December 27, 2009

As you can see, I’ve been a miserable blogger despite my attempts to the contrary. But I’ve been very active on my Facebook fan page (I guess I can only handle one form of social media at a time…).

Here’s what’s happening over there, for the curious. Come on over and say hi!

December 18, 2009

Sorry for the delay in posting this…my blog got hijacked by spambots (235 spam-comments in one night) and I couldn’t log in for a day!

Anyway, this is an announcement of the winners from my newsletter-subscriber contest, in which I’m giving away the first in my new series writing as Joss Ware.

Beyond the Night will be released on January 12, 2010, but these five lucky ladies should have it in their hands before then:

Shari/dragonlady

Nathalie Nakouz

Pat Baldwin

Vicki McGrew

Lisa Holland

Congratulations, ladies! Thank you all for participating…and if you aren’t a member of my newsletter list…why wait? Join now. I never spam.

November 3, 2009

After learning from a friend of mine that her new MacBookPro’s hard drive crashed a few weeks ago, and fully aware that I never, never back up my brand new MacBookPro laptop (which is completely foolish as I do most/all of my new writing there), I made a trip to the Apple store today to get a portable hard drive for said laptop.

(Which, I think, I’ve named Buffy, by the way. The laptop, not the hard-drive. Considering the fact, however, that the hard-drive plugs in to Buffy, perhaps I ought to name it….Spike. It’s sleek and red and very, very sexy.)

Anyway. *cough* Feeling virtuous as I am sitting here at Panera watching that little red hard drive work very hard to back up my Buffy-top and blogging.

Will wonders never cease?

September 21, 2009

So I went and saw 9, Tim Burton’s post-apocalyptic animated movie on Friday night.

As is true for all Burton films, it was…interesting. I wouldn’t see it again. The story was meh. But what I loved about it was the visuals. There was so much to look at. Everything was so fascinating and detailed, from the puppet-like creatures that were “all that’s left of humanity” to the spider-like monster robots to the remnants of our world. (Or, more correctly, the world of the 1950s.) It was so very creative and full of visual depth.

But for me, it didn’t save the movie. The message was clear, of course, that we have to take care of our world and our race, and that sacrifices must be made for the good of all…but other than that, I wasn’t engaged. It could have been shorter and I would have enjoyed it more.

Has anyone else seen it? What did you think? Did anyone see the new Jennifer Aniston flick? Apparently it got lambasted by the critics. (I don’t have any desire to see it.)

The one I really want to see is Mr. Damon’s The Informant! After seeing him on Jon Stewart and listening to him being interviewed by Terry Gross last week for Fresh Air (fascinating–give it a listen if you haven’t heard it), I’ve been able to get beyond my worry that his dweebishness in this movie will ruin Mr. Damon for me.

There is no ruining Matt Damon. Not for me.

September 18, 2009

As of about 11:30 am today, I am the mother of a teen-ager.

Holy crap.

Does this mean my life is about to disintegrate into slamming bedroom doors, yelling matches about clothes, hair, boyfriends, friends, music, social engagements…etc?

I was fortunate. My mother and I always had (and still do) a great relationship based on mutual respect and friendship. Yeah, she played The Mother Card often enough, but that was only when she had to. We had our fights, but I was never a teen who’d complain about my mom to my friends. Nor was my mother always trying to marry me off or tell me how to live my life.

Because of that, I’ve tried to model my relationship with Mini Me after the one I had with my mom. And Mini Me has even said that she doesn’t think we’ll have that yelling, screaming, “you-don’t-know-anything-because-you’re-not-a-teen-ager” relationship that lots of mothers and daughters have. We’ve even talked about it.

So, no, I don’t expect my life to descend into that sort of world. I consider myself very lucky on both sides of my parental relationship (as daughter and as mother).

I do have more things to worry about with my daughter than my mother did when I reached 13 (or even 16 or 18)…but we’ll just take it one step at a time.

So tell me. What was your teen-aged relationship like with your mom? Did you get along (mostly) or hate each other?