Love While Ye May

Madam Erie had a bath yesterday. She wasn't impressed. In fact, no matter where you are in the United States, you might have heard her opinion on the matter. I wouldn't have subjected her to the indignity except that she's old, arthritic, and we've just learned, heading into chronic renal failure. Her coat was greasy, dirty and matted. With her kidneys challenged, her skin needs to be kept clean so it can assist in detoxing her system to some small degree. We switched on the onboard water heater, and snuck around gathering the towels and soap while debating the potential retributions the cat might visit upon us after the deed was done.

As with many things, gathering my courage was harder than the actual activity. No blood was shed. That isn't to say that the wet, soapy, slippery cat didn't try to make a dash for it at every opportunity. She did. But I prevailed. A much cleaner, sweeter smelling and totally PISSED OFF Eratosthenes emerged to be wrapped in towels and fussed over. She wasn't buying what we were selling. It took most of the day for her double coat to dry - double coat means she has layers, the guard hairs you see and a shorter, denser undercoat. She wanted DOWN and far away from anything on two legs.

I was loathed for an entire two hours.

She forgave me when I showed her a sunny spot for her snoozing pleasure. And today, the entire thing is a bad memory. It's clear she feels better now that her coat is cleaner.  Of course, it won't be the last bath. It can't be. Her disease is a process. Caring for her is also a process, one that's lasted thus far for seventeen years. As a friend once said, "You love 'em while you've got 'em,  then you give them back to Bast." That's our plan.

As for retribution? Erie spent a few hours last night howling, just to be certain we comprehended the depths of her post bathtime despair. Bribes eventually satisfied her thirst for vengenace, however, and we arrived at detente in time for lights out.

That's when the cat snuck around and left a ginormous hairball right in the middle of the hallway for me to step on in the middle of the night.

Why Write Genre

It's Word Whores day, today (content is 100% PG, I swear). We're discussing the question of why all seven of us write what we write and wherein I compare my writing to Looneytunes. Which may be really, really presumptuous.

Coping with Rejection

I'm at the Darker Temptations blog today, where I'm owning up to how I deal with rejection. I'd love to have you stop by and offer up your advice. Chocolate is welcome, too.

Cover for Enemy Mine

It was a priority-two alert for beautiful Commander Cashel Khaleize: a contract put out on the life of Xiao Zhong. Professionally, Xiao was the Captain she reported to. Personally, he was man she desired. But as female Guild Assassin Mekise Tollenga closes in, Xiao wonders if even Cashel can be trusted with his safety. And with a tenuous bond between them, Cashel wonders how far she’s willing to go to earn that trust.



Do the cover gods at Berkley love me, or what? Heaven knows I love this cover. ENEMY MINE is set in the same universe as ENEMY WITHIN and ENEMY GAMES. If you've read the first novel (ENEMY WITHIN) you may recognize the hero of this sexy novella. This story is hot. It is has some very minor BDSM elements to it. The story will be available April 3rd from the vendor of your choice in e-formats only. Several booksellers already have the novel listed for pre-order.

Oh, Temptation

A few weeks ago, the DH ordered a new laptop online. During the course of the transaction, he input my cellphone number. The computer company promptly passed that cellphone number to its outsourced marketing group. Which has been calling my phone daily in a vain attempt to get me to purchase an extended warranty.

Now, DH using my cell phone number in this fashion is completely legit. It used to be our home phone number. You know. When we had a house. And a land line. So while it's now a cell phone that lives in my pocket and that runs my life, it is still ostensibly the family phone number. That doesn't mean I want phone calls trying to find out how I intend to vote (tell you what - check back in November, k?) or trying to convince me to buy some widget or another.

I've stopped answering 800 numbers, blocked numbers, or numbers I don't recognize. If a call is from a real live person who actually wants to talk to me, they leave messages. My mystery 800 number didn't. A quick reverse look up and I knew who'd been calling at 10am every day for two weeks. It was at that point that my imagination kicked in and let me tell you.

The temptation to use my power for evil rather than for good is compelling.

Now, I am SO tempted to answer that call. Here's my imagined script:

Marketeer: How do you like that new computer?
Me: What computer?
Marketeer: You bought a model xyz brand abc computer on this date.
Me, putting on grim voice: Oh, I get it. I'm sorry. What's the name on the invoice?
Marketeer gives me my DH's name.
Me: Who did you say you were with again? I'm going to need all of your information for the police report since this is clearly a violation of the restraining order on my ex.
At this point, I have a mental bet with myself that my marketeer would hang up on me.

I haven't actually pulled this stunt. And I won't. It's turned into a story idea, though. That's all it will remain - a work of fiction. I don't want to belittle, make light of, or abuse a system put in place to protect those people who are actually being preyed upon.

Course, another bonus for me: Here it is, Monday afternoon and no phone call from that 800 number. Maybe after two weeks of unanswered calls, they finally figured out I didn't want to talk to them?

Snow Day

We've had several questions about what it's like to be aboard the boat in the snowy, blowy weather currently hitting the pacific northwest. In general, the answer is - not a whole lot different from being in a house - except that when the wind blows, our house bobs around on the water. We have heat. So we're warm and cozy inside. Outside, not so much. The wind has risen to 20-25mph. Snow is still slanting in, hissing over the fiberglass. It sounds ominous. We take the hint and venture outdoors as little as possible. The nice thing about Seattle is that we aren't particularly good with snow because we don't have to be. We can hunker down for a day and wait for it to go away. That's the forecast. 40 degrees and raining by Friday. Yay. Seattle isn't built for this nonsense. Now. On to the photos:

 

This is the view out the starboard side window. You can see the snow is melting off the boats - all of the boats have some heat inside and little insulation. So our heaters end up melting the snow. We went from solid white windshields this morning to rivulets of snow melt this afternoon.

This is out our door. You're looking at my neighbor's dock box and dinghy. Yes. The sky really is that color and it's a solid, unbroken mass of that color with small, stinging pellets of snow driven on the wind. Not much accummulation, really, but it is more than it looks like in this photo.

Same shot, wider angle. This photo is crooked because I'm standing on the boat and the wind is bobbing us around on the water. Yeah. The water is indeed the same color as the steel pole in the foreground. 

This is our dinghy. Resolution isn't what I'd like, but really. That's 3+" of snow on the seat...at 1' above sea level. I can't say this storm is a nonevent - because there will inevitably be a series of hilarious and painful Youtube videos about people who attempted to drive in this stuff. Hilly terrain and wet, heavy snow = auto insurance nightmare. But really, about the only thing we'll get out of this is a really spectacular flood on Friday, Saturday and Sunday when the rain comes back in to wash it all away. A bunch of the farmers in the flood plains are already bracing.

For us, though, it's a lazy day of tea and comparing notes with the family to see who still has power. By Friday, this will all be a memory. Which is good. I need to go to the grocery store.

The Baker's Dozen. Bonus Nerd Holiday Goodness

If you didn't see the 12 Days of Nerd Christmas, hie thee to author Laura Bickle's blog. You can scroll through the days. Each offering is geekier than the last. Notice anything missing? I mean, there's kryptonite. And a Zombie Apocalypse ready Barbie. But where are the zombies??

Don't you worry, cookie. I got your zombies. Right here. Behold.

These horrifying menaces came to me courtesy of Jen Barrick. I plagued Jen for an online source for her cookie cutters, but alas. That has proven elusive. She found the zombie gingerbread cutters at a local grocery store, then provided proof of life after death with the telling blood red gel icing. Sheeyeah. Icing. Suuuure it is.

As to the rumors circulating that I have since been infected with the zombie plague? All I can say is these little guys sure were tasty.