Lousy Weather

The weather has really been crappy this year - tons of rain, Hurricane Irene - and it's cost people psychologically and monetarily.

Put me in the money category.

We're having a rare October snow (a heavyweight one), and the branches have been coming down. Now, that's bad enough. But when one especially thick branch came down on our fence and destroyed a section of the fence.

Oy vey. You can see the mess in the pictures below. What might have cost of hundreds of dollars will probably now cost us about a thousand bucks. Of course, we have that much just lying about. (Sarcasm, naturally.) There's no way I'm going to ask my mother, because she's given us so much over the years. I'd ask my sister-in-law (my hubby's sister), but we'd be beholden to her forever, that's if she deigned to give us anything.

Yeah, she's watching her pennies despite her husband making well over $100K a year. Yeah, right.

Anyhoo, I do have two permanent job prospects, and I'm crossing my fingers that one of them pans out, especially as I have to explain away a firing from a few years ago. (I'll be honest about it; I just have to say it right and say it as if I mean what I'm saying.)

A permanent job would blunt the dough we'll have to cough up for this. ::sigh::

Where Were You 10 Years Ago Today?

I suppose most bloggers are going to reflect today, 9/11, 10 years later.

The First Plane

I was home on 9/11/2001, recuperating from surgery. I was scheduled to see the doctor the next day, for the okay to go back to work. After being on short-term disability for a few weeks, I was antsy to get back to the office.

I was flipping through the TV channels until I happened upon a news broadcast - showing the first tower already on fire. It was freaky and unusual enough for me to call my husband and tell him about it. He was away from his desk; he called me a few minutes later.

The Second Plane

I had nothing else to do, so I kept flipping around, but kept coming back to the local news channels. I don't know which one I was watching, but as the smoke grew bigger around the first tower, I couldn't change the channel.

And then it happened.

The second plane came in from the right side of the screen. I freaked. "What? No, no, can't you see the building?" Those were my first thoughts, not knowing what really was going on...

It wasn't until I spoke to my husband just after the second plane hit, that I realized - and not until after my husband actually said, "We're under attack" - he was right.

Life would never be the same.

The Third Plane

The third plane originally took off from Newark, New Jersey, it flew over where my husband was then at work...and all those aboard perished, deciding to take down the evil turds who wanted to visit more death and destruction in Washington, DC. The plane went down in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, in a field.

Brave, brave souls.

The New Normal

My brain just refused to accept the fact that terrorists would attack the U.S.; how could that happen?

But it did. And we no longer feel safe. Up until that point, I was under the delusion that the U.S. was secure, that we were immune to this sort of hatred, this sort of violence.

My feeling of security - and that of many others - was shattered that day.

Safe

Hurricane Irene has gone through.

Hubby, Sammy the Alaskan Malamute, and I are still here.

The damage - if you want to call it that - is a flooded basement and a few small branches down in the backyard. Sam has been out a few times already, as the rain has stopped. The wind is still a tad gusty, and we have a big silver maple out back, so I want to keep Sam in for the most part.

My mother lives well east of here and was without power this morning. We were fortunate, in that we never lost electricity.

While there was still some rain coming down, hubby and I went to the local river and took a pic of it. Talk about churning! Yeow!

Color Me Frustrated

Please pardon my rant, but I really need to get this off my chest.

I was sort of depressed yesterday, especially as I thought I heard something.

That something came true today.

You see, I've been working steadily in corporate jobs for 30 years. I have a shitload of experience with all sorts of things (from an administrative assistant perspective).

And what do I mostly do during the day?

I'm the shipping department for this place. Shipping stuff out by overnight mail.

Sure, I do a few other things, when people decide they feel sorry for me and throw a few bones my way. But I tend to finish these jobs quickly...which leads me back to being the shipping department.

Don't get me wrong; I'm glad I has a job, even though it's a temp one.

So what brought this on?

I found out for sure today that the woman who sits in the cube next to me (a very nice woman, BTW) will become an employee on Monday.

What makes this even more frustrating is that she's accessing the same sort of information from the same secure website that I've been doing for several months before she came. Why didn't they offer the position to me, when I was already familiar with that particular system? I could have done it in addition to what I'm doing now.

The "other" stuff I'm doing isn't hard at all; I can finish these damned summaries in about 20 minutes. But obviously none of the higher ups ever thought of giving me a chance at it.

No. Stick the old idiot with shipping duties, that's all she's good for.

What a waste.


I now return you to your regularly scheduled life.

Some Fun, Some News From the Homefront

First, the Fun

I've been surfing the web in between working on the 2nd book in the series (in between working on the cover of the first book). I Googled a certain phrase and found a couple of fun blogs on crappy SF and fantasy covers.


A couple of the covers weren't that bad.

But most were horrific. One had 5 different fonts on the cover. One had a squid in among a bunch of other crap. (I kid you not.) A few had naked warrior-type (I think) men with strategically placed...stickers, sparkly things, and who-knows-what-else. (I kid you not.) There was even one mostly-naked woman whose groin area was (wait for it)...dark. I mean, darkness as in black-hole-in-space darkness.

Wow.

Here's the first one: The Joys of Awful Sci-Fi and Fantasy Book Covers. Appears to be U.S.-based (but what do I know, lol?) The June 20th entry starts off with a truly bad Ray Bradbury cover. Didn't he deserve something better? (I think so.)

The second one is U.K. based: Good Show Sir - Only the worst Sci-Fi/Fantasy book covers. This one has one book per blog post. Read the comments; they're as hilarious as the deadpan captions under the crappy covers.

You're welcome. :-)

From the Homefront

So, yes, I'm working and working on the cover for Changing Faces, the first in the Haven New Jersey series. They're short novels/novellas, all contemporary fantasy. Plenty of humor; the MC, Tessa, doesn't take herself seriously at all. (First person, BTW.) I'll probably post a couple of excerpts at some point.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY!

Yup, it's me birthday. :-)

Before I get to all the gushy stuff...

LOVE The Beatles.

The music from the video below actually takes me back to when I was a young girl.  I'm a Joisey Girl through and through but I haven't sounded Joisey in quite some time (living in another part of the country for a year does that to you ;-)).

I grew up in northeastern New Jersey, and all my cousins and aunts and uncles pretty much lived in that area.  But what the music below really zeros in on are (of course) summers and pool parties.  My dad's niece and her husband had a nice house with its allotted 1/10 of a square inch backyard (that's a Jersey joke; if you've ever lived here, I think you'll understand).  They had a round, above-ground pool that took up most of that space, with the rest for chairs and a small grilling area.  I had a ton of fun, and I look back on that time very wistfully.  (This is why I rarely stroll down memory lane; the memories are too painful.)

The wistfulness comes from all those tons of cousins I used to see on a fairly regular basis and from all the aunts and uncles who have passed away.  All the cousins have moved out of the area, they have their own families.  (Think of the Jewish Diaspora, where all the Jewish tribes were blown to the winds.)  And as I said, all of my aunts and uncles are gone.  Anyone who wants to be immortal can have it - I can't handle the thought of having to deal with the death of loved ones over and over again for an eternity.

Sorry for the downer; this is supposed to be a happy day (and it is :-)).  After all, I've made it to 49, more or less physically intact, my humor intact, my mental capacities...mostly intact ;-), and with my first book to go live by the end of the month (if all goes to plan).

So, for your viewing and listening pleasure, Theme From a Summer Place...

Google Reader

I have one person (or maybe more; what the heck do I know?) who has been reading posts off of Google Reader, and for some reason, the new posts weren't popping up.

I did some finagling with the feed, including pinging this blog, and I'm hoping this means new posts (like this one!) will finally start to appear on a regular basis on Google Reader.  And don't forget to hit that refresh button over at Google Reader - my posts do pop up that way.

Sorry I haven't posted much, but it's crunch time!

More in a day or two...

It's Been 27 Years...

It's our wedding anniversary!

It was 27 years ago today that we were married.  The day before was rainy, but it cleared up the next day (a Saturday).  Whew.

About a month before that, I found out that the church screwed up; they scheduled another wedding for the same day.  Of course I freaked out!  (Young bride, all that.)  But cooler heads soon prevailed, and people at the church realized the mistake.  What we did turned out to be nice - we had our receiving line outside the church instead of inside.  The other wedding then entered the church, etc., etc.

Pretty flowers all around, a sunny day, and my honey bunny. :-)

BTW, I was only 3-1/2 years old when I got married. ;-)  J/K.  I was all of 21, my hubby, 22.  I was 3 weeks shy of my birthday.  (I'll do the math for you - I'll be 49 on June 21, the first day of Summer.)  Although most people don't think I look that old, lol.

I now return you to your regular (or irregular) life. :-)

The End of the World?

The nuts and whackos (no, not me; I know you were thinking that ;-)) have been coming out of the woodwork and cobwebs about the end of the world.

Well, I want to get the jump on them, by one day anyway...

For your viewing and listening pleasure, here is R.E.M.'s It's the End of the World As We Know It (and I Feel Fine).

Think of it as the last fun video you watch before oblivion tomorrow. ;-)

Elizabeth Taylor, RIP

A true beauty - yes, the violet color of her eyes was real - no faking that.

She gave herself over to helping the AIDS cause...even before her friend, Rock Hudson, came out just before he died.  Okay, maybe there wasn't AIDS back in the 1950s...but Elizabeth Taylor was a very good friend of Montgomery Clift, who was gay...and had to keep it quiet.

After all, we're talking the 1950s, here.

Montgomery Clift was involved in a horrific accident, right in the middle of filming (I think) Raintree County, Liz's try at a Gone With the Wind-type movie.  She stayed by his side, even as he recuperated, and loved him as a dear friend until he passed.

Here's the weird thing for me.  I remember watching all of those silly old Doris Day-Rock Hudson "sex" flicks back in the 1960s (watched them in the 1970s, as I was a liddle too young in the 1960s ;-)).  Since Rock came out, I've never been able to take him seriously in any love scenes.

But I have no problem with Montgomery Clift in love scenes; he's still believable when he's in an embrace with a woman.  ::shrug::  Maybe he's just a better actor than Rock Hudson.

Anyhoo, Liz made a lot of really great movies.  Hard to say which one was my favorite, but two come to mind: Elephant Walk and Father of the Bride.  The first takes place in India; Liz's role originally went to Vivien Leigh, who was having a nervous breakdown (I read somewhere that there might still be some glimpses of Vivien if you look real quick).  The second is the best version (sorry, the Steve Martin version sucked) of, well, Spencer Tracey as the father of the bride, Liz.  Soon afterwards, Liz married Nicky Hilton (of Hilton Hotels), the first of her 7(!) husbands (Richard Burton twice, naturally).

I thought this was a nice compilation of photos and movie stills with a really nice Sammy Davis, Jr. song accompanying it.

Phyllis A. Whitney, the First Writer I Ever Went Nuts Over

Yes, Phyllis A. Whitney was a mystery writer, not the genre I prefer to read and write in.  Yes, she died three years ago - at the age of 104!  (I should live so long.)

But she was the first writer that I sought out on a regular basis as a teenager; not that I had the money to go out and buy her books (I'm not sure she was writing much at that point in time), so I went to the library and got out her books.

She had a ton of 'em.

Another thing that most people who enjoyed her stuff didn't know was that she had a how-to book out back in the 1970s...can't remember the name of it, but I so loved her stuff - think lonely teenager ::sniff:: - I thought about writing mysteries.  So it was a surprise and a pleasure when I found that book.

Nothing came of that, and I've since gone through loads and loads of how-to's over the years.  (My current fave is The Fire in Fiction, by Donald Maass, the literary agent.)  But she was the first one that kindled something in me.  I eventually took a course on writing short stories, and managed to sell that after only putting it out there three times.  (It helps to read what the magazine is and isn't looking for.)

That spoiled me.

I thought I was one hot mama.  ::snark::  I came up with an idea from a Beatles tune...and it was rejected and rejected.  Yeah, I gave up.

But I've revived that idea, pouring it into the first book of my paranormal suspense series (which I am diligently editing, although I had to take a break from that the past two days due to work overload and a sinus headache that lasted most of yesterday).

This is the first edit.  I'm committed to only editting two more times and getting it out there.

So a thanks to Ms. Whitney, may she rest in peace, for putting the writing bug in me. :-)

Domestic Violence

My day job is at the foundation of a well-known telecom company; you'd know the name, but I'm not going to say it here. :-)

A woman who mostly deals with domestic violence organizations just sent around an email with a link to an upcoming show on the Discovery Fitness & Health channel (formerly Discovery Health channel).

A plastic surgeon has taken it upon himself to help reconstruct the faces of two women and one little girl.  In the trailer I just viewed, he basically says he wants to cut away the scarring so these three can move on with their lives.

Very touching, even though it's just a trailer for the show.

Please watch it here, and count your lucky stars that you haven't had to deal with such horrible violence.

Congrats to the Green Bay Packers!

Yup, watched the Super Bowl all the way through.

It was an enjoyable game, and it wasn't until the end of the fourth quarter that (I think) anyone knew the Pack would win.

Aaron Rodgers was stellar; Ben R., less so.  Of course, Green Bay could've been up by a lot more points if some of his receivers held on to the ball.  But the Steelers kept coming back and coming back, and I was reminded of the 2nd Giants-Eagles game this year (what a nightmare, one I really don't want to remember).

The Steelers, though, weren't able to overcome the Packers' defense at the end.  Or maybe it was a combo of that and some poor throws by Big Ben.

Whatever.  I like both teams, still do (except when they play the Giants).

This was a great ending to the 2010 NFL season.  Now if the Collective Bargaining Agreement can be worked out before the start of the 2011 season...

Nancy Beck

I still have a Wordpress blog

But I decided to resurrect this one...because it's more fun for me (and I can do neato things like suggest books, including my own (once that day comes)).

For the time being, I'll keep the Fantasy Scribblings blog, but I'll phase it out at some point.

Hmm...welcome back, welcome back, welcome back! (Remember the old sitcom, Welcome Back, Kotter. Yeah, sung to that music.)

Fun to welcome myself back, wot?

Nancy

Christmas and Stuff

So now is the time of year when a lot of people's thoughts turn to that old (and cherished) chestnut, A Christmas Carol.

I've seen the original American film version (done in 1938), with Reginald Owen as Scrooge (it was supposed to go to Lionel Barrymore, who used to do an annual radio version of the book, but he was scratched because of an injury), the classic British film version (about 1951 or so), with Alastair Sim as Scrooge, and an American TV version with George C. Scott as Scrooge. All are excellent.
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I'm embarassed to admit that I haven't actually read the Dickens' novel, but I hope to be rectifying that some time soon.

The Radio Broadcast

However, a friend of my husband and I has a radio show (it's an all-volunteer station in the area), and he invited us to be part of his annual Christmas deliverance of A Christmas Carol (like Lionel Barrymore's)...and, yes, your not-so-humble, er, writer here did indeed partake of it, playing three roles, that of a girl in mourning, Fred's wife (Fred is the nephew of Scrooge), and a servant girl.

Our friend took the part of Scrooge, since it's his show...and he did a marvelous job of it.

Who, Me Nervous?

We're not talking a national broadcasting station, but our friend's show is heard in the northwestern counties of NJ and some eastern counties of PA (think: Easton). Anyhoo, I read through the script (which changes every year), thinking about the people whom I had to portray...their stations in life...and the fact that I had to do all three with a British accent.

The first one was a little hard, as the young girl is in mourning, and gives a sort of intense speech. I had the most verbiage with this role. The next one, I decided to give a sort of dour but sprightliness to my accent, while the last one, I was trying to give a sort of Cockney ring to it (this is right after Scrooge changes).

Amazing

All eight or so of us were standing around the mics, as the studio is pretty small, and fitting all those chairs in made our friend feel a bit claustrophobic. One of our friend's friends, who typed up the script, gave me a big thumb's up after reading through the first role.

And then everyone was complimenting me on my readings! :-) Let me tell you: IT WAS A BLAST!! I had so much fun, I talked about it for a long time afterwards. Of course, my husband complimented me as well, and as he always fancied himself the actor type, it took my breath away.

Oh, it was fun, fun, FUN!! I wanna do it again! I don't know if I'll be able to next year, depending on the work situation, but I hope I'll be able to take off that Friday before Christmas.

Love and kisses,

~Nancy Beck

Been A Long Time

"...been a long, lonely, lonely time..."

I was reminded of the Led Zeppelin lyrics when I sat to write this post, the first in a very long time.

I have been through a lot of crap recently, the latest being a "holding pattern" in my current job. I haven't been at work since the end of June, although I continue to be paid.

Before you say, "Hey, where do I sign up?" let me tell you, it's no fun, especially with hubby at home on disability pay.

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Still, you say, that sounds like a great set up.

Again I say, it's not.

I have begun to rewrite my WIP, lol, for the billionth or so time. I just recently picked up a couple of how-to books that have spurred me on, including one about creating better characters (which I think was one of the problems with this WIP). I'm going to write more in depth about the writing books in other posts, but suffice to say, I feel like one in particular has given the WIP a new freshness.

Yeah, I'm excited about writing again! :-)

I'm also going to do one or two catch-up posts on the fiction I've read recently, including a fantasy series that I've been curious about a little while, and another which I've been curious about for quite a long while (just started that one a few days ago).

Plus, I've joined Facebook and today, Twitter (names at both: ncbeck). With Facebook, I can keep in touch with friends, and even managed to find a couple of cousins who use it (although I haven't yet corresponded with them beyond the initial friending). As for Twitter...not sure yet what I'm going to do with it, but I can always delete it if I feel I don't use it enough or find it useful.

Before I sign off, I want to thank Theadra and others out there who have given me a boost, a sort of, "Keep at it!" Much, much thanks and love to you all! :-)

That's about it for today. Look for the fiction catch-all(s) and my take on some good writing how-tos.


Love and kisses,

~Nancy Beck

Sorry For Not Posting Anything For A While...

My personal life is kind of in a shambles right now.

It's got nothing to do with hubby not having a job for 2 years now.

Or that he's waiting for Social Security Disability to give him the thumb's up for getting disability pay.

No.

It's about me.

I am on the precipice, looking into the abyss (almost, sorta, kinda rhymes) known as getting fired.

Yup.

Me.

Me, who has 20-some years experience doing this sort of stuff. Me, who suffered a brain aneurysm last year, but survived. (No, this is not a ghost or a clone typing this, heh.) Me, who's had trouble getting all this at my new job to click in my head.

And maybe that's part of the problem. Maybe certain brain functions are screwed up or something, because a lot of what I'm being taught and trained just isn't staying in my brain; I've had some faux paus lately that I knew were wrong, but it's as if I couldn't help myself.

Sheesh.

Anyhoo, I actually brought home a manual I've been told to work on in the hopes that I can get all of it banged out and to my boss on Monday. She's wanted to see it from time to time to edit, and I've tried to give that to her, but it's not good enough. I've always tried to finish things first before handing them over, but that's not what she wants, apparently.

Again, this might be more of my fried brain, but who the hell knows?

All I know is that I've been playing the lottery like you wouldn't believe. Not that I'm spending hundreds of dollars a week on that; that's nuts. I have spent $10 or $20 a week, and have managed to get 2 numbers on 2 or 3 different tickets, but that's been it so far. I got some books that take a more mathematical approach to this (lowering the odds to win by looking at different trends or patterns), but I still haven't done better than 2 numbers on a ticket.

Once I get to 3 numbers, I know I'll have gotten this thing down. Until then, I keep looking for certain trends and have actually caught a couple, but nothing won as yet.

It's all a matter of time, all around, ya know?

Love and kisses,

~Nancy Beck

I'm In a Funk

I've had the flu or a stomach bug the past few days, although I felt much better earlier today.

Went over to my mother's house on Saturday; no problems, even though she'd told me she hadn't been feeling well for a couple of days. She did feel okay Saturday morning.

No problems for most of Sunday.

Then, Sunday night - I threw up a few times, had to run to toilet a few times, too (I won't get into specifics, heh).

I stayed home on Monday and Tuesday. I started to go to work on Tuesday, but felt all weirded out driving, so I went right back home.

Came home, and hubby almost immediately took any fun out of me (trying to set up a radiology appointment at the hospital and having to contact the neurosurgeon's assistant - a non-responder if there ever was one - kind of set me edge for a little while), and I actually cried a bit before.

I could pull the whiny, "Why me?" bit, but it's old and cliched, so I won't go there. But I really wish the past two years hadn't happened; why couldn't just be like that stupid Dallas episode, where Bobby finds out the past year was nothing but a dream.

(Newhart did it much better - funnier, naturally - a few years later.)

Heck, I'm not even talking about the aneurysm I had or having one of my kidneys ripped out (which will come some time this year). That, I can handle.

I can't get into anything more than that except to say that...life at home just isn't the same anymore. Which is probably why I actually look forward to getting out of the house super early in the morning...except for the fact I have to adorable, sweet doggies.

Sorry for rambling on like this, but I just had to get this out, and I don't know who to talk to.

Thanks for listening, whoever you people are.

Love and kisses,

~Nancy Beck

Inauguration Day

Isn't it interesting and cool that Obama's inauguration is right after Martin Luther King Day? :-)

Love and kisses,

~Nancy Beck

Happy Holidays to One and All!

Merry Christmas!

Happy Hannukah!

Happy Kwanzaa!

Christmas Eve was spent at my mother's house; nice and comfy-cozy, with lots of food to go around (stuffed peppers, kielbasa, and pierogies [basically, dough stuffed with mashed potatoes]).

Celebrating On Christmas Eve

My family and I always celebrate Christmas on the Eve. This goes back to when the family first started popping out babies back in the 1950s (and where one of my uncles - one of my father's brothers - would tell those kids born during that time of his exploits in a POW camp in Germany; we're talking Stalag 17, of movie fame).

By the time I came along in 1962, that uncle - Uncle Joe, a really swell guy - had stopped telling everyone about that. And, as typical for that generation, didn't tell anybody about his silver stars or any other medals he received.

But, getting back to celebrating on Christmas Eve, the parents of that generation decided that it would be easier if my dad's side celebrated on other than Christmas Day - to avoid any of the squabbles that some families get into when deciding, "Where are we going to go this year?"

So there's no problem with me going over to my husband's side on Christmas Day; I'm used to the day itself as an anti-climax. Almost. :-) We still received presents from our parents, as opposed to receiving presents from the paternal aunts and uncles and cousins - lord, the cousins we have! - so it was still a nice, but low-key day.

Believe in Yourself and in a Higher Power

I always liked Mr. Spock from Star Trek because there was a struggle between the logical (Vulcan) side and the illogical (human) side of his nature.

Although I believe in God, I truly think that there must be a higher power in the universe, or else why is there only one planet in this particular system that has life as we know it? (I know that's kind of narrow minded, but go with it.) I also think there are other life forms out there, because I also think a higher power wouldn't just create life on one chunk of rock - considering how huge the universe is.

Belief in a higher power = belief in yourself. You can do anything you want, especially in a positive frame of mind.

May the writing muse tickle your creative juices!

Love and kisses,

~Nancy Beck