Nothing special

Just considering my "book" story about my CIA girl assassin.  I think she should be a karaoke fan and burst into "It's a Man's World" every once in a while.  Maybe translate it into Farsi.  

Remembering when we made our own fun and it didn't cost a thing....

I am remembering the childhood version of the upcoming candy fest, Halloween.  When we were kids, the best place to go trick or treating was in the nearby streets close to Grandma Berglunds house. 

We carefully went to houses that had the lights on.  When we got back we looked into our brown paper bags a bit more carefully to inspect the home made goodies.  There would be popcorn balls, cookies, fudge, candies and the occasion toothbrush.  We thought actually getting one of the miniature individually wrapped candy bars was an absolute treasure.  Mom did hide the bulk of the candy.  I am a bit fuzzy about whether we ever say any of it again. 

Grandma Horn had a recipe for Hawaiian Penuche.  It was mostly brown sugar, butter, walnuts and pineapple pieces.  Sweet enough to send you into instant diabetic coma.  She always used a Paul Revere ware sauce pan and my main job was to scrape out any left overs and lick the spoon.  Grandma Horn was VERY good about getting everything out of the pot and into the dish.  There was never very much to clean up..dang it.  But I was a faithful hanger on. Now as for dressing up in costume, forget about it.  We were considered adequately clothed and costumed if we maybe had a mask or something and it was always cold in Gem county.  That was fun. 

Now as an adult, at one point I lived in a very popular mobile home park.  We got slammed by the helicopter parents and children and, oh can we get a treat for the baby in the care?  Uh sure. So we do not participate in the event here.  The cost of candy along can become staggering, then costumes and parties and Lord only knows what else.  I read somewhere that America was going to spend something like two BILLION dollars on All Hallows Eve.  Oy Gevalt.

Long Delayed Book Report

I just completed re-reading all three books about Spot an Smudge by Robert Udulutch.   The second book is Glasgow Grey and the third book is Let Slip The Pups of War.  I found them purely by happy accident. 

I am not particularly enamored of Dog stories, well except I loved Beautiful Joe in the fifth grade.  I liked Lassie stories books and television until one episode they had Lassie herding baby chicks for some god awful reason and whining of course  Nope, no more Lassie re-runs, Lassie had jumped the shark.  T

he first book opens somewhere in the more rural bits of South Boston area.  The family involved are the Hogans and the Walkers.  Ben Hogan is 11 an gets bullied a lot.  His older sister, Kelcy is not afraid to wade in the fight with fists fly given the situation. Their parents Dan and Aila are good loving parents. 

They had recently decided to move out of Boston proper to live with Mimi the Scottish grandmother.  You will learn LOTS of Scottish slang. At any rate Kelcy was working part time at the local Veterinarian. 

There was an international plot afoot wherein a very ancient Chinese power family that runs Hong Kong, Kowloon and southern china obtained a whole bunch of barrels of chemicals.   These chemicals were mixed into dog food.  Orphaned pups were fed the dog food and the clan was experimenting with using dog meat in the local Chinese restaurant special special and testing the populace for any signs of acceleration in intelligence etc. 

Some rather incompetent locals were raising the dogs and some of the chemicals were spilled.  One pregnant mixed breed dog got away and hid under the Hogan/Walkers hen house and gave birth to two black pups before she died.  Ben found the pups and the race was on to save these two tiny puppies.

Now another component of this story was that the chemicals were owned or paid for by a ruthless Russian oligarch who trains assassins and he wants the chemicals to accelerate soldiers.  The FBI is trying to determine what every one elses move is next and the Hogans are in the middle of this mess.  This is just the first book.  Do go get it.  It is available on Kindle.  I LOVED it.

Bravest New World of Film Making etc.

Day dreaming is such fun.  I like to do more or less organized day dreaming pending winning a very large lottery or someone unknown to me bestows a larger monetary tax free gift to me of oh say 500 million.  I have a few projects in mind. 

I would very much like to purchase movie rights to the first three books by S.M. Stirling regarding his novels of The Change; Dies the Fire, The Protectors War and a Meeting in Corvallis.  Also, I would like to purchase the rights to Mr. Stirlings Nantucket novels, Island in the Sea of Time and the two following. 

Also on my purchase list are at least the first three books of Pern by Ann McCaffrey. 

If Lynn Kurland could be interested I would love to make movies about her first book A Dance Through Time.  Having gainfully employed several lawyers in obtaining these rights, I would seek an excellent CGI vendor. 

As far as casting is concerned I would only be interested in people who had actually read the books of whom I would ask questions such as "Where is Ruatha?" and "Who is Mike Havel?" and "Who is Elizabeth Smith?".  I would also entertain producing in Bollywood versus Hollywood versus China. There is talent everywhere.  I would also be very interested in exploring the vast area of secondary markets. 

As for casting the main characters, I have a very firm idea of the ideal actress for Captain Alston.  She should be a younger Grace Jones. Mike Havel is clearly described in the book, he is 28 of Finnish/Anishinabe descent, an ex Marine, a pilot, he is 5 foot 10 inches and tough as nails. Mike should be a 28 year old (I shudder to say this) Tom Cruise.

I would cheerfully bribe some big names to command these projects.  Big Names.  Preferably ones who come to me with serious inquiry, Maybe George Lucas would like the Pern projects, or we could draw names out of a hat. Get busy people.  There is work for many thousands of people for a decade or two.  Lets get busy on the money then. 

JUST MENTAL MAUNDERING

I received my Amazon order of various Christmas cards.  Then I got to thinking, why I think I ordered some cards a few months ago. So I searched the roll top and sure enough I had several squirreled away. Note to self, put them all in the same place.

Also the other day when I went shopping at Safeway in North bend I purchased two gigantic bottles of calcium pills.  Tim dragged out a big baggie  with two largish bottles of calcium from storage. 

Well crap! I'm turning into Mom.  When we cleaned out her apartment we took all her extra unopened bottles of lotion and shampoo to the local long term care facility. It's going to be bad enough, I have 3000 plus books that need to be sold, given away, burned. Libraries get rid of books all the time. They won't want this collection as many of the books are over 20 years old.

Another worry is that when I die, husband will continue to hoard.  You think we have enough paper product now? Just wait! 

WE WILL MISS YOU

With apologies to Queen.   Gale wrote on her blog that she wanted this done at her funeral.  I have seized the day and cabbaged lyrics, tune is unabashedly Queen, but it is doubtful this will ever get sung. 

"We Will Miss You".

CLAP CLAP (stomp)
CLAP CLAP (stomp)
CLAP CLAP (stomp)
CLAP CLAP (stomp)

Baby you're a girl, make a big noise playing in the yard gonna be a beauty some day. You have stuff on yo' face, flashing your smile all over the place. 
WE WILL MISS YOU
WE WILL MISS YOU.

Baby you're a young girl, smart girl. Shoutin' in the road, gonna take on the world one day. You got pride on your face, you won the race, wavin' diplomas all over the place. 
WE WILL MISS YOU
WE WILL MISS YOU.  

Baby you're an old lady so we're told, you made your peace, it made you bold. You got love on your face, amazing grace. We'll all help you to the better place. 
WE WILL MISS YOU, MISS YOU
WE WILL MISS YOU, MISS YOU. 

If Weird Al gets ahold of this.....

More stuff that rhymes but will never be matched up with a tune...ever...

I do not possess an advanced degree in English. However, I have come to appreciate some forms of poetry. I really like Haiku. There is something very satisfying about squeezing something beautiful regarding man and nature into three lines of 5 syllables, 7 syllables and again 5 syllables. My Haiku tends to be sarcastic and at times darkly humorous. Haven't written any in a very long time. Wait, I forgot that an Alaska friend posted a picture of her black cat, Elmyra, gazing fixedly outside to the leaves in the back yard. She challenged everyone to write a caption. 

Fall in Anchorage

sure does not last very long

crap I can smell snow.

Or something on that order. Meh...

I was idly channel surfing and caught the last five minutes of Oregon Art Beat. There was a short piece about the Total Eclipse of the Sun and the celebration that went on for those two days. It looked a bit like Burning Man met the Hippy movement and relocated to the path of the solar eclipse. I jotted down a few lines.

Brief digression regarding the first sentence in this thing. I did take regular English at BSU, the class was taught by a vastly superior English God? And we learned quickly not to ask questions about anything. Some poor soul asked about the verb To Be. I swear he lectured a solid 15 minutes reciting every paragraph from the dictionary. Not a peep out of anyone the rest of the semester. At one point I rather rashly turned in an assignment that included a poem that I had written. He pointed out that it was not a poem and merely a quatrain. Er...thanky. I think I got a B out of that class only because I followed the requirements for writing a research paper including footnotes and citing references religiously. The subject was “King Arthur's Court” and then did a comparison of Mark Twain and who ever wrote about King Arthur. Thus ends the circular metaphor (more of an interruption) regarding English et al.

To return to the twiddles I wrote on a scrap of paper last night whilst ignoring the telly.

90 th anniversary of US Total eclipse of the Sun.

Hippies, some poets, on lookers were looking

people with tailgates were set up for cooking.

Burning Man came for some celebrating others brought colorful barrels and crating.

There was free style prancing and proud native dancing.

There were parents and children out getting chilly. 

All the dogs kept barking, the cats were not silly.

There should be another verse about the traffic etc. The verses rhyme but the scansion sucks. This has potential to be sung as a folk song but Bob Dylan is busy.

I just finished banana pancakes and needs must take my nap a bit early...urp...

List of US Presidents who won the Nobel Peace Prize and don' forget Al Gore.

Oh ain't it purty?  Woodrow Wilson, Theodore Roosevelt, Jimmy Carter and Barrack Obama won the Nobel Peace Prize.  Al Gore, Vice President won it as well.  I'm thinking that President Trump will not be seriously considered however many times his people eagerly nominate him um unless he somehow brings Kim Yong UN,  around to the middle way of peace.  That, my friends, will be a freaking miracle. 

working title

It is about time I assigned a working title for my book. I like "Hostage".  Probably needs to be something else. 

I had a truly evil idea about incorporating a current event into my story.  I was thinking of inserting the Las Vegas massacre.  This would appeal mightily to the Taliban and the girl could be horrified and determined to play it off as Russian disinformation and here is why. 

I also had an idea for an alternative book for her to recite chapters out of only she is making it up as she goes.  It is all about alternative history if Jane Seymour had survived the birth of her son Edward and Henry the VIII would have secured his male heir.  So Elizabeth would not ascend to the throne.  Her cousin Jamie Stewart of Scotland would not become James the First, King of England.  So many possibilities.  Or maybe this makes things too complicated. 

Wish I were a rich editor and that I could assign this to be written by an eager young author.  Sigh.