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Making Vanilla Cake
I just finished reading Garlic and Sapphires, Ruth Reichl‘s account of being the NYT food critic (yeah, it’s been out forever but I’m late to a lot of stuff). I loved how she included recipes instead of photos, so you can make the food she’s talking about. There’s a point in the memoir where she…
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I Had a Very Good Week, Thank You
Last year, I went around to various bookstores and signed stock (and left boxes of chocolate wherever I went, like an Easter Bunny in August.) I went into one and couldn’t find my book, though it had only been out a couple of days. I asked if they had it. “Let me see,” said the…
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Nature Walking
This afternoon, Little Girl was particularly cranky. She is an extrovert, unlike me and the other kids, so she gets antsy. Unfortunately, it’s been too hot in the daytime lately to go outside and play, unless it’s at a pool (and even then, you don’t want the hot afternoon sun beating down on you). But…
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Stranger than Fiction?
“Nobody would believe you if you wrote this in a book,” my mother-in-law said by way of greeting. We had come to visit her daughter, Deb, who was recovering from surgery in the hospital. I sat down to hear the story. I fully believed that the story would be an interesting, albeit frustrating, one. While…
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Using Up Summer Fruit (if you’re not afraid of butter)
We got invited to a cookout recently, and while we weren’t told to bring anything except ourselves, of course we did. I decided to make a cobbler, which I hadn’t before. Moreover, I decided to double the recipe and use strawberries along with yellow and white peaches, because I am crazy like that. Don’t you…
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Newspaper Taxidermy Antelope Head
Some months ago, I saw this project for a papier mache taxidermy and immediately thought, “I want.” So eventually I got a roll of chicken wire, some gloves, glue, floral wire, and a bunch of newspaper together and made it (all of these “do it yourself” things sure necessitate a lot of equipment, don’t they?).…
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Writing Wednesday: 10 Ways to Socialize
Yes, I know it’s Friday, not Writing Wednesday. But bear with me– I’ve been writing guest blog posts for the release of my paperback next week, so that has consumed most of my time. For me, working alone is one of the hardest things about writing (aside from, you know, the practical aspects, like unpredictable…
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Fear and Loathing in Legoland
I’m not the biggest fan of roller coasters there ever was, but I’ve been known to enjoy them occasionally. When I was a youngster, there were a few that I was afraid to go on. Mostly because my parents took me on Space Mountain when I was about 3. I don’t even think I was…
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A Night of Stories
On Thursday Cadillac and I went out to the Old Globe Theatre. We hadn’t been back there since returning to the Mainland (which is what Hawaiians call the continental US, which I didn’t know before I lived in Hawaii and therefore am assuming that at least some don’t know). When such events are planned in…
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Writing Wednesdays: Creating Sympathetic Characters
A friend wrote to me with this question: How do you make the character jump off the page? You know, make him someone memorable, someone you want to root for? You make a character someone you want to root for by making them sympathetic. I used to have some trouble with this. I’d give my…
MARGARET DILLOWAY 