Thursday Thirteen

Thirteen Things about ME 1. I've never done one of these before so I had to go and visit the Thursday Thirteen site to figure out what the hell it was about. 2. In nine days it will be my birthday. On Monday it will be my cousin's birthday, and she's nine years younger than me. 3. I have a new book out today that I wasn't expecting until Friday! 4. I think smock dresses make people look pregnant. 5. I still wish my hair was curly, even though I know it's way more work than I could ever be prepared to do. 6. I haven't brushed my hair for about three years, not counting ruby weddings or funerals. 7. There's a black and white cat who thinks he lives in our house, even though someone else has put a collar on him. We named him Jess after Postman Pat's cat. 8. I eat chocolate muffins for breakfast. They're low fat and used to be really nice, but recently they changed the recipe so they're not. Now I'm wondering how many Weight Watchers points there are in the proper ones. 9. I first went to Center Parcs when I was about three and have never lost the sense of childish wonder I had then. In fact, I'm going back next week all by myself. 10. I have never read Pride and Prejudice. Or any book by Jane Austen. Does this mean I'm not allowed to be a romantic novelist any more? 11. My favourite song in the whole world is Fall At Your Feet by Crowded House, and has been since I was about fourteen. 12. I still can't remember which button makes a space, which makes punctuation, and which cycles through options when I'm writing a text message, even though I've had my phone nearly a year. 13. Even though I got a B in maths I never actually learned my times tables. Links to other Thursday Thirteens! 1. (leave your link in comments, I’ll add you here!)

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Cats and Sophie and birthdays, oh my!

Remember how in June last year I posted a gushing blog about Sophie? Well, nine months later, here she is, pink and shiny and about as clever as a newborn. And I'm just as proud of her!

So proud, in fact, that I'm running a contest for one lucky person to win a free download. It's super-shiny, too. See, Sophie works in an airport--at least, to start with. And we all know airports are ideous places. In fact, I believe there is a circle of hell that very much resembles Terminal Four of Heathrow.

Anyway. What I'm asking you to do is just this. Think about your worst airport story. Or your worst air journey. Or tell me the lengths to which you've gone to avoid flying. Email them to me before Sunday 11th March, when I shall pick a winner. For more details, check my website. While you're there, check out the Extras.

Also speaking of things that happened last year, you may remember nearly a year ago a completely ballistically ecstatic post from me on the occasion of my birthday when I was given an IOU for a cat. Well, actually, I got two (no, did I? Funny, I never mention them here).

Well, today my babies are a year old! Yes, the tiny little Sugar-plum and Spikelet are officially grown-ups. And, as predicted when they were still small enough to reduce grown men to cries of, "Awww!", they turned out to be super-gorgeous.

Yes, I'm smitten with the...cats. So, happy birthday Sugar and Spike!

Oh, and don't forget to check out my March news, in case I've forgotten anything today.

Catch-up

Wow, I left it a whole week? And I still don't have a lot to report--been busy the last week preparing for not one but two releases this week! I, Spy? is out tomorrow, and Maneater on Friday. I also suddenly realised I sort of need to get working on the next Sundown book, which doesn't quite have a title yet, but is about a fae and a vampire in New York. I think.

Also, I'm going away next week for five days, so I need to...I dunno, fiund a suitcase and some clean clothes. Given the state of chaos in which I live my daily life, this may prove timeconsuming.

Oh God, yes, and I need to get my newsletter out!

In the meantime, have a cat picture. It's been a while since we had one of Sugar. Here she is, trying to figure out how the door works.


Oh, and just for fun:

Boromir
With good intentions but misunderstood motives, you are a hardy, if somewhat unreliable, companion.
I ask only for the strength to defend my people!
Boromir is a character in the Middle-Earth universe.

I, Spy, the movie!

Well, sort of. Er, I hope this works since I don't have much luck with uploading videos...

Doublespeak

Big Brother is watching you. No, seriously: I signed that online petition about roadpricing, and in return got a personal email from His Toniness. I was going to blog about it (because it's just amazing how several hundred words can totally fail to contain anything actually resembling a fact) but in reality politics bore me silly and I really hate discussions on the subject. I try to keep politics and religion off this blog.

I will, however, give you this rather wonderful quote on the (sort of) subject:

I must confess the the activities of the UK governments for the past couple of years have been watched with frank admiration and amazement by Lord Vetinari. Outright theft as a policy had never occured to him.

...from, of course, Terry Pratchett. (Go and read some more here. Especially the one about cats and pills. And the 'fast lane' one, which I've put on Sophie's MySpace).

In other news (and you damn bats nearly had me typing 'udder gnus' there), yours truly is feeling a little delicate because she somehow ended up in a pub with late opening hours with a bunch of Irish rugby fans. After Ireland had beaten us at rugby. And I was on Guinness. Which wasn't being served in half pints. So I'm going to go to bed now...

Busy busy

With three books scheduled for March I've been run off my feet. Well, actually that's a lie: I've been glued to this keyboard. Ought to have blogged more, but how interesting is: Got up. Did promo. Ate. Slept. Hmm?

Also, yesterday was tricky since my office is upstairs, and shortly after I went downstairs in the morning, my parents started ripping up the stairs carpet, underlay and grippers in preparation for the new carpet being laid in the afternoon. Then, of course, when the carpet was being laid, going up and down the stairs was also inadvisable. So I read my book instead.

You want to see the new carpet? I know you're desperate to. Here's Spike, trying to recreate those carpet ads (who did them? Can't remember) with the fluffy white puss sprawled on the shagpile. See?



Oh, and I did some website work: check out the profiles I made for Sophie and Luke!

ETA: yes, those boots are awesome, aren't they? They only cost about £25, too (I love cheap stuff). However, I've only just recovered from the severe pain they induced not only in my feet but all the way up my legs as I tried to balance on those heels all night!

Watching the people get lairy

is not very pretty I tell thee!

See? Picture from Saturday night, which was a West End Musicals party at my friend Nick's house. He and his ex-flatmate Tom dressed each other--which meant Nick was the Child Catcher and Tom was Maria Von Trapp. And he wasn't even the silliest one there: there was also a hill (who was alive...geddit?), two tractors (from Flashdance, apparently), a sheep (er...?) and a Blue Man. Made me, as the Phantom of the Opera, look positively sensible.


The Phantom of the Opera is theeeeeere, inside your miiiind! Ahem.


Tractors. Apparently.



You know you've had too much beer when the hills really do seem to be alive.


Yes. Definitely too much beer.



The name on everybody's lips is gonna be...well, Amanda and Ailsa, actually.




Sheep. With Billy Elliot (see, tutu and boxing gloves, yes? I know. She's Australian).



Oh, this one's sideways... anyway, no one had heard of Brigadoon. What's wrong with people these days?

New cover!

It's tough to form a meaningful relationship when you have all the dating skills of a praying mantis.

For Chloe, human interaction is an absolute disaster area, but then she is a siren. Vegetarianism is not an option when you turn into a six-foot eagle with a human head. But in the glittering lights of Las Vegas, she meets the dazzling, irresistible Alexius.

He's gorgeous. He's sexy. He's perfect in every way. And he's about to hand her over to the harem of a collector of paranormal beings.

Alexius is about to find out that when a siren says you look good enough to eat, she's really not joking…

Pretty, huh?

I'm not going to mention Valentines Day

Oh bollocks, I just did.

Well, anyway. Today is important for so many other reasons. My neighbour's daughter is X years old today (yes, X, I can't actually remember and am too lazy to go back and rewrite a sentence I've already started). The TRS CAPAs, which which yours truly is nominated, are announced. It's the first anniversary of Candy's death.

Anyway. That's miserable, so I'm going to post a little quiz. Yeah, I've done it before, but since it took me five whole minutes to find an entry I posted a year ago, I reckon Blogger has given up on archiving by date so I doubt anyone'll find it.

Here's the game. You put your iPod on shuffle (or in my case, the songs my new PC managed to extract from my old one before the connection gave up and died) and they magically give you the answers to the following questions!

It's like being 15 again. Except when I was 15 my computer didn't even have speakers...


1. How does the world see you? All Saints: All Hooked Up
Am I?

2. Will I have a happy life? Buddy Holly--True Love Ways
Er, I'm reasonably sure I never uploaded Buddy Holly...but i take this as a yes?

3. What do my friends think of me? Jennifer Lopez--Ain't It Funny.
Okay, would like to point out that this is the video which I have--and that's because it has a VERY hot guy in it. Seriously.

4. Do people secretly lust after me? Maroon 5--This Love
Also a video. But actually a Buffy fan video about Spuffy. So...er.

5. How can I make myself happy? Maroon 5--This Love
Um. The song this time. I think this is broken...

6. What should I do with my life? Johnny Rivers--Tracks Of My Tears
I don't even know this song. WTF is going on?

7. Will I ever have children? Craig Armstrong: Glasgow Love Theme
From the Love Actually soundtrack. Um. Well, there are usually rosy-cheeked youngsters in Richard Curtis films, right?

8. What is some good advice for me? Girls Aloud: Biology
"The geek at your feet says you're neat and your heart beats closer..." of course.

9. How will I be remembered? Elvis Costello--Oliver's Army
Uh.

10. What’s my signature dancing song? Alicia Keys--Never Felt This Way
Not...really...a dancing song.

11. What’s my current theme song? Al Green--Let's Stay Together
Who the hell has been programming this thing?

12. What do others think is my current theme song? Abba--Angel Eyes
This one almost makes sense. Or might, if it had any actual relevance to me.

13. What shall they play at my funeral? Eve Cassidy--Ain't No Sunshine
Yes! Yes! SUCCESS!

14. What type of men do I like? Angie Hart--Blue
Better get stocking up on woad, then.

15. How’s my love life? Fleetwood Mac--Tell Me Lies
...Yeah.

Well, that was a diverting waste of time. Methinks possibly someone else has been downloading music on here. "I need it for the band." You're gonna play Al Green songs?

Anyway. Have some cat pictures:

Sugar: non temeris messor. "Fear Not The Reaper."



Spike brooding that he's whiter, softer and fluffier than that silly cold stuff outside.

All the world's a stage

Even if some of it is centre-stage, some of it is in the wings and bits of it are stuck up in the fly loft. Or in the back row of the auditorium, behind a pillar.

If that's so, then Sheffield is sort of outside the back door, hanging around the rubbish bins, waiting for an autograph. Or always used to be, anyway. Since Sam West took over at the Crucible, best known for hosting the Snooker World Championships (the glamour!), Sheffield's been edging into the auditorium again. It's still sort of in the wings, but it's doing okay.

Why am I blethering on about this? Well, because I went to see a play at the Crucible the other night. I've never been a great reveiwer, so I'll just say that a) I liked it, b) Eve Best is bloody brilliant (but then I knew that when I saw her in 'Tis Pity), c) Sam Troughton is really quite adorable and d) I still haven't figured out what that sodding bird was about. If you want to read a proper review, go and have a look what The Times has to say. I mostly agree with them.

I'm more interested in saying how it was to go to a city I've previously only seen the greyest parts of, and finding out what it is that student friends have raved about. You see, while they hang around the hip'n'happening West Street area of pubs, curry houses, and more pubs, I go to see my nannans. And they live in the really grey bits.

Sheffield has a lot of grey.

But...it also has someone really keen on the town council, who's been building galleries and museums and stuff that I suspect are probably only really freqented by school trips and the aforementioned students. They've also built the Winter Garden, which is like some little version of Kew or Center Parcs, and which was right next to my hotel, viewable from the breakfast room by means of a giant glass wall. A jolly nice place for a stroll after brekkers (and don't you love hotel breakfasts? There's so bloody much on offer and since it's all paid for, you end up--okay, I end up--faving a four-course breakfast. Madness!).

Anyway. Conceptions changed. I actually didn't see much outside the hotel, Winter Garden and theatre, but it was a nice change from council flats and nursing homes. And you know, what, maybe I've been to too many london theatres, but it was kind of sweet to see people treating the theatre as an event. They were dressing up for it, ordering ice creams and everything. People in London tend to snob about (and yes, 'to snob' is now a verb, I have decided) and get all intellectual about the plays wot they're seeing.

Plus, it snowed. Which was a) pretty and b) no inconvenience at all, since we walked about a hundred yards in it. Hah!

The internet is really really great (part 2)

When it works, that is!

Ahhhh, it's good to be back. You probably didn't even miss me. But I missed you!

Stupid connection.

The internet is really really great...

FOR PORN!

Sorry, I just love that song (it's from Avenue Q, by the way. I have it as my ringtone). But it also reminds me that calling romance porn is, as pointed out by Emma Sinclair, rather like calling your best friend a slut. You can do it, but woe betide anyone else who tries it. Besides, most romances have about as much in common with porn as...er, I can't think of anything that has less in common with porn. Kindergarten, maybe, although preschoolers do seem to have an obsession with bodily functions.

Anyway. My attention was diverted recently to Danuta Kean's piece on the revival of the horror genre in Britan. I've never realy been big on horror, either in books or film, but right at the end she has a few paragraphs I did take note of.

Chick lit is also getting a makeover, thanks to a new generation of writers inspired as much by Buffy as Jane Austen. Paranormal romances, to give them their official title, are the rising star in a market pioneered by independent press Piatkus. All the leading players, including Headline, Orion and Time Warner, are moving in this year.
Horror expert Steve Jones says Para Porn represents a new genre, though he regards it disdainfully as women’s fiction rather than horror. “A lot of the writers have come from chick lit and it is aimed at a different audience to traditional horror,” he says with the hint of a sneer.

Oh dear. Oh dear oh dear. Calling a genre of romance 'porn'? How...Republican. And sneering at a genre written by and for women? Stop, please. Paranormal romance isn't horror. That's why it's called 'paranormal romance', and not 'horror'. Next time you visit the bookshop, you may want to point your feet in the direction of the shelf labelled 'horror'. Not the one labelled 'romance'. You'll be safe there. There will be no "kick ass chicks who fight vampires and have romances". I don't know what modern horror books contain, but Ms Kean's article contained lots of words like 'chilling' and 'postmodern'.

Funnily enough though, I didn't see the word 'entertaining' there. Guess that's what you go to the romance shelf for.

Yay and boo

First the yay! I read a while ago that the SciFi Channel in America is making a TV series based on the Dresden Files by Jim Butcher. I freaking love those books, so I was really excited when I saw a January start date. However...when I emailed to ask if the SciFi Channel in the UK was going to be showing it...they said no. Stupid SciFi!

But, I saw an advert this morning (saw, not heard, couldn't get anyone to shut up in time) for it on Sky One, for the 14th of Feb! Result! Harry, you're my Valentine. Don't let me down now.

Now for the boo. Photoshop. It's driving me crazy.

Breif reason why: I just got a new computer. On my old one, there was a program called PictureIt! which I used for image editing. I got pretty good with it. However, Microsoft doesn't make it any more and as it came with the old computer, I don't have any setup files for it. So, I need to start learning how to use Photoshop. Only, it's like learning French and then starting on Japanese. It's just so different and I don't understand what anything means.

I want to remove red-eye from a photo...I can't do it. Don't even know where to start. I want to cut out a person from a photo and stick them on a different background. Ditto: how do I cut them out? How do I import a background? What the frilly heck is a layer?

Does anyone know where I can get a talking-in-single-syllables tutorial for this? Or another program that's not as maddening? I know Photoshop seems to be the standard...but like I said, it's all Japanese to me!