emmyellis

Facebook Rudeness

2012-01-08T08:18:00.000-08:00

I’m writing thisbecause something happened that I knew would. I’m not mentioning the person’sname because it isn’t my thing, but unfortunately this person’s actions havesent me into rant mode. Call it the straw that broke the camel’s back.

A little while agoI switched off posting on my Facebook wall because I was sick to death of everymorning having to clean other people’s promo off it. As in, around 10-15 promodrops while I slept and God knows how many throughout the day. I KNOW writersneed to promo, but there’s a time and place for it. Honestly, imagine mine andother people’s walls as our homes, right? Would you walk up to someone’s house,slap a poster on the outside of it telling the world you have a book out, thenwalk away? Would you knock on the door under the guise that you’ve knocked toshoot the shit, catch up on the latest news with the house owner, letting themthink you CARE about them, slap a poster in their face then walk away?

No. You wouldn’t. Itwould be rude, wouldn’t it? You’d be embarrassed when the house owner told youto take that damn poster off my house, you cheeky sod, and don’t knock on mydoor again! You’d risk being seen as a complete pig. So why is it acceptableto some to do this on Facebook?

This is utterrudeness. Some people might leave that shooting-the-shit comment along with theblatant promo on their wall because it would seem churlish to remove it when ithad a nice sentiment on it, but me? Hell no! I take them OFF. It smacks of thenice sentiment only being written as an excuse to drop promo on the end of it.

Now, I onlyswitched my wall back on this morning so that people in my family who don’tlive with me and those friends who don’t slap their stuff on my wall could havethe opportunity to wish me a happy birthday tomorrow. I knew when I switched iton that by the end of today someone would drop promo. Already I’ve changedwhat I want to do in my life by totally switching my wall off, and that annoysme because there are family and friends out there who don’t have theopportunity to leave me messages because of other people’s rudeness. Other people's actions affecting my life.

Do I switch my wallback off now, forcing those who want to speak to me tomorrow to send a notethrough PM? I shouldn’t have to. My wall should be respected.

I very rarely getarsey, but this kind of thing really does get on my nerves. You promo on yourown walls, and when it comes up on the newsfeed, if it catches my eye and I goand buy your book, excellent. I've done this several times. I shouldn’t feel forced into reading stuff I don’twant to read; the people who visit my wall shouldn’t have to see link afterlink of book promos.

Have some manners!

Now, I just saw myfab friend Rhonda Helms posted on my wall. She said something nice, and THIS iswhat my wall is for—to connect with friends and family, for them to be able tosay stuff they wouldn’t use a PM to say. I’ve denied myself this kind of thing—otherpeople’s actions again. I’m missing out on nice conversation, and to be honest,with my time limited where I can’t natter on emails very often, catching up onmy wall is brilliant for me.

D’you know what? Itreally does stink. I would never dream of dropping links on people’s walls. Itjust isn’t done in my world.

Another thing thatbugs me is getting friend requests from people then as soon as you accept themthey slap you with promo. With my wall switched off, those promos came via PM,and every one of them is deleted once I see what's going on. In future,anyone who adds me just to show off their book is going to be deleted from mylist. Those in the past lost a sale the minute they promo’d. I won't buy one of their books EVER, just because they were rude like that. Those people clearly don’t want to bemy friend, they just want to either expand their friend list or try and get meto buy their book.

Now, I have nearly5K people on my friend list. I don’t know many of them—those I added right at thebeginning were people I wanted to add, people I was interested in. Since then,those added have been people who added me. I may not comment much on yourwalls, but I read every single status at some point in my day—mainly morningsand evenings. I might not comment, but I do read because I’m interested in whatyou have to say. People post things that make me laugh or smile, cheer me up ondays I might feel a bit poo. I really don’t want to have to sift througheveryone and remove those who have offended me with promo in the past, but ifit continues, I will. You’re taking up a slot in my friend list that people whoactually want to KNOW me in some way will miss out on when that hideous 5K isreached and they try to connect and can't.

Rant over.

Gosh. There Are Cobwebs In Here...

2012-01-08T05:03:00.000-08:00

Have you ever had one of those times where you’ve been racing along doing stuff then stopped to see where you’re at and shocked yourself? I’ve just had one of those times. I updated my website today, thinking it only needed artwork adding, and saw how many books and news of them I had to add as well.

Below is a list of books to come for the first quarter of 2012.

The Coterie Series ~ Lincoln's Woman ~ Release Jan 2012 ~ Natalie Dae

That Filthy Book ~ Natalie Dae & Lily Harlem ~ Release April 2012

Shades of Grey ~ Natalie Dae & Sam Crescent ~ Release date TBA

Rude Awakening ~ Natalie Dae & Sam Crescent ~ Currently in Submission

Minute Maid ~ Natalie Dae ~ Release date TBA

Voices Series ~ Sugar Strands ~ Sarah Masters ~ Release Jan 13^th 2012

Voices Series ~ Queer Rites ~ Sarah Masters ~ Currently Being Written (almost done!)

The Dreaming Series ~ Tools of Justice ~ Sarah Masters & Jaime Samms ~ Release March 26^th 2012

The Dreaming Series ~ Book 2 ~ Sarah Masters & Jaime Samms ~ Currently Being Written

Bad News ~ Natalie Dae & Lily Harlem ~ Currently in Submission

Shadows & Darkness ~ Natalie Dae ~ Release date TBA

As Yet Untitled ~ Natalie Dae & Sam Crescent ~ Currently Being Written

Planned Works for the rest of this year ~ Fight 2, Fantasies Explored 3, The Coterie 2, Voices 3, 2 As Yet Untitled (with Lily Harlem), 7 As Yet Untitled (with Sam Crescent), 1 As Yet Untitled (with Paige Turner). A mainstream novel written as Charley Oweson (started). Any other book that enters my head.

I’m lucky that I can knock out 10K in one day—lucky because I work full-time for Total-E-Bound and being able to write so fast means I can still produce the amount of books I did for the past two years. I’ve actually found that being only able to write at the weekend has helped. I have so much stored in my head from thinking about my books during the week, that it’s brewed and ready to spill onto the page by Saturday.

Work

My job as Head of Art for TEB is still as inspiring and wonderful as it was when I started last year (March 1^st full-time, Jan-Feb freelance). I adore my job because art is another of my loves and it isn’t really like working. I get to go into that place in my head while creating covers where I don’t think of anything in particular. Everything fades away and the time zips by. Before I know it, another day is at an end and I’m shocked at how quickly it passed.

For anyone who ever wondered exactly what I do, I don’t just create covers. I make promotional banner packs for every book (postcard, bookmark, banner and thumbnail), update TEB’s merchandise site, create any promotional artwork that needs doing, send work to the other artists, do paperwork to ensure I know where I’m at and what needs doing next (on Excel to begin with then scribbled notes in several notebooks that are sprinkled with multi-coloured highlights, each colour meaning something different to me but looks a mess to anyone else), paperwork on the images used, uploading my work to the database, checking the release schedule for any changes (in case a different cover needs doing), print book flats, audio covers… Gosh, it all looks rather frantic but I have a little system going where certain things get done on certain weeks of the month and by the end everything is done.

This job is THE BEST for me. I think about it a lot when I’m not working and recently had 9 days off (November). I didn’t fully relax until the Thursday, and by then I felt depressed and very bored without my job to keep me going. I didn’t even want to write. It felt horrible. When I returned to work the following Monday, I was in heaven. I’ve now come to the conclusion, with Christmas as my guide, that having two days off work, including a weekend, is enough for me. Any more and I go nuts.

I realise I’m a workaholic not only with my job but writing as well. I’m happy this way. The thought of time on my hands for an extended period makes me break out in shivers.

Writing

At the end of 2011 I had a strange little book come out as Sarah Masters called I Am the Wind. I say strange because I hadn’t planned to write it and it wasn’t something I thought would sell. A friend from my days on a writing forum challenged me to write a short book with a hacksaw in it—and it had to be written over the course of a weekend. I did it and sent it to one of my publishers, who loved it, said it was “one of the most fucked-up romances I’ve ever read” and published it. Yes, it is a bit effed, but that little bugger has surprised me in how very well it’s sold. I wondered if that was because I hadn’t had a book out as Sarah Masters for quite a while or because readers enjoy books involving very tortured men. Either way, it was one of the highlights of 2011 in that just because you don’t think it will sell (because, let’s face it, we’re steered towards what to write and what supposedly sells), you may be shocked when it does. A kind of write-from-the-heart thing and see where it goes.

Which leads me to wondering whether I ought to create more tortured men just to see if that is why I Am the Wind sold. It’ll be an interesting study anyway.

On another interesting note, I received a message from a reader a couple of months ago regarding Mane Attraction. That book got a bit slammed on Goodreads (I don’t want to sound a bitch, but that place…Gawd!), with people saying the quest wasn’t explained, among other things. I sat here and thought: The quest is there for all to see. Man has to get lion shifter back to Africa. I frowned, wondering how something that is so obvious wasn’t picked up by certain people. Also, when someone states they couldn’t finish the book, you question what you could have done differently, what you can do in future books to ensure this doesn’t happen again, and, me being me, I also think: Okay, you didn’t like it. Sorry about that, but I loved writing it, other people have enjoyed it, so we’ll put it down to that particular book coming off as total crap to you and move on, shall we?

However, going back to the message from someone on Goodreads… He asked if there was going to be a book 2. I told him I doubted it because I didn’t think anyone would be interested, and he said he would be. Well, that was enough for me. One person wants book 2, so that person will get it at some point—complete with content the man wished to read about. I explained about my other projects and that I’d try to get it done and received an excited response. Okay, so I may only be writing it for that one person and myself, but if it makes us both happy, I’ll do it.

Thank you, reader.

I’ve been busy with co-authoring too. I started writing with Lily Harlem last year after meeting her in real life at a TEB function. We got along so well and writing with her is an absolute dream. We have one novel contracted so far—That Filthy Book—and another in submission—Bad News. As we’re both so busy at the minute, we’ll be starting two new books later, one she has in her head and one I have in mine. Who knows where the hell they’ll take us, as the previous two have turned out to be quite the crazy ride!

I also began writing with the lovely Sam Crescent. We penned a Texas werewolf novel last year which has been contracted—Shades of Grey—and have just submitted our second novel—a BDSM called Rude Awakening—while writing our third. I write the male POV, Sam writes the female, and it works well for us because I prefer writing about blokes. Our books seem to take on a life of their own, and we get them done with alarming speed—we both write fast, so this is a bonus.

And then there’s the delightful Jaime Samms. Our second co-author is due out at the end of March—The Dreaming: Tools of Justice. This novel is about 90K, and we realised we still had so much more to say about these men and their world so decided to make it a series. We’re currently writing book 2, where the plot thickens and new characters have been introduced, as well as keeping those from book 1.

Sugar Strands, the first in my Voices novel series is out on Jan 13^th. I love the guy in this one—Oliver—who hears voices from the dead. His relationship with Detective Langham was a joy to write, and because these two got right inside my head, I decided to write a series. I’m nearing the end of book 2 at the moment (5K left whoo!)—Queer Rites—and have a vague idea of what book 3 will be about. With this series, I started with Oliver and Langham. In #2 we have O & L plus two new men, Dane and Adam. In #3 O & L will feature, possibly D & A as very minor characters, but the other main POV will be from a serial killer. Needless to say, me and my penchant for horror… I’m really looking forward to writing #3. Obviously, with the series title being Voices, that is the main theme. Oliver hears the dead, Adam hears the living in his head, and the serial killer will hear…a different voice entirely.

As Natalie Dae, I have a couple of books I need to write before the end of this year’s first quarter. #3 in the Fantasies Explored series, coming from Jack’s POV, and #2 in The Coterie Series, entitled Cormag’s Woman. Best get busy then…

Reviewing

Last year was a good one for Miz Love Loves Books. We weren’t able to review every book sent in, and sadly some had to be deleted as they’d been in the queue for more than 4 months, but we reviewed a good deal of them. The inbox/genre folders are currently bursting. There are more books than we can handle right now, so inevitably some aren’t going to get picked up this year and will be deleted. I hate doing that but it’s the only way we can keep on top of things if we stick to the 4-month-in-the-queue rule. We’ll plod on, cast the guilt of deletion aside, and concentrate on trying to get a new review out every day of the working week. Sometimes, due to my schedule, this doesn’t happen and I have to put up a wedge of reviews on one day, but such is life—it intrudes so rudely sometimes.

We had a Best of 2011, where we nominated our favourite books from last year. These books were chosen by us rather than going down the public-vote route because…well, I don’t think I should go into the vote-rigging scenario here. I asked the reviewers to pick books that stood out to them the most, the ones they could remember still, regardless of the score they gave. If we went by scores we’d have chosen all Golden Nib books, which wasn’t what I wanted at all. I wanted books that had stuck in the mind, books that will probably still be in the mind for various reasons this time next year, and here are the results. The site has also had a revamp, so it now looks less cluttered and more…refined? No idea, you be the judge of that.

So…

After that huge waffle, which will possibly remain here at the top of my blog posts for some time to come because I’m such a shitty blogger, I wish you all the very best for 2012 and that many of your dreams and wishes come true.

Until next time, loves!

A Little Before and After Artwork

2011-11-29T08:04:00.000-08:00

1, 2, 3 Rants!

2011-09-21T10:54:00.000-07:00

Apologies for any foul language that is present in this post. Some is bound to slip out because I’m annoyed.

Rant #1

I don’t usually get pissed off. Well, I do, but not with cold callers on the telephone. I used to get really arsey with them but realised I was fighting a losing battle so started either ignoring their calls when an unrecognised number came up on caller display, or, if they caught me out by making their call display “withheld”, which could be any of my family or friends who’ve opted to keep their number private, I began just putting the phone down.

To save me typing it out again, I’ll just paste my Facebook status here so if you haven’t seen it you’ll get the idea of why I’m annoyed:

Umm, just had a phone call on my mobile (how did she get that number?) from someone trying to get me to do a survey, and I was incredibly polite in saying I didn't wish to participate and could she take me off her calling list. She argued that I didn't know what she was going to ask me yet, can I just spare her a minute, so I said I couldn't, that if she wasn't any of my creditors, could she please take me off her list. She said: There's no need to be rude, Michelle. WHAT? If she wanted rude, she'd have heard me call her an effing mofo. Silly cow. DISLIKE BUTTON!

So then, while letting off steam on Fb, I realised she’d used my real name. So she knows my name, my phone number and most probably my address. This bugs the hell out of me. I’m a private person. I don’t like people knowing my shit. If they need to know, I’ll tell them. And what happened to privacy? What’s with feeling like you have to explain yourself to some turd caller who won’t take no for an answer? How do they manage to make YOU feel guilty for asking them to not call you again?

It’s their job. I get it. But when they call me, they’re interrupting MY job or my spare time. I don’t want to buy their sodding awnings. Yes, let’s talk about the guy who called me about awnings. Did I want one in my garden? They’re very good for keeping off the sun and rain if you want to sit outside. Never mind the bloody fact these awnings STARTED at two grand each… This call came back in the day when I’d politely tell them no thank you and try to get off the line. So I told the guy to ring me back in six months, hoping he’d bugger off.

He did.

For six months.

The phone rang one day, and he spoke to me as though I should have remembered him.

“Hi, Michelle, it’s Clive.”

Clive? I don’t know any bloody Clives.

Laughter. “You know! Clive! Clive from Awesome Awnings!”

Awesome Bloody Awning

That wasn’t the name of the company, but it may as well have been the way he ranted on about how awesome those awnings were. I fobbed him off again by saying my finances had taken a nosedive and I couldn’t afford an Awesome Awning.

“Nooooooo problem, Michelle. I’ll give you a call in six months again.”

“Um, no. My finances won’t be any different by then.”

“Okay then, what about…hmmm…let’s say a year?”

“Okay.”

A year later…

“Hi, Michelle, it’s me, Clive!”

Fuck me sideways.

It was at this point I realised I needed to grow some hairy balls and tell these kinds of people no, that I mean no, and that’s that. I did.

Hubby registered us with this company—

There is a pause in this post for me to tell you I’ve just burned my effing dinner. And not only that, I originally typed “borned” my dinner, which set me off wondering how on earth I was supposed to have given birth to a cow.

—whereby when you quote their name the caller immediately disappears. It was instant magic. They were scared of this company. I think it was something to do with them getting caught for making unsolicited phone calls.

The calls stopped for ages. Bliss. Then they started again, with a new breed of arsehole calling who wasn’t scared of this company. They rattled on like they had before, only worse, like they were daring me to threaten them with some other company who’d frighten them into hanging up.

The latest spate of calls have been the pre-recorded ones. The one that starts, “Did you know…?” in an irritating monotone really drives me up the damn wall. No, I didn’t know, and whatever it is I’m supposed to know, I don’t want to. Ignorance is bliss, love. So the other new one lately starts with bank names: “Natwest and Halifax—“

Can knob off.

Rant #2

It isn’t often I buy decent steak. The only reason I did the other day is because Tescos supermarket had a special offer on. Peppered steak. So, after being pissed off by that phone call, I decided to go and make dinner. I got the steak out of the fridge. Tescos had laid the three steaks in the packet overlapping one another. “Oh yum,” I muttered to my damn self—it’s becoming a bit of a freaky habit, that—and began opening the package. Only to find this so-called peppered steak only had the pepper stuff ON THE BITS OF STEAK THAT WERE SHOWING TO THE CUSTOMER THROUGH THE CELLOPHANE LID!

Cheeky, peppercorn-stealing buss-tards!

I have been defrauded of several bobbles of peppercorns and feel affronted in the extreme. Mumbling that Tescos is a pig of a supermarket who have taken over our nearest town, not only with TWO large supermarkets but several of the wanky little express shops, I rammed the steak under the grill. Switched it on. Huffed off to have a cigarette in order to calm down. After this, I returned to the oven to check how the cooking process was going, only to find, as usual with me lately, that I’d just switched the bloody oven light on and not the grill.

I piss myself off.

So I switched it on, making sure the electric element glowed red before I walked away to begin this post. And, as I stated above, I borned the effing things.

Today was going absolutely fine until that bloody phone call. I think the survey lady has secretly hexed me.

I’ll just state for the record that I hate Tescos. I hate their greed, the fact that every time another supermarket bids to build a store here, Tescos make a complaint and have the build stopped. I resent just having Somerfield—which smells of old lady’s pissy knickers (not that I’ve gone up to an old lady who wee’d herself and took a hefty breath) and doesn’t look very clean at all—or Iceland, which attracts a certain element, shall we say, as other shop alternatives. I hate the fact we have to go around 20 miles to shop elsewhere or buy it online—and I ALWAYS fuck up my online food shopping so that idea is slowly going out the window. If it isn’t me messing it up, it’s them.

Don’t get me started on their “alternatives” if what I want isn’t in stock on the day the pickers pack my shopping. What part of hand WASH says hand CREAM to a picker? What part of MENTHOL cigarettes says NORMAL cigarettes? What about the most recent one: “I’ll just forget to pack your deodorant, your shampoo AND your hair conditioner today”? Oh, that’s okay, love. I really enjoy going around smelling of B.O. and having hair so greasy you could fry chips on them. And then, when I called customer services to say some of my shopping hadn’t arrived, and I gave them the product numbers, and she told me how much they would refund…why, oh sodding bloody why, did they only refund HALF of it, making me have to ring them again?

Barforama

And what about when I was online shopping the other day and I wrote "Asda frozen potato lattices" in the search box. How the HELL did their computer throw up CHICKEN LIVERS? How come, when my daughter looked for this carpet freshener stuff they had it, but when I went to look they didn't? Don't they want me to buy Shake 'n' Vac with the scent of summer-shitting-breeze? Do they know it's me shopping and they devise some trick every week to test my patience?

I’ve decided I also hate Asda.

Rant #3

At present, I am enduring:

1. Middle Son rapping beside me. Yes, he's rapping some insane garbage about body image or something, and I wonder what the hell has happened to music these days. As I type this, he is listening to a rather irritating song on his phone by some guy who is an ultra-fast rapper who rapped ultra fast because people didn’t believe he could rap ultra fast. He put his ultra-fast rap on You-Tube, God bless him.

He can rap the hell off, because his voice is getting on my nerves.

2. Smallest shouts from the garden that she’s painting the back door with water. I ask why she’s doing this and receive the response that it’s fun. I don’t argue with that. I’d like to paint with yellow water right now, if you know what I mean. I’d like to pain the faces of every cold caller with it so they smell like those old ladies I mentioned earlier.

My mum said I'm a greedy wanker

3. The cats are yowling from the garden telling me they want some of the meat they can smell. They’re not having any. But they come in anyway, sneaking about in my kitchen while I’m in here, and when I just went in there to turn the meat they scrabbled outside so fast it was like their arses were on fire. Yes, they’d better run. If they even THINK about stealing any of that food there’ll be trouble. I confess I called him a terrible name.

I am a nasty pet owner.

4. The TV is blaring some horrible tune on the opening credits for a film called Gone in 60 Seconds. I dislike this film because it has Nicholas Cage in it. He gives me the creeps.

My ire is mounting.

While I’m at it, on the back of a Fb conversation last night, I may as well admit here that cherry tomatoes also give me the creeps. I have no clue why they bother me and normal tomatoes don’t. They are hateful, tiny little balls of creepiness. I wonder if I’ll have a nightmare later. Murder by cherry tomato. A dream where I’m running in syrup to get away from a horde of angry-faced cherry tomatoes and I try to fly and can’t until they’re nipping at my heels with their pippy little teeth.

5. I’m slowly going mental with all this going on.

6. I’m telling myself there are far more important things going on in the world for me to rant about, but I’m too far gone.

7. I just had a cherry-tomato-induced shudder.

8. I just had another phone call. Hubby is very in tune with me even when we're apart. He isn't allowed to use his phone at work, so he can't have seen my Fb status.

"Hello?" I said.

"Did you know...?" he said.

"No, I fucking didn't!" I said.

It's time for some calming camomile tea, I think...

Long Hair is a Pain in the... by Larion Wills

2011-09-20T08:49:00.000-07:00

Please welcome Larion Wills to The Ellis Herald, where she talks about long hair and what a nightmare it can be. Take it away, Larion!

How many times have you read a line similar to ‘he couldn’t wait to run his hands through the long silken stains of her hair’? It sounds so romantic; I’ve seen such references in every romance novel I’ve read. No one mentions what a pain in the rear long hair is to the wearer. I, no doubt affected by the façade, always wanted long hair. It’s sexy, right? I envisioned myself giving a long dangling curl a flip over my shoulder along with a coy come here look. In my younger years I did manage to get it to grow a little past my shoulders, just not quite long enough for that sexy flip. Then about ten years ago I stopped putting perms in it. Lo and behold, it started growing. My light auburn glory, well tinged with natural highlights—yes, I really mean gray—hangs to the middle of my back. Anytime I lean forward it does fall over my shoulders at a time when there isn’t a man alive, except my husband, who would remotely think it’s sexy when I throw it out of the way. ‘She leaned forward and her hair fell in a curtain to hide her face.’ That means she’s blinded, has hair in her mouth and eyes. Not sexy or romantic.

You want a reality check on what it’s really like to have long hair? I had this project, a very simple one: build up a rock wall around a small pond in my yard, following an example seen at good old Home Depot. Once the rocks were in place, work I supervised, simply use an aerosol can of spray insulation foam to set the rocks in place. I, of course, had to show my helper, a 19-year-old grandson, how to do it. Try not to get ahead of me here. You’ve probably already guessed. I leaned down and somehow one of those sexually falling strands of hair came in contact with the blob of foam at the end of the nozzle. AGHHH! Followed by panic. Holding the contaminated strand away from my head to prevent the foam from drawing more hair to it like a cancerous magnet, I ran into the house. What will take it out? ran through my mind. Gooey, sticky. What takes gooey sticky out? Fingernail polish remover takes off gum left behind from labels. I tore the bathroom cabinet apart. It got it wet, but didn’t help the sticky. Must have been one of those non-aceton kind for false nails. I still had a wad equal to a three piece mouthful of bubble gum. Acetone! That takes off the glue used to put Formica on a counter top.

I dash off to the pantry. I know we have some left from taking the excess glue off the counter top. Leaning over the kitchen sink, I work in acetone with fears of frying my hair and ending up looking like I’m wearing a clown wig after sticking my finger in a light socket. Whoa. The funds are astounding. Hair held out as far as I can, head turned to avoid the fumes as much as possible, I’m relieved to feel the sticky subside. Alas, relieved too soon. Must have been the fumes. After washing the acetone out, the paper towel used to blot out the water sticks and the hair is still a bird nest wad defying efforts to separate. Oh, no, what am I going to do? There has to be something to take it out. Back to the pantry. Ummm, Goop Off. Can’t be any worse than acetone. Back to the sink. That round I didn’t relax until the paper towel didn’t stick and I could separate the strands. I’m also happy to say, I didn’t fry my hair. I did go back outside to see how the project had progressed in my absence. Little side note here, don’t let a 19 year old loose with a can of aerosol foam without supervision. Seeing the mess he’d made and thinking of the clean up, I wondered if the directions on the can tell you how to get it out? I know, I should have read the directions before I ran into the house, but I did tell you I panicked. After all, it was a threat of my ‘crowning glory’ and if you don’t understand now what a pain in the…long hair can really be, you will forever be blinded by words of glamour and sexy in fiction. I still am or I’d cut the stuff off.

Click for:

Oh, My Dear, I Feel Like a Tart!

2011-09-17T08:19:00.000-07:00

Last Saturday night I discovered I really don’t “do” pubs anymore. Well, not pubs the younger generation frequent anyway. I don’t mind going to the pub for a meal with the fammo, but to be honest, my days of going out on the lash are well and truly over. This particular night was my friend’s hen night. For those of you who aren’t UK and don’t know what a hen night is, it’s a night out for the bride-to-be, usually the week before the wedding (or even a weekend break away), with all her friends. The men have stag parties.

Anyway, I wore a dress and my lovely red shoes—and promptly felt like mutton dressed as lamb. A tart. I mean, okay, I know I live in my jammies, and on the days I do get dressed it’s leggings or jeans, but wearing a dress always makes me feel so…RUDE. I can’t explain what the hell I mean. Hmm. I always feel exposed, but not in the fleshy way. Exposed, as in, vulnerable, that I’m not comfortable with what I’m wearing. So, with this feeling going on, plus the fact I hadn’t been out with the girls in yonks—not counting the TEB “do”, which was different anyway—we got the bus into town. After having a quick drink in a pub—Disaronno for me because anything stronger and I’d have been all over the place as I don’t drink much these days—we got on another bus to Oxford. Aaaand sang a lot on the way to tunes on my iPhone. Hilarious to get funny looks from the other passengers, but instead of feeling young and groovy like I would have done once upon a time, I felt like the other people saw me as some silly old granny on a day-trip to the seaside, swaying to the music, except we weren’t singing Cliff Richard songs.

Hmph.

The meal in Oxford was delightful, a really nice time had by all, and then we returned to our home town. I’d told myself to go home at this point because I knew I wouldn’t like the pubby bit to come, but I went along anyway. In the first pub, I felt uncomfortable but it wasn’t a feeling that nudged me to the door and made me call Hubby to come and get me. But the second pub? Good bloody LORD! The minute I walked in I wanted to turn right round and walk out again. The young people looked about 12—they can’t have been, but that’s how they seemed—and it was so blatantly obvious who was gazing at who, who had a raging need to approach who, that I was amazed at how apparent it was now that I’m older. I never noticed this going on at ALL when I was younger. Probably because I wasn’t looking and no fucker ever looked at me anyway HA HAAA! But you get the idea.

Testosterone filled the air along with giggly girls trying to look older and sophisticated by prancing around on the dance floor as though they worked the poles every other night of the week.

I was quite disturbed.

Now, I know this goes on, I’m not stupid, but to see it like that when the days of me having anything to do with such shenanigans—God, I’m even using old lady words now; effing great!—are over, well, I knew it wouldn’t be long before I turned into a woman who tutted a lot and rolled her eyes.

Tonight, a week later, is the wedding. I’ll be wearing a dress again, but one that doesn’t show my chest, thank goodness. And Hubby and Smallest will be with me, so I suspect I’ll feel more comfortable. The bride looked absolutely stunning this morning when she climbed into the silver limo outside her house, and there I stood, with Smallest, another friend and her daughters, all in our bloody pyjamas, crying and seeing our friend off.

She’s waited ten years for this, and I know she’ll be so happy today. Sigh. I can’t wait to see her later, see how radiant she is. Sometimes, life really is bloody wonderful.

Revamp and the Pissy Old Lady

2011-09-09T13:53:00.001-07:00

THE INFORMATION BIT: I got bored. The blog wasn’t making me want to come here and post. So I revamped. Again. As you can see, it’s a newspapery kinda place now, where I hope people will want to guest here in order to spread the word about their books. You want a spot here, just email me your article or whatever, and I’ll post it if the day is free, and if it isn’t, I’ll let you know which day it’ll go live to the masses! If you want to be in Celebrity Squares, just email me your web link and I’ll do the rest.

THE SHOOTING-THE-SHIT BIT: Now we have that out of the way, I wanted to talk about my mentalness. I doubt that’s even a word, but who cares. It is now. For the past year I’ve been getting increasingly forgetful with regards to things non-work related. With work, I have my notebooks—three of the buggers—my highlighter pens with each colour meaning different things. Yellow means the cover is complete. A squiggly black line through that means the banner pack is complete. A tick beside that means I’ve uploaded the cover and pack to the database. A cross means the author has their artwork.

Scribble on that chicken baby, yeah!

If only I could use pens to sort the rest of my jobs out. Just think, when I need to remember to carve the chicken, I can scribble all over it in luminous green pen. When I need to remember to cook the bloody thing, it can be red. Sorted.

Earlier, I made a salad. I’m miles away, as per usual, mind on the workday just gone, what’s left from this week’s list to complete next week, then my tasks for this weekend—writing (whoo!), housework (effing hell), reading (can we have a hell yeah?) and a Hen Night. Yes, one of my pals is getting married next weekend, and tomorrow night is her last night out with the girls as a “single” woman. She hasn’t been single for the past ten years (bugs the shit out of me that people are classed as single even when they’re in a relationship), but they’re finally tying the knot.

Anyway. I went off track. I wanted to discuss onions. I was making the salad, musing away on everything above, one after the other. (Also how I thought I’d lost my red sandals I bought to go to the TEB bash in May—I wanted to wear them tomorrow night—when, in fact, I’d put them away “securely”. So securely I couldn’t find the sodding things, and after gutting the whole house in a late spring clean, with Hubby finishing off with searching in the cupboard under the stairs, which is a veritable nightmare of coats, shoes, bags and umbrellas, I saw the shoe box sitting on top of the fridge...but that’s another story, and I’ve bleedin’ well gone off track again.)

See, this is what I’m on about. I go off on tangents.

You beige-haired buss-tard!

Onions. Salad. Chopping away at the lettuce. Slicing off the ends of the onion. You know the bits, where it looks like they have thick, coarse beige hair growing out of them. I’m talking red onions. So I lop off the ends, put the ends in the bin and go to cut the main onion that’s left. Only, I see I have the ends still on the chopping board. I go to the bin. See a whole onion sitting on top of all the other crap in there. When did that happen? How did that happen? It took a moment’s pause for me to come to grips with the fact I’d done this. I’d acted like “one of those mad people” you read about on the news, where it starts with small things like hairy onion ends on your chopping board and progresses to pissing your knickers every time you sneeze or laugh. Wait, I’ve already accomplished that stage…

I’m 38. I dread to think what I’ll be like at 48. I can’t even begin to imagine. Maybe I’ll cook the highlighter pens instead of the chicken. Maybe I’ll go outside to piss, thinking I went upstairs, swearing blind I was in the bathroom. The kids in the street will all laugh, calling me Smelly Ellis because after I pissed myself, I forgot to go and change.

The future does not look too bright.

Still, I’ll hope for a miracle cure. A tablet that will stop this crazy business before it even really begins. Please share your senior moments with me. I feel terribly alone and wibbly (*wibbly - word taught to me by the fabulous Jaime Samms).

Moany Old Cow

2011-08-21T02:33:00.000-07:00

When I was a kid, I always wondered why “old” people got up so early on the weekends. Why they didn’t stay in bed until noon and why they always rushed about “doing” stuff at the weekend. Now I’m “old”, or older anyway, I fully understand it. You get up early all week, sorting the kids for school then working, then cooking and doing a bit of cleaning. And I’ve decided that bugs the shit out of me. The working after work thing, I mean. I finish work, but my work isn’t done. I don’t just flop on the sofa and watch TV or whatever. No, like millions of people, and dare I say the majority are women here, finish work and cook dinner, clean up, do other things that need doing, and then they get to sit down, maybe at about 7 p.m. if they’re lucky.

Yes, that was a gripe about a woman’s work never being done, but I’ll get over it.

So why do we get up so early at the weekend and race about doing “stuff”? It’s simple. There isn’t time during the week. But the funny thing is, today I could have stayed in bed. Wasted half the day away catching up on sleep. Lolled about because last night I didn’t feel very well—horrible tummy ache—and allowed myself to wallow in illness. But I didn’t. I woke at 6, got up at 7, and straight away painted a doorframe. Then I did some edits, rooting out my irritating repeat words that appear with every bloody book no matter how hard I try not to do it. And now I’m thinking, at 9:42, what the feck can I do now? I’d planned to read all day, but I’m surprisingly alert and wanting to do something, knowing that if I do, and fill my day with “doing”, I’ll regret not having rested come Wednesday next week when I’m feeling tired and flagging. But there are things to do, like a late spring clean, dumping lots of things we’ve hoarded because “we might use that later” and never do. So many jobs, so little time…

Next weekend, we have a three-day jobbie because we have a bank holiday on Monday. I’m looking forward to spending Saturday doing the other thing I love other than art or writing, and that’s decorating. I have the bug again, so I’ll be painting and also wallpapering Smallest’s room. I want to get our bedroom repainted as well, and seeing as our wardrobe collapsed on us last week—not literally on us, but you know what I mean—Hubby will also be assembling some new chests of drawers so we at least have somewhere to store our clothes.

Maybe one weekend I will do absolutely nothing but read and doss about. No cooking, cleaning, going into town, writing, laundry, “Mum, where is…?” “Mum, do you know…?” “What’s for dinner?” “Can I have…?”

Yeah right.

I suppose you could say I’m feeling a bit ratty inside. Feeling a bit woe is me over always being the one who knows where this or that is, who solves all the issues, who does stuff when I don’t want to. It’s only me who can solve this by saying “Do it yourself!” or “I don’t know where that is!” or “D’you know what, I just want to be like you and float along in life without a care in the world, knowing someone else will be taking care of the shit.”

Except I’m a person who solves the shit or takes care of it, and sometimes it gets a bit grating. I’ll have my moan now and will shut up, accept that I’m a shit cleaner—in more ways than one; my house needs cleaning again!—and just get on with it. But for just one day I would love to:

Finish work and do absolutely jack shit! The rules would be simple:

1. The kitchen is closed. Chef’s too tired to cook. The oven works if you switch it on, though, and food is in the fridge and freezer. The food packages have instructions on them. If you read them, it will tell you how to cook it. On this occasion, after reading those instructions, you must NOT then ask the chef how to cook it, how hot the oven should be, and the real kicker…DON’T ASK THE CHEF HOW TO SWITCH THE OVEN ON. She’s likely to grab one of her trusty knives and jab it at your nether regions.

2. The encyclopaedia is closed. The Fountain of All Knowledge is too tired to answer any questions about where your things are. Her page edges are frayed, she smells musty, and if you request an answer to something, she’s likely to open her mouth and spew fire. If you value your eyebrows and hair, remain at least twenty paces from her. If you ignored the knife warning in #1, you are most likely lamenting that hindsight is a wonderful thing and have discovered that you hadn’t valued your balls as much as you should have.

3. The vacuum cleaner sits in the kitchen corner behind the door. To use it, you will have to plug it in and switch it on. Yes! It needs electricity to work. You then push it over the floor and amazingly, it picks up all manner of things THAT YOU DROPPED.

It is perhaps best to polish the furniture before you vacuum. You don’t even need to use the spray and the yellow cloth. In the cupboard under the sink in the kitchen, there are polishing wipes. Swipe these over the furniture and bin the cloth when finished. The bin is that grey thing under the kitchen counter. This is the place I put your crap when you leave it on the table or whatever, the place you were supposed to put it yourself.

The washing machine is set to “work” once you’ve loaded it and placed detergent and softener in the drawer by you, not me, pressing the button with a triangle on it. Once again, amazingly, this machine will clean your clothes for you.

When the machine has finished, you then transfer your laundry to the other machine that looks very similar—it’s on the other side of the kitchen beside the small freezer—shut the door, turn the dial to the required drying time, and press the button with the triangle on it. Do not ask how long your clothes will need. Do what I usually do and periodically touch the clothing to check for dryness.

Once dry, fold the clothes. A heap is not a good thing. Heaps make me cross.

When the toilet rolls run out, you will find replacements in the set of drawers on the landing, bottom drawer. Please do not leave the empty roll on the floor, the windowsill, or, God forbid, the place where the toilet roll is SUPPOSED to be but never is—ON THE TOILET ROLL HOOK ON THE BLOODY WALL!

Clean towels are in the same set of drawers on the landing, top drawer. When you are done using them, please hang them up to dry. Like I said earlier, a heap is not a good thing…

4. If you decide not to do any of the above, which I can quite imagine, and take it upon yourself to go hungry, wear something that has already been washed, use a wet, previously HEAPED towel, don’t bother to wipe your arse, then that is your problem. Tonight, Mother has left the building. She may be sitting there reading, or even sleeping, but you must pretend that she just isn’t there. And that's another thing. When a person has their eyes shut and snores come out of their mouth, IT MEANS THEY ARE ASLEEP. It doesn't mean they are pretending to be asleep. So when you see your mother in this state, do NOT tap her and ask a question that could have waited another hour. Like: Do you know whether it's going to rain later?

I wonder, if I wasn’t there, what the bloody hell would happen?

Nothing. Absolutely nothing. They’d wait until I got home.

/End gripe.

A Fun Look at Cover Art Creation

2011-07-26T11:50:00.000-07:00

Have you ever wondered about the stages of cover art? Well, look no further. I've saved the various stages of creating a cover so you can see how it all comes together--and added some wordage for fun. There are things I do when creating a cover that you can't really see in these pictures, things like filters, layers and whatnot, but here is the basic idea. There are also things you can't see or hear that have occurred in the making. Many a cover has had curse words thrown at it, me being frustrated because I can "see" it so clearly in my head, but the creating of it just will not happen. Sometimes, I walk away, try it again the next day and it works. Other times, I abandon my ideas and go with something completely different.

*Please note, this cover didn't give me any hassle at all. I'm just using it as an example. The added wording is to give you an idea of what I think and feel when a cover doesn't go my way without me wanting to scream.

Swearing is Good For the Soul - A Look at Cover Art in a Different Way to the Norm

1. Read the cover art form and get a feel for what is required. This cover is for a collection of four stories. It's for Halloween. It's about vampires. This gives a good basis for what the cover will have on it. Sit and think about scenarios. This one comes quickly. You're over the bloody moon because, yes, you can see it all in your head. Guy with long hair, wind blowing it. Misty, creepy background, but not too creepy. So, you say to yourself, let's get this bugger started! You're so excited you could wee your pants!

Open a new layer. You decided to colour it black, as usual. Sometimes this changes, depending on what you put on top of the background layer and how the base affects what is on top. But, hey, you're rockin' and rollin', full of the joys of spring.

2. Ah, you think. Let's have some tombstones on there. Select a picture and place it on a new layer. Position it where you want it to go. It isn't the colour you have in your head, but that's fine. It's a new cover, and you're raring to go. You're full of optimism. You love it already!

3. You want to go with a blue/grey feel, but after farting about with various colours and filters for twenty minutes, you decide it doesn't look right. You call your Photoshop an effing little shit, but in a jolly voice. You're not upset. Honestly. It'll be all right if you go with purple. So, you add some mist and decide to sort the tombstone layer out later, because secretly you're annoyed with it. Then you smile and tell yourself it hadn't really pissed you off.

4. Well, whether Photoshop is being a dick or not, you've decided on purple for sure. You're eager to get your guy on the page, so you select a few men you think might work, but they don't "feel" right. So you opt for a back shot and decide to add some hair, because, even though you spent a while looking for photos--and really, it honest to goodness didn't annoy you that you couldn't find one for aaaages--you couldn't find one showing the hairstyle you wanted.

Cut your man out from the background he was originally on, muttering about the ridiculous shortage of pictures of men with long hair. Your mouse keeps slipping--the damn ball underneath is being an arsewipe--so it takes longer to do this job than you would have liked. You smile as you get to the end of cutting out, because you loved every minute of it. Especially when your hand shook and you cut his elbow off by accident.

5. In your mind, you have this guy wearing a cloak, because the theme title for this book is Cloaks & Daggers. It's a super idea. It will look really cool. After several attempts at making a cloak and seeing it looks utterly shite, you're on your way to nutting the screen. You remove yourself from your seat and go and have a cigarette or a cup of tea. While you do so, you muse that because cutting that man out had proved more difficult that it usually does, and because he didn't look right in a cloak when he effing well SHOULD have, the bastard, if you met this model in real life, you would quite gladly kick him in the nuts.

When you get back to your computer, very happy at the nasty thoughts you'd been having, and the names you called this man, you decide he doesn't look "right" in jeans. So you colour them in, nice and rough, because later it will be mostly covered with mist anyway.

6. You giggle, because you've made him wear purple underpants. You wish he could see himself in those silly purple underpants. After laughing like a loon, you fill the bottom of the cover to match.

7. You're happy with that, then decide to add some more mist.

8. Because the man didn't annoy you or make you think horrible things at all, and you don't want a little break from him in any way, and you're not alternating between gritting your teeth, muttering obscene things, and laughing at purple pants, you decide to do work on another part of the cover. The house in the background isn't the kind you had in your head, so you select another one and, after cutting it out from the background it was originally on, which didn't go wrong a few times, and flickering about with various filters and whatnot, you're happy with the new house.

9. You decide you're now ready to go back to working on the man. Him having his head chopped there is really bugging you. So, you decide to make some hair. Some days, making hair is easy, but today... Yes, today you're going to be positive, a veritable bundle of happiness, and off you go, selecting brushes and colours and beginning this man's wig.

10. Several bucking farsted, manking flap, utterly, ghastly bloody curses later, you've finished the basis of the man's hair. It went really well, you lie to yourself, grinding out a smile at the fact you've arrived at this stage without having pulled out your hair. Yet.

11. Seriously now, you have to admit to yourself that when you tried to change the colour of this cover earlier, the fact that it wouldn't do what you wanted had been festering inside you this whole time. You give in, acknowledge this fact with your whole heart, and decide you simply must give this cover some colour because if you don't, you're going to scour the internet, find out who this male model is, track him down, and get on a plane just so you can kick him in those hairy, ugly nuts of his. Yes, you really are such a happy camper.

12. Okay, so he's gone a bit pink, and you're frothing at the mouth about it, but hey, he needs some hair shading, so you busy yourself with that delightful task. You say delightful, because if it goes like the base of his hair did, you're likely to run out into the street and grab any male human and kick them where it hurts, just to satisfy your need to hurt that cover man!

13. Poo. ARGH. Banker. Duck. Chit. You get on and finish the hair.

14. He really is a little too pink for your liking. Asshole. You add some more colour to tone him down a bit.

15. You love him now. You can't believe you called him any of those horrible names at all. You wipe it from your memory and add another block of colour over the bottom of the cover, singing merrily.

16. Then you add some more mist, and you're starting to think you're in love with the man.

17. After your crazy I-hate-you-but-now-I-love-you hoopla, you remember that this is a Halloween cover. So you decide some bats are in order, and wouldn't they look nice? After cutting them out, you place three at the bottom.

18. The series title has something to do with a knife, you recall, so you decide to add one. However, you didn't think you would be creating the final look by using several layers, each with a different filter on it, to get the effect you wanted. That's okay, you tell yourself, it was worth it. If anything goes wrong with the cover from here on out, you can imagine that knife going into that man's back. You acknowledge that you still secretly harbour a grudge against him and decide to watch yourself for future signs of insanity. Calling pictures, Photoshop, a mouse, a keyboard, a monitor, and yourself terrible names really isn't normal behaviour. Knife added.

19. After typing out the series title and flicking through about 300 fonts, you finally decide on the first one you chose. Don't you just love yourself when you do that?

20. You feel the end drawing near to knicker-wetting time. You can see the light at the end of the tunnel. You add the book titles, author names (there are four in this series), and publisher logo. You hope Mr Llewellyn, Ms Augustin, MS Q. Chase, and Ms Smith like the cover.

21. You're finally happy with it. Decide it wasn't such a bad experience after all. You walk away from it, like you always do, and smoke a cigarette or drink tea. You left it "large" on the screen so that when you came back, you'd see it with fresh eyes. You decide you like it again.

Although that knife still looks a little too appealing...

And so the shit hits the fan... How...droll.

2011-07-14T01:56:00.000-07:00

So, as the inevitable shit flies, I sit to write this post—one I wasn’t going to write because of what other people might think of me afterwards, but then the stubborn side of me kicked in, and I thought, “If I want to blog about something, I bloody well will!” I’m actually sick of not writing about things that affect me in some way, just because others might not like it.

Today I’m stating my opinion, just like everyone else is stating theirs. That people may not agree with my opinion, just as I don’t see things the way they do, is a fact of life. Always happens, wherever you go, in many scenarios. Nothing to fall out over.

First off, I’d like to state that I don’t know Laurann Dohner, okay? I’ve read one of her books, know from Facebook she writes like the wind, and have commented on her page that I loved the main character in said book. Rayne, his name was. I’m not writing this, either, to jump on any bandwagon, to have her be my new best friend (if she even sees this bloody post anyway!) since the news hit the internet about her 75-book deal with EC—I’m too busy for gassing on email, as my current friends know! Nor am I writing it to stir up more “shit”, which, incidentally, is flying around everywhere at the moment. Surprise, surprise. The stench will linger for a while, then everyone will go back to their regular schedules. (Yawn.)

So why am I writing this post?

Because I’m shaking my head at how this event has affected people. And I wanted to share how it affected me.

Okay, I’m a laid-back person. I’ve been through those thoughts of “Hey, that’s so not fair! Why didn’t that happen to me?” years ago. I got over it. It didn’t happen to me because my writing style didn’t/doesn’t appeal to the majority. It didn’t happen because I didn’t dedicate myself fully to pursuing a writing career. It didn’t happen because of many reasons. It didn’t happen because it just didn’t fucking well happen! Shrug. Do I give a shit? No. I have a nice life, thanks, and although the dream coming true would have been cool, it didn’t. Something else came my way—cover art—and I got a salaried job with TEB. It changed not only my life but my family’s. We’re not struggling anymore. My kids are happier. Myself and my husband are happier.

And this is why Laurann Dohner’s success story has struck a chord with me. I’m only guessing here, but the EC paycheques have undoubtedly changed her and her family’s life. Like me, and again, I’m speculating, if she had been struggling to make ends meet for all her life, she has discovered a new world where the weight is off her shoulders and she can LIVE not plod. She has a purpose. She has the need to write and now has her dream coming true where she can do what she loves and get paid for it. Same as me. That alone makes me smile.

I don’t hear about this kind of thing unless a friend alerts me. I’m a busy gal—no time for looking around on blogs or groups. Quick scan of Facebook, and I’m off back to work. I have no urge to be involved with that kind of thing anymore. I got sick of the back stabbing, the whinging, the “I’m better than you, yet you sell more books than me!” bollocks, among other things. If others want to talk about that, more power to them. Just that I don’t have to participate. I’m not saying they’re right or wrong. People need outlets in different ways. Maybe I’m weird in that I don’t get arsey about stuff like this very often these days. But this morning I did venture out to have a little read of what has been said.

I kinda wish I hadn't. Once again, the ugliness of human beings was very much apparent.

We all write differently. Some people will say I’m crap, others will say I’m great. Some people will like my art, some will hate it. The same goes for Ms Dohner. Regardless of whether people like her work or not, this deal has happened. Regardless of whether other EC top-earning authors feel slighted that they weren’t chosen for this, there’s nothing anyone can do about it. For all we know, this deal may have been offered to someone before and was declined. Whatever your opinion is on this, can anyone find ANY bit of happiness for the woman? Why does envy and anger rear its ugly head? It always does, always will, because that’s human nature, and I freely admit at one time I would have been one of those people who are upset about this. I would have examined my writing, wondered what was missing, what I was doing wrong that I wasn’t offered the same deal or even sold 1% of what I assume Ms Dohner sells. I have pondered this so long, so often, that in the end I accepted that the dream wasn’t on the cards for me. It’s on the cards for Ms Dohner, though, and as I said to a friend yesterday when she told me about this deal: I’M GLAD FOR HER. HONEST TO GOD GLAD.

Sometimes life is a pile of shit, we all know that. Sometimes we struggle so hard to be where we want to be and don’t make it. To hear about this deal, well, it’s one of those times where I sat back and smiled because, yes, you CAN make a go of writing for digital publishers, despite what those people said years ago. That is something worth rejoicing, isn’t it? You CAN make money from what you love doing best. For so long, people have written knowing they’ll make poor sales (I’m talking from personal experience). They’ve written with the hope they’ll hit the big time. They’ve written anyway because writing is what they do, what they love. For me, knowing “it”, the big dream, has happened to someone, ANYONE, gives me pleasure. It gives hope to others that they can do it too. It spreads like wildfire, this feeling, at least inside me, that hey, if you want it hard enough, you can damn well get it.

So, even though things are being said about Ms Dohner, the deal, and EC—and don’t you just LOVE certain sites that are so obviously anti-EC dissing everything about this? Jesus, how boring. How repetitive. How…fuck it. I can’t even be bothered to add more about them—I’m hoping she isn’t taking all the nasties to heart. SHE’S the winner here. She’s prolific. She loves her publisher. They love her. They wouldn’t have offered her the deal if it wasn’t beneficial to them. She wouldn’t have signed the deal if it wasn’t beneficial to herself and her family. She’s got it in her to write those 75 books. And think about it, as prolific as she is, she hasn’t signed her whole writing life away to EC. She can whip those 75 books out in no time. Book deal over, she can move on elsewhere if she chooses. And another thought struck me on that deal too. Think about it, yeah? Who’s to say she wouldn’t have sent her next 75 books to EC anyway, deal or not? She isn’t doing anything different to what she might have already planned to do, except sign something that says she’ll DEFINITELY do it.

I’ve read some plain mean stuff this morning on various sites. One woman’s dream coming true means thousands of angry, jealous, pissed people. It brings despair to some—after all, they write the same kind of thing as Ms Dohnner, so what is her magic formula? I totally understand how some people will ache deep in their bones over this for some time to come. I was once a person who would have felt that way for a few days before picking myself up and getting on with life. But now I’m not; I don’t think that way anymore. Now things like this don’t bother me because I think of the more disastrous things in the world going on. Death. Kidnaps. Illness. People being held hostage. War. Starvation. This deal really isn’t something, when you get right down to it, to be up in arms about to the degree some are. It’s not to say I don’t understand them being up in arms, I do, just that stuff like this no longer bothers me in this way.

In a nutshell, I’m thinking: Get the fuck over it and be happy that Ms Dohner's kids will have a damn fine life!

And before anyone even thinks of saying, “Oh, she’s one of those EC lovers”… I wrote for EC at one time and decided not to anymore because of reasons personal to me. Things didn’t happen the way I wanted them to. Was I upset? Yes, for a time I was, because the dream of getting there had been a long haul. Sometimes, when you get to where you want to be, being there isn’t like you thought it would be. Ah, well, shit happens. I walked away and have never regretted it. I could still send them work if I chose to. At present, I don’t. Others love it there, friends of mine who do get what I wanted. Unfair, but that’s life. And I do believe everything happens for a reason. I honestly feel that me writing, me getting to know how the publishing world works behind the scenes as an editor, then learning to do cover art, was my path. I ended up still doing something I love, became Head of Art, and THAT is where I am meant to be. Not writing fulltime as I first thought.

I believe in destiny.

Simply put, Laurann Dohner is exactly where she’s meant to be on her life path. Things worked out for her. And d’you know what? I wish her all the bloody best.

Planet Alignment or Just a Plain Old Crazy Morning?

2011-07-12T02:48:00.000-07:00

So I’m blogging today after a long period of silence. Nothing new there LOL. I’ve had reason this morning to question whether the planets aligning, the confusing word retrograde and all it entails when discussing astrology, and anything else astrology-like has caused me to have a morning that was so unlike my usual regimented pre-school run that I could quite gladly have self-combusted, gone back to bed, and said to hell with the world.

I didn’t. Of course, I plodded through the mire that seemed to want to block my attempts of having a good day. I wanted to beat that mofo and get back on an even keel.

First, I woke (as you do, funny that, eh?), did my usual thing in the morning, and all was well. Until it was time to wash my hair. Now, if you have a shower like mine, where you rely on the hot and cold taps being turned just the right amount in order to get any semblance of a comfortable temperature, you’ll understand what I’m about to say. There I was, bending over the bath, knowing if I didn’t wash my hair this morning, by the end of the day there’d be enough grease in it to fry some damn chips, trying to make the shower temp suitable. Sometimes I can get it to work right away, but this morning it decided to play me up. As we only have one bathroom in our house, so only one toilet, my fifteen-year-old middle son had to have a wee sitting down behind me because he had to get ready for another day of work experience. (During the last two weeks of summer term, kids my son’s age have to go to a work placement to get them ready for the big bad world out there.)

The shower decided to be the dick from Hell, so I gave in and washed my hair in cold water, hoping said son didn’t decide to have a crap while he was at it.

He didn’t. Good.

Head freezing cold, not only from the water but because I’d used tea tree shampoo and conditioner—I’m not the brightest spark first thing in the morning—I went downstairs to root out some clothing from the laundry pile I’d failed to put away last night. Yep, I keep up to date with actually washing it, but putting it away? Um, no. I couldn’t find the clothes I wanted. I’d particularly had in mind a pair of black leggings that fitted—a size bigger than my usual because I’ve indulged in carbs a lot lately and have become quite a chunky monkey. Yesterday’s leggings that I used to have to pull up because they were too big, were pulled up throughout the day for an entirely different reason. The buggers had shrunk on me—yes, shrunk, I tell you!—and ended up in a sausage-like roll around my hips at various moments of my day. So, I’m looking for the larger size, also my short denim skirt that has also shrunk, goddamnit! (What IS it with dryers these days, eh? Set them on low temperature and they still shrink your clothes. I don’t know…) Anyway, I couldn’t find the skirt, so I ran—or my version of running, which involves wheezing and getting all hot and bothered at the just-a-bit-faster-than-walking pace I adopted—upstairs only to not find it in the wardrobe or on the other pile of laundry at the bottom of the bed that I’d also failed to put away.

I know I washed it, because, as is always the case with me, I notice weird stuff, file it in my mind, and that lets me know whether I did or didn’t do something. The weird thing to do with the skirt was that after I took it out of the dryer, I was annoyed that the hem had rolled up, so I recall folding the skirt in half, placing it at the bottom of the pile while trying to make sure the hem was unrolled, and telling myself that the weight of all the other washing would act as an iron so I wouldn’t have to press it when I wanted to wear it.

Full of ingenious ideas like that, me. I say it’s a time-saver. That’s my excuse and I’m sticking to it. I mean, some would say I’m a lazy cow, but hey, we all have our own opinions…

So, I couldn’t find the skirt, and I muttered several times that I knew I’d washed it because I’d remembered the hem rolling up—you get the idea. I came back downstairs, determined to find the little sod and put it on. I found it, in another pile of washing I’d placed on the other worktop—the pile of clothes I’d apparently sorted out earlier that morning but had no recollection of doing so.

Eff me sideways.

So, I put on the leggings, thankful for no rolling business, put on the skirt, excessively pleased with myself that the bottom-of-the-pile-hem trick (I actually wrote PRICK then and had to erase it. Terribly sorry…) worked. I placed my arms inside my nightie—at this point I had two teenage lads downstairs so didn’t want to get caught with my tits swinging about on show in the kitchen—and reached for my bra…and couldn’t see one. So I searched the other pile. No bra. At this point, I’m muttering naughty words that sound incredibly like duck’s cake, you bucking stupid twitch, and scoot upstairs, arms still inside the nightie, hoping to God I don’t lose my balance, pitch forward, and break my nose on the bloody step edge.

I find a bra. Put it on. Go back downstairs and instruct oldest boy not to come into the kitchen as I needed to put my top on that I’d forgotten to take up with me.

I was dressed. Jesus Christ, I was dressed. Now I needed to dry my hair, which is naturally curly and takes blow-drying and using hair straighteners to sort it out, because, I tell you now, there was no way, even though it was 8:40 by this point and a time I should SO have been trotting up the school, I was going out with curly hair.

We get to the school. I deposit Smallest. I say goodnight to her, as I do every day when I drop her off. This little thing came about from a morning a while back when I was so tired I said goodnight instead of goodbye by mistake. When I said goodnight this morning, it took a moment for my brain to process the fact that it was just our little joke going on. I wondered if it was, in fact, night, and I was sound asleep having some weird-assed dream about missing bras, kids having shits behind me, and skirts disappearing.

Luckily, I’m still sane enough that I distinguished the difference between asleep and awake, and walked to the shop to buy some cigs. I NEEDED them. So I strolled home, telling myself that the worst was over. I smoked my cig. Listened to the birds chirping. Saw a woman allow her dog to crap on the footpath, move to walk off, see me coming, then thought she’d better pick that turd up. I got home, the thought running through my mind that I’d made it, I could boil the kettle and have a cup of this delicious apple tea I’ve discovered—only to see Smallest’s lunchbox sitting on the side. If it had a mouth, it would have opened and showed me teeth made of the grapes sitting inside it. Mocking me. A gurgle of laughter that sounded like Monster Munch crisps being chewed.

I stared at it for a few seconds, wondering whether to ring the school and book a cooked meal for her, then remembered that it’s Tuesday, and she doesn’t like the dinner that is served on Tuesday…

There was nothing for it but to pick up that bucking banker of a lunchbox and go back to the school.

I returned home, finally got my apple tea, had another cig. NOW I’m ready to lose myself in cover art, because muck, I need to go to the one place where everything annoying fades away.

Reviews. Can You Help?

2011-06-05T12:31:00.000-07:00

I need help! Do you have time to read one or two books a month (or more if you can!) and are prepared to write a positive review of that book for Miz Love Loves Books? If you go to the site, HERE, you’ll see how we review. Can you write reviews like that and make notes as you read of all your Best Bits? Can you express how certain parts of the book made you feel? If you can, we need you!

The inbox is getting fuller by the day, and due to all of us working fulltime, we’re unable to read as many as we’d like. I’d love a review to go up every weekday, but it isn’t working out like that, however hard we try.

The review guidelines are HERE. If you’re interested, can you email me at the addy in the guidelines? If you have a favourite author or publisher, be sure to let me know. If any books come in by them, I can forward them to you, one at a time, sending another once your review for the last has been sent in. As well as the books in the queue, I’m allowed to request books for you from Ellora’s Cave, Resplendence Publishing, Dreamspinner Press, Breathless Press, and Total-E-Bound. If there’s a book out there you’ve always wanted to read published by these publishers, it’s all yours in return for a review! At the moment, though, our main aim is clearing the present queue, so I would randomly send books your way until it has been reduced.

Please help! We’re drowning in books and desperate to get them all reviewed for the authors who have spent so much time writing them. Even if only one of you responds, that will help immensely. Your identity will remain a secret, with only me knowing who you are. Alternatively, you may wish to write in with a new email address if you want to remain totally anon. And, of course, you would choose your Miz name.

Thank you.

*Goes off praying someone writes in*

The Total-E-Bound In-Person Experience!

2011-05-15T01:58:00.000-07:00

This week I did something I never thought I’d have the chance, or courage, to do. I put on my big girl panties (or in my case, Goks, and let me tell you, they do NOT stay up like that. They roll into a sausage around your waist) and ventured into the world of publisher events. I’m the kinda gal who dreads things like weddings and such because it means feeling uncomfortable, exposed, and out of my comfort zone. I’ll either disappear into the walls wishing the day would go quickly so I could get back to the safety of home, or throw myself into it being the zany cow I am with family so that, although the focus is on me while I’m being silly, it’s not on me as such, but at me. I was the latter at the TEB Ladies' Night on Tuesday, but not because I felt the need to be that way as a coping mechanism to get me through an ordeal, but because it felt like I was in the company of family.

That may sound cheesy, but it’s true. I’ve heard this spoken about before, where author and publisher events are a family gathering where everyone is so nice, and now I know how true it is. I instinctually felt “at home” with these wonderful people, and we all got along as though we’d met several times before. It’s a bizarre yet wonderful feeling, one I hope to experience time and again. If you get the chance to go to a TEB event, please try your hardest to attend. Meeting fellow authors, people who understand exactly where you’re coming from with regards to your writing, the crazy stuff in your head, and how you think and see things differently to non-writers, is an experience you won’t want to miss. It’s almost like a big sigh of relief that no, you’re not crazy—others understand where you’re coming from.

Along with that family feeling also comes the knowledge deep inside that whatever you tell these new found friends, it won’t be repeated elsewhere. You relax, share parts of yourself you’ve never told a soul (like when I told Serena Yates and Elizabeth Coldwell on Saturday that I have “branches” in my head—kind of like a tree trunk which is the basis of my thoughts and the branches spread out to infinite possibilities) and I received a nod from Serena in return, because she just “got” me.

Now, there are times in life when you meet someone that you would swear you’ve met before, in another time, another place, another life (and here is where you might think I’m nuts…) but I’ve met Serena before, I’m certain of it. I connected with her very well online anyway, but in person? My God, I love her, and when I had to say goodbye on Wednesday morning and again Saturday afternoon, my eyes filled and I just didn’t want to leave her. I have found one hell of a beautiful friend, an amazingly intelligent woman who is compassionate, funny, and very well balanced, and I wouldn’t have missed that for the world.

My road-trip partner, the very beautiful Lily Harlem, was another I connected with, where, from the minute we hugged upon meeting outside my house, I knew I loved her to bits. We’d been talking online for close to a year prior to meeting, and spent the journey gabbling away (I had the terrible thought afterwards that I had been a convo hog all the way, but Lily assured me she spoke just as much!), and by the time we arrived, despite my silly insecurities, she made me feel I could “do this thang”! She was my last link to home, the person who had collected me, and the child in me needed her not only as a friend—and I know we’re friends for life now; yay for me because she’s a superb person—but that anchor to keep me from floundering while apart from my loved ones. There were quiet moments where I got terribly homesick and wanted to click my red shoes together, shut my eyes, and find myself back home when I opened them, but I got through it knowing Lily was there.

In typical Em fashion, I had a bit of a Bridget Jones moment while getting ready for the evening event. I don’t do dresses or high heels, and I most certainly don’t do tights (hosiery), so I’d completely forgotten to do the old shaving routine before I left home. We’d been talking so much prior to getting ready we had about half an hour left to scrabble about, get dressed up, and make it back down to the meal. So, there I was, struggling to put my tights on, when I saw a forest of hairs on my shins that were visible through the tights. Oh. My. God. I pulled the tights down around my ankles and scuttled over to my suitcase, hoping to God I didn’t pitch forward and headbutt the windowsill, knocked out cold for eternity. I had my heels on at this point too, and being “shackled” at the ankles by the tights made it hard to walk, but I made it to my bag, where I proceeded to shuffle around inside it for a razor. After dry-shaving my legs (ouch!), seeing a line of hairs nestled in the bunched-up hosiery like a madman’s eyebrows, I blew them away—and yes, they landed on my face. Unconcerned with that little mishap, I finished getting dressed then looked in the mirror. With hardly any time left, because I had to meet Lily at the elevator, I brushed as many leg hairs off my cheeks as I could and just hoped none remained, ready to be spotted by fellow humans.

At the point where we entered the event with readers in attendance, nerves got the better of me and I muttered a pathetic, “Don’t leave me!” to Lily, who assured me a dash of alcohol was in order. I rarely drink because it makes me even sillier than I am, but this time I indulged—three delicious cocktails, one after the other, called The Lincoln Cup—and it helped. Lily, bless her, was never far away, and I thank her wholeheartedly for putting up with me and my quirks.

I’d met Claire, Nicki, and Heidi before with regards to my working position in the TEB family, so seeing them again was like meeting up with sisters. Sounds soppy, I know, but they really are the nicest people who make you feel at ease, as though you’ve known them all your life. But I got to meet another member of office staff, Rebecca, who became my partner in crime in slipping outside for cigarette breaks. I connected with her on a level much like I had with Lily and Serena, and once again found myself marvelling that such bonds can exist so quickly. She’s absolutely bloody great, quite frankly, and once again I’ve found a friend for life.

Lavinia Lewis. What can I say about her? Well, she has so much enthusiasm for her genre (M/M), is so dedicated to creating great stories, that it shines from her. She’s also very funny, so I got along with her like a house on fire. We share a love of flip flops (the shoe kind), M/M, and the wonder of writing in general. I’m also lucky enough to be her crit partner now and can’t wait to read her manuscripts before they hit the shelves. Super excited!

I was lucky enough to sit up with Lavinia and Serena until 4 a.m. in Lavinia’s room, nattering about M/M, life, flip flops, frozen kangaroo tails (don’t ask!), other authors we admire (A.J. Llewellyn, D.J. Manly, Jaime Samms to name but a few), drinking very British tea and coming down off the high of meeting one another earlier. That private little meeting with stay with me forever as a treasured memory—I was so lucky and am thankful I got the chance to be there.

Scarlet Blackwell is a lovely little elfin lady, stylish, trendy, with a super hair-do that I wanted sitting on my head. She looks way younger than her years (lucky thing!), and she brought a friend with her, who was equally lovely and young-looking. I need to know their secret... Ansley Vaughn is a very charming, very funny lady who loved my red shoes (so I loved her for loving my red shoes!), and I, in turn, loved her purple dress. Shermaine Williams is a dinky little thing, whose feelings on the train journey up to Lincoln made me laugh, and her excerpt reading—I really want to read Art of the Written Word now!

I wish I’d had more time to spend with Scarlet, Ansley, and Shermaine, but there’s always a next time. I left them hoping Ansley’s dogs had fared okay in the doggy hotel, that Shermaine’s train journey home went without any hiccups, and that Scarlet would forgive me for helping her friend veer back to the dark side regarding cigarettes. I had no idea she was supposed to have given up…

Although fabulous, you can forget the entertainment, the glamour, the buzz—meeting new friends was the highlight for me. Forging new bonds, expressing yourself freely, being accepted just as you are and being liked for it was the best part of my experience. Oh, and seeing my artwork in the form of posters, seeing my TEB trailer playing on the large-screen TV...that got the lump expanding in my throat. It felt surreal to see it, to know I had created it, and not for the first time I blessed the day I was offered my job—blessed the day Claire and Nicki felt I was the one to do it.

Another highlight, one I’ll never forget due to the bizarreness of it, was The Man Who Came Out of the Bushes. There I was, nattering away outside with Serena, when this guy appeared seemingly out of nowhere. Perhaps we were so engrossed in our conversation we didn’t see him approach, but I swear he just appeared on the path. He was around 50, drunk, and muttered something to us in a very slurred manner that had Serena saying to me, “I have no clue what he’s talking about.” I wanted to laugh so loudly at that point because of her facial expression but refrained. Instead, I asked him to repeat himself. He said:

“Would you go over there with me and help me get my two friends out of those bushes?”

Um, pervert alert anyone? I responded rather indignantly with, “No I will not!” and he said, “Okay, I’ll do it myself.”

Now, “over there” just happened to be in the cathedral grounds. Dark and creepy cathedral grounds, somewhere I wasn’t going to venture even if paid a million pounds. Off he went, swallowed by the darkness (and only a writer would see it that way, eh?), only to have an argument with his friends waiting in the bushes. A loud argument, because clearly, he’d failed in his mission to get us to join them. Then me and Serena got sucked into the idea that he was maybe a ghost (we’re not crazy, honestly, just have vivid imaginations), because he was a little grey-faced, and that he was arguing with himself, making his voice change when he responded to himself. Very funny moment, of which there were many—too many to write about.

And, you know, I don’t want to write about them all. Some things will remain secret, a special set of memories that only we shared, things only we would understand, and that was the magic of spending time with all those wonderful authors. I’m so glad I went, so glad I felt at ease in their company, so glad to have made some wonderful new friends that enriched my life and will be a part of me forever.

Saturday, I got to meet Elizabeth Coldwell and Victoria Bliss. Elizabeth has an air about her, so calm and serene, that you immediately feel safe with her. She’s lovely, and her little story about how certain aspects of her life (and others!) fit into her books had me nodding to myself. Victoria Bliss is a master at people communication. When folks dropped by, she made them feel instantly welcomed. I said a couple of times to Serena (yay, I got to see my buddy again LOL!), “Isn’t she great?” because Vic’s ease with other people is highly apparent.

The Saturday event was at the Lincoln Drill Hall, where an array of people to do with writing and reading were there. We took it in turns to leave our section and go “out there” into the masses, so to speak, and hand out Total-E-Bound postcards that enabled recipients to download an ebook. I changed out of my high heels into flip flops (Lavinia would have been proud of me LOL), and off I went, determined to hand out all my cards. Well, I managed to give away two, and here is the reason why…

First, I decided to stand out the front in the street and accost passersby in an attempt to lure them inside. Because I’m a bit of a talker, I only managed to hand out one card to a guy who was taking a cigarette break. He took the card for his girlfriend, and during our chat I discovered what he liked to read and that they run an online review site. Fascinating! Then I went back inside, telling myself I would hand out all my cards and put on my salesperson head. I approached a woman of, shall we say, later years, who I was convinced liked a goodly amount of romance as her reading choice. Oh, yes, this lady was going to love me and the fact I was giving her the chance to get a free book.

“Hello!” I said, holding the postcard out to her. “Would you like to have a free erotic romance book?”

“I’ve just finished reading the Bible,” she said. “I don’t like romance; I only read Christian things.”

I smiled, nodded, said “Oh, right, how great!” and wished the ground would swallow me up. I listened while she told me all about her daughter, grandchildren, and the fact she was waiting for them to finish their browse so she could get off and have some lunch.

Spotting another opportunity, I mentioned that TEB had free tea, coffee, biscuits AND glorious cupcakes on offer, and that maybe her daughter would like our books.

She said, “A cupcake isn’t a sandwich, is it?”

I left her after wishing her a great day and flip-flopped back to TEB’s area, explaining my encounter with the woman. Well, bugger me, but a little later she walked in, family in tow, and had a cup of coffee and a cupcake that wasn’t a sandwich. I could have shrivelled on the spot.

Please, if you get the chance to do this kind of thing, do it. Even if, like me, you think you couldn’t, that you wouldn’t fit in or enjoy it, believe me, you will. It’s an experience I can’t fully put into words, but for the connections alone, it’s worth every minute. You’ll meet so many nice people who all share your joy of writing, the highs, the lows. You’ll discuss headhopping, dangling modifiers, how much sex is too much?, the endless possibilities of plots and genres with such relish it’s like falling into a big pit of everything you love—everything that most people in your everyday life finds boring or just doesn’t understand.

I’m convinced writers and artists are a breed apart. I'm glad to be one of them.

Weird Dreams

2011-05-07T01:42:00.000-07:00

I just had one of those just-before-you-wake dreams. I was in my sister-in-law’s house, but it wasn’t her house she lives in now, and she was sitting in an armchair reading. She had a dog, wasn’t one of the dogs she has now, but a younger version of one of my sister’s. So, this dog had puppies, and me and Hubby went to visit to see which one we were going to have. We had to look at them under a microscope they were that small, and we chose a bloke one.

Anyway, the mother dog kept pacing the floors and shedding hair and it bugged me. So this foam spray cleaner appeared in one hand, and a mop in the other, and I set to work spraying everything in sight then mopping the floors and the rugs. The dog kept walking over the nice clean wooden floor and really getting on my nerves with it, but because it was someone else’s dog, I felt I couldn’t tell it to bugger off outside or something until the floors had dried. So every time the dog walked over the clean bit, I re-cleaned it.

While this was going on, every time my sister-in-law picked up a new book to read (I assume she was a major speed-reader in the dream as she got through them really quickly), they changed into these sweets we have here called Tooty Frooties. I know where that came from, because our current Skittles advert has things turning into piles of Skittles every time a bloke touches them, but the Tooty Frooties ended up covering my sister-in-law until just her head poked out. I’m still washing the floor, the dog’s still pacing.

I woke up thinking, “Fucking dog, making a mess like that!”

WEIRD!

But I always analyse my dreams because they always end up meaning something.

Dream site analysis:

Microscope: To see a microscope in your dream, suggests that you need to take a closer look at some situation. Something that may seemingly be insignificant may actually be causing much troubles or hindrances. (Yessss! It is!)

Dog: To see a dog in your dream, symbolizes intuition, loyalty, generosity, protection, and fidelity. The dream suggests that your strong values and good intentions will enable you to go forward in the world and bring you success. (Okay, cool. Everything in this dream relates to a certain dilemma I have, and this makes me feel better because things will turn out okay in the end--success with it.)

Puppies: To see a litter of newborn puppies in your dream, is indicative of the amount of time that an idea has been developing or will take to develop. Look to the number of puppies to give you that approximate amount of time. (2...minutes, days, hours, weeks, months, years? Please, not years...)

Cleaning: To dream that you are mopping, suggests that you are ready to let go of something. It is time to release your emotions and express it in a productive way. (Yep, I know exactly what that is, but it isn't as easy as just letting it go. Never is!)

Sweets: To see or eat candy in your dream, symbolizes the joys and the special treats in life. It also represents indulgence, sensuality and/or forbidden pleasure. (Yep, I understand that. I feel guilt over some things when I shouldn't.)

Sister-in-law: To see your sister-in-law in your dream, represents characteristics in her that you find within your own self. (Yep, she’s an avid reader like me. Also, this will relate to my feelings about the growing book pile over at Miz Love. I think the books are the Tooty Frooties!)

Being annoyed: To feel annoyed in your dream, represents annoyances that you are feeling in your waking life. Something in your mind is bothering you and you need to express them. (Um, yeah. I do, but now is not the time. I think the dog making a mess no matter how much I clean up after it/being the one who is annoying me, relates perfectly to something going on in my life. I want to shout at it to get out and stop making the mess but feel I can't...yep, exactly what's going on here.)

Sooooooo, there you have it. The dream now makes perfect sense to me, and now I can focus on what my subconscious was telling me and get these things sorted!

Did you dream recently? What was it about?

Agreeing with Anny

2011-05-05T00:20:00.000-07:00

I read a “notes” post on Facebook this morning by Anny Cook and agree with it wholeheartedly. It’s about the things she misses—stuff like “proper” telephones, where if you were out and someone called, oh well, they’d have to call back. Now, we have mobile phones, and although I think they are great with regards to my kids and me being able to check on them to make sure they’re okay when they’re out and about, I don’t much like my own.

I spoke to my eldest daughter about this a while back. You get a text message and feel compelled to read it “just in case” it’s important. There are days when you think, “I’m not answering that bloody thing today!” and switch it off, only to have your house phone ring because the person continually texting you is calling to see if you got their text about the new dress they bought or the new eyeliner. Some things are just not important enough to either reply to or bother with until you’re in the mood to do so.

Those who are joined at the hip with their phones…don’t they get days where the bleep or ringtone of it gets on their nerves? Where they just want to “be”, relaxing with a book or watching TV, or even, something I like to do, just sit in silence for a while? Are they constantly immersed in the digital age where the simple things in life cease to exist—do they even know what those simple things are? Sitting in the garden listening, just listening. Hearing the traffic in the distance, the birds chirping, the breeze ruffling the leaves. Is this a pastime now attributed to someone of “later years”?

I’m 38, don’t consider myself old in the sense people might laugh at the simple things I like to do, and I put my “quirks” down to who I am and what I like doing. Although, yes, I do admit that as I’ve got older I like different things. Sometimes I’m in the mood for noise, but most of the time I’m not. Peace is scarce around here, so when I get it, when I get days where I don’t want to speak to anyone, even by email and texts, I want to be able to do so without upsetting anyone. Why can’t a person ignore their texts? Is there a new law I’m not aware of where you have to answer immediately?

We have an amazing life now where you can contact someone in various different ways without ever having to leave your seat. If they don’t answer a text, you can call them on that mobile phone or try their home phone. Next you can try email, then Facebook, then blogs etc., and then, if you’re really sure your new eyeliner warrants an exclamation of wonder, you can get your arse off the chair and go around to that person's house (who so rudely ignored your other forms of contact) and tell them about it there.

And that leads to something else that bugs me. Some days I don’t want to answer my door, so I don’t. I never used to do that, but now I do. If it’s a family member, that’s different, but anyone else? I have the right to ignore that knock. If I’m busy or just don’t want to see anyone, or don’t want to deal with whatever they are bringing to my door, I ignore it. I used to hide until they went away, but not anymore. My desk is under the window, the window is beside the front door. I don’t care if they can see me behind the blinds and know I’m in. I don’t care if they feel offended that I’m “ignoring” them. It’s my house, my door, and if I don’t want to answer it, I bloody well won’t!

It’s MY life where I make the decisions about what I do.

I think too many people forget that about a person.

Thoughts?

Out Now! Wasted, 91K of Weirdness

2011-04-29T01:51:00.000-07:00

Wayne Richards has a theory: Is it possible to make a woman do everything she’s told? To find out, Wayne kidnaps a young woman and holds her hostage in his home. After a time, the woman grows to trust Wayne, and a warm and caring relationship develops. But things aren’t as they seem. Something isn’t quite right…

Upon realising certain truths, Wayne finds himself in a mental institute. His therapist encourages him to face his past and oust the demons from his mind. With help from the institute’s employees, it appears the young man is on the mend. Or is he?

More shocking truths hit Wayne, forcing him to face the past in an altogether different way. Given two options, Wayne must decide which path to take. Will he choose the road of goodness, or has his past tainted him so badly he takes the only road he has ever travelled? The road to Hell.

Click the book on the left to buy!

Out Now on Amazon!

2011-04-25T13:59:00.000-07:00

Samuel Harding is a sociopath. After receiving a comfortable inheritance from his monstrously abusive father, he spends his days carefully selecting young women to bring home with him—young women who will never leave alive.

When Samuel meets Bernita, a waitress in a café he frequents daily, he begins to realise she may be the fifth victim he has been seeking. He initiates the elaborate courtship ritual he has developed to determine whether the women he stalks are worthy of love, or destined for death.

Samuel recalls, through conscious thought and dreams that leave tangible evidence behind, the endless physical and sexual abuse he suffered at his father’s hands, as well as the odd behaviour of the crass, reclusive grandmother who became his primary guardian after his father’s death. As his relationship with Bernita deteriorates towards a violent end, he asks himself the simple question: Will I get away with murder?

From a young age, Robert Keagan displays psychopathic traits. Killing small animals gives him pleasure, and he discovers he doesn’t have a conscience. His life spirals out of control when his mother entertains men while his father works, her gin-drinking bouts growing more frequent. When his mother announces her pregnancy and Robert hears the terrible row between his parents, hatred for his mother grows. After moving to a new home with his father, Robert commits his first murder, taking him into new territory.

Robert marries and lives the life of a respectable man. But his cruel tendencies return. Unable to contain them, he murders again and again. Will he keep his secrets from his wife, or will he go a step too far?

Carmel Wickens longs for a ‘proper’ life—one with a mother who hugs and cares for her and works as a waitress or secretary. Instead, Carmel is blessed with a prostitute mother who thinks nothing of her pimp taking explicit photographs of her child.

At the age of six, Carmel commits her first murder—an ‘accident’. The young girl she kills presents herself on occasion in ghostly form, ridiculing Carmel and urging her to cause more ‘accidents’ until every person that has hurt Carmel has been killed.

The shop keeper, the old man at the end of the street, her mother, the pimp…they all feature in Carmel’s upbringing. How did she stage their deaths and get away with murder? But even with the last one dispatched to Hell, Carmel’s journey isn’t over.

She has other demons to slay.

Click covers on the left if you wish to buy!

Out Today on Kindle - $1.86 or £1.14 - BARGAIN!

2011-04-25T01:31:00.000-07:00

Tessa Stone lives in fear of her life. Her controlling husband, Den, has a sinister side, and he'll stop at nothing to keep her where he wants her...even murder.

Unable to take any more, Tessa makes plans to flee, but she has a problem. Den has told her if she left him he would find her. She doesn't doubt him. He's a detective.

Den Stone has built himself up from a terrible childhood to the life he's always wanted. Perfect wife, perfect house, perfect job. When Tessa makes friends with a woman, Den feels his control slipping. In the ultimate bid to keep his wife to himself, Den commits three murders.

Will Tessa gain her freedom, or will Den find her and take her back home-back to the beatings, the torture, and a life of depravity?

BUY NOW ~ GO ON, IT'S A BLOODY BARGAIN FOR OVER 50K!

Rob is settled in a great relationship with Stuart, but his past catches up with him in a startling way. Photographs of Stuart engaged in sexual acts arrive in the post, sending Rob into turmoil. Stuart denies cheating, so who is the man in the pictures? Rob aims to find out, discovering someone from his past has a side to him even Rob finds hard to swallow.

The two men turn into amateur detectives and soon realise they have stumbled into something far more sinister than they could have imagined.

BUY NOW - ANOTHER BLOODY BARGAIN! (16K)

Proof Reading Is A Dying Art

2011-04-23T08:25:00.000-07:00

Man Kills Self Before Shooting Wife and Daughter

Clever guy…

Something Went Wrong in Jet Crash, Expert Says

Really? Ya think?

Panda Mating Fails; Veterinarian Takes Over

What a guy!

Juvenile Court to Try Shooting Defendant

See if that works any better than a fair trial!

If Strike Isn't Settled Quickly, It May Last Awhile

Really?

Cold Wave Linked to Temperatures

Who would have thought!

Couple Slain; Police Suspect Homicide

They may be on to something!

Red Tape Holds Up New Bridges

You mean there's something stronger than duct tape?

Man Struck By Lightning: Faces Battery Charge

He probably IS the battery charge!

Astronaut Takes Blame for Gas in Spacecraft

That's what he gets for eating those beans!

Kids Make Nutritious Snacks

Do they taste like chicken?

Local High School Dropouts Cut in Half

Chainsaw Massacre all over again!

Hospitals are Sued by 7 Foot Doctors

Boy, are they tall!

Typhoon Rips Through Cemetery; Hundreds Dead

Did I read that right?

Knickers!

2011-04-21T13:51:00.000-07:00

I know being a royal means being in the limelight, getting "caught" doing things, and supposedly having to act differently to us mere peasants, but I just saw a snippet of news that Kate Middleton was seen out buying knickers. Umm, is it just me, or does Get a life, reporters! spring to mind? Why shouldn't she go out and buy them? Why does she have to have them delivered or whatever? Everyone knows we all wear undergarments, so what's the chuffing problem? It's not like it was years ago, when the royals kept everything hidden. I like the fact she went out to buy some knickers. Makes it feel like she's in touch with reality.

I hope they were the flimsiest, sexiest pair on the planet and make William a happy man.

GO KATE!

:o)

Don't Laugh at Your Sister When She's Stung by a Wasp

2011-04-19T09:16:00.000-07:00

So, I killed a wasp today. Last time I did this I felt really bad because I'd sprayed it with wasp killer and the poor thing sounded like it was screaming. It wasn't doing anything but headbutting my kitchen window, being annoying--maybe that's why insects are called pests?--and it wouldn't get out even though I opened the window and made shooing motions. Not close enough for it to dart through the blind and sting me, you understand, but enough to create air movement. I thought about how horrible I was, taking a life even though it was "just a wasp", and it bothered me for days. It was the screaming sound that did it, and I wondered, if like in A Bug's Life, it had a family and all that business who would miss it when it didn't come home.

Crazy, I know...

Today was a little different. There I was, minding my own business, sitting in the park while Smallest played football. We had a bottle of Mountain Dew each, and the little stripey bleeder was intent on buzzing around them. I was possibly silly in shooing it away. It decided to take exception and threaten me. With darting, menacing movements toward my person that I found quite offensive. It was doing this mad, quick-flight bomb-diving effort that brought back memories of when I got stung before. I didn't fancy that happening again.

So I sliced my arm through the air while trying not to whimper and catch the attention of other parents and kids, and my idea worked. The wasp sort of fell to the grass, stunned if I'm any judge. So while it was staggering about, I...um...picked up the Mountain Dew bottle and, err, squashed the little bugger. Death by the thing it most coveted.

I looked at it, making sure it was totally dead, because even though I'd squashed it I didn't want it suffering, then got up rather quickly because I read somewhere that they let off this warning smell to their mates when they're being attacked or killed, and I didn't fancy a whole swarm of the sods coming after me.

I also read somewhere that wasps are the only insect on the planet with no purpose whatsoever, but last time I mentioned this someone commented that they apparently do, but I can't recall what s/he said. I'd go and Google it, but that might mean going onto a website with wasp pictures and I can't be doing with that.

Do you feel guilty killing bugs?

Last time I was stung was fifteen years ago. The only time I was stung, if my memory serves me right. My sister had been stung the previous day--we were both heavily pregnant at the time--and I think I laughed at her, not sure. Well, karma got me the next day by having me stand on a damn wasp in the garden while I hung the washing on the line. The kids had dropped a chewed-up sweet and the wasp was feasting on it. Of course, I didn't know this, and as I moved to hang some more washing up I trod on it.

You'd think my pregnant weight would have killed the little bleeder, but as I lifted my foot, thinking I'd trodden on a thorn or something, he was still attached to my sole by his stinger--and was still stinging! He pumped a goodly amount of his nasty stuff into me, and I found it difficult to walk for several days afterward.

Have you ever been stung by a wasp? Bloody hurts, doesn't it?

Welcome To My New Home!

2011-04-18T15:31:00.000-07:00

So, here I am in my new blogging home. It’s not fancy, but I wanted something to match my new website, which is finally finished and also isn’t fancy. I’ll be blogging here from now on as every one of me (LOL), which will save time. And who knows, maybe I might blog more often now. Famous last words…

At the weekend we decided to do something. You ever get like that? When you need to get the hell out of the house and live a bit? Well, we decided to take Smallest to the cinema. Okay, to some that’s hardly living, it’s a weekly/monthly thing, but to us it’s a day out, man! It’s like…amaaaaazing! She’s never been before, and it was a first for us as a couple too. God, together nearly 9 years and we’ve never done the usual things couples do. We’re a kind of boring pair, prefer staying home, but the cinema idea was to create a memory for Smallest, so off we went.

I chose the film Rio. Ah, you might think. A cute little film about a bird. Well, I’m scared of bloody birds, so it really was a stupid movie choice. I don’t mind watching them in the garden—find that quite soothing—but it’s the ones that fly at you. Bugging pigeons in town. My nan’s budgie when I was a kid. Claws and shit in my hair. Lovely.

Anyway, the film was in 3D. We sat there, me feeling a bit of a prat in my 3D glasses, to be honest—good job it was dark, that’s all I can say—and I’m scoffing my Doritos, as you do. Well, bugger me if this bird didn’t fly at the screen while I was in mid-chew and scared the crap out of me. I yelled out, mashed-up Doritos flying out of my mouth, and had to turn away from the screen. Feeling a complete plonker, and really glad the cinema only had another three families in it, I told myself to stop being stupid.

More birds flew. And then there was a scene where these people are using those hang glider thingies—and they’re flying where it shows the ocean in the background. I’m also scared of vast expanses of water, and every time I saw something freaky I kept huddling into Smallest. She found this amusing, and I think she’ll take the piss out of me about it for a long time to come.

Next time we go, I think I’ll be more careful of the movie choice. Friday night we watched a couple of movies. The Social Network and Paranormal Activity 2. PA2 didn’t scare me like #1 did. God, #1 was just horrible. And then, from a response on Facebook to my shout-out about good films, last night we watched The Frailty. They didn’t have it in the rental place, but lucky for me I found it in a second-hand store for a couple of quid. Great film.

And there’s the thing. We’re walking down the street, and I said to Hubby, “Maybe they’ll have that film in the porno shop.”

He looked at me a bit shocked. I knew what I meant—the second-hand place is like a PAWN shop—and I realised that my working life has seriously seeped into my private. I don’t do pornos. Got no problem with them, no problem with anyone watching them if that’s what tickles their pickle, but me? Nah. So poor Hub must have thought the wind had changed or something. I was left knowing that if I don’t get my mind and mouth straight before I speak in future, I’m going to land myself in some serious shit.

Anyway, that’s enough waffle from me tonight. Welcome to my new gaff*, thank you for visiting, and let’s hope I start blogging more often and we get to have a good old natter. For now, cheerio, and watch out for pornos and flying birds.

*gaff = place/home.