Think Tank Thursday: Finding Time Enough for Love... in the midst of the Parent Trap

I have to apologize to everyone; I'm falling down on the job of keeping up my end here on the blog!

I'm, usually, a day late and a dollar short, but hopefully things will be looking up soonish, so... we'll see.

Anyway, just for a taste of "This is what makes me so crazy," here is what my day has been like:

It all started yesterday afternoon, when I finally finally managed to get the boys settled down for homework (oh, JOY. /sarcasm). VelcroBoy had a little notice in his folder, and a progress report. The notice was for an awards ceremony -- each teacher gives out awards to the kids in their class who had perfect attendance/good citizenship/best grades in each subject/whatever, and VelcroBoy almost never gets anything except perfect attendance sometimes or good citizenship, so I of course promised him that I'll come to the ceremony this afternoon at 1:40 (don't actually know what he's getting, but from last year's Bs and Cs, a couple of amazing teachers have helped him pull his grades up to As and Bs, so... I'm hopeful. Maybe not Honor Roll this time, but... maybe an improvement award? We'll see). Anyway, DinoBoy got all "I always get awards; are you going to come to MY ceremony?" The school does each grade at a different time, and he couldn't tell me what time his was supposed to be because, apparently, "The copier didn't work, and I don't remember if my teacher told us."

So, this morning about 8:50, I called the school office to find out. The nice secretary said it was supposed to start at 9. I was still in my pajamas, braless, hadn't even EATEN... I made a mad scramble to get out the door by 8:55, was *still* 5 minutes late, and DinoBoy, of course, was the first student to get an award, so I missed that. (Perfect attendance and Honor Roll, for the record.) But I got to see him after, so it all works.

I still have to go back at 1:40 for VelcroBoy's, and there's inclement weather coming, so they've ALREADY made the decision to close school, and the public library, and who knows what else, for tomorrow, Thursday to be decided Wednesday night.

On the plus side, I finally got all the stuff I need to do taxes so I'm currently at the library for the WiFi, all prepared to try to take care of that. If I don't manage to finish it today, it'll have to wait, I guess, till Thursday, if the kids go back to school; maybe Friday otherwise. We'll see.

Also, I think I forgot my cell phone at home. *sigh*

Now, I'm going to go real fast to schedule something for Friday...

Friday Friday Friday!

I can't remember whose day it is today, but I'm here & I've got a couple of things floating around my brain, so....

I've been sick for a week & a half now, but I'm starting to come out the other side, so excuse any incoherence, please.

Top gifts this Christmas were the scarves I crocheted (I ended up having to rush one in a day & a half for the hubby b/c he felt left out) and my mom's gifts to my sons -- there's this toy called the Perplexus. It's a clear acrylic sphere with this maze-y thing inside, and a little marble ball you're supposed to manipulate through the maze by twisting and manipulating the sphere. It's excellent for hand-eye coordination and spatial/motor skills, and it is frankly FRUSTRATING. But the two the boys have (the Original and the Epic) have kept all 8 people in the house over Christmas occupied for simply hours at a time.

Seriously. All 8 of us (me, hubby, 3 kids, my parents and my sister) were enthralled.

At one point, DinoBoy said "Oh My God I HATE this thing!"

Me: "OK. Can I have it?"

DB: "NO! It's MINE! It's just driving me CRAZY!"

Seriously, these things are AWESOME. Go find you one, and PLAY!

Minion Monday!

Hey, everybodeeeee! It's ME, your friendly (hopefully helpful) Minion! (OK, well, Cherie's Minion, actually, but I think you all know what I mean...)

So Minion Monday is going to happen every...we haven't really decided how often. It's going to be when I'm going to talk about all the fun stuff that's happening in my life & how I manage all that along side wrangling Cherie from a distance (it's really mostly just a lot of emailing and messaging and blogging and reading, and LBR I'd be doing a fair bit of it ANYWAY; this is just slightly more formalized.)

So, since it's right here, we're just going to talk kids and school and loooong school breaks right now, shall we?

Quick background for those of us who are new here, and a catch-up for everybody else because, yeah, it's been a while -- I've also been really bad lately about keeping up with my personal blog, so...

Hubby was military from the time I got pregnant with VelcroBoy (my youngest, who is currently 8) until this past summer (he also had several years in from straight-outta-high-school, which was  LONG time ago -- he's 11 years older than I am, the Dirty Old Man/Cradle-Robber! ;) ) and now that he's no longer military, he's back in his fall-back career as a trucker.* Theoretically, he's supposed to be staying primarily in the southeast, but he's pretty much been all over the place since he started this job. It's kinda ridiculous, actually.

Ours is not gonna be this awesome.

The kids this year are in 8th grade (Girl-child), 4th grade (DinoBoy), and 3rd grade (VelcroBoy), and DinoBoy is in the gifted program finally this year -- I've gotten permission notes for testing for him since Kindergarten, but either he didn't test in before & I just wasn't informed, or they didn't bother testing him until last year. VelcroBoy's teacher has had him started on testing, also, and I have to be honest, I'm having mixed feelings about this because of the experiences I'm having with the Gifted program this year with DinoBoy. Apparently the Gifted curriculum doesn't change from year to year, and because it's a one-day-a-week thing, it's very homework-intesive. By which I mean, the homework tends to be big projects, due the next week. We've done a diorama (It has to have a boat! and a lighthouse! and a dock! and a building! I mean two buildings!), a papier mache figurehead, a couple of knotting/macrame projects (for which I had to learn how to do it then teach DinoBoy because apparently he doesn't learn well from videos/written instructions), and, over Thanksgiving, a boat-in-a-bottle. Yes, I have spent the last week(ish) stressing about getting a boat in a bottle.

My kids get a whole week off for Thanksgiving, which, if we could have managed to go visit family, would have been awesome. My dad SO NEEDS the joy of helping his grandson put a boat in a bottle! We're just lucky DH was able to be home; he helped with the wood and sharp knives portion of the event; I'll figure out the rest of it over the next couple of days. Woohoo?

Also, because of the New Job-ness of the DH's new job, we have managed to completely deplete our savings, just in time to be completely broke for Christmas, with my car (minivan) with two (count them, TWO) flat tires that we can't afford to replace and DH's car (a slightly elderly Jeep) having issues that he believes are the carburetor (which, again, we can't afford to actually do anything about, even IF he were enough of a backyard mechanic to feel confident that he wouldn't leave it more broken than it already is... *sigh*

this is how crocheting makes me feel...

Part of my "Ugh we're SO BROKE for Christmas" thing is that this year, I am Making Things for my kids. & maybe for other people if I don't get all frustrated & burnt out before I can get to them. For VelcroBoy, I am crocheting a blanket. I'm going granny-square, and it's just going to be one giant one and it just keeps going and going and going and I'm starting to feel like it's never going to be done... It's a multicolor-y yarn in beachy shades ranging from nearly-white to a rich, deep blue. For DinoBoy, I'm going to (try to) crochet a scarf from Pittsburgh colors (black & gold -- well, yellow), the simplest pattern I can find. For Girl-child, I don't know. I might have a cut-&-sew apron lying around; I can either go ahead & do it myself, or just give it to her to do herself. We'll see how the crocheting goes. But the crocheting is problematic for me, primarily because I can't really read while I do it, and I'm not really a fan of TV-ing. But I have to. I've found that something light but long-ish works best for me. Sitcoms are great, but the half-hour (which is really about 20 min or so once commercials are out) is just too short. & I'm watching on Netflix or Amazon, or DVD, so... I've found that the BBC's Jeeves and Wooster (starring Hugh Laurie & Steven Fry) is absolutely PERFECT for my purposes.

I need my very own Jeeves, please, Santa.

Anyway, compared to all that? Cherie's EASY. I just have to remember to check our mutual calender regularly to see if she's juggled deadlines on me, make sure she's working on the right stuff, occasionally beta something (which reminds me -- I have some things I haven't had time to look at what with kids and hubby), and remind her to send me whatever info she has that's actually newsworthy for Tuesdays.

There's other stuff, of course -- I had a couple of random epiphanies over the last couple of days -- but I think I'll save that rambling for my personal blog. Now, I think I need some pictures. :D

*Just FTR, yes, I have read Heidi Cullinan's Special Delivery. I love it. And, yeah, it's kinda weird to think about too hard. Especially when DH suggests we leave the kids with my parents for a couple of weeks in the summer so I can drive around with him.

Tuesday Newsday

Just a few little tidbits this week:

Shifty Fox Shenanigans has been submitted to MLR for the Big Bone Lick Anthology.

On Dec. 16, Cherie will have a free short story up on N.J. Nielsen's blog as part of her annual month-long Christmas Bash -- it will also be available here starting the 17th and running through Christmas (now I really have to get it in gear & get things a bit more organized over here, huh?)

The next installment of the Rescue Twinks series, Down and OUT in Christmas Village, is scheduled to release on Dec. 20; as always, as soon as I have cover art & buy links, they'll be posted!

Angel's Song (part of the Liquid Sin series) has been pushed back to a Dec. 30 release date. Again, covers and links as soon as I have them!

Fabulous (Feel-Good) Friday

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So, I'm sure many of you saw, last Friday, about the Make-a-Wish Foundation teaming up with the city of San Francisco to turn 5 year old leukemia survivor Miles Scott into BatKid for the day, complete with stopping a bank robbery and rescuing the San Francisco Giants' mascot from the Penguin. (I particularly liked that the "villains" were dressed to resemble the bad guys in the campy Adam West/Burt Ward version of Batman; that one's my personal favorite, not least because it's the one that I like to watch with my OWN kids! "Some days, you just can't get rid of a bomb")

BatKid receiving the Key to Gotham City

Of course, this was an expensive undertaking, and many people have been griping about that cost -- most of which, of course, comes from donations to the Make-a-Wish foundation, which exists solely to make these once-in-a-lifetime dreams come true for kids whose lives have been so very profoundly touched by illness & adversity.*

Someone who said much better than I could all the reasons why focusing on the cost of something like this is not only wasteful but cruel, and why the opportunity to give experiences like these is a wonderful and uplifting thing for all of us who emotionally invest in it is, well, a blogger here: evoL = , where I will admit to reading a pretty fair way back through the archives.

Another interesting article, complete with pictures of Miles's younger brother, dressed as the most adorable Robin EVER, is this Buzzfeed one, Everything You Need to Know About Make-A-Wish Foundation's Adorable, Crime-Fighting Batkid

There are tons more videos, articles/blogs (both positive and negative) and pictures around the internet, if you're interested and managed to miss this over the last week!

*I'm a huge supporter, whenever I can and as much as I can, of both Make-A-Wish Foundation and St. Jude's Children's Hospital, as I have dear dear friends who have been blessed by both, some as patients and some as parents.

HAPPY FRIDAY, FRIENDS!

Fantastic Friday! (from your friendly Minion)

*taps mic*
Is this thing on?

Umm... So apparently, Cherie is swamped today, and it's up to me to blog today! I'm having one of those "Cannot brain today" days, so...just a few quick notes on GRL.

Basically, it was overwhelming.

Honestly, I think I'm horrible at people. I simply cannot just walk up to someone and say hi without a LOT of pep-talking. And here I was going to a thing where there was going to be one -- ONE -- person out of around 500 that I had ever met in real life before.

By the time I got myself to the hotel, I was pretty much ready to completely panic, and I was seriously THISCLOSE to turning around, going back to my car, and escaping back home. Only the fact that I knew Cherie was waiting for me (quite literally) and the fact that I really needed a bathroom kept me from doing just that.

I will admit, I spent a lot of time kind of hiding in my room, but I did try to join in the actual "social" events in the evenings -- dinners & parties -- and not just because of the free drink tickets, although they did help.

What really did it for me was a friend who wasn't even there hooking me up with other friends of his via text message. So I ended up having some really awesome conversations with a couple of really awesome people who managed to make me feel grounded enough to join in on conversations with completely random strangers in, for instance, the loooong line for drinks at the bar at the various parties.

I never really think people will actually connect the me in real life with the me online, so a couple of highlights for me were along those lines -- like, when Anne Tenino realized, about 20 minutes into our really really long and amazing conversation that I'm the Tracy who posts frequently (regularly) on the Lanyon Q&A group on Goodreads about all the far too many projects (dioramas & the like) that my kids have to do for school. (We were supposed to talk hockey, too, but somehow never quite got around to that.) Or when Amy Lane remember the nicknames I use online for my boys -- DinoBoy and VelcroBoy -- but then, Amy Lane's just all-around awesome, and gives great hug. And Katey Hawthorne, who was there as a reader & let me geek out a bit with her at a party -- we kind of monopolized each other, but it was good.

The best thing was Saturday night, when Cherie and I went to dinner with a lovely group of people including Aleksandr Voinov (who is responsible for bringing the two of us together in the first place) and L.A. Witt. I had Lobster mac & cheese, basil rolls (sort of like spring rolls), and fried green tomatoes (I LOVE eating in the South). Then the bulk of the group left and I stayed behind with Clancy Nacht and Thursday Euclid (lovely lovely funny people) for a piece of truly foodgasmic red velvet cake.

It's kind of sad to me that I was so overwhelmed for the first half of GRL that I really only managed to actually talk to about half a dozen people, but they were really good conversations. I didn't feel like I really got my feet under me till Saturday lunch, but I do feel like I'll be more comfortable with the whole experience next time that I'll be able to settle in quicker. Especially if I can meet up early with the people I'll already know by then!

(Also, since next year it's going to be in Chicago... If there's a home game that weekend, does anybody want to maybe see about going to watch the Blackhawks play hockey? My hubby doesn't know it, because he & the kids would probably disown me, but they're my other hockey crush. First and best is the Pittsburgh Penguins.)

Love,
The Minion

Source 

Minionizing. Ish.

Soo, I missed Minion Monday (we will get used to that) but I had a VERY good reason! Monday was the local school system's Open House day, where kids get classroom assignments and learn bus route numbers & pick-up times and we get to meet teachers and maybe have a little paperwork & fun like that. This is a little more complicated than it sounds because I have 2 kids at one school and one kid at another school on the other end of town (we live not-quite-exactly equidistant from the two). And the other school, the one with just one of my kids, is the middle school, which means not just one but 5 teachers to meet, plus choosing an "extracurricular" -- You know, band, athletics, chorus, whatnot.

Oh, and did I mention, only a couple of hours to get all this done? Right at suppertime, too. AND DH was supposed to be starting his new job.

Note the italics. Yeah. Hopefully he'll be for real starting next Tuesday when they fly him to Indiana for orientation (the actual JOB will be closer to home, thankfully).

So, yeah, Monday was a bit...fun. If by fun you mean crazy-hectic and stressful.

And then Tuesday was the joy of shopping for school supplies. Of course, all the local stores are sold out of half the stuff my kids needed (folders with the little prongs for holding loose-leaf paper? I need five. There was ONE. Also my youngest still needs scissors b/c I refuse to pay $10 for a pair of school scissors.) Luckily all their backpacks and shoes are in good shape. Note to parents: Spring for the expensive backpacks, and buy good quality tennies in the spring. TOTALLY worth the money.

So now, here I am, having done grocery shopping and a last lunch date with the DH b/c once he starts working again, that'll be it for mid-week lunch dates.

And I see my boys running up the driveway, home from their first day as 3rd and 4th graders, so... Happy reading!

Minion Monday

...and I got nothing! Seriously, it's been a long, exhausting few weeks for me, and this weekend was the WORST. I'm too tired to think, but I have so much I need to get done.

On the plus side, the Boss Lady and I are trying to work up some ideas for a couple of giveaways, with one of them possibly including a blog tour. So, watch this spot!

Release date change

Just a quickie drive-by blogging to let y'all know (I'm allowed; I'm Southern) that this lovely specimen here:

...won't be out till the 6th. Which, if you're keeping track like I'm NOT, I swear! is the day before my kids, affectionately known as The Barbarian Horde, return to school. Bless their pointy little heads. Now, it's time for me to either read smut or watch cheesy old musicals. Or possibly both. I can multitask, right? Right. *nods*

BOOOORED on Hump Day

For some reason up until just now, I was thinking today is Thursday.

My boys have a friend over, and DinoBoy (the elder of the two) has an earache -- pretty sure it's Swimmer's Ear -- which is making it extra-fun.

They made me watch an episode of the current revamp of TMNT, which, frankly, is orders of magnitude worse than the original, which I watched as a kid. I should note that I was not actually a fan of the original back then, but my younger brother was, which means I watched it way more than I would have chosen to (which means, I had to watch it EVER AT ALL, and I would have chosen to watch it NEVER AT ALL).

Sooooo... I thought I'd come entertain myself at the Boss Lady's expense (as it were) after having randomly rambled somewhat vaguely rantingly (but not really) over at my own personal blog.

Since it's Hump Day and I'm distracted, I'll share some of what normally entertains me when my kids aren't being irritating...

I have this playlist on my iPod which is, no joke, composed nearly entirely of multiple versions of the same song. Sometimes, it's the album cut plus the acoustic/live version/s. Sometimes it's original artist and whatever covers I didn't totally hate. Sometimes, it's two (or more) different cast recordings of the same soundtrack songs. And I have really random taste in music, so the Phantom of the Opera soundtrack rubs shoulders with Hank Williams and Aretha Franklin and Gaelic Storm and Weird Al Yankovic. I usually leave all my playlists on shuffle, because sometimes it can be weirdly prescient, in the same way that Pandora can.

Here's a song I love: Something Stupid, sung here by father/daughter duo Frank & Nancy Sinatra

And here's another version I love, by the Secret Sisters (who have this very vintage-country sound and look, singing covers of the likes of Hank Williams, Sr, and Patsy Cline & doing it VERY WELL.)

I love the way the voices blend on this song. It's very mellow, but the lyrics are heartbreaking -- the singer is in love with someone who doesn't love back. There's unrequited love, and, frankly, the object of that love seems undeserving -- he might not leave the club with the same person he came with. But I can't help but listen with the unsubstantiated hope that maybe it's a case of In Love With the Oblivious Best Friend, which is one of my favorite romance tropes.

SO, how about you? Favorite tropes? A song you love, for itself, or a mood it evokes? A cover that you really like, as much as or more than the original? Share!

Now Available! Quality Control

Quality Control is now live on Goodreads! Click the title for linky!

Also, Incongruent Angel should be available on Friday, 26 July.

Hope you're all having a great weekend!

BONUS LATE-NIGHT COVER ART

Boss-Lady just emailed me with cover art.

First is Incongruent Angel, book one of the Liquid Sin series:

Next comes Quality Control, written for the M/M Romance Group on Goodreads for their Love Has No Boundaries event:

This is the cover that will appear on AllRomanceebooks as book one in the Accidentally Yours series, and....

This version of the cover is for the Goodreads group. :D

Pretty pretty!

They will get their own posts with release dates, blurbs, links, etc. when those things are available to me!

Naughty minion!

The Boss-Lady hasn't been communicating much Minion-ward this week. Also, my little corner of teh Interwebz has been relatively quiet (I think about a quarter of it is in Atlanta for RWA and the rest of us are all feeling jealous & wishing we were there....)

Sooo... perhaps I should just find something pretty for us to look at?

(source)

Not your thing? I can offer something a little... naughtier!

(source)

Anyway, have a fun weekend! I'm planning on cleaning!

Happy Fourth!

There's a lot that's wrong with our country right now, but there's also a lot that's RIGHT!

So on this day of celebration of our Independence as a country to make our own mistakes, here are two videos!

Flash Mob!

And what holiday is complete without the Muppets?

Everybody have as much fun as you can, and I may be a bit scarce until this time next week as I will be having family visiting and my hubby will be leaving for three weeks.