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Hello and welcome to the new people on my newsletter list!
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We’ve had, uhm, CRAZY weather this last week. The following are a couple of pictures from Thursday morning, when I woke up. That isn’t snow, though we had some of that as well on Wednesday. The snow didn’t stick. This is accumulated hail.
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Today, it’s warm. 60s. We’re having some strong winds, so we may or may not hit the predicted 70s. And the trees and plants are all going wild. The entire hood of my truck is green with pollen. We have air purifiers in both the main house as well as the TH2 (that’s tiny house two for the new folks. It’s the building in the background of the upcoming pictures.)
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We don’t mow the yard in April. Sometimes not through May either. We have a lot of dandelions growing, which are good for the bees and butterflies. I also have a lot of the wild oregano growing. I’m going to start harvesting and drying it this week. Last year, for our annual BBQ, I gave away jars of dried oregano. Think I’ll do the same this year. (I can’t give away dried oregano at my live events, or special spice blends, or I absolutely would.)
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I believe we still have five different types of oregano growing in the yard. So I do an oregano blend of all the various types, including the hot and spicy oregano and the pizza oregano.
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Last year was the first year we had a tremendous amount of cherries. It’s always been too wet and cold up here for them to properly fertilize. This year, well, we’re close. The cherries are currently flowering like crazy. However, it’s only supposed to be warm today and tomorrow. Then we go back to cold and gloomy. So despite the number of blossoms on the cherry trees, we may or may not get much fruit.
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The other trees are also flowering currently. This is the Asian plum, which has a bunch of limbs of different types of plums grafted onto root stock. A couple of weeks ago one of the plum limbs had all its flowers. Now, the rest of the limbs are getting into the action.
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This is the Asian pear. Like the plum, it’s many different flavors of pears grafted onto common root stock. They mostly are all blooming at the same time.
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Different plants mature at different times over the course of the spring. The apple trees are just starting to bud, whereas the grapes haven’t even woken up yet.
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We did have a few gooseberry blossoms. I was thinking that maybe, perhaps, I might finally have some gooseberries. Then, of course, the elk came through and stripped the plant. I’m going to have to box it in if I want gooseberries some year.
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I’m still recovering from doing events on back-to-back weekends. I am going to make a concerted effort to not do that to myself again. Like, ever. It’s just too draining for me. I know some writers do events every single week, and frequently more than one event during a week. I just can’t.
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Anyway, I think that’s all I have at this point. How about you? How is your spring going?
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Los Angeles. The city that never sleeps.
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These stories take inspiration from those hard-boiled detectives of yore, with broken noses and steely eyes. The white knight you could rely on because the rest of the world had soured like a rotten apple. Even if he (or she) didn’t follow the rules.
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Or maybe because they broke them in order to see justice done.
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Come see what the MCM Syndicate has to say about these types of “heroes” as we enter our seventh year of publication.
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MCM – So Criminal, It’s Good.
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And now for something a little different...
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For the month of April, Birth of the Star Dragon, a science fiction novel written with an 1950s pulp flair by Blaze Ward, is on sale for $0.99!
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Two tiny lizardmen scientists/criminals power up their illegal wormhole generator, getting ready to kidnap their next victim by pulling the poor human across the galaxy in an instant, forever trapping him in the Accord of Souls.
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Maybe this human won’t destroy everything they love.
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The last human they kidnaped killed the big boss, took over their criminal gang, and now, threatens to conquer the entire galaxy.
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The problem? Despite being criminals, the human they want to kidnap is a cop.
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What could possibly go wrong?
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Birth of the Star Dragon—science fiction written with an 1950s pulp flair—opens new vistas for readers of Blaze Ward. Fantastic, weird worlds, populated by aliens, criminals, and, oh yeah, one human cop.
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Previously published as Awaken the Star Dragon.
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