Victoria Zigler's Blog: Zigler News, page 185

Devin turns 15

My nephew, Devin (my hubby's sister's son, for those who don't know, or don't remember) turns 15 tomorrow. Seems like only yesterday he was a cute little boy of four, just learning how to tie his laces! Time flies, doesn't it? Anyway, since I have something else planned for tomorrow, I'm going to say happy birthday to him today. I doubt he'll see this, but I usually say it, so I will this year too! So... Happy birthday, Devin!

Of reading challenges and itchy dogs

Here's how many books I've read for each of the reading challenges I'm doing right now: 2014 Goodreads Reading Challenge: 40/300 2014 A-Z character challenge: 20/26 2014 A-Z title challenge: 20/26 2014 1st quarterly challenge: 30/12 February 2014 Love Themed Reading Challenge: 6/15 I'll post what the books are for the last two at the end of the time frame (end of March and end of February respectively) along with a short description of what the challenge was, and will do the same for the others when I've completed them. **** Kero's still scratching, though not as much. We're pretty sure he's flea free, but not entirely certain so we'll give him another flea treatment next week and see how he goes. We want to do one more flea treatment first because of how he's calmed down some on the scratching. I really do want to avoid the vet if I can! *** OK, I'm supposed to be working on some writing projects right now, so I better get back to them... Especially since some of them have deadlines to be finished by!

Kero's fear-filled leap

Our weather's been really bad lately. Storms, storms, and... Yes, you guessed it... More storms! I don't mind storms, but Kero and the degu boys (Jasper especially) hate storms! Jasper starts squealing shortly before a bad storm, so at least we get a bit of warning. Though not enough to prepare Kero for the huge peel of thunder that - as far as he was concerned - came out of nowhere Wednesday night, causing poor Kero to somehow manage to go from being curled up in his bed not far from the window to standing on top of me on my bed in one swift movement (there's a gap of about a foot between his basket and my bed, and his basket is under a low table on which I keep my stereo). It's a leap he can't usually manage, especially now age has made his hips weaker. I'm glad he's a small dog, that's all I can say! I mean, it hurt enough having him land on me like that, so I'd hate to think how much it would hurt being hit by a larger dog. I couldn't be mad at him when he was so frightened though... Poor little guy was trembling with fear! He spent the rest of the storm laying under a blanket between Kelly and myself. We couldn't do anything about the degus at the time, but they weren't squealing so we had to assume they were OK and comfort Kero. Or rather, I had to, since Kelly slept through most of it, only waking long enough to pull Kero between us, since how he was standing on me made it impossible for me to do so without hurting him or myself (he was standing on my back). I checked on the degus afterwards though, and - though a little upset - they were fine. I guess Luna did a good enough job with them for me or something.

Upcoming book birthday blog party

I remembered what I was going to post about last night. There's going to be a post on here on February 25th 2014 as part of a blog party to celebrate the birthday of a book. There's a Banner about it on the sidebar. Keep an eye out for the post, because there's a coupon code for a free book in it, and details about a giveaway!

Weekend writing progress

I've had a pretty productive weekend. I got the second draft of one of the stories I had in early draft done, and the first draft of the prologue for a longer one I'm working on done too. I'm quite excited about this longer story, because it's going to be longer than the longest of the ones I've published so far! I actually came on here to post about something else, but I forget what it was, so I'm going to leave it at this for today. I'm tired, so don't judge me too harshly, LOL

Pre-released platypus

I've finished "Filicity The Musical Platypus" and prereleased it. It's already approved for premium status too, since Smashwords gave it approval less than 24 hours after I put it up on their site. So that means it will soon be available to pre-order from sites like Barnes And Noble. The official release date for it is April 15th 2014. Now to start working on my next book! :)

A Very Degu Christmas

The Degu Days Duo, Book 2: A Very Degu Christmas

Genre: Animal Stories - Mice, Rats And Other Rodents/Holidays - Christmas And Advent

Description: "It’s Christmas, and the human caretakers have told the degus that Santa Paws is coming to visit. They have no idea who he is, but since the human caretakers say he’s bringing nibbles for them, and degus love nibbles, they’re excited about it; though the news that he plans to come when they’re sleeping seems strange to them.

Will Santa Paws really be coming? If so, what sorts of nibbles will he bring? More to the point, can the degus stay awake long enough to make sure they don’t miss his visit? And, if not, will they still get nibbles?"

“The Degu Days Duo” is a short series of just two books telling the story of two different days in the lives of Jacob, Jasper, Jenks and Joshua – four degu brothers who live in a cage together. The stories are told from the point of view of one of the degus, so read on and see the world from the point of view of a small and furry rodent!

Published: 3rd February 2014

ISBN: 9781310351044

Buy it from Smashwords: https://www.smashwords.com/books/view...

Degu Days, Book 2: A Very Degu Christmas

"It’s Christmas, and the human caretakers have told the degus that Santa Paws is coming to visit. They have no idea who he is, but since the human caretakers say he’s bringing nibbles for them, and degus love nibbles, they’re excited about it; though the news that he plans to come when they’re sleeping seems strange to them.

Will Santa Paws really be coming? If so, what sorts of nibbles will he bring? More to the point, can the degus stay awake long enough to make sure they don’t miss his visit? And, if not, will they still get nibbles?"

This is the synopsis for the second book in my "Degu Days Duo" series, which is officially published today.

Yeah, I know Christmas was almost two months ago, but I wanted to get both of the books in this series published now. Plus, I have another story in mind for December.

Anyway, you can already buy it from Smashwords and Barnes And Noble, and will soon be able to buy it from other retailers.

The landlord and the dog

The landlord was back home pretty quickly; we've heard him pottering about up there. From what I understand, he hit his head as he fell and got a mild concussion, causing temporary confusion and memory loss. But he seems to be fine now. *** We're working on clearing out clutter, so we had Music Magpie pick up a box with a couple of old games consoles in on Monday. We'll have a bunch of movies and games for them soon too, but we need some boxes. Because we did that though, and I didn't want to be in the middle of bathing Kero when they came for the box, I ended up not giving Kero his other bath and flea treatment. Then it didn't get done today because of food shopping. I'm hoping to do it tomorrow. He's not scratching as much as he was before though; still scratches a fair bit, but not as much. I mean, I could have done him after those things, but the nights are so cold - not as cold as they seem to be in the US and Canada, but still pretty cold - so I don't like the idea of doing him at night in case he's still wet when he has to use the yard and ends up catching a chill from it, and I'm sleeping during the day right now so don't have much day available to me at the moment.

Platypus story progress update

I'm still working on "Filicity The Musical Platypus" (the fourth story I was working on for NaNoWriMo). The cover is ready when it's done though... Thanks for doing that for me, Iggy; hope you enjoyed the challenge of drawing aplatypus? Anyway, it just needs a few bits of description fixed/padded out, then it will be ready for the editing phase. If I finish it in April or later then I'll release the book as soon as it's done, but if it's done before the end of March then it will get pre-released for April.