Well the epiphany came to me. A little cutting here and there and I was down to the 250 maximum number of words.

That noise!

Beep-beep. I woke to the annoying high-pitched sound of something electronic. But what was it? I lay there listening, assorted thoughts running through my head. Was it a carbon monoxide detector? A smoke detector? My son’s alarm clock? I looked at our clock. Definitely not that. It was only around one thirty. The one thing I knew was that this noise definitely wasn’t was the BEEP-beep from either cell phone indicating low battery or missed call.

I eventually dragged myself out of bed. Outside the door, I stood in the hall and listened. It wasn’t coming from upstairs. Beep-beep. It continued. Down the stairs in the dark, I followed the sound. I stood at the foot of the stairs and listened again.

Beep-beep. It was louder now so the origin of the sound was definitely on this level. I moved into the living room. The sound grew fainter. Was it something in the front hall? I approached from the other archway. A flashing red light caught my eye. I looked closer. BEEP-BEEP!

The mystery had been solved! It was the cordless phone! It had been unplugged too long and was telling me that it needed to be put back where it belonged.

I gathered it up, made my way back upstairs, still without turning on a light, plugged the base back in and put the handset back in place. BEEP-BEEP. It had to get the last word. A few seconds later, all was quiet and I fell back into bed.

I decided to take the plunge and register for this year’s conference that takes place the last weekend in September. Luckily for me, I registered early enough that I’m confirmed in the draw for a critique! I was one of the first forty to register so that automatically put me in the draw. There are five representatives in total from publishing houses, an agent, and a published author who will be doing the critiques.

So friends and fans of my writing, keep your fingers crossed for me that I’m one of the lucky ones – or the lucky one, depending on how things are done. The conference registrar thought there would be five individual draws but she would have to double check. Either way, sounds like pretty good odds and I’ll be rubbing shoulders and networking with the right kind of people to get me that much closer to having one of my novels published.

Guess that means I best get my skates on and finish novel #2 which is currently about 50% complete. I know the beginning, the middle and pretty much the end and have written segments from each of those sections.

No epiphanies today at work. Oh well, I still have until June 22 to come up with 250 words on the subject – or not.

Currently, my priorites lie elsewhere but you never know when inspiration will hit and the words come gushing out of my brain through my fingers on the keyboard.

Unfortunately, the title doesn’t allow me to italicize the theme for the next flash fiction prompt. It should appear as That noise! So what noise will it be? Scratching? The ice cream truck playing that SAME song again? Crying? The possibilities are endless. Unfortunately, my available time right now isn’t.

Time to get ready for work. Maybe I will be struck with an epiphany while there.

Well, it’s done. Not as quickly as hoped for but one side after a few hiccups of rain and wind, this past Tuesday and the other side started yesterday morning and done by mid afternoon.

WooHoo!!!

It’s here… well in our case, has been all winter long providing we could get to the barbie. Wallowing through snow up to your wazoo… not pleasant.

This weekend is the first “official” long weekend of the summer season. Campgrounds open with restrictions, people start planting veggie gardens and flowers, and then there’s us poor sods who will be putting on a new roof.

Even though there will be mass confusion on Saturday and Sunday, I plan on cooking outdoors both days. Time will tell if I’m successful…

Then on Monday, I’ll kick back and relax and enjoy my week’s holidays.

To every woman out there with kids and grandkids… Happy Mother’s Day!

Before I post this draft, I should say that my “Narrow Escape” was the winner of my writing group’s impromptu contest – not so much a contest but a dry run at how we’re to determine who’s piece will be sent off to Real Life magazine for their fall issue.

So without any further ado my second draft of Breaking Loose – exactly 250 words! Woo Hoo!!! Hmm… I have a dark side that’s even darker than I first imagined. Must have something to do with all those Hammer Film Production movies I watched as a kid.

Breaking Loose

Anne woke suddenly; her skin cold and clammy. When she tried to move, she discovered that her hands were bound behind her back and her ankles tied together. Even though her eyes were open, there was nothing but darkness, yet she felt like she was being watched.

When the feeling subsided, Anne rubbed her head up and down over the musty-smelling surface she lay on. Eventually, the blindfold slid up and she was able to see her tomb. A sliver of light shone in from across the room which smelled of decay.

She reached down so that she could wiggle her ass over her bound wrists until her arms were under her legs as far forward as she could move them. Painfully, Anne drew her legs up tight to her chest. Once in that position, she fumbled with the ropes around her ankles until they dropped to the cold cement floor.

Unable to free her hands, Anne shoved her feet into the gap between her bound wrists and thighs and slowly worked them through. The rough ropes cut into her wrists and burned her shins but she didn’t give up. Eventually, her persistence was rewarded. Barely able to walk, Anne moved to the sliver of light. She gratefully inhaled the fresh air outside.

Suddenly, the door opened and she was able to see where she had been imprisoned – a cemetery vault with a dead body! She swung her clenched fists with all her might, knocking her captor unconscious and ran.

What can be said about Monday? It’s back to work for those of us who work a normal five day Monday to Friday schedule. It’s usually a day from hell and if things go totally right, you think there has to be something you’ve forgotten to do and it’s going to come back and bite you in the arse a few days or weeks later or even longer!

After the glorious weather we’ve been experiencing these past couple of weeks, today was quite the shock to the system. Cool, rainy and just plain dreich. It could be worse, though… we could be getting the 10-15 cm of snow that parts further afield were to get. It can stay with them, I say. It can stay with them (for those who are Coronation St viewers, you’ll recognize my impression of the not-so-recently demised Fred Elliott.)

How many people can say that their almost 12-year old grandchildren think that their grandparents (grandmother specifically) are cool? I can and I’m going to enjoy every moment of it because I know that it won’t be much longer and I’ll no longer be ‘cool’ but relegated to being just another ‘old fart’.

And on that note… that’s all for now folks!

Sarah’s Gift started out as a short story, written not long after I discovered Diana Gabaldon and her Outlander series. A good friend and co-worker told me I could write something just as good – so I tried. A few years later, while taking a Creative Writing course, I was encouraged by my instructor to write a novel. I believe his exact words were “you could write a cracker.”

Since then, Sarah’s Gift was first entered in the 2007 Dundee International Book Prize. After it was over and there was no success there, I tried marketing it to various publishers. I’ve sent it to Avon Romance, Oak Tree Press, New Concepts Publishing (they asked for the entire manuscript), Annick Press, Lilley Press – all with the same result – rejection. Currently, an electronic copy of my manuscript is with Drollerie Press.

Somewhere out there, there is a publisher that’s the perfect match for me.