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My favorite fiction reading is regency romance. I just completed reading Before the Season Ends by Linore Rose Burkard.
The author writes with rich detail(something that is sorely lacking in my own writing) similar in style to Georgette Heyer.
Miss Ariana Forsythe is resolved to the fact that her lot in life is to marry a clergyman–even after the young rector moves away and is replaced by a man older than her father.
Ariana seems a little silly as she pines for this older man who seems to have no other redeeming qualities other than he is a rector. Her parents feel the only solution is to remove her from the situation by sending her away to her aunt’s who is to sponsor her in her first season in society.
She is told to stay away from one eligible bachelor, Mr. Phillip Morney, because he has been known to destroy the social chances of other young women by his indifference to them.
A great story. Read what happens when she meets Mr. Morney at a picnic on his estate. Let’s just say she doesn’t end up marrying a Rector.
My father has this recurring dream that while standing he can bring his feet back(at the same time) against the back of his knees and fly through the air upright. So I guess he is more like a hover craft.
Sunday before last my family discussed the poor woman who found out years after the fact that her husband’s legs had to be cut off to fit him in his casket. Apparently, she had ordered the right size but the funeral home got it wrong.
My father is 6′2″ tall and, well let’s just say he is frugal. Okay, Okay he’s cheap. So I told him that if the 5′5″ casket is cheaper than the 6′2″ casket, then we might just have to cut off his legs. We could bend them back just like in his dreams and we’ll play I’ll Fly Away at his funeral.
By the way, my Daddy will probably outlive me. He is extremely young at heart– he has the energy to play hide&seek and ball with his grandchildren.
Charles Billingsley is a vocal genius, is he not?
1 Corinthians 15 (New International Version) : 20-25 & 54-58
20But Christ has indeed been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep. 21For since death came through a man, the resurrection of the dead comes also through a man. 22For as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be made alive. 23But each in his own turn: Christ, the firstfruits; then, when he comes, those who belong to him. 24Then the end will come, when he hands over the kingdom to God the Father after he has destroyed all dominion, authority and power. 25For he must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet. 26The last enemy to be destroyed is death.
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54When the perishable has been clothed with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality, then the saying that is written will come true: “Death has been swallowed up in victory.”[g]
55“Where, O death, is your victory?
Where, O death, is your sting?”[h] 56The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. 57But thanks be to God! He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.
58Therefore, my dear brothers, stand firm. Let nothing move you. Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord, because you know that your labor in the Lord is not in vain.
The October 3o, 2008 issue of the Wall Street Journal had an article about how springing forward to daylight savings time might be detrimental to your health. Researchers found that heart attacks increased by 6% in Sweden the day after the change to daylight savings time. Falling back an hour resulted in 5% fewer heart attacks.
I’ve always hated the time change in the Spring and loved it in the Fall. Now I know why–we need our sleep!
And I can attest to what a lack of good quality sleep can do to a child.
My son has always been a quiet, shy child. Because he was quiet and shy, he did well in school. In Kindergarden he had the highest grades in his class and of course, I was proud of him. His first grade year was going along just as well until the Spring came around. Something changed in him. His teacher started sending reports home that he was being disruptive in class. That was SO unlike my child. I had read another Wall Street Journal article that said that children who didn’t get enough sleep were more likely to be hyperactive. So I wondered if maybe he wasn’t getting enough sleep. You see, at that time, he was coughing quite a bit.
I took him to the Doctor with my concerns. The Doctor prescribed Zirtec for allergies. His Granny has allergies, so I believed that was the problem.
One evening, after being on Zirtec a few days, he was in bed reading from Dr. Suess. He stopped reading mid-sentence, got up and began jumping up an down on the bed with a crazed look on his face. I have never been more afraid in my life. I didn’t know what it was, but it wasn’t “right”. And I blamed Zirtec.
I set up an appointment with the Pediatrician. I described what happened. The Doctor performed the now familiar neurology exam and referred him to a Neurologist. The Neurologist scheduled an EEG. The first EEG was normal and I didn’t see any signs of anything odd.
The occurrences continued. I took him back to the Neurologist who suggested a sleep-deprived EEG. My husband and I, with the help of my father, worked in shifts to keep my son awake. It was a miserable night. He was having the “episodes” often.
To get the electrodes on his head, I had to get on the bed with him and hold him down, because he had two to three events while they were wiring him up.
I apologize for the poor quality of the video.
The episode looks fairly benign, I guess. But if I had continued videoing within 15 – 30 minutes he would have had another and another. He wasn’t getting a good sleep. His heart raced. His pupils dilated and as you can see he looks like he doesn’t know what he’s doing. And he doesn’t. Fortunately, by the time the seizures had gotten this bad, we had put the child locks on the doors of our cars, because if he fell asleep and he had a seizure, he would try to open the door.
The teacher said he was putting everything in his mouth–dirt, grass and he threatened to eat the teacher’s hair. He would get in front of the class to read stories he’d written–completely unlike him.
The anti-seizure medication is a miracle drug in my opinion(Thank you Glaxo) and he began sleeping through the night without the constant interruptions after about a week on the medication. He returned back to his quiet shy self.
When my son was in 5th grade it was decided to wean off the medication–with poor results. The seizures returned and he went for another video EEG.
In the video while he is awake, the seizure doesn’t start until after he is fiddling with a piece of paper which I believe is a lead that is supposed to be on his chest to monitor his heart. Notice how his fingers move and how he pulls at the covers and swipes his nose and then ends with his hands behind his head.
The Doctor said that maybe something had “changed at home” and that was the reason behind his behavior. But the only thing that changed at home was that we were no longer giving him his medication per the Doctor’s orders. The Doctor sent him home without medication that day and I was furious.
Of course, I took him to another Neurologist(Dr. Poplawski) who put him back on his medicine. I’m pretty cheap and I don’t want to pay for medicine if I don’t have to. But in this case I have to.
I write all this because tomorrow(Tuesday) my son goes for an EEG and a visit to his Neurologist (Unfortunately, not Dr. Poplawski who moved away to be head of Neurology at a hospital in the western part of our state)who I’m sure will suggest to take him off his medicine. I don’t want that and neither does my son.
Good thing my son doesn’t read this blog. He’d be mortified that I posted these videos.
I want my child to excel in school. He did at one time. And sometimes I don’t know if the reason he no longer excels has something to do with his seizure disorder or just that he is a teenager. Many people tell me it is because he is a teenager. Well then, this too shall pass as they say to people with kidney stones. But in the meantime it can be painful.
There are two movies that I find inspirational and Iwant to recommend them to you parents out there: Akeelah and the Bee and Gifted Hands: The Ben Carson Story.
I don’t know if Akeelah and the Bee is based on a true story, but I know that Gifted Hands is. I had read a book about Ben Carson and am amazed. You see, he was the “dumbest kid in class” and rose from that status to become one of the most well-known neurosurgeons in the country and heads the neurosurgery department at Johns Hopkins University. What made the transformation in his life–reading. His mother turned off the TV and made him go to the library instead.
It will come on again on February 21st on TNT at 9/8 c.
Picture me at a podium behind a presidential-type seal proclaiming, “I am not a cook.”
I am not a cook. Well, I’m not.
It’s not that I can’t cook, but that I just don’t like doing it. I’m slow at it, I have to clean up afterward and it gives me no time to do what I enjoy most–writing my wacky fiction pieces.(If you are a publisher/editor/movie producer, I would love to share my ideas with you).
This weekend I embarked on what I thought would be a life-changing event– once a month cooking.
You see, there are times I’m slightly embarrassed that I don’t cook especially when I cannot help someone in need like when my branch manager’s wife was in the hospital for two weeks(for which she received no diagnosis) and others were preparing meals for him and his children.
So, I got out a cookbook I’ve had for a long time–Once a Month Cooking, did the shopping for ingredients with the notion of cooking all day on Saturday. And I did. And I was somewhat miserable (except for the many episodes of The Doctors on my DVR that kept me company while I cooked). By two in the afternoon my feet were killing me, but I had all this meat that I didn’t want to spoil. (The premise of the book is to make the dishes ahead of time and freeze them until the night before you eat them).
By 7:00 pm I had not completed the cooking and I was exhausted (and it was Valentine’s Day and I wanted to feed my husband one of the dishes I cooked–which he liked, by the way). I decided I’d finish what I started on Sunday(the whole ox in the ditch concept–I didn’t want the meat to spoil), so I woke at 6:00 am and fixed two more dishes, then went to church and my parents’ house for lunch. I’m so lucky to have two wonderful nieces who were more than willing to come home with me and help me cook. They did and were a big help. We made a few more dishes together and then I got out the hamburger meat to start the beef dishes. Unfortunately, when I pulled out the ground beef, it was all brown and truthfully made me sick to think of cooking it, so I threw it away (which my husband thought was wrong–but he wasn’t the one gagging over it).
Anyway, we’ve had two meals and both were delicious. This cookbook will definitely work for the person who works fast in the kitchen and is too busy during the week to make a made-from-scratch meal.
The dishes I cooked: Heavenly Chicken and Poulet de France — both very good and I will probably fix again–just not all day on a Saturday.
Last Sunday was Sanctity of Human Life Sunday.
This week President Obama signed an Executive Order that would give our tax dollars to international organizations that perform abortions.
In the state of our economy, why would he give away our money for purposely killing babies?
Many people feel that the war has killed too many of our troops. And it has. But those men and women volunteered for the military. They understood the risk.
The unborn babies have no voice and no choice.
You know, when money is more important than life for some people, why didn’t Obama wait until our country had the money again to sign that unholy Executive order?
Could it be possible that the person that would find the cure for cancer was actually aborted by his or her mother because it would be too inconvenient to have a baby?
This is an old video, but I urge you to watch the whole thing.
First Lady Michelle Obama, does this appall you like it does me?You looked so classy at the inauguration. How can you let this happen?
The Fairy Tale is over.
My boss had the job of delivering notices of deaths for the Marine Corps.
I’ve had a chance to learn English Country Dancing and I am writing a historical romance(I read them too), so when I saw this music video on TV, I had to post.
Post update: I’m a little disappointed Taylor didn’t win Female Vocalist of the year. I like Carrie Underwood too, but Taylor writes her own music and that impresses me as a writer.
If you’re having problems in your marriage…
If you’ve grown apart…
If you hate your spouse…
If the spark of romance has long since been extinguished…
Then see the movie, Fireproof, starring Kirk Cameron.
I saw it this weekend and loved it. Go see it soon before it is out of the theaters.
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