Trip to Virginia

A friend and I went to Virginia for the Hunt Country Stable Tour. I’m milking the trip for all it’s worth for posts for The Horsey Set Net. That link is the gateway to more links to the previous entries, if you’d like to read them. Photos, too. I have two (maybe three?) more planned.

BISW (Book in Six? Weeks)

In our case, it’s Book in Seven Weeks. The Charter Oak Romance Writers group, one of the two RWA chapters to which I belong, is having an amass-pages-like-a-maniac event from early July through the third week of August. Even though I’m too repressed to be much of a maniac, I’m moving forward. Last week? Crazy good. This week? Oh, not so much.

I pretty much set aside the summer to work as much as I can on my long-standing WIP.

I reduced my posting schedule for the horse blog to twice a week, after having posted daily during the Triple Crown races.  Curiosity about those races drove a lot of traffic to my little horsey blog. Some of those readers have stayed on to become RSS feed subscribers.

More travel planning

I’m going to Saratoga for the first time during The Season. Heck, I’m just going to Saratoga for the first time in the nearly 30 years that we’ve lived here.

I’m also working on a strange combined trip to Kentucky and Indianapolis for the fall. Fly into Louisville, drive to Indianaoplis for an event, drive back to Kentucky for a few days, then fly home from Louisville. It seemed like a good idea when I dreamed it up.

At-home feline health care

Our 12-year-old kitty Amber has been diagnosed with hyperthyroidism. First, we had trouble figuring out how to get the meds into her. Now, we pulverize the pill and mix it into soft food. Twice a day.

Soon, she got too much of the medication and turned into Yoda with itchy ears. We got her meds balanced (more like, reduced by half). She has  mellowed out and looks fluffy again, but she’s getting a bit dodgy about the meds and her “treat.” It’s ongoing. When I finish this, I’ll lure her out for her morning’s dose. I hope.

In case you’re wondering, she lets DH give her her “treats.” But we’re the only ones. Travel as a couple may be out of the picture for a while. And I don’t want to really think much beyond that.

Frankly, how she is while I’m in Saratoga and after my return will tell me if I should go hrough with my travel plans to KY in October, let alone next October for the World Equestrian Games (like the Olympics, but rarer – it’s never been held outside Europe.)

Exercise

I’m battling genetics (a long line of British bulldog women), leftovers from three years on steroids and the menopot. I’m not sure that boot camp at Parris Island would take this off. But I’m doing what I have the strength to do.

* Oh yeah, DH and I scored tickets to see Hugh Jackman and Daniel Craig on Broadway in “A Steady Rain.”

I know, I know – some of those spill over into fall. But I have even more big plans for fall, including setting up a blog on my author (to be) website, which is now dormant.

When that finally happens, I’ll link there from here.

But, first, I need to amass many more pages on that novel. And keep that kitty stable.

It was only afterward, once I was back home, that I started thinking … .

If you haven’t seen the new Star Trek movie, you might want to stop reading right here. But …

If you’re a woman, maybe you want to know before you go in. Especially if you’re a Boomer woman. Really especially if you were a pioneer yourself leading women into new professional territory.

Really, if you want to watch the movie and be surprised — stop reading now.

I mean it. Last chance … because …

Uhura is sleeping with her boss.

Not Kirk. Spock.

Who is cute, I admit. But a smart cookie like Uhura would be too professional to play where she works. Especially in a military unit. Despite what Battlestar Gallactica portrayed.

Thank goodness she’s still smart as far as her job is concerned. She’s still the ears of the Universe picking up odd noises and interpreting them like a crackerjack submarine sonar officer.

I’m okay with the fact that she’s a babe. I do wish she’d been given more to do.

I wonder what Nichelle Nichols, the original Uhura, thinks.

Y’all know the famous story. Nichelle was bored out of her skull with her role as a TV space ship switchboard operator. She was about to quit.

Then Martin Luther King Jr. himself stepped up and asked her to please stay, that she was showing a black woman in an important job on a TV show.

Even if not many people then were watching her.

But Dr.  King knew a potential pop culture icon when he saw one.

In those days on the cusp of the woman’s movement, Uhura was a bridge officer on the flagship of the fleet. Smart, good at her job and good in a fight. Every once in a while, she had to act like the flinching pre-ERA woman and say, “Oh, captain, I’m so afraid.”

I think I remember reading where Nichelle had to protest a few of those wimpy throwback moments and remind the producers and directors that Uhura was a soldier.

Apparently, the creator of Alias’s tough Sydney Bristow and Fringe’s capable Olivia Dunham forgot that Uhura is a soldier, too.

But now she’s a space babe in lacy lingerie. Perhaps on a career track to become “The Captain’s Woman???”

It all makes me wonder about what we leading women have wrought.

We embraced the freedom to reproduce when we wanted, not when biology happened. The control that The Pill gave us allowed us to wonder what else we could do now that we weren’t shackled by biology?

Then, we wanted to learn more about our own biology for health reasons. And we took the shame out of acts of love.

We didn’t want our daughters and nieces to feel the same taboo that we used to feel, either.

In the ’90s, fashion designer Donna Karan added sex to the power suit, which had morphed from Joan Crawford’s shoulders to a bow-tied-almost-Mormon-nun thing to attorney Ally McBeal wearing a mini skirt in court.

Hey, Uhura wears a mini on the bridge of the Enterprise. Both Uhuras.

A positive aspect of the new character is that today’s Uhura takes the lead in the relationship. Which makes Spock whipped, even though he’s in a position of authority. I’m not sure that’s a good image for him, either.

One character trait about the original Captain Kirk, who is probably about 15 years older than the new Kirk of the movie, is that he was always a professional with his subordinates.

The military has strict rules against romance in a unit between superiors and subordinates.

Kirk’s behavior on the Enterprise showed that he lived by that code. He knew that, when he was aboard his ship, he would spend his nights/afternoons/spare moments alone. His female yeoman’s blonde beauty weighed heavily on his mind. His hormones must have tormented him greatly.

Granted, this crew is young, their hormones coursing. But they’re still in the military.  And, supposedly, Spock’s hormones only activate every seven years.

So, has the new Star Fleet abolished the military code of conduct?

And I wonder, what would Dr. King say now?

P.S. – Actress Zoe Saldana deserves better.

• It’s for kids.
• It’s for kids who text on Blackberries.
• It’s a time suck.
• “What I’m doing” is nobody’s beeswax!

It’s where “posts” are “Tweets.” And I’m a “Tweeple” identified with an @ sign in front of my name. And I have all of 140 characters to make a statement.

That includes spaces and punctuation.

When I posted about a neat marketing book I’d read on the train home from NYC, I was dumbfounded when the author started “following me” (signed up for my feeds.)

Come to find out, you don’t have to have a cell phone that texts to use Twitter, you can do it over the Web.

I see people my age on there, and some are fellow writers.

It’s not a time suck, as long as I use some common sense. I may Tweet three times in a day. Sometimes, I even have mini-conversations with some of my Tweeple. I also post my latest additions to The Horsey Set Net. (I’ve got a few horse Tweeple.)

And I’m careful about what I Tweet about. Nothing truly personal that I’d blush about. But Twitter is not just about “what you are doing,” but what you are thinking. What you find interesting and want to share.

And some people have been tweeting about needing a good book to read.

The Horsey Set Net is The Blog That Ate My Life. I’d feel guilty, but I love it too much.

So, it’s almost hard to believe that this blog is more than a year old now. (Yeah, I know – not so many posts, though. Oops. My bad.)

If you’ve been kind enough to keep this in your reader, I’m going to send you some links about helpful blogs that I’ve discovered along the. (No, they’re not affiliate links.)

They’ll be helpful to anyone who needs to learn about marketing (what we writers call “promotion.”) And they don’t look like those sleazy-looking irect mail type websites.

After spending more than six months hanging out with some Internet marketing hotshots, I’ve seen plenty of those. But I’ve also seen some that inspire me to make the unimaginable possible.

These aren’t affiliate links. You can learn tons from these folks without pulling out the credit card because they all blog. Yes, they do sell e-products, and I have used offerings from each of them and been very happy with what I bought.

But these are links to their blogs. Where lots of good free info awaits. Here goes:

Yaro Starak’s Entrepreneur’s Journey often has some gems. His audience is largely internet marketers, so he writes to their needs. However, he’s big on what he calls “the giving mindset,” as well as having balance in one’s life He’s doing some spiritual explorations lately, too.

IttyBiz looks like a tough, sassy place to hang out. Naomi Dunford has no problem with plain talk and swearing in her posts. But take part in one of her teleconferences, and you find out that she’s not as intimidating as the tough talk would indicate. She gives practical advice on how marketing helps people find what they want and need. And she’s a mom with a family business.

Naomi’s BFF Havi Brooks and her duck Selma take an even more spiritual approach at their blog The Fluent Self. Havi is a yoga instructor. If promotion feels ickily unseemly to you, Havi can help you ease your way into it. She renames gross-sounding things like “marketing” without sounding like she’s talking down to us.

For all of these blogs, your best bet is to probably snoop around the archives or site maps. Some have search boxes built into the site, and those are handy, too.

The two adventurers/Photo by Rhonda Lane

This morning, we’re still reeling. Last night, about 11 pm, our two male house cats slipped out of the house to go walkabout.

Ever since we updated the attic insulation, we’ve been a bit warm, especially after exertion. DH Rod sat down at the dining room chair and slid open the patio door.

What he didn’t realize was that our friend who cleans had left the screen open. I hadn’t realized it, either.

I was in another room preparing Sam’s liquid heart meds for his nightly dose. I heard  Rod call in even but tense tones, “Come get Sam and Amber. Now.”

I left the kitchen to pick up Sam, who had a cold wet belly. That could only mean one thing — he’d been outside in the snow.

I carried Sam with his wet, cold belly to our bedroom and put him on the bed. We live on a busy road. Late night, busy road. Bitterly cold winter night at 22 degrees F. And I have heard coyotes out there. I was so glad to see him that I put him — wet belly and all — on the bed. And closed the door.

I managed to hold the panic reflex at bay. Back out in the living room, Amber was in up in the top of the kitty tree. I tried to move her, but she wouldn’t budge.

That’s when my husband came back inside with Max.

Rod’s story came out through tense, breathless sentences. While I had been in the kitchen, he’d been cooling off in front of the open slider door. He happened to look down to see Amber sticking her head out through the gap. Gee, her head sure went out far.

Our good girl Amber/Photo by Rhonda or Rod Lane

That’s when he realized that the door was open and then wondered where the other two were.

Out in the darkness, he saw Sam still on the patio but cowering under a table.

Max however, had disappeared into the night. That’s when DH called me to come get Sam and Amber.

Rod went outside and worked hard to stifle the rising panic. He called Max with as cheery a voice as he could muster. He had expected Max to have headed for the woods.

Soon, the orange cat came bounding back to the patio. But instead of from the woods, though, he came from the other side of the house, from behind the garage as if he were on his way to the busy state highway that serves as the town’s commercial strip, about the length of a football field from our hose.

We’re very glad that it had been so cold outside that Max wanted to hurry back inside.

We’re also very glad that Sam cowered under the patio table.

And we’re extra glad that Amber ratted them out and then refused to make her own escape.

We’re very thankful.

(BTW, if you’re thinking of buying one, please do it through the link inside this blog post? Or just click on the link and go buy other stuff instead? It’s my Amazon Associates link. I seem to suck at selling, so if you need something, please shop through me? Now, before I lose what’s left of my dignity, we now return to those Easter eggs.)

We’d watched the movie and the credits only to see different colored type on letters in the credits. My engineer husband called out, “Cool! Easter eggs!”

And thus began the code-cracking. Although we suspected some possible computer keyboarding shenanigans, we (he) used the controls on the DVD remote.

“Easter eggs,” if you’ve never heard the term, are surprises built into the code of a website or some digital media that you can access by tapping a certain sequence of keystrokes.

We used the clues from the credits to no avail. Timing is often important to finding Easter eggs. So, I had an idea.

Someone has to have figured out a bunch of them by now and has posted the solutions.

So, I went a Googling. After all, Dr. Horrible and the Whedons have many tech-savvy fans.

Sure enough we found several at the Whedonesque.org forum. I suspect there could be more. After all, the DVDs only landed into eager hands right before Christmas. That’s not a lot of time for testing theories of Easter egg locations.

BTW, if you’d like to sing along to the songs while in the car, go through my other Horsey Set Net Dr. Horrible post for a CD. (Be sure to enjoy the video of actress Felicia Day being sniped at a games convention.)

As you probably noticed from watching the clips, the songs are catchy tunes. Not unpleasant as earworms, as you can see in the video above. You’ll want to sing along.

See? It’s true. I suck at sales.

It doesn’t have a lot of readers yet, but the readers I have enjoy it. Some of them “don’t read other blogs,” as they tell me via email. And they don’t know how to post Comments, they say — and that’s why they email. They like that it doesn’t take long to read. It’s a break in the day for them.

And that makes me happy because that’s exactly how I want my site’s readers to feel.

I designed it like Peter Jackson reportedly designed Hobbiton for “The Lord of the Rings,” as a place where people would want to go on holiday.

So it’s a pretty place. A diversion with pretty pictures and sometimes funny, sometimes playfully snarky prose.

Anthony Bourdain is another influence. DH and I watch “No Reservations” faithfully. We like his mix of irreverence and poignancy.

Most of the other blogs in its niche are more how-to’s. Or they’re a diary. p. And some are just places for people to jeer at other people.

Even though mine has an animal at its center, it’s not just about the animal. Or a journey with the animal. It’s sort of a journey to the animal.

Huh?

So, I think that makes me a travel writer.

And what do you mean, it’s time to dig the heavy sweaters out? I just put them away. Or did I? Where are they now anyway?

Whaddya mean, it’s Christmastime again? Are we having it twice a year now?

There was a time when I needed change to wash my clothes.

We add change, make change, keep the change (what’s that all about? how can you “keep” change??) change our minds, change our clothes and change our tires. Except for those of us with AAA on SpeedDial.

I think I’ll change back into me now after this brief stint of attempting to write like Steven Wright.

How did the 19-year-old Daniel Radcliffe manage to remain “uninspired” during his simulated sex scene with the lovely Anna Camp’s character?

After all, Radcliffe is a teen-age boy, a walking hormone. How did he manage to remain impotent, live and in-the-buff, as the script demanded? Especially with an equally live and in-the-buff girl paying a lot of attention to him?

Maybe he used some kind of Method actor technique? Or some kind of a ninja-yogi-Jedi mind trick? (“These are not the droids you’re looking for … “)

But my friend and I detected a more practical technique.

The theater was very, very cold.

Right after intermission, we felt a distinct chill.  The kind of chill that tenses you up and makes you shiver. The shift was sudden. As if they’d cranked up the AC to refrigerator levels.

Plus, we were seated in the mezzanine, high above the stage, up where science says the warmer air should have risen. So, that tells me that the stage must have felt like a meat locker. Pardon the pun.

Not to take anything away from Radcliffe’s focus and talent as an actor, but the production took no chances by hedging their bets with science.

Problem solved.

I used to use “You bet!” or “You betcha!” for those moments when I am agreeing but have reservations. And not “the good kind” of reservations that come with menus and waiters.

Usually, I say it if I’m trying to feign enthusiasm, either to bolster another’s energy or my own. When I say, “you bet” I’m trying to be supportive but I have my private doubts.

Which now have gone public, now that I’ve blogged about it.

After all, if you smile enough, you might make yourself happy. At least, that’s what conventional wisdom sez.

So, if I exude a positive attitude with a cheery “you bet!,” I can be supportive with a bit of energy.

People like it. I look like less of a crumudgeon. Win-win. Especially when I’m working one-on-one.

Now vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin has made it sort of her wanna-be superhero catchphrase. “You betcha!” — with a wink.

Imitator Tina Fey chirps that phrase and flashes that wink like a hyperactive flamenco dancer with castanets.

For the record, I don’ t do the wink. Besides, I think a wink is like the winky emoticon. That tacks on a “just kidding” to the previous statement. It lightens up the meaning of any previous statement.

I wouldn’t dream of using it when speaking about serious matters. Unless I’m engaging in serious tough talk and I don’t want to get flamed.

So, watching Palin do it makes me wonder. I know that I’m BS-ing when I chirp “You betcha!” at someone. Is she?