Waltzing Puppies and Silly Movies

Was I supposed to laugh out loud at Independence Day?

There was no baseball on last night and nothing else worth watching, so my hubby had Mission Impossible on when I got home from work yesterday. I like James Bond better and the ending... So stupid. It's the one where Jon Voigt kills everybody, pretends he was a victim, too, shoots his wife or lover after making sure she knows how contemptuous he thinks she is. Then he runs away, trying to escape from the London to Paris express train by catching a passing helicopter. The helicopter ends up inside the Chunnel - after clipping its rotors on the edge of the tunnel entrance.

Sorry, folks - wrong! From everything I've read, and from my little experience in a cartoon video game that's supposed to emulate how a helicopter looks and feels - heck, the video screen even had the blades whirring around the top! - helicopters are like totally unstable. If you clip something like a concrete wall with your rotors, you will lose control and probably crash. Particularly if you're only twenty or so feet above the ground because there's no room to maneuver. There are no stabilizers in a helicopter. It was pure-d Dumb. Yet another movie at which I laughed out loud. Bad writing, bad acting, no real story that wasn't easily predicted. All about the special effects for fourteen year old boys. Whatever. Then we watched Independence Day, which I've never seen before.

The special effects were good but, oh my God! The acting and the writing? God awful! Contrived and awkward, silly to the point of head shakingly bad (there goes that whiplash again!).

How amazing that even though there's a concussive shock wave from the White House imploding, the presidential helicopter has no problem taking off. Same with the fire when Air Force One is taking off - missed by just tha-aaat much. Oh, and the dame in the tunnel with her kid and dog? Nope - that explosion didn't cook her and her kid, didn't suck all of the oxygen from the space she manages to get into and thank God Fido didn't even get singed when he leapt through the door with the fireball missing him by tha-aaat much! And then, the president's wife survives it all only to die from internal bleeding about twenty hours after being injured. That is one seriously slow bleed. Oh! But it did allow for a touching scene in which she and her hubby say good-bye over their little daughter's head. Or something like that. I went upstairs to pee when the doc said 'there's nothing we can do.' Yeah, I know. Life support ain't gonna help this thing so I came back down with my iPad, even though hubby disapproved, and I played games for the next couple of hours.

Okay, enough of that. Next time I want to watch something silly...

Sorry if those are on your hit parade. When I want comedy, I prefer that it be clearly labeled as such. If it's action thriller, like Casino Royale or any of the other, older James Bonds movies, at least make it believable. Make sure there's a story line and at least some acting. And even though I know the good guys will win at the end of it, give me enough doubt that I want confirmation.

Another decent series are the Bourne movies. I like those, and not just because of the eye candy actor (don't even know his name). Matt Damon, maybe? There's a fight scene in the first one that is really well done and even though it's contrived and silly, it's so well done I don't care. In the next, he's guiding this guy through a crowded mall someplace, directing him by cell phone, while the bad guys and a sniper are trying to take him (Damon's character) or the guy he's guiding out. It was a tense couple of minutes as you can just about feel the terror this mark feels. He knows these bad guys are out there and that there's a sniper looking for him. That's the kind of action I like. That not quite sure he's gonna make it action.

Did you ever see the movie Charlie Varrick? That's a good movie with action without much at all in the way of Hollywood special effects, and it has a good, solid twist at the end. So does The Woman in the Window with Edward G. Robinson. The end of that took me completely by surprise the first time I saw it.

Okay, let's get away from that and get back to the waltzing puppies. I'm actually quite pleased with myself after yesterday. My projects are at about the 40/80 stage. That's not bad.

I made myself start on the one I didn't want to do, the MS Project fix, and spent about three hours working on that one.

I made a good start. The new tables are set up and partially populated. I've decided on colors so that if someone opens any of them up, despite the file names being highly specific, it will clue them in to which table they're looking at. I even got started on manipulating the data.

As of yesterday noon, when I put it aside, the Immediate Needs table has data from the first two files, the Long-Term Needs table has the same for the longer term needs, and the 100% Complete table has it's data. I'll work on that exclusively this morning so that, hopefully, by the end of the day I'll have something I can turn over to the director who's requested it.

The other project, the training show, went pretty well. But have you ever tried standing a puppy on its head and making it waltz in a different direction? It's hard!

Because of the change of focus and how I need to present this, I couldn't just move things around. There was quite a lot of re-writing needed, too - to soften it and make more pablum than meat so folks won't get their backs up.

That one is about 80% done. I'll do a walk-through with the director who's directing this one, and then make any changes suggested. No matter what, this has got to be done by Monday afternoon. That's when I have my Guinea Pig session in front of the six early bird people. I also need to get my cheat sheets ready - to make sure I know what I want to cover in what order in case I get stage fright and get lost.

After that, there are four more sessions and, I think, I've got a total of about twenty-five people signed up for those. Naturally, there are still some laggards out there, but it's only about seven or eight, so I'll capture them later. I have time since the last session isn't until the 18th.

The good news is that the external microphone I ordered arrived yesterday. It wasn't supposed to get here until next Tuesday, so maybe I can get the voiceover done this weekend. Or not. It occurs to me that with the guinea pigs on Monday, I might want to wait, to see if there are any glaring changes that come out of that session.

We'll see. Then it's the weekend - thank goodness! And it's not going to be blisteringly hot which it has been this week.

Now, though, I need to get running - have a lovely day!

Best~
Philippa

Follow me on Twitter:  https://twitter.com/PhilippaStories

Ephiphany & The Swords of Damocles

It’s four-thirty in the morning and I can’t sleep because it’s still hot, even with the fan in the window and the overhead running. I haven’t got a clue what I’m going to write this morning, and I’ve got two big projects waiting for me at work when I get there. Just like swords dangling, preventing the peasant (me) from resting easy.

Do you know the story of the Sword of Damocles? You’ve probably heard of it, it’s a great little story. In fact, I’ll tell you what I remember of it (it’s been a while so give me a break if you remember different).

There’s this king, see, and he’s got all the kingly problems every king has. Then there’s Damocles, a peasant. He’s outside the castle bitching and moaning and going on and on about what a jerk the king is, how he has it so easy. The king gets tired of hearing all of this stuff, so he has his guards bring the peasant into the castle.

“You think I’ve got it easy, huh?”

“Yep.”

“Well, I don’t. If you’ll join me for dinner tomorrow evening, I’ll explain.”

“Sure, it’s a date.”

Damocles shows up for dinner the next day and there’s a fabulous feast spread out on the table. His mouth is watering. He’s never seen such a spread. But, there’s a bit of a problem. There’s only one chair at the table. Hanging over that chair by a single horsehair is a sword, point down.

“See, Damocles,” says the king, “that sword is like my problems. One little shift, one wrong move and boom it’s all she wrote. Those guys out there, that army on the other side of the border? They’re a problem. I’ve got to feed and clothe my army to defend against them. My soldiers need weapons and…” The king tells Damocles all the headaches he has and Damocles gets it. It isn’t easy being king.

Now, if anyone ever talks to you about the sword of Damocles, you’ll know what it’s about (and you can Google it, if you want – but that’s the gist).

Anyway, back to me and my world. So I’ve got these swords of Damocles and…

Both of these projects “have” to be done by tomorrow, and both are HUGE given the time constraints – each probably at least six or eight hours apiece.

On one I did hedge and told the director requesting it, ‘I’ll do my best’. That’s all anyone can do, so I got started yesterday, got sidetracked by an emergency from another director, but have clear direction. Now, if MS Project will just cooperate, I’ll be fine. It might not be 100%, but I can probably get it to 75% or so, without too much sweat.

See the deal there is that MS Project is being difficult. It keeps crashing. Of course, the fact that I have a file that’s about 100MB doesn’t help. But it crashes and I lose what people have told me about – their task updates – and we all get frustrated. I don’t like being frustrated. I don’t like other people being frustrated. Something has got to change. So I talked to our IT guys and we came up with an idea that might solve the problem.

We’ll take this monster project and break it into three pieces but, of course, it’s not that simple.

Knowing this thing was going to be massive and a problem from the start, I began by creating one file into which I linked each department’s tasks from separate, department specific files. For the past eighteen months or so, it worked well. The data was added to the master file and filtered through to the linked child table. Then it got too big and here we are.

So somehow I’ve got to collect all of the data from all of the tables into one new table from which I will create three separate tables that include elements from each, but it’s not that easy.

I can’t do a save as because there’s no single table to save – there are nine tables, all separate and discrete except for their linkage through the master table. That means I have to copy and paste all of the records from all of the tables into a new table, and make sure they’re in the same order so no one gets confused.

Then I have to verify the data, line by line, to make sure that nothing got lost in the translation, and then I have to make sure that the people and departments responsible still have the responsibility assigned to them in the new table. Meaning I have to recreate the two custom fields I created in the master table, and replicate that data, too.

It’s not rocket science. It’s just challenging and time consuming. Then, once I get that done, I need to do a save as to create one table for the immediate need, another save as for the longer-term goals and a third for the completed tasks. We want to see those completed tasks, to be able to look in the rear-view and see where we’ve been, but they don’t need to be shown in either the current project or long-term goal tables.

I’ve been asked to have that done by tomorrow. Hmm. Dunno if it’s possible but since I hedged, and since I have a clear idea of how to get from here to there, I’ll back-burner it. Set it aside and work on the other, more pressing project.

This is that training I’ve been working on. You know, the PowerPoint with the voice over with which I’ve been struggling.

I never did get the voice over done, which is just as well. I discovered on Tuesday that I have to take what I’ve created, stand it on its head and make it waltz in a different direction because Perception and Reality have not been aligning.

Months ago, our company auditors came in, poked around, saw we had some things but not others and said, ‘you have to get this under control!’

That’s where I come in. I have been tasked with Document Control – which is cool. I like stuff like this. The idea of me doing this surfaced a few months ago after the audit and the discussion of bringing someone in from outside was tossed about and discarded. My participation was kicked around, firmed up, sent through the mill and came out the other side with a stamp of approval. Now I need to introduce it to everyone, but not everyone is thrilled.

The lack of thrill isn’t in the concept, really. I discovered the other day that it’s in the way the concept was introduced. There’s a misconception that requires clarity.

One of the company directors, not the one driving this train, another one, doesn’t see the need. They’ve been clear that they’re less than thrilled and have been, quite honestly, dragging their heels. That was until the other day, when we both had an epiphany.

We were sitting across the table from one another in a meeting with their team when the subject came up again. They said, ‘they’re taking over the world!’ and I said, ‘no we’re not. We’re just here to make sure the world fits the standard.’

See – that’s all it was – a perceptual difference of opinion.

They had not clearly stated their concerns or cause for reluctance, and I had not clearly stated what it really is all about. We both thought we were clear, but the prism between us was refracting The Light of Comprehension in different directions.

So, I explained. ‘No, it is not about me taking over and doing this. It is about me looking at what you create and making sure it fits the standard that’s being set. I can help you, but it’s still your job.’

Epiphany!

But, because of the perceptual difference there, in someone integral to the original discussions, I realized that I have got to make the prism shift crystalline so everyone sees the light. That leaves me with the immediate pressing task of turning this puppy on its head, and making it waltz in that different direction.

I got started yesterday – changing the title slide and starting to re-work the script. But I have got to have it done by tomorrow when I have been asked to do a walk-through for the director charged with getting this going. But that’s okay, too. It will give me a chance to walk through it, to think about what I’m saying, how it’s being said, and seeing how (if) it flows. It will give me greater comfort if I know it’s ready.

Game plan for this: print out what I have in the PowerPoint and the script. Identify the broad strokes that will clarify the goal and then focus down through layers. In the end, everyone has to understand why we’re doing this, how we’re doing this, and what our final goal is so that the process is easy to follow.

Once I get that done, I’ll put both the slide show and the script back together and get it ready for tomorrow by running through it by myself a few times, to make sure it flows, is smooth and conveys what I need it to convey. From there, I’ll have to find a quiet place – not the conference room – where I can do the voice over so we’ll have a training deck ready to go. Maybe back to Plan B - my bedroom over the weekend. Whatever, that can come later, in the final bars of the puppy's waltz.

This should be a fun day – I’m looking forward to it! Hope yours is half as exciting!

Best~

Philippa

Follow me on Twitter:  https://twitter.com/PhilippaStories

Caught on the Horns of a Moral Dilemma

Day before yesterday I spent my drive home thinking. I do that a lot. My favorite places to think are the shower and the car because, for the most part, there's not a whole lot going on in those places. I have to pay attention, but it's not mind bendingly complex at every moment.

Earlier that afternoon, a writer friend of mine and I got into a conversation about our stories. We're both in the midst of editing, so we commiserated. Then he asked me a question about my storyline which led me down the path of character motivation. What drives my character to do as she's doing. Along the way he asked a good, solid and pertinent question about my MC and her potential actions.

In brief, he asked, 'Why not?' and I really didn't have a good answer to give him, in the moment. I tried. I gave him what I thought was a good answer but thinking about it afterward, on my drive home, I realized it was only a partial answer, one that didn't really address the core question.

That realization resulted in my thinking about it some more, and here's what I've concluded:

Melanie, my character, is in London being interviewed because she's written a book that includes a character with traits similar to someone rich and famous. The interviewer brings the man out on stage, surprising (stunning, shocking, horrifying - pick your adjective) Melanie. They get to talking and hit it off (see Monday's post too). Before dropping her back at her hotel, this man, named Gordon, asks her to dinner and she accepts.

That evening, as a surprise, he orders up his private jet and flies her to the south of France where he drives her up to his villa in the hills above the Riviera. This villa was featured in a television show she had been watching when she got the idea for her story and, because it is integral to her book, she talked about it during her interview. While they're there, he charms her and she's more than willing to go along because he's attractive, he's attentive, and 100% everything Melanie's husband isn't.

In her 'real life', Melanie no longer loves her husband, Patrick. She doesn't even like him and, if they met in her now, he's not someone to whom she would give more than the time of day.

He's a dead-weight, but she can't divorce him for very good reasons. They sleep in separate bedrooms and, in the framework of my story, have nothing in common except an address, shared bank account, creditors, last name and the comfort of familiarity. There is no marriage left. It has been eroded by her disgust of him and his attitudes toward her.

Patrick calls her stupid and lazy. Whenever anything doesn't go quite right or pokes his 'Anger' button, he goes off on long rants about whatever it is. There's no conversation, no back-and-forth - it's a straight one-sided diatribe to which she is expected to pay attention, and respond, even though it's all opinion and nothing to which she can respond, except by an 'uh-huh' or nod.

When it comes to her writing, her one creative outlet and passion, he tells her, at every turn, that the stories she writes are garbage and worse. It is, in short, a one-sided and somewhat abusive marriage, and she's stuck in it.

Back in France with Melanie and Gordon. Before their evening ends, I'm caught in my dilemma.

He seems to be attracted to her, at least physically (since this is all her first-person I can only allude to and hint at what he's thinking). He's attentive, charming, and appears to be interested in something more about her than her bulges and curves.

They're talking together, having an honest to God conversation - something she never gets at home, and she's enjoying it. Beyond the simple pleasure of sharing ideas and thoughts and opinions, she's attracted to him. Before they finish their dinner, she wants nothing more than to explore the space under the blankets on his bed.

Okay, okay, and a little more. She wants to jump his bones, get down and dirty with him. Okay? But she can't.

Or can she?

At home, Melanie has an empty marriage. It has been dead for almost all of it, but she has her pride, her ethics and a commitment she made, no matter how empty it has become.

If she goes to bed with Gordon what would she have after it was over?

Pride would be gone, along with ethics and her commitment to something that once held promise and hope.

Even if she didn't feel guilty, all she would have would be memories of a time out of time and, most likely, remorse for what could never be (as far as she knows).

It would be a pointless exercise, physically pleasurable but without meaning. An act as empty as the exercise of her everyday living. Since she already has empty in her marriage, she doesn't want more of the same in her memories of what should be a special time.

Melanie's dream is to meet someone as an equal, to engage with them on more levels than the simply physical or the purely subservient. She wants to share interests and goals, to be able to converse and participate in a back-and-forth supportive relationship where she cares for and about her partner at least as much as her partner cares for and about her.

In the moment, the time of deciding and waiting for things to change enough for her to strike out on her own, her dearest wishes are first, to stand on her own two feet for a time, to discover who she is, apart from her identity as Patrick Taylor's wife. She wants to recover and rediscover the Melanie that's been subsumed by her wife-to-Patrick role, and find out who the person she's been kept from being by her family's demands really is.

She wants to travel, for herself, to go to the places Patrick has already said he has zero interest in seeing. After having been burdened by a man who shares no interests with her, she wants to take time to do, exclusively, what interests her without the weight and drag to which she's been subjected.

Then she wants to meet someone new, someone who will meet her halfway and share at least some of her interests and appreciate her passions, even if they are not his. She doesn't want to live on the terms someone else lays out one-hundred percent of the time. She is willing to compromise, a lot at times if necessary, but she wants to be able to live on or by her own terms at least occasionally.

She would like the freedom, within a partnering relationship, to be able to pursue her interests - writing, the theater, travel - without having her partner pooh-pooh or deride those interests, or flat out say she 'can't' do things she wants to do.

At home, with Patrick, there is no conversation. There is only one-sided dissertation. Patrick wants to hear nothing from her but assent and agreement. They have no interests in common. He talks only about what interests him, and spends hours of time each day talking about how screwed up the world has become while Melanie stands by as a captive audience.

She is not asked or expected to participate in his diatribes. She is not allowed to dispute or disagree. It is strictly a smile and nod participation unless she wants a fight - at which point he will always accuse her of 'not being on the same page' and, all too often, throw out the threat of divorce. Because of things he has done within the finances, that would leave her bereft of almost all that she has worked for her entire life.

Patrick talks a good game about the future, but she knows that her future with him is, at best, bleak. He's an alcoholic. He doesn't take care of himself to the point that at less than sixty years old, he can't walk more than about three hundred yards without everything threatening to explode or fall off. When he does walk or stand for any length of time, he's just about incapacitated for hours or days after.

Her picture of what's coming is not encouraging. By the time she's ready to retire and do the traveling they have talked about for thirty-plus years, he's going to be in either a scooter or a wheelchair. Which will restrict her even more. From being a wife, she will devolve further - to being his nursemaid. A role she has already fulfilled to his mother who lives with them. She doesn't want to spend however many years she has left being an unpaid, unloved and unappreciated nurse. She wants more.

Given that background, and the current moment on the lawn of a virtual stranger's villa in the south of France, what should she do?

Realistically, she has no future with this man. It would be a physical act of a moment with nothing ahead of her. More like dogs rutting on the sidewalk than the kind of deeper relationship she craves and dreams about. If she does as she wants to do, gets naked with him and climbs into his bed, what she's going home to will be commensurately more bleak. She will have those memories, and nothing else - mist in a bottle that leaks - and profound regret for what cannot be.

If she doesn't, then nothing fundamentally changes. She can cling to her pride and her morals, the vacant promise of 'cleaving' given what her marriage has become. There will be remorse for what was missed, but no regret for what could never, to her certain knowledge, be.

And there are the horns. To be or not to be, that is the dilemma.

To be faithful, despite misery and emptiness, or to be brazen and then have to live with the knowledge of empty.

It's a tough call and, because of this dissertation and what I know in my story, I'm going to go with it as it is. She's going to give in, to take a goodly swipe at the golden ring of momentary happiness because, then, she will at least have the memories. Even if it isn't right or moral or whatever, she'll take the leaky bottle of memory as validation that she does have worth.


Now I have to get writing, to explain all of this to my readers so they don't get knotted up and offended. In the meantime, I wish you guys and gals a lovely day!

Best~
Philippa

Follow me on Twitter: https://twitter.com/PhilippaStories

What Is It All About? A Trip to Nuts.

I had this all ready to go, and then thought I would do something else in answer to a serious question asked by a friend.

But, on my way to work this morning, I realized that my answer to the serious question is more complex than at first blush. It deserves deeper thought, so I'm not ready with my response. Which means I'm back to this post that I wrote last night in response to something else.

So we're clear, if you haven’t found the theme in my blog, it’s because there is none. I write what I feel like writing when I feel like writing about it. I write about what’s happening in my world and what’s interesting to me.

Take yesterday, for instance and, in protective response here's my disclaimer before I get started:

I have worked for a lot of different companies in many different industries. I have worked for two different Fortune Five companies (Bank of America and General Electric), I have worked for a Fortune 100 company (General Dynamics). I have worked at start-ups, with entrepreneurs and for small business owners. I have worked in banking, finance, construction design, chemical manufacturing, dental service and food service. I have seen stuff like what I'm about to describe happen in more than one place. It is not unique. It is not isolated. It is, in fact, human nature at a weak point.

Now, with that out of the way:

At work we have what should be a fairly simple event taking place. It involves several departments all working together toward a common goal. The goal is getting rid of old business records, having them destroyed.

Simple, right?

Hardly.

Department A and B provided counts of the storage boxes in which their records are kept. Department C did too, but it was “late” according to Department A that is driving this exercise. Therefore, since it was “late” because the person who was responsible for providing the count was traveling on business and didn’t get back to the office until after the deadline, Department A has declared that Department C can’t be included in the event.

At this point, if you’re anything like me, you’re shaking your head, too. After all, I am a person who likes to get things done. When it comes to definite goals and the fact that things sometimes (almost always) slip, I accept it. It’s part of life and living. Whining, bitching, moaning, bullshitting, complaining and waffling are not going to get the job done. So I don’t do those things. What I will do is sigh, roll my eyes and then do what I can to make it happen.

If there’s an obstacle, time in this case since the ‘deadline’ for notifying Department A of how many boxes Departments B and C have to be shredded has passed, I work around it. I do not say, ‘Nope, sorry. Can’t be done.’

That response, or one like it, drives me nuts! With that attitude I get to Nuts faster than with just about anything else.

Well, guess what happened? Yep. Someone said those five despicable words.

Which are nonsense, because it can be done with just a little bit of effort.

In this case, all it would take is a sigh, a heavy-duty roll of the eyes, moving the hand, picking up the handset on the phone and making a simple, three minute phone call a la ‘Hello? Yes, that order we placed, we’ve found a few more boxes. Can we add them?’

Do you really think the company that’s in the business of shredding documents cares how many boxes you add to an order? No, because they’re charging for the service – they’re making money on it so, for them, it’s probably a case of the more the merrier.

Is it inconvenient? Perhaps.

Will it cost more? Probably.

Will that additional cost be significant? Probably not.

Is this recalcitrance (it’s not reluctance – there’s no hedging here) because this individual just can’t be arsed to get it done? That’s my guess.

Why? I have no idea.

This is a definite goal and the end-zone is clear and well defined. It isn’t rocket science, for God’s sake! They’re boxes of paper, so what’s the hold-up?

In the meantime, swirling around my head shaking, sighing and rolling eyeballs, everyone else is pointing fingers, laying blame and basically running in pointless circles. Because I am as I am, I stepped into the middle and tried to get it done.

I went online, found the company, chatted with a representative and posited, if this, then what? According to the online agent, a phone call is all it would take.

To avoid making this confusion worse, I then contacted the head of Department A and said, ‘here’s what I’ve done, here’s the answer, now I’m out of it and I’ll let you guys deal with it’.

I still don’t know if anything’s been done, but I am currently standing in Nuts, shaking my head and wondering, ‘why?’

Now, let’s take this scenario and smooth it out.

Instead of one person standing in the middle of the road with a hand up in the air stop sign style, and a blizzard of e-mails whizzing back and forth in the background, expanding to include others from other places and departments, let’s just say this happened:

‘Hi, Department A, I have sixteen boxes to add to that order. Is it too late?’

‘I don’t know, let me check.’

Phone call.

‘Hello, can we add sixteen boxes to our order? We can? Great! How much extra will that be? Oh, that much? That's not too bad, thanks.’

‘Hello, Department C. There’s no problem with that, so just make sure they’re ready to go.’

That is ten minutes, tops and no blizzard, no running in circles for hours, frustration, irritation, finger pointing or anything else. It just got done except for collecting the boxes into the collection point.

Why is that so hard?

Is it a control thing? Is it some inter-departmental rivalry that’s making everyone else’s life harder? I don’t get it, I really don’t. And it’s at times like this when I wish, really truly wish, it was my responsibility because then it would get done, without the drama and pointless exercise.

Oh well, this too shall pass and then there will be something else, right?

In the meantime, take a valium for me and have a chilled out day. While you do that, I’m going to get an icepack for the whiplash I developed as a result of all that head shaking and do some more serious thinking about my answer to the question that was asked.

Best~

Philippa

Follow me on Twitter: https://twitter.com/PhilippaStories

Monday Morning Catch-up

So much stuff. Just all sorts of odds and ends, loose flappers hanging out there after the culinary exercise of yesterday.

I got to bed later than I should have last night - nearly 10:30 - so I'm just on the narrow edge of being tired. Not really tired, just almost, aware of it.

There's no good reason for that, but hubby seemed a bit testy when I was thinking of going upstairs. Our cat, Sam, got restless at about nine o'clock and started crawling all over me. It's his normal, 'Mom, I'm tired. Can you put me to bed now?' routine so I got up to put him to bed.

'Where are you going?'

'I'm putting Sam to bed.'

'No you're not. You're going upstairs to go play on that damned computer.'

Apparently he didn't see that 'damned computer' was closed and sitting on the coffee table while I had a cat and his blanket in my arms.

'No, I'm putting the cat to bed and I'll be back.'

'Why now? It's only nine-fifteen.'

'I have a cat crawling all over me, sticking his nose in my face. He wants to go to bed. I'll be back when I'm done.'

'Good night.' in snotty tone.

Given that, it was easier to stay up than have our evening devolve into any more of a stupid argument so, despite the fact that I would have preferred to go to bed, I got Sam set up and went back downstairs.

An hour later, when I think it's safe, I get up to go to bed and he says, 'I didn't expect you to stay up this late. Nine-thirty would have been okay.'

Uh... Cat-to-bed took fifteen minutes so I would have come back downstairs, said 'good night' and had an argument if I had gone to bed at nine-thirty. Sometimes I just can't win for losing.

So I went up to bed. Got to sleep and woke up a little later because I was too hot. Blankets off, overhead fan on, reposition and fall asleep again. Then, at 12:38, some idiot in the condo complex across the parkway decided it was a brilliant time to light off left-over fireworks. Not firecrackers. Fireworks. The kind that fly up into the sky and burst, like a child's version of the real grup fireworks that go off after baseball games, for Fourth of July, etc.

Hubby came in to make sure that the fireworks hadn't woken me by saying, 'I hope they didn't wake you up.'

So many answers to that, but I bit my tongue and muttered something. I'm not even sure what, but he left and I got back to sleep. For a little while, before I got too hot (I had pulled the blankets back over me at some point).

Hot - cold - hot - cold all night.

Needless to say, the past eight hours haven't been ideal and I'm starting my Monday off a little tired. It'll be okay, but I could do with more sleep. Maybe tonight? Maybe not. It's supposed to warm up this week, into the 90's tomorrow through Friday. Oh yay. Hot days and warm nights and not a lot of good sleep.

Geez. What a whiner I am this morning!

Oh, and here's another one for you. You know that story I've been talking about for the past few days? The one with all the adverbs that's in need of a good edit?

Well, I've gotten up to chapter seven and have been taking out almost all the adverbs that I've found. I also took out all that excess back-story that isn't relevant to this one except as set-up. Now, instead of being at 119,059 words, I'm up to 119,700 something. I'm not even sure how that happened but there  I am and, at this point, I've boxed myself into a corner.

See, my MC is married and miserable in it. She's written a book about which her husband sneers and basically says 'it's crap'. Still, the book is good enough that it's gotten attention. First, on local morning programs, then L.A. and New York and, from there, she's invited to an interview in London. What she doesn't know is that the host of the London program has a trick up her sleeve.

Along with my MC, this morning show host has invited the man upon whom my MC has modeled the main male character in her book. It's the kind of prank this woman likes to play on her guests. Because the man is successful, high-profile, wealthy and famous, there's going to be traction around the viewers' breakfast tables, and friction when the trick is played, and great ratings.

My MC is introduced and the interview starts. They're in the middle of it when, from the wings, comes this man. Of course, my MC is stunned, shocked, humiliated and all the horrible sick sinking feelings anyone normal would have in a situation like that. Imagine it. You've been talking about this person, saying how attractive you think they are, that you've fantasized about them and taken your impressions of them and used them in a story. Then boom, without warning, you're confronted by them.

You can't run away. You're standing in the middle of a television studio with the cameras rolling, publicly humiliated, and you have to just suck it up and stick it out. First, you just stare at him, like Bambi in the high-beams. Then your brain kicks in - you've opened yourself up, made yourself vulnerable by speaking as you have, even though nothing bad was said. It's just that inner you who's standing naked on the stage.

This person sees that you're all screwed up and takes pity.

So that's the set-up. From there, they get to talking. She shows she has spunk and character, sticks the moment out and turns it around.

The interview ends and this man invites my MC to breakfast. He doesn't have anything on schedule that morning, he hates being bored, and he's interested in hearing more about her.

Nothing untoward, nothing too far fetched. They have breakfast and spend the morning together. While they're talking, he becomes more intrigued by her and about the stories she's written. When they get back to her hotel where he'll drop her off, he invites her to dinner. She accepts. That evening, he flys her to his villa in France - the one with the lovely swimming pool, deck and lawn. (Trust me, it's integral to the story thus far.) They have dinner, still talking like good friends.

During dinner she talks about some erotic art she included in the story that got her to where she is. There's nothing described in either story, nothing explicit, but he's curious about them, asks to see them. After dinner they go inside, she gets on the internet and shows him.

His actions, moving closer, leaning over her, almost touching her, make her nervous (read 'aroused'). He backs off and offers her a chance to go for a swim. She takes him up on it, hoping the water is cold (you know, the cold shower routine). After her swim, she goes to lie on the lawn under the stars and watch the Milky Way float by. He joins her and that's where I am, in my corner.

I have two options with this. I can make her out to be an adulteress who no one will respect. Or I can take her right up to the edge of the abyss and deny her the jumping off. Which, the more I think about this, is the way I'm going to play it.

Hey! Thank you. That was a great help and my way is clear.

I'm off to get started on this and I hope you have a lovely day!

Best~
Philippa

Follow me on Twitter: https://twitter.com/PhilippaStories

Chow Mein Sunday

This has been a good Sunday.

I slept well last night, woke up reasonably early, and got started. Got the laundry going, emptied the dishwasher, got my mother-in-law’s pills done for the week, took care of the cat, made the bed and was ready to start cooking up my stir-fry by eight o’clock. After getting the cooking done, I spent several hours editing and writing before starting this. Which is why this is being posted so late in the day.

I'm looking forward to eating pork chow mein for lunch this week. It is really good! Yep – I cheated and had some. The best part of it is that it cost me about $11 to make, but I’ve got plenty for at least ten or eleven meals. At a buck a meal, that’s pretty good value. It’s great being a cheap date!

In case you’re interested (this recipe takes less time to write than it does to make), here’s how I did it. That’s a bit like:

Only it’s better.

One pack chow mein noodles

One pork tenderloin about four pounds, slivered (1/4-inch thick strips)

One head (head, not clove) of garlic, peeled.

Two medium sweet onions, chunked

Three small fresh jalapeno peppers, sliced (optional)

Two red bell peppers, seeded and chunked

Ten large mushrooms, chunked

Two baby bok choy

Six stalks of celery, chopped and soaked

Bamboo shoots, one can, drained well

Salt – just a little, for the meat

White pepper, to taste

Turmeric, to taste (because it’s really, really good for you!)

Chinese Five Spice, to taste

Powdered cloves, to taste

Vietnamese Garlic Sauce

Soy Sauce

Sesame oil (this is for flavor)

Peanut oil (this is for cooking)

Yeah, it’s a lot of prep, but with how much this makes and how good it tastes, it’s worth it. Get out a lot of small bowls. One for each veggie that’s big enough to hold as much of that veggie as you’re going to make. It makes dealing with the cooking easier if everything is separated before you start. You’ll also need a great big bowl to hold all of this stuff as you go and once it’s all cooked. You’ll also need a big kettle or stockpot because this is pretty much a one pot meal. Except for the bowls, those are extra.

Before we get started, just so you know, I don’t follow recipes. I like to be creative so I fly by the seat of my pants. The worst case scenario is that it probably won’t kill me. Everything I add is edible and it will probably still be edible when I’m done.

Given the edibility of everything, I’m not going to measure or suggest how much of anything to use because this is your deal, not mine. You need to cook this so you like it because, unless you invite me for dinner, you’re going to eat this. So you’re on your own with the measuring.

When I say ‘spice’ I mean add as much or as little as you like. If you want to use something other than I’ve listed here, go for it. Okay, we got that?

First, cook the noodles in oiled and salted water (the little bit of oil, about two tablespoons worth – and I use olive oil – keeps the pasta from sticking together). Keep an eye on them and stir them a few times. They cook quickly, about five minutes. Once they’re cooked, dump them into a colander or large sieve and rinse them under cold water, then let them drain while you do the rest of the stuff. I just leave them in the colander on top of a plate. They’ll dry, but that’s okay because no one likes soupy chow mein.

Next, because it’s easy, open and drain the bamboo shoots. Just cut the lid off the can, hold the lid in place, leaving a gap, and drain them. No need to waste a sieve or strainer for them. Just get as much of the liquid off as you can, without making a production out of it (if there’s a little left, that’s okay).

I prep the veggies first, so I’m not doing the veggie-prep (like a new dance move) on a board on which I’ve prepped the raw meat. That’s icky.

Peel the garlic head and separate the cloves of garlic. Take one clove at a time and lay the blade of a large kitchen knife flat on top of it. Keep the blade flat with the cutting edge away from you so you don’t cut your hand. Smack each clove sharply. If you do it right, you won’t demolish the garlic clove (it’ll taste the same if you do, but it’s better not to), but it will burst the skin making it easier to peel. Peel them and put them in a bowl.

To chunk onions, peel them (like, DUH!). Trim the top and root. Cut it in half, through the axis. Take one half and lay it flat. Cut it in half across the middle. Turn the halves together, keeping them flat, and cut those two halves three times so you end up with six sections. Those are chunks. That’s how you do it. Do the other half and the other onion and put them into a bowl.

Next, chunk the red peppers. Slice the seeded bell peppers along the seams. Finish cleaning them out and then slice each section into three strips, then cut the strips crosswise, in half. They are chunked. Put ‘em in a bowl and set ‘em aside.

If you’re adding the jalapenos, use rubber or plastic gloves to handle them. As you probably know, you do not want jalapeno juice on your fingers or hands. Even if you don’t have a cut, it can irritate your skin and if you get it in your eyes, I swear – you will wish you had never been born! Slice ‘em and put them in a bowl. Wash the rubber gloves with soap and get rid of them.

Wash the mushrooms and trim the bottom of the stem. Cut each mushroom into chunks. You’re on your own because I don’t know if you like big chunks or little ones and, since you’re eating this, do as you will. Put them into a bowl (are you seeing the theme here?).

Rinse the bok choy well. Peel the leaves and clean the bases, wash the tops. I like the stem part, not the leaf part, so I usually cut the tops of the leaves, keeping most of it but getting rid of the tops. Slice the bigger stems into two or three strips. Get a bowl and…

Trim the tops and bottoms of the celery stalks and slice them into pieces as large or as small as you like. I just cut them across the stem, about 1/2-inch or so wide. Now this, because I like crispy celery, is where I add water to the bowl in which these are going to wait.

A way of keeping celery fresh for longer is to stand it up in a pitcher and add fresh water before you stick it in the refrigerator. You know those stringy things inside celery stalks? Those are tubes and water gets sucked up inside, making the stalks crisper. Like a straw you used to play with when you were a kid. This is the same idea while the celery hangs around, waiting for its turn in the pan.

Now, spend a bit of quality time with your meat. Slice it and dice it until you end up with a bunch of strips about 1/4-inch on a side and a few inches long. I keep the 12 quart stockpot in which all of this is going to be cooked handy and just toss the slices in as I go.

This is a rare time when I use salt. Not a lot – just a little.  Put the kettle on the burner and turn it on. Pork has a lot of water in it, so you don’t need to add oil or water or anything just yet. Cook it on medium low. It’s pork, so you have to cook it all the way through and slow is better. Salt it and let it go for a few minutes, stirring whenever you feel like it.

I like spices, so I’ll add some white pepper, turmeric, powdered cloves, and Chinese five spice at this point. I’ll also add some of the sesame oil because I like the flavor. Just add a little. The goal is not to grease this pig. It’s just to add the taste of the sesame oil.

Once the meat starts to brown and you’ve turned it a couple of times, put a lid on it for a few minutes. Let the seasoning cook into the meat until the meat is done through.

Spoon the meat out of the pan, leaving the liquid behind, and put the meat into that great big bowl I asked you to get out and set it aside. Pour the liquid from the pan, right down the sink and put the pan back on the burner, turn the heat to medium.

Put a little peanut oil into the pan and let it warm up. When it thins, spread it around and toss in the garlic cloves. Let them cook, stirring a couple of times, and add the jalapenos.

Cook those for a couple of minutes (you want to take some of the garlic out of the garlic and some of the heat out of the jalapenos, so be patient).

Toss the onion into the pan and let that cook for a few minutes, stirring.

Drain the celery and add it, cooking for another couple of minutes. Add some more spices, however much you feel like and stir it all up. Let it cook for a couple of minutes, stirring. Once you’re happy with the way these are cooked, take them from the pan and add them to the meat and stir it up so the flavors blend.

Add a little more peanut oil to the pan – you don’t want to get crazy, just add enough to keep the ‘shrooms and peppers from sticking. Add the ‘shrooms and get them started. Once they’ve had a minute or two and you’ve stirred them around, add the red bell peppers and go for another three or four minutes, until the peppers start to look cooked. Splash some soy sauce over them, maybe add some more spice if you feel like it, and cook them for a bit longer.

Once you’re happy with the way they look, dump in the bok choy. You don’t want to cook this to death – it’s good to have some texture when you’re done, so go easy. Just cover the pan for about a minute or a minute-and-a-half, and then take the lid off. Pour back in all the other stuff you’ve already cooked, except the noodles, and stir it up.

Add about two or three tablespoons of the Vietnamese Garlic Sauce – it’s potent so if you don’t like heat, use a little less – maybe one or two, but it’s good stuff so be brave and at least add some! Mix it in well and let everything blend together for a couple of minutes, stirring so the heat gets mixed through.

Add a bit more soy sauce and cook it for another minute, still stirring.

When you think it’s done, start spooning this creation out, into that great big bowl that’s big enough to hold it all, letting the liquid drain off, back into the pot. Don’t get rid of this liquid – you’re going to cook the noodles in it for a couple of minutes.

Once all the veggies and the meat are in the bowl, let the sauce in the pan cook down for a minute or two. Add the noodles and heat them up. After a minute or two, turn them over. They’re going to be solidified into whatever shape the colander had, so just treat it like a pancake and do your best to flip it over. Try to separate them a little once they heat, but don’t re-cook them.

Once the liquid is absorbed, pour the meat and veggie mixture back into the pot and mix it all together. When it’s heated through, take it out and put it into that bowl you have that’s big enough for everything and, except for the clean-up, you’re done.

So that’s how I did it. I hope you enjoy it and have a wonderful time trying this recipe. Better still, I hope you enjoy it!

Best~

Philippa

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