Monday Again

Thank you for all the suggestions about using up bread. I had eggy bread aka French toast over the weekend and I very much enjoyed it, so that's on the list. I need to buy extra eggs. I'll also need them if I try the savoury bread pudding - I was thinking layers of bread and butter, intermingled with onions, crisped bacon and plenty of herbs. When I had a rummage on the internet, I found Yorkshire Savoury Pudding, which sounds amazing, though this bread isn't going to produce anything like soft white breadcrumbs. This bread is robust. It's tasty, but it's extremely substantial. 

I also plan to dig into the medieval tradition of trenchers. In England, in the Middle Ages, food was served on thick slices of coarse bread instead of plates. At the end of the meal, those pieces of bread were often given to the poor, as part of the Christian charity that was preached. The tradition has survived in the British meals of beans on toast, poached egg on toast, and scrambled egg on toast. I don't see why I shouldn't pour a portion of chili or ragu over a hearty slice of bread instead of over rice or pasta. I'd still get the carbs and plenty of fibre, reduce waste and, as long as no-one from Italy or Texas found out, it wouldn't hurt anyone. 

It's been windy here. 

That's the trellis with the honeysuckle that's blown over. Because of the way the street works, we rarely get wind and rain against the house, but weather blows down the street with an almost wind tunnel effect. As the honeysuckle is verdant enough and heavy enough, the strong winds have caused havoc. 

I took a quick and rather poor pic of how lush the honeysuckle was.

This year is the best it's been, but it blocks the wind, and so it's blown over. I thinned it out a little today, but I can only manage five or ten minutes at a time. I'll keep going at it. DH propped up the trellis with broom handles, and he'll fix it properly with bear when bear comes back for Easter. I think that I'm going to have to get rid of this particular honeysuckle, which may need dynamite as it's well rooted and been there for a while, and replace it with climbing annuals, like sweet peas. 

Speaking of bear, I had a lovely phone call with him and he got me an amazing gift.

He knows me so well!

Writing stuff - Today's instalment of The Guest is here. And if anyone would like to be an ARC reader for Tales from the White Hart, you can have a quick look at what's involved here. If you leave a way to contact you in the comments, which I won't publish, I'll be in touch. 

Hugs and good health to all. 

Oh Crumbs!

I ought to do at least something other than writing and erratic napping, but not much is happening. The latest thing I ought to have done is make Carrot and Butter Bean Burgers from the Tesco Recipe site. The important thing about those burgers is that they use breadcrumbs. I need to use breadcrumbs. 

As you may know, I can't have gluten. It comes out in my skin and I'm going to skip the details because it's pretty gruesome. However, I've been cut off from 'normal' bread and I miss it bitterly. Most gluten free bread isn't good. I swear that the packaging in some brands is tastier than the alleged 'bread.' There are some nicer gluten free breads, but they are expensive. I don't indulge often. However there was an amazing deal at one point and I picked up a loaf of Promise Multigrain bread for something approaching a vaguely reasonable price. DH had a slice, as he felt like a piece of toast at the time and we didn't have any real bread in. I was a little worried as DH loves his bread and can be particular. I was right to worry, but not for the reasons I expected. DH loves the bread. I took a pic of a slice this evening.

I had it instead of pasta with my sort of stir fry thing of quorn chunks, green pepper, red pepper, onion, mushroom, peas and sweet and sour sauce. 

You see, at 7pm sharp, DH likes to have supper, and he prefers a couple of slices of toasted Promise Multigrain loaf with marmalade. The trouble with this loaf, though, is that the packaging is dreadful. It splits wildly when you open it up no matter what you do, the slices inside fall apart, and without careful management, it gets stale quickly. I'm desperate to use the stuff up, and I was scouting around for recipes with breadcrumbs. This recipe looked perfect. I've been meaning to make it all week, but... I don't like tinned carrots, which are a vital ingredient of the burger. I can substitute with cooked carrots, but they're not exactly my favourite either. I like carrots roasted with cumin and turmeric and last time I tried that, I nearly set the microwave on fire. 

So any suggestions for using up extremely expensive, dense, non-sweet stale bread that aren't too calorie heavy? And that are easy for someone to make who's mind is mainly elsewhere, because I'm still neck deep in writing stuff. All ideas gratefully recieved.

Writing stuff - Reminder - Kane will be disappearing from my writing blog at the end of tomorrow, hopefully to reappear as a book in the near future. I've written a post about ARC readers, or readers to review, on my writing blog here. The reason for that is a post on this blog, here, with the details near the bottom. 

Hugs and good health to all. 

Explaining Some Writing Stuff, and Why Some Books are Amazon Only

Someone commented on Angela's kind post about buying Cats in the Bible from outlets other than Amazon. The short answer is that I'm working on it. The longer answer is rather more long-winded than I thought was good in a comment, so I thought that instead of doing something productive, I'd share what I know about it on here. Please don't take the information blindly, as I'm far from an expert, but I think it's a good start. And there's kind of a big thing at the bottom, which I've headed up with bold type so you can scroll down if you get bored of the cats.

First, here's a pic of a cat, as I can't bring myself to put the cover up again. 

Photo by Bogdan Farca on Unsplash

Which is a pose that Smudge often had as he checked up on us between spells of surveying the terrain outside the window.

Self-publishing has always been around, but it used to be expensive, back in the days when you used to have to pay for a bulk run of books on a physical press. With the rise of ebooks and what is known as 'print on demand,'  it's a lot easier. Now anyone can hop onto Amazon and publish anything for free. Amazon will help the author create a cover, assign an ISBN (the official identification that places like proper bookshops and libraries use to identify a book), and these days there is even a box that says 'there may be spelling and grammar mistakes, do you want to check?' Because Amazon got there early, it got a strong control of the self-publishing market. This can make it hard if you love books but aren't so keen on Amazon.

The biggest pull that Amazon has is Kindle Unlimited. For readers, you pay a monthly fee,  it's £9.49 in the UK, and you can read any of the ebooks enrolled on Kindle Unlimited for no further charge. And there are literally millions of books enrolled on there. There are similar schemes on Everand and Kobo, and no doubt others, plus many libraries lend ebooks, but Amazon is the big one. Authors get access to a big, dedicated readership, and in return get a slice of the income from Kindle Unlimited. For example, at the time of typing, someone read 9 page of Cats in the Bible today through Kindle Unlimited, and I will get a royalty payment of 3p. However, if I want my ebook to be in Kindle Unlimited, it can't be listed anywhere else. It's okay for paperbacks to be published in other places, but not ebooks. 

This isn't exciting, so I'm putting in another pic of a cat.

Photo by Timo Volz on Unsplash

It's not just boxes. While I've never met a cat that could resist a box, we once couldn't find Shadow and tried a different tactic. We put a sheet of paper on the floor, walked away, then came back ten minutes later to find her seated regally in the 'they used to worship us in Egypt' pose. 

I made the decision that I would enroll Cats in the Bible in Kindle Unlimited as it's a short, undemanding read, and a reader who didn't know me may not be willing to buy it, but may be willing to dip in if they subscribed to Kindle Unlimited. This means that the ebook is only available there. I also published it as a paperback on Amazon and on another site called Draft2Digital. You can't buy directly from Draft2Digital but they distribute to places like Waterstones, Barnes & Noble, and Gardners - places where people who buy books from somewhere not Amazon can go and order a book. 

Draft2Digital is a great site, but I found parts of it confusing, including where the fluff I needed to look to see where the book was available. I'm still working on it, but you can buy a paperback copy of Cats in the Bible online at Walmart (here), Bokus (a Swedish company here) and Saxo (a Danish company here). 

I'm finding it somewhat bewildering, so I need another cat pic. 

Photo by Roman on Unsplash 

Anyone who has said 'don't let the cat out of the bag' has obviously never tried to keep a cat from diving into a handbag/suitcase/carrier/tote to investigate and/or steal something.

I'll get in touch with Draft2Digital and see if I can work out where else the dratted thing may have ended up. I know that other shops have got Out of the London Mist from there, so Cats in the Bible should end up with a wider distribution at some point - I hope!

ARC Readers - ARC readers are people who get a free copy of a book and in return leave an honest review in places like their blog or sites like Amazon. I approached a few people from here for Cats in the Bible, and I was so grateful for their kind response.

In the next month, I will be publishing Tales of the White Hart. It's the second edition, but it's been dusted down, spruced up and rigorously edited. It's been removed from blogs and websites, is ready to be unleashed once more on Amazon and the wider web, and I'm looking for ARC Readers for it. I've written about ARC Readers and what can be involved on my writing blog here. If you've not come across it so far, it's a full length urban fantasy/paranormal romance, with plenty of vampires and werewolves. and a little dash of magic. It's set in York, England, and if you're interested, please leave a comment (which I won't publish) with a way of contacting you online and I'll be in touch. This is the provisional blurb:

When Fiona Greene saved the life of an ancient elfen, Kadogan, he asked her heart's desire. Exactly 100 days later Fiona found herself opening up 'The White Hart,' a shop in a converted pub that sold handcrafted cards, exquisite gift wrap and a range of merchandise aimed at werewolves, vampires and the rest of the non-normal community. What could go wrong? Lots could go wrong. They had a Tarot reader that didn't believe in Tarot cards, a werewolf who had been thrown out of his pack as their warehouse manager and the redoubtable Mrs Tuesday coming to stay. Fiona could deal with all that, but she wasn't happy about the attempts to pair her up with Steve Adderson, salesperson to the non-normal domains and magician. Then the staff at the White Hart found themselves in the middle of a dark power struggle and suddenly her romance had to take a back seat. A Paranormal Romance set in the beautiful and ancient city of York 

And if you've made it all the way down the page, you deserve a medal!

Hugs and good health to all. 

Nearly Asleep

I'm waking up and falling asleep erratically, so I thought that I'd post quickly while I'm still awake. 

I've been working at writing stuff between naps, so I've not much to share. I've nothing to show. So I made this in Canva. 

And it's true. I took a blurred pic of some buds on Saturday, and the evidence of Spring is bringing me joy.

It's the lilac, and I think that it's looking good. I'll get a better pic later.

Writing stuff - Yesterday I posted the latest from The Guest, here. There are a lot of chapters cued up to post automatically, and I keep forgetting to look on there. 

Hugs and good health to all. 

While I'm Awake

I was going to post yesterday, but I fell asleep. I'm about to fall asleep again, so I'm dashing in while I can.

I managed to leave the house yesterday and when I called into Aldi, they still had the duvet cover that I wanted so I picked that up.

I'm a sucker for blue and white, especially this shade of blue. Yes, it is for a king sized duvet. Yes, I have a single bed. Yes, I have issues. It was a wonderfully inexpensive £14.99 and I'm happy. I'll keep an eye out for when they have duvets on sale next.

Bear called and he has a cough. I know that it's just a little thing, and he's really doing fine, but I worry. If anyone has any tips on dealing with the worry, I'd be grateful. Bear is far more sensible than I have ever been, and I know that he'll be okay. It's just that he's so far away. 

As I have mentioned, the house next door but one was empty. Yesterday, on my way out, I saw signs of habitation with lights on behind closed curtains. I haven't seen any actual occupants yet, but DH spotted a couple of police officers knocking on the door this evening, so I'm keeping a curious eye out. 

Writing stuff - and why I should have posted yesterday. I re-posted an article about research - Location and the Lost City. I really need to re-read The Lost World by Arthur Conan Doyle and Tarzan of the Apes by Edgar Rice Burroughs. Though Tarzan is absolutely not correct on... evolution, women, class systems, the French... Perhaps I should look at other stuff. Tomorrow I take down all of the White Hart stuff and for a last look you can find it here, here, here, and here. 

Hugs and good health to all.

I Did Stuff!

I finished the first hat for Lent and cast on a second.

And I only had a tiny scrap over. I've decided to save the scraps and eventually they will end up in an extremely ugly blanket. I'm not saving the tiny ends, but a few yards, or metres, left over. 

My stomach is still happy settling for toast. We had marinaded chicken last night and I think that I should have cooked it a little longer. It was far from raw, but it just didn't settle in me. It tasted amazing, and I hope that I can recreate the recipe. It had honey, soy sauce, olive oil, lemon, garlic powder, oregano, pepper, and worcestershire sauce. It was supposed to be honey and mustard, but the mustard looked off and so I looked for another recipe, which was delicious but I found it by searching on my phone and I immediately lost it. I'll have to look again. It was a nice change from our usual dinners. 

I've made the most of sitting carefully, and I hope to keep going with the knitting. It would be great to reduce the stash and help seafarers at the same time. 

I feel like the weekend has been incredibly busy, but I can't remember doing much. As my stomach was tender, I haven't gone anywhere. It's calming down, now, so perhaps I can get out tomorrow.

Writing stuff - my paperback copy of Cats in the Bible arrived!

And the latest instalment from the Guest is on my writing blog here.

One of the things that filled up my weekend was formatting. I'm republishing The White Hart and, after a long think about it, I'm going to have to take down all of the posts on my blog and Royal Road. If you want to have a read before they get removed this Friday, the story on the Royal Road is here and that is the first three big stories. The big story on the blog has two halves, the first one is here and the second one is here. There are also collected short stories here. 

When they go, along with all the stories with Kane which will disappear on the 13th March, my writing blog is going to look very thin indeed. 

Hugs and good health to all. 

A Pint of Milk

I've not been doing much at all for the last few days, as I ate something that didn't agree with me. I stayed very close to the bathroom, and stuck to writing stuff and feeling sorry for myself. 

I have a pint of cow's milk in my fridge. Bear isn't a fan of the almond milk that I drink, and I don't usually have soy. Dairy makes me poorly, and I've had enough of that this week, and it doesn't really agree with DH either. So I got in the smallest practical unit for bear, because he likes cereal with either cow's milk or soy milk for breakfast. To the surpise of no-one, he didn't even open the carton. 

I'm frustrated by this, because now it's going to waste. If it was what I would consider normal times, I could offer it to a neighbour, preferably before it reached its 'use-by' date. However I hear the rows coming from the neighbours at the back, so I don't have the courage to knock there. Next door to the side never answers their door. They're lovely people and don't cause any fuss, but they never, ever open the door to knocking. Next door to that is empty and next door to that is someone where I can't say anything good, so I'm not saying anything at all. 

There are no houses in front of us. This is an old pic, but shows that the only ones that may be able to use up the milk are rats.

There are some young men doing thing with cars to the left of this picture, but after they abandoned a car in the middle of the street, and ignored us when we politely asked them to move it so that we could get deliveries, then we called the car in as abandoned after a few months, I don't think that we're on those sorts of terms. 

I'm annoyed at myself as I should have seen this coming and I hate the waste. Next time, I'll ask him to pick up milk for himself and I'll give him the money for it.

In other shopping news, I bought a packet of Overnight Oats. I've been making overnight oats for bear for ages. I used to get the tubs set up for him to pick up in the morning and he'd eat them when he got to college. It was just oats, chia seeds, almond milk (and he didn't complain about it then!), something like honey or agave sweetener, and cinnamon and he was fine with it. This had extra things like vitamins and stuff, though, and I picked it up on Tuesday in a moment of weakness. I feel a fool. I've spent far too much on what was described as overnight oats, but is also describe as instant overnight oats, ready in 3 minutes.

How can overnight oats be ready in 3 minutes? Doesn't it make them instant oats that can also be made the night before? I'll go back to the usual way after I've finished this packet. 

Writing stuff - I've finished the first round of editing on the complete White Hart collection. DH is checking it, but that's going to take some time. Then I'll check his edits, format, and attempt to publish. I should, in theory, be okay for the ebook, but it's pushing against the limits of the print book. It may not be possible. I'm going to have to work on this. Over a quarter of a million words takes up some space.

While that's going on in the background, I'm also collating the stories of Kane. I'll be adding a couple more new stories and I'll publish the collection at the same time as a separate novella that I'm working on. Because of the way that Amazon works, I'm going to have to take down all the Kane stories that are currently on my blog. I'll be doing that after Friday 13th March, which is as good a date as any when you're talking about ghost stories. I daren't post plans, as they never work out if I mention them aloud, but the collection of stories plus new novella should be along shortly after that. Please wish me luck. 

Hugs and good health to all.