We made it safe to California–made it to Mark’s folks’ house before midnight! Today, we went to visit his dad, who is still in a rehab center…it is unclear for how long, or what happens next, but between Jail vs Rehab he preferred rehab. But he recognized us, and smiled at me (and at my […]

Today we take off for an epic journey, to visit Mark’s family for Christmas. What with all the logistical pieces involved, this will take all day…getting to the terminal in time not to miss the popular mid-day Sunday ferry, driving to SeaTac offsite parking, waiting in the airport (probably for several hours, but the next-later

In some news: my first novel published yesterday! And lo, today I am poking around on the Amazon site, trying to figure out if anyone is buying it. Is 72,701 a good number or not? I understand that lower is better. I can certainly envision numbers lower than 72,701. But, there are many, many numbers

The day is finally here…you can read Eel River! We’re having a slow roll-out–first the Morrigan Books site this morning, now it’s also available on Amazon. Barnes & Noble is coming next, and then (I hope!) Powell’s. All e-books, for now; print version is coming later. It’s exciting and nerve-racking and…also strangely quiet. I mean,

We’re really being a bed and breakfast this week–more guests than we’ve had the whole time we’ve been here (well, not counting my family being here over Thanksgiving, which doesn’t really count, because they weren’t really strangers). It’s been fun, but busy! We’ve had SUCH nice people coming through, my goodness. We’ve exchanged contact info

So the time has finally arrived…Eel River is going to be released this week! Thursday, to be specific. Mark drew a beautiful cover for me: I will have ordering information for you as soon as it is available. Morrigan Books is the publisher, and they’ve done a beautiful job with it. It’s an ebook at

So, I’m not super cutting-edge…I imagine those of you reading this on LiveJournal can relate. 🙂 But I did sign up for a Twitter account a few years back…only a year or so after all the cool kids did. And I tried. I did, honest. But I didn’t GET it; it’s impossible to keep up

Reveling in the repaired oven, today I baked two batches of muffins (bran, and zucchini-pecan); then I made a batch of ice cream (mint chocolate chip again, because I like it so much). This time I NAILED it. Creamy, not icy; perfect texture. Yum! Other than that, I worked worked worked. Didn’t leave the house.

You know, in all the excitement, I don’t think I ever showed you a picture of the berry pie I made on Thanksgiving: Yeah, it looks homemade. Because it was! And I’d never made such a pie before. And it was delicious. So I’m counting it a win. Today was a nice quiet, get-stuff-done day.

Neighbors drop by, on the island. They come to the back door; and if you don’t answer the knock right away (because you’re deep in a novel [because RESEARCH, honest!] and under a pile of blankets) they open the door and walk in, calling out, “There’s someone at the door!” This is not a bad