So because of the holiday this week for all the bloggers in
the U.S. ISWSG, which is normally on the first Wednesday of the month, can be
posted on Tuesday or Wednesday this week.
BUT. I don't normally post on Tuesdays, AND I’ll be hanging
with the fam on Wednesday (which means no access to respond to comments in a
timely manner), so I decided to cheat a bit more and post my ISWSG post today
and leave it up until I’m back on Friday with Friday Fun.
IT HAS BEEN DECIDED!
Anyhoo, so I’ve recently gone back to writing on my stalled
WIP All That Remains. It was stalled out after NaNo 2011 because I really
wanted to work on Break Free. And I was just NOT feeling Remains at all. It was
not fun to write and I was really struggling with it, even after 30K words. I
mean, a little struggle at the beginning before you figure things out is
expected, but 100 pages of it was just a little ridiculous.
I was afraid I would go back to it and read it and it would
be terrible and I would have to start over. Or HORRORS ditch it
altogether. Though every time I’d read my query draft (I write a query before I
write a rough draft of the novel) I would get totally excited about it.
So I read it, and it wasn't as bad as I feared. Which is
also something that happens a lot. Sometimes that feeling that something is
terrible is just our Muse being a jackass or something.
So I’m back at it. It's slow going, mostly, I think, because
it takes me some warm up time when I switch from revising back to writing, or
writing back to revising.
So I think the moral of the story is, trust your instincts.
I really felt like I needed a break from Remains, and clearly I did. I know
it's a good idea to put your head down and push through things most of the
time, but sometimes you may just need to step away and regroup a bit. Work on something
else, or revise. The WIP will wait for you. It's not going anywhere.
A few weeks ago I promised some readers (*cough* Maria *cough*) photos of the veggie garden exploits this year and now that things are growing fairly well and I've gotten some better photos I figured today's a good day for them.
These pics are a few weeks old, so the garden's much more fuller and filled out now. We've got blossoms on the cantaloupe and tomatoes and should see them on the zucchini any day.
long shot of the entire garden along our front fence
this is just a close up of the garden after we expanded it this year. You can see how much bigger we made it, from back to front, where the dirt color changes. The plants on the right is the garlic, which you plant in Oct. Next to it is green onions. We have no idea where they came from. They just popped up this spring. Kind of a nice (and delicious) surprise
Left, potatoes in a tater bag. Top to bottom, clockwise, asparagus, peas, cucumber, zucchini
top to bottom, clockwise: peas again, soybeans, cucumbers
Top to bottom, clockwise: peas, yellow onions, green onions, bell peppers, tomatoes, carrots in their nice little rows
Top to bottom, clockwise: green onions, garlic, corn, cantaloupe, watermelon
The watermelon is having a tough time of it. We've got two plant left, and they're fighting, but really anything could knock them out. We just have to cross our fingers. Also something mowed the top off of one our corn stalks (it's growing back) and has been snipping off the tops of the soybeans. Probably rabbits. But otherwise things are looking good.
We've got plans to plant another crop of peas, once this one is done, since we like eating them the most. Corn and soybeans are new for us this year. As is the watermelon. I really hope we get some corn, because that would just be cool. And since we love edamame, I really hope we get some soybeans. There's a bit of a monopoly on soybeans, so it's really hard to find soybean seeds, but we found some at seedsavers.
And that's it. How about you? Doing any veggie gardening this year? How's it going?
Today is kind of a double whammy, because not only am I pals with the author from QT Forum, but I'm pals with the cover artist too (Because, of course, it's VIC!)
BAM! Time to see the cover for Kimberly Ann Miller's TRIANGLES!!
Isn't it AWESOME??!
Anyhoo, here's the info on the novel:
A cruise ship. A beautiful island. Two sexy guys. What could possibly go wrong?
In the Bermuda Triangle--a lot.
Hoping to leave behind the reminders of her crappy life--her father's death years ago, her mother's medical problems, and the loser who's practically stalking her--seventeen-year-old Autumn Taylor hops on a ship with her sister for a little distraction. When she wakes up in the Bermuda Triangle, she fears she's gone nuts for more than one reason: that loser's suddenly claiming they're a happy couple... a hot guy is wrapping his arms around her and saying "Happy Anniversary"... and suddenly, she's full of bruises, losing her hair, and getting IV medication. Autumn visits the ship's doctor, hoping for a pill or a shot to make the craziness go away. Instead, she's warned that one of these "alternate realities" could become permanent.
She just has to ask herself one question--how the hell is she going to get out of this mess?
Sounds tantalizing, right? Release date is June 18th, 2013 by Spencer Hill Press. So put it on your calendars!
Also, if you're a reviewer, you can request an ARC, using the reviewer form on the SHP website. ARCs should ship in early 2013.
So there you have it!! A brand new, beautiful cover! CONFETTI!
One of my all time favorite Broadway musicals is Into the Woods. I mean, fairy-tale retellings, all wrapped up together? It's the original Once Upon a Time. With awesome songs.
One of the songs happens when Jack comes back from climbing the bean stalk and sings Giants in the Sky:
Then of course, later, some giants come down and wreak havoc and kill a crap load of the characters, including the play's narrator.
Anyhoo. What does this have to do with Wednesday Weird? Simple. Today we're talking about North American Giants. Because forget the giants in the sky. They're not nearly as interesting and weird as the giants that lived among us.
Now. I don't mean people that are born as giants, those occasional people who grow to extreme heights and typically die young because their hearts can only support them so long.
No. I'm talking about actual races and peoples that lived in North America and were giants.
The Paiute Indians of Nevada told tales of the Si-Te-Cah, which they said were red-haired men and women with light colored skin as tall as 12 feet who lived in the area when the Paiute first arrived. They said that these human giants liked to eat the Paiute, which as you can imagine, pissed them off.
Finally, the tribes of the area joined together to put an end to the Si-Te-Cah. They ambushed the giants and killed most of them and the remaining giants took refuge in a cave. So the Paiute piled the entrance to the cave with brush and set fire to it. Any giants that then tried to escape were shot with arrows until all the Giants were killed that way or were asphyxiated in the cave.
Great story, right?
In 1911 bat guano harvesters (harvesting for fertilizer I assume, right? Anyone know for sure? Just curious...) started working in Lovelock cave (formerly known as Horse Shoe cave in the 1800s). After digging out like 4 fee of bat guano, they began to find broken arrows fired into the cave.
And then they found the giants.
Even in shrunken, mummified conditions, the skeletons ranged in height from 8 feet to just under 12 feet (depending on the source, heights listed vary. Some sources say heights only ranged from 6.5 feet to 8 feet. Still quite large).
This whole shebang is cool on it's own. But it's not the only time giant human skeletons and remains have been discovered in North America.
In 1931 two giant skeletons were found in Humboldt lake bed. Both skeletons were wrapped in a gum treated fabric. The first skeleton was 8 and a half feet tall, the second was just under 10 feet.
In 1877 prospectors outside of Eureka Nevada found a human leg broken off four inches above the knee cap including the foot. This leg was found sticking out of solid red quartzite rock dating from the time of the dinosaurs. They measured from heel to knee at 39 inches. The owner would have stood over 12 feet tall.
These are seriously just the top of a huge iceberg of giants found in North America. A quick google search and you can come up with dozens more. Here's a list (though it's uncited. I had a list, with citations I was going to post, but now I can't find it. Sorry). Unfortunately, it's hard to find the remains found in North America in any museums. I've heard most of them are snatched up by the Smithsonian and never put on display, but who knows how true that is.
But that's not to say that North America is the only place the remains of giants have been found. Peru especially has a lot of uncovered giants, and you can see them in Peruvian museums if you're up for some travel. There's also the Breitenwinner cave on the German/Swiss border as well as these bones in turkey:
Though singular bones and bodies are still fascinating, they're easy to discount as genetic abnormalities. It's much more interesting, to me anyway, when there are multiple bodies discovered, hinting at a separate species or race.
So, what are your thoughts on North American giants? Or giants in general?
I know a few of you were waiting until it became available in e-format before purchasing and I promised I'd let you know when it was available.
Now I've done so.
This weekend is 4th Street Fantasy, which I attend every year with the awesome Hannah. It's going to be super fun and great and I'm excited. BUT! I'm also bummed because Brave comes out this weekend and I really wanted to see it, but now I'll have to wait and find some other time.
Sigh.
June is a crazy month for me. July should hopefully be calmer, but not August. Not at all.
How are things with you? Is June busy for you or have you been lazing out in the sun, enjoying the summer?
P.S. Fun fact! I spelled "available" wrong every single time in this post. Skills: I haz them.
P.P.S. I'm watching the Ultimate Spiderman cartoon on Disney channel, which was pretty entertaining until Hulk showed up. MJ actually asked Hulk if she could interview him. What. The. Eff. Umm, bad news, MJ, I distinctly remember ultimate Hulk eating a nurse in the comics. Just swallowing her whole.
