Ramblings

Because of my change of diet, I’ve had long stretches of feeling good, of being able to write. This has spoiled me, at least in terms of writing essays. Used to be that I’d always write my essays on Sundays because I never knew if I’d be able to produce them on Thursdays. I had […]

Essay – Bouchercon 2023 This past weekend I went to Bouchercon, down in San Diego. Bouchercon is a mystery con. It is all about readers and writers. I want to start by saying that I enjoyed Bouchercon. I met some really cool people and talked with both readers as well as writers. I’m still pretty

OMG. I have MOIST brisket! I don’t know if the pictures do it justice. If you can see how the juice is just oozing from the meat. But it is so moist. So tender I can pull it apart with my fingers. (!!!!) And so tasty! I keep saying that I’m not making competition level

I’ve passed two milestones regarding Duolingo recently. The first was my four-year anniversary of speaking Hungarian. The second, which happened recently, was the one-year anniversary of speaking Spanish. Duolingo has changed their interface at least four, maybe five times since I started. Two of those major changes happened AFTER I had finished going through all

I’d been thinking about doing a general update for a few weeks, vacillating between writing an essay versus writing a blog post. Then I went back and I realized that for the last couple of years, right around this time, I always did a general update. So this is kind of a mix between a

I frequently write short stories as kind of “pallet cleansers” as it were, in between writing novels. Sometimes, those stories are pure inspiration, that is, I write about whatever comes to mind. However, often that isn’t the case. I’ll have some story that’s due for an anthology or other assignment. Then, seeking inspiration becomes a

I went ahead and hired a marketing person this year, off the Reedsy marketplace. (https://reedsy.com/#/freelancers/deni-c) So far, it’s been good. And it’s helped me in terms of figuring out what I need to do for my books. I’m going to share some of what I’ve started doing to research a book market, before (or even

I’ve been doing some long-term thinking about writing careers. A few of the writers I know have recently made very different choices about their writing careers than I would have, and I’m still thinking about it. So I figured I’d do some of my thinking “out loud” as it were. Back in the bad old

I’ve been doing hydroponics since mid-year 2020. I started because I was honestly concerned about the food chain, and being able to grow my own veggies, as I was eating so many of them at that point. I started with two little kale plants. One of these kale plants is still with me, almost three

Today marks the anniversary of the day I got my kitty, Kiera. Seventeen years ago. She was already a year or so by that point. This means she’s at least eighteen years old. Wow. Longest relationship I’ve ever had. Seriously. Not sure how long she’ll stick around. Some days I think she won’t make it