Tag! I'm it

Rachelle, writer, former editor, and all-round wonderful friend, has requested answers to the following questions. Be sure to click your way over to and check out her answers and great writing as well.

1. What's the one book or writing project you haven't yet written but still hope to? This one is easy: in 1993 I typed the opening paragraphs for an intense and dark themed work of fiction. It's unlike anything I've written to date...waaaaay unlike. It will give voice to matters of which we're afraid to speak and doesn't promise or necessarily deliver some neat and tidy wrap up. Evil--true evil, seldom can be boxed and processed as such.

2. If you had one entire day in which to do nothing but read, what book would you start with? Daniel Silva's newest release (July 24th) "The Secret Servant." Man, oh, man, I love this guy's stuff!

3. What was your first writing "instrument" (besides pen and paper)? An IBM Selectric, circa 1981.

4. What's your best guess as to how many books you read in a month? 8-12

5. What's your favorite writing "machine" you've ever owned? Well, I confess I still miss my yellow legal pad machines. Computers are all so bland and so, well, non-favorite inducing for me. I guess my current Dell which I've somehow managed to figure out how to autosave and back up my writing in progress.

6. Think historical fiction: what's your favorite time period in which to read? I'm more a non-fiction bibliophile but without a doubt years the years between 1932-1949 always capture my attention when picking up a fiction work.

7. What's the one book you remember most clearly from your youth (childhood or teens)? I could wax on about this forever so I'll contain myself. The one book would be The Boxcar Children by Gertrude Chandler Warner. Sigh. How I wanted to have two brothers and a sister to create a home in the woods near a babbling cool brook. How I wanted to purchase milk in a glass bottle and keep it chilled in the aforementioned chilled running water. How I wanted to live in an abandoned box car and decorate it with nearly discovered treasures. I wanted to be Violet...sweet, strong, and loving Violet.

HTML Madness

Gads! It just took me 45-minutes to figure out how to configure a clickable web link from my home web site to here. (There are perfectly good reasons why some of us are less than capable when it comes to matters of the cyber-net kind.)

Nevertheless, I did it.
I stuck with it.
Googling and surfing my way through www.HTML.com reference heaven I remained, as always, tenacious and unwilling to concede defeat. One could consider it a blessing or a curse, I suppose. This unrelenting drive to figure things out. To get things right and to get things done. It's Monday so I'll go with blessing. But come, oh, Thursday, I'll probably be singing a different tune.

Anyone else like me out there reading these words?
Anyone else prone to sinking their teeth into a project, goal, or, well, life?
Any other all-or-nothing types?

Speaking of Cheese Dips

Major crisis here on the home front.

I am a voracious consumer of white Mexican cheese dip. I travel to the local El Rancherito, belly up to the bar (no smart-aleck comments, please), and ask for a shot of the stuff far more times than I should. But here's the deal...I can not duplicate this tasty food item for home consumption for anything!

I've probably spent +$200.00 purchasing varying types of cheese that purport to deliver the delicious goods. But they don't. I've purchased and melted all manner of expensive Mexican cheeses from my groceries cooling shelves. I've tried white American cheese mixed with other stuff. I've looked online and typed in any and all "keyword" searches to can imagine. To no avail. So here it is.....for the love of all that is holy!!!!! Somebody tell me where I can purchase that fine, smooth, tasty white dip that is served in restaurants.

No cheese that melts into a greasy ball.
No cheese that has a funky grainy texture.
No cheese that is orange or off-yellow.

Just give me the stuff like they have at El Rancherito. (And yes, I've asked and they're not sharing their secret.)

Email me immediately and if it cuts the Jules Cheese Mustard, I'll post it for the entire world.

Allow me to introduce myself...again

Hmm...I'm thinking two and a-half years might be a bit long in-between posts. My apologies, really. Although I'm in to the early months of my fourth decade on earth, I still find it difficult to get done everything that needs to get done.

And there's always a Lifetime Movie Network program calling my name. Sigh.

But anyway. I'm back and it's my intention to show up quite routinely. I'm shooting for three or four posts a week, will settle for two, but promise not to go longer than two years. How's that for accountability?

There are chicken nuggets begging to be pulled from an oven right now so I'll wrap it up and be back shortly with far more interesting opines and such.