Purls O' Wisconsin

Yep. It's gonna effect most of the gulf coast including inland areas. Here's our Hazardous Outlook.
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Have you ever stopped by Bitten By Books?  It's a great review site, with tons of interviews with authors.  Readers regularly say that one of their favorite things about Bitten by Books is the contests - great prizes, with many chances to win.

And, dear reader, *I* am playing at Bitten by Books on Monday, 11/9.  Stop by to read an interview, to ask your own question in comments, and to get a chance to win a $25 Amazon US gift certificate or one of five copies of HOW NOT TO MAKE A WISH.  Yes.  Five copies, going to five readers.  I said that there were many chances to win!

Here's the invitation to the event:  http://bittenbybooks.com/?p=12646

You'll note that merely RSVP'ing, saying that you'll swing by on Monday, gives you several possibilities to win.  So? What are you waiting for?  RSVP today!  And stop by on Monday!

Mindy, eager to see you all there!

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I had such great plans for today and instead, I laid around, I read, I played on the computer and I napped.  I don't have pants on.  And I don't feel guilty.

Remember that short story that I wrote, set in the same world of HOW NOT TO MAKE A WISH?  The one that consists of 20 chapters, each chapter containing 500 words?  The one that has cliff-hangers at the end of every chapter (until the last?)  The one that introduces you to genies, and to the sometimes-troublesome way that they grant wishes?

Well, all 20 chapters are now posted online.  *You* can now go read them, straight through, without any annoying breaks for weekends, or for late  postings, or any of those little online annoyances!

Here's the link:  http://eharlequin.com/article.html?articleId=1438

Feel free to register at that site, if you want to participate in the ongoing online discussion, or to make comments, ask questions, etc. here!

Mindy, pleased to have seen so much discussion over on the story's discussion board, but always eager to see more!

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That's all I do of late.  I shouldn't bitch. It's probably PMS.  Of course, sometimes my bitching amuses people.  But mostly it probably annoys them.

So, to take Sir Tom's Grad class and the re-scheduled voodoo weekend workshop, I had to drop the Art Therapy class.  Which is ok, I am sure it will be offered again.  Which reminds me, I have to get to Quality Art and pick-up some watercolor paper and get it prepped for class next weekend.  Bleh.  It's a have, I need the credit class.  I have taken it before, the teacher is useless. But I get to go on-base at Gowen.  Not sure that's a plus, honestly.

I dropped by Sir Tom's today to have him sign my 'yes, you lowly fucking undergrad, you can take a graduate level class but only if you follow the course of fire' form.  His signature, his dean's signature, the signature of the dean of the graduate college.  For Christ's sake, it's a class.  Chill.  But I am excited because Tom is excited.  It's something called a Shadow Book that's a collaborative effort.  And since it's a grad class, I expect good collaborations.  I hope he gets at least one other artist in there.  It's a lot of pressure being the only one, especially since it'll be a collaborative effort on an art project.  If everyone else is an English major, I'll be vastly outnumbered.  We also talked about his weekend workshop and he's pretty excited about that as well.  So, two classes with Tom and one with Karen, another with Chris the archaeologist that I discovered by accident this semester... not too shabby.  There's a couple others too but those are the coolest.  I am actually looking forward to classes next semester quite a lot.

Oh, thestitchwitch sent me a lovely package of goodies- a bag with the SCT logo on it, a skirt, a scrub top and this really awesome shawl with a dragon embroidered on it.  It's purple, that makes the awesome level triple.  It was part of my witchy costume on Saturday night.

Tomorrow I am going to talk to Marcus Eaton's management and get the date firmed up.  We have been playing phone tag for a week now.  But it's looking a lot like December 19.  I can't wait. I hope he enjoys the venue as much as Rosalie Sorrels did.  Speaking of which, we need to bug her too.

Not much happening at the theater right now, Kevin and I are both asst. directing for upcoming shows.  Which is really not too labor intensive.  My cast just finished blocking, thank god.  I despise blocking.  I have decided that should I ever get rich and/or famous, I will pay someone to block my show.  Ok, I probably won't because I would just change everything to the way I wanted it and annoy the actors, but how cool would it be if I could?  It's just tedious.  I just want to work on line delivery and character and we are figuring out movement.  Necessary but tedious.

I am going to hit the board with a new approach. We have been focusing on fund-raising so much and are getting deeply burnt out because it's pretty much the same folks doing it all.  It occurs to me that if we just got more people in the seats, we could stop the fund-raising all together.  So, we are going to work on some efforts that way.

And that's update.  Oh yea, we are going to Twin this weekend. 

I got back to the office and there were several phone messages.  I keep forgetting to check my voicemail when I am out of the office.  Oh well.  I had 6 calls.

One was from John.  I called and left a message for John and nothing.  Since I am taking tomorrow off, I thought I would call.  He answered and I told him who I was.  He said, "Oh, uh, yeah, you're over by the university, right?"  Yes.

"Oh yes, well I wanted to know how to get a license to put up a kiosk in front of the stadium during a football game."

And you are calling me beeeecccaaaauuuse....?  Which I asked, slightly less sarcastically.  Apparently he did a search and just happened to come across my work number and thought he would call.  

I realize that the uni is big and there's a bajillion departments, but DON'T FUCKING CALL ME BECAUSE YOU ARE LAZY!

Normally, I would give folks like him a few phone numbers or something.  This time, my patience is at an end so I just told him to call Athletics.  Dumb ass.

 

I think I want to make a bookmark for this:


The Contest Crew has for you our November Contest, which asks you to design a Harry Potter themed bookmark.  Originality and creativity rule the day for this contest, for your bookmark may be hand drawn, computer generated, or consist of original photos.  Only one original entry will be accepted per person; collaborations or team efforts will not be accepted for this contest.  Any person over the age of 13 and not involved in the judging process may submit one original entry to contests@the-leaky-cauldron.org by 11:59pm EST on November 30, 2009 with "Bookmark" in the subject line of the email.  The first place winner will receive a custom made wand donated by Wizard Wood Wands.

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Just a quick reminder - I've updated the website for November.  As a practical matter for you, that means that you can:

1.  Enter this month's contest:  http://www.mindyklasky.com/contest.html

2.  Send me your wish for inclusion on the site:  http://www.mindyklasky.com/makeawish.html

3.  Read the first chapter of HOW NOT TO MAKE A WISH:  http://www.mindyklasky.com/chapter_hownotto.html

3.  Reload the pages endless times, to see some of the incredible wishes that people have already sent me.  Read them!  Reload!  Collect the whole set!

Mindy, looking forward to reading more wishes!

Hello there!  Remember me?

I'm back from World Fantasy Convention, in San Jose.  Everyone else has already posted their con reports, and I don't want to bore you by repeating the many wonderful things that others have said.  Suffice to say:

• The ConCom was wonderfully organized, and I got all my information as I needed it (or well before that point in time.)
• I have enough reading material to last through the next millennium.
• I remembered much more about San Jose, from Worldcon, than I thought I did.  Alas, the Borders bookstore that I remembered is no longer.
• This con was mostly about seeing people, for me.  I had a wonderful, fantastic, amazing time catching up with friends new and old.
• A special shout-out to my SFNovelists friends - I wish I could have stayed longer at our gathering!

Along with standard con insanity, I also had "college reunion" insanity, as I visited with my college roommate and caught up on all the things that have happened since we last saw each other three years ago.  (Yeah, there are phone calls.  No, they aren't the same.)

I ate way too much food, drank a few too many cosmos, had a lovely time visiting the beach at Pescadero, was intrigued by the Disney Family Museum in the Presidio, and had a lovely time overall.

And now, I'm trying to figure out how to get back in the swing of things!

So, one and all.  What did I miss while I was gone?

Mindy, trying, trying, trying

Crazee sent me the following auto-response this morning:


Hello, I am away until 12/31/1969 and am unable to read your message.


This amuses me quite a lot, actually.

So the gal that is the partner and unprepared had to leave, so she left her boss here to help.  I have to leave for a bit mid-day and was trying to prep her on the AV.  She looked blank and then said, in a condescending voice, "Can't the speakers just do it?"

Well, yes, they could, I suppose but I am not sure they would be able to.  Speakers are not notorious for being techies.  I said that I would take care of it and recruited someone else to double-check.

I have been rotating coffee airpots in and out.  One in the training room and another in the kitchen for the tenants.  She grabs the pot from the training room brings it in and shakes it, spraying coffee all over the kitchen.  I said, "OH!  There's still coffee in there, I guess."  At which point, she dumps a quarter of the airpot which is still fresh.  I was just stunned.  Why pour it out when it's still hot and fresh?

Glad she isn't my boss.

I am in Nampa at an IRS seminar with a bunch of CPAs.  It's a class we are sponsoring.  The room is set up for everyone to sit at the tables up front but there's a big round table in the back of the room where myself and the other presenters sit.  One of the participants came in and sat at the table.  I nicely said, "Oh  there's severa seats up front still."  To which she responded, "Then you go sit there."

I was stunned.  I just looked at her with my mouth hanging open and she said, "I don't like sitting in the front.  Then perhaps you ought to get here sooner you fucking cow.

The co-partner on this was supremely unprepared this morning.  She didn't have the sign-in sheet, she hadn't downloaded all the presentations to have on the laptop. It made for a somewhat crazy morning.

Can cats and dogs catch swine flu?

The answer appears to be no. DVM Newsmagazine reports that there is no evidence cats or dogs can contract, carry, spread, or suffer illness from H1N1 influenza.

H1N1 influenza has been isolated from a ferret. Fortunately at this time there is no evidence that ferrets can spread the disease to people.

Although it appears we can rest easy about our cats and dogs catching swine flu, remember that cats are susceptible to an even scarier form of influenza: bird flu (also known as H5N1). Cats contract bird flu by preying upon or being fed raw bird meat. The virus does not appear capable of spreading from cat to cat. That is a good thing, since the fatality rate among cats infected with H5N1 appears to be 100%.

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Alan Tudyk is on V!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!