I finally started my synopsis for the fourth Wing Slayer Hunter book.  It’s going to take awhile to flesh it all out, but at least I have a rudimentary plot that I’m excited about! This will be Key’s story, and I knew a good deal about him, but I had to find just the right witch-heroine and a plot that brings it altogether with in the framework of the world I’ve already built. That takes a lot of weaving together of different threads!

But I have a start and I was feeling great!

Then I shut down my files and attempted to get a few things done. One of them included vacuuming. I managed to break the vacuum. Again.  Being stubborn, I continued to vacuum just to finish. Since it was the self-propelled thing that broke, it was very hard to push and I pulled my neck, strained my hand a bit and filled the house with the aroma of burning rubber. I’ll be fine (it’s very minor), but now I feel like the back end of  this…

I know the vacuum does this just to annoy me. I bought the stupid thing because it was self propelled. Even the vacuum repair gal can’t figure out how I keep breaking these belts so often.  Whatever…

But once again, I believe that I have proved my prevailing theory CLEANING IS DANGEROUS AND SHOULD BE AVOIDED.

So which are you today? The hot witch or the backside of the horse?

I had a great three day weekend and did no work! Today–all work and no more play!

We went to see The Time Traveler’s Wife.  I found it depressing.  Maybe the book was better.

I promised I let you all know what I thought of RED HEADED STEP CHILD by Jaye Wells.  I wasn’t sure at first; the heroine is an assassin, and she kills a friend in the opening scene. That was hard for me to get past, HOWEVER as I kept reading, I really did get caught up in the story.  While I started out with very little empathy for the heroine, I did eventually emotionally connect with her.

My two favorite things in the book: the demon who is addicted to infomercials and the hot,  sexy mage that shows up.

The writing is good. Toward the very end of the book are these two lines:  “His face was grim, but his eyes told the real tale.  Through them,  I could see his soul had aged.”  These lines were so perfect for the situation.

So my verdict is that I’d read her again.

How was your weekend? Did you guys do anything fun?

Silver, on her Penumbra Blog nominated me for the Kreativ Blogger Award.

I’m honored!

And worried…I’m much more interesting in fiction than in real life.

According to the rules of the award, I’m to share seven things about myself that you witches may not know and then to nominate seven other bloggers for the award.  WARNING: This is long and boring.

1) I was once mistaken for a hooker. Hey, it could happen to anyone! Okay, yeah, it usually happens to me. I was 16 and working at a hotel gift shop across from Disneyland. I remember what I was wearing–a summer dress that went down to my knees, had a pretty high neck and  wide straps over my  shoulders. They dress was way more feminine than sexy. I was walking back from lunch when two men approached me from behind and made suggestions. I was so terrified I ran in the hotel and told the bellmen. The bellmen were NOT amused and chased the guy–don’t know what happened after that.

2) I once thought I’d be really good as a Wedding Planner….then I realized I would kill the crazy brides and their mothers.  I scrapped that idea.

3) My 7th grade science teacher said I was too much of a day dreamer to ever amount to anything.  Ha! Now I get paid to day dream!

4) A real hero saved me from a knife attack. This isn’t actually funny–I came home from work and there was a male neighbor outside my apartment door talking to a stranger. I stopped to say hi, but the neighbor was abrupt like I was interrupting. That was odd but my nylons were killing me,  so I went in the house, locked the door and went to change.  A minute or two later there was a huge thump on the front door. I was tangled in my nylons,  and by the time I got to the door, no one was there. Turns out, the neighbor was stabbed by the stranger–he survived. Somehow he got across the courtyard to another neighbor’s house. And he had known something was off about the guy and wanted me to go in the house (I was young, probably 18).  I do wish I had done more, realized what was going on somehow stopped the neighbor from getting stabbed. It still bothers me.

5) My husband swears I’m a crazy magnet. I’ve had people at book signing describe  how they once killed someone, or how they just got out of prison and want to write their stories, or various kinds of jaw dropping things. Seriously people will CONFESS to me. I don’t know what it is. Most people are great and I enjoy myself, but every now and again, I’m thinking “restraining order.”

6) Right after 9/11, I was stuck on my book ( I think it was the second Samantha Shaw book). I had the bright idea of going to the police station and asking if there was any way I could schedule a time to talk to a community relations officer or get a tour. Also, I just wanted to go into the police station to see what it looked like and felt like.  Everyone was a little touchy around this time, so the receptionist called out a lieutenant. Right about then, I was starting to realize I didn’t think this out. The Lieutenant  took me into his office and verified my ID, then took me on a tour. He was super nice, showed me everything, including the locked weapons room, and introduced me to the two VIPs walking around. Everyone was incredibly nice and helpful. I think it’s because they were bored. My husband thinks it’s because I was…and I am embarrassed to admit this…wearing shorts. I can’t believe I didn’t change clothes before going!

7)   I once sent an email to my sister talking about my editor…only I sent the email to my editor NOT my sister. Fortunately, I was saying nice things. My editor thought it was unbelievably funny.

I know I’m forgetting to nominate 7 more people, but seriously, no one is going to read this blog to the end!

I published this blog under the wrong date, so I’m moving it to the right place now.

We go through this every year in Southern California–fires. We’re still early in the season, but we have several fires whipping through the state.  One has already killed two firefighters (as I write this, and I hope it won’t be more).

Dry brush, high temps. low humidity and sometimes, winds make this a seasonal problem. Some fires start by lightning or accidents, but it’s the ones set intentionally that make me one furious witch.

Doesn’t nature screw with us enough? Do we really need to add Arsonists to the mix? Talk about a cowardly crime–set fires and sit back and anonymously watch the destruction, the horrible injuries and terrible deaths.

Arsonists are trolls…that’s all I’m saying.

Oh, and there are no fires in my area, I’m fine.  But I think we should all get together and do a witch rain dance to help the firefighters.  And while we’re it, we need to come up with a spell for the arsonist trolls, any ideas?