Chrissy Munder's Blog, page 65

Have you hugged your local volunteer firefighter today?

The view across the street yesterday evening. Kudos to the local volunteers who showed up so quickly and were able to get the people out of the home safely.

Happy Paczki Day!

Yepper, it's that time already! For those who celebrate - enjoy! For those that know not of what I write? Get thee to Wikipedia and then to Hamtramck before they are all gone. We called in our order ahead of time so this morning was coffee and paczki heaven. *urp*

A quick look at the sights and sounds of Michigan

Here's a little fun for a Saturday. A friend sent me this link and it's a wonderful glimpse at the variety found in Michigan I try to share in my stories. Also on the cool side: the number of places we recognized and have been to!

Color Me Kindleccomplished!

WhooHoo!!!!! At last my Kindle project is done! Let me savor the sweet taste of accomplishment for a few moments. Now that it's all done I'm pretty darn sure there was probably an easier way, but I still feel remarkably pleased. Some of you may remember my giddy joy when, after a long period of decision making, I received my Kindle 3G (hey, do they even still make them?). I eagerly converted and loaded my ebooks, pdf documents, word documents, html documents....you get the idea. Mobipocket Creator and Calibre were my boon companions for many weeks.

Well, if you know me, or read my Twitter post over at Clare's blog in January, you wouldn't be surprised to learn that I ended up with a huge, unorganized mess. Since I didn't go near a WiFi connection for close to 5 months (I'm serious, really), and couldn't register said Kindle until I did, I wasn't able to immediately set up any collections.

Which led to my Kindle project this New Year. First creating appropriate collections, next opening each document to see what it was (sorry, my memory isn't that good), and then, finally, either adding the document to the appropriate collection or deciding that I didn't like the story enough to keep it on the Kindle, and removing it from the device to the archive.

My Kindle is now a lean, mean 1800 document bundle of organized and easy to find collections, and with the resolve to immediately put each new document into a collection when I add it to the device my dark and anal retentive little soul is well pleased.

Huzzah.


 

Clare and Chrissy Get in the Mood!

Clare and Chrissy: Happy 2012 and welcome to our first post of this New Year. For those new to our fun, we took January off and spent our time enjoying the month-long adventure that is the Clare London Birthday Blog Bash . Go ahead and swing by for a wide variety of posts and free fiction for all tastes. But now we've cast the inaugural confetti for 2012 into the air and coffee in hand, we are ready to start our February by getting *in the mood*.

  Chrissy: The question is, the mood for what?

Clare: Take a look around any store, scan the advertisements on the web, or watch any television commercial played during February and you might think you know the answer.

Chrissy: Subtlety is not an advertiser's strong point.

Clare: It's hard to miss all the red satin, candy hearts, and jewellery adverts coming at us from all angles.

Chrissy: Don't forget the phone ads. Because hey, nothing says Happy Sensual Valentine's Day to me like a cell phone.

Clare: That doesn't exactly ooze passion, doesn't it?

Chrissy: I suppose it *is* a vital necessity when it comes to phone sex.

Clare: And surely there's some study out there wanting to tell us the endorphins from talking on the phone are the same as those released during sex, or found in a good box of chocolate.

*pause*

Clare and Chrissy: Naaaaaaah.

Chrissy: But we're romance writers. And that means while the rest of the world is buying roses and chocolate at inflated prices, we need to channel a different kind of mood this February. We need to forget about our rose-petaled sheets…

Clare: …toss our satin thongs over the bedpost….

Chrissy: …and leave our inner Ho behind.

Clare: Yep, it's time to get in the mood to write our Holiday story for this year.

Chrissy: A ho' different mindset.

Clare: Chrissy…

Chrissy: You get it? Ho? And then Ho, ho, ho?

Clare: I got it. I got it. *rolls eyes* Now I want to forget it.

Chrissy: Pfffffft.

Clare: Most of us start out January with a plan for our writing in the year ahead.

Chrissy: *sings* Lists, glorious lists!

Clare: We might divvy our plan up via word count, decide on specific work lengths (say 2 novellas, 1 novel, 1 short), or just swear to finish up some of our old works-in-progress.

Clare and Chrissy: *groans*

Chrissy: But no matter our favorite method of planning our work, somewhere along the line we'll take a look at a variety of publisher's calls for submission and the accompanying deadlines.

Clare: Which is how we end up in the middle of the Valentine's Day Frenzy struggling to reclaim that Holiday spirit in time to meet deadlines than seem to end before we even send the kids back to school.

Chrissy: You might think it's easy, seeing as how it was just a month or so behind us.

Clare: And surely we might have actually been inspired during the festivities and planned for our next year's work?

Chrissy: Speak for yourself. Right now everything in me is striving for spring, and the sweet sweat of summer. I want tulips in my life, not poinsettias.

Clare: Balmy walks along the seaside, not dashes through the snow.

Chrissy: And as much as I love butterscotch schnapps and cocoa après ski, a tall strawberry daiquiri après swim sounds pretty darn appealing.

Clare: That's it. We’re heading to the Caribbean and not coming back until July.

Chrissy: In our dreams, sweetie. In our dreams.

Clare: So how do we set the mood and write something that's not even close to being on our radar?

Chrissy: Every writer has his or her own little trick. Some surround themselves with props. Imagine a miniature Christmas Tree with twinkling lights on the desktop, gaily wrapped presents; maybe even a bowl of potpourri to recreate that unmistakable Holiday mood and scent.

Clare: I can just see the men of my household if I try spraying a pine-scented freshner throughout the house.

Chrissy: We've talked with other authors who set aside a period of time and read nothing but Holiday-themed stories to get themselves in the mood.

Clare: Others watch classic Holiday movie favorites.

Chrissy: Or listen to their favorite Holiday music.

Clare: The trick is to trick your senses and recreate the magic of the season…

Chrissy: …even if you and your laptop are sitting on the beach under the tropical sun.

Clare and Chrissy: How about you? Authors, what are your tricks for finding that Holiday spirit out of season? Readers, do you enjoy Holiday-themed stories throughout the year, or do you prefer to match your reading to the calendar? Let us know what you think and win. Everyone who comments to this post will be entered in our random drawing to win some Clare and Chrissy Swag. One lucky Winner to be announced during next month's post.

pic credit: four seasons by vxside at deviantart

*****************************

December Winner: marasmine - Congratulations! Please email your mailing address to Chrissy at chrissymunder@yahoo.com for your festive Clare and Chrissy Swag.

Missed any of our posts? Follow the 'sticky' post for these rambles of ours HERE .

Reclaim your own Holiday spirit with our anthology release, Winter Warmers with Lou Harper, Josephine Myles, and JL Merrow.


Here's Chrissy! website // blog .


Here's Clare! website // blog .

Ever Feel Overly Invested in your iPhone? Be careful...

Under the "One Day I'm Going to Write This" heading....

Watched an older episode of a popular television show the other day. Was amazed at how utterly dismayed I was to once again see the use of the psuedo-unattractive, overweight, and thus psychologically-damaged female as the 1) obsessive and deluded stalker, and 2) poorly disguised humor device. Wouldn't this have had more "unexpected" impact and given them more than a few stereotypes to explore if they had used a thin and conventionally viewed as attractive actress in the role? Just think of the possibilities!

Yeah, I'm wondering where that bit of critical thinking came from as well. Not usually in the forefront when I'm seeking light, televised entertainment.

Put this on your Reading List...

I'm not the most involved individual around, especially here on my professional blog, but I have to share a post excellently written by Heidi Cullinan and one that I think well worth reading:

RWA Shouldn't Be in the Business of Discrimination
Posted by: Heidi Cullinan on: February 3, 2012

– Note: MTM will no longer accept same-sex entries in any category.

from the contest rules for the More Than Magic contest hosted by Romance Writers Ink
Chapter of RWA

Read More at Heidi's Blog.

And for those dear friends who have already told me this is only one contest, and only one chapter.... Pffffffftttttt.

Many years ago I was thrilled to join the RWA. Look Ma, I'm a real writer! Just as many years ago I canceled my membership. I know strides have been made, especially the RRW Group, and appreciate the efforts of those involved, but in the end decided I would pay my money to a more accepting organization.

Sadly, I'm not seeing any incentive to rejoin.

Edited to add: Here's another post by author Kari Gregg from February 2nd worth a read as well.

More Free Fic Than You Can Shake a Stick At!

There are dribs, drabs, drabbles, shorts, novellas, pdf's, links, the list goes on! Yes, it's her birthday, but we get the goods. Vist Clare London's blog and go wild at all the free fiction!

Be sure to wish her a happy birthday while you are there.

Planting my flag on the summit!

Suitably chuffed as I've now caught back up on Clare's Birthday Blog Bash. Being sick had kept me offline and I missed some great posts. I am especially pleased to have learned about several authors new to me.

Oooh, and on that other note: the heroine in my ranted about latest batch of reading has finally blacked out due to being strangled instead of being hit on the head. Not sure it's an improvement.