Brenda Bradshaw Blog

I know, I know... updates, Bren?

2011-04-12T22:38:00.003-05:00

Not a lot to update on: Tons of Girl Scouts, gardening, working out, blah blah blah. And since this auto-feeds into Facebook, most of my daily life is on there anyway with the kids, the dogs and Rick. But well... poor Blogger is feeling neglected.

Having lost 48 lbs to date since May 2010 and with just 21 pounds left to go to hit my goal, I thought I'd post a new photo. By the way, who knew how fun shopping would be in this new small size? I LOVE IT! I used to hate hate hate shopping but now, it's amazing. So, well, here's the newest photo, taken this afternoon. Wish I'd done my hair, etc., but hey, the life of a mom, right? Right!

Hope you're all well and happy and living life to the fullest. My new motto:

Just for today, I can do anything.

Diamonds Are Forever

2010-09-23T23:01:00.005-05:00

Awhile ago, I posted the ring we'd picked out, but the photo I had was for a smaller sized diamond. Here's The Ring, in all of it's 1.25 carat glory.

I love it!

I think he maybe loves me!

Skirts Refashioned

2010-08-19T10:33:00.007-05:00

So in between getting ready for the craft fair, the girls have wanted a little somethingsomething of their own. Actually, my youngest daughter did. So I started with her:

This is a basic $5 skort. So boring.

This is after we added $5 of fabric to it (she wasn't home when it was finished, thus no model):

Then my older two daughters wanted their own. Nothing says YES! quite like having your 16 and 20 year old daughters asking for something homemade. Although Daughter #1 did hers in pinks, as 10 year olds are prone to do, Daughter #2 wanted tans and blacks:

The 20 year old wanted a "rockabilly" feel to hers (although she's borrowed the tan and black one from her sister a few times already). I love the Elvis aqua print in the middle!

So 3 skirts, all unique to each girl, and each only costing a total of $10 each and an afternoon of sewing.

Pretty neat!

This post is linked over to Tea Rose Home as part of a link party -- check it all out!

Twirl

2010-07-28T14:56:00.007-05:00

I haven't updated this blog in quite awhile -- excuses or reasons aren't really necessary. RWA National is in full swing in Orlando and I hate that I'm missing it, and reading everyone's Facebook updates is great and equally agonizing. Rick and I had planned to go when it was in Nashville -- not only go but get married there as well -- and so I sit here and think of what classes or book signings I may have been at if the venue hadn't changed, and if I'd be Brenda Sanders by now or not. Sigh.

A couple of nights ago, I finished my skirt. I'm so thrilled at how it turned out. It's really full, so if you spin, it'll twirl around. It's a perfect fit and first clothes I've made myself since I was 13 and Mom first taught me how to sew. I'm SO happy with how it turned out. Here's a pic:

Then today, Wednesday, was a day for heart issues. I went to let the 5 dogs back inside, and no dogs to be found. The gate was opened. My heart dropped. I yelled and two of our big dogs returned immediately. I walked around the front, still yelling, and turned around to see Casanova, the basset, who I was really worried about because he's so skittish, but he darted right in. So two to go: Keiko the Akita, and Oliver, the little black pug.

So I go back inside, tell Rick, and we load up in the van to drive and look. Nothing. After several times around the neighborhood, there was Keiko in the yard. No Oliver.

Now I'm seriously concerned because Oliver was out on his own. We decide to take Sassy and Keiko out on leashes, thinking (hoping) they'd lead us to Oliver if he was hurt. We walked around and nothing.

Shandie and Sydney load up in her car. I post on Facebook to see if someone knows something. We'd asked everyone we passed and nothing. I knew he wasn't ran over because we'd covered all the streets already. My greatest fear was someone took him, and would keep him. He's so outgoing and cute and funny and well-trained. We would never get him back.

And all the time, Carly was at work, having no idea this turmoil was happening. I had no idea what I'd tell her. Oliver is hers, and they are inseparable. He's like her child, and I'd have to tell her he was gone. Of all the five dogs, THAT one was missing and there was nothing Mommy could do to make it okay again.

Rick asks if I want to drive around in his truck with him, looking. I felt there was no need -- we'd covered everywhere. He. Was. Gone. But I loaded up, and we drove.

And drove.

And drove.

Peering into shadows, driving in areas we knew he couldn't be. We kept going. And that's when fear and sadness sank in and I made my bargain with God: Let me find this dog, LEAD me to wherever he is, and I promise I will be in church TONIGHT.

And I opened my eyes, and there he was in a driveway. Rick hadn't even seen him and I said: There he is!

Rick still didn't see him but stopped the truck and I jumped down and grabbed Oliver up and I twirled, holding that fat little black dog so hard.

We got home and he darted into the backyard, and Casanova, his best buddy, danced around him. Then Oliver jumped in the dog pool and plopped his bottom down to cool off while lapping up the water around him, so hot and tired from his adventures.

I don't know if it was coincidence. I can't swear it was something divine. I just know neither of us saw him just a few feet down from that spot. I just know I opened my eyes after my desperate prayer and there he suddenly stood. And I cried with such relief.

My daughter's heart would not be broken.

And guess where I'll be tonight.

Saying "thank you".

Friday's Five

2010-06-11T10:53:00.004-05:00

I know, it's been awhile. Bad, bad Brenda. But now I'm back, and today's Friday Five are

Five Things That Made Me Happy This Week:

1) Okay, I know I'm SEVERAL years behind here, but I just started watching Sex in the City on DVD (the series) starting with the first year. This week has been SO funny watching these. Gotta love me some Netflix to bring me all the series tv shows I've missed over the years, eh?

2) My hibiscus in the front flowerbed now has HUGE hot pink flowers on it. They're simply gorgeous.

3) Over at my favorite blog, Lucy March, all the Betties, as we like to call ourselves, are putting up their personal blogs so our Bettiness can grow and expand. Watch here for a Betty Blog Section to be built soon. Swear.

4) Finishing a certain book last night, which I won't name, but it was painful to get through. It wasn't quite bad enough for me to give up on all together, but it so hard to muster through it. Finally I finished it last night. Usually with a book, I'm sad when it's over and often times read it again in the near future, but this one? This ending brought relief. Just goes to show that not every New York Times Bestseller should BE a NYT Best Seller.

5) Dad called yesterday to tell me that the children then grandchildren will be going to Granny's to divide up her stuff, so if I wanted anything, I needed to be up there Sunday afternoon. No, there's nothing I need. Several years ago, I received her coo-coo clock. Dad had actually bought it overseas decades ago and gave it to Gran as a gift, and so it has double special meaning to me -- Dad picked it out and Granny owned it forever. I already have that, and I'm glad it's here safe and sound. I still need to hang it up. I didn't hang it up for years and years because Sydney and Cooper were little and I didn't want to fight over them messing with the parts that hang low, but now they're older so it'll be okay. And a coo-coo clock? Are you kidding me?!

It'll fit right in.

The House That Built Me

2010-05-10T09:35:00.003-05:00

I truly love this song. Although they say you can't go home again, you can. If some things are so constant, you really can go home, even if you yourself have changed. Yesterday, Rick took the kids and me to my parents, and we drove by Tracy's -- well, where her house used to be before the city wiped it away -- and there's part of the fence that surrounded her backyard pool, and I desperately want to go and get a section and bring it to my own house and keep it, and in keeping it, keep the memories of her house that's now gone, and of us swimming in her backyard. But to do that, I think I'd need a blow torch or something to break the wrought iron free enough for me to snag it and then run.

And we got to my parents' house, and the huge live oak from the front yard is gone thanks to the Snow Day of 2010, but it's the same. Mom and Dad are at the door, ushering us in with hugs, and food is everywhere -- brisket and pecan pie -- it's the same. And you go out in the backyard and see their flowers growing better and bigger than a commercial ever could and even though he's not doing it right then, the picture of my dad in his overalls watering the backyard is the same -- the same it has been for so long that it's etched in my mind forever. Like Granny Souder and the hoe and her garden in the front yard, even though she's been gone for 15 years, the memory is the same, branded in our minds, and anyone who knew Granny or remembers any time at my house at all with Dad knows exactly what memories and pictures in the mind that I mean.

But it's not just me that was built with that house. I think anyone close to me growing up as a memory -- a STRONG memory -- of my parents' house. We had the pool table and the ping-pong table and the basketball hoop and a yard full of kids sometimes. Or going to my parents' house just to raid the fridge and cabinets, because it was always stocked. The memories there aren't just memories for me, but memories for so many people, this constant never changing world of The Bobo House. When people ask about my parents, I say, "They're great -- they're just the same" and people know instantly what I mean, transported to their own memory of the home my parents created.

I've moved 17 times since leaving that house. Even for my own kids, their house is the "home", the constant, the safe place. The idea of them moving, or the house belonging to anyone outside of the family leaves me mentally crippled. My mind can't grasp the idea. That wouldn't be a good change. Life needs certain guarantees and that's one of them.

Now that Rick and I are together and building our new future, with our new house and our gardens and our own holidays, I can only hope I'm able to create a home that builds up others the way my parents' house built us, even if I'm 20 years late getting started. If I can give others a fraction the memories my parents gave me and so many others out there, I know I'll have accomplished something spectacular.

I just hope my parents know how significant they are as well as the house they loved and nurtured, and what their home has meant: It's the House the Built So Many.

I love you, Mom & Dad!

Yikes! Nashville Floods!

2010-05-03T21:35:00.002-05:00

It's been flooding in Nashville, and the Gaylord Hotel is where the RWA National Conference is schedule to be held. According to the emails I've received today, we're apparently in a wait-and-see, although one email did suggest that the Gaylord and RWA are working on finding an alternative location. Makes the most sense because I cannot fathom they'd have all of the mess from the video fixed by July. However, after such devastation, I'm sure they hope to fix it in time because it would generate a lot of cash after being closed. Such a horrible situation. I hope everyone is safe.

I know the Board of RWA does the scouting and locations of our national conference years in advance. They put in such long hours and hard work. I hate to imagine them scrambling around now trying to find a solution but I know it has to be done.

Rick had suggested we get married in Nashville. I guess I should tell him about the flooding and possible/probable rescheduling. He'll think he's off the hook.

Ha!

The Eye of the Storm

2010-04-28T21:11:00.006-05:00

Today is April 28th. You know what today is? The Day Between the Birthdays.

Brett, my brother, and I had just a day apart from our birthdays. Well, 2 years and 363 days. I'm October 11th, and he's October 13th, and man oh man, there hath no sin committed by my mother greater than forcing Brenda to share a party with Brett. Well, at least until I grew up and saw the convenience of it. When he and I were little, it made even more sense; it's not like we went to school yet, so all of our friends were from church, and therefore, friends with both of us. Yet I hated it all the same. I specially remember one birthday in particular. It was a rare birthday in which my parents bought a store-made cake (Mom usually made our cakes) and it was split right down the middle, decorated in two themes, one for him... one for me.

He played peewee football, so his side had little football players all over it with goal posts and everything. Made sense... he was a little football player.

My side was done in Halloween, with witches. Made sense, right... since I was a little... wait a minute!! *indignant pause inserted here*

I don't remember many shared birthdays after that, and please do not get me wrong here, in fact, if I'd been Mom, I'd forced shared birthdays forever.

I can say that because I find myself in the same situation, but instead of just three years apart, my two are SIX YEARS apart. And well... (sighs) Okay, I admit it: it's my fault their birthdays are only separated by one day.

Little Miss Carly Victoria was born five days late, induced on April 29th, 1994. YAY! Pizza anyone? (Inside story). Then, six years later, I was in the most horrific pregnancy ever, and having 5 pregnancies, I can say that. So the doctor gave me two dates in which to induce Baby #3: April 27th, or May 5th.

Well... in hindsight, being the Beast that hindsight IS, I should have held out for May 5th, but the pain got the best of me, so on April 27th, 2000, Sydney Elizabeth burst forth into the world.

So April 28th is the Day Between.

I've tried pretty hard since Syd was born not to "share" the birthdays. Unfortunately, Syd came home from the hospital on Carly's 6th birthday, and of course, people in their sweetness and ignorance told Carly she got a new baby sister for her birthday. Well Carly didn't ASK for a new baby sister -- she just wanted a Barney video or Barbie or cash to hide in her room (another inside story). So after that, I did my best to keep the birthdays as individual as the girls themselves.

Then this year came.

My goal is to always give the weekend before the birthdays to Sydney, and the weekend afterward to Carly. For traveling family (like Mom and Dad, plus friends, like Margaret and company) this doesn't always mean you get the visit ON the birthday because it's a bit to travel two weekends in a row. But this year is unique. The weekend after the birthdays, on Friday, Carly and Sydney and me and a few girl scouts all head to Girl Scout Camp at Texlake in Austin to camp in treehouses, so there's no way to party the weekend after.

So we partied the weekend before. Combined.

We had about 25 people here. Shandie came up from Texas State (a 2 hours drive), Mom and Dad and Margaret and Charlie and Cari all came down from Ft Worth (a 2.5 hours drive). Neighbors came over for the cookout (about a 20 second drive in Cameron), and Sydney had NO. IDEA. AT. ALL.

I'd told her last year that from now on, all birthdays were family only. No more friends invited who never show up and never RSVP (so irksome). So she thought there was NOTHING. In fact, her father told me the following:

Sydney to her dad: Can we buy me some party favors?
Brian: Why?
Sydney: Because Mom said no more parties, but if I can buy some favors, at least it'll FEEL like my birthday.

Guilt much, Sydney? Geeze, child.
Thankfully, Brian knew of the plans already made and did not give in to the favors.

Instead, Sydney walked into the backyard to hear everyone say SURPRISE and get showered with gifts and love. It was also for Carly, but she knew about it, and didn't seem to mind sharing it with Sydney.

At least this one time...
So Happy Decade Old for Sydney Elizabeth and Happy Sweet Sixteen to Carly Victoria. I love you both more than you will ever realize until you're blessed with your own beautiful daughters. (In 30 years or so, of course.)

As for Brenda, Happy April 28th -- my day of nothingness.

I'll Have What She's Having

2010-04-21T09:00:00.005-05:00

Harry Burns: There are two kinds of women: high maintenance and low maintenance.
Sally Albright: Which one am I?
Harry Burns: You're the worst kind; you're high maintenance but you think you're low maintenance.
Sally Albright: I don't see that.

I’m fascinated by this idea. Unfortunately, I’m apparently like Sally Albright, because it appears that even though I don’t view myself as High Maintenance, others DO. I’m not sure why, but they do. So… I did some research.

On Facebook, I put it in my status, asking others what they thought High Maintenance meant to them. Several said the way I view it: Perfect hair and make-up, designer clothing, wanting only the best of material things, blah blah blah.

One friend said when he and I dated, I was pretty laid back. Which is funny, since I was only 19 at the time and 19 in general is a living, breathing hell, but given who his girlfriend was before me, that may be why he viewed me a “laid back”. I just know I wasn’t going to argue since he’s apparently one of the very few who think of me as low maintenance.

A few years ago, in fact, it was 2007 because I remember it vividly, it dawned on me that there is emotional high maintenance so very different from how I’d viewed high maintenance in materialistic ways. Needing reassurance, mental stimulation, the spark and connection. I could see me high maintenance that way. Of course, it was also pointed out to me by someone else that those things weren’t high maintenance in their opinion, but just basic human necessities to feel needed and wanted and loved, and if those things were not being fulfilled and thus creating the high maintenance fallout, that was on the other person to not provide as promised. Which makes sense; I’ve always claimed Love is a verb, an action, so if those actions aren’t made and the love isn’t evident, then yeah, the questions and insecurities would definitely flair up. Anyone can say they love someone else. But showing love – that’s worth much more than diluted words someone may utter just to float by in life to maintain a status quo.

Anyway, back to topic:

Another friend said: It’s like a high performance car. If you want the best out of it, you have feed the best into it. (paraphrased)

A third friend said I’m a drama magnet, which used to be very true. But note the magnet – it somehow finds me, but isn’t generated by me. That was good news. And I think it’s the Libran in me attempting to fix and balance others and then getting dragged into it, but… (shrugs) That friend also said that the good thing about my brand of high maintenance is that it’s never boring.

Um. Thanks. I think.

I know I’m definitely not the materialistic high maintenance. I like to shop as much as the next person, but I really like finding good deals, etc, and name brands are not my thing. But the emotional high maintenance, I think if it’s being nurtured and fed and reinforced, that’s not high maintenance at all: That’s what I call Happily Ever After.

Friday's Five -- Heroes

2010-04-16T16:42:00.005-05:00

Five qualities my heroes always have:

1) Self-confidence boarding arrogance but not crossing the line.
2) Intelligence. Most definitely.
3) A scorching look.
4) Barely contained passion toward everything important to him.
5) A innate need to protect what he deems is "HIS".

True Love and Fate

2010-04-13T13:52:00.005-05:00

While working on BARELY THERE, I’m digging around in Delaney’s past and Mitch’s past, seeing what makes them – well – them. One of the most important things in my hero and heroine’s make-up is how previous relationships have affected them, and how that past relationship makes them view the idea of new relationships. This isn’t just in novels, obviously, but is something we’ve all probably have experienced in our own lives.

Most everyone – aside from Rick, apparently – knows the movie The Princess Bride and tons of the movie quotes, including “TruuuUUUUe Love”. But before that particular quote, there’s another one regarding the real-deal True Love. At the beginning of the movie, when Buttercup is speaking of her love’s assumed death, she states:

“I died that day.”

And I think this is true. If one has loved, truly loved, and it dies a shocking, violent end without consent and closure, we all die a little. We’re not remotely the person we were before. We are jaded. We are scarred. The scars may fade in time, the jaded outlook may calm, but part of us will never be the same again. Ever. The innocence of that purity of love is forever gone. You know now there’s a fantastically bitter alternative that you hadn’t experienced before. You are forever changed. Part of you has, indeed, died.

And it’s my personal belief that if you were to see that person again (as in a break-up, obviously not as in death situations), that part of you will emotionally fling back to that pain. Instantly. You may have memory jolts of the extreme love and happiness, but I promise you’ll also have shards of the pain pressing against the tender scars.

But…here’s the real question circling around my brain today: what happens while the wound is still fresh, blood is still leaking out around your hasty bandage, and someone else comes along? It’s pretty natural, at least to me, to find someone quickly to help dull the pain, to justify that you’re worthy enough to be with someone else, etc. And there’s a name for that: rebound.

And we all know how rebound relationships go, right?

But, just for “what if”, let’s say it’s NOT a rebound, or at least it’s claimed not to be a rebound. That this is IT, The One. (cue Snow White’s chirping birds here)

Is it possible to have BELIEVED you truly loved when in fact, you hadn’t? Is it possible to claim that your future only seemed bright with that first person, only to find that the level of brightness isn’t comparable to the newly neon shine of the latter love? Any proclamations made to the first may have been true at the time, but then a couple of weeks or so later, another person stumbles into your life and suddenly, the first doesn’t have the glow you once thought? At the time, you thought you’d never eat again, sleep again, smile again – your life and the future you’d planned on having with that person is gone gone gone with no hope of renewal but a month later, your head is spinning with love and happiness and the future dawns bright again.

In my world, that doesn’t make sense at ALL but really, I have no idea of these answers and the more I think about it, the more questions I end up asking myself. This is one of the reasons I hate hypothetical questions. I can’t pinpoint the validity of the answer, especially if I’m not the one living it.

From another one of my All Time Favorite Movies, EVER AFTER:

Prince Henry: Do you really think there is only one perfect mate?

Leonardo da Vinci: As a matter of fact, I do.

Prince Henry: Well then how can you be certain to find them? And if you do find them, I mean really the one for you, or do you only think they are, then what happens if the person you're supposed to be with never appears, or she does but you're too distracted to notice?

Leonardo da Vinci: You learn to pay attention.

Prince Henry: And let's say... God pus 2 people on earth and they are lucky enough to find one another, but one of them gets hit by lightening, well then what, is that it? Or perchance you meet someone new and marry all over again, is that the lady you're supposed to be with, or was it the first? And if so, when the 2 of them are walking side by side, were they both the one for you and you just happened to meet the first one first, or was the second one supposed to be first? And is everything chance? Or are some things meant to be?

Leonardo da Vinci: You cannot leave everything to fate, boy. She's got a lot to do, sometimes you must give her a hand.

Okay, taking Prince Henry’s rambling thoughts to mind, let’s say you’re foolish enough to fall in love again – and your gut tells you that it’s real FOR REAL this time. Should it end yet again and the future is gone gone gone yet again, will the pain be as blindingly horrific as the last time, or, because you’ve experienced it already, the pain is muted, even if just a little, because scars cover the previous wounds. The most pain now would be an itching against that scar, a reminder of what you’ve already survived and acknowledgement that you could – if you had to – survive a great loss again. And, because of that survival, because of the jaded past that now defines the new you, are you that much more willing to toss away love and futures and walk away because you know you can survive it? If you begged that first relationship to not be over, but on the newer one you tend to think of ending it more often, what, exactly, does that mean? Is it a gut reaction to stave off pain like you barely survived, and is an acidic “I don’t even care as much as I used to” type situation? What makes someone change the core of who they are so completely? What makes them go from begging one person, then the second person they supposedly “really truly” love they don’t cling to it just as strongly? Ugh, so many questions!

OR! Maybe this is all a male vs. female thing. Maybe men do recover from lost love faster than women do. I don’t think this is the answer, but it could be. For my hero and heroine, this is what they’re telling me, but it just poses a lot more questions of their past and their personalities to figure out their future.

Because you know me: I have to have my Happily Ever After. There’s no alternative for that in Brenda’s World.
.

Friday's Five -- Websites

2010-04-09T13:29:00.004-05:00

Today I'm posting the websites I go to every day, without fail:

1) Facebook

2) Lucy March's Blog

3) Perez Hilton Celebrity Blog

4) Google

5) eBay

Also on there would be gmail to check my email, but I didn't think that'd really count.

What are the websites you go to every day without fail? Maybe I can find a few new ones to add to those I already visit.

Put Up or Shut Up, Brenda

2010-04-07T12:35:00.004-05:00

So... I either messed up, or it was fate, or something similarly squicky, but either way, a revelation definitely happened today, one I knew -- in my heart -- but hadn't really looked at too closely until this morning, and the shock of it jolted me. Violently.

One of my favorite places to visit every day is Lucy March and it's really great to watch her on a daily basis as she travels emotionally and mentally through Life right now. I replied to her post, and then she replied back, and reminded me of an email I sent her years ago after reading her first book, TIME OFF FOR GOOD BEHAVIOR, and if you read my stuff at all, you'll know it's one of my all-time favorite books. I'd forgotten about that email I'd sent until she reminded me of it, and in doing so, I went digging through my blog, back to 2005, and time after time of reading blog post after blog post, one thing kept sounding loud and clear, and I sat here, staring and reading, it was like roadkill I couldn't look away from.

A huge, vast galaxy of excuses.

I wasn't writing because of this. I wasn't writing because of that. Day after day, week after week, YEAR AFTER YEAR!

I sat here, staring at my laptop.

So okay -- the other side of it. In the last five years, tons of changes have happened in my life. HUGE, HONKIN' changes. Two moves, Sydney's asperger's, Cooper's epilepsy, Shandie off to college, a divorce. Finding who I really am, aside from wife then ex-wife, mother, daughter, Rick's girlfriend, online friendships, now Girl Scout leader and real life friendships. If I strip all of that away, over the course of these years of turmoil, I'm pretty comfortable now with who I know I am.

So, today, April 7, 2010, I'm drawing my line in my own sand. For FIVE YEARS -- five years -- my God just to type it... I've spewed excuse after excuse on why the writing isn't forthcoming. In the last two months, I've written more than I did the last couple of years, but it's not enough. Sure, I've made progress, but it's NOT. ENOUGH.

Two years ago I said I wouldn't attend another National conference until I had something ready to pitch, and I didn't have anything ready, so I didn't go to San Fran or to DC. But this year, this is the year I was going to return, I was going to be in the writing world again, and I was going to write and be ready to pitch. I know I want to write for Blaze. I've created myself a one year, five year and 10 year plan. I've learned collages. But I'm still not producing pages on a daily basis. I'm a realist enough to see the progress I've made and give myself credit for it, but also to understand, deep in my soul, that it's simply not enough.

As Rick said when I talked to him about this, my writing STILL has not become a priority. And, as usual (grumble grumble): He's right.

April is always a tough month for me. Easter and then Carly and Sydney's birthdays. Money is tighter than usual. So I said I didn't think I'd make it to Austin for my writers meetings (it's an hour and a half each way to travel.) But if it's important, I'd find a way, so we'll figure it out to make it happen because *It's Important* that I do so.

For me to keep my promise to myself not to attend Nationals unless I can pitch, I have until May 18th. Early registration for Nationals ends on May 19th. That means that as of today, April 7th, I have six weeks to FINISH this book I'm currently working on.

If I do not meet this goal, I will walk away from writing altogether and simply be a fan of some of the most wonderful women I've ever met and support them as much as I can. This is my line.

Wish me luck.

Friday's Five ~ Language

2010-04-03T16:30:00.000-05:00

Five words I wish would come back in everyday language, just because I like them, which of course, is reason enough right there:

1) Nonsensical -- noun

words or language having little or no sense or meaning.

conduct, action, etc., that is senseless, foolish, or absurd: to have tolerated enough nonsense.

impudent, insubordinate, or otherwise objectionable behavior: He doesn't have to take that nonsense from you.

something absurd or fatuous: the utter nonsense of such a suggestion.

anything of trifling importance or of little or no use.

2) Thwart -- verb (used with object)

to oppose successfully; prevent from accomplishing a purpose.

to frustrate or baffle (a plan, purpose, etc.).

3) Happenstance -- noun

a chance happening or event.

4) flummox [fluhm-uh ks] -- verb (used with object)

Informal.

to bewilder; confound; confuse.

5) Glib -- adjective,glib·ber, glib·best.

readily fluent, often thoughtlessly, superficially, or insincerely so: a glib talker; glib answers.

Side note: glibber is an awesome word -- never heard that one before!

So, any you wish would come back into language style?

Collages: Adult-Style

2010-03-30T19:06:00.001-05:00

(You can click on the photo thumbprints -- here and below -- to see larger versions.)

So this is the collage for BARELY THERE. I started collaging after hearing Jennifer Crusie and Lucy March aka Lani Diane Rich have such success with it. So I thought what the heck, I have nothing to lose.

And it really does work. I went to type something about the stapler and instead of just saying STAPLER, I said, "plain black office stapler" and everyone under the sun now knows exactly what I mean when I say "stapler". And I only have that description because I have the storyboard for this right there in my face the entire time I'm typing. In fact, yesterday I could only manage 300 miserable, horrible, where's-the-delete-key-words and I think it may have been because I didn't have my collage right in my face talking to me as I typed.

So this is the full thing: I bought a tri-fold presentation in black and cut it in half horizontally because I didn't think I needed that much space. So okay -- the black tri-fold board is then covered in sheer black meshing with glittery dots then topped with black satin tied with black and red plaid bows. I used a hole puncher to work those ribbons through. Then I started to abuse the printer...

Whenever we read a book, we create our own visuals of what characters and settings look like based on the information the writer has given us to work with. And of course, everyone mostly visualizes something different, and I think that's why a lot of times people think books are better than movies; the visuals in the movies don't match up to the visuals in the mind (although I think an excellent example against that are the first two Harry Potter movies -- everyone always said it was just as they imagined it. Then, of course, they had to go and get a new director and muck it all up, but I digress...)

So, on that idea, the "characters" on my board are more like the IDEA of the book character more than what they really look like. Delaney Dupree, heroine extraordinaire, is sassy and has crazy red hair -- so of course, Debra Messing came to mind instantly. If you notice there's the bigger photo of her -- I printed that off and used a mat around her and put the name above it. Her favorite drink is a mango margarita, so I glued one of those on as well. Then TIME and STAPLERS are important, so I found ones to be hers, and ones to be his. HIS, being Mitch Parker, womanizer to the extreme and sporting that "everyone loves me" flash of a grin. Who better than Michael Weatherly to give me that on both counts. So... he's framed with a mat as well, he gets his version of stapler and clock, and then I glued his scotch on his hand, and the small photo under him is a spreadout of women -- to represent his womanizing ways.

Okay, then. They both crave landing the VP seat of their advertising agency, so I printed off an executive looking office and put it between them. Right under that is some lingerie, since they kind of battle it out for this new client, so it's also "between" them.

Under Delaney, you'll see a photo of her best friend, Jodi Todd. I describe Jodi as cool and calm with a sleek blonde bob, so I printed out pics of that to represent her. Jack Kincaid, over there under Mitch, is known for his laid back style and basically a good guy.

On the left, most of that represents the dreams that seem to connect Mitch and Delaney. The bottom photo on the left is Delaney's apartment.

On the right side of the board, there's a photo overlooking a downtown office area and over it reads "Little Miss Double D" -- Mitch's nickname for Delaney. Next to that is a photo of Mitch that says "Mitch the Bitch", Delaney's nickname for Mitch. A lot of the book takes place in their offices, and between their offices is the Cubicle Arena, so I printed out a photo of that. On top of the "Instant Ad Exec Just Add Coffee" coffee mug is a small print of a standard office break room. And another red stapler, because staplers are big in this book.

Below that is a photo of Mitch's apartment. On the lower right are photos of the inside of clubs that represent Duke's Bar from the book.

Whew. I'm tired now!

At the top center of the board is a photo between the words BARELY and THERE (which have white and silver glitter on them for a magical visual appeal) and that photo is the core of it all -- a connection, the sensuality, the need, the trust.

The perfect embrace.

Hope you enjoy seeing the creative process and I hope it doesn't bore you to tears! As I stated, this is my first time with working a storyboard collage, and I really, really enjoyed it a lot.

There are a couple of close-up shots:

Happy Birthday, Lester Bobo!

2010-03-28T12:30:00.001-05:00

Today is my dad's birthday -- and this song always reminds me of him.

Happy 72nd Birthday, Dad! I love you!

Making a Playlist and this Breaks My Heart

2010-03-27T20:41:00.001-05:00

Working on my playlist for BARELY THERE, and while downloading one song, this one came up, and just watching the video breaks my heart. To know he's singing this live is amazing to me. The pain radiates.

Friday's Five ~ Springtime

2010-03-26T09:52:00.004-05:00

Five things I love about Springtime in Texas:

1) Flowers -- especially the bluebonnets growing wild on the side of the road, or driving by a store and seeing the sparkling array of flowers in all colors for sale.

2) Sunshine -- although I really dislike daylight savings time, I do like that the kids get longer periods of outside play on school days.

3) Rebirth -- nothing beats seeing the grass start to turn green again, and watching the trees bloom after months of emptiness on the branches.

4) Frolicking -- the dogs seem to come to life with everything else, finding sticks to play with, hopping through the grass, rolling around thinking, "I'm a happy dog! I'm a happy dog!" I loooove it.

5) Flipflops!!! Although occasionally, I'm still a child of the 80s and call them thongs, much to the snickering of my children.

Oh So Ordinary

2010-03-20T19:49:00.002-05:00

Today we watched American Beauty, which I'd never seen before. Very interesting film and it's obvious why it won so many awards. And the theme of ORDINARY resonated: Lester Burman's "I'm just an ordinary guy who has nothing to lose" but especially this one line by Angela Hayes:

"I don't think that there's anything worse than being ordinary."

I think this is a universal truth in us all, even though very few of us would admit it. We may say we want "the American dream" or "just an ordinary life" but that's not only lying to the world, it's lying to ourselves. Is it the need to feel humble? Who said we had to be humble when it comes to our lives? I don't get this mentality at all and I definitely believe that it is a great unspoken fear, this fear of being ordinary, but we just don't have the guts to state it for whatever personal reasons we may think we have. And, in craving it, I have no doubt that people turn to the darker side of it, the entire "negative attention is better than no attention at all" or those people who kick others on the ladder in an attempt to make themselves appear higher, even if just to themselves. But aside from the obvious negatives, I don't think there's a single thing wrong with loudly exclaiming we want more.

We all want to stand out, to get acclamations, to rise above. No one would want a review stating it was "an ordinary performance" or "an ordinary book". So why would any one state that they want the ordinary? I don't want an ordinary love -- I want a spectacular love, defying odds, a love that others re-tell, the one books are written about and for which movies are made. And our lives, from memories to the future of our personal bucket lists -- does any one have "pay the mortgage" or "take out the trash" on their lists? Of course not. They have swimming with dolphins and climbing mountains and other SO out of the ordinary goals listed and for a reason -- we don't want to die having been ordinary.

I crave the extraordinary, and I'm pretty sure I'm not alone. We shouldn't settle for less, and we shouldn't think we deserve less than extraordinary. The ordinary becomes acceptable when we all lower our expectations and settle.

The only settling I want to do is to settle into my extraordinary bed with my extraordinary Rick with my amazingly extraordinary kids dreaming their personal dreams down the hall and keep living our extraordinary life and making extraordinary memories.

Also -- don't say ordinary a lot. It starts to sound really weird. Don't believe me? Try it. Say it aloud like 20 times. Just don't accept it.

Same for extraordinary. That one, well, you're allowed to accept that. Aren't you glad I gave you permission for something you didn't even know you needed?

You're welcome.

Friday's Five

2010-03-19T21:14:00.003-05:00

Today's FRIDAY FIVE is for my five favorite books that never let me down.

1) Bet Me, by Jennifer Crusie
2) Kill & Tell, by Linda Howard
3) Time Off for Good Behavior, by Lani Diane Rich
4) Ain't She Sweet, by Susan Elizabeth Phillips
5) Envy, by Sandra Brown

The Tulip and the Black Thumb -- A Love Story

2010-03-14T21:42:00.005-05:00

I can grow kids -- lots and lots of kids -- but give me something in plant form, and watch it shivel and die a horrific, tragic death. Well, I'm pretty good at cactus. Too bad I don't like them. And there's an aloe that Carly gave me a few years back at Christmas that I've kept BARELY alive -- it's not really green right now, more of a pale poopy greenish color, but it's mostly alive. And the worst part of it all is that my dad can grow ANYTHING -- gorgeous flowers, hugely over-abundant vegetable gardens. Then I look at the flowers in his backyard and you can HEAR the leaves quivering in fear because I'm near.
And looking their direction.

Then this last Christmas, as I was making my dad a wishing well for his present, I found some bulbs on sale. I picked up some beautiful blood-red tulips and we put them in the ground and guess what?? Apparently if you ignore that patch of ground for a few months, MAGIC happens.

My tulip first presented signs of red two days ago. Today, though, it stood proudly in full glory, so I thought I'd share it with you. Ya know, so you can see it before I somehow destroy it with my mere presence. Maybe I'll keep ignoring it, now that I have a photo as proof.

Stay tuned for our next part of this love story and we'll see if it has a Happily Ever After or ya know, more of a Romeo & Juliet kind of ending.

Wish me luck!

Don't Go Changin' ~ To Try To Please Me

2010-03-11T16:11:00.003-06:00

That entire song is just one honkin' huge lie.

Just a couple of months after Rick and I started dating, I realized I'd started to change a little and said so to Rick and he said, "Well, that's no good." (Direct quote.) But it was good: I was smoking less -- a LOT less -- and making better dinners and keeping house better, but I was definitely changing. And he totally lied with the "That's no good" because over a year later and knowing him so much better, he really does have issues with housework and smoking, so I'm pretty sure "changing Brenda's certain behaviors" was actually pretty high on his Brenda List of Necessary Requirements.

Just sayin'.

But like I said, they were POSITIVE changes, so I can't really complain about them. Well, I can, and sometimes DO, but I digress...

And then there are those who really, really hate it when you change. They can't comprehend who are you now verses who you were then. They refuse to accept it, and in denying it, they cut all ties. I would understand if I'd become addicted to heroin or dating abusive men: yeah -- cut those ties if she won't help herself because then you're just enabling. But that's the far end spectrum, and it's also on the far negative side as well. When the changes are overall a positive thing, I can't comprehend what is so absolutely horrible that they'd just. . . POOF.

Well, I do know why, if I really, really think about it. I'm a needy person in general, but having Rick who defines FIXER, well, we balance, and in that balancing, I don't "need" certain aspects that were originally part of certain relationships. And I guess in some people's viewpoints, that's a huge negative. I get it, I just refuse to accept it because I find it selfish and foot-stomping-taking-my-ball-and-leaving childish behavior.

So if you have a friend (and I'll let you define "friend" in your own way) and you see him or her changing their life in a positive way -- she's happier, her kids are happier, she's almost found SOLICE -- celebrate with her and still love her. You may have to change your roles in the relationship a little, maybe a lot, but if that relationship meant anything at all to you, if you truly had a selfless love and concern, you don't just up and walk away. You reshape, you redefine, but you still care, you still suppport.

You still love.

But in the end, the change is for yourself and not to try to please another person out there. Swear.

2010-03-05T08:17:00.003-06:00

See that adorable West Highland Terrier? His name is Scooter. On Rick's birthday, September 15th of 2009, Scooter died.

Scooter was a force of All Things Doggy, including the need to be the biggest and baddest there is (he got that from Rick). Unfortunately for Scooter, our other dog, Ambush (note the name?!) is bigger and badder, a mixed breed of what looks like German Shepard and Big Goofy Dog -- 99% of the time, Ambush is simply a big goofy dog who really reminds you of Scooby Do. Most of the time, due to Scooter's need to prove himself, they were kept in separate yards, with the occasional inter-mixing. Then one day, on a rush out of the house to take the heathens somewhere, I saw that Scooter wasn't moving. He was on the ground with the other dogs simply looking down at him.

I yelled for Rick, and after shoo'ing the kids back inside, we took Scooter to the garage to assess his condition. It wasn't good. Mud caked his tongue from when he'd laid on the ground, his breathing was simply gasps, and I suspected a punctured lung. We wrapped him around with plastic wrap and his breathing eased. A sucking lung wound at the age of 12 for a dog? Not good. And when Rick had lifted him up, he said he could FEEL the broken parts of his ribs and back.

Then Scooter tried to stand up.

Have I mentioned the tenacity of this dog yet?

Now, Scooter picked a fight with Ambush two years or so ago, and lost then too, and after four days in the hospital and endless drain tubes, he healed. Amazingly. But now he's 12 years old, so old for a dog, and his body has endured so much. And in the midst of our anguish, decisions must be made.

Rick decided to take him to a local vet, and as of right now, the only vet in our country area. We take him in, and I try to speak for Rick, I try to be the Devil's Stupid Advocate. If the machine needs to be turned off, I have to step up with my emotions off and say this is what's best. He hasn't been MY personal dog for 12 years. I don't have the memories of him as a puppy. It was 5:30pm and the vet is closing for the day, but they all go into Critical Mode as we rush in.

And as this lady is looking him over, I say those words: Is it in this dog's best interest with these wounds and his age to simply relieve him of the pain and put him down?

The vet cleans him up, starts an IV, starts antibiotics, and the worst of it, she gave Rick hope. I had to leave to pick up the kids and while I'm gone, they've shaved his fur and even the vet said you could see the broken, damaged bones of Scooter even more so. Scooter fought every inch of the way, so they sedated him to SHAVE HIM.

So now he's on the ventilator, he's on pain meds, he's on antibiotics. They tell us he'll either pull through over night or not, but there's no way to really determine. We take turns petting him and ruffling his ears and telling him he's the bravest, dumbest, cutest thing ever and kiss him g'night with promises to see him in the morning.

The call came in just after midnight: Scooter died.

I had a flannel blanket with dogs all over it and we took it up there, and the vet gave us Scooter all wrapped up so we couldn't really see him. We went to the receptionist and she chirped up with, "Your total is $400."

Well now I'm just angry. Rick is standing there, prepared for around $100 or so, holding his dead dog on this birthday, and these people who I attempted to talk to the night before on what was best for Scooter are now asking for more money than it took to save Scooter before (at a different hospital -- and with a four day stay!) Rick pays the $100 he'd brought with him, and they happily -- yes, I said HAPPILY -- agree to let him pay out the rest.

So now we see a reminder every month in the mail when a statement comes reminding us how much we owe because the vet did not make the best decision for our dog. Granted, I'm not a vet, but I've been around animals my entire life, and the odds for a 12 year old dog with such huge, huge injuries to make it all, to go through the pain meds and the antibiotics and oxygen cage and blah blah blah -- did you really do what you thought was best for Scooter, or what you thought was best for YOU, Dear Vet, in a tanking economy? In all honesty, my anger knows no bounds and we will never, ever use that business again, and even suggest to others not to as well. Again, not knowing a lot about vets but I have to wonder: Do they not have an oath as well? Is it not their MORAL POSITION to do what's best for the pet, not what's best for the people, the owners or the vet, but to be an ADVOCATE for our creatures who can't speak for themselves?

One of the saddest -- sad to the bone, heart-breaking-standing-there kind of sad -- things I have ever, ever witnessed is a grown man crying as he digs the grave for his dog, on his own birthday, no less.

Less than three months later, Elly, Scooter's "wife", died at the age of 13, under our coffee table surrounded by us all. She's buried next to Scooter, where I'm sure he's taking turns frolicking with her while growling at other dogs to know their place on the totem pole - because even in Dog Heaven, he's still Top Dog.

A Polygon in a Round Hole

2010-03-03T11:45:00.006-06:00

A few disclaimers:
1) My R key keeps sticking. That's just irritating, and so is the word IRRITATING because it has 2 Rs. So if you see mistakes due to an R missing, it's 100% the keyboard's fault. Forget the fact that I originally typed "keyword", k? Thanks.

2) Cooper and Sydney got in an argument on the way home after school yesterday over polygons. Not even kidding. Cooper, the 3rd grader, got it in his head that the sides had to be equal (don't even ask what that shape would be -- I am not smarter than a 3rd grader, especially not THAT 3rd grader) whereas Sydney (the 4th grader) said it's a closed shape, regardless of equal sides. I piped up with: Look it up but I'm pretty sure in the grand scheme of things, a POLYGON isn't going to make or break your day, and they must have agreed because I don't think either looked it up because I didn't hear a word about it once we got home.

3) I looked it up. Not only images, but the "real" definition as well. According to dictionary.com:

pol·y·gon /ˈpɒliˌgɒn/ Show Spelled[pol-ee-gon]
–noun
a figure, esp. a closed plane figure, having three or more, usually straight, sides.

How's THAT for vague?

Where ya goin' with this, Bren? Well, I'll tell you: Having a lot of writers on Facebook as friends shows you the speed (and sometimes not such speed) in which they're working and cranking out books. Granted, I just started back up and to see my own silver lining, I'm just under 13K on this novel, but still...

I think back when I first found this world of writers and how some had started around the same time I had back then and holy smokes -- look where they are now. Nine books later, twelve books later. It can be so intimidating. And I'm plunging back into the writing world I used to be so familiar with and there are loops and forums and blogs out the wah-zoo and you try to be out there, amongst them, trying to wriggle into the different "communities" set up and then I stop and think:

I'm a square peg trying to fit a round hole.

Then that didn't feel right and suddenly I'm reminded of Syd and Cooper's polygon discussion yesterday and I'm like great -- I'm a polygon in a round world. Now isn't that just a bright, sunshiny feeling or what? Ugh.

And I try not to make comparisons with others, truly. I'm here to do what I can, and they're there doing what they do, and we don't even write the same sub-genres so why am I comparing anyway? At least, after a horrific five year struggle, at least I'm back, right? Right.

So WHAT if I haven't sold yet -- I'm just now really trying. So WHAT if I can't seem to flitter into well-established online communities, at least I'm THERE.

I really hate being my own cheeleader but hey -- you take what you can get and work with it.

Now I have the visual of polygons with pompoms. It's gonna be a long day.

Forever & For Always

2010-02-28T15:22:00.003-06:00

Just hit my writing goal for the day and still going strong but working on my play list and basically, Happily Ever After is summed up in this song. And although I've always loved this song of Shania Twain's, mixing it with Allison Kraus is just breathless, so I thought I'd share a musical Happily Ever After with you today as I celebrate hitting today's goal.

Friday's Five

2010-02-26T18:40:00.003-06:00

I'm hoping to post every week a FRIDAY'S FIVE -- 5 things that make me happy!

1) Hearing from an old friend after years and years and feeling that instant connection again.
2) Casanova's sighs when he finds his spot on the bed at night.
3) Cooper's enthusiasm of "I made a 110 on my spelling test today!"
4) The anticipation of a writers meeting to renew my own energy.
5) The hope when cracking open a new book I haven't yet read.

Trashy Karma

2010-02-25T22:00:00.002-06:00

What a long, long day today. Man oh man! Today was the last day of my first year of Girl Scout cookie-ing and I can honestly say: WHEW! FINISHED! And of course, now that we're done, we have people wanting more. It's like Black Friday -- you don't want a particular item until you see the frenzy of others getting what's left so you go to grab it to make sure it's YOURS YOURS YOURS and oh crud -- it's gone.

Now keep in mind, this is the first time in decades that Girl Scouts have been in Cameron. So this isn't just MY first year as leader or in cookies, but most of us here in town. Our troop alone sold over 800 boxes. I have no idea what the Cameron troops combined sold, but it's impressive. Carly and Sydney were out front on our street holding up LAST DAY signs and it worked down to the last delicious box -- I'm SO proud.

But it's been a... well... a different kind of day.

It started earlier today. Every day after I do the morning school run, I go to the convenience store down the road and get me a big ol' honkin' fountain drink of Diet Coke, and today was no exception. As I'm walking back to the truck, one of the ladies who work there bent over and picked up some trash. As she grew closer to me, I noticed it was a thrown-out scratch off lottery ticket. So I ask her about it as she proceeds to dig through the trash can right outside the door looking for more.

See? Different.

Apparently she's won over $100 in the last two weeks on tickets people assumed they'd lost on when they just hadn't read it well enough. Can you even imagine?? She said she used to buy the occasional scratch off but stopped when she realized she could win without spending a thing! I told her she must have a lot of good karma out there that she's literally cashing in on. *gobsmack moment*

Then, tonight, a lady stopped to buy some cookies. We didn't have the ones she wanted, but she stayed around and asked a lot about the scouts and when we moved here, etc. She moved here about a year ago, and amazingly enough, she and her husband bought a house that Rick and I had looked at a couple of blocks away before we found this one. And it was one of those times where you meet someone and feel like you've known them ALWAYS. She has no children and surprisingly, my herd of heathens didn't deter her at all! (Hmm... maybe I need to requestion her mentality!) She and her husband ended up staying over for homemade pizza and hugs all around when they went to their own house. It was very weird in the grand scheme of things, but felt very natural in the moment. And all because two of my daughters were selling cookies at the curb.

Have I mentioned yet how scouting has changed MY life?

Oh, and the convenience worker who checked tickets there while talking to me? Well, she didn't win a thing today.But I still think about her karma being repaid, and then I think about my new friend made today, and perhaps that's my OWN karma being repaid as well.

And I like it.

Guts, Gore & The Quest for the Magical Solution

2010-02-24T18:56:00.003-06:00

In an attempt to blog daily, I have to dig around my real life to find something of any significance and put it out there for the world, unless, of course, I want my blog to resort back to fluff and videos and things of no depth. No thanks.

Today I spent most of it on the phone. In a world of technology as we have it, it was like this flashback to the 90s and a phone to my ear all day. After countless issues with my website -- thankfully it wasn't me, the user (who designed it) but an issue with the hosting site -- and after continuing to talk for about two hours, we came to the conclusion that what I want cannot be done, at least by them. So they refer me to another blogging site which supposedly CAN do what I want. Great. So I scurry my fingertips over there and fiddle around for two hours just to realize that it's not as easy as blogger and I'm not sure I really care all that much for the time and energy it's already taken out of my life especially given that the "five minute download" didn't even seem to take.

Gah!!

So I stop and think: Is what I want so important to me that I'm willing to make myself insane to get it, read a gazillion things and hope it works out, invest unlimited number of hours to make it look like I want (assuming I ever get that far anyway!!!) when I've already invested so much time and energy and love into the blog and website I have. The answer is no.

Disclaimer: If someone can help me easily figure this out, rock on. Otherwise, I'm done with the idea until I sell some books and can hire someone to magically do what I want.

So that's the bottom line: What do I want and what am I willing to do/not do to get it?

And then there's my beautiful and brilliant daughter who is in that god-awful age of truly still-a-kid-but-really-an-adult in college crisis. She wants this, but fears that. She needs this, but is told that. She's spinning. All I can do is stick my hand out and attempt to slow down the speeding merry-go-round she can't seem to get off of and hope that my slowing it down is enough so she can jump off and get back on track to the future that's waiting out there. But part of her issues are what others say, what others think, and granted, they are significant in their stance in her life "as others". Their words and opinions carry a great, great weight. But in the end, it's her life. It's her future. The decisions she makes are hers alone.

I'm thrilled when she calls for my opinion, and I'm even thrilled when she calls The Others for theirs. But I'm not thrilled when she calls me even more confused than she had been after I'd slowed the spinning, even temporarily. Nor do I like the sound of defeat and indifference in her voice when she hits the "I really don't care anymore, I'll do whatever." When she loses her passion, it ups mine to feverish degrees. As her mother, I have to verbally cattle-prod her into believing these dreams are still viable, to transfer some of MY tenacity back into HER passion.

But at the end of the day, her choices with school -- although much, much grander and heavier than my webpage ones -- are the same: Where's your bottom line? What do you refuse to compromise on? What must you have and what are you willing to give up? Every path we wander down, whether creating a webpage for a hopeful future or deciding college choices for a hopeful future -- well, they're ours. We have to claim them, own them, nourish them, so we have to make sure the details are worth the pain and gore to get to the magical solution of The End.

Whether The End of a novel or The End of the college education, it's a bumping, gory road, but the pain will so be worth it.

I promise, baby girl. It will be.

Puppy Love and other Bodily Fluids

2010-02-23T09:45:00.005-06:00

With all great things comes a bit of ewwy. I think that's what keeps us grounded in reality as opposed to the fantasies we all wish our lives were, at least to some extend (there's a REASON why romance sells so well, people, even in recessions.) And with those big, big puppy eyes comes little surprises from the other end.

Somewhere in this six month old puppy's life, he was abused. I'm definitely not saying it was the owners right before us -- they'd had him a short time, from my understanding. I'm just stating with absolute fact that some human out there -- beyond any inkling of a doubt -- abused this precious animal. He's horribly afraid of feet. If we move, he ducks, although NOW he ducks with his tail wagging. So someone has kicked him. And his first night home, Rick went to hand me some papers and Casanova tried to climb into my head to get away from the source, so someone has hit him with papers.

There's a special, horrific circle of hell for animal abusers.

But he's made such huge strides. Oliver, the black pug, is teaching him how to be a PUPPY and not a quivering mass of nervousness. He pounces now, jogs after Oliver, tries to wrestle away toys. Oliver, being just one year old, is still a lot of puppy himself, but instead of jealousy, he's taken his role of big brother and is taking Casanova and showing him how it's done, what it's like to live in a house where being a puppy is okay, even with occasional accidents, where you're cuddled to pieces and coo'ed at until you wish those long, long hound dogs ears had an OFF switch. It's been just four days, but to see the changes in this animal feel like so much more. And just think: Only 12 more years or so for us to drown out the violent months of his life and replace them with more love then one dog could ever hope for.

He's snuggled down on the couch next to Rick while big, fat, wet cotton snowflakes fall outside our window and it looks like a postcard as I sit here and watch.

Then I realize it is: It's a post card of my new life.

WISH YOU WERE HERE!
~Bren

Times Are a'Changin'

2010-02-22T12:47:00.004-06:00

So let's see -- it's been since September since I updated my blog. I could easily blame this on Facebook. I mean, let's admit, those tiny and not-so-tiny details of your life, including photos, are so easy to put there and everyone from grandma to your first friend at five years old to writing buddies and online friends can see it instantly. Makes updating this a little less -- well, frankly, necessary. But, having said that, I'm doing it anyway.

First change, of course, for those who noticed: NEW BLOG LAYOUT! I wanted it to match the website a little better but also, I needed a change of all things from attitude to life in general to even how my blog looks. Don't knock the small stuff.

So what's happened since September? Well, the divorce was completed at long last, and remember that post I made in January 2009 about watching the world through the windows and how I have to make changes to my entire life to fix that little issue? Oh man oh man, have I made those changes.

I have no doubt in my mind at all that there are a few toxic individuals I've had the displeasure of knowing who still come here to see what I'm saying (one of the reasons I haven't posted in so long -- don't feed the hyenas) but then I realized they really have zero to do with me and my new life anymore, and that includes releasing any power they think they had/have by doing what I want, when I want, INSPITE of their constant presence. To those people, I hope one day you can find your own peace without it being at the expense of someone else. You truly do not have to lie, manipulate, and lose all morality in order to be "better". Promise.

Now that those issues have been addressed, where was I? Oh right -- January '09 Watching Life Through the Window Thingy. Right after I'd typed that post, I met an amazing individual named Rick Sanders, and despite my huge, huge issues and my huge, huge amount of offspring, something insane inside him decided to love me anyway. He moved to Cameron (can you even believe it?!) and we bought a house and now we're working on our own happily-ever-after, and over a year later we're doing a damn fine good job of it. Then, in September, Syd Vicious joined Girl Scouts -- first time in like 20 years GS have been in our town -- and lo' and behold -- I'm the Junior Leader, and I have to tell you, I LOVE IT. It has changed my life beyond words, and only those who truly knew me could appreciate how much of an impact these two things -- Rick and Girl Scouts with Sydney and Carly -- have changed me as an individual and mostly as a mother.

And now that so much of my personal life is finally obtaining serenity (did we EVER think this day would come?!), I'm writing again. *gasp*shock*omg-you're-lying!* Nope, it's true, and just recently even entered a contest again. And Rick is determined I make it to Nationals again having missed the last couple of years. AND, in the manner of support-his-woman that he is, he's going to drive me to Nashville himself. Now my goal is to write on my blog as much as possible, even if it's not all sunshine and rainbows, and to be ME. And if there are those out there who support me and what I write here, FANTASTIC! And if not, there's an X at the top of the screen. Feel free to click it.

And for those who ever read 100 random things about me, Rick just fulfilled another one off my list: I now own a basset hound puppy.

And I named him Casanova.

Temporary reassignment

2009-09-22T11:06:00.004-05:00

For the next few weeks, my usual website is down and moved to a new location, a dot info instead of my usual dot net. This is because I received conflicting emails, saying my auto-renewal had posted, then another one saying it was due, blah blah blah, and when I finally called them today about it, lo and behold, those emails were for two different things. I'm sure if I was a bit geekier in my knowledge of All Things Computers, this wouldn't have gotten mixed up as it did. And, of course, being that I'm a huge loser, my website hasn't even been finished or updated since January. Okay, so I've had a few huge, life-altering things occur this year... sue me. No, don't really sue me. Humor.

Or, ya know, a pale attempt at it.

So... for those who may occasionally wander onto brendabradshaw.net, and can't find it, you now know to go to brendabradshaw.info.

In bigger and more exciting news today: SEASON PREMIER OF NCIS! WOOT!

That's all.

As Ms. Julia Quinn said it best...

2009-07-24T14:06:00.002-05:00

"This is why I write romance."

For those who follow me on Facebook as well as this blog, sorry for the double posting, but I wanted it on here too!

Let me hear that BOOM BOOM POW -- Wait, in CAMERON?!

2009-06-17T22:57:00.003-05:00

1) This is not a joke. The following events are true and accurate and experienced by yours truly.

2) Cameron, TX: Population approx. 5300 (yes, really)

3) Time since moving into the new house: two weeks

So, for those who are familiar with the blog, it comes as no surprise that I'm writing about this Sunshiny Town called Cameron, which I sometimes (lovingly...*cough*) refer to as God Spit, Texas. This is another of those posts.

It's a gorgeous June Tuesday night (nope, not even a WEEKEND! Can you even believe it?!) and I'm sitting outside on my beautiful deck while my four babies frolick in the new pool. They have Shan's laptop playing music to which they've choreographed this odd pool-dance thing to. I'm standing on my deck, watching the refreshing shimmering blue of the pool, the beaming smiles of my amazingly talented children when all of the sudden...

BAM! BAM! BAM!

Three gunshots in rapid succession. We all freeze then instantly jump into action, herding the smaller ones out of the pool and up the deck as another three

CRACK! CRACK! CRACK!

explode in the air, sounding like they're RIGHT IN FRONT OF THE HOUSE!

The kids are screaming and Carly scurries them all into the bathroom (smallest window, like this is a tornado or something) while I snag my cell and dial 911 while opening another drawer and pulling out the Constantly-Loaded-Walther, also known from hence forth as WALT. I dash back out the door onto the deck and I'm telling dispatch that I heard three shots in rapid succession, about a 30 second pause then three more shots. She kind of puts me on hold and takes another call of someone else reporting it, but apparently this guy went out his FRONT door and got a look at the car as it sped away, and noted that the gangster was right-minded enough to turn on his stupid left blinker when he got to the four-way stop two blocks down. How socially conscious of him. JERK!

I hear voices from the deck. Our house sits on a full city block, a total 0.51 acre, so our side neighbors share their backyards to our backyard. Two neighbors to our one backyard. Make sense? So we all start comparing notes.

THEN! I see from the backyard that going down the road is someone on a GOLF CART! HUH?!?! Oh wait... it's the HIGH SCHOOL PRINCIPAL! No, I'm not kidding.

Now, for the record, I grew up in Dallas/Ft Worth. I lived in Cove for awhile where we did have some stabbings at the schools. But in CAMERON?! Gangs?! Uh... okay.

So, in the end, it's a block party. And I'm not kidding. 10:30pm and the intersection is filled with cops and detectives searching for casings (they found four of the six) and all the neighbors gathered together. So, I got to meet some new neighbors I hadn't met yet. That's nice, right? Then more people start to show up who HEARD IT ON THE POLICE SCANNER and came to check it out, all saying hi to each other and blah blah blah and "How is your grandmother doin'? She good? Good to hear it!"

I stand there, godsmacked.

The police and the neighbors all reassure me that in all their lives living here on "this side of town", they'd NEVER heard gunfire or any gang activities. Yeah sure. Not only did it sound right in my front yard, but it was in the street literally in front of it. I'm kinda thinking they were aiming at the the principal; he lives next door about 1/2 a block down. HE, of course, thought my house was the target. The casings were found right between us, so I'll go on thinking they targetted him and he'll probably keep thinking that they targetted me and we'll both revel in our denial.

About a year after moving here and living out in the country, I'd heard a gunshot then too (I'm pretty sure I blogged about that too). The cops came out and said it was someone shooting snakes. Eeep. But this wasn't snakes. This wasn't the country. This was a few blocks from the schools in the middle of "the good part of town". Very scary in this odd surreal way of everyone hanging out, and all that was missing was a bonfire and marshmellows on sticks.

The weird part? Yes, I mean weirder than the above. Shandie's friend was telling her some details, and get this! It was members from this gang: Eighteen and a Half.

I'm not kidding.

This town has "half" streets. So like 401 N. 15 1/2. So they have a GANG named EIGHTEEN AND A HALF?!

AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

Better hope 15 3/4 doesn't raise up to take you on! And you better really hope you don't ever meet the gangs in Austin or Dallas where they're not named after HALF STREETS.

This has been your newest Cameron update. A shout out to my new neighbors, especially the across the street neighbor Mr. Hooker, the high school principal and owner of the golf cart. You rock!

I hate April

2009-04-03T15:22:00.004-05:00

The following conversation took place via text messages with my oldest daughter, Shandie, who is currently at Texas State University.

Shandie: Mom, I have to be out of my dorm by 5pm tomorrow.

Me: What?!

Shandie: Are you going to be able to come and get me?

Me: April Fool, huh?

Shandie: I wish. They did a search of my dorm and found alcohol and cocaine in my dresser.

Me: Cocaine.

Shandie: I've been suspended for a full semester. I'm losing all of this semester's credits with no refund. (Side note: That really is the school policy...)

Me: Sucks to be you then. (She lost me on the cocaine. Bad drug choice on her part.)

Shandie: Thankfully they didn't find the prostitutes under my bed.

Me: I just hope they were MALE prostitutes.

Shandie: You know they weren't. I had me a tranny. As Hannah Montanna says, "You get the best of both worlds."

Me: Hit Mimi (my mom) with this next.

Meanwhile, I'm trying not to wet myself in the van while laughing hysterically at the Hannah Montanna quote. Mimi does not have texting, so Shandie had to do it all via telephone and have NO DOUBT that she did, indeed, make that particular call. I think there was an odd glee Shan got when hearing the distress in my mother's voice as she wove her little tale of lies. And my parents thought I was bad. The worst I ever did to my mother was the "Mom, I'm pregnant." Every year for years and years, I did that call, even two years after I had my hysterectomy. Welcome to the new world generation with people like Shandie with their Hannah Montanna and tranny prostitutes.

Monday's Music

2009-02-09T20:48:00.001-06:00

Say your sorry
That face of an angel comes out
Just when you need it to.
As I pace back and forth
All this time cause
I honestly believed in you.
Holdin' on
The days drag on
Stupid girl I should have known, I should have known.

That I'm not a princess.
This ain't a fairytale.
I'm not the one you sweep off her feet,
Lead her up the stairwell.
This ain't Hollywood, this is a small town.
I was a dreamer before you went and let me down.
Now it's to late for you and your white horse to come around.

Maybe I was naÎve, got lost in your eyes,
and never really had a chance.
my mistake, I didn't know to be in love
you had to fight to have the upper hand
I had so many dreams about you and me.
Happy endings, well now I know...

That I'm not a princess.
This ain't a fairytale.
I'm not the one you sweep off her feet,
lead her up the stairwell.
This ain't Hollywood, this is a small town.
I was a dreamer before you went and let me down.
Now its too late for you and your white horse to come around.

And there you are on your knees.
Begging for forgiveness, begging for me.
Just like I always wanted but, I'm so sorry.

Cause I'm not your princess.
This ain't a fairytale.
I'm gonna find someone some day, who might actually treat me well.
This is a big world.
That was a small town, there in my rearview mirror disappearing now.
And it's too late for you and your white horse...
Its too late for you and your white horse to
catch me now.

In honor of Inauguration Day...

2009-01-19T20:27:00.002-06:00

Our Presidents!

I'm a geek: I watched it twice... the second time to see when neckties became popular to wear. Apparently bowties were the fashion before Roosevelt, who stepped out of the box and wore a regular necktie. What a rebel.

Then if you notice, Jimmy Carter is the first to smile for the portrait, then they all did! Way to start a trend, President Carter!

Quest in Saving the Contemporary!

2009-01-19T13:09:00.004-06:00

With paranormal still hot and going strong, and with the lovely comeback of historical novels with notable thanks to Sherry Thomas and Courtney Milan, it seems that the basic of contemporary is on a horrible downward spiral. Considering I write contemporaries, this is not a good thing at all.

The ladies over at Smart Bitches are campaigning to save the contemporaries with a fantastic free book offer. They recently did a review for Jill Shalvis's novel called INSTANT ATTRACTION and loved it so much that they're offering to give away copies if you post on their comments (I highly recommend you read the review too. They really liked this book and it shows in the review and gives you a bit of insight as to what the novel is about.)

So help spread the word! Help save the genre that's so very close to my heart.

The Best Book Review EVER!

2009-01-17T12:58:00.002-06:00

I'm not kidding. I just read the entire thing aloud to Shan so we could both crack up laughing. I'm warning you though, it's a review about an erotic novel, so keep that in mind. But, rest assured, it's totally worth it to hold your sides as you roll laughing at how the SMART BITCHES break it down.

By far the best line from the review (and probably the book over all): "I'm in your ass. Saving your life."

I didn't make that up.

A World Away

2009-01-16T20:01:00.002-06:00

Today I made the comment that I wanted to run away... if just for a little while. One great friend mentioned Tennessee, but she has a hidden agenda (we haven't seen each other since we were little kids!). Another simply asked me where I wanted to go, and ya know, I had no answer.

As writers, we're always creating worlds, this being especially true for paranormal/sci-fi writers since they have to create vastly different worlds with different rules and everything.

But all writers do it. The location, sometimes a city even... or just a job, an apartment or house. Decorate it. Live in it. BE in it to have it come to life on paper. And then the cast of thousands. All in this new world created in one's imagination.

But where is your world? That personal, just-for-you place? If you were creating a place for a fictional you, where would your story take place that isn't the reality you currently live in? A mountain top with snow-capped ridges, filled with the scent of cold and purity that only snow can create, mingled with the heavy scent of the pine trees. The air so frigid you're afraid of freezing from the inside out, but you have to inhale deeply anyway, a visceral need to swallow the cleanliness of it into yourself. The crunch under your feet with each step you take. The whispers of whomever is with you, who knows that only softly spoken words fit in this particular environment. The smoke rising from the chimney of a cabin, the fire inside beckoning you into its comforting warmth.

Or do you prefer a beach? The salty, briny air you can smell and you can taste on the tip of your tongue. The gentle breezes lifting your hair from your face as you watch the firey sunset meeting with the endless blues as it darkens. The individual grains of sand sifting through your toes, the water lapping up to greet you a little at a time as the tide comes in to say hello, depositing small gifts of shells and pebbles for your pleasure of exploring. A bonfire at night, the crackling wood, the colors of the flame as it licks the salted wood, the warmth of a blanket and the person you want with you to keep the chill away.

Where's your world?
What do you create?
Where would you run?

As for me, I'm not really sure, but I'm definitely going to think about it and create it, not to be shared in a book someday, but to be treasured by just me for those moments when I crave the escape. And I'll know it'll be there, waiting to greet me.

Hero

2009-01-13T08:16:00.004-06:00

I am in love with this song so I thought I'd share it with you.

Would you dance if I asked you to dance?
Would you run and never look back
Would you cry if you saw me crying
Would you save my soul tonight?

Would you tremble if I touched your lips?
Would you laugh oh please tell me these
Now would you die for the one you love?
Hold me in your arms tonight?

I can be you hero baby
I can kiss away the pain
I will stand by you forever
You can take my breath away

Would you swear that you'll always be mine?
Would you lie would you run away
Am I in to deep?
Have I lost my mind?
I don't care you're here tonight

I just want to hold you
Am I in too deep?
Have I lost my mind?
Well I don't care you're here tonight

You can take my breath my breath away
I can be your hero

3 out of 4 children wish you...

2009-01-10T15:47:00.001-06:00

A HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Dawning

2009-01-03T07:08:00.005-06:00

I sat here for a moment and wondered what to label this particular blog entry. The I-wish-I-wrote silly girl in me always likes to to attempt to come up with something fun and different, but my mind grew blank. I vaguely knew of what I wanted to write, but as usual, I opened blogger without any exact idea in mind. As usual, my brain vomits in eruption of chaos and spews out of my fingertips. In less than 30 seconds, the title slammed into me.

The time is 7:10am on Saturday, January 3rd, 2009. This is my first blog entry for the new year. Anyone who knows me at all is probably sighing at the time of the writing. No, I'm not waking up at my usual morning time. You are correct, for those who attempted a guess: I have yet to sleep.

My initial thought is, as usual, to blame someone else, and in this case, it would be the ever delightful and disgustingly talented Susan Elizabeth Phillips. For those who have not yet had the honor of reading her book, AIN'T SHE SWEET, you should be flogged on general principle, however, once you do read it and question why you've been granted life to continue for such a blatant oversight as to have not read it sooner, I shall save my beatings. Even though this is by far the first time I've read this novel, once again, I read it to the end. Once again, I laughed. Once again, I cried. And once again, I sighed as it was over. Sugar Beth -- I know thy soul all too well.

As I finally turned out the light to sleep and rolled over, I noticed the odd smokey blue of the sky. My room faces east. Sunsets are more my thing than sunrises as I'm usually very much still asleep at this time of morning when the sun graces us with its appearance. But those few times I catch a sunrise, I cherish them. Not enough to arise early every day, but just those special accidental occasions such as this.

I don't miss sunrise-kisses as much as I thought I would. And there was a time in my not-so-recent past that I never thought I'd be able to proclaim that sentiment.

In a weird act, I gathered up my laptop and headed to the backyard, and climbed up onto the new trampoline Santa brought the kids. I hadn't even been back here since it was set up -- why? I mean, after all, I can see it from my bedroom window.

I see lots of things from my bedroom window.

I don't live them. I see them. From the enclosed sanctuary I've made for myself.

So... I'm out here now, sitting on this new trampoline, and since I live in the country, imagine this: a flat pasture, ten acres, the tallish grass brittle and brown, fall leaves gathered high along the cyclone fence that separates the backyard from the field. There are no buildings out here in the country save two very old, tinroofed barns, the boards gray and white with age, and tin tops rusted to a dull reddish brown, sagging in the middle, missing boards in the outter walls. Just a flat landscape turning softer blue as I type. In the far distance, the tree line looks almost like that of a sketch, the trees having no defining lines. Barbed wire pulls and leans on old pieces of wood, almost sticks really, something some old rancher somewhere thought would serve as fence posts. Along that fence, dividing this property from the neighbor's land, Scout, my black cat with white socked feet scampers along, probably wondering what I, of all people, am doing in the back yard, much less this time of day. I wonder where she's been overnight and what all she saw and played.

I'm watching the sky turn to fire. The pink that begins the sunrise. There's a very mild breeze. It's January 3rd, but it's Texas, and although it was bitterly cold with winds in December, now it's mild, maybe 55 degrees with this tiny breeze. A canopy of leafless branches of the huge old trees are above my head as I sit cross-legged in the middle of a black trampoline and realize what I coward I have become.

The sun winks shyly above the treeline in the distance.

And for the first time in a long, long time, I'm awake.

Black Friday - 2008

2008-12-02T16:38:00.005-06:00

This year was incredibly anti-climatic after the Cat Fight Christmas of last year. Mom and I went out at 3:30am again and waited in line, but we were inside Walmart, so it wasn't bad at all since we were inside this time. I left Mom to gather up two of a certain item while I went and waited for another item. While waiting, I wandered the store, talking to managers and finding out where items where that they had wrapped up in black plastic so we couldn't "peek". It was kind of dumb, especially when you just ask and they told ya anyway.

I got everything I went after, so that was good.

Seriously, it was a boring day, aside from the cramming of items into the van and wondering where we'd go next. I'd kinda hoped for another story like I had last year, but alas, none to be had.

The weekend was a whirlwind though. We arrived in Ft. Worth on Wednesday night. Thursday morning was cooking and baking and then to my aunt's for lunch. Thursday night, the girls and my cousin and her daughter and I went to the movies to see Twilight. I'd never gone to the movies on Thanksgiving night, but it was pretty neat. I'll post about Twilight later because I actually have things to say about that. Then Friday morning, Mom and I got up at the crack-ass of dawn and did the shopping thing until 4:30pm then went back to her house and died a little... I mean... recovered. Saturday morning was more shopping, I got a haircut, then Saturday night we had a mini-class reunion for some of us in the area, so I got the fabulous opportunity to reconnect with people from high school, including my partner in crime, Margaret -- who looks GORGEOUS -- as well as Danny, who took me to my senior prom 20+ years ago. He still looks gorgeous too. I love surrounding myself with gorgeous people. If I could get my laptop to acknowledge my photo card, I'd post pictures, but alas. The beautiful chick up there in the photo is Margaret with me, taken with her camera because HER card/laptop still work!

Then Sunday morning, it was up for church, then lunch, then the horrible drive home. Our 2 hour drive took 5 hours with traffic down the parking lot known as I-35. Then I had to go further to take Shandie back to San Marcos, so I ended up back here at 12:30am Monday morning.

So although there was nothing exceedingly dramatic over the long holiday weekend, it still left me exhausted! And this could be, hands down, the most boring blog post I've EVER written.

I promise to do something way more exciting in the very near future. Well, as exciting as I ever get.

I hope your Thanksgiving was filled with family and fun and the making of fabulous new memories.

Happy Boo to You!

2008-10-31T22:57:00.013-05:00

Yup, it's another Halloween here in God's Spit, Tx. This year, for the first time in several years, I got fully into the holiday spirit and went all out with decorations and costumes (for the kids! Not me!) We had a lot of fun and created a lot of new memories.

Cooper's first pumpkin! Designed by Dudeface, cut by Mom.

Syd Vicious and her first pumpkin and her first design!

Carly being particuarly disgusting, insighting screams from Syd and Cooper. (No, she didn't really eat it!)

THE FINAL RESULT! Plus my rockin' cool witch!

TADA! The Queen of Hearts, The Mad Hatter, and the Walking Dead Seven Year Old.

Hope you and your family made a thousand great memories this Halloween, and you all got a load of CHOCOLATE! I mean, isn't that what Halloween is for?
Happy Halloween '08!

Another Year Older, but None the More Wiser

2008-10-11T01:22:00.000-05:00

So after midnight, to ring in my birthday this morning, I listened to Big and Rich's Lost in this Moment for the first time in months.

I didn't cry.

Then I listened to Edwin McCain's I'll Be.

And I did.

For Riley

2008-10-07T02:52:00.000-05:00

For the last few months, I've been suffering huge, disgusting bouts of insomnia, and for those who know me, that's rare. Just my condition alone requires tons of rest, then mix in my cocktail of medication and I should pass out rather quickly. Yet... here I am.

I spoke with one of my very dear friends tonight (shout out to Ang!) and she mentioned trying to blog more often, and to capture one humorous part of her day and write about it. I found it a neat concept. I've often whined on here that I'm not sure what to write, but I know I need to be, so I thought of her idea, and yet nothing funny came to mind.

Tons of other stuff did though.

Friday morning I lost a very good friend of mine. Her name was Riley. She was a tiny little puppy in this huge cage at the pound, shivering against the wall. I never knew why they had her isolated. She wasn't the dog I went to see. She was maybe 10 weeks old. But I asked to see her, and when we got out to the "play yard", she came alive, running and bouncing, and when she wagged her tail, her entire body wagged right along.

We already had Samson back then, who was a Newfoundland mix, so HUGE. I'd been looking for him a playmate, and had wanted something large enough to handle his playing. Instead, I found this little redhead with golden-green eyes and this goofy under-bite that made her grin like the Grinch.

About two weeks later, I heard about big puppies at the store here in town and went to see, since they were the kind of breed I'd originally searched for. And being me, I took one home, and named her Delilah, to go with Samson. However, having two new puppies, four kids, and the slew of other animals at the time proved to be too much for me and for the longest time, Delilah and Riley were simply outside farm dogs. Samson couldn't be contained (we tried everything in the book) so we rehomed him for fear of him being hit. We live on a highway.

Last summer, after about two months of having Delilah, she died from a snakebite, but I barely knew her, hadn't really interacted much with her, and since it was summer, the kids and I were at my parents anyway.

So even with Samson rehomed and Delilah now dead, Riley was still this outside dog, seen once a day for food and water, and her entire body wagging with unbridled delight to be petted. My guilt knows no bounds.

I'm not sure what triggered it, but the last three months, Riley was integrated into the family fulltime. Inside dog. She wasn't very playful in general because of lack of interaction but she was protective to a fault, and her favorite activity became the morning school run to take the kids to school. Todd, the chihuahua, bounced between me and Carly in the front while Riley maintained one of the middle captain's chairs, Sydney being made to ride in the back because Riley had her post to maintain. And maintain it, she did. Anyone walking by our van would result in this low growl, and those intense gold-green cat-eyes of hers were beyond focused until the PTA Moms were no longer considered a threat. Every. Single. Morning. it cracked us up to no end.

Friday morning, I got up for the usual, and the first thing I do is put Todd and Riley outside. But I couldn't find Ri. Then I heard it. This horrible keening sound. I found Brian and told him. He went out and found Riley in the ditch... hit. He drove the truck down the driveway with her in the back and covered her with a blanket. I took the kids to school with just Todd, Carly just instinctively knowing... Cooper and Sydney still too sleepy to notice. And by the time I made the 15 minute round trip, Riley had died. She was in the back of the truck, covered in a navy fleece blanket, and I undercovered her, and her golden-green eyes still shined, and her under-bite held her infamous grin, forever staying just like that. I petted her, I kissed her head, and I thanked her for loving us. And for some odd reason, just last week, Carly captured this wonderful picture of her grinning and those cat-eyes. In all the time we had her, a photo was JUST taken that truly grabbed her personality. Such odd timing.

I walked into my house and didn't think about it. The amount of animals we've lost since living out here is astounding. I had a PEACOCK hit by an 18-wheeler. Who DOES that? Who lives in a place like that? Me.

My only consolation when it comes to Riley's life was that at the end, she was a very vital part of our family and not just the country dog living in the backyard. But damn if I can do the morning school run and not still listen for the growl from the backseat as mothers pass our van.

It's 3:10am and pouring down rain, a pretty decent Texas thunderstorm, and tonight is the first night I've cried for Riley. Maybe I had to wait for God to cry with me.

I haven't posted this because of some issues in my life. If you look at recent postings, they're all generic. I've lately discovered that evil truly lies in the oddest of places and the most unsuspecting of persons, and I have no doubt that some out there would take this pain my family is suffering and joke about it, and make light of it, or even say we deserved it, so I hadn't posted like I should about personal stuff just to try to keep them out of my life, and then I realized that I'm giving them way more importance over me than they deserve. And they know who they are. They are the ones dead to me.

Riley will forever live on.

I miss you, Ri. You were my friend, my guardian and protector, and the one with the grin that always made me laugh when I was quite sure I'd never laugh again, and for that, I will forever be thankful. I hope you died knowing you were loved, because you were. Hugely.

So What

2008-10-06T10:29:00.001-05:00

This is the song I'm loving right now. LOVE the message, especially in how it fits in my own life. First few lines aren't fitting because it's not my "legal roommate" it reminds me of, so I took that part out. It still applies if another word was used, but alas...

Anyway...

This song empowers. Energy. Attitude. LOVE it.

So What by Pink

Na Na Na Na Na Na Na
Na Na Na Na Na Na
Na Na Na Na Na Na Na
Na Na Na Na Na Na

So so what?
I'm still a rock star
I got my rock moves
And i don't need you
And guess what
I'm having more fun
And now that we're done
I'm gonna show you tonight
I'm alright, I'm just fine
And you're a tool
So so what?
I am a rock star
I got my rock moves
And i don't want you tonight

You weren't there
You never were
You weren't all
But thats not fair
I gave you life
I gave my all
You weren't there
You let me fall

So so what?
I'm still a rock star
I got my rock moves
And i don't need you
And guess what
I'm having more fun
And now that we're done (we're done)
I'm gonna show you tonight
I'm alright(I'm alright),I'm just fine (I'm just fine)
And you're a tool
So so what?
I am a rock star
I got my rock moves
And i don't want you tonight

No No, No No
I Don't want you tonight
You weren't there
I'm gonna show you tonight
I'm alright, I'm just fine
And you're a tool
So so what?
I am a rock star
I got my rock moves
And i don't want you tonight

Ba da da da da da

Strokes

2008-09-27T21:37:00.000-05:00

Seems hardly fair that 23,000 keystrokes only equate to 4,300 words. But hey, just the way it is, I guess.

And better yet, those 4,300 words are GOOD ones. Man, I forgot what a rush this is, watching it come to life on the page and knowing I did that.

Hee!

Talk about TMI...

2008-09-20T04:03:00.000-05:00

Okay, so I'm blog-hopping today, which I haven't done in a really, really long time, but since I'm forcing myself to write a minimal number of pages a day, I figured I'd see what all was going on in rest of the writing world (it's amazing how left out you feel if you miss Nationals, I tell ya.)

So I stumble across The Lipstick Chronicles and thought, "Cute name" and clicked on it. Then I got to reading.

Let's note the time: 4am Central. So I'm already in that kind of slap-happy state as it is, and this post had me DYING. Read it, but don't say I didn't warn you!

SAY GOODBYE

2008-09-02T07:14:00.001-05:00

Yeah, I know, another book review. Yeehaw, right? Sorry! Deal with it!

Lisa Gardner holds a special place in my heart. She was one of the keynote speakers at my very first conference back in 2004, right here in a good ol' Dallas. Although we get a crapload of free books at Nationals (this year blew for me, since I had to miss San Fran), we get the recent books for the keynotes on our chairs at the meal. Lisa was funny and SWEET. Keyword there: SWEET! Because afterward, I read the novel that had been on my chair: THE PERFECT HUSBAND. And as she addressed in her keynote that day, I then knew why she always got asked, "How does a sweet girl like you write such dark novels?" And I was hooked.

And don't tell her, but I happen to know she has issues with Freecell.

SAY GOODBYE is by far her one of her darker novels, and although her notes in the book say she thinks it the darkest, I don't think it is. I don't know why... but (shrug)...I digress. I do believe it's one of her best and that says a lot. It IS dark, it IS gory, it IS suspenseful.

I think a lot of times, guys get suckered into thinking only other guys, like King or Koontz or Patterson, can write something that would thrill them in print. I always recommend Lisa, because she's right up there with them. So, embrace the new age, boys, and pick up and let me know what you think, k?

SAY GOODBYE by Lisa Gardner

Come into my parlor...
For Kimberly Quincy, FBI Special Agent, it all starts with a pregnant hooker. The story Delilah Rose tells Kimberly about her johns is too horrifying to be true -- but prostitutes are disappearing, one by one, with no explanation, and no one but Kimberly seems to care.

Said the Spider to the Fly...
... she's close -- too close -- to a psychopath who makes women's nightmares come alive, and if he has his twisted way, it won't be long before it's time for Kimberly to
SAY GOODBYE

I left out part of the jacket cover teaser. It's up to you to find it and read it.

It's 7am and I have yet to sleep. Forgive any typos, as I'm sure I'll find tons after a decent nap. Due to my conditions, sleep is exceedingly difficult but on nights I can't take my medication, it's worse. I lay there in the dark, and my brain can't turn off. The constant shifting for my body issues, the constant sighing for my life issues. So I got up and I finished reading this book. Lisa has stayed up with me many nights. This night was no exception. And the mind wonders:
What if you knew it was time to say goodbye?

What would you do?
What would you fix?
What would you ignore?
Who would you cling to?

I have a feeling Life's Priorities suddenly slam into order, exceedingly quick and with blaring clarity. Sometimes I long for that moment, just to see how it all would lay out for me.

Damn curiousity anyway.

The Dirty Secrets Club

2008-08-21T21:26:00.000-05:00

Not everyone has a quote from Stephen King:
"The next suspense superstar."

By Meg Gardiner

An ongoing string of high-profile and very public muder-suicides has San Francisco even more rattled than a string of recent earthquates; A flamoyant fashion designer burns to death, clutching the body of his murdered lover. A superstar 49er jumps off the Golden Gate Bridge. And most shocking of all, a U.S. attorney launches her BMW off a highway overpass, killing herself and three others.

Rest of the jacket, you'll have to read for yourself. And I highly suggest you do. Although I wish a couple of the characters were more fleshed-out, the book held me captivated to discover the secrets of these characters who would rather kill themselves then have their dirty little secrets revealed into the glaring, unforgiving light. A couple of them I thought, "Um, okay, not worth killing oneself over, but hey... whatever works."

Then I thought about my life (as one is prone to do when reading a fascinating novel about secrets, the irony of the timing in my own life almost laughable) and found myself desperately boring. I don't have huge secrets. And the few I have, they're definitely not the kind I'd rather kill myself over, much less murder another prior to suicide.

And you? Do you have those truly dark, beyond conscious-forgiving secrets which could absolutely ruin your life as you know it, resulting in not only affecting you, but your CORE BEING: your family, your children, your entire world imploding if others found out, so great and disgusting that suicide is the only way you'd ever find inner-peace?

Like I said... fascinating read.

The Adultery Club by Tess Stimson

2008-06-03T14:33:00.000-05:00

Without pause or exaggeration, this should be required reading for every adult on the planet, regardless of reading preferences, regardless of whether you're single, divorced or married.

Just... read it.

A Mother's Brag

2008-05-11T17:17:00.001-05:00

Being Mother's Day, I can't get over the idea that this is quite possibly the last Mother's Day that I know for sure Shan will be with me and not at college, or married with her own family some day.

This picture was taken last weekend for her prom, but it's also the photo I included in her graduation invitations. The beauty of her blinds me, knowing her soul and the funky mentality and wit she possesses is captured, the confidence she radiates, it's all in this photo and it leaves me speechless. My baby girl...

Shandie has been accepted to Texas State University, her SAT score of 1790, and graduating high school with thirty-three college credits already successfully completed. My pride knows no bounds.

I look at my other three kids, ages 14, 8 and 6 1/2, and I remember when Shan was that small, when The Class of 2008 seemed forever away, and yet in less than two weeks, my baby girl will no longer be mine, but simply Shandie, in all the wonder and splendor that she is.

So yeah, it's Mother's Day, technically MY day, but all I can think of is when I met a blood relative the very first time: Shandie Alexandra Fontenot.

The world is yours, baby girl. Rock it.

Happy Anniversary to a Glorious Addiction.

2008-04-22T22:05:00.000-05:00

Of all the photos and cartoons on one of my favorite websites, I decided to use this one because like caffeine, Evil Editor is an absolutely wicked addiction.

And I'd have it no other way.

Today celebrates the 2nd anniversary of Evil Editor gracing the Internet and making it a better, if somewhat more sardonic, place. Sometimes I try to think of what my life was like without his presence but my brain just doesn't wrap around the idea. He's alpha and omega. He just... IS.

In celebration of this day, there is a party blog created by his many devoted minions. Please stop by and see why we bow in amazement at this man, and how overall awesome his entire community is. We are this incredibly odd-functioning family who love, need and depend on each other. It truly is a fantastic thing to be a part of, and I love it.

EE has the rare ability to place us on pedastals when we need it, then back to groveling at his feet when we need that too. He is encouragement, he is punishment and scathingly harsh, he is witty and sarcastic and a man who will forever have my loyalty. He gives without expectation. He strives to make us smarter, faster, to mold us into the writers he knows we have the potential of becoming. We have mourned deaths, celebrated successes and became brothers and sisters from the fatherhood he created two years ago today.

How do I put into words what this anonymous man means to Brenda though? I've never heard his voice. I've never seen his face. I don't know his nationality, his age, his history. There is not one personal thing I know about him save one thing:

I know his heart.

You humble me like no other.
You make me laugh through my tears.
You lift me up when I can no longer see the sky past my own fears and insecurities.

Most importantly, if I never get published, I will forever know there is a very wise man out there who truly believed in me, and that's a gift beyond comprehension and worth more than gold.

Happy Anniversary, Evil Editor. You truly are a god amongst men.

One Song

2008-04-09T21:38:00.000-05:00

I drove down the road today, admittedly tired, so that may be why I was affected so, but I doubt it. A song came on, one that used to calm me, but now it just rips through my soul with an ache beyond words, the kind that makes you double over and wrap your arms around yourself, rocking back and forth in an effort to self-soothe. In one instant, in the beat of four notes of a song, and my good mood plummeted. That fast. That intense.

My fingers wrapped tighter around the steering wheel and my mind flashed to different times, to moments in my life when that song meant something else to me, to those memories that hurt and you try not to think about anymore. I have no idea why I didn't change the station. If I'd thought of it, I doubt I could. The bittersweet memories held me captive.

Breathing hitched, fighting off a panic attack I hadn't experienced in a long time, the road blurred as tears threatened to escape and I blinked and blinked and blinked, my eyes wide in an absolutely lost effort to keep tears from escaping. But one did... one fled from my inner eye and trailed down my face. I tilted my head to the side and the salty moisture lingered on my lip and I licked it back into me.

It didn't escape after all.

My mood hasn't lifted yet.

How was your day?

Tired but... Unethical?

2008-03-11T09:02:00.000-05:00

Granted, I don't know crap about cars, much less tires, so we're going to begin there with that little fact.

My daughter's car had a flat tire. For some ungodly reason, in the two years we've lived in this little town of God Spit, Tx, we have had a LOT of flat tires. Not sure what's up with that. I went to our one and only tire store to have it patched.

The owner comes in and tells me it needs to be replaced, that "steal is showing", but what do I want to do? I knew the car needed to be aligned - it's been pulling really badly. He gives me a rundown on tire prices plus alignment. "So around $175-$200." Um, okay. I mean, it's my daughter in this car. I don't want her to have a blow out or anything. I need her safe.

This was at 4:30 yesterday and they said they'd do it this morning. During the evening, I found out it's ILLEGAL to patch a tire if the steal is showing. Ooooh, I see. So which is it? Was the steal showing as he stated and they HAD to be replaced? Then why offer to patch it if it's ILLEGAL? I can't fathom an ethical place risking lawsuit and sanctions by doing that. Or, if it WAS patchable, why lie to me and tell me steal is showing? Either way, he's lied about something. Either way, this is a dinky town man screwing over a citizen by playing up their ignorance on the situation. Either way, it's WRONG.

I dropped the kids off this morning and rushed immediately over there to tell them to patch it and do nothing else because of the information I found out last night. Oh too late. It's already done. Of course. Oh, and, by the way, it's now $233. Whatever. Fine. I pay it. Shandie is to pick it up after school.

I come home this morning and I'm talking to people about it. I finally call this dinky place back and tell them to put my tires in the trunk because I want them ON HAND to show people what they did. They didn't seem too happy about it, but I really couldn't care less.

I called around and two shops in Temple are going to look at the tires and give me their opinions on it. Should be interesting.

Anyone else have anything like this happen to them? I'm pondering a letter to the editor in our Once a Week newspaper.

~Yawn~

2008-02-22T23:41:00.000-06:00

I have a theory, and I don't claim it as my original idea, because I'm sure I heard it from somewhere but I have no idea where that may have been: Life is too short to read a boring book.

I believe this 100% except for one small factor. Dr. Dickson, my biggest nightmare through two years of Advanced English, held the belief that you should give any book at least 100 pages before you made a judgement on it. I specifically remember which book we read at the time of him making this small declaration: LORD OF THE FLIES.

If you've read it, you do know, for a fact, that after the first 100 pages, that book gets quite um... interesting.

And being the ever hopeful one, I like to think that even if I can't stay awake in the first 50 pages, surely it will improve or it wouldn't have been published anyway. Then before I know it, in a quest to prove this book worthy of being read, I get past the Dr. Dickson required 100 pages and I just don't have that much left anyway so I trudge on through it.

But when your To Be Read list takes up approximately four shelves (and those shelves are a good five feet across and packed double layered and some on top of others - in other words CRAMMED full - I took it upon myself to ignore Dr. Dickson's 100 pages and if I couldn't get sucked into it, I'd give up after about 3 chapters (that's the writer in me - supposedly this book sold on proposal, so SOMEONE thought the first three chapters were good).

Another thing I can't do is read more than one book at a time. My brain can't seem to keep the characters of two unrelated books straight, so I have to do one a time. This is so extreme that during a judging contest, I have to stop reading for pleasure or it confuses me going from a judging 'script back to my pleasure reading.

Now, add that all up: I can't read more than one story at a time and I'm bound -- most times -- to finish one I've started. The first book I never finished was Terry Pratchett's THUD. I spent a month trying to slog through it while my TBR list sat and waited helplessly. I finally gave up. I wanted to like it really badly because a lot of people praised it like crazy, but alas, I just couldn't do it and I grew recentful because it kept me from the books I DID want to read.

I'm now on another book I just bought. I specifically bought it because it's written 1st person past tense and I'm looking into working on one of my 'scripts that's written the same way (my only one like that) which I hope to make into a series. I found this book and barely glanced at the pages, realized immediately it was a contemporary AND written first person. Rock on. When I got home, I then learned it was a series book too! ~GOLDEN~

Oh. My. God. Trudge. Trudge. Trudge. I'm dying here. I'm on day four and still, I'm barely making it through. I literally started falling asleep in the tub while reading. Uncool. Worst part yet, the author quotes on the cover are from goddesses in writing. If you take the premise (series) and the viewpoint (1st person past) and the quotes on the cover from some of my favorite authors, this should have been a freakin' goldmine in "reading my line" but as of right now, I don't see how I will ever get it finished.

Have you ever had a book like this? One you felt you needed to read, one that came with great quotes and recommendations and yet in the end, it was dryer than a marked up copy of Cliff Notes?

Talk about sleeping material and it was SO unintentional. I doubt if I ever meet this author she'd want to hear, "Whenever I had a hard time falling to sleep, I just picked up your book and started snoring after three pages." Ugh.

You have one of these? Please oh please say yes, even if you have to lie to me.

Hop Skip and a Cyber Jump

2008-02-18T19:07:00.001-06:00

Life is filled with rituals, but I think my most tried and true is my morning online ritual while inhaling nicotine and guzzling caffeine. Those places I check in first thing every morning. I work through my "favorites" folder and go down the list, one at a time, doing my daily check for all the things out there in cyberland that make Brenda smile, or at least things that make me go "Hmmm".

I've been trying to find new places to add to my usuals, and of course, the easiest way is to blog hop. Then my morning checklist goes from that above to looking more like this:

(And I have no idea why when I upload an image here, it automatically puts it at the top and I have to go and copy all that flippin' code and cut it to where I had it originally destined to be placed. Grrr.)

So what does your morning ritual consist of and where are you favorite cyber spots? They may be places I'd love to visit too and who knows - may accidently bump into you there.

Expanding Horizons

2008-02-16T23:47:00.000-06:00

I'm doing new things as a writer I've never done before. (And although I said I was going to blog daily and don't, ya gotta admit, I AM doing it exceedingly more often than I ever have, so any progress is good, right? Right!)

After a couple of years drastically out of the writing world, I'm slowly but surely making my way back.

I look for any excuse not to write, it seems, so for me to suddenly participate in writing challenges/exercises is something I pushed myself to do. There's no commitment to 250-300 words or to spend 20 minutes pushing my brain into new places and genres and thinking ideas. I've found it quite fun, especially to see if I can nail to the EXACT word count required. I've always felt that if I write, it has to be toward publication, toward a finished product, and never just for fun.

Another new thing I'm doing is participating in novel chats and book discussions (well I haven't yet, but will be).

I owe these new horizons to the God of All Things Sadistic and Brilliant. Thank you.

Love & Chocolate

2008-02-15T17:43:00.001-06:00

I never know what to write for holidays like this, but at the same time, especially being a romance writer, I feel it's expected, like married sex on holidays and birthdays, even if you would really rather ignore it.

Evil Editor had a romance writing exercise, so I did that. I believe there were 23 scenes submitted, so if you need some reading material, scuttle on over there and read up.

I spent the evening with the heathens. The typical Italian meal, served on a white tablecloth with my red dishes, candles in red and white and pink, gifts on their Valentine's Day napkins atop the plates, helium balloons tied to their chairs. They loved it. Spoiled punks.

Then we spent the evening watching Pride and Prejudice.

There are many things that come to my mind on this holiday, and for those who are regular readers here, you already know how I feel about days created for forced appreciation, like this day, and Mother's Day, etc. Regardless of claims, expectations are set and often disappointed, and I'd rather be told what I mean to someone on a regular basis than on a day someone chose from the calendar.

So to keep from blathering on about this... holiday, this year in particular being difficult for me - I decided to list my favorite all time romantic movies (in no particular order):

Pride and Prejudice
Ever After
The Notebook
The Princess Bride
A Knight's Tale

I find it interesting that my favorites tend to be period films. Hmm. Maybe I was born in the wrong century. That would explain so much.

What are your favorite romance movies?

Oh, and a special thank you to Furry Sound for the Valentine heart I posted here. It was my only Valentine. So thank you, much. ~kiss~

Bloggy thingies...

2008-02-09T14:07:00.000-06:00

I want to do RSS feeds from my favorite blogs, but I have no idea how to do this. Surely someone here knows.

I did not call you Shirley, so don't even start with the jokes.

Also, as I mentioned, I cleaned out my blogroll of names of people I didn't even know and plan on putting new ones that I do read regularly. If you want yours listed, just drop a comment.

And to email me, it's brendabradshaw@gmail.com - I'm about to go into the template and see if I can find a way to put a link in there.

And life in general is aggravating me to epic porportions.

100

2008-02-03T21:43:00.000-06:00

I got this idea from my friend Kat's blog. 100 random things about me:

1) I don’t really like chocolate.
2) I collect Santas, quilts, baskets and oil lamps.
3) I want to be Jennifer Crusie when I grow up.
4) I think Evil Editor is rockin’ cool and I don’t even know who he is.
5) I think people watch too much tv.
6) I have a huge, huge phobia of snakes.
7) My first pet was a poodle named Pancake which was then ran over by a car. Bad name for a dog.
8) When I’m nervous, I rip at my toenails.
9) I took the time to explain to my mother that my screaming of “OH MY GOD” during labor was not taking God’s name in vain, since I was literally pleading.
10) That same birth, I ordered pizza afterward and my mother said I wouldn’t have craved that if I’d just seen what she had. I didn’t need to know that.
11) I like made up words, like “hork” and “extramarricular”. I claim the first. BAT gets the second.
12) I really, really love ghost hunter shows even though I don’t believe in ghosts.
13) One of my dreams is to travel around to the most haunted places just to see for myself.
14) I have a thing for plaid and checked fabrics.
15) I like puffy Cheetos but not the crunchy ones.
16) I read 3-4 novels a week.
17) I have a huge, huge fear of success.
18) I fight the label “lazy” in my own mind.
19) I innately believe in Happily Ever After, even if I never experience it for myself.
20) Rachel Ray’s voice grates on my nerves, but I still find myself watching her stuff if I come across it.
21) I have three tattoos.
22) I don’t think I could spend $500+ on shoes, even if I had the money to do so. But I could on a purse.
23) I love to people watch.
24) I can read people well, but I’m a horrible judge of character.
25) I understand the mentality of cutters.
26) John Edwards freaks me out.
27) I think I talked to my grandmother once when she was a butterfly.
28) Commando is the best way to go.
29) I want a fourth tattoo.
30) I got beaten up by a ski lift when I was 13 in Red River, Colorado.
31) I haven’t taken my younger two kids to the beach yet.
32) I can start novels but can’t seem to finish them (aside from one).
33) I can pass a lie detector when lying.
34) Today is February 3rd and I still have Christmas stuff out.
35) I’m in denial that I am old enough to have a child graduating high school this year.
36) I love fireplaces.
37) I love rainy days.
38) I believe that reverse discrimination is hugely ignored.
39) I love cold.
40) I am blessed with some truly good friends who I know will be friends for life.
41) I wish I could re-do from 9th grade to college.
42) I’m a lucid dreamer.
43) I want to stop smoking but I’m afraid of gaining weight and going through withdrawals.
44) I believe kissing is more intimate than intercourse.
45) There are moments in my life that I wish I could freeze forever.
46) My son has the longest eyelashes ever.
47) House is my favorite show on TV, followed by SVU. Only shows I purposefully watch.
48) DVR is a kickin’ invention.
49) I only like Hershey Kisses with almonds.
50) I love to bake, but don’t very often because I hate to clean up.
51) I refuse to buy generic toilet paper, peanut butter or sliced cheese.
52) A Knight’s Tale is the greatest movie ever.
53) Heath Ledger was the first death of someone I didn’t know which made me cry.
54) I want a basset hound and name him Casanova.
55) I don’t believe that sitting in a church pew will make or break your entry to heaven.
56) I think most attorneys get a bad rap on their reputations and jokes.
57) I could care less about Aggies vs. Longhorns.
58) I love all things vanilla. Candles, shampoo, lotion, food.
59) Basic things like toilet paper, deodorant, toothpaste, shampoo should be free. ‘Cause ew.
60) Gluttony is disgusting beyond words.
61) I innately believe in karma.
62) I love wildflowers.
63) Facial piercings make me want to grab it and rip it out of their face because it’s distracting when I’m trying to talk to them.
64) I hate white walls in houses.
65) I had a weird pseudo brain tumor thing in 92 that I never bothered to learn to spell.
66) Yankee Candles are the best candles ever.
67) I have cankles.
68) My brain doesn’t wrap around 900 channels and nothing but crap on tv.
69) My parents were the best parents kids could hope for.
70) Amish people have the right idea.
71) I voted for Ross Perot twice.
72) I adore George Bush and his family.
73) Right now, at this moment, I understand why some animals end up eating their young.
74) I sleep with four feather pillows.
75) If a doctor’s office charges you for missing an appointment, we should charge them per minute we have to wait past our appointment time sitting in the waiting room.
76) Dentists are sadists.
77) I wish Fred Thompson had made a serious run for President.
78) I cannot sleep without a heavy blanket on me, even in the summer. The weight of a sheet, or nothing at all, and I wake up.
79) I want to own a bottle of My Insolence. It smells great and the name is awesome.
80) I do not believe in abortion unless it’s from a crime or the mother’s health is in jeopardy, and even then, I’m iffy.
81) Ron White is a riot.
82) I drink Diet Coke just for the taste of it.
83) I’ve met over 400 people from the Internet.
84) Arch angels have just got to be the baddest of the bad.
85) I refuse to use the motorized scooters in Walmart and instead use the wheelchair if I need to. I hate the BEEP BEEP of backing up. Stick a WIDE-LOAD sign on it and make it more obnoxious, k?
86) I LOVE LUCY is a timeless sitcom. I really want to own all the seasons on DVD.
87) I hate floral scents.
88) I love the word serendipity. The sound of it, the definition of it. Even the movie.
89) My favorite mixed drink is Long Island Iced Tea.
90) Jared from the Subway commercials? Yeah… wanna kick him in the teeth.
91) I hate chat/text speak and refuse to use it.
92) I want to go on a cruise.
93) I don’t CARE if Ryan Seacrest is gay or not.
94) No, I’m not related to Terry Bradshaw. No, I’m not related to Carrie Bradshaw. By the way, Carrie Bradshaw is a fictional character. Hello…?
95) Music drastically affects my moods.
96) I had a gum transplant in 1988 and I’m going to have to have another one. Ouch.
97) I think it’s funny the Patriots went all year undefeated but then lost the Super Bowl tonight. (No, I didn’t watch it.)
98) I answer to the name Lira as easily as I do the name Brenda.
99) I wish I’d retained more of the French I learned in high school.
100) I find it intriguing you just sat there and read 99 random odd tidbits of my thoughts.

A Little Too Much of a Good Thing

2008-02-02T18:28:00.000-06:00

Have you ever had a moment when you realize your romantic tendencies have gone too far? Have you ever read in a book where it says something like, "This was real life, not a romance novel" even though, obviously, it WAS in a book? When you hear the phrase "romantic at heart", do you raise your hand and pretend you're not such a romantic that you had an episode of insanity you craved so badly to be real but it wasn't, and you mutter to yourself, "This is real life, not a romance novel"?

Once upon a time, after awhile of internal struggles and personal chaos, I wrote an email, a "Dear John" letter, if you will. I poured myself into it, every ounce of emotion, every drop of despair, every thought that spewed out of me and onto the page. And I stared before hitting send, because that's your "can't turn back" moment, after all, and I read and re-read and questioned and questioned, but in the end, I sent it. And waited. It sounds so horrible to do it via email, but given the mileage between us in that long distance relationship, there really wasn't another option, at least, I felt I'd ran out of them. But I'm a silly girl, right? Err.. WAS a silly girl. When this happened. Anyway...

I'd ended the email with "If you want to discuss this, find me, otherwise I'll assume you agree this isn't what either of us wanted" (paraphrased, of course) and waited to see if I heard a word. And waited. And waited. And finally, with the hours of silent confirmation, I came to the conclusion that he agreed with me. The bandage had been ripped.

Four hours later I left to run an errand. On the windshield was a small piece of paper. Nothing on it. But it was under the blade and I couldn't figure out why or how or anything like that. Then, as I drove down the highway, I passed this truck that looked incredibly familiar and I noted the time: time for him to drive to me to make that effort to show me, prove to me, erase all questions, to snag just one night of precious time when we could, when I felt so lost, so alone, so in doubt. And it explained why I hadn't heard a word. It made *sense*. As I passed the truck on the highway, in my rearview mirror, I saw the brake lights come on. I convinced myself that my brain was wanting it to be something it wasn't. I made myself keep driving to the store.

Of course, I mentally turned it every which way, inside and out, one minute convinced it was him, the next berating myself for being so foolish. On the way home, back down the highway, I passed a black truck and I couldn't see the driver's face, but his hand was stretched passed the steering wheel, and I swear I'm not making this up, his finger was doing that circle motion like "turn around". I blinked. I'm going 50 mph but holy crap, why did I see that? I drove on to my house, up my driveway, and forced myself into the house.

And thought and thought, sitting there. Was it serendipity like when we first met? This was exactly like a novel I might read, one I'd write, that moment when she's convinced it's over and he's literally chasing around a town trying to find her for that huge lovely moment we just flipped through 400 pages to find.

Right?

Guess what?

It really is just a novel. It really is just in a chick flick. I had really read one too many Happily Ever Afters.

Have you ever had a moment that felt it was right out of a novel? If so, please share it so I don't feel like Kathleen Turner in Romancing the Stone. She didn't age well. I don't want that same fate, k? Thanks in advance.

Court is now in Session

2008-01-30T20:13:00.000-06:00

Uh huh. Pardon me while I yawn.

For those following the Day in the Life of Cameron Tales, today was the day I was summoned to court. Note just me. Why Cooper's father wasn't listed not only floors me, but he seemed slightly offended by it as well, until he realized I'd be the one in jail for going off on the judge and he could dance along his merry way.

I was scheduled to appear at 9am and in an unusual display of all things odd, I showed up early. There were five other people waiting to be seen, and then I saw the principal waltz in as well. I have a history with this principal from back in the days when Syd went whacko in Kindergarten, and once again, my gaydar dinged so loudly I was convinced others had to have heard it. If they did, they also bit back squeals of laughter as I did, because no one moved. Finally, we were told we could go in. Yippee.

I, of course, showed up in a sweatsuit, no bra (hey now, my jacket was zipped!) and black house slippers. No make-up. I'm 99% sure I didn't bother to brush my hair, although I did take pity on others with my teeth. It was the principle of the matter. Normally, that's what I'd be wearing to deal with house stuff all day, cleaning and laundry and all that jazz, and I'd be damned if I was going out of my way to change my routine for something so inately stupid.

I sat on the front row, smack dab across from the judge. Takes a lot to intimidate me, and he wasn't going to be one who did it. We were then told we were all there on the charge of "Parenting contributing to the nonattendence of a student."

Took everything in me not to stand up and scream, "My FOUR children don't even have to grace your schools ever again. I have the right to HOMESCHOOL them and then guess what? You LOSE those government funds sent to you per student per day they attend!" (Because that's really, really what this is all about, and we all know it.) But I was good and just stared right back at him and decided to not tell him that I'd bill him for the time he was wasting in my day. I had a nap scheduled. I was running late for it now.

They called roll to see who all was there. Lots were missing. He got to "Brenda Bradshaw" and like a good little girl, I raised my hand and said, "Here!" Then the judge, perched way up high on his little throne to look down upon the masses, spoke directly to me for the first time, even though I hadn't been called for my testimony yet. Gulp.

He peered at me and said, "When did the constable serve you?"

Well! Now that you ASKED! "He served me night before last, Monday night, even though this paper states he had the form for a full two weeks before he decided to grace me with his presence."

The judge nodded and made a note. I think the Constable may be getting a spanking, and it explains why so many others hadn't shown up. Said Constable must not be taking his elected job very seriously. Given my experience thus far, I can't really blame him.

The first parents were called up and had to go and sit in the defendents' table. Interesting. I felt like a hillbilly version of Law and Order. The judge read them their rights, told them that if they signed this form, they agreed to waive said rights and they should check the plea they wanted to enter: guilt, no contest, or not guilty.

This is where it got good. I feared I may been the only one to raise a bit of angst, but nooo. The first set of parents (note that BOTH of the parents were on THEIR form, unlike mine) beat me to it, and it took all I had me not to stand and applaud them. They said they were entering not guilty, and requested a trial. Woot! The judge stared. The principal (seated at the table for the state) had his jaw drop to the floor. I had to bite back giggles in the biggest way. Then the guy said: Is it trial by judge or jury? The judge said: Whichever you decided. The guy looked at the judge and said: Oh, definitely by jury.

Oh SLAM! Judge said: I'll send you the paperwork with it scheduled. You're done.

That man and his wife left. What a way to start the day! Hee!!

I was second to last. I got called and sat at the table and Brian sat down next to me (and everytime he sat down with me, he made sure to put a chair between us. Smart man.) The clerk brought me over the papers to sign (everything between the first guy and me had plead guilty - no way in God's green earth was I about to do THAT). I said, "Um, I have a few questions first."

Brian muttered, "Oh God, here we go."

I can't really blame him. Most know my attitude for the stuipd and ignorant and lack of common sense. I have very, very little patience, but I DO start out nice. Promise. I just go from Nice to Verbal Castration at the speed of light should the situation arise. I have at least two people who already told me they had bail money ready, and I had them on speed dial on the cell should I need it.

Judge said, "Go ahead."

Me: "One of his absences was 11/5/07, although he was there for part of the day, and still there at 10:30, so legally he was counted as there. However, we have the dental note stating he had proceedures done on that day. The two days after that date, the 6th and 7th, are two of the days in question as being unexcused."

Judge nodded, having the note in front of him.

I said, "I realize NOW that it has to be in writing, however, on the morning of the 6th, I walked in my son and my 7 yr old daughter and hand delivered the dental notes. Cooper was still dressed in PJs and I had him wrapped in a quilt. I sat him on the desk and the receptionists were all doting on him as he showed them the work done. I told them his mouth was sore from it all, and that I'd be keeping him home for the next couple of days."

Not only was the judge nodding, but so was Gaydar Principal. He'd been in there that morning. He remembered it.

I said, "In my world, I've expressed, as his parent, that he would be absent and the medical reason behind it. If it was an issue, one of the receptionists should have said, 'Here, jot me a note real fast for his folder', but she didn't do that, so I had no reason to believe there was an issue which would later land me in court. I'm requesting those that two days be reversed from unexcused to excused due to the circumstances."

Judge agreed. By law, by the State of Texas, he can do that. He had the school note the change. The school, however, has the right to still view it as four (not now two) unexcused absences. He asked the school if there had been any since, and Principal said, "No." Duh.

Another incident involved a note I DID sent with Cooper after an absence that the teacher never received. I'd sent that thing back with Cooper for DAYS, yet every afternoon, it was still there when I checked his folder. I told the judge that if I, as his parent, am expected to check that folder everyday for notes from his teacher, then that teacher should have the same expectation of her. That was our form of communication and I had the expectation that it worked both way. Judge agreed again. I got to stay nice, which was a little disappointing because I do so love a good verbal castration, but since he has Striped Prison Wear on his side, I guess I shouldn't press my luck.

I expressed my concern over all absences. Cooper missed 3 1/2 days last week during the Epilepy stuff, and I told the judge he'd be out Thursday of this week for pre-op and next Tuesday for his MRI, and of course, I'd have a note. He said that would be fine. I swear, he seemed as bored with it all as I was.

We still had "sanctions" levied on us. If Cooper has anymore unexcused absences, we'll be fined $187. I said not to worry: Since my verbal word wasn't good enough, and since notes sent with Cooper were often overlooked, I'd start sending the notes via mail, with delivery confirmation and signed return receipt required.

The judge smirked, I winked, and got up and left.

As I was leaving, the prosecution's table of the Truancy Officer of the district leaned over and whispered, "Hey, did you film the Constable serving you like you said you would? I want to watch it!"

I laughed and said, "No, I couldn't find my battery."

She seemed disappointed.

Apparently she hates the anti-climatic as much as I.

Ummmmmmmm Plucky Plucky

2008-01-29T23:26:00.000-06:00

Growing out eyebrows is almost as painful as growing out a bad hair cut.

Just sayin'.

(Note that it may not be a thrilling topic, but I AM blogging regularly again!)

Go tweezers?

You just can't make up this kind of crap...

2008-01-28T19:17:00.000-06:00

For those long-time readers of my blog, I'm sure this will come as no surprise when I tell this particular little story, but even for someone like me, who lives in this town day after day just shy of two years, I'm continually amazed and equally appalled by the latest development of Living in the Town Called Cameron.

There is a Texas law that states that children may not have more than three UNexcused absences. Okay. Easy enough. But when I take my child in, who just had some major dental work, and set him on the office desk wrapped in a quilt while he shows off his work and tell the women in that office that I'm going to be keeping him home the next couple of days due to the pain, in MY little brain, that's excused. I'm informing the school that he won't be there, and the medical reason why.

So explain to me why I'm summoned, served court papers in my home, to show up in court for "Parent Contributing to Nonattendance". And, shocker of shocks, this is just toward me, my son's father not remotely named. Why? Not sure, but I plan to find out.

I understand the need for this particular law. I really do. Shandie drives herself t school with a vehicle her guardians provided for her. If she then uses that car to ditch school, I happily and readily agree that I'm at fault. But this was summoned for COOPER. He is SIX. If a six year old isn't in school, I betcha he's with his PARENT. (In this case, a parent who did, indeed, notify the school of his absences, but apparently it wasn't WRITTEN DOWN to be placed in his PERMANENT FOLDER. Pardon ME.)

Ohhhhhhhh I don't know. Maybe when I sat him there in the office explaining his dental work and that he wouldn't be in school the next couple of days, the secretaries could have said, "Here. Jot down a note for us to put in his folder." Instead, they nod and give him hugs and wish him well and I think all is fine until two months later when, at 6pm on a January night, a constable knocks on my door.

There comes a point when common sense has GOT to dance hand in hand with the law. Pile this lame, incredible waste of my time and tax payers' money to the load we've carried the last week or so with my Lupus scare and Cooper's Epilepsy, and all I could do was laugh in the constable's face. I said: When is this because if it's on the day he's scheduled for his MRI I won't be gracing your little courthouse.

He said: Oh... judge wouldn't like that.

Oh pardon me AGAIN while I attempt to CARE.

Crap... nope, didn't work. Can't summon up an ounce. SUMMON! HA! I'm so flippin' funny.

So Wednesday morning, 9am, I shall be at the courthouse (Cooper has pre-op for his MRI on THURSDAY morning - judge got flippin' lucky on this one.) I promise to update you as soon as possible. If there's a fine attached to this, guess who will not pay it on general principle. Yup. Me. Many people thought I'd be an attorney growing up because of tenacious ways and word usage, but I know me, and my attitude, and I know I'd be in contempt alllllllllllll the time. Considering I plan on letting this judge know exactly what I think about all of this, we'll be lucky if my happy little ass doesn't end up in jail now. Maybe they'll have internet access.

I've kept my rant to a minimum and my cussing reigned in. Mom sometimes reads this, and she hates when I get that way. You're welcome in advance, Mom.

I've already got my call into my Attorney Extraordinaire, JBM. Maybe he'll have huge words of wisdom. One can hope.

I look really bad in stripes.

Shake Rattle and Roll

2008-01-26T21:22:00.000-06:00

The title of this is hugely inappropriate but given how he's handling it, with his usual nonchalance and Super Cooper ways, I decided to use it anyway.

There are times when you do things you'd never, EVER dream of doing. I had one of those moments last night. I had my little six year old dude on my lap, absorbing his little boy giggles and the best hugs and whispers in the world, and teaching him to say a new word:

Epilepsy.

Cooper received this diagnosis yesterday and twenty-four hours later, my heart is still attempting to deal with it. It stems from head trauma and a van door over two years ago, recently rearing up in our world with little seizures that don't seem to phase him but freak me out beyond words. He's got a fabulous physician, hates the taste of his medication, but thinks the idea of Med-Alert dogtags sounds uber-cool. In the grand scheme of things, we're still very lucky, and I know this, and I accept this, but the blood that courses through my veins wants nothing more than to make this all go away, and let him be just a normal little dude who doesn't have to worry about a thing in the world, much less how to pronounce Ep-i-lep-sy.

Shake, rattle and roll, dude face. Momma's got your back.

Click it! Click it GOOD!

2008-01-24T23:26:00.000-06:00

At the top of this blog is a little tab that says NEXT BLOG. Click it. It's quite neat to see where all it takes you. Several years ago, this was how I found John who ended up designing my fabulous website, so you never know who all you may find that will influence your life later on.

I did this tonight for the first time in YEARS. The very first one had these great shots of her dog and really funny captions, and like a total twit, I didn't save the link to share it here. I did leave a comment for her, so maybe she'll visit here and you all can see her cute dog and her creative camera angles.

Anyway, try it. It's kinda neat.

On another note: I've updated my blog roll. I had people listed over there and I have no idea who they are. Sorry, but it's gone now. As you can see, the only one really there is EE, my personal editing god because he's the only one I read faithfully right now. I have a few personal friends I'm going to list (non-writing) here in the next day or so, but if you frequent this blog and want to be listed, just give me a hollar and I promise to add you.

On another note: I'm trying to be more creative, so one of the things I want to try is daily blogging on whatever comes to mind. Could be from the kids, the news, whatever. Hope you drop in more often if I do this. I miss my commentors!

On yet another note: I'll update Christmas tomorrow and how it all went down, and get you all caught up on what's happening in my world thus far in 2008. It's not so great right now with the Super Cooper Dude.

On a final note: I'm noted out... g'night.

Black Moments

2007-12-09T17:56:00.000-06:00

As writers, we all know what this means, what it entails, its signifigance to the story, the necessity for the character arch, the need to justifiy the Happily Ever After. That moment so dark, so helpless, there is no way the hero and heroine can possibly make it. It's over. It's done. And you wait with eager anticipation, flipping the pages, reading faster and faster, your heart in your throat hoping the two pull through, regardless of this huge, horrible BLACK MOMENT.

Possibly the most heartwrenching black moment I've watched/read was in the movie The Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. If you haven't watched it, I highly recommended it.

Never have I felt what I experienced when watching that movie. Such despair. Such desperation. A love that ended in such pain, you choose to wipe it all away. Better to have loved and lost to have never loved at all? No thanks. The pain is too great. Erase it.

And you relive the moments as they're being erased, you remember the beginning, the pure fun and excitement, the exhiliaration of seeing each other, the skipping heartbeats at a single touch, the thrill that not only have you found someone you'd searched for - hoped for - but that unbelievable passion and breath-taking realization of that person loves you back. Those are there, and you see it all again, you RELIVE it, every smile, every word, every touch, forced to remember before the stresses of every day had hit, before the mundane drowned it out. But the memories, those moments, they fade during the removal along with the bad times you wanted taken away, and you scream, "No, not this one. LEAVE ME THIS ONE!" and then it's just... gone. The absolute panic, pure desperation to hang onto what once was. What you'd give, what you'd say, to not lose what was once there. When you finally see it really being gone FOREVER, you belatedly realize you not only desire it, crave it, you have to have it. You need it. Even through those bad times. Even through daily stresses. You look at the relationship from beginning to end in mere moments, months and months zeroed down into snapshots and you see how much the great times outweighed the bad times together. Then you blink, and the process is over, and all the moments, all the memories, are lost. Not even a shadow remains of what once was.

In this particular movie, with this huge black moment, I honestly didn't see a way to achieve the Happily Ever After. But the hero and heroine run into each other again, total strangers to each other now, but Fate brought them together again, this beating of hearts that matched so perfectly, looking into each other's eyes and seeing a reflection of something great, knowing in their soul that whatever "this" is, it's huge and needs to be explored.

And they started again. Fate was stronger than anything that could ever be erased, no matter how hard we tried to make that pain go away.

If it's meant to be, it just WILL be.

Better to have love and lost than to never love at all? I don't know. I really don't. But I do know we have to go on faith, even when that faith is shaky, because you never know what sneaky Fate has in store, and in the end, it may have been worth the pain just to experience the ride, to record in your heart and mind those amazing times over and over again, those little snapshots of love.

The Hunt for Hidden Treasures and the Pitfalls of Finding Them

2007-12-01T14:52:00.000-06:00

I know, I know. I said I'd post about this the day after the last post, but alas, I didn't. Here it is though.

I cannot reveal what "the item" I really, really wanted was, because I never know if one of the older children may come over here and read, and it's such a huge surprise, it must remain a secret until after Christmas morning. But here is the story of the hunt for two of the items I really, really wanted to get, two items were the reasons for me to head out at 3am after a cold front hit Texas. If my kids ever, ever question my love and devotion to them, I'm absolutely pointing them to this blog.

I think, in general, my mother thinks I'm a not-so-nice person. I don't attend church all the time as I was raised to do. I don't talk the "right way", do the "right things" (in her opinion, of course), and I'm sure the way I do every single little thing could be done ohhhhh so much nicer. I believe with all my being that my mother loves me and adores me, but that inately she feels I'm not one of those who people say, "She's 'good people'." Frankly, I'm okay with that. I have no problem making waves if I feel strongly about something. I have no problem at all saying what I think the moment I think it. I'm stubborn, short-tempered, and patience never even knocked on my soul as I was created. I'm passionate and tenacious to a FAULT.

But I do try to be a good person in general, with basic kindness and friendship and small, simple gestures so ofter overlooked these days. I've never met a stranger - thus the bonding with the married couple in front of us that day at Toys R Us and I am the first person to let someone else in front of me if I'm not in a rush and I can sense that they are. Why do I do this? Because it makes me feel better, makes others feel better, and waves out positive vibes into The Land of Karma.

All of this I pointed out to my mother after the following things occurred:

We left Toys R Us around 5:45am with everything we went after, save that one item and rushed over to Target, where no incident occurred at the door (YAY!) I had ONE thing there I desperately wanted that was ONLY at Target. My mother grabbed a cart while I bolted in and out of clothing, staying off the main and crowded aisles, and headed straight for the toy department, knowing what I was after would be on an end-cap. I found the end-cap, and lo and behold, ALREADY empty. I sighed. This was one of Sydney's big gifts. ONLY found at Target, and, I suspect, ONLY on Black Friday. I was dismayed and another lady and I sighed and shrugged at each other, told her my story, she told me hers, then she went off to find something else. A lady in the cluster of people around us tapped my shoulder, and said, "I picked up two. Here... take one of mine."

I was floored. Absolutely shocked. There are rare, rare moments when I have nothing to say, no words utter forth, but this was one of those times. I squeeked out, "Are you sure?" as my fist clenched in a painful effort not to snatch it and run.

She said, "Absolutely. I grabbed two just in case, but I only NEEDED one. Go ahead."

I swear, it took everything in me not to break down in sobs. I was on an emotional overload after the Toys R Us failure on one gift, the fight behind us, the rush to Target, then the dismay at not finding this one. Add in only 3 hours of sleep, and I was already a wreck. I thanked her profusely, and if fate would have it, maybe someday she'll stumble upon this blog and realize what a huge difference she made in at least one life that day.

I found my mom stuck with the cart on one of the main aisles and told her what happened as I placed the precious item in the cart, under my jacket (I was seriously afraid someone may take it from the cart.) She just stared in amazement.

From there, we went to Walmart. We had very few items we wanted there, but one thing I wanted was what Toys R Us ran out of. Walmart has a POLICY of price-matching on the exact item, so as long as they had that in the brown color, it should be mine. I rushed to the department and asked. The manager said he had price matched it, but was out. Ugh! My bummed heart!

I looked at Mom who had this "give it up" look on her face. I gave her a look back that said, "Uh, no."

We rushed to another Walmart further out of town, I bolted to the department, and OH MY GOSH! They had eight of them! In BROWN! It was mine! I had my Toys R Us ad in my trembling little hand as I went up to the department manager to ask for one and have it price matched.

He said they weren't doing it. My jaw dropped, my heart sank. Then he said that another woman had just been there and was up talking to the store manager. I said, "Point me the direction, because now there will be two of us."

I went up there, my mother - never the trouble-maker - trailing a bit behind me. I saw a cluster of 3-4 people talking near the front, and one broke away and walked toward me. I said, "I'm looking for the store manager."

He said, "I'm the co-manager."

I held out my ad and said, "It's your store policy to price match. You have this exact item, I have my ad, and I'd like to buy it, please."

He said, "No. I'm not doing it. It's a percentage off, not an exact price, and the policy states we don't match percentages."

Um, WRONG ANSWER. I used to work for Walmart parttime over the holidays several years back. I KNOW that policy. He was partially right; they don't match percentage off ads. However, this not only said "Percentage of savings: 60%" but it gave an EXACT price. The percentage he attempted to use wasn't the "ad price" but to let the customer know the percentage of savings.

I start out nice. I really do. He, however, succeeded in pissing me off. I said, "You obviously don't know your store policy well, yet you co-manage. I'll continue to the manager who understands how the policy works" and promptly left him standing there. The other group was a lady and her son and the manager, and she'd been sent by another Walmart to that Walmart for the same item I was after.

I walked up, overheard her, and said, "Yeah. That. I came from another Walmart (different than the one she'd come from) and they were price matching this product as well. I know the story policy on price matching, and you, me, and that co-manager over there (pointing to him) know that the percentage listing here isn't what you're attempting to make it. You don't get to pick and choose price matching. You either do it or you don't. And no where in the policy does it state, 'We match competitors' ads EXCEPT on Black Friday.'"

The manager grinned at me, turned to the co-manager, and ordered him to go and get two of those items, one for me, and one for the other lady. The look on that co-manager's face was priceless. I beamed. I thanked the manager over and over as my hand clutched the item to my chest. He grinned back and said, "Merry Christmas."

We bolted for the check out and left. As I walked out the door, I turned toward where he stood and waved, mouthing another "thank you". He smiled and waved and went to calm some other frantic mother out there trying to do her best for her kids.

Two of the biggest items I'd wanted that day weren't mine to have. Twice, I lost. But due to the kindness of strangers in two different incidences, I ended up with them in the back of my van and relief and happiness in my heart.

We got in the car and I said to my mother, "I know you think I'm not that nice of a person, but all of this that's happened today, that's good karma coming back."

She just said, ever so unapologically, "You should still go to church though."

I laughed, started the car, and cranked up the Dixie Chicks' song SIN WAGON. Life is good. Just follow your heart and your never-ceasing tenacity. Never settle. Never.

It's a Cat-Fight Kinda Christmas

2007-11-26T12:49:00.000-06:00

It's Monday, officially known (I think it's offical) as Black Monday, the first "work day" after Thanksgiving when online shopping gets its turn like the stores get on Black Friday. Black Friday... ah yes, that special time of year when the stores open early, the mothers of the world head out in the pre-dawn hours in a desperate attempt to find THE perfect gifts at the ROCK BOTTOM prices, because let's admit it, this crap we scurry around for is available all year round. It's the the DEALS. It's the hunt for the savings.

So the heathens and I headed out for Ft. Worth on Wednesday so we'd be at my parents for T-Day. Our 2 hour drive took four hours due to everyone else getting a jump on the drive. Our little town has a half-day of school on Wednesday, and I thought if I left right around the time they got out of school, we'd miss most of the traffic of those who had to work until 5pm.

Wrong.

Now, if our school district had an ounce of sense, we'd have had all of Wednesday off and that drive could have been done on Tuesday night, way before the rush, but nooooo.

Wednesday morning, dressed in shorts and tank tops and complaining about 80 degree weather in November, we hit my parents' house around 7pm and started complaining about 40 degree weather. Apparently we drove against a cold front, so by the time we landed in Ft. Worth, it had hit.

God has a sense of humor. Keep Texas mild and balmy all flippin' season until the day before Black Friday. Nice.

I'd post pictures of my family (including aunts, uncles, cousins, second cousins, etc.) but 1) I didn't take any because 2) those lovely Thanksgiving pictures always show people with their mouths wide open shoveling disgustingly fatty yet holy-crap-that's-good food into their mouths. Not a flattering thing to capture in a photo. Trust me on this, as I have years and years worth of such pictures.

The kids were still up and hyped at midnight on Thanksgiving Night, but Mom and I had the alarm set for three am.

Yes, that's 3 am. You read it right.

Okay, so I didn't have an alarm. MOM set HER alarm then it was her job to wake me up. Lucky her. Dad remained in bed. And they say men are the stronger of the sexes. Wimps.

I love Black Friday. For me, that's when Christmas is official (although it seemed to arrive awfully fast this year, didn't it???). The idea of what to get the kids to make their eyes shine on Christmas morning. The parents out shopping in Christmas sweatshirts and sweaters (I wore a t-shirt which reads: STUFF THIS with a picture of a stocking, but hey, it's just me, so that kind of says it all, right? Right.) Holiday decorations all around, holiday music piping through the stores. Ahhh. Bliss.

And a catfight at Toys R Us. Not kidding.

Mom and I have done Black Friday for as long as I can remember, and I truly love it because Dad watches the four kids and Mom and I go out, alone, just the two of us, doing whatever we want, buying whatever strikes our little fansies. Dad normally takes the kids to a movie while we're gone. We leave while it's dark, have lunch somewhere hours and hours later, then return home around 3 or so. (Sometimes we have to come home to dump the loads from the car, but this year we had the van, so we were golden.) In all the years we've done this, and all the horror stories you hear about Black Friday, we had never EXPERIENCED it. Until this year.

Now, *last* year, we got to Toys R Us around 4:45, right before they opened. The line circled the building. Rather than walk all the way to the far end of the line, a group of us stood to the side and just waited, then when the line got through, we went in. Nice and calm. We'd had some heckling from the group in The Line, but after reassuring them none of us had any intention of ruining their perfect formation, it calmed right now. So, having been on THAT side of the situation, apparently it was my turn to experience it from The Line Side.

Toys R Us had something I *really, really* wanted to get. It was marked down by $120 savings, and something I couldn't have bought if not for the remarkable price. So, Mom and I got there at 3:20. We were #46 and #47 in line. At 3:20. Ugh. And, remember God's sense of humor? Uh huh. It was like 20* with the breeze. Pardon me while I shiver in memory...

I took a McDonald's break and got us breakfast, which we ate ... IN LINE. We bonded with the husband and wife in front of us for an hour and a half, etc. Good times. Then a Toys R Us employee comes walking down The Line announcing that the item I specifically went to buy is already gone. They'd only had 25, and gave tickets to the first 25 in line. A huge bummed sigh ran its way down the shivering people, but few left The Line. I personally had several times I wanted this year from the store, so in line we stood.

And as it got closer to the infamous 5am store opening time, a group gathered near the doors, across the way, presumably to do what we'd done last year: Wait til the line went through, then enter after us, rather than walk to the end of the exceedingly long line just to have to walk back up.

Someone in The Line started the heckling (as happened last year) with "Haven't you learned what a line is?!" and I thought, "Here we go." One lady from The Group said what I did last year: "We're just waiting here til you all go through." Made sense. I'd said the same thing just 12 months ago.

I assured the husband and wife we were standing near that the same thing happened last year, but that The Group was just waiting til The Line went in, THEN they'd go after us.

And The Group, being what they were, made me out to be a huge, honkin' liar.

The doors opened, and The Group CHARGED the door! I was amazed. I'd never seen anything like it. The absolutely audacity was mindboggling. Well, not to be outdone, The Line charged the door, and we had SHOPPING CARTS. The husband in front of us would have made the Dallas Cowboys proud. He used his cart and surged forward, his wife holding on to our cart so that we formed an unbreakable barrier. He blocked from the left, where people from The Group were attempting to overpower The Line. Another father/husband came up from behind me in The Line and took over The Guarding of the Door.

Well, as he was watching to the right, making sure no one cut in our Line, some girl went left from behind him, and ducked under his arm. The woman right behind me snatched her by the hair, jerked her back and yelled, "Oh I don't think so, bitch!" and it got ugly from there and caused the entire Group/Line struggle to come to a grinding halt, this cluster of cussing and bodies blocking the entrance to the store.

I just took off. This left NO ONE behind me, so I could slow down and grab the other stuff I'd wanted on my way to electronics (where, of course, there was ANOTHER line). I passed a couple of employees and said, "You have a fight at the door" and that was it for my personal responsibility. I got what I wanted (minus, of course, the item I *really* wanted) and as I stood next in line to get into electronics, lo and behold, there were the police. I said, "If you're here about what happened at the door, you should arrest the Charger, not the girl who stopped her." They laughed it off, said no one was arrested, and the woman who charged the door never even got in.

Ahhhhhhh. Karma. I love it.

In case you're wondering, that one item I *really* wanted, I did end up getting. The story of THAT will be posted tomorrow.

Oh, yeah, almost forgot. When we got to Target at 6am for their opening, I dropped Mom off to be a part of The Line, then I parked and waited with The Group. It was a good Group - no fighting, no heckling, but can you even believe it - they'd already heard about the Toys R Us incident on the *radio*. Then it was reported in the local paper, although they got the details wrong. Kinda neat! Yes, I am that easily amused. What of it?!

Ho... Ho... MEOW!!!

Just the Way We Are

2007-10-23T20:54:00.001-05:00

Let's see...

I spent most of the summer in the Dallas/Ft. Worth area. The younger two took swimming lessons, and then Vacation Bible School at my parents, then Nationals.

Ah. Nationals.

Which I almost MISSED! I am not remotely kidding. I had it set in my brain and on my calendars that I'd be in DFW for two weeks for swimming lessons (I have pics around here somewhere - if I find them I'll post them), a week in Cameron, a week in DFW for VBS, a week in Cameron, then back to Nationals. But um, someone said, "Aren't you supposed to be at Nationals?" and I said, "Not til next week" and they said, "Um, noooooooooo" and I said, "Ohhhhhhhhhh crap!" and turned around and literally ran right back out the door, calling my parents to let them know I was headed back and OH, by the way, you're watching the kids THIS week, not next. Ooops on me. I got there, registered, asked where the bar was, found it, and first people I saw were Suzanne Brockman and Nora Roberts. Kinda cool way to start it. Since I didn't have to worry about weight of luggage due to driving this time, I got to totally take advantage of books galore. Unfortunately, my digital cam decided not to work, but Chris, the Critique Partner Extraordinaire, saved the day and I got this fabulous shot with Susan Elizabeth Phillips!

So that covers most of June and July. August - I finally got my disability determination. I'm legally disabled. Yeehaw.

School started. Ugh.

Shandie's now a senior. And my house is swamped with college flyers and emails and all that jazz. She's in the school's play this fall as well as a community play, so she's busy as usual. (Yes, this is stage make-up, NOT what my kids look like when they make me angry. Promise!)

Carly's in 8th grade, and just got inducted into the National Junior Honor Society. Needless to say, we're disgustingly proud.

Sydney ~ Now in 2nd grade, decided to go on a tooth-losing streak in a freak attempt to bankrupt the Tooth Fairy, 'cause let's face it, Syd's just that way.

Cooper ~ First grade, and not one to sit by and let Sydney get all the Tooth Fairy Gold, quickly started his own quest... At Chili's no less. What a way to lose a first tooth, eh?

Then he decided to save the day... 'cause let's face it, Cooper's just that way. He has HERO written all over his face, don't ya think? My dude...

Then we had Homecoming in September, and I made Shandie's huge mum, and did alterations on Carly, and got the infamous burn on my finger, which, even afer totally healed now, still leaves a huge, huge, INDENTED scar on my middle finger on my right hand - 'cause - yes, you know where this is going - I'm just that way...

Now it's October. I just turned 38. Yeehaw. ~sigh~ But overall, life is pretty good. As far as writing, I'm currently working on a 'script and still reading my line. I do have a new laptop, so I finally faced the fact that every attempt (yeah, yeah, every EXCUSE) has been erased, and I have been working at long last. I even signed up for a challenge through Austin RWA and I'm DOING IT! YAY!

So there ya go. This is long, but hey, consider yourself updated.

Idle Threats

2007-10-22T23:07:00.000-05:00

So, I'm online with someone cracking me up... (kisses, RCM) and I threaten to post it on the blog. Shandie, the ever so insightful one, says, "You haven't posted since June. That's an idle threat."

Had to rectify that, huh?

I have a lot to catch up on for anyone who bothers to ever stop by here anymore, which I'm sure is few and far between, and totally my own fault. Life kind of took a huge turning point for me, and whereas some aspects calmed down, others vomitted into new life forms I've never had the misfortune of experiencing. I have Nationals to cover, kids to cover, back to school, and here we are coming up on Halloween and we have a post about last year's which, unfortunately, isn't very buried on the blog 'cause I blow chunks at blogging for the last year.

So, for now, I simply had to post to renew the very real threat of "You never know what or when Brenda will blog". I do promise upon pain of delicious torture that I'll do a proper update TOMORROW. Swear.

Maybe.

No, really. I do.

Pinky swear.

The Strength of Will

2007-06-22T22:11:00.000-05:00

I’m creating a sound track of songs, and one that landed there is Loving You Against My Will by Gary Allen. I’ve listened to it repeatedly – I mean REPEATEDLY – and it got me thinking.

Bad, I know.

Can you love someone against your will? Or was your “will” simply seeking out an echo, a sound that matched itself and found it, even if by accident?

Two people with so much conflict, perhaps too much conflict, and yet the vortex pulls them in anyway, despite those obstacles. Perhaps because of them. I know we read and write about characters who have to face conflict after conflict after conflict, each harsher than the one prior, but at what point is it TOO much conflict? At what point do you stop and realize, “No way in hell”?

But there’s that promise of things to come, right? It’ll get better. There’s a reward at the end of all that pain, all that conflict, if you just hang in there long enough, if you’re patient enough.

Those promises.

Those dreams.

And even when the conflicts leave those dreams unrealized, even after promise after promise goes unfulfilled, they still love, they still need, they still CRAVE. Is that the point you’re really loving against your will?

I read and write romance because I believe in the Happily Ever After. I believe that if the love is pure, if the love is real, if the deep pulse of heartbeats match, it doesn’t matter how cruel the conflict. It can’t be contained, nor can it be controlled to meet the needs of everyone else around you. It just has to BE. You can ignore it, you can run from it, you can attempt to make others around you what you want them to be, you can do everything you can to ignore that true, pure love but in the end, it happens. Period.

There is no compromise.

There is no “Kinda Happily Ever After” for a reason.

Defining Literary?

2007-05-28T20:29:00.000-05:00

A friend of mine met author Jodi Picoult. I'd never heard fo her, but then again, there are thousand of authors I've never heard of, so...

The next time I browsed books, however, I saw several of her books. I chose this one, THE TENTH CIRCLE, out of the lot for my first experience in reading Picoult.

As most of the readers of this blog know, I tend to read only my lines, which consist of romantic suspense and comedy. So needless to say, this was quite a different experience for me. Overall, I did enjoy it. My only issues were the following:

1) The writing is beautifully done. The story is excellently told. However, if you remove all names and pronouns from any page, you don't know whose POV you're in. I did not get a distinct voice for each of the three main characters, and given that one is a mother, one is a father (different sexes think different ways) and one a teenage daughter of 14 (and let's face is, teenage girls are an entirely different species all together...), there should have been clearer voice for each.

2) I really disliked the ending. It felt too abrupt. Not bad, but I wish there had been more closure to all the various situations presented in the book.

It this book literary? I wrote the Brilliant One, but Evil Editor was buried in Novel Deviations II. I don't read literary, so I have no comparison. I think it is, but I'm just not sure. I've heard agents and editors both say it's hard to define but they know it when they see it. I don't know it, I'm not sure I've seen it, but I'm thinking this may be it.

By the way, I do recommend this book. I liked it enough to stay up and read it in just two days.

All in a Mother's Day

2007-05-14T10:09:00.000-05:00

I have to say, I really dislike holidays like Mother's Day, Valentine's Day, etc. They seriously serve no purpose except to get people to spend money, and usually out of guilt. Labor Day, Memorial Day - those are good. People get the day off, usually, to be with friends and family. These other holidays of "appreciation" just seem... lame. I mean, c'mon. Buy me a gift any day of the year, tell me you love me just because. Don't do it because it's written on a calendar.

Anyway, rant off.

My children are getting older, and regardless of my denial, that means I am too. Every year is interesting though. Cooper, kindergarten and age 5, is still in that "usual school created" Mother's Day theme. He came home Friday with a flower he'd grown from a seed, and a flower-shaped blue cardstock with his photo attached to it. And of course, I had to unwrap it RIGHT THEN. Sydney's 1st grade class made a thing to hang on the refrigerator.

Carly, the mini-me and ever the practical one, got me two pens I really like to use. Love this gift. And they're always stealing MY pens, so I needed them as well. Not that I believe for an instant that these pens will remain on my desk for long, but I digress...
She also made me this really neat braided ankle bracelet that is really well done, and I plan to wear it starting the day school is out, and keep it on until the hemp just wears out. Perfect for summer. The best gift from Car, though, was she cleaned the kitchen for me. THAT'S what I'm talkin' about!

Shandie. Oh, my freaky sixteen year old. Two years ago, for you long-time readers of the blog, you'll remember she drew me a picture and it read, "If mothers were flowers, I'd smash you in a book." This year, being older and so much more mature, she bought me several little things: A book from the NEXT line of Harlequin called LIKE MOTHER, LIKE DAUGHTER (But in a Good Way) with three stories in it by Jennifer Greene, Nancy Robards Thompson and Peggy Webb. She also got me two of my favorite candies: A Skor bar and a box of Wonka Bottle Caps. Syd stole the Skor bar, and all of them have raided the Bottle Caps. She got us matching silver rings, hers says DAUGHTER and mine says MOTHER, but neither of us can wear silver well, so we've put them on our keychains. And she got me a silver heart that says PATRICIA.

Whyyyyyyyyyyyyy does it say PATRICIA? I'm so glad you asked. After almost 17 years of "Mom Mom Moooooooooooooooom MOM MOMOMOMOMOM", I've learned to block it from my hearing. So several months ago, Shandie started calling me Patricia. Ugh. Even at her school, she'll say something like, "Thanks, Patricia!" and I'll yell "Don't call me PATRICIA!" and her friends are like, "I thought your mom's name is Brenda." And she nods and says, "It is."

Seriously, explain that mentality to others. Not an easy task.

So, I now have a PATRICIA silver heart that goes on a necklace. Not quite sure what to do with THAT yet. But she cooked dinner for us too, so that delayed her beating on general principle.

And the homemade cards. Let's not forget those. Remember Shandie's "smash you in a book"? Well, remember the deballing of Santa from the blonde child named Sydney? Hmm. Remember my post about YOE DAY? (Some of you may have some back-reading to do to get caught up here.) I'll summarize though: Yoe Day is an official school holiday here. I actually heard the reading of the will this year, and Ms. Yoe, before donating all the money to the ISD, declared a day off where the presidents of the different school organizations will go to the graves of Mr. and Mrs. Yoe and put flowers on them. I kid you not: Official No School Day here for that. Very odd. Well, apparently this had an impact on Sydney, ever the literal thinker. Her cards to me reads:

"Happy Mother's Day. I love you. You are kind. So when you die, I'll have everyone put flowers on your grave. From: Sydney"

And ya know, I just had no reply to that, other than, I love you too, Syd Vicious, you little freaky darling.

Happy Mother's Day to to you too - and may you have someone in your life who loves you enough to smash you in a book, or have everyone put flowers on your grave when you die.

First

2007-05-11T10:15:00.000-05:00

First Look
Seeing him there, the light in his eyes, the height and strength of him, the surity of how he carries himself. The king of his domain, regardless of what domain he happens to be in at the time. The world falls back into shadows, and only he glistens there in the reality that instantly becomes your world.The first words. The realization of his voice, sure, confident, spoken into the very air you inhale, becoming a part of you as your breathe deeply. Despite the chaos that tumbles through your mind, the current drama life has flung at you, he lured you there as a confidante, just to talk, just to listen but there he is and you're hearing his voice, watching his expressions, seeing that little dimple he has when you say something funny - that dimple you never noticed before in a photo.

These are the moments this life is about.

Watching his expressions, the tone of his voice matching the movement of his body. Instantly he has changed, after a year of random back-and-forth emails, he is finally real. So very, very real.

The first touch
That nervousness of his hand on you, even platonically, because he knows you're distracted with thoughts of something else. He knew when he called, but he beckoned anyway, and you went. And that calm settles over you. There's a peace found with him that you hadn't experienced before. You'd read about it, you'd written about, and God knows you've heard about it, but now you KNOW about it, and you want more of it.

The first good-bye
That time when you have to leave, even if you don't want to. The time when you gather every ounce of sass and bravado your body can muster and start to walk away. Alone. A teasing grin, a promise of plans, your damn heart still betraying you with reactions you never dreamed would happen as you fight to contain it, not let it show.His voice saying to wait but your heart, the coward that it is, pleads with you to run. You don't turn back until he demands it, but you continue walking, looking back at him, still grinning, still hoping, your heart begging you to hit your knees and crawl to him if you must, but you deny it all and continue walking backward, keeping him in sight as he follows, never realzing at the time that he'd never follow you again.

The first real touch
He strips away any idea of platonic. He pulls you close, so close, holding you to him, pressing his body against yours, and that strength you saw, now you feel it, the curve of a bicep under your fingers, the span of his chest against your breasts, his thighs aligned with yours, the perfect sizes, the perfect fit. You inhale him, his scent, his heat molding your body, your hands on his neck, memorizing the feel of him, just in case there's never a second change. Then more, his hands on are you, under the jacket, fingers spread widely against your back, dancing along your ribs, the outter curve of your breasts, the strength if his fingers as they skim your body, along your sides, down the flair of your hips, to the roundness of your bottom and you know he's feeling you, really feeling you, the shape of you under all those clothes you wore as a sense of false protection. His mouth, that delicious mouth, just inches from your ear, whispering, "Close your eyes."And you do. For him, you do.

That first kiss
Soft, pliable lips, ever so talented, barely grazing your cheek. The music of the room fades away, the sounds of clinking glasses turn to windchimes in your mind. Magical sounds. With your eyes closed, every other sense sharpens, concentrates, focus, is magnified a thousand times stronger now that you can't see, can't see his face, can't see his movements. Your heart falls into your belly and you shake. Your entire body trembles as his mouth ever so softly kisses your check. His voice, next to your ear. So close. So there, but this time, no phone invades the space. It's just you. It's just him. It's just you two together and nothing else. And you can feel his breath now, and his promise of, "Next time I won't kiss you on the cheek."

I Dream of Linda

2007-03-14T21:46:00.000-05:00

I had the strangest dream today. I know dreams in general are strange, but this was super strange. Ya know when you dream and you're in your own house, but it doesn't look remotely like your house, so you kind of know it's a dream? (Okay, I admit I'm a lucid dreamer, so others may not know what I'm talking about, but anyway...) This dream had my house as my house. Made it seem super real. My room, my desk, the usual mess of books and papers all over it. Black leather chair.

Linda Howard sitting at my desk.

(Very NOT the norm, in case you're wondering...)

She's one of my absolute favorite writers. I never stopped to ask WHY she was at my house, but she was. I was all kinds of stoked as I had a new hard copy, first edition no less, of my favorite book of hers, KILL AND TELL, and she signed it for me. Her signature was super elaborate, and I asked when she started signing her books like that. She said she always did. Um, no. She's on the top of my list of authors to visit at Nationals, and she's signed my books before, and never like she did then (in the dream). But it's Linda Howard, and who's gonna argue, ya know? And since I met her, my dream had her personality and accent down pat. In my real room. It felt REAL.

So then, in the ways of great authors, she asked what I was working on. And again, I got all excited because I happen to really be writing again, so I showed her, and she liked it! I said I wasn't happy with how this chapter is ending (I'm really not) and asked her what she advised on how to get from this point to this point. Ya know, tap the brain of a brilliant chica. I said, "I've read McKee's STORY and Volger's JOURNEY, but neither really seems to be helping me much."

She replied: "Change your font to Times New Roman 11pt."

I stared. HUH?!?!

I wasn't talking fonts! But ya know, it's Linda Howard, so I said: "Well, I'm using Courier New 12pt. But I was actually wondering about..."

And a kid walked into my room (it's Spring Break, so the four heathens are constantly attacking) and woke me up! ARGH!

And there stood my desk in its glorious mess.

My leather chair.

But no Linda Howard.

(Photo: Nationals in Atlanta, 2006. EE, if you're reading this, I had on my Evil Editor t-shirt!)

Again and again

2007-03-08T19:49:00.000-06:00

So every excuse I've ever had about why I'm not writing has been met, down to a new (refurbed but new to me) laptop. I eagerly open up a manuscript I'd started and proceeded to stare.

Ugh.

I forced myself to write. It sucked. I backspaced. I wrote some more. It blew chunks. I backspaced again. And again. Then I made myself stop thinking and simply DO it, knowing I could remove it later if I needed to (which, without a doubt, I would), and got to the end of the scene.

And then I realized that since I wrote that little beginning with just an idea of the story, I knew next to nothing about my character. Well, you can't write without knowing the character, so I started on a character worksheet to try to get into her head. My own head is confusing enough. We can only imagine how hard it is to get into a character's head that comes from my head. Kind of as confusing as that last sentence, but I think you know what I mean.

So tonight I'm whipping out craft books on characterization. This is just like anything else: You have to retrain your mind to do it. Flex those muscles and get them limber enough to work with ease.

And try not to get a brain cramp in the process.

More Satan, Please, and a Side of Minion.

2007-02-10T10:58:00.000-06:00

Blog, Brenda, Blog! Ya know, you can always help out by sending me ideas and topics on what to blog about when you write to tell me to blog. *hint*

It's very strange to me that people don't use the comment section here as much as they used to and now send me emails instead. Not sure what's up with that, but...

Anyway, Satan.

If you're a reader of my blog for the last two years, you'll remember that I refer to Janet Evanovich as Satan. She tempts and teases and sucks hours of sleep away from you as she creates more of Trenton in your mind. I knew she had #13 of the Plum series coming out this summer, but what I did NOT know was that there's another book, PLUM LOVIN' ("A Stephanie Plum Between-the-Numbers Novel") already out there. I almost cried in pure joy when I saw it at the store, and then did a small little dance because my hands were not only holding a new Evanovich, but because it's a first edition too. I read it, in one night, of course, and it's great. It has Deisel in it again, and if you recall how I felt about her Sugarplum Christmas novel (go midget elf attacks!), it's kind of the same thing. These odd supernatural powers that aren't really explained. Whereas Stephanie, Ranger and Joe could be real (and especially Grandma!), when these novels toss in this supernatural stuff, it simply takes out an element of reality for me. Still though - I loved it, and this time, I was better prepared for the supernatural stuff anyway, since we'd met Deisel before.

In other news, after quite awhile away from all things writing, I've re-entered the world of Evil Editor and Miss Snark. I even ponied-up a New Beginning of one of my novels to be posted on EE's. Yeah, I was in the hospital a couple of weeks ago, and they assured me the high fever was over, but with me taking such a drastic action on his blog, I have to doubt those doctors. Anyway, I love these two to bits, between their witty ways and learning something in the process. If you want to know about writing, read ON WRITING by King and be a faithful Snarkling and Minion, and you're set. Doesn't get much better than that.

EE could use some queries, I believe, so go and visit him and find out what being a minion is all about.

Hmm.

Satan.

Minions.

That works.

Sympathies to Evil Editor

2007-01-03T19:46:00.000-06:00

Many of you here in the writing world know Evil Editor: the anonymous editor out there blogging - everyone aching to know his identity and yet more than satisfied in simply having him out here, even though we don't know his name or his face. He thrills us, teaches us, entertains us, and makes us have hope instead of angst at the two words: "query letter". He's our own real life hero. I happen to adore him and proudly claim myself as one of his minions.

His mother passed away on New Year's Day. As another minion said on EE's blog, what an amazing woman she must have been to raise such a strong and stunningly intelligent man. I whole-heartedly agree.

We mourn with you, EE. You're in our thoughts and prayers.

Have a Rockin' Merry Christmas

2006-12-22T18:14:00.000-06:00

We're leaving tomorrow for DFW to spend Christmas at "home" aka my parents. I hope you have a fabulous day, relish in your traditions, make new ones, laugh and hug your friends and family and be forever grateful for them. Eat, drink, and be merry. From my family to yours, have a rockin' Merry Christmas!

Dear Santa: Define "good"

2006-12-08T13:07:00.000-06:00

We were at my parents in DFW for Thanksgiving, and my oldest, Shandie, was playing around with my mom's rockin' cool digital at the park with the smaller two.

Shandie: So say Santa decides you weren't good this year...
Syd: Define good.
Shandie: Let me see what faces you'd make if you wake up to only coal this year.

This is the result.

Note that Cooper looks like a broken-hearted little boy. Sydney, however, looks like she's considering Jingle Bell Castration.

I sound like my mother.

2006-12-06T15:43:00.000-06:00

Not really. Not that it's a bad thing if I did. My mom is one of my best friends. We're just VASTLY different. And besides, that's really not the point. The point is I said a "motherly" thing. Ugh.

I had lunch with Sydney and Cooper. Syd leaves after lunch to go to recess and it was kinda cold out. And I kid you not, the words came outta my mouth: "Where's your jacket?"

Before *I* had a chance to cringe at my own words, Little Miss Six Year Old piped up with, "Mom, it's not THAT cold out."

Well yeah, I knew that. She didn't have to roll her eyes to get the point across either. Needless to say I felt decidedly old. Major suckage.

In other kid news, Syd's also at that age where she's constantly losing teeth. I remember thinking it was super cool when I was little, but man oh man, it squicks me out when she walks up and wiggles a floppin' tooth with her tongue. Worse yet is the laughter she emits at my reaction. A couple of nights ago she came up to me with tissue in her mouth and her tooth held triuphantly in her hand.

"Did you pull it by yourself?"

"No, Cooper punched me in the mouth and it fell out."

Oh. Well, okay - whatever works.

Then she had the audicity to say that the $2 she received from the Tooth Fairy was fake. FAKE!

I said, "Well give it back then!"
She said, "Why would I give it BACK to you when it's FROM the Tooth Fairy."

Uhhh.
Right.
Oops.
Nevermind!

Sassy little thing. And we wonder why her five year old little brother smacked her in the mouth? I think not.

You know it's Thanksgiving when...

2006-11-20T08:51:00.000-06:00

You can say these things and not get in trouble:

1. Talk about a huge breast!

2. Tying the legs together keeps the inside moist.

3. It's Cool Whip time!

4. If I don't undo my pants, I'll burst!

5. That's one terrific spread!

6. I'm in the mood for a little dark meat.

7. Are you ready for seconds yet?

8. It's a little dry, do you still want to eat it?

9. Just wait your turn, you'll get some!

10. Don't play with your meat.

11. Just spread the legs open and stuff it in.

12. Do you think you'll be able to handle all these people at once?

13. I didn't expect everyone to come at once!

14. You still have a little bit on your chin.

15. How long will it take after you stick it in?

16. You'll know it's ready when it pops up.

17. Wow, I didn't think I could handle all of that!

18. That's the biggest one I've ever seen!

"In Bed"

2006-11-18T20:18:00.000-06:00

Okay, I think we all know the rules of reading fortune cookies, right? You take the saying and at the end, you add "in bed".

Here are our fortunes from when we had Chinese:

The wise thing to do is to prepare for the unexpected
(in bed. "You wanna put WHAT WHERE?!")

There is always time for you to try a new path (in bed. Path? Suddenly it feels like hiking, which is exercise, which isn't as fun when viewed like that).

Be moderate where pleasure is concerned and avoid fatigue (in bed, cuz yeah, that'd be bad!)

Be yourself and you will always be in fashion (in bed. Because I was really worried about fashion faux pas while bumping uglies).

There will always be delightful mysteries in your life (in bed. Well ROCK ON!)

And my personal favorite: Soon, a visitor shall delight you.

Bet you added "in bed" to the end of that one automatically, huh?

Halloween 2006

2006-11-05T10:35:00.000-06:00

Our first Halloween in Cameron. Yeehaw.

We obviously live in the country, what with the horses and turkey (down to one now, the other committed suicide) and chickens, etc. Neighbors cows and donkeys. Smells GOOD out here. Not.

So we drove into the "city" (cough cough) and drove around the area where the schools are. One of the things that stuck me as odd is no one was walking. They were all driving around, pulling up to a house, kids get out, go up, get candy, come back to the car and drive to the next house. Why no, we don't live in a lazy society at ALL. Of course, part of this is because neighborhoods overall don't seem to have consistent amounts of people home handing out treats, so you'd have five dark houses for every lit one. But that's a rant for another time.

We moved here in February, so my kids attended the end of the 2005-2006 school year. Of the 100 graduating students, 10 were pregnant. 10%. Nice. And I think I saw one of those girls Tuesday night. There was a girl walking around in a tight, "sexy" kind of costume with a little baby, maybe 2 months old, in its own costume, going house to house. It struck me as horribly sad. A child with a child - that was her "friend" to go out and about on Halloween night. No one else was with her. No huge group like my oldest went out with. I found it sad. I still do.

Then there were the really weird people. Backs of vans open with massive amounts of legs hanging out, kids jumping down and out of vehicles before they were stopped. I don't know how many accidents I saw almost occur. I was almost in one, because some girl around 16 thought she'd pull over all the sudden, and oh wait, there's MY CAR. She literally got within 3" of hitting me. Other kids were sitting on TOP of the cars. Not the back on the trunks, not the hoods. On the ROOFS. There were flat-bed trailers being pulled with 20-30 kids in the back. And all I could think were "Where are these parents?!" Well, I did see that one parent, but she was a teenager, so I don't think that counts. We went to one neighborhood and it was like inner-city scary. Super nice houses, but the mobs walking around were downright frightening, and no kids in costumes! I wouldn't have handed them out candy if they weren't in a costume. Then again, maybe I would, since they look like they'd shoot up your house if you didn't.

Needless to say, it was an interesting night.

As for our night:

We'd been to a couple of houses and then came upon this one house on a corner that stood kind of by itself since none of the others on the block were lit up. I pulled in front of the house and pointed out lots of things. Kids on the porch handing out candy. The flashing lights. Decorations in the yard - one of which was a coffin. Standing next to the coffin was "Dad". No costume, just standing there, overseeing the action. Good for him.

Too bad I'm going to have to de-ball him someday soon.

Since there weren't any others lit up, Carly (age 12) decided to take Sydney and Cooper by herself and I'd wait in the car. Okay then. They're walking up to the porch when surprise surprise, a teenager comes flying out of the coffin. Carly starts that nervous giggling. Sydney, being Sydney (age 6) does her shrinking thing. She gets super quiet, kind of goes inside herself and you can practically see her size reduce as she visually disappears. Cooper... ~sigh~ (age 5), in his Ninja Turtle Glory, screams a scream to wake the dead and DARTS back down the driveway. Now, what's the one rule about haunted houses and scary places like that? Chase the one who's scared. So the kid does.

Cooper's little dinky legs couldn't go fast enough, and big scary boy rounds on him, getting in front of him, between Cooper and the car where Mighty Mom sits, granted laughing my ass off. I'm getting out of the car because I know he's honestly scared, and I see Cooper screaming, hugely crying with ginormous tears, and swinging his candy bag like a man gone wild. He sees me, darts around the boy and literally skitters up my body, arms and legs like little vices around me.

Ends up it the girls handing out the candy were friends of Carly. Too bad all the kids got too freaked to remember to GET any candy.

About that time, obviously missing his cue, the Grim Reeper comes running around the corner to the front yard. Dude, not only are you late, but there is NOTHING you can do to scare these children more.

What irks me about this is that normally dressed Dad who stood there next to the coffin. There should have been some kind of kick to the coffin to let the teenager know there were little kids, to simply sit up and say BOO, which would have scared them enough. Thus, said Dad must be de-balled as an example to dads everywhere.

I get the kids loaded back up, snuggling Cooper next to me in the front seat while Syd and Carly go to the next house. (He decided to take a small break - imagine that.) I said, "Dude! You were scared and you were crying, but you were still kicking serious butt by swinging that bag at him!"

Ya know, build up that self-confidence!

Cooper: "Yeah, I did good, Mom, and I was aimin' for his WINKER!"

Just not much left to say after that, ya know?

Happy Winkin' Halloween!

The Wrath of God and Birthday Cake

2006-10-11T08:59:00.000-05:00

There were the Twelve Plagues...

There was Noah and the ark...

(We have an animal theme in common, that Noah and me!)

And then, 37 years ago today, God perked on His heavenly throne. "AHA! I have it! A new torture for civilization that shall forever confuse scores of humanity and leave them scratching their heads in wonder! There shall be a face to go with the chaos!"

Poof! I was born.

Thirty-seven candles - that's obnoxious.

A Piece of... Work

2006-09-21T20:35:00.000-05:00

Shan, the oldest, is in 11th grade, but two o fher courses are taken at the local college, one of them being advanced English. It's called dual-credit: she gets her high school credits plus college credits. Way cool.

Her first assignment for English was to write a paper - autobiographical.

On February 19th, in the year 1990, I was born to Jon and Brenda Fontenot in San Franciso, California. My first birth certificate read that my name was Martha Jane Fontenot, weighing in at five pounds, three ounces, and measuring fifteen inches long. It wasn't until my father flew back home from an art convention three days after my birth that the mistake was noticed. My older sister's name is Martha Jane; my mother had named me after her other daughter while she was high on the anesthetics. When I was born, Martha was nine and Paulson, my older brother, was seven. My grandparents came to visit me the day after my father did, but, unfortunately, got in a fatal car wreck on the way back to San Jose. They both died instantly. My mother, an only child, received all of the inheritance. Our family is very fortunate, despite the great loss that I'm positive my grandparents were.

My childhood was very auspicious. My father was, and still is, a world renowned sculptor, and my mother sang in jazz clubs during the night. I began attending a vocational, arts-based elementary school in uptown San Francisco called Randolf Primary Academy when I was five years old until I turned ten. I took many classes that are often not taught in standard elemenatry schools, such as art history, vocal, theatre, and dance. I picked up on all of it instantaneously. Dance was my main passion; I devoted all of my spare time to perfecting myself under the training of Ms. Judie Forrester. After five years of intense training, I took part in the Bazmark National Dance Competition. I took second place, defeating people years older than myself and landing a position in an international tournament. The next year, two weeks after my twelfth birthday, I danced at the Mostiko Nuto International Dance Tournament in Japan. Against two-hundred competitors. Celia Mathis approached me and invited me to join the Mathis Dance tutors, but then quit right before the start of seventh grade. I wanted to be a normal girl.

I began grade seven at Salizar Junior High in Ft. Worth, Texas. We moved to Texas during the summer to try to settle down and get away from the big city. Ft. Worth was big, but not as big as my hometown. I attended that school until the first semester of eighth grade, when I was expelled after being caught smoking in the girls' restroom. My parents, under the assumption that the influence of the public school system caused my downfall, immediately registered me in Brooley's Reform School or Young Ladies. I stayed in the boarding school for two years, visiting my parents on holidays only. We relocated to Copperas Cove, Texas, before my freshman year of high school. I became pregnant and delivered my beautiful daughter, Fiona Calecia, on July 2th, 2004. We stayed in Copperas Cove for one more year before moving once more to Cameron, Texas, where my mother started a horse ranch and I acquired the nickname Dinaes. I am now a junior at C.H. Yoe High School.

I plan on following in both my mother's and father's footsteps. I have my own art room and I also have coaches who continue to train me. After I graduate, I hope to attend the San Francisco Art Academy to double major in the dance and art studies, during which time I will enroll my daughter in a full-time boarding school. I do not want a husband, nor do I desire more children. In this class, I don't aim to get a specific grade. I will do what I want when I want, and whatever grade that leaves me with is the one that I will ultimately be satisied with. Although I believe in reincarnation, I also believe in living for myself like I will never live again: No regrets, no would-haves, could haves, or should-haves. This is also why I have no problem with exceeding the word count limit; you asked for my childhood and I gave it to you. Leaving things out would cheat you out of a great story.

When it comes to literature, I'm a not picky woman. I read studies on mental disorders and novels about people like myself. I enjoyed the book FARENHEIT 451 because it was easy for me to pull apart, and I loved THE GOOD EARTH by Pearl S. Buck. I like books that I can find the symbolism in. Likewise, I enjoy over-the-top works of fiction that make one wonder about whether something like that could really happen. I dislike boring, superficial books that do not have any meaning behind them, that leave me with nothing more than a headache.

Want to take a wild guess on how much of that is true? I'll tell you. Out of ALL of that, "1990" and "Jon and Brenda Fontenot" is it. AND - she got a 93! The professor made all kinds of notes, like "I'm so sorry!" for her grandparents dying!

Gah. So apparently I'm not the only storyteller in this family.

Big Shoulders and Tight Butts.

2006-09-17T21:42:00.000-05:00

It's kind of odd - I've been married twice, and neither of them are/were (one's dead, after all) big on watching sports on TV. For some unknown reason, B's watching the Cowboys tonight (and c'mon, if you have to watch football, at least make it the Cowboys, right? Right.) I sat here checking email and spun around in my chair to oogle men with unnaturally broad shoulders and tight, spandex-ed butts and realized football really IS the ultimate in men being MEN.

Over the last few decades, we've taken the men out of men. We want them to be more sensitive. We want them to understand us. We want them to carry equal weight around the house (yeah - right. Never happen, and don't write me telling me you're the exception, because dollars to donuts your wife would tell me the TRUTH. Your delusion is cute though.) We want them to be interested in our lives. Why? Why would they care about a sale on clothes or what happened on Desperate Housewives? Do we REALLY want men like that? We are so busy blending and blurring the lines that distiguish men from women that there's a freakin' term for it: Metrosexual.

Which is weird in general, I think. Don't label EVERYthing. That's a rant for another time though.

I miss MEN. Dominant, this is my way men. Cavemen mentality. I hunt. I protect. I drag my woman by the hair at night and have my way with her.

Purr. Yum.

What's so bad about a woman wanting this anyway? I can't see a single thing. I want my guy to provide for me, to protect me. I want him to hold me and know I'm safe, not only physically, but mentally and emotionally too, and I can go "all girlie" on him while watching a chick-flick or after reading a book or being all stupid because the shoes I wanted went on sale. I want him to think it's cute - I don't want him to UNDERSTAND it. If I wanted that, I'd call up my girlfriends instead. I don't want to think, "Oh goodie, if someone breaks in, my guy can teach him how to wax the backhair off - or hose him down with his hair gel." Oh yeah, that gives me goosebumps.

Ya know how girls complain because her guy is always trying to "fix it" and all she wanted to do was vent? Guess what? That's what guys DO. It's part of protecting us. If we're complaining about something, we're unhappy. If we're unhappy, they want us happy again - thus they try to fix it. I LOVE this about men. I think I should have been a woman in the 50s or something. I don't know.

Women are always told we should celebrate being women. Yeah, well, I think we should celebrate men being manly men. Give me an alpha-male and I'm a happy girl. I want him because he knows I look pretty, not because he knows I use the same hair products as Carmen Electra. That's flat-out weird.

Which brings me back to football. How great are these guys? They get PAID (overly paid, but not the point) to do what men want to do: Kick-ass without getting hurt like in a bar fight. Slap each other on the butt without being called gay. Scream profanities at the other team's line. Watch cheerleaders bounce around in skimpy outfits, because what guy doesn't love that? They have this energy and anger and driven purpose and they go at it 100%. They ooze testosterone, and I think that's a really fabulous thing.

Green, Gooey Glop

2006-09-01T19:50:00.000-05:00

There's nothing quite as disgusting, much less disappointing, as bad guacamole.

Comforting

2006-08-30T21:19:00.000-05:00

I think one of the neatest things is what we find comfort in. We feel bad, and we want Mom's soup. For me, it was her potato soup. She makes the BESTEST. I've tried to make it myself, but it's just not the same. Gotta have that MOM aspect to it, I suppose.

But it's not just food we find comfort in. Songs do that for me too. Some songs just soothe me. Some wrap themselves around me and simply associate it with what I'm feeling at any given moment. Movies especially. Like a song, they can bring back a memory - how old you were the first time you saw it, what was going on in your life, the feelings it gave you when you saw it, and if those are happy memories, it brings those back to you. Like THE PRINCESS BRIDE, for example. The first time I saw it was in a huge auditorm, my first semester at Harding University in my first week there. I was on this high, I guess. First time away from my family, on my own (although in a "dorm" at a university with strict rules, but still...) It was a happy time, and even now, when I watch it, that good feeling comes back.

I collect quilts. My quilts are a comfort. Some are never used though. My grandmother made a couple of them. One was on my bed growing up - that old "Amish doll" style. I don't use it anymore - it's on a quilt rack - because I don't want it "worn" anymore than I did to it as a child. I don't want it to give out and have to get rid of it. I have two others she made - and when I say made, I mean MADE. When I was little, we'd go out to visit Granny and Papa and Gran had this HUGE rack that suspended from the ceiling that she'd lower to work on it, all hand stitched, from the piecing all the way to the actual quilting, matching the batting and the backing. The talent is awesome. The uniform stitching is a true talent. Another one of my quilts was made from my great-grandmother. Heirloom to the extreme.

But other times, I pick up some up at garage sales. I love the softness of them. I love the idea that someone made such a difficult thing out of a need to express herself. And now it's mine. And it's soft. Not too heavy, not too light. Perfect to wrap up in. Even though it wasn't made specifically for me, it brings me comfort anyway, and I like to think that the original creator knows it goes on, bringing peace and warmth to even a stranger.

Right now, my comfort item is a couch. I LOVE this couch. It's so comfortable, and the memories of it are ... well there are no words for the memories this couch holds for me. We just rearranged the entire living room to accomodate this, making it the center of our living room. The last couple of days have been super bad ones for me, and wrapped in a quilt, watching some of my favorite movies, resting on The Couch has been one of the best things ever.

Now if only had my mother's soup.

Update, Bren! Update!

2006-08-27T11:57:00.000-05:00

Bossy people!

I had planned on updating after Nationals and uploading some pics to here at the same time. I don't have the photos yet, thus the delay. I actually DO have lots to share, but I really wanted to add the visuals with it, so those things will have to wait for now. So for an update on Nationals, hold up awhile longer.

In the meantime, I've actually been writing. I finally got the laptop working on all fronts, and now it's back to acting stupid again, so I'm trying to write here on the PC. And now my keyboard is going out, hating the E and J keys and refusing to type them until my fingers finally force it out. J isn't that bad, but the E - well, we use E a LOT, in case you didn't realize that. I used to use a split keyboard, which I LOVE. This one is a regular one. Since it's going out, I thought I'd get a new split one, right? Yeah. $70! I couldn't believe the price difference, and places like Walmart and Target don't even carry them now. So looks like I'm going with the $10 plain one from Walmart. Yeehaw.

School has started up here again. Last year, for those that remember, my plan was to write while they were in school, since my youngest would finally be attending fulltime. I kept anticipating the first day in 2005 and then that day came and went and nothing happened. This year, I refuse to lose that time and so I'm working on what I can do to make it easier.

When I started out, the plan was to write romantic suspense. That got shifted over to romantic comedy as I learned about this thing called "voice". Now I'm shifting again - to be announced later - but taking some real life knowledge and applying it to fiction. Should be interesting to see where that goes. Either way, my plan is to take babysteps. I get overloaded on the "big picture" and freeze up. I have this "all or nothing" mentality and it's making me nuts, along with others close to me who witness it. Just like blogging - I put it off until I could do what I'd planned, rather than ANYTHING - which, of course, is better than nothing. Frustrating to be me.

Yesterday, Syd Vicious, age 6, came up with a song. The words are, "I didn't know who you were when you walked into my door, but in a week you changed my life forevah!"

I stared at her for a moment then asked, "How old ARE you?!"

She grinned. "Sixty-seven."

Why am I telling you this? 1) It's cute and my kids are rockin' cool. (By the way, those wondering about Shan's blog - blogger problem and she's going to be redoing it.) 2) Part of my new writing exercise is to blog SOMETHING daily. So those little things like what one of the kids say may be all I have to share. Gotta get you used to it now.

Because I'm sadistic like that.

A Vacation from Vacation

2006-07-15T14:21:00.000-05:00

As I mentioned in my last post, I went to DFW for a week. It wore me out. Between constantly running around and constantly being with my parents and my mother's need for constantly eating, I was draggin' big time. I haven't even unpacked yet. I thought this week would be my resting, recovering from the "vacation".

Then my husband's appendix exploded.

Thankfully, he was in surgery when it happened. It was all really fast, actually. Well, as fast as hospitals EVER are, right? But when they went to do it the easy, fast way (laporoscopy), he started bleeding out. He'd had a heart attack like two months ago, and the blood thinners were messing it up. Thankfully, the surgery had been delayed for a couple of hours while they had platelets brought in from Austin, so they'd planned for this possibility and handled it. Then the surgeon went to remove the appendix, and "it fell apart in his hands". To quote him, "It was the nastiest thing I've ever seen." Coming from a SURGEON, I figure that's pretty gross, and did not allow my brain to visualize. So now his recovery will be longer.

That gives me another week. I have a week before I head back to DFW to ditch the kids --- errr --- drop off the kids at my parents. I'll get to DFW on Friday or Saturday, then Tuesday, I'm heading for Atlanta for RWA's National Conference. Shari and I will be having fun, but it's a big time, hectic, fast-paced kind of fun. Getting up early (that means before noon - yikes) and getting to bed around midnight (if we decide to crash early) with constant events in the meantime. Seminars, the bar, classes, the bar, editor/agent appointments and panels, networking, the bar. See what I mean? It's crazy, but in a super fun way!

I'll return from there on August 1st. And I'll need a vacation. Recharge and all that. Because for the next two weeks afterward will be all about BACK TO SCHOOL. For four kids. That's a lot of shopping. I figure coming August 16th, I'll be ready for a day of nothingness in the worse way - the first day of school, and once again, my house will be nothing but QUIET!

Now, if only I can survive til then...

The Sweetest Thing

2006-07-09T21:23:00.000-05:00

I've been gone to Dallas/Ft. Worth for the last eight days or so. I take the kids up there to their Vacation Bible School. And my mom got the date for her cornea transplant while I was there. I knew she was going to have one - I knew her eyes were bad, but what I didn't realize was HOW bad they are.

Until church Sunday morning.

Something caught my eye, but when I looked over at my parents, nothing was there. Then I caught it after the next song. My dad quietly slipping the open song book onto my mom's lap, while she passed him her closed song book. After each song, the same thing happened.

My dad was turning it to the page number for her, then silently slipping it onto her lap before he took the one she handed him and turned his own pages. Never in my life have I seen such a sweet thing.

So small, and yet so incredibly significant.

I sat there, blinking repeatedly, vowing not to cry and being so happy for them to have that kind of devotion, that kind of love.

She's back - Be Afraid

2006-06-27T22:42:00.000-05:00

For those who have read the blog for a long time, you may remember my teen daughter who was linked from this blog. She took the site down (sniff - sob - sniff) but she's back up and running. The mentality of a 16 yr old is kind of scary sometimes, but it's neat to look back and remember how it was then, the emotions and chaos and everything else, through her writing. I know she'd love for anyone and everyone to drop by and please feel free to leave a note (YES! Even you, Dwight!)

Check it out HERE

According to Cosmo

2006-06-16T18:08:00.000-05:00

Men equate saying "I love you" with having sex.

Does this mean everytime they're plugging it in, they LOVE that person? I mean, they may be GRATEFUL, which they dang well should, but I don't think this would be LOVE. I mean, I'm a GURL and even I don't equate it 99% of the time, so I can't fathom how a guy can.

If they mean "in a relationship" he shows his "love" through sex and thus equates it that way, that's crap. Grow a spine, open your mouth and SAY it.

Of course, being that I write romance, this could particular irk me. As writers, we work really hard to have ANYTHING, from words to actions, reflect the movement in a relationship. To that point, yes, often times if you do choose to have a sex scene, and since it does need to have relevence in the book, it can mean that, but I refuse to acknowledge that because then Cosmo is at least partially right.

Then again, I write heros with spines. That's one of the things that makes him a hero, after all.

Pass the IV Please

2006-06-12T10:04:00.000-05:00

So, I got sick.

Really sick.

B had cold-like symptoms, then I did too. Ya know, the basics: runny nose, cough, blah blah blah. He started to get better. I got a fever. I kept treating the symptoms. I got worse. My fever got higher. By Day 9, I knew I was really sick. Then I started coughing up blood.

I went to the ER. They gave me three breathing treatments upfront. Man oh man, that'll give ya the shakes bigtime. They shot me up with morphine (that stuff hits FAST, by the way!) My fever hovered around 102. I have pneumonia - both lungs, and the kind I have attacks something in the back of the lungs which caused incredible pain (thus, the morphine). I was admitted to the hospital and stayed two days, IV antibiotics and morphine every two hours.

I'm home now and better. I'm still on the meds and percocet for the pain, with cough meds with codeine in it. They said in a couple of weeks, I'll be back to my ol' feisty self. So ya'll get a little break from me for awhile, but no worries: Like Arnold, I'll be back!

6.6.6

2006-06-06T04:07:00.000-05:00

Insert evil laugh here.

Hold on - I think Sydney's throwing a party. I still think she could take Damien down in a heartbeat and have that boy begging for mercy.

So how fitting is this little thingy I found today for today's date?? I hobble into the gas station for more medication. (I'm on Day Seven of what appears to be the flu - or virus from hell, not sure which). I'm standing at the check-out. They always have these little keychains and a lot of times I like them. I bought one once because it said, "I'm out of bed. What more do you want?" (Those that know me know I'm a sleeper, dreamer, napper kind of woman.) So I'm fingering through them, nothing too funny, and my finger brushes against something soft.

And furry.

My eyebrows raise. My interest, in a fog of fever, is piqued.

Oh look. It's a cute little rabbit's foot keychain. Nice and normal. We've all owned one.

BUT WAIT! These have been MADE TO LOOK LIKE THE RABBITS AGAIN! One looked suspiciously like a cat. Little ears, little tails, little red beady freakin' eyes. Out of honest-to-God rabbit fur. Holy crap, this is a scary freakin' little town!

So I'm commenting on the demonic virtues of these to the cashier.

Me: That's messed up.

Him: Squeek.

Me: Pardon? (again with the raised brows)

Him: Squeek.

Me: blank face like :|

Him: *eye roll* THEY SQUEEK!

Uhhh. So of course, what do I do? I reach and squeeze the little real-rabbit-fur-dressed-up-to-look-like-mini-rabbit-with-beady-red-eyes-from-Hell and SQUEEK! It sounded like I imagine it would as a dog gnawed on it.

I paid and left. I'm almost convinced now that it was a fever-induced hallucination. I'm mostly afraid it's not. And if they're still there when I go back, I'm buying one just to take a pic to show you guys how truly scary it is.

UPDATE!!! B just walked up to me while I sat here at my desk and I heard the ever-familiar demonic SQUEEK SQUEEK SQUEEK. He bought one!!!!

It's all about CHARACTER!

2006-05-30T12:04:00.000-05:00

As I delve deeper into my new book, I'm plagued by nightmares of revisions - ya know, those horrible rewrites my first novel is still waiting for me to complete.

Granted, I knew NOTHING about writing when I spewed forth that 100,000 word mess, but the premise is still good, the characters are still good, and so I suppose someday I'll open it back up and frighten Shari by saying, "Ready for the revisions on this one?" Then she'll scream and run into the night - which is okay now that winter is over in Wisconsin.

As mentioned in a previous post, I have GMC by Deb Dixon and it really, truly is an amazing craft book. So you take the revisions of my first novel and the insight of GMC, and think: Hmm. If I do this right the FIRST time through, I won't have to face those scary, demonic revisions.

Sounds like a plan, eh?

I thought so too. I whip out GMC and start to go through it with this new book in mind. Kate wants ________ because _______ but ________. There ya go. First blank is her goal. Second is her motivation. Third is her conflict. I wrote that out, just like that, on a piece of notebook paper and proceeded to stare at it for thirty minutes.

It's such a simple little sentence, is it not? And yet at the same time, my brain cramped up and my eyes glazed over and for a short period of time, I lacked the ability to speak coherent sentences. My family worried for a bit, then relished the silence and figured not to mess with a good thing.

Through this painful process, I've discovered I cannot create character worksheets. I have to simply write and let the characters reveal themselves to me in whatever way THEY decide. I'm just the scribe, the slave to the keyboard as THEY tell their tales.

Even my characters are bitches. What's up with that?