Souper Day

Tomorrow afternoon I'm hosting knitting at Zambaldi Beer instead of at my house. The hostess makes the "main course" and the others bring whatever. Since it's winter and cold, I thought I'd make soup. So I did. I made a cauldron of Jamaican Cream of Pumpkin Soup. Not with pumpkin which is what Jamaicans call all winter squash, but with butternut squash. I learned a good lesson by buying two smaller squash which were much easier to trim, peel, and cut up than one biggie.

 

Two of the things I like about that soup are there's lots of onions that get sauteed in 4 tablespoons of butter. I love cooked onions. I always over-onion soups and stews. Anyway, it's a very simple recipe. All you do is saute the onions, throw in the cubed squash, add 50 oz. of chicken broth, and simmer it for about 45 minutes. Then I mash the squash before whirring it with the stick blender until it's mostly blended. Next you add a can of evaporated milk (you could add cream but that makes it almost too rich) and a shake of hot sauce. Oh, and plenty of salt and pepper. And, voila!, you have soup. I'll heat it up in my smaller slow cooker and take it down to the brewery along with a bag with bowls, spoons, and a ladle.

 

Oh my God, you guys. I nearly fainted when I saw how many people downloaded The Seaview yesterday and just now I checked and it's way more. The total free downloads for yesterday and today are 8,517. The sales for Open For Business are 542 and for Spies Don't Retire they're 530. I don't understand why the other two aren't even but I guess not everyone buys the bundle. These numbers are beyond my wildest dreams. The Chirp Freebie Friday Promo was a good investment. It runs through Monday, so if you're interested, go on chirpbooks.com, sign up for an account (there's no membership fee), and download the entire Seaview Series for just around $5. GBB said you have to put in my whole pen name to find it. It's Barbara Angermeier Malcolm, just in case you're interested.

 

I thought you'd enjoy seeing the end of my 4-year-old neighbor's sledding run. She and one of her parents start up on the snow pile from the parking lot kitty corner from our backyard and ride the slide down to my yard. This time it looks like she stopped short, usually they end up past the bird feeders. They have so much fun. I love hearing them laughing and cheering. 

 

Today's flower is a Gerbera daisy. I worked really hard to make the petals that jut toward the viewer short so they look right. I didn't do too badly. I like the way I colored the petals with orange, yellow orange, yellow, and red. Cheerful.

 

I was kind of distracted by the whole promo thing so I didn't get as much writing done today as I might have. I reread the critique pages for Monday and then worked on a couple more short stories. And I took a shower. You're welcome. ;)

--Barbara 

Overnight Snow

They said we'd get more snow overnight and they didn't lie. It is only February, after all. We got about four inches of the stuff. I especially like the way it clings to the retaining wall stones. I think it looks like frosting. It got up to 34 degrees today and it was partly sunny in the afternoon so a lot of the snow melted. I didn't have to shovel or snowblow because I was waiting for the plow to come by before going out, and, in the meantime, my neighbor shoveled my driveway. Thanks, MD! The plow still hasn't come but I'll handle the plow drift when it piles it up.

 

My fears about the Freebie Friday promo last night were unfounded. This morning I had an email from the support guy, Victor (my new best friend), saying that my books were in the Chirp catalog and available for the promo. He put a link in the email so I could see them in my Chirp Audiobook Dashboard and then I got my usual Freebie Friday email and there was The Seaview front and center on the cover page and second on the list. Open For Business and Spies Don't Retire are available with it as a bundle with a deep discount. I looked a few times today to see if there was any way to check how many downloads there'd been but I couldn't find anything. That's okay, I'm just excited to see it. Think how many people saw it and read about it and saw my name. I'm over the moon! BTW, if you're interested you can go to chirpbooks.com, sign in for an account (there's no membership fee), and download a copy. The promo runs through Monday.

 

Today's flower is a Tulip. It was fun to draw and I like the way the leaves turned out. A tulip isn't a very complicated flower so I feel pretty good about it.

 

To bleed off some of the Freebie Friday excitement, I spent most of the morning finishing up a couple of short stories and then scheduling them into early March. I like to have them posted so I don't have to scramble to load one up every week. Speaking of Substack, I got an email from them saying that one of my writing friends, AC, recommended Stories That Need to See Daylight to her readers. She had nice things to say about my writing. Thanks, AC, I like your writing too.

 

At Friday Night Knitting I worked on the ribbing of the Melt the ICE hat #2. Six inches is a long time to rib, I'm telling you. My fingers and forearms are tired from three hours of knit 1, purl 1. Only one more inch of ribbing and then I knit a little stockinette before starting the crown decreases.

 

I mustered up my guts this afternoon and called DM at OtherWorlds Books & More in Sturgeon Bay. When I spoke with him a couple weeks ago I mentioned that I had a new book coming out soon and he offered to host a launch event for me. Well, I called today to ask if he meant it. He did, so I'll be up in Sturgeon Bay at OtherWorlds Books & More on Saturday, March 7 from 10am to 2pm with many copies of Anneke's Legacy, my new lighted palm tree, and the flamingo head sunglasses holder. Come see me if you're in the area. I hope the weather cooperates.

--Barbara 

Snow

It was snowing when I got up this morning. It was that lightweight, fluffy stuff but still I had to go out and clear the driveway and the minuscule plow drift. I used the snowblower because, well, because I wanted to. And it's supposed to snow more overnight. So I'll get to do it again tomorrow. Yippee. 

 

This morning I drew a gratitude journal page for yesterday. I was mostly grateful for the opportunity to have a Freebie Friday promo on Chirp but found out today that it might not happen because my audiobooks aren't listed as being available to Chirp even though they're on the distributor Chirp uses. I've got a support guy looking into it but it might be too late.  Dammit.

 

I spent the afternoon working on a couple short stories. They might both be done. I'll have to read them tomorrow to make sure, then I can schedule them for a Wednesday on Substack. I love that I can get them lined up way ahead of time so I don't have to remember to do it every week.

 

Today's flower is Water Lily. It's okay. I have a hard time drawing the petals on the front of the flower. The angle's wrong or something. I like the leaves and the coloring though.

 

My virtual assistant, KM, sent me graphic designs of ads for Anneke's Legacy and a video and caption for it too. We're going to meet next Wednesday on Zoom to talk about where she should put them. She also offered to make a new bookmark with it included. Naturally I just ordered 100 of the old ones. I'll have her design it, just in case.

I've been doing yoga again six days a week for about a month and I keep expecting my knees to stop aching so much but so far they're not stopping. They woke me up at 6 o'clock this morning. No fair! Pushing the snowblower around didn't bother them. Walking around three groceries yesterday didn't both them. Doing yoga this morning barely bothered them. Sleeping last night did. Arrgh!

 --Barbara

And Today I Got Photos

Just by luck I was standing by the patio door when a Chickadee landed on the square green feeder. It actually stayed long enough for me to take a couple pictures. They don't hold very still so it's a little blurry but I was excited to see a live bird for the second time in a couple of weeks.

 

Then a Downy Woodpecker showed up on the suet nuggets, pecked a bit, and then swooped over to the square green feeder too. Look at that! Two birds!

 

I had to go to the grocery today and left it later in the morning after my shower and yog-ing. It wasn't too crowded but they were out of the one thing I was really hoping to find--frozen butternut squash. I want to make a pot of Jamaican Cream of Pumpkin Soup this weekend and it's a lot less fuss made with frozen squash. But now I get to peel and cube fresh squash because that's what they had. Oh well. 

 

Once I got home I sat down at the laptop and worked on extending some story starts into short stories. My supply is running low since I spent the last three months working exclusively on my next novel manuscript. One of the starts feels like a whole story but it's very short, no, VERY short so I think it needs more words. I'm trying.

 

Today's flower is Foxglove. It was another one of those intimidating ones but it turned out to not be so bad after all. The coloring was challenging but I'm happy with the way it turned out.

 

I went on The Clearing's website this afternoon to check when the Watercolor class will be in the spring. I got kind of nervous when it wasn't in May. It's always in May but this year it's in June. And the class description talks about painting different things, summertime things. Should be fun! I've got to share the dates with my former neighbors to see if they're interested.

And my laptop weather thingy just said "Light snow tomorrow." Ugh. I figured it was going to snow because there were slurry marks on the streets when I went to the store today. They apply this stuff to the streets that really helps with making them not too slick. I appreciate that and the advance warning. I guess.

I got a call from GBB tonight that she heard from the DePere Women's Club that we've been accepted for their show. That's the show that's juried, so we're surprised and pleased to be in. Although that means we'll have two days of shows back to back one weekend in March. Yippee. We should be exhausted by Sunday afternoon. Let's just hope the weather cooperates.

--Barbara 

I Saw Two Birds

When I was doing yoga this morning I saw two birds--a Chickadee and a Mourning Dove--but I wasn't in a position to take their pictures, not that they held still long enough for that to happen even if I hadn't been holding a Boat Pose or a Chair Pose. I was just glad to see them.

I'm on a lucky streak. Last week I entered a Writers Helping Writers blog contest and won a critique of the first three pages of my next novel. I sent my pages in immediately and got her comments back today. They're very complimentary and not too critical of my writing, kind of surprising for a first draft. 

 

About ten days ago, I applied to Chirp (the audiobook arm of BookBub) for a Freebie Friday promotion. I got word today that I'm accepted. That means that from Friday to Monday The Seaview will be offered for free and the other two books in the series will be deeply discounted. They say that there's the potential for thousands of free downloads and hundreds to thousands of paid downloads. It's not free to me, but if I get a few hundred downloads of the discounted audiobooks it'll be worth it. I'm willing to pay the fee to get my name out there in front of thousands of readers/listeners.

 

After yog-ing, I came back here and sat down to make Amazon Ads for Anneke's Legacy. I made 14 of them--two Auto ads (where the Amazon algorithm chooses where to display my ads, one for each format, eBook and paperback), six Category ads (I chose three of the categories that pertain to my story and made an ad for each category and each format), and six Keyword ads (where I found three different book titles that seem similar to my book, used a data scraper to collect book titles and author names from their sales pages, and made ads using that data for each format). It was a tedious process and I was soooooo glad that I had printed off and kept a file of the instructions for making ads from the last time I did Bryan Cohen's Amazon Ads Profit Challenge. Those little sheets of paper were a godsend.

 

Today's flower drawing didn't turn out as well as the last few have. It's a Calla Lily, well, two of them, and I think they're a little misshapen. I like the coloring on the leaves, though.

 

When I got home from Writers Guild tonight, I sat down and registered for the last two vendor fairs on our list. I'd have done it on Sunday when I did the first one of my share of the list, but the last two wouldn't open yet. So I got it done and will send off the checks tomorrow. Yes, we're going to be hauling tables, chairs, and books around the area again come fall. We're even going up to Marinette (50 miles north on Hwy. 41) for one show. I think we'll pile all our stuff in GBB's SUV and only take one vehicle. She says we can cram it all in there.

Sorry I don't have more engaging photos to share with you tonight but nothing I did today was very photogenic. It was sunny again today, so that's a good thing. And it didn't snow.

--Barbara 

A Little Snow

We got a dusting of snow overnight, maybe an inch, and it snowed a little this morning but was overcast most of the day. I was working on re-editing Open For Business this afternoon when I saw orange light reflected in the windows of the house across the street. So I grabbed the camera and took this shot of the sunset. It was brighter in person than it looks in this picture and I could see a part of the sun but that doesn't seem to be in the picture either.

 

Today's flower is Bird of Paradise. It was fun and a bit challenging to draw. I like the colors of the flower and all the shapes of the various petals and sepals fanned out.

 

I knitted a few more rounds of the Melt the ICE Hat tonight while I watched TV. I'm not a very fast knitter so it takes me a while to grow a hat. 

 

Today was the monthly St. Agnes Class of '65 lunch. We went to a new place and I wasn't too impressed. They only had one server to tend bar, take orders, and serve the food. I don't know what was up with the cook but the food took forever to arrive and came out one at a time. The person served first was long finished by the time the last person was served. It was less expensive than the previous place and the food was good but I don't know if that outweighs the poor service.

I realized this morning that I don't have to unpublish the eBooks to add ISBN numbers because they don't have them on Amazon Kindle Direct Publishing. So I got Horizon's eBook fixed up but have to unpublish and republish the paperback. I'll do that tomorrow.

--Barbara 

A Sudden Thought

Just now when I got up to go get the camera so I could upload and crop the pictures for the blog tonight, I had a thought. See, I've spent the day working on writing--reediting Open For Business, meeting with GBB to plan our vendor fairs, more reediting, republishing Spies Don't Retire, updating my Categories & Keywords list. The thought that came to me was that I didn't work this hard when I had a job! This is the screen that was making me wait to preview the new edition of Spies Don't Retire. It takes its own sweet time getting everything all organized before it opens so I can look at it all together and approve it. Whew. It's a job and for very little pay. But I sure am having fun.

 

One cool thing that happened today was the very first copy of Anneke's Legacy came! I always order one retail as soon as it's available on Amazon so I have the first one. I've ordered 25 author copies to be delivered in a couple weeks so I'll have them to sell but this one won't be sold. It's mine. All mine. This book isn't part of The Seaview Series. It's a standalone novel about a young woman who has to go to Bonaire to settle her late great-aunt's estate. She meets two men--a brooding fisherman and a suitable young attorney. Guess which one she falls for.

 I've been seeing squirrels running across the patio or scampering across the fence by the retaining wall but today this one stopped to try to hoover up some fallen goodies under the suet nuggets feeder. And I heard a bird crash into the patio door but I wasn't out there to see what kind of bird it was. Probably a Mourning Dove. They hit the door a lot. They're not great fliers.

 

Today's flower is a Snowdrop. They're mostly white but I used my lightest blue pencil to shade the petals just a bit. I think they call that "artistic license."

 

It got up to 29 degrees today and it was sunny so it felt great outside. I walked out onto the porch when GBB left and the air didn't hurt. Made a nice change. I just checked my weather app and it's supposed to snow in half an hour. Hopefully not much. I'm not in the mood.

--Barbara