A Sampling of Our "Holiday" Sights

I can't seem to drag myself away from the sun and fun to post all the photos I've taken since we arrived on Friday.  I do appreciate all of you who visit my blog so here are a few pictures that I hope will delight you.  I promise to share more.

I hope the Christmas season is filling you with happiness, joy and thankfulness.  I'm all of the above because of you.

Bye, only for now.

A Snowman's Perils in Florida

I've learned this week that snowmen have unique challenges in Florida.  I came upon this poor fellow just the other day on my walk along the Gulf of Mexico.  I don't think he'd ever been in the water before and there he was, pursued by a trio of sharks!!     

A Florida Snowman

Walking the beach along the gulf shore of Siesta Key, we passed this cute sand snowman.  I love seeing a "snowman" without having to experience the cold weather that normally necessitates such a creation.

If you enjoyed this, come back for more highlights of Christmas in Florida. 

Sip, Sip.

During November, I wrote a book.  I was motivated by the promoters of National Novel Writing Month.  You can get the scoop on NaNoWriMo on their website. 

I originally titled my book:  Writing Under the Influence.  My entire book was written between sips of wine.  When I took a sip, I'd interject the words:  Sip, sip.  As I wrote, I e-mailed chapters to my audience of one and dear friend, Sarie.  She suggested I name my book:  Sip, Sip.  I like Sip, Sip better.  It's cuter.                 

I often wrote here.  But, where am I and where's my wine?  !I must have slipped away for a refill).    

Having fun while I was writing was my main priority.  I Had to embark on my journey with this bottle.

I love anything cute and colorful.  My second writing companion was Funky Llama.

Bottle #3 was Lucky Duck.  For five days I was feeling lucky and loose.

I chose Yellow Tail for my fourth bottle, another dose of cute and colorful.  It didn't taste bad either! 

Mid month the wine was flowing and I began to relax with Bottle #5.

During any challenging endeavor, humor helps.  I had to have some of this!

Last but not least, I sipped across the finish line with Bottle #7, Cedarburg Spice.

My first bottle lasted five days so I anticipated I'd drink six bottles in the thirty days of November.  I drank seven.  The title of next year's NaNo novel may well be:  How I Became a Wino.

FYO:  My reward for writing 50,119 words is more expensive wine from now on, nothing less than $7.00 a bottle.   

My Brother Carl, A Hair Stylist?

My brothers, Tom and Carl, traveled from Michigan to spend Thanksgiving with my other two brothers, Bob and John, me and other family members. 

This is Carl.

And this is Carl.

And this is Carl and his granddaughter, Abby.  All of these photos were taken two years ago.  I should have taken photos at Thanksgiving this year.  Duh!  Carl is wearing his hair shorter with some spiking going on.  He really should consider becoming a hair stylist!! 

Although Carl isn't officially a hair stylist, he told me that my hair was too long in a couple of places near my temples.  I asked him if he wanted to fix it for me.  He said he would so I gave him a pair of scissors and held still for him.  He very carefully used the scissors to snip away the hair that was out of line.  Voila!  When I looked in the mirror I could see that he was right.  Although I had been frustrated with my hair, I had assumed my hair stylist had left it longer in those areas because my hair is so straight that it sometimes won't lie down if it's too short.  After Carl's snipping, my hair is behaving quite nicely and I'm so glad he was assertive, pointed out the problem and made it better.      

How many of you would trust your brother to "fix" your hair?

Where's Shaddy?

This is just a quick note to let you know that I haven't buried myself under the rather large number of words I've written to date for NaNoWriMo 2011.  I'm happy to report that I'm right on target if I'm to reach 50,000 words by midnight on November 30th. 

I'm writing approximately 1,667 words each day.  If I continue at that rate, I'll finish my novel this month and be a NaNo winner.  Today is day 17.  My total word count after today's writing is 28,427, just a smidgen ahead of schedule. 

If you like to write, it's really not hard to write 1,667 words in a day.  If you've never tried, I'd like you to encourage you to do it.  You might be pleasantly surprised, in fact, I bet you will.

Thanks for checking on me. 

NaNoWriMo #3

At the last minute, I decided to participate in NaNoWriMo again.  National Novel Writing Month challenges individuals to write a 50,000 word novel in one month.  Traditionally, this challenge takes place in November.  I was drinking wine on the afternoon of October 29th.  Under the influence, I decided I would commit myself to a month of writing again this year.    

On November 1st, I wiped down my desktop with Windex, straightened up other areas in the room (all delaying tactics) and took a deep breath.

I bought this bottle along with a few others on Sunday, after I decided to do the novel writing thing.

I've never indulged in this particular wine.  It was inexpensive, $3.99 a bottle.  I was attracted to the label and the cute description. 

In preparation, I wrote this title for my written work.  That's the sum total of my preparation.  I don't like to follow rules; I'd rather fly by the seat of my pants.  Oh, I did buy the wine in preparation as well.  I promised myself never to write a word until I've at least had one sip of wine. 

Time waits for no man.  (I heard that somewhere).  I could have started writing at 12:00 midnight and here it was, 3:47 PM.  I'd put in 4 hours at my job, raked leaves and wiped the dust off my desk.  It was MY time.  I poured myself a glass of wine...

...stared at the blank screen and began to write.



That was Tuesday, the first.  Today is Saturday, the 5th day into the month.  I've written my daily quota of 1,667 words every day.  My present word count is 8,575.  

So far, so good.

One bottle down and, at this rate, another five to go. 

What's not to love about this? 

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