Memorial Day

We should all be giving a big THANK YOU to the men and women who died defending our country.

Memorial was a big thing when I was a little girl. Back then, it was celebrated on May 30 rather than the last Monday in May. And we didn't call it Memorial Day, but Decoration Day. We would all put on our Sunday best and pile into the car for a trip to the cemetery. Each family would decorate the graves of their ancestors and loved ones with fresh and artificial flowers. As I recall, it was mostly artificial flowers. And they weren't the silk flowers we have now.

These flowers were made by the women of the community. I remember 'carnations' made of facial tissue. They were easy to make and kept the kids occupied. One of our neighbors made beautiful flowers from various colors of crepe paper and then waxed them.

At the cemetery, the women would place the flowers on the graves while the kids played around the tombstones and the men stood in the shade talking. After the decorating part, the men set up tables from sawhorses and planks and the women brought out bowls and platters of food. Fried chicken, potato salad, cole slaw, beans, watermelon, fruit salad, pies, cakes and cobblers--all of it homemade and delicious.

We'd spend most of the day at the cemetery celebrating the freedom these men and women had given their lives to protect.

The Miss Snark Tribute


It's been a year since Miss Snark's last post and Patricia Atwood is hosting a tribute. Words really fail me when I think of Miss Snark. I have no idea how she had any kind of life when she was blogging so much. She gave us advice that we couldn't get anywhere else, and if we paid attention, we became better writers and better authors. So, go read the comments. Maybe leave one of your own.

And, if you somehow missed the Miss Snark blog when it was alive and kicking. Go check it out.

It's been a busy weekend...

Busy, busy, busy. The husband dragged me all over looking at properties he wants to flip. It's fun but also time consuming. The fun part is that I get to choose the appliances, flooring, paint colors -- stuff like that. We also give the properties names. This weekend we were looking at The Septic House and The Toxic House. He decided to forego The Toxic House. (Big sigh of relief from me). I also met a woman who does staging for houses that are up for sale. We hit it off immediately. I was thrilled to find another woman who has cards of paint colors in her purse.
The time consuming part was that I'm still working on this huge copywriting project. Back when I was a full-time, staff copywriter at ad agencies, I'd get asked what I did for a living and when I answered "I'm a copywriter", some people would ask if I worked at the copyright office...LOL. Now that I tell people I'm an author -- well, you don't need to hear the questions I get.
I just read Erica Orloff's blog and she poses an interesting question about what her character HATES. I love Erica's blog because she makes me think. And now I'm thinking about what my character hates instead of finishing this project.
Oh, and I got everything done for the RT Author Spotlight. I thought writing back cover blurbs was hard until I had to write a 50-words-or-less book description! But it's done, and so am I. At least for the weekend.

Yikes! It's been a MONTH?
Where did the time go? Oh, right. I was writing copy. Writing copy isn't as much fun as writing a book. No imaginary friends to play with.
But I have good news!
I just found out today that I'm going to be in the Author Spotlight on the RT website in July. Yay, me! The Author Spotlight is a special section of the website that is available to subscribers of RT. I'm excited. And I need to write a 300 word article. 300 words isn't much (unless I'm having a really, really bad writing day -- then it's perfectly fine!). And I have to choose a 500 word excerpt.
This is definitely fun stuff. Especially compared to writing about fireplace tool sets and screens. Hundred of them. Seriously. Hundreds.