Tag Archives: Darkspire Reaches

Diet is working!

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My pants don’t fit anymore, as in falling down. O-O. Still, this is a good thing. The diet is working really well for me and cutting out the starchy foods has made me feel a lot better. I am not hungry, or irritable and I am also not terrible active, yet the weight is falling by the day. Getting on the scales in the morning is now a joyful experience.

Yes, I am supplementing with vitamins. I take selenium, zinc and probiotic capsules. I am also drinking watered down grapefruit juice for vitamin C and eating fruit. I find I really like the coconut Silk as a milk substitute in my coffee, but it is becoming more difficult to get. Still, there is one store in the nearest city stocking it. Yay. Cheese is a protein, so fine in moderation and full of calcium. Oh, and I am allowed one square of dark chocholate a day if I feel the need. I am not a chocholate fan, so this doesn’t really bother me, but some might find this important. On a roll, here.

No calorie counting, or portion control. No special little frozen dinners, shakes or ‘health’ bars. It is a modified Atkins diet/thyroid diet, basically cutting out all processed food. I am also cooking with virgin olive oil, so I suppose there is a tad of the Mediterranean diet in there, too. I honestly expected to gain a few pounds this morning, after a supper of steamed asparagus and a baseball steak, especially after I cheated and put gravy on the steak, but no, I was down two pounds this morning. I admit I couldn’t eat it all. It was too much and I always stop when I start to feel full.

I have hated clothes shopping for a while and now I find I am beginning to look forward to getting something that doesn’t make me look like a zeppelin. Not that I was ever huge, but it is all about body image and I hated mine. My heaviest was 185lbs. Yuk, yuk, yukkity yuk, yuk.  I had gotten to the state where I was eating so little that my capacity was possibly less than a child’s needs. Obviously, something wasn’t right, as the weight was totally undeserved. Here speaks a person who doesn’t much care for chocolate and candy, cookies or desserts. Nor did I browse on unsuitable things like potato chips. I don’t and never have snacked. I think it is all about finding the right diet that is also healthy.

My goal is to look darn good by the time my new book, Shadow Over Avalon, goes live on Halloween. I hope to have dropped thirty pounds by then. This is looking doable.

Very happy camper!

Wordbuidling.

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Someone recently said writing fantasy was easy. Let’s nix this notion right now. In the process of coming up with Darkspire Reaches I created a whole new planet and a variety of very distinct races to populate it. How? Creating fantasy isn’t as simple as calling a bunny a flubbit, or some other strange name. A bunny is still a bunny and recognizable as such to any reasonable and sane person, to misquote Mark Twain.

A new world has to be just a tad off kilter, but still easy to visualize for the reader. Still thinking this is easy to do? A world must have weather patterns and this means a north and a south pole. A world entirely constructed of tropical rain forest would never be possible in nature. Why is this important? When I read a book I need to be able to suspend my disbelief. If this does not happen, I am questioning everything else. A world is therefore built from the bedrock upwards. 

This is just one book, Darkspire Reaches. Shadow Over Avalon explores a whole new world, complete with rules and structure. If anyone else would like to tell me this is easy, they are inviting a fat lip.  

Another great diet item on my menu.

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This is mine. On a bed of fresh and well washed raw spinach leaves, put cooked beetroot cubes, diced, hard-boiled egg, walnuts and diced apples, previously soaked in fresh lemon juice. Serve with a raspberry vinaigrette. The flavor explosion is something else. This is a low cost meal that give a wealth of protein, fibre and a load of essential minerals.

Dissolving Bankers into fits of giggles.

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My visa is about to expire so I called my bankers today to activate my new card. Ok, so I admit I am bad and this gets worse if I have to do boring things. I love my bank, but boring this was as they had been instructed to give a long sales pitch to make me agree to pay 99c per month to protect my balance in case of death/dismemberment/redundancy, et al. I tried three times to explain that I kept my card instantly paid off and my balance was always zero. Off the spiel would rattle again and my badness was now activated by boredom. I took one last shot.

“Hon, when I pop my clogs with a zero balance, which I always have, it is hardly going to cause the bank any grief.”

That did it. She tried very hard to repress it and couldn’t. The giggles permeated the rest of the conversation. It is always great to see bankers have a very human side.

Split green pea soup

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One cup of dried spit green peas to four cups of water.

Add to that, half a cup of onions, lightly sweated and a quarter of a teaspoonful of jalapeno peppers, parsley and fennel leaves.

When boiling, add in a quarter of a teaspoon full of black pepper, a pinch of sugar, and a chicken stock cube.

Cook for about twenty minutes. Add two tablespoons of sour cream. Yum.

Flash Fiction Competition from Kristell Ink

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https://kristellink.submittable.com/submit/22350

Feline Flash Fiction Competition

On the 16th July 2013, Kristell Ink is exactly one year old…

“Holy potato, Batman! How did that happen?”

Exactly. Time has flown, and our first twelve months have been full of excitement, heartache, heartbreak, laughter, happiness, sadness and tears. However, we wouldn’t change a thing. We’ve loved putting together our books and releasing them into the big bad world.
Non-Compliance: The Sector, Strange Tales from the Scriptorian Vaults, Healer’s Touch, Guardians of Evion, Darkspire Reaches, Space Games and The Art of Forgetting: Rider… all of them have that something special. Over the next twelve months we have more wonderful titles to share.
As a little thank you/ writing challenge, we’re running a small flash fiction competition. In 500 words, we’d like you to tell us a fantasy/science fiction/steampunk/ subgenre story involving something with a feline feel.
“Feline? Huh? Why?”

Well, In May 2013, Kristell Ink became an imprint of Grimbold Books, and our parent company’s logo consists of two rather mischievous cats: Grim and Bold, and so we’d love to tie in theme to our new parents!
Also, we love cats…
To be extra nice, we’re opening the competition up to artists as well. If you don’t want to write, or feel you can’t write (not that we believe that!), then draw us/ paint us/ photo-manipulate us a unique picture involving something feline in the genres we’ve already mentioned.

Grim and Bold will be judging, along with Alex Shepherd (reviewer for Fantasy Faction and all around fantasy lover). Once a shortlist is decided, we’ll bring along Adam Dalton (Gollancz author) and decide on the top three.
In the event of a split decision, we will turn to Mark Lawrence (Harper Collins author) to make the deciding decision.
Closing date is the 16th August 2013.
Good luck! And Have fun!

First Prize: Kobo Mini e-reader loaded with Kristell Ink titles (and some special books from authors we admire and believe you should read!) and a £10 Amazon Voucher.

Second Prize: £20 Amazon Voucher (or $30 if you’d prefer).

Third Prize: £10 Amazon Voucher (or $15 if you’d prefer).

Crazy Times.

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So it starts. I had a phone call from my electrician first thing this morning and he was most apologetic for the hour, but he needn’t have been as I was up and about two hours before he called. He was scheduled to come wire in my generator on Monday, but now wanted to come tomorrow. One doesn’t mess with one’s contractor, and he is a good one. No, it is not very convenient, which I didn’t tell him, but I will work around it.

Late tomorrow night, Kid 1 arrives from Vancouver Island to stay with us for the wedding of Kid 3 on the 27th.  Fortunately, we have three vehicles, so she gets the use of her choice. I thought she was coming in just before the wedding and that I had more time. I was going to redecorate my guest room. I guess this isn’t going to happen.

Kid 3 wants me to go through the family pictures again to find a picture of her and her granddad for her slideshow at the wedding. Gulp. I don’t know that I have any that aren’t on slide and I don’t have a slide projector anymore.

Publishing stuff needs to be done, but my Publisher is being very nice about my busy time. All the same, I need to get stuff done. Not because I am being pressured in any way, but because I really want to participate and this is my choice.

Will my grandbaby stick to his/her due dates and arrive on September 7th? I doubt it from the appearance of that adorable child on his/her latest ultrasound picture. The mom to be cooked early and I think she might have inherited the same oven. In which case, this already well-developed baby might well put in an appearance with a very respectable weight at eight months. Time will tell.

Buying and who doesn’t.

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This was a writer related post, but it got me thinking back. Many years ago my late father had a soft furnishing company. It was top of the line, but even so, he offered considerable discounts, think cost price, to relatives. His nephew never stepped up. Not once. They lived in an outdated apartment with the drapes in rags and no, they were not poor. If you both earn and you don’t spend, you have the money. They never took up a cost price offer, not even for scatter cushions.

I guess a person can get out of the habit of spending if they live their whole life never improving anything. My cousin’s wife still had a twin tub washer long after these became dinosaurs. Darn, it even had a mangle on the top. Does anyone remember what a mangle was, even? I feel kinda sad for them really. They had no children by choice, so they had the opportunity to treat themselves, and yet didn’t. I fail to see the point of endless hours spent and dire jobs when there is no carrot in the offing. I expect my cousin’s wife’s relatives got a nice next egg on her demise, after he went, but what about them? Where was their payout for the years of work? Not comfort, not home ownership, not even nice vacations. So sad.

Coming back into full circle, I guess this is why I don’t spam family and friends. It is there and I will give a discount as allowed by my publishers, but I will not push it down your throat. Speaking of which, I do have some copies of Darkspire Reaches that I can give a 20% discount on if anyone is interested. Postage and Packing to the States is another $7.60 CAD on top, but not out of line with what Amazon charges for a single purchase. Oh, and then there is one copy earmarked for that special person who gives the most interesting comment on the cover. I will cover the cost of postage for this to anywhere in the world.