I’ve never met a cliché that I haven’t mangled in some way or other.

The other day I was thinking to myself, “Hey, wait a minute. There is a cliché that I know inside out. That I would never, not in a million years, mangle. A dollar for your thoughts. Hah!”

It took me a few hours to realize that perhaps the correct saying is actually, “A penny for your thoughts”, and maybe even “A nickel for your thoughts”. But it’s highly unlikely that inflation has had that kind of impact on this particular cliché just yet.

I’m not sure why I have this glaring lack of ability when it comes to clichés. All I know is that I usually don’t dare to employ a cliché when I’m writing anything.

Once, I sent an email to a group of wonderful, empowering women who have been by my side every day for the past five years or so, and I headed it “Petal to the medal”. I meant, I realized later, “pedal to the metal”, but to this day, “petal to the medal” looks right to me (and as proof, I actually had to Google “petal to the medal cliché” to find out exactly what the right phrase was).

Luckily, embarrassment isn’t something that happens when I’m within the circle of this particular group of friends. But still, it was a reminder that I must stay away from clichés.

I guess as a writer, this is a good thing. On the other hand, in my current WIP, words and idioms play a rather large role.

So I’m now well-armed: I decided to get a copy of The Facts on File Dictionary of Clichés, and on my wishlist is The Scholastic Dictionary of Idioms, which I had borrowed from the library last year but didn’t get a chance to do more than dip into.

I figure I’ll be well-prepared as a result.

What about you? Are there any clichés that you tend to mangle?

It doesn’t often happen to me, but yesterday I woke up feeling rather glum. Whenever that happens, I find that the best antidote is to focus on being open to inspiration.

Often, too, the inspiration that comes tells me a lot about something important I’ve been forgetting, which is often at the root of why I’m feeling glum to begin with.

It turns out that yesterday’s spot of down in the dumps was due to my writing – or rather, my not-writing. Because, as it turned out, all the inspiration that flowed to me was related to writing.

First up: a new perspective on my writing. Joe Finder tweeted about James Patterson Inc., an article in the New York Times, which was the first step for me in coming out of the doldrums.

It’s quite a long article, and what fascinated me the most was the reminder that there are two sides to writing: there’s the creative side, and then there’s the business side. And from a business angle, my writing is all about a product. I know it’s not a romantic, creative or artistic way of saying it, but from a business perspective, it’s true. Each novel I write is also a product, and the thing is, if I’m not-writing, well, my writing isn’t exactly going to go anywhere, is it? Because I won’t have any products to put out there into the big wide world.

After reading this article, I suddenly remembered reading about J. Kaye’s new writing blog, 365 Days of Novel Writing at Molly’s blog, My Cozy Book Nook earlier this week. I had scooted over to 365 Days of Novel Writing that day, and enjoyed reading about J. Kaye’s commitment to her writing this year.

And I’m really tickled to see that Molly just posted more extensively about J. Kaye’s writing endeavors, as well as her own, in this Sunday Salon post yesterday.

Putting the James Patterson article together with J. Kaye’s new writing blog, I remembered something else: writing is something that I need to do every day.

It’s not that the month off from writing has been a bust, creativity-wise. I have spent time nearly every day “working on” WAVERLEY, my current WIP, in my mind; I “see” my novels in my mind, like I’m watching a movie. I’ve always done this, and I have to say, it really makes daydreaming fun and productive.

But still, eventually the scenes that I see need to be put into words. And that’s what I’ve been needing to do: the actual act of writing down those words.

And that’s what prompted me to start listening to the audio version of On Writing, by Stephen King; I have read the print version many times, but a good friend of mine sent me the audio version as a gift a while ago.

Last night was the first time I listened to it. It’s read by Stephen King himself, and it turns out he is quite a good narrator. I skipped right to the “writer’s toolbox” section, because I’ve always found myself most inspired by King’s discussion of the tools every writer needs to hone.

So I ended up going to bed inspired, and this morning, the inspiration continued when I discovered this delightful post (again, via Twitter, this time through Debbie Ridpath Ohi) on Johanna Harness’s blog on Magic Note Cards.

I happen to be an office supply store nut – I can never go inside one without coming out relieved of a lot more money than I had intended – and I love index cards. I don’t do any outlining, preferring to write by the seat of my pants, but I’m thinking now that maybe using index cards would be fun for revisions.

You’re asking now – so, did you sit down to write some more of WAVERLEY today, Belle?

Um. Well, if you’re going to put it so bluntly … not as of the writing of this post. BUT the night is still youngish … !

It’s been quite a week – I’ve finished a couple of deadlines, spent Wednesday morning getting a test done (no worries, all is well), Wednesday night feeling pleasantly drowsy, pampered and well-fed, (oh, and I spent Tuesday night very hungry since my test required an all-liquid diet the day before), and today I finally managed to get back into Twitter and Facebook mode after having to stay away during the weeks I was drenched with deadlines.

(I don’t think I mean “drenched”. I think I mean another word, but for the life of me, I can’t think of another suitable word right now.)

So I thought it’s time for a nice odds and ends post!

2010 Blog Improvement Project

I joined the Blog Improvement Project last year, but quite late, after people had already dived into the first few assignments, and I never really did end up truly participating. But since I have plans to revamp the template here, and clean up my categories and tags and things like that (and couldn’t participate in Bloggiesta because of deadline woes), I thought it might be nice to participate this year.

This year the BIP is being run by both Kim at Sophisticated Dorkiness, who hosted last year’s BIP, and Jackie at Farm Lane Books, and it has it’s own site: 2010 Blog Improvement Project.

Have you joined? What kinds of things are you looking forward to doing this year with your blog?

Work Sanity: The Art of Taking Breaks

During my recent avalanche of deadlines, I made sure to take several breaks each day. In addition to pampering myself with baths, I also used games as incentives. When I finished a chapter, I’d indulge myself with a few rounds of the following games (but beware. They can be addictive.)

Mah Jongg Dimensions. This game is hosted at AARP, but luckily you don’t have to be retired to play it. It seems simple, but you only get five minutes and the second and third levels have a lot more tiles. Very fun.

Yumsters 2. Don’t ask me why I became so beguiled with these musical worms. But I was. And I took that trek across all those countries with them many, many times on my iPhone.

Suduko. I played this on my iPhone – and I admit freely, I finally clued in that Suduko is solved EXACTLY like a logic puzzle. I love logic puzzles. I never loved Suduko. Now I do.

If You Like Cats …

(And I do.) My not-aunt Margaret sent me the link to this video (she’s also the one responsible for the Mah Jongg Dimensions game, too. In fact, I tremble in fear before opening her emails because she finds the most addictive and fun stuff online, guaranteed to fritter away chunks of my time).

This video’s on the long side (and it’s been around for a while, so you might have already seen it), but it is totally worth it (if you like cats, that is).

The bit near the end when Maru plays with the boxes is just priceless!

So those are my odds and ends. I’m really looking forward to the weekend – I have a few days to rest, relax and (fingers crossed) get back to my writing. No, I haven’t forgotten that I am writer, and a writer writes. (Not to mention the manuscript of NANTUCKET which is still waiting for me to read in its entirety for the first time …)

Any odds and ends going on with you?

Recently my husband made a decision that seemed very practical to me; practical, and in my opinion, long overdue.

As a martial arts instructor, his passion has always been in teaching people to be the best that they can be, and so he’s never cared about the number of people he’s training, only about how well he’s teaching them. But we have always run the dojo in huge leased locations, and our large overhead has always demanded a different, more commercial approach, one he’s never been willing to take.

Last month, he made the difficult decision to go from our leased premises, to a single large room we’ll be renting for specific hours of the week. It’s a space from which we will be able to grow the dojo again, but in a way that makes more business sense.

As his partner in business, I gave an audible sigh of relief, because this portion of our business has, from its very inception, been the proverbial money pit.

As his partner in life, though, I didn’t have a clue how much courage this decision required of him. Not until afterward did I realize how brave my husband is to do what he’s done.

To me, this decision seemed a very practical one. What we’d been doing simply wasn’t working; it wasn’t working in a way that had quite a large financial impact on us. It seemed to me nothing much would change for his students. The quality of instruction would remain the same; only the space itself would be different. Wasn’t it, after all, the actual teaching that mattered?

Maybe, maybe not. In six weeks’ time, as we make the transition, we will find out.

I know now the courage it took for him to do this. After he announced the news to his students, he was drained, physically and mentally, for two days.

For the past decade, he’s given his students not only the best of himself, but also the best physical space in which to train – something he could ill-afford, but he did it anyway.

I’ve always felt that in the martial arts, it’s the teacher who makes the difference. Unlike an endeavor that requires special equipment, where the type of equipment you have the use of makes as much difference as the quality of the teacher, with the martial arts, it’s all about the teacher.

But perhaps not everyone feels this way.

And so I am seeing, so very clearly, how brave my husband is. How much courage it took for him to make what to me seemed like a simple, practical and well-justified business decision, a step that any professional advisor would have recommended he take.

And I have this to say: I admire his courage, his bravery, so very much.

I believe in you, with my whole heart and soul.

My husband is one of the best martial arts teachers around. And it seems to me, when the teaching is at the core of a martial arts dojo, it doesn’t really matter where the dojo is, because the dojo isn’t any physical location.

The dojo is the teacher; the teacher is the dojo.

We get a lot of telemarketing calls, and often, this is how the ensuing conversation goes:

Me: Hello.

Caller: Hello. Is your mom or dad at home?

Me: No.

Caller: Okay. I’ll call back later.

I’m usually grinning when I hang up the phone. A three second conversation with a telemarketer and I didn’t even have to lie!

You see, ever since I turned, oh, twelve, I’ve sounded like a twelve-year-old.

Not that I’m actually aware of this myself. Frankly, the voice I hear when I speak sounds womanly and appropriate to my age and maturity. Not low and husky, no, but certainly not like a prepubescent child.

This, however, is not what people tell me. Not that they put it as bluntly as “Oh my gawd. Did you know you sound just like a twelve-year-old?” But I get the drift. And the telemarketers provide ample evidence.

The only time I ever really hear the way my voice sounds is when I’m tinkering with my work voice mail message.

When I first started my business, I was extremely professional – you simply can’t practice law without having that kind of highly-toned, almost paranoid professionalism seep into you. So – yes, I actually did this – when I first hung out my own shingle, I would change my voice mail message every single morning. Worse, if I had a meeting to go to, and would be “out of the office”, I would change my message again.

And every single time, it would strike me how young I sounded. I can’t tell you how often I pressed “1” to re-record my message – to this day, that “1” button looks more worn than all the others on my office phone.

Thankfully, though, those days of professionalism are long gone. I’m still professional, in that when I have a deadline, I meet that deadline. But I never change my voice mail message unless I’m going on holidays.

At which time, I am, once again, struck by how much like a twelve-year-old I sound.

I’m telling you all this because I am, at present, enjoying the perk of having had a sore throat a month ago. Sore throats, I admit, are a pain in the, well, throat. But I find that as long as I load up with lots of packages of  Fisherman’s Friend and a box of those awful tasting, throat-numbing lozenges (it doesn’t matter what brand – they all taste the same), I do just fine.

Because in the midst of all that sore throatiness, I am, you see, looking forward to the perk that I know is on its way.

First, though, after the soreness wears off, I go through a day or two of not being able to talk much at all. Which is okay, because it gives me an excuse not answer telemarketers’ phone calls.

But then the perk starts. And let me tell you, this particular perk lasts a long time.

For nearly one glorious week, I find myself speaking with a husky voice that sounds to me like some glamorous 40s Hollywood sex symbol. (I have not asked anyone if this is indeed true, as I have no wish to destroy the illusion.)

I’ll just say that I talk a lot during that one gorgeous week.

As the perk begins to fade, which it does over the course of three or four lovely weeks, my voice is lower. I can hear it. To me, it has a slight husky tinge to it. To others, I probably merely sound like a woman my age, but at least, not like a twelve-year-old, but again, I never ask because frankly, I don’t want to know.

So yes, you can just take my word for it, right now I am on the last days of that lower, huskier voice.

And it just occurred to me that maybe today’s the day I should be changing my voice mail message.

Because in a few days, I’ll be back to telling people, no, my mom and dad aren’t here right now.

These past six months or so, I’ve really been getting a lot of use out of my library card. Ever since I signed up for Library Elf, that wonderful service that sends out reminder emails about books coming due or overdue, I’ve even managed to keep my library fines down to a minimum (you don’t want to know about the arm and the leg I paid to my library before I discovered Library Elf – and I have no excuse, not really, because there’s a branch of the library within a few blocks of my house).

(If you’re not using Library Elf, I definitely recommend you check it out and see if your library is listed with them.)

I discovered a few months ago that my library offers monthly newsletters that feature their latest acquisitions in a variety of genres. I’ve signed up for several of these newsletters, and always look forward to getting these emails – I’m always sure to add a few more holds to my library account.

Yesterday came with a flurry of these emails. The books listed in them aren’t necessarily new releases – often they are just “new to us” acquisitions. And of course, I placed several holds!

The Crossroads, by Chris Grabenstein. I’m not sure why this showed up in the new books for teens newsletter, actually, as I’d already borrowed it once previously (but then got stuck under an avalanche of deadlines and had to return it unread). It’s by Chris Grabenstein, who writes the John Ceepak mystery series for adults, which I really enjoy.

Zack, his dad, and new stepmother have just moved back to his father’s hometown, not knowing that their new house has a dark history. Fifty years ago, a crazed killer caused an accident at the nearby crossroads that took 40 innocent lives….

The Brightest Star in the Sky, by Marian Keyes. I think I’ve read one Keyes novel in the past – I seem to remember I enjoyed it. The storyline in The Brightest Star in the Sky sounded very intriguing. Since Keyes is such a popular author, it will be a while before I get my hands on this one.

The Brightest Star in the Sky follows seven neighbors whose lives become entangled when a sassy and prescient spirit pays a visit to their Dublin townhouse with the intent of changing at least one of their lives.

But what will this metamorphosis be and who will the sprite choose? There’s Matt and Maeve, the newlyweds struggling to overcome the first obstacle in their storybook romance; Lydia, the brassy but vulnerable cabbie; Katie, the just-turned-forty PR executive searching for a more gratifying life; and the eldest resident, Jemima, currently playing hostess to her son Fionn, who is in town to star as the hunky gardener in a hot new television show.

The Book of Tomorrow, by Cecelia Ahern. I haven’t read Ahern’s P.S. I Love You, but I did enjoy the movie (much more so the second time around, when I knew what had happened – I think I went through a whole box of tissue paper that time). The Book of Tomorrow sounds quite interesting:

Tamara Goodwin has always got everything she’s ever wanted. Born into a family of wealth, she grew up in a mansion with its own private beach, a wardrobe full of designer clothes, a large four poster bed complete with a luxurious bathroom en-suite. She’s always lived in the here and now, never giving a second thought to tomorrow. But then suddenly her dad is gone and life for Tamara and her mother changes forever. Left with a mountain of debt, they have no choice but to sell everything they own and move to the country to live with Tamara’s Uncle and Aunt. Nestled next to Kilsaney Castle, their gatehouse is a world away from Tamara’s childhood. With her mother shut away with grief, and her aunt busy tending to her, Tamara is lonely and bored and longs to return to Dublin. When a travelling library passes through Kilsaney Demesne, Tamara is intrigued. She needs a distraction. Her eyes rest on a mysterious large leather bound tome locked with a gold clasp and padlock. With some help, Tamara finally manages to open the book. What she discovers within the pages takes her breath away and shakes her world to its core.

Murder at Longbourn, by Tracy Kiely. I couldn’t resist this cozy-sounding murder mystery, although on reading the summary, I’m not sure where Jane Austen comes into play …

A die-hard fan of Jane Austen novels and the traditional English mystery, Tracy Kiely has combined elements of both for this truly delightful and witty debut. Planning New Year’s resolutions to rid her life of all things unhealthy, Elizabeth Parker has dumped fatty foods, processed sugar, and her two-timing boyfriend. Indeed, the invitation to join her Aunt Winnie for a How to Host a Murder Party on New Year’s Eve at Winnie’s new Cape Cod B and B comes just in time. But when the local wealthy miser ends up the unscripted victim, Elizabeth must unearth old secrets and new motives in order to clear her beloved aunt of suspicion.

The Taken, by Inger Ash Wolfe. This is the sequel to The Calling, which I haven’t read yet either – a copy of The Calling is available on the shelves, so I’m going to get a hold of it and get it read before this hold on The Taken comes my way. It was actually the summary of The Calling that made me decide to give this series a try.

From The Calling:

Detective Inspector Hazel Micallef has lived all her days in the small town of Port Dundas, Ontario and is now making her way toward retirement with something less than grace. Hobbled by a bad back and a dependence on painkillers, and feeling blindsided by divorce after nearly four decades of marriage, sixty-one-year-old Hazel has only the constructive criticism of her mother (the former mayor) and her own sharp tongue to buoy her. But when a terminally ill woman is gruesomely murdered in her own home, Hazel and her understaffed department must spring to life. And as one terminally ill victim after another is found, Hazel finds herself tracking a truly terrifying serial killer while everything around her spins out of control.

Through the cacophony of her bickering staff, her unsupportive superiors, a clamoring press, the town’s rumor mill, and her own nagging doubts, Hazel can sense the dead trying to call out. Will she hear them before it’s too late?

From The Taken:

Detective Inspector Hazel Micallef is having a bad year. After major back surgery, she has no real option but to move into her ex-husband’s basement and suffer the humiliation of his new wife bringing her meals down on a tray. As if that weren’t enough, Hazel’s octogenarian mother secretly flushes Hazel’s stash of painkillers down the toilet.

It’s almost a relief when Hazel gets a call about a body fished up by tourists in one of the lakes near Port Dundas. But what raises the hair on the back of Micallef ’s neck is that the local paper has just published the first installment of a serialized story featuring such a scenario. Even before they head out to the lake with divers to recover the body, she and DC James Wingate, leading the police detachment in Micallef ’s absence, know they are being played. But it’s not clear who is pulling their strings and why, nor is what they find at the lake at all what they expected. It’s Micallef herself who is snared, caught up in a cryptic game devised by someone who knows how to taunt her into opening a cold case, someone who knows that nothing will stop her investigation.

Don’t you love placing holds on books at your library? I like adding to my holds list – it’s like having a guarantee that I’ll always have something good to read. If I’m lucky, the books trickle in at a nice, steady pace … (if I’m not so lucky, I come home with 20+ books and no time to read them all!)

It’s a weird sort of phenomenon. I co-exist comfortably, easily and happily with our two teenagers in this lovely household of ours. My husband also co-exists with our two teenagers in this lovely household, just not always as comfortably or as easily as I do (although he swears up and down that he is quite happy with them – and we all do believe him, except maybe when he’s muttering about towels and dishes under his breath).

So I got to pondering why there is this difference between my life with our two teenagers and his life with our two teenagers.

It didn’t take long before I figured it out. To put it simply:

“It doesn’t drive me nuts that …”

You see, it doesn’t drive me nuts that:

They go through clean towels like crazy. Personally, I see my kids’ point – I like to re-use towels but only a couple of times. And when it comes right down to it, towels are so simple to wash and put away.

Whenever I hear my husband muttering “Another new towel!”, I can never resist pointing out that at least they’ve placed the old towels in the laundry hamper, rather than leaving them on the floor, or draped over the bathtub, or spreading mildew among their dirty clothes scattered on their bedroom floor.

They hoard dishes and water bottles in their rooms and at their computers. If I see an excess of dishes and water bottles in the office, I just gather them up and take them to the kitchen – I pass by their desks on my way out of the room anyway.

And, as long as they’re not doing anything illegal or bringing in mice and/or bugs, I figure their rooms are their space to do with as they please. Sooner or later, they get tired of the mess and clean it up. Yes, that does happen.

My advice? “Just don’t look in their rooms, honey.” That’s why they have doors. And they very cooperatively keep those doors shut most of the time.

My closet is constantly raided. I am the same size as my daughter and most of her friends. Over the past few years, I’ve gotten over any sense of surprise when the door opens and one of my daughter’s friends comes into the room wearing one of my tops.

In fact, now that several of them have part-time jobs and seem to have upgraded their wardrobes, it’s been quite lovely, because I never know what might end up in my laundry somehow, and yes, I harbor no guilt about wearing anything I see that catches my fancy.

Not to mention, they all, very fortunately, have larger feet than I do. So my precious shoes are safe.

The occasional impromptu ramen party takes place in our kitchen. It happens. And when four to eight teenage girls descend on the kitchen to make themselves bowls of ramen, well, you’re going to find ramen noodle wrappers and used soup base packages all over the place, right?

It takes just minutes for me to toss the packaging into the garbage. I’m just happy that they’re having fun here, at our house, rather than somewhere else. It’s always nice when my kids are home.

They play video games or are on the Internet all night long. Well, it’s tough for me to get riled up about this one, isn’t it? Especially since I’m sitting there on my computer next to them the whole time, and if I have any spare time on my hands, I’m playing The Sims 3 …

On the odd occasion when I do find myself getting upset over something teenager-ish (like when I can’t find ANY of my jeans), I find it fairly easy to switch thoughts in mid-gear (plus, they usually leave my skirts alone). On such occasions I usually remember things like:

• they (almost) always call to let me know where they are, and when they’ll be home.
• they hate asking me for money or asking me to buy them anything. (I can’t quite figure this out because I’ve always spoiled them rotten, and you know what people say about spoiling your kids rotten).
• I don’t embarrass them (much).
• they often sit next to me on the couch and help me out with whatever iPhone game I’m playing (especially if I’m playing Bejewelled or Suduko).
• if I’m lying on the sofa with a head cold or some such thing, one or the other of them will walk by, pat my head, and say, “Poor mom”.
• they think I’m a techno-wiz when it comes to the computer and social networking (not so much when it comes to working the DVD controls).
• we have so many lovely, grown-up conversations, and they talk to me about all the things I want them to be able to talk to me about: sex, friends, school, plans for the future, women’s rights, gay rights, human rights – the list is endless.
• it gives them both such delight that they are taller than I am.
• spending family nights together on the weekends watching Bones on DVD.
• getting the occasional surprise hug from one of them – and almost always, it’s out of the blue.

Most of all, any aggravation I have fades when I look at them and remember that they’ll both be off leading their own lives within the next few years.

And I’ve promised myself I will only cry about it when they’re not looking.

Here are the winners of my December Giftaway!

Top commentators

The draw was actually from 25 names, as several people were tied for the number 20 spot. The top commentators in December were:

1. Jemi Fraser
2. rhapsodyinbooks
3. Steve Kubien
4. Dorte H
5. Cat Woods
6. Kathy
7. Margot
8. Memory
9. Barbara
10. bunnyb
11. Ladytink_534
12. Audrey/brizmus
13. Beth F
14. Jackie (Farm Lane Books)
15. Janel
16. Rebecca
17. Aarti
18. Alessandra
19. Cara Powers
20. Cass
21. Michelle
22. Molly
23. Nicole
24. Petunia
25. Cathryn

And the winner is:

Number 2 on the top commentators list is Jill, at Rhapsody in Books!

Comments on December Giftaway post

There were 51 comments on the December Giftaway post – luckily, my blog template numbers the comments!

And the winner is:

Number 28 on the comments on the December Giftaway post is Anna Shah Hoque!

I’ve emailed the winners, who each get their selection of 2 paperback or trade paperback books of their choice from either Amazon.com or the Book Depository. (If either of you haven’t received my email, please contact me with your book selections.)

I love baths.

Back when my older two were much, much younger and I was in a far less egalitarian marriage than I’m in now, the bath was my sanctuary. It was the only time and place in an otherwise hectic day when I could lock out the outside world, and sink deep into scented bubbles, my latest read in hand.

These days, I don’t have the need to run away and hide from the world like that. And I actually don’t read in the bathtub anymore, either, although I do listen to the occasional audiobook (not often, though – I always have this nagging fear that my iPod might fall into the water, and as you might guess, nagging fears are not conducive to a good time, anywhere or anyplace.)

Nowadays, my time in the bath is my me time. Often, it’s a very creative time for me – I’ve dreamed up solutions to plot tangles while in the bath and I’ve stumbled magically onto solutions to what I had thought were pressing problems. Mostly, though, it’s a time and place of serenity and contemplation. At its best, it’s meditative rather than reflective.

I only require three things for a great soak:

1. A candle. Only one is needed. Lots of candles are always lovely, of course, but I only need one.

2. Something scented to put into the water. I don’t require it to produce bubbles, either.

3. Something scented to wash with. If it’s the same scent as the fragrance in the water, that’s a bonus, but again, it’s not absolutely necessary.

I’ve been thinking about baths quite a lot, because over the past three weeks, when it seemed like my life was all about work and nothing else, I made a deal with myself: I would find the time to pamper myself with a bath every day.

As it turned out, it was a splendid deal, and made the work go by more quickly both before and after each day’s bath. I felt refreshed, pampered, and comfortable after my bath, and looking forward to it made me work more quickly. It really did.

One thing I’ve learned over the years – and this is my point for writing this post (as Ellen Degeneres would say, I do have a point). There are very definitely two camps when it comes to baths vs. showers.

There are people who adore a good long soak in a lovely, hot, scented bath.

And then there are others who haven’t taken a bath in ages, for whom a shower is the only way to go.

My own daughter, for example, falls within the “showers only” camp. As she said to me recently, “Ugh. You know, if you look close enough, you can see flecks of your skin on the top of the water. Why would you want to sit in that?”

Or my sister, who I seem to remember telling me once that a bath feels like trying to clean yourself with dirty water.

Personally, I think if that’s one’s problem with a bath, then the simple solution is to do it the Japanese way: take a shower to get clean and then soak to your heart’s content in a nice hot bath.

(Now that I think about it, my sister said that to me long before she went to Japan on holiday a few years back. So her perspective might indeed have changed. I should ask her.)

Despite loving baths, I’m not adverse to showers myself. They are the only way to go on a hot sticky summer day, for example. And when I finish a rare bout of time on the treadmill, it’s not the tub I head to, but the shower.

Still, though, the moment the temperature starts dropping, the bath comes quickly to mind.

So here’s what I’ve been wondering (don’t ask me why I’ve been wondering this, but I have been, and the inquisitive part of me wouldn’t rest until I agreed with myself that I’d write this post) – where do you stand in the whole bath vs. shower debate? Are you a showers-only kind of person? Or is a bath the only thing that calls to you? Maybe you partake of both methods, but lean more towards one than the other?

And if you love baths, do you read in the bath? Listen to audiobooks? Or just reflect?

Image credit

Happy new year, everyone! I know, I know – it’s nearly the middle of the month, and you might all be feeling the new year is already feeling a bit old. But since I’ve been so busy, I haven’t really had a chance to do “the new year thing” – and I figure I can celebrate the New Year at any time, right? And invite you all to celebrate with me, too!

So, happy new year, everyone!

This will be a year of many changes for me, a lot of wonderful changes. I’ll have one child starting university in September; it’s a strange feeling that. I know he’ll have a wonderful time, but at the same time, it will be so funny not to have him home all the time.

Ward and I also have big plans afoot for the dojo, which I can’t talk about right now because everything is still under wraps and will be until our Kagami Baracki celebrations next Sunday (Kagami Baracki is the martial arts new year). But they’re very exciting changes, and I’m looking forward to them tremendously.

Some Blog Changes

And there’s another change around our household, blog-wise. A few days ago, I introduced you all to my sister’s blog; I’ve been bugging her for years to start blogging, and I love her new blog, BananaViews.

I’ve also been exercising my persuasion elsewhere, too. For a while now, Ward has been blogging over at my food blog, Muse in the Kitchen, but it really felt to me like he needed a cyber home to call his own, something that truly reflects who he is.

So earlier this month, we started up a new blog for him – and for those of you who’ve heard all about him here on the pages of Ms. Bookish, I’m sure you’d agree that Sensei Cooks is a much more suitable name for Ward’s food blogging!

And as for Muse in the Kitchen, I’ll probably start writing about food and food-related stuff there again – but no cooking! Because I don’t cook. But I do love to eat. Do I ever love to eat!

As For Ms. Bookish

I will be revamping Ms. Bookish this coming month as well. I was too swamped with deadlines to participate in Bloggiesta this past weekend, so I’ll be holding my own version of the event here this month. Along with an anticipated template change, I will be taking a good, hard look at exactly what I want Ms. Bookish to be about.

Many of you have probably already noticed that I have not stuck to my original intent of blogging about books only. I started blogging about my writing, and then I started posting about other things in my life, and one thing has lead to another. I’m not so sure that I can really say that Ms. Bookish is a book blog anymore. It’s that, yes, but more.

And I am so thankful that you all have continued to come and visit me here even though I’m not always posting about books!

And Last, But Certainly Not Least: You

Picture this: I’m in my flannel PJs, hunkered down at my desk, working my way through yet another index (or, when I was deep in the middle of the two major science texts I was working on, it felt more like working my way through days and days and days of chemistry and biology).

Occasionally, I would sneak some time to write up a post for Ms. Bookish, because I missed writing here. A lot.

And every single time I’d post here, someone would always drop by and comment. I can’t tell you how much your comments uplifted my spirits.

A lot of work is great when you’re self-employed, but working too much can have a deadening effect. It’s too easy sometimes to come away from a long, hard working session feeling a little depressed.

But I never even got near that low place these past three weeks. And I owe a lot of that to all of you who came by to read, and especially to all of you who took the time to add your comments.

So, to finish up my New Year’s post, thank you, all of you, from the bottom of my heart!

Now, if I could only figure out how to make smooches here …

Ah, well. This will have to do for now: