Merry Christmas!

I hope everyone is having a wonderful day, whether you celebrate Christmas or not.

The grandbaby asked Santa for snow, and he delivered big time. It’s been snowing off and on for the last few days and it’s looking very Christmasy out there. Just perfect for snuggling under a blanket and watching some Christmas music videos.

I Believe In Father Christmas - Emerson, Lake, and Palmer



Drummer boy – David Bowie and Bing Crosby



TSO – Christmas Cannon



TSO – Wizards of Winter



TSO – Christmas Eve in Sarajevo

Almost There...

Christmas is just a couple of days away, which means it's time for me to start posting Christmas videos!

Today I'm including some of my favorite Christmas songs and Monday I'll be posting my all time favorites. :-D

I apologize in advance if this page takes a while to load, but I hope the videos are worth it.

Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas - Judy Garland


Winter Wonderland - Doris Day


Silent Night - Bing Crosby


Faith Hill – Where Are you Christmas


Carol of the Bells - Celtic Woman


Enya - Silent Night in Gaelic


Harry Belafonte - Mary's Boy Child

A Bit of Christmas Fun

I don’t know about you, but with all the Christmas madness going on I could use a little comic relief. And what better way to get a laugh than a parody. . . or two.

The poems I have for you today don’t really need an explanation, but I’ll give you one anyway. The first one I wrote yesterday morning (and posted on my author’s Facebook page). Let’s just say I was inspired. The second one I wrote about ten years ago, and is my version of A Visit From St. Nicholas.


O Furnace Guy
(to be sung to the tune of O Christmas Tree)

O furnace guy, O furnace guy
I really must apologize
O furnace guy, O furnace guy
I really must apologize
My basement it’s so messy
and maybe smells like kitty pee
O furnace guy, O furnace guy
I really must apologize

O furnace guy, O furnace guy
was that sneezing I just heard
O furnace guy, O furnace guy
was that sneezing I just heard
Did I not mention dry wall dust
or that my furnace is full of rust?
O furnace guy, O furnace guy
here’s some Kleenex, help yourself

O furnace guy, O furnace guy
you sure are taking your sweet time
O furnace guy, O furnace guy
you sure are taking your sweet time
I’ve got so much Christmas stuff to do
Like wrapping presents, baking too
O furnace guy, O furnace guy
At last you’re done, I wave bye-bye.


A Visit From the Computer Tech

’Twas the night before Christmas, and all through the house
Not a creature was stirring, just the optical mouse;
The cords were all strung to the PC with care
In hopes the technician soon would be there.
The children were nestled all snug in their beds,
While visions of interwebs danced in their heads;
The wife couldn’t take any more of this crap
So she went to bed while I took a nap.
When there on the screen there arose such a clatter
I sprang from the chair to see what was the matter.
Away to the keyboard I flew like a flash,
Grabbed up the mouse and gave it a bash.
The monitor gleamed with a brilliant blue glow
Seeming to mock me as I loudly moaned, “No!”
And what to my wondering eyes should appear
But a security warning that made my eyes tear.
With an attack on my drivers, so lively and quick,
I knew in a moment my computer was sick.
More rapid than eagles the popups they came,
And I whistled, and shouted, and called them by name;
“Now Trojan, now Wormy, now BankerFox vixen!
A technician’s coming, my computer he’s fixin’
By installing protection, a router, a wall!
And then he’ll delete you, delete one and all!”
And then, in a twinkling, as I thought to despair,
A van entered my driveway and parked with a flair.
I opened the door with a feeling profound,
And into the house came the tech with a bound.
He was dressed all in blue from his head to his toe
And his jacket was covered with a sprinkling of snow.
A box full of tools was grasped in his hand
And he looked like an angel, come down to land.
His eyes, they were bloodshot, his face was unshaven
From his pocket he pulled a business card graven.
He was balding and old, and he started to sneeze,
Then, spotting the cat said, “I’ve got allergies.”
The stump of a cigar he held tight in his teeth
And he caught his hat on the door, in the wreath.
A squint of his eye and a shake of his head
Soon gave me to know the bill I would dread.
He spoke not a word, but went straight to work,
And in a few moments pulled the plug with a jerk.
“The mother board’s fried,” he said, shaking his head.
“And the rest of your hard drive looks like it’s dead.”
Then he packed up the tower and picked up his tools
“Gotta watch these old ‘puters, they’re stubborn as mules.”
He walked to his van, my computer in hand
I had to admit, this did not go as planned.
And I heard him exclaim, ere he drove out of sight,
“Happy Christmas to all, but no more surfing to-night.”

All Kidding Aside...

Short Fiction - LOL
Long Fiction - LOL
Poetry - LOL
Total Words - Hahahaha
Paragraphs of Notes - None

Oh, come on now. Did you really believe I was going to make good on my vague pledge to get at least a few words in every day? Seriously, you should know by now that I’m the chief paver of good intentions leading to the road to Hell.

To be honest, last week is a bit of a blur. I remember my stomach being off for a few days which may, or may not, have been a brush with E. Coli. We finally got some snow. It got super cold and I got some cool pictures of the lake...

That’s the view from the pier from where my writing buddy and I parked in the summer time.

And I’m going to honest and tell you not to expect any words from me this week either. I do have a Christmas poem for Wednesday, which will be repeated on my other blog on Friday, but Friday will be Christmas videos, as will next Monday.

It took three trips to the post office, but I got all my Christmas parcels sent last week, and no, it was not as matter-of-fact as it sounds, but I’ll spare you the gruesome details. LOL And we knocked off just about all the remaining Christmas shopping on the weekend. I also managed to get all my baking supplies - well, all except green maraschino cherries.

Not shown are the extra dozen eggs, four bricks of margarine, and brick of butter. The boxes of cereal at the back are actually the hubby’s, for making nuts and bolts. And that big white bag? That’s flour. I had a brain fart in Costco and was seduced by their low price. Damn you Costco! That bag is 10 kg (about 20 lbs to you Americans). Any guesses what I’ll be doing this week instead of writing? Well, that and making the grandbaby her Christmas dress.

Here’s wishing you and yours a very Merry Christmas. And don’t forget, you have just one more week to get that Birdy Story finished. :-D

Fiction Friday Excerpt

The last few days have been really busy, plus I’ve been a little under the weather. I didn’t want to miss this post since I already missed my Wednesday post, so I’ll cut to the chase. This week’s excerpt pretty much follows last week’s. Our intrepid heroes have escaped the Children of Lavan and keep going.


Excerpt - Lost and Found

“I can’t believe we escaped,” Sara said, dropping her pack to the ground.

“I can’t believe we entered at the same spot we exited,” Nathan said. At her curious look, he added, “How else do you explain finding our packs again?”

“Nathan,” she said slowly. “You’re going to think I’m crazy, but I could swear that just when I thought the watchers were going to catch up to us, the Myste shifted and swept the closest ones away.”

He hesitated, then said, “I don’t think you’re crazy, I thought I saw the same thing too. And think it was like it...reached for us, bringing us to safety.”

“What do you think it means?”

He shook his head. “I have no idea.”

The grove they sheltered in had nothing more ominous in it than a family of rabbit like creatures who bounded off across the plain to a different grove. Small birds twittered and chirped in the trees, and the wind made a shushing sound in the long grass. Nathan and Sara finally felt able to relax.

The first thing they did was check the food situation. The bread and fruit Patience had supplied them with, what seemed like a lifetime ago, was no good and they tossed it aside. However there was still plenty of dried stuff, and cheese sealed up in wax. Their water bottles, unfortunately were nearly empty and they chose not to waste what little they had trying to stew anything. After feasting on one of the cheeses and some dried fruit, Sara changed from her gown into her own clothes and felt immeasurably better.

The sun began to lower in the sky and after building a small fire from twigs and broken branches they found scattered around, they sat close to one another and watched the sun set. It was spectacular, as though putting on a show just for them.

The night was warm, but not unpleasantly so, and they slept cuddled up to each other beside the fire. The sky remained clear, the weather pleasant, and the only insects were the ones heard in the grass or buzzing around the fire. There was the call of some kind of hunting beast, but it was far enough away that it didn’t worry them unduly.

“What do you think?” Nathan asked in the morning. “Should we stay here another night? Or keep moving?”

“I know you don’t believe the Children of Lavan have any experience travelling the Myste, but I think I’d feel better putting a couple more worlds between us. Besides, we’re getting low on water.”

The next world was a grassy plain stretching away in all directions. In one direction there was the faint outline of a mountain range, the opposite direction a glimmer of what could have been some large body of water, but it was too far away to warrant travelling to. Between the two were mile upon mile of waving grass.

Next they found themselves on a long, narrow peninsula. The crashing water was at least a hundred feet below them, with no way to get down to it. There were, however, fruit trees along the leeward side of the cliffs.

Nathan picked one of the fruits and his face lit up. “It’s pira fruit! Kelvin and I could practically eat our weight in it when it was in season back on Trellian.”

They were careful not to overdo it, not wanting to make themselves sick, but it made a welcome addition to their supplies. Sara also discovered a variety nut trees growing nearby, and after watching a group of squirrel like creatures to see which nuts they ate and which they rejected, she was able to gather a respectable amount, using a piece of her formerly white gown to carry them in.

“At least it turned out to be good for something,” she told Nathan with a grin.

After a day on the peninsula, the crashing waves became a little tedious, and they really didn’t want to have to swim for it if the Myste moved, so they moved on again.

This time they emerged from the Myste into a powerful storm. The wind took their breath away as they were lashed by a cold rain. They were thoroughly soaked in seconds. The rain made it hard to see - there was no lightning to light up the landscape.

“There,” Nathan said, shouting to make himself heard over the storm. He pulled Sara along with him towards whatever it was he’d seen.

It turned out to be a stand of trees, some kind of pine with branches that dipped down to the ground. Under other circumstances Sara would have protested taking shelter under a tree during a storm, but there was no thunder or lightning, and while it wasn’t completely dry underneath the fragrant branches, at least they were somewhat sheltered from the wind.

“Well,” she said. “You said to keep an eye out for water. Now all you have to do is find some way of collecting it.”

“We can just wring it out of our clothes,” Nathan said ruefully.

They spent an uneasy night in the meager shelter of the tree. The storm didn’t let up at all, in fact Sara was sure it was getting worse. All of a sudden there was a booming crash, then another, then another. They looked at each other.

“We’ve got to get out of here,” Nathan said.

The crashes were getting closer as they crawled out from under their protection. The rain was definitely coming down harder as they raced to the Myste, which fortunately had not moved during the night.

“Now this is more like it,” Sara said, when they emerged in a warm, pleasant, wooded area. The trees were a mixture of hardwood and softwood, diffused sunlight streaming down through their leaves. Flowers were growing freely on shrubs between the trees as well as coming up from the ground itself. There was the chorus of birds in the trees and only a hint of a breeze.

Believing Your Own Lies

Short Fiction - 0
Long Fiction - 0
Poetry - yes
Total Words -
Paragraphs of Notes - 5

I had every intention of getting some writing in last week, but all I have to show for my time is a bunch of emails, a few notes, and a hand-written poem. Well, that and a decorated Christmas tree and over half my Christmas shopping done.

What can I say? The spirit was willing but the body was just too darned worn out. And it didn’t help that last week was pretty grey and dismal (and windy!) for the most part. But no snow yet. They’re promising some for this week, and it’s certainly cold enough for it, but I’m not holding my breath.

I don’t know if anyone else who’s done NaNo has noticed, but once November is over and you can breathe a sigh of relief, suddenly Christmas is staring you right in the face. So all those good writing habits you’ve developed over the month fall by the wayside in the holiday rush.

Let’s face it, as much as we’d like to do everything, we just can’t. There are presents to buy, and wrap; trees and houses to decorate; baking to be done...and if you’ve got kids you’ve got them to deal with too. And let’s not forget all the social obligations the holidays bring.

Something’s gotta give, and unless you’re a full time writer who supports their family with their writing, writing’s usually the easiest thing to put off. There’s always tomorrow. Or next month. But the thing is, like most things the more you put it off the harder it is to get back into again. Last year I felt justified in ignoring my writing in December - after all, I’d just written a 50,000 word novel - but when January rolled around I found my pen had dried up. And the dry spell lasted for months.

The solution may seem obvious, just don’t stop writing, but for a lot of us it’s easier said than done. NaNo got us used to writing big blocks of words every day. Big blocks of time alone aren’t easy to find this time of year, unless you’re very, very lucky.

I propose we try for smaller blocks of time. Instead of an hour for writing, try 15 minutes. Instead of 1,000 words a day, try 100 and if you’re able to do more, so much the better. The thing is, even 100 words a day is still 100 more than you had before. And even 100 words a day will start to add up.

I do my serious writing sitting at my lap top, which is a little unhandy when it comes to just adding a few words here and there, so I carry a notebook and pen with me. I’ve written entire stories in notebooks, but I also write poetry or make notes to continue in a WIP. Some people are able to use their phones or a tablet to write on, and that’s great - five minutes here, five minutes there, and before you know it you’ve got your hundred words in.

The thing is, you want to at least keep a toe in the water. Don’t make the mistake of thinking you can keep putting it off for tomorrow, or next week, or after the holidays are over. Because once you start believing your own lies - justifying not writing - you’re going to have a real struggle to get back into the writing frame of mind.

Trust me, I know.

For Want of a Pen

So how’s everyone’s birdie story coming? I’ve got a couple of ideas so far, but nothing I’m ready to commit to paper yet.

One thing I’ve learned the Neo is not good for is writing poetry. I did some extra babysitting yesterday and part of it was during the grandbaby’s nap time, so I took a couple of notebooks with me that I’ve been using as workbooks for poetry, thinking to finish a couple of poems I started a while back. And it would have been a great idea...if I’d also remembered to take a pen or pencil with me. LOL

Ironically, I had pens and pencils with me the day before, even though I’d planned on working on my Neo, and a poem came to me. I wrote it out from start to finish at one go - sometimes poems come to me that way. All it needs is a little tweeking.

At any rate, seeing as poetry was out of the question, I figured I’d work on one of my WIPs on the Neo. I know I’ve only got one big scene left to go on my NaNo novel, but I couldn’t remember where I left off. Guess I'm already blocking it from my mind. LOL

So then I decided to work on Wandering Wizards. When I left them, my characters were getting ready to break out of the sanctuary they’d been hiding out in in one of the elven realms. But as I was typing, I got this feeling of deja vu. It was so strong that I stopped writing, and when I got home I checked and sure enough, I’d already written them out of the sanctuary and through the barrier.*sigh*

The lesson here is to keep the writing bag ready at all times. Right now I’m using a canvas bag, but I have a small leather backpack I’d like to start using instead. If I can find it. And get it cleaned up.

At any rate, for today’s Fiction Friday excerpt I’m going with another one from Lost and Found, my NaNo novel. This scene takes place shortly after the last one I posted. Nathan and Sara contracted some sort of illness during their stay in the tropical paradise, and ended up being nursed back to health by the Children of Lavan, a religious community.


Excerpt: Lost and Found

Though the women were kind, and she was grateful for the care they’d given her, there was something off-putting about being here. Maybe it was all that white - white walls, white bedding, white clothes - she’d been given a white robe like the others to wear and while it was comfortable enough it wouldn’t have been her first choice. Or maybe it was all the religious talk and they way they deferred all their decisions to the men in charge. All except the skinny old bat who’d lectured her about it being unseemly to keep asking after a man. To which Sara had replied if they’d just tell her what was happening to Nathan then she wouldn’t have to keep asking after him.

All they’d tell her is that he was recovering as well and soon they’d both be well enough to contribute to the good of the community in the name of Lavan, praise be his name. She didn’t like the sound of that one bit. She had the sinking feeling they’d stumbled across some kind of cult or religious commune. Either one of them spelled trouble for getting away.

Feeling particularly sullen, she was in no mood to return Constance’s cheerful greeting when the woman turned up unexpectedly. Constance had been assigned to watch over her while she was recuperating, and as soon as she was able to sit up for longer periods of time, began to instruct her on the Way of Lavan. Lavan had some pretty outdated ideas on what was proper behavior for men and women and Sara wanted nothing to do with it. But they were trapped here for now and all she could do was to try and make the best of it.

Constance surprised her by bringing her a bowl of warm, fragrant water and a towel and washcloth.

“What’s the occasion?” Sara asked, just the tiniest bit afraid of the answer.

“The Staff and Chalice have given permission for you to have visitations with your pledge-mate.”

“My what?”

“The one to whom you are pledged to complete your journey to Lavan with as one.”

Sara felt a chill of fear. This didn’t sound good at all. “I don’t--“

“No, that is not the term I was told he used,” Constance said. “Now what was it he called it?” She paused in the act of brushing Sara’s hair. “Betrothed. That was what he called it.”

“Betr-Nathan? I’m going to be allowed to see Nathan?”

“This betrothal is similar in nature to our claim-pledge. So yes, you will be permitted to spend one hour every second day in each other’s company. Supervised of course.”

“Of course,” Sara echoed.

“You will wish to freshen up first, of course. There is no call to be frightening him away before you are duly wed.”

Impatiently Sara let Constance fuss over her, then she was led down the hall to a small sitting room. There was a table with two chairs and a window overlooking a walled garden. Constance took a position just inside the room to the right of the doorway.

After a few interminable minutes, Sara heard footsteps approaching. A young man dressed in unbleached cotton trousers and a pullover shirt entered first. He darted a glance at Constance and quickly looked away, moving to take a position on the left side of the doorway.

Right behind him was, “Nathan!”

Sara practically threw herself into his arms.”I’ve never been so glad to see someone in all my life!” she said against his chest. His arms around her, holding her tightly, was the best feeling in the world.

“No physical contact,” the man admonished.

Sara looked over at him, about to tell him off and good, but a slight shake of Nathan’s head stopped her.

“Sorry,” Nathan said. “We are not used to being parted.”

“It is Lavan’s will,” Constance said gently. “It is something you will have to get used to.”

Not if she could help it, Sara vowed.

Blackout Poetry

I’ve known about blackout poetry for a few years, but for some reason I never got around to trying it.

When I first considered it for the form of the month I thought it would be really easy, maybe even a little fun. Basically, to do a blackout poem you take a page of prose, pick out a few key words, and then black everything else out.

With the holiday season closing in fast, I decided to use a page from one of my favourite Christmas stories, the Gift of the Magi, by O. Henry. I actually started out with two pages. The first page I used a yellow highlighter to highlight words that caught my eye. Then I reversed it on the second page, blacking out everything but the words I highlighted on the first page. And this is what I came up with:

It wasn’t as easy as I thought it would be, especially the blacking out part. I went through seven copies before I got it right. LOL

Meanwhile, here’s another couple of examples of what you can do with blackout poetry:

Smore - Blackout Poetry Challenge

Scholastic Blackout Poetry

For more examples and a better explanation, check these links:

Power Poetry  - 5 Tips For Creating Blackout Poetry
Medium - Creative Deconstruction For Writers: How to Write a Blackout Poem

Aftermath

Short Fiction - 0
Long Fiction - 17,000 +
Poetry - 0
Total Words -
Paragraphs of Notes - 7

Well, NaNo is well and truly over and things should be getting back to normal right? Ha! That’s what you think. Christmas is coming and that’s a whole other kind of stress.

Normal would be keeping up the good writing habits I was starting to develop: an hour before babysitting, an hour during, and an hour after. Wednesdays and Fridays I don’t get the free hour before babysitting, but Fridays I get extra time during. And I was also writing up at storm in the evenings.

Normal would also include the good habit of doing more writing on my Neo. I’m not kidding when I say I write better and faster on it. I never realized how easily I was getting distracted when using my lap top. But think about it, the Neo can only be used for writing. The lap top can be used for all kinds of things, including socializing, game playing, and surfing.

However, as good as that sounds on paper, the proof, as they say, will be in the pudding. It’s one thing to keep to that kind of strict schedule when I’ve got the deadline of NaNoWriMo looming over me, it’s a whole other story now that the pressure is off.

Take this morning, for instance. Here I am getting this blog post finished instead of working on a WIP. And I’m doing it on my laptop. And before I buckled down to work I checked not only my email, but Facebook as well. And started playing Letter Garden before stopping myself. Yup, off to a good start.

While I’d like to promise I’ll do better, realistically, as I sit here all tired and headachy looking out at another overcast day, all I can promise is that I’ll try. And who am I promising anyway? Myself, that’s who.

I can promise that the blog posting will be returning to something near normal. I got this month’s picture prompt posted on the weekend and the results will be posted at the end of the month. And this being the first Wednesday coming up, I’ll not only be posting a poem on Wednesday, I’ll be sharing a form.

At some point I’ll start to post Christmas music videos - I’m kind of thinking starting next weekend and replacing the poems with them for the holiday season. Or maybe I’ll pick a different day and then after the holidays I’ll replace the Christmas music with just regular music videos.

Meanwhile, I have Christmas crafts to make, cookies to bake, and decorating to do. This is also the time of year I start thinking about the year ahead and changes I want to make.

How about you? All set for the holidays? Santa Claus is coming you know. ;-)

Prompt Me - Birdies

As promised, I’m here with my picture prompt for the month of December.

Is that happy enough for you Catherine? Little birdies sitting on a string of Christmas balls. Are they someone’s pets, trained to sit there? Did they sneak in from outdoors to get in from the cold? Inquiring minds want to know.

The challenge is to come up with something creative inspired by the above picture - a story, a poem, or even a non-fiction article. I'd love to see what you come up with, and if you send it to me at carolrward(at)gmail(dot)com by Thursday, December 28, I'll post it here on the 29th. Please try to keep it to 1,000 words or less and if I get more pieces than will fit comfortably in a single blog post, I'll post them over a couple of days.

Even with the holidays coming up I’m sure you’ll be able to find the time to come up with something. Can’t wait to see it!

NaNo For the Win!

I know that this is the first Friday of the month and normally it’s the day I post a picture prompt for you to work on, but seeing as it’s the day after NaNo ended I thought I’d do my recap for it today along with a final excerpt. I promise to post the prompt picture tomorrow.

On Monday I was 14,000 words behind in my NaNo novel. So I tell you true, no one is more surprised than me that I won NaNo. And with 3,000 words to spare.

To further boggle the mind, that means I wrote 17,000 words in four days. SEVENTEEN THOUSAND!

So how did I do it?

Well, first of all, the weather turned sunny. I’ve always said I was solar powered, and the week before was insanely gloomy. Monday dawned bright and sunny and it’s crazy what kind of difference it made to my energy level.

The second thing was, I stopped fighting my imagination. I stopped following the notes I’d made when I first came up with the story idea and gave my imagination free reign. This landed my characters in a few unexpected situations, like getting sick at the same time and being nursed back to health by a religious cult they then had to escape from. That alone spanned several chapters.

And the third thing was the one I mentioned in my Monday post - I wrote exclusively on my Neo. No bells, no whistles, just words. For some reason I tend to type faster on my Neo - maybe because writing is all it’s good for. I don’t really care. I just care that I pulled off a writing miracle.

So...what’s next? Well, I’m going to continue using my Neo and finish the novel. My characters are about to have a run-in with a group of Amazons, and once that’s over all that’s left is getting them home. I have no idea how many words that’s going to take - I thought the religious cult thing was only going to be a few thousand words and it was over ten. The Amazon encounter is even more intense.

After Lost and Found is finished, it’s nose to the grind stone until Wandering Wizards is done. Maybe I can pretend it’s another NaNo. :-D

In the meantime, here’s the final excerpt from my NaNo novel. The dream Sara is referring to is a recurring one she had near the beginning when she dozes off waiting for her friend Hannah to phone her to let her know she made it home safely. And it’s just after this scene that Sara and Nathan become ill and end up in the hands of the above-mentioned cult.


Excerpt, Lost and Found:

They finished eating and were just making up their bed over the mound of palm fronds when Sara happened to glance towards the shore. Letting out a gasp, she straightened up.

“What is it?” Nathan asked.

But Sara ignored him, and walked towards the shore. She stood mesmerized on the sand, the light breeze caressing her bare shoulders. As she felt him come up behind her, she spoke. “I know this place. I’ve dreamed of this place.” She turned to face him. “I’ve dreamed of you in this place.”

“How is this possible?”

“I don’t know. But I dreamed that I stood watching a sunset, just like this one, on a beach of white sand, like this one. I could feel the same perfumed breeze on my skin. And...and I realized I wasn’t alone, you were with me. I mean, it was you, but I didn’t know it was you.”

“And then what happened?”

“And that’s when I usually woke up,” she said, turning away to stare at the sun as it dropped below the cliff until only a brilliant glow remained.

He wrapped his arms around her from behind, pulling her close. “It sounds like a wonderful dream.”

They stood for a while, watching the glow disappear from behind the curve of the bay. The only sounds were the waves lapping gently on the shore and the slight breeze rattling the palm fronds.

“Look, there’s two moons,” she whispered.

One was the color of butter, the other a pale blue. They both hung low in the sky, overlapping each other.

“Can’t get much more romantic than that,” he whispered back, his breath hot on her neck.

She turned in his arms and he kissed her softly. It wasn’t nearly enough. Fueled by her memories of the dream, she pressed herself closer. Without breaking the kiss, he scooped her up in his arms and carried her back towards their nest. Halfway there, Sara jerked in his arms.

“Ow!” she said, slapping her arm.

“What--ow!” He let her slide to her feet so he could slap at his upper thigh. “Damn!”

For the next few minutes all they could do was curse and slap as they were stung over and over again.

“The water!” Sara gasped, sprinting for the shore, Nathan hot on her heels.

They waved their arms over their heads as the swarms followed and regardless of how dark it was they dove right in. Several yards from shore they were forced to come up for air, but the insects didn’t seem to have followed.

“What the hell was that?” Nathan asked, bewildered.

“They certainly weren’t in my dream,” Sara said, treading water beside him.

Back in the jungle they could hear the birds come to life, screeching and squawking.

“Well at least we know what the rest of the birds live on.”

The light from the moons was bright enough they could see the swarms of insects cutting great swaths of black along the shore. Then the birds descended on them, feasting on the wing.

“Please tell me we won’t have to stay in the water all night,” she said after they’d been watching for a while.

They moved closer to the shore until they were able to stand, neck deep in the water, ready to duck down any second.

“I hope not,” Nathan said. “This water doesn’t feel nearly as warm as it did earlier. I don’t suppose your survival training included how to ward off attacks by flying insects that bite?”

“I’ve had to deal with swarms of mosquitoes before,” Sara told him. “They’re kind of like these but not quite as vicious. But normally they’re most active during dusk or dawn, sometimes during the day, not in full dark.”

“So what do you do to repel them?”

She gave a short laugh. “Insect repellent. Lavender, garlic, apple cider vinegar, citronella candles - none of which we have. One of the counselors at a summer camp Hannah and I went to swore by smoky fires. Of course that would mean one of us would have to leave this rapidly chilling water, go up onto the beach, start a fire, and then find some greenery to throw on it to make it smoky. All without getting stung to death.”

“I think I’d rather take my chances in the water,” Nathan said.

Down to the Wire

Short Fiction - 0
Long Fiction - a lot
Poetry - 0
Total Words -
Paragraphs of Notes - 0

I have really, really been struggling with this NaNo. As you might have guessed by the lack of posting last Monday. Had I a lick of sense I would have quit while I was ahead and moved on to something else. I did that one year, seven days and 10,000 words in and I went with a totally different story and still won.

It’s not that I don’t like my story, I just have zero interest in working on it. Last Monday I was a mere 6,000 words behind, today I’m...uh... something like 13,700 behind. Which was better than it was going into the weekend when I was close to 20,000 behind.

I have to admit, when I decided to do NaNo this year I did not anticipate the toll babysitting has been taking on me. It’s not just the time spent babysitting, it’s the fact that the grandbaby is an energy vampire. A few hours with her and I’m exhausted. Plus there’s been some extra babysitting thrown in for good measure.

So between the lack of interest and the babysitting, there’s a very good chance I won’t finish NaNo on time this year. First year since my first time that I’ll be participating and not finishing.

If I do finish on time, it’ll be thanks to the writer’s best friend, my Alphasmart Neo. Saturday I sat in my office for about seven hours working on my lap top and only managed a measly 888 words. Then I switched to my Neo and did close to 600 more in just a couple of hours.

Yesterday I sat in the living room for a couple hours here, a couple hours there, and wrote just over 4,000 words. Kinda wished I’d been working on the Neo exclusively Saturday too.

The reason I write faster on the Neo is there are no distractions, no bells and whistles, just words. At the end of the day I just sit back, plug my Neo into my lap top, and watch the words appear in a Word document file. Can’t get much simpler than that, and when it comes to writing, simple is better.

So keep your eye on the little widget on the right. 3500 words a day to finish isn’t too much to ask, is it?

And do yourself a favour, go to ebay and buy yourself a Neo - they stopped making them a few years ago so the only way you can get one is used.

Alphasmart Neo. Don’t do NaNo without one.

Oh, No, What Happened to My NaNo?

I’m gonna be honest here, it’s not looking good for me to finish NaNoWriMo on time. I have seven days to write 20,000 words. And given that all I’ve been able to manage during the week is 500 a day.... Well, I still have the weekend ahead, and I’ve been known to pull a few miracles off in the name of NaNo in the past, so I guess we’ll just have to see.

The thing is, I’m just not feeling it with this novel. I like the characters and it’s not a bad story, I just don’t feel like writing it. At some point, when I feel ready to move forward with this series, I’ll have to sit down and create a guide to the Myste, which plays a major part in the whole story line. But for now all I can do is make it up as I go along.

So for this week’s excerpt, I give you Nathan trying to explain to Sara about the Myste that’s surrounding them:

Excerpt

“Time doesn’t work the same when you pass through the Myste.”

Sara finally reached her limit. “All right, you’ve pussy-footed around the subject long enough. Tell my about this...Myste.”

He took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “There’s been debate for centuries over whether the Myste is naturally occurring or it was somehow created. It spans both time and space. Some worlds it only touches temporarily, some worlds have permanent access points to it. As near as I can figure, you and your friend Hannah entered the Myste through a temporary access point and it was only through sheer luck that you entered at different times but ended up in the same place.”

As she tried to process this, he tried a different tact. “When Madalyn was explaining the Myste to Hannah she asked if there were any stories where you come from of people who have been lost in the fog and when they’re found only hours or days have passed for them but years have passed for those left behind?”

“Sure, Irish folklore is filled with stories of people who’ve stepped into the land of fairy.”

“Only it’s not a fairy tale, it’s real.”

She stared at him, eyes narrowed, and he continued. “Islands like this can be found in the Myste, but are not part of the Myste itself. They’re like sanctuaries. One of the reasons for the expedition was to try and map the islands - I have no idea why, unless it’s to make it easier to travel from world to world. Right now it takes special equipment to make this possible, and even then it’s chancy at best.”

“Why would it be chancy?” Sara asked, in spite of herself. “I mean, other than the generally poor visibility. If this Myste spans worlds, like you say, I’d think people would be lining up to go world hopping.”

“Just being in the Myste is dangerous - breathing it in can cause lung damage, and if it changes colour even a breather won’t help you. *this would be a really good place for the Myste poem that I will have to re-write*

“We were breathing the Myste in,” Sara pointed out. “But we seem to be okay.”

He sighed heavily. “Look, I know you have no reason to believe me but I have no reason to lie to you.”

They stared at each other for a few moments and then turned away to watch the Myste.

“I probably wouldn’t believe me either,” Nathan admitted.

“Are we safe here?” she asked with a shiver.

“I don’t know,” he said. “Probably.”

“That’s not very reassuring.”

“No, but at least it’s honest.” He hesitated, then said, “We need to figure out what we’re going to do.”

“Do? Isn’t that obvious?” Sara asked, a little surprised. “We need to go back the way we came. Or better yet, we go to wherever the others went and then Hannah and I can go home together.”

Nathan drew back and looked at her askance. “You can’t seriously think it’s that simple! Haven’t you been listening to me?” He got up and began to pace. “Getting back to your world is impossible - the access point you passed through was temporary.”

Sara felt her first real chill of fear. “Then I guess we go back to where you came from. Surely there’s someone there who can–”

He was already shaking his head. “That’s really a long shot at best. We–”

“Then we just wait here to be rescued,” she said a little desperately. “Someone will have to come back for the equipment at least right?”

“Sara.” Nathan stopped pacing and came back over to the bench. Sitting down again he took her hands in his. “I’m not going to sugar coat this. The chances of anyone coming back here before we run out of food and water are pretty slim. We’re going to have to take our chances out there.” He waved a hand towards the Myste.

Back on Track

And by back on track I mean I’m behind by about 5,000 words. LOL

But never fear, the weekend is soon to be upon us and I have no doubt I’ll be able to make up at least a few of those words.

So last week’s excerpt was the first meeting of my main characters Nathan and Sara, this one is kind of a continuation of that.


Excerpt

They were surrounded by dense whiteness. It was like walking in the center of a cloud. No up or down, no beginning and no end. It was like they were weightless. An intense feeling of vertigo washed over her and Sara stumbled, nearly dropping her hold on Nathan. He was leaning more and more of his weight on her. If he passed out completely she didn’t know what she’d do.

Time started to lose all meaning. It felt like they’d been scuffling along for hours, even though it was probably only minutes. And was it just her imagination or was it getting lighter up ahead? No, not lighter but the fog was definitely thinning.

“Come on, Nathan, we’re almost out of it.”

It was just barely possible to make out the shapes of trees and brush now. The fog eddied and swirled and soon parted to reveal a path. The path itself was even more frightening than the fog. It was a dirt track, strewn with rubble, cutting a path through the gloom. She and Hannah had walked to town from the house many times and she knew for a fact there was no path like it anywhere around here. So where were they? Had she somehow taken a wrong turn? It just didn’t seem possible.

Sara shivered without realizing it. Her mind kept insisting the fog wasn’t natural. It flowed just beyond the path as though there was an invisible wall keeping it at bay. Where were they? Certainly not in the woods near the causeway. What was happening? Maybe she took a blow to the head when she hit the brakes in her car.

“Left,” Nathan whispered. “The camp.”

Okay, don’t let the fear become paralyzing. She tightened her grip on her victim and they staggered off to the left, following the path. Sara grew more afraid with every passing moment. She kept expecting the fog to break through the invisible barrier and consume them. They’d be lost forever. But the question that kept tormenting her was, where were they?

Just when her own strength began to fail the path opened up into a clearing. There were several tents and a couple of long tables, and every sign that people had been here, but the camp was deserted. Sara dragged Nathan to the nearest tent and eased him down on the cot inside. He never made a sound and she sank to the floor to rest. After several minutes she caught her breath and turned around to get her first good look at Nathan.

“Oh, my!” She all but licked her lips in appreciation.

She estimated he’d top her by several inches when he was standing, instead of leaning on her. His smooth skin was a golden bronze and he wore his jet black hair long, braided in hundreds of tiny braids. High cheekbones graced a strong face and dark lashes swept down from his closed eyes.

“Okay, get a grip girl,” she muttered. “You’ve seen gorgeous men before.”

He didn’t look badly hurt, from what she could tell he looked in damn fine shape. She noticed a smear of blood and gently ran her hands along the sides of his head. Lifting his head slightly she felt the back of it and her hand came away bloody. She frowned. If she didn’t know better, she’d say he’d been hit on the back of the head with something. There was no way she could have done that with her car.

Sara sat back on her heels. Now what? She really should see if there was something she could do for his head wound, but she suddenly felt exhausted. There was another cot in the tent and she sank down onto it gratefully. Maybe all she needed was a good night’s sleep and when she woke in the morning she’d discover this had all been a product of too many margaritas and too much raw cookie dough afterwards.

Just Nanoing Along

Short Fiction - 0
Long Fiction - 9397
Poetry - 0
Total Words -
Paragraphs of Notes - 3

Last week’s total included 1600 words I’d written on Wandering Wizards, but this week’s total is all NaNo words. For those of you keeping track, I’m about 3,000 words behind at this point, which really isn’t bad. While I have every confidence I’ll be able to catch up, I’m not going to stress about it if I don’t.

I’m very close to being able to work at my new desk in my reclaimed office. There’s still several boxes scattered around, but they’re mostly empty. Well, except for the stack in the corner that’s waiting for a trip to one of the thrift stores.

One of the most time-consuming parts of working in the office last week was trying to figure out what stuff goes in what drawer of the desk. If I thought figuring out what files to keep close was bad, it was nothing compared to all my little stuff - pens, paperclips, knick knacks, markers, USB keys, and all the other myriad things I kept in my desk drawers and the upper drawers in my filing cabinets.

Which reminds me...I think I’m still missing a box of “stuff” that needs to be relocated. Specifically, the stuff that was in the bottom drawer of my other desk - a bunch of fancy notebooks and stacks of CDs and DVDs. And didn’t I have a small first aid kit in one of the drawers? Nuts! Guess I’d better take another look around.

Despite ending up with more drawer space, it was still hard to decide what should go in what drawer. Two of the drawers have lift out inserts - one that’s easy to get at, one a little more difficult. So then there was the question of what should go in the upper part and what goes in the lower. And you want to be logical about it so you can find stuff again.

I guess this is something that will be ongoing for awhile. The main thing is to get my desk cleared off so I can use it. And find a new chair to sit in. I was using the secretary’s chair that the hubby was using, but it’s old and squeeky and way too low (you can adjust it, but it will slowly sink down again). So I swapped it for the executive chair from the other room and it’s really too big. Just like Goldilocks, I need one that’s just right. :-D

So...which do you think I’ll finish first? My NaNo novel or the Great Office Shuffle?

Place your bets now.

NaNo Madness!

Well, I’ve got ten days of NaNo under my belt and much to my great surprise I’m only a little off track. Be still my heart! And I only really fell behind last night, but if you knew the kind of day I had yesterday you’d understand. My luck wasn’t just bad, it was abysmal!

But enough of that.

Remember how I said how quickly some people are able to finish the NaNo challenge? Congratulations to C.L. Hannah (aka Kittster), whose had a couple of stories featured here. Not only has she already completed 50,000 words, she’s still going. At the typing at this post, her word count is 54,357 and she’s still going strong.

Wow. I was scrolling back through my last few weeks’ worth of posts and I realize that with all my talk about NaNoWriMo, apparently I haven’t really talked about my novel for this year. My very first NaNo novel was finished at 35,000 words. But while I didn’t complete the challenge with it, it did spawn ideas for two sequels and one prequel. My novel this year is the first sequel.

I got the idea for the original novel, Driving Into Forever, one day when I was driving to pick my daughter up from Queen’s University in Kingston. Despite it being February, there was a heavy fog. I LOVE driving in the fog, it’s like driving into forever (hence the title), and I started thinking, what if the fog was a gateway to another dimension? In my novel, the fog became the Myste, a phenomena that spanned space and time and many worlds. My main character, Hannah, unknowingly entered the Myste and there her adventures began.

She left her best friend Sara behind, and I decided Sara deserved a story of her own. Seeing as Hannah found romance, it was only logical that Sara find it too, and who better to hook her up with than Nathaniel, another minor character who disappears partway through the first book?

Turns out that Sara is a worrier. So when a significant amount of time passes and she doesn’t get a phone call from Hannah telling her she got home safely, she sets off to find her. What she finds instead is Nathaniel, who had met with foul play in the Myste.

Excerpt from Lost and Found

The fog began to thicken as Sara turned off the highway onto the road that wound through the woods to the causeway. Unlike Hannah, she’d never liked being out in the fog, it creeped her out. It was at times like this she appreciated her Cadillac El Dorado. It may be a gas guzzler but it would stand up to anything the fog could throw at her.

She could barely see the road but she was afraid to slow down, you never knew what might be lurking in the fog. Every horror movie Sara had ever seen flashed through her mind. The road was in good repair and she’d been down it often enough to be familiar with it. It led pretty much straight to the causeway, which lead straight to the island Hannah lived on. It was probably just an illusion because of the fog, but it seemed to go on forever.

A dark shape loomed up suddenly in front of her. “Holy crap!” Sara slammed on the brakes and yanked the steering wheel hard to the right. The big car jerked to a halt and she sat there, clutching the steering wheel and gasping.

“Ohmygodohmygodohmygod!” Did she hit whatever, or whoever that was? She should go check. Really she should. Just as soon as she could make herself let go of the steering wheel. They might be hurt. It might even have been Hannah. That ratty old Jeep she drove might have broken down and she could have been walking along the road, on her way home.

That thought was enough to make her release her death grip on the steering wheel and scramble out of the car. The fog was so thick she could barely see but she had a vague idea of where the road was. She shuffled forward slowly, hands out in front of her to ward off anything she might run into.

“Hello? Is anyone there?”

She’d always thought fog was supposed to amplify sound, this fog was so thick it seemed to muffle it.

“Are you all right? Hannah?”

Was that a groan off in that direction? Sara followed the sound. Her foot struck something soft. This time there was definitely a groan.

“Oh jeez!”

She hunkered down and could barely make out a dark form on the ground.

“Oh my God, are you okay?” Frantically she ran her hands over the body, trying to determine if there were any serious injuries.

“I am so sorry! You just appeared out of nowhere. I know I was probably going a little too fast, you know, considering the fog and all, but oh my God what are you doing out here in the middle of the road anyway? Didn’t you have enough sense to move out of the way when you heard my car coming?” She couldn’t seem to stop babbling.

The body started to rise under her questing hands.

“Are you sure you ought to do that? Maybe you should just stay put until we’re sure you’re all right. Is there someone I could call for you?” She patted her pockets. “Oh, damn! I must have left my cell phone at home. Do you have a cell phone? Is there someone I could call for you? Although maybe it’s not such a good idea to have someone else risk coming out in this fog. Oh well, it shouldn’t be too far to my friend Hannah’s house. We can use her phone. Wow, you are a tall one, aren’t you? Let me help you to my car.”

So far her victim hadn’t managed to say a word. Sara couldn’t decide whether that was a good thing or a bad thing. All she could tell through the dense fog was that he was a man, a tall man, and he felt pretty solidly built under her helping hands. He moved slowly, carefully, with her towards the car. Or least towards where she thought the car should be.

After a few minutes she halted them. Sara bit her lower lip and glanced around. “I know you probably don’t want to hear this, but I think we missed the car in this fog.”

The man mumbled something.

“What did you say?”

“Not fog, Myste.” His voice was strained.

“Well, whatever you want to call it it’s as thick as pea soup. I’m telling you, I’ve never seen a fog this thick in all my life.”

“Got to keep moving,” the nameless man told her. She had to strain to hear him. “Not safe.”

“Not safe? I don’t know about that, but I do know that it can’t be far to my friend Hannah’s house.” She carefully turned them around.

“Not there.”

“What’s not there?” Sara asked absently. She tried to concentrate on where they were going. Where was that road?

“Hannah,” he said with a great deal of effort. “Not there, she’s with Kelvin.”

“Kelvin?” Sara stopped and turned to him. “ Who’s Kelvin? You’re a friend of Hannah’s?” She peered closer at him but his features were still indistinct. “Who are you?”

“Nathan,” he answered.

She sighed in frustration. “Okay Nathan. Save your strength. We can talk once we’re out of this damned fog.”

He didn’t answer and she got the feeling he was too busy concentrating on staying upright. She had a bad feeling about this whole situation. There was something unnatural about this fog, it was giving her a real bad case of the heebie-jeebies. Worse than fog usually did.

Always

With Remembrance Day just around the corner, this week’s poem was an easy choice to make. I wrote this several years ago, and while it doesn’t include every member of my family who’s been in the military, I think it gives a nice cross section. And despite a couple of close calls, I’m pleased to say our family has never lost anyone to any military conflict.

Always

I remember my grandfather.
He liked to draw
and when I was very small
he taught me the proper way
to draw a pine tree.
He served
with the St. John's Ambulance
as a driver
in World War I and II.
I will never forget.

I remember my uncle.
He like to read
Louis L'Amour
and to work with
anything mechanical.
He served
as a tail gunner
in a British Lancaster, in World War II before
he became a POW.
I will never forget.

I remember my father.
He liked to work with his hands;
he loved power boats
and used to take me fishing
when I was a child.
He served
with the Canadian Armed Forces
as a Peace Keeper
in Egypt and Korea.
I will never forget.

I remember my brother-in-law.
He had a ready smile
and loved to play pranks.
He carved wood and leather;
he was an amazing artist.
He served
with the American Armed Forces
and fought in Korea.
I will never forget.

These men are my family.
I do not need
a single day
to remember them.
I will remember them
each and every day.
Always.

Feast or Famine

Short Fiction - 0
Long Fiction - 10933
Poetry - 152
Total Words - 11085
Paragraphs of Notes - 4

If you’re wondering about the sudden jump in my word production, then you obviously haven’t heard of National Novel Writing Month, which started at the stroke of November 1st and runs until the end of November 30th. I’m pretty much right on track with my words (you need to write 1667 words a day to complete the challenge) but my story is beginning to flounder so that’s probably going to change.

My usual pattern with NaNo (as it’s affectionately known) is to start out strong, fall behind, fall way behind, catch up a little, fall behind again, catch up, fall behind to the point where you’d think there’s no way I can finish on time, and then have a burst of words at the end that sends me across the finish line. The fact that we’re six days in and I’m still on target is a little disconcerting.

What was also disconcerting was the conversation I had with a writer friend of mine a couple of weeks ago. During the course of our lunch she informed me she was retiring from writing. I didn’t even know that was possible.

This is a woman who’s written twenty novelettes and created her own micro-press so she had total creative control over them. She even went so far as to print them and bind them herself. They’re not available electronically, you had to buy the print version, but she found a niche market that paid her very well.

But not only is she no longer interested in writing any more, she doesn’t even want to print up the books she has to sell them. I suggested maybe she should give electronic publishing a try, but she isn’t interested in that either. It just boggles my mind.

But it also raises an interesting question. What happens to the books you’ve written when you die? I would hate the thought of them dying with me. Can you leave the copyrights to your works to someone in your will so they can continue to profit by them? Would they even want to?

Something to think about.

Na No, Na No, It’s Off to Write I Go...

As I mentioned earlier in the week, I am not posting a prompt picture for the month of November. I’ll be doing NaNoWriMo this month, and I hope you will be too.

One of the super exciting things about NaNo for me this year is I finally get to change my user name. I first heard about the challenge through a writer’s message board I’m a member of, so when I first signed up for it I just used the name I went by on that site, which was Lady Cat. The novelty of being Lady Cat wore off rather quickly but there was nothing I could do about it unless I wanted to lose all my stats. And considering I had several wins under my belt by then this was unacceptable. However, this year I finally got to change my name. Yay!

With only a couple of days worth of writing under my belt, an excerpt really didn't seem feasible. However, I received a belated story for last month’s prompt and I thought I’d share it with you today. Better late than never, eh?


Shadows

by C.L. Hannah

You know how people tell you that you’re seeing things when they fail to see what you are pointing at?

Well I’ve been listening to people tell me there is nothing out there for as long as I can remember. Yet, my eyes are always drawn to that same strange light, surrounded by a dark patch of land, every night.

I wonder if I’ll see that glow again, I wondered as I watched the light outside my window morph from the grey of twilight to the black of night.

“Ahh…there you are.” Pushing my nose to the window I stared at the blurry yellow glow in the distance. “I wasn’t sure you were going to show tonight.”

My words fogged the glass and I rubbed at the window with the sleeve of my nightgown. But all that accomplished was a blurring of the barely distinguishable yellow glow. Suddenly I felt bereft.

“Some night I’m going to go out there and find you,” I said to my empty bedroom, without breathing on the window glass.

Nodding my head, in agreement with my words, I whacked my forehead against the glass. Jerking back from the window in frustration, I rubbed my forehead and snickered quietly at myself.

“You goof. You knew the window was there,” I whispered, to my reflection.

“Yes. You did know the window was there. Yet you still leaned into it my Queen. Why?”

Freezing in place I peered out from under my hand that was still rubbing my forehead and stared into the yellow eyes of the black cat sitting on my window ledge, outside.

“Where did you come from?”

The cat rolled its eyes, smoothed its whiskers back then shook its head at me.

“Why are you rolling your eyes at me? I only asked where you came from?”

“I know you only asked that, but it’s such a silly question that I’d hoped you’d drop it,” replied the cat, wrapping its tail around its body and sitting up regally.

“Why are you talking to me? No wait…how can I understand you?

“Ahh…” said the cat, standing and stretching with its head low and butt high. “Now we’re getting somewhere my liege.”

“No really! What’s going on? Is this some Halloween prank?”

“So you don’t want to know where I came from then?”

“What? No. I mean yes. I want to know that.”

“First off, you know where I come from, think about it. Secondly, I’m not some Halloween prank, that’s just rude and thirdly, it’s time you were back on the throne. ‘Tis time to go. So to speak.”

I suddenly remembered that a head bump could cause confusion and that confusion could make people do funny things and wondered briefly if I’d given myself a concussion when my forehead hit the window.

Opening the window, I stared into the black cat’s eyes and noticed a fog swirling within them.

Standing up the cat lowered its head, as if bowing, then sniffed me. Next it ran a paw over its nose, stared at me with wide eyes and sneezed like I smelt badly or something.

“Nice. Not,” I said, raising an eyebrow. “Well lead on then.”

Climbing out the window wasn’t difficult, I’d been doing it for a long as I could remember. The climbing down the Maple tree beside the house however, was another thing all together.

I watched as the cat jumped limberly from branch to branch and thought why not? Following suit, perhaps not as gracefully, I managed to get to the ground without killing myself.

“Score one for me,” I said, looking back up at my open window and shivering. “I can’t believe I just did that.”

“Coming or what?” said the cat, flicking its tail impatiently.

“Coming, coming, coming,” I said, still looking up at my bedroom window but moving forward into the shadows. “Is it far?”

“Too far for most but obviously not for you.” Trotting off into the darkness, the cat didn’t look back to see if I was keeping up.

I kept the cat in sight as we trudged through a dark field and dodged around some cows. I marvelled at all the new scents filling my nose and wondered why I could smell so many different things all of a sudden. Finally I pushed through a dense line of bushes that I’d spied the cat sliding under and stepped into a clearing.

“You’re welcome,” said the cat, squinting one eye closed and glaring at me with the other.

“Welcome? For what?”

“You’re here aren’t you?”

“Here? Where? And you still haven’t told me why I can talk with you.”

The cat sighed heavily.

“I didn’t know cats did that,” I said, the corners of my lips quirking up into a smile.

“Who says I’m a cat?”

“Aren’t you? You look like a cat so therefore you must be.” Crossing my arms over my chest, I stared down at the animal and smirked.

“And yet, you can talk with me. Sometimes things are not as they seem to be. But let’s get on with it. Since it’s All Hallow’s Eve, it has been decided that you should be brought back home, tonight.”

I stared around the clearing and tensed. All I saw was a lamp post giving off a weak, yellow glow, the talking cat, a bench and some geese. “Home? This is home for you?”

“Yes and now, for you.”

I jumped as the geese suddenly took flight. My head felt like it was spinning and my body shrinking - getting longer and the ground closer.

I spied a goose feather floating down and reached out to grab it. But instead of a hand, I saw a furry black paw in front of my face.

“Welcome home Queen Keket,” said my cat guide. “We’ve been waiting a long time for your return.”

The Balassi Stanza

It wasn’t enough that I wanted to do a rhyming form for this month’s poetry form, but because I’d be posting in on November, first I wanted to do a poem revolving around All Saints’ Day. Jeez I’m not very bright sometimes.

So the form I decided on was the Balassi stanza. I forgot how much I dislike the Balassi stanza. It was created by a Hungarian poet named Balint Balassi who was lauded for his new use of rhymes. This stanza consists of nine lines and it might be easier just to show you the rhyme scheme: AABCCBDDB

But wait! That’s not all! There’s also a strict syllable count. Lines three, six, and nine have seven syllables and all the rest have six. The result is a somewhat choppy rhythm that really bugs the crap out of me. Okay, maybe it’s the syllable count that bugs me. Could be the restrictive syllable count is what makes it choppy.

At any rate, while researching All Saints’ Day I came across the term Allhallowtide. Also known as the Triduum of Death, it spans October 1 through November 2 and consists of All Saints’ Eve (Halloween), All Saints’ Day (Hallowmas), and All Souls’ Day. Awesome - three days, three stanzas.

I have to admit, I’m not happy with the way this poem turned out. Like I said, the form makes it choppy and I found the syllable counts very limiting. However, it is what it is. Maybe some day I’ll re-do the poem and forget about the form.


Allhallowtide

Fires of bone light the night -
year’s dark half now in sight -
end of harvest, feast with kin;
watch mummers in the streets
in disguise - give them treats.
Fortunes are told, fate to win.
Deter the spirits ill,
draw the good and we will
survive Samhain with our skin.

Hallowmas is when we
honor saints faithfully,
their lives and deaths, famed or not -
and give God solemn due
for all He’s done for you.
Honor too those who have brought
the light to other souls
sharing the Christian goals -
give thanks for all you have got.

All Soul’s Day is the last
for honoring the vast
list of purgatory souls.
You dress in black and roam,
peal out a mournful tone
and hope to fill up your bowl.
For each soul cake you eat
a soul’s released to seek
its way - heaven is its goal.

Counting Down

Short Fiction - 424
Long Fiction - ?
Poetry - 121+
Total Words - unknown
Editing Hours - 0
Paragraphs of Notes - ?

Last week was one messed up week. As you can see, I have no real idea what my word count was. I know my cat story was a measly 424 words, but that’s about it. I plugged away at Wandering Wizards, a bit here and a bit there, but didn’t keep track. I wrote a cute little veggie poem for the Brazen Snake Books prompt and then started working on a poetry form for this week and again, didn’t keep track of the words.

I got a little work done on the office but not as much as I would have liked. At least I’ll be able to sit at my desk to write for NaNo, although it’s probably going to take me until the end of November to get all my stuff squared away.

I have to say I wasted far more time than I’d like to admit to on Sunday playing around with pictures and banners for my blogs and my author’s page on Facebook. Of course I was also watching the new season of Stranger Things on Netflix, but only the first four episodes. Okay, six episodes - I watched two in the evening as well. ;-)

I suspect the mess in the office will get bigger before it gets smaller. I find that the older I get the more anal I am about being organized, so I don’t want to just throw things back together, I want some order to the chaos. I have a lot of office supplies - pens, notebooks, stick notes, notebooks, decorative paper (for letters and poetry), notebooks - which are scattered between two rooms and a cabinet. I really need to take stock of what I’ve got and maybe even gasp get rid of some.

I will be introducing a new poetry form on Wednesday, it being the first of the month, but I won’t be doing the picture prompt of the month on Friday. I mean seriously, who has the time? I was able to churn my cat story out pretty quickly, but I’ve been known to spend days, if not weeks, on a flash story, and that just ain’t gonna happen in November.

Tomorrow night while people are up late going through their kids’ candy looking for anything suspicious (and maybe stealing a bite or two), I’ll be waiting for the witching hour, hands poised over my lap top, ready to start writing. As will thousands of writers all over the world. Maybe even you!

At least I’ll be in good company. :-D

A Cat's Tale

It’s the last Friday of the month and you know what that means, it’s story time!

Despite having a couple of people telling me they were working on stories for this month’s prompt, my inbox remained empty. The stories don’t do me any good if you don’t send them to me people. :-D

When I first posted the prompt picture I had a great idea for a story, but of course by the time the deadline was looming, that idea was long gone. Still, I’m pretty happy with the story I came up with and I hope you enjoy it too.

A Cat’s Tale

The night was crisp and cold, one of those beautiful fall evenings that was perfect for walking in the park. The moon was full and hung low in the sky as a flock of geese honked, winging their way south.

“George, what have you done?”

George got up from where he’d been sitting patiently and started down the path. For some reason she felt compelled to follow.

“It’s not so bad, being dead, you know. But I’m kind of fuzzy on why I’m here.”

The cat ignored her, continuing forward at an unhurried pace.

“I want you to know, of all the things I’ve had to leave behind, you’re the one I miss the most. You were the smartest cat I’ve ever owned and the best familiar a witch could have.”

That earned her a flick of the tail.

“I guess I shouldn’t be surprised that you figured out a way to bring me back.”

Twitching an ear, George continued forward. They reached the edge of the park and the cat turned onto the sidewalk.

“I don’t suppose you could tell me where we’re going?”

George meowed at her but kept going.

“I didn’t think so,” she said, voice resigned.

The neighborhood they were passing through was one of the nicer ones. The houses weren’t huge, but there were nice sized lawns attached to them. Several of them had neatly kept gardens.

George turned up the sidewalk to a modest bungalow and led her around to the back.

“Is this why I’m here? You wanted to show me where you live now? I’m glad you found a nice home. I’m guessing the family who lives here is just as nice.”

Pausing, George looked back at her again and meowed.

“I’m sorry, I don’t understand what you want.”

George pushed through the cat door to enter the house. Still compelled to follow, she passed easily through the door. Looking around curiously she realized she was in the kitchen.

A sharp meow brought her attention to George, sitting near a shallow alcove. She looked closer and realized this is where he was fed. Then she took a closer look at the dishes.

“Seriously? This is why you brought me back?”

George stared at her, giving her that look, the one he practically patented for when she stated the obvious.

“You know I’m dead, right?”

Another meow.

She waved her hand through the table beside her. “I’m incorporeal. I’m sorry your food dish is empty, but there’s no way I’m able to feed you.”

The disgruntled look on the cat’s face was almost comical.

Jack O'Lantern

Whoops! I almost forgot about this week's poetry post. Sorry about that, but I'm in the middle of a bunny crisis. No, not a real bunny. I'm making a bunny costume for the grandbaby. From a sleeper pattern that just barely fit her when I made her Ewok costume last year. Please pray for me that it fits. :-D

I thought considering we're so close to the end of the month that a Halloween poem would be fitting for today. Once upon a time I was a member of a poetry group and as a fun exercise we'd write from prompts. I don't know what the exact prompt was for this poem, but it's one I wrote about five years ago.

And for those of you interested in such things... I did a lot of research before writing this poem and the story about Stingy Jack and his deal with the devil is true, as is the fact that early jack 'o lanterns were carved from turnips.

* ~ * ~ * ~ *

Jack O'Lantern

Beware ye fool the devil, for the devil has his due
Beware ye lest the devil, should turn the tale on you
Stingy Jack was one who thought the devil he could best
For him his fate was worse than death, he wanders without rest

Now Jack was not a well-liked man, a mean and wretched soul,
He liked his drink, and that's a fact, be it bottle, keg, or bowl.
'Twas on a night that's such as this Jack bade the devil drink,
A guileless smile upon his face, his cheeks a ruddy pink.

They drank a toast to Samhain Eve and all the souls in hell.
Another, then another, till they heard the church bells' knell.
But Stingy Jack had not the coin 'twas needed then to pay,
He had a plan instead and this is what I heard him say:

"Old Scratch, into a coin ye must turn into straight away.
I'll pay our tab and ye'll change back without a long delay"
The fiend agreed not knowing that old Jack had tricked him well,
In a wallet with a cross beside, Jack put the coin to dwell.

The devil seethed, the devil raged, but all to no avail,
He tried to use his power, even knowing he would fail.
They struck a deal, that should Jack die, he'd not go straight to hell,
Instead he had a year of grace in which to say farewell.

Before his year of grace was up, Jack took the plague and died
But Heaven didn't want him, and the devil had his pride.
Because the year was not complete, he would not claim Jack's soul,
But sent him off into the night with just a burning coal.

A coal is just too hot to hold in nothing but your hand,
So Jack, he carved a turnip face to hold the burning brand.
On Samhain Eve he wanders now throughout the chilly night
A sad and lonely figure in the Jack 'O Lantern's light.

Beware ye fool the devil, for the devil has his due
Beware ye lest the devil, should turn the tale on you
Stingy Jack was one who thought the devil he could best
For him his fate was worse than death, he wanders without rest

The Short and the Long of It

Short Fiction - 0
Long Fiction - 3548
Poetry - 187
Total Words - 3735
Editing Hours - 0
Paragraphs of Notes - 3

The short version is that I missed my wordage goal by about 1500 words but I’m going to be doing NaNo anyway.

The long version is...I don’t know what I was doing last week, but apparently it wasn’t writing. The words are there, I can feel them, and I know pretty much what’s going to happen between now and the end of the book, but knowing and doing are two very different things.

And that’s when it hit me. Every year I go through a writing slump in the weeks leading up to NaNo. The closer I get to November 1, the less I write. It’s almost like my brain is saving up the words to spew them forth in November.

Decision made, I picked my novel and even came up with a working cover for it (to go with the working title).

The story is actually the sequel to my first NaNo novel, which was an utter failure (although it did spawn ideas for two sequels and one prequel). The book was finished at 35,000 words with a week of NaNo left to go. It being my first book and all, I had no clue what I could do to make it longer. Who knows, maybe it doesn’t need to be any longer - as I recall it was pretty action packed.

I’m probably setting myself up for failure, but the lure of NaNo is too strong to resist. This doesn’t mean I’ll be giving up on Wandering Wizards, I’ll be working on both novels at the same time. You know, just to make things interesting.

Think it can’t be done? Never under estimate the power of determination. I know people who’ve done twice and even three times the required 50,000 words in the month of November. I even know people who’ve knocked off their 50,000 in the first week. I’m pretty sure they lived alone and were fed intravenously, but they did it.

At least my office will be more or less back together by then. We got the futon dismantled and stashed away (you can read more about that HERE if you like) over the weekend and the hubby made the inserts for the upper desk drawers. I need to clean the carpet and shuffle the furniture around, but the desk itself is where I want it to be and I can plug away at the rest as time permits.

So this week the focus will be both working on getting my office set up and getting as many words in on Wandering Wizards as I can manage.

Oh! And since my inbox hasn’t exactly been flooded with stories, poems, and articles inspired by my picture prompt, guess I’d better get on something for that too, eh?

A writer’s work is never done. ;-)

A Place of Your Own

First of all, I’d like to remind you that you’ve only got a week left to come up with a story for this month’s picture prompt. And in case you also need a reminder of what the picture was, you can find it HERE. I’m hoping to get my story done this weekend...you know, in all my spare time. ;-)

As you know, or maybe if you’re new here you don’t, I’m in the midst of The Great Office Shuffle - I’m moving my office to the smaller room across the hall. Pretty much everything from my old desk and the filing cabinets is in boxes stacked in corners or in the small storage closet. I moved the hubby’s electronic equipment over onto the desk and dismantled his old work space. And that’s pretty much where things stand at the moment. I can’t do much else until my new desk is in place.

I really didn’t think it would be a big deal to have to wait until this weekend to set up my new desk. Apparently I was wrong.

I had just started getting into the habit of writing at my desk before I started the Shuffle. But not only was I unable to use my new desk this past week, I also couldn’t use my old desk - it’s covered in “stuff” that won’t have a home until I get my new office set up. I was actually kind of surprised at how much I missed it.

It’s important for a writer to have a space of their own in which to write. I’ve been fortunate enough to have a room of my own, but not everyone is that lucky. So what do you do if you don’t have that kind of space?

A desk in a corner of the living room or basement would work. The bedroom is a good choice because you can close the door to keep interruptions to a minimum. A screened in porch could be winterized so it can be used year round. I know one writer who turned a large closet into their work space. If space is an issue you can use the kitchen or dining room table. And there’s always the option of writing in a coffee shop.

Roald Dahl, George Bernard Shaw, and Dylan Thomas wrote in a sheds. Agatha Christie came up with her plots while in the bathtub. Gertrude Stein wrote in her car. Maya Angelou liked to rent a hotel room to write in. Truman Capote, James Joyce, Edith Wharton, and Marcel Proust all wrote in the comfort of their beds. Virginia Woolf and Ernest Hemingway wrote standing up at their desks.

The important part about having a space of your own is that once you start using it on a regular basis, your brain will realize that when you’re sitting there it’s time to write. And that can only lead to being a more productive writer.

This week’s excerpt is from Wandering Wizards, the third installment in my Moonstone Chronicles series. There have been a few signs that there’s trouble brewing, and this scene, taking place during a class in divination, only confirms it.

* ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ *

“Try again, Horace,” Paranithel encouraged gently.

Dutifully Horace scooped up the stones and placed them back in the velvet bag. Paran was pleased to note the boy remembered the cleansing spell, to alleviate any negative energy, before he started gain.

“Remember to focus on the question you wish answered.”

“Maybe you should focus on whether or not you’ll pass this class,” one of the other boys snickered.

Paranithel rapped his cane sharply on the ground. “That will be quite enough of that!” His voice gentled as he gave Horace an encouraging nod. “Go ahead.”

Face fierce with concentration, Horace slowly dipped his hand into the bag and stirred. He pulled five stones out at random and cast them onto the table in front of him. All five fell with the symbol marking them facing down towards the table.

There were murmurs from the boys and tears filled Horace’s eyes. “I focused, I really did!”

“I’m sure you did, boy.” Paranithel patted his shoulder. “These things happen when the stones have no answer to give. Garnet, why don’t you have a try?”

A little nervously, Garnet approached the table. She took the bag of stones Horace offered her, smiling slightly in thanks. Taking a deep breath, she cast the cleansing spell and then focused on her question. Dipping into the bag, she pulled out five stones and cast them on the table. One again they all landed face down.

“Most curious,” Paranithel murmured, looking over her shoulder. Rather than have Garnet try again he nodded to the next student. “Warner, you give a try.”

Warner swaggered up to the table and took the bag from Garnet. “Let me show you how it’s done,” he boasted. He made an elaborate show of the cleansing spell, shaking the bag and casting the spell again for good measure. Finally he reached in and cast his stones. For all his theatrics, his also fell face down.

Paranithel had to bite back a chuckle at the boy’s crestfallen face. Warner was one of those students who sometimes needed to be taken down a peg or two.

“Maybe the stones need to be re-energized,” one of the students suggested.

“Perhaps, perhaps,” Paranithel agreed, although that was not how the stones worked. “But it is plain we’ll get no answers from them today. Class dismissed.”

Murmuring amongst themselves, the students picked up their notebooks and filed out of the room. When the last student was gone, Paranithel reached into his pocket and pulled out the small box that held his Tarot cards.

Lifting them from their silk wrapping, he did his own cleansing spell and began to shuffle. While the cards were capable of being more specific than the stones, he focused on the future and what it held. Done shuffling, he laid the cards out in a spread.

For a long moment he stared at the cards in front of him. Too many reversals, too many swords, all leading to an uncertain future. With a sigh he gathered them up again. He needed to talk to Thackery again. But before he did that, perhaps he would have a chat with Aracelia to see if the elves were experiencing similar problems.