October 14 2014 Romance Weekly

Do you like to read romance novels? Wouldn't you like to know more about your favorite authors? Well you came to the right place! Join the writers of Romance Weekly as we go behind the scenes of our books and tell all..... About our writing of course! Every week we'll answer questions and after you've enjoyed the blog on this site we'll direct you to another. So come back often for a thrilling ride! Tell your friends and feel free to ask us questions in the comment box.

Hi! Missed you last week. Today we have a really fun blog hop and a break from our usual question and answer format. The prompt was created by Collette Cameron. Can't wait to read about her dating disaster.

If you are joining from Kim Handysides or starting the hop right here, welcome.

Here's the prompt: Date disasters

Many of our heroes and heroines have a rocky beginning. Let’s hear some real life stories about disastrous dates. Real is fun, but if you don’t want to go there, feel free to create a real whopper.

Blind dates are always tricky and here’s the story of me and my husband’s first date.

I didn’t want to be there. Kimberly had talked me into it and I knew it was a mistake from the start. The restaurant was slow and dim and supposed to be romantic and one of the hottest new places to dine in the city. Kimberly always pushed until she had her way. I couldn’t go through with the online dating again not after the last time. I deleted my online profile forever. What a nightmare the guy turned out to be. Not only was he a compulsive liar but for a second I believed him when he said he was an undercover agent for an undisclosed government group. Yeah, The Get in Her Pants Club. He was really good, academy award performance. So, I sat here like an idiot seeing if it was going to happen again. I guess I have a gullible nature.

Kimberly wouldn’t tell me a damned thing about the guy. Said he wanted us both to have a genuine reaction to each other. What did that mean? I didn’t have a name or description. He would only know who I was because I wore my purple stripped henley and I placed a single purple rose in the center of the table.

I shouldn’t have agreed. This screamed serial killer when someone wouldn’t identify themselves. I trusted Kimberly despite extreme blind dating being her method of operation. Who in the hell went on blind dates in this day and age? Me. So, Mr. Secretive was already ten minutes late. I decided to only give him another five and I was out.

A hand touched my shoulder and spread across my back. “I’m so sorry I’m late. There was a traffic jam on the loop.”

Right. That’s all I can think. Nice save.

I squirmed in my seat shaking off his hand, not because it creeped me out but because it had the opposite effect. Hi, Mr. Seductive. He sat as I reached for my ice water to cool down and immediately noticed his warm and friendly brown eyes, sexy stubble, and the bulge in his jacket. Kimberly never said he was a cop. I couldn’t decide if that was a good thing or not.

The waiter came and took our order. I already knew what I wanted (he had been late) and wasted no time. I wondered if my date would be annoyed at me for rushing him. Didn’t phase him. He ordered without looking at the menu. A regular?

“Our mutual friend didn’t do you justice.” I lowered my head to ask for clarification and before I said anything... “You’re beautiful.”

Holy Cow! My blush further heated my body and even in the darkness of the restaurant I wasn’t able to hide it. “She wasn’t suppose to say anything because she was zipped tighter than a pencil skirt on her fat days.”

I shocked him but his immediate laughter let me know he liked my smart ass nature. Good. The last guy had issues with my mouthy attitude. He stood slightly and reached across the table, hand extended, but instead of the expected shake he knocked the vase over and cold water rushed from the center of the table to the center of my body. I jumped from my chair and knocked it back into the table behind us which upset all of the water glasses waiting for the next patrons.

“So sorry. I got this.” His napkin, and of course his hand, brushed against my legs before I knew what was happening. My body couldn’t decide if it rather have the heat of his fingers between my thighs or the freezing sensation of the water to snap me out of this spell he wove over me.

The waiter and the hostess trotted over with additional towels and napkins. At the hostess’s gasp I looked down and the red fabric of the napkins apparently didn’t like the white of my skirt and there were red streaks along the front. Mixed with the wetness and pressing of the towels, my white panties (I wasn’t a complete idiot back then, just a partial one) showed and also all the tiny little hearts and lace edge. On a dry skirt these were NOT noticeable.

The server from the back comes over with our meals but in all the commotion of me trying to hide my underwear with a napkin and at the same time get away from Mr. Seductive’s smoldering stare my elbow hit the server in such a way that the entire tray of food slid off in slow motion. It landed on my date.

I’d never seen a mouth gape so wide. He smeared some of it off with the same napkin he used on me and the same red streaks appear on his jacket. He held back a smile and winked. “Don’t worry. The same thing happened to me the other day on a sting.”

I started laughing and really didn’t think I would be able to talk but I said. “Kim has a funny sense of humor.”

He gives me a funny eyebrow quirk. “Who’s Kim?”

Apparently we didn’t have a mutual friend and the fates somehow brought us together in a somewhat unconventional fashion. The rest is history. Married ten years now this fall to the love of my life.

Hope you liked my date disaster. :) Did it really happen or not?

I’m jones-ing to find out what dating nightmare our Heart’s Ease author, Victoria Barbour, tells.

Hope to see you next week.

Photos provided by depositphotos.com

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The Damned To-Do List

Can this list help my creativity? depositphotos.com — Can this list help my creativity?
depositphotos.com

I wonder...can the evil to-do list help me be more creative?

Housecleaning, laundry, dishes, take the trash out, repeat. Chores can become endless mind numbing items I have to do everyday. Can they really be useful in any other regard besides items that just have to be done? Adding chores to the endless to-do list creates clutter in my brain and pushes my creativity out the door. Why? Repetitive tasks mean the to-do list will NEVER end. Never.

It’s funny what happens when I’m in the zone. You know the zone. It’s the one you get in when you really have a lot of other more important things (chores) to do yet you don’t do them at all and focus on the more enjoyable things you’re engrossed with.

I thought the zone could only occur during enjoyable tasks but the zone can happen at anytime. This is where the to-do list comes into play. (If you are haunted by the to-do list, like me, see my post on meditation as a way to beat it into submission.)

When I am blocked there is just about nothing that is going to fix my problem. All my old tricks seems to be plain and painful to implement. Now this next bit of information is going to be a hard sell but just hear me out for a moment. Tackle the to-do list.

What? Traitor you say. You hate the to-do list.

Yes. I do hate it. It’s evil and taunting.

But life needs to get done at some point. This is probably more difficult a challenge to those of us currently working from home because we see the non-fruits of our labor staring us in the face when we ignore the list. And it can keep us from the important job of being creative and living a fulfilling life doing things we enjoy because we are constantly doing the to-do list which we don’t enjoy.

We are suppose to not let the to do list control our lives or take away our creativity. So what can checking off items really do for me?

I can get a quick sense of accomplishment. When creative endeavors aren’t leading me anywhere I can get sad because this feeling of having achieved something is lost. Getting a quick chore done gives this back and then I can get back to creative work refreshed.
I get moving. Repetitious activities take our minds into a different state and direction which allows the unconscious part of our brains to chew on problems. How many of us have had a eureka moment in the shower because the sound of the water spray puts us into an unawareness zone.
I get a much needed break. It can be difficult to pause and take the time to put something important aside because it feels like I’m are wasting time. A short or long break rejuvenates. Even when performing physical exercise we need to rest our bodies in order to become stronger and have greater stamina.

When I juggle the to-do list I usually get knocked in the head a lot but after finding a balance I find confidence to get back to my creative work. The dreadful to-do list never ends and therefore I know I will always have a way back to being creative.

Is it possible for you to find this balance?

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September 30 2014 Romance Weekly

Welcome!

We have a great set of questions today from romance and suspense writer, Vicki Mixon. You could be starting the hop or coming from Hot As Blazes author Dani Jace. Check out Dani's blog post, too.

Was there a defining moment in your life when you knew you were going to become a writer? If so, what was it?

I do have a moment. It’s only defining because it was when the lightbulb in my head went off and the neon sign flashed a brilliant pink. I was consoling myself with a stack of favorite romance author titles and a few new books I had purchased for the weekend. I had been pondering what to do with my life for a few years. I had a good life, a good career but something was missing. I wanted to do something that would engage my mind but at the same time I would be able to create something for myself. I poured over personality books and career books to find out if maybe I matched them up wrong in my current configuration. Everything seemed too hard. (I laugh now because there is nothing I’ve done that’s harder than writing (and editing!) a full length manuscript.) I was writing in my journal about how directionless I had been feeling when it dawned on me that I had always been a writer. I had written stories and journals since before I could remember. I also had devoured romance books since I was twelve and loved reading anything since I learned how. I thought this would be sooo easy. I’ve read so many romance books and often wanted to change some of them to how I thought they should go. It seemed the perfect fit to write my own. Well, it has been easy and incredible difficult. But I guess I finally found the correct personality and career configuration because I’m still at it and can’t image my life without it.

When you write a story do you see it unfold as one big picture, or do you add layering in subsequent drafts?

I think it’s both. Ideas come to me at odd moments and they usually get jotted down on paper or in an electronic file. Then they simmer for a while. I see the idea unfold into a story a lot like a movie but perhaps it’s more like a series of trailers. I have a general idea of the whole picture and get it down as quickly as possible. When it’s time to edit I usually get moments where more details spring up and make the story fuller with each edit I do. This is probably because the edit process makes me slow down (like a snail) and I have time to really get into the meat of the story.

How many drafts do you usually write before you send your work to your editor?

Oh crap. I was supposed to count them? On my current work in progress I would say I’m on draft seven or eight. Those are full manuscript edits. Sometimes I think I’m suffering from perfectionist syndrome until I come across a really bad chapter and then I breathe a sigh of relief that no one had read it but me. But I also edit a chapter several times as I’m going through the manuscript. I could easily have read and made edits to a chapter four to five times in one day before I call it quits then the next day I read it over again just to make sure. (This is why I’m in editing hell right now. But you know us writers do anything for our babies!)

Photos from depositphotos.com

All done! Hop on over to Murder & Mayhem and find out Elizabeth Janette's insights.

See you next week.

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