Amanda Frederickson's Blog: Musings - Posts Tagged "random"

Last weekend my family was surprised by the arrival of two kitten litters! We knew one of the cats was pregnant, but it turned out her daughter was pregnant too. Magic had two little babies that survived and Callie had three.

Talk about a long weekend! After Magic's first little one didn't make it we were all anxious about the rest of the litter. The second and third ones didn't come until morning the next day, but they're both healthy and fluffy. One squeaks a lot, the other is quiet, so my youngest sister named them Phineas and Ferb.

Even though Callie had a litter before, half the family crowded down to the basement to make sure she was all right when she went into labor. Callie decided it was too much crowd, so she picked up her first baby and hid under the basement stairs in a box.

Now both mammas have decided to crowd themselves and all the kittens into the same box. They're an absolutely adorable little furry pile. My mother was talking about moving them to something more spacious, but mother cats are a bit like mother dragons: you let them have what they want! They've staked out their box, and they'll probably stay until the kittens are old enough to roam.

Sadly, my apartment doesn't allow pets that are less than a year old. But that doesn't mean I can't keep my eye on one. *Plotting....*

This is what can happen at five a.m. when I haven't been able to sleep all night. I created a movie cast for Keystone. Why not?

So. *Rubs hands together.*

Charlie - Allison Scagliotti, (Claudia on Warehouse 13) because, well, I think she'd play Charlie perfectly. (Charlie in squirrel form would be played by a trained squirrel - no CGI thank you.)

Rhys - Luke Goss, (Hellboy II, Blade II). He's played both an elf and a vampire (not at the same time), plus he would look old enough to play Rhys with age makeup, and then also be able to look younger.

Jack - Michael Shanks. Do I need to explain this one?

Tom and Lallia - I originally thought David Tennant and Billie Piper, because Tom and Lallia are actually named for Tom Baker and Lalla Ward from the classic Doctor Who series, but then I realized that David Tennant and Billie Piper would actually be perfect for a different pair from Kingstone (Shh! Spoilers!). So, for Tom and Lallia the pixies, Kate Winslet (because I think she would have fun playing Lallia) and Rupert Everett as Tom (After all, he played Oberon in glitter; can't you see him in turquoise hair?) (Yes, both pairs technically look older than Tom and Lallia are supposed to, but I'm considering an acting perspective, not completely looks.)

Princess Maelyn - Katie McGrath (Morgana from Merlin). Princess princess princess princess. She would be AMAZING as Maelyn, especially with the range of character she's showed as Morgana.

Taryn - There are several actresses who could pull of Taryn and put their own twist on the character. Keira Knightly would be fun, or Naomie Harris maybe. Actually, Penelope Cruz might be entertaining in blue facepaint. (Somehow these all ended up Pirates of the Caribbean actresses.)

Gwynne - Flexible, mostly because young actors grow up so fast. Daniel Huttlestone would fit.

Taliesin - Anthony Stewart Head. Again, need I explain?

Edouard - Liam Hemsworth. His role is pretty simple.

Isil - Allison Harvard, for her distinctive eyes. O.O

The Guardian - BWAHAHAHAAAA! Spoilers!

The Mara - This part actually would be more than one actress, with her face morphing. I think it would be funny to use Joanne Kelly, Genelle Williams, and Jaime Murray (the other Warehouse 13 ladies).

The Blood Prince - Duhn duhn duhn! I couldn't decide this one, actually. He would be spending most of the time in a mask, so the actor would have to act without eyes. This would take some real acting skill, I'm thinking. Nobody is really standing out and waving their arms, begging for the part. Huh.

What do you think?

Edit: I thought of a better Tom! Tom Hiddleston. He has the right facial shape, obviously wouldn't have trouble playing a trickster, and would be adorable in turquoise hair. I'm still keeping Kate Winslet as Lallia.

I am now officially a resident of the Keystone state. How funny is that? And I think my cat has a vendetta against my Lord of the Rings posters.

Pippin (my cat) has discovered that the sounds of rattling posters will wake me up in the middle of the night. He has now completely destroyed my map of middle earth and has moved on to my Two Towers poster. He hasn't touched I, Robot, Tangled, my dragon poster, my unicorn poster, Star Wars, or any of the others (yes, I have a lot of posters, and finally have the wall space to put them up). I had to finally kick him out of my room or the bottom edge of my Two Towers poster would have been shredded. This seems to be the equivalent of his brother's obsession with knocking over unattended glasses. Which means that no amount of discouraging him will actually work. Sigh.

Maybe I'll just have to resort to framing them.

Just a quick word because I'm not sure when my next post will end up being. My computer had a near brush with death that thankfully wasn't the computer's fault, but its cord, which was a lot less expensive than a new computer. However, now that I have it back I'm planning to type like crazy to enter in what I've written of Blood Queen, and when next I can manage internet access I'll be posting the new update.

As most writers know: ALWAYS BACK UP YOUR WORK. I would have lost a chapter or two and a slice of Kingstone, but otherwise even if my machine had given up the ghost I could have recovered. So I tell myself. Whee!

Busy month. Busy, busy month, and not done until next month. Three big non-writing projects and my sister is getting married in Ohio this weekend. Whee!

Two days left of April Camp Nanowrimo, about 6,000 words left of my 10,000 word goal, which would bring Blood Queen to 50,000 words total. On the one hand, it feels a little pathetic, but on the other, it's four thousand words further along in Blood Queen, and I've managed to squeeze in some writing on other projects too. Meeting the goal is still physically possible (especially since I have a slice of turtle pie riding on the outcome), if my brain can hold together long enough.

Hear me, baby? Hold together. (Speaking of which, Han Solo is coming back. There might be a glimmer of hope for the new movie. A New Hope. Haha. Wow, my brain is fried.)

Is it seriously June already? I blinked and missed most of May! I don't think I had a single quiet weekend this month, but I definitely managed to get some things done.

Blood Queen got a small update, and there's more on the way the moment I can manage to squeeze in some battle choreography, but the bigger news is: new covers for Night Dancers and Ever Dream! Both of them are already updated on Smashwords and Amazon, and the changes should be showing up on the other retailers soon. I'm especially thrilled with Night Dancers.



*Drumroll* I've also been looking at putting together a short story/novella anthology, which would include all the short stories I've independently published as well as a few new ones. That might end up being Camp Nanowrimo's July project. (Camp time again, already! Yikes!)

In other news, I'm about to be an aunt again! It's a boy. ^_^

You know that book you’ve been thinking about? That book you saw at the store, in the library, online, or the one languishing on your own bookshelf or ereader. The one you’ve been looking at wistfully every time it crosses your path. The one that really intrigued you, that caught your interest, but you put it back. The one you’ve been wanting to read, but there just hasn’t seemed to be enough time.

You keep thinking you'll pick it up, but maybe later. Tomorrow. Next week.

What if you died tomorrow? Wouldn’t you regret not opening those pages?

Read the book.

You know how cats are supposed to have nine lives? My youngest sister's cat has to have something like 3,000.

James "Jamie" Cameron MacPherson is my cat's older half brother from another litter. One morning, about four years ago, Mom heard this loud, squeaky mew coming from the basement. It turned out to be Callie's first kitten, a tiny ball of orange fluff. We all fell in love, but my youngest sister (Mizu - yes, this is her real nickname; yes, she's probably going to kill me for posting this; no, not all of my sisters have Japanese nicknames) is the one who named him James Cameron. Jamie stuck.

We added the "MacPherson" when his troublemaking streak came out, for Warehouse 13's season one villain. We learned quickly not to leave cups unattended, resigned ourselves to picking him out of the sink before washing the dishes, and learned even quicker that he was a climber. A serious climber.

Jamie balanced his way along mantles, bookshelves, shutters, you name it, he climbed it. For the first time ever, we had a cat who would take down a Christmas tree in a single bound. Jamie's favorite perch? Draping himself across someone's shoulders. (This was Mizu too.)

When Jamie discovered Outside, that was it. Outside had trees. He became an indoor/outdoor cat, whether we liked it or not. Back then I was living at my parent's house, and there were many mornings when I woke up to plaintive mews from the narrow sill of my second story window. He would climb one of the trees and jump the distance from the branches to my window sill, and then be stuck there until I let him in.

Who knows how many lives he used up in all his escapades, but he always came home (mostly) unscathed. Until the beginning of 2013, when his lucky streak broke.

Nee-chan and I were at the house, which was lucky because no one else was home at the time, when we heard cat yowls. It wasn't like any of the normal cat sounds and it scared us both to death. We ran outside and around the house. I found Jamie under the back porch, where we piled wood for the stove. He dragged himself toward me, squeaking. There was another cat there, which we chased off.

I scooped Jamie up and brought him inside. He had one little scrape, otherwise there wasn't a mark on him, but when I tried to set him on his feet he simply flopped to his side and lay there panting, looking dazed. My first thought was that he was in shock, so while Nee-chan called Mizu and my father, I bundled him up in a blanket and lay him close to the heater.

Mizu and my father took him to the vet. Jamie's pelvis was broken, possibly his tail as well. They might have to cut off his tail. He might not make it.

A few months later, after being confined to a cage to limit his mobility while his bones healed, Jamie was out of the cage, getting in trouble, and making regular escape attempts. He didn't care a bit that the end of his tail had no mobility, he was determined that he could still do everything that he used to, including climbing trees.

Not quite a year after breaking his pelvis, Mom woke up to a cat screeching. She found Jamie downstairs, dragging his back end. His back legs were cold.

My parents rushed him to the vet, who told them he had a blood clot that was blocking his circulation. My parents couldn't afford to put Jamie in a pet hospital, so they brought him home to watch him themselves, and bring him to the vet once a day for blood thinner.

A well meaning friend who had gone through having a blood clot herself told me to brace for the worst. This cat would die.

This last Sunday, Jamie scared me half to death by jumping onto my shoulders, then onto the kitchen table. He's determined that even though he has less feeling in his back feet, he can do everything he used to.

He's working up to trees.

I don't know about you, but here it's calling for snow on the first day of spring, just in time for my birthday coming up. So, I decided to do my birthday celebrating a little early.

If you visit my Smashwords page pick up Keystone for half price ($1.50) with coupon code SSW50, and Moon and Shadow, Apples and Onions, and Ever Dream all free with coupon code SW100. These will be good all week. ^_^

First of all, thank you everyone who entered Keystone’s giveaway and congratulations to the two winners! The signed copies of Keystone will be in the mail soon.

For those who are wondering how my kitty is doing, Pippin is feeling much better. The vet did put him on a stronger antibiotic, which he loathed as only a cat can loathe, but it did the trick. For the moment he’s also on the special urinary health food, which he also loathes but finally caved in to eating. His poor little patches where they shaved him for his IVs and such are starting to get some fuzz back so he’s not quite so pitiful-looking.

The heat has made for some very lazy cats, but I can tell Pippin is feeling more himself because he’s not cuddling so much anymore (sigh) and is back to chewing my toes in the mornings (with a vengeance). His newest favorite trick is jumping onto my headboard, knocking everything down onto my head (in Jamie’s memory, no doubt) and then leaping full force onto my stomach.

The joys of owning a cat. :p