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That's Harlequin Historicals author Lyn Randal on the
right and me on the left, at a Southern Magic meeting
in 2004. Heard recently that Lyn may have a new
book coming out from HH later this year. Yay!
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Harlequin author Bonnie Gardner on the
left,
presenting me with a First Sale plaque from
Heart of Dixie Romance Writers.
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This is the cake Heart of Dixie had made
to celebrate
my first sale. You'd be surprised how giddy a
little something like a cake and a plaque can make
a new writer feel.
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Feral kittens born in the basement of my
day job
office. There were three; I took two and an office
mate took the third one, Boo, a little black
long-haired male. All three kittens were males. |
Cody, the red tabby. Notice the
"thumb." Cody is a
polydactyl—he has 6 toes on each of his front
paws. He's what's commonly called a Hemingway
cat, because Ernest Hemingway was famously a
fan of polydactyl cats.
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Mac is a brown tabby. He has the classic
tabby
pattern, with large black stripes. In this photo, his
eyes look blue, but they're turning a golden green
color as he grows. |
Cody, sitting in the windowsill,
pretending he's the
thoughtful sort. As if.
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Cody, sitting on top of my wireless
router and next
to part of my collection of books on serial killers and
violent crime. Hmm, that's one of Gayle Wilson's
books on top. It sort of fits the theme. Cody is
squinting at the bright sun outside. Or maybe he's
contemplating bird-i-cide. Whichever. |
Mac is just a pretty, pretty cat, isn't
he? He's not
even six months old yet in this picture and he's
already up to 8 pounds. |
Lest you think that the kittens are all the cats I have,
au contraire. This is Sabrina, aka Tatertot, aka
TayTay. She's technically my sister's cat, but we
all feed her, so I consider her part of my cat family.
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Doesn't this look like a painting?
That's my sister's
other calico, Tabitha, aka Big Fluff. She's lying on
a comforter on my niece's bedroom floor. My
niece is a slob.
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Here's another little calico, Gingersnap,
aka Cookie.
When my mom got up after midnight to let one of
the dogs out to go to the bathroom, she heard a
pitiful mewling sound and spotted a tiny kitten. She
tried to catch her, but she went down into a storm
drain. The next morning, my niece went searching
for her and was able to catch her. She's a pretty
little Torbie (tortoiseshell with tabby markings). |
We decided Ginger needed a buddy, so we
went to
the vet. Came back with not just one but two new
kittens. This is Bella, a silver tabby. It's hard to
tell in
this photo, but despite the fact that she's tiny, she has
huge feet and tufts on the tips of her ears that make
us wonder if she has a little Maine Coon in her. |
This is Tempe. Or, as I call her,
Blackjack. She's
the biggest of the kittens. We were going to just
get one companion kitten for Ginger, but my mom
made the mistake of taking both my sister and my
niece with her to the vet. They couldn't
choose between Blackjack and Bella, so they
adopted both. |
After about a week, it was clear that
Bella was so
much smaller than Ginger and Blackjack, she was
getting ganged up on during play time. So we
decided to go to the vet to adopt one more kitten to
be a pal for Bella. As it turned out, I lucked out and
got the little Siamese mix I've been wanting ever
since my cat Simi, another Siamese mix, passed
away at the age of 15 a few years ago. This is Miko
and he's a tiny little bundle of feistiness.
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This is a photo of my niece
Ashlee and me, taken on a
cell phone of all things. She's my little Psych-watching
buddy. I dedicated my book One Tough Marine to her. |
