NEW RELEASES
Still – she seems devoted to the effort
You ever feel like this? Like you know what you’re doing but not really. Like you’re racing forward at top speed only to stop at the last moment and give a half-hearted tap instead of a hearty try? I do love, love, love how she backs up with such determination only to weenie out in the end.
Sept 6
This week has been a doozy. There has been way more bakery items consumed than should be necessary to maintain our happiness. Cookies, cake, brownies, ice cream – dear God. And we wonder why we’re never losing weight. We blame Bank of No Forks. That place would depress Richard Simmons. It’s either eat a plethora of dessert while we jigsaw puzzle or we’ll never stop crying. Nobody needs that. Nobody. Least of all
the bakers in town who are counting on us to maintain their business. We did manage to giggle about these five things.
1. Unhappy fans. There has been a great deal of hullabaloo over the selection of Ben Affleck as Batman and Charlie Hunnam as Christian Grey in the 50 Shades of Grey movie. The Fan Boys/Girls lost their freaking minds over this. We just want to go on record and say we believe that Ben has the chin to pull off Batman, and we’re totally willing to suspend judgment until the movie comes out. The second selection actually made us squeal. We’ve paid as much attention to the casting of Christian Grey as the next red-blooded American women. We read the books and were not especially 
impressed but the names bandied about for the lead in the film version did give us pause. We are more than happy to pay our $37 admission fee to see the beautiful Charlie Hunnam run around with torn jeans and no shirt. You boys need a pep talk, come on over. We have cake and kind words.
2. Dilbert. We are 97% certain that Scott Adams works at Bank of No Forks. There is no possible way he can understand so succinctly the irony and insanity of what goes on over here if he doesn’t work here. Really. It’s uncanny. We read the morning comics and after getting to Dilbert we check under our desks for sneaky, eavesdropping cartoonists.
3. OTHER banks. For the sake of clarity and to dispel any rumors before they get started, we want it to be perfectly clear that we DO NOT work for Azizi Bank in Kabul, Afghanistan. Now that we’re all clear – a young female employee is 
missing from the bank. She worked there for three years in the money transfer division and then one day she just disappeared along with $1.1 million. Wisely, Bank of No Forks doesn’t let us anywhere near any of the money. We think that’s best, don’t you? Think of how many bakeries we could keep in business if we had that kind of access.
4. Fall Fashion Mags. We’re talking seriously serious magazines here. Vogue alone has 902 pages of “Fabulous Fall Fashions” and In Style has 716 and is the “biggest issue ever!”. We can only hope the mail man doesn’t have to deliver both of these on the same day. The poor fool could get a hernia since each one weighs eight or nine pounds. Imagine an entire subdivision of fashion minded moms. Gads. 
5. Surprise rain. We love rain. Those of us in the desert are fascinated by water, boarding on obsessed. We love nothing more than a huge rain that comes out of nowhere. We were told by the professionals (smirk) on the local news that there would be no more rain. Not today. Not tomorrow. Maybe never. We lamented the heat and the dryness. We did some whining and – we’re sure you won’t believe this – but we also complained. Then lo! Out of the blue the sky opened up and rain poured down. There was thunder and lightning like all respectable storms must. The best part? The sky was blue during the entire episode. Really. The desert weather is very weird.
He cooks to the tunes of Frank Sinatra…I did pork chops MYYYYYYY WAAAAAAYYYYYY
So my husband is a musician. The current band he’s in plays very heavy metal. I describe it as loud and angry. However, at home we listen to a massive array of music. Our CD wall is extensive. We have everything in there from classical (I have a special leaning towards Baroque, but also the dramatic stuff like Rachmaninoff) to Country, 80’s hair bands to big band. If you’re looking for a genre, I certain we have representation in the wall.
Then there’s the iPods and iPhones.
Last night when I got home from work, I found My Honey and The Bandit sprawled across my bed. The boy was doing his
Back in the hay day
“Whatcha doin?” I asked the one staring at the iPhone.
“Looking at iTunes.”
“Ah. Whatcha lookin for?”
He shrugged. “Just stuff. I had no idea Neil Diamond had so many songs. I don’t even know half these.”
Neil Diamond? OK. “Like which ones?” I asked.
He started listing off titles. I sang several of their opening lines.
I’m sure he was wondering what I was doing knowing all those Neil Diamond lyrics for the same reason I was wondering why he was shopping the Neil Diamond catalog.
“I can’t believe you know all those songs.”
“Apparently, you don’t listen to the ’70’s station at work,” I replied.
I wonder how much of his street cred he’s gonna lose if his band mates get ahold of his play list.
Oh dear…how do we love a bakery?
It was that kind of day that begs for a flour and sugar based item with frosting. Ava sent me and the receptionist to the store with $20. We were expected to come back with baked goods.
That wasn’t a problem, of course. The problem was just deciding how to best spend our $20.
All of that reminds me of this:
Your Tueday poll question because we’re hungry…
Me swimming was even more terrifying than my kitchen…
When I received an email from a reporter from the local newspaper requesting an interview I was certain it was in regards to the Tucson Festival of Books. Why wouldn’t it be? I’d invited the paper to speak to the Romance Writers when they did a really flattering write-up of a mystery writers group several months ago. At that time they declined the opportunity. Ah well, I thought.
So this email was exciting. Ava and I met the young lady at a local coffee shop and chatted for an hour in the heat. The reporter was really young. I’m thinking somewhere in the neighborhood of twelve. Actually she was freshly graduated from the University and was very excited about the article. We will say she was remarkably prepared and had really great questions. I was nervous so I talk a lot. A lot a lot. A LOT! That’s what happens when I’m nervous.
I talked up romance writing like you wouldn’t believe. I gave her two names of some fabulous writer friends who have had impressive careers and referred her to the Romance Writers of America website to get statistics and such. Yet she kept asking me questions about me.
Then she wanted to take my picture. WHAT? What the hell for? Writers are typically shy people. I know anytime I have to have my picture taken I’m practically besieged by my lack of self-confidence. I don’t photograph well. It’s a family trait. My grandmother was a gorgeous woman and it was never really proven in photographs. I wouldn’t go that far with myself, but there are very, very pictures of myself that don’t make me feel like simultaneously crying and throwing up.
At first they mentioned showing me writing. I was OK with that. I figured I could be hiding behind a coffee cup and a lap top.
Next they decided they wanted me with my kids and husband – doing family stuff like we normally do. They wanted pictures of me yelling at my kids? Why the hell would they want that? Like I need Child Protective Services getting involved with my writing interview. I mentioned this new scenario to My Honey and he said, “They want a picture of the kids playing video games, you on your computer and me asleep in front of the tv?” Right? Why?
They were hoping to take pictures of the dog I wrote into my first book. I informed them that would be better for Halloween time since sadly, that dog is dead. And no, they couldn’t come over to my house. There’s no way I’m letting a staff photographer into my crap-hole of a house. It was bad enough that they wanted pictures of my kids. I had a lot of trepidation about that. I make a concerted effort to keep my kid’s and husband’s name out of this blog because I dont’ think it’s fair to them. Ava brought me around to their point of view so I suggested the park. We could ride bikes or walk my current dogs.
“Do you ride bikes at the park a lot?” the reporter asked me.
No, but who the hell knows that? They didn’t like the idea of the park and brought up my house again. That was a clear and definite “NO.” I suggested my Mom-in-law’s house for pics of the kids swimming. That finally made them happy. I spent the next two days driving Ava insane with my fears and random freaking out. I don’t know why I bother having a break down over it. I know exactly how it’s going to work out. Why stress over it? Why? Because who wants to look like a yeti on the local newspaper? Sigh.
The staff photographer wanted to know why I wasn’t swimming while the kids and My Honey were splashing around in the pool. Clearly that woman was insane. The fact that I didn’t hire some model to come in and pretend to be me was a huge success, I thought. But in a swimsuit? Stupid skinny photographers.
The whole thing turned out better than expected. The article was lovely and very well written. The picture was atrocious but, honestly, I didn’t expect anything better.
Rosie is very serious about this matter…
But still you should totally go read this article I was in for the local newspaper.
TUCSON WRITERS FALL IN LOVE WITH ROMANCE
I’ll post a blog about the exciting and absurd details of the interview tomorrow.
August 30
Just give us a minute here to wring ourselves dry . . . believe it or not, even though we live in the desert we experienced some pretty high humidity this past week. We don’t like humidity. We’re not used to it and we’re not having it. It makes us surly and unreasonable. What’s that you say? You thought we were always surly and unreasonable? Very funny. Here’s some more funny stuff . . .
1. More oddness with Vermont. Remember last week there was a giant pile of goat poo on fire in a
Vermot leaves. Not AZ
their Gorge is better than the Grand Canyon. OK. Everyone needs to just calm down now before someone gets hurt. Does Vermont realize that everyone in the state of AZ has a permit to carry?
2. Llama love. We have the wrong jobs. That became abundantly clear when we read this article. We’d be so happy to drive llamas around even if it was to talk to sick people. We make it a point not to be around sick people. They’re icky and there are fluids involved. But still, these llamas are very cute – especially the one with the hair cut. Where do we submit our resume?
3. Chaser the world’s smartest dog. We’d like a smart dog. None of the Quill Sister’s dogs are smart. They are high functioning morons in that they are smart enough to come out of the rain. Chaser is smart. Really smart. She knows like 1200 words including verb and noun combinations. That’s crazy. She can play hide and seek and hot and cold like a 
little kid. We don’t need our dogs to do that but it would be nice if they’d stop being so freakin dumb. What stupid dog needs to eat an entire pillow? Or a complete pack of raw spaghetti noodles? Dumb we tell you. Pretty but dumb.
4. Why doesn’t this happen to us? A guy in England rolled over to cuddle with his girl friend only to find that the person nuzzling his neck was in fact a wild fox. The guy freaked out and chased the fox back out the cat door. We think that was the wrong tack. If we woke up with a fuzzy little fox in our bed there would be a completely diffent outcome. For crying out loud, all the thing wanted to do was snuggle. What kind of selfish bastard won’t snuggle with an adorable fox? Cuddle up under the covers. Maybe turn on the tv. Perhaps call in the cat to join you. 
There are many acceptable responses that don’t involve screaming like an old woman and kicking it out. Wrong, wrong, wrong.
5. Google searches. Honestly we don’t know what Amylynn did before Google. Actually, we do know. She had the library in her Rolodex and she called them all the time. To the point where they knew her voice when she called in. That girl really needs to get on a game show. Anyway, today there was much silliness and in the course of our regular discourse, we looked up the following search “How to do a home vascectomy.” Alarmingly, this was already a known Google search and we didn’t even have to type the whole question into the search box. This is hysterical stuff. The first responder clearly doesn’t have a sense of humor – at all. However, the rest of the group are a laugh riot. Now we bet our husbands are very concerned.
In honor of FRIDAY!
We might have put this on the blog before, but everyone needs a little more Muppets doing Queen – It’s totally worth a four-minute investment.
Godzilla AKA Ed vs. Mothra
Ed and I went to bed last night and as soon as we turned the TV on a GIANT freakin’ moth appeared out of nowhere. It was so LARGE that you could hear its wings when they hit the wall. You know you’ve been married for more than 25 years when you have to turn to your spouse and say “Oh My GOD, are you going to get out of bed and kill that moth or not??!!”
Luckily for him, he jumped out of bed and sprung into action. I stayed right where I was, under the covers, hoping 
Mothra would only see Ed as a target and ignore me. While I was cowering, he got a towel from the bathroom and started trying to kill it. (Normally, I would laugh hysterically over my husband running around our bedroom naked trying to kill a bug – but this was no laughing matter considering the size of the enemy.)
I thought this was a good plan until he actually hit it and it disappeared.
That’s right; a three-inch moth just disappeared. We couldn’t find it anywhere. How is that possible?
I told him he couldn’t get back into bed until he found the carcass – preferably dead. He looked everywhere in our room, places it couldn’t even actually be to appease me. I even tried to wake up the dog that slept through the entire “search and kill” mission but all he did was open one eye and re-shut it.
Hours later, I let Ed give up. Then he said the exact wrong thing, like only a man married for 25 years can – “Maybe it crawled under the bed.” A bed, I will have you know, that can’t be moved and has a platform that you can’t see under.
After he got back into bed, he asked me if I was going to sleep. Ed knows me well.
“Nope, how am I supposed to go to sleep with a giant moth under the bed? Don’t you think its waiting until we fall asleep to come back out and kill us both?”
And what did my dear husband say to that? Here’s the direct quote, “SNORE”
How anyone could fall asleep with Mothra in their house is beyond me, let alone under their bed. I made sure parts of Ed were out from under the covers so the moth would get him first and then I covered up every square inch of myself under the blanket.
25 years don’t mean nothin’ when it comes to being attacked by a giant moth in your own house – it’s every man for himself!