Last week I helped my daughter with her first housesitting job. We were out in the country where many things kept me entertained throughout the day, and some of the nights.

Here are the Top Ten.

1. A swimming pool. This was great. For the first time in I don’t know how long, I have a light tan, and I’m kind of excited about it.
2. Toads, and not just a couple. No, there were lots and they all thought they needed to swim with us.
3. Animals. We’re talking dogs, cats, and horses.
4. Trees. Lots of them.
5. Trains. I didn’t time them, but it seemed like one passed every hour on the hour.
6. Wasps and Bees. Now, if you’ve beenkeeping up with my blog and read about my trip to San Antonio, you know how I feel about these creatures with stingers. They seemed to migrate to me in the country as well.
7. Rocks. Nice, sharp pointy ones perfect for jabbing holes in the kiddo’s knee so she thinks she can’t walk for two days.
8. A satellite dish with 100+ channels that somehow rarely gets turned away from Hannah Montana or the Suite Life of Zach and Cody.
9. A rowdy group of dogs ready to send up a rousing rendition of the Dog Carol every time one of the train went by. Singing and howling filled the air almost every time I heard the train.
10. Thunderstorms that knock the electricity out for several hours at night.

Now, some people might think that the country is uneventful. I assure you, it isn’t. So, how did my plans of getting soem work and writing done play out? Not as badly as you might think. Just like writing at home, where I have multiple distractions like cats hissing about who is going to lay where and which one gets to block the monitor…

I’ve trained myself to work around, or through, the distractions. (Including now when Destruction is locking herself in the cat crate in the room next to my office because she’s playing house. Oops, strike that she just dragged a cat across the room to lock him up in the crate with her.) So, when the thunderstorm took out the power, I kept right on working.

See, it’s my desire to find my own books on bookshelves one day, and I have to work hard with no excuses to make that happen. Come on, who doesn’t want to see the rewards of their hard work? And can you think of I’m aiming for a similar placement as Sylvia Day’s ASK FOR IT one day.

So, I thought I had enough animals with the 2 cats, the full grown Collie, and the fish. Apparently I was wrong.

My sister, who is never home anymore, needed a new home for her two cats. Yes, I’m a sucker and took them in. So now, I’m blessed with:

~ Lovey, as her name suggests, is my fat cat who sits on my desk or in my lap while I work and sleeps beside me in bed. She comes to get me around 10:30 each night to let me know that it’s bedtime but if I don’t answer to her right away, she waddles back her spot on the bed. She’s an unassuming kitty that just wants to be loved by me, and anyone else handy if I’m not around. CIS swears that she paces the house meowing when I’m out of town.

~ Rose, my daughter’s cat who is a holy terror and sits still as stone, aside from her head that bobbles slightly in the oddest way, as she glares at whatever it is she’s getting ready to pounce. She’s the instigator of all the fun and fights. This cat has a bizarre connection with my daughter. She follows her to the bathroom and the longer Chaos is gone from home visiting family the more testy Rose gets. She came up to me the other day, butted her head against me wanting petted, and when I reached out for her, she bit me. Yeah, she’s the troublemaker all right.

~ Frack is another fat cat who stalks the house thinking he’s the king of all despite the reality that he’s only lived here since last Sunday. He’s actually like a little dog in so many ways. He meets you at the back door, follows you around until you sit somewhere, rubs against your legs, and if you’re a man he bites your toes when he’s rubbing on you. Oh, and he likes to lick your toes too. LOL. He also terrorizes the 90 pound collie and doesn’t let him near CIS for attention. Oh, and in the few days that he’s been here, he’s almost totally killed a poinsettia that I’ve had since November that has been getting bigger and bigger despite my uncanny knack at killing plants. I’m going to have to find a way to keep him off it to bring the plant back. It’s a new challenge of mine that I could have done without. Oh, and he has a tendency to race for the door when one is opened. He didn’t have this habit at my sister’s apartment, so I guess he figured that with all the kids in and out of the house I needed yet another thing to keep up with. Sneaky devil.

~Little Kitty is one that I suspect people will think we’re dreaming when we say he’s here. He’s the phantom of the crew. Late at night when all is quiet and no one is around he’ll creep from his hidey hole in the bottom of my bed, yes that’s the bottom of it not beneath it, as he’s ripped a hole in the thin fabric covering the bottom side of the box springs. He’ll allow us to greet him and look at him, but so far we can’t get close enough to pet him. I’m thinking he was incorrectly named. If he thinks we’re going to get close to him, he is faster than lightening as he jets from the room and finds a corner. I consider myself lucky that I got this picture, not that Little Kitty had to see me when I took it. I reached around the back of the bed with the camera. I’m surprised he’s not in the bed.

At least they’ve all settled in to a fairly peaceful coexistence among themselves. Frack and Lovey I think will take a bit longer as they both think they have the domain of my desk when I’m working. It’s a big desk, so there’s room, but only if they learn to compromise. Umm, I’m not holding my breath on this one, as currently Frack is lying in the doorway of my office as if he’s intent on keeping intruders at bay.

The day is rapidly approaching for this book’s release! If you’re calendar isn’t already marked, it should be. I was lucky enugh to be involved in this book from the earlier stages of its plotting and now to its release.

In true Shayla Black fashion, it is a sexy read with a sizzling sensuality. What is unlike any other Shayla book I’ve read is it’s darkness and the complexity of the world building. Magic abounds, but this is not your traditional story of witches and wizards with wands. Sure, they use wands, but no two magical people are exactly alike with their power.

If you’re looking for the character depth and emotion that you’ve found in other Shayla Black and Shelley Bradley books, you will not be disappointed. In fact, you’ll get more of it with more characters than ever before.

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TEMPT ME WITH DARKNESS is a fast paced, thrilling read that will keep you flipping pages until the end. If you haven’t heard about TEMPT ME WITH DARKNESS yet, here’s the blurb and an excerpt can be found on Shayla’s Doomsday Brethren site.

He’s an immortal knight hungering for satisfaction. . .

As soon as Marrok sees Olivia Gray, he’s sure they met in eons past. He’s felt her soft, gentle curves writhing in pleasure beneath his own powerful body. . . Morganna! For centuries, towering Marrok, once the mightiest of King Arthur’s warriors, has endured a terrible curse cast upon him when he spurned the witch.

She’s a modern woman about to discover ancient magic. . .

Olivia shares a mystical—and irresistible—connection with brooding Marrok. Soon after the sexy warrior appears in her erotic dreams, he abducts her, demanding she uncurse him. Their intense passion is more powerful—and intimate—than either of them has ever known. Olivia may be the key to unlocking the diary that will break Morganna’s hold on his life. But in the wrong hands, the book also holds the power to destroy magickind. As they search for answers, a ruthless wizard returned from exile is building an army of evil. When he discovers Marrok and Olivia have the diary, only their love—with the help of a powerful group of magical Brethren—can save them.

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TEMPT ME WITH DARKNESS, is in my opinion, the best thing Shayla Black/Shelley Bradley has ever written. She has taken evry skill she’s learnd over the years and rolled them all into this book, along with some skills I didn’t know she had. there are scenes that will rip your heart to shreds and others that leave you gasping in shock. Trust me, if you like a steamy romance with a magic that reaches beyond the pages, you don’t want to miss this one.

Like when I was sent an advanced copy of

Cursed by God, hunted by demons, desired by Cain and Abel… All in a day’s work.

For Evangeline Hollis, a fling with a bad boy from the wrong side of the tracks just became a disaster of biblical proportions. Her indiscretion with a leather-clad, Harley-riding man of mystery has led to a divine punishment: the Mark of Cain. Overnight her life transforms from normal and orderly to dangerous and otherworldly.

Thrust into a world where sinners are drafted into service to kill demons, Eve’s learning curve is short. A longtime agnostic, she’s startled to find herself maneuvering through a celestial bureaucracy where she is a valuable but ill-treated pawn. She’s also become the latest point of contention in the oldest case of sibling rivalry in history…

But she’ll worry about all that later. Right now she’s more concerned with learning to kill while staying alive. And saving the soul she’d never believed she had.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Okay, so that’s the official blurb of the story and it sounds down right tempting. Guess what! It couldn’t be a more awesome read! I was lucky enough to be granted, by SJ Day, an early copy of EVE OF DARKNESS. I printed it out with the intention of reading it when I went on vacation to San Antonio. You see I wanted it quicker than what the mail could get it to me. Anyway, as soon as I had it physically in my hands I started reading. And I read. And read. We were supposed to get on the road at 10:00 on Saturday monring. I think I finished packing at 10:30, and I lay the blame squarely at SJ Day’s feet, but oh it was soo worth the delay.

Eve is what you might term as reluctant when it comes to accepting her Mark, but the changes facing her are too obvious for her to ignore. And when the one man she’s longed for for year’s shows up at her doorstep, holding all the answers, she finds it even harder to deny what’s happened. But…days pass, change occurs, questions are answered, and more are uncovered.

The cast of characters and the way they ineract with one another kept me guessing and flipping pages long into the night and as perviously mentioned had me ignoring the task of packing for my trip. As I was telling SJ after reading the book, EVE OF DARKNESS was the first book I’ve read in longer than I can remember that sucked me in to the point that I found myself getting a tad grumpy (this is a really mild description) when someone had the audacity to interrupt my reading. I read late into the night until my eyes burned and my body refused to let me go on. I had to force myself to leave the book alone long enough to pack the car, but it was back in my hands before we pulled out of the garage. Between interruptions from the kids along the way and the required conversations with CIS, I was 10 pages from the end when we arrived at our hotel. The kids wanted to immediately change clothes and hit the pool. Bad, bad Eve! She’d sucked me in to the point that I refused to budge my rear fromthe chair until I’d finished the book.

It was a fantastic read with a sensual and emotional connection between the main characters that I wasn’t expecting in an Urban Fantasy. It’s that same connection, that spark, that I think will make this book and the books to follow hits!

I can’t stress enough how much I loved this book, or how badly I’m already chomping at the bit for the second one. Do yourself a favor, mark your calendars for May 1, 2009! I know it’s a long wait, but these books are ones that you will not want to miss! Better yet, pre-order the book now from Amazon.

In the meantime, show your support for this book and SJ Day, by grabbing her book widget and placing it into your site. To make this really simple for you, it’s in the sidebar right next to this blog. Oh, and if you blog about the book or place the book widget in your site, contact SJ to let her know where you’ve put it!

In the coming weeks, SJ Day will be putting links to blogs on her site to other people who have blogged about EVE OF DARKNESS. Be sure to check it out and go see what everyone else has to say about the book.

I would LOVE to tell you more about the book, but I fear that if I go on any longer I’ll get caught up and start spilling some of the deep, dark secrets about this. Instead, I’ll just say that in a complicated world, things are complicated even more by politics, emotions, and desires.

It’s the home of the Alamo, but we’ll not be seeing the Alamo during this year’s vacation. I figure that’s acceptable since we’ve seen it a few times already. Right? Instead, we’re spending time with the girls and relaxing as much as possible. The resort we’re at is beyond gorgeous, the mood of the people here is friendly and happy, and the pace of life in this slice of the world is very relaxed–just what we all needed.

Our room is beautiful and is better equipped than a lot of apartments these days. I stepped into the bathroom to the sound of my name be called in a quietly seductive voice. Hypnotic, enticing, the bathtub is summoning me for a dip.

CIS and Chaos have been taking advantage of the water slides. I’m still not sure how it happened, but CIS managed to get Destruction to go down a smaller slide. He did do his job as her hero and keep her face out of the water when they went into the water.

In an attempt to even out my tan lines before wearing dresses at the upcoming RWA Nationals Conference, I did something I never do. I laid out in the sun. There I was, lying in the sun, reading a friend’s eBook I’d printed out for the trip, Here Comes the Bribe by Sherry A Davis. Doing nothing wrong, just minding my own business and along comes a bee and stings me. You can sort of see the little red welt from where I had to pull the bugger’s stinger out. The stinging sensation radiated in the area for quite sometime before finally backing off. No biggie right?

After swimming and playing in the sun for a few more hours, the little round welt has swollen and gown larger. It also feels like a huge bruise and if I move just right, even without bumping it, I get a reminder that it was there. See, this is just a reinforcement that I should not try to use the sun to get a tan.

So, after getting stung by the bee by the pool and slides while waiting for Chaos to make ice cream, we headed over to the lazy river. I’m telling you, I would be perfectly happy floating in the river for days and weeks and never doing another thing. They have sprayers set up to get you wet just as you’ve started to dry out and get warm. Music plays in speakers spread throughout the area, giving it a fun atmosphere without being too loud or making relaxation tough. Though um, floating on the river tends to add a lovely red tint to skin that has otherwise not experienced prolonged exposure to the sun. Yeah, though I was only on my stomach for a couple of rounds, the backs of my legs are a lovely red.

To finish off the afternoon in the sun, we built sandcastles in the sand. Well, some people built sandcastles. I can’t be like everyone else, so I made a mermaid. Destruction thought it was very cool to lay in the sand so I could form the mermaid around her. I think it turned out pretty well considering I can’t recall the last time I played in the sand, and I’ve never been great at creating shapes freehanded.


So, now we’re back in the room and I’m thinking it’s about time for some kidlets to start getting ready for bed. Tomorrow, we hit the San Antonio Zoo!!!!

I saw a preview for The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor last night and I noticed they didn’t (couldn’t) get Rachel Weisz, the original Eve, to return. They’ve replaced her with Maria Bello, who I like, but I can’t decide if the movie will be the same without the same Eve. Weisz and Fraser had a chenistry and banter that made them entertaining. What do you think?

Do you like The Mummy movies? Will you see the third one? Do you think Fraser and Bello will have the same chemistry?

Click here and check out the trailer. I’d love to hear your thoughts.

Carly Phillips couldn’t have said it better when she called this “A snappy, funny, romantic novel.”

Can you imagine what happens when a witch and wizard are banished to Big Knob (yes pun intended), Indiana? Here’s a clue.

They meet a sexy man who attracts hordes of women by simply walking through town. To help him find true love they cast a little spell on him that is supposed to strip him of his sex appeal. LOL

This poor man has the worst days following their spell as he deals with the one woman he wants to be with. She however isn’t interested in the nerd that he is.

Or is she?

As if that isn’t enough for him to deal with, he’s threatened with the possibility of having his dreams bought out from beneath him for the sake of a venture that could forever change (ruin) the town he loves.

This is a must read if you like a funny, witty book! She released Wild andHexy in this month, so be sure to visit Vicki’s Website for more information.

My sister’s birthday is coming up in a couple of weeks, and this year her friends took mercy on her. See, every year Wendy throws herself a birthday party where instead of gifts she raises money for her 3 Day Breast Cancer walk. Well, this year her friend’s orchestrated a surprise party/fundraiser. It was great, and they did an awesome job of keeping it a surprise. Even as she walked into Main Event, you could tell that she suspected nothing.

Her boyfriend, who lives in another state, had been in town this week for work, but called her today to let her know he was at the airport getting ready to get on his flight. Sneaky dude, he’s here until Sunday, but how cool was that for part of her surprise?! She was especially surprised, because he’d walked away from the group and so he wasn’t standing there when she came in. It wasn’t until after she’d made her rounds that he came up. Her face lit up when seh saw him. It was totally awesome! Oh, and I hadn’t met him before but I really liked him. He’s a great guy.

To top the night off, sweeter than the AMAZING icing on the cupcakes, I bowled a few games against CIS. He and I used to be on a bowling league together, and I was the bowler they all liked because of the handicap I gave them. CIS has his own bowling ball and shoes in addition to an amazingly accurate approach (his stance can be seen in the picture) to each bowl. So tonight, I beat him on our first game. Yeah, that’s right. The girl with the handicap beat the guy who used to bowl almost perfect games. LOL. He told me it was luck, that he was out of practice. So, during our second game I was leading the way 8 frames into it. I would have beaten him still except I started feeling a bit loopy from the medicine I’d taken for a headache. I got sloppy in my game and guttered my last two balls of the game. Missed beating him by 7 stinking pins. So, we went for a third game. We only got to bowl 5 frames before the clock ran out and the computer shut us down, but at the end of that 5th frame, I was winning again! I cant tell you how much fun it was to finally beat CIS at bowlig. Even if he is out of practice and I didn’t win by much, it all counts.

From a nurse:

I’ll never forget the look in my patients’ eyes when I had to tell them they had to go home with the drains, new exercises and no breast. I remember begging the Doctors to keep these women in the hospital longer, only to hear that they would, but their hands were tied by the insurance companies.

So there I sat with my patients, giving them the instructions they needed to take care of themselves, knowing full well they didn’t grasp half of what I was saying, because the glazed, hopeless, frightened look spoke louder than the quiet ‘Thank You” they muttered. A mastectomy is when a woman’s breast is removed in order to remove cancerous breast cells/tissue. If you know anyone who has had a Mastectomy, you may know that there is a lot of discomfort and pain afterwards. Insurance companies are trying to make mastectomies an outpatient procedure. Let’s give women the chance to recover properly in the hospital for 2 days after surgery.

It takes 2 seconds to do this and is very important. Please take the time and do it! Please send this to everyone in your address book. If there was ever a time when our voices and choices should be heard, this is one of those times.

If you’re receiving this, it’s because I think you will take the 30 seconds to vote on this issue and send it on to others you know who will do the same. There’s a bill called the Breast Cancer Patient Protection Act which will require insurance companies to cover a minimum 48-hour hospital stay for patients undergoing a mastectomy. It’s about eliminating the “drive-through” Mastectomy where women are forced to go home just a few hours after surgery, against the wishes of their doctor, still groggy from anesthesia and sometimes with drainage tubes still attached.

Lifetime Television has put this bill on their Web page with a petition drive to show support. Last year over half the House signed on. PLEASE!! Sign the petition by clicking on the web site below. You need not give more than your name, state, and zip code.

http://www.lifetimetv.com/breastcancer/petition/signpetition.php

It seems lately that people around me are struggling with things in their lives, or if I’ve just been more aware of it all of a sudden. Anyway, a few weeks ago I wrote an article for my local RWA chapter newsletter called Survivor Island: The World of Writing that was almost instantly picked up be several other chapters and I had several people at our chapter meeting this weekend tell me how much they enjoyed the article. I didn’t write it for validation, but to think about it now, to know that people read it and were impacted by it is an awesome feeling.

Today, on WickedWriters, a YahooGroup that I’m a member of, while I was catching up on emails, I ran across a thread where a girl was talking about how being around some members of her family drains her and even the idea of spending time with some of them gives her a headache. As the conversation wore on, I was reminded of an analogy I heard years ago about dealing with negativity around you.

So, I thought I’d share it with you.

There are people who try to poke holes in your bucket to drain you. It’s up to you to find ways to plug the holes or make the bucket impenetrable. You do that by surrounding yourself with people you like and things that make you happy. That way, when you run up against the hole pokers you’re strong enough to handle it. Or your bucket is full enough that the temporary leak isn’t a huge deal.

What have you done or seen other people do to combat the effects of negativity on you?