Posted April 13, 2022
Painting by Gary McMillan

remembering gael

Our friend Gael Blackhall was a sweet, kind, complicated, funny, infinitely generous soul. She never married, never had kids, and she only had cats in the last few years of her life. Gael spent her money, not on herself, but on supporting various artists, writers and musicians, and all kinds of arts groups and environmental organizations. She gave money to Shakespeare in the Park, helped a filmmaker finance a film, bought art supplies for a painter, and every time I had a book published, she bought multiple copies to give to friends and libraries. Helping others. That’s what Gael was all about. In a lot of ways, she had a tough life, but what I remember most about her was her smile. It had such a sweetness to it, a kind of innocent delight in life. I can still see the look on her face when I put one of our cats on her lap (the first time Gael had ever had a cat sit on her lap). Her whole face lit up and she grinned from ear to ear, afraid to move so much as a finger in case she disturbed the cat. I will always remember her like this.

Gael passed away in 2020 and, to the surprise of many (including us), she died a wealthy woman. The list of her beneficiaries was as long as my arm: friends, family, arts groups, environmental organizations, animal shelters, CNIB guide dogs, health care support groups. The list was so very, very Gael. She left money to Mike and I. We’re doing the responsible thing and socking most of it away (being a Canadian author doesn’t really allow for the accumulation of huge retirement savings), but we did decide to buy a painting to honour Gael’s generous spirit and her love of the arts. We chose this one, painted by our supremely talented friend, Gary McMillan (you can find his work at McMillanFineArt on Etsy). I can hardly wait to hang this in our living room, to gaze at the play of light and shadow. To admire the gift of nature and the artistry that can capture it.

I know Gael would approve.

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Posted January 19, 2022
photo by Michael Dudley

thanks, past me!

Over the past two days we’ve had 20 odd cm of snow fall—this on top of the 20 cm we got a few weeks ago. This morning, wearing more layers of clothing than I can count (it was -39C with the windchill), I was out shovelling. Now my shoulders and neck are aching (pretty sure I had covid over Christmas, so things are a little more sore than usual these days). Fortunately, Past Me put a pork shoulder roast in the slow cooker before I went out. I’m back inside now sitting with a nice cup of tea, looking out onto the frigid-crisp sparkle-snow clear-blue day, with the scrumptious scent of pulled pork-to-be wafting up from the kitchen. Past Me RULES!

*The photo above shows how the Wee Floof is dealing with this latest cold spell. Yes, the heating pad is on…

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Posted November 10, 2021
Tweet visual by @RedPenKaitlyn

living in the magic of bliss

As writers, we often equate our worth in terms of our success. By success, of course, I mean securing a grant (of which I’ve had a few), an agent (still working on that one), or the epitome of it all, The Golden Publishing Contract (I’ve had a few of those too). I, myself, am guilty of this kind of thinking, especially in the last few years. It’s been seven years since my last book was published, and lately I’ve been thinking of myself as washed-up, a has-been, yesterday’s news.

Has life stuff been kicking my butt for five of those past seven years? Oh my, yes. And have I stopped writing because of it? No, I have not. I’ve written the first book in a YA epic fantasy trilogy AND a delightful MG standalone fantasy. So why do I feel like a writing loser? When you get turned down for grants, rejected by countless agents, and the Golden Publishing Contract is so far distant on the horizon that it might as well be in the next solar system, how do you keep going? How can you keep justifying writing for a living when you’re not actually making a living? How can you keep feeling that what you’re doing is worthwhile?

These are the times when we need to be reminded that we are so much more than those limited definitions of success. We need to remember that we’re writing to connect to the people who need our words. We need to remember that we’re writing for the sheer joy of creating our own, unique magic.

Years ago, I had the good fortune to hear Jack Whyte speak at When Words Collide (a Western Canadian writers convention). He wanted us to think about the name of the convention and how eminently appropriate it was to our profession. In the act of writing, our word are constantly colliding with each other. Sometimes it’s like an explosion, others the merest brush of lips across a sleeping brow. We struggle and fiddle and fuss with those words, but when they collide in just the right way…that’s when magic happens. When we’re in that space of blissful creation, we are, in fact, making magic, and that is a wondrous thing. This, my friends, is what successful writing is all about. 

Mythologist Joseph Campbell always advised people to follow their bliss:

“If you follow your bliss, you put yourself on a kind of track that has been there all the while, waiting for you, and the life that you ought to be living is the one you are living. When you can see that, you begin to meet people who are in the field of your bliss, and they open the doors to you. I say, follow your bliss and don’t be afraid, and doors will open where you didn’t know they were going to be.”

Yes, the grants are a lovely form of validation, so is getting an agent (at least, I assume that it would be). The same applies for landing that elusive publishing contract.  And yes, I know that if you don’t land the contract, or get the agent, or win the grant, it’s very difficult for your work to be out there connecting to the people who need it. Difficult, but not necessarily impossible. As long as you’re following your bliss, you never know when and where a door might open for you. Or a window. Or even a Twitter post that reminds you of why you’re doing this.

And so today, I will try to take the pressure off. I’ll try not to angst about agents and publishers and years between books. I’ll send words crashing gleefully into each other and see what sparkling magic results from it. I’ll try to live in the moment of creation. I will follow my bliss. Who’s with me?

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Posted October 20, 2021
Photo by Paul Andersen on Flickr.com

a new direction

It all started with my daughter, a very talented animation student. One of her team’s assignments this year was to come up with a bunch of story pitches for an animated short film. Given the creative nature of these students, it wasn’t surprising that they came up with quite a few very viable ideas. One of these was about the trials and tribulations of a teenage boy who gets turned into a vampire. It was only the merest skeleton of story, and the idea was voted down in favour of another concept, but there was something about this one that spoke to me. I asked my daughter if she would mind if I took the basic idea and ran with it. She told me to go for it.

And thus, Norbert MacPherson was born. I don’t want to give away too much of the story, but it’s humorous and touching and surprisingly real. And a HUGE amount of fun! I’ve written it for middle grade readers, which is a bit of a new direction for me (the last novel I wrote was a YA/adult crossover), but considering the positive feedback I’ve had from my beta readers (including my dentist’s son), I think Norbert’s story might just fly. So this is me immersing myself MG/YA books, querying agents and publishers, and for the first time in a long, long while, having fun.

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Posted March 3, 2021

Photo by Karen Dudley

old friends

For me, one of the more challenging aspects of this pandemic has been the inability to concentrate. On writing. On reading. Heck, some days I can’t even focus on a 20 minute TV show. Apparently, this is a perfectly normal response to the amount of stress that we’re under. The kind of chronic stress caused by Covid has exhausted us all. Rates of insomnia, anxiety and depression are higher than ever. So is brain fog.

In the past, I dealt with stress by escaping into a good book for a while, but ever since the pandemic began, I seem totally incapable of reading anything new. At the beginning of the lock down and while I was still in deep recovery mode from surgery, I ordered a bunch of books from Chapters/Indigo and McNally Robinson. Normally this would be a book lover’s dream. A stack o’ books as high as my waist? Woohoo! But do you think I can read any of ‘em? Nope. Not even one. I get a few pages (sometimes a couple of chapters) into them and I can’t remember who’s who, or what the world is, or why the magic system works the way it does. Argh!

All I can say is…thank the gods for my old friends! Yes, the books I’ve loved and kept and read and re-read over the years are now saving my life—or at least my sanity! I know the stories, I know the worlds, I know the characters, so I don’t have to keep all that in my poor brain-fogged mind. I can just crack open a book and suddenly I’m flying on angel wings over Samaria, or riding through the scorching Punjab with Tiger and Del, or poking around in Egyptian tombs with Amelia Peabody.

Spending time with old friends. It’s what’s going to get me through this…

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Posted January 15, 2021

Photo by Karen Dudley

waiting for a brighter tomorrow

I haven’t got a whole lot to say these days. We’re on lock down again. Visiting with friends over Zoom again. Trying to rehab my body remotely again. I am so very weary of life under Covid. Losing my dad has gutted me. The pandemic has gutted me. The whole world feels strange and unrecognizable. I just want the pandemic to be over. I want to have my pre-surgery body back. But most of all, I want my dad to not be dead.

I know that I’m just having a bad day, that tomorrow will seem a little brighter. That I’m better off than many other people. After all, we still have an income, we still have a home and enough to eat. My heart aches for those who don’t. But today my heart is aching for me as well. I think I’ll make a cup of tea and go find a cat to cuddle and wait for a brighter tomorrow. Some days that’s all you can do.

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Posted July 9, 2020

my dad

Jack Smith, dog-lover, wilderness buff, enjoyer of good jokes, provider of questionable tech support, and owner of multiple pairs of glasses (most of which he could never find), passed away on Wednesday, July 8, 2020 at age 83.

Jack loved being outdoors, preferably with a dog or two at his side. He often said that he liked dogs better than he liked people, though you would never know it by how easily he made friends. He loved science and fixing things (usually two hours before company was due to arrive), and he enjoyed ranting about politicians and how they were all ‘a bunch of dorks’. He adored a good joke, even if it was about him, and his shirts always had holes in them from the cats who liked to ride on his shoulders. He got excited when he saw a cool bird and took many pictures of them, most of which were, quite frankly, terrible. He always needed a good book to read, his workshop always needed cleaning, and he never had cash on him, though he always had gum. If you were cheeky, he gave you the one-raised-eyebrow look. If you were whining, he would tell you to look for sympathy ‘in the dictionary between shit and syphilis’. And if you were complaining about something legitimate or were sad or scared, he would come over and sit down with you and drink tea and then he’d fix your weatherstripping before he left because those ‘little dork’ cats had been clawing at it again.

But for all the things Jack loved in this life, he loved his family and friends the best. Along with his numerous friends and extended family, we’re going to miss him so very, very much. But whenever a colourful bird flits through the trees or a big, slobbery Labrador retriever charges across a sunny field, we will know that he’s still with us.

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Post date: May 10, 2020

Photo by Michael Dudley

weathering the storm

Recently, I was interviewed by Speculating Canada about what I’ve been up to during the Covid-19 outbreak. The answer was not a heck of a lot—at least with regards to writing. The pandemic really hit at terrible time for me. My dad is quite unwell and I am currently recovering from major surgery (though naturally I tell everyone the 8-inch scar on my abdomen is from a bat’leth fight). Keeping everybody (including me) together has been tough. Combined with anxiety/fear about Covid has meant that I’ve basically been doing my best interpretation of a fruit fly: buzzing around, lighting on something for a picosecond before taking off again. I haven’t cleaned closets or made bread or learned a new language or calculated the distance to Mars in Mars bars. BUT my family is (relatively) sane, the cats are happy, everyone is getting fed, and the house isn’t too gross, so I call it a win.

At first, I spent too much time reading upsetting articles, scrolling through social media, and having an occasional cry. But I am trying to enjoy the beauty of a quieter, less smoggy world. I write messages of love in chalk on the sidewalk and put hearts and stuffies in the windows so kids out for their daily stroll can count them. We’ve also been taking advantage of the various productions that are streaming for free: operas, Andrew Lloyd Webber musicals, Shakespeare plays.

The other cool thing that we’re doing—the thing that is helping most to keep my daughter happy and occupied—is having theme dinners. The first was, not surprisingly, an ancient Greek dinner. We researched the foods, the clothing, the makeup, and the dining rooms to recreate an ancient Greek symposion. We brought out the camp cots to make dining couches and piled them with pillows. We dressed in our finest chitons and ate sesame pancakes and shrimps in honey while we listened to lyre music (thanks, Youtube!) and gossiped about how Socrates always looks like an unmade sleeping couch. It was so much fun!!! We went Medieval after that. We were nobles in our dining hall and all my grandmother’s old silver serving dishes looked amazing (though the kitten tried to make off with one of the trenchers). This weekend we’ll be dining in an Elizabethan tavern. My husband and daughter look fantastic as lace-collared dandies about town. I, however, will be a lowly serving wench. Ah yes, staying sane…

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Post date: Feb 20, 2020

Photo by boxo on Flickr.com

thinking about farts

Every since I got diagnosed with a (thankfully small!) kidney cancer, a lot of people have advised me to write about ‘my journey’. As my surgery date approached, these suggestions grew more and more frequent. Now, I’m not really one to write about stuff like that, being far more interested in playing in my imaginary worlds, but while I was in the hospital, I did pen a few thoughts. I don’t think it’s quite as reverential as some people might have expected, but this is where my mind went. For those of you who know me well, I suspect you will not be too surprised...

In a Hospital Bed

I am lying in a hospital bed thinking about farts. There is a drain dripping out my side, my pajamas keep flapping open in the back exposing my naked pink butt cheeks to all and sundry, and I have to carry around a pee bag whenever I go for a walk like some weird iteration of Jacob Marley. There is no dignity in hospitals.

I am so bruised from needles and IVs and the consequences of having open surgery on my kidney, that I look like the ‘other guy’ in the proverbial fight. To make things worse, several times a day various nurses and doctors come in to ask me deeply personal questions about my digestive processes. I haven’t talked this much about my bowels since I ate a bad ham sandwich back in 1984. But now, it seems, everybody really, really wants me to fart.

“Have you passed gas today?”

“Are you passing gas?”

“Are you able to pass gas?”

At first, I instinctively lied. They had already done so many terrible, terrible things to me and I didn’t want them to do more just because I couldn’t squeeze out a wee fart. Astutely (no pun intended) guessing they wanted me to say ‘But of course, I am farting up a smelly storm in here thank you very much. I am surprised you are all still standing. And by the way, you might want to check on my roommate.’ I told them ‘yes’ and they went away.

They’ve taken my blood pressure, temperature, and oxygen levels so many times, frankly I’m surprised they don’t have some sort of fartometer to measure gas output. It would certainly reduce the need for all these intensely intimate questions.

So I’m lying in bed thinking about farts. Thinking that, for people who are so excessively interested in having me fart and poo (and who are, at the same time, filling me with Tylenol 3s, which have completely the opposite effect), they might want to try feeding me some food that actually has fibre in it. Oh, there are vegetables on the tray, but they are sad, soggy things which have had all the fibre thoroughly boiled out of them along with, I hardly need add, their tiny vegetable souls.

On Days 1, 2 and 3, the nurses gave me ‘stool softeners’, which sound gentle and soothing. All meadow flowers and fluttering birds and soft focus lenses. I am here to tell you it is a cruel lie.

“I’d just like to let nature take its course,” I tell them on Day 4.

And Day 5.

And Day 6.

“Are you still passing gas?”

“Like a high school quarterback,” I assure them, not mentioning the fact that I think their stool softeners blew out my entire colon three days ago.

But after three days of no action down there, you do start to get a bit concerned. Are things moving? Can people live without farting? How much money will I save in toilet paper if I never poo again?

And then, from the deep, a faint gurgle. And another. And another. They join, building in intensity, summoning other, lesser gas bubbles to the cause. Finally! The pressure builds and keeps building. This, you realize with breathless excitement, will be a doozy. The mother of all farts. Possibly even the Ur Fart itself, the fart from which all other farts are derived. I take a moment to hope my roommate is strapped down in her bed. This might just take her out. Possibly destroy the entire ward. Perhaps even level half of Winnipeg.

But just as I prepare to unleash this Supreme Fart onto an unsuspecting universe—an action that will clearly change the very tenor of the world—the pressure suddenly disappears and The Fart retreats back to the depths of the bowel with a malicious and vengeful gurgle.

“Did you pass gas today?”

“Oh yes,” I lie, but inside I am saying ‘No! And you should fall on your knees and thank all your lucky stars that I did not!”

Now, I am certain that one day the dwarves will dig deep enough to release the Balrog, and I will poo and fart with impunity once again—and (hopefully) without anybody pestering me for details. Until then, all I can do is lie here surrounded by pale striped curtains and stare at the fluorescent-lit whiteboard on the wall as I continue to contemplate the creature in my intestines. Lurking, lurking...

Addendum: For all you kind people who expressed their concern about whether I did eventually manage to fart, you may now rest easy knowing that I did. And while it wasn’t the mother of all farts—and certainly not the Ur Fart—and it didn’t take out half of Winnipeg or even my roommate, it was, in its own way, glorious.

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Post date: Mar 20, 2019

Photo: Eden's pillbug on Flickr.com

spring is in the air...and the basement

What is the first sign of spring? For some, it’s seeing that first robin, tangerine breast flashing through winter-greyed trees. For others, it’s the first pale petals of crocuses poking bravely up through an icy crust of melting snow. And for still others, it’s the postman wearing shorts, his muscled runner’s legs bare as he strides purposefully over melting snowbanks to deliver Public Lending Rights cheques to eagerly waiting authors.

But for me, the quintessential first sign of spring has to be bugs in the basement. Yep, that’s right. Bugs in the basement. Pillbugs, to be exact. When we first moved to Winnipeg in 1998, neither Michael or I had ever seen a pillbug before. That changed as soon as we went into our basement. Pillbugs are kinda gross and segmented with lots of scrabbly little footses, and they like to congregate in basements and other damp places. I was NOT happy to find them in our house—even after I discovered that pillbugs are not insects, but rather land crustaceans. In fact, they are more closely related to shrimp than they are to any kind of insect. Basement shrimp. Well, I suppose this was interesting, but unless they were on a skewer and covered with cocktail sauce, I didn’t want them in the house. Yeah, yeah, they breathe through gills. And mother pillbugs carry their young in a pouch. And they don’t pee, but they can drink with their anus. And they have blue blood, and if they’re sick, they turn blue. I get it! From a biological perspective, pillbugs are super talented and uber cool. Freddie Mercurys of the crustacean set.

I just didn’t want them drinking from their little blue-blooded anuses in my basement. Call me crazy.

And then that fall, Pixar released the movie A Bug’s Life. In it, there were a couple of goofy blue bugs who smiled a lot because they didn’t speak English. They looked remarkably like the pillbugs in our basement (in fact, they’re supposed to be pillbugs, though I don’t know if they were supposed to be sick pillbugs). At any rate, we started calling the bugs in our basement smiley bugs after the ones in the movie and a strange thing happened. Suddenly, the basement bugs didn’t seem so gross and undesirable. Suddenly, they seemed quite acceptable, almost cute. It’s all in the label. After all, how can you hate something called a smiley bug? And when our daughter was learning how to speak and couldn’t quite pronounce her ‘s’s, they got even cuter when she dubbed them ‘fmiley bugs’.

Smiley bugs hide away in the winter. Throughout the colder months, they are absent from our basement, even from the cracks and crevices (and given that our house is over 100 years old, there are a lot of these). I don’t know where they spend the dark days of winter, but once the weather begins to warm, the smiley bugs return. It did get a bit warmer this past week and the sun, stronger now, has been reducing the icicles to frigid drips and creating lakes where before there were only barren Hoth-like landscapes. But today I finally saw a smiley bug scurrying across the basement floor and I knew—I really knew!—that spring had finally arrived. I love robins and crocuses as much as the next person, but for me, nothing says spring more than a little land crustacean trundling across my basement floor. I wish you all a joyous Ostara!

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Post date: Jan 3, 2019

Photo by Karen Dudley

best gift of the year

Three years ago, my friend Tamara and her family arrived in Winnipeg as refugees from northern Iraq. They knew only two words in English: yes and no. They’ve learned a lot more of our language since then, but it’s been hard for them. I can only imagine how difficult it must be to try to understand and make yourself understood in a foreign language. Every. Single. Day.

Tamara once told me that she used to read novels all the time when she was back in her country, but although her spoken English has improved, she still can’t read it, so she hasn’t read a book since they came to Canada. That stuck with me. I kept thinking about how much I love to read, how much I rely on books to relax, to take me out of the world, and how very, very difficult it would be not to have that respite—especially if I was immersed in a new language, a new culture, a new country.

I wanted to give her that little bit of home, that escape, that portal to a wondrous and imaginary place, and so, after a LOT of searching, I finally found a novel translated into Arabic. It’s a second-hand copy of The DaVinci Code, a discard from the New York Public Library. It was supposed to be a Christmas present (Tamara and Mahmood celebrate Yule with us as we celebrate Eid with them), but the book didn’t arrive in time. It finally came yesterday and I can’t wait until I see her next! I love that I can give her a gift like this. And I hope, at least for the time it takes her to read it, she can escape from the world for a spell and bring much-needed rest to body and mind and spirit.

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Post date: Sep 11, 2018

Photo by Avin CP on Unsplash

how i spent my summer vacation

Writer Unboxed is a website which explores the craft and business of fiction in a positive and empowering kind of way. In a recent post, Confessions from a Weary Writer, Julia Munroe Martin wrote frankly of her discouragement and feelings of failure. A few days later, Donald Maass, President of the Donald Maass Literary Agency, replied to her post with an e-hug and warm words of encouragement. In one of the subsequent comments, he also wrote about having a pillow fight with his family despite the fact that he’d been jet-lagged and exhausted at the time. Here is my response to his inspirational words.

(you can read the blog posts here: Writer Unblocked)

Don, I love that you gave in to the lure of a birthday pillow fight! I made a similar choice this past summer though I almost didn’t because of what I “should have” done. First, a wee bit of history: two years ago, with six published novels to my name, I had just finished penning the first book of a new fantasy trilogy and was shopping it around (Oi, the query process! Even with six novels in your back pocket, it’s a soul-crushing affair). I’d had some initial interest, but nothing concrete and I was beginning to feel discouraged. I’d just started working on book two (seriously, I think I’d written eight pages of it), when suddenly Real Life decided to rear its ugly head. Aging parents, a child in crisis, health issues, downsizing and moving said parents, the death of a beloved pet and the serious injury of another. Oh yeah, the universe really let loose! During the next two years, I tried to spend time in my story world. After all, the real world basically sucked. Sometimes I was successful, but not for long and not consistently. Any dribble of creativity seemed to go up in a poof of rainbow-coloured smoke. More often than not, I didn’t have the brain space to write because I simply couldn’t keep an entire novel in my head.

By the time things finally calmed down this past June, I was feeling like Julia Munroe Martin: a failure and a fraud—or, at the very least, a has-been. Now, I tell you all this so you can understand how deeply, how desperately I wanted to get back to my writing. When school ended, I read my family the riot act. This summer, I was to be left alone. This summer, my daughter was to occupy herself in a useful and quiet fashion. This summer, we would eat sandwiches and cereal for dinner because I was not going to cook. And whenever I was in my den, I was not to be disturbed unless someone was bleeding or on fire. I was going to write.

Well, two weeks into the summer, I realized something: my daughter, who is almost fifteen, wanted to spend time with me. You said your son is only eleven, so I don’t know if you’ve begun to experience the Teenage Attitude yet, but for a teenager to actually WANT to spend time with their parents is both a rare and astonishing thing (I’d say that it is almost as rare as the Golden Publishing Contract, but, in fact, I believe it is even more uncommon than that). At any rate, I decided to take a week off to spend with her; at her age, how many more summers might I have this opportunity? One week turned into two, which turned into the whole summer. I spent the entire months of July and August just hanging out with my daughter. We went for long walks together and cooked together. We had deep and meaningful conversations about life and relationships and the state of the world. We grew herbs and tomatoes and did each other’s nails and dyed our hair weird colours. I would not have traded that time for anything—even the Golden Publishing Contract.

School has started again and I am now ready to get back to writing. I know that my imaginary world has gone on without me, that my characters have grown and changed. I can feel the weight of their voices pressing on me, urging me to come and play, to let them tell me their stories of what happened while I was away. It’s true what you said about a story world always being up and running. But just as you’re glad you took the time to have a pillow fight with your son, I’m glad I spent the summer with my daughter. I know I need to get back in the proverbial querying saddle again, to hurl myself with a berserker cry at the impenetrable walls of the industry fortress, but first I think I’ll play in my story world for a while and see how the mountain streams have fared in the spring thaw. Thank you for your words. As always they are timely and inspiring. I wish you strong seams on your pillows!

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Post date: May 4, 2018

Photo by Karen Dudley

still working magic

Still here. Still working magic as I ignore the less pleasant aspects of writing (i.e. querying agents/publishers). I am enjoying just creating for now, though I know I'll have to get back to the business stuff eventually. But for now, on this lovely sunny Friday morning in May, this is what my desk looks like. Awesome new owl mug? Check. Tea? Check. Burning enthusiasm? Check.

Here I go!

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Post date: Mar 29, 2018

Photo by Andy Holmes on Unsplash

working magic...

Another rejection.

Another agent who doesn't feel like my manuscript is right for them. It makes me wonder if literary agents EVER offer representation. Oh sure, logically, I know they do, but still. It's getting downright discouraging. I need to take a break from it. From all the querying to obsessive checking of email to that falling stomach feeling when yet another rejection comes in. It can be soul-crushing. And so, I need a break. I need to get away from the business end of writing and reconnect with my creative side.

I need to work some magic for a while.

And so, querying officially goes on hiatus for a spell and the magic of Book 2 begins. If you need me, I'll be playing in my imaginary world.

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Post date: Mar 8, 2018

Photo by Artiom Vallat on Unsplash

happy international women's day!

Earlier today, someone on Twitter put up a list of their favourite women authors. I tweeted back a few of mine, but as the day progressed, I kept thinking of other names that I ought to have included, hence this post.

I am a re-reader. I reread all my favourite books. I’ve always done this, ever since I discovered Anne McCaffrey’s Pern novels when I was a teen. There’s nothing more comforting when you’re tired or feeling under the weather than curling up on the couch with a cat, a pot of tea, and a dog-eared copy of a familiar friend. There is no order to this list, I wrote the names down as they occurred to me (and knowing me, I'll probably keep adding to the list). Quite a few of these writers are those whose books I’ve had to replace multiple times over the years because they’d grown too yellowed, too battered, too well-loved. For the rest, I’m sure it’s just a matter of time before I’ll need to do the same.

And so, in honour of International Women’s Day, here is a list of women writers whose words have enchanted me, informed me, inspired me, and kept me good company over the years. If you haven’t read anything by them, I suggest you give them a try. And if you have, then why don’t you put the kettle on, curl up with a cat (or a dog), and spend some time with old friends. I guarantee you won’t be disappointed.

Anne McCaffrey, Sharon Shinn, Jennifer Roberson, Lindsay Davis, Barbara Hambly, Elizabeth Peters, Gail Carriger, Rachel Caine, Sarah Prineas, Terri Windling, Louise Marley, Martha Wells, Vonda McIntyre, Patricia McKillip, Naomi Novik, Katherine Kerr, Judith Tarr, Mary Stewart, Jane Yolen, Joan Vinge

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Post date: Feb 1, 2018

Photo by Debby Hudson on Unsplash

the year of hearts

2017 was a year of hearts.

It started in January when Murf, my beloved cat of seventeen years, fell ill. My heart broke when he died, and even now, a year later, it still has not mended. There is a Murf-shaped hole there that will never be filled.

Later that month, my daughter had an episode of extreme anxiety brought on by ptsd stemming from her stay in the hospital a couple of years ago. My heart was terrified and confused and very, very worried. She is well now, but I would not wish that experience on any parent’s heart.

February brought the heart-rending task of moving my aging parents out of their house and into a condo. The purging—both physical and emotional—as well as all the packing and cleaning and moving was utterly exhausting and by May, when they took possession of their new home, my heart was weary and sad.

Fortunately, the summer brought light along with sunshine in the form of two kittens: Neetsa and Mango. They couldn’t fill the Murf-shaped hole, but they lightened my heavy heart, soothing it with soft paws and inquisitive whiskers, and my heart learned how to laugh again.

In September, I went out one morning to find The Dude, our ten year old cat, injured and bleeding on our sidewalk. Heart in my throat, I rushed him to the vet. He had to have one of his back legs amputated, and the opposite hip needed surgery too. It has been four months since then and he is recovering well and learning how to be a ‘tripawd’. I must admit, however, that my already sore heart has taken a bad beating during these past months.

And finally, just before Christmas, my dad was told he needed heart surgery. Two weeks ago, he had a quadruple bypass. He’s home now and on the long road to recovery, and right now my heart, like his, feels fragile and vulnerable.

A couple of days ago, my best friend came into town for a brief visit. She lives much too far away now and I find that difficult, but as I watched her sit in my living room and teach my daughter how to play her first ukulele, I realized my heart felt warm and full.

In many Muslim cultures, when you want to ask them how they’re doing, you don’t say “How are you?”. Instead you ask ‘How is your haal?’ This word, haal, means the transient state of one’s heart. Essentially, you are asking “How is your heart doing at this very moment, at this breath?”

When I think about this past year, sometimes I am astonished that my heart is still beating. Still ready for the next trial or celebration. Still ready to support someone in their time of need. Still open to laughter. Still pulsing with life and love. Still full.

Truly, the human heart is an amazing thing.

How is my heart doing at this very moment, at this breath? It’s battered and weary, but still good. Still good.

...

Post date: Jul 2, 2017

Photo by Cole Keister on Unsplash 

Canada Day

I am celebrating Canada today.

Am I ashamed by the genocide that was committed by our ‘founding fathers’? Yes. Am I outraged at the prejudice shown to indigenous people, and the fact that many of their communities are still without safe drinking water and adequate healthcare? Yes. My heart goes out to the people—OUR people—who are still hurting or suffering the consequences of the hurts that were done to them. Or their parents. Or their grandparents. Do I think we have further to go as a nation? Oh yes.

But I am celebrating Canada today. Not the Canada of 150 years ago, but the Canada of today. The Canada that opened its arms to a family fleeing from Mosul which, if circumstances and place were any different, could have been me and my family. I am celebrating a Canada in which I pay for someone in British Columbia to have heart surgery, or someone in Nova Scotia to have their appendix out. I am celebrating a Canada where two people who love each other can get married regardless of things like gender or orientation. Today I am celebrating the Canada that has taken the first steps towards reconciliation with its indigenous peoples. They are tiny steps, but they are steps that are moving in the right direction, and I am confident that those steps will turn to strides and then to leaps until one day soon, we get where we need to be. Together, loving, strong and free.

Happy 150th Birthday, Canada!

...

Post date: Jan 24, 2017

Photo by Karen Dudley

saying goodbye

Seventeen years ago I lost my heart to this little guy. A little over a week ago I had to let him go. I wasn't ready, but then, I wouldn't have been ready even if we'd had a thousand years together. He saw me through the arrival of my daughter and the deaths of friends. He saw me through the writing of four novels, all the self-doubt and the celebration. During the sharp stress of house renovations he was there, glowering at me from under the bed. During countless long, lazy summer afternoons he was there, poured across the lawn chair like a liquid cat. On clear cold days, he was stretched out on the craft room bed, his beautiful orange fur on fire in the bright winter sunshine. During the dark times, the anxious and bitter times which beset us all in this life, he was always there, letting me bury my face in his silken fur, consoling my grief and sadness with the muted rumble of his purrs.

I hate that he is gone. I hate that now, when I need most to hold him, he is not there. I hate that the memories of him will eventually fade. That one day, years from now, he will be little more than a picture on the wall, a password on my computer. I hate that I won’t remember—I mean, really remember—the feel of his face pressed against mine, the velvet touch of his ears flicking irritably away from my caressing fingers. I hate that I won’t remember the look in his eyes as he gazed up at me. An old soul in a feline body.

I know it’s our nature to forget. That new experiences and sensations will gradually crowd out the old. I even know it’s necessary to forget because we can’t move forward in a constant state of grief and pain. I know all this, but I still hate it.

How do you say goodbye to such a large piece of your heart? It’s been over a week and I still don’t know. I miss my cat. My Murf, my little fuzzy guy, my honey sweet. I don’t feel like working on my novel today. Or cleaning the house. Or talking to anybody. I can do those things tomorrow. I think for now I will just sit here for a while and let the tears come and remember, while I can, the warm, soft weight of him against my heart.

...

Post date: Jan 1, 2017

Photo by Jingda Chen on Unsplash

happy new year!

Every New Year, people talk about their hopes for the coming months. These generally involve health, happiness, prosperity, world peace, etc. Now I’m into world peace and happiness and success as much as the next person, but there are times (like now) when these things seem...well, perhaps not unattainable, but certainly difficult to accomplish. With this in mind, here are a few smaller, more achievable wishes for you all.

Happy New Year, my friends!

In 2017, may you:

- Have warm blankets and a cool pillow

- Have a drawerful of clean underwear and socks that match each other

- Always have enough tea (or coffee) for one last cup before you run out

- Never have a mushy toothbrush

- Only spill food down the front of you that is the colour of the shirt (or tie) you are wearing

- Discover a chocolate bar at the back of the cupboard on the day you really, really need some chocolate

- Find a forgotten toonie in the pocket of your spring jacket

- Have cats (or dogs) that throw up in the garden where you don’t have to clean it up

...

Post date: Aug 15, 2016

Photo by Milada Vigerova on Unsplash 

you smell and your mom dresses you funny

Trying to sell a book by sending out query letters is not my favourite thing to do. You’ve got to research literary agents to find the ones who represent the kind of thing you’re trying to sell, you’ve got to make lists and spreadsheets, and then you have to put together the dreaded query packages. These involve writing THE MOST AWESOME query letter which, in a single page, will hook the agent, sell your book, sound like your book, and tell a bit about yourself (except for stuff like the time you accidentally kissed your cat on the mouth and kind of liked it, or the other time you spilled your tea on the keyboard and had to write an entire chapter without the letter ‘k’).

And then there are the ‘extras’. You see, some agents just want a query letter, but others want more. ‘A brief synopsis, a 1-2 page synopsis, a detailed synopsis.’ Every agent is just a wee bit different—and don’t even get me started on the sample pages! First five pages. First three chapters. First fifty pages. First four chapters, but only if they fall between 20 and 30 pages and don’t include the letter ‘k’ (score!).

Needless to say, it takes a loooooooooong time to get those packages together.

But hey, no worries. You’re keen and ambitious and full of the knowledge that you have written a STAGGERINGLY AWESOME book and as soon as an agent reads the first three words, he or she will recognize its awesomeness and the offers for representation will come pouring—POURING—in!

And so, you begin. You set up the spreadsheet with the agent’s name in one column, the date you queried them in another, and a third column for their response. ‘“This is going to be great!” you enthuse to the cat. “And I am totally Spartacus!” you add, forgetting that that particular phrase didn’t exactly work out too well for the Roman slaves. The cat yawns and resumes his nap, but you don’t care because you are FULL OF OPTIMISM.

And then, the first responses begin to arrive

‘Dear Author, Thank you very much for submitting your material, but after careful review...’

!?!

After the initial shock wears off, you shrug it off. Hey, even J.K. Rowling got a crap ton of rejections for Harry Potter, right? So you type a simple ‘no’ in the response column and gamely send another query package out.

‘Unfortunately, I did not connect with your material’

‘Not the right fit for our agency’

‘Too similar in tone’

‘Not right for me’

It gets harder and harder to maintain your starry-eyed optimism. After a while in a bid to stay positive, you even start to get creative with your entries in the response column: nope, nyet, you smell, your mom dresses you funny, bugger off, piss off, maybe you should get a job at Starbucks. The sparkle leaves your eyes and the cat starts to avoid your den.

And then, wonder of all wonders! A request for the full manuscript! ‘Hell, yes!’ you write in the response column. ‘YES, YES, YES!!!’ your fingers type, clearly channelling for Sally Albright.

Of course, this is just a first step. The agent still has to read your manuscript, fall in love your manuscript, develop a plan for it, and offer you a contract. But at least you have managed to lift your foot onto that first steep step and, in the immortal words of Malcolm Reynolds, ‘that ain’t nothing.’

Of course you will continue to send out more queries because a first step does not guarantee a second, but for now, in this brief moment in time, you are on top of the world. You kiss the cat on the mouth and start putting together another query package.

...

Post date: Dec 16, 2015

Photo by bruce mars on Unsplash

musing on music...

A few days ago, a friend on Facebook requested suggestions for happy songs. She was having a difficult time and just wanted to listen to some upbeat music. This is not the first time I’ve seen a request like this and I posted, as I had before, that she should listen to Walking on Sunshine by Katrina and the Waves.

Walking on Sunshine is a very happy song—really, you can tell just from the title of it—but for me, it also has the lovely associations of being on the charts the summer I met my husband. All I have to do is listen to that music and I am transported back to 1985. It’s hot and sunny, and I’m sitting with a bunch of friends at the beach by the amazing water slides at Sylvan Lake, Alberta.

This is not the only piece of music that I associate with happy times in my life. Of course, one would expect to have happy associations with things like the music that you walked down the aisle to (Rachmaninoff’s Vocalise)—and I do!—but there are other moments, quieter, less public, moments, in which music resonates.

After I left a long term relationship back in my early 20s, I moved from Ottawa to Calgary and felt like I was starting life afresh. I’d gotten a good job, I’d just met my husband-to-be, and everything about life seemed bright and full of promise in that way that seems unique when one is twenty-three. One day on the bus home from work, the fellow behind me was humming Polovtsian Dances by Borodin. He hummed it during the whole trip and when I got home, I dug out my parents’ CD and listened to it. To this day, whenever I hear that music, I am back in that bright, happy time.

When I graduated from university and felt like the world was my oyster, my husband and I took a road trip through the badlands around Drumheller where we listened to Deep Purple’s Child in Time. The first, magical time we drove the Icefield Highway, we had the Anonymous Four’s Voices of Light playing. When I turned 50, my husband, daughter and I went on a fabulous road trip to Tofino playing Nightwish’s Imaginarium as we passed the snow-clad mountains and crashing waves of the Pacific Ocean. And every December when we have our Solstice tree lit up and decorated, my husband and I turn off all the other lights and sit together by the warm, golden glow of the tree immersing ourselves in the sacredness of the midwinter season by listening to Rachmaninoff’s All Night Vigil.

It’s weird, but although I have had my share of difficult times in life too, I do not associate a particular song or piece of music with them. Don’t get me wrong, I listen to music when I’m sad or stressed; it helps me cope. But there is nothing I can listen to now and say, oh yes, that reminds me of this sad time. There is only the happy.

Another friend posted recently that stress is the number one killer in the world and that music is the number one medicine. I would agree with that, but I would take it further: the best medicine in the world is the music you listened to when you were happy, when life was sunny and bright and going your way. It won’t be the same for everyone—Nightwish is probably not most people’s idea of ‘happy’ music—but as long as it works for you, that’s all that counts. So if you’re feeling stressed or going through a sad or anxious or confusing time, do yourself a favour and put on some music. Reconnect with a lighter, happier you. Even if it only lasts for the duration of the song, it will be a break from what you’re coping with now. And sometimes, those little breaks are all you need to get through the day.

...

Post date: Aug 12, 2015

a new cooking scroll!

Coming soon! EUKRATES’ Back to the Academy Lunchbasket Ideas by Chef Pelops

As the hot summer months spend themselves in a fragrant cloud of barbequed bream and cups of Chian cooled with ice from Mount Parnitha, a parent’s thoughts naturally begin to turn to those Academy days just on the horizon.

But when your offspring is used to snagging a handful of olives, or a piece of last night’s roasted quail as he dashes out the door, how can you tempt his appetite when it’s time to settle down and join the other likely lads at Plato’s Academy? Barley rolls and cheese are all very well and good, but they’re hardly satisfying—and they have limited staying power. As Sokrates once said, if the stomach is empty, then so, too, is the mind.

So what is a good parent to do?

Fortunately, EUKRATES has come to the rescue once again with an all-new cooking scroll from the famous Chef Pelops! Back to the Academy Lunchbasket Ideas by Chef Pelops will provide you with dozens of recipes designed to keep your little philosopher’s mind in top working condition! Smoked Sausages and Flatbread, Olive Relish and Rock Eel, Stewed Lentils and more! Buy EUKRATES’ Back to the Academy Lunchbasket Ideas by Chef Pelops today and banish lunchbasket boredom!

Here’s just one of the fabulous recipes you can find in EUKRATES’ Back to the Academy Lunchbasket Ideas by Chef Pelops! EUKRATES: the name you trust for all your self-help needs—at a cost you can afford! Look for Back to the Academy Lunchbasket Ideas by Chef Pelops in the Agora today!

Smoked Fish and Flatbread with Grilled Fennel and Goat Cheese

1 fennel bulb, sliced

olive oil

sea salt

ground pepper

1 small pot of soft goat cheese

a handful of sliced, smoked fish (salmon)

2-3 flatbreads

fresh thyme or dill

shallots or green onions, diced

Brush fennel slices with olive oil and sprinkle with sea salt and pepper. Grill over a medium hot flame until you get a nice char on each side and the fennel is tender. Remove from grill.

On each flatbread, spread some goat cheese and lay thin slices of smoked fish on top. Arrange fennel on the fish, then sprinkle thyme or dill and onions. Fold the flatbread over to make a half circle and toast each side on the grill until lightly browned and the cheese is melted. Serve immediately, or wrap in a cloth or chard leaves to pack in a lunchbasket.

...

Post date: Dec 16, 2014

Photo by Karen Dudley

nutmeg blogs!

Well, it’s that time of the year again and, once again, I am a cookie-making mah-chine. As such, I was invited to join a select group of writer/cookie-making mah-chines on a cookie blog that was started by Linda Poitevin, who tagged Marie Bilodeau who emailed me to see if I was interested in joining and then when I forgot to email her back (sorry, Marie!) she tagged Nicole Lavigne who then turned around and tagged me (probably because Marie told her not to let me off the hook!). At any rate, I am sometimes forgetful, BUT I did remember to post this recipe, so there’s still hope for me.

For all the recipes from this cookie exchange, go to Linda’s blog and follow all the threads to author after author.

Nutmeg Blogs

1 c. butter

3/4 c. sugar

1 egg

2 tsp vanilla

2 2/3 c. flour

1 tsp nutmeg

1/4 tsp salt

Cream butter. Gradually add sugar and cream until fluffy. Beat in egg and vanilla. Stir in dry ingredients and mix well.

Roll pieces of dough into long ropes 1/2 inch in diameter. Cut into 3 inch lengths and place 1 inch apart on cookie sheets. Bake at 350 for 12-15 minutes. Cool and ice. Dust with more nutmeg.

Frosting

2 tbsp butter

1 1/4 c. icing sugar

2-3 tbsp rum

Beat until creamy consistency.

...

Post date: Sep 19, 2014

Photo by mr.throk on Flickr.com

arrrr!!!

In honour of Talk Like a Pirate Day, did you know the root of the word ‘piracy’ comes from the ancient Greek peiráomai, which basically means an attempt to rob for personal gain?

While piracy certainly didn’t originate in the classical world, the geography—human and physical—of the Mediterranean was particularly favourable to this sort of lifestyle. A rocky shoreline and relatively barren soil meant that large scale agriculture was out, so many of the ancient Greeks lived in small villages and made their living through fishing. This, of course, meant that all those able-bodied villagers had boats, not to mention better-than-adequate seafaring skills and navigational knowledge. In and of itself, this would not necessarily lead to piracy, but when you add to this the fact that the larger city states could not support their populations with locally produced goods and that much of these were brought in by a constant stream of trade ships, then you have both means and motivation.

You can just imagine the conversations that went on in some of these villages:

“Look, Simonides! There’s another big fat trade ship going by.”

“Another one? Bollocks! Let’s turf these smelly fish nets and go catch us some trade goods?”

And thus, the word ‘piracy’ was born.

...

Post date: Sep 3, 2014

Photo by Karen Dudley

peach season is here!

The kitchen smells divine, my hands are wrinkled and prunified, and my thumb has small cuts in the spot where the paring knife has hit it too many times. Ah yes, peach season is upon us again. Peach pies, peach crisps, peach cobblers, peach shortcake. I looooooove peaches!

I’m sure Pelops would have loved peaches too—if he’d known about them. The first ancient Greek author to mention peaches was a certain Thracian named Diphilus of Siphnos who was writing sometime at the beginning of the third century BC (approximately 200 years after Pelops’ time). Although Diphilus called the fruits ‘Persian apples’, scholars think he really meant peaches. These Persian apples were also different from the familiar and ever-so-juicy fruits we have now, those having emerged from central Asia during historical times. It’s also possible that the ancient Greeks did not use peaches in baking. During the time of the Roman Empire, for example, peaches were fruits that were only eaten fresh.

But regardless of the when, where, how and why of it all—and the fact that he didn’t have to be gluten-free!—I think Pelops would have approved of my peach cobbler...

Bon Appétit!

Peach Cobbler

For the filling:

6 cups peaches, skinned and sliced

4 T sugar

2 T lemon juice

1 T cornstarch

1 T minute tapioca

sprinkle of cinnamon

butter

For the crust:

1 cup gluten-free flour (recipe below)

2 1/2 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp xanthan gum

2 T sugar

1/2 tsp salt

1/4 cup butter, grated

1 egg, lightly beaten

1/2 cup milk

sugar

cinnamon

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Assemble the filling in an ovenproof dish. Dot with butter and bake for about 20-25 minutes, until filling is bubbling.

Meanwhile, assemble the crust. Place dry ingredients in a bowl and mix well. Grate butter into the bowl and mix with a fork. In a separate bowl, mix egg and milk. Pour into dry ingredients, keeping a small amount aside. Mix up the crust, then drop by tablespoons on top of hot filling. Brush the crust with the remaining egg and milk mixture, sprinkle with sugar and cinnamon, and bake for 10-15 minutes, or until the cobbler top is golden brown.

Gluten-free Flour

2 cups brown rice flour

1/2 cup white rice flour

1/4 cup arrowroot starch

1/4 cup coconut flour

1/2 cup cornstarch

3/4 cup plus 2 T potato starch

3/4 cup plus 2 T tapioca starch

1 tsp xanthan gum

Mix well and use as you would regular flour.

...

Post date: Dec 5, 2013

Photo by couldntbeparve on Flickr.com

I am a peanut brittle mah-chine

Yes, it's that time of the year again when my house is filled with the scent of peanut brittle and my teeth ache from eating too much sugar. I usually make twenty-one pounds of the stuff—yes, I have that many people on my gift-giving brittle list—but up until this year, I've only made peanut brittle. Now things have changed.

Inspired by the latest Fine Cooking magazine, I have branched out. At eight o'clock this morning, I was making pecan almond brittle with cinnamon and cayenne. By noon, the scent of coconut pecan brittle filled the air. I still made two batches of peanut brittle, but now, now my horizons have been expanded. Who knows what will happen next!

A number of people have asked if I would share my recipe, although I did notice that none of these folks were on my gift list (I guess it's still better to have someone else make it for you!). I am not one of those people who jealously guards recipes. Awesome recipes should be shared. So, this is me sharing the Awesome. Happy holidays, everyone...

Peanut Brittle

1 cup granulated sugar

1 cup packed dark brown sugar

1 cup corn syrup

1/2 cup water

dash salt

1/4 cup butter

2 1/2 cups blanched, salted peanuts

1 tsp baking soda

Butter a large, rimmed baking sheet. Butter a heavy 3 quart saucepan. In saucepan combine sugars, corn syrup, water, and salt. Cook over med-high heat until sugars dissolve and syrup begins to boil. Add butter and stir until dissolved. Cook without stirring until the mixture reaches 230 degrees on your candy thermometer. Cook and stir occasionally till candy reaches soft crack stage (280 degrees). Stir in peanuts. Stir constantly (the temp will go down a bit and it will be difficult to stir; I usually use an oven mitt to hold the thermometer in place at this point) until the candy reaches hard crack stage (300 degrees). Remove from heat. Quickly stir in baking soda (it will foam up, so do this quickly) and mix well. Pour onto buttered pan, smoothing the brittle out as much as possible. You'll have to do this fairly quickly. Wait until candy cools, then break into pieces and ENJOY. Share if you must.

Variation #1:

Same method as above, but add 1 tsp salt and substitute peanuts with 1 cup raw pecans and 1 cup raw almonds. Just before stirring in the baking soda, add 2 tsp cinnamon and 1 tsp cayenne. Then add your soda and continue on as above.

Variation #2:

Same method as above, but add 1 tsp salt and substitute peanuts with 1 1/2 coconut and 1 cup raw pecans. Just before stirring in the baking soda, add 1 tsp vanilla.

...

Post date: Oct 28, 2013

Photo by Maggie Meng on Flickr.com

on realizing a long-lost dream

Years ago while enrolled in Classical Studies at the University of Alberta, I dreamed of someday working at the Archaeological Institute of America in Athens. I wanted to dig up temples and statues and pottery sherds under the Mediterranean sun (preferably while quaffing Greek wines). Obviously it didn't happen. I went on to other things including writing novels.

Well, last week, I got an email from Mark Lawall, a Classics professor at the University of Manitoba. He told me that a student had given him a copy of my book and that he’d read it while digging in Rhodes and had laughed his way through it. He invited me to attend a lecture and reception by a visiting scholar who has done a lot of work in the Athenian Agora. I went yesterday (it was a great lecture!), met the scholar (she was super-nice), and gave her a copy of Food for the Gods (she was delighted). And then Mark told me that he'd also given a copy of my book to the head of the Archaeological Institute of America in Athens! And so even though I never worked at the AIA in Athens, my work is there now!

Can't seem to get this smile off my face... 

...

Post date: Apr 17, 2013

Photo by Anton Darius on Unsplash 

the smell of spring

I realized last night that the most probable reason for this revoltingly interminable winter is that I haven’t made lilac soap yet. Yes, yes, it’s true. You see, every February, in the depths of Winnipeg’s winter, I make a batch of lilac-scented soap so my house smells of spring. It’s sort of a promise to myself that fairer weather will, in fact, arrive one day even though it’s minus whatever outside and blizzarding and the cats refuse to get off the craft room bed. Come March, the snows begin melting, the sun comes out and the temps start a’rising. Except for this year.

Mid-April, and it’s still winter out there and, I’m sorry to say, this is probably my fault. With all the kitchen renovations we’ve been undergoing, making soap seemed a low priority. Well, I am writing today to tell you that I’ve now rectified this problem. I took some time out of my writing day this morning to mix up a batch of purple and white soap. My whole house now smells like lilacs, and when I cut the bars tomorrow, it will smell even better. So bring it on, spring. Bring it on.

And so, with the scent of spring flowers in the air, I am heading back to ancient Greece now. You’re welcome.

...

Post date: Feb 6, 2013
Photo by Keyur Nandaniya on Unsplash 

science and elephant dung

The Google doodle today celebrates Mary Leakey’s 100th birthday. Now I’ve always loved stories of scientists and how they made their discoveries, but my favourite one involves Mary Leakey.

Years back, Mary Leakey’s team was at Laetoli in Tanzania looking for evidence of early hominids. After a long day of searching, members of the team were amusing themselves by throwing clumps of dried elephant dung at each other. One member, dodging a particularly well-aimed clump, fell on the ground. As he pushed himself up, he noticed something odd. It turned out to be footprints preserved in volcanic ash. At 3.6 million years old they were the earliest evidence of bipedalism at the time.

I love science--and elephant dung!

...

Post date: Jan 22, 2013

Photo by William Murphy on Flickr.com

of balls and brass monkeys

It’s been in the minus forties celsius here in Winnipeg for a few days now. Cold enough to freeze the balls off a brass monkey, as they say. I always thought that particular saying was rude—funny, but rude—until a couple of years ago when I heard the radio DJ announce that it was a brass monkey warning out there. My first reaction was ‘Hey, are you allowed to say that on the radio?’. Then I started thinking about the phrase. Who came up with such a weird saying? And why would monkeys be anywhere that was cold enough to freeze their nether parts off so that people would make it up?

So I googled it.

The first thing I found was that ‘brass monkeys’ were small brass plates used to hold iron cannonballs on the decks of sailing ships. These plates had indentations for each of the cannonballs in the bottom layer (the cannonballs were stored in pyramids). But when the temperature fell, the indentations got smaller because brass contracts faster than iron. The result was the bottom layer of cannonballs would pop off the brass monkeys, spilling the entire pyramid over the deck.

Oh, the disappointment!! ‘Cold enough to freeze the balls off a brass monkey’ wasn’t rude? Man, that just seemed wrong!

Well...it is! Turns out there is no evidence for this at all. There is no record in the Oxford English Dictionary of the usage of the term ‘brass monkey’ to refer to those brass plates. And warships didn’t store cannonballs on their deck (except when the decks had been cleared for battle) for the simple reason that iron cannonballs would rust when exposed to the elements and therefore wouldn’t fly as true. Not to mention the fact that when space is at a premium, as it was on those old warships, you’d keep your decks as clear as possible to allow room for the sailors to carry out all the tasks necessary to the functioning of the ship. So, brass plates and iron cannonballs? It’s all a bunch of rubbish.

The truth is, nobody really knows where the phrase ‘cold enough to freeze the balls off a brass monkey’ comes from, but according to several sites, it is very likely that the ‘monkey balls’ do refer to a primate’s testes, so it’s a good bet the saying is, in fact, rude. And thus, my faith in the functioning of the universe has been restored.

Not sure what that says about me...

...

Post date: Nov 21, 2011

Photo by Tengyart on Unsplash

on a winter's morn...

I woke up to minus 21 with the windchill this morning. Trying to be very Zen about it all, I reminded myself that nothing is either positive or negative, it is merely our perception of a thing which makes it so. In that spirit, here is what I love about winter.

I love the quietness of it, the muffled hush of the world when it snows. I love big, fat, fluffy Hollywood-style snowflakes.I love the aching clarity of a clear winter morning, when the moon is a bright crescent smile in the sky. I love sleeping under the weight of two blankets and a comforter and flannelette sheets. I love writing in my pink leopard print fleece footie pajamas. I love how puffy the cats get as they hunker down on the heat registers. I love taking long baths in my clawfoot tub, a drink and good book on the bench beside me. I love when the house cracks in the dawn cold, and I’m warm and comfortable in my bed. I love the swishing sound that my husband’s bike pants make as he, hardcore to the last, prepares to cycle to work. I love hot chocolate and hot apple cider and stick-to-your ribs stews and soups. I love snowballs and snow angels and seeing the pawprints of my cats around the yard, the pathways of their mysterious adventurings made visible in newly fallen snow. And I love the cool softness of my daughter’s rosy cheeks when she finally comes in from playing in the snow, chilled and happy, to be warmed in my arms.

I woke up to minus 21 with the windchill this morning. And that was okay.

...

Post date: May 12, 2011 

Photo by Maksim Shutov on Unsplash

those ants...

This morning, while researching ancient dyes, I came across a website about Classical Greece which began like this:

"Just like ants in a colony, the people of Athens had jobs, made art, and had a great government. "

What?! Ants make art? Ants have great government? Who knew? Now I'm feeling kinda guilty about all those ants I squished in my garden last year. Who's to say the ant equivalent of Leonardo da Vinci wasn't in my backyard busily working on his Mona Lisant (sorry), and then I came along and smushed him flat? Oops. My bad. Of course, if it had been the ant version of Stephen Harper, the guilt would be significantly diminished...

God, I love doing research!