went to look in the mirror. My upper eyelid wasswollen. Hmm. I tried some ice. It didn’t help.

Bydinner, the lower eyelid was swelling and my eye was watering. I made coldcompresses. I was avoiding oral Benadryl because it makes my hands shake. Byevening, child two came home from an exam and said, “If you don’t do somethingabout your eye, it will swell shut.” Cal said, “Whoa, you look like you’ve beenpunched in the face, only no bruising.”

SoI took Benadryl. And went to sleep, and woke up a lot. But the dreams...

Idreamt of a 50 foot brick fireplace with a wide maw. And it was hungry. I sawrows of old-fashioned tuxedo collars that looked suspiciously likeconstrictors. I saw psychedelic paint that rippled and danced malevolently. AndI rode in elevators that opened into nothingness. If I’d dreamt of tutu-cladelephants carrying stilettos, I’d have known I was in a macabre version ofFantasia.

WhenI woke up this morning (my eye still looks terrible), I wished that I wrotespeculative fiction because I’d have material enough for a month of shortstories. Has anyone else ever had Benadryl dreams?

I have to admit I’m almost looking forwardto more Benadryl tonight.

Waiting

2011-09-19T08:22:00.002-04:00

Myson Jacob had a Calculus 2 exam the other day. So he spent the weekendobsessively checking the university website, where grades are posted. (Thisreally beats the old days when professors posted grades on their office doorsand you had to trek down to their office to get your grade.) Though I know whatit’s like to wait at the computer. Any writer who’s trying to get a bookpublished knows what it’s like to hit the refresh button on their email.

I’mwaiting to hear back on a full of my literary novel (I call it “the platypus”though it has nothing to do with animals), which is with one of my dream agentsright now. She’s read a partial already so she knows the voice and writingstyle. Now I wait. And try not to think about the book. And ignore the nervouspitch in my stomach when I check my email. For those of you who haven’t had thewriting experience, the next step is either an emailed rejection, an emailasking for revisions, an email wanting to schedule a phone conversation, or aphone call out of the blue to talk about representation.

Inthe meantime, I enjoy my kids, clean my house, and write some more. I’m 4/5s ofthe way done with a sequel to the YA novel I’ve written. (Yes, I write morethan one genre.) And I have an idea for another literary novel, which I can’twait to get to.

Anyoneelse out there waiting?

Nightmares

2011-09-16T06:00:00.000-04:00

Everyonedreams. Most people can tell the difference between dreams and real life. I’mnot so good at that. My dreams are extremely vivid. (I would have been a greatarchitect in Inception.) So when Iwake up, I’m often very confused. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve shakenCal awake and said, “The police are pounding on the front door.” His response aftermany such episodes is, “I’m not getting up. The police can beat down the doorif they want in.” Now before you wonder if I’ve committed any felonies, theanswer is no. I suspect these dreams may be the result of the stories of Nazisoldiers breaking into my mother’s home and chasing after my grandfather. Butthese dreams make sense. I have an existential reason for them.

ButI have other nightmares. These are worse. They wake me up and leave mebreathless or hyperventilating. They’re claustrophobia dreams. Which would beunderstandable if I was claustrophobic, but I’m not. Closed in spaces don’tbother me in the least. You need someone to creep on their tummy down thecrawlspace and put up insulation 100 feet from the floor opening, I’m yourcrawler. The idea of inching my way through air conditioning ducts to breakinto an evil lair sounds like fun to me. So why do I have these claustrophobianightmares? Is there anyone else out there who has psycho dreams too? I’d loveto know I’m not the only one.

Getting Something for Nothing

2011-09-14T05:30:00.000-04:00

Wedon’t have cable. We’ve never had cable. Don’t get me wrong. I’m not one ofthose I-don’t-believe-in-television-we-only-read-Shakespeare kind of people. Ilove Shakespeare and could talk about the plays and the sonnets for hours. But I also love Leverage,Castle, and the Yankees (I don’t really love baseball, but I love my husbandand sons. And they love baseball, so...I know that Nick Swisher is called “Swish,”Robinson Cano is called “Robby,” and Curtis Granderson is called “The GrandyMan.”) Anyway, I enjoy popular culture. But without cable, it’s kind of hard.And cable is just too expensive. (Do you know how much beef/chicken/beans I canbuy with that kind of money?)

ButI worked out the popular cultural connection. For years we streamed from thecomputer onto the television. Everything was great. Until last week.

Lastweek, we tried to stream the final episode of Leverage. And it was locked!?!And you had to type in some stupid cable code to unlock the episode. How couldthey do this to me? I realize that I’m not actually paying for the content, butI watch their uber-stupid commercials. (Actually, I like the one with the fakeraccoon-man who destroys the attic.) But most of the commercials assume thatthe viewers are stoned/drunk/brain-dead—I mean who wants to listen tocommercials that scream at them. Or watch over and over again, the lame eyelashcommercial (Latisse) that warns you the product may permanently “darken” youririses and eyelids. Why would anyone buy that crap?

Sorry,I don’t mean to diss the pharmaceutical companies. At least, not much. But why lock the final episode of Leverage?It’s not like that’s going to make me buy cable. And Netflix isn’t much help;their streamable content is mostly junk that no one wants to watch. ThoughDownton Abbey and the new Sherlock series were notable exceptions.

Ifear this is the beginning of the end of the something-for-nothing glory of theinternet. Even Amazon is going to start charging sales tax in some states. Whatis the world coming to? I want my something for nothing.

BTW, here’s a link to my book blog post “Moaning Monks.” Enjoy.

Nutraceuticals

2011-09-12T07:59:00.001-04:00

Idon’t often wander through the nutraceuticals* section of the grocery store orpharmacy (mostly because the stuff is way too expensive and the results are toosketchy), but I was looking through a Costco coupon book and came upon the adsfor nutraceuticals.

Nowthe ads don’t make a lot of health claims, though there is the “Green Tea FatBurner” that clearly seems to be making a claim. But there are some really oddones out there. There’s “Grape Seed.” Um, couldn’t I just eat grapes and chewthe seeds? And “Cranberries.” I’ve got those in my freezer.

Whatabout CoQ10—it sounds like a French chicken dish. Don’t forget Acai BerryCleanse. I’m not sure what that’s supposed to be, except there’s a picture of awoman’s stomach on the front. So it’s some kind of intestinal gut soap? Ithought that many kinds of intestinal bacteria were good and made importantthings like vitamin K.

Whatabout “CinSulin?” That sounds like something you’d hear preached against onSunday mornings. My favorite was “Flush-Free Niacin.” Would you really want toput something like that in your mouth? Eew.

I’msure I’ve stepped on some toes. (I don't mean to--if they help your health, great). Nutraceuticals are big business in theUS and a lot of people swear by them. But it seems to me that you could be taking a LOT of these things. Icounted 26 different supplements, and those are the ones on sale. (Okay, I don’t need “Prostate Health” becauseI haven’t got one of those.) But it seems to me that a balanced diet andexercise would be a cheaper, more proven route to health.

Onthe other hand, my fingernails are still recovering from the paint/lacquer stripperI used on the bathroom doors. Maybe I need to try “Hair, Skin & Nails,”which is probably a modern version of Knox gelatin that teenage girls used todrink/eat to make their nails stronger. I never tried it; flavorless jello wouldnever make it past my gag reflex.

*Notea “nutraceutical” is a combination of the words “nutrition” and“pharmaceutical.” It’s a food or food-based supplement that is supposed tobring health or medical benefits.

Irony

2011-09-09T07:52:00.001-04:00

Amonth ago I was talking to a friend who is a linguist. We were discussing thecultural aspects of language, and he brought up irony. He asked me how I wouldexplain irony to someone whose language didn’t have a term for it (i.e., it’snot part of their cultural milieu). I tried to explain it and failed. I toldhim that I’d have to consult my trusty M.H. Abrams, A Glossary of Literary Terms. (I adore that book!)

LaterI realized that the best way to explain a term is by example. I’m teachingMacBeth right now and it’s rife with irony. For example, after Duncan’s murder,MacBeth wonders what will clean the blood from his hands. Lady MacBeth says “alittle water.” Yet, she’ll be the one washing her hands saying, “Out damn spot”by the end.

Butas good as literary examples are, real life ones are better. Yesterday, my daughtercame home from her computer programming class. She said that class always getsinteresting right around 5pm when the computer announces that the system willbe shutting down in two minutes—right during the middle of the professor’slecture. And it takes the professor about ten to fifteen minutes to get thewhole system rebooted afterwards. It’s the third week of classes so theprofessor is getting very frustrated. He hasn’t been able to fix the problem.So yesterday he asked the class if they knew what was wrong. One student toldhim that the university computers are scheduled to reboot at 2am, and for somereason the computer system clock in the Java 2 class was set to the wrong time—2aminstead of 5pm. All the prof had to do was reset the clock to the correct time.But the prof didn’t know how to do that. The student told him to right clickthe clock in the bottom right hand side of the screen. However, English is notthe prof’s first language. And so he wasn’t able to reset the computer’s clock.A programming prof who can’t reset the computer’s clock—that, my friends, isirony. (Kind of like mathematics profs and students who can’t multiply—butthat’s another post.)

I expect Ariel or someone else will havecompassion on the professor and show him how to reset the computer’s clockbefore next class. I have to admit, the incident makes me feel much betterabout my computer skills, or lack there of.

Virtues and Vices

2011-09-07T04:00:00.000-04:00

Mydaughter is studying French at the university she attends. She’s taking it forfun since she needs some extra units. Since she studied in high school forthree years, she’s also hoping that it will also be an easy A.

Oneof the things she likes about the class is her instructor’s focus on culturaldifferences. (Since we’ve lived in several different places, we’ve experiencedmany taboos the hard way—breaking them by accident.)

Herprofessor has talked about living in Paris, about her homesickness, whichresulted in overeating, and about a Parisian friend’s response. When she sawthis friend after her bout of homesickness, the friend said, “Tu es grosse. Cava?” Which in English is “You’re fat. How are you?” Of course, Ariel’s Americanprof nearly burst into tears. Later, she realized her friend wasn’t trying tohurt her feelings. It was just frank. (France was peopled by the Franks.) Itwas honest. As the prof admitted, it wasn’t like she could hide her largersize. And it did motivate her to do something about it.

Oneof the cultural virtues of the South, in which they take great pride, ispoliteness. The other day I was very impressed by it. A little old lady hadstopped her car in the middle of the road. None of the ten cars lined up behindher (through an intersection) could get around her. But through the multiplelights, no one honked. Finally, a woman got out of her car and walked to theold lady’s car to see what was up. (I was traveling in the other direction andcould see that nothing was up—the woman was staring around herself—either anAlzheimer’s situation or something worse. I felt very pleased that no one wasmaking the situation worse by selfish honking. Score one for politenessvirtues.

However,sometimes virtues become vices. The same day I was driving home and a lightturned red. Cars stopped and waited. The light turned green. The car in thefront didn’t move. And it didn’t move. At first, I thought, “Oh, some poorperson killed their car or has car problems.” Until I realized that the personwas texting—this was pretty apparent because it could be seen through thewindow. And still no one honked their horn. Twelve cars waited and waited. Ifinally honked, and the person looked up, put their phone down, and the light turnedred. ACK!

So I’m learning patience, not one of my virtues.But I’m still honking when someone rudely makes twelve cars wait until theyfinish texting.

The Lady with the Crazed Appliances

2011-09-05T08:35:00.001-04:00

Inever knew that I’d be known as “the lady with the crazed appliances.” It’s notsomething that I aspired to in college or as a child. But given that peoplegoogle “crazed appliances” and find me or friends say, “Um, any new appliancemishaps?”, I guess it’s time to embrace the title.

I’mtempted to blame our house. After all, it was built in 1940. But most of theappliances are new. Besides there were several incidents before we moved. Theone that comes to mind is the stove that exploded while I was cooking. Yes, theburner exploded and sent molten metal through the air. Thankfully, I like towear heavy aprons and it didn’t hit any bare skin. It was truly amazing—the potthat was on the burner was coated with metal afterwards and had to be thrownout. And, of course, we had to buy a new stove.

Butthat’s not the incident I meant to tell you about. (That was just backstory.)My latest appliance fiasco was the burglar alarm.

Aburglar alarm has no interest to me. We have Jezebel—and even though she’s abig softie, Labs are territorial and very protective. So she gets properlysnarly when a stranger comes near the house. (Our new mailman is afraid ofher—she’d probably lick him to death.) Jez is our burglar alarm.

Butthe people who owned the house before us prefered electronic surveillance. Sothey put in an ADT system. We didn’t renew the contract. Fine. Of course, theynever shut down the system completely, so the system pinged whenever a door orwindow opened. No big deal. Until last Thursday.

Thursdaynight the system went haywire. You haven’t experienced confusion until aburglar alarm that you know nothing about goes off at 1 am. It’s especiallydifficult to shut it off when you can’t find your glasses. I know because I wasrandomly punching buttons on the wall monitor. Eventually, I pushed the rightbutton and the system turned off. If I had been wise, I would have found myglasses and put them on my nightstand. I was not wise. When the alarm went offat 2am, I had the same fiasco all over again. The same thing happened at 3am.

Nextday, I was determined. The ADT alarm was going to die. I called ADT. I had myI-lived-in-New-England-I-can-be-very-tough attitude on because I had heardhorror stories about how difficult ADT can be to work with—if you aren’t payingthem, they don’t care. But, providentially, the woman at the service center wasvery sweet—I explained the multiple alarms during the wee hours of the morning.She explained that the battery backup was dying. All we had to do was “pop thebattery.” Simple, right? Not.

Thesystem controller was in the bathroom linen closet, and someone had builtshelves over it. Can you say “stupid”? I removed the shelves. Then lady told meto take the key on top of the box and unlock it. My first throught was “Really?You think there’s going to be a key there.” There was no key. I informed her. Along pause ensued, followed by “Oh. Well, it’ll be okay. You’ll just need tounplug the system from the electrical feed.” That sounded to me like “Cut thered wire.” It wasn’t that easy. She told me the electrical connection should bewithin 15 feet of the box. It wasn’t. So I had to trace all the lines leavingthe box—there are a lot of lines given that every door and window is wired. Andthey all ran through the basement—a 70+ year old basement is an accumulation ofabandoned wiring, unused ducting, and spider webs. Not to mention that Ihaven’t reorganized it since the last time it flooded (when we had tornadoesand lost electricity for 5 days), so the basement is a rat’s maze of bins andboxes stacked higgledy-piggledy.

Aboutthis time, the ADT woman said, “I can’t stay on the phone with you anymore—Ihave to talk to paying customers.” Which I understood, but now she’d abandonedme to the basement. I asked for Cal’s help, but in a couple of minutes hepronounced the situation as “trying to find a needle in a haystack.” He wantedto take a crowbar to the bathroom monitor box. I wasn’t quite that desperate.

Aboutfifteen minutes later, I found the electrical feed—on the other side of thebasement—nowhere near the 15 feet. I unscrewed the plug from the electricalsystem. Of course, the inevitable happened. The burglar alarm went off.Finally, the battery backup died. Yay! Now we sleep blissfully. The only onewho misses the burglar alarm is Jezebel—it was her early warning system. Whenit chimed, she’d jump up out of a deep sleep and charge the offending door orwindow. Now she can only sleep for 20 out every 24 hours. Poor baby.

Insteadof photos of me climbing around the scary basement, I thought I’d include oneof the tea party I gave last Friday. It was a lot of fun.

Recharge

2011-09-02T08:06:00.000-04:00

Backin July I e-published my YA novel, ScrewingUp Time. A little marketing research showed that I needed to write asequel—indie books, particularly YA, sell better when they’re part of a series.Besides my novel had a few unanswered elements that I was planning to deal within a sequel. Thankfully, I didn’t need to start from scratch because I’d donesome writing on the sequel a while back. Although to my chagrin, half of whatI’d written got scrapped or revamped.

Approachingthis book, I knew that I couldn’t use my normal plodding style of writing. Ineeded to set myself a goal. I decided that 1000 words a day 5 days a weekwould work for me. (What was I thinking?!) After all, I know people, who appearsane, that write 5,000 words a day. I tell myself those writers don’t havekids, don’t work, and have full-time maid service. (For those of you who aren’twriters, one page is 250 words.) The most I’ve ever written in a single day is2000 words. And that was when I was flying high on a creativity rush.

I’vebeen doing the 5000 words a week for a couple of weeks now. The novel is movingat a brisk pace, and I’ve reached the halfway point. So everything’s good. Exceptmy kitchen needs sanitizing (not good since I’m hosting a tea tonight—time tobreak out the bleach and other caustic chemicals). Every muscle in my bodyaches. I guess writing is a physical activity for me. (Does that mean I can cutdown on my three mile runs?) And my brain is turning to word mush.

SoI’m looking for brain recharge. Anyone have ideas? Two caveats. I can onlywatch an occasional movie as flashing lights give me migraines. Even on TV withthe lights on. And I can only eat so much chocolate, or I’d have to increase myruns. And that is not an option since I hate exercise—I’d rather shove bambooshoots up my fingernails. (Ack—my cliché meter is going off. Help me recharge.)

BTW, suggestions of a Caribbean cruise areappreciated, especially if you feel compelled to provide the cash for the trip.But since it’s hurricane season, it’ll have to wait. That makes me wonder, if I wrote 5k words a day on a cruise, could I deduct it from my taxes?

Liebster Blog

2011-08-31T08:00:00.000-04:00

First off, I want to thank Krispy again for the award. And I'll have you know that I posted it all by myself without help from my techie children. (Which means that my coolness points just went up. Smile.)

I have to pass on the award to since it's intended to connect bloggers, specifically those with less than 200 followers. Here are the rules.

Show my thanks to the blogger who gave me the award by linking back to them.
Reveal my top 5 picks and let them know by leaving a comment on their blog.
Post the award on my blog.
Bask in the love from the most supportive people on the internet—other writers.
And best of all – have fun and spread the love.

Without further ado, I'd like to spread the Liebster Blog Award to:

1. Rowenna at Hyaline Prosaic who always wows me with her sewing and history knowledge.

2. E Louise Bates who always has a kind and encouraging word to say, a true Barnabas.

3. Kirsten Walker at Tanta's Kitchen who shares her wonderful recipes.

4. Katie Klein at Katie Klein Writes, who's indie writing success inspires me and helps me figure out the hows/whys of indie publishing.

5. Ellen at Hurrayic. Her creative endeavors never fail to amaze me.

One more bit of excitement. I guest blogged "Removing the Scaffolding: Finish Editing" at My First Book. (Thanks, Misha, for the opportunity.)

Coolness

2011-08-29T07:31:00.000-04:00

Theother day I was given a blog award. (Thanks, Krispy!! You should visit her blog. She and her blog buddy do great book reviews, talk about writing, and they're in the midst of NaNoWriMo* in August.) And when Krispy mentioned me on her blog she called me “cool.” I told my kids about it at dinner. “I wascalled ‘cool’ today by someone who actually is.”

Sighswere heard from around the table. Then, came the commentary. “Yeah, my friend(name redacted to protect the innocent) told me that he thinks you’re cool.” And“my friend X said, ‘Wow, your Mom is so cool.’” Several similar statements weremade. My kids were not happy. Apparently, moms aren’t supposed to be cool.

Iexplained that everyone has an opportunity to be cool. My husband Cal was coolwhen he was young. Even when we were married, everyone thought he was “a surferdude” back in the day when that was a compliment. (He did have beautiful,streaked blond hair and a dark tan.) But Cal used up his coolness when he wasyoung. Though he's still very handsome.

I,on the other hand, had a full contingent of the possibility-for-coolness leftover from adolescence because I have never been cool. In the ’80s, when everyone was listeningto Pearl Jam, Blue Oyster Cult, and, even, Debbie Gibson, I waslistening to Gene Krupa, Benny Goodman, and Judy Garland. This, of course, mademe extremely cool in the late ’90s and early ’00s when big band music was thelatest rage. And when most people were watching Freddie Kruger, my friends (Hi,Kristin) and I watched Hitchcock revivals and Cary Grant movies. We dressed upand went to an old theater and sat with really old people who were also dressedto the nines. I wore a white dress and hat. And I even had white gloves.

Ofcourse, now that Cary Grant is cool, all my kids’ friends know that I havenear-complete knowledge of the Cary Grant oeuvre,including movies like Penny Serenadeand I Was A Male War Bride.

Iremembered when my daughter was in elementary school and had friends to thehouse for a birthday sleepover. I put in RomanHoliday. Some girls said, “Euw, black and white.” Two hours later, thosesame girls were in tears and said, “Oh, Mrs. Keller, I have to go home andwatch that with my mom.”

Thenthere was the time that Jake and his friends were bored out of their minds. SoI sat in the midst of them and said, “Old Captain Kirk versus New CaptainKirk.” Much discussion later, the new Capt. Kirk had won, and we were discussingthe merits of Voldemort versus Darth Vader.

AsI thought about these things, my head began to swell. My kids’ friends thoughtI was cool. But then, I realized that I was going to have to ask one of my kidshow to post the award on my blog because I had no idea how to do it. I was likea pin prick in my swelled head. Because everyone knows that the new cool isnerdy, and I’m tech-challenged.

At least, my kids are cool.

* For those of you who don't know, NaNoWriMo is National Novel Writing Month. It's in November and the participants try to write 50,000 words in one month, which I can't imagine. I'd be drooling on myself by the end of the month. No, not really, it would be by the end of the first week.

PS I'm pass the award along and fulfill all the obligations on Wednesday, when I get help putting up the award.

PPS Thanks to to Susan who also said she was giving me the award. You should visit her blog too. She's always got some random, funny facts to share. And who doesn't need a smile?

Not A Level Playing Field

2011-08-26T08:12:00.000-04:00

Yesterday,the boys and I watched the Yankees hit three grand slams in one baseball game.It was really cool to see history being made. I Facebooked about it and gotsome comments about the Yankees’ payroll. It’s true that they have a ton ofmoney, and it allows them to acquire great players. And I understand why fansof teams with less financial ability get frustrated. My parents, who areMariners fans, often call Seattle the AAA farm team for the Yankees becausetheir best players often get taken by the Yankees. Interestingly, many otherfranchises have the ability to make the same kind of money, according to mydaughter’s sports economics class at the university. But they don’t. Why?Because they aren’t as successful. It’s hard to get fans to come when you lose.And it’s hard to get the money to get better players if you don’t have tremendousfan support.

Sowhy am I doing this whole baseball post when I’m not really that much of abaseball fan? I think a lot of this applies to writing and writers. It’s easyfor writers to grouse when they see books that make the bestsellers’ list thatthey deem not well-written. But the truth is that while the playing field islevel, i.e., any book can make the NYT best sellers’ list (excepting indiee-books), in another way the field is not level.

Publishingis a business. And individual books sales are greatly influenced by yourpublishing house. Whether they give your book the editing it needs, the bookcover they select (authors get some input, but not final say so), whether theypay for good book placement in bookstores, etc. But those things are out of writers’control. Yes, you can do marketing, and every writer does, but there are noguarantees.

Andlike baseball fans and players, writers have to do it for the love it. That’swhere the satisfaction and the joy come from. And who knows, maybe you’ll dowell—word of mouth is the greatest sales tool. Don’t forget, the Athletics tooktwo out of the three games.

Is It Only Wednesday?

2011-08-24T07:47:00.002-04:00

Okay,this week has been twice the length of a normal one. And it’s only Wednesday. Ithink it’s the whole back to school/college thing. We don’t have an establishedschedule yet. Plus, I’m trying to figure out who needs which car when (fivedrivers and three vehicles). Throw in multiple jobs (Luke has two and Ariel hasone), and things get hairy.

And,of course, I need to start teaching Shakespeare and I can’t find my notes. ACK.How can this be? I know I put my Shakespeare lit crit book on the shelf, but it’snot there. GRR. I’ve scoured every bookcase, and it’s still missing. Did I letsomeone borrow it? I did find my MacBeth notes, which were in a different place.So guess which play we’re starting with?

Oh, we also have a GI bug in the house, whichmeans I was up past midnight with a sick person. The week is becoming longer bythe moment. But, hey, no appliances have died in the last month. My black fliesbites have stopped itching. And autumn is right around the corner. Things arelooking good.

Thrifting

2011-08-22T08:38:00.000-04:00

Whilewe were on vacation, Ariel and I, along with the friends we were visiting wentshopping. In case I haven’t said it 100 times already, I hate shopping.However, I’ve been known to shop if it’s a good thrift store and If Ariel comeswith me.

Yousee, thrifting isn’t really shopping. Thifting is more like treasure hunting.You drive to a part of town where the rents are cheap. You enter store thatlooks like it hasn’t been painted it the last decade, or two. First, the smellhits you. If it’s nauseating, you turn and leave. If it smells like Great AuntMillie’s house, you’ve hit the jackpot. An important fact to remember is that 99%of the stuff in the store is dreck. This is where the treasure hunting comesin. You have to find the one percent. I’m not skilled at this. You’d think thatwith Dutch blood and a tight pocketbook, I’d have the necessary skill set. Idon’t. But Ariel does.

Forexample, I grab a couple of pairs of jeans. They fit. I look at Ariel. Shesays, “No. Those are Mom jeans.” I say, “But I’m a Mom.” Ariel says, “Not thatkind of Mom.” I say, “Yeah, but—” Then, Ariel plays her trump card, “Dad willnot like those jeans.” And she’s right. My friend hands me a pair of pants—they’remy size, they’re hip, a very good name, and cheap--$3. The pants were keepers.

Mythrifting forte is shoes and purses. I found a cute pair of backless red heeledsandals for $3. And I found the mother lode in purses. First, you have toignore the purses that should have been put in the garbage. Then you have topass by the ones that are so big that they ought to have been labeled “luggage.”Finally, you have to steel yourself against the styles that were popular in the80s and 90s. Then, you can find a brown, leather Tommy Hilfiger purse that’snever been used for $3.50. You can also find a deep red leather, snakeskinpatterned purse that matches the cute red heels for $3.50. And then, when youhem and haw over whether you really need it, your precious daughter says, “Letme buy that for you.”

See, this is why I take her thrifting.

Here are the red heels.

One more bit of news, my YA novel, Screwing Up Time, got another five star review on Amazon. Yay!

Friday Five

2011-08-19T07:45:00.000-04:00

Todayis the last day of summer vacation for me. School starts up on Monday. I couldn’tdecide whether this Friday Five should be nostalgic for the summer or lookingforward to the fall and winter. So it’s both. List what you’ll miss aboutsummer and what you are anticipating in the next few months.

1.I miss the days when I can stand outside and let the heat penetrate my skin. I alwaysimagine that the sun’s rays are sharing their power with me. (I know that’s hokey,but it makes it easier for me to embrace the heat.) I’m looking forward to coldbreezes that bite the skin and give me a zest for life.

2.I’ll miss the butterflies, snowy egrets and the hummingbirds. But bring on thefreezing death of cockroaches, mosquitoes, and biting black flies.

3.I’ll miss swimming pools and the ocean. On the other hand, let it snow, let itsnow, let it snow.

4.I’ll miss homemade ice cream, cranberry juice popsicles, and watermelon. But it’stime for steaming hot chocolate made from dark chocolate cocoa.

5.I’ll miss getting up whenever I want (I hate alarm clocks). But there’s nothinglike watching the pink of sunrise streak the sky.

What are your Friday Five?

Attack of the Mutant Blood Sucking Creatures

2011-08-17T08:09:00.001-04:00

I have blogged numerous times about my extreme hatred of mosquitoes. Howmosquitoes are a scourge to me. How even Deep Woods Off is merely an aperitifto the mosquitoes who feast upon me. And you know how I have tried almost everyremedy known to humankind, including fans, vitamins, vodka (wiped on the skin,which may have been my big mistake because if I’d have drunk the vodka at leastI wouldn’t have cared.) The newest mosquito remedies I’ve heard of are Listerineand fabric softener sheets.

Ihaven’t tried either new remedy. In fact, I’ve “come to terms” with the factthat I am a mosquito feeding ground. And I can live with that. Assuming that Ibuy cases of topical Benadryl gel.

ThenI discovered that there are worse things than mosquitoes. I suppose I shouldhave known something like this might happen. I have always attracted bloodthirsty feasters. When Cal and I were first married, we went sailing in SanDiego bay. Afterwards, we were pulling the catamaran, and my legs werestinging. I assumed it was salt water on freshly shaven legs. It wasn’t. Istepped out of the water and discovered clear jelly-fish like creatures turningpink with my blood. Cal and I ripped them off. Over the next couple of weeks mylegs got severely infected. It was an omen.

Acouple of months ago, I woke up in bed yelling. Some creature the likes ofwhich I have never seen was biting me. I ripped it off my arm and flung acrossthe room. Cal thought I’d had a nightmare because the “alien bug thingy” Idescribed couldn’t possibly be real. Even when I pointed out the fangs marks onmy arm, he was doubtful. But he agreed to look for it since I said I couldn’tgo back to sleep until it was dead. When he found it, he said, “Oh, wow! I’venever seen anything like it in my life.” This was also an omen.

Thefinal omen occurred on vacation. One evening we were swimming at the beach. I finishedmy saltwater frolic and sat on my beach towel to let the salty water dry on myskin. (There’s nothing like the taste of salt water on your lips. Bliss. Ireally am a selkie.) Anyway, after a few seconds of bliss, I felt stings. Iopened my eyes. Big black flies were clustered on bare skin, sucking my blood.I swatted. They circled and came back. I covered myself in beach towels; theyfound the edges and flew underneath. Needless to say, the beach outing came toa quick end.

And these bites did not respond to Benadrylgel—I wanted to scratch my skin off. Thankfully, the bites have faded.Especially since my kids told me I looked creepy with bites all over my neck. Thebites were everywhere, but the neck ones were particularly nasty. But here’sthe thing. This time I recognize the final omen. The Apocalypse of Mutant BloodSucking Vermin is coming. Prepare yourself. And remember, Benadryl probably won’twork.

P.S. Yesterday I posted a short excerpt from the sequel to Screwing Up Time. Click here to read it.

May Cause Death

2011-08-15T07:00:00.001-04:00

Okay, I have a question. Why on earth do pharmaceutical companies advertise their prescription meds to normal/non-medical people? I mean “hello,” it’s not as if I can go to the store and buy them. What do they want from me? Am I supposed to go to the doctor and whine, “I want the new uber-high-potency-give-me-perfect-health medicine”? Isn’t the reason I pay my doctor big bucks because he/she is supposed to know what medication is correct for whatever’s wrong with me?

I suspect the pharmaceutical company wants me to whine at my doctor. Instead of the generic meds, which are cheap, they need to sell their new, weird variation, which doesn’t have a generic, so they want me to want it. But I don’t care. In fact, the ads irritate me. After all, who’s paying for those ads? The consumer!!

And doctors have no idea what the new meds cost (BTW, not all pharmacies charge the same price for the same medicine) or which insurance company covers which drug. When Jake’s doctor prescribed a medication, the cost was $250. Chad, our favorite pharmacist tech, said, “Uh, just so you know, you could get over the counter med A for $6 and prescription med B, which is $8, and if you take them together, they do the same thing at the same strength as the $250 medication.”I called Jake’s doctor, and she gave us a prescription for med B. She also apologized—she had no idea that the medicine she first prescribed was so ridiculously expensive. $250 instead of $14. No wonder health care costs are ludicrous.

And here’s another thing; when they advertise their drug, they’re required to list the side effects. But listing the side effects does NOT make me want to buy the new-uber-high-potency-give-me-perfect-health drug. I mean, thirst and sore-throat are one thing. But what about loss of sensation, heart attack, mood swings, weight gain, appendages falling off, and possession by the prince of darkness. Okay, I made up the last two. But death is usually listed as one of the side effects. Hmm. Doesn’t make me eager to try the new u-h-p-g-m-p-h drug. Let alone whine for it at the doctor’s office. Kind of counter-productive. But then, advertising has never been about logic.

N.B. My novel Screwing Up Time, is being featured this week on Ken Hoss's blog. Click here to visit Ken's "Indie Authors in the Spotlight" page.

Vacation Photos

2011-08-12T09:38:00.000-04:00

I promised some vacation photos. Here are a couple.

Ariel doing computer work in the car on the drive to NC.

The boys and a friend at an artillery park.

A photo of the moon rise last night at the beach. It's beautifully pink because there was a controlled forest fire going on.

I hope you enjoyed the photos. We're having a relaxing time.

On Vacation

2011-08-10T09:49:00.004-04:00

We're on vacation this week. So I'm taking a break from blogging today. But I hope to blog on Friday and post some photos. In the meantime, I'll enjoy the surf and the sun for you. :)

Make-up Artist

2011-08-08T07:00:00.000-04:00

FridayI became a makeup artist. Now before those of you who know me well enough snortyour Monday morning coffee up your nose by accident, let me assure you that itwas a one time deal. I volunteered to help the real makeup artist get theactors and actresses ready for the Shakespeare play. (I did it once before acouple of years ago, so I wasn’t a complete newbie.) I was put in charge ofhighlights. Highlighting consists of painting light and dark shadows on characters’faces to make their features stand out under the stage lights. (Notice I wasnot put in charge of blending highlights into the foundation grease paint as Iam not a good “blender.”)

Butmy time as a makeup artist was profitable. I made several discoveries.

1.According to Calvin (who’s trained as a watercolor artist), the important thingabout painting is the brushes. You can’t paint well with bad brushes. I musthave had bad grease paint brushes.

2.Boys scruntch up their eyes when you put eye-liner on them. And it looks like adotted line. They also flutter their lashes like butterflies, and mascara smearseverywhere. The subsequent mess makes people glare at the incompetent make upartist.

3.I am very good at painting on fairy eyebrows—but mostly because nobody can tellme that I’ve done them wrong.

4.Rubbing alcohol removes grease paint. (Okay, Luke told me that—apparently,basic chemistry should have taught me that.)

5.Young men should shave before showing up for makeup.

6.Under no circumstances should one try to put lipstick on a boy.

7.Although necks also get coated with grease paint, it does not look good onwhite shirts.

8.Girls, especially little girls, will let you paint as much make-up on theirfaces as you like. They will, however, have distinct opinions as to the colorsthey want and the job you have done.

9.Grease paint powder (which keeps the paint from sliding off your face when yousweat) is to be applied ONLY after all the grease paint is applied or blendingwill not happen.

10. Boys really do have longer eyelashes thangirls. Grumble. Mutter.

I wish I could take credit for this make-up job, but the professional did it.

Here's another photo with Matt and Jacob.

Updating the System

2011-08-05T08:46:00.002-04:00

Jacobis a senior in high school this year. And he’s going to take a dual enrollment Calculus2 class. Originally, he was going to take it at the community college where hetook Calc 1. However, in an effort to save money, the community college decidedto cut one hour per week from the class. (Yes, per week, and the prof still hadto cover the same amount of material—can you say impossible?) Then, to cut downon paperwork, they made the homework and tests “on-line.” In other words, thecomputer grades everything. Problem. A computer can’t read your work. Theyovercame that hurdle by making the homework multiple choice. Yes, Calc 2 homeworkis multiple choice. I won’t even go into what they did for the tests.

Obviously,the community college was out. So we enrolled Jacob in the University dualenrollment program. After I heard the cost and picked myself up off the ground,I said, “Okay.” We don’t want him waiting another year before taking the class.Then came enrollment.

Iexpected the community college to be horrid at enrollment. (This is a collegethat forgot to send all the nursing students grades to the nursing board, sothey could take their board exams. Oops.) I expected the university to knowwhat they were doing. I was wrong.

Apparently,they don’t know quite how to do dual enrollment. We filled out all thepaperwork, and they processed it. Jake tried to sign up for a class. He wasn’ta student. I called dual enrollment. They called the “tech people.” The techpeople said it would show up in 24-48 hours. It didn’t. I called dualenrollment. They called the tech people. The tech people promised they’d fix itwhen they “updated the system that night.” I know that excuse. When I worked atHarcourt, that is what the tech people always said, and then it wasn’t fixed. Ithink “we’ll update the system tonight” is geek speak for “I’m tired and I’mgrabbing a beer on the way home, so bother me tomorrow.” Eventually, when therewere only two spaces left, the problem got fixed. Sadly, Jake didn’t get theprof or time he wanted, but he did get the class. And we thought thateverything was hunkey-dory. Until we tried to pay for the class.

Jake’sbill was $3491. For one class. The rounds of phone calls began again. It turnedout that the computer people mis-coded Jake. And, of course, it would take acomputer system update to fix. (Maybe some day, someone can explain why this isnecessary.) Just when I thought it was all over, the dual enrollment advisortold me, “Um, just so you know, it’s not my fault, it’s the State’s fault, butthe class is now $200 more. I’m really sorry. It’s not my fault.”

Lovely.I wonder what else is waiting around the corner.

Stripping

2011-08-03T06:30:00.001-04:00

M’kay.Please tell me that you knew this post was about paint stripping. ’Cause myblog is definitely G or PG.

Earlythis year, I got a lovely idea. The boys’ bathroom, which is also the bathroom-that-everyone-who-visitsuses, needed work. But it needed to be cheap and do-it-yourself. Over SpringBreak, Luke and I repainted the ceiling and the trim. Then I fixed and re-groutedthe old honeycomb tile. Now that summer is waning and I didn’t get any houseprojects done, I decided the bathroom door and the bathroom linen closet doorneeded doing.

Caland I bought heavy-duty stripper. The metal container is covered withskull-n-crossbones and “peligro” warnings. Cal took down the doors and broughtthem outside. The bathroom now has a privacy sheet—my boys aren’t complaining,but they aren’t impressed. Our dog Jezebel thinks it’s cool.

TodayI started stripping. Then I found out that 70+ years of varnish, stain, andpaint does not come off easily even with peligro stripper. I also discoveredthat bare skin which comes into contact with peligro stripper gets chemicalburns. Finally, I discovered that even though I coated myself withdeath-to-mosquitoes bug repellent and the air was redolent with essence of tolueneand other vile chemicals, the mosquitoes still bit me. And when I scratched mybites, the toluene does not make the bites less itchy, it just makes them burnlike...well, you know.

After four hours of stripping, I now have a “box”full of scraped paint. One door is down to the wood grain after five rounds ofstripping. The other isn’t close after three. And, of course, this is only thefirst side. Round two is Wednesday.

Shakespeare Costumes

2011-08-01T09:09:00.000-04:00

Todayis the beginning of Shakespeare camp. Monday through Thursday 9 -12, they will work on A Mid-summer Night’sDream. The performance is Friday, August 5, 7pm at Baylor.

Here is Jake. He plays Demetrius.

Here is Matthew. He plays Puck.

Friday News

2011-07-29T07:30:00.001-04:00

Todayis exciting for me. I’m being featured in the Author Spotlight on “The Word isMy Oyster” blog, which is written by Lydia Kang. Besides being a writer, mom,and wife, she’s a doctor and writes the most fascinating posts. Medical Mondaysare my favorites. If you’d like to read the Author Spotlight, click here.

Onemore exciting book announcement. My book is now available for Nook. So if youwere waiting for the Nook version, click here.

I was hoping to post photos of Matt and Jake’sShakespeare costumes today, but I’m searching high and low for ¾ inch silverD-rings. I need 16. I have 12. I’ve cleaned out the local fabric stores. AndWalMart doesn’t have them. Neither does Hobby Lobby. And I can’t finish the gauntletswithout them. I did find out that JoAnn’s was getting a delivery Thursday.Friday morning, I’ll be at the store, hoping for D-rings. If anyone else isthere looking for D-rings, they’ll find out that I don’t run those 9 miles aweek for no reason. Okay, I don’t run them so I can beat other women toimportant store items. (I actually hate shopping.) I run because it means I canbe healthy, eat more of what I like, and read novels. I think I’m the onlywoman at the gym who runs a treadmill while wearing reading glasses. But, hey,I’m getting my exercise, which is good because Lindt chocolate and Salt andVinegar potato chips are calling my name.

"Why Is It" Wednesday

2011-07-27T08:33:00.001-04:00

Iknow that Wednesday follows Tuesday and comes before Thursday. But this is morealong the lines of "complete this sentence."

Whyis it that....

1....in the summers when I can sleep in, I wake up at 6am?

I’mthinking it’s because of the sun peeking around the edges of the blinds. I needto buy one of those lace-edged black sleeping masks.

2....grass grows really well in my flower beds, but not in my yard?

Andweeds grow well in both places.

3....that computer-y things hate me?

Itturns out that my Nook problems may be a flaw in the “Nook for PC” applicationthat I was previewing it on.

4....all the fabric stores in Chattanooga don’t have any ¾” silver D-ringsavailable, so I can finish Jake’s gauntlets?

Ican’t wait to post pictures of the costume.

5....chocolate, Brie, potato chips all taste wonderful, and Brussels sproutstaste like...Brussels sprouts?

I’d much rather eat healthy food pyramid portionsof chocolate and Brie than kale, okra, and beets.

What about you all, do you have a "why is it"?

Senseless Screaming

2011-07-25T08:04:00.001-04:00

Isit me or have commercials gotten inane? We don’t have cable and living on the back of a ridge means an antennadoes nothing. (Yes, the children are deprived, but in a good way.) So when wewatch a TV program it’s usually streaming with either no commercials or veryfew.

Lastnight, we visited my parents and watched Leverage. (BTW, why are they focusingon Sophie and Nate? I’m glad they found each other, but Parker and Hardison aremuch more interesting. And it’s clear that Eliot is on the show as eye candysince they still haven’t given him an interesting back story. All he gets istender-hearted tough guy—can you say “cliché?”) Anyway, back to commercials.

Soa commercial comes on. Some guy comes on the screen and screams for the entirecommercial. And then the name of an insurance company comes up. The problem isthat it is unclear why he is screaming. As far I could tell a tornado has notdestroyed his house and car. No one has been carried off to Oz. A contractorhasn’t told him that his whole house needs to be rewired/re-plumbed. And hehasn’t had eight major appliances die in a two month period. (Insurance doesn’tcover that anyway—believe me, I know.)

Icould only surmise that the guy was sitting in the agent’s office filling outpaperwork to get his teenage son added to the family’s insurance policy and hadjust been given the final bill. And he couldn’t stop screaming because the goodstudent discount barely made a dent in the bill.

WhenI shared my discovery with Calvin, he said, “That’s our insurance company.”That left me a bit nonplused. All that money and this tripe was the bestcommercial they could come up with. Maybe I should learn to write advertisingscript.

N.B.I’m excited to let you all know that this Friday I’ll be participating in anAuthor Spotlight. I’ll include a link to the site on my Friday post.

ACK. I went to my blogger dashboard and found that all the blogs that I follow have disappeared. I've refreshed and reloaded. They're still gone. Anyone know how to fix this?

E-Pubbing Nightmare

2011-07-22T07:59:00.001-04:00

We all know the cliché that says you don’t appreciate what you’ve got until you lose it. I’ve discovered a similar one—you don’t know how easy Amazon’s e-publishing is until to try to e-publish on Barnes & Noble’s PubIt or Smashwords.

I have to take a deep, cleansing breath even before I begin telling you about it. Imagine that I have uploaded my novel to Amazon without a single glitch. I scroll through the entire book in the preview mode, perfect. I follow the formatting guidelines, and everything including the cover art went up smoothly. I sigh in giddy relief.

The next night I decided to upload my novel to PubIt, so it can be bought for Nook at B&N’s site. I begin filling out the online paperwork. At some point there’s a glitch, most likely with the auto-fill and my email address is inserted incorrectly. So when I try to access the account, it presents me with the paperwork for filling out the financial information again. I assume (incorrectly) that it didn’t save properly and fill out the paperwork. PubIt sends me a note saying that my social security number is associated with another account and they can’t process my information.

So I send an email to PubIt customer service. They tell me that my SSN isassociated with another account. Uh, yeah, I got that. I send them another email including a screen shot. I wait several days. Nothing happens. I call. I talk to a nice man who makes me type in more stuff (which doesn’t work) and promises that whatever the issue is, they’ll fix it in 24 hours. I believe him. I am an idiot.

72 hours goes by. Nothing happens. I call B&N again. A very crabby man answers the phone. I explain my situation. He grumbles at me. He accesses my account and grumbles some more. Thanks to the first customer service rep, I now have three accounts associated with my SSN. I ask if the extra accounts can be deleted. He spews venom and tells me that it will take a week to do it and I won’t be able to use an account until then. I politely say that a week seems pretty long given that the first customer service rep said 24 hours. Crabby man spews more venom and says that it can be resolved in 24 to 48 hours. I ask crabby man if the situation could be resolved if I accessed the working account and changed the email address. Crabby man says, “NO.” I am beginning to see why B&N has financial trouble and why writers pay people to upload their books.

After another 48 hours, nothing happens. I call B&N and talk to a sleepy sounding woman. I explain my problem. She pulls up my account and says, “Whoa, I’ve never seen anything like this. I have no idea what to do.” I explain what crabby man said he would do to fix it. She tells me that he and the first guy did nothing to my account. Not even a notation. Imagine fire in my eyes. But this is not sleepy woman’s fault. I politely ask sleepy woman if I could just change the email address. Sleepy woman says, “Yes.” I change the email. It takes lots of finagling because the account doesn’t want to process the change. Eventually, I fix it and sleepy woman thanks me and I thank her.

To make a long story short, I try multiple times to up load my novel into PubIt. Every time, there are formatting errors. The bizarre thing is that when Arieland I fix one thing, another random thing pops up somewhere else. Right now we’re down to three random errors, which appear to be unfixable—Ariel’s checked the coding and there’s nothing wrong. We tried new documents, retyping, typing in the coding by hand, etc. Nothing worked. So now I have to decide whether I want to publish with three blank pages stuck randomly throughout the book.

In the intervening time, I decide to do Smashwords. After hours spent formatting according to their odd guidelines, I decide to upload... You know, it’s always a bad sign when someone names their conversion process the “meatgrinder.” It’s a worse sign when they tell you that e-pubbing isn’t about perfection in formatting (they mention random blank pages that appear for no reason), but getting your words “out there.” I might agree, but they are so far from perfection that I remove my novel from their site.

Anyway, if you’re considering e-pubbing, start with Amazon and follow the formatting guidelines. If you are meticulous, it’ll upload. When you get around to PubIt and Smashwords and need someone to commiserate, I’m the person to talk to.

Oops. Breaking Cultural Laws

2011-07-20T07:57:00.001-04:00

Afew weeks ago, I was shopping at Costco and had a different cashier. She said,“Good morning.” I said, “Where are you from?” I’d heard the distinctive NewEngland twang. Too twangy for Connecticut, not twangy enough for Maine, nothard enough for Boston, and not Rhode Island-y. She was from centralMassachusetts. I told her that we moved here from Connecticut. I became her newfriend. Every week, I wave and she waves. She tells me about her kids, and Itell her about mine. She gives me a good dousing of New England wit and bite,even if it zings me. It makes me laugh.

Herco-workers don’t laugh. When they interact with her, they give her thesteely-eyed gaze. I cringe when I imagine their interactions. New Englanderspride themselves on telling the unvarnished truth, no matter who it hurts. Theybelieve anything else is a lie. Southerners pride themselves on politekindness, even if it isn’t the truth because you don’t want to “be ugly.” (But youcan talk about it to others later, as long as you say, “Bless her/his heart.”)

It’scurious to me, having lived all over the US (Southern and Northern CA, GA, IL,HI, CT, TN) how bound people are by their cultural upbringing. How breakingthese cultural values become the great sins. And, of course, it’s true outsideof the US. One thing my husband had to get used to was that Dutch culturereveres birthdays. On her birthday, my grandmother sits next to the phone allday with a pad of paper and pen in hand. When you call to wish her a happybirthday, she will let you know that you are caller #16 or whatever. Then shewill proceed to tell you who has called. And heaven forbid youshould forget to call, which is why I listen to my grandmother read the list ofeveryone who has called her and then call to remind those who haven’t called tocall before the day is over.

Andthen there’s the kissing thing. Dutch relatives kiss each other on the lips,regardless of sex or age. I made the mistake of doing this to my father-in-lawby accident. Not good. And very hard to explain your way out of. Then there wasmy husband’s experience with my relatives’ kisses. He learned to wait to thelast second to turn his face, so the kiss would end up on the cheek. And thenthere was my Chinese sister-in-law, who I thought would have cardiac arrest,when my uncle came at her for a kiss. I learned to stand next to her and dokiss-interception.

Whatweird cultural/ethnic oddities did you grow up with? Or which ones have youbroken by mistake in a new culture? And what was the response? I’ve had peopleback away slowly as if I was a time bomb waiting to explode.

N.B. For those of you waiting for Screwing UpTime for Nook, it’s still not available. Once again, Barnes & Noble PubItemployees have not come through on their promises. So I have to call themagain. Heavy sigh.

Shifting Gears

2011-07-18T08:49:00.000-04:00

Inthe midst of figuring out how to do publicity for my new book (I’m open tosuggestions), it’s time for me to sew Shakespeare costumes. Matt and Jake areboth in the play Mid Summer Night’s Dream. Jake is playing Demetrius, and Mattis playing Puck.

Jakereally liked his costume from last year (blouson shirt and tunic with fauxembossed leather accents). So he said he’d wear it again this year. GREAT.Then, I volunteered to make him accessories. He wants gauntlets and a feathered hat.They will be very cool, but a lot of work. I’ve done a hat before—more brokensewing machine needles than ever for one project. And the gauntlets are studdedwith metal studs, meaning I probably will need to purchase a studding tool, if there is such a thing. Matt needs a tunic covered with leaves, which should befairly easy, I hope. When the costumesare done, I’ll post photos.

Forthose who are interested, things with my novel are going well at Kindle. Theexciting thing this weekend was discovering that a total stranger loved my bookand wanted to contact me. (Yay!) I’m still having trouble with Barnes &Noble—their promises to rid me of the imps have not materialized. So I willcall them again, and, hopefully, get better promises. As soon as that's done, I'll get back to the Screwing Up Time sequel. I've left Mark and Miranda in a very precarious situation, and I need to rescue them.

Celebration

2011-07-15T08:16:00.001-04:00

Myyoung adult novel, Screwing Up Time, is available as an e-book on Amazon.(Throws confetti.) The book is selling.(Throws lots more confetti.) Click here to visit the book’s blog.

Ifyou’re interested in my novel, you can check out its Amazon listing here. Andif you need apps to read it (for iPad, iPhone, Android, Blackberry, computer,etc.), I put them in yesterday’s post, just scroll down.

Imust admit it was a scary thing to throw my baby out into the big bad world.When I was telling this to the kids, Jacob asked, “Why?” I said, “Because it’sputting a piece of your soul out in the world and hoping no one stomps on it.”I think there are very few avocations/vocations/artistic pursuits that are sotime intensive and alone.

Myhusband is a gifted watercolorist. In a week he can paint an exquisite painting.In a week, most writers have a couple of chapters—and that’s if they’ve writtenan IOU to the laundry and the dust bunnies.

Onthe other hand, the opportunity to share your story with total strangers isamazing. The idea that someone you don’tknow could enjoy the strangers that have lived in your head for the last year/yearsis a heady feeling.

Inthe next week or so, I hope to have some kind of give away to celebrate. Butright now I’m in the midst of trying to work with Barnes & Noble’s imps toget Screwing Up Time available for Nook.

Check back periodically and I’ll update you onmy experiences in e-publishing. If you have any questions (it really is a bravenew world), don’t hesitate to ask them in the comments or email me.

Kindle Apps

2011-07-14T09:05:00.000-04:00

Tomorrowwill be the official announcement/celebration that my young adult novelSCREWING UP TIME has been released as an e-book. But I know people have alreadystarted talking about it, so I thought I’d go ahead and put up someinformation.

Ifyou don’t have a Kindle, you can still read the novel. You can download a free Kindleapp here (Kindle app for PC) that will allow you to read the book on your computer. Ifyou have an iPhone, iPad, etc., the iStore has a Kindle app. Or you can click the various devices and I've put in links to the apps. And here's an app for Android. And one for Blackberry.

Ifyou have a Nook, I will have the book available soon at Barnes and Noble. (OnceB&N and I work out the kinks with my account.)

Hereare some other links:

SCREWING UP TIME on Amazon This takes you to the place where you can buy the novel.

SCREWING UP TIME blog This takes you to my brand new book blog. (Don't worry, I intend to still write this blog.)

Thanks for everyone’s support andencouragement!!

BTW, if you enjoy the novel, please rate the book and write a review. (It helps with publicity and search engines.)

Kindle Imps

2011-07-13T08:32:00.002-04:00

YesterdayI finished the edit and final proofread of my YA novel. Ariel jumped on it andsaid, “Let’s get the upload to Amazon started.” I tried not to panic and mumbled,“Sure.”

Soshe translated the book through various permutations. Everything was going sowell (not my usual experience with anything computer related). We set up thefinancials. (You can have Amazon send you a check or they can direct deposit it.And they sell in the UK and Germany and you can select to have it changed intodollars instead of pounds or euros. Plus, they worry about adding the VATtaxes. Phew!) Then came the final file uploads. And the imps got busy.

First,we found blank pages in the novel text. Why? Who knows? We played with the textand they disappeared. We had to put the manuscript through the various permutationsagain. Then we tried to upload the cover art. Even though everything wasperfectly formatted, it came out blurry. I called in the “big guns”—the professional.She tried loading the cover art—it came out in black and white. Which made nosense at all. How is that even possible? (I get that on Kindle the cover artwill be black and white, but the Amazon site uses full color.)

Wedecided to go with the early blurry upload, hoping that it would turn out notfuzzy when it pubbed. So we went to the next step—the final preview. And a newweird formatting issue popped up. So we went back to the original documentfixed the formatting issue and re-checked the whole document for the sameerror. Then, we re-processed and uploaded the book again.

Andafter it was finished, I panicked and realized that I’d forgotten someone fromthe acknowledgements. So once the book is accessible, I have to try and fix it.

Atany rate, check back on Friday, hopefully the imps will be working with me andI’ll have an exciting announcement. In the meantime, I’m being to study the Imp-ishlanguage (If you can’t beat them, join them.) Especially since my microwave isnow behaving oddly. It shuts down for no reason and starts up for no reason.And it’s not an electrical short. Watch out—the imps are going to take over theworld.

Game Crazies

2011-07-11T08:22:00.000-04:00

Matt’sstill sick. And everyone’s getting tired of it. Especially Matt. He’s decided he has Black Death. He’s been known to break out in singing “Ring Aroundthe Rosies,” which Wikipedia says is not about the plague. But I’m not sure howelse you’d explain the nursery rhyme.

However,since Matt has gastrointestinal issues and not an upper respiratory infection, the plagueis doubtful. But he points to his rash (which my doctor friends call “viral exanthem”—coolword) as confirmation of his self-diagnosis. He’s been known to moan, “My rashis getting black rings.” Thankfully, he’s too tired to go get a sharpie andstart circling them.

Becausethe rashes are itchy and we’ve tried everything else, I gave him oral Benadryl.I really, really should have known better. Matt doesn’t process medicationsthat same way most people do. He became very hyper. There’s nothing like ahyper 14-year-old who says, “I’m bored, I’m bored, I’m bored.” Thankfully,Jacob came to the rescue. He got out characters from our games “Aunt Millie’sMillions” (a game where you fight over a deceased woman’s possession—it’sactually very funny because you make up wild stories in order to get the assetand the rest of the players vote on whether your story is good enough) and "Guillotine" (seriously, it’s a game about collecting heads). Okay, I need to insert acaveat here. Those games make us sound like psychopathic crazies. We’re not. Atleast, not all of us are.

Backto Jacob, he took these characters and made up this long interactive story/gameinvolving all the games’ characters. Jacob has made up a lot of games over theyears. My favorite one was "Zombies." It's a competitive/ cooperative game whereyou’re locked in a house and attacked by zombies, and in typical teenage boyfashion you can slow down the zombies by giving them raw meat, or you can killthem with explosives or flame throwers.

Hmm. Maybe we are a bit demented, but in a goodway. I can’t wait to play the new game he’s working on—I see cards lying aroundthe house, but he won’t tell me what the game’s about. Apparently, everyone heknows reads my blog, and he knows I’ll blog about the game. Smart boy.

Let's Play a Game

2011-07-08T07:30:00.001-04:00

I’msorry that I didn’t get a blog post up on Wednesday. It’s been a long week. I’mtrying to get the last few things done on my YA novel. Hopefully, it should beavailable next week—probably on Friday (but maybe sooner). And if finalproofreading wasn’t enough, a very nasty gastrointestinal bug hit our home. I washoping it would be one of those 24 hour viruses. But it’s not. And I’m washinglots of icky laundry. (Enough said.)

I’vebeen reading that it’s National Book Month/Week. Of course, when I looked itup, I discovered that there are lots of National Book Months/Weeks. But, hey,books are great, so multiple celebrations are good.

Inhonor of whatever book celebration is going on, we’re going to play a game hereon the blog. Find the nearest book, look up page 56, and copy the fifthsentence into a comment.

Here’smine.

“Butthey are all wrong.” He Shall Thunder inthe Sky by Elizabeth Peters.

Don’t you love that sentence! Short and powerful,even with a “to be” verb.

BTW, if you've never read Elizabeth Peters, you must. Exotic Egyptian locale, feisty female archaeologist detective, and witty writing.

Top Ten Lies I Tell Myself About the Heat

2011-07-04T08:23:00.000-04:00

It’s really hot. Yesterday, it was 101 degrees F. That’s way too hot for me. If I could choose my weather, it would be 75 year round, with occasional bouts of freezing and snow. After all, when it’s cold, I can put on my silk thermals, wool sweaters and pants. But the heat is harder for me to handle. You can only strip off so much clothing, and even then it’s still hot.

But I don’t want to complain. So I’ve decided to become a true Southern magnolia and embrace the heat. Here’s a list of what I tell myself.

1. I am a plant soaking up the sun, growing strong in its mighty rays.

Myself replies, “Have you looked at your plants? They are sad and shriveling. Whatever strength they get comes from a 75 degree sun, not the burn-your-chloroplasts heat.”

2. Plenty of places get much hotter.

Myself: Yeah and most of them don’t have humidity that steams you al dente.

3. It’s only temporary—the season will pass.

Myself: There are a lot of days between now and October.

4. Thriving in the heat makes me stronger.

Myself: If it doesn’t kill me first.

5. Sweating is healthy.

Myself: Seriously? I feel like a greased pig.

6. Two words: air conditioning.

Myself: Okay, you’ve got me there. Air conditioning is one of the great delights of the modern age. That and the high efficiency washing machine, but that’s another post.

7. In the summer, there is no need to scrape ice off car windows, to shovel snow off sidewalks, and no need to look for that missing glove.

Myself: weeds, weeds, and weeds. They love this weather and multiply like, well, weeds.

8. Amazing thunderstorms.

Myself: tornadoes and power outages lasting five days.

9. Running around in the great outdoors.

Myself: bug bites, poison ivy, and sunburn.

10. Fireworks.

Myself: Okay, fine. They are worth sweat, sunburn, and bug bites.

Have a great Fourth of July, everyone!

Connie-Ariel Comedy Hour

2011-07-01T16:51:00.002-04:00

My daughter and I drove down to Atlanta today to pick up a friend of hers from the airport. Our trip down was blissfully uneventful. The trip back not so much. First, we encountered 4^th of July traffic. I’m not a patient driver. And I was hungry, but I wanted to get out of Atlanta before we stopped for food.

I was driving north and not paying enough attention and ended up taking an exit that I hadn’t intended. I made a couple of U-turns, which Ariel decided were reckless. (But, they weren’t illegal.) Anyway, we got back on the 75. We wanted to go to a Chick-Fil-A for lunch, but couldn’t find one. On the drive down we saw about a 100 CFA restaurants, but on the way home, not one. (BTW, CFA has the best waffle fries in the world.)

We ended up going to Subway, except we missed it and ended up in a very red-neck area of north Georgia—interesting tattoo parlors. Finally we found the Subway. Ariel wanted sweet tea, but the sweet tea wasn’t sweet tea. So Ariel tried to “sugar” it with Sprite. It was gross. We discussed who needed to go get her something drinkable. I lost that argument. Not sure how she won, but I think she played the “headache” trump card.

After we were sated, we kept on driving home. I have a habit on commenting on other drivers’ poor driving habits. Particularly abhorrent are the drivers whose vehicles apparently did not come equipped with turning signals. I guess that feature was too expensive.

And Ariel likes to comment on my driving habits. (As mentioned before on this blog, Ar thinks that Cal and I are rude inner-city, Northern drivers.)

Ar: I think you cut off that driver.

Me: I didn’t. I used my turn signal.

Ar: Yeah, right.

Me: No seriously, that lady wasn’t coming over. Look, she’s still back there, letting another car go ahead of her.

Ar: She’s polite.

After an hour, Ariel’s friend commented that she should’ve video’ed our drive home. Yep, the Connie-Ariel Comedy Hour.