A Long Overdue Update

Life with the dogs has been crazy lately. After Tiberius went to the kennel for training, we had a couple of incidents with Emmy and Cookie. First they got into a fight and Cookie bit Emmy’s ear, requiring stitches. Lesson learned, Cookie wears her muzzle at all times, no questions asked, unless it’s dinner time, she’s in her crate, or John and I are walking them together. Two weeks later (on my birthday, no less) they got in another fight. I think Emmy’s paw got caught on Cookie’s muzzle, and the muzzle came off, allowing Cookie to bite her leg. Back to the vet for more stitches. Since then, Emmy has been staying with a friend of mine so she can heal in peace, and so Cookie and Tiberius can have time to become friendly without Emmy causing trouble.

The good news is, Cookie and Tiberius are starting to get along. Yesterday they played chase in the yard for a few minutes. Tibs licks Cookie’s ear, and lets Cookie sniff him as much as she wants. We’re not ready for them to go muzzle free yet, but we are starting to feel better about their relationship.

Tomorrow will be nerve wracking – Emmy is coming back home. I hope she’ll be healed enough soon so she can go to board and train. Bo wants to have her for 3 weeks, and at the same time Cookie for probably 2 weeks, to work with them together. So we’re making progress, but it’s been slow, stressful, and expensive.

On the writing front, well, see above. There hasn’t been much time for it, which has thrown my schedule off a bit. Or has it? I planned out what I need to have finished when in order to meet a September release date. (Don’t ask when in September…I don’t know yet. Probably mid month.) Basically, I want to have the rough draft finished by the end of this month. I’ve been aiming for 70,000 words to make it a similar length as Divided. But I think I’m finished telling the story in fewer words than that, so I’m polling some writer friends as to whether series books should be of a similar, consistent length, or if the story is told well, maybe it doesn’t matter.

The last bit of news is I’m going to have a booth at Contamination Defcon 4, the local horror and pop culture convention. I’ll be there all weekend, August 2-4. Stop by and say hi, and have some fun. I’m also planning to get a booth at Archon, but haven’t reserved that yet.

And now it’s time to get back to writing. I’m going to review my notes one more time and see where the story stands, then take the pups for a walk. I do have one more scene to write that I’ve been putting off, but I already wrote one difficult scene tonight. Maybe that one can wait until tomorrow.

Happy Mother’s Day!

Happy Mother’s Day to all moms, but especially my mom, who has sacrificed so much for me. My parents adopted me through Catholic Charities when I was 4 months old. Back then things were wildly different. My mom had to quit her job so she would be home to raise me – if at any time during the first year Catholic Charities found out she was working, they could have taken me back. After that, my mom remained a stay-at-home mom while my dad worked to support us. She wanted to be with me, and once I started grade school, she wanted to be home when I got home every day.

When I was around 10 years old (I don’t remember my age exactly,) we got our first computer. That’s when my mom started working again – she’s an amazingly fast typist, so she found a job doing data entry from home, which still allowed her to be there when I got home from school. I didn’t realize at the time how lucky I was for that. It was great to not have to stay at latchkey, and never have to miss social events because I didn’t have a ride there. My mom was always around to drive me wherever I needed to be.

As I got older, we definitely had our differences, but no matter how much she may have disagreed with some of my choices, she ultimately supported me in anything I chose to do. She was there to pick me up when I fell (literally and figuratively) and to provide a shoulder to cry on when my heart was broken. She is an unending source of love and comfort, and comfort food.

Now that I’m on my own and married, she still helps me out and is far too generous for words. I am so thankful to have the best mom in the world. Thanks, mom, for everything you do. I love you.

Changing the Way I Eat Part 2

As promised, here’s the second part of the post from yesterday.

The final change I’ve made to my diet is the time frame in which I eat. I’ve been reading a lot about intermittent fasting. It makes sense to me, and I know several people who have had great results with it. There are many ways in which you can do this. I have chosen to restrict the hours during which I eat every day. I only eat between 11am and 8pm. I’ve been doing this for 2 weeks, and have had mostly good results so far.

The Good
The first week I did this, I also started walking about 2 miles every day. I lost 5.5 pounds that week, and jeans which haven’t fit for several years now fit, as well as a dress I haven’t been able to wear for almost 10 years. To be fair, the dress is still ridiculously tight, but I can at least get it on without busting a seam.

The Bad
This is an easy way to restrict caloric intake. A little too easy. I find myself only eating 2 meals a day for the most part. Over the weekend I discovered that I need to be more careful about this. I ate dinner around 6pm on Friday. Saturday was a very busy morning, so I ate an Egg White Delight McMuffin (no cheese) from McDonald’s that morning and an orange juice, consuming a mere 300 calories. I didn’t get to eat again until close to 4PM. By that time I’d gone 22 hours with only 300 calories. I was feeling weak and sick, and had to eat very slowly when I finally got to a decent meal, because I was afraid if I ate too fast I’d throw up. It was not a good feeling. It bled over into Sunday and Monday, so those days I ate whenever I felt hungry so as not to exacerbate the problem. By Tuesday, however, I feel better and switched back to intermittent fasting.

The Lesson
I’ve been tracking my calories using My Fitness Pal on my iPhone. This lets me see when I need to eat more. Even after the weekend episode, there have been a few days this week when I still haven’t eaten enough calories. So I definitely need to look at how I can consume more calories.

I also found insufficient caloric intake to be detrimental to weight loss. After a while your body goes into starvation mode, and instead of losing pounds, it stores everything you eat. I gained 2 pounds back last week. Though that might also have something to do with the fact that I did not walk every day as I had the first week.

Overall, I like this plan of eating for several reasons. As with all “diets”, it just needs to be tweaked. Aside from the weight loss, it helps me to eat healthier. There’s a cafeteria in my building at work with all kinds of fatty, delicious breakfast foods. When I started working there, I gained 10 pounds from it. Now that I don’t eat until 11:00, it takes that right out of the equation. I’ve found that I need to play “tricks” like that with myself. I love breakfast food, and could eat it for every meal. So just telling myself, “I’m going to eat oatmeal instead of biscuits and gravy and bacon,” doesn’t work. Skipping breakfast entirely does.

I look forward to sharing more tips that work for me as I make more, small changes over time. What eating plan works for you?

Changing the Way I Eat Part 1

The past several months I’ve been making small, slow changes to my diet. About 2 years ago I gave vegetarianism a shot. It was easier to cut out meat than I anticipated, but I wasn’t healthy about it. I ate a lot of pasta, bread, and cheese, and not a lot of fruits and veggies. I was lethargic much of the time due to the lack of proper nutrition. I decided my health wasn’t worth a moral stance, so I went back to eating meat and immediately felt better. I still want to go back, but need to learn to eat my vegetables before I do, so I can be healthy about it.

From that and other drastic changes I’ve attempted in the past, I know the only way for me to change my diet is by small, slow changes. It will probably take me a few years to get the eating habits I want to maintain. But better to do it slowly, and stick with it, than all at once and only do it for a few weeks or months.

So far I’ve cut the following items out of my diet:

  • most soda – I’ll very rarely still have one, but it’s very rare indeed. In fact, yesterday I got a fountain Coke (usually a favorite treat) and it was too syrupy sweet for me to take more than a few sips.
  • most caffeine – I still have the occasional cup of tea or iced tea, but have switched entirely to decaffeinated coffee. I LIKE coffee, so decaf it is.
  • cow’s milk – I have switched to almond milk, and only drink 8 ounces a day, instead of the many many glasses I used to drink. Bye-bye liquid calories.
  • most cheese – This one is hard. I ADORE cheese. But I know it’s not good for me, and has loads of calories. Because my overall eating habits aren’t the best yet, and I’m awful at keeping food around the house, I am still allowing myself to eat cheese if it comes in the form of pizza. I will phase that out as well as I improve my skills at weekly grocery shopping and keeping food in the house.

    • My eventual goal is to return to vegetarianism – in a healthy way. I don’t think I’ll go full vegan, because eggs are a great source of protein (and that’s one of the things I struggled with 2 years ago,) but I will buy only free-range organic eggs. I also want to become gluten free, but that will likely be one of the later changes I make since I don’t know much about it and am sure gluten hides in many foods I wouldn’t think about. I have a friend with Celiac’s Disease, so I’ll be able to get help from her when the time comes to make that change.

    I’m not just cutting things out of my diet though. I’ve added:

  • Amazing Grass Green Superfood. (That’s an affiliate link for The Minimalists, the ones I learned about this product from.) I mix it up in my almond milk once a day, and it gives me more energy. The berry flavor tastes great (though it looks kind of gross.)
  • I also add about a teaspoon of organic apple cider vinegar to the above mix. I just started this a week ago, but it’s supposed to be good for your skin, and helps keep mosquitoes away. Mosquitoes love me, so I hope this works. And no, it doesn’t alter the taste of the above mixture.
  • I take a teaspoon of raw honey once a day. This provides small amounts of pollen exposure to my body to help it fight allergies. Again, I just started this a week ago, so can’t report any results yet. In order for this to work, it must be raw, local honey. The junk you by in the grocery store is useless. That’s pasteurized and all medicinal properties are leeched out of it. It must be local, because that’s the pollen you’ll be subjected to.

    • There’s one more change I’ve made, but in typing this up it’s gotten much longer than I anticipated, so I’ll post the second half of this tomorrow.

    Trading Dogs

    On Saturday we went to the kennel for another training session with Tiberius and Emmy. We put them in the play yard with some other dogs. When he let the first dog in, Tiberius immediately ran to him and tried to start a fight. Bo broke it up immediately, and by the end of the session Tibs was behaving better, but we learned that he also needs a lot of socialization, and is probably more the problem than Cookie. Very good to know, because it helps determine the best plan of action for training. We also learned the Emmy acts as Tiberius’ backer, his wingman so to speak, but on her own she’s just scared of almost everything.

    We also found out Cookie had hurt her foot and wouldn’t put any weight on it. Bo, the owner of the kennel where Bo does his training, John, and I all looked at it and couldn’t see anything wrong with it, so decided to wait a few days to see if it healed on its own. Turns out it’s not getting better and she still won’t put weight on it, so Bo can’t train her.

    This afternoon Bo is going to come by and bring Cookie back, and take Tiberius to the kennel with him for a week of socialization and training there. He’s also going to spend a few hours working with Cookie and Emmy together. Based on what we saw Saturday, Bo thinks that once Cookie and Emmy get together without Tiberius around, they’ll bond quickly. I certainly hope so, because otherwise life is going to go back to extremely stressful and hectic working to keep them from fighting. But whatever the case, it will all be worth it in the end.

    Today is going to be a very sad day for me. John will be at work, so I’m the one who has to watch Tiberius leave. He’s my furry shadow, my special little man. I have no doubt that I’ll cry when he leaves. Yes, I’ll be happy to have Cookie back, but I’m not as bonded with her yet as I am with Tibs. I’ve had almost 6 years with Tibs following me around the house. This will be hard.

    Musical Exploration

    Yesterday I stepped WAY out of my musical comfort zone and listened to several bands that I would normally declare to be “not my style.” It started on the drive in to work when I wanted to listen to something upbeat, but nothing on my iPod caught my attention, so I decided to listen to some Christina Aguilera. I’ve always agreed she has an amazing voice, but her music just isn’t “my style” so I never gave it a chance. Turns out I quite like some of her songs. Not all of them, but I could easily find several to add to a workout playlist.

    Then I moved on to the new releases section of Spotify with groups I’d never heard of. First I tried Major Lazer. No thank you. Same with Charli XCX. Then Olly Murs. Oh my gosh yes, why has he not been in my musical repertoire? I really love his music and have listened to the album twice since yesterday already.

    Next I listened to Adam Lambert. I’ve wanted to hear his album ever since I saw him on American Idol. (I don’t watch the show…I rather hate it, but my parents watch it, and sometimes when I’m over there I’d get stuck watching it with them. But I digress.) So I was really impressed with him on Idol, and I’m not sure why it took me so long to check his album out, but again, I really like it!

    Finally I stepped so far beyond my comfort zone I almost hesitate to admit this. I do not like boy bands. Period. I never liked New Kids on the Block, even though they were the BIG THING when I was a teeny bopper. I never liked NSync or Backstreet Boys. Just…no. But a friend of mine is a massive fan of…it’s hard to type this…One Direction, and I finally decided to check out what she liked so much. So what’s the verdict? Well, I can’t say I’d listen to them on a regular basis, but they didn’t make me want to stab knives into my ears. Actually, I think they’re fairly talented, and I just might listen to them of my own volition again at some point in the future.

    So what’s the point of all this? Stepping out of your comfort zone on any subject is a good thing! No matter how certain you are that you will absolutely, beyond a doubt, despise something, give it a try. You can’t truly say you hate something unless you’ve tried it. I can say I think baby octopus is the most disgusting thing I’ve ever eaten. But I can say that because I tried it. (True story.) And I can now no longer say I hate One Direction. It was a stupid thing for me to ever declare having never listened to a note of their music.

    What new thing are you going to try today that you’re certain you’ll hate?

    Board and Train

    Bo from Kranky K9 Dog Training came to our house on Saturday to work with Tiberius, Emmy, and Cookie, and see what the situation was. It turns out Cookie is definitely the instigator, and has a pretty serious case of dog aggression (not an ounce of human aggression though.) We took them all on a long walk to tire them out a little. I was amazed at how well they walked. Up until now I have never consistently walked my dogs, because they pull on the leash something awful and it’s a miserable experience. But Bo told me to get prong collars for them. I’ve always been against them, but obviously my method of training wasn’t working, so I decided to give it a try. I tried it on myself first and gave it a good yank so I’d know what they would be feeling, and it’s not nearly as painful as I expected. Not fun, but not awful, and not injuring. And they walk almost perfectly now!

    After an hour and a half, Bo said, “I don’t know, you might have to find her a new home,” which almost made me cry. But he’s not one to give up, so we kept at it. Another hour and he was hopeful we could work the mess out. But he strongly recommended 3 weeks of board and train, where Cookie will get 3 sessions every day with Bo. Knowing that the situation is far beyond my limited capabilities, I sadly agreed. He picked her up yesterday morning at 9:00. I already miss my Cookie Monster. But I’m hopeful Bo will be able to get everything worked out. He’s been training dogs for 10 years and was the first in the area to deal with severe aggression cases. He knows what he’s doing.

    In the meantime, we’re also taking Tiberius and Emmy to 10 sessions with Bo. The first was on Sunday, and I’m already amazed at how much we’re all learning. I really enjoy working with them daily, and can’t wait for our next session on Thursday to find out what we’ll learn then. They’re already starting to learn to walk right alongside us instead of pulling ahead, and to pay attention to us. We’re also working on crate training. I learned that crate training is far more than getting your dog to go into a crate for a treat. It’s getting your dog to go into a crate on command, for NO treat, and for him to stay in there, even if the door is wide open. Bo told me Tiberius has some crate anxiety, which I didn’t realize. I thought he just whimpered because he didn’t want me to leave. True, but that equals anxiety. He’s already getting more comfortable in his crate. And they’re learning not to walk through doors ahead of us. Before going through any door in the house, they have to sit and wait for us to tell them it’s ok to go through, even if I walk halfway down the hall before saying so. I am amazed at how quickly they’re learning all this.

    Part of the training is to walk them twice a day. So I’ll be getting up an hour earlier every morning to take them on a long walk, and walking them again in the evening. This will be good for me too – forces me to FINALLY start a regular exercise routine! And since they walk very nicely now, it’s also very enjoyable, and it’s nice for John and me to do something outside of the house. We tend to be homebodies if left to our own devices.

    If you’re curious, here’s Kranky K9′s YouTube page. Bo said he’ll post some videos of Cookie. There aren’t any up yet as of typing this, but I can’t wait to see how she does. We’ll also get to see her Thursday, because he’s going to bring her to our training session with Tibs and Emmy to see what progress he’s made already.

    Lessons Learned from My First Book Launch

    I’ve done loads of research on self publishing, and thought I had a pretty good handle on what I needed to do. And for the most part, I did. But there were several things I completely overlooked and was left scrambling to complete in time. Some are minor, some…not major, but big enough that they left me a bit frazzled until they were resolved. So for anyone reading this who is looking to self publish a book, here’s what I learned publishing my first novel. Be sure to read to the end…I saved the biggie for last.

    Contact local independent bookstores at least a month in advance.
    A week before launch the idea finally popped into my head to do this and ask if they would either be interested in carrying a few copied of Divided, or hosting a book signing. So when Subterranean Books said, “Yes, we’d love to have a book signing for you, how about April 4?” I realized that wasn’t the best plan as far as selling paperbacks goes. I accepted the date happily, but next time will ask much further in advance. By not having the signing until 3 weeks after release, and wanting people to buy the paperback at the signing rather than online, I had to ask locals to please wait to buy the paperback. I know they understood since it was friends and family I asked this of, but still…I could have planned that better.

    Leave PLENTY of time for reviewing the paperback proof, then leave some more time.
    I thought 2 weeks would be enough time. But then I got the proof (which I’d paid out the wazoo for expedited shipping.) And I needed to make changes. So then I ordered another proof (which I decided to wait for the regular shipping speed.) Then I got the second proof, and there were still some things I need to fix. Then I paid for more expedited shipping for a third proof. But I finally got it right.

    Have at least 2 sets of eyes proofread your manuscript.
    Especially if you can’t afford professional editing. My editor was amazing, but she’s not professional. My dad scanned through the manuscript and found some more errors (he’s amazing with grammar.) Even then, my mom found some more typos when she was read the book. And someone else found a typo that everyone else had missed, and it was a biggie! The good news is, you can update the Kindle file easily at any time. I hope I can afford professional editing with my next novel, but even if I do, I’ll still get a second set of eyes, because no one is perfect, not even if they’re paid for it (though they had better be close.)

    When working with a cover designer, you need more than just the cover.
    Some things I wasn’t prepared for – author bio, author photo, back cover blurb, and – most importantly – how many pages is the book? That is vital for the designer to know if you’re asking for a paperback design as well, because that will determine the size of the spine they create. Also, don’t depend on the PDF to tell you the correct page numbers. I guarantee it will be wrong. Be sure you upload it to CreateSpace (or whichever printing service you’re using) and let it tell you the page number. Once I thought we were completely finished with the cover, I had to ask Denise for one more update to the spine size. I was completely unprepared for all that.

    Not only do you have to buy ISBNs, you have to buy a barcode too!
    OK, you don’t have to. If you want to stick strictly with Amazon, you can use their free ISBN service. But I wanted to own my ISBNs, so purchased a block of 10. I didn’t realize that didn’t include barcodes, and each barcode is an additional $25. You only need that for the paperback though. Speaking of barcodes…

    Have the barcode BEFORE giving the final approval on your cover design.
    Or have some knowledge of how to edit PDFs on your own. Denise had left a white block on the back cover of the paperback version of the cover for me to insert the barcode. Problem is, I don’t have Photoshop, and even if I did, I don’t know how to use it. I really didn’t want to bother her yet again with yet another update, and was lucky a good friend of mine is extremely proficient with Photoshop, so she was able to update it for me. But if I’d had the barcode before, I could have just sent it to Denise and she could have inserted it for me. (I’m sure she would have anyway if I’d asked, but I felt like I’d been a big enough pain in the butt already.)

    Have business cards with your name and website, and the name of the book, made.
    I only figured this one out after talking with complete strangers in my physical therapy office who showed interest, that it would be nice to have a pretty card to give them rather than a scrap of paper with my name scribbled on it. I have them in hand now, but would have been nice to have much sooner. Maybe even include the release date if you plan to hand these out before it’s available.

    And last, but certainly not least…
    I would have done the free promotion through Amazon’s KDP Select (Kindle Direct Publishing Select) later.
    There were people who were going to buy Divided regardless of whether or not it was free. At first I thought that making it free for a few days right from the start was a nice move since the paperback wasn’t available yet. And it was. But I think most of these people would have bought the ebook anyway. And if they weren’t going to buy the ebook AND the paperback, they weren’t going to buy the ebook at all. So I kind of feel like I lost out on a chunk of sales from people who would have otherwise paid for the book.

    I have nothing to compare the effectiveness of the free promotion to since this was my first book. So I can’t say if it did any good or not. I’ve been listening to several podcasts and reading a lot of blog posts about the debate over whether the free promos do any good anymore. For myself, though, I simply don’t know. I don’t think I’m ready to write the program off entirely. But I do think that when I released Ravaged, I won’t make it free immediately. I might make Divided free at the same time Ravaged is released, or maybe for a few days the week before, to help drive sales. But I’ll wait until sales slow down to make it free so I can give it a boost.

    What Questions Do You Have About Divided?

    A few people have mentioned things to me that they can’t wait to see how they pan out in the next book. Some are things I hadn’t consciously thought of yet. That’s one of the dangers of being too close to a project…you forget that there are some things in your head that haven’t made it to the page yet. So, that being said, if you’ve read Divided, what are some questions you have that you’d like to see answered in Ravaged? I can’t promise to answer them all in this book, but I’d love to hear from you and get your input.

    I’ve been listening to the Writing Excuses Podcast, and it’s gotten my wheels turning. On the way to work this morning I listened to episode 8.4 about side character arcs It made me think about some of my secondary characters, and how I can really flesh them out a lot more. I think I can even add a bit more life to Vittorio in the next book. I have some great villains, but when I think about it, I don’t know much about them. They’re really kind of two dimensional at this point. Which is perfectly ok, because it’s the rough-rough draft. But it kicked the idea into my head that I need to learn more about these characters and what makes them tick. So my next task might be to do some free writing to learn more about them. Words that will never make it into the novel, but are necessary to make the novel great. I think I’ll get to work on that tonight, as soon as I eat dinner (because my stomach is growling quite loudly at the moment.)

    My First Book Signing was Amazing!

    WOW! That sums up my signing. Thirty-three people showed up! Thank you so much to everyone who was there. I can’t express how much your support means to me. We packed Subterranean Books! Tori, the wonderful girl working, told me this was the largest turnout they’ve had for a signing, so again, WOW!

    I was a bit nervous about reading my work to people…especially people I know. I wasn’t worried about the intro or Q&A, but reading my own stuff…that’s nerve wracking. It went well though. Tori introduced me, then I talked for a few minutes about myself and my writing, then read the first two chapters of Divided. After that was a Q&A and there were some really wonderful questions, some that gave me ideas for some possible bonuses to post here on my blog. I’ll have to see what I can come up with.

    After the signing about half of us went to Blueberry Hill for appetizers and drinks. I have the best parents in the world, as that was their idea and they paid for it. Thanks so much Mom and Dad. It made the night even better, and it was so fun to hang out with people afterwards.

    John recorded the whole thing, and it turned out pretty well, especially considering I’d just bought the camcorder that day and we’d never used it before other than a few minutes messing around to figure out the controls. So here it is. Something happened in the middle of the Q&A and the recording stopped, then starts up again a few second later in the second file. So watch the longer one first.

    I really enjoyed myself and can’t wait for my next signing. I hope Subterranean Books will have me back for it…though if too many more people show up I’m not sure where they’d all go! What a great problem to have!

    The videos were too big to upload here, so here are the links to the videos on YouTube. Enjoy!

    Part One
    Part Two