Life in progress

Category Archives: Life


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I Could Have Died!

When someone famous (I thought it was Hemingway; upon investigation, I found that it could have originated from numerous people) said something like writing is easy: just bleed on the page, I don’t think they were talking about bleeding on the book after it’s written. But I almost did that today.

My friendly local UPS man came to my door with the first of two boxes of my books. I signed for it and hurried into the kitchen for a knife to open it. That was my first mistake.

As I sliced open the box, the knife slipped and I stabbed myself, millimeters away from the vein in my wrist.

It doesn’t look like much, but it’s deep.

So if you want to buy a copy of my book, for pity’s sake please buy it directly from Amazon and not from me! You may never get to read Book 2!!

There were only six books in this box – when I get the other 44, I promise to try to avoid slitting my throat. 😉

 


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#SoCS – Picky

I’m a bit of a perfectionist. Which is an oxymoron in and of itself, because how can you be an imperfect perfectionist? I suppose what it comes down to is some things I absolutely insist on getting perfect and some things I can say it’s good enough and leave it. But not without a lot of internal finger wagging.

I have to wonder how much of my perfectionism I’ve handed down to my kids. It’s really a bit of a disservice, when you think about it. Our kids inherit our fears, our dislikes, our prejudices, and yes, our insistence on getting things right. At least some of our kids do. I suppose it depends on whether you see perfectionism as a positive or a negative.

As I typed the above list of things that our kids inherit, I tried–I really tried–to write something positive, like our love of music or our appreciation for having a clean house, but these things are not always so. Yes, sometimes our kids inherit our positive traits somewhere down the line, but it’s more often they inherit the negative ones. I wonder why that is.

But I digress. Is perfectionism a positive thing or a negative one? I’m thinking it’s positive until it gets in the way of having a sound mind. I can drive myself crazy trying to get something right. But once it’s there, I’m happy with it. It’s a relief.  There also comes a point when I know I’m just being picky, which may or may not be a positive thing. It’s easier to let go of a picky point than a perfectionist point.

This picky post is brought to you by Stream of Consciousness Saturday. Click the following link and join in: it’s fun!! https://lindaghill.com/2017/07/07/the-friday-reminder-and-prompt-for-socs-july-817/

Have you picked up my new book, The Magician’s Curse yet? I now have three rave reviews and one pretty good one on Amazon.com. Check it out and please take a chance on an indie author!

(Note: In the online preview, the formatting (tabs and spaces between paragraphs) is off in a few places. The copy for sale does not reflect this. I’m working on getting the “Look Inside” fixed.)

On Kindle and in paperback:
Amazon US
Amazon Canada
Amazon UK
Amazon Australia
and Amazon where ever else you are in the world, as well as
Kobo worldwide.


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#SoCS-haustion

Ooooh, am I ever sore. This is going to be short and sweet more than likely (though who knows – I’m typing with my eyes closed and just coasting along on what’s left of my steam).

I walked with my best friend, John, and two of my kids to see the local fireworks display tonight. It was pretty spectacular, and the mood, being Canada’s 150th birthday, pretty warm and happy. I’m glad I’m Canadian. I’m proud of my country. But as much as I loved being included in the festivities, I’m happy to be home right now and almost ready for bed.

Just one last push up the stairs and then aaaaah… zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

This tired old post is brought to you by Stream of Consciousness Saturday. Click the link and check out all the other posts!https://lindaghill.com/2017/06/28/the-friday-reminder-and-prompt-for-socs-july-117/
And thanks so much to Dan Antion for helping me out this weekend! You did a fabulous job!


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#SoCS – Insanity Reigns

Well, I’ll give myself a pat on the back. This is two weeks in a row that I’ve missed my own prompt on the day it was supposed to be posted. My excuse this week is insanity.

It’s funny. I’ve been driving myself nuts with all the preparations and advertising and stuff for my book, and what have I been wishing for? Those nice, calm days when I was busy editing someone else’s work. Which is crazy for me, because normally I’m not happy unless I’m writing. Somehow I must know this, even when I’m not conscious of it and you wanna know how I know? Because I signed up for July’s NaNoWriMo camp.

Because I have nothing better to do. HA!

I’m totally rambling tonight. Can you tell? And I haven’t even been drinking. Not since the cup of coffee I had at dinner, at least. I did just put a bottle of white wine in the freezer so I can have some before bed though. Kind of insane, if you ask me.

I should probably rein in all this craziness. But that’s me. I can’t stop challenging myself and I have no idea why. It’s almost as though if I slow down, I’ll waste away to nothing. So I just keep piling it on. I may just explode one day. Though I should probably implode – less messy. And the last thing I need is more housework on top of everything else.

This post is brought to you by Stream of Consciousness Saturday on Sunday morning because I’m such a rebel. Click here for details: https://lindaghill.wordpress.com/2017/06/23/the-friday-reminder-and-prompt-for-socs-june-2417/


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#SoCS – Seek A Sign

I have two things I want to post today but I’ve been procrastinating since I got up while I tried to choose which one to post first. The two things are (or were) this SoCS post and my cover reveal for my new novel, The Magician’s Curse. As you might have guessed by now, I decided to grace you with this gem first. 😛 (I do think a lot of myself, don’t I?)

While I was dithering deciding, I was looking for a sign to tell me which order to post them in. I do that a lot – look for signs.

Forgive me if you’ve heard his one before – even if you have, it bears repeating. A whole bunch of years ago, while I was feeling sorry for myself because I was alone, I was looking for a sign that I wouldn’t be forever lonely. I used to do automatic writing back then, which isn’t really that much different than letting a character guide my writing when I’m penning a book. It seems to come from nowhere. Outside of the worldly realm. Whatever. Anyway, I don’t remember the exact details, but I wrote something like, watch for signs passing by. It made no sense whatsoever – you pass by signs on the road, not the other way around. At least that’s what I was thinking.

Then the next day I was driving somewhere, diligently looking at all the signs, when I looked up just before I drove under a bridge that crossed the road. There going across above me was a city truck full of road signs. Made me laugh – it’s something I’ll probably never forget.

By now you’re probably wondering what the sign was that made me post this before the cover of the book you’ve been waiting for since I first mentioned writing it four years ago when I started this blog. My sign was the dog wagging his tail in his sleep while I thought of writing this. Not as spectacular as signs passing by on the road, but I’ll take what I can get.

Watch out for my new cover, would you? Thanks. 🙂 Drumroll please…

This post is brought to you by Stream of Consciousness Saturday. Click the following link and see how you can join in! https://lindaghill.com/2017/06/16/the-friday-reminder-and-prompt-for-socs-june-1717/


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#SoCS – I Admit to Things

I have a few things to admit to today, it seems.

I admit that although I drive to the bus station, spend $4.50 to get on with Alex (because he loves bus rides) and do an entire route just to get off at the same station, it’s not all that bad, regardless of how much I complain about it. It’s one of the few times every week I get to observe people.

I admit to buying Alex a child’s ticket even though he’s sixteen years old. He’s small enough for me to get away with it, and it’s not as though he could get a job. His mentality is that of a six- going on two- going on adolescent-year-old.

I admit that I feel bad about the torture I put Belinda, my cover artist, through, considering I can’t pay her what she’s worth – a million bucks.

I admit that although I have my book set for release on June 27th, I have no idea how to organize a cover reveal (sorry, Belinda), or run a blog tour. (If anyone wants to help with these things once I get them figured out, please email me at bacamjoly at gmail dot com. Thanks!)

I admit to laughing at this until I cried

(Horrible of me to laugh – it’s all in the execution, though. That’s my excuse and I’m sticking to it.)

I admit to wanting to read all the other admissions in the SoCS posts this week because I’m nosy.

I admit that I’ve run out of things to admit to. For now.

This post is part of Stream of Consciousness Saturday … er … Sunday. Click the link and read all the other posts – you’ll find them in the comments. And join in – it’s fun! https://lindaghill.com/2017/06/09/the-friday-reminder-and-prompt-for-socs-june-1017/


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#SoCS – The Weather

Whether you’re from the east coast or the west coast or somewhere in between, if you’re Canadian, you love to talk about the weather. It’s our national pasttime, aside from drinking our Timmie’s and jumping into a frozen lake on the first of January. …okay, not all of us are that brave. I’m not that brave. Scratch that last one.

The weather was lovely today. I sat outside (in the car) and read my book for an hour while I waited for my son to get out of his movie. With the windows down and everything! (In the car, not in the movie.) I sometimes hate not being able to fix my grammar when I write a SoCS post. Why did I make up that rule? Oh yeah. To make it feel like we’re actually sitting down, talking together. My grammar isn’t as good when I speak, compared to when I edit what I’ve written. And let’s face it, who’s going to stop listening to me because my spoken grammar sucks? Wait… nobody listens to me anyway. Never mind.

What was I talking about again? Oh yeah, the weather. It went up to 24C today. Perfect. My best friend, John, came over and cut the grass – he brought his own lawn mower since mine kicked the bucket. Luckily I only have a front yard to worry about. The back is still just dirt. And speaking of dirt (and mud), I had a smell outside today that was so rotten that I called the gas company to come and check to see if there was a leak. Turns out my next door neighbour was emptying his pool of skunky water. Yeah, it was that bad. And where did he drain it? Let’s just say Winston’s paws were wet when he came in.

Thank goodness for my back door neighbour’s beautiful yard. Makes up for my muddy one and the next door neighbour’s stinky one – as long as I keep the windows closed and the dog in. But who wants to do that with all this lovely weather?

Stream of Consciousness Saturday (yeah, I know, it’s Sunday now – shoot me) is brought to you by me and my prompt, here: check it out! https://lindaghill.com/2017/06/02/the-friday-reminder-and-prompt-for-socs-june-317/

 


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Attack of the Puppy-Sized Spider

So I’m driving down the highway last night, cruising along at about 115km/hr (around 75mph) when out of the corner of my eye I see the silhouette of a spider crawling down my window.

“Oh God, it’s a spider,” I exclaim to my adult son in the passenger seat.

“I see it,” he says.

“Can you kill it? Without going across my line of sight?”

“Maybe,” he says. He’s panicking too. He hates bugs. He once tried to jump out of a moving van because we had a fruit fly travelling with us. No joke. Okay, he was three years old at the time, but you get the picture.

“If you can’t kill it, just watch where it goes. Tell me if it gets too close to me. NO WAIT! Don’t tell me.”

“Okay. I won’t tell you. But you might want to pull over.”

“I can’t pull over for a spider!! We’re on the frickin’ highway!”

“Okay, okay,” he says, sounding more anxious than ever. “But you don’t want to know where it is right now.”

“DON’T TELL ME! DO YOU WANT TO DIE?” We’re passing two transport trailers at this point, and I’ve sped up to 130 to get to the offramp. We’re almost home.

“NO! No, it’s okay. It’s nowhere near you.”

We stay quiet. I’m trying to sit as far away from the driver’s door as possible; I can see him looking my way out of the corner of my eye.

“It’s really dark,” he says. “I don’t see it anymore.”

I get off the highway and force myself to stay calm until we get to the parking lot of the nearest Tim Horton’s. As soon as I park the car I start looking for the beast.

“It crawled along your arm and into the back seat,” my son admits. “It was only this big though.” He holds his hand up and forms an “o” that’s less than the size of a dime.

“No, it’s huge,” I argue.

He looks at me, but says nothing.

“Well, thank you for not telling me it was crawling on me,” I say. “I didn’t want to die tonight.”

“Me neither.”

Then I say, “Okay, I’m going in to get a coffee. You stay here and look for the spider.” (It’s such a privilege, being a mom.)

“Get me a croissant,” he says. It’s the least I can do.

A few minutes later he comes into the restaurant. “I couldn’t find the spider.”

“Oh no,” I sigh.

I managed to get us the rest of the way home without freaking out last night, but we still haven’t found the spider. Despite the fact that it was the size of a puppy.

Anyone want a really cheap car?


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#SoCS – Smell

I have a funny smell in my house right now. I think it’s a bag of garbage that needs to get out to the garage. Maybe I should put it out before it leaves by itself. Yeah, it’s gonna grow legs soon – that’s how ripe it’s getting.

It must really suck to have a sniffer as good as my dog’s. I can throw a dog biscuit out into the back yard and he’ll find it with his nose. He’ll start with a wide circle and go around and around in smaller circles until he finds it. It’s a target.

Winston

He’s definitely a hound.

When I write, I try to include smells. It helps to put a reader into the story when they can relate a smell to a scene. So what would fiction for dogs be like? All smells with the occasional command stuck in that they can relate to?

Other dog, other dog, cat, food, bone, SIT! Pant pant omnomnomnomnom…

Bestseller. New Pork Times.

This (woof!) post is brought to you by Stream of Consciousness Saturday. Click the link and join in! https://lindaghill.com/2017/05/26/the-friday-reminder-and-prompt-for-socs-may-2717/


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#SoCS – All or Almost Nothing

All the time I’ve blogged up until now–all four and a half years–I’ve been jobless. Okay, I have the 24/7 job of single-handedly looking after my two disabled kids, but other than a paper route, I haven’t had a job that paid me anything. I haven’t needed to work due to the money my kids receive from the government, thank goodness. But that won’t last forever. If one of them decides to move out, or if I don’t receive as much money when Alex turns eighteen next year (which I expect will be the case), I won’t have enough money to keep a roof over their heads.

Thus, the career in editing. And my forced inattention to my blog and those who support it. It’s not an “all or nothing” situation yet, but you might have noticed that I’m not visiting you as much lately. It’s not a case that I don’t want to, believe me. There are just so many hours in a day.

To be honest, I feel almost guilty enough to stop doing the prompts. Although you seem to be doing okay without my input, I feel like I’m being rude. Please know I’m doing my best.

In other news, I’ve been trying to get out for walks more often. This editing gig requires a lot of time sitting on my butt, and I decided that before I’m able to take up the entire couch by myself, I needed to get some exercise. Unfortunately, my beloved waterfront trail is under water at the moment. Here are some before and after shots:

So instead of walking down at the waterfront, I’ve been strolling around the neighbourhood, taking pictures of doors and flowers and bunnies.

Join us in Stream of Consciousness Saturday! Click this link to find out how! You know what’s better than SoCS? Nothing!