Thursday This n That

Happy Halloween.  We're not doing anything, but hey, this is a better holiday than Labor Day, even if you don't automatically get the day off.  I did buy a couple Reese's Peanut Butter Pumpkins and a couple Russell Stover Marshmallow Pumpkins, so life is good.  

I'm in the middle of another freebie thing.  I really should be posting marketing stuff right now, but I'm tired, so I'm blogging instead.

Speaking of tired, I didn't get out of bed this morning until almost 7, which meant I had like 10 minutes to get to semi-functional before I called Mom.  

The DirecTV bill went up again.  Bastards.

The temp when I got up was 59.  It's only supposed to get to 66 today.  Woot.

I'm not sure anyone is still seeing my posts on Facebook anymore.  Every rare once in a while, someone will react to one, but not like they used to.  Between my marketing posts and my political posts, I think FB has throttled my reach.  Bastards.

Old Pervy Bill was up in Michigan stumping for the Hyena and admitted that the economy was better under the Big T, but Bill said we should all still vote for Hyena because reasons.  Go away, ya perv.

My cats are obsessed with pens.  I thought I'd hidden the pen I keep on my desk well enough, but nope.  It was pilfered in the middle the night and found on the floor.  It already had little teethmarks on it, so no harm done.  I don't think they're interested in chewing it enough to get to the ink.  They just want to perforate it a bit.  On a lighter note, it's fitting that a writer's cats should be pen-obsessed.

Some days, I'm not sure if I should call myself a writer.  I'm not actually writing much.  Hell, I'm not even editing much.  I'm just lazy.  I think I'll do like an Edit Wri-Mo thing for November.  Give myself 30 days to get this book done and ready to publish.  It's doable. We'll see.

Okay, I'm off to wreak havoc elsewhere.  Have a great day.  Eat some candy.  Watch a scary movie or something.  

Monday Marketing

Okay, so SLEEPING UGLY is free this week.  Thursday is Halloween, after all, and this book would be a perfect read for the holiday.  

Unfortunately, I am not in a marketing frame of mind today.  I'd like to be able to tell you all the awesome things about this book, but this morning's marketing attempts were more like 'here's a book, buy it'.  I don't expect great things from this.  Maybe tomorrow will go better.  

This book was fun to write.  Readers have told me it's fun to read.  I mean, she's a super model who's been cursed to turn ugly day after day (she gets prettier throughout the day, so yeah, at the stroke of midnight she's butt-ugly again - every day - which sucks for her), and crazy things happen to her because she had NO CLUE magic was real or anything before all this happened.  And she's always relied on her looks, so she's kinda screwed. It all works out... well, not all of it in this book.  It's all worked out by the end of the series.

Anyway, go buy it.  Grab a cup of coffee and read to your snarky heart's desire.  

Oh, and in case you didn't already know... Silver James' latest book - MOONSTRUCK MAFIA: BOSTON - is now available for you to buy and love.  This book is epic and amazing!

Sunday Update 10/27/24

 :blink blink: I just woke up, so bear with me.

Still not writing.  In editing news, I finished the first round of edit notes on Friday - 21 pages worth of single spaced notes on college ruled paper.  Not the most notes I've ever made on a book, but still, that's lots.  Yesterday, I sat down and started inputting those notes. Then I had to refer back to Rumor Has It about something and I discovered, to my dismay, that I wrote the entirety of TTW in the wrong person.  Should've written in first person.  Wrote it in third.  Derp.  Much swearing occurred and then much laughing because really, how silly can one gal get?  Sooo... I need to fix that, too.  I did manage to get one page of edit notes entered and five pages edited for notes and POV.  

I almost forgot... SLEEPING UGLY is free starting tomorrow.  Kind of a Halloween thing.  

I read a book this week.  Unfortunately, it doesn't count toward my goal because it was a book I volunteered to proofread for the author.  It's now out for sale, and I bought a copy, so I'll read it again and then count it.  The book?  Oh, it's Silver James' Moonstruck Mafia: Boston.  It's wicked awesome.  Pick up your copy today.

This week in cooking, I made a vat of chicken soup, a crockpot worth of pulled pork, and applesauce bars.  Oh, and I used leftover pulled pork to make Cuban sandwiches, which is no small effort.  (I mean, if I had a panini press, it wouldn't be hard, but I don't, so it is.)

On the activity front, well... you see... Falling on my ass in the woods and twisting my knee kinda put the kybosh on that.  I did get into the woods once and I went for one walk, which wasn't far and I had to turn back for home because my knee was being a whiny little bitch.  Sitting on my butt and eating copious amounts is not helping my overall physical well-being.  Weight: 175.2

The reason I went into the woods is to start putting my 'grow your own trees' scheme into motion. I've been researching what needs to be done to grow these trees from seeds, so I'm working on that.  I gathered seeds from the redbud in our front yard, a couple of spicebushes along the side, the buckthorn up front, and then went down into the woods to gather dogwoods seeds.  Yesterday, I separated all the redbud seeds from their pods, put them in a coffee mug, and doused them with boiling water.  They need to sit in that for 24 hours and then I can hit the next step, which if memory serves is to put them in dirt.  The other seeds all require different magic, so I could be remembering wrong.  Dogwood seeds need to be cleaned and scarified (i.e. the process of artfully damaging the seed hull to allow for germination), then they need to live in the fridge for 3-4 months.  Same with the buckthorn seeds.  The spicebush seeds just need to be cleaned, I think, and then chilled.  As I do this, I'll make sure to apply the right method for each seed.  Should be fun.

I'm also thinking about doing wood carving in my spare time.  Right now, I'm researching the tools and trying to see which ones to buy.  We'll see if I keep at it or get bored before I even start.

Oh, we went fishing this week.  It was only for a couple hours and I only caught one fish, but it was good to get out again.  And now I have nightcrawlers, so I can go whenever and not have to worry about waiting for my bait shop to open up.  

While we were driving to the fishing hole, we saw two bald eagles flying low and dancing in the air around each other.  It was AWESOME.  We also saw yellow-bellied sapsuckers this week, so yay!  I love fall migration.

Okay, that was a lot of read, so thank you for getting all the way down here.  Have a great week!  And feel free to drop a comment to let me know how your week went.

Thursday +1 This in That

 Okay, so it's not Thursday, but it's Thursday +1, so I'm doing this.

I don't want to suggest that we control the weather, but see, it's like this... We've noticed that every time Hubs mows, it rains the next day.  Except he hasn't had to mow in a while and now we're in a drought.  Also, back when I was fishing way more often, it seemed like every time I said I was going fishing the next day, I'd wake up to it raining.  Last night, I was talking about fishing this morning and I woke up to rain.  And another thing, I started thinking that maybe I'd still go fishing, because it's warm and warm rain is nice to fish in.  I no sooner thought that then the sky flashed and there was a big clap of thunder.  So, yeah, we control the weather.  To a certain extent, otherwise I could make it stop and go fishing. ROFL

If you think I actually believe that, you don't know me very well.  I do think it's a funny coincidence, though.  Well, we were laughing about it.

Man, it is pouring outside.  Yay!  The last time it rained like this was September 21st.  Hell, that was the last time it rained at all.  And we only got like two rains in September.  It's been dry here since like July, I think.  I'm not sure if this is going to spark a trend, but it's nice to hear rain on the roof again.  The cats, of course, are confused and have vacated their spots to probably hide under the bed.

So, I bought worms yesterday from my regular dealer.  When I started buying worms from her, they were $2.90 for a dozen.  Then she raised the price to like $3.15.  Yesterday, worms were $4.23 (after tax).  Frickin' inflation.  

My regular worm dealer is an older gal who runs a little corner store.  I wondered if she'd recognize me because 1) it's been a couple years since I've been there and 2) she's a stroke victim.  Yep, she remembered me.  Unfortunately, she's gotten more crochety since I was last there, so I've got to work on rebuilding the report we had.  :shrug: Life happens.

Fall colors here are really in full swing.  It's lovely.  And it makes me happy.  I do wish we had more maples here, so there would be more red added into the palette, but even though I didn't get to choose the painting, I still enjoy the art.

And wish that profoundness, I'll let you get on with your day.  Have a great one, wherever you are.

Non-Writing Projects

 I'm embarking on a couple new projects.  No, not writing projects.  Yes, I'm still editing and I still have tons of stuff to do in the writing vein.  These are for me. 

First off, Hubs and I decided to try our hands at growing trees from seeds.  Yesterday, I went out onto the property and gathered seeds pods from the redbud, then I gathered fruit from the dogwoods, the spicebushes, and the carolina buckthorns.  I've already done a ton of research to see if this is even possible and then to see what exactly needs to be done to get the seeds to germinate and thrive.  I've already planted an elm (poor Elmer, may he rest in piece... he was quite lovely before the deer ate him) and two cedars (Cecil and Cedric.  Cecil is doing fine in a pot right now.  Cedric never recovered from a late night critter attack.)  This won't be a short process and we won't even know if this works until Spring.  Fingers crossed.

The other project... err, hobby?... I'm gotten the urge to embark on is woodcarving.  We have all this wood and some of it is quite lovely (cedar, lilac, black cherry), so I'm going to try my hand at using it to make something beautiful.  I spent some time yesterday reading up on it and looking at tools on Amazon.  Sadly, the majority of inexpensive wood carving tools are made in China.  I may have to spend more to get domestic tools.  We'll see.  

Yes, I am quite aware that these are distractions and time sucks away from what I should be doing.  I also think I need this to keep myself sane.  :shrug:  Who knows how long I'll stick to this stuff?  It's worth a shot.  I mean, sure, I still have a big plastic tub full of yarn from my crocheting days - along with a blanket I started back in Colorado that I have yet to finish.  This may all come to nothing.  Either way, I'll learn something and that's never bad.

If the trees and shrubs work out, they'll make nice additions to our landscaping.  If the carving works out, I'll sell the stuff I make - or use it for gifts for friends and family.  I really want to carve up some really nice walking sticks and canes.  I have a thing for those.  :points to sporadically gimpy leg:  

Your turn... Tell me about something you do as a hobby.  Or tell me about a hobby you would like to have.  

Trigger Warnings

I know the people who stop by here on a regular basis are not trigger-warning type people.  We venture into the world without much of a care what other people say and we tend not to get offended by offhand comments.  If we read something that doesn't sit right with us, we close the book and move onto something else without it harshing our lives.  

I don't have trigger warnings on my books.  As a lark, before my last freebie offering, I put a warning on SLEEPING UGLY - something to the effect of WARNING: The main character of this book has a potty mouth.  Because she does and some people take issue with curse words.  I took it off there this morning.  Like I said, it was a lark and I didn't want it to stick.  I haven't yet gotten a bad review due to curse words, but should it happen, then it happens.  The book is what it is.

FERTILE GROUND centers around the hunt for a serial rapist.  It should be clear from the blurb, so if a person has issues with the subject, they should be able to suss out that this book isn't for them.  I hope they don't turn away from the book because of that.  It really does have a satisfying end.  Also, I do not go into any details in any of my scenes to show actual rapes, because I do have a problem with that.  It's more 'behind closed doors' and the after effects of said rape*.  

I'm a firm believer that we shouldn't hide from things that bother us.  Yank that shit out in the open, explore why it bothers me, find the cause, and then tuck it back away.  I mean, you don't have to invite it to sit in your living room, but you should at least know what bothers you and why.  

So, I guess you shouldn't expect any trigger warnings from me.  If you're triggered easily, my books probably aren't for you.  There's swearing and violence and ideas you may or may not be offended by (not all of these in every book... your mileage my vary).

What do you think of trigger warnings?  Do you use them?  Do you need them?  

* I have seen where people are now using asterisks in the word rape because even the word is a trigger.  I don't ascribe to that thinking.  I'm also now shying away from using asterisks in the word fuck.  Are people really less offended by f*** than the the word fuck?  Not sure what the rational is behind that.  Anyone above the age of 8-9 know what's behind the asterisks, don't they?  My friends and I were liberally using the word on the playground in fifth grade. 

Sunday Update 10/20/24

Good Morning.  I think.  The jury's still out.

I'm deep in editing right now.  Not any of my books, though.  I'm working on doing proofing for a friend.  I should finish today and then get my notes over to her.  Then I'll get back to my own stuff.

I did a lot of marketing this week.  WISH HITS THE FAN was free.  I moved 124 copies of that and sold a WISH IN ONE HAND in Australia.  It's not much, but it's better than a sharp stick in the butt.  I hope to see some residual sales and page reads in the coming weeks.  Like I did a free thing for BOAI last month and yesterday I saw where someone had read the whole thing in KU.  It's the long game here, people.  I've also earned double this year over last year.  Again, not a lot of money, but something is better than nothing.

I'm still not reading, unless you count that friend's book.  

The only thing I made this week of any note was battered tilapia fillets.  I'm all out of baked goods, so I need to rectify that soon.

On the activity front, I walked twice for 1.65 miles and I worked in the woods two days for an hour each day.  Mileage: 52.90.  I haven't weighed myself.  Unfortunately, all physical activity will be on hold for a bit.  Here's the dealie-bob: I was working in the woods and fell on my ass.  What happened was I was carrying a load of sticks from one pile to another, a longish stick fell out of the pile, hit the ground and stabbed me in the leg, so I twisted to get away from the ouchie stick. In doing that, my foot got hung up and my knee started to hyper-extend, so I jigged away from that and went down like a sack of dirt.  I did land on my ass instead of my face, so that's a win.  In the bizarre gymnastics of it all, though, I wrenched my knee pretty damn good.  It's not swollen or anything, but I probably shouldn't go hiking around with it.  Derp.  Hey, I usually fall at least once a year, and I haven't fallen in a couple years, so I should've seen this coming.  :shrug:

Right now, I look like I've undergone some type of weird abuse.  I have grease burns on my hand from the tilapia (flipped the fish and the oil splashed).  I have a bruise on my left leg from Friday when a tree limb snapped and came whipping back at me, whacking me just below the knee.  I have another bruise on that leg from the stabby stick and my right leg is both bruised and missing a layer of skin off the knee.  (I find this all amusing, so no worries.)

And that's about it.  I think I'm going to hit the coffee pot, have a smoke, and then go back to my recliner where I can put my leg up and get back to reading/editing.  Have a great day, everyone.