The Romancechick Speaks

Lots of interesting stuff is going on.

WRITING UPDATE:

HeartLA has its monthly meeting today. It’s always fun to get together with other writers. We have a couple of members who are “characters” and one was in fine form today, which made for an interesting meeting, but otherwise, it was great.

We had several visitors, which is always gratifying. When I was president, it was my goal to raise awareness of our group and it looks like it’s still working. Today a couple of them mentioned their story ideas and they spurred my imagination.

Today’s “workshop” was on goal setting, done by my friend Rhonda and now I’m psyched about working harder to get Sword & Illusion finished. I’m still struggling with one of the early chapters that will have repercussions throughout the book. So, I really need to make sure it’s right.

FAMILY UPDATE

Not much to say here. Beloved was sick a little this week and I was kind of afraid I was getting it, but possibly not. We’ll have to wait and see.

The Girl got an industrial piercing in her ear and I’m not totally thrilled with that but she is 19 so basically, whatever!!

The Boy has had some bad days in school. I’m not sure if he’s past it or not, but we’ll see next week.

SCRAPBOOK UPDATE

I saw a layout someone made with my Mardi Gras 2009 kit:

You can find this kit at any of the stores listed on the sidebar.

I also found out today I’ve made my first sales at two of the stores, so that’s pretty exciting.

I’m still trying to figure this whole thing out, but I’m still having fun.

LENT UPDATE

I’ve given up hitting the snooze and I’ve done pretty well, but I can tell you it’s taking its toll on me. I think that’s why tonight I feel so tired and almost like I might be getting sick. We’ll see. I didn’t go to Adoration last night because I’m getting up at 5:45 am every morning and had the HeartLA meeting today so being up until 1 am just didn’t sound healthy.

Well, I’m off to worry about my characters and try to get another kit finished. Talk to you all later.

I have a blog roll that I try to peruse every day. Don’t usually get through all of them, but I try. However, near the top of my list is a place called SF Signal. It’s a roundup of all that’s happening (at least all the author finds) in the worlds of science fiction and fantasy, whether it’s books, films or on TV.

Today he mentioned this post  by David Louis Edelman and I love it. If you’re looking for ways to help your favorite author, and surely you are because the more successful he/she is, the more books he/she will be able to write, check out some of this suggestions. My favorite:

…write about the author on your own site(s) and link to the author’s website. Got a blog or a website? It may seem like a no-brainer to write reviews of your author’s favorite works. But linking to the author’s website helps in a number of other, less visible ways: with Technorati ratings, with Google rankings, with Alexa rankings, etc. Not to mention having your favorite author’s name linked on your site is a constant tickler to your web visitors, who may be inclined to purchase something on your recommendation, but who might not always remember the name of the author you recommended.

This is a great way to get people going to your favorite author’s site and if he/she is anything like me, he/she checks the number of hits the site gets several times a week. It’s a great day when my site gets more hits than the day before! I’m always looking to see what brought people here and I try to make my content more reader friendly.

Check out Mr. Edelman’s post and let me know if you try any of this suggestions!

I found this story and video on Modestly Yours. It’s nice to see young people talking about abstinence is actually practical in their lives and that there are benefits far beyond not getting pregnant nor getting an STD.

As an NFP teacher, I know that abstinence isn’t only a problem for teens. Many couples have problems with NFP because it requires some time of abstinence, and it seems that the majority of those who express this objection didn’t abstain before marriage either. So, why should they abstain after marriage, especially with contraception is so readily available??

Our culture is so rife with sexual images and messages, of course the idea of abstaining is ridiculed. That is one of the things on the video that I loved. The only male on the panel told Meredith Veira that he chose abstinence because he wanted a lifestyle that would give his peers reasons to make fun of him!

Of course, he was kidding, but what struck me about this story was that all the proponents of abstinence were well-spoken and clean cut and looked so wholesome. I remember years ago watching a Phil Donahue show where he had “fundamentalists” – both Christian and Muslim, I think – on his show. This was long before 9/11 so he wasn’t trying to make the Muslims look worse than Christians.

In fact, I think he was trying to make the Christian family look like dangerous fanatics. I only watched long enough to find out that both families were “ruled” by the father and the Christian daughter wasn’t allowed to answer any questions. Her father answered for her. I honestly didn’t see the Muslim family answer anything that I remember because it was so blatantly obvious that the message was that religious people of any culture are somehow fanatics.

One thing Phil talked about was that the Christian girl said she wouldn’t kiss a boy until they were married, I think. Maybe it was engaged, but it was certainly not on the first date or any time after that. It might even be that she wasn’t allowed to even hold hands.

Okay, this is taking things pretty far, but of course Donahue had found the most fanatical people he could to make anyone who suggested that kids not be allowed to get “physical” before marriage look crazy. This was when I turned it off.

My daughter is 18 and yes, I can’t control what she does, but I do know that she’s asked her father and me for a purity ring, and has talked to me about friends of hers who aren’t virgins anymore and some of their struggles. So, I think I’m safe in assuming that she’s remained abstinent, and she had a boyfriend she hid from us for awhile. Yes, there were a few issues when we found out!!

I think the idea of teens not be “able” to remain abstinent is insulting to our children. My daughter’s doctor asked if she wanted to have that HPV shot. I was in the room and said, “You can’t get that virus unless you have sex, right?” The doctor said yes that was right, but apparently the earlier you get the shot the more effective this is. So what this means is if you want to make sure that your teenage daughter won’t get HPV WHEN she has sex, get her inoculated at nine years old! I know that’s the message of all those “One Less” ads, but it drives me crazy that parents would rather just assume their child is going to be sexually active and give them a shot instead of just saying, “Hey, save it until marriage and you won’t have to worry!”

I guess Donahue would love me because I’m apparently a fanatical Christian!