FOLLOWING MY FORTUNE COOKIE FUTURE

by Korina Moss 

Sometimes when your life’s path seems particularly up in the air, you cling onto things that might give you something to grasp onto: a Tarot card reading, a horoscope, a Magic 8-Ball. I don’t normally put a whole lot of weight into those, but when my son and I get Chinese food… Let me tell you, those fortune cookie fortunes I hold sacred. 

I got this one early on in my publishing journey, so I knew the cookie fortunes were the real deal.

Once my Cheese Shop Mystery series got going, I modified Homer Simpson’s fortune.

And I even opened a fortune about my love life… but it was a bit of a curveball. 

I guess it could be worse than Humphrey, my Highland cow.

The next time we went to the Chinese restaurant in July, I feared another mocking fortune cookie. However, this was the one I pulled out. 

It was especially exciting! Although in a tiny corner of my mind, I did wonder if it was meant to be literal, and before the end of the month, I’d somehow end up with a glittery, broken raw egg on my lap. (At least I’d still have Humphrey.)  

But this fortune did not mock me. Two days later, it actually came true in all its metaphorical glory! I was asked to be a founding faculty member and Author in Residence for Stone Lyon Society, a new online writing school focused solely on cozy and traditional mysteries.  It seemed too good to be true! I met with Patrick, the founder of the school, who has a vast background in business, education, teaching, and writing. As a freelance developmental editor specializing in cozy mysteries, I work with a lot of new mystery writers, so I’ve gotten to know the common areas where they tend to fall short. Of course, being a writer myself, I also have an idea of what’s important when learning the craft. In the meeting, I was thrilled to discover that Patrick and I are so aligned in what we think mystery writers need and how to meet them where they are. As fellow New Englanders, we also got along famously. After signing some contracts, I’m now helping to shape the school’s curriculum.

I’ve said before how satisfying developmental editing has been, because I get to help mystery writers strengthen their abilities and reach their goals. But I can only work with so many clients, as each manuscript takes me a few weeks—I’m already booked through next March. To have this opportunity to now reach more writers through this program is certainly a “golden egg of opportunity.” My fortune was right on target.

Now I wonder if I should leave my foretold future on a high note and stop reading my fortunes. We could always switch to an Italian restaurant. At least if it had fortune breadsticks, it would be the same every time. 

Readers: Have you ever gotten your fortune told? Do you believe in it in any of its forms? 

KORINA MOSS is the author of the Cheese Shop Mystery series, which includes the winner of the Agatha Award for Best First Novel, as well as two novels short-listed for Best Contemporary Novel. Listed as one of USA Today’s “Best Cozy Mystery Series,” her books have also been featured in PARADE Magazine, Woman’s World, and Writer’s Digest. 

Korina is a faculty member and Author in Residence at Stone Lyon Society, an online writing school for cozy and traditional mystery writers. She’s also a freelance developmental editor specializing in cozy mysteries. To learn more, visit her website at korinamossauthor.com. 

Life in a New House by Nancy L. Eady

Life in a new house is fun, once you overlook the whole unpacking gig. Even so, I’ve had to make adjustments.  

Remotes that are more than a simple on/off switch with up and down arrows to move the channels on the TV defeat me. Worse than that, they conspire against me. I can hit a sequence of keys on any remote more complicated than the aforesaid on/off model and nothing happens. My husband hits the same sequence of keys on the same remote and the thing does somersaults to keep him happy.  The new TV’s remote has forty-two buttons. Even though Mark showed me what to do before he went to bed last night, it was a lost cause. I was trying to finish an episode of "New Tricks."  All the remote revealed was a show about a colonial ship buried in Manhattan.

The charge cord for the laptop is still missing.  I desperately need it for my writing.  We have managed to locate every other charge card for every electronic device any of us own, as well as a few extra. Those last will be placed with honor into the graveyard for lost cords, otherwise known as the second drawer in my nightstand. That’s probably where they came from in the first place when we packed up the old house. Some of those cords have been with us since the mid-90’s.  

Even after five years, I never was certain which light switch went with which light in the old house, so why I thought I’d learn them here in two weeks is anybody’s guess. At least in this house, every switch you touch turns something on or off. In the old house, the electrician put in a lot of three switch switchboxes, every one of which had at least one switch that did nothing. I never did learn why. 

The irrigation system is a great feature to have, but it has a learning curve too. I bumped something on it by mistake the other day, lost the program, and tried to reschedule it. Wonder of wonders, it came on at the time I programmed into it. It must have stopped listening to me after that.  When I stepped out of the house three hours later to run an errand, it was still running. 

What adjustments have you made when moving into a new home or apartment? 

Thoughts on Moving by Nancy L. Eady

After having had the house on the market since last October, we have a contract for sale, and hopefully we will be moving in less than two weeks. Every time we move, I realize that I’ve forgotten how much I hated it the last time. I am excited about the new house and location, but I’m nervous about all the thousand and one things that have to go right for the closing on our house and the closing on our new house to happen as scheduled. Such practicalities aside, I have compiled a list of things that either prove you will be moving soon or show that you are in the process of moving.

You will be moving soon if:  

1) You changed the shelf paper in the house any time recently. (Confession time: I don’t have shelf paper in this house.) 

2) You will be moving soon if you order new checks with your address on them. (Yup, we did that last year.) 

You know you are moving if any of the following are true: 

1) You are on a first-name basis with the Home Depot greeter, or the cashier at the local U-Haul, and they keep a stack of boxes reserved especially for you.

2) Images of full trash bags (with someone else’s stuff) dance in your head.

3) You tell someone, “I don’t care what it costs; all books are coming with us!”

4) Your husband gives you an uneasy glance when you inform him that you and you alone will pack the craft room.

5) You raise the art of swearing at the tape gun that refuses to work correctly for you to new heights. (The tape guns always work well for Mark and my daughter; I end up in the middle of a wadded tangle of tape.) 

6) You are seriously considering donating everything you own to charity and moving to Key West, where you will live in a tent in ultra-minimalist style.

7) You ditch the Key West idea because two parents, one 24-year-old girl, and three dogs are too much for one tent to hold.

8) You have to navigate a labyrinth of boxes to reach either end of the house. While navigating, you discover where the book boxes are by running into them. A trip to the ER is optional.

Hopefully, the next time you hear from me, it will be from a new location. 

Have you had any adventures in moving that make for good stories? 

Customer Complaint by Nancy L. Eady

January is not my favorite month.  The bright lights and cheerful colors of Christmas and New Year's have been put away, the weather turns cold, the days are short, and sunlight scarce.  So, I feel like laughing, and I hope you do too.  This is a short short story I wrote a while ago, but it still makes me smile.  

CUSTOMER COMPLAINT

Customer Service
Interspace Robotic Corporation
800 New England Way
Cambridge, Massachusetts

Dear Sirs: 

Pursuant to your request, I am writing to explain further why we returned our Model 3300 Housekeeping Robot.

As advertised, the Model 3300, whom we named Gertrude, was a hard worker possessing in-depth, encyclopedic knowledge about nutrition, household chores and yard work.  Her additional logic booster chip allowed her to make choices in the best interest of our family independent of any orders from us.  The independent functioning of the logic chip proved problematic.

While Gertrude was correct that vacuuming at non-peak hours was good for the environment, placing less strain on the electrical grid, no-one in our family got any sleep on Tuesday and Friday nights during her 2:00 a.m. house-cleaning sessions.  Similarly, shaving the dogs cut down on the amount of dog hair floating around various rooms but the dogs are still suffering from the trauma of being shaved bald in 2 seconds flat.  One of the dogs, Sparky, continues to refuse to come out from under my daughter's bed except at meal and walk times.  The other, Shadow, now considers every item possessing an electronic processing chip a mortal enemy that must be destroyed.  Since Gertrude shaved her, Shadow has proudly defeated three laptops, two e-readers, four cell phones and one toaster, although why the toaster required an electronic processing chip to begin with is beyond us. 

Prior to Gertrude’s arrival, like every parent, I had fantasized about placing my children on house arrest when they failed to clean their rooms or do their homework, but the logistics of such a move were problematic.  The electronic location bracelets with accompanying smart phone app to enforce confinement which Gertrude designed were quite clever.  However, the Department of Human Resources, Child Welfare Division, had problems with the electric shock the bracelets delivered whenever the children violated the terms of their confinement.  

Gertrude’s presentation of her research on optimal nutrition was flawless but after seven days of tofu, fruits and berries for meals, we began sneaking out of the house to stuff ourselves with cheese fries and chocolate sundaes.  

Gertrude also decided to improve the cost effectiveness of our landscaping.  However, the neighborhood covenant enforcement committee found Gertrude’s solutions objectionable.  Apparently, Astroturf, plastic flowers and plastic bushes violated neighborhood covenants.  The committee members were also singularly unimpressed with Gertrude’s passionate dissertation and several follow-up demonstrations regarding individual liberties under the United States Constitution.  

Four weeks ago, we returned home from vacation to find that the wooden floors and carpet throughout the house had been replaced with industrial strength concrete. Drains were strategically located throughout the house so that the floors could be hosed down instead of vacuumed or mopped.  The floor and carpet installers we have since hired told us that Gertrude did an excellent job, as did the locksmith we called in to bypass the lockout system placed on our air conditioning system to prevent the thermostat from being set below 82 degrees.  However, we are not looking forward to the payments on the second mortgage to reverse Gertrude's improvements.

Accordingly, we returned Gertrude to you. 

Sincerely, 

Jenny White

P.S.  The covenant enforcement committee has asked me to remind you that the restraining order will stay in effect for 10 years.  

Drunken Puppies by Nancy L. Eady

Every once in a while, you run across a headline that makes you go “hmm.” The other day I ran across the following gem: “Pet Store Bans Drunken Puppy Buying.” After I looked twice to be sure I read it correctly, I realized the headline makes a lot of sense. After all, how can a puppy make a good owner choice if it is drunk? And if drinking and driving is bad (and it is), how can you condone drinking and selecting an owner?

Coordination is an issue too. Puppies have a hard enough time walking and navigating around a room to begin with; imagine the effects with alcohol added. Our first dog, Shadow, as a puppy, loved to run through tunnels she had made under the bed between storage boxes at night at full speed – until the night she made a wrong turn and slammed into the bedroom wall. (We didn’t see it, but we heard it.) How much worse if she had been drunk.

Shadow and Woof:  Always Crazy, Never Drunk

We all know that alcohol impairs judgment and a puppy’s judgment is questionable at best; I suspect with alcohol it would be nonexistent. The first week we had our gentle giant, Darwin, aged one year, he tore out our porch screens in three days. (He liked the ripping sound.) With one or two daiquiris beforehand, not only screen replacement, but also a vet visit would have been in order, since his lack of balance would have precipitated him over the 15-foot drop between the porch and the ground. (Vets are much more expensive than screens, for those of you keeping score.)

Darwin, Our Gentle Giant

And let’s think a minute, people – is it really a good idea to give a mind-altering substance to an animal that loses its mind when it experiences its first car ride with the windows down or its first potato chip?  For that matter, how exactly do you give a puppy a breathalyzer test and what is the legal limit for puppies? The enforcement issues are mind-blowing.

So, kudos to the pet store for the courage to take a stand and here’s hope for the rehabilitation of all those drunken puppies!

Missing Market by Nancy L. Eady

Two-factor authentication and biometric identification on electronic devices are two of my particular bête noires. I hate fumbling with my phone, tablet or computer trying to remember one of my passwords to look up something simple, like how far it is from where I am to the nearest drug store, and having everything screech to a halt until I can insert a four or six digit code or scan my face or thumb. However, since both are here to stay, I think there is a huge untapped market for both devices in the areas of bathroom toiletries, refrigerators, and snack foods, especially for parents with children of all ages. 

Most mothers of girls can relate. I reached into my basket in my vanity this morning for a particular grooming implement, only to find it missing. I had to wake my daughter up to get it back. Let’s just say it wasn’t a gentle awakening, either. 

I have unknowingly donated tweezers, combs, nail clippers, hair blowers, hair straighteners, bobby pins, razors, shaving cream, shampoo, conditioner and hair ties to my daughter through the years. She has an expanded definition of family property – what’s hers is hers, and what’s ours is hers. Nor do I think she is the only child in her generation that thinks so. I have a friend who bought tweezers and nail scissors and put a set in every bathroom and bedroom she could get her hands on, and still ended up having to search for her own set periodically. 

Imagine a world where such implements come complete with two-factor authentication. My daughter reaches under my counter to retrieve my hairblower, and a polite ding informs her that before she can remove it, she needs to enter a six digit code provided by me. There’s a better than fifty percent chance she’d just give up. Even if she didn’t give up, I’d know she has it; she’d know I know she has it, and my odds of getting it back increase drastically. 

A timed pressure plate in the shower or cosmetics drawer might work well, also. If the item is removed from the pressure plate and not returned in a set period of time, the removed item begins beeping until it is returned to the pressure plate. My daughter’s room would sound like a forest of chirping crickets, but my chances of getting my stuff back improve. 

Biometrics, especially thumbprints or handprints, would work well for refrigerators and snacks. The purchaser’s biometrics could be imprinted on the packaging once the purchase is complete. Similarly, an owner could use a password and screen to record biometrics for the refrigerator door.  Once registered, the refrigerator, snack food or box can only be opened by the registrant(s). It’s not that I want to deny my child food when she’s hungry; I just would occasionally like to eat Cheetos or Olive Garden leftovers too. 

If I have to put up with biometrics and two factor authentication anyhow, they might as well be put to good use. What items do you think might be improved with either?

You Might Be A Mystery Writer by Nancy L. Eady

 With apologies to Jeff Foxworthy: 

1)  If your first thought on passing a nook or a cranny (there is a difference!) is what a great place it would be to stash a body, weapon or assailant , you might be a mystery writer. 

2)  If your browser history would make you the top suspect in the event of your spouse's death, you might be a mystery writer. 

3)  If your Facebook or blog posts ask for or share enough lethal information to make the NSA computers hiccup and focus on you, you might be a mystery writer. 

4) If, when watching Law & Order re-runs, you see ways to twist the Law & Order twist, you might be a mystery writer. 

5) If you use a notebook or memo app to record different types of crimes, victims and motives you discover in the real world, you might be a mystery writer. 

6)  If you regularly solve the mysteries on television shows based upon the fact that person A serves no other reason on the episode other than to be the killer, you are either my husband or a mystery writer. 

7) If you start to spin a tale around a chance sighting of a man dressed in a Burger King uniform, wearing a backpack and hiking along the side of the road, you might be a mystery writer. 

8)  If you can think of at least five sinister reasons why the same man stopped and turned back towards a running car sitting on the shoulder of the road, you might be a mystery writer. 

9)  If you read the labels of household products for inspiration on creative ways to poison someone, you might be a serial killer, in a very unhappy marriage, or a mystery writer. 

10)  If the terms “police procedural”, “amateur sleuth”, “protagonist”, and “legal thriller” mean something to you, you might be a mystery writer. 

11)  If your personal heroes include at least two of the following:  Sherlock Holmes,  Sir Conan Doyle, Dame Agatha Christie, Dashell Hammett, P.D. James, Rex Stout, Archie Goodwin, Nancy Drew, the Hardy Boys, Encyclopedia Brown, Ellery Queen, Susan Grafton, Sara Peretsky, Dorothy Cannell, Elizabeth Peters or Edgar Allen Poe for Murder in the Rue Morgue, you might be a mystery writer.  

12)  If you ever killed the same person twice under two different pseudonyms in two different manuscripts, you might be a mystery writer. 

If you ever wrote a mystery, you ARE a mystery writer.

The Power of Words to Make Me Laugh

 The Power of Words to Make Me Laugh by Debra H. Goldstein

Writers often talk about the power of words to evoke emotions, engage readers, and share ideas. Recently, I’ve taken note of signs that make me chuckle. What could be more emotion evoking, engaging, and idea sharing than words that make one laugh?

On one of the roads I travel, there is a storage unit facility in the middle of nowhere. I don’t know its name, but I am aware of its existence because it puts up a new sign each week that always catches my eye. This week’s sign reads:

Beef Steak is not a good Password

It isn’t Stroganoff 

Did you laugh once you figured it out?

Sometimes signs that started out as one thing become iconic in their own right. For example, on Interstate 65, near Prattville, Alabama, there is one that has a metallic red devil holding a pitchfork. The devil originally was meant to remind people about the Red Devil gasoline chain (bet you’ve never heard of that!), but in the 1980’s, the devil was incorporated into a billboard, which sat on private land, where the devil took up the entire left side of the sign, with its pitchfork pointing at the words that say:

GO TO 

CHURCH

Or the DEVIL will get you. 

For years, people took comfort when they passed that sign, but it was blown down in 2016. Subsequently, people tended to mention it as an Alabama icon. In response, the owner put it back up in 2016, because he enjoyed providing a message for motorists to contemplate.

In prepping this blog, I Googled for other funny signs. Three were particularly funny. In one, a man stands outside Target holding a self-made cardboard sign that reads: “Not Homeless. Wife in Target 2+ hours. Please Help!”  In another, a man with a homemade sign also is featured. His message is simple: “It’s Not Self Checkout If I Need Help Every Time.” Perhaps the funniest, to me, is a high mountain of snow that looks like it was pushed together by a street plow. A small sign hung on it says: “FREE SNOWMAN  some assembly required.”

Are there any signs that you can remember seeing that tickled your funny bone?

In Which I Encounter an Unexpected Detour by Nancy L. Eady

Fifteen days ago, I sat in the ER waiting room with a CAT Scan report from urgent care that said I had an intestinal blockage due to a tumor. Mark, my husband, was with me. And wait we did. At long last, however, we were called back to our own little partition in the ER.  

The nurse began by starting an IV and then the doctor came to talk to us. Now, in my job, I often have a brief due, and I had something due in the 11th Circuit that coming Friday (it was Wednesday). So when the doctor started talking about surgery, I asked Mark to get my laptop so I could knock it out before surgery. The doctor (strenuously) disagreed with that plan. He said I needed to clear the decks for the next two months. He also said I needed an NG tube inserted. An NG tube is an instrument of torture a medical tube inserted through your nose, then down your throat that suctions stuff out of your stomach and upper intestine when things aren’t moving in the normal directions.  Trust me, you don’t want one.   

I will draw a merciful curtain over the NG insertion tube experience, except to say that I insisted once they got it in they needed to be sure it stayed in because I was not going through that again.  Then we sat in the ER room and waited, again.  

Turned out they were working on getting me a room at one of the hospitals in the area who had a surgeon who could do the type of surgery I needed.  Once they had a room, I had to wait for an available ambulance.  I was curious about the ambulance because I’d never ridden in one.  It wasn’t nearly as thrilling as it looks on TV, which is probably a good thing.  So it was about 4 am on Thursday the 11th before I found myself in a room in a hospital downtown.  They managed to get me into surgery by noon.  

The only thing I remember about the surgery is telling the nurse in the pre-op area that if they had to take the NG tube out to do the surgery, they needed to put it back while I was under anesthesia.  When I get hold of an idea, I tend to hang onto it.  

The next thing I remember is being wheeled back into my room, where my husband and sister were talking to the surgeon.  I don’t remember much about that, either; I was capable of four words:  hurts, Mark, and thank you.  Given what I was going through, it wasn’t a bad set of words to have.  

Somewhere along the way, I acquired more words and decided I needed to use them.  I think there was still some anesthesia or something in my system, because this was the email I sent to my work the day after the surgery:  

Day 3 of my incarceration - uhhh, hospital stay.  Yesterday's schedule included an open laporotomy so some doctor could remove 14 inches (!) of my intestine with carcinoids attached.

Today, the reality of Diet Coke withdrawal set in - and my captors' sad decision not to allow mainlining of caffeine.  I am sitting in a chair right now.  Trust me, that's a big deal.

Carcinoids looked non-cancerous but they are testing them to be sure.  Alas, the NG tube remains, but I have hope of liberation from it in another day or so.  As you probably can tell from this email, they do have me on some righteous pain medicine.

Seriously, everyone here is very nice and putting up with me through caffeine withdrawal.  I HOPE to go home Monday or Tuesday.  Thank you everyone for your kind wishes and prayers and help.

Most people at work thought it was hilarious.  Fortunately, my family kept me off of email for the rest of my stay, and I was allowed to go home on Monday, April 15.  I’m cleared to go back to work this coming Monday.  

The worst part of the experience weren’t things like the surgery and pain from the surgery, but the NG tube, cutting out caffeine cold turkey, and the hospital bed.  A modern hospital bed is a technological marvel, but I, at least, was unable to get comfortable in one. Cutting out Diet Coke was not in my playbook, either.  Cold-turkey caffeine withdrawal is an ugly thing.  Caffeine withdrawal on top of major surgery is personality changing – and in my case, not for the better.  As soon as I could, I started drinking it again.  I became a much nicer person once I did.  Both of our offices are stocking up for my return on Monday.  

Sometime during the last two weeks, I thought about how we are taught that mystery novels require an inciting incident that leads to instability and then a new normal.  In this case, fortunately, the inciting incident was just a detour that doesn’t require a new normal.  But somewhere in the whole experience a story lurks; I just have to discover what it is.

Holiday Capers by Nancy L. Eady

 In the crime fiction world, a “caper” is a story on the light-hearted end of the spectrum where the criminal is the protagonist and pulls off some spectacular hoax or heist. I am, alas, not gifted in writing short fiction, but if I was, a caper short story would be a lot of fun. However, I do enjoy sharing personal anecdotes, and having been the victim of two capers, thought I would share them with you.  I’ll give you the ending first – these capers are two of the best swindles that ever happened to anyone. They both occurred during the holidays.  

(I have attached some photographs to this; please forgive the quality.  Not only are they pre-digital, but three of them come from a roll of film we forgot about and developed years after the pictures were taken, and the fourth is from a Polaroid instant camera.)

We had been married just six months, living in a small town in North Carolina where Mark, my husband, worked as a supervisor at the local textile manufacturing plant, and I taught high school mathematics. To splurge, my husband bought us tickets to a swanky New Year's Eve party with dinner and dancing at a hotel in Charlotte, an hour and a half away. The evening was perfect. Even though it was 1987, the band played big band music from the 1940s, which my husband and I love, and the dinner was excellent. I wore a lace-trimmed black velvet dress that Mark gave me that Christmas. For dinner, we sat across from an older couple who lived in Charlotte and we ended up talking about dogs. Press pause on that thought.

When we got married, I was in favor of getting a dog, and my husband was not. His family never kept a dog in the house, and that was the only way I knew how to have a dog. But then his best friend and his new wife got a cocker spaniel puppy they kept indoors, and the friend sang the puppy’s praises to my husband for months.  By the time New Year’s Eve rolled around, Mark’s attitude had shifted ever so slightly from “absolutely not” to simply “no.” Now press play.

Wonder of wonders, the couple we were talking to owned a black cocker spaniel who had birthed a litter of black cocker spaniel puppies three months earlier.  One puppy had never sold.  And they were willing to sell us the one puppy left if we could 1) pick the puppy up the next day (January 1, 1988) and 2) pay them the bargain basement price of $100. Unfortunately, they explained, they would have to mail the puppy’s papers to us later, since they hadn’t yet received them. The couple got up to dance to allow the two of us to talk it over.

Then occurred one of those little miscommunications that happen to even the best newlywed couples. My husband turned to me with a very serious face and said, “It’s now or never. Do you want a dog or not?” Knowing that it would be terribly inconvenient to get a puppy on January 1, find supplies for it, drive the hour and a half back to our apartment and then begin training it January 2 when we both were working, he expected me to say no, we should wait and get one later. I, however, had but one thought. If this was my one chance to get a puppy, I’d take it. I said yes. And his “now or never” statement had locked him into a position. When the couple came back after their dance, we told them yes, we would pick the puppy up the next day.

So, January 1, 1988 found us driving through Charlotte, North Carolina, in search of an open store where we could buy supplies for our new puppy, a round black butterball we named Shadow. I’ll never forget the long look Dr. Gandy, the vet we took her to the first day we could, gave her and his saying, “Well, some cocker spaniel puppies look like that at first, I guess.” The papers never did arrive in the mail.

Mark and Shadow 1988

Shadow and Me 1988

I am certain that Shadow’s mother was a black cocker spaniel, because she was with our puppy when we picked her up. But as Shadow grew, size was the only trait she possessed that resembled a cocker spaniel. In all other respects, she was a miniature Labrador Retriever. She acted like one, too. She lived to the ripe old age of 16, and not a week passed that I wasn’t grateful to that older couple for our wonderful dog.

My husband committed the second holiday caper. “Peepo’s” as we call them, are the footed one-piece pajamas that little children used to wear, especially in cartoons.

I was born on December 27. Mark’s mother always swore she knew I was the one Mark would marry the minute she learned my birthday, since Mark’s sister’s husband’s birthday is December 21 and his brother’s wife’s birthday is December 22. My 30^th birthday, in 1994, was the first one with a zero at the end of it that bothered me. Still childless, we had presented Shadow with a sister in the fall, a Cocker Spaniel/Labrador Retriever mix puppy whose full name was J.P. Wooflesnort. It stood for “just plain Wooflesnort,” but we called her “Woof.”

Shadow (left) and Woof (right).  The yellow boxes were added to make the dogs more visible. 

Becky, my sister-in-law, knew my upcoming 30^th birthday was bothering me, so she wanted to be sure she got me an extra-special gift. She used Mark as her consultant and exerted much time and effort to find the item Mark assured her was the one thing I required for a meaningful 30^th birthday. When I opened the package, I laughed until I cried. The gift was perfect—an adult pair of blue and green plaid adult-size peepo’s, complete with rubber-bottomed feet. He had been threatening to get me a pair all year to stop me from complaining about getting older. And I truly appreciated the enormous effort Becky expended in finding them—a real accomplishment in the age before Google or Amazon. Becky got her revenge the next year, when she gave Mark red flannel long johns for Christmas, which he, in turn, modeled for us all with good humor.

Me in my peepo's with Shadow and Woof

Those are my two holiday capers. I hope whatever holidays you celebrate during this time are happy ones and filled with memories of light and laughter and family.

See you next year! 

A Picture is Not Always Worth A Thousand Words by Nancy L. Eady

 I spent decades of my education learning to read—first picture books, then chapter books, then young adult fiction, then regular fiction and non-fiction, then legal cases. I sometimes think maybe I should have stopped at fiction and non-fiction; there’s nothing worse than trying to read long legal opinions when you are having an afternoon slump. After page twenty, I’m not sure if I’m reading words, or counting sheep. By page fifty, I begin to nod off, which I don’t recommend as a savvy career move. 

But I digress. (I tend to do so.) With all the time and effort I have put into learning to read, nothing is so irritating as opening a box of equipment or furniture requiring assembly, and finding the instructions explained with pictures only. A picture of a screw with a twisty arrow on top of it may seem self-explanatory, but for someone who constantly argues with herself about the meaning of “righty tighty, lefty loosy,” such instructions are fraught with peril. I will always talk myself out of one meaning (the twisty arrow means I turn the screw clockwise) into the opposite (no, the twisty arrow means I turn the screw counterclockwise.) And no matter which meanings I flutter back and forth between, the one I finally choose will be wrong. Worse, the error will not become obvious until twelve steps later, when I get to exercise a part of my vocabulary that most people aren’t aware I possess. 

If the sentence is written out—insert screw 20 into hole 12 and screw it in counter-clockwise—I’ve got it. No need to debate or ponder, just instructions to follow. 

We bought a flat screen TV a few years ago. It came with a stand that had to be installed before you could set up the TV. The directions were pictorial only. I have a law degree and my husband a master’s in human resources, and the TV stand still almost defeated us. After two hours of effort, it was our tenth-grade daughter’s suggestion that provided the final piece necessary to get the TV mounted on the stand correctly. And while I tend to be inept with mechanical things, my husband and my daughter both are skilled with them. 

There is an increasing tendency to use pictures and icons in warning and clothing labels as well. Even I can figure out that a skull and crossbones means that whatever is in the bottle so labeled probably shouldn’t be part of my dinner, but other warning labels are more esoteric. The hardest warning labels to decipher involve a stick figure doing something with a red X over it. The red X I understand but figuring out whether the stick figure is walking up a ramp, punching someone else, tap-dancing on the forklift prongs or doing the hokey pokey can be difficult. 

And with clothes, deciding which symbol means wash in hot water, which means wash in warm water, and which means cold water only still defeats me. Let’s just say those symbols aren’t intuitively obvious to the casual observer. 

The only time I ever found a pictorial sign more helpful than a written sign was when our daughter first came to live with us. The social worker who came to inspect our house informed us that the next time she came to visit, we needed to have a fire escape plan posted. She came back to a sign in front of our daughter’s room showing flames and an arrow pointing toward the front door. She wanted to argue that the sign was inadequate, until my husband pointed out that our daughter was three, couldn’t read, and that sign was all she could understand. Our daughter helped us out, too; the social worker asked her what she should do if there was a fire. Kayla announced she should run outside, go next door, and call 911. The social worker was sufficiently impressed to move on to other matters. It’s a good thing she wasn’t around an hour later, when Kayla said thoughtfully, “The only thing is, where is next door?”  

As writers, we draw pictures with our words for the canvas of our reader’s minds. These word pictures evoke not only landscapes but emotions and memories as well. Because of our words, readers are transported from their current world to the world we create for them, and they go gladly. I don’t think the increase in pictorial instructions and warnings can threaten that, and I’m glad. There’s nothing better than being lost in a good book—and I defy any picture sign to lead me out again before I’m ready. 

A Simpler Time by Nancy L. Eady

             My daughter is now 20, and while we deal with the issues parents and children handle at that age, sometimes it’s amusing to look back at the problems of yesteryear. So, just like a good book might, let me transport you back in time 11 years, to when my daughter was 9 and I had a list of rules I never expected to need.  

1.       Do not cut the screen out of its frame in the window to pick roses indoors.  (The need for this one arose when she was 6. In later years, she would cut the screen out of its frame to sneak out at night.  THAT was a whole different level of problem.) 

2.       Do not try to pierce your ears with the end of a paper clip, even if it looks like an earring hole is there.  (Age 6 and 7). 

3.       The controls on the dashboard in the car, including the radio, are MINE!  Please leave them alone.  (This battle still goes on today at age 20.) 

4.       Do not drag the dog into the bathtub with you.   (Age 6) 

5.       Do not dump the entire bottle of shampoo in the tub for bubble bath.  (Ages 6 through 8). 

6.       Do not dump the entire bottle of liquid soap from the sink in the tub for bubble bath.   (Ages 6 through 8). 

7.       Do not dump the entire bottle of conditioner in the tub for reasons I have yet to understand.   (Ages 6 through 8). 

8.       It’s not a good idea, either, to dump all of the bathroom dixie cups in the bathroom sink and then fill it up with water to watch them float.  (Age 6, but she had help from a visiting 4 year old.) 

9.       Soap is required for a bath to really be a bath.  (Age 5). 

10.     Do not put anything in your ear, including rocks, without consulting an adult first.  (Age 4.) 

11.     Do not put anything in your nose, including wooden sticks, without consulting an adult first.   (Age 4) 

12.     Which led to:  Do not put anything in any body part for any reason unless a parent says it is okay, with the exception of food or drink in your mouth. 

I hope you enjoyed this visit to yesteryear.  

A Hypochondriac’s Guide to Surviving COVID by Nancy L. Eady

I gave up reading about disease symptoms online about the time I read up on the symptoms of bubonic plague and decided (wrongly) I was coming down with it.  However, with the advent of the COVID pandemic, I find at least one news story a day which sets out the current list of possible symptoms. As I told someone at work weeks ago, if I got tested and isolated myself every time I thought I might have COVID, I would no longer be employed.

So, it is ironic that the time I finally tested positive for COVID is the time I went to get help with something else. I suffer from an IGG deficiency, which means the memory in my immune system isn’t always great. It’s really just a fancy way of saying that if I get a cold or a sniffle anytime in the winter, I end up with bronchitis. And in true January fashion, I had every sign I was headed there—the congestion, the drainage, the sore throat and the coughing. And with IGG, the only way to stave off  bronchitis is to take antibiotics.

Tuesday, January 11, found me setting off in search of an urgent care. Little did I know one would be hard to find. The first place I tried (note, I arrived there five minutes before it opened at 8 a.m.) had no openings before 5 p.m. that day. The second place I tried, where I arrived 20 minutes after they opened, was already closed for the day because they had filled all their appointments. I tried one other place, which wasn’t any better, so I bit the bullet and drove the two hours back to the town where the Alex City branch of my work is located.  The Alex City hospital’s urgent care could see me after a mere two and a half hour wait. They insisted on testing me for COVID and darned if I didn’t test positive. The doctor there loaded me up with a bunch of prescriptions, told me to stay home for five days, and wished me well.

The good news is that IGG patients, at least this one, apparently don’t develop bronchitis with COVID. We cough like we’ve got bronchitis, mind you, but we don’t have it. But this fatigue stuff is for the birds. No matter how sick I have been with anything, I have always been able to read and write. Always. Until now. COVID fatigue is like trying to push a thought through cold molasses. The thought is there, somewhere, but you just can’t get it to filter through. And somewhere in the middle of searching through the molasses for the thought, you end up falling asleep. I have slept more and written less the last 2 weeks than ever before.

I am slowly climbing out of the Sargasso Sea I have found myself stuck in. I am distressed by how conflicting the information out there is about when I will finally be done with this mess. Three different people told me I should keep getting tested until I test negative, and two different urgent cares told me there was no point in getting tested again because I could test positive even 90 days from now but that was okay because no matter how I feel, I’m no longer contagious. Now, I just tell the armchair quarterbacks trying to call plays I am following doctor’s orders.

So, I’m going to be grateful I am getting better, no matter how slowly, and be thankful I have been able to keep a steady supply of DayQuil and NyQuil to get me through it. Now it looks like it’s time for me to take another nap…

Have you had to deal with COVID yet? What was your experience? 

Occupational Hazard: Absent-mindedness? by Nancy L. Eady

 The fellow authors I know are delightfully organized people.  I am not one of them.  I am not sure whether absent-mindedness is an occupational hazard for writers or just a character flaw on my part. But I have it in spades. 

My family is resigned to this trait. They are used to reminding me of the dinner choice they made in the six feet between the couch and the kitchen, traveling behind me to be sure doors are locked and speaking up before I miss the turn because I am thinking about something besides driving. 

Of course, they can’t help me when they’re not with me. Once I sat in the drive-through at Wendy’s for five minutes before I realized I was waiting behind a parked car in a parking spot, which explained why the line wasn’t moving. That’s what I get for trying to read while waiting in line.

More than once, I sat at a four-way stop sign waiting for the light to change, wondering why the people behind me were honking their horns

Another time, I swapped cars with my husband, and became quite annoyed when it wouldn’t start - only to realize that I had been pressing the air conditioning on/off button to start the car, instead of putting the key in the ignition. (My car back then had a push button start, while my husband’s was a traditional keyed start). At least I realized my mistake before I called for a wrecker.

I have left the house for one specific item from the grocery store and returned 30 minutes later with $100 worth of groceries, none of them the item I left for originally. I started wondering whether and where a murderer could hide a body in the grocery store while I was shopping.

I have found the peanut butter, and various other dry goods in the refrigerator; I have found the ice cream in the refrigerator and not the freezer; I even found the milk in the cupboard once or twice. It is so much more pleasant to be thinking through characterizations and plot while cleaning the kitchen than to pay attention to what I’m doing.

My latest escapade happened last week, when I was mentally outlining an essay I had to complete in the afternoon. Heading out to lunch, I walked to my car, opened it, and got in before I realized I was in someone else’s Ford Bronco Sport (the car my husband now drives and which I had driven over the weekend) rather than my own faithful baby Buick!

So what do you think? Is absent-mindedness an occupational hazard for writers? If not, is it a character trait you share? I’d love to know I’m not the only person out there!

The Mysterious Missing Socks by Nancy L. Eady

I don’t divide my laundry by color, but by disposition—the hangables (the clothes that get hung directly from the dryer or which need to hang dry without going into the dryer), the ironables (the clothes that need to be ironed), and the foldables (yep, the clothes that need to be folded). Under the normal laws of physics, you would expect a simple equation. Socks in hamper = socks out of dryer. 

It doesn’t work that way. A black hole periodically appears and disappears in the dryer, taking a sock with it. One oddity of this phenomenon is that it is sock specific. I’d expect any self-respecting black hole visiting a dryer to vary its diet with shirts, jeans, or underwear, but not mine. It transports socks. I’m not sure where the black hole takes them, but by now, it has a vast collection of athletic socks, compression socks, pants socks, knee socks and any other sock you can imagine. 

I take it in stride. If the dryer didn’t get a sock occasionally, the dogs would, still leaving me short. My husband, however, is much more careful with his clothing. We have gone on safari before to locate his missing clothing. The black hole must know this, since my socks disappear at a far faster rate than do his. But whenever the black hole takes male socks, Mark and I have the same discussion. It always starts with “What is happening to all my socks?” He hasn’t bought into the black hole theory yet. 

The dryer has help from my 19-year-old, who refuses to wear socks bought for her.  Instead, she seems to believe my socks possess magic properties, requiring her to snatch them from my drawer. Today, I mentioned to her that my socks are disappearing at an alarming rate. Her response? 

“I put them in your hamper when I was done with them.”    

The urge to thank her for her consideration warred with the impulse to suggest that if she’d drop the rest of my clothes that she borrows in the hamper also, I’d at least get to visit with them. She likes to “borrow” my size XXL T-shirts, which she says drape comfortably and artistically around her size XS frame. But I know the socks aren’t her fault, especially since she has no use for Mark’s. 

I often wonder where the black hole sends the socks. It’s not the other side of the world, since I checked the “antipodes map” at antipodesmap.com. Antipodesmap.com is a website showing what is on the exact opposite side of the earth from you. In my case, if you dug a tunnel straight through the globe from where I’m sitting, you’d end up somewhere in the Pacific Ocean about 2/3 of the way east between Madagascar and Australia, not a very propitious site for socks. It’s possible that the black hole is part of a secret government experiment that transports objects to Tuttle, North Dakota (pop. 77), but why socks? Why North Dakota? Why Tuttle? The list of questions continues. 

One day, I will discover the closet holding every missing sock and open it, only to die buried in an avalanche of socks. What a way to go!

On the Need to be Funny By Jennifer J. Chow

I write humorous cozy mysteries, and I embrace that fact. Murder and mirth: Do they go together? I’d like to think so—and not only because I write them. I’ve heard morticians and paramedics talk about using morbid humor to get them through tense situations. Comedy can act as a balm.

Growing up, I was definitely not the class clown, but I appreciated humor in my life. I admired wit from my family, friends, and through books. Back then, I never would have imagined that one of my books (Mimi Lee Gets A Clue) would be nominated for a Lefty Award for Best Humorous Mystery.

Recently, I’ve even been asked to sit on panels on being funny. I did a virtual event on July 20 with other bloggers from Chicks on the Case called, “A Killer Sense of Humor: Adding Mirth to Murder Mysteries.” I was also on the Killer Humor Cozy Panel (August 13, 2021) sponsored by Murder by the Book.

Even as I participated in these events, I also made sure to jot down advice from the other panelists.

How do we insert humor into our novels? Some ideas are:

·         Add humor—but not too close to the actual murder

·         On the other hand, kill those whom you love to hate

·         Use realistic observations but go at them sideways (like a stand-up comic)

·         Throw in funny situations, even veering into slapstick if you want

·         Subvert readers’ expectations: set them up for something and then do the opposite (a.k.a. go for the punchline twist)

·         Make characters witty: people (or animals) in books can have witty internal thoughts or external chatter

In the end, humor is subjective. That’s why it’s super helpful to have beta readers, critique partners, and editors reel in the joking.

However, I do try to make myself chuckle while I’m writing. For me, that’s a good barometer of achieving humor. And the sweetest reward is when others agree, like Katie’s Cottage Books. Katie said of Mimi Lee Gets A Clue:  “5 laugh out loud stars!” and “I was reading this book at the bakery and laughing so hard, the random guy at the next table asked me, if I was ok!”

What tickles your funny bone? 

One Simple Rule by Nancy L. Eady

God has a sense of humor. I know this because God invented teenagers. According to Genesis, before God invented teenagers, He created Adam and Eve. He gave them a beautiful place to live, a garden, animals and He visited them in person every day. In return, again according to Genesis, He asked them to obey one (count it, one) simple rule—do not eat the fruit from one particular tree. So, of course, they had to eat the fruit from that tree. If I had been their parent, I can see shaking my head and muttering to myself, “One simple rule. All they had to follow was one simple rule.”

So, of course now, we who are parents have little people we adore who can’t follow rules, either. For example, we say, “Don’t drink from my drink,” and that focuses the toddler’s attention on the drink and guarantees that they’ll drink from it. We can handle that from toddlers because they don’t know any better and we expect them to learn. Teenagers do much the same thing; the difference is that they know better, and they do it anyhow.

My 19-year-old has taught me a lot about rule following (or the lack thereof.)  Understand, I am a compulsive rule follower. I feel like a wild rebel just ignoring the driving lanes in an empty parking lot. The 19-year-old doesn’t have that problem. For her, a rule is not even a guideline; it’s more of a suggestion. She has learned that certain rules lead to greater punishments if she breaks them than others. Because she loves her car and cell phone, those rules she obeys. She seems to consider the rest optional. For example, we want her to keep her room (relatively) clean. We try to stay out of it, but when the dog that has slept with her since she was 10 refuses to go into her room anymore, it’s bad. That incident caused her to be grounded until she thoroughly cleaned her room. Another example involves the screen on her window. When she was seven, during naptime, she got scissors and cut the screen out of her front window because she wanted to pick roses through her bedroom window. Even though she was disciplined, it was also cute. When she tried the same stunt at 17 in a bid to slip out at night after bedtime on a school night, not so much. (Another grounding and loss of phone.) 

A teenager’s priorities are skewed, as well. If a 17-year-old was skipping school when she witnessed a murder, making her a target for the killer, I’m willing to bet she would be more worried about her parents catching her skipping then she would be about the killer pursuing her.

But here’s the thing—fundamentally my daughter is a good kid. She’s a teenager, and teenagers do dumb things, but she’s also funny, good at fixing things and using tools, loves animals, and sticks up for other people against bullies in situations where she wouldn’t stick up for herself.

So what do I do with that?  Well, besides growing gray hairs and possibly an ulcer, as a writer, I use her behavior to ask myself questions. What if a kid decided to take a car for a joy ride, only to discover a toddler in the child seat in the back?  What if the child was left in the car deliberately by a parent in the middle of summer?  What does the teenager do when they realize the parent was trying to murder the child?  How on earth does the police detective assigned to work the kidnapping sort all this out?  I’ll have answers to those questions one day and build a story out of those answers. And maybe give my teenage protagonists extra grief to aid my sanity as I deal with the live teenager who keeps my days interesting.