Liberating

A new years resolution, to clean out the home office, is proceeding apace.  I only have a couple file cabinets left to go.  Not much, considering the piles and piles of paper that have been carted away for recycling.

Today I cleaned up another big ugly pile: lists and lists of literary agents, their web sites, interviews, lists of whom to query for what book, rejections, magazine articles on how to find an agent. . . I dumped 98% of everything.  It wasn't depressing, well, just a little, to think of all the time and effort gone for naught, but it was really liberating, just wonderfully liberating.  Crap going back to 2004.  Lots of crap. 

I can start fresh.  One just-finished novel to query, a short story or two to send around, and one novel with a publisher (waiting for them to decline) and two move novels with another publisher, not the full manuscripts, but just the first ten pages, and I get the feeling I won't even hear from her.  A virtual decline.   O.K.  Good riddance.

Good riddance to everything, good riddance to the big heavy wastebasket full of paper.  Who knows?  Maybe half those agents are no longer agents. New ones come in to take their place.  Just like writers. Goodbye, adieu, hasta luego.   Tschuss!

In another year, I may have three, count 'em, three more books out there on Kindle.  Somehow, this is more exciting than all these tedious queries, now mostly unanswered since email.  Email should make it easier to answer queries, right?  Nobody does anymore.  Merde.  Hey, we are your customers.  Ignore us at your peril.

So liberating.  I'm going to go upstairs and drink a glass of plonk and eat a bit of brie.  The office looks so good.  I have even begun to dust, now that there are empty places to drag the Pledge Wipes across.  This, too, is liberating.

Why did I wait so long? 

Saturday Night Company Dinner

Blackberry Clafoutis in skillet Recipe


Unexpected company on Saturday. We ran to the store on Friday after taking a quick poll on what everyone wanted to eat. Came up with Steak Tips with Harissa, but I got confused and bought Sirracha sauce which must be pretty similar. Hotter than old billy-be-danged. I got two (2) 1 lb. 1.5 inch thick sirloins, and cut them into 13 chunks. Marinated, then fried in two big skillets. Managed medium rare, a miracle. Here is the Recipe

I made Lucky's Potatoes and Cherry Tomatoes Provencal recipe as side dishes, and made a salad of iceberg (on sale) garnished with artichoke bottoms. For dessert, there was a blackberry clafoutis, made in a cast-iron skillet and 100% delicious. Lots left, praise be.

Note:  I updated this post with links to recipes.  Everything but Lucky's potatoes which don't seem to be on the web.  Later. Later. 

Now I am planning a dinner party with no seafood and no dairy which is something of a challenge, but I think I have mastered it. 

Yesterday I watched Diner's, Drive-ins and Dives and the topic was barbecue. It look so good I thought I might have to put on a bib to catch the drool. Well, you know.

On another topic altogether, I mailed my novel, Chased By Death to my Kindle, and it was amazing how some typos and unnecessary description just popped out. This is the last walk thru. I'm pretty psyched.

Book Girl

From Beantown to the Big Apple

We drove to NYC to celebrate Significant Others Significant Birthday.
It was fashion week, which is barely a blip on a retiree's radar.  New York Fashion Week I did notice the ugly-on-an-ape high heels and anklets photos in the Times. Unattractive, grumpy-looking women who look like they could use a cheeseburger-and-fries stalking about in clothes that befitted their in-your-face unattractiveness.  The fact that these clothes are so far out there that only the 1% can afford them, and the 1 % of the 1 % would want to wear them, makes you wonder how these designers stay in business.  Well, what they actually sell is not what you see in fashion week, or at least what the Times deems fit to print. 

We had a lovely Valentine meal at Pascalou,  an upper East Side place that serves delicious food and doesn't break the bank.  Service and meal were good, esp. considering that Valentine's Day can produce crowds, inattentive service (due to crowds) and less than stellar food.  Not the case at Pascalou.  I absolutely adored my sole. Pascalou

Before we left, I baked a "Marmorkuchen," or marble cake, S.O.'s favorite.  We bought a cake carrier (an adventure in itself) to schlep it with us.

Our host cooked a fab birthday dinner, which was somewhat clouded by the fact that the car, which had to be moved because of parking rules, would not start.  A call to AAA would solve everything, we thought.  Just need a jump.  Nope.  What we needed was a battery, alternator, labor and a bill in the low four figures.  Ouch!

Then we got a late start for home, landing us in rush hour, rain, darkness, and traffic hell.  Our host drove back to Boston, too, because she had to go to a memorial service.  I cooked a quickie dinner at 9:30 at night--Italian sausage with a cobbled together vodka sauce.  Pasta with Sausage in Vodka Cream Sauce Very delicious if I say so myself.  Wonderful Blackberry Clafoutis last night.  So simple and delicious. 

In New York, we visited the Met and saw the American (both continents) Indian exhibit and also the European sculpture gallery.  Lovely. European Sculpture Gallery at the Met

In Boston we heard Handel & Haydn Society Orchestra play Eroica and also a great rendition of  the Egmont Overture.  That Beethoven sure could compose beautiful music.

Last night I cooked a decent meal and inadvertently invented a recipe.  This post is getting mucho longo, so I'll discuss the recipe anon.  And explain my serendipitous error.

Must catch up on missed TV programs and the Sunday papers.  Also laundry.  Writing.  House.  Bills.  Stuff.  Life is strange.

Grapeshot

Best-Liked Posts

Over the years, some posts have resonated with readers of this blog.  Without rhyme or reason, I might add.  Maybe there's a reason, but I'm not privy to it.  

That being said, here are links to the posts that receive hits year after year, week after week.   Many of them are recipes.  Some are thoughts about art (Mary Seagull) or even books.  Take a look if you have missed them.

Whither Mary Seagull

Grave Yard Stew

Penzey's Butter Chicken Recipe

World's Best Stuffing Recipe for Turkey

College Drinking Song: Let Nellie Sleep Under the Bar

Books Men Like

The Changing Email Wars

One of my resolutions for the year was to change my email address. One of the last tasks was to migrate my 450+ list of contacts. Pure comma delimited hell. The file exported all right, but the new email provider offered only limited help unless I ponied up $59.99. Ha! Not bloody likely.

I have been struggling with this task for 4 hours, and I finally was able to import only the email addresses, but somehow not the first and last names. The email addresses are what I would normally miss-key, so now I just have 425 first and last names to key. Oh, the fun that will be.

Now get this: the software required you to INTUIT the column headings. I just got (finally) email right. When I'm done, I can export the file to my other address on this system.

I did not set my hair on fire, but I also did not do any writing.

Have I mentioned I have the WORLD'S BEST MEATLOAF RECIPE. I might have had time to share that, too. But no!

Victory against the forces of stupidity, cupidity and bad technology! I have prevailed.

A pyrrhic victory, to be sure. Arrrghh!

Feeling Optimistic

What is it?  The appearance of the chickens?  The Social Networking Workshop?  Having  material with two publishers (both of them are considering, not publishing
)? 15,000 words into the California book?  

I just have this crazy feeling of optimism.  Wonder why.  They say the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. 

Back in the day, Significant Other and I used to try and try to make Sachertorte and we always wondered why it didn't rise to extreme heights.   Many cakes later, we discovered it actually wasn't supposed to be a big tall cake.  We've decided to make it again sometime. 

Social Networking 101

On Saturday, Significant Other and I attended a workshop on social networking sponsored by New England Sisters in Crime.  The networking guru was Shawn Nicholls, who is senior digital marketing director at Harper Collins.

We learned a lot about Facebook, Fan Pages, and Content, until everyone's head was swimming.  The lunch with yummy salads, mini wraps, fruit and cookies couldn't be beat.  Then it was on to Twitter, Blogs and Websites.  Sorry to say, but websites will soon be on your Facebook page, likewise blogs.  Facebook is where it's at, using Aps and Tabs and parsing Insights.  One has to run to keep up.

Barbara, Mo and Ro --ladies with laptops

Here are a few photos of the group.  For some reason, Blogger is really slooooow to load photos these days.  Inquiring minds want to know why.               

We can make an executive decision.  Barb, Sheila and Pat

Shawn said that fan are interested in the process of writing.  Sometimes when one talks about that, one sounds kind of, you know, crazy, as in "my characters talk to me."  Oh really?

Pensive Liz

The participants agreed they had learned a lot and everyone rushed home to Tweet, post, and review notes.   All in all, a day of useful learning.

Unintended Consequences

 I have mentioned before that our oaks bore no acorns this fall.  I've been importing them from Long Island, when  possible, and I also  bought 50 pounds of cracked corn.  The squirrels have been indifferent to the cracked corn but the birds like it and I had fond hopes that the wild turkeys would discover it.

Hen and Rooster eating corn in the front yard

Not yet, but guess what?  We are kinda sorta in exurbia, to the degree that some of the land directly around us in zoned farm land.  Which means . . . chickens.  Who found the corn.   I'll be danged.

Uninvited Guests eating cracked corn 

 The rooster is a handsome fellow and knows it.  He approaches one sideways in a half-threatening way.  I just walk on by, saying, "nobody is afraid of you," and he loses his "attitude."  Of course they managed to poop on the sidewalk. 

Never a dull moment.  The cat Thisbe likes to get on her perch and peer out the kitchen window.  Her eyes were as big as saucers when she spotted these two.  The biggest birds she's ever seen.  Oh! Thisbe,  they would probably run away.  On the other hand. . . a rooster with attitude can be quite intimidating to a fraidy cat,