February 1st, 2015 Challenge

Hi, it’s Christina –

Good Morning! What is it about 3:38 am? For the past twelve days I have woken up at exactly 3:38 - not 3:30, not 3:45, 3:38 on the dot. On a few of the mornings, I have been able to fall back to sleep; but for the most part, at 3:38 the invisible rooster has crowed, and I have been wide awake.

Needless to say, this new predawn ritual has left me a bit foggy come late afternoon early evening. I have tried taking an afternoon nap (but that’s nothing new – it is a well-known fact that I love my naps), but I’m even finding it difficult to sleep then. Last night, I was so tired, I went to bed shortly after dinner, around 8:30ish. I did well. I think I fell asleep around 10:30, which is an hour to an hour and a half earlier than I have been. So, when 3:38 rolled around this morning I had actually gotten five hours of sleep. Not optimal, but I should be able to function today.

Function, ha, I need to do a whole lot more than function today. I have around twenty people coming to my house today at five to watch the Superbowl. I have to finish cleaning up the house, bake brownies, make the chili, the wings, and the various dips.

Now this next confession will probably have you rolling your eyes at me, but I also have to take down our Christmas tree. Yeah, yeah, I know. Normally it would have been down by January 15^th, sometimes even sooner if I get sick of looking at it, but this year, for some reason, I still haven’t gotten to it. I asked Paulie to bring the ornament boxes up from the basement so I could take the tree apart this morning before he woke up, but he forgot, and with my back, I can’t carry boxes up and down the stairs. Then again, last night Dani did ask if we could keep the tree up until her birthday… It’s on Wednesday… LOL. I don’t know, we’ll see.

I have admitted many times before that I am a total Twitsaster. I don’t know why, but Twitter baffles me, and if I’m being honest, intimidates me. However, I do know it is a necessary evil as far as marketing my books goes. I am trying.

Yesterday I learned how to shorten the links to my books. For example, here’s what the Kindle link to Taking Chances looked like before:

http://www.amazon.com/Taking-Chances-Bradford-Christina-Paul-ebook/dp/B00B8RJWQM/ref=sr_1_3?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1422790750&sr=1-3&keywords=christina+paul&pebp=1422790755940&peasin=B00B8RJWQM

Wow! I’m pretty sure I’m over the 140 Twitter limit before I even typed a word. That just won’t work.

Now through this site called Bitly, the link to Taking Chances looks like this: http://amzn.to/1BIMing Infinitely more manageable. Now the trick was to, in the remaining 118 characters, include the appropriate #hashtags and something catchy or witty as well. Considering I have been told the following #hashtags are the ones I should be using - #IARTG #SNRTG #amwriting #tw4rw #romance #IAN1 #WW #RT – I had to put my thinking cap on, because I only had 14 characters left.

My first Tweet was pathetic. I put in all the #hashtags, the Bitly link and the words “Now only $2.99”. Seriously, who cares? Nothing makes that stand out from the pack, but at least I got something out there. I gave it considerable more thought this morning, and I came up with this:

Snow’s on its way. Stay toasty with a warm romance. #TakingChances http://amzn.to/1BIMing

You might say, “Wait, that’s almost all of your characters. What about the #hashtags?” I split them into three tweets. It’s a little more work, and if you follow me, you’ll see nine tweets from me in a clump, but I have got to do something to boost sales.

Taking Chances has fallen to its lowest ranking ever, and I can’t fathom why. Honestly, in my opinion, it’s the best of the three books I’ve written so far. The mystery is more intricate, the historical detail is more in-depth, there are more twists and turns, and the sex is much hotter. The book holds elements which would appeal to a much broader audience.

Because of this, I know it must be because of something I’m not doing marketing wise. So, for 2015, my goal is to get more marketing savvy. I have expanded my books to Nook, and hopefully soon Kobo. I’ve also gotten involved with sites like beezeebooks.com, and I am going to look into advertising with bookbub (if they’ll have me).

Okay, enough confessing for one day. I hope you have a spectacular day, and happy writing!

Your Next Challenge is:

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.

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.

December 1st Challenge

Hi, it’s Christina – 

AHHHH IT’S DECEMBER!! YIKES!!

I had to do some quick repair comments this morning when I opened up my computer. I can’t swear to it, but I have a sneaking suspicion, it was either my girlfriend Fran or her boyfriend Carl who hijacked my computer last night and posted on my Facebook page. They wrote one that just said, “I Love My Dog.” over and over, but the second one said, “Who the heck invited all these people to my house? OMG the food and drinks they went through!! Oy I need a nap!” LOL. Needless to say, I had to set the record straight and say, "I DID NOT POST THIS!!!!"

 

So the final count for potato pancakes made yesterday was 112, which means you get 11 pancakes per pound of potatoes. Good to know. I sent a few home with my son, my in-laws, with Carl (because his son didn’t make it last night and potato pancakes are one thing that the incredibly picky eater eats), and with Brianna, Karolyn’s daughter (because, although she was there, she came right from a basketball game, and she can’t eat after she’s been playing – food after exercise don’t agree with her). That left me twelve pancakes, which I put in the freezer for some future dinner for the three of us.

Out of the thirty individual pot pies I made – which I posted step by step photos of the recipe yesterday – there were five left, which Lys is bringing with her back up to school today. Lys is also taking the remaining red velvet mini cupcakes Karolyn made.

We had a wonderful time last night, until everything went to hell in a hand basket at the end of the night, but I won't get into it; but I will say there is no room in my life for nasty, mean, vindictive people, and we’ll leave it at that.

We had two surprise guests. A friend from NY, Brielle, who just happened to be visiting my friends Becky and Lenny came. Another friend, Bernadette, from Cape May, happened to be visiting her parents who live up our way, and she popped in as well. It was a very nice, and totally unexpected surprise on both counts!! 

The tree is up, and mostly decorated, thanks to my seven year old “nephew” Noah. He must have hung 2:1 what everyone else did combined. I saw he found one of his ornaments and hung it on the tree, but I didn’t see the one with his name on it on the tree. I looked for it after they left last night but couldn’t find it, so I’m wondering if it was one of the ornaments which did not survive the flood. We lost a bunch, and losing ornaments is like losing photos, because we don’t do run of the mill, colored glass balls on our tree, we do memory ornaments (Baby’s 1^st, vacations, milestones).

Oh well, it’s getting late, so I better go get in the shower so I’m not late for church. We’ll be leaving right after church to head back to Vermont. The weather report says snow showers up there all day today, so say a little prayer for us to arrive safely please.

There probably won’t be a blog tomorrow, and if there is, there definitely won’t be a challenge, so you have a couple of days to come up with your response to today’s challenge.

I hope you have a wonderful day, and happy writing!

Your Last Challenge was:

You hear your mom’s (or your dad’s) words come out of your mouth for the first time.

 

Admit it, you know it has happened to you, and it probably made you cringe the first time it did. You’re there, more than likely reprimanding your children for some misdemeanor, and out of your mouth comes…your mother’s voice. You freeze, close your eyes and scrunch up your face. Did I really just say that? I SWORE I would never say that! Good Lord, I’m turning into my mother.

The realization shocks you. Shakes you. Rocks you. You think, how can this be happening? But there it is, still hanging in the air, the dreaded words you swore you would never use with your children.

“Because I said so!”

You hated those words. They weren’t an explanation. They were irrational, a cop out, a bullying tactic. They made no sense and you were never going to utter them. But you just did, perfectly parroted, tone and cadence dead on; and you clench your back teeth as if someone just scratched their fingernails down the blackboard.

At this point your children are looking at you as if you have lost your mind, because they have no clue the inner turmoil you are attempting to wade through.

 

Ten minutes are up, but somehow, I think each of you can relate to what I wrote. If it hasn’t happened to you quite yet, don’t worry it will, and when it does, it will rock your world. LOL.

 

Your Next Challenge is:

 

 

You have 10 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 30th Challenge

Hi, it’s Christina – 

I DID IT!! Just before 10:30 yesterday morning, I hit the 50K mark for NaNoWriMo!! YEAH!!! The official number is 50,864. Yeah, I know I was over 68K last time, but last time I wasn’t driving back and forth to Vermont or having two major parties at my house two days apart. I’m happy I reached goal, and I rewarded myself with a piece of pumpkin pie and a long nap.

 

I had planned on pre-making the potato pancakes yesterday and then just throwing them in the oven to heat up today, but I just couldn’t force myself to cook two days in a row. The nap helped, but I was still exhausted from Thursday. So now, after I finish the blog, I will start making them – all ten pounds - and hopefully, by four o’clock, when people start showing up, the house won’t still smell like cooking oil. I doubt it though. I made a small batch last week for just the three of us and I could still smell the oil two days later.

I will also be making thirty individual pot pies, the ones you do in the muffin tin with a refrigerated biscuit for the crust. Plus I have cheese and crackers, chips and dip, and pie. Others who are coming are bringing, appetizers, desserts, and one person is bringing a third main dish. I think we’ll have enough food.

One of the fun things about my tree decorating parties is, I really never who is going to show up. Word just gets out there and friends start walking into my house, picking up and ornament or two, sticking them on the tree, then they start chowing down. Everyone brings some food with them to share, so there’s always enough, except for my potato pancakes. I swear I could make twenty ponds of them, and every single one would go, but I draw the line at ten pounds.

Okay, off to peel potatoes. I’m pretty sure I’d rather be “off to Ireland” like I have been for the past twenty-nine days. Oh, don’t forget, you’ll be getting your last installment, chapter 16, of Faerie Tale Queen later today on my Facebook page. So, until tomorrow, I hope you have a great day, and Happy Writing!

 

Your Last Challenge was:

Tell a little something about you and the holidays – what makes them special for you, a tradition you’re pretty sure is only done by your family, you’re little holiday secret, whatever you’d like to share.

 

I am going to let you in on a little secret – I am a total Christmas sap. The very second radio stations start playing Christmas songs, even before Thanksgiving, I have them tuned in, but I make sure to flip the station before anyone else gets in the car. Ooo and if I can sneak in a Christmas show on Lifetime when no one’s looking, woohoo!

I get excited when I see the first Christmas lights go on in our town, and I even drive home different ways, just so I can see more lights and decorations. Although everyone rolls their eyes over the silent decoration war between my one neighbor and another neighbor a few houses up the street, I anxiously await to see what’s new every year in their displays. Pretty soon both families are not going to be able to add anything new unless they swap out with an old, because they are seriously running out of lawn space.

The holiday also turns me into a bit of a water fountain. I can’t hear Christmas Shoes on the radio without crying. I get a touching card in the mail, I cry. Heaven knows most of the Christmas movies make me cry at some point, and I will admit, there are a few commercials that get me going as well. This year’s zinger was the Budweiser commercial where the snowmen offered their carrot noses to the team as a thank you for saving the mail truck and delivering the presents. Want to hear the really sad part? I only caught a glimpse of the commercial on Thanksgiving. My husband simply told me what had happened and I got choked up.

 

See, I told you, total Christmas sap. Today I was glad for the time limit because, believe it or not, there’s more, but I ran out of time…

 

Your Next Challenge is:

 

You hear your mom’s (or your dad’s) words come out of your mouth for the first time.

 

You have 10 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 24th Challenge

Hi, it’s Christina – 

Good Morning! So we made it home with only encountering a few flurries along the way. I actually saw more snow last night driving my youngest daughter to a birthday party then I did driving home from Vermont. I am glad we left when we did though. One of my daughter’s housemates sent her a snap chat of their dorm with a pretty good covering of snow, and another one of him with a pretty good covering of snow.

Sadly, I have come to the realization today I probably will not hit my goal for NaNoWriMo this time. I have only six days left and twelve thousand words to go, and I have no idea how I will be able to do them and prepare for Thanksgiving all at the same time. This does not mean I am giving up. Whatever spare minutes I can sneak, I will spend writing. When the girls are out shopping on Friday, I plan on chaining myself to the chair and writing. Unfortunately on Friday my husband is home as well, so I’m really not sure if I’ll be able to get much work done then either because I’m sure he’ll be pestering me to clean up for the party we’re having on Saturday.

We are having our annual tree trimming party on Saturday. Every year we shoot for the first Saturday of Chanukah to put up our tree, unless Chanukah happens to fall really late. It’s a tradition that started in our family quite by accident well over a decade ago. One of my dearest friends happens to be Jewish, but she loves decorating Christmas trees, so I invited her over for dinner and to decorate our tree. It was a Saturday and it was the second or third night of Chanukah, so since my girlfriend’s family wasn’t around, I thought I would surprise her by making potato pancakes for dinner. She was thrilled. We had a blast and made some good memories.

The following year, purely by chance and not design, the same thing happened. We were putting up our tree during Chanukah, my friend came over again, and I made potato pancakes because it was Chanukah. Now, I believe this is our seventeenth year, the tree trimming party has grown to include friends of various religions and family. I still make potato pancakes, although now it’s ten pounds of potatoes instead of five. We have a blast, and we make more good memories. Oh yeah, and my tree gets decorated.  

Maybe I’ll start setting my alarm for 4:00am for the next three days as well, instead of getting up at 5:00 am. This will give me an extra hour to write, an hour which my husband can’t complain I’m not cleaning. Sorry, for swinging back to this, but I’m still trying to figure out a way to get to my goal. If I say I’m going to do something, then dang it, I will do everything in my power to do it. I can’t stand falling short of a goal.

Don’t get me wrong, Faerie Tale Queen will get finished. I never had any delusion of actually completing the book in a month, because it will take far more than 50K words to finish the story. The question is, whether or not I will be able to hit the 50K goal by November 30^th.

Well, I have forty-five minutes before I need to start getting ready for church, so I had better use every second efficiently and get writing. I hope you have a wonderful day and happy writing!

 

Your Last Challenge was:

 

“See, I told you I wasn’t lying.” Camie whispered. “It’s right there, just like I said.”

Joey peaked around the bush, “Whoa.  Do you think anyone lives there?”

“I don’t know.” Camie repositioned herself to get a better look. “Do you want to go and find out?”

“What do you want to do? Just go up and knock on the door?”

“I don’t know. Maybe?”

“Are you crazy? What if an axe murderer or something lives in there?”

Camie rolled her eyes, “Like an axe murderer would be living there. Now who’s crazy?”

“Well I’m not going anywhere near the place, and neither should you.” Joey insisted. “Come on we should go.” Camie’s eyes widened and she began to rise, but Joey pulled her back down behind the bush, “What are you doing?”

“Look the door is opening and there’s an old woman coming out.” Camie whispered again.

“Who’s there? Timmy, is that you? Timmy, have you come home? Timmy?” The woman called.

“Oh Joey, she sounds so sad.”

Joey moved a branch so he could get a clearer view of the house. “What are you talking about? I don’t see anyone.”

“She’s right there,” Camie pointed, “and she’s calling for someone named Timmy.”

Camie rose, rounded the bush and walked into the clearing. The woman turned and smiled at her. As Camie began walking toward the woman, Joey grabbed her arm and spun her around. “What are you doing?” He hissed.

“I just want to go and talk to her.”

“Dammit Camie, there’s no one there. Let’s go.”

 

Your Next Challenge is:

 

This year you are able to go home for Thanksgiving for the first time in many years. When you get there, things feel just a little off…

 

You have 10 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.