dunesteef.com has decided to produce Around the Bend in audio format! I say “produce” because more and more podcasts are not just reading stories–there’s music, acting, different voices–they are getting more complex and more professional. Dunesteef, in particular, wanted to involve authors more so asked me to read a blip on how the story came about.

Me????

I wasn’t too certain this was a good idea. Okay, I was completely against it. I’m basically quite lazy and can be a rather self-conscious creature. I’ve never liked my voice; I took singing lessons off and on for years thinking something might help it, but other than learning how to “breathe” right, nothing rubbed off.

Unfortunately, despite my reclusive nature and extreme laziness, I do believe in supporting the magazines that give authors like me an opportunity to spread stories. So I began recording. Who would think that one tiny paragraph would take so much time? First off, I sounded bored. I don’t mean a little bored, I mean a monotone that could compete with Alan Greenspan testimony, only a lot shorter and sounding more like your grandmother. Second off, who wrote all these extra words??? The more words in a single sentence, the more air that is required…and ups and down in tone so that I didn’t sound like a dead pickle.

I had no idea that so much acting was required to read aloud: Lilting. Pauses. Hints of lightness or intrigue. Emphasis. Pacing. And I wasn’t even reading the story.

After some practice I managed to sound like a moderately interested human, if not a talented one. Then came the technical part of recording. I forgot to turn the sound off on my machine, so incoming email pinged right at the beginning. Got rid of that only to have the stray cat show up in the back yard, which set off the birds–quite loudly–in the background. Husband opened the garage door. Air conditioner came on. Then…the perfect lilt, the perfect pacing…I had it!!!!! Only…the first word was strangely cutoff so “there” could have been “where” or just “ere” or perhaps not a word at all, but a gagging sound.

Hmm. I had no editing tools. I’m sure a professional could have recorded the one word and glued it on the front in place of the miscellaneous chopped noise. Barring that…I had to record it again. Only I had to sneeze in the middle of that one…and so on.

Oh bother.

At any rate, much to my complete surprise, I learned a few significant lessons. One: If I am ever to give a reading of a short story or excerpt, I had better practice. A lot. Two: I should probably avoid doing readings, but if I do, I need to think about whether I will do a single voice, many voices or just try not to sound like a dead pickle. Three: The job these readers do on the podcasts is hard. Adding background music, artwork, introductions, editing the scripts–all a lot of work. And more talent that I would have guessed.

So next time you hear a podcast or an audio book that you like, make note of the reader. If you enjoyed the book/work, it could have a lot to do with a reader making the work sound interesting, because even the most interesting work, read by a dead-pickle reader, is going to be a flop.

Well, that’s it folks. The zucchini hosted the last worm it could stand. Looked pretty bad the last few days. I tried to save it again–found three or more worms in the stalk about 3 or 4 days ago. I dug them out with a sharp stick, shot the thing full of BT worm, gave it some shade…but it was too much. Must have been about the fifth or sixth time the stalk had been invaded. When I pulled up the plant, the inside was mostly hollowed out. I’m amazed the thing produced as long as it did. Just goes to show that if you work at it–cut off infected leaves and leaf stalks, keep it very well watered, scrape any eggs off that you can–and inject the stalk with BT worm killer periodicallly, you can have squash for months. I think the first infection happened in May on my plant–it’s July 23, 2008. I had 3 squash per week the entire time. This week I got one, and I was pretty sure it would be my last…

For more info on the squash borer, here’s the orginal article with pictures of the moth and eggs.

Next year, I think I’ll try that white, winter squash. I’m sure I’ll have the same problem, but I’ve always liked that squash…

7/17/08 Couple of writing items, both great news!

Wrong World has decided to perform Haunting Clues in a special Halloween issue! I’m pretty impressed with their work; it’s a classy site with top-notch presentation. The short stories are sold as a packaged DVD or on a per download basis. I’m especially impressed with the production of the introductions. Here’s one sample. There are excerpts of the stories out there as well.

Good stuff.

I’ve also sold a new short story (Year of the Mountain Lion) to Aberrant Dreams! (I love that animation! It’s still by far my favorite out on the web.) The story won’t be available for some time yet (could be as long as a year!) but after it is published online, it will be a part of their year-end print antholgoy. I’m already hoping for a fantasy cover, something adventuresome or maybe whimsical…(no, I don’t have anything to do with the cover. I just like medieval covers depicting heroes or mysterious, magical scenes.) I’m really looking forward to the publication of this story. It’s a little different style for me; a lot less whimsy and more danger-filled adventure.

I hesitate to talk about this because stray cats can be so heartbreaking. We adopted one in the past and had a great two years with her before she disappeared without a trace. We had to capture her and her three kittens, take them all in and get them fixed, etc. It was…beyond challenging.

Lately there’s been another mom cat scurrying through our yard. We started the long process of trying to feed her because it was pretty obvious she wasn’t getting enough food. Within a week, her kitten completely disappeared. It’s a dangerous world out there for feral cats trying to survive on the leftover scraps of other pets. At any rate, we continued to feed the mom and have gotten her used to stopping in the yard to look for food. We’ve even gotten the three days worth of dewormer down her…a bit off schedule, but you don’t really get to schedule regular cats, never mind feral strays that may or may not pass through.

Here’s a picture–not a very good one. We’ve gotten closer to her than this picture. She came over near the garden to see what I was doing one morning and she sat and watched me for about an hour. She runs only about 3 yards away now when we come out with food–unless something spooks her. So we’ll see how the process goes. She may disappear without a trace. I know that trapping her is going to be very difficult. Cats are quite smart and they don’t like entering the trap. We never would have caught the other cat except her kittens went in the trap. We then used them to get her. She was mad at us for weeks over that trick…

Planning a possible trip to Spain next year. Thinking about going in Sept or Oct. Yeah, yeah, I’ve noticed the weak dollar. My plan is to cost average in. Buy some now (well, when the dollar pretends to be strong again) and then buy a little more Euros later and so on. Or maybe by then we’ll all be back on the gold standard and I should be buying bullion. But I digress.

What I want to know today is this:

Why is it that when looking for maps of Spain, I can find them on amazon UK–that ship from the US? These same maps aren’t available at Amazon US. If I were to order them from amazon UK, I’d pay international shipping rates, pay in Euros (converted) and then the map would come from Jersey. HUH?

I love gardening, I truly do. But there are days when I hate it. There are times when it seems that every bug in the county is in my garden and they brought their pet worms to play with. This morning, the garden was drippy. It’s not that we’ve had enough rain or anything–in fact, the rain completely missed us yesterday afternoon, so we’ve had less than half an inch in the last month. But it was humid enough that the plants were wet, drippy and hanging on the ground.

I couldn’t find any new cucumbers growing. None of the cantaloups were ripe. The tomato plants were mostly draped along the ground and I’m out of poles to tie them up off the ground. The plants are suffering from spider mites (again).

The cucumbers just had a huge infestation of aphids and what I think are white plant lice. I sprayed last evening, but I do it one individual leaf at a time so as not to get the insecticide all over myself and the rest of the garden. This morning everything is damp and drippy and I don’t want those leaves touching me.

I had to spray diluted milk all over everything because I’m afraid that I’ll get another mildew problem with the high humidity if I don’t. That made the garden even more drippy.

The tomato I went to pick this morning had been eaten out by a WORM. I found another one, not even started to ripen that has been attacked by worm’s brother.

I cut a zucchini off the plant and accidentally chopped a leaf off. Rats.

The rain barrel had about half a barrel from the rain we got two days ago. Emptying it is not usually that difficult, but today the hose got kinked. Then I couldn’t position the barrel right to get the water out properly. It was 75 degrees out when I stared, 80 before I was close to finishing. Hot. Sweaty. Drippy.

ARGH.

Actually it’s the first cantaloupe I’ve ever grown, period. And it was a success, if I do say so myself!

It’s a “little sweetie” that is smaller than your average cantaloupe–supposedly about the size of a softball. This one is considerably bigger than that and I’m not complaining. It was easy to grow in Texas (because all the bugs were on the zucchini and tomato plants, I think!). It took a long time to grow–this one has been in the ground since February/March. It was probably 4 feet long before the first fruit set. Then it took weeks and weeks to get big and start to ripen. I picked it pretty much by accident, which I read, is the right time. I was just looking at it and picked it up just a tad and it fell off in my hand! We tried it this morning and boy was it good. Very firm and very sweet. Success!

I hear the best way to eat them is to scoop out the seeds and fill the center with ice cream…so I wonder…chocolate ice cream or vanilla???

Let’s talk about Chocolate. I know you want to. Sure, it would be even better to EAT the stuff, but that’s essentially what we’ll be talking about anyway!

Have you noticed that grocery stores (including Wal-Mart) are starting to carry better chocolates? Instead of just low-end Hersey’s there’s the high-end Hersey bars. Even better, there’s Lindt chocolate and some very nice Ghiradeli bars. I didn’t like Ghirardelli all that much the first time I tried them years and years ago. I drank their cocoa because it was one of the few decent ones on the grocery shelves–easy to obtain. Several years ago the internet made it possible for me to order from anywhere and I’ve tried a number of cocoas:

Scharffen-Berger: This is a lovely cocoa, especially for cooking. Very rich, non-dutched, deep cocoa. My favorite recipe for this cocoa is: Chocolate Buttermilk cake with chocolate buttermilk icing. Be prepared to swoon.

Guittard - I believe they supply chocolate to See’s Candies (My all-time favorite store candies). They also have some dynamite chocolate bars for baking or making your own chocolate. They have single region chocolates and mixed. Quite a selection to choose from. Single region chocolates have really unique notes. Many have what I describe as “fruity” notes–a blackcherry or an undefinable fruitiness that just…melts into your sense.

They also sell a wonderful dutched cocoa that is very similar to the more expensive French and quite well-known Valrhona cocoa. I have a cup of Guittard cocoa almost every morning.

What are your favorite chocolates? Where do you get your chocolate fix?

Me, I usually order the cocoa in bulk from www.Chocosphere.com. I enjoy the Ghirardelli bars from my local grocery story. The Citris Sunset has tiny bits of orange scattered throughout a luscious dark-chocolate; the Toffee Interlude is perfect for just a bit of crunch and when you want that extra sweetness; And their Twilight Delight is a wonderful 72 percent creamy chocolate bar with a hint of fruitiness that is all about chocolate’s deep base flavor. All of these bars are just dynamite. Expensive too. But really, really satisfy that chocolate craving.

I like the Lindt bars too, but they’ve gone up in price recently, so I don’t buy them nearly as often. Hersey’s has some new “fine” chocolates out as well, but I haven’t tried them.

Here’s my favorite chocolate recipe book:  Bittersweet: Recipes and Tales from a Life in Chocolate: Alice Medrich, Deborah Jones (Photographer)