Simplify your life and other trivia

 

Irene's in trouble again and definitely needs saving,
if I can only get that second book written.

Thanks to Susan Wittig Albert’s blog, “All About Thyme,” for alerting me that this is National Simplify Your Life Week. My first thought is that through quarantine I simplified my life about as much as it can stand—got it down to bare bones. Eat, sleep, write, and read. What else do I need? But as I read farther, I realized that there are many hints that I automatically follow—and still my desk is a mess and household chores still overwhelm me. I won’t quote Susan’s list, which in truth she borrowed from someone else. But if you want to see it, here’s a link: https://susanalbert.com/all-about-thy...

A couple of Susan’s suggestions struck home with me, and immodestly I admit they are practices I try to follow. One is “Have a To-Do List.” How many times have you wracked your brain trying to remember what it was that you meant to do, who you meant to email, and so on? A list makes it so easy to tick those items off. Every time something crosses your mind that you should do, write it down on that list, whether you keep the list on your phone, a piece of paper, or your computer. I recently bought a desk-size whiteboard, with erasable pen, for a friend for a birthday gift. I figured it would be a great way to keep your to-do list. As it is, mine is too often on scattered bits of paper all over my desk.

Related is the advice to plan each day the night before: make that list of what you need/want to do. For novelists, I find it so important to note each night where the novel is going the next day. I am a pantser, which means I write without an outline, but if I don’t have some idea of what’s next, I’m liable to stare at the screen all morning. But it doesn’t all have to be about writing. First thing on my to-do list for tomorrow? Make refrigerator pickles. I found a really easy recipe, and I have some cucumber that need to be used.

A piece of desk advice: only handle a piece of paper once. When you pick it up, deal with it; don’t put it aside with, “I’ll deal with that later.” I’d add to that: once you open an email, deal with it—answer if you need to, jot a note on a calendar if that’s what’s required, or delete. I have known people who had a hundred emails stashed in their inbox—it would infuriate me if I’d written that person, got no answer, and knew that I was among a hundred being postponed or ignored. I usually keep my inbox empty; if it has five items to be dealt with, that’s unusual…and a big deal for me.

All that about efficiency leads me to add that I have been terribly inefficient today. I messed up sending some publicity materials to an online newsletter for readers, I botched up trying to advertise my forthcoming non-fiction title (thanks for asking: it is The Most Land, the Best Cattle: The Waggoners of Texas, about the largest ranch under one fence in this country and the legendary family who built it, enjoyed it, and ultimately sold it. A bittersweet tale.) A big goof of the day: I love cottage cheese and can do lots with it, but somehow I managed to order five containers from Central Market today. Guess what I’ll be having for breakfast for days…and days. Jordan is still laughing at me.

I vowed I would get back to writing on Irene in Danger today after a three-day holiday away from it, but I had so much email and trivia to deal with that I didn’t before I left the computer at two for a nap. Proud to say though, that while I was waiting for Christian to grill salmon, I wrote 900+ words. Yay for me. The salmon was delicious

So back to daily work. Vacations, even long weekends, are nice, but it’s good to be back in routine. Sweet dreams, everyone.

A different kind of a day

 

There really is more to Irene's story. 
I'm just slow in getting it on paper.
But watch for a tale of a wedding and drug dealers and, oh my!

Not bad, even a little bit good, but different. Those who know me well—and particularly my family, who will groan as they say it—know that I am pretty much a creature of habit. I get up about eight in the morning and go to my desk (okay I do brush my teeth first) with a cup of tea. A light breakfast, usually yogurt, about ten and a light lunch, leftovers if I have them, about twelve-thirty, both eaten at my desk while I work steadily until two or two-thirty. But then it’s a long nap. And after that, I piddle at my desk, following Facebook and reading recipes. It’s taken me five years to get over the idea that dinner must be at six and to adjust to the Burtons’ later schedule of dinner at seven-thirty and beyond.

But today my schedule got thrown into array. Rosa, the wonderful young woman who styles my hair, was coming at eight-fifteen. I got up early, brushed those teeth, cleaned the kitchen, and was all ready. By nine o’clock, I figured that she was not coming, so we talked…and she said she could be here at three-fifteen. Boom! Right in the middle of my nap. But I like Rosa so much, and I am so grateful that she does house calls for me, that I said fine.

I adjusted my schedule. Instead of breakfast and lunch, I indulged in a hearty brunch about eleven-thirty—poached eggs on buttered rye toast with cheddar cheese. Isn’t that called eggs on a raft? Or a Huck Finn? Or something like that. Anyway, it was wonderful. I got in a good morning of writing on the novel that seems endlessly in progress—and is still only half the length of most cozies. Then I took an early nap, so early that a little before two I was up, ready to do—what? My schedule was all thrown off. I did have a lot of housekeeping chores to do, and then it was back to my computer to work on the wip. I somehow have had a burst of energy or imagination or something on that novel (novella?) and am writing furiously.

Rosa did cut my hair—really short, which most of my family and friends like though one friend does not—and then she was gone. It was three-thirty, a time I’d normally be napping. What did I do with myself? Went back for another short nap, but I’d promised Jordan I’d sauté the leftover mushrooms and make more cucumber salad while she was off picking up Jacob from a golf tournament. Guess what? The mushrooms were already sliced, and so was the cucumber, and I had leftover dressing from last night’s cucumber salad. So what to do? I worked on the novel some more.

I don’t think I’ll change my established routine, but it was interesting to me that I got in more writing time today with that revised schedule. Don’t know if it was coincidence, because I’m fired up over the story I’m telling or what.

An odd day too in terms of menu choices. Those eggs for brunch are definitely not on my usual diet, and tonight, while waiting for Jordan to come home, I had some leftover Caesar dip with potato chips—the longer it sits, the stronger the anchovy taste gets, and I think it’s about time to say goodbye to it. But it is so good! And tonight—mushrooms on toast (a British thing, I think, that my mom taught me) and cucumber salad, followed of course by a bit of dark chocolate from Central Market. Admittedly an odd dinner, but it hit my favorite tastes. Jordan asked how I cooked the mushrooms, and I said, “Oh a bit of this and a touch of that.” Actually, olive oil, butter, white wine, garlic salt, and Worcestershire. But I insist you have to put them on toast, preferably rye. The bread soaks up all that good cooking liquid.

So now, as the poets say, the day is waning. I don’t think I have another word in me for Irene’s story tonight. And my kitchen duties are done. I’m off to find a good book from the TBR pile on my Kindle. I started one last night, about Chicago in the nineteenth century and a woman Pinkerton agent, but it was about the seamy side of Chicago—not the history that really grabs me. I have lots of other choices.

Tonight around six we had lots of distant thunder. Sophie laid right by me, but it all came to nothing. Not a drop of rain, and now the thunder is long gone, and the cicadas are singing. Happy summer night.

 

Big day in the world of books

When I did my usual first-thing-in-the-morning run through my email and Facebook this morning I thought to myself that the world of books was really alive with news.

Let me begin with the event that caused few ripples in that world but was a major celebration for me: Saving Grace is now available in print and digital from Amazon and in digital form from several other platforms. I know some people labor for years over one book—I can’t quite claim that. Almost two years ago I wrote twenty-thousand words about a young woman who was assistant to a TV chef in Chicago. I put it aside, I suspect because the contract for The Second Battle of the Alamo came through.

Last April, frustrated with quarantine and the temporary closing of my western publisher, which meant I had no projects, I picked up Irene’s story again. (Really it’s Henny’s story.) Whichever, it struck me as not too bad, and thereafter I wrote daily until I found myself at the end of a convoluted mystery, all told by Henny.

Here’s what my longtime friend and mentor, Fred Erisman, said about the novel: “It's beignets versus bagels when Julia Child wannabe Chef Irene and her loyal gofer [JA1] Henrietta ("Henny" to her friends) cross ladles over the contents of a planned cookbook. What follows is a nicely convoluted murder mystery and a glorification of America's diverse cuisines, played out against the attractions of a lovingly drawn Chicago.—Fred Erisman, In Their Own Words: Forgotten Women Pilots of Early Aviation.

And here’s the Amazon order link: https://tinyurl.com/yyffdr4t

Today I announced the book several places but most thoroughly on the blog known as Killer Crafts and Crafty Killers. You can read about Henny and Irene as they stir a stew of murder, kidnapping, and French gossip—and you get a free recipe for Hamburger Stroganoff. Irene called it peasant food, but Henny and I like it a lot. https://anastasiapollack.blogspot.com/2020/09/cooking-with-cloris-author-judy-alters.html

Other books also caught my eye this morning: One, featured in a special Shelf Awareness email was Outlawed by Anne North. How can y ou resist a first line like this: “In the year of our Lord 1894, I became an outlaw.” Yes, it’s a western but so different—a Feminist take on Etta Place and the Hole in the Wall Gang. Set in an alternate-historical setting—the U.S. government has collapsed and in its place are Independent Towns West of the Mississippi-- with a determined and almost fearless heroine, the novel touches on such themes as the politics of infertility and gender identity. Read more about it here:  https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/46038742-outlawed

 In 2002 (I think) Leisure Books published my historical novel about Etta Place, Sundance, Butch, and Me. It was and is nowhere as inventive as North’s version—the wildest assumption I made was a long-term attraction between Etta and Butch. At the time I thought sticking to the facts of her story was bizarre enough, but now I’m anxious to read what Anne North has done with the material.

When I turned to the daily column of Shelf Awareness, an online newsletter 

for booksellers, I found a lengthy piece on an interview with controversial fighter for equality, Reverend Al Sharpton. I have never been sure what I thought about Sharpton—a troublemaker? A publicity-hound? A sincere fighter for racial equality? A devout man of God? I came away from this article with respect for his sincerity. Sharpton’s had a long career and was set to retire just about when trump was elected. He recalled saying to himself, “Wait a minute … I better rethink that. A lot of what we fought for is at stake.” He praised booksellers, saying they are in a unique position to help our country make major changes.

Sharpton’s new book is Rise Up: A Country at the Crossroads. Read about the interview here: https://www.shelf-awareness.com/issue.html?issue=3813#m49672.

So many books, so little time!

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 [JA1]