February 11th, 2015 Challenge

Hi, it’s Christina –

WWIII still going on in my stomach today, so this blog will be short, and will be dedicated to my friend Ron Shaw.

http://amzn.to/17fKxnS

Over the past several months Ron and I have built a strong, bizarre, hysterical relationship which I wouldn’t change for the world. I am a firm believer that God puts people in your path, at particular times in your life, for a reason.

Ron is an ex Atlanta police captain turned author after a near death experience he had a little over a year ago. He chronicles this experience in his first book Seven Fish Tree.

http://amzn.to/1AXlZMC

Since the release of his first book, Ron has exploded on the writing scene. Seven Fish Tree was quickly followed by The Yellow Bus Boys. He brings you back to 1964, when he and thirty-three other 6^th grade inner-city boys went on a ten day trip. You’ll laugh out loud. You’ll cry. Buckle up, ‘cause you’ll be in for a wild ride. Oh wait, school buses didn’t have seatbelts in 1964.

http://amzn.to/1zLcGh5

On the heels of The Yellow Bus Boys came Transmutation – The life of a twisted cop. Unlike his previous two novels, this one is gritty and raw. No smoke and mirrors, he laid it all out for you to see.

http://amzn.to/1E0qqUK

His latest release, Cramped Quarters (I came up with the title, thank you very much), is back to his original – for lack of a better word – style. Cramped Quarters is the story of Mary, the ghost Ron and his wife Donna inherited when they purchased an old trunk at a yard sale. It is formatted like a snippet from a journal – entries of Mary’s antics and Ron’s reactions to what it is like living with a ghost.

http://bit.ly/1EXZHfa

When Ron’s not writing, he’s a Twitter fiend, and probably one of the most active Indie Author supporters I have ever met. He hosts a Monday night talk show on ArtistsFirst Radio Network. Actually, I have been interviewed twice. If you’re interested in listening to the two of us cut up, her are the links – Show1 – Show2.

Ron and I have LITERALLY spent hours on the phone – the man can talk – two months in a row I exceeded my allotted talk minutes on my wireless plan. It’s all good though. We have helped each other with our writing, computer issues, marketing issues. He has introduced me to several people I now consider my friends, and I have hooked him up with several talented authors to interview on his radio show. Ron and I are also two of the ten authors in the Spirited Tales anthology, published by AAPublishing, I told you about, which is going to be published soon. Yes, God definitely put Ron in my path, and I’m thankful.

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

Your Next Challenge is:

It was like I stepped into a 70s sitcom…

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.

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.

July 19th

Hi it’s Christina –

not my kitchen, but close

Good Morning! I woke up at five today so I would time to get a little writing done before I needed to get ready and leave for my book signing, but then I went into the kitchen to make coffee, and realized I forgot to do the dishes last night. Then of course the sink was messy, so I had to scrub that. Oh yeah, I promised Lys I would soak the top to her water bottle in bleach to clean it – hmm, I should do that to the travel mug lids while I’m at it…

I finally drag myself out of my distracting kitchen, and sit down at my computer, but I’m munching on a cinnamon roll, so I can’t exactly write. So I go take a look at Facebook. My first stop, every day, is the birthday reminders. I try very hard to wish everyone a HBD on their birthday, and I feel bad when I miss. (I know, I’m a kook, but you already know that.)

Then I noticed my cousin posted a photo with “Happy Birthday in Heaven” written as the comment. That made me want to share a song I had saved down to my timeline. After half an hour of hunting, one posted plea for “does anyone know an easier way to do this”, and one failed brainstorm of – Ooo, I sent this to Lisa, so the link should be in one of my messages to her (it wasn’t), over an our was wasted.

Then a back and forth chat with Ron Shaw about doing an interview on his

radio show, sucked up the rest of my expendable time, so this will be just a blog post today, without a challenge. I’m not complaining, it was all good. The chat, not the hunting for the link – I’m still a bit steamed over that. It was a youtube video of a girl singing a song about a friend going to Heaven. The song was amazing and comforting. The girl’s voice was phenomenal. I can’t remember the name of the song or the girl, so I can’t go hunting for it on youtube.

There needs to be a better way to find things on your timeline. I don’t understand why Facebook doesn’t do something as simple as have an “only me” folder, so when you share something with an “only me” status, it dumps it in there. I don’t know how many recipes and “home remedies” I have shared via “only me”, but when I go hunting for a new idea for dinner, or can’t remember if it’s vinegar or baking soda what gets out a grape juice stain, I can never find the post. If they automatically went to an “only me” folder, I’d know exactly where to look. Y’all know what a technological ditz I am, but seriously folks, this seems like a no-brainer, don’t you think?

So the reason for the back and forth between Ron and me, is his radio show is LIVE. I’m not sure I can be entertaining for an entire hour. Yup, you read that correctly, an HOUR long interview. I made Ron a deal. I said we chat on the phone FIRST. If, after our conversation, he still feels he wants me to do his show, then I will. If not, no hard feelings.

He agreed, but said he has read my blog, so he knows I’d be fine. Yeah, my blog, written word, where I can backspace and delete where needed. Ya can’t exactly do that on LIVE radio.

Oh yeah, did I mention, each segment is archived and can be accessed at any time via the radio’s website? So when I stick my size nine foot in my mouth, which I’m sure I will, it will be out there for all eternity. My only hope is for a bleep delay – I’ve been known to let a “D*mn” or “H*]]” or “S&*T”, among other things, slip from time to time in conversation.

I’ll keep you updated as to when and if I’ll be doing the interview. Okay, it’s time for me to hop in the shower. Wish me luck at the book signing. It’s cloudy right now, so I am hoping the weather holds out (the signing is outside). I hope you have an exceptional day, and happy writing!

July 5th Challenge

Hi it’s Christina –

Good Morning! What a GLORIOUS day! It was actually a little chilly last night, and today is bright and sunny, there’s a slight breeze, and NO humidity. It is going to be perfect weather for my girlfriend Sharon’s picnic. I already have the broccoli salad made, and all the fruit is ready so all I have to do is assemble the dessert. All I have left to make is the baked beans, and I’m golden.

Did you have a nice 4^th of July celebration? We did, for the most part. At the party yesterday, after my son cut his birthday cake, one of his friends pulled the cord on one of those popper cannons that blow out confetti, and wouldn’t you know it, the stopper on the top hit my son in the eye. After half an hour of flushing it out, it was better, and we resumed our partying, but it was tense there for a while.

My son, I love him to death, but you would think, by twenty-four, he would have outgrown being an accident magnet. The poor kid, calamity seems to follow him around. Oh, did I mention this was the same eye that got hit with a screwdriver a few months ago? He has caused more than a few of these grey hairs on head.

Ugh! It is 7:15 on a Saturday morning, and Lys just walked out of her room. I couldn’t sleep, so I got up around six, thinking I’d have a quiet house for several hours. Apparently, she couldn’t sleep either. Phew! She grabbed a bowl of cereal and went back in her room.

Before I started my blog this morning, I thought I should clear out my emails. One of the emails I clicked on before deleting it was my Twitter week in review. I swear, if I didn’t get those weekly emails, I’d completely forget I have a twitter account. My tweets are directly linked from my other accounts, so I rarely tweet anything from the Twitter page itself.

It was interesting, my June 21^st blog post wishing everyone a great longest day of the year, got just shy of 300 views. The second highest amount of views I had was about my books being on sale for $0.99. That tweet had 18 views. What was it about the summer solstice that garnered so much interest?

So, of course, the update made me log on to my actual Twitter account, and there I found six notifications. Five of the six were ones showing the ninety new followers, but one was from a man named Ron Shaw asking me to check out his page. Ron is an author and a radio talk show host – no, I had never heard of him before he sent me the tweet.

It was still ridiculously early, and I didn’t feel awake enough to write, so I went and checked out his page, Seven Fish Tree. This guy seems to be quite a character. From what I’ve gathered from his page, he is happily married to Donna who unfortunately is battling breast cancer at the moment, he is a retired police officer, he is a garage/yard sale junkie, and he lives in the Atlanta area. None of those make him a “character”, they are all fairly mundane facts. However, his stories of his 4:00 am battle with a four legged masked intruder, and his Victorian ghost, Mary, who lives in a camel backed trunk, do make him one. I laughed at his raccoon escapade, was touched by Donna’s battle, and found myself actively scrolling through his page to find out more about Mary. If his books are as captivating as his short posts, I would probably enjoy them immensely.

Here I was, thinking I would spend ten minutes or so clearing out the junk from my email, and I got distracted for over an hour. It’s going to be a shiny object day.

Okay, since I don’t know how long the quiet will last, I should skedaddle. I hope you have an wonderful day, and happy writing!

Your Last Challenge was:

Fireworks

The crowd begins form, they come from near and far

Brought to the grassy meadow by foot, shuttle bus or car

The food tent’s bustling and the band begins to play

We’ll be sharing festivities with ten thousand friends this Independence Day

Chairs are set, the blanket’s spread on the plot of grass we staked

Anticipation builds as we sip lemonade and indulge in funnel cake

Games of Frisbee and tag cease as the light begins to fade

A brief second, a lull in the din, and crickets begin their evening serenade

The mayor speaks, the anthem’s sang, the time has finally arrived

The first launch, a warning shot, booms and flashes in the night sky

The crowd all cheer then settle in to watch the marvelous show

In rapid succession, six rockets launch, then cause the sky to glow

With shimmering gold and green, yellow and red, silver and blue

The gathering replies with spontaneous “Ahhs” and “Ooos”

***

There were probably two more stanzas to wrap it up, but I ran out of time.

Your Next Challenge is:

(S)He looks so familiar…

(It took me quite a while to come up with this new challenge, so if you have any suggestions for a writing prompt, I’d be more than happy to entertain ideas from you!)

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.