Category Archives: trips

Cool Beans

Posted on November 12, 2007 | 2 Comments

Got some totally cool news today. The Eternal Rose has gone to a second printing.

This is a big deal for Juno. And it is a big deal for me. So, to all you folks who’ve read The Eternal Rose and told your friends about it–THANK YOU!!! And keep telling all your other friends. :)

Okay, so we drove, like, a bazillion miles this past weekend. When I say–well, actually, it was probably only 1400 miles–you will understand that the distance between 1400 and a bazillion actually isn’t that great, especially from the pov of the person actually experiencing driving all that distance in one weekend.

It’s not actually that far to drive to Clarendon and back–about 1200 miles. The extra 200 come from discovering that the Broncos were playing Quanah for the district championship for the first time since we moved to town, only they were playing IN Quanah, which is 90 miles away. So–despite the fact that we had already driven through Quanah once that day–we hopped back in the vehicle and drove Back to Quanah to watch a 1A high school football game. I also got to visit with a bunch of friends while we were there, who we wouldn’t have been able to see without going to the game. And then the Broncos lost.

Because the new town is so much larger, it’s not de rigeur to go to the Friday night football games here–but it still feels weird not going. We spent a LOT of years going to the game every Friday night, because we either had a kid in the band or playing football or both. It was pretty cold. We didn’t take our seats, and the metal bleachers were definitely cold. Daytime temps are pretty much the same on the coast or in the Panhandle, but the temp drops a whole lot more at night up north. No moderating influence of the water.

I’m trying to figure out plots now, and I think I want to rewrite Chapters 2 and 3 of White Elk from the opposite point of view. I’m also having to think about bad guys–what they want, what they’re doing that the good guys can stop them from doing, and it’s tough. I think I’m going to have to do that “think up 20 things to happen here” exercise, because there are just too many possibilities. I have to pick some things–that will need reasons for them to happen–and then the next events will lead from that. I’d rather be writing, but if I don’t know what’s going to happen, I’ll be writing in circles, and I don’t fly well into the mist. I need my roadmap, and I’m having trouble deciding where it needs to go.

The bad guys are in New Mexico. This limits some of the things they can do. They have evil witch powers of several varieties and are of several ethnic backgrounds. This expands some of the things they can do. They want power, because they want to do what they want to do without anybody stopping them or crossing them, and they want money because money provides power. Power feels good because it means they can do anything they want to anybody–they’re the boss dog. Taking stuff from other people proves their power, and taking a life is the ultimate power trip. So. This is where my bad guys are coming from–and now I have to figure out what steps they’re taking to acquire more power. What EXACTLY are they doing? How are they going about acquiring this power? Ugh. What do you think they ought to be doing?

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Posted in fantasy, pastimes, The Eternal Rose, trips, White Elk Red Sword, writing

Adventures in October

Posted on October 31, 2007 | 1 Comment


Busy, busy weekend. And I’m expecting L.K. Hamilton’s Lick of Frost on my front porch any time now, and when it comes, I’m pretty much going to drop everything and read (hmm, isn’t there a school program called that? DEAR?), so I thought I’d get a blog in while I could.

So, I went to a chapter writing retreat in Valley Mills this past week. As you can see, the little house where we all crowded in isn’t much, but it gave us privacy, a place to all squeeze round the same table, and a place to sleep, so we camped out for the weekend and talked writing. I got positively inspired. I’m still working on the Irish/Navajo story, but I brainstormed a plot for a two-page excerpt I wrote who knows how long ago that I always liked and thought could make a good story… and now, I really want to get to work on that one too. (The other picture is the view from the porch at our retreat place.)

Then, I headed to DFW to see the daughter while she was down in our neck of the country at her 10-year-high school reunion. (Good grief–do I have a kid that old?)(Guess so.) Her brothers came from Waco and Dallas and we had a great family visit. I can’t get any more pictures to upload, or I’d share some of the pics of the great big lugs riding on the kid’s toy tractor. They’re pretty hilarious. Oh, and the punkin my littlest grandboy painted for me. It’s adorable. And now sitting on top of my TV. (Hopefully, it won’t start leaking stuff before Halloween’s over.)

Came on home Monday, after taking the girl to the airport to fly home. The fella had to go to Austin with his board members Sunday, and came home on Tuesday just as I was heading out for the post office. It’s a lot farther away here than it was in Clarendon. Lot bigger, too. Anyway, last night, we had yet another thing to go to–at a Mexican restaurant this time (yum). Since there’s a big biker rally on the island this weekend–they’re expecting around 600,000 people to stop in–the “proper attire” for the dinner was Biker Gear. All I could find was a long-sleeved hoodie with a dragon on the front, which made it too hot to wear my leather jacket. Did my best, you know.

I’m told there’s an average of one death-from-stupidity per every 100,000 people at this biker fest. Rally. Whatever. Last year, one guy rode straight down 61st Street and right off the seawall without stopping. The fall killed him. He must have missed the ramp down to the pier, and gone off the side with the rocks at the bottom of the wall. Hope they’re smarter this year…

Beach report: Slower tides these days. Just one today, in fact–low tide at around 3 this afternoon. Lots of rocks on the beach, lots of gulls. Most of them were waking up for the day–except for one young bird who still had his/her head determinedly under his wing, sleeping late. Saw a one-legged gull again, and a cormorant, and a whole flock of the little skittery sand birds. Mostly I’ve seen them in ones and twos, but this was a flock. Saw a bunch of seagulls fishing, too. They were flying in a line, like brown pelicans do, but not as big, of course, and not flying nearly so high–maybe 3 feet off the water. Then they’d swoop down and fly along at less than a foot off the water for a stretch, then back up for another 10 or 20 feet, then back down. I think some of them dipped down to catch something every so often. Bigger waves–lots of guys in wetsuits with their surfboards. I even saw one coming out to surf as I was leaving.

While I have to wear actual shoes to walk, while it’s colder, I’m going to have to walk on the seawall sidewalk. I get too much sand in my shoes and track in up the steps and into the house, and I hate having to deal with the sand. If I’m in the flipflops and barefoot, I can wash it off on the driveway. Still, it’s going to hit 80 F (26C) most of the rest of this week. I could go later in the day and still walk barefoot…

Need to type things into the computer and see how many chapters of White Elk, Red Sword I have, and I can go work on the science fiction-y story… Need to come up with a title for that one.

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Posted in family, the beach, trips, White Elk Red Sword, writing

Wild Weekend

Posted on October 22, 2007 | 1 Comment


The harbor cruise was fun. We took the motor-powered cruise. Big ol’ boat that A&M uses for marine research of various kinds. Just six of us on the boat with “Captain Jim. ” Basically, we went down the harbor to the ship channel and back, didn’t go out in the bay at all. Lots of interesting stuff to look at. (This is the “other” boat, very much like the one we’re on. Took the picture while we were pulling out.)

We saw lots of cool stuff. The local cruise ship, getting loaded up for another Caribbean cruise… We saw the “tall ship Elissa,” from the water. Elissa is a museum herself, and also a working sailing merchant ship. Locals volunteer to sail her and keep her ship-shape.

There were also cargo ships unloading tractors and shipyards that didn’t look like they had any ships to work on. I think one of the shipyard things was still under construction. Besides all the big ships (including Coast Guard cutters and ferries and barges), there were people out fishing. Apparently it’s about time for the flounder run to begin and folks were everywhere, on the bank and in boats, catching fish while all these huge ships were pulled up to dock right across the water from them.

But the absolute coolest thing we saw while we were out cruising down the harbor was the bottle-nosed dolphins. A whole pod surfaced right in front of the boat–six or seven of them. I couldn’t get but three in the same picture–they were pretty far ahead when the big bunch surfaced, and not all of them came back up close enough for me to take their picture. But they were right there in the harbor along with everything else, swimming around like there were no ships or fishermen. Cool, huh?

And then we went to see Elizabeth: The Golden Age, because I’d been wanting to see it, and it was totally worth going to see. Loved the clothes…

Sunday, we got tickets to the Grand Opera House to a concert, and decided to go to that, since Moody Gardens–which was having “Free Day for locals” will be there next year (or whenever) and the pianist won’t be. The music was great, but Sunday afternoon is not a good concert time for this girl. Sunday afternoon is Nap Time, and I kept falling asleep in that dark theater, at least through the Brahms. I did stay awake for the Mussorgsky Pictures in an Exhibition–just because I like that music a lot.

There were a whole bunch of other things going on over the weekend…a bicycle “ride around the bay” benefit thing, I think a breast cancer walk, an art festival, I think there was also a jazz festival…and we just couldn’t get to all of it. (A couple of the cyclists got hit crossing the causeway, even though they had two lanes blocked off just for the bicyclists…)

So now, it’s Monday. Worked on White Elk this a.m., got the latest version of chapter 1 in the computer and sent off for critiquing. Hopefully I’ve added in enough emotion that it will work. Hopefully.

Beach Report: Went back out to walk this morning. They’ve been predicting a cold front for today since last week, but you couldn’t tell it by my walk. It was 81F (27C) when I got to the seawall at 8:30 a.m. And there wasn’t a lick of breeze anywhere. I have NEVER been on the beach when the air was so absolutely still. It was hot, walking this a.m.

Because it was Monday, and the beaches got groomed for the weekend, most of the seaweed was gone, unless it got washed up right next to the seawall. I saw a couple of chunks of floaty, crinkly kind. (Guess I ought to take a picture of that, too.) A few shells, more rocks, and a whole lot of rocks right next to the fishing pier.

But I saw something I’d never seen before, completely new for me, and totally cool. I guess it washed ashore because it had broken off something else. It was a chunk of hard, clear plastic pipe about 2 inches in diameter, with a metal plug on one end that had been completely covered three-quarters of the way around, and over the end with some kind of little mussels or clams. Each shell was about thumbnail sized, and attached to the pipe by some kind of…neck, or stem. Kind of an icky, fleshy, ribbed, dark brown stem. The shells looked thin, and they were triangular shaped, with rounded points, white with dark orange edges. Looked sorta like mouths with lipstick on, because the shells were all open, some with little critters sticking out.

I thought about bringing it home to take a picture of here, but the critters were still alive, and when they died, they would sure stink. So I tossed them back into the water (they washed back out again) for the seagulls to eat, if they ever figured out they were edible. (Maybe they aren’t. I don’t know.) The seagulls weren’t messing with them when I first saw it. It looked sort of like a rhythm-band instrument–a stick with little castanets stuck all over the outside to rattle together. It did rattle when I picked it up, as the shells clacked into each other…

So, anyway, that was the cool stuff I saw this morning.

Then, sometime later this morning, the wind swooped in out of the north, blew over the rubber tree and the purple ginger (I did pick them back up), and brought in the cold weather. By 2:30 p.m., it was 63F (17C), and blowing like crazy.

I may have to go out and check the beach at low tide tomorrow, see if anything cool can be found. We are told that this is the time to go beach-combing, because the wind pushes the water way out, and all sorts of things turn up on the sand…

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Posted in fantasy, movies I watched, music, the beach, trips, White Elk Red Sword, writing

Beyond Tired

Posted on August 15, 2007 | 1 Comment

Although I probably shouldn’t be by now. It’s Wednesday. I’ve been home (again) since Sunday evening. But I still feel like I’ve been dragged backwards through the bushes. And then maybe beat with a stick some.

I went to ArmadilloCon in Austin last weekend. It’s a science fiction/fantasy conference, was lots of fun, but dang, I’m really tired now. And it was hard attending when I hadn’t even been in the new house for a week. Still, I bet I’m the only one in a while who’s been put on both the sex- AND the religion-in-fantasy panels. We had a lot of fun doing the panels–laughed a Whole lot during the sex-in-fantasy panel–and I scored a necklace-and-earring set and a dragon print at the art auction. Both very cool and very lovely. (The jewelry is purple rock–and no, I don’t remember what kind it’s supposed to be–that will go very well with the purple rock earrings I already have.)

So, now the boy is down from college for the week. I need to go drag him out of bed so we can go to the washateria (all the laundromats around here seem to have that title) since we haven’t rented laundry equipment yet–and doing laundry in the garage is REALLY going to be not fun around here… The heat index has been in the 110s (43 C) the past few days–worse than in Houston because of the killer humidity.

We have had fresh boiled shrimp this week–bought at the grocery store, not a fish market, but still the freshest stuff I’ve had in a long time. Wonderful. My next goal for the week is to get out to the beach and get IN the water, sometime before the boy heads back to school. The grandboys are coming to visit next week (so the posts here will be sparse, I’m sure) and I plan to take them to the water several times, but their WunkaBob won’t be here then…

Cross your fingers that the books (The Eternal Rose) come in next week. The printer has promised them by then, but…

I’m trying to write, but not very hard. I got 4-1/2 pages done Monday, but there’s just too much to do. Went to Ikea to buy tables to set up for computer desks–and forgot to buy the second table. Sometime, when I’m back that way, I’ll have to get the second table. (sigh) That’s my project for today, though. To put the table on its legs. It’s bound to work better than the card table I’m using right now…

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Posted in family, fantasy, pastimes, the beach, The Eternal Rose, trips, writing

New Time Waster on the Web

Posted on July 30, 2007 | 4 Comments

Okay. I have a MySpace space. I’ve never really been able to figure out what to do with it. But some kind friend sent me an invitation to a NEW thing where I fit RIGHT in. It’s called SHELFARI. I guess as a sorta pun on Safari–I dunno. But it’s a place where you can list the books you’ve read, state your opinions on them, and find other people who like to read the same kinds of things you like. And make friends with them. And stuff. It’s GREAT!

Yeah, of course I’m there. Or here, as the case may be. I’ve found another place to put up the books I list on my private “personal reading log.” I share my “reviewlets” with the loop at Romance Readers Anonymous, and now I’m putting them up at Shelfari. So far, I’m only doing the books I’ve read this year, because I’m working like mad to get the books in the ABR boxes into my log before I move this weekend. So I can know which ones go to the library and stuff. So I do my 10 books at a whack, e-mail the list to the RR-A loop, then head to Shelfari to stick them all on my Shelf, then go back and paste in the reviewlets. It’s been lots of fun. I’ve found friends–I mean, friends I know in “real life,” there and waved frantically at them. (Oh! Yvonne “friended” me! Yay!)

So, yeah. I’m not writing. I’m trying to pack (put all the “essential” family pictures in a box this a.m. along with the essential cookbooks and the research books–and then actually managed to carry it out to the garage). Trying to keep things neat-ish. The real estate agent and a MLS guy came by today to measure everything. I’d been told they would come take pictures–I took some pictures last night, not including my still messy office–and copied them onto a CD, which I gave the agent. And they didn’t take any more pictures, so I guess they’ll use the ones I took. Hope somebody buys this house soon. It’s only 2 bedrooms, for all the size it has, so it may take a while.

So Shelfari is giving me something else to obsess about (aka waste time on) till I have to go pick the fella up at the airport on Thursday. I’ll go into town early and watch a movie, or something… 😉

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Posted in books I'm reading, life, pastimes, trips, writing

Hitting the Fan

Posted on July 23, 2007 | 2 Comments

Something has hit the fan. We shall not endeavor to figure out what the substance is. But it is not pleasant. I have been on airplanes, and spent the night in a place other than home without my suitcase. The trip started off good, but the ending? Not so much.

Went to the island to look at places to live. Spent 3 days doing it, looked at so many houses they started to blur together, and we have a place–or will in a couple of weeks when we hook up the U-Haul and head down to live in it. There is a great big deck. With a roof over it, so one can sit on the deck and admire the rain falling. It rained while we were looking on it. This is something of a temporary solution, but I think we’ll probably be here at least a year, so not that temporary.

We went walking on the Seawall one evening. It was fairly cool, and as long as the offshore breeze could reach me, it was pleasant, but it was so humid, when the buildings blocked the breeze, it got really hot. It’s going to take me a while to get used to the humidity, coming from West Texas, where there isn’t any.

The fella is currently staying in a little beach shack, even though it’s about six blocks from the beach (sounds close, but it isn’t) that really is a shack. The boards flooring the porch are a little too flexible, and a few are missing their ends. It has one living area, a bedroom with a twin bed, a bathroom and a little kitchen. It’s liveable, but not really comfortable. The futon we slept on had to be the most uncomfortable thing I’ve slept on since the floor. But it was good enough for a weekend visit.

We changed my flight to later on Sunday so I could stay a while longer and look at a couple more houses–and when I got to the gate at the airport in Houston, the flight was delayed about 45 minutes–but my connecting flight was delayed too. Then, when it finally arrived and they let us get on the plane, a thunderstorm had moved in and they shut down the ramp, brought all the baggage handlers and such inside. Which was a good thing. I didn’t want them fueling the airplane in the lightning either. But that meant I missed my connection in Dallas (the whole world connects in Dallas–if they’re not connecting through Atlanta). I could get off the plane, have the fella drive back into town and get me, or I could go on to Dallas and stay with relatives, and no suitcase. I went to Dallas. They had a toothbrush for me and a pair of clean underwear (a girl has to keep her priorities straight!)–(I will not return the underwear. I’m buying a new pair for her) and a bed to sleep in. And finally, a day and a half late, I am home again.

I am having domain crises, so yes, the website is down at the worst possible time, when the book is due out at any time. I will try to get it back up asap–but I’m not sure how long that will take, especially since I’m feeling poor. We will just have to see.

Oh, and I got to watch pelicans fishing. They are such huge birds in the air, and they seem to like to fly in straight lines, one behind the other, in groups of three or four. Not in a Vee, in a line. When they were fishing, they would go about 20 feet in the air, then drop like a rock into the water. Big splash, then they’d sit there a while, floating. Don’t know if they were swallowing or recovering from the belly flop (that’s what it looked like)–I wasn’t close enough to really see. But it was totally cool. Can’t wait to see it again.

Getting the steampunk book revisions in the ‘puter this week and printing it out to mail. Hope I get it all together. Have to pack my research books to move… At least we don’t have to worry about moving bookcases–this house has lots and lots of builtins.

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Posted in New Blood, steampunk book, trips, writing

Off We Go

Posted on July 19, 2007 | 1 Comment

Not so much into the Wild Blue Yonder, but off to the beach, anyway. Looking at houses. By August, I should be re-located. For the most part. I hope. So today, I’m trying to get everything ready to go–and mail a birthday present. The oldest grandboy will be six on Monday. (Ack!) I also packed up all the stuff I found at the house when I cleaned up. (Including the missing box for the video.)

I have written my 25 pages for the week. I wanted to go further, but I wasn’t sure where I was heading. The past couple of days, my characters have been walking somewhere–today they arrived, and I am not real sure what needs to happen here. I can figure out some kind of a scene, but what purpose would that scene have? How could it affect the plot? It needs to affect the plot in some way. So, I’m thinking I might do a flashback, use it to explain why my heroine stayed on the island.

I’ve decided on some major revisions, cutting out early scenes, mostly because what I’ve learned during research doesn’t match up with what I had originally plotted. Westerners were actually in less danger than Chinese in Japanese-occupied territory during WWII, even out of China, even those from nations at war with Japan. At least somewhat. And the plantation society was primarily male, so there weren’t many children needing teaching. Schools mostly came through the missions. And all this means major tweaking, especially to my motivations. Major plot events don’t have to change, but the hows and the whys will, and I don’t know exactly what those are going to be. So I guess I’ll have to think about that over the weekend.

I was going to post stuff about RWA conference, wasn’t I? Well, I forgot. I’ll make a note of it for next time…

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Posted in family, Thunder in a Cloudless Sky, trips, writing

And Summer Goes Slipping By…

Posted on July 18, 2007 | 4 Comments

I have been scolded for not getting a post up. It’s not my fault–or not so much. I’ve been away. And I’m about to go away again. But I’m here now and so I shall attempt to get up a quick post.

You may recall from earlier posts (like the one just previous) that I had the grandboys for a week plus. We had lots of fun, going to summer reading at the library and such. Spent more time that I liked hunting for a) video tapes borrowed from the library and/or b) the boxes said videos came in. I had to get out a left-behind golf club and fish one of the boxes out from under the TV stand. One of the boxes I still can’t find–but the nice ladies at the library said to bring it on back anyway. (the video, not the box, since I don’t know where the box is, so I can’t bring it back. But the orange video is sitting on the end table in the den.)

Then their granddaddy left town to go start his new job. (For some reason he thought that was important.) That wasn’t so bad, but then the son–the little boys’ daddy–didn’t make it to town till about a day later than we’d hoped. (Me and the little guys.) We did fine, but we sure were glad to see their daddy.

Then I took them all home, and drove down to Austin to see the parents and the sister & B-i-L who were down from the far northland to see my niece graduate from Air Force bootcamp. That was an adventure and a half, but we don’t want to make this blogpost too long. The picture here is of the niece getting her Coin the day before the official graduation. She was an honor grad, but I blurred most of those pictures. (sigh) Anyway, it was a lot of fun to get to go and see all the ceremony, where she lived, all that stuff, and to visit with the family.

I took Mama & Daddy home before the rest of them came back up, because they couldn’t keep up too well with all the “young folks.” We had a nice time shopping and “resting up.” Then it was time to go to Dallas for RWA.

That was an experience and a half. And I took Absolutely NO pictures while I was at conference. I don’t know why, except that I just didn’t feel like dragging the camera around. So I didn’t. I didn’t even get a picture of me with my Prism award.

Yeah, I won the Prism Award in the fantasy category, which is a pretty nifty and well-respected award for fantasy and paranormal (like vampires and stuff) romance, presented by the Fantasy, Futuristic and Paranormal chapter of RWA, for The Barbed Rose.

The Prism is given each year for the best published novel in several fantasy/SF/etc. categories (of the books that are entered, anyway). The other two finalists in the fantasy category were also LUNA authors, and I honestly never expected to win, which meant that when I did, and they asked me to say a few words, I had to fumble to come up with something. I sincerely hope I didn’t make an idiot of myself. I was absolutely thrilled–I’ve wanted one of these babies since I got to rub the one Robin Owens won…in Reno, I think it was. The award is a beautiful crystal…prism. It’s a pyramid engraved with the award name, the category, and the book title and author (me!), and it turns all sorts of lovely glowy colors depending on what angle you look at it. It’s sitting right on top of my desk (in one of the cleared off spots.)

I’ll write more about conference when I recover a little more. I danced a lot at the Harlequin party, and I’m still sore from that. A few of us tried to teach all the Yankees about the Cotton-eyed Joe, but I’m not sure how well it worked. Oh well. And then there was all the REST of the dancing.

I intend to post at least one more blog before I head down to the island for the weekend to look at houses. We shall see if I make it. I’m trying to write 25 pages on the World War II novel (working title: Thunder in a Cloudless Sky–because that’s what artillery firing sounds like…) by Saturday this week, so I can earn this month’s charm. It’s 25 pages for the month, and I haven’t written anything at all so far this month. (First boys, then out of town.) It’s looking pretty good. I’m up to 16.5 so far. Of course, I haven’t done a THING toward moving… except unpack the suitcases and divvy up the give-away books from conference.

Okay, done. I’m ending this too-long blog. Really. Now. I’m quitting.

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Posted in family, fantasy, The Barbed Rose, Thunder in a Cloudless Sky, trips, writing

Second Draft – Complete!

Posted on June 12, 2007 | 2 Comments

I’m trying to make a list of things I’d like to blog about sometime, so that when I think of something that would make a good blog, I won’t forget what they are before I get round to blogging them. Mostly I just wait and see what I can come up with on the spur of the very last moment possible. Which is what you’re getting today.

I finished typing New Blood into the computer today. (Yayyyyyyyy!!!!!!! – again, picture Kermit the Frog running around in circles, waving his little spindly arms in the air, going Yayyy) As a second draft, it’s pretty minor. I don’t make a whole lot of changes during the typing of the manuscript. But I do make some, and once it’s all in the computer, I can print it out, and go at it with the weedwacker. And it’s IN THERE!!

It does need a weedwacker. And some makeup and disguises. Maybe some wholesale demo and rebuilding. I have made notes–mostly mental, but today I did write some stuff down on the back of an earlier revision paragraph page. And it’s mostly, sorta readable. And I need to do the vast majority of this fixing next week.

Because the Dallas grandboys are coming to visit (I hope) the week after that. And half-a-week after that, I’m heading off to the parents to visit the sister and b-i-l coming to visit from the mountains, and after a week at the parents, I’ll head up to Dallas for RWA–and then…well, it’s going to be time to go home and clean up my office to sell the Panhandle house, so we can see about getting our Beach house. I might have about a week for that. Maybe two. Yeah. It’s getting busy.

But the book is in the computer.

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Posted in fantasy, New Blood, trips, writing

On Moving to the Beach, and Souls

Posted on June 4, 2007 | 3 Comments

The contract is signed, the commitment is made and I can officially talk about it now. The fella and I are moving to the beach–from the rolling plains of the Texas Panhandle 600 miles or so to the Texas Gulf Coast.

I’m really excited about it, even though it means leaving my wonderful office with its two big windows, and having to go through all my books–including way too many that I haven’t read yet. (Ugh.)

But we have always loved the coast–everything about it, from the salt water, and the sand and the seafood and boats–all of it. Okay, maybe not the hurricanes, but we’ve been living in Tornado Alley for 30 years. At least with a hurricane, you get more warning than you do with a tornado. I don’t think there’s any place that is 100% safe. It just depends on what kind of weather/nature hazard you’re willing to put up with. I’ll be happy living on my barrier island, and writing is one of those jobs that can be done anywhere.

A while back, I sent the daughter a book I thought she’d enjoy, because it was about math, and the mind and other strange things. I didn’t read it, because I didn’t think I’d be able to follow it. Instead, she was outraged when, not far into the book, the author stated that “‘mentally retarded, brain-damaged, and senile humans’ have less consciousness and therefore less of a soul than other human beings. But don’t worry, they still rate higher than dogs and bunnies.” (I’m quoting the daughter, mostly.) The idea that someone would actually think that her son had less of a soul than they did rightfully pushed all her buttons.

This guy appears to equate intellectual capacity with soul, which in my not-so-humble opinion is utterly false. How much soul would the merely stupid possess? How can you account for the apparent soullessness of many intellectually-gifted persons? Frankly, I believe that all humans are issued souls of equal value–and then we mess them up as we go through life. Innocence, which is found in the young, and in those whose mental functions differ from the norm, provides a purity of soul not often found in “normal” people.

Soul is not a property of the intellect. It is a property of existence. Of the human condition–whatever condition it might take.

I could probably go on, but I think I’ve been metaphysical enough for today. And I have stuff to go through before I start packing. Wish me luck.

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Posted in life, thoughts, trips