Category Archives: Uncategorized

I picked up a hitchhiker today.  What else could I do?  She was starving, dirty and lost.  She also fits in my hand and is covered in brown and black striped fur.

I was driving home from my day job, exiting the amazing amount of road construction in Marion.  I noticed something on the shoulder of the road, and it was so small that at first I thought it was just a piece of trash.  Then I noticed the piece of trash had four legs and a tail. 

By the time I realized that the thing on the side of the road was a kitten, I had gone too far past it.  I turned around at the next light, hoping I could get back in the westbound lanes before it was too late.  As I maneuvered my car through traffic, I knew I simply could not have another cat.  I also knew I simply could not leave it there on the highway, to combat four lanes of traffic all by itself.

I’m sure the drivers behind me were not pleased that I was going about five miles under the speed limit, searching hopefully for the kitten.  When I passed it this time, it was barely visible against the weeds on the side of the road. 

As soon as I got out of the car, I could hear it meowing pitifully.  It took a few steps toward me, and had absolutely no problem being picked up.  I looked around for more kittens or a mother, but found nothing.

The drive home was interesting.  Forty minutes in speeding traffic with a rambunctious kitten in the car does not a pleasant ride make.  On my lap, on my shoulder, on the passenger seat, exploring the console, and even sinking its little claws onto my Broncos steering wheel cover and trying to do the driving for me.

My boyfriend and I are big fans of rescuing animals. Three out of our four current pets were rescues.  Porkchop, a pug and beagle mix that had been left at a foreclosed home, is absolutely in love with our little foster kitten!  He stood guard next to her cardboard box for at least an hour after I brought her home, cocking his ears to all her little noises.  Elwood, my most recent cat rescue and up until now the baby of the household, is terrified of this little creature that is about an eighth his size.  He has spent a good deal of the evening in my lap, assuring himself that he is still loved just as much.

This poor little kitten (whom we believe to be a girl) can’t be more than six weeks old.  I am at capacity with my pets, so I would really like to find this baby a “furever” home.  Please contact me if you are interested.  And, as Bob Barker would say, please have your pet spayed or neutered.  There are enough homeless babies out there.

I just had the most awesome time in a cemetery!  I know that sounds very strange to most of you, so let me explain.  I have been preparing to release my latest book, Life, Death and Frank.  Like any other book, it needed a cover.  Since this is, in essence, a mystery story revolving around a ghost, much of the book takes place in a cemetery, so that seemed the only logical setting for a cover photo.

I grabbed my cover designer (Sydney, of Artistic Photography by Sydney) and headed to the cemetery near my house.  We got the right shot for the cover pretty quickly, but we didn’t turn around and head back to the car after that.  The particular graveyard we went to has a very interesting mixture of both new and old headstones, dating back to the early 1900’s.  It was remarkable to read them all and imagine what these people’s lives were like and how they might have ended.

I have often taken inspiration from the names on gravestones.  Last year I attended a funeral, during which I stumbled across the name that would inspire Life, Death and Frank.  The name haunted me; I felt like I needed to do something with it.  It rolled around in my head for a couple months, until I attended another funeral.  As I gazed across the cemetery during the services, I realized I could solve the mystery of what happened to this unknown person by writing his story myself.  My novella was born!

My trip this evening has not only given me a great cover shot, but also the last name for the main character in the new book I am working on.  As I came home with half the cemetery on the bottom of my feet (flip flops were not a good idea), I couldn’t wait to sit down and let the creativity flow.  Look for Life, Death and Frank coming soon!

They say, “Do what you love, and you will never work a day in your life.”  In researching this quote I found some conflicting information, but for the most part “they” appears to be Confucius.

I, however, am not so sure I agree.  I mean, I love to write, but there are certainly times when it feels like work.  The creative part of it is a bit of an adventure, and it’s not so bad.  But when I am sending out a manuscript submission, I can’t just write “Hey, check this out!” on a sticky note, slap it on a manuscript, and shove it in the mailbox.  When the kids are asleep and it is Time To Write, I sometimes find myself too tired to do as much as I would like.  If it wasn’t work, could I ever be too tired to do it?

In addition to writing, I have a day job in the financial sector.  I don’t really care for finance, and it most definitely feels like work.  So what’s the difference?

If you decide to Google Confucius’ quote for yourself, you will find several articles advising you not to do what you love.  They say (“they”, in this case, being business and financial experts) that you will be miserable and broke.  So should you do what you love and be miserable?  Or do what you hate and be miserable?

To me, it seems that the biggest delineation between the two is the willingness to do the work.  When I sit down to write, or send submissions, or order business cards, it is definitely work.  But I am more than happy to do it.  In fact, I am excited to do it.  Writing brings me more satisfaction and self-worth than any other job I have ever had.

So, while I concur with Confucius’ general idea, I think it should be amended a bit:

Do what you love, and you will want to work every day of your life.

Parents look at the world a little differently than the non-parents do.  Fingerprints on the storm door are just part of everyday life, everyone needs an afternoon snack, and the laundry will never (ever) be caught up.  Parenting also affects how we look at dining out.  Many people consider things like price, quality of food, and service.  As important as those things are, the one thing that I really look for when it comes to a restaurant is family-friendliness.  Here is a list of my favorite kid-kind joints:

• Buffalo Wild Wings – “BDubs” ranks very high on the list due to the noise factor.  This is not a sit-down-and-have-a-deep-conversation type of place.  The constant din is at full volume, so we don’t have to worry so much about the kids using their indoor voices.  They love the food (even though I find it just so-so) and with about a thousand TV’s they have no problem staying occupied.  It’s also not very expensive, which is nice when you have a family of five.
• 17th Street Bar and Grill – Not as noisy as Buffalo Wild Wings, but the kid’s meals come with a free scoop of ice cream.  I hate it when restaurants charge nearly as much for a kid’s meal as they do a regular entrée, and it’s barely big enough for a baby to eat.  The portions are relatively generous, and the kids were shocked when the waitress asked them what kind of ice cream they wanted.  17^th Street, unlike BDubs, has food that I like too, which is always nice.  The biggest bonus?  Every table has a roll of paper towels, so you never have to ask for more napkins.
• Chili’s – aka “The Big Pepper”, Chili’s has quite a bit going for it.  While it doesn’t quite get up to the crashing roar of Buffalo Wild Wings, it is still a pretty raucous place.  The kids get a choice of both entrée and side dish, and mommy gets a pomegranate margarita (as long as daddy is driving, of course).  I do have to consider that fancy electronic doodad on the table, the Ziosk.  You can pay for your meal whenever you like (a plus when we need to get the kids home and into bed) and can play games for a small fee (a potential plus, but we don’t use it for that most of the time).
• Garfield’s – The kids (and parents) can color on the table.  Do I really need to say more than that?

Ironically, one of my absolute least-favorite restaurants for the family is McDonald’s.  Yes, they have cheap food the kids like, but despite the apple slices in the Happy Meals it is just not healthy food.  Yes, many of them have a Playland, but I have actually had to venture inside one of them to rescue my wandering tot.  I could not take enough showers that night, and have been loath to let the kiddos play in that biohazard again.

Good luck and happy dining!

I decided to make taco soup for dinner tonight.  This had absolutely nothing to do with the fact that today is Cinco de Mayo.  It was my turn to cook, it sounded good, and I love my Bean Pot.  (By the way, if you don’t have a Bean Pot, contact your nearest Celebrating Home salesperson and order one.  Go on.  I’ll wait.)

Now then, I have a hard time understanding why Americans are so eager to celebrate Cinco de Mayo.  The only thing that it means to me is that the tortilla chip section at the grocery store has been ransacked.  So, I expect, has the tequila section at the liquor store, but I don’t have that information first hand.  And here’s a little chips-and-salsa for thought:  Many of us have gone out to the Mexican restaurants today.  Why make those people work when they are the ones that should be celebrating?  Yes, I understand that if they wanted to keep the restaurants open on May 5^th then it is their prerogative, but still.

Do people in Mexico celebrate the Fourth of July?  I don’t really know, and I am too tired this evening to look it up to be honest.  If they do, well then good for them I guess.  Who doesn’t like a few fireworks and some grilled hotdogs?

Ah, well.  In the end I guess it doesn’t really matter if we celebrate Mexican Independence Day, Boxing Day, or Mythical Magical Monster Monday.  Enjoy your Dos Equis!

All my life I have loved to read.  I hope that never changes. 

When I finish a book, I have a mourning period.  This isn’t anything I do on purpose, it just kind of happens.  I race to get to the end of the book, ecstatic to discover the ending and what happens to all the characters.  I giggle with glee as I add the title to my booklog.  (Yes, I really do keep track of all the books I read.  I am a nerd.  I can’t help it.)  I have an entire shelf of books waiting to be read, so availability is not a problem.  Eventually I do select the next lucky volume, and by the end of the first chapter I am no longer grieving for the last book.

Now I just have to hope the same goes for writing books.  Almost seven years ago, shortly after the birth of my first daughter, I wrote a children’s book called Simon’s Perfect Web.  That was the last thing I wrote for a long time.  I would like to say that this was such an awesome book that my mourning lasted that long, but that really isn’t the case. 

I have since turned Simon into an ebook, and have written a 17,000-word novelette that will seen be for sale as an ebook as well.  I can tell you I am very much in mourning over my novelette!  I was very attached to some of the characters, and even when I wasn’t actively writing I was plotting the storyline out in my head.  It all started with just one simple idea that I wasn’t sure how to use, and has morphed into an entire book.   And now, it’s over.  Just over.

I’ve had some other ideas for books here and there, and scribbled them down in my notebook.  I’ve been very distracted by sending submissions of Simon’s Perfect Web to publishers, figuring out how to launch a freelance business, and bisecting the basics of blogging.  I even actually sat down to start the next book the other night, but I just didn’t have my heart in it.

Surely this will end soon.  I will be able to cast of the veil of mourning and dash headlong and fancy free into the madness of writing again.  Meanwhile, I will stand by the notion that chocolate and Cherry Coke fixes anything, and head to the grocery store.

For those of you who follow my blog (and shame on you if you don’t!) you know that I recently whacked my mane for charitable reasons. 

I miss it.

Before my hair and I were separated, it spent a lot of time getting slammed in car doors, caught in drawers, and tangled in my glasses.  While this certainly sounds like a major difficulty that I ought to be glad I am rid of, short hair has its own complications.  Now that the weight of my hair is gone, it rearranges itself into wonky swirls and flips.  These are quite unattractive, and must be tackled with a serious flat-ironing session every morning.  No more wash-n-go for me!

I am still working on training my subconscious self to realize that there just isn’t as much hair there as it used to be.  When I’m in the shower, I find myself still using a rather large dollop of shampoo, even though I only need about a third as much now.  Not to mention I get many of my blog ideas in the shower, so the shorter hair severely cuts down on my creative time.  When I get home from work, I am in the habit of putting my hair in a ponytail to keep it out of the way while I clean the house/cook dinner/poke around on my computer.  Shorter hair renders this completely unnecessary, so I have to slap my own hand almost nightly when it reaches for a ponytail holder.

Faithful readers, don’t get me wrong.  I do not for one second regret the reason behind my brisk bob.  I am very glad to know that someone will benefit from my scalping.  Perhaps I just want to say that I hope they enjoy it, and maybe slam it in a car door occasionally to make it feel at home.

A few days ago I went to the hair salon and had most of my hair chopped off.  It had been down to about my waist, and is now shoulder length.  Part of the reason I did this was because it was just getting too long and difficult to manage.  Another reason is because I was ready for a change.  The biggest reason, though, was that it was just time to donate again.

The first time I donated my hair was in late 2008, while I was pregnant with my second daughter.  I don’t think I had a very good reason for doing it that time.  It was just what the hormones commanded of me.

Several months later, I went to my obstetrician for a routine 7-month ultrasound.  The ultrasounds were always one of the best parts about being pregnant.  There is nothing like seeing your child up on that big screen, moving around and growing inside of you.  There is nothing like being told that the ultrasound is abnormal.

The ultrasound tech and the doctor were not able to tell me much.  They explained that there was something “down past the spine”, and it had not been there in the ultrasound that was done a couple months prior.  I burst into tears, and my doctor held me while I cried.  I am still so grateful for that amazing gesture.

A few days later I found myself at the Center for Advanced Medicine in St. Louis.  A very lengthy and detailed ultrasound (which was rather uncomfortable given how pregnant I was at the time) revealed that Claire had a Sacrococcygeal Teratoma.  Basically this is a tumor on the tailbone. She would have to undergo surgery very shortly after birth to have the tumor and her tailbone removed.  The length of her hospital stay was unclear.  How well the lower part of her body would function was unclear.  The likelihood of the tumor being cancerous, however, was very small.

A follow-up ultrasound in St Louis showed that the tumor was growing rapidly.  The doctor sat down in his office with me, and explained that the “solution” for this was to deliver the baby via c-section.  This particular type of tumor has a very good blood supply, and he didn’t want to risk it hemorrhaging.   When I asked about the time frame, he said, “How about tomorrow?”

Claire was in the NICU at St. Louis Children’s Hospital for a total of two weeks.  She had her surgery at one week old.  I was so happy when they told me at the two week mark she could come home.  The worst was over.  Then the oncologist showed up.

There is a very bright side to this story.  Claire is going to turn 4 in May.  There have been many return visits to Children’s Hospital for tests and scans to make sure the tumor wasn’t coming back.  She did not have to undergo chemo or radiation.  I like to joke that Claire has spent enough time at the hospital that she has nearly completed her residency.  I can’t deny that it has been a long and difficult journey.  Last August her oncologist declared her a “normal kid”, and she now only has to go back for annual visits.  We celebrated with ice cream.

The point of all this, is that donating my hair now means so much more to me than just a change of pace.  Claire didn’t have to lose her hair, but I can’t help but think what it could have been like.  My baby was lucky.

(Please note:  Do yourself a favor and don’t look up Sacrococcygeal Teratomas online.  The images are not pretty, and the majority of them show cases that are far worse than what Claire had.)

WARNING:  The following blog post may contain spoilers.

I recently had the chance to see Oz: The Great and Powerful in 3D. This is only my second 3D movie, and I was pretty impressed with it.  While it would be a great movie even in normal-D, there are lots of scenes where the 3D actually seems worth the extra few dollars. By golly, if I have to wear those silly glasses there better be some stuff flying at my head.

I have very dear memories of the original The Wizard of Oz. My Grandma O’Melia did not have cable, so there was never much on in the way of kids’ shows when we would spend the night at her house.  She would pop in a VHS tape for us instead. These included Smurfs, The Busy World of Richard Scarry, and The Wizard of Oz.  It didn’t matter how many weekends we watched it, it never got old.

One thing that really kept me from getting excited about Oz:  The Great and Powerful was the simple fact that it stars James Franco.  I am just not a Franco fan.  He oozes the dirtbag vibe for me, and I didn’t see how that could fit into an Oz movie.  The funny thing is that the slimeball is exactly what they needed for this movie, and he was perfect!

Another part of the movie I was very happy with was how they tied so many things in with the original.   Some things were simply a part of set design and probably could not be avoided. The Land of Oz still has an Emerald City, the Yellow Brick Road, and a poppy field.  But there were also more subtle tributes to Wizard that really pleased me.  For instance, this movie also starts out in black and white, and isn’t in color until the characters are in Oz.  Also, Annie says John Gale has asked her to marry him, and so we know she must be Dorothy Gale’s mother.  The circus in the opening scene is the Baum Brothers Circus, saluting L. Frank Baum.  So even though the story line and many of the characters are completely different, we still know this is the prequel to the movie we know and love.

One aspect of Oz that sparked a debate at my post-movie lunch was the crossover characters.  In the original movie, Dorothy travels to Kansas only to find most of the people she knew back on the farm in Kansas.  At the end of the movie, she wakes up from her dream. This explains how the characters could be in both lands at the same time. 

In Oz, Oscar finds fewer crossover characters, but the ones he does find are very important ones. Annie in Kansas is Glinda in Oz, his assistant Frank is Finley the monkey, and the girl in the wheelchair is the China Girl.  This could just as easily be explained by a dream, but there is nothing to indicate that Oscar is dreaming at all.  He never wakes up and says, “And you were there, and you…”  In fact, at the end of the movie, Oscar is still in Oz.

All of this leads me to wonder, was Dorothy really dreaming? Or did she go to Oz after all? If she did, then how did the other characters get there?  Is Oz a real place that is altered by the perception of the visitor, and the people there look like those you are familiar with?  If Dorothy was dreaming, then wouldn’t that mean Oscar was dreaming as well?

Despite all of the new mysteries, Oz is definitely a movie I would recommend.  And spend the extra greens to see it in 3D. After all, when it comes to movies, we’re not in Kansas anymore.

Welcome to something absolutely incredible! Excitement! Adventure! Psychological balance!

Wait, what?  Perhaps I should explain.

We spend our entire young lives trying to figure out who we are. We experiment with different clothes, hair, groups of kids, everything.   I think the general idea is that by the time we get out of high school we have a pretty good notion of who we are and what we want out of life.  I remember one girl I went to school with. She said she was going to get married and have six kids.  I also remember thinking six kids was just way too freaking many.   But guess what? She is married and has six kids. 

I was only vaguely aware of what I wanted after high school.  I wanted a degree in biology, and then I was going to do something really cool and satisfying with it.  I had (and still have) no concrete idea of what that cool thing was.  But even though I didn’t have my life planned out to the minute, I felt that I knew who I was.  I knew what I liked and what I didn’t like, and what I would and wouldn’t do.   I would never get married before I finished school, and I certainly wouldn’t marry anybody that drank or smoked or bossed me around.

And guess what?

I married a guy that drank and smoked and bossed me around.  And during those six years that I spent with him, I completely forgot who I was.  I strived so hard to be who he wanted me to be, that I totally neglected anything that mattered to me.  I couldn’t tell you why I did this. I had always been a very strong-willed person before that, but it just melted away for the sake of “love”.

After my divorce, I felt completely lost. Not because I missed my ex (insert hearty laugh here) but because I didn’t know what to do with myself anymore.  I honestly didn’t know what I did and didn’t like, and what I would and wouldn’t do.  I won’t bore you with all the ins and outs of every little experience that helped me figure all this out again.  But this is what landed me here, with all the excitement and adventure and balance that I promised you. 

This blog is another piece of me that I forgot.  I LOVE to write! The first story I remember writing was about the Easter Bunny. I was probably about five years old, and I was so proud of myself.  I continued to write throughout school and into college, but once I got married, I quit.  At first I thought that I was finally happy, and therefore had no more inspiration to write.  I have since realized that was the most stupid misconception I ever could have had.  

A few months ago, a friend brought up my writing and suggested that I start submitting it for publishing again.  Much like the other realizations about myself that I have had over the last couple years , it was like a thump on the head.  I have since been sitting down with my laptop every evening and working on my craft. This, my friends, is why we are here, in my magical, mystical, exciting, adventurous place called my blog!  So welcome and enjoy!