Me and My CAL

This weekend marks the end of summer. Maybe it’s not the official end of summer, but the mental end. Though to me September always feels like a beginning. After the languid days of July and August, everything seems to start up again.

Some people think spring is full of promise. For me it’s the fall. I think of crisp days and changing leaves. That’s really a throwback to growing up in Chicago. In L.A., September is actually the hottest month and instead of looking for changing leaves, I’m still planting flowers.

I’m having a hard time getting a flow going on this blog entry. One of my cats, a huge black and white one named Rocky, keeps pestering me and knocking things around. Any second I expect him to come over the back of my chair and start hugging me. Yes, he does really hug me. He puts his front paws around my neck and purrs in my ear. He prefers it when my hair is loose. He likes to stick his paws in my hair and flip it around. He’s an unusual cat, at least compared to the other cats we’ve had. We adopted him along with his “sister” last March. He’s seven, she’s ten, so their already pretty set in their ways.

This isn’t supposed to be about my cats or my dog who was sick last week, but is now recovered. Or the blind dog that showed up in my driveway. Luckily, she had a collar with a phone number on it. The point I was on my way to was that I did start something. I joined a CAL. What’s a CAL, you ask? I didn’t know either the first time I saw the letters. Eventually I figured out it means Crochet Along. It seems like it should really be CA then, but I guess CAL looks better. Even knowing what the letters stood for, I still wasn’t sure what it was.

I noticed a group that meets in a library back east had done a Crochet Along with HOOKED ON MURDER. In that case, it appears the members all used the instructions for a granny square wash cloth I included in the book. Then they posted some of the final projects. I was pretty cool to see what they had made and know it came from my head.

The Crochet Along I joined is online through the Lions Brand yarn site. They showed a photo of the Crochet Along project which is a lovely afghan made up of squares. The whole thing is done in one color, but the stitches in the squares vary. I liked the idea of squares. They are portable and when you finish one you have a sense of accomplishment. Since I’m going to Chicago on Wednesday and like to crochet on the plane, the afghan squares seemed perfect.

They asked that you introduced yourself by leaving a posting. I left a posting the other day and the number next to it was something like 167. Now there are over a thousand postings of potential CALers. I read a lot of them. It turns out that many of them were already altering the kind of yarn and don’t plan to use the Fisherman’s Wool that I spent the afternoon looking for. Since it’s my first CAL, I didn’t know that you didn’t have to follow the rules or apparently the pattern either as some of the posters were going to change that, too.

Actually, there don’t seem to be any rules for the Lions Brand CAL. We all more or less make the same thing and then at the end there’s a chance to post a photo. During the CAL, there’s a chance to aks questions. I’m not sure with over a thousand people how that’s going to work. But it should be interesting. Many of the people who joined seemed to think it would give them the incentive to finish something. I guess I’m not the only one with a room full of unfinished projects. Uh oh, the cat is sitting behind me and looks like he’s getting ready to jump.

As a last thought - I will post a photo of whatever I have done of the afghan at the end of the CAL. I just hope it is more than one square.

Home town

Sorry this is so late. Lack of internet and late planes conspired to keep from blogging until now.

I’m blogging from the streets of Commack, Long Island. Hometown of Rosie O’Donnell, Bob Costas and Courtney Galliano, recent runner up of So You Think You Can Dance. And me. My family moved here in the early sixties, when I was in sixth grade, and my mother still lives here, although she’s always viewed the move as a temporary one.

Everything is so green. It’s hard for me to adjust to my old neighborhood as a verdant one. We moved onto what had been potato farms. Any tree that had might have been here was plowed under so new homes could be built quickly. The landscape was as barren as the moon. The houses were cookie-cutter and construction continued for the first couple of years we lived here non stop.

Now the houses have morphed into individual abodes and the maples and pin oaks are fifty years old. They are majestic, making a canopy arching across the main drag and changing the cul-de-sac down the street into a secret garden. The trees soften the hard edges. Instead of a raw landscape, the place is beginning to look like someone’s idea of a home town.

One thing that amazes me are the driveways. Lots are big around here, most a half-acre. Consequently, driveways are enormous fields of gleaming macadam. Some are horseshoe shape, taking up much of the front yard. Many resemble used car lots. It’s not unusual to see four five, six cars. And a boat. Whether it’s because there are several generations living in one house (a distinct possibility as LI rivals CA as an expensive place for young folks) or because every teen has their own wheels, I’m not sure.

I do know the size of the high school parking lot has doubled since I went to school there. Of course we rode the bus, and had late buses for the after-school activities.

Mostly what I remember about my new school are the field trips. We’d moved from upstate NY from a parochial (in every sense of the word) place. I was amazed when the sixth grade class took a bus into the Museum of Natural History in NYC. The dinosaurs, the mastodons, the dioramas of Indian life fascinated me. But the best thing was the Good Humor truck parked outside. That was my first experience buying ice cream off a truck and I remember feeling very left out because I didn’t have a favorite Good Humor bar. I got one fast.

I couldn’t wait to leave Long Island, and I have no desire to move back to a place where there are a limited number of exits. (Think about an island populated with millions of people. The only way out are a couple of ferry routes, several bridges. Talk about a bottleneck.).

But it’s been fun.

I walk along the boardwalk at the beach where we toasted our skin with baby oil and see signs warning against the danger of skin cancer. Another warns against the stinging jelly fish swimming in the Sound. I walk through the streets where there had been no trees to protect us. We survived, and thrived, and I can’t help but wonder if the kids today even read the warnings and take the trees for granted.

Body image from Hell

One of the realities of writing a regular blog is that you wind up writing about yourself.

I mean, you really write about yourself.

Take me, for example. My "hobby" is diet and exercise. But the meaning of that topic has evolved for me over the years.
When I was in my teens, twenties, and thirties...hell, even into my forties--my only concern was weight control. All I saw was the number on the scale. If I weighed below 150, that was good (I'm almost 5 foot six); above 160, that was disaster.

Fast forward to the golden milestone of 50, and everything changed.
For once, the scale was not my enemy. Thanks to some alchemy of habit, discipline and possibly pharmaceutical intervention, my weight is under control.

My body is not.

Loose flesh, cellulite run wild, a waistline that curves in only when constrained by a breath-stealing waist-cincher--this is my current reality.

What the hell happened? This is not the way it was supposed to be.

This is the way it was for years: You lose weight, you're happy. You gain, you're unhappy--that's the mantra of the teen-to-forty-somethings.

Come fifty, and all of a sudden, everything changes.

Take your underarms, for example. When did they start waving independently of your hands and lower arms? Oh, the shame of it all.

Then there's cottage-cheese upper thighs. Let's not even talk about that.

In the midst of all this middle-aged decay, there are glimpses of hope.

My breasts, for example, Currently, my boobs are like the eighth wonder of the world. I used to be a size 38DDD. Thanks to the intervention of a talented Beverly Hills plastic surgeon. who removed two pounds of fat and rearranged the support structure. for once in my life I can actually go braless. I haven't gone braless since I hit puberty. That's my one body-joy in life. I also got an eye-lift and some fat grafts--which means they extract some fat from your stomach and inject it into those marionette lines around your nose and lips. That one procedure was responsible for erasing at least five years from the mirror's reflection.

But there are so many areas left to address. Underarms, stomach, upper thighs--I have enough body zones in distress to keep a plastic sugeon busy until retirement. By the time all those are done, I'm sure I'll be ready for a facelift.

Is this a byproduct of the fact that I live in LA? America, please give me your feedback. Are you okay living with body areas that are far less than subpar?

My denouement came recently, when a down-on-her-luck homeless woman started haunting a particular corner in my Southern California seaside village. Okay, overall, she looked terrible. But her arms were way tighter than mine. (Of course, she might have been twenty years younger than me, but only looked sixty).

But the arm thing pissed me off. Where was the justice in that? What did I do to deserve a body from hell?
Is it just me? Does anyone else suffer from middle-age body blues? Aargh!

Any input would be most appreciated.

Olympics for All

I have to admit that I’m not much of a sports fan. Even so, I enjoyed watching bits and pieces of the Olympics over the last couple of weeks. And cheering on the U.S. athletes.

For a lot of the time during the Olympics, I was traveling. That meant less access to TV, although news of this kind is available nearly everywhere. I want to thank Camille for posting her fun recaps from past blogs on Thursdays during my absence.

I missed my dogs, of course. And I think they missed me, even though they were well cared for. My younger son was around a lot. So was our new pet-sitter, who could be an apt colleague for Kendra Ballantyne, my mystery protagonist, in her wonderful care for her charges. Possibly even more professional, but don’t tell Kendra I said that. Plus, a neighbor popped in a lot to check on everything. My pups had a lot of company, even though they’re still trying to convince me they were persecuted and lonesome.

Speaking of pups and the Olympics, it turns out that there are pet Olympics currently going on in Hong Kong. That’s almost as intriguing to me as people Olympics. Some of the on-line clips I’ve viewed suggest they’re similar to agility trials.

Anyway, I’m home now, back in routine, which includes keeping an eye on media reports pertaining to animals. Did you hear the one about the break-in and crime spree in an Atlanta courthouse... by a raccoon?

What else did I miss while I was away?

--Linda

Tombstones and Fairgrounds

Two events to report this week. First, last weekend Ellen and I went to Milwaukee to attend a Jewish service/ceremony called "Setting the Stone." It is a custom among some Jews not to put up a tombstone until a year has passed since a person’s death. Ellen and I had a friend named Sherwin Kader for many, many years – I used him as a character in my first published novel, Murder at the War, and used his real name (at his request) for a character in Ashes to Ashes. I knew him as Solly (for his SCA name of Solomon ben Jacob the Levite – he was very proud of his Jewish faith, can you tell?). Solly took up everything he did with passion. Not only was he a passionate Jew, he was a passionate member of the Robert Burns Society. So at the ceremony of the unveiling of his tombstone, not only his son the Rabbi spoke, so did the president of the Milwaukee chapter of the Robert Burns Society, an authentic Scot with a brogue so thick he was difficult to understand. It is also a custom when visiting a Jewish cemetery to put a small stone or pebble on the tombstone marking the grave of the person visited. There were a great many stones put on Solly’s marker, ranging in size from thumbnail to fist, a touching thing to see. We went back to his house after, where there was an awful lot of food waiting to be eaten, another Jewish custom -- but one shared by my Irish ancestors. The whole time Solly's spirit was so strongly present I could feel his strong arms around my shoulders and hear his powerful voice in my ears. We came back home on Sunday and I can still feel him near. The odd thing is, I wasn’t his closest friend, and I’m wondering if everyone who came is being haunted (in a warm, friendly, unnerving way) by Solly.

Second, I’ve made two trips to our State Fair, researching a short story I want to write for a new anthology from the editors who brought you Silence of the Loons and Resort to Murder. This will be called Murder on a Stick, and I want my short story to be called "It Slices, It Dices." I’m sure if you’ve ever been to a fair you’ve seen those booths with a man using a small knife to work miracles with fruit and vegetables. Making a palm tree out of a carrot and a green pepper, a rose from a radish, turning a potato into a pretty coil of circles. "Tell ya what I’m gonna do," he’ll say and make you a package offer of the potato peeler, the paring knife, the filet knife, and the hollow thing you stick into an orange to make it possible for your child to suck the juice out – and, of course, the CD to tell you how to do all those wonderful things with the Handy Dandy True Steel Eversharp Knife. He makes it look so easy! Part of the secret is the extreme sharpness of his blade. Which, naturally for a mystery author, turns her mind to murder. The interesting problem of murder at the Minnesota State Fair is, of course, what to do with the body? The place is crowded, fenced, and has few places locked against casual visitors. Even at night, when paying customers go home, there are police patrols, people taking care of the animals, and vendors straightening up for tomorrow. Well, I think I’ve found a place to dump a body, if my murderer can get it over there. It's a place everyone tends to stay away from or, if forced to visit, doesn’t look close or stay very long. Think about it: there are hundreds of cows, pigs, horses, sheep, llamas, chickens, ducks, turkeys, rabbits and God knows what other varieties of animals entered in competition for blue ribbons at the fair. They have to be fed and watered, and you know what happens to animal that’s been fed and watered. It was an interesting trip down among the animal barns, trying to find out where the effluent is put, and who takes it away, and how often. It was interesting to discover our fair is so big it has its own police department. It was interesting to find out how many booths offer knives, and who runs them, and how they have two barkers who switch off every hour. It will be interesting to see if I can get the doggone story done by the deadline of October 1.

Allow to dry 24 hours between layers

Look what popped up as I was looking for a suitable quote for a passage in the book I'm working on. Another gem from Abraham Lincoln:

"Give me six hours to chop down a tree and I will spend the first four sharpening the axe."

I wish I'd learned that as a kid. It's too late now.

I'm the one you'll find hacking away with a blunt axe because I don't have the patience for sharpening it. I want the tree down. Now.

By the end of the first two hours, I will have broken two axes trying to chop down the tree with unsharpened blades.

Then I'll give in and find instructions for sharpening an axe in two hours. I'll work on it for one and figure, "Close enough." I'll use the half sharpened axe and it will break also.

We're now at hour four. I'll spend that hour trying to use the first two broken axes. My arms will hurt.

During hour five, I'll rest.

Just before hour six, I'll hurry to the nearest axe sharpening place and pay three times the price to do a rush sharpening job.

Ten minutes before the six hours are up, the tree will be down, I'll be exhausted and the sorry owner of three broken axes and one very expensive sharp one.

Where was Lincoln when I was learning important life skills?

Doing crafts has helped me a bit. It's almost impossible to rush through the making of a miniature scene. Glue and varnish have to dry, an afghan has to be knitted one stitch at a time. Still, I've managed to ruin a few items because I put coat number two on before number one was truly dry.

One solution: I now have five or six scenes going at a time. One of them is sure to be dry enough to work on.

What would you do with your six hours?

Back to School with Scrapbooking

Note from Joanna: Lori Elkins Solomon is our guest blogger today. I found her thoughts on scrapbooking and education to be stimulating--and timely. Enjoy!

By Lori Elkins Solomon

Good news for parents and teachers as they prepare for the upcoming school year—scrapbooking is not only fun, but it is educational!

For those of you who are not familiar with scrapbooks, they are living histories of one’s life expressed through writing, photography and artwork. If you teach, these types of activities probably sound familiar, whether or not you have ever made a scrapbook. Have you ever asked a child to write an autobiography, or to bring in a photo of a loved one to write about? Have you ever told a student to illustrate a poem with a drawing? If you have, then you are well on your way to teaching kids about scrapbooking.

Scrapbooking is not just for young children; older kids love it too! A good way to introduce older students to the craft is to have them read scrapbooking-themed novels such as Joanna’s new book-- Paper, Scissors, Death: A Kiki Lowenstein Scrap-and-Craft Mystery. This intriguing book not will only encourage students to read, but it will motivate them to try scrapbooking as well.

Here are some other powerful reasons to incorporate scrapbooking into school classrooms, as noted in Readin’, Writin’ & Scrappin’: Scrapbooking as a Teaching Tool:

· Student motivation is built right into the assignment because students are creating a book about their favorite subject—themselves.

· While the most direct application of scrapbooking is to the learning of reading and writing, scrapbooking projects can be used to develop these skills not just in language arts and English but across the curriculum— thus developing literacy in social studies, science, math, foreign language, art and other subjects as well.

· Scrapbooking is a natural extension of journal writing. In fact, in the classroom I like to refer to scrapbooks as “photojournals.” This makes the concept more easily understood by students (and better accepted by fellow teachers and administrators as well).

· Scrapbooking is easily adapted to different grades and ability levels.

· Scrapbooking incorporates various learning modes: visual, motor, verbal and auditory.

· Scrapbooking encourages hands-on learning—a real incentive for children who are bored with traditional textbook learning.

· The ordinary becomes extraordinary when you add scrapbooking to your curriculum. All the basic supplies—looseleaf binders, paper, page protectors, glue sticks, drawing and writing utensils—are already in your classroom just waiting for a touch of creativity.

· Scrapbooking creates a sense of community among students--and among parents and families who can’t resist getting involved as well!

For more information about the educational applications of scrapbooking, please visit: http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Store/Lori-Elkins-Solomon

© 2008 Lori Elkins Solomon

Fashion Sense or Nonsense

I was going to do this hours ago, but there has been just one interruption after another. My dog has been sick all week and she needed her pill and walk. My cats meowed until they got their backyard time.

Then my son needed to eat before he went out to a party. I thought parties had food, but I guess I am just old fashioned. So, we went out for pizza. The surprise was that Steve Carell (The Office, The forty year Old Virgin, Evan Almightly, etc) came in to pick up a pizza. I guess even actors who can open a movie get pizza on a Saturday night.

When I got home, my husband told me the light burned out in the freezer. Besides being the I.T. person around here, I’m the fixit guy, too.

And now finally to the subject of my blog this week.... I was in the dentist’s office thumbing through a fashion magazine when I came across this what’s in and out list. The things on the “out” list were described with disdain. I kind of got it with the sunglasses that were really a visor. I had to wonder if they ever were in. When I saw the picture of the Crocs and some comment that they were only for kids, I had to object. For those of us with chronically hurty feet, they are a godsend. How else could I have walked all over Disneyland on Monday? As far as I’m concerned they belong in the fashion hall of fame. But that’s beside the point.

All the “ins” and “outs” got me thinking about the whole idea of fashion. There was nothing intrinsically better about the things that were now deemed out of fashion than those considered in other than we are sold a bill of goods that something looks good. And being told that, we alter our taste.

Take colors for example. Navy blue and black always looked awful together to me. It was a terrible color combination until recently. But once men in navy blue suits and black tee shirts started showing up on TV talk shows and in magazines, my perception changed. Me, who was horrified when my husband wore a black tee shirt with navy blue shorts and told him he looked like a bruise, started liking the two colors together.

When I was in high school the in color combination was pink and cranberry. Prior to being told they looked good together, I always thought they clashed.

It’s true of clothing styles too. Faded jeans used to be something to wear to clean the house, then came the eighties and we all thought acid washed jeans and shaggy hair cuts looked good. How did I ever think that kinky perm was attractive?

Styles change in crochet, too. I have a Sunset crochet book, and a Woman’s Day magazine featuring granny squares, both from the ‘70s. I remembering drooling over all the photos in both, thinking someday I wanted to make all those things. Some of the designs still seem okay, but the color choices they were made in verge on ugly. And to my 2008 eyes, some of the patterns look pretty bad, too. There is a man’s tie. It’s wide, one color and a little crooked. What man would want to wear that to work? And there is a page of men’s hats. Would some man really want a kelly green crocheted fedora, or a crochet cowboy hat?

When I was working on my third book, Death and Doilies, I got an old booklet about filet crochet. The patterns in the book were impressive in terms of being ornate and requiring a lot of work, but they weren’t appealing to my contemporary eye. While a much simpler pattern of spaces and some hearts done in filet I saw in a current book seemed more attractive.

It just fascinates me how our perception gets manipulated. I always laugh when I see things like bra straps that are supposed to be showing, people in the grocery store in pants that look like pajamas, and socks with high heels. Today’s high fashion was yesterday’s bag lady.

Sisters are doing it for themselves

I recently went to the Scrapbook Expo at the Santa Clara Convention Center. It was a high-energy affair with aisles full of scrappers and booths full of beautiful, interesting products. The array of wonderful kits, eye-catching papers and creative stamps and stencils was inspirational.

And aside from one guy who looked like he’d been transported from the Ginzu knife booth at the county fair, it was mostly women.

Quilting and scrapbooking are two industries that seemed to have grown up without the help of big, male-dominated corporations. Many of the businesses are women-owned. Not to say there aren’t men involved in every facet of both industries, but it’s mostly a girl thing. Women are designing fabric, scrapbook paper, and stamps and selling it to their public. Finding their retail niche at conventions, home parties.

It’s exciting to see.

I recently enjoyed former Clinton White House Press Secretary DeeDee Myers’ book, “Why Woman Should Rule The World.” Her thesis is that women react differently, based on their experiences and emotions, than men, and that the world will become a very different place as women take on roles of leadership. Not instead of men, but alongside.

I wonder if we can learn anything from the quilting and scrapbooking world. There are stories of bitchy women, of quiltzillas, as Mark Lipinski dubbed the worst of them. But there are thousand examples of businesses, begun by women, that have been successful in the long term. Women own the majority of scrapbooking stores and quilt stores, and are making these industries grow.

When I speak to the general public about my books, people are slightly puzzled by the idea of a craft mystery. How do you kill someone with a rubber stamp, someone will ask. I explain that the craft is merely the world that the characters live in. And then I hit them with the facts, the number of people, worldwide, that are involved in these crafts. They’re always astounded when I tell them how big these industries are. Unless they have a quilter or scrapbooking taking over every available piece of spare space in their home, they’re completely unaware.

Quilting is a nearly four billion-dollar industry now. Scrapbooking and stamping are fast approaching that mark. Women’s desires are driving the industry. And women are stepping up to fill the needs.

By the way, I won a door prize at the Stamping Expo. The prize is a home Mini Photo Album Workshop for six people with Linda Sturdivant of Close To My Heart. I’m willing to share my good fortune. If you’d like to be one of the six participants, email me. First come, first serve. It’ll either be at my house or hers. Sorry out-of-towners, that would be in San Jose.

A week of Zen hell on the Okinawa Diet

By Kathryn Lilley

My sister, that guru of body wellness, put me on to the Okinawa Diet recently. The Okinawans are reportedly the happiest, healthiest people around.They're not only the longest-lived people on the planet, but they have a good time while they're here—reportedly, they have great centenarian sex. And if that's not a reason to hang around Earth for a long time, what is?

Unlike in the United States, where youth is worshipped and age is shunned, Okinawan elders are revered. Women in particular are the keepers of the spiritual bonds between the present and the past. In Okinawa, age is celebrated with healing rituals. They promote lifelong health through the practice of dance and martial art, which they believe nurtures your chi.

This was all sounding very good to me. I could do with less stress, more chi, and I could definitely do with more exercise and a better diet.

But then, I tried living the Okinawan way.

I read that the Okinawan diet staples include green tea (good), seaweed sheets (not so good), tofu, and eggs.

So I launched myself on Week 1. The first day’s breakfast was actually pretty decent: Toaster waffles, orange juice, and jasmine tea. Hmm…not that different than what I usually ate, if you substituted four cups of milk-laden coffee for the cup of tea.

Lunch was a bagel with nonfat cream cheese, salad, and more juice. By now, I was hankering for a little protein. Was the whole day going to taste like breakfast?

Dinner was much better. Beef Teriyaki with brown rice, ¼ cup low-fat vanilla ice-cream with strawberries (for which I substituted a scoop of Light Phish Food by Ben & Jerry’s), and papaya.

I enjoyed a newfound emphasis on exercise and de-stressing techniques. I bought little stones that say “Peace,” “Harmony,” “Positive Energy.” But was I supposed to carry the rocks around with me all day, or just arrange them on a shelf where they’d emanate good vibes my way?

My hometown lacks shamans, which are evidently critical to the Okinawan health practices. But there is a local masseuse in town who acts a tad shaman-like—she hums Zen-ish ditties as she shakes drops of tutty-fruity oils on your back during her aromatherapy special. She also does a nice ritualistic laying-on of cucumber slices over your eyes. So I payed sixty bucks to be turned into a fruit basket, and chalked up the fee to the cost of going native.

I have to say, after a few days on the program, I did feel more relaxed, centered, and I’d lost a few pounds. But honestly, the whole thing was a lot of work. Every day involved different menus, various healing stone messages to study, plus a valiant struggle to down something called Mugwort tea. I also confused some of my friends, who were surprised by my newfound, desperate desire for social connection, which is something else that helps the Okinawans live a long life. Ufortunately for the diet, my friends and I always do our social connecting at Houston's, where we wouldn't dream of bonding without our ritual of a shared pot of spinach-artichoke dip and tortilla chips. Probably real Okinawans let their hair down over something healthier, like stirfried sea horses.

Exercise, on the other hand, was a roaring success all week. I walked down to the beach each day and chatted with a guy who does Falun Gong exercises every morning on the sand. He’s a mondo harmonious, peaceful fellow—or at least he became peaceful after he made a running escape from mainland China. Evidently in China, they feel threatened by too much harmony. I'll bet anything they don't live as long in Beijing as they do in Okinawa.

Frankly, I don’t know if the Okinawa lifestyle is right for me. That’s my problem with diets. I’m stellar for a week or two, and then suddenly, I never want to see a sheet of seaweed or a “Joy” stone in my pocket again. And next thing you know, I’ve slipped back into American fast food slumming, which involves hanging around the corner of 31 Flavors and Mrs. Field's. And those good ole Yankees always welcome me back with open arms and a free cookie.

Kathryn Lilley is a mystery writer and a recovering journalist. She recently broke the Okinawa Diet by diving into a pint of Brownie Madness. If pint-diving qualified as an Olympic event, the judges would have given her solid "10s" for angle and speed of entry.

Best of, Part 2

Thursday's child, Linda O. Johnston is still out of reach, so I'm filling in.

Many times I'm asked how I can think of something to blog about every week. The answer is that I couldn't do it alone. Not only does sharing a blog spread out the work, but reading my sister bloggers gives me inspiration every time. Last week I pulled out quotes from Kathryn Lilley, Monica Ferris, Joanna Campbell Slan, and Linda O. Johnston. This week I'm sharing gems from the Weekend Wits, Terri Thayer and Betty Hechtman.

TERRI THAYER has a great answer to the question: How long did it take to write your book?

How long did it take? My first book took over five years to write, by the calendar. But that doesn’t take in Mr. Robinson’s senior English class or the business writing in night school or the proposal writing classes at the extension. The writers conferences, the seminars, the how-to books. The words that were cut, the drafts discarded, the characters axed. The other stories (typed, for crying out loud) that were almost sent into Redbook’s story contest.

So when that person in the back row, raises her hand and sweetly asks, “How long did it take you to write Wild Goose Chase?” I’ll be prepared. I know the answer.

My whole life.


BETTY HECHTMAN gave me a lot to think about with her "confession!" (Sunday, July 27, 2008)

It’s official. I have become my mother. I’m not saying it’s a bad thing. No, I am developing one of my mother’s best traits. She could strike up a conversation anywhere with anybody. You could have dropped her on Mars and she would have been friends with those Martians in no time.


From me:
Thanks to the ladies of Killerhobbies!

Thunder Lake Diary - Part 2

August 13 – It’s Turtle Race Day, one of several held in Longville every summer. So people were gathering and their main street was being blocked off and kids were all over the place. There is a circle about twenty-five or thirty feet across painted on the street, with a smaller circle about six or eight feet across inside it. People bring or "rent" turtles and in groups of ten stand in the inner circle. At a command, they put them down, then release them. First turtle crossing the outer circle boundary wins. Even adults will race a turtle. One turtle used the inner border as a highway and went very fast along it, to the disappointment of a little boy. We found a coffee house after an early lunch at Frosty’s (lots of flavors of ice cream and sandwiches and pizza, we had pizza – eh, not bad or good). Common Grounds didn’t seem to mind that we didn’t buy a beverage but sought a table and suddenly we were back in the world via our laptops! Sent my weblog entry to Killer Hobbies, noodled around the 'Net until one, then went over to the library to plug in to the electric power and INDULGE. It was nice . . . Found that book, Behind Barbed Wire, the Story of German POW Camps in Minnesota, and ordered it from Amazon.com. Maybe it will tell me the location(s) of the camps in Cass County. I’ve been told of three locations, one in Longville (that’s incorrect), one near Baby Boy Lake, and the one over by Remer.

A man was selling sweet corn, tomatoes, onions and cantaloupes from the back of his pickup across the street from the library and I bought four ears. Came home, heated the leftover pizza, boiled the corn, and that was supper.

It’s 8 pm and the loons are starting in. The eaglet has been shrieking a whole lot less today. I wonder if he is learning how to fish yet. Or if he’s sitting up there slowly starving to death. I understand the majority of raptors don’t make it to adulthood.

Thursday – We went to The Lone Wolf, a bar that sells groceries, at eight in the morning to meet again with the retired men who come in for coffee and conversation every morning. The man everyone wanted me to talk to was there, and the discussion became very lively. I learned a lot about the "good old days." For example, the original owner of The Lone Wolf, a Mr. Brigham, had the only phone in the area during WWII, and so telegrams (you know, the sad kind about MIA and KIA) would come to his phone and he had to take them down and then deliver the news to the families. He hated that, and was glad when the draft finally came for him, a 35-year-old bachelor. They told old jokes and made old wisecracks. ("What did I say to make you go away? I want to say it sooner tomorrow.") Retired pro baseball players bought homes up in this area. Some were friendly, some were loners. A man used to capture wild ducks, attach a "collar" to their necks, run a string from the collar to a stool and rent the arrangement to duck hunters to lure free ducks to the field to be shot. The man who told that story has two of the collars in his possession. There was a bar with a famous door with bullet holes in it, said holes shot by John Dillinger – which was true, but the door was brought from Chicago! John D. Brigham built the Lone Wolf as a tiny outlet shop to sell bread and pastry he had made in a bakery (somewhere around here). It was just a tiny shop, but it grew over the years. Sideways and backwards, then the front porch got enclosed and a new one put on. For awhile it was a dance hall, with booths along one side. Now it’s a grocery as well as a bar. To get alcohol "to go" you have to go out front, down the porch, and into another entrance to an attached liquor store, some kind of state law. The place is still called "Brigham’s" by old-timers. People who gather wild rice have many restrictions. One is on the width of the boat used. A fellow’s boat was too wide, so he took a saw and cut it lengthwise, cut a few inches off down the keel, then nailed it back together. A local farmer had a wife who knew the right kind of clay to make bricks with, and they went out to find some and dug it up, mixed it with water, smoothed the "mud" into wooden forms and left it out all summer to dry. That winter the farmer baked the bricks a few at a time in his furnace and next summer built a fireplace. I guess in those days, if you wanted something, you made it yourself. When I mentioned that I’d heard that the reason the lake was named Thunder Lake was because it emitted, on rare occasions, a sound like thunder from its depths, the old men laughed. It got that name because, in winter, it freezes from shore to shore and, ice expanding as it grows colder, it pushes up against itself, groaning and grumbling and sending terrifying-to-ice-fishermen cracks skidding across its surface. A sound like thunder.

We parted on good terms, and soon after started for home.

Writing in color

I've been following our own Kathryn Lilley's other blog, The Kill Zone, with much delight.

Besides KL's entries, I loved John Gilstrap's recent blog on his fascination with pens.

I'm addicted to pens myself, but John's taste is better than mine. He loves his old fountain pen and would probably appreciate a beautiful antique writing implement, whereas I'm happy with one that says I (heart) Des Moines and will ship anyone who sends me one a signed book.

For me, it's actually more than pens. It's all office supplies. Early on my husband figured this out and stopped trying to find just the right necklace or earrings and bought me a paper cutter for my birthday one year. Wow, my own paper cutter, like the ones only offices and schools had back then! I guess my gratitude was apparent because he's been sticking with the category ever since—an electric pencil sharpener, a supersize three-hole punch, an electric stapler, a postal scale, reams of colored paper, and expensive three-ring binders that don't eat your fingers when you open and close them.


Recently he designed a special package label for sending out "Mayhem in Miniature." I guess I'm a cheap date because this thrills me more than jewelry or candy. Well, maybe not more than candy.

One year he bought me an amethyst necklace, too delicate for my taste, but it cost him a great deal—not in money but in the discomfort he feels in every retail store except Radio Shack and Fry's Electronics. I worried that he'd notice how infrequently I wore the necklace, so I pulled it out last week and wore it to a party.

"Where did you get that necklace?" he asked. I won't worry anymore.

Now my relatives and friends have caught on and I have Vera Bradley folders, teal bookends in the shape of hands, and packing tape with an image of a zipper.

And an update to that old paper cutter: one that has a laser beam shoot down the side, for perfect alignment, as soon as you raise the handle!

When I was a kid pencils were green and pens were black and dipped in ink wells. Paper bags were brown, folders were manila, clipboards were brown, index cards and mailing envelopes were white. The first sticky notes came in yellow only, with no clever sayings or die cut edges.

No wonder I lived an uninspired life, coming to writing only as an older adult. I needed color and florals and plaids to get me going.

Any ideas for an office supply I shouldn't be without?

Leaving the Nest

On Saturday morning glancing up from my packing at our Kiawah villa, I saw a gathering of people by an orange-topped stake in the sand. I put down the clothes I was folding, grabbed my camera and ran to the loggerhead turtle’s nest. The volunteer watching the site had noticed a problem, so she flagged down other volunteers, and they helped her dig. They found seventy-nine dead baby turtles, ones that had hatched, but not survived, and forty-some live babies, plus three unhatched eggs. They speculated that the incredibly heavy downpour we’d had a few days ago drowned the new hatchlings. Some of the “pips”, the babies who had just broken through their eggshells, still had umbilical cords and egg sacks attached. Others had carapaces soft on the underside. All of these were examined carefully and then returned to the nest. (The dead ones were taken away. They could attract predators which would kill the live babies--or worse, ants which would flood the nest and also kill the live babies.)

Now that the sand was loosened up above, and the rain was over, the hatchlings could draw nourishment and strength from their egg sacks before digging their way to the top. From there, they would cross the sand—a necessary activity for their survival. Long ago, volunteers discovered that if they picked up the babies and carried them across the sand, their internal “compasses” wouldn’t set. The hatchlings would be set down in the ocean, only to swim in circles, and provide easy pickings for predators and die.

I had the privilege of holding a struggling hatchling in my hand. The strength of his tiny legs—no longer than my thumb—amazed me as he pressed and pressed against the flesh of my hand. He was trying and trying to swim away. He looked calmly around as he lifted his small head, shaped and colored like a log. It's this similiarity that caused sailors to call these turtles “loggerheads." Always, he seemed to be moving toward the sea.

Watching those baby turtles reminded me that my son Michael must leave the metaphorical nest. He’s a “pip” right now—we’re taking him to college this week. My son’s fully formed, having broken out of his eggshell, that tender environment we’ve provided for him, and over the next few days his carapace will harden. But digging his way up through the sand, toward the surface, and crossing the treacherous sand (four or more years of college) is his journey to make.

This year, my son has struggled. Trying to push against us, only to be held back by our rules and curfew, trying to become a man, but still living at home and attending high school. On Thursday, we’ll perform one last duty as his parents. We’ll get him moved into his dorm room, then drive him to a nearby hospital and sit with him. My niece Lexie is having her baby—a boy! And the timing couldn’t be more perfect. Michael, my husband David and I will wait with my family until we can see our newest member. Then we’ll drive our son back to his new college home and say goodbye. Hello to baby Skyler Logan, and goodbye to college freshman Michael Harrison.

I hope those turtles make it.

Photo Opp

It started because I wanted to be like my blogsisters and include a photo in this weeks entry. Since I’m the I.T. person at my house – yikes what a frightening thought – I thought I would just monkey around and figure out how to do it.

I thought I’d try a practice run before I actually tried to put a photo in my blog. Of course, then I couldn’t think of any kind of photo to look for. Crochet, I thought finally. I’ll find a photo of hooks or yarn or some finished item. I found a photo on of some Irish crochet which was pretty and actually is featured in Dead Men Don’t Crochet so it was relevant.

There is no point in going through the boring details, but all I was able to do was save the photo to my computer. At the end of this I am going to see if I can move it from there to here.

But reasoning there must be a way to take a photo from a site and plunk it right into a blog, I decided to try a photo from somewhere else.

All I know is I ended up freezing my computer so bad even ctrl alt delete didn’t help. I had to push the on button to shut it down. Luckily no permanent damage. By now I had wasted all my potential blog writing time.

So, here goes. If it works, you’ll see a lacy photo of Irish crochet. If it doesn’t ... I don’t even want to go there.

The photo was supposed to go down here. Having it appear on top takes away all the suspense. I've seen photos in other parts of blogs. How did they get there?

I did notice as I was adding the picture there was something about getting photos from the web which makes me think I was trying to do it backwards. Okay, there's always next week.

What could be better than San Francisco on a rare warm summer day? I'll tell you what's better. Being in the middle of the bay on Alcatraz Island for the annual alumni day.



Once a year, the prison holds an anniversary party for the guards, children brought up on the twelve-acre island, and inmates. National Park Rangers and volunteers swarm the island. They treat the returning occupants like royalty. The Alcatraz alum make themselves available for questions and special lectures are scheduled throughout the day.



From 1934 until 1963, Alcatraz was a federal penitentiary, home to rapists, murderers and kidnappers. Incorrigibles who got into trouble in other prisons were sent here. The famous, like Machine Gun Kelly, and Al Capone and the Birdman, Robert Stroud, and the just infamous, like Doc Barker, one of Ma Barker’s boys.


The guards, wardens, and prison doctors and their families lived on the Island. Children were sent to school in San Francisco by boat. We were given a tour of Building 64, where most of the civilians lived. The buildings are in grave disrepair but the feeling of a bustling neighborhood still exists.



Yes, inmates do come back. I watched one former inmate and his grandson being interviewed by the local TV station on the second tier of C block. The inmate seemed nonplussed about standing outside the 5x9 cell he once lived in. You haven't seen anything until you see a former guard and a former bank robber, both now well into their eighties, exchanging phone numbers. Talk about bygones. This is John Dekker, an inmate talking about the "screws". His take, vehemently disputed by the guards, was that they weren’t so tough.



San Francisco is a short ferry ride away. The city seems close enough to touch.



Walking down the steep steps into the exercise yard, the wind is fierce as it blows through the Golden Gate. Fog obscures most of the bridge, but the famous towers are visible.


This piece of real estate has million dollar views.



John Hernan, a former guard, told us a story of seeking out the source of music one night. He thought one of the inmates had made a crude radio. He finally realized the music was coming from a band at an elite country club across the bay.



As with any historical building, the most fascinating aspect is the people who lived and worked there. Guards, and inmates and children were available all day to answer questions. Their love for the place and their place in history was evident. I talked to Bob Stites, whose father was killed on duty in 1946. Bob was fifteen at the time. He was forever tied to this island. He and his wife of 53 years were on their last visit to Alcatraz.



The writer in me was thrilled to find out that it's possible to spend a night at the prison, sleeping in D block. What a great place for a retreat. And a murder mystery.



Care to join me?

French Women DO Get Fat

By Kathryn Lilley

The headline this week read: “French paradox a diet myth.”

It turns out that French women (and men) are struggling with a steep rise in obesity rates.

I pause now to snort out a supersized American, “Hah!”
Let me repeat that: Hah!

It’s not that I’m happy that my Liberty sisters across the Atlantic have had to join us in the Battle of the Bulge.

It’s just that I’ve been haunted over the years by too many well-meaning people who have cheerfully handed me that book: You know the one—French Women Don’t Get Fat.

Just eat like the French and you’ll be fat free, the book promises. Eat three meals a day, walk everywhere, and take the stairs instead of the elevator. Oh, and drink lots of red wine, and don’t forget to indulge in your favorite foods every once in a while.

Hell, that’s what I thought I was doing! Okay, maybe I was over-overindulging in my fave foods (especially Chubby Hubby by B&J). But could the whole thing really be this simple?

Evidently not, at least if you measure by the recent results of the French population. Over time they have evidently become a lot more like us: eating meals on the run, consuming fast food—and getting fatter.

The average size of a real French woman, studies suggest, is likely to be on the surplus-side of size twelve (Okay, that’s still smaller than the average American’s size 14. But the point is, they’re catching up).

I hear the French government is fighting back by proposing anti-obesity measures and promoting public ad campaigns that exhort our Gallic guys and gals to take the stairs. We’ll see if it helps them return to the Land of the Annoyingly Thin.

But whatever happens to their waistlines over there, just don’t anyone write a book about it. And if you do, don’t hand it to me, okay? Je suis fini with French diets, but I'm keeping the french fries, thank you very much.

Kathryn Lilley is a writer and former journalist who lives in Southern California. She's currently on the Okinawa diet and dreaming about éclairs and pain perdu.

Best of killerhobbies

It's Camille/Margaret Grace posting for Linda today.

I thought I'd do a Best of … blog, looking back on the words of inspiration, fun, and wisdom from my sister bloggers.

From our blogger emeritus, DEB BAKER, some Barbie facts:

• Barbie was introduced in 1953. Among her 80 careers, she went to college when she was 11 years old and joined the Army at 39.• In 2000, she developed a belly button.
• She has seen over 150 nations and every second THREE Barbies are sold.
• An original in mint condition has sold for $10,000.00

From LINDA O. JOHNSTON, remember this description of unusual guests at a party:

One of the really fun things was the attendance by Christiana, a delightful lady from the West Valley Bird Society, an organization I visited while researching my third Kendra book, Fine-Feathered Death. She brought along a variety of beautiful and personable birds, including a blue and gold macaw, the type featured in FFD. There was also a hyacinth macaw, a white cockatoo, an adorably charming toucan, and a unique-looking black bird whose type I never did learn. Party guests could pose with the birds and have their photos taken. I had great fun with the toucan, who observed me cheekily even as he pulled petals off the pretty lei I had around my neck. The cockatoo perched on Fred’s arm for our picture. I learned later that the hyacinth macaw took great pleasure in pecking at the kukui nuts, and the men who wore the necklaces were soon told to take them off while posing for pictures.


I found this wonderful story from MONICA FERRIS, posted February '07:

One Sunday after church, a mom asked her very young daughter what the lesson was about. The daughter answered, "Don't be scared, you'll get your quilt." Needless to say, the mom was perplexed. Later in the day, the pastor stopped by for tea and the mom asked him what that morning's Sunday school lesson was about. He said "Be not afraid, thy comforter is coming."


JOANNA CAMPBELL SLAN visits her spiritual home:
There are the places we live because we must, and the places we would live if we could. For me, the coast of South Carolina has always been my spiritual home—the place of my dreams and wishes. It is where I return to find strength and solace. I love everything about the area called “the Low Country.”
The moment I step outside the Charleston airport, I stand and sniff the air like a lost dog searching for home.
"Everyone has a holy place, a refuge, where their heart is purer, their mind clearer, where they feel closer to God or love or truth or whatever it is they happen to worship," writes J.R. Moehringer in "The Tender Bar."


KATHRYN LILLEY, whose graphics surely take the "Best Of .." prize, confessed in October '07:
When I started writing DYING TO BE THIN, the first installment in the Fat City Mystery series, I was not fully aware that the mystery sub-genre known as “cozies” had to follow certain restrictive guidelines.
And so…ahem. In the interest of full disclosure, I should let you know that even though DYING TO BE THIN often gets lumped in with cozy mysteries, readers will encounter a few “uncozy” passages:
• Murder victims are presented splat on the page, complete with a discussion of the deceased-one’s physical appearance (including, in the case of one victim, the impact of weaponized fondue forks).
• There are frequent and colorful references to a fictional S&M scene in the story’s locale, Raleigh-Durham, North Carolina.
• The plot line is neither kind, nor particularly gentle. But it is often humorous.

Do you have any fond memories of early KilleryHobbies?


[Next week: More Best of, from our newer members.]

A Report from "Up North" Minnesota

Sunday, August 10, 2008 – A looooong drive up from St. Louis Park to Thunder Lake, and we’re in Cass County, named after a pre-Civil War general who explored this area and made treaties (later broken, of course) with the Indians. The area is heavily forested, some oak but mostly birch and white pine – lots and lots of pine. Weather spectacular, sunny and not quite cool. Rita’s cabin is up a winding gravel road closely set with big trees. As advertised, it is elderly, made of logs, set in a clearing it shares with a much lower-class cabin of broad boards (with an outhouse!), which also belongs to her, and a higher-class log cabin with a stone chimney of the sort that means a fireplace. The higher-class one is not made of real logs but that siding designed to look like logs.

Rita’s cabin is small but not tiny, a cozy place with an efficient kitchen, dining area and living room, bedroom, bath. The windows are horizontally rectangular and open like French doors – they’re original to the house, though work has been done on them to make them fit tightly again. There is an enclosed back porch with big screen windows that faces the lake. It might once have been a front porch, and there was a door leading out of it that wasn’t properly braced and so it was pulling the whole cabin down. And once started, the cabin might well have ended up in the lake, because there is a very steep slope of about seventy yards down to the water’s edge. The old logs of the cabin are a dark red-brown and some are fissured or split. I wish I’d brought my bird book along because there are all kinds of birds up here, some I don’t recognize. Rita reports there are bears and otters, kingfishers and loons. She has a canoe we can use. Thunder Lake is beautiful, of an odd, oblong shape. It makes me think of a plucked duck. There are other cabins and several resorts.

There is a very tall, ancient pine near the lake on her land with a huge bald eagle’s nest in its top branches. There is a single baby eagle in the nest, who shrieks a lot because his parents are not feeding him right now. They want him to find the courage to fly to a nearby tree, where they sit calling and waving fish at him. So far he’s refusing, he sits in the nest fat, angry and complaining (typical adolescent?) and calls for them to bring the fish over.

Ellen and I went to Remer for supper. It’s about ten miles up highway 6 from here. It’s a very small town, one of those "wide places in the road." We went into The Woodsman, a country café sort of place, with fake knotty pine paneling and faded pictures of local wildlife. But the food was pretty good – real mashed potatoes and home-made gravy, fat breadsticks with just a hint of sweetness, flavorful "chopped steak" (hamburger) with mushrooms and onions. The owner said an elderly woman named Lou has lived here all her life and could tell me about the German POW camp right outside of town. She comes in every morning early for coffee.

Back at the cabin darkness drew in and there came the odd, sad "yodel" of a loon out on the lake, followed by three or four loons having fits of nervous giggles. The song of the northwoods, absolutely. I am looking forward to writing this novel!

I spent a certain amount of time wide awake that night. I find I have turned into a city girl. We left the windows open to the delicious, chilly night air, and I was sure a bear or a cougar was going to break the screen and come in after us. It was incredibly dark and very quiet out there, with occasional rustles or faint whuffling noises ("Oh, my God! A bear!") or rumbles ("Oh, my God, a cougar!"). In the daylight next day, I was ashamed. But later, while I was driving out the gravel road to Highway 6, something loped across the road in front of me. It was much bigger than a cat, but it didn’t look like a dog. Too small to be a bear. It was medium brown, furry, thick-legged, tailess. It didn’t move like a bear cub and anyway they are black. "Oh, my God, a bobcat!" And in fact, it might have been, they are rare but present up here.

We did go to talk with Lou, who is a very spry and youthful 80. She is, in fact, Lucille Anderson, who was 15 when the German POWs came to Remer. Her grandfather worked at the camp, which was converted from what they call "the CC Camp" – Civilian Conservation Corps, an FDR remedy for the Depression. She remembers army trucks hauling them around, they standing in the back, and how they would call out and wave to her grandfather if they saw him on the street. She told me where the Remer camp was located. (Go out the graveled Highway 4 past a cemetery to a "tar road" that curves to the right, go past a house and look for a very tall stand of pines: "you can’t miss it.")

And we didn’t. I sprayed myself heavily with Deet, took the camera, left Ellen in the car, and went into the woods via a faintly marked, grassy, weedy road that had been built up across a very deep ditch. The trail branched here and there, and I found smallish clearings marked with old trunks, but even the clearings had tall pines growing in them, and I couldn’t find any sign of any old buildings. I didn’t want to wander too far off the trails, first because I thought they might be the remnants of roads leading to the camp, second because I didn’t want to get lost. There was evidence of passage on the "roads" by vehicles not so long ago, probably checking the place out for logging.

Later I walked down to the lake in front of the cabin, trying not to break into a trot which could only have ended in a soaking. Coming back, I detoured to the big pine the eagles are nesting in. It is a very big pine, its trunk at least twice the diameter of the other pines around it. Suddenly I heard the peculiarly high-pitched squeal of the eagles coming in short, excited bursts and saw a dark shadow circle and land up out of my sight. Landed heavily, with a clap of wings. Then two more shadows circled in, also squealing. The eaglet is out of his nest! Well, he’s back again, but he’s taken his first flight.


There is Internet access in Longville! Checked e-mail there Tuesday. The librarian showed me some history books on the Land’o’Lakes area – one focusing on Longville – and we sat down to read and wait. One of the books said the POW camp was over by Little Boy Lake (perhaps in addition to the one at Remer – or is Remer near Little Boy Lake? Need to do more research!) and told a couple of brief anecdotes about the Germans. One said a prisoner ran off but stopped by a house (got lost?), where he was fed, comforted and returned to the camp the next day. Another recalled the Germans being brought along by American soldiers stopping off for beer – this is beginning to sound like "Hogan’s Heroes!" A POW was asked what he thought of young American women and he, an older officer, "indicated by gestures" that he would not allow his daughters to use lipstick or nail polish. (I wonder if they changed his mind after he’d been home a couple of years.) Just in passing, there was a story about a man who’d served time in prison during the 20s and, after another conviction, was "persuaded" to leave the Chicago area to live with relatives in Longville. His grandson didn’t know about this as a boy and was shocked to discover years later that his sweet old Gran’dad was setting up illegal slot machines in the backs of bars and going around weekly to collect the money. I think the word we want here is "incorrigible."

All this is, of course, gold to my research for Buttons and Bones, a future Betsy Devonshire novel.
The library opens at one on Wednesday, so this won’t get posted until then.

I have to go to work

Last week I gave a talk at a local Rotary meeting. The group of about fifteen all work in my city at various jobs: banking, real estate, small business, and consulting are the ones I know of. It's a breakfast meeting at 7 in the morning. It's a good thing I like this group.

I've talked to them before and they were receptive as usual to my topics: the writing process, the state of publishing as I experience it. They know that I also teach and work as an editor at a lab. One woman in particular always asks when my classes are since "some day" she wants to write a book.

Nothing unusual so far. Several people stayed around after my talk AND THEN, one by one they left, uttering some variation of "I wish I were a writer, but I have to go to work now."

Can you hear my growl?

I've heard this all my life. My father was a laborer, the kind who literally dug ditches to support us. A plum job for him was a gig at a construction site where he might have the pleasure of building a stairway, pouring concrete, or putting on a roof.

To my parents, who had six or seven years of school between them, anyone who dressed up before they left the house in the morning was not really working. I understood that—and I've always been able to see the difference between my father's kind of work and my kind of work.

But I don't expect to hear remarks like that from professionals. How can an educated person think it's not some measure of work to write two books a year, for example, or even a half a book a year?

The last woman out the door of the Rotary meeting said, "Once I don't have to work, I'm going to write a book, too."

"Good luck with that," I said.



Does anyone have a better answer that I can use the next time?

That No Good Cheating Rat--John Edwards

They are rapt in scrapbooks of 60th anniversaries and trips to Disney and gap-toothed tots.

They're framing their best memories in glitter and lace.

They talk families and foreign oil. They debate the war. They recall first concerts and favorite shows.

Tonight, they talk about that no-good, cheating rat.

So began a story which ran August 10 in the St. Petersburg (FL) Times. http://www.tampabay.com/news/politics/article765093.ece
• • •
Seems that the news of John Edwards’ infidelity is everywhere you turn this week.

“I tell you, Joanna, these men,” sighed my villa neighbor as she shook her head. Later she shared the story of her own husband’s fling with a co-worker. A fling that ended their marriage and ruined his career and his relationship with his children.

Hearing all this makes me sad—and, strangely, I also feel vindicated.

You see, one of the editors who read an early draft of Paper, Scissors, Death: A Scrapbooking Mystery turned it down, because “people won’t read about a woman with a cheating husband.”

I don’t know what planet she came from. On the terra firma where I stand, cheating husbands getting what comes to them ranks right up there with, oh, slap-downs of smug young movie stars.

To that editor’s credit, she is a lovely young lady who turned a brilliant smile on me and said, “I hope you prove me wrong.”

I sure hope I do, too. In fact, I'm banking on it.

Meanwhile, let me add this: We’re all human. We all fail. Someone of us go down in a spectacular blaze while others simply stumble around in the dark. John Edwards made a huge mistake. And yeah, we’re all reading about it. As will his wife and his children. Frankly, I prefer fiction some days to real life.

How about you?

In My Own Backyard

The other morning I had an experience that with a few changes could have easily been in HOOKED ON MURDER. Somehow the action always seems to show up where ever Molly is - even in her own backyard.

There I was in my night gown, drinking my morning coffee when I heard this loud noise. At first I thought it was the replacement instant hot water thing we recently had put in. When it goes through whatever it goes through it sounds kind of like a plane overhead. But this noise sounded different and definitely like it was coming from outside. When I went out into the yard and looked up, a helicopter was hovering directly above me. I mean if they had dropped something out of it, it would have hit me on the head. I think the helicopter situation in Southern California is different than other places. They are all over the place here. The police use them, all the news stations have them. Big Army ones fly over occasionally. When there’s a forest fire, large red ones ferry huge containers of water.

The one above me wasn’t a police helicopter. They always seem to circle and make a thwacking sound. This one was staying in one place and making a loud constant drone. The way it was hovering made me pretty sure it was a TV news one. I’ve seen them before, hanging like dragon flies when there was the end of a police car chase or a bank robbery in the area.

So there was obviously some news story happening nearby. I rushed inside and looked out the front window, expecting to see maybe a SWAT team moving down the street or at least a bunch of police cruisers. The street was quiet. Even the landscape workers across the street weren’t there.

I tried going back to my coffee, but the noise made it impossible to ignore the helicopter and I went back outside and stared up at it again. It was in the exact same spot. With a thought that whatever was going on might be live on TV, I turned on the small kitchen set and started flipping through the stations. That TV isn’t connected to anything and relies on an old rabbit ears antenna for reception so the lower channels were all fuzz, but I could tell by the sound it wasn’t any breaking news. I kept moving up through the channels and then suddenly when I got to the Fox station, there in the corner was a notation saying something like live from Sky Fox.

There was a shot of a backyard and some woman in a red dress talking on the phone. Who knew Jillian Reynolds, the co host of Good Day L.A., apparently is one of my neighbors and that she had just come back from a vacation in Cabo and the show decided to make a surprise visit via the camera on the helicopter.

So there I was listening to the helicopter over my head and watching what it was seeing on my TV. Maybe it’s just me, but it seemed kind of interesting strange. It seemed like the kind of thing that would happen to Molly, only if it had happened to her there would be more to the story.

Molly would put down her crocheting and figured out which house it was and probably showed up there in time to find a body floating in the pool or at least ended up on camera.

Me? I just finished my coffee and thought I have something to put in my blog.

After the ecstasy, the laundry

After the ecstasy, the laundry. That’s the name of a Jack Kornfield book about a Zen koan. To me the meaning is clear. No matter how many wonderful things happen, there’s always the mundane day-to-day housekeeping duties that need our attention.

Like in February, at my huge launch party, I signed books for about 150 people attending, I had a blast, meeting up with old friends, giving a speech about the meaning of my book, collecting kudos all around. The next morning, I was washing clothes. Quite literally, the ecstasy and the laundry.

This week I got wonderful news. Stamped Out, the first in the Stamping Sisters series, was singled out for a starred review in Publisher’s Weekly. This is big news, so exciting, so validating, I’m thrilled. According to my editor, Sandy Harding, this is the first time a cozy mystery from Berkley has received a starred review. Getting the review will translate directly into more sales from bookstores and libraries. Awesome. I was flying high.

You can read it here. Scroll down to Mass market. You can't miss it. It has a big red star.
http://www.publishersweekly.com/article/CA6583334.html

And then the computer died. A quiet death, so unlike it’s usual noisy everyday existence, that I knew it was a lost cause. I tried to hang on to my good feelings engendered by the review, blocking out the lost files, the backup detail, all of the time and energy that would be necessary in getting and setting up a new system. Not to mention the inconvenience of working on my 13-inch laptop.

There’s another not-so Zen koan that’s also in play here. My own little truism. It goes like this: Make a little money and it will be spent. I was so looking forward to the paycheck for doing the Santa Clara Library Mystery Author panel talks that I’ve been taking part in this summer. Just a little mad money. Don’t get me wrong, I would have done the panels for free. I’m having a marvelous time, being on panels with Penny Warner, Kelli Stanley, Cara Black, Claire Langley-Hawthorne. No remuneration required. But nice to have.

And now it’ll go to pay for my shiny new computer.

Catch me at the Milpitas Library on Thursday, August 14th at 7:30 with Penny, Cara, Claire and Mark Coggins or at the Saratoga Library on Monday the 18th with Penny, Cara, Mark and Michelle Gagnon.

I’ll show you my starred review. It’s a beaut.

Oh, the fun places you'll go!

Last Friday's guest, author Michelle Gagnon, just wrote a funny post about her recent book tour over at the Kill Zone. Now that I'm preparing to launch my own book tour for A KILLER WORKOUT, which hits the bookstores on October 7th, I'm in the mood to anticipate and do a little neurotic worrying ahead of time:



Gas. Yikes! Gas is nearly five dollars a gallon in LA! It puts a pricey pall on those long drives to Phoenix, Las Vegas and points north. If I wind up running out of gas and hitchhiking down a lonely stretch highway, don't worry--I won't climb into any pickup trucks or white panel vans.

Book signings. You just never know what to expect. Some bookstores promote your appearance and assemble people for a discussion--others stick you in the "gilded cage" to the side of the front entrance,where you basically collar anyone coming through the door with a pitch. Sitting quietly does not sell books, so I've developed a special smile and greeting that makes me feel like an airline stewardess. The funny thing I notice is that there are two types of people--those that engage with you easily, and those that avoid eye contact and actually do a flanking maneuver around my table to avoid interacting. The second group are the people who hate a hard sell. But they sometimes sneak back and shyly buy the book on their way out.

Bringing goodies. I always bring cookies and water with me to hand out. I don't know if that helps me sell books, but I'm a hit with kids and homeless people.

Being a trooper. I hate canceling things at the last minute. One time I was scheduled to do a signing, but I woke up that morning feeling sick, and getting sicker by the minute. Twenty minutes before the signing was supposed to start, I was sitting in the car with my husband, projectile vomiting into a plastic bag. The appearance went off flawlessly. I had a surge of adrenaline that magically suspended the illness for precisely one hour. The instant I got back into the car after the signing, I resumed vomiting, and continued do so, all the way to Urgent Care.

Maximizing family connections. I combine book tours with as much family interaction as possible. Fortunately, I have family spread all over the east and southeast, so I can combine book stops with mini-reunions. My husband is used to chugging along in my wake, and he tries not to fall asleep as I give the same talk or sign books. I suspect this year, however, he may chug off in search of a golf course while I'm doing my book thing.

Being zen about what you can't control. Things I can't control 1) the book retailing model, 2) the publishing business, 3) the fact that people who can't find my book in the bookstore, because they've sold out, wind up buying them at deep discounts online.

I just have to smile, show up, and keep on writing no matter what.

What about you? Are there any things you most like, dislike about pitching your book on the road?

Pets in the Media

Being a pet-person, I’m always watching for stories in the media relating to animals. Apparently, I’m not alone, since the papers and TV seem full of interesting stories nearly all the time--which I assume wouldn’t happen if the media people got feedback that no one was watching or listening.

A couple stories over the last few days really caught my attention. One was about the way the current housing crisis has harmed pets. That’s becoming old news, unfortunately. A lot of people whose homes are foreclosed on can no longer keep their beloved dogs and cats, and shelters are becoming full of these poor abandoned dears. That hurts enough. But in this particular story, the people who came to take charge of the foreclosed-upon home found that the family dog was still there--starving. Eating the walls, since there was nothing else. How horrible! I don’t understand how anyone could do that to their best friend.

Also, there’ve been stories about a woman who had her beloved pit bull cloned by an outfit in South Korea that’s affiliated with a cloning company in the U.S. She now has 5 pit bull puppies. She doesn’t have her home any longer, since she sold it to pay for the cloning; the process is very expensive, but presumably she’s gotten what she wanted. Maybe she’ll be able to sell her story for enough that she’ll have someplace to raise the pups.

My latest Kendra Ballantyne, Pet-Sitter mystery DOUBLE DOG DARE has a cloning theme, so I found that story of particular interest.

Have you seen or read any pet-related stories lately that especially caught your attention?


--Linda

THE WINNAH!!

We have a winner! The winner of two pounds of chicken-themed fabric did not even submit her name to me – it was submitted on her behalf by a woman I’ve heard from before. Her name is Noreen and she suggested I send my fabric to the flood victims of Iowa. (Actually, she wrote to say that Kaye England sent out an e-mail suggesting that.) So I sent the box to the person collecting it:
Jill Reicks
Pine Needles Sewing Center
1000 Old Marion Rd NE
Cedar Rapids, IA 52402

I could do worse than suggest my readers – those who find themselves threatened by an avalanche of fabric every time they enter their sewing room, and you know who you are – might consider thinning the herd, so to speak, and sending the result to Ms. Reicks. Or even just going through the shelves and/or drawers and pulling that length of gorgeous fabric you are ready to admit you’re not ever going to use and gladden the heart of someone who could use a little gladdening.

Thank you, Noreen! And thanks to everyone who sent an entry. If it weren’t for the obviousness of Noreen’s entry, I’d be in a real quandry deciding who the winner was. The entries were cheery and creative and plaintive and inspiring. It would have been extremely difficult to pick a winner. I am glad I didn’t offer second and third place prizes, because I’d still be arguing with myself over whom to place. I am pleased that so many of you thought to enter. Thank you so much. Happy stitching!

I am going to be in upstate Minnesota most of next week, staying in a cabin on the fringe of a state forest, researching a novel I hope to be writing in 2009. Working title: Buttons and Bones – I’ve talked about it a little on this blog. I will bring my laptop with me and will try to find an Internet connection to send a report to Killer Hobbies from up there. But places out of reach of the ‘Net are becoming truly rare, aren’t they? And that’s a good thing. Really. Isn’t it?

Beach boy

WELCOME TO OUR GUEST BLOGGER, Simon Wood

We All Fall Down came out slap bang in the middle of summer vacation season, so emails have been hitting my mailbox from readers recently. As with all my previous books, I can honestly say there’s a little bit of trepidation when I receive an email titled: I’ve read your book. Sounds innocuous enough, but a statement like that can be read a bunch of ways.

I’ve read your book…and I loved it. But it could also mean, I’ve read your book…and you should be looking over your shoulder for a long time because I know where you live, you son of a *&^%$.

Luckily the emails I’ve received have been the former and not the latter—and for those who think the latter, I’m armed, okay? So just back off, buddy.

So my ego has been fed over recent weeks with some very nice praise. One of the recurring themes has been along the lines of, “a great beach read.”

Hmm. A great beach read, eh? No one has mentioned anything about it being a future classic of literature or a life changing experience. It keeps picking up the beach and airplane tag. I mentioned this to a friend and they asked, “Aren’t you offended?”

The simple answer is no. I think it’s wonderful to be thought of as a beach or airplane read. I have no pretensions. I really mean it when I say I want to entertain the reader. I don’t have an agenda. I don’t want to educate. I want to provide a little escapism. I want someone to forget how cramped it is in economy and how much work is building on their desk while they veg out on the beach as they flip through the pages of my imagination.

If the book ends up as a dog-eared bundle of pages that spends the rest of its productive life as a doorstop, so be it. All I ask is that they’ll remember me the next time they hit the beach or board a plane.

Yours in your hand luggage,

Regards,
Simon Wood