People, Places and Things

And while searching for a monkey face

... and while searching my computer files and folders for the one document I believed lived on my hard drive with the word "monkey" in it, I discovered that there are more than 20 occurrences, including Kid Rock lyrics, the screenplay "Fargo," and a 2005 article about sex written by news anchor Anderson Cooper ... go figure ...

WomenBloom

My WomenBloom loot arrived and knowing what was inside, I tore open the package. This wasn't as difficult as it may have been becuase as you can see by the photo, Canada Post did a pretty good job of opening the package with what looks to be a worker's boot.

Maybe it's not fair to lay it all on the Posties. Maybe it's standard practice for Canada Customs to punch a hole in every package to see if there's anything valuable inside??!!  And in this case, can we really blame them for trying to steal my stuff?

What if they couldn't resist? What if those federally-employed dogs were overcome by the sweet scent of delicious Mary Louise Butter Brownie's inside?

Maybe the person saw the name WomenBloom printed on the parcel and had some other ideas of what the plain, brown box contained.

In any case, the would-be thief couldn't reach past the tissue paper and therefore wil have to enjoy his (or her?) morning coffee in a mug that is not my awesome WomenBloom mug. And she (or he?) will have to count the days to their government pension on a calendar that is not my very, very pretty WomenBloom calendar.

And so, I give my monkey face to the looting looter who tried to loot my loot.  }:-(|)

And the winner is ....

Me! I won! I haven't been this excited since I won a five-pound Hersey's chocolate bar when I was ten. Oh, right, there was that lottery money back in 1995. Come to think of it, there was that other contest a while back---the one where I won a "meet and greet" with author James Frey, but couldn't go. Well, this prize is coming to me.

If you want to preview the booty go to Women Bloom. Also, have a look around the site. The site, run by Allison Allen, has dozens and dozens of smart, well-written, and informative articles on a range of subjects, all of them of specific interest to those of us who are, eh-hem ... could be, I suppose .... are technically ... mid-life.

Enjoy Women Bloom!

I'm a pin-up

This was not something I expected, or had even considered before I recieved an email asking me if I, or any of my fellow writers was interested. These things seem to happen when you least expect it. So there you are. Or rather, here I am: I am a pin-up at http://www.pwac.ca/.

I am envious of the backyard visitors my mother has.

The only wildlife we see in our backyard in the winter are pre-teen hockey players battling it out on our backyard rink. We do, however, get those ugly, black, Toronto squirrels spring, summer, fall.

      

Out of Sick Bay, back to the office

I've been in Sick Bay for the past few days and haven't posted much in the past month or so due to the constraints of work (a stressful bore), an on-line, technical editing course (interesting, but time-consuming), and my own writing projects (perpetually stalled).

The upside of having a cold or flu is being bedridden.

For me, that means reading and/or watching movies while drifting in and out of sleep. When I was sick with a case of flu between Christmas and New Years I spent four days watching television in the living room and was finally booted off the couch by my family who wanted their living space back.

Being sick is like a mini-vacation because office work never enters my mind.

Coincidentally, I had been given a feature film script to read and comment on by a friend. Just days before, a coworker lent me a novel "The Secret Life of Bees." With sinuses too inflamed to set glasses on (and thereby removing television watching from my agenda), I substituted two of my own pieces of work and settled beneath a comfy duvet.

I had enough reading material to keep my mind off the mean virus coursing its itchy, scratchy, ouchy way into my ears, nose, and throat.

Days later, I'm still under the weather and now nursing the Kid back from his fever of 103.1, and looking forward to going into the office tomorrow if only for a change of scenery.

While I have been sworn to secrecy about the comedy script, I can tell you that it's one of the funnest things I've worked on in a while.

I had no idea that working with another writer could be such a blast.

Collaboration, it seems, means something very different to an artist than the concept of "team work" means to other technical writers.