Thursday, November 4, 2010

Day Four-Nano

Medical Mystery Saga
Very little writing done due to life interference, but even some is better than none. Will try to do more tonight. Need to focus and so much goes on between work and home, it's difficult to find that point for your mind to latch on to. Hoping for a better writing weekend and maybe some time on Friday and Sunday.
Sometimes I think I have a good handle on the story, other times I'm sure I don't. Writing out of my usual genre makes me have to work harder. I can't rely on a demon attack or magick happening to move the story along in a medical mystery and there are only so many times you can have a heart stop in one story. I actually have to make my characters work at being themselves.

Wednesday, November 3, 2010

Nano Madness

It's time for Nanowrimo-National Novel Writing Month. I decided to post my progress on Something Old, even though I'm not an official Nanoite. I really need to finish the first draft this month so here I go, trying to hold myself accountable.

I love writing and would love to ditch the day job, but, food on the table counts, besides I work with nice people doing good work in healthcare, so can't complain too much.

If you haven't been to the blog lately, I haven't been keeping up. Maybe I'll post more when I'm trying to meet my own, public deadline. I promise to post more, of course if I don't have readers to interact with, it's a little more difficult to write to a vacume.

Sprayed for bugs yesterday, noticed some I hadn't had before. Pests encroaching into my space. Doing coffee, loving cooler weather.

Monday, August 30, 2010

Oil It


I went to a class about infusing oils this week and was amazed at how easy it was. At least this class was.

All you need is oil (olive, canola) and any fresh herbs or spices you like. You can follow the same steps to infuse flavors into vinegar.(Use a plain vinegar.)

Take a clear bottle, put fresh herbs and spices, in a combination you would like for cooking, in the bottle.

For one bottle I used a combination of dried tomatoes, garlic, oregano and bay leaf. Filled it up with oil, a funnel is helpful if you have one, and put in the stopper.

Set the bottle on a window sill that gets sun. A west window is good. Turn the bottle over to mix the ingredients every day. In two weeks, strain the oil and store the oil in the refrigerator. I want to make a garlic, dill vinegar next I think.

I also am infusing an oil with cinnamon sticks and cloves and orange peel to use on candles to scent them. I'll let you know how that works.

For those of the magical persuasion, consider infusing an oil with salt and fresh sage to use for protection and purification.

Tuesday, August 24, 2010

Lets have Pun(s)

A friend's father sent these to her and I had to steal them.

Puns for Educated Minds
1.
The fattest knight at King Arthur's round table was Sir Cumference.
He acquired his size from too much pi.
2.
I thought I saw an eye doctor on an Alaskan island, but it turned out to be an optical Aleutian .
3.
She was only a whiskey maker, but he loved her still.
4.
A rubber band pistol was confiscated from algebra class, because it was a weapon of math disruption.
5.
No matter how much you push the envelope, it'll still be stationery.
6.
A dog gave birth to puppies near the road and was cited for littering.
7.
A grenade thrown into a kitchen in France would result in Linoleum Blownapart.
8.
Two silk worms had a race. They ended up in a tie.
9.
A hole has been found in the nudist camp wall. The police are looking into it.
10.
Time flies like an arrow. Fruit flies like a banana.
11.
Atheism is a non-prophet organization.
12.
Two hats were hanging on a hat rack in the hallway. One hat said to the other: 'You stay here; I'll go on a head.'
13.
I wondered why the baseball kept getting bigger. Then it hit me.
14.
A sign on the lawn at a drug rehab center said: 'Keep off the Grass.'
15.
The midget fortune-teller who escaped from prison was a small medium at large.
16.
The soldier who survived mustard gas and pepper spray is now a seasoned veteran.
17.
A backward poet writes inverse.
18.
In a democracy it's your vote that counts. In feudalism it's your count
that votes.
19.
When cannibals ate a missionary, they got a taste of religion.
20.
If you jumped off the bridge in Paris , you'd be in Seine .
21.
A vulture boards an airplane, carrying two dead raccoons. The stewardess looks at him and says, 'I'm sorry, sir, only one carrion allowed per passenger.'
22.
Two fish swim into a concrete wall. One turns to the other and says 'Dam!'
23.
Two Eskimos sitting in a kayak were chilly, so they lit a fire in the craft. Unsurprisingly it sank, proving once again that you can't have your kayak and heat it too.
24.
Two hydrogen atoms meet. One says, 'I've lost my electron.' The other says 'Are you sure?' The first replies, 'Yes, I'm positive.'
25.
Did you hear about the Buddhist who refused Novocain during a root canal? His goal: transcend dental medication.
26.
There was the person who sent ten puns to friends, with the hope that at least one of the puns would make them laugh. No pun in ten did.

Thursday, July 15, 2010

Monday, July 12, 2010

Almost Time

Time to go to Colorado
Time to see friends
Time to write what I want to write
Time to draw
Time to enjoy old friends
drink wine
watch squirrels and birds
be on guard for bear visits
smell mountain air
dance
look at art
watch a chick-flick
listen to aspen
cool mornings-coffee on the deck
Time to be selfish
wait on myself
take naps
read, read, read
shop
read more.
This is my idea of vacation.
I leave on Saturday.

Wednesday, July 7, 2010

Balancing

Once again I find myself in a balancing act, much like those very bad ones on America's got talent, the ones that Piers immediately buzzes because they drop something. I'm dropping. I get involved in one project and immediately drop something that I should be taking care of on another one. I'm trying to keep up with nonfiction, fiction and a work related project that I have to partly do on my own time.

Fiction is fun and what I love to write, even though it's work sometimes. Nonfiction pays, enough said. Writing about diarrhea and the bugs that cause it, not so much. Then there is studying for IC Certification. A pain, but necessary. I miss the fiction, since it gets short-changed for the more immediate deadlines.


Its kind of like when you write fiction only, love the creative juices that go along with writing the first draft but hate editing, and yet you are finishing a first draft, editing another project and writing a synopsis(everyone hates that.) I should have put a whine warning at the first of this, huh?

Here I am published, on Amazon and Kindle, print books and I'm fussing about having work to do. Can I whine about the full time job? No, guess not, since a lot of people would kill for one. Getting old? Oops, the alternative ain't so great. Guess I'd just better look forward to Colorado and get it together.

What's your whine today?