Entries by admin

Baseball Beards – More than Superstition

Baseball Beards – More than Superstition As a baseball fan, Stan would be all over the post-season. Twelve-year-old Stan is a huge New York Yankees fan – what 12-year-old who lives East of Kansas isn’t? He and his buddy are thrilled to meet two members of the Yankees’ Double A team, the Albany-Colonie Yankees: Andy […]

What’s on Your Travel Bucket List?

What’s on Your Travel Bucket List? While the character of Stan is loosely based on a friend of mine, he is fictional. There may be a man (or men) out there in the world who are similar to him, in terms of age, interests, and world views – but I don’t know them and did […]

Hometown Holidays Different from Holidays Around the World

Hometown Holidays Different from Holidays Around the World So yesterday – October 1st, was International Music Day, International Coffee Day, and National Walk Your Dog Day. I posted about all of these on my author Facebook page, as all are relevant to Stan’s story. How does one learn about all these interesting and very specific […]

Talking Out Loud to Myself in My Head

Talking Out Loud to Myself in My Head A couple weeks ago, I had this idea for a new novel. The entire story is told via the running dialogue in the main character’s head. For one thing, it would definitely prevent “head hopping” – the (controversial) “practice of switching point-of-view characters within a single scene.”* Of […]

Phoenix’s Fetish for Name Changes

Phoenix’s Fetish for Name Changes I don’t know if this is a phenomenon specific to Phoenix, or if it occurs a lot of other places, but I noticed recently that we seem to have a fascination with changing the names of locations around the Valley. Here’s a list, off the top of my head: (1) […]

Weathering the Weather Around the World

Weathering the Weather Around the World This and similar memes have been going around my Facebook feed the last couple days. It’s probably only funny – or freaking frustrating! – if you live in Phoenix, have escaped the inferno that is Phoenix, or know someone who still slogs through 27 months of summer in the […]

Pooping to Communicate

Pooping to Communicate Traveling with your pet, no doubt, has its challenges and rewards – Stan does it, takes his Jack Russell terrier, Isis, around the world with him. But I have three dogs and a cat. So most of the time, when we travel, my husband and I need to hire someone to come […]

Packing Your Bags – and Packing on the Pounds

Packing Your Bags – and Packing on the Pounds Stan, the main character in my novel, Stan Finds Himself on the Other Side of the World, actually likes exercise. It’s easy for him and he feels better when he does it. He goes out of his way to find places to run and ways to […]