December 8th Challenge

Hi, it’s Christina –

Class of '84
(obviously not all of us)

Good Morning! I have been seriously remiss in making blog posts lately, and I have a bunch to share with you now. It also didn’t help that I noticed I never posted the one from the 29^th. I’m not exactly sure what happened, but I posted it Sunday morning on the blog site if you’re interested.

So, the 30 year reunion was a blast. I got to see a bunch of people, but I really couldn’t catch up with many because the music was too loud to chat. The common consensus was, four hour was definitely NOT enough time. We all wanted more.

The Committee
Back Row: Vinnie, Karolyn, Rebecca,
Bob, Mike, Laura, Gary
Front Row: Amy & Me

I think, in 2016, we are going to hold a 50^th birthday party for the class. We had some money left in the kiddy after the reunion was over, and we are throwing around the idea that, for the people who were there, it will be free, and for the folks who couldn’t make the reunion, there would be a nominal fee of $25 to attend. Now the reunion committee has an excuse to get together in under five years. It’s going to be great!

Yup, in PARK on the
highway

At ten in the morning, following the reunion, I began my drive south to bring Lys and her friend Max back to school. We decided taking Route 81 back would be much better than attempting Route 95. The best laid plans… It turns out there was a major accident on 81 in Virginia early Sunday morning, and traffic never quite recovered. We passed a dozen accidents, and if it wasn’t for this app Max had, we would have been sitting in more traffic than we did. All in all, the trip took 13 ½ hours, which I guess isn’t too terrible considering at one point I had the car in park on the highway, and we took several breaks and a 45 minute dinner.

Bumper to bumper on
Route 81

I crashed at Lys’ that night, and before I left, we had one errand to run. You see, for the past month, Lys has been getting cyber bullied, so our errand was to the police station to file a report. We had thought they would be able to subpoena Yik Yak to have them trace the IP address of the person doing the harassing; but even though the anonymous posts are disturbing, they do not cross the line into threatening, so the police’s hands are tied. They can’t do anything. The same holds for the college itself.

Because of this, Lys has elected to part ways with High Point, and return to Champlain. She would rather deal with a cranky Mother Nature than a psycho in the human form, and I can’t say I blame her. This means, next Monday, I will be driving back down to North Carolina to pack her up and bring her home. Then, in January, I’ll be bringing her back to Vermont, and setting up her new room up there. Never a dull moment. To be honest, I’d rather have her safe and only six hours away, so I’m not heartbroken that things did not work out at High Point. It would have been better if my daughter wasn’t traumatized in the process, but, live and learn. She’s a strong woman, with a good head on her shoulders, she’ll be fine.

The drive home was considerably better. It only took 11 hours, and that was with multiple stops, including a 45 minute one when it was pouring. The weather and traffic was terrible, and I was exhausted, so I pulled off at a rest stop, climbed into the back seat, and took a power nap. When I woke up, I felt refreshed, the rain had stopped, and the traffic had dissipated, so it was a beautiful thing.

I did not have my radio interview the Ron Shaw Show on ArtistFirst Radio Network on my drive home. I got the dates mixed up. My interview is actually tonight at 8pm. Ron told me my last interview had over 30K downloads, which completely shocked me, but he has the reports to prove it. Now that’s not the people who listen to it the night it aired, these are actually folks who clicked into the link after the fact, and listened to the hour long show. That’s mind boggling to me.

I have to make sure my phone is all charged and ready to go. I also have to figure out where I can do the interview. Last time I did it sitting in a chair in my driveway, because that’s where I got the best reception. That’s not exactly an option for a December in the Northeast interview, especially with a Nor’easter on its way. (There will be a special announcement on tonight's show, so, if you are available, please tune in.)

At least it’s a rain event, not a snow event. That’s all I would have needed. LATE Tuesday night, I am driving to Philly to pick up Dani’s boyfriend and his family from the airport. They have been down in Florida for the Cheerleading Nationals, and their flight comes in at 11:30. If this Nor’easter was going to be a snow event, I would have had them make other arrangements to get home. Then again, if it was snow, the flight would have more than likely been cancelled and I would have to pick them up on Wednesday.

Of course the lights on the
pre-lit tree wouldn't work, so
Paulie had to string more.

Saturday, we had our annual tree decorating party. It was over a week early this year. We usually do it as close to the first night of Hanukkah as we can, but Hanukkah is on the 17^th this year, and I wasn’t going to be home.

The 17 year old tradition started with one of my dearest friends, Rebecca, who happens to be Jewish. She loves decorating Christmas trees, but for obvious reasons, she did not get many opportunities to do so. I had invited her over to do ours with us. She would spend Christmas with us whenever she was in town, so why not have her help decorate the tree? By accident, not design, it was the first night of Hanukkah, the first year we did it. I had felt bad that on her holiday, she was helping us prepare for our holiday, so I made potato pancakes for dinner that night…and the tradition began.

3 dozen ornaments and
more lights out. The tree still
needs serious work!

Now, every year, I make a vat of potato pancakes (10lbs – roughly 200 - 250 pancakes), and a bunch of people come to my house and decorate my tree. With the exception of Rebecca’s son Noah, who placed more ornaments than everyone else combined, they did a sad job. I was too busy cooking to supervise, but I can just about guarantee, everyone else put exactly one ornament on the tree. I think next year, I am going to withhold the food until the tree is done. LOL.

Well, this had gone on long enough. I told you I had a bunch to tell you. The next blog entry will more than likely be next Sunday. There’s just too much to do this time of year, that I can’t find the time to blog as well. Sorry. I hope you have a fabulous day, and happy writing!

Your Next Challenge:

It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas…

You have ten minutes (be honest). There is no right or wrong, just write. Spelling and punctuation don’t count, and NO ONE is allowed to criticize what someone else has written. Go.

November 29th Challenge

OH BOTHER! I'm not quite sure what I did, but I never posted this. So here's the 11/29/14 post. I'll give it a little while before I post the one I have for today.

Hi, it’s Christina –

My sister-in-law Cindy
with the cake Lys made

Good Morning! So has everyone recovered from their food comas yet? I haven’t because our feast was a two day event, and today isn’t going to be much better.

Obviously on Thursday we pigged out on the traditional Thanksgiving fare – turkey, mashed & sweet potatoes, stuffing, corn, cheesy vegetables, creamed onions, green bean casserole, cranberry sauce, rolls, cranberry bread, and apple, cherry, pear raspberry & pumpkin pies. Yesterday we celebrated my sister-in-law’s birthday (a little late, but she wanted Lys to be home for the celebration), and my mother-in-law cooked. We had ham, more mashed potatoes and corn and sweet potatoes, broccoli, red cabbage, carrots, and birthday cake (which Lys made).

My High School Senior
Picture. 

Tonight I have my thirty year high school reunion, so we are going to be stuffing ourselves yet again. It’s so hard to believe a little over a year ago we were starting to plan the event, then there was a huge push these past five months, and now the day is finally here. Thanks to advances in the internet, we were able to locate more classmates this time around than ever before. Unfortunately many will not be able to make it, but we will have around a hundred people, so it will be a fun night.

One good thing is, the folks who cannot make it are now connected through a Facebook page we have dedicated to our class. For the past few weeks the page has been exploding with posts of old photos, and comments. It has been amazing. Hopefully, even though the reunion will be over tonight, folks will keep posting photos and stories between now and the next reunion. I’m also hoping we can persuade the classmates who are not on Facebook to join, just so we don’t have to lose our minds next time around trying to track them down again.

Carol, her husband, and her 5 kids.
Aren't they a beautiful family?

One of my friends, Carol, just started a thread, on our class page, where we are to post where we are now, what we are doing, and a recent family photo. The replies are starting to come in, and it’s nice to get the updates. I will admit, I am a little jealous of Carol. She has five kids, including a set of thirteen year old twins, and she looks more beautiful now than she did in high school.

I wish she was able to come to the reunion, but travel on Thanksgiving weekend is so cost prohibitive, I think that is what kept many of our classmates from being able to attend. This was the first time we held the reunion on Thanksgiving weekend. I think our mindset was classmates would be visiting their families anyway for the holiday, so they would be in town. It turns out that many of the families have also moved away in the past thirty years, so it kind of back fired on us. I’m pretty sure, next time, we are going to shoot for late September – early October to have the reunion.

Okie-Dokie, I am off to Kohl’s to return a sweater for Lys. She bought it when she was home for fall break, wore it once, washed it, and it fell apart. I’m hoping Kohl’s doesn’t give me a hard time about it. All I want to do is exchange it for the exact same sweater.

BTW – I probably won’t be posting again for a few days. I’m fairly certain I will be driving Lys and her friend Max back to NC tomorrow. It’s a twelve hour drive between my house and Lys’ college. The kid she drove home with made it in just under nine hours. He was driving between 95 and 100 mph most of the way. YEAH, I am NOT letting my daughter get back in the car with him.

The ride home Monday should be interesting. I am scheduled to do a radio interview with Ron Shaw on ArtistsFirst Radio Network at 8:00 pm on Monday, and interview I will be doing via Blue Tooth in my car. It should be interesting. Please tune in.

Okay, I really have to run now. I hope you have a great day, and happy writing!

Your Next Challenge:

Let the insanity begin…

You have ten minutes (be honest). There is no right or wrong, just write. Spelling and punctuation don’t count, and NO ONE is allowed to criticize what someone else has written. Go.

September 23rd Challenge

Hi it’s Christina –

Good Morning! I tried, but I just didn’t have it in me yesterday to make a blog post. I was wrecked after the two day book signing. Sunday, I had intended to walk the festival after the signing and get pictures of all the displays so you could see, but I was spent. I was literally fighting to stay awake during the drive home. I will be back at Peddler’s Village next weekend (not this weekend), and I will get the photos for you then.

I did well on Sunday, not as good as on Saturday, but it was a good day nonetheless. It wasn’t quite the same without the two Karens there. Karen Scheuer was not feeling well, so she was unable to return on Sunday, and Karen Hluchan had a prior commitment. I did however get to spend some quality time with Joanne Holliday, and I have decided I thoroughly enjoy the woman. Her and her sister Lucy were a riot! I look forward to seeing both of them at future signings.

I did have a nice surprise on Sunday. Do you remember me telling you about meeting Jessica at a previous signing? She was the aspiring writer and jewelry maker (I told you about an upcoming craft fair she will be attending). Anyway, she stopped by to say “Hi”, and it really made my day. She brought along her husband and her mom, who barely looks old enough to be her big sister, let alone her mother, so I got to meet her family. It’s moments like these that warm my heart.

Yesterday the only writing I did were email correspondences and I did jot down some notes on a story idea which popped into my head. It may or may not turn into anything, we’ll see. If it does, you’ll be the first to know.

I also spent part of the day hammering out details for this weekend’s event – Milford Alive. I’ll be honest, I have no clue where Milford even is, but I am happy to report, it is only about half an hour away. I really should do a little more research before I agree to do these things. My friend, Kathi Kurz, an author of children’s books, will be joining me this weekend. I am picking her up early, we are packing up my car, and heading up there. We will be sharing a tent, so if you happen to be in the Milford, New Jersey area on the 27^th, please come by and say “Hi”.

So my big sale started on Sunday, and things are going a little slow which is surprising. I’ve only sold about twenty books so far, and they have all been on Amazon.com. Not a single one has sold on Amazon.co.uk, and I’m not sure why. All three books are either at $0.99 or £1 – that’s a 67% discount. I created an event on Facebook and invited over 800 people. If they’d each share it with two friends, I’d be able to get the word out.

The last time I ran a sale, I did almost no advertising for it, and the amount of sales surprised me. So this time I figured, if I put forth a little more effort, they would be even better. Logical, right? This is just one of the many mysteries of book marketing for me – truly not my forte, but a necessary evil all us authors must endure.

I have received several direct messages requesting the link to my radio interview. Really? WOW. Thanks! At the risk of no one seeing this post on Facebook, I have decided to chance it, and post the link here. (If you are reading this directly from my blog, this comment won’t make much sense to you. You see, if I include any pictures or any links within my posts, Facebook severely hobbles the number of followers the post reaches. It is very frustrating.)

Okay, I should go. I hope you have a great day, and happy writing!

Your Next Challenge:

I’ll set the stage: A crowded room, lots of people are chatting, you notice one person standing alone…

You have ten minutes (be honest). There is no right or wrong, just write. Spelling and punctuation don’t count, and NO ONE is allowed to criticize what someone else has written. Go.

September 16th Challenge

Hi it’s Christina –

Good Morning! It’s a chilly, rainy, yucky day here in central New Jersey, but I’m not going to complain. It has been forever since we have had rain, so it is desperately needed.

Sorry I didn’t do a blog post yesterday. I knew, the way my day had started, I was not going to do much other than complain. Yesterday started with me waking up early, because Dani was supposed to go back to school, and I come out into the living room to find it completely littered with trash. My hubby forgot to take the garbage out on Sunday night, and Colby helped himself. Not the sight I wanted to see at 5:00 a.m.

I said Dani was “supposed to” go back to school yesterday. It didn’t quite work. She got up, showered, dressed, put her make-up on, and she was done. She came out of her room, shaky and white as a sheet; and I said, “Uht, ah. No way. Back to bed.” I knew she wasn’t up to it because she didn’t fight me on it, not one complaint. She just turned around and went back to bed.

So, at nine, I called the doctor and told him what happened. He advised she slowly work her way back into school, so that’s what we are doing. Today she will be at school through third period, tomorrow through sixth, Thursday through eighth, and then the full day on Friday. It’s a good plan. Now I’m just keeping my fingers crossed it will work out that way.

I brought her to school this morning, and we went directly to the nurse’s office. We got her a pass to get out of gym, a blanket hall pass to the nurse’s office whenever she needs it, a pass to use the elevator because she’s still having issues navigating stairs, and a pass to get to class, because by the time we got all the paperwork filled out, she was late for first period.

Since first period had already started, the nurse asked me if I would walk Dani to class. I get her to the classroom, I signal the teacher I would like to talk to him for a second, Dani walks in, and the first words out of the teacher’s mouth are, “You picked a bad day to come back.” What the heck? Is he out of his mind? Why would he say that??

Then, I’m still standing outside the classroom, and he completely ignores me. You would think, he would excuse himself for the fifteen seconds it would have taken for me to bring him up to speed, but no. After five minutes I gave up and left. Man I really hope this was an isolated situation and this guy isn’t such a jerk all the time, or we are going to have an issue.

I refrained from posting yesterday because I didn’t want to complain, and here I am today, complaining; so enough with that.

I had the radio interview on ArtistFirst Radio Network last night. It was a ton of fun. Ron and I spent most of the hour laughing. I did get to talk a bit about me, my books, and the stories behind them. I also managed to work in shout-outs for three of my author friends, Keith, Linda and Dorothy May. All three of them will be appearing on The Ron Shaw Show sometime in the near future. We also talked about the covers for my books, so I was able to give Linda’s son Matt – the creator of my Corporate Blues cover, and her daughter Krista – the model for my Corporate Blues cover, some airtime as well.

It was so surprising how quickly the hour sped by. Ron warned me it would, but honestly, I didn’t believe him. Let me tell you, I enjoyed the radio interview far more than the TV interview last week. I got to do my radio interview in a sweatshirt, old pair of shorts, no make-up, and my hair was probably a mess, and it didn’t matter. You can’t get away with that on TV, that’s for sure.

We had such fun last night, Ron asked me to come back on his show the second Monday in December, and I accepted. Not exactly sure what we will talk about then, but what the heck, right?

Hey, if you get a minute, go check out ArtistFirst’s website. I glanced at it before, checked to make sure there were no errors in what they put up about me and my books, but I didn’t really look at the whole page. I did last night, and I got a big surprise.

My book’s cover and my bio are right next to a picture of Johnny Depp! Other folks they have interviewed are Dr. Oz, Priscilla Presley, Joan Collins, Jaclyn Smith, Ben Vereen, and MANY more names you’d know – HOLY CROW! Here they are, interviewing all these mega stars, and then little old me. I feel unworthy. I’m so glad I didn’t notice that until AFTER my interview, or I really would have been ill.

In case you were wondering, the last challenge was a quote taken from The Last Lecture, by Randy Pausch. If you haven’t had a chance to read this book yet, I highly recommend it. As a rule, I pretty much do not read non-fiction. The spare time I have to read, I want to escape, to be taken away to another time, another place, and most of all to a happily ever after; and let’s face it, non-fiction usually cannot deliver my requirements.

This book however, was an assigned reading for Dani last year, and I read all of the books my kids have had assigned to them. I finished the book in a little over two hours, and then I went and watched the video of the actual lecture. The book was amazing, and it is the first book EVER that I did not find a single editing error. That alone impressed me. My only complaint was the insane cover price for the tiny book. $22 for a 4X5, 205 page book, even the Kindle edition was $11. I’m sorry, I don’t care who you are or what you’ve got to say or how amazing what you have to say is, it’s not worth that kind of money. I managed to get a used copy for $5, and I strongly suggest, if you plan on reading it, you should too.

Okay, I’ve rambled on long enough. I have to get this puppy posted everywhere and then go get Dani from school.

I hope you have an amazing day, and happy writing!

Your Next Challenge:

I think I can, I think I can…

You have ten minutes (be honest). There is no right or wrong, just write. Spelling and punctuation don’t count, and NO ONE is allowed to criticize what someone else has written. Go.

September 6th Challenge

Hi it’s Christina –

Good morning – just barely. Today has been a shiny object day already. I am going to be hard pressed to get this blog out before the house wakes up and it’s too noisy for me to concentrate.

I spent an hour plus on the phone with Ron Shaw, the talk show host from ArtistFirst Radio Network, who I am doing the interview with on September 15^th. He had sent me a proposed mock up for a cover of the newest book he was working on, to ask my opinion. I really didn’t care for it, but instead of just saying “yuck”, I made him a mock cover. Guess what? He really liked it, and probably more importantly, his wife liked it.

Please don’t get me wrong, the artwork he had for his cover was exceptional, but it was not appropriate for the story, well at least I did not think it portrayed the correct expectations for the book. Let’s face it, you do judge a book by its cover, and that cover led you to believe it was a horror story, and it isn’t, it’s a ghost story.

So we chatted about the upcoming interview. We chatted about some publishing stuff, and we chatted about our ghost experiences. Then POOF an hour and fifteen minutes had gone by. It’s no wonder, last month, for the first time EVER, I went over my minute allotment on my phone. Ron and I get to talking, and 60 – 90 minutes get eaten up just like that. It’s all good though. I truly enjoy chatting with him.

I did not get as much writing done yesterday as I had hoped. All the computer glitches had me twitching, so I downloaded a new anti-malware app out of desperation, and had it go to town. I rebooted this morning, and everything seems to be okay. I’m keeping my fingers crossed. So far I have not had 9K pop-ups telling me to upgrade my GoogleChrome, my video whatever, or anything else, and I can actually read my screens because they are not covered with ads. That annoying iStart123 still comes up when I initially log on to the internet, but it does not appear to be causing any issues, so I’m just going to ignore it for now. All my major problems started when I tried to remove it from my computer.

I did get a small reprieve yesterday. I found out my church meeting is NEXT Friday, not last night. Yeah. I was so exhausted last night, the last thing I wanted to deal with was another meeting. It was good to stay home and do nothing. Well, not exactly nothing. I got caught up on all the missed episodes of a show I like but have not been able to see for several weeks.

Today we are going to my nephew’s going away party. He leaves on September 11^th for Japan, and we have no clue when he’ll get leave again. Chances are we won’t be seeing him for a whole year. Hopefully he’ll get some down time while he’s stationed over there so he can explore Japan a little. It would be a shame if he went half way around the world and didn’t get time to actually experience the country he’s in. That and I’m looking forward to seeing pictures because I doubt Japan will ever be in my future.

Okay, I’m on borrowed time at this point, and I need to get something done on FTQ. I hope you have a super day, and happy writing!

Your Next Challenge is:

Do you remember your very first day of school, or any other memorable first day of school? Tell us about it.

You have ten minutes (be honest). There is no right or wrong, just write. Spelling and punctuation don’t count, and NO ONE is allowed to criticize what someone else has written. Go.

September 3rd Challenge

Hi it’s Christina –

Good morning! It’s HUMP DAY, and the last day of summer break. School starts tomorrow, so after I’m done working today, Dani and I are going to be doing a whole lot of running around. She wants to stop at Verizon to get her phone fixed, at Kohl’s to get a new outfit for tomorrow, and I need to stop at the grocery store because after having the summer off, tomorrow morning, I need to start making sandwiches again. YUCK! The smell of cold cuts in the morning turns my stomach.

This week is insane, and it marks the start of a hectic fall for me. Last night I had my critique group, and surprise, surprise, we had a film crew taping our session. Apparently there was an email I missed warning us it was happening last night. I have to say, I completely forgot the camera was even in the room with us, so I guess that’s an inclination of how good the director was, totally unobtrusive. They are coming back next Thursday for our writing group, and now that I know what it is going to be like, I have no reservations.

I already told you what today is going to entail. Tomorrow I have a reunion committee meeting to go over continued planning for our November class reunion; the first one I’ll actually be able to attend, so I am REALLY looking forward to seeing my old classmates again. On Friday, I have our church women’s group meeting to plan for our November church bazaar. I’ll be doing a lot of the work on the silent auction portion of the bazaar, which is going to be a neat trick since I’m pretty much booked up every weekend between now and Thanksgiving.

The only thing I have planned for this weekend is a celebratory dinner for my in-law’s anniversaries – yes plural, my sister-in-law’s anniversary is Friday. However, Saturday will more than likely be filled with shopping for the list of required school supplies Dani will get on Thursday when she returns to school.

Book wise, things are pretty packed as well. The 9^th is the filming for the TV show. On Monday, September 15^th, I’ll be appearing on Ron Shaw’s radio show on ArtistFirst Radio Network at 8:00 pm. It should be a blast, so I hope you tune in. Saturday and Sunday, September 20^th & 21^st I’ll be back at Canterbury Tales Forever; and Saturday, September 27^th I’ll be at Milford Alive.

I’m not sure yet which authors will be joining me at Canterbury Tales (I’ll let you know when I find out), but my friend, Kathi Kurz, will be coming with me to Millford. Actually, I’m going with Kathi (even though I’m driving), because I would never have known about the festival if it wasn’t for her.

I am going to be waking up extra early Saturday and Sunday, and probably all week as well; and on Friday and Monday, after everyone is out of the house, I will not be moving from my chair. The publisher is calling for an update next Friday, and FTQ is still not finished. If I keep my blog down to a minimum over the next week, it will give me roughly forty hours to finish up Faerie Tale Queen. Considering this is first draft, that should be enough time.

This whole going with a publisher is a double edged sword. Having to be creative under a deadline is stressful, and can very easily cause writer’s block. However, having to be accountable to someone else’s deadline, forces my butt into a chair and makes me write. It’s easy to brush off deadlines I set for myself – not so much when there’s someone else involved.

On that note, I should start rereading what I have written already so it will be fresh in my mind to start the next chapter as soon as I wake up tomorrow. I hope you have a wonderful day, and happy writing!

Your Next Challenge is:

Since I haven’t done one in a long time, today’s challenge is a photo challenge.

You have ten minutes (be honest). There is no right or wrong, just write. Spelling and punctuation don’t count, and NO ONE is allowed to criticize what someone else has written. Go.

July 24th Challenge

Hi it’s Christina –

Good Morning! Well, it’s official. I will be a guest on Ron Shaw’s radio show, on the ArtistFirst RadioNetwork, on Monday, September 15^th, at 8 pm. After chatting with him for over an hour last night, he wore me down and I agreed to do the show. Lord only knows what you’re going to get, ‘cause this guy’s a hoot. There was a whole lot of laughing going on during our conversation.

I’m still really nervous. It’s a live show with twelve million listeners worldwide. Hopefully my tongue won’t get too tied. We hit so many different topics during our phone call, I have absolutely no idea what direction the interview is going to go, but I think that will turn out to be a good thing. If I know what’s coming, then my answers will sound rehearsed, and I’d come off sounding like a commercial instead of a real person.

I know one thing that will undoubtedly get screwed up, Ron – or as he likes to be called “Whale” – will end up using my real name during the interview, instead of my pen name. The story behind the pen name is marginally interesting, and now that my kids are older, it doesn’t really matter much anymore, so I guess I’ll be “outed” on international radio. Oh well, c’est la vie. LOL.

Now that we are in the last week of Camp NaNoWriMo, my brain has the consistency of scrambled eggs, which is making coming up with daily writing prompts a challenge. Anytime you folks want to chime in with some suggestion, I’d be happy to have them. Send‘um on over.

I only lasted half an hour longer at work yesterday than I did on Tuesday. I came home laid down for a couple hours, then dragged Dani with me to a long overdue trip to the grocery store. Basically I hung on to the carriage while Dani did all the work. She was a huge help. The back is a whole lot better today, but I am still going to take it real slow so I don’t mess it up again.

RV has an early appointment, so I only have time for the blog today. Maybe, if it’s quiet when I get home, I’ll be able to work on FTQ, but I’m not holding my breath. Oh well, I hope you have a fabulous day, and happy writing!

Your Last Challenge was:

What is that stuff all over you?

“Eww, Josh, what is that stuff all over you?”

“I have no idea. Find me a towel or something will you?” He pleaded while he tried to wipe the sticky green gunk from his eyes and face.

Lauren found the box marked ‘Kitchen Linens’, tore off the packing tape, and grabbed a handful of dish towels. “What the heck happened?”

“I was putting a box in the back bedroom closet, and the next thing I knew, I was covered in this stuff.”

“Where did it come from?”

Josh paused in his wiping. “Sorry, I wasn’t about to take the time to investigate while I had slime dripping from me.”

Lauren touched a spot on his arm and pulled away a drop of the substance, rubbed it between her fingers, then brought it up to her nose and smelled it. “Phew, it stinks.”

“Really? I hadn’t noticed.”

“I put the boxes with the bathroom supplies in our bathroom. Why don’t you go take a shower, and I’ll try to figure out what happened.” She handed him a plastic bag. “Here. Put your clothes in this. I’m not putting whatever that is in our new washer.”

***

Did you figure out where this one was going? A young couple just moved in to a new house…

Your Next Challenge is:

This ought to be good…

You have ten minutes (be honest). There is no right or wrong, just write. Spelling and punctuation don’t count, and NO ONE is allowed to criticize what someone else has written. Go.