Telemarketers – Loath them or … well … loath them.

February 18, 2012

Personally, I HATE them with a passion that borders on pathological.   You know the calls. Usually as you’re getting ready for dinner.                 “Good evening, Mr.Smith. Have you had a great day?”  (Aha, the first small YES. It’s a sales tactic. Any sales man, be it car, insurance, electronics, all of them, knows […]

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San Francisco Writers Conference – Q&A

February 7, 2012

A quick Q&A with San Francisco Writer University Dean, Laurie McLean. How long has SFWC been running? This is our 9th year for the conference. How many attendees are expected this year? Speakers? Agents? Classes? We’ll have 300 attendees, 100 speakers (including 20 agents) and since we’ve added two new tracks this year—social media and […]

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Loss of innocence

January 21, 2012

Once upon a time … Oooops. That’s the standard start to a fantasy story. The fantasy in question? That modern global marketing mega-companies sales will miss a single dollar or permit our children to enjoy their childhood – as children. Far better if they are dragged – and the companies are very cunning to ensure […]

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Psychics more believable …

December 6, 2011

Psychics were once viewed as witches and burned at the stake. But the findings of a new study show perceptions of them have improved considerably over the centuries. So begin’s the national newspaper story posted on stuff.co.nz. Why am I so interested? The newspaper interviewed my friend and teacher, Kath Weldon, minister of the Wellington Spiritualist Church […]

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NaNoWriMo is dead, long live NaDeWriMo

December 1, 2011

The madness of NaNoWriMo is over. In theory. The 50,000 words  we crazy writers needed to crank out in a month are done. Yippee. I’m a winner. A small amount of work remains to finish a scene I parked and came back to. By finish I mean … first draft. It appears “The Watchers”, my first attempt […]

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The Lazy Squirrel

November 29, 2011

Since I moved into my winter lodgings, there has been a single squirrel making the rounds each day, stopping to check if the new resident has made a donation to the squirrel benevolent fund. After a few days I caved, and began putting a few nuts out on the snow-covered deck, then sat back to […]

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The Hermit goes Mad …Mad … MAD!!!

November 12, 2011

Mad Hermit For a giggle, click on the above video link. Trust me … it’s safe and child friendly. No computers were harmed in the making of this video. FacebookTwitterPinterestLinkedinemailPrint

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“The Ten Suggestions.”

November 10, 2011

… previously known to many as the Ten Commandments. I was hearing a story from a reliable source about a southern minister, a married man, who ran off with a married woman from his congregation. So a big fail on items VII and X. Got me thinking. I decided to arbitrarily rename the Ten Commandment […]

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Ye gods, it’s cold!

November 4, 2011

I blinked and missed it. It? What or is that which it? Winter. It arrived overnight. -10C outside, -7.5C inside poor Lucy. That’s 14F – 18.5F for you US types. End result, apart from a slow starting Russell? I hadn’t winterized my water systems, my now FROZEN water systems. It caught me by surprise because […]

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Conference over, heading north.

October 24, 2011

The Surrey Writer’s Conference is over for this year. An emptiness descends upon the soul. Silence. No hubble bubble of energy as you and your peers and idols mingle, exchange, chat, share meals. Such a change from the San Francisco conference where we went in fear of and supplicant to agents, in awe of our […]

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Coincidence

October 2, 2011

Do you believe in coincidences? Most people see them as just that. Others see coincidences as a higher power at work. I’ll give you an interesting example I saw today. I kinda blew my mind. Those who have been following me on my travels knop I bought an old car a while ago, saved it […]

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The Winds of Change

September 19, 2011

About four to five days ago, after enduring sweltering heat since my return to the USA, I noticed for the first time a breeze blowing through the farm. A very welcome breeze. And I distinctly recall thinking – “is this the end of summer?” An interesting thought, especially when you consider that since that day, […]

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To beard or not to beard ?

September 13, 2011

Yours truly is growing a beard. Again. Those who’ve know me many years probably won’t even notice. It started out like any beard, laziness. And in this case, sensitive skin in mid 90F temperatures. Then something happened. I began to think about my image. As someone who aims to be a successful author/writer, I realised […]

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Bureaucracy gone mad – so no change there then.

September 8, 2011

Having passed into and out of the USA, Canada and Mexico on numerous occasions over the past three years I have become accustomed to some pretty silly goings on. Advice given me by one border station has caused problems at another as the rules, or are those guidelines, are interpreted in a different way at […]

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I know BS when I hear it …

August 31, 2011

Got to hand it to some Americans. They have BS down to a fine art. They just haven’t figured out that we DO know BS when we hear it. First there was guy at the show who had some seats that would suit my RV. Horrid colour he said, describing them to me. I grimaced […]

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Update USA

August 24, 2011

So called experts say the main thing that kills interest in your blog page is talking about yourself. ME.ME ME they say. Hey, it’s MY blog page and I want to update my friends. Being back in the USA is hell, temperature wise. The day after I left NZ it snowed. This week in southern […]

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Plan Ahead…….

August 17, 2011

 Amazing what you see out ‘there’. I’m not sure if any particular country can lay claim to the prize idiots,  but the USA certainly has their share. Yesterday I was following a truck through town. Attached to the back was one of those industrial sized wood chippers, you know the ones; big enough to put […]

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New Zealand v American drivers

July 24, 2011

I have heard many times over the years, from the so called experts, how bad New Zealand drivers are. On my arrival in the USA I had these comments in mind but didn’t see any real difference. After 2 years and 50,000 miles on US/Canadian roads, I returned to New Zealand. NOW I see it. […]

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Characters take on a real life

July 23, 2011

I found myself in an odd situation the other day. Listening to comments from what I can only describe as an oaf and wanting to defend Emma, a character from Tough Justice.  But not as an intellectual exercise, but physically protect her from boarish comments. I was talking to a friend, my barber, hairdresser. His wife […]

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Publishing in New Zealand

July 12, 2011

Yesterday I posted two complete and one partial manuscript, DIRECT to the New Zealand branches of international publishers. How many writer’s in the US would give part of an arm for the chance to approach a publisher direct? It gets better. After reading about others, who like myself, received ZERO replies from US agents after […]

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Different Publishing landscape

June 29, 2011

So I’m back in New Zealand for a visit. One of my first tasks, after much sleep, was to check the local publishing landscape. Boy, is it different here. The few literary agents I’ve found so far want you to contact them with background info. on you and your project. THEN you might be allowed […]

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Half way home … time wise

June 25, 2011

Enjoying Sushi at San Francisco airport. Two hours wait then it’s on flight NZ007 back to New Zealand. Portland is the first place in the world I have seen a car have to brake and honk the horn to get a determined …. bird out of the way. So domesticated and intent on it’s find […]

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Nearly time to go home.

June 15, 2011

It’s nearing that time when I must return to the land of my birth, New Zealand. The plan … ha … is to come back to USA after a short mandated absence. The laugh is because so many plans I make these days seem to run off the rails before reaching their destination. It seems […]

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Printing, Eprinting, old cars and Vegemite.

May 29, 2011

Sounds like the title to an Indie movie. It’s been a busy week. Coordinating a veritable hoard of parts suppliers and repair/rebuild jobs, all the while editing my first book. The most stressful day of the week was Wednesday. I had a list of things to do. Lots of things. Then the phone rang just […]

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Men CAN mutlitask.

May 20, 2011

First off … I submitted the first 50 pages of Tough Justice to Katharine Sands today. The last few weeks have flown by. I’m busier than ever, splitting my work day between rebuilding my new toy, a 1963 Buick WIldcat 4 door hardtop, and editing my book in preperation for submittion (as above) and running […]

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Major reality check.

April 18, 2011

The cold, hard world of publishing came crashing down on my head today. After sending my first query, as requested at the SFWC, out to an agent on Friday I harboured notions of best sellers and demand for subsequent books. Todays email box had a reply, which I assumed was the standard automatic “thanks we got your […]

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Publish and be damned.

April 15, 2011

Damn. No booze in the storage cabinets of my motorhome. I bit the bullet, and after numerous critiques and rewrites – I sent the first ten pages and synopsis off to the first agent today. The <enter> key finger trembled and sat suspended for some time before finally striking the key with suitable force. I […]

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Big Flat – Visitor for a day

April 12, 2011

Having listened to Bob’s childhood stories of Big Flat, I wanted to see the area for myself. It was time for a break and Bob & Ruth wanted to make the trip as well, so we combined forces and made the day trip down 199, then left onto 427, South Fork Rd. The weather blessed […]

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Thursday night RAG meeting.

April 8, 2011

Another great meeting at the Downtown Bookshop. Our second time here and the first with a full compliment of healthy writers. Welcome to Dawn. Everyone enjoyed themselves and we hope to continue in this venue. There’s something about reading in a location surrounded by thousands of books that lifts the event. Our thanks to Ryan […]

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Gotta love Twitter

March 28, 2011

I only joined the Twitter community within the last 14 days and am already amazed at the information available. No self respecting wannabe author can afford to be without it for contacts, networking or news. The link below is an interesting article on the pros/cons costs/benefits of traditional and epublishing. Found it mentioned on Twitter, […]

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