I'm blown away by the fact that no passenger was killed in the Air France plane that crashed in Toronto. I've flown in thunderstorms and snowstorms. On one flight from Dallas to Shreveport, the lightning was so bad that I became a white-knuckled passenger--and I used to own my own plane!
Once in Denver, the snow was more like a blizzard. There was so much ice on the plane, I saw the ground crew knocking it off with the wood chocks. I had second thoughts about getting on that plane, but I'm still here to tell the tale.
I'm not even Catholic, but I felt like doing the "Pope thing" and kissing the ground when I got off those flights.
Of course I've also heard of plane crashes due to lightning or ice that makes me think my being here is kind of a miracle itself. Actually, when I think of all the things I've experienced first hand--anti-American riots in Japan complete with molotov cocktails, the Rapid City SD flood, a handful of Gulf Coast hurricanes, a couple of Texas tornadoes, a dozen or so typhoons when I lived in Japan, and a few other momentous events--I begin to wonder if maybe there is a reason I'm still hanging around.
In life, we all have a mission. I believe this. The trouble is we're sent here with sealed orders, and we spend a lifetime trying to discover what that mission is.
Sling Words out.
10 best smells in the world
Recently, I visited my local, friendly Office Depot for toner. Why friendly? Because so many fresh-faced, young people ask me if I need help finding anything that I'm tempted to make a micro cassette recording of, "no, thank you" and punch play when they start stalking me with their good intentions.
Down the center of the store were the back to school specials, and the smell of Crayons washed over me, whisking me back to all the years I'd participated in the annual rite known as shopping for school supplies.
Of the five senses, smell is particularly interesting. I wrote a romance novel Say Yes in which the heroine was a perfumer by trade. I found the research fascinating. I'm sure all of you have smelled something and immediately remembered something linked to that smell. I can catch a whiff of Estee Lauder Youth Dew and my mom's face pops into my brain. That was her signature perfume when I was a kid.
Of all our senses, smell is the most primitive and is hard-wired into our brain which accounts for the smell-memory connection. Pheromones, those "invisible" smells account for probably 99% of love at first sight.
So here's my list of the 10 best smells in the world not in any particular order.
1. A freshly bathed baby
2. Crayola crayons
3. Johnson baby powder
4. New mown grass
5. Old-fashioned roses in the garden
6. My mom's homemade mayhaw jelly cooking on the stove
7. Chanel No. 5 (Love that old movie Seven Year Itch where Marilyn Monroe says: "That's their highest number.")
8. Clean clothes drying on a clothesline in the sun
9. Really old, single malt Scotch
10. Baking bread
Down the center of the store were the back to school specials, and the smell of Crayons washed over me, whisking me back to all the years I'd participated in the annual rite known as shopping for school supplies.
Of the five senses, smell is particularly interesting. I wrote a romance novel Say Yes in which the heroine was a perfumer by trade. I found the research fascinating. I'm sure all of you have smelled something and immediately remembered something linked to that smell. I can catch a whiff of Estee Lauder Youth Dew and my mom's face pops into my brain. That was her signature perfume when I was a kid.
Of all our senses, smell is the most primitive and is hard-wired into our brain which accounts for the smell-memory connection. Pheromones, those "invisible" smells account for probably 99% of love at first sight.
So here's my list of the 10 best smells in the world not in any particular order.
1. A freshly bathed baby
2. Crayola crayons
3. Johnson baby powder
4. New mown grass
5. Old-fashioned roses in the garden
6. My mom's homemade mayhaw jelly cooking on the stove
7. Chanel No. 5 (Love that old movie Seven Year Itch where Marilyn Monroe says: "That's their highest number.")
8. Clean clothes drying on a clothesline in the sun
9. Really old, single malt Scotch
10. Baking bread
Nine missing days
Before I get to the capitivating way I spent July 23 thru July 31, let me say that tomorrow's blog will probably be more interesting. Wow, is that self-defeating or what? Telling you in advance to skip my riviting blog about the last nine days and just tune in tomorrow. {Picture me shrugging my shoulders.}
Next week I think I'll have another WAR STORY of a recently contracted first author.
Back to the 9 missing days. They just disappeared into some cosmic Bermuda Triangle because I swear I don't know where they went! I blogged on the 22nd, and here it is the 31st. So what did I do for nine days? Read, wrote, talked, visited, and a few other things.
Read:
If Angles Burn by S. L. Viehl (Get it!!)
How To Murder A Millionaire by Nancy Martin (old book but good)
the daily Houston Chronicle (looking for ideas)
Muscle Pain Relief in 90 Seconds (back acting up again)
Last Girl Dancing by Holly Lisle (Get it!)
last 6 issues of Romance Writers Report
research on law enforcement skills, protocols,
research on small town infrastructure
histories of several parishes in Louisiana
again Writer's Guide to Poisons
Howdunnit: How Crimes Are Committed
Wrote:
WIP
birthday and anniversary messages
notes on book to be started when this one finished
emails--too many to count unfortunately
Phone calls (doesn't include leaving voice mails):
Mom--3 times
DH--twice
daughter A--2 or 3
Mom--3
son M1--2
son M2--1
daughter-in-law--3
various irritating solicitors--1
lawyer--1
insurance agent--1
Housework:
not enough
Other things:
took lots of photos of different things--will be used on my web site in the months ahead--many of them on the MY TEXAS page.
went to San Antonio--nice place but HOT! Seems hotter than Houston for some reason, and the air quality was awful. Made me long for my inhaler. Smog reminded me of L.A.
That's about it. I'm outta here so I can meet with my web mistress MAE to start the monthly update of my web site.
Sling Words out.
Next week I think I'll have another WAR STORY of a recently contracted first author.
Back to the 9 missing days. They just disappeared into some cosmic Bermuda Triangle because I swear I don't know where they went! I blogged on the 22nd, and here it is the 31st. So what did I do for nine days? Read, wrote, talked, visited, and a few other things.
Read:
If Angles Burn by S. L. Viehl (Get it!!)
How To Murder A Millionaire by Nancy Martin (old book but good)
the daily Houston Chronicle (looking for ideas)
Muscle Pain Relief in 90 Seconds (back acting up again)
Last Girl Dancing by Holly Lisle (Get it!)
last 6 issues of Romance Writers Report
research on law enforcement skills, protocols,
research on small town infrastructure
histories of several parishes in Louisiana
again Writer's Guide to Poisons
Howdunnit: How Crimes Are Committed
Wrote:
WIP
birthday and anniversary messages
notes on book to be started when this one finished
emails--too many to count unfortunately
Phone calls (doesn't include leaving voice mails):
Mom--3 times
DH--twice
daughter A--2 or 3
Mom--3
son M1--2
son M2--1
daughter-in-law--3
various irritating solicitors--1
lawyer--1
insurance agent--1
Housework:
not enough
Other things:
took lots of photos of different things--will be used on my web site in the months ahead--many of them on the MY TEXAS page.
went to San Antonio--nice place but HOT! Seems hotter than Houston for some reason, and the air quality was awful. Made me long for my inhaler. Smog reminded me of L.A.
That's about it. I'm outta here so I can meet with my web mistress MAE to start the monthly update of my web site.
Sling Words out.
Universal pain
Yesterday I had my nails done and had another of those truth is stranger than fiction experiences. In writing, we are exhorted to find the universal truth--that which is true for all people regardless of race, religion, or national origin. One of those universal truths is the pain of betrayal.
For nearly three years, I've had the same young Vietnamese woman as my manicurist. I find it interesting that I'm one of the few people (meaning anglo and hispanic women) who patronize this salon who actually has conversations--other than, "How you? I'm fine. How are you?"-- with the Vietnamese women there. Maybe it's because I'm not uncomfortable around people who chatter in their own language--probably because I lived in Japan for so many years. I feel at ease with my manicurist and even can spot a few words I recognize in the flow of Vietnamese that characterizes a typical nail salon.
My manicurist (I'll call her Wanda) and I have an easy relatinship, and she has often confided in me and sometimes asked for clarification of our (meaning Americans) strange ways or English words or phrases. So I wasn't particularly shocked when she told me that her husband had left her.
I'd already noted that she looked awful--you know that glassy-eyed look from too much weeping? So I'd asked with a rather more serious tone than usual, "How are you today? Are you all right?"
In a salon crowded with a trio of giggling teenage girls, suburban wives, and half a dozen other nail specialists giving manicures and pedicures, Wanda shared her story. Because of the mask she wore, I could see only her pain-filled eyes. It was even worse than a story of a husband abandoning a wife and a four-year-old son. Wanda had found out that her husband probably wasn't even hers. His "real" wife had called Wanda to tell her to leave the woman's husband alone.
"I was number four," Wanda said, her voice choked with pain. (I honestly couldn't understand and didn't want to probe deeply about whether he had actually gone through a wedding ceremony with her or if she'd been the fourth girlfriend in a live-in relationship with the man.) She'd thought her husband worked off shore--several weeks out in the Gulf and a small amount of time at home. She'd discovered that he'd never worked off shore. Everything she thought she knew as truth was a lie. Now she's left to raise her son alone and try some day to explain to him who his father is and why he'd done what he'd done. Maybe one day she can even explain it to herself.
When she fell silent, I asked if she'd seen a lawyer to pursue him for child support. I already knew that probably she wouldn't do this. The Vietnamese community is assimilated into our culture in varying degrees. There are many who never go to the police when they have been victimized. They often don't seek the legal redress that we wouldn't hesitate to go after. Wanda said she couldn't do that. Her husband had disappeared. She fell silent.
When I was getting ready to leave, her gaze lifted to mine. With her eyes blinking rapidly to hold the tears at bay, in a low voice, she said, "I hope my son does not grow up to be like his father."
For nearly three years, I've had the same young Vietnamese woman as my manicurist. I find it interesting that I'm one of the few people (meaning anglo and hispanic women) who patronize this salon who actually has conversations--other than, "How you? I'm fine. How are you?"-- with the Vietnamese women there. Maybe it's because I'm not uncomfortable around people who chatter in their own language--probably because I lived in Japan for so many years. I feel at ease with my manicurist and even can spot a few words I recognize in the flow of Vietnamese that characterizes a typical nail salon.
My manicurist (I'll call her Wanda) and I have an easy relatinship, and she has often confided in me and sometimes asked for clarification of our (meaning Americans) strange ways or English words or phrases. So I wasn't particularly shocked when she told me that her husband had left her.
I'd already noted that she looked awful--you know that glassy-eyed look from too much weeping? So I'd asked with a rather more serious tone than usual, "How are you today? Are you all right?"
In a salon crowded with a trio of giggling teenage girls, suburban wives, and half a dozen other nail specialists giving manicures and pedicures, Wanda shared her story. Because of the mask she wore, I could see only her pain-filled eyes. It was even worse than a story of a husband abandoning a wife and a four-year-old son. Wanda had found out that her husband probably wasn't even hers. His "real" wife had called Wanda to tell her to leave the woman's husband alone.
"I was number four," Wanda said, her voice choked with pain. (I honestly couldn't understand and didn't want to probe deeply about whether he had actually gone through a wedding ceremony with her or if she'd been the fourth girlfriend in a live-in relationship with the man.) She'd thought her husband worked off shore--several weeks out in the Gulf and a small amount of time at home. She'd discovered that he'd never worked off shore. Everything she thought she knew as truth was a lie. Now she's left to raise her son alone and try some day to explain to him who his father is and why he'd done what he'd done. Maybe one day she can even explain it to herself.
When she fell silent, I asked if she'd seen a lawyer to pursue him for child support. I already knew that probably she wouldn't do this. The Vietnamese community is assimilated into our culture in varying degrees. There are many who never go to the police when they have been victimized. They often don't seek the legal redress that we wouldn't hesitate to go after. Wanda said she couldn't do that. Her husband had disappeared. She fell silent.
When I was getting ready to leave, her gaze lifted to mine. With her eyes blinking rapidly to hold the tears at bay, in a low voice, she said, "I hope my son does not grow up to be like his father."
Sex, Murder, and Mint Juleps
Okay, that's my new title for wip. How do you like it?
Primary song on my playlist for this manuscript is Sway by Pussy Cat Dolls. Why? Well, it's playful and sexy, characteristics of my heroine in the wip. And it makes me smile when I hear it which I hope readers do when they read Sex, Murder, and Mint Juleps.
I so agree with Paul Guyot, aka Ink Slinger, about playlists. It was such a relief to discover I'm not the only author who plays the same song endlessly.
Since getting this "new" computer, which came loaded with RealOne, a couple of years ago, I started making playlists. Last year when I returned to writing fiction after nearly four years of a massive, but well-paying, technical writing project I'd taken on, I decided to create a playlist for the manuscript I started writing. I discovered hearing the music I'd selected got me immediately "into" the story.
Now if I hear a particular song, I immediately think of writing a particular scene or manuscript. Kind of like when I hear Janis Joplin's Piece of My Heart, I can close my eyes and remember in detail the road trip I took many years ago, mostly driving at night, from San Francisco to L.A. in my new sports car with Janis wailing on the stereo.
Will post other songs in the playlist another time. Need to get writing.
Sling Words out. (Yeah, as someone commented in an email, that's what Ryan Seacrest says. No, I'm not a Seacrest groupie. I find him mostly annoying, but I guess he's paid well to be that way. I just like that signoff.)
Primary song on my playlist for this manuscript is Sway by Pussy Cat Dolls. Why? Well, it's playful and sexy, characteristics of my heroine in the wip. And it makes me smile when I hear it which I hope readers do when they read Sex, Murder, and Mint Juleps.
I so agree with Paul Guyot, aka Ink Slinger, about playlists. It was such a relief to discover I'm not the only author who plays the same song endlessly.
Since getting this "new" computer, which came loaded with RealOne, a couple of years ago, I started making playlists. Last year when I returned to writing fiction after nearly four years of a massive, but well-paying, technical writing project I'd taken on, I decided to create a playlist for the manuscript I started writing. I discovered hearing the music I'd selected got me immediately "into" the story.
Now if I hear a particular song, I immediately think of writing a particular scene or manuscript. Kind of like when I hear Janis Joplin's Piece of My Heart, I can close my eyes and remember in detail the road trip I took many years ago, mostly driving at night, from San Francisco to L.A. in my new sports car with Janis wailing on the stereo.
Will post other songs in the playlist another time. Need to get writing.
Sling Words out. (Yeah, as someone commented in an email, that's what Ryan Seacrest says. No, I'm not a Seacrest groupie. I find him mostly annoying, but I guess he's paid well to be that way. I just like that signoff.)
The siren call of the fictional world
Got Stevie Ray playing with Floodin' Down In Texas so appropriate as I watch the storm clouds roll by. I thought I was going to have to get the tranquilizer gun out when the power went off earlier today during the British Open. DH hit the panic button when he couldn't see what Tiger did on the 14th hole and the succeeding ones. Thought I was going to have to trank him, but, thankfully, the power came back on by the 17th hole. Tiger won, and all is right in my husband's golfing world. Thank goodness. I hate it when he sulks all Sunday afternoon because Tiger didn't rack up another win.
Bam! I'm getting ready to kick it up another notch and get my manuscript finished. Sure am having a lot of fun with the characters and the story. My brain is becoming more and more preoccupied with the fictional world I visit each day. Had thought I would take today off from writing, but I've been whittling on the log line for the story. I've had a log line for Eat, Drink, and Kill Mary, but on second draft, I've had some of those serendipitous things happen that make a writer laugh out loud with joy. So I have to change the log line, and I think I'm going to change the title too. Maybe. Still like my original title, but I've thought of one that is also good and maybe reflects the romantic comedy/chick lit tone of the mystery. After all, my roots are in romance.
Sling Words out.
Bam! I'm getting ready to kick it up another notch and get my manuscript finished. Sure am having a lot of fun with the characters and the story. My brain is becoming more and more preoccupied with the fictional world I visit each day. Had thought I would take today off from writing, but I've been whittling on the log line for the story. I've had a log line for Eat, Drink, and Kill Mary, but on second draft, I've had some of those serendipitous things happen that make a writer laugh out loud with joy. So I have to change the log line, and I think I'm going to change the title too. Maybe. Still like my original title, but I've thought of one that is also good and maybe reflects the romantic comedy/chick lit tone of the mystery. After all, my roots are in romance.
Sling Words out.
Sci Fi Friday is back!
I'll try not to be a total geek and rave too much about Stargate SG-1, Stargate Atlantis, and Battlestar Gallactica, but they're back!!! Finally, something interesting to watch this summer.
If you haven't discovered these three shows, shame on you. You're missing some great characters and action. My only regret is that Richard Dean Anderson won't be reprising his role as Jack O'Neil. Actor Ben Browder, the new leader of SG-1, is familiar to fans of Farscape, as is Claudia Black who was on tonight as the thief Valla.
I guess this respite will have to suffice until my other favorite action show 24 comes back to the small screen. Haven't seen anything on the big screen that interests me enough to spend an afternoon at the movies. {sigh}
Daughter and DH are out to snag the latest Harry Potter as soon as it's put on the shelf at one minute past midnight which is right about now. She spent the week re-reading all the previous Harry Potter books to ready her palatte for the new one.
If you haven't discovered these three shows, shame on you. You're missing some great characters and action. My only regret is that Richard Dean Anderson won't be reprising his role as Jack O'Neil. Actor Ben Browder, the new leader of SG-1, is familiar to fans of Farscape, as is Claudia Black who was on tonight as the thief Valla.
I guess this respite will have to suffice until my other favorite action show 24 comes back to the small screen. Haven't seen anything on the big screen that interests me enough to spend an afternoon at the movies. {sigh}
Daughter and DH are out to snag the latest Harry Potter as soon as it's put on the shelf at one minute past midnight which is right about now. She spent the week re-reading all the previous Harry Potter books to ready her palatte for the new one.
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