Linda L. Zern's Blog, page 8

C is for Cacophony

We live on a hobby farm. That’s a farm that doesn’t seriously try to make money or make any attempt to apply for government farm subsidies. Money goes in but it never comes out. It’s like owning a boat, but with goats.The countryside of Central Florida, where we hobby farm, has its own special sounds and smells. I like to call it the cacophonous order of freedom. We live outside the city limits, limits being the optimal word. We live in the county where the rules are different, options abound, and the sound of gunfire is frequent and non-threatening.“Why is the dog hiding under the dinner table?” I ask.“The neighbors,” a grand boy replies, “they’re shooting at stuff.”Everyone tilts their head—some to the right, some to left—to listen. Sure enough, the sound of blam, blam, blam drifts through the dining room windows. “Ahhhh . . . target practice.” It’s a consensus.The smell of smoke accents the sound of gunfire. We all breathe deeply. “Ahhhh . . . Mr. Medina is burning stuff,” I observe.Sandhill cranes bang out their hollow drum call as they sail across the sky. In the cow pasture behind us, coyotes send up their primal howling. A lone cow, possibly in labor, bawls out her distress. The air boat guy two properties down, fires up his airboat, sending a bratty, screechy whine spewing across the neighborhood. Children yell and shout and yip from the “talking tree.”By the by, the talking tree is not a tree that talks, it is a tree where you go to sit and talk to your buddies, thus, the talking tree.Our dog barks at something only she can see or hear or smell.The wind sets the leaves to trembling and skittering in the golden light of a dying sun.The sounds of sirens and traffic are intermittent at best and act as a counterpoint to all the rest—the cacophony of the countryside where we live. But now that I think of it, isn’t a cacophony a discordant collection of jarring noises? Answer: Yes!So, I’m going to change my word. It’s not a cacophony at all.The sound of air rattling past Maple leaves and rushing through Spanish moss mixed with the perfume of smoke and colored with the shrieks of laughing kids and the bleating talk-talk between mother goats and their babies isn’t a cacophony at all. It’s music.Linda (All Ears) Zern

B is for Bask

B is for Bask
When we bought our house in Central Florida, the former home owner handed me a long, slender strip of wood with a bent coat hanger hook stapled at one end.He said, “This is your snake stick. You’re going to need it.” With that, he and his lovely wife climbed into their RV and roared off into the Florida sunset. The snake stick is designed to humanely lift cold-blooded snakes off the handle of the garbage can—a handle that a human might be about to grab with his/her bare, warm-blooded hand.I didn’t even get a chance to thank him for my new snake stick. And I should have. Thanked him. Black snakes patrol the foundation of our home like North Korean soldiers looking for random American tourists or Christian hikers. They bask—to expose oneself pleasantly to warmth—in the sun on my walkways. They drape—to fall or hang in loose folds—themselves in the branches of my hedges. They shed—to fall off—their skins among my sunflowers. They make me wet—tinkling urine out of fear—in my pants.Not that I’m anti-snake. I’m not. But dang, is there an animal on the face of the earth better at the “gotcha game” than the cold-blooded snake? I think not.How many snakes, you ask? Approximately twelve dozen or one really busy one. I’m not sure.What do they want, you may wonder? Lizards. Florida is awash with creepy, crawly types, and I don’t just mean the massage parlor boys. Lizards dart, whip, creep, flick, and crawl all over the screens of our porch. Our snakes have developed an interesting lizard hunting technique. They slither along the base of the porch and then leap straight up to pluck distracted lizards off the porch screen. True story. I’ve seen it. Our snakes can leap—about as high as a couple of chubby toddlers stacked one on top of another. Snake stick? You bet. I carry it with me when I stroll through the pasture or feed the chickens or breathe fresh air. I worry that the snakes will mistake me for a porch screen covered in lizards. It might not be a rational concern, but it is real.Today, I smacked a lizard off the back-porch screen, sending it flying into the yard. It hit the ground, gained its feet, and blazed its way back to the safety of the porch screen. A wily black snake gobbled the lizard up inches from safety, and now I’m going to have to continue to feed the foundation snakes or they’ll break into the house and punish us. I know it. It’s not a rational worry, but it is real.Linda (Snake Skin) Zern       

A is for Ameliorate

WRITING MY WAY THROUGH THE DICTIONARY: A is for Ameliorate
I don’t know anyone who isn’t writing a book, who isn’t thinking about writing a book, who hasn’t already written a book, or having written a book isn’t now planning to write My Book, Part Two—Cash, Check, or Charge.  All of which is wildly exciting—also bewildering. It’s a brave new book-writing world.
Guttenberg would be proud—also bewildered, I bet.
I’ve written a book—of course—well ten books, actually. One of which is a middle grade, soft cover, work of historical fiction called MOONCALF. It’s literature. It contains no sex, drugs, wizards, or rock and roll. I made $1.68 cents in royalties last month, and I’m competing with 700,000 other titles in my category on Amazon.  I have twenty-one EXCELLENT reviews on Amazon and only one of them is my mother.
The problem with everyone writing a book, including my poet house painter, is not the competition, but it’s the sheer mathematical mass of the competition. It’s like being one oat in a silo of oats or a jet liner at the bottom of the Indian Ocean. Tricky. Very tricky to get noticed.
A writer friend of mine suggested paying for and participating in a Book Blast to ameliorate the trickiness of being one book in the flood of one million plus titles published each year.
I did this and wrote the check.  Please don’t ask me what a Book Blast is, because I still don’t know.  I think it’s when your book title gets tweeted by a trillion people hoping to win a free _________________ (fill in the blank.)
It was fun.  I got lots of strangers wanting to be my tweety friends and email pals.
I also got promptly hacked, causing my new email, tweety friends to send me messages alerting me to the hackage. They were very nice about the hundreds of posts advertising weight loss products that appeared to be coming from my fat bottom. They said, “Hey, you’ve been hacked. Fix that would you.” It wasn’t a request.
My book, MOONCALF, was not mentioned.
And so, I ameliorated—a word meaning to make better or improve—the problem of someone pretending to be me by changing all my passwords, ninety percent of which I’ve promptly forgotten.
No worries. I press on. My next book Healing the Strandline (third in The Strandline series) is a young adult romantic prepper action adventure that will fit nicely into the already over-crowded young adult romantic prepper action adventure genre.
To ameliorate the potential of being crushed under the endless weight of vampires, shape shifters, and death game players, I plan to keep my characters naked for the entire book as they fly from spot to spot while hanging from their own personal drones.
No, I don’t. 
Someone’s probably already written that book.
Linda (Better Now?) Zern  
   
       


 

The Next Epistle of Saint Zern

1  

1      And they did continue to dwell among the eagles and racoons in the land of Florida Central, having fought the good fight against the state taxation found in the land of Carolina in the north country, finding it grievous. And they did rejoice in a land both warm and cheap.2       And thus, we see that Sherwood and Linda did endeavor to live as goodly parents and doting grandparents in the land with no state income tax.3       And it was done with good intent, whilst they did binge on Netflix and the like. 4      Furthermore, it was with great happiness that they did, in the year of our Lord, 2018, count among their greatest gifts and blessings the children that they did count as grand. And Phillip and Heather begat Zoe and Conner and Kipling and Zachary and Griffin and even one more, Ender. His name being that of a character in a most excellent book.5      Maren and Thomas begat Reagan and Hero and Leidy and Boone the Baby pants.6      To them also did Adam and Sarah count Emma and Sadie and Scout and the youngest of them, Ever Jane, who did vex many with her dislike of the chamber pot; however, much she did smile and show forth much spunkiness.7       And in the land northward, a land of much snow and cucumbers, they did see Aric and Lauren bring forth both Silas and Ellie.8       And it was like a tribe of old that did grow and prosper and become both fair and delightsome.9      And so, there was the giving of great thanks.10    And the honor was Poppy’s, who was both adored and admired by the children he found grand and who did arrive daily asking, where doth Poppy dwell and is there Pepsi and candy?11    But behold, YaYa did impose the rule of law, and receiveth much in the way of deathly looks and muttered curses, but she doth continue to hold high the standards of truth and meanness. 12   But it came to pass that YaYa did both rule and reign and bring forth collections of her words, arranged in blocks called paragraphs, numbered on pages, bound up in books called novels. And she did continue forth writing much, yea even a great number of volumes which can be found at a place called amazon.com/author/lindazern 13   And now, it came to pass in the fortieth year of their being wedded that Sherwood and Linda did continue in this vein, sitting much in the afternoon and evening gathered about a pot of fire recounting the days of their youth and silliness. And they did laugh much at the memories and silliness.14   And they caused that their family did stand in readiness, lest they be caught flat of foot in the last days.  15   And I make an end.     

Relax, Your Government is Keeping You Safe From Crotch Metal

Flew to Ohio. Flew back from Ohio. Got strip searched in Ohio. Okay, maybe not all the way naked, but it was close. It was a lovely little family trip to experience a baby’s blessing and naming ceremony. You know, one of those delightful days that make all the other days—worth it. This delightful day happened in Ohio. We don’t live in Ohio. We have to fly to Ohio from Florida to experience this delightfulness. We could drive, but we’d rather ride Florida alligators in public without pants.On the way back from Ohio, in the Dayton airport, we were shuffled into the regular person line by TSA. Usually, we get to go through the pre-check line because our Poppy is a travel diva who doesn’t have to be a “regular” person due to excessive perks.What I learned being a regular person:The fancy, expensive, taxpayer funded scanner machine is easy to confuse. I confused it with plastic sparkles on my sweater, which it detected as plane exploding metal. The next thing I know a TSA-stranger-lady is asking me if I would like to go in a private place to have my breasts touched.Tempting! But no. I turned my head and said, “Get it over with.” TSA-stranger-lady patted down my confusing plastic sparkles and then moved on to my chubby thighs. I said, “Hey, there aren’t any sparkles down there.” It’s possible TSA-stranger-lady did not care.She waved me through after checking my hands for powdered sugar. (That was a near thing. I had some dreamy chocolate covered strawberries at my daughter-in-law’s house.)Shaken, I straightened my sparkles, looked over my shoulder, and saw my seven-month pregnant daughter having her crotchal area checked for metallic objects. TSA-stranger-lady had my daughter’s shirt pulled up to Heather’s nipple region and was running her hands over my sixteenth grandchild. Heather started to cry.That’s when I yelled, “Cry, Baby! Cry! You cry right now!” Stripped of her dignity and Ugg boots (made in Australia and purchased by the above-mentioned travel diva) Heather tried to put her footwear back on after the TSA-stranger-lady got through with her and went to smoke a cigarette, but the pregnant chick couldn’t bend that far, so Conner, her twelve-year old, steered her to a plastic airport chair and put the boots back on his mother’s feet.“Mom,” she sniffled, “the machine thought I had metal in my crotch.”“It’s broken. Let’s go home.”So, at this fine season of peace on earth, good will to us, please be advised your government is working hard to keep you safe from my plastic chest sparkles and the pregnant chick’s crotch metal. Merry Christmas,Linda (You Missed a Spot) Zern

DON ARGO AWARD WINNING LITERATUREWhen readers read, write...

DON ARGO AWARD WINNING LITERATURE
When readers read, writers rejoice. Thanks Red-headed Book Lover for the great review!!!Don Argo Award Winning Literature

Gaslighting

Gaslight is an old, old movie. It’s a classic. It’s an old classic. The beautiful Ingrid Bergman is in it. She’s a classic.In the movie, her husband tries to drive her insane by moving stuff, hiding stuff, and dimming stuff. The movie coined the term gaslighting or to be gaslighted. It means trying to drive people crazy by means of moving stuff, hiding stuff, and dimming stuff like the gaslights. Since the invention of the lightbulb, people (mostly my husband) try to gaslight people (mostly me) by acting like they’ve NEVER heard people (again me) say that I need someone (mostly my husband) to change the lightbulb in the ceiling fan on the porch. Because if I change it I have to drag the ladder from the barn, climb to the shaky top, balance on the top rung, while holding the lightbulb in my mouth and . . .It’s still dark out there on the porch when the racoons form a human pyramid trying to pick the lock to the office and get to the mini-fridge.The gaslighting conversation goes like this. “Honey, did you change the lightbulb, so that I can fight off racoons in the night?”Honey says, “What porch?”Recently, Honey was in Australia. He called me and wanted to know if I wanted a pair of Ugg boots. I said, “No thanks. I think they’re ugly and they make me look like an Inuit Indian, but I could go for a pair of those backless, slip-ons they make.” I purposely did not call them mules because I was pretty sure he’d bring me an actual mule.He bought a pair of Ugg boots for daughter # 1, daughter # 2, daughter-in-law # 1, and a neighbor lady. I received?A bookmark.Made of wood.With a kangaroo.Am I speaking English? Is he? Did my desk lamp just dim?And don’t even get me started on how often he thinks he’s told me stuff because he thought it to himself really loudly, or is he just pretending to think stuff he never told me?Gaslighting.Linda (Light Bright) Zern

WARNING - Learning Curve Ahead!!!

What I've learned to do . . . Covers, Formatting, Blurbs, Short Stories, Novels, Writing, Authorship and MoreWatching my son-in-law try to dress our first granddaughter for her ride home from the hospital was painful. He gingerly tried to trap one of her flailing fists to gently guide her hand through a darling pink jumpsuit. The fist eluded him. He acted like she was made of frozen glass spider webs. Finally, I could take it no more; backing him away from the baby, I grabbed her fist and shoved it through the sleeve of her outfit; first one and then repeat. She was dressed in less than a minute.

The learning curve to dressing a newborn baby isn’t steep, but it is real, and it’s a pattern for the rest of our ever-learning lives. Just about the time you’re pretty sure you know stuff, the stuff changes and becomes a baby with twitchy hands or a book that needs formatting.

In nothing is this more evident than in the shifting world of social media and the Internet.

I no longer have babies that resemble my husband. I have graduated to making babies that resemble “War and Peace,” only a lot shorter. I write novels. They are like my babies, and I want you to read them—not read to them.

When people ask me what I write, I say, “Yes.”

The learning curve associated with writing books is varied and curvy. First, you learn how to keep your baby safe from the black hole of Where did it go? I know I hit the save button! And then you progress all the way up to books on audio, where you’re interviewing actors to read your book—on tape!

It’s not hard, but there’s some tech stuff and a bit of a learning curve. That’s what I’ve been told.

So let’s discuss what is meant by “learning curve.”

1. It means that you are empty of answers—also ignorant. How do you grab a baby’s jerky little hand? Will it hurt the baby? Are babies made of frozen glass spider webs? Is CreateSpace run by elves? Why does my formatting look like reformed Egyptian? 
2. You are not stupid because you are ignorant, but you will feel stupid.
3. The feeling of stupid will give way to the feeling of intense, painful frustration because people will start explaining how to ride the learning curve, using words you will not understand.
4. If your learning curve is anything like algebra and it will be; those that know will use words you don’t understand over and over again, getting louder and louder, until you pretend to “get it.” When they say, “See?” You shout, “Of course.” Then cry.
5. After a zillion hours of riding the learning curve of ___________________ (fill in the blank) you will acquire a certain level of proficiency.
6. Then THEY will change the program, the coding, or the rules.

The good news is that learning curve stuff is good for me, and writing books is like having a baby made by my brain. It keeps me young. It keeps me sharp. It keeps me in the game. Otherwise, I might never have been able to figure out how to stick a baby’s hand through one of those tight, clingy, little sleeves.

Linda (Sit Tight) Zern 

THREE FOR FREE - Today!!!!

amazon.com/author/lindazern

Zippity Zerns Talks Changing Genres: an interview on the Hangin With Web...