Virgo and Scorpio....Who Knew?

 So you know, as a Christian, I don't put too much stock into the whole Zodiac thing, but I do believe that it has some merit in the area of personality traits. I don't read a horoscope, I don't follow the stars (even though God made them) and I don't think I will end up with fame and fortune just because a scrolled-up piece of paper says so; which can be altered to fit any and all zodiac signs. What I do believe is that there are certain times of the year that a person is born and that these dates and times can have an influence on the way they believe, think, or feel. For instance, I was born in the Autumn, and Autumn just happens to be my favorite time of year.  My best friend was born on the first full day of Summer, and she loves Summer more than any other season. All that being said; let's get into the fun stuff.

    I have been single since March 31, 1999.  That's right, I've not had a single date since the 20th Century!!  I'm OK with that fact really, I have had the best friends ever, the best kids ever, the best dogs ever, and of course, I'm not ever really alone. I have me, and I'm enough. I decided for fun to read a book (on Kindle) about the most complete you...or me.  It was saying that a Scorpio woman (I am one. I was born on the last day of Scorpio on the last day they counted November 22 as a Scorpio) can be one of two types of Scorpio.  Who knew there are two types of Scorpios (apparently the only sign with this)?  I found out I am an EAGLE and not a belly crawler. What that means is I look out for others with a fury and viciousness that other Scorpios use to look out for themselves.  Again, who knew? 

    I am reading the book and it says I need a Virgo man to complete myself. If I had a man at all, he would or should be a Virgo according to the book and their gurus who do actually follow this stuff.  They list the reasons as "opposites attract" but that they also have many traits in common. Both signs are intelligent, intellectual, and independent, but that they also love being a part of a union, they want to be mated and mated for life. That was interesting to see because I have chosen NOT to date for that very reason. I will NOT date anyone, but I may marry them. I will mate, but it will be for life, none of this temporary crap; it's all or nothing. So far, it's been a whole lot of nothing, and I' not crying about it.  

    The Virgo man has a few traits that other zodiac signs don't appreciate apparently, but the Scorpio (the Eagle Scorpio) actually desires and hopes for in a man. One such trait is being a neat freak, a bit OCD, because the Scorpio is too busy living to slow down long enough to make the bed. The Scorpio isn't upset about a frame being crooked but doesn't mind if the Virgo goes around straightening things, or organizing the refrigerator. The Eagle Scorpio will not only allow the Virgo to clean, organize, straighten, streamline, and/or otherwise make ready, but they will adhere to the program and do their best not to disrupt the flow, whereas a belly crawler Scorpio will intentionally disrupt and destroy the work of the Virgo, so the Virgo (according to the book) needs to be sure he/she has found the EAGLE type before jumping into bed with them...which is another trait that the Eagle finds interesting about the Virgo. Let's go there.

    According to the book, the Virgo (especially the men) are a bit kinky. They are shy and introverted in public, but in the bedroom, they can be open, naughty, and even a bit unorthodox. The Scorpio (any of them) is open to this as long as the lovemaking is very very very monogamous. The one thing a Scorpio won't tolerate is a cheater or a swinger. Strangely, with Scorpio being the zodiac with the most famous libido, it's also known for its monogamy as well. I can see that. I divorced a man for his infidelity, and I won't be fooled again. I'm open to experimenting, exploring, and having the best of times but only with my soulmate. Maybe I should be on the lookout for a Virgo man....a bearded Virgo man....a quiet musician-type bearded Virgo man with only eyes for me. Why a musician? Well, I want to learn how to play the guitar for one thing, and he can teach me...while he's naked and hanging upside down if that's what he wants to do.

    Another trait that attracts the Eagle to a Virgo is that the Virgo is a clean man/woman. They like taking showers and wearing deodorant. They feel complete when they have a bit of perfume or cologne on; but not too much. I like that. I like being clean, and I want my man to be clean, but then again, if I can get a bearded musician with haunting eyes and a big grin to roll down the hill with me and end up in the mud I'm OK with that too. I do like kilted bearded quiet musicians with haunting smiles and bedroom eyes...and dirty black boots....and if he's hungry and wants to be fed, I'm really into that. I like to cook.  I really don't care if he's a Virgo, but the book says I need one, there's that. 

    Yet another trait the Virgo man/woman has that the Eagle Scorpio appreciates is that they are workaholics and don't always need to be cuddled or held constantly. They don't always come into the same room I'm in just to be with me. That's good. They don't like to stop working to eat, sleep, or hang out, and I'm OK with that too because I have things I'm doing. I don't have an inferiority or insecurity issue where I feel that I have to be in someone's presence to be theirs. I don't have to wear their ring, they don't have to wear mine. Their word is their word, and their actions are their actions, so if the bearded kilted musician with haunting grey eyes and dirty black boots decides to work another hour or so on something he's writing or thinking about writing, he can do that and I'll be on my Kindle when he's finished and wanting to scarf something down before he shows me how to strum his....strings...remember, I said I want him to teach me how to...you know, play the guitar.

    The last trait that the Eagle appreciates that the Virgo man/woman does that other zodiac signs either don't appreciate or refuse to assist with, is the fact that the Virgo becomes upset about something and will get really quiet and reserved. If they are upset with you (me) they pull away, and if they are upset with someone else they are still quiet, but will mention it over and over again in different ways, allowing the other person the opportunity to either ask them to discuss it or to let them know they are aware of the situation; the Eagle will say something like "I'm here if you want to talk about it" but the belly crawler will often blame the Virgo and say it's probably their fault...Virgos need to stay away from (anyone needs to stay away from) the belly crawlers.  It's OK bearded music man without your kilt, but who still has those boots on your feet while hanging upside down naked in the bedroom with your guitar --- I am here for you...if you need me. If you don't, I'll at least stick around and watch.

    https://thezodiac.com/eagle2.htm  (Eagle / Scorpio info) 

Photo Credit: Stocksy.com

You Get What You Get. I'm FINISHED.

 If I was 100% completely honest with you, I would have to tell you that I could probably go back over the manuscript another 3 or 4 times, but I'm not going to do it. I'm LEAVING IT alone, and if that means there are mistakes, then that's the way it will have to be. I'm just done. I've read the book "Of Kilted Pleasure" more than a dozen times from start to finish. I've been pouring over it, trying to find the tiny mistakes and I know (I just know) there are a few. I can't do it again.  I really should pay for an editor, but hey, where is the fun in that?

    Here's the thing. I am a human. I really am a basic individual. I write. I have money to publish, but not always to have the thing edited. When I had one or two things looked at for editing (back in the day) they wanted to change the story, change the plot, change this or that. I didn't write this or that. I wrote what I wrote. I have always been that way. Even in High School, when my creative writing teacher tried to tell me it would sound better if....I told her to write it if she preferred it that way. I asked her to think about grading it as if she wasn't trying to make me do things HER way. If she gave me anything less than an "A" I took it straight to the principal to claim she was discriminating against me for being a great writer and she was envious. YES, I have always been a writing diva.  The good news is, I'll leave your work alone. I won't try to ask you to write like I do. Have I won awards? Yes. I have won money, awards, scholarships, and other things. I don't talk about it because I think writing is too subjective to be pigeonholed. I took the money because I needed it but I NEVER gave my words to the buyer. NO ONE uses my words except me. THEY ARE MINE.

    That being said. I am selling my books for people to read, but no one can say they wrote "Of Kilted Pleasure" or anything else I wrote. In a very real sense, I created Aria, Ewan, Antoin (even though I fashioned Antoin using someone) and I created the plot, the story, the events, the places and the situations. No one gave me hints or clues; not even suggestions. I didn't know what I was going to write when I sat down to do the book. I knew Aria would have an imagined lover Craig Allan Mackenzie, and that's about it. Craig, by the way, is my personal imagined lover, we've been "married" for over 35 years. The Craig in the book is NOT the Craig in my mind. My Craig is rounder, and more robust. He's older, and he burps.  I'm getting to the point that I can actually understand one out of every 40 words he says too. My Scots Gaelic is getting so much better. "Tha mi aon cu agam".  It is true, I have one dog.

    So, the book is now sent off to the publisher. I'm not going to tweak it again. It is done. You get what you get, and if you go through it and find mistakes, please email me to let me know. I love that. I know, some people would hate it, but I love it. It keeps me humble.  I am having a fit with the illustrator at the moment, but it will work itself out, I'm sure. I paid for Level 3 and they sent me their rendition of what it should look like but they used a Level 1 drawing, of what can ONLY be described as a cartoon...a coloring book illustration. I'll post it.  I won't go into the battle I'm waging at the moment, but I know I'll hoist my flag soon enough. This old Southern wet hen won't stop pecking at their legs until I get my way. It's my money. It's my book. I won't even apologize for feeling that way. I'm not Canadian. 

    In about six weeks or so the book should be ready to buy online. I'd love to have control over what they charge, but again, I really don't. I think I'll try to get them to have it on sale for $1.99 a download for the first month, that way it can get out there. I think that's fair. The downloads are usually $5.99-7.99 on Kindle and the paperback will be $19.00-21.00.  I'm not doing a hardcover option on this book. It's a romance novel, come on!!  I think the Kindle is the way to go, it's cheaper, at your fingertips, and you can make the font bigger. OH...that's a good point to make; I did make the font bigger. I told them to make it 12 point, not 11. It makes a HUGE difference when you're reading it, and I used THIS font, which is GEORGIA. They had not done a book in Georgia before. I am the first. There you go!  It's just an easier wider font. I like it.  I hope you do too.

    Whew.  Done. Well, the manuscript is. Now we fight for the lovers to be painted and not displayed as something a child would take a crayon to.  Geez!

 

Photo DISCREDIT: Xlibris.com (I'll give her name if I don't get this settled)

Books I May Not End Up Writing.

 I'm about to submit "Of Kilted Pleasure" back to the publishers for its final go before it's made into an actual book. They've been so kind to me in terms of letting me go back through it a dozen times to make sure all of the mistakes are found, corrected, and that the spelling of the Scots words are right....or are they? Anyway, I have been reading some of the reviews given by random people who I've never met, who are giving my book a read before it hits the market. These are readers paid by the publisher, not myself. They give a genuine thought or comment about this or that. You take it with a grain of salt or you listen and end up stabbing yourself in the eye. I choose not to listen and just thank them for their candor.  Most of the people are NOT American, and they couldn't find Scotland on a flat map of the world.  To expect them to understand anything related to 18th Century Scotland would be a stretch.

    That being said, I was dreaming last night, which is something I do quite often, and I came up with an idea for a book that I may never write. Why? Why would I not write it? Well, because it was full of unbelievable truth and also unbelievable antics that would cause my readers to think I was that way. I'm not that way. I'm this way. To say that I am one way or the other would be difficult, but I'm certainly not going to go into prostitution to make my bills. I am NOT that way.  Sounds like an interesting read already doesn't it? Maybe I will write it. LOL

    As with all book ideas, there is NOTHING new under the Sun. It wouldn't matter if I told the world every idea I have, they can only duplicate it in THEIR way, not my way. It would NEVER have my humor, my spin, my thoughts, etc. I'm OK with telling the world that Susie had sex with Davy, and they were in Mikey's tree house at the time. They were both finishing college and both dating Patty. That's not the dream, but you get my drift. I could say anything at all, and someone could steal the idea but would it really be stealing? No. It's not really all that nice to take someone's idea, but unless you verbatimly (is that a word?) write out someone's book or idea, it's not stealing. You should however be cognitive that it could sound like the other book, and you should add your thoughts, ideas, spin, and/or humor. Just sayin'.

    So, the book I won't write, or may write deals with a school in the mid-west of the United States; we'll say Chicago.  There are dozens of teachers in the school, hundreds of kids, and a few administrators. That's the way it is all around the world. Nothing new there. The teachers are paid what they are paid, the benefits are so-so, and there is always room for improvement, so one or two teachers realize after having a tryst with the same man (for money) that they could benefit by combining their efforts, be on rotation, as it were, and collect the money from the man, not allowing him the time to go elsewhere. Sort of "keep it in the house".  This works, then they realize they could bring in more teachers who could use the supplement to their income. This leads to a full-blown pimp-house, and the teachers who started the mess can retire literally off the backs of their cohorts. 

    It was a dream, and I have to tell you, I laughed all the way through the thing. I wondered if it was wrong to even think it, but you can't help what you think when you dream. You can help with what you write, so I may not, but then again, I may. If someone else reading this takes the idea and makes $$$$$ off of it, go for it. I'm good with that. I'm just over here spitballing anyway. It could be that your story is better than mine ever would be. Or, it could be that I go back to this blog and use it to sue the pants off of you and make my money that way. It's all relative. You just never know. It would be a good book, it would be a fun book, it would be a sexy, sort of quirky book, but you know, it could also be dark, twisted, evil, and ominous. It could be spun any way you want to spin it. Throw in a Brit to make it that much funnier. 

    That was it, that was my dream. I may or may not write it, and I may or may not publish it if I do write it, but the thing is, it was a good idea. Someone else may have already had that idea. I wouldn't know. I got it from the fleshy tenant in my skull while the rest of me was in slumberland just checking out the new dirt roads that lead from the old barn out back to the new Oz out front. 

Photo Credit: Dreammeaning.online

I Work From Home.

 I work from home, and I don't ever want to go back into the "real world" to make a living. If the truth is told, I shouldn't have to, either. People throw out the current year all the time as if because it is THAT or THIS year, we should be doing this or that. OK, it's 2023, I don't want to have to get up at a certain time, get dressed, put makeup on, drive to work, fight traffic, get to the place, only to find it too cold or too hot, or that see that the others who work there can't be cordial, polite, or civil. I don't want to deal with people coming into the office to ask me something that could be handled in a text, email, or I don't know, by them doing their own due diligence! Guess what, buddy, there's an APP for that!  GET IT. USE IT. (I have to, everyone I know has to, and you can too. (I'll go ahead and say, "It's 2023!")

    When I work from home I don't get dressed for success, I'm dressed for work. I don't have to impress anyone by slathering on base, eye-shadow, lipstick, or blush. I won't wear mascara for anyone, so there's literally NO CHANCE of that happening. I don't have to, but if I have to, then the boss has to, and every damn person in the office is going to because no one is going to tell me that a WOMAN wears makeup. Think about it, I'm a right-wing conservative saying that; imagine if I were a left-wing liberal and the boss or someone else wanted me to wear makeup. I know my politics shouldn't come into it, but what if my religion forbids me to wear it? It doesn't, but that's not the point. The point is I work from home! Not one of my dogs or cats (not even my lizard) has asked me (or expected me) to dress and wear makeup. I still do my job, and I still do it well. There you go.

    I work from home. I chose to work from home so I don't have to fight traffic and put myself into lethal situations when idiots decide they're late and can't be bothered to drive like a human rather than a cretin. I can't tell you how many times I have literally counted how many accidents I've seen or passed on my way to and from work all because, or mainly because, someone decided to pass someone, or get by someone, or they decided that they were more important than the rest of us who are abiding by the rules and laws. Why do that if you don't have to? Driving to work takes literally 40-45 minutes each way, and I'm trading that time for NOTHING. I don't get paid for it, it's given away. I'm losing it, and not being compensated for it. If I were to suggest being compensated for it, I would be laughed at. Don't laugh at me, just acknowledge that I work from home. 

    I work from home and yes, I have dogs. You may hear a dog bark if you call the office number. You can survive that. At least you won't hear a co-worker cussing or the boss freaking out. You won't hear me saying "I'm sorry, I can't hear you, there's a train going by."  I mean, I could say that, but there aren't any trains, it's just me and the dogs, cats, the lizard, and my kid. She works from home too. You could hear her, but then you'd think I was at work, wouldn't you? You'd think she was a co-worker, and want to know more about the Australian woman in the background? My daughter is a voice-over actress.  She could be a robot, she could be a man, she could be a chipmunk. She could be a male chipmunk from Australia fighting with a robot. She's very talented. 

    By the way, I work from home so I can make better lunches, and not have to spend an hour away from the office either driving around or pretending that I have something to do so I'm out from under the pressures of co-workers and bosses. I work from home so I can get my coffee when I damn well, please. I can go poop and not have to worry about someone coming in behind me and making faces. I can dance, do squats, lift weights, and study my Financial Advising materials without wondering if I will be seen, heard, or interrupted. If I am interrupted by work, I do my work. It's my job and I do it. I don't take from one boss to give to another. I am the other. I work from home for one boss, and for myself.  I work from home because I can get much more done that way. Yes, there are distractions, but not the type that sends me over the moon screaming and wishing I was at home, because I am at home. My distractions are the Amazon man delivering something, or the neighbor wanting to take my dog for a spin because she recently lost hers.

    All in all, I am very happy to be an at homer. I literally roll out of bed, take the shower, and dress back in my jammies. I eat when I want to, drink as much coffee, good coffee, as I want to, and NO ONE...NO ONE tells me to smile, and they don't ask me to run an errand. NO ONE ever asks me to just run to the post office, or the bank, to pick up their dry cleaning, their kids, or anything. NOPE. I work from home because it's where I feel most comfortable, free, relaxed, and capable. I do a much better job from home and when the whistle blows and the day if done, I don't have to get into my car and fight traffic again. I make it home on time for dinner, and I have NO angst or anxiety from the trek. 

    If you think about it, the Pandemic taught us that we don't need to be out and about and mingling with people. So, I guess all of us right-wingers were correct, not that the big pharms or others will admit it; but it is good that we can use their own words against them now. I don't want to be around people who may be sick. They say they're OK, but they say that so they don't lose their jobs. Being home I can work through a cold or fever. I don't have to lose money and my boss gets the work done without having to wait on it. There really are about 10 good reasons to work from home, but the best one I can think of is that I CAN!

Photo Credit: Flexjobs.com

Waiting on the Interior Proof

 I get a lot of emails every day, certainly every week, asking me what the process is for writing and publishing. I've been privileged to have written more than 100 books, but people like to tell me that my personal journals don't really count. Are you kidding me? I go through a 300-page handwritten diary every six weeks. They do count. I may not have them published, but they do count. The process of writing is simple, you grab a book and a pen and you start unloading everything inside your head. You don't stop just because the clock says it's late. You get the thoughts OUT of your head. Then, because no one really rewrites their diary or journal, you move forward to the next day. I have always dated my entries, and I even say what time I'm writing, where I am, and what the weather is. Who knows, someone may someday want to use my writings to prove something. Did you know that most of what we know about Blackbeard the Pirate comes from his own journals? Truth.

    Well, the process of writing is that you write. You get it out of your head either on paper or on the screen. You just write. Prewriting is easiest because you can either just write without a direction, and say absolutely anything, or you can start off with an idea and build on it. I tend to have an idea if I'm writing a book. I don't jump in willy-nilly. I think I may end up writing a book about writing a book. I could do that.

    The prewriting can last as long or as short as you want it to be. You can write and add to it, take away from it, split it up into sections, make an outline, build on the skeleton of what you think you want to say, and then add the flesh. You dig into it piece by piece, and you get a GIST of the story in place. That can be Phase 1 if you don't count the prewriting as Phase 1. When you've got it written, and I prefer to do it longhand first, you can add it to your Word documents either as an idea and/or as a sort of loose story with a sort of loose timeframe or plot. You put one foot in front of the other until the story is told from front to back.

    Phase 2 can be the meat of the story, the details, the truths, the lies, and the part that proves or disproves whatever it is that you set out to say. You use the skeleton to find the words you want to flesh out the bare bones of the story. You start with Chapter 1 and you build it until you're finished telling that part of the story. Chapter 2 is the next part of the story. This goes on until you've reached the end, but you can take the chapters and move them around later on to fit the way you want them to fit. By breaking them up one chapter at a time, you can easily move them about. They don't always have to be in chronological order as long as your readers don't have issues with going from one part of the story to the next. I've seen books that have three separate main points, and they are told in A, B, C style. Chapter 1 is A, and Chapter 2 is B, and so forth. Then you do it again.

    Phase 3 is the part where you find all the fluff and stuff. You find points, bits, and details, and you put these into the story by telling little stories inside the other stories. You may do it in paragraph form, or you can take an entire chapter to dive deeply into a sublevel character who may interact with the main characters, or maybe they give background. With my latest book, I created several side characters and gave them really interesting features, facts, folly, and fun, just to be able to stretch the book another 30-40 pages really, to give the reader a break from the same old story they were reading, and keep their mind thinking about the overall tale, not just the details about the two or three main characters. I fill my books with historical facts, fun facts, lies, and discoveries, I don't want it to be boring or mundane.

    Phase 4 is the part where you sit back and clean it up. You go through it for comma issues, misspellings, word choices, and overuse of words. Let me tell you, you may be inside Phase 4 for a good while!! You clean it, pick at it, tweak it, and then you mull over it a few times to be sure you got it all. You never get it all. You have someone else read it a few times so they can find your mistakes. You correct your mistakes.  Then you send it off and you know you screwed up and you can't wait until it comes back to you so you can fix what you know you missed. 

    Phase 5 is the last phase. You've sent the book off. The publisher has formatted it, and has sent it back to you. You've gone through it with a fine toothcomb. You make the final changes. You list all the errors, or they may let you go into the original manuscript yourself to correct them, and send it back. Once it's done, and you are really sure it's done, you send it back again....and YOU WAIT. You wait on the cover art, and you kick yourself for all the times you made people read the galleys before they were complete, and before you had gone through them 188 times to be sure you hadn't used the same words a gagillion times; like I did. You panic because you think you misspelled Chapter. You panic because you can't remember if you put quotation marks on the inside or the outside of the punctuation mark. You panic because you just wrote a book and everyone is going to know you wrote it...and you ask yourself if that's really what you wanted to say. Then you decide to write a sequel to be sure you got all of the stories told.

    That is the writing process folks.  I'm in Phase 5. I'm waiting for the interior proof to be done again. Whew....and then when it is done, I can say it's a book, it's done, it's going to be great - - and I can't wait to start the sequel. 

Photo Credit: Praxis.com

ONE MORE TIME....I MEAN IT.

 It's Saturday, so I have a bit more time to blog. I'm about to go back into the throws of reading "Of Kilted Pleasure" one more time. I can honestly say that I've read this book more than 10 times now, and it is the one book I've read more than any other book. I'm going back over it for a really good reason. You'll love this too. 

    Xlibris was kind enough to send me the book in production form and to allow me to make corrections one more time before they finished the book.  Well, when they sent the book to me, I immediately dove into it, but I wasn't looking for misspelled words or misplaced commas (which I found), I was looking for word choices. I decided to use the FIND option and see just how many times I had used the same word(s) and I decided I would either change 1/2 of them to something more colorful, or I would find a way to restate what I had stated.  OMG...by that I mean WHAT THE HELL was I thinking?  I used the word "question" more than 150 times. I had used the word "seemed" as many times as I had the word "question". I had used the word "good" too many times. I think I said "little dog" eight or nine times, but come on, you're going to know the dog is small if I just say it twice! 

    Bottom line, I went through the book AGAIN and rewrote the rewrite. I went through it AGAIN, and changed the word "changed".  I went through it so many times and so many ways, that now I need to go back again to be sure I didn't miss putting an "an" in where an "a" had been before, and so forth. This makes me think that now I need to see how many times I used the words "so forth".  I did take out about 50 "now" and 50 more "he" or "she" to make the flow seem better. Geez, writing can be a pain in the ass. Speaking of body parts, there really aren't many choices to use when you want to replace the word "cock" in a book that takes place in the 18th century. Nope, you can say "dick" because the origin of the word does date back to the start of the 18th century in England! There you go! I was able to use that. I wasn't about to say "penis" or "phallus" in my novel, and "willy" just seemed too funny. Not as funny as "pecker" or "wood".  I did use "knob" once.  But yeah, you get the picture. It's hard to find a good word for "cock".  I almost said it's hard to find a good cock, or is it good to find a hard cock? I'm not really sure. Either way, I made my point.

    I'm going back to reading now. She smiles. I really like this book. The cover art should be out soon. I did have to write to the artist(s) to say that Craig Allan Mackenzie does have hair on his bare chest. 

Something like this, only longer hair and yeah, a kilt.

Photo Credit: Pinterest Adrian Paul

NAIR - UNDERARM and BIKIKI

 I am so weird sometimes. I found underarm and bikini hair remover in a tube like you'd find in a deodorant. It's from Nair, and it's still cream, but it is packaged in a deodorant-style package and you roll it up from the bottom, it squirts out from the top, and you apply it. You wait 5-10 minutes and you take a shower.  I think I paid $6.99 for it on Amazon. I'm currently in the waiting stage, and like a dummy, I sat down to write the blog though I have a towel under me, I'm no doubt wasting the product, so I'm going to get up now.

    So yeah, now I'm standing, and let me tell you, my desk isn't one of those that lift, so I'm bending over to type. Not the most fun, but when I stood up from the chair I had in fact left a great deal of the product on the towel. I am not going to be a product waster..nope. I do, however, think I want to order one of those cool desks.  I had one when I worked for the trading company, and it was really great. I could do squats while I worked.

    HERE WE GO! I applied the Nair at 12:13 p.m. and I waited until 12:22, which was nine minutes, and it took about a minute to get to the bathroom, turn the water on, get the shower set up, and get into it. So, let's say the cream was in place for 10 minutes.  I used soap to scrub the areas and though I really couldn't see any hair falling off my armpits, which would have been fun, I did see it fall off on the lower area.  While washing the area with a wash cloth and body wash, there was definitely a release of hair from "down there".   It works. The product works. I did go ahead and finish up with a light razoring just to be sure, and it was really smooth already. 

    I will recommend using Nair's cream remover for sure. This one and I don't know if they all do, has coconut oil in it to assist as a moisturizer as well.  I use coconut and/or shea oil anyway after I shave, but it was nice that it is already in the tube. There you go, your first-hand experience review of a product I'm not sponsored by, but would recommend.  There are certain scents that people may not like. The remover component does still have a scent to it. There is a tinge or tingle of that "burning" feeling, but nothing like it would be if you put the harder stuff down there. I didn't feel anything at all under my arms.

    Have fun people! Hope you have smooth sailing -- and/or shaving. 

Photo Credit: Nair.com

Of Kilted Pleasure is a REAL Book Now.

 Well there you go, my book, my first novel, titled "Of Kilted Pleasure" is a real live book now. It has been registered with the Library of Congress, and it has its own ISBN number. Woot! I can do the dance, but I have to reserve my entire enthusiasm for when it is released to the public for purchase. Right now, it is still in the production stages. I have been going through the PDF to make corrections.  

    About 100 years ago, when I wrote my first book through Xlibris, I had to wait for them to send me a hardcopy galley to go through and that was really tough. Not only did they send it in 11-point font, but it was also squeezed together to save paper I guess. I was NOT a happy camper when the finished product came out the same way. I was LIVID because I had made it perfectly clear that I wanted 12-point font, and I wanted more space between the lines. This was my first experience with book publishing. The ONLY thing they could or would do for me is to scrap that project and make a 2nd Edition, and in doing so they really only fixed those issues, not the 100+ corrections I had sent in to be changed on the first edition. Talk about FURIOUS! That book is a mess.

    This is my sixth or seventh book, I'm not sure. It's my first novel. I do know that. I have more experience and I've been working with other publishers as well, so I know a thing or two now, about standing up for myself and telling the publisher exactly what I want. I'm paying for it, right? That's right. So yes, they will listen. Xlibris has been pretty good this time around. I had a few minor issues with the cover designing team not wanting to do an illustration, but after speaking with my project manager, and then paying a little bit more, not the full price by any means, they were able to get that going. The project manager was able to give me the best discounts because he had failed to explain there would be an additional cost for illustration vs. photography-type covers.  I want illustrations, realistic, not photos. This is a Highland Romance book, not another genre.

    Well, I sent off the manuscript last Thursday I think, and it has already been returned to me in book format! Wow, that's really good. I was quite impressed with that. I do have to go through the PDF and make corrections. I am FLAT amazed at how many mistakes I made. Not even gonna lie about it, I suck! I wrote the book in a month, and got it on the screen, but didn't take the time to make sure I had spelled everything correctly, I was more concerned with getting the Scots words spelled correctly. I didn't go flow-blown on using the Scots language because I didn't want the reader to be completely confused. I wanted them to taste the difference, but not be overwhelmed by the flavor.

    So, now I have to go through the PDF, and I am. I will submit the mistakes and the changes I want. They'll redo it on their end and send it back once more for the last and final look-see.  I hope we can get all of the corrections done this time. I hate having that fear that I missed something, but I know it's going to happen. I have people writing to me now to tell me about the first book's mistakes. LOL  Well, that's about it, I'll go back to work now. I just wanted you to know the book is in production and about to be released in May 2023.  The cover will come out soon and I'll post it when it does.

Photo Credit: Me.

The Gourmet in Me.

Cooking and baking have always been something that I've enjoyed doing. I can't give Mom credit for that one; sorry woman, Daddy gets the title of Cook in our family. My mom did bake, and she was decent at it, but her daughter, my sister Linda, is the ESSENCE of awesome! She really does "take the cake"...OMG, I went there. Did you see that? Yeah, OK, that was dumb, but she really is great at what she does. I think Lin should write a book and she should show you just how wonderful she is. Mom and Linda both were cake makers in the 80s and although they have slowed down their work in that area, it still remains that they are both really gifted and talented people when it comes to making and decorating cakes. I am not that kind of a baker. Nothing I make will be baked for a wedding, anniversary, or birthday. I just bake it, and then I eat it.

    What I decided to do is to write my own recipe book since everyone seems to think that recipe books are the way to express yourself.  I mean, I get that, but mine won't be just a book with recipes in it, it will have to be a storytelling type of book as well. I'm thinking something along the lines of a blog book with 100 recipes and stories in it. I'll likely tell a story, share a recipe, and add a photo of what it turned out to look like rather than what it SHOULD have looked like. No one, including myself, is going to call me a gourmet chef. Nope. I cook. I will add that I cook well, but I am not a true gourmet. I use great ingredients.

    My culinary experiences began as a kid when my dad cooked and I helped. I can't remember my siblings helping Dad. I don't know why I can't remember that. I'm pretty sure they had to. Andie (my big big sister) always brought the green bean casserole to the family dinners, so I know she can cook that. Linda (my little big sister, she's under Andie and before Mike. I'm the baby.) was in charge of all the good stuff. She put herself in charge, and we didn't argue. She was really good at it, so yeah, we let that happen.  She brought the sweets and jello stuff. Mike brought the ice...and that tells you a bit about his kitchen skills.  I brought the sweet potatoes and occasionally I'd step over the boundaries and bring a cake or something. 

    When I really got serious about learning to cook well I was really super old. I had already earned my Masters at Oklahoma City University, and I was teaching at the Platt School of Culinary Arts in their General Education department.  I won't say it was the best job out there, but it had its perks that is for sure. All of my students were culinary chefs in the making.  They made us lunch EVERY day, and often they made something in the afternoon that I could pick up and take home with me for dinner or dessert. One student, in particular, decided to teach me the tricks of the trade and he took me in as his personal student since I was giving him extra credit to make up for his lack of writing skills.  It worked out.  He learned not to plagiarize and I learned how to cook really well! Thank you, Patrick.

    The one thing I remember about the school was Master Chef saying to the students, and I was present when he did, that there should always be a party in your mouth when you make something worth eating. You mix salsa and you think it's great, but did you add apples and cayenne to that salsa? Did you add bacon to your taco? He would throw out things that made you think. He had written at least two successful recipe books and he had more than 30 years of culinary experience in Dallas, so I think the man had a bit of experience for the students as well as myself, to glean from -- so we did.  He was a true Artisan with the creations he made. It was mostly about the presentation; the quality of the food, he said, could be secondary. I didn't really like that concept.

    I told myself that I didn't need to present the food in a way that made my dinners memorable, I wanted the guests to say it was good, they liked it, they wished they could do that, you know  -- that's the concept I was hoping for. When it comes to food and anything else, it's OK to disagree with someone. It doesn't change the way we love it. Presentation is definitely a good thing; but not the most important; to me, the person I'm serving is the most important. Does that person like the food? That's what I'm interested in, so that's what I try to achieve. I use my kids as guinea pigs all the time. They usually don't seem to mind. If they do, they've never said so. I like my kids.

    I'll end up going to Pinterest and finding breakfast ideas, lunch ideas, dinner ideas, snacks, appetizers, and dessert ideas. I'll end up taking photos of them and giving credit to the photographer if I can, and then I'll end up making the dish(es) and taking photos of what my food actually looks like. I may need to set up a cool corner in the dining or kitchen to show off the dish(es) before I devour them. I also want my book to be a book that suits a single person or maybe only two people. I'm not into making a lot of food anymore. Those days are very long gone for me. I'm just out there making a good meal for me and my daughter. If I ever do move out, which I hope is sooner than later, she can come over to eat. I can see her that way. 

    There you go. There will be ANOTHER Blog book and it will be the Gourmet Book. So, it will be "Jude's Almost Daily Blog: The Gourmet in Me"  No one can steal that idea because that would be the gourmet in them, not me. I'm the only me there is. Ha! Some are really happy about that fact.  I know I am. So, what's for dinner tonight? Well, I think I'll make Grilled Cheese Brie sandwiches with bacon, spinach, and a tangy avocado balsamic drizzle on top!  Sounds good. Here's a photo of what the Pinterest suggestion is. I'll add spinach and avocado to mine.

Photo Credit: Pinterest. (Yammie's Noshery)

The Hound of the Baskervilles. (Or is it)

 Being an avid reader, when I was less than ten I remember reading every Sherlock Holmes mystery that I could get my hands on, and that was literally every one of them since I was often hanging out at the library. Yes, I was that kid.  You'd catch me walking from 2212 N. Mueller to the corner of 35th and Mueller so I could be at the Bethany Metropolitan Library, and you know, I loved it. It was MY hiding hole. I would find a good spot to sit in, usually up against the wall and on the floor between aisles of reference books since no one ever went there. I would bring my pillow and to my surprise, one of the staff members said I could keep one up there so I didn't have to drag it back and forth with me. What a thought! I did that.

    When I was less than a teen I was in the spot where I found such peace, and I had in my hands the hardcover bound book titled "The Hound of the Baskervilles". I remember the story. It was ONE hound. It wasn't the HOUNDS of Bakerville, as some people would call it. My freaking teacher called it that and YES, I corrected her. I know, I'm not really supposed to do that, but I did. I was in the 5th grade when that happened and my mom was called to the office to speak to me. Can you imagine if that were to happen today? A kid corrects a teacher, and then their parent is asked to come up to discuss it? No. That is what is WRONG with our society today. I was in the wrong for trying to openly and publicly correct my teacher. I get that now. I don't know that I got it then. I was right. I knew I was right. My mom even told me I was right, but it wasn't the best practice. It was in fact, WRONG to correct the teacher the way I did it.

    What I remember about the entire event is that our school media center didn't have that particular book as it was considered too scary or something for elementary kids. We had other books, but not those written by Sherlock Holmes. That was the year I found out (I was corrected) that the books about Sherlock Holmes were actually written by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle!! WHAT? I knew him. I knew he was a writer too. I just hadn't put two-and-two together until the 5th grade. It was likely because when I went to the library to get the books they were all in the same area (Thank you, Dewey Decimal System), and all the books I was looking at said "Sherlock Holmes" on them; so naturally, my ten-year-old brain assumed he was the author. Also, I was flat upset about the fact that Holmes didn't narrate the books, his friend Dr. John Watson did. I couldn't figure that one out either.

    So, here we are so many hundreds of years later, and I am still correcting people when they bring up the book in conversation; or they make a reference to it. They almost always say "The Hounds of Bakerville" as if Baskerville is a place and there were multiple hounds. Nope. It was ONE big dog, and the Baskervilles were a family who lived in a fictional manor on a fictional moor. It's kind of funny really. I mean, I am wrong, absolutely wrong, about so many things. I'm not as wrong as I could be because I get really really upset with myself when I am wrong, so I tend to fight to my own death about decisions I need to make so I'm not wrong. I kick my own ass, no one else needs to stand in line to do that.  

    My good friend got it right! I called her and I said "OK, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle wrote a book about a family who lived on a moor, and one by one the head of the household was either killed by or chased by a big black dog. Do you know the name of the book?"  She answered yes, "but I didn't know his name was Arthur. I thought it was Conan Doyle." I did laugh.  She did however get the title of the book correct, so we're still best friends.  If I turned that around and I had to answer for her who sang this or that song, or what the title of it was, I would be lost in the abyss because I'm not going to get that unless it's a Bee Gee song. 

    I sat myself down this past week and read the book on my Kindle. I recalled so very little of the book from when I was ten. I really hadn't remembered most of it whatsoever, so that makes me think I now need to go back and read every last thing that Doyle ever wrote. Yes, I do. Did you know, and maybe you don't care, but did you know that before he was an author Arthur Conan Doyle was a medical student and he is a graduate of the University of Edinburgh Medical School? WHAT? Yes, he really was a doctor, and Dr. John Watson is not. Dr. John Watson is a fictional character. I can't tell you how hard I took that information when I realized that neither he nor Sherlock Holmes were real people. Just devastated me. I think I was about 12. I had to question my entire existence at that point.

    If Sherlock Holmes wasn't a real person, I asked myself, were the other people in the other books real? That was when I had a long and drawn-out conversation with Sheila Parker; the teacher who lived behind our house. She had kids that we played with, and since she was a teacher, and I had seen her in the Reference section of the library, I figured she might know something about it. She did. She set me straight on fiction vs. non-fiction, and she even told me about TWEEN books and that was fascinating. I didn't do too much reading in that section, but for some weird reason, I loved the Betsy and Tacy books. Geez, now I have to go back and read those again. I have NO clue what they did, but I remember I loved it.

Photo Credit: Audiobookstore.com