I wasn’t at work again today.  I spent part of the morning at the doctor’s office with my son.  We’ve all been battling sniffles and a sore throat, but today, my son’s throat was really hurting.  So I figured it was best to go to the doctor.  Sure enough, it was strep throat.  Now we all have antibiotics and everyone should be better soon.

So I guess you could say we were tagged by the strep bug.  And then yesterday I was browsing my favorite blogs and got tagged again by my CP. 

Here’s the deal:

1. Grab the book closest to you.  Okay.  Got it.

2. Go to page 123.  Look down to the 5th sentence.  I’m not counting the partial sentence that starts the page. 

3. Post the text of the next three sentences in your blog. 

“Your mantle, while lovely, lacks warmth.”
“My hatred for you keeps me warm enough.” She gripped the pommel or her saddle.

4. Include the title and the author’s name.  This is from Jolie Mathis‘ The Sea King.  An autographed copy, btw.

5. Tag three people.  Hmmm, let me think.  I guess I can’t just tag anyone.  I need three people with blogs.  Alright then.  Mary Alice, Lexi, and Vonda, I tag you. 

Well, at least this way we’ll find out what these ladies are reading, right?  You know, those few lines from The Sea King sounded pretty good.  Check out the excerpt at the link. I love it when the heroine hates the hero - at first.  LOL  And I have the perfect excuse not to worry about writing this evening.  I’m still sick remember? 

I’m off to read.

Nita

Wow. It’s been a tough few days.  My father-in-law passed away on Saturday morning.  He left us peacefully.  We were with him, standing by his bed.  I held his hand and my husband and I spoke to him.  We told him we loved him and listed all of the family and friends who loved him.  We told him it was alright to let go, that we would miss him, but we’d be alright, not to worry about us.  His breathing slowed as we spoke and he left us knowing we loved him.

I still can’t talk about it without tearing up.  Or write about it either.  So… That’s enough of that…  

Today we went to his house.  We found some really old pictures and stuff dating back to the early 1900’s. There was a 100 year-old wooden chess set that once belonged to the FIL’s grandfather whose name we chose for our own son.  We gave the set to our son since he loves to play chess.  I thought that was pretty cool.  Our son was named after his great-grandfather and he now owns his chess set.  I think the FIL would have given that to him already had he remembered it was out there amongst all those keepsakes.  The FIL bought our son a chess set for Christmas a couple of years ago.  I don’t know which set will be the favorite now.   

Anyway, there were lots of memories to go through.  We divided up the pictures between the family members.  Oh, and we found this really cool picture of the FIL when he was in the service that we’ve saved for my brother-in-law.  I know he’ll love it.

Last night, I managed to find a few minutes to upload my submission of ARH to the agent who requested it.  She said to allow up to two months for a response.  I suppose two months will come and go before I know it, but I’m already anxious to hear. 

It’s back to work tomorrow.  And hopefully back to normal.  I have a feeling it will be a while before everything is actually normal again, though.

Nita      

No, I haven’t disappeared.  In truth, I haven’t posted for a couple days because I didn’t want to write anything too depressing.  My father-in-law has been moved to hospice care.  They’re giving him morphine, so he sleeps most of the time — which is a blessing.  We are praying for a quick transition.   

Things have been crazy around the house, though.  I’ve only had a moment or two to work on getting ARH ready for the agent.  I need to get that in soon.  She gave me a window of 7-10 days to upload it to her site and I received the email on the 22nd.  I suppose I could go ahead and send it off as is, but I just want to make sure it’s as good as it can be. 

I also have some entries for the Great Expectations contest I need to judge.  There’s only four of them and the deadline is not until mid February…  But still.  I don’t like to wait till the last minute for anything. 

So much to do and not enough hours in the day.  If only I could learn to function efficiently without sleep.  Trouble is: I don’t do well on less than six hours.  I’m fairly useless to anyone with less than four hours.  Just look how much I could get done in those extra hours if I didn’t have to sleep!  I might even find the time to exercise occasionally. 

Nah, probably not.

Nita

I queried an agent last week about A Real Husband.  Today I received her request for the first 30 pages. Yay!  I’m trying not to get too excited.  I don’t want to be disappointed if she doesn’t like it.  But it’s awesome that’s she’s interested in considering it. 

I need to go over it again… As if I haven’t done that 1000 times.  LOL  But I can’t send it off without giving it another look. 

Nita

The past few days have been pretty rough.  The kids saw their grandfather at the hospital today.  My son was really upset.  Of course, that was pretty hard on me, too.  I’m still feeling helpless from not being able to ease my husband’s pain.  That powerless feeling is even worse when it’s the kids.  I have always hated to see my kids cry. 

The good news:  When I got home from the hospital today, I found an email from a friend.  She got her cover today for her book.  It is so cool!  I have to share it here, too: 

I want a cover like that. Heck, I’d just like a contract so I can get a cover– any cover.  LOL

Nita

That’s part of what I’m feeling.  Powerless partly describes it.  Helpless, too.  Torn.  Frustrated.  Sad.  My father-in-law has been sick.  He’s seventy-six and we knew he had pneumonia, but he wasn’t responding well to the antibiotics.  So it was obvious that there was something else, possibly even worse than pneumonia. 

Test results done yesterday show advanced lung cancer. The doctors are pretty sure he’s had a recent heart attack. He has congestive heart failure.  His kidneys are already failing.  In other words, it could be any day.  The only hope left is that he won’t suffer for very long.

While I’d like to help my father-in-law and I’m saddened by his condition, I know that he is seventy-six and none of us can expect to live forever.  He’s had a fairly long life.  I can accept his passing without too much denial, anger, and all the other things that come with losing a loved one. 

It’s my husband that has me feeling so powerless, torn, etc.  He’s hurting.  And I can’t make it stop.  He doesn’t like for anyone to see him cry, so he tries to hold it in. 

I know, everyone says all I can do is just be there to support my husband.  I will.  I just wish there was something more I could do.

Nita

It seems to be everywhere but here.    My CP has been completely snowed in two or three times already this winter.  I’ve visited my favorite blogs only to see beautiful pictures of snow scenes and read about winter weather in Texas. 

Where’s our snow?! Granted, we don’t get much around here.  In fact, sometimes we go a whole winter without it.  But it seems like it’s been years since we saw some real snow.  It’s definitely been cold enough here the past couple of days. 

I’m pouting here.  LOL  I want snow, too.  And I want enough to cause the city to shut down so I don’t have to go to work or drive in it. 

That’s not too much to ask.  Is it?  For heaven’s sake, we are surrounded by mountains here in southeastern Tennessee.  It’s not like I live in Corpus Christi, Texas or something.  Oh, wait…  My brother lives there and at Christmas 2005, they had six inches of the white stuff.  Even the tropical climate of Corpus Christi has had more snow than we’ve had the past few years. 

Nita

I slept till about 8:00 this morning.  That was nice.  Then I had coffee and Strawberry Yogurt Cheerios before I got dressed.

Then I went to the spa!  Oh, that was soooooooo nice.  I started with an hour massage.  I knew it was going to be awesome when she started with my feet.  LOL I love to have my feet rubbed.  I know, I know… Who doesn’t?  Anyway, the massage was just the beginning. 

After that I had a manicure with a paraffin wax treatment.  And then came the spa pedicure.  Soaking my feet in hot water while the vibrating massage chair kept me completely limp after the massage that almost put me to sleep.   The pedicure included a sugar scrub, peppermint and eucalyptus foot wrap and then a paraffin treatment for my feet, too.  Wow. 

Okay, I know to some this might seem commonplace.  But not for me.  This was my first ever professional massage and first  pedicure.  I’ve splurged a few times (and I do mean a FEW times) on a manicure.  I can probably count on one hand how many times I’ve done that.  But I’ve never had a pedicure that I didn’t give myself.  And though the hubby’s massages are nice, they can’t compare to the ones given by the trained hands of a massage therapist. It was just totally wonderful to be pampered that way. 

More than three hours later I left the spa and I stopped by the grocery store to pick up a couple things on the way home.  When I got home, it was raining.  The house was fairly quiet.  My husband was working in his workshop and my son was playing a video game.  My daughter had gone out with friends.  So what did I do? 

I took a nap.    I couldn’t help it!  I was so relaxed from the spa and the patter of raindrops on the roof was just too much. 

It was a very nice, relaxing day– one that was totally needed and rejuvenating.  Back to work tomorrow. (sigh)

Nita 

I’m so glad my kids have cell phones.  Yesterday at about 11:30, I got a call from my daughter.  She said, “Hey.  I’m in the middle school gym.  The chem lab caught on fire.”  As we talked, my son joined her and I knew that both of my children were safe.  The high school had been evacuated and the students were waiting in the middle school gym next door. 

Moments later, I got a call from a friend whose husband is a firefighter.  Can you imagine how worried I would have been if that second call had come first?  And what if I couldn’t get in touch with my kids at all?  OMG! That would have been a nightmare.

Turns out that the fire was contained to one room.  No one was injured, but there was quite a bit of toxic smoke due to all the chemicals that caught fire.  The kids were just disappointed that they had to go back to school this morning.  LOL  Apparently, there was not so much damage to the school that the majority of it couldn’t be set to rights in time for school this morning.  Much of the mess to be cleaned up was from the sprinkler system, but then, without those sprinklers there would likely have been a lot more fire damage. 

Anyway, I’d have to argue with anyone who says kids don’t need cell phones.  There’s been too many situations like the one yesterday when I needed them to have a cell phone just for my own peace of mind.  And any mother knows just how important that is.

Nita  

Well, I did manage to prepare an entry for The Roscommon Faerie Tales for the Great Expectations contest.  I was cutting it pretty close.  LOL  I sent my entry in with about an hour and a half to spare. 

I decided to enter The Roscommon Faerie Tales as full length novel with two parts - How Faerie Dust is Made and the yet to be titled part two.  That’s the way I’d like to see it published, so it just made sense to do it that way.  The final round judge is Chris Keeslar from Dorchester Publishing.  They have a romance category just for Faerie Tales, so I’m really hoping to make the finals. 

And as I posted before, the final round judge for the historical category is from Avon.  It would be awesome if A Real Husband made the finals.  It’s my dream to be listed among my favorite Avon authors including Teresa Medeiros, Victoria Alexander, Eloisa James, Julia Quinn, and Stephanie Laurens.  I know, I know… That’s a big dream, but I don’t think it hurts to dream big.  One of my favorite quotes is by Les Brown: “Shoot for the moon, even if you miss you will land among the stars.” 

We won’t know till the end of February if either entry made the final round.  Keep your fingers crossed for me.

Nita