The Migraine Scene

Last night I saw Mission Impossible III. I am not a big fan of the Mission Impossible movies, even though Tom Cruise is handsome and really has to be in good shape to play in these movies. The series I adored and still watch the re-runs of. The series was more of a team effort, not just one agent with everyone else supporting him alone. There was a lot of action and adventure, and even a pretty good story surrounding Ethan Hunt, Cruise's character. I enjoyed the movie. I did not love the movie and want to own it afterwards. I am even glad I was able to see it on the big screen. I guess you could say I am luke warm where this movie is concerned . . . except for one scene.

In the movie, Ethan Hunt is trying to get out of the IMF (the Impossible Missions Force) and wants a life with his fiance' who ends up being his wife (Julia Meade played by Michelle Monaghan). A superior informs him that the one person Hunt trained and even recommended for a job had been taken hostage. This one person is Lindsey Farris (Keri Russell). A pretty blond. Hunt's mission, if he chose to accept it, was to get her out and get her back to the states. She was being held in Germany by a really nasty man by the name of Owen Davien who was played by Philip Seymour Hoffman.

Davien is the kind of guy who tortures for fun. How do we know? Because he tells Hunt what he did to Agent Farris was "fun." Yeah, he's a bad, bad man. Perhaps it is needless to say, Ethan Hunt and his team (the only returning member is Ving Rhames as Luther) get the girl and after giving her a massive dose of adrenaline straight to the heart, get her to a helicopter just as she begins to go into serious pain where her head is concerned just as a pretty good helicopter chase ensues. Luckily for Lindsey Farris, Hunt tells her, "This is adrenaline. And you're going to feel it."

Hunt, using a gadget, discovers an electrical charge implanted in her head. It is priming and preparing to go off. The only way to save her? To shock her heart with a defibrillator and then shock her again to bring her back. Piece of cake. Or it would have been had it not been for the helicopter chasing them and shooting nasty missiles. Hunt gets the onboard defibrillator and has to wait for it to charge, as well as save a team member from falling out of the helicopter. Just as the charge is counting down at three seconds, the explosive charge goes off in Farris' pretty blond head and she is no more. There is angst in the helicopter and on the ground. Farris' death is covered by a car crash on I-95. The chewing out Hunt and his superior Musgrave (Billy Crudup) by Lawrence Fishburn as Theodore Brassel is not pleasant.

Hunt gets the bright idea of going and capturing Davien and without authorization plans on kidnapping the fellow while he is in the Vatican at a charity function of some kind. (We never know what the charity function is for and the Pope is never seen, which I found to be a little odd.) Of course Hunt and team do exactly as they have planned, capture Davien and on the transport plan back to the states Davien tells Hunt, "You know what I'm going to do don't you? I am going to get her, the woman, and I am going to make her cry, and bleed, and make her call out your name. Then I am going to kill you in front of her. Remember your friend in Germany? That was fun. Fun." For some reason I believed this character when he said it. He was cold. Scary cold.

When Hunt and team land and Davien is placed in a transport van the convoy begins easily. It doesn't last. There is a drone that begins shooting missiles. A helicopter filled with black clad, German speaking mercenaries who have only one agenda - free Davien. They do.

Once Davien is free, Hunt begins a mad race to the hospital where Julia works before Davien's henchmen can get to her. There is only seconds, perhaps minutes between the time when Davien is rescued and Julia goes missing. Davien has connections somewhere it seems.

Hunt is captured by Brassel because he, Hunt, is considered to be a rogue agent. Musgrave helps him escape and sends Hunt's team to him in China where Davien has said that he will spare Julia's life if he gets this thing code-named "The Rabbit's Foot." It is a biological agent.

Hunt and team succeed. Hunt takes "The Rabbit's Foot" to Davien who has him get into the back of a spiffy white limo and a vial of nasty brown liquid where Hunt is told, "Drink it. No questions." He does. Passes out. When he wakes, there is a nasty looking man there saying "Good morning" as he shoves something that looks like an ear-piercer up Hunt's nose and pulls a trigger. Hunt passes out again. When he wakes again, Julia is across from him with Davien beside her, and Davien has a gun. It does not look good.

Davien keeps asking where The Rabbit's Foot is and Hunt tells him, "I gave it to you." Davien keeps asking. Hunt keeps trying to buy Julia time. Davien shoots Julia in the leg. Hunt is racking his brain trying to come up with an answer. Davien says, quietly, almost placidly, "I am going to count to ten and if you have not told me what I want to know I am going to shoot her when I reach ten." Hunt has nothing else to tell Davien. He broke into a top-secret Chinese lab, stole the biological agent requested, nearly got killed in Shanghai traffic a dozen times over chasing the thing when it slipped out of his hands, had drank the icky brown stuff, and given, as far as he knew, Davien the correct thing!

Davien reaches ten. Julia dies. Hunt is more than devastated. More than shocked. Davien walks away and at the door begins whispering to a man we cannot see.

Enter...intrigue!

Before Davien is "removed" from IMF custody and Julia is taken, Hunt and Luther de-code a microchip Farris had sent to Hunt. It was a video message that said she thought Brassel had set her up! Yeah, the man top guy! The guy who wanted Davien caught so bad he couldn't hardly sleep at night!

It isn't Brassel who sits down across from Hunt. It is Musgrave. I thought that was a pretty good plot twist. He begins grilling Hunt on whether or not Farris bought his snow job that Brassel was trying to set her up. Did anyone else have a clue it was him or was everyone still buying that it was Brassel? Musgrave gets up and goes over to Julia. "Don't touch her!" Hunt roars. Musgrave rips the tape from off of Julia's mouth and part of a mask comes off too! It isn't Julia, it is Davien's assistant. The assistant he blamed for him getting caught in Rome!

Musgrave tells Hunt Julia is alive, but won't be for long, unless they get the information they need from Hunt. After talking to Julia to verify she is indeed Julia and is indeed alive Hunt escapes in a cool way. See the movie. It's cool. It isn't all that plausible, but it is Mission Impossible after all.

Big run through Shanghai. As I said, Tom Cruise really needs to be in shape for these movies. He flat out booked it through a good portion of this movie. I know there are tapings in movies, but he had to be in good shape none-the-less to do these things.

Hunt finds Julia! She is alive! She is tied and handcuffed and duct taped across the mouth. Hunt grabs his head. He looks like he is having a migraine. Now the movie becomes very interesting for me because I have been fighting migraines off and on for an entire week. The bad ones where all you can do is lay down and pray it goes away, or you die. There isn't much choice it feels like when they are that bad. Ethan Hunt/Tom Cruise looked like that. Davien tells Hunt, "I've activated the charge in your head. Remember what I said? She was going to bleed?" Shot of Julia. She has a few bruises and a few abrasions. So she has bled. "She was going to call your name?" Shot of Julia as Davien rips off the duct tape. She begins asking Ethan what's going on, and calling his name as Davien begins to beat the absolute crap out of Ethan hunt.

Hunt begins fighting back. Hunt gets more crap beat out of him. "Remember how I said I was going to kill you in front of her? Well, I'm going to kill her in front of you," Davien says and begins walking back toward the gun lying on the floor. Hunt looks at Julia. Julia looks at Hunt. There is calm trust in her eyes. Hunt charges Davien and the beatings are reversed.

However, as Hunt is giving Davien his beating, he is grabbing his head. He is using his elbows. He is fighting in a brutish, lethal fashion I can easily see a person with a migraine fighting with! I sat there and watched this scene and kept thinking, "Kill him for all of us who have those damnable things! He gave you yours on purpose! Get him! Get him!" I wanted to scream it out loud! I wanted to jump up and down and hoot and holler! But I didn't. I felt like it. But I didn't.

Hunt kills Davien.

Hunt frees Julia. Shows her how to take the safety off of the gun and reload it and gives her an extra clip. "Point and shoot. That's all it is. Point and shoot. Identify your target and point and shoot." All the while he is telling her this he is rigging a basin with water and turning on and off a power switch. When he has done all of this he explains he has a charge in his head and as he sits down on the floor he says, "I am going to die unless you kill me." I chuckled. Julia's response was, "What?" Yeah, I can see it. "Turn it on, then off. You can bring me back. Don't forget the off." As Julia begins to turn on the switch while Hunt is holding live wires (or soon to be live wires) he says, "Wait! Wait!....I love you. Don't forget the off."

Switch is thrown. Switch is off. Ethan Hunt is dead on the floor. Bad guys are coming. If Julia Meade had never held a gun before she did some mighty fine shooting and took out a miscellaneous mook and Musgrave to boot before beginning resuscitation procedures. It is looking as if Hunt may be no more. Then, voila! He is alive! Julia is in his arms! A gun is in his hand pointing at the dead Musgrave! "You did that?" he says, very bemused, quite proud.

Julia finds out Hunt is a member of the IMF. Hunt is given an interesting set of papers by Brassel. Hunt and Julia head off on their way to their honeymoon. Roll credits.

Yeah, the best part of the movie for me was the migraine scene. It was retribution. If someone purposely gave me a migraine, yeah, I'd go off on their ass too.

Catching Up on the Flip Side

Sorry about no recipe for yesterday all. It was dang hot here. In fact, it was SO hot (how hot was it) the Internet connection became quite wonky. Now that my friends, is hot.

Also because of heat, we do not have the next installment for "The Sleepy Hollow Inn" because M. Davenport's AC went out and Davenport is now recovering from heat exhaustion while trying to repair it and Davenport's computer is at the computer doctor trying to recover some of its files so we can indeed have the next installment of the story!

It appears heat is the topic for many blog subjects recently. I have visited my usual ones and I can say "heat" appeared quite a lot in the subject line. For myself I didn't think it was that hot and unbearable. The dogs needed to go outside so I just went out there and sat for a little while and some things came to my attention that made me quite grateful for the AC we have here at the house. Namely, the birds.

I am a big fan of listening to the birds and providing them with as much seed and water as I can. Today, while sitting outside and being very grateful to be warm and happy I noticed the jar flies were quite lazy and not at all loud. Only a few hearty souls were there to make their summer song. A lone monarch butterfly came swooping in to the gardenias planted in the pots along my ramp and I was still caught by how they flew: it looks as if butterflies sometimes are tied to a string and someone is pulling it up and down in a jerky fashion to make the wings move and thus keep their adrift. The big thing though, was the absence of bird song. The trees were a droopy green and all around me was shade. I saw birds sitting quietly with their bills open and their wings dropping in the mulberry tree, but not one peep or warble was heard. A lone cardinal male came swooping in from a neighbor's tree looking for a possible hand out, or maybe just shade, because he looked to make sure me and the dogs were not a direct threat and then headed for the shade of the bamboo.

Me and the girls came inside, drank us a hearty amount of water and then settled down with the air conditioning. It felt good to be comfortable and I am going to try and make sure Hubby can put some water out there for the birds. I just don't know in what yet. I miss hearing them sing. That makes me happy. It means summer. Summer is indeed here, now we just need to help the little birds wet their pretty sounding whistles. For all of the heat though, and the current absence of bird song, I am still most thrilled it is summer.

Decisive Day and Giving the Rest to God

I hate making decisions sometimes. When you are married, the decisions you ultimately make do not just involve yourself, but those of your spouse also. Today I made a decision about myself and my life in the future and my spouse took it quite well, in fact he seemed pleased. I wish he had been just a little more nervous to go along with how I am really feeling.

What did I decide?

I decided I wasn't giving up on my writing no matter what, and I also decided I was going to go back to school to get a criminal justice degree. By the time this degree is done I will be fifty years old. Fifty. Who will want to hire me then? Being in a wheelchair and physically disabled will not be as much of a problem as my age. So why did I do it? Because something needs to change in my life, and I need it to be a positive change, something ultimately filled with hope. So, I am trying for this, and, because I am trying for it, I am pretty sure I will succeed, because I dearly love to learn and this intrigues me.

I am scared, though. I am scared down to the very tips of my toes to the utmost tops of my hair. Hubby is pleased and happy, proud, but I am afraid really, and I am going to have to hide this fear. Why then am I writing it here? Because he doesn't read it. There is always an excuse why he can't read anything I write. So, I may as well be honest somewhere in my life, especially with my life: I am going back to school and I am afraid. I am going for a job and I am afraid. I am not giving up my writing and I am afraid.

Yeah, I guess you could say I am a little on the uncertain side of things. All I can do now is just give it 110% and give the rest to God.

Poetry Monday

The Tiger
By William Blade

TIGER, tiger, burning bright
In the forests of the night,
What immortal hand or eye
Could frame thy fearful symmetry?

In what distant deeps or skies
Burnt the fire of thine eyes?
On what wings dare he aspire?
What the hand dare seize the fire?

And what shoulder and what art
Could twist the sinews of thy heart?
And when thy heart began to beat,
What dread hand and what dread feet?

What the hammer? what the chain?
In what furnace was thy brain?
What the anvil? What dread grasp
Dare its deadly terrors clasp?

When the stars threw down their spears,
And water'd heaven with their tears,
Did He smile His work to see?
Did He who made the lamb make thee?

Tiger, tiger, burning bright
In the forests of the night,
What immortal hand or eye
Dare frame thy fearful symmetry?

A lot has been said about this poem of late from Britney Spears to David Letterman. I thought it would be nice for everyone to actually have the full poem to enjoy and read.

"World Peace" is on my list of To-Do's This Week?

It's Sunday and I am sitting here looking down the road at the week approaching and feeling as if, all of a sudden, I have a life and things to do. Ever had one of those days where you just sit quietly and look ahead of you and see all of the things you need to do and are probably going to succeed at doing and then you know, without having been wanting to know or expecting to know you had a life? Yeah, that's where I am at the moment. It isn't spooky or anything, like it would have been a few years ago, but it is . . . strange.

For example, I have three writing projects that are very important for me to work on and complete this week. Two short stories and my newest novel. One short story actually has a conclusion and is waiting on the editorial and second-draft writing to begin the spit-and-polish it needs before sending out to a magazine somewhere. The other short story isn't finished, but does have a good possibility of being picked up by a magazine. The novel, well, the novel just needs words down on it and progress.

On the domestic front I want to clean my kitchen and re-organize it so that when the expected company arrives in two weeks time, there will be a place to sit and eat, have tea and coffee and there will be a place to relax. In country homes this is usually the kitchen. Just because I live in a moderate city doesn't mean my home isn't a country home, so it is very important to me the kitchen is in order.

Hubby needs help with finding a job, so I will be doing a lot of computer searching and applying so that I can be of some assistance.

Plus, there is the ever-present exercise to do. Thank the good Lord it is yoga! If I had to go to the gym this week I would fuss every single day and hate any moment spent there. With yoga I can go into our room, close the door, and let the day slip away or the morning organize itself silently depending on when I actually get to do it.

And then there is cooking and preparing for the Dormition Fast which begins on August 1st. Birthday cards to secure and send out. Bills to pay. Blog posts to plan. Budgets to balance and world peace to secure.

OK, I can't do anything about world peace, but sometimes it just seems like something that should just be on someone's weekly list somewhere. What if it was on everyone's list? Would world peace be found and kept that way? It is an interesting thought.

Computer Maintenance Update

Hubby did computer maintenance today so there was no posting. More later.

Thursdays Alter Ego

Yes, I am running away from all of the mundane things I should be doing. I am running away here, to the Internet and for entertainment and information because here is some place I would prefer not to be at the moment.

Have you ever had those moments when you just wanted to run away and be somewhere else, someone else? I am having one of those days.

Today, I believe, my alter ego would be...Marquessa, a beautiful Italian lady of great title and beauty who had servants to do her bidding and all she had to do was compose the sweet directives and mysteries her friends enjoyed to read. And, could it be possible? The queen wants to hear one in court?!

The Sleepy Hollow Inn, Part I

M. Davenport lives in Lexington, Kentucky and is a fledgling author. M. Davenport prefers gender to be unknown, but does wish it stated that the Davenport household is filled with the love of four cats and two dogs and six birds of various breeds. Personally, I am quite curious to see how the cats and the birds manage to get along, but according to Davenport, they do, quite well.

The house sitting on the outskirts of the sleepy little town of Richmond, Kentucky would make a perfect bed and breakfast. I knew it the moment I laid eyes on it. It was a massive Victorian era structure with a tower and enough land for wonderful, old fashioned garden parties. I could just see the evening garden parties with ladies and gentlemen in period costumes floating among the torch and candlelight on warm summer evenings. The majority of the land was screened from the road leading to Lexington proper and I-75 by a collection of pines, black cheery, and oak trees. An old iron fence did its best to keep things out and the trees in, although when I saw it, the thing had nearly fallen flat to the ground, yet defiant to the very end. Seeing it as I did in the moonlight, I could also see Halloween parties and me there on the expanse of front porch in my favorite costume of a vampire lord. It would not matter if people mistook me for the legendary Dracula: People just did not comprehend there were other vampiric lords besides him. The house would be a good investment, and just before dawn I made my requests known to my friend and protector, Micky Smith.

Despite having lived for 251 years, I needed income, just like everyone else. In order to remain hidden, and hidden well, you needed a cover whether you were a vampire or a human on the run. How many people would it surprise to know not all vampires were rich and had magnificent fortunes tucked away in unexpected places to fall back upon? Most of us of the vampiric kind, struggle to make ends meet just like those who work and toil during the day. True, I had enough money to purchase the house and enough left over to get it going fully, but I was no where near "comfortable" in means.

Besides that, I also had to pay homage to the elegant and beautiful Alison Reese who ruled over a good portion of the Small South as Kentucky, Tennessee and Georgia were known as in the make up of the vampire world of North America. I was coming into the Small South from the Northern Territory and I had to pay tribute to her before officially opening my establishment. It has been done this way for centuries, and, I suspect, it will continue on for centuries to come.

Alison Reese had set up court in a refurbished plantation in Tennessee just outside of Knoxville as the crow flies. I sat there in the ballroom of the mansion and waited like everyone else. Humans mingled with vampires of high and low rank. The humans received wine and water in classic crystal goblets, and we vampires were served small sherry glasses of blood mingled with just the right amount of wine. The blood was of the porcine variety, which made sense - part of Alison Reese's income came from the sale of pork and beef to the markets of the day walkers.

To be quite honest, I was very used to the Northern Territory which was run very much like a business. Here everything was run in Old Southern style where nothing was rushed and it mattered if Alison Reese approved of you or not.

A footman dressed in vintage livery tapped a long staff upon the floor and those who had been sitting rose. Alison Reese floated in dressed in an antebellum gown of lavender and black. Her blond curls were done up in royal fashion and she even wore a small diamond studded tiarra. Seeing her, feeling her presence even before she entered the room, you knew you had met pure royalty, vampiric or otherwise. Her lavender eyes scanned the room quickly and quietly, sizing us all up openly. She seemed to linger over a human male dressed in a three-piece suite of fine silk. As he bowed before her I could see the coldness of her gaze settle upon him and I was very glad I was not him.

The order of business was simple. There was an introduction, the presentation of gifts, and then other business that required her direct, personal attention. Hopefully I would not require anything of her personal attention. Upon seeing her I had a healthy respected fear of her. The less I had to do in her court the better.

There were four new comers ahead of me. They presented her with chests of coins, stocks, and beautiful clothes. The vampire ahead of me merely offered himself to her service which she accepted with the slightest of inclinations of her head. Standing there before her as I now was, I was actually sad at having to part with the little bauble I had kept with me for over 150 years. It was a necklace of the finest gold and sparkling rubies accented by too many diamonds to count. I had received it from Queen Victoria herself as a present and now I presented it to another queen. Everyone praised my gift and waited for Alison's approval.

She extended her pale hand and I placed it directly upon her palm. Her fingers glided over it adoringly. She looked to me and gave me a soft smile and a gentle nod of her head. It was done. I could open up my beautiful bed and breakfast now, which is what I directly returned to Kentucky to do.

That was in 1999.

The Sleepy Hollow Inn became a big success for little Richmond and even was placed in the tourism map. It was a great mystery how some of the men and women awoke with bite marks upon their necks. It just added to the mystery of the place. We were booked for months in advance.

Micky ran everything during the daylight hours, and I hosted in the evenings. I was the story teller, the one dressed in period costume to make all giggle nervously at the ghost stories and tales of lost love and sadness. We were a good team. Micky received good pay for his trouble and I was at peace and mostly ignored by the residents of Madison County until someone didn't wake up one morning because they didn't have any blood left in their body. The thing is - I didn't touch them. Not once.

Recipe Tuesday and the Tuesday Reminder

As the series of days-of-the-week posts progress, I would like to know what all of you think.

THE KENTUCKY MOUNTAIN GIRL NEWS is open for submissions. No payment is given, just a bi-line which helps all of us beginning writers to have our name and our work somewhere posted for the ever-growing portfolio that a lot of editors seem to be looking for these days. Send an email to hahwriter@yahoo.com for writer's guidelines.

Tomorrow we have new fiction from a new writer, M. Davenport. You'll like it. This will be the first serial I have accepted from outside, so to speak, and I believe you will find it very entertaining a little quirky.

Oven Pockets

This makes clean-up a breeze and the food wonderful. Quick and simple, which makes summer cooking a lot easier.

On a piece of tinfoil large enough to hold a good single-serving piece of chicken, drizzle a little extra virgin olive oil.

Season the chicken on both sides with a little salt and pepper.
Add 1 clove of garlic
Add I Tbsp of butter or margarine.
Close the tinfoil like a grannysmith apple turnover (tee-pee style, not tented)
Place in a pre-heated 400 degree oven
Bake until done all the way through.

This way you can make individual servings of garlic chicken and it won't be a mess to clean up and you don't have to stand over a hot stove. Serve with a nice fresh salad and some good iced tea or lemonade and you have a wonderful summer meal.

Poetry Monday

Teasing the Water
By H.A. Handy

Upon the sloping shore
Water laps like icy tongues
Licking and lapping
Hungry for what it can taste
To drag back into the depths.

My toes wriggle in the sand
Playing with the water-tongues
Coaxing them, teasing them
Waiting for the wave to come once
Twice more to cover my feet.

Above the sky turns bluer still
High noon done come and gone
Shade covering me at my spot
Birds diving and singing
I stand still, teasing the water with my toes.

Good News of the Writing and Posting Kind

Beginning this Wednesday we will be delighted with a wonderful serial by a new writer by the name of M. Davenport. Other than that I am afraid I can give you no more details.

Also, beginning next week there will actually be something close to an actual schedule for everyone to keep track of regarding what is going to appear on The News and when such as poetry and ponderings, as well as fiction and other pieces of note.

The NWP is also beginning to be quite firmly moving forward. Here is to keeping fingers crossed and wonderful bottles of ink that may rarely go dry!

NWP is being done in a totally different fashion - I am using the dip pen and the bottle of ink I mentioned earlier. Every word is truly a labor of love and the words are much better. Yes, I am still using a thesaurus, what writer doesn't? However, the words I am choosing are different, better, or feel better. Sometimes the feeling is just as important as what goes down I am discovering.

Have a good day all.

New Writing Project

4,659 / 100,000 (4.0%)

Wordage

Yes, I know, today is supposed to be fiction day but have been typing like mad to get all of my words in and now I can say there is indeed progress.

New Writing Project

4,659 / 100,000 (4.0%)

A Tale of Two Imps - from Cheyenne

Cheyenne here folks.

I’m going to tell you a very quick tale. It’s not a tale of woe, not really, so there’s no need to fret about that. It is, however, a tale of two imps.

The first imp is Tempit. He’s a nasty little thing, full of sand and gears and numbers. His face is sealed behind a pane of glass that flashes 12:00 again and again and again, and his chest is round and elegantly embossed with vine-like filigree numbers, 1 through 12 evenly spaced around the edges. Spinning arms adorn his hands, whirling like helicopter blades on the back of his wrists, and more than one fat black moth has tried to get at the delicious silks wrapped tightly around him, at the silver threads gleaming against the golden numbers of years gone by, only to die screaming a quiet, terror filled shriek as the sweep hand on his back spins round and around.

Tempit, you may imagine, has a love of time. He steals it every chance he gets, from each and every person he comes across. He delights in hearing us go on and on about how “There just isn’t enough time in a day anymore!” His job performance is measured in seconds stolen and minutes wasted, and he is very good at his job.

Occasionally, however, he cant seem to steal enough time, or not from the right people. He has that problem with everyone now and then, and he accepts it, a little – one must be Zen about these things, after all. He can’t steal each and every minute, not unless he wants to be out of a job completely. But yesterday, The Editor – our own beloved Editor – made excellent use of her time, and Tempit was not able to steal even one brief second away from her.

So he called his buddy, Migrat.

Migrat is a pained thing, miserable and wretched. His skin is two and a half sizes too small, and his bones grind against each other instead of gliding. His eyes bulge and his ears bleed, and every nerve in his head is pressing against the inside of his skull. His chest barely has enough room for him to draw breath, and it is almost fortunate that, being an imp, Migrat doesn’t need to eat, for his belly would be hard pressed to hold a drop of water or a crumb of bread. It would be most fortunate, if he was not always beset by thins maddening hunger. Migrat is a creature that knows nothing but pain, and unlike most imps – Migrat loves to share.

Which is why I am here today, telling you all that the Editor has been abed most of the day with horrible migraines after having a most productive day yesterday. Fortunately, Migrat lacks patience, so she should be up and about – if not entirely right as rain – upon the morrow.

Kind thoughts, well wishes, and prayers are, as always, encouraged and appreciated.

Yoga and Suddenly Me

I have been doing yoga for about six weeks now. I confess I haven't done it every day as I know I should be doing, or the very minimum of once a week. Yesterday I did yoga, more as a desperate plea for movement and feeling better - just to feel better. I didn't do the complete routine I have, but it made me feel good. It wasn't the sort of "feeling good" I have been used to with exercise. It was a heart-warming, soul-filling good that I had just done something good for myself and that I had actually enjoyed every moment of it.

When it was all over, and after I had a few moments just to myself, I sat down on the foot of our bed and thought about it. In the past I have promised myself that I would do something to get in shape, start it, and then stop it. This is a point of contention between me and Hubby, especially in an argument (he loves to bring this up). Yesterday, sitting on the foot of the bed and feeling my back more relaxed and my shoulders less stressed - I looked up and saw myself looking back at me.

For the first time in a long time I sat there and looked at me. Did I like the person looking back at me? Yes, I decided. I like that person. Still, the person looking back at me was not in the best of physical condition, but that still didn't make her un-pretty. There was a real beauty underneath it all there, and, quite suddenly, I wanted to make that beauty come out. I wanted to see it. I wanted to experience it. I suddenly felt myself ready. Does that make sense at all? I'm not sure if it does to me or not, but I knew I was ready. It was time. No matter how much I would say it or had said it in the past, it really was time to let that beautiful person I saw just underneath my eyes come out and see the light of day.

In accepting this and knowing all of the work it was going to take, I also realized that I didn't need to hide any more. It was even more surprising to realize I had been hiding a big part of me for most of my life - the pretty side. It has always been more important for me to get the story down, to make a living, to help my parents, to help Hubby and my friends, but never did I fully give time to myself. I always kept time for myself to a minimum. Yesterday I felt important to myself. It was a surprisingly wonderful feeling. It was also in that moment I realized I didn't have to depend on make-up to make me feel pretty. It, the make-up, was just something to help me bring out my eyes and to accent the already full lips. The person looking at me, which was me, was actually very physically pleasing in appearance. I was pretty and there was no need to let it hide in my eyes.

Self-esteem is another word for all of this. I saw self-worth looking back at me from my own eyes. It was startling. It was good. And now I have the strength to go on - letting the prettiness out and letting myself be worthy of everything there is out there for me.

One of THOSE Moments

Sitting quietly before the computer screen with the TV going in the living room and the dogs either snoring or making yummy chew noises on something they probably shouldn't be chewing on, I realized today that there was a lot on my plate as far as life was concerned.

The writing and creativity has truly jumped a hundred leagues. The days of the week are filled with things for me to do. Yoga truly IS important to me. Despite some bad days, I am really quite happy now. It has taken a long time to reach this point and I am going to try my best and enjoy everything about it for as long as I possibly can.

mimibaron

mimibaron,
originally uploaded by hahwriter.

I am just trying out a few things with my new Flickr account.

It's Official

It is official - the new novel has begun.

Last night and today I read for research because the main character is a big fan of . . . Traci Lords. You know her, right, or have heard of her? The teenager who got caught up in the porn industry and has struggled out of it to be accepted (for the most part) as a legitimate actress?

When I first hit upon the idea of making the person my main character admired an actress I actually did a lot of thinking about who would be a wonderful person to admire. I thought of all of the usual ones - Fay ray, Marlena Dietrich, Lauren Bacall and all of them would have been wonderful, but these people have been used a lot. I wanted someone different, someone people wouldn't expect and came up with Traci Lords, and, yes, I did so because of the "porn queen" image I had heard about.

Last night I sat reading Traci Lords: Underneath It All totally caught up in the frank manner the autobiography was written and finished it off today. I felt ashamed of myself for thinking of her initially as "a porn queen" and realized I had fallen into the age-old trap of thinking little about her, almost as if she herself were fiction, someone made up. By the end of the book I had an admiration of her and highly recommend this book to all to read.

Traci Elizabeth Lords (originally born Nora Kuzma) is frank and honest about her life. She speaks openly about her rape, how men molested, abused, and used her; as well as her struggle to over-come what had happened to her and regain control of a life that seemed shattered and fractured beyond repair to an outsider's eye. She was fifteen when she began in the industry under a false name, got hooked on drugs, and her last porn was the only one she had done legally at the age of eighteen.

She takes you through her recovery and lets you explore with her the trials and tribulations of over-coming all of the horrors that life can deliver and help you see a vibrant and tough woman who decided she was going to survive and actually did so and in the process secured happiness in her life, which was not easy at all, and success in her chosen field, which, again, was not easy.

A friend of mine and I once guessed that perhaps porns had been her "break," but I had not read her book at the time and I have to admit I was stunned to even admit I had thought like that before.

Yes, it is official that the novel has indeed begun, especially the research, but what is even more official is that my main character indeed chose a wonderful role model. It is also official that the fictional character in my head taught me a few lessons and I am most grateful to him for that. Truth really is stranger than fiction.

Poetry

Do We Ever Know?
By H.A. Handy
Copyright (c) 2006 by H.A. Handy

Prayers are answered
Battlefield to hospital
Classroom to end of life.

Are we ever too old to pray?
Do we ever truly stand aside,
Saying fully in our hearts -

I can do this alone,
There is no power out there to help me
There is nothing I can turn to?

Do we always not wonder?

Female Stars 1920-1958 and Polynesian Weapons

OK, it is time for me to begin the new novel. (The short story is finished and will be heading out to the whims of the world soon. Will keep you updated as to where it is going.) Since a new novel is beginning, so is the research. Here are a few questions that if anyone has any knowledge of or ideas, or even something they like, please leave me a comment so I can journey forth in blissful research.

What female movie star or starlett do you think of as being most elegant in the years 1920 to 1958?

What do you know of Polynesian weapons?

Finding a Little Control in the Middle of Chaos

It has always been hard for me to have any control in my life where I felt I was in control. Growing up in hospitals can do that to you. First your parents have control over you, and thus, in the middle of it, you know you have choices and can make decisions regarding little matters, but when the child is quite sickly and in and out of hospitals on a regular basis, can't move without excruciating pain, the control leaves. You have medicine forced upon you. You can't go running through the house because you're too sick and, well, it hurts too damn much to breathe, much less walk - so you are resigned to a room and that room depends on where your Mom or Dad puts you for the moment. In you are lucky, as I was, they would ask sometimes if you would like to be brought into a different room, or outside with them in the summer. Sometimes you even got to sit outside by yourself and play with your cat. Somehow you figure out how to feed the birds, and since you have to sit quietly to keep the pain away, you learn that by sitting quietly the birds come to light upon you and they are light and their feet and toes are very sharp because that is how the sit upon the limbs of trees, so they grip your toes in that same manner. You learn not to flinch, because that is a different pain and it is a magical one because something that flies through the skies actually came to sit on your foot and hop up your leg, turning its dark eye this way and that. But let the cat come or the door open, or your Mom call from inside the house to inquire how you are and the bird, sometimes several of them, flit away to land on a walnut tree limb and look back at your suspiciously, but if you're quiet and patient...they come back.

Then, when you're too sick to stay at home you end up in the hospital. There even your parents don't have a say over you. The nurses move your body and cause pain, or they stick you with needles and draw blood, or give you shots that make it feel like you're dying and floating away. There isn't any way to go outside. There aren't any cats to purr and comfort you. There isn't any television you can watch because your parents don't have the money for it, and you have to try and eat food you can't really put in your mouth. You go where someone else wants you to go, and heaven forbid if you have a book to escape from the pain. The light goes out at eight or nine o'clock in the evening. There isn't any more reading. There isn't any more escape. So you just lay there, and if you're lucky you can be by a window and look up at the stars and wonder if there could possibly be life out there, and, if so, what type of life would it be. If you're not so lucky, maybe you can imagine and make the imaginings come to life to help distract from the pain and help lull you into sleep.

Sometimes I don't feel very far away from that time in my life when there was constant chaos around me and no place or chance of escape or to have a chance to take some control over it. Recently that feeling, which I hadn't realized was always present before, actually has begun to fade. I look around me and see things I can change and correct; actions I can do to make things happen in favor of this or that.

When did this feeling start to change? When I began using a dip pen and a bottle of ink to tell stories. Suddenly there was control in the middle of chaos, and I was the one in control.

Slowly it is spreading to other areas of my life. My friends and family are quite happy about it all, but they can't understand how something so old fashioned can help you regain part of yourself, especially the important part that says you can make a difference in your environment, and especially in your own life.

Yes, I am finding a little control in the middle of chaos, and also discovering the chaos really isn't as chaotic as I thought it was. Imagine that.

Progressive in Being Peaceful Department

Today was one of those writing days that don't come by very often. I sat at the kitchen table and dipped pen into ink, literally, before applying the pen to the page. The scritch scratch of the pen was the only sound to be heard except for the occasional snore of the dogs or them shifting positions. The scenes were brisk in my mind and came out, I think, quite well onto the paper. The words kept collecting and collecting until, at last, the thing was finished. Two weeks of working on a short story and it was finally done. When I wrote the last night, punctuated it and leaned back into my chair more comfortably I felt as if I had just written a short story! Now begins the typing.

Holiday Blues

The Fourth has come and gone and now the normal week tries to impose itself back upon us. Today is the day when there should be some fiction isn't it. I don't want to work on fiction just yet, but it has been requested that "The Child's Voice" be continued - so, we will continue it come tomorrow or Friday. I'm just not ready for the holiday to be over y'all. I guess most of you understand that. I ask your forgiveness now and promise to try and do better.

Holiday Blues

The Fourth has come and gone and now the normal week tries to impose itself back upon us. Today is the day when there should be some fiction isn't it. I don't want to work on fiction just yet, but it has been requested that "The Child's Voice" be continued - so, we will continue it come tomorrow or Friday. I'm just not ready for the holiday to be over y'all. I guess most of you understand that. I ask your forgiveness now and promise to try and do better.

The Fourth of July, Independence Day

I have always been a patriotic person. Despite the problems this country has had to face or had to go through, I have been here pulling for her and doing my part by voting, even when I didn't believe voting actually made a difference any more.

Maybe it is because of the era and family I grew up in. My Daddy was a World War II veteran and a hero to me. He fought against one of the greatest evils I had ever read about - Hitler - and I admired him for that, even when he said he did not want my "admiration" because all he had done was been scared and had to kill people who were just like him, scared and young and just trying to do the right thing for their families. In everything he did, my Daddy was a very honest man, and he is still my hero.

Now, in looking at this country and where it is in relation to the world powers, I am still a patriot. I still admire the things we have accomplished as a nation and I am hopeful for the future of it. At the same time I admit it has problems. Big problems. But if the people stand firm and actually work for what is right and good for all citizens, then there is a good possibility things will work out just as it should.

Sometimes, when I look at the Independence Day holiday I still wonder if we are as independent as a people and a nation as we should, or could be. Still, I don't believe I would live any where else because I have the freedom to put my words onto a screen and share them with the world in relative peace and comfort that someone is not going to come and knock down my door and take me away because I said something the government didn't like.

Although I am not part of "the press" as a whole or as the world sees it, my own opinion is important to me and being able to express it is a privilege I will never take for granted. It is the independent, sometimes individual voice that rises in freedom and encourages others to be free, even in the same nation, or perhaps somewhere else. Having the ability to say what you like is important, far more important than most people of America would like to accept.

So, on behalf of all of those out there who do not say it enough: God bless America, and may our flag forever wave over the home of the brave and the land of the free.

A Writing Dream Come True

Yesterday I received something in the mail that has pretty much made my year: three vintage dip pens in splendid condition.

Sometimes when you are a writer, a story teller, you get an image in your head of what you would like to write with ultimately. For me it has always been a dip pen. I could see myself easily sitting at a desk dipping my pen into a bottle of ink and writing upon beautiful paper.

Last night, I not only got to write in this fashion, but I got to do so in my paper diary/journal.

The very sound of the pen scratching across the paper was beyond beautiful. The pen itself was light and easy to hold which kept my hand from becoming excessively tired, and the image I had of myself so long ago came full force into reality and caused me to catch my breath.

What lies ahead in this writing, story telling craft I do not know; however, I do know that writing has changed forever for me and creating poetry and short stories have also changed. My very life feels as if it has changed, and I am thankful for it.

Gaming Update

Yesterday, instead of having a major role-playing session we had a character up-dating session. Despite four players being on the missing list, a.k.a. vacations, there was a good number that showed up to make sure their characters were up-to-date. It wasn't uproariously funny, but it was still a good day had by all.

Pet Notes

I was tooling through the email today and trashing a good quantity of it, when I discovered an email talking about first aid for your pets. Since I do not have an equine and my husband does not yet have a salt water tank, the only one I really paid close attention to was for the cats. It is here, for cats and I have to admit it got me to thinking - what about dogs?

I think this is pretty much a good thing to have set aside for the canines as well. Along with the sharp tweezers, for the dog emergency kit I would also have a pair of blunt ones because with dogs they need to have burs and things removed, and scratching or upsetting an animal that is larger, usually, than a cat, not irritating a wound would be quite good. If anyone has any further additions to the kit for dogs (or cats), I would be most interested.

Poetry by Jewell Asher Foley

BEYOND TOMORROW
By Jewell Asher Foley
Copyright (c) 2006 by Jewell Asher Foley

Sometimes the future seems uncertain,
And we're not sure of what tomorrow holds,
Then is the time to look beyond tomorrow,
Where the certainty of our salvation unfolds.

It's not for us to see behind the curtain
That covers the future things.
For we who are weak could never bear
The burden that knowledge would bring.

Joseph was sure he had a bad day
The day his brothers sold him.
He could not see his future,
Though in a dream God told him.

We creatures of the present
Count many things as loss.
When, instead of wishing, when God says,
"Go Fishing,"
We should take the tartar sauce.


Jewell Asher Foley
April 20, 2000

Yeah, it's Monday.

I've survived it so far.

A Really Easy, Totally Vegetarian Taco Salad

4 cups lettuce, torn into pieces
1 medium red bell pepper, chopped
1/2 cup chopped green onions
1 small cucumber, peeled and chopped
1 cup pinto beans, drained of juice
2 oz baked tortilla chips, broken into pieces
1/4 cup salsa

Instructions:In a salad bowl, mix together the vegetables, pinto beans and tortilla chips. Add the salsa and stir gently to blend.

Nutritional Information:
Per serving:
203 calories
2 g total fat (0 g sat)
0 mg cholesterol
40 g carbohydrate
11 g protein
11 g fiber
213 mg sodium

Note: You can also spice this up and add cheese and more vegetables. It is filling but not fattening or heavy during the hot summer days. Try it and tell me what you think about it. For other recipes, check out The Ox and Hare Inn.

The Secret Book of Grazia dei Rossi

The written word is calling. Last night I purchased a novel to read at Barnes & Noble and found myself, while grazing through the stacks, that I was being extremely careful about my selection. True, we have very little money to spare at the moment, but books should never be skimped, especially if they are under $10. Still, I was careful about what I chose to read. It was important to me what went into my brain and it felt wonderful to take an interest in the books out there.

At one point I had about four books in my possession. I read and re-read the backs and the prologues (if they had them) and the first few pages if there was no prologue. Finally I decided on The Secret Book of Grazia dei Rossi by Jacqueline Park. It is about this woman's life in the Renaissance. Yes, it is fiction. Since the last book I read was a biography, it seemed like a nice change to actually select a novel, a piece of fiction to let my brain wander and imagine, other than in my own worlds, of course.

I think the next novel I read will either be campy or science fiction or fantasy oriented. Life needs some SF and F in order to make it through it. This is my belief at the moment.

When it is finished I will share with you the book.

Here is the blurb from the back

The Secret Book of Grazia dei Rossi is a sweeping tale of intrigue and romance set in a time rife with court politics, papal chicanery, religious intolerance, and inviolable social rules. Grazia, private secretary to the world-renowned Isabell d'Este, is the daughter of an eminent Jewish banker, the wife of the pope's Jewish physician, and the lover of a Christian prince. In a "secret book," written as a legacy for her son, she records her struggles to choose between the seductions of the Christian world and a return to the family, traditions, and duties of her Jewish roots. As she re-creates renaissance Italy in captivating detail, Jacqueline Park gives us a timeless portrait of a brave and brilliant woman trapped in an unforgiving, inflexible society.

See any reason why I would have chosen this particular novel to read, say, over the science fiction novel and thrillers I had in my lap at the time?

Some Writing News

I was going through some e-mail and several different sites recently and discovered some very interesting and useful information. You can check it below by just clicking the links. See, I really do care for you all. :)

Writer's Weekly

Writer's Digest.com

Game Report

Last night we gamed. A good time was had by all. In the middle of it, the main idea for the game hit me like lightning! I KNOW THE BACKGROUND AND PREMISE NOW! In games you either start with this crucial fact, but usually it hits you between the first and fourth gaming sessions. So it was this time. Of course, now that I know what should happen this means I am going to have to put in a good amount of time, more than just the day before the game, in putting the game together for the players. The plan is to work on it some every single day once the major writing projects are done. This is a good plan. Hopefully things won't develop to hamper the GM from doing her job.

One of the more memorable things about last night was a 22+ year gamer gave me the comment of "Your games are never boring." The next gaming session is really going to be a character session. People who have leveled up and need help selecting skills and special things have requested help, so we will spend some quality time on working on characters and getting everyone to play on Thursday, which is going to be a wonderful and much needed thing because on the next session we will begin hitting the serious plot of the story. As for the players, this is a good thing because the ones who have never played before are beginning to get a good idea of what is done and needs doing so that when the major bad guys begin to appear, as they should appear in the third full-fledged game session, they will have a much better chance of surviving.

One of the most memorable moments of the game was when "SwordBoy" said, "I am going to turn my motorcycle toward her {the bad guy at the time} and do a back flip off of it and land on my feet while it crashes into her." He rolled a 3 - the back flip didn't quite work and he landed on his butt with the bike missing the bad guy totally. "SwordBoy" gave the BEST of expressions to add to what had just happened. He makes me laugh and everyone else. SwordBoy isn't "comic relief" but he sure does add to the gaming experience in a positive way.

Soccer

USA = 1
Ghana = 2

The US is out of this World Cup. It was a good game, except for the refs and some coaching decisions.

Nacho Libre

I'm not sure what I was expecting when I went to see Nacho Libre with Jack Black playing the main character - you know, the one the movie is all about. The previews looked funny, and since I am a big wraslin' fan it seemed like a piece that could actually entertain instead of just be brain fluff.

It was more than just entertaining and funny, it was downright GOOD. Jack Black wasn't playing Jack Black but a real character named, "Nacho Libre" who was really a poor and humble orphan growing up in an orphanage who always loved the Luchadores (Mexican wrestlers) and wanted to be one when he grew up. Instead of that he became a friar, but he still had his dream.

Being the cook, without money to buy the orphans proper food, he found a way of getting his ingredients by being a masked wrestler. He lost many matches, but won something else instead - the desire to fulfill his dream.

God is not the bad guy in this movie, and those who are religious are not seen as evil and to be made fun of. They are people, trying to live their faith the best they can and be honest about their own hopes and dreams and serving God. This was something that was refreshing. However, many chuckles and belly laughs do come because the characters are just people trying to do the best they can.

Jack Black surprised me most of all, and his paper-thin (I mean this guy is skinny!) partner really made the movie work. Jack Black ceased to be "Jack Black" and actually let himself explore the character of Nacho. He has a wonderful chemistry and timing with "Stephen", his partner in the ring, and eventually his best friend. It was wonderful watching them together. It would be interesting to see the two of them in another movie I think.

Nacho made me laugh, and almost made me cry, and when we came out of the theater I felt uplifted and happy. In many ways I was reminded of my own dreams and how, despite the hardships for going for your dream, they are worth it; if you don't try, all you are is miserable.

Want to see a good movie, not just brain fluff? Then go visit Nacho and tell me what you thought when you get back. Go ahead. I'll wait.

You Can't See What Happens in Life - You Just Live It

"We must walk consciously only part way toward our goal and then leap in the dark to our success."

– Henry David Thoreau

"The Greedy Ones" Made Me Think

There was something else I was going to write about today - but that was before I read Michael Yon's piece entitled "The Greedy Ones" on his web site. This really made me stop and think. Think serious things about life and love and people and friendships and how you never know how things are actually going to turn out.

It came from Poland, a message, via email—zzzppt. They were searching for her, a woman with whom I had recently made friends of the sort one finds while traveling abroad in wild nations. She had disappeared. The investigators had found my contact information in her hotel room.

Now, that is what you call an opener. From there Michael Yon goes on to describe, in a knowing manner, what happens with a car bomb or the suicide bombings that are happening in Iraq now. There is a photo in the article also of empty shoes. Sometimes the only thing left behind by the victims of a car bombing or bombing is their shoes.

The morbid part of me always wanted to know what really happened in a car bombing like those happening in Iraq and elsewhere. Now I know. I am glad I know, because this makes the happenings, the deaths over there, the senseless killing even more real and far more senseless. More ruthless and cruel than what I had already imagined in my unknowingness.

Beneath a photo of the shoes which was taken by an unknown soldier after a car bombing (read the article, please, to get the full text of everything that happens) are the words, "Empty shoes can always be found after car bombs rip through victims, and normally the genitals of the terrorists remain intact." Serves them right. Let them have their "seventy-two virgins and two youths" (that's right two youths) and not be able to do anything about it! How fitting it is.

Read the article. Let him explain everything as only he can in this poignant piece as he mourns for a friend.

!!! WOW !!!

Ghana beat the Czech Republic! It was an awesome game to watch. However, the refs for the USA vs. Italy match are being, well, too damned difficult for BOTH sides!

The Sound of Fun

There were ten people gathered around a couple of long tables that made a T shape in a small room of a gaming shop last night. There were new players and older ones to the game gathered together to continue the adventure from last week.

As I opened in to the beginnings of the next phase expectant faces were looking at me. Time slowed, as it usually does when you role play, and everyone eased into their alter egos, which, to be honest, is merely a continuation of who they are.

Dice clinked and bounced on the tables. There was excited laughter that reached out and drew people from the store into the depths of what was happening in the game.

Laughter would erupt at wonderful moments, at hoped-for moments, and then spontaneously with botched roles and results from actions not quite thought through.

Chatter and excitement, quiet moments when all attention was focused upon the expanding and unfolding story they were somehow taking part in.

When it was all over and books were being put away and characters were handed back and forth, time seemed to return to normal and everyone went on their way back to their normal lives.

We didn't need a long and continuing game or one that would last for forty-eight hours - we all just needed a moment to escape into a novel we were all creating, and it was absolutely wonderful. It seemed as if, for just a moment, that small back room had expanded to an entirely different universe and we filled it with good friendship, laughter and the makings of one heck of an adventure!

Rustle of swords in the dawn light
Riding the equs beyond the misty mountains
Landing safe and sound back in the normal, boring reality.

This is gaming!

Open for Submissions

I've been in a poetry mood of late, so, tomorrow, or possibly later today, you will be treated to some more poetry goodness. It feels good to put the poems down here. It doesn't feel as if they are wasted. I should really start sending off some poetry. Yeah, I know, need to get off my butt and DO it, not just talk about it.

Any way, Wednesday is coming up which means I may or may not have something interesting for you to read.

THE MOUNTAIN GIRL NEWS IS OPEN FOR SUBMISSIONS!

No rights purchased.

Fiction - 5000 words max (but if it is good can serialize)

Non-fiction - 5000 words (if longer query me)

Poetry - 40 lines maximum

Submit full piece in the body of an email with your name and pen name if you decide to use one to hahwriter@Yahoo.com.

I Needed THIS Weekend

It has been a seriously long time since I have had a weekend like this past one. There wasn't anything done that was of major consequence, it was just one of those FUN weekends where there wasn't a hassle needing to do one thing and then another, or having to be some place and then somewhere else within a very short span of time. It was one of those weekends where I wanted to play and have fun and, quite surprisingly, that is exactly what we did.

On Saturday Hubby and I just relaxed and waited for a visit from one of my sisters that didn't materialize. While we were waiting for a score of other people too, this time friends, we watched loads of movies on TV (thank the Good Lord for cable), then got all gussied up and went to eat at our favorite Indian restaurant called Tandoor here in Lexington. After eating we went to the $1.50 movies and saw Take the Lead with Antonio Banderas. It had been quite a while since I saw pure elegance in a film and it was beyond refreshing.

Hubby liked the movie, too. He laughed and pulled for the kids and we ended up bobbing to some of the movie soundtrack. We had a wonderful time in the movie, although just prior to going into the movies there was a bit of tension, but that is for just a little bit later.

When we came out of the theater there was LOTS of lightning flashes and a crash of thunder directly over our heads that almost made me pee on myself! It was intense and we laughed, because even my darling Hubby flinched at the sudden sound of it.

Sunday we went to Church then went out to eat lunch at our favorite Chinese place, #1 China Buffet, and then dived over to a game store for Hubby to pick up a memory card for his PS2 and I picked out a game for myself on the XBox and he grabbed a new game for his PS2 (it was a used game, just new to us). After that we picked up his pants from the tailor's and then on to Barnes & Nobles where we met some friends and finished making their characters for the role playing game I am currently running. It was beyond fun.

When our friends left Hubby and I just tooled around Barnes & Noble's and looked and books. We didn't buy anything, of course, but we still had a wonderful time. When we came home we ate some wonderful sammiches and watched things we had recorded on the DVR.

This was a weekend of play for me and Hubby. It was the sort of weekend we've needed for quite a while. I suppose we could have tried to plan such a weekend and see if we couldn't make it happen, of course, but it is so much more enjoyable when it just happens spontaneously and life gives you a breather.

*** *** ***

OK, when we go to the movies there were two police cars there and several police officers. According to a black family, there was a woman taking pictures of her children who had gone to see Ice Age 2 and just before going in, a while family came out with the mother crying and the father upset because a woman had also been taking pictures of their child. Also, a man had offered to expose himself to some other man's daughter. It was a black man and he was ready to collect his friends and wait for the guy to come back to the theater just so they could dole out a little justice. The police convinced them otherwise, but, quite honestly, I was with the men who wanted to teach the perv a lesson!

Is it my imagination or is it getting almost impossible for children to be children these days without having to worry about perverts?

A Happy Moment (poem)

untitled poem 1
By H.A. Handy
Copyright (c) 2006 by H.A. Handy

Blue skies
Hope abounds
Life continues
Even in the heart and depth of surprise.

Gaming

Yesterday was the character generation for the role playing game of Chaos Earth which I am running. I was a little uncertain in the beginning, not because I was uncertain whether or not I could run the game, but whether or not people would come. Guess what! People came! And much fun was had by all! Even the GM, me!

Imagination (poem)

Imagination
By H.A. Handy
Copyright (c) 2006 by H.A. Handy

Imagination -
Paint brush dripping words
Hovering over expectant canvas.

Imagination (poem)

Imagination
By H.A. Handy
Copyright (c) 2006 by H.A. Handy

Imagination -
Paint brush dripping words
Hovering over expectant canvas.

Not Remembering, Not Forgetting (Poem)

Not Remembering, Not forgetting
By. H.A. Handy
Copyright (c) 2006 by H.A. Handy


Sit quiet
Bird song trilling
Echoing that longing,
That longing of some deepest memory
Where something is almost remembered.

A pleasant something,
Flowing and coursing
With unending depths
Some song of long ago
Something perfect...

Lost within the eternal memory
Locked away almost accidentally
By hands or thoughts once thought or did,
That closed the memory,

Just behind the consciousness
Almost seen, glimpsed, touched
A thousand times a thousand times
But never fully grasping hold of it
We've almost brought it forth, time after time...

And we feel it -
That moment of remembering and moment
Now and Then
Existing simultaneously
Within the depths of our very Souls!

And we smile.
We lift our heads to the sun
Not remembering,
Not forgetting,
Enjoying the moment of Current Time.

The New Blade

Blade: The Series is going to be on screen soon at Sci Fi Channel. Although Wesley Snipes is not going to be Blade for the series, they have a very interesting gentleman, Kirk Jones, a.k.a. Sticky Fingaz, to take over his part for the film. And, according to Jones, he is doing a good deal of his own stunts.

I am going to miss seeing Wesley Snipes in the role of Blade for the series, but I am still going to watch the show. How could I not? A muscular bald man with a sword to combat vampires? Yes, I may be the only person who watches, but I will watch. If it is totally crappy I will be very disappointed.

Note: I tried to upload a picture of Mr. Jones for you all to see, but the computer trixies decided against it.

Mindhunters

Since my dear hubby has been not working he has become a Latin music junkie and, much to my surprise and happiness, a movie junkie. We have watched good movies, bad movies, really good movies, and movies that make me blush that we even turned it on there to see what was happening. We have watched Porky's again for the first time in, oh, say, a decade, and we still managed smiles. It was most surprising that some of the lines were still remembered. Not many. Thank goodness.

Today, however, we watched an excellent movie called Mindhunters starring LL Cool J, Val Kilmer, and Christian Slater. The movie came out in 2004. I don't know how well it did in theaters, but if you can find it on DVD or catch it on Starz this month, I highly recommend it. Trainees in the FBI's psychological profiling program must put their training into practice when they discover a killer in their midst. This is what the teaser said on Starz and on Imdb. It doesn't give justice to the thrilling character of this movie or how well acted it really is.

To be quite honest I was surprised at LL Cool J's (James Todd Smith is his real name) acting abilities. Christian Slater buys it most gruesomely, but not so gruesomely you can't watch the rest of the movie. The killer that must be found is horribly wonderful and you can catch the clues slowly. But, you don't really figure out who the killer is until the end of the movie, but it isn't an ending that cheapens the film or makes the viewer feel dumb or stupid. Oh, and Val Kilmer's character also dies.

The movie is taut with psychological evaluations and how people, very intelligent FBI people at that, can fall apart under extremely trying circumstances.

And, for those of you who are curious - LL Cool J makes it to the very end. He is one of two survivors.

This is a movie I may go and watch again simply because it kept me on the edge of my seat the entire time, without making me dive to cover my eyes at the gore. Blood was present and dead bodies, but it was done without being "gory" and, somehow, this made the movie even more scary than what it would have otherwise been.

I can't recommend the movie enough!

If you like a good thriller and want to help catch the killer before the end of the movie, go check it out. Like I said, it is on Starz this month.

Sorry for Vanishing Like That

I wish I could say I had been in the very center of writing and have many pages of productivity on The New Novel to report, but, I do not. I enjoyed the long weekend. I enjoyed my 9th wedding anniversary and received pearls. Then I came down with a hearty something that gave me a nasty fever and made me feel like death warmed over with an icing of absolute frozen frigidity. Today I am better. I am not well, but I am better. And, with being better I feel guilty. Why do I always feel guilty for being better? Maybe because there are no longer any excuses for not having time to do productive things.

A Wonderfully Creative Day

Today I did not put one word down on any poem, story, or the novel currently in progress, yet today has been a most creative day. How? Because ideas have been simmering and words have been playing and romping inside the brain. Atmospheres and descriptions have been noted and people observed who can add more flavor to the stories currently in progress. It is my hope that Monday, Labor Day, I will finally be able to get this short story out of my brain that is currently simmering there on one of the closer back burners - getting all of the flavors out into the mix for something I hope which is most good. Yes, although one word was not written, it was still a most creative day.

Just a Quick Ramble

Sorry for not posting yesterday, Dear Readers. It stormed a good deal of the day and prior to the storming there was much computer maintenance to be done. Today is the remainder of the computer maintenance and hopefully that will be help yours truly get back on the curve. When husbands are home and unused to how much they do on the computer and how much clean-up is required have a tendency to slow things down. Still, he is happy and reading a novel at the moment. Maybe he is finally enjoying just a wee bit of his time off? One can only hope.

On the writing front, the new novel is progressing very slowly. Some days I am getting down a good solid thousand words and some days if I go above 500 I am quite happy, nay, elated!

20 Worst Agents

Check out Sartorias is helping spread the word from "Absolute Write" about the top 20 worst agents/scammers out there and for all writers, especially young writers, to stay away from. Please read her journal entry for the day to make sure you have all of the background. Now, to help spread the word, here is the top 20 worst agents out there, so beware!

THE LIST (in alphabetical order):
The Abacus Group Literary Agency
Allred and Allred Literary Agents (refers clients to "book doctor" Victor West of Pacific Literary Services)
Capital Literary Agency (formerly American Literary Agents of Washington, Inc.)
Barbara Bauer Literary Agency
Benedict & Associates (also d/b/a B.A. Literary Agency)
Sherwood Broome, Inc.
Desert Rose Literary Agency
Arthur Fleming Associates
Finesse Literary Agency (Karen Carr)
Brock Gannon Literary Agency
Harris Literary Agency
The Literary Agency Group, which includes the following:
Children's Literary Agency
Christian Literary Agency
New York Literary Agency
Poets Literary Agency
The Screenplay Agency
Stylus Literary Agency (formerly ST Literary Agency)
Writers Literary & Publishing Services Company (the editing arm of the above-mentioned agencies)
Martin-McLean Literary Associates
Mocknick Productions Literary Agency, Inc.
B.K. Nelson, Inc.
The Robins Agency (Cris Robins)
Michele Rooney Literary Agency (also d/b/a Creative Literary Agency and Simply Nonfiction)
Southeast Literary Agency
Mark Sullivan Associates
West Coast Literary Associates (also d/b/a California Literary Services)

The Child's Voice

The Child's Voice
By H.A. Handy
Copyright (c) 2006 by H.A. Handy

Emma had told him then she was working on a new novel. She didn’t tell him what it was about though. She never did.

“Will you read it?” she had asked softly.

“Of course! I read everything you send me!” he had declared. Emma had looked up at him then with a sad, little face.

“I remember when you used to baby sit me,” she said.

“You do?” She had nodded. “We had a lot of fun didn’t we.”

Emma had turned back to looking out into the hollow just below them.

“Yeah, we had a lot of fun sometimes. It seems so long ago now, and just like yesterday,” she said softly.

***

There was a certain ritual Billy went through when preparing to settle down with one of Emma’s stories. First, there was food. Billy went through the bags and the freezer and selected two very large fried chicken frozen dinners. These he promptly slid into the oven while he hastily put away the perishables.

Next came a shower and clean clothes. Since he didn’t have pajamas and a smoking jacket, Billy settled on clean sweats, a clean white tee, and a UK Wildcats’ sweatshirt. Billy combed back his thinning red hair carefully until it as good as it was going to be. Once this was done he shaved.

Billy didn’t like to shave. His skin was very sensitive, but Emma didn’t like beards, so he made a point of shaving before he read one single word of any of her books. It was silly, he knew, but he didn’t want anything out of place when he started reading. It was OK if the stubble appeared once the book was finished, but nothing could be there to begin with.

Billy looked at himself in the mirror. He remembered when she started reading big thick books and understanding them. She was four years old, and he had been as proud of her as he would have been of his own baby sister. Sometimes she would even read them to him, but he rarely ever understood her enthusiasm and interest in history and paleontology. She had researched and read so many books the local library had to start getting books from other libraries to help keep her head filled!

Billy could understand why she read so much: the pain had been almost unbearable for her. There were times when she had been unable to physically hold the books themselves, so others had volunteered to hold the books or read them to her. He had never read the books because he was afraid of making too many mistakes, and he didn’t want to look stupid in front of the smartest little girl he had ever seen.

Billy patted his face dry carefully and gave himself a once-over in the mirror, just to make sure. Satisfied, Billy headed back to the kitchen. The frozen dinners were ready, so all he needed to do was get something to drink.

Beer, though his favorite, would not do for one of Emma’s books. Billy went under the sink and brought out two bottles of port, Taylor Sinclair to be exact. Next came the good wine glass he had just for these occasions.

Now, with food on the table and the port breathing in his glass, Billy got the reading frame from the sink’s third drawer and positioned it before his food. He had seen Emma do it a thousand times, but he had not done it himself until he had found one just like her old one, and now could not begin reading one of the Emma Williams novels without!

Billy seated himself and reached for the bright orange envelope, which, up until now, had been waiting ever so patiently on the kitchen table. With treasure in hand, Billy bowed his head and said a humble prayer of thanks for all the good things he had. Billy was smiling when he opened his eyes and ripped the end of the envelope open. Turning it on its end and giving it a good shake, a thick, hard backed volume slid easily out to land with a soft thud upon the table.


.....to be continued

The Karate Chim?

http://videosift.com/story.php?id=599

Karate chimp.

I don't believe this is such a great idea.

Call for Submissions

The Kentucky Mountain Girl News is open for submissions.

Length = 5000 words, for non-fiction and fiction, but if the piece is good it can go longer and we will serialize it.

Poetry = 40 lines

I do not purchase rights so you are free and clear on all the rights to your stories.

Rediscovering Neverland

Last night hubby and I watched Finding Neverland and I must admit I was smitten. It was more than a love story. It was more than just reaching out for a dream. It was about believing dreams could come true.

Johnny Depp plays J.M. Barrie, playwright and author of Peter Pan. This is one of the finest performances I have seen Depp do. It was serious and yet humorous in the way he let J.M. Barrie's character come forth and be believable.

I hurt with him over his failed marriage. I hurt with him over the loss of his dear Sylvia, and I rejoiced with him over his love and acceptance of the four Davis brothers. This movie really should have been quite sappy and sugary, but the truth is it was poignant and filled with creativity and imagination.

Not only were the characters creative and filled with imagination, but there was something about the movie that touched the creative spark in me and helped me to see just how important my writing is to me. Yes, I know it is important to me, but sometimes it is wonderful to be reminded just how much so that when picking up pen and paper or looking at the blank computer screen there isn't a sense of dread, but of deepest joy!

Normally movies about writers and writing don't appeal to my B, but this movie was one he truly got into. Although he married a writer and lives with her (me), he doesn't truly understand how writing affects the writer and how difficult it can be sometimes to actually do the writing. Now, perhaps, he understands how some things, simple things, spark the creative juices and the words flow. If you haven't seen this movie, I highly recommend it, especially for all of the dreamers out there who also just happen to be writers.

Plottings and Plannings for the Normal Way of Life

Today is Sunday, this means that tomorrow is Monday.

Normally Monday would mean hubby is heading off to work, I would do some work on the kitchen and then I would begin working on the writing and, of course, playing with my babies (my dogs). Now, since hubby isn't working, Mondays aren't exactly Mondays you know? And if the truth be known - and admitted - I miss them. I miss the normalcy of them. I miss the regimen of knowing what I am going to do in a given day.

So, if it is possible, tomorrow I am going to try and reach "normalcy" by getting into a different routine, and, hopefully, keep it even though B is not working and has not found a lead on any jobs. The routine is simple: do yoga, do some quick job hunting for/with B, and then start writing and write like mad until he takes needs the computer!

See, there is a plan!

Some Very Important, Simple Words

http://www.michaelyon-online.com/wp/the-green-gator-phenomena.htm?BMIDS=28920956-dcc93951-128250

S.M.A.R.T. Goals, or Some Things I'm Learning from My Yoga Book

OK, let's get something out in the open. I have arthritis. I have had arthritis since the day I was born, literally. I use a power chair most of the time because I am in bad shape physically. I am doing yoga.

For a while I was almost apologizing to people because when they found out (usually because my very proud husband told them) they would look at me with a mixture of sadness (poor thing, she thinks she can do something like yoga), incredulousness (how dare she even undertake to try something so strenuous or can she even do any of those poses close to correct?), and something very close to anger or at the very least upset-ness (why should she even attempt anything like yoga when I won't!?).

Seeing their expressions and hearing their sometimes confused and oh-so-polite questions afterwards made me more than just a little self-conscious and uncomfortable. This would encourage me to apologize for doing the yoga by saying, "I have to modify some of the poses, but, yes, I am doing yoga." It wasn't until recently I realized I was apologizing at all. That I must modify some of the poses should be a given. That I have to modify them is a necessity, but this does not mean I am not doing yoga.

Since realizing this I sat down and re-read my yoga book and more things clicked than they had before in the first reading. One of those things was just how I had set myself up to fail in my weight-loss attempts before by either being too rigid and unbending in the goal setting as well as being too vague on what I wanted to accomplish: to lose weight and not gain it back.

"SMART goals are Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Realistic, and Time-framed." (Yoga for Weight-Loss: the 4-Week Slimming Plan, Celia Hawe, Barnes & Noble publishers, p. 34) I had to read and re-read this a couple of times before it really fell into place for me, especially after reading an example of the un-SMART goal setting she listed:

My Yoga for Weight-Loss goal is to
lose 10 lbs.
I will have achieved this by
2 weeks from now
I know I will have achieved it because I will
weigh in on my bathroom scales 10lbs lighter
and feel
great

This is a very familiar way of setting goals for my weight-loss and one the author, Celia Hawe, is also familiar with. I had to really think about why this was not a SMART goal. It fits into the categories of specific and attainable, as she points out, but it isn't realistically attainable because other factors we cannot foresee weigh in - what if it is time for the monthly or what if it was a very stressful week or few days in the time frame? This makes it far more difficult to lose weight and you retain water. Even though it has a time-frame for the completion of the goal, it isn't SMART, which means all factors need to be in place.

Now I have begun setting myself Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Realistic and Time-framed goals, just not far into the distant future. I am not going to lose weight or get into better shape by doing the yoga in the future, it is done by doing it one day at a time, and this is how I am setting my goals: one day at a time. So far it is working, even though I am having to almost constantly with the impatient part of myself that wants to have an out-lined plan of what I'm going to do and when I am going to do it.

Each day comes with goals, not a to-do list of all of the things I need to accomplish. I have a to-do list, how can you get by without one? But, I look at everything before me and distinguish between what goals I need to set for my own personal self and not as a part of a to-do list that I can have a better chance of letting go or telling myself I can catch up on that tomorrow, or the next day, or next week.

For example, a couple of my goals for today included doing my yoga routine and take my morning meds. This was on my goal list which was totally separate from all of the other things that make up tasks for a day. In setting goals and tasks each day has begun to move along more smoothly and I am accomplishing things for myself and not just the household, B, or writing. In accomplishing things for myself my confidence is growing and I am seeing a positive change in my attitude at times (of course I can't see it all the time because I am not perfect and do not change as quickly as I would like to); my body is changing to the positive and is looking better, and although it will take a while to get to the body I want, I am more confident I will achieve it, and if I don't I know I am going to feel better.

Another interesting thing Celia Hawe says in her book is, "...many diet program advocate sticking up a photograph of someone whose body you wish yours could look like, in a place where it might prove a timely reminder, such as the fridge door. But you are not Julia Roberts or Kate Moss, and never can be." (Ibid p.33) This released me in so many ways from feeling like I had to be a certain way. It gave me room to be me. I needed that. I needed the space to be myself, to discover my own body and shape and size and feel more like I was on an adventure than the horrific I'm-on-a-diet-and-exercise-plan-to-lose-weight mentality.

I like SMART goals, and this book. It is helping me change, mentally and emotionally, what needs to be changed in order to progress, not just get caught in the yo-yo weight loss I've done forever in the past. In short, I am encouraged to the core of my being, and I like that. I've needed this encouragement for a very long time, and even though B has tried to instill it in me, I had to discover this for myself. Never fear though, he did help: he got me to buy the book!

Good Movie, Bad Movie

Since my dear B has been off work we have reverted to staying up late and getting up late. Both of us realize this isn't a good thing, but sometimes it is just too much fun to play a video game for a few hours and discover it was two o'clock in the morning.

A couple of nights ago we were up late just watching movies. The first movie we watched was really quite good, The Black Mask starring Jet Li. B had said it was really a hokey movie but when he watched it again he liked it. I had no preconceptions about the movie so liked it from the very beginning. After The Black Mask we watched, Team America, World Police.

Honestly, I had no intention of EVER seeing that movie, but once we started watching it there wasn't any turning away. It was like watching a car wreck, or a train wreck in progress and being so horrified you couldn't look away.

There were some funny moments, but only moments not most of the movie. To say this movie was "juvenile" is actually giving juveniles a bad name and an even worse connotation! The humor was base, the sentiment gross, and at its deepest level it was making fun of what people believe in, whether that is peace, war, pride in your nation, or religious zealousness. It made fun of the people doing the actual fighting in Iraq and elsewhere. It made fun of the people who wanted peace. It made fun of actors who actually stand up for their beliefs, regardless of popular opinion - not as actors, but as individuals.

Watching the movie just made me sad. It made me sad because this piece of so called "entertainment" encouraged apathy toward ideals and beliefs and morals. It encouraged ridicule of everything that made people, especially young people, uncomfortable.

The question arose in my head upon laying down to sleep after seeing such a piece of trash, would I have liked this movie twenty years ago when I was just in my twenties? I hope not, but I fear I probably would have laughed along just to make sure I belonged, just to ensure I was a rebel. The thing is, even when I was in my twenties and doing this very thing, I always felt uncomfortable because I was uncomfortable with the person I was discovering I truly was.

I also understand what the writer(s) were trying to do with this movie I think. They wanted the American people to see how the U.S. had become this self-proclaimed police force for the world and how we should really be sticking to our own shores and let the rest of the world police itself. How this policy of "world police" had gotten us on the bad side of many nations. Still, it failed. It failed horribly.

The Child's Voice, fiction

The Child's Voice
By H.A. Handy
Copyright (c) 2006 by H.A. Handy


The house was good and warm which caused Billy to shiver suddenly with realization of how cold he really was. Ritchie went to his rug which was in front of the fireplace which was glowing with ruby embers. Bill deposited his beer close to the corner of the fridge and put his mail on the kitchen table. First things were first, he decided, so turned his attention to the wood box close at hand, and began to put wood onto the glowing embers.

He loved a good warm fire. He didn’t need it, of course, since he had had heat and air installed a couple of years back, which was a lot more economical than the coal stove the house had been heated with for so many years prior. Even then his mom had had him build a fire for her. It made it all feel like home. Cheery.

Emma had also loved the fire. Billy could remember her from when she was about two years old, nothing but a toe headed toddler. She had looked out at the world at the tender age of two with blue eyes so intelligent they almost made him afraid. When she had been diagnosed with Lime Disease at three and the subsequent medical trials the family had faced since then, it seemed amazing, a miracle she had survived year after year. Finally, at the age of four the doctors said they had misdiagnosed the symptoms and what Emma had was really juvenile rheumatoid arthritis, it seemed as if all hope of the beautiful little girl having a normal life had vanished. Already her limbs were trying to draw into unnatural shapes, but Susan and family worked ceaselessly to try and correct that. Emma had been in and out of hospitals constantly with dangerously high fevers for years.

Still, Emma had lived. She had had a wonderful imagination and had indeed begun to live her dream of being a successful writer. When Susan and Parker had fallen victim to kidney failure and Alzheimer’s respectively, Emma returned home to care for them as best she could. It had nearly broken Emma’s heart when they had had to place Parker into a nursing home, but she still stayed with her mother unfailingly until the bitter end. That had been five years ago, but Emma still came in dutifully for her mother’s birthday all the way from Arizona.

The fire was popping and crackling when he finally left memory lane and returned to the present. Outside it was already falling dark. It was time to get supper started, as well as the new book Emma had sent him.

Emma was really good about sending him one of the author’s copies of her books. She sent one to Jimmy as well, but he never sat down to read them. Billy shook his head. Emma loved Jimmy with a loyalty he felt was undeserved. True, Emma was family and Jimmy would do anything for her, but the truth was, Jimmy was more concerned with finding some oxycontin, or OC’s as they were known on the drug market.

Oxycontin had nearly taken out the pot trade in the mountains. They had almost destroyed the young people themselves. According to everyone Billy had talked to who had taken them, snorting an OC or two made you forget about all of your pain and problems, but when you came down you came down hard.

He didn’t want Emma to know the truth about Jimmy. Not yet. It would break her heart and cause her to worry. Billy didn’t want Emma to worry any more than necessary, she had already gone through enough. Losing her parents within a year of each other had almost devastated her beyond any hopes of recovery emotionally. He had seen that the last time she had come in to put flowers on her mom’s grave. Emma’s normally well-groomed hair just hung limp and straight down her back, and her eyes looked haunted and lost. She hadn’t said anything much to him then, so they had just sat side-by-side at the grave where he had put a bench for her, and shared a joynt. When she was beginning to get a little high her smile returned and her eyes didn’t look so distant and empty. As she relaxed, Billy saw the dark circles forming under her eyes from loss of sleep. She was also quite bony, not shapely like she normally was.


.......to be continued

Underfoot or Bored?

When husbands don't work they sometimes become worse than children with needing entertainment. It is understandable - they are used to going out every day and being gone, and feeling, usually, as if they are doing what they need to be doing even if the job they have isn't the best or one that makes them happy. When this feeling of being useful and doing what needs to be done goes away for a bit, they are lost and try and fill their time with as much as possible of something else, anything else, just so the day passes.

I don't have proof of this, but in observing my dear hubby for the past couple of weeks makes me believe this is so. It doesn't help that he gets underfoot and I get annoyed and aggravated at him for always taking up time I usually have for doing the things I need to be doing and that make me feel useful. So, slowly, I am learning how to entertain and grab time to myself to get the writing done and feel like myself. It isn't easy, but it is beginning to get easier...I think.

(How do you say "no" to such cute puppy eyes? Any way, No - mommy is writing today.)

It has been a while hasn't it, Dear Readers? I apologize. Since hubby is currently not gainfully employed there isn't a good schedule or even a moment to attempt a schedule any more. He has downloaded a program called "ProShare" which lets him download music and he is always on the computer downloading music now. This means no writing for me, of any sort, and as for up-dating The News or LJ means, well, it just means it is relatively impossible. So, today while he is out, here I am explaining what has been happening. *sigh* Hopefully this week will not be as lax in updates as they have been.

The Writing Front
The new novel is almost snail crawling forward, but it is progressing none-the-less. It would move faster if I had the computer to use during the day hours as is usual. At the moment it creeps forward on paper with pen. Today I am putting as much of it to the screen and a computer file as I can possibly do.

"The Child's Voice"
I know, I missed several installments of this story, but it is going to be appearing this week come heck or high water (with all of the rain we've been having, hopefully the high water won't appear where we are).

All right, that's it for me for the moment. There will be more later this week, if not today.

Still trying to get things organized. It is proving quite difficult because B has a program on the computer now he wants to play with and I need to get some writing done. I believe we are turning into a two computer family.

Tired, but Determined

Have not fully recovered yet from traveling so here is something for the writerly folks: Writer's Weekly.

Made it to Columbus

Made it to Columbus.

Michael Yon Before Traveling

We are pretty close to heading out the door, so I am posting quickly. If you have not checked out Michael Yon's blog by now I highly recommend it. With so much mis-information that is coming out of Iraq, it is good to read the real news, or as close to the real news as we can get.

Since the weather is warming and I and my girls go outside, I keep a wary eye out for any signs of fleas attacking them. Yes, they are big girls and can defend mommy without much problem, but when fleas attack they are miserable and thus it makes me miserable as well. So, for those dog owners out there, here is an article I discovered on the 'net and it may be of use to you. Also, if you have any other flea remedies, please let me know. It would be most appreciated by all concerned.

Natural ways to get rid of fleas.

Some Words from Stephen Hawking

"When one's expectations are reduced to zero, one really appreciates everything one does have."
– Stephen Hawking

Energy - 1.0, Potassium - 3.3

I apologize all: It appears my potassium has dropped down to 3.3, which is very low. At least this explains the lethargy and draggy-ness I have been experiencing. I was able to take some potassium supplements yesterday, so I am feeling a bit better today, though I think I could sleep quite a few more hours.

However, I can report I have a good idea for my newest novel. It is that SF adventure I was telling everyone about, howbeit extremely vaguely. It is here, just at the back of my brain, nudging me forward and encouraging me I won't be sorry if I give it half the chance it so rightly deserves. So, I am.

If all goes well, I will be putting more words down on it today. It would help if I would be able to do more of that tomorrow and the rest of next week. Hopefully on Tuesday I will get some words down because I will be in Columbus and will have to borrow Cheyenne's computer. Still, thanks to Box.net, I should have everything I need to get some more words down. Just to be a little on the safe side, I am putting what I currently have on disk and taking that with me. You can never be too careful these days.

B gave me an idea, although quite unintentionally for a zombie story! I shudder at my own horribleness. I do not want to write that twat, but, at the same time, I would like to see what happens with the story, just to see if I can pull it off. I will see. I will work at it...maybe.

OK, time for another potassium pill and a little more food - then on to writing, and getting the rest of my life back into some semblance of order.

Turtle-like and Writing - Somewhat Related

Yesterday I did not have enough time to sit and just let myself Be. I enjoy doing this in the sunshine. Sometimes I compare myself to a turtle and sometimes to a cat because of their love for the warmth of spring and summer. Mostly I think, I am a little more turtle-like than cat-like because a) I don't move very fast at all; and b) turtles have a tendency to just sit and Be: they are in their own moment, their own portion of the world, and don't truly see a need for moving too quickly. (But when there is a need, you would be quite surprised to see how quickly a turtle can move!) So, yesterday, I didn't get to experience the zen of the turtle enjoying the sun as much as I would have liked.

Today I will not get to be as turtle-like as I would like either - because B and I will be doing things away from home today. This is really an extra shame because a new story, a new novel has presented itself. It is a science fiction adventure and I am pretty sure it is a novel, or will be a novel length piece before it is finished.

At the moment it resides in one of my beloved moleskin journals. Since I am not going to tear the pages out, this means I will be writing there and then transcribing until the story becomes so large it isn't feasible to keep it there. Before all is decided and done, I may just transcribe what I have now and continue on the PC. Sadly, now is when I would love to have a laptop just so I could go outside and write. The tools of the trade become necessary at some points. When I have my first big sale you can pretty much guess my first big purchase.

A Note for Those Out There Who Understand

When playing a really good video game - do not get jump happy!