~Getting to know the~

~Petit Fours and Hot Tamales Crew~

February’s Spotlight is on Marilyn Baron

Who are the ladies of the Petit Fours and Hot Tamales Blog?  Why should you spend your precious time reading our daily posts?  Why do we want you to follow us and read our books, our personal blogs, our FB status updates and our Tweets?  Let us tell you why…

Once upon a time ~ ~

I read Laura Ingalls Wilder’s Little House books and decided I wanted to be a writer. I wrote my first “book” in 4^th grade. Called “East-West Island,” it featured all of the children in my class and the teacher read it in installments. I wrote the scripts for the school assemblies; was co-editor of my junior high school newspaper; and feature editor of my high school paper. I received a B.S. in Journalism [Major in Public Relations] and minored in Creative Writing at University of Florida. 

How many “careers” have you had throughout your lifetime?

During high school and college, I sold popcorn at a movie theater; worked in the Credit Department at Sears; and at Kresge’s scooping ice cream, making subs and making announcements over the PA at the jewelry counter. Maybe that’s why I love jewelry so much. I also spent one summer working as a reservationist at the Downingtown Inn and Golf Club in Downingtown, Pennsylvania. I lived on the property in a setting much like the resort in “Dirty Dancing.”

My first job out of college was in the Public Relations Department of AT&T Long Lines in employee communications—as editor of the Southern Region newsletter; then in media relations, community relations, marketing support and special events planning. I was with AT&T for 12 years. I spent a year doing employee communications and media relations for the Florida Department of Offender Rehabilitation in Tallahassee, Florida. My husband always jokes that I was in the prison system. For nine years I was principal/owner of the Atlanta-based PR firm Baron Leatherbury, Inc. Corporate Communications, and for 18 years I headed my own PR firm, Baron Communications, Inc., handling such projects as annual reports, employee and marketing communications, brochures, newsletters, direct mail, copywriting, ad design and copy development. Corporate clients have included AT&T, AT&T of Puerto Rico, AT&T of the Virgin Islands, AT&T Network Systems, Lucent Technologies, Georgia-Pacific, Mirant, Georgia Power, Southern Company, Emory Healthcare and a variety of smaller companies in real estate and other fields.

My husband and I live in Roswell and we have two daughters—one in Atlanta and the other in New York.

What is your current “day” job?

I am owner of Baron Communications, Inc. Public Relations. Services I provide include copywriting and editing for newsletters, brochures, the Web, advertising and other special projects, primarily for health care clients.

What advice would you give someone just starting to dip their toe into the writing world?

Keep writing. Never give up hope. Someone once told me you’ll be successful if you’re the last one standing.

Why you should read my books?

Whether they’re romantic suspense, thrillers, women’s fiction or paranormal, my books and short stories have one thing in common—humor. I like to make people laugh and I use humor even when confronting serious issues. My women’s fiction, The Edger, which I coauthored with my sister, Sharon Goldman, is a perfect example of how the heroine maintains her sense of humor despite a crumbling marriage and other obstacles. I also tend to write about older characters, since, let’s face it, we’re not getting any younger. The Edger is unusual because it features paintings and artwork by my sister, who is an award-winning artist in Florida.

http://sgoldmanart.com/contact.htm

What is a typical writing day like for you—from the time you get up to the time you go to bed?

I wake up around 5:30 a.m., shower and watch Squawk Box on CNBC with my husband while we’re getting ready for the day. Then we have breakfast and I get started when he leaves for work. The first thing I do is read the Petit Fours and Hot Tamales blog and comment. I’m very deadline oriented. If I have a project deadline for one of my PR clients—whether that’s producing a physician’s newsletter or editing an annual report—or a writing deadline, like a guest blog, I feel compelled to finish that job before I can do anything else. Once the deadline is out of the way, I devote the rest of the day to writing, with breaks for lunch and snacks (too many of those).

Currently, I’m doing revisions for my WWII thriller “Under the Moon Gate.” When I turn in those revisions, I will complete my romantic suspense “Sixth Sense.” On the horizon, my sister and I are working on a musical about Alzheimer’s. She’s already written some of the songs. Now I have to write the play. Around the time of a release, I spend most of the day on marketing. I do my best work in the morning. I used to be able to stay up late at night writing, but now after dinner, I pretty much relax (fall asleep) on the couch watching TV or reading. Then, since I’ve gotten about three hours sleep in front of the TV, I’ll read until I fall asleep. Anytime I am at a stopping point during the day or at night before I go to bed, I’ll check Facebook. Since I’m running a PR business, I do spend time answering my e-mails because I want to be accessible.

What is your most rewarding experience since being published? 

I think it was when I walked into my local library and the librarians all rushed up to me and said they saw an article about me and my new book The Edger in the local Roswell newspaper and they said, “That’s our patron!” That was thrilling. And they asked if I knew that the library has a visiting author program. And I said, yes, a lot of my friends in Georgia Romance Writers have given talks at the library that I’ve attended. It made me feel like a real author.  

What’s a little-known fact about you no one would suspect?

I love the Young and the Restless and The Bold and the Beautiful. I tape the soaps and watch them every day. It helps me hone my dialogue, my favorite part of writing. I am a snoop. I use snippets of everything I overhear anywhere, in grocery stores, malls, at dinner, the beauty parlor, etc. No one is safe, except my sister’s family because she forbids me to write about her (not the sister who coauthored The Edger).

Anything else?

I love the beach. I get some of my best creative ideas sitting on the balcony staring at the ocean. I love to travel. I spent six months in college living in Florence, Italy, where I took Italian, Art History, Religion and Mythology classes and traveled around Europe sightseeing and eating, mostly spaghetti. I love to read and am never without a book.

The Edger is available at:

Amazon Kindle ASIN: B006Y3P12Y

Barnes & Noble Nook Books and

Smashwords ISBN: 978-1-4659-7621-5

Marilyn’s Angel Trilogy—A Choir of Angels, Follow an Angel and The Stand-in Bridegroom—humorous, supernatural e-short stories—debuted last year with TWB Press, a small publisher specializing in science fiction, supernatural, horror and thriller stories

http://www.twbpress.com/achoirofangels.html

Please stop by and say hi at:

Petit Fours and Hot Tamales www.petitfoursandhottamales.com

and at the Roswell Patch http://roswell.patch.com/search?keywords=marilyn+baron

Facebook Author Page at http://www.facebook.com/#!/pages/Marilyn-Baron/286807714666748

Follow me on Twitter at http://twitter.com/#!/MarilynBaron.

What Marilyn’s friends have to say~

Something you might not know about Marilyn? She’s not your average foodie; she’s a pastrami connoisseur, an old-school purist who appreciates the real deal. ~~~ Although she doesn’t have a sense of smell, she is amazing at capitalizing on her others senses and this shines through in her writing.  ~~~ Marilyn is a strong, confident woman.  This is something she has passed along to her daughters.  ~~~ She is an incredibly ambitious woman who doesn’t sit around waiting for life to find her. 

~BONUS REVIEW~

The Edger

By Marilyn Baron and Sharon Goldman

Reviewed by Anna Steffl, GRW President

Publisher: Amazon Digital Services

Genre: Women’s fiction with elements of murder, mystery and romance.

Length: 70K + words

Publisher’s Blurb:

The Edger is a humorous Women’s Fiction about landscape artist Alexandra Newborn’s shocking reunion with her college art professor, Nick Anselmo—once a celebrated Italian artist, now a homeless lawn man—which sows the seeds for murder, mystery and romance. In gratitude for food, art materials and company, Nick, or The Edger, as Alex comes to think of him, drops off a new sketch in front of Alex’s house every week when he comes to do her lawn. Nick’s provocative artwork is the key to revealing a dangerous liaison between Alex’s husband, Mark, and Bitsy Diamond, owner of the gallery where Alex dreams of having a one-woman show. When a deadly hurricane takes a dangerous turn the night of Nick’s opening, Mark’s body washes up behind Bitsy’s beach house, leaving readers to wonder whodunit?

Review

“The pieces of the puzzle finally fit together as her life began to fall apart.” Marilyn Baron, The Edger

The hardest thing about writing a book review is not giving away too much of the story. That’s especially the case with The Edger, a women’s fiction novel by Marilyn Baron and illustrated by Sharon Goldman. Let’s just say that any book opening with a drawing of a rabbit isn’t going to be what it seems. Just ask Alice.

The Edger opens with heroine Alexandra (Alex). She’s a 40-year-old artist in denial that her marriage and art lack passion. She compulsively fills the void in her life with stuff that turns to clutter, both physical and mental. Who better to show her the worthlessness of the stuff and propel her to rediscover her love of painting than a homeless yardman who was also once a world-famous artist? The Edger of the title, he is named both for a tool of his trade and for the fact that he now lives on the edge of society. The complication is that the Edger, Nick, was a professor with whom Alex once nearly had a relationship.

So, you think that’s it. We’re going to see these people fall in love. The author does do an admirable job of unfolding the relationship between Alex and Nick without damaging the morals of either character. As much as Alex is stirred by new-found passion, she stays true to a marriage about which she’s only slowly learning the truth. Too, the writing in Alex’s point of view, often gently humorous, is endearing. In a moment of revelation, Alex comes to see her life in terms of the accumulated stuff around her: “A food processor that blended a homogenous mix of unfulfilled dreams. A food processor that didn’t inspire passion.”

But, dear reader, the expertly handled relationship is not all you’re going to get. The way in which Alex finds out the truth about her marriage and the value of her art is a page-turning journey down a twisting and turning rabbit hole in which nothing is what it seems–not the diamond bracelet, the art show, or even Nick’s drawings.

Just follow the rabbit for a riveting read.

Petit Four Rating: 4

Hot Tamale Rating: 1

Check out another great review of The Edger on Amazon by AJ Kirby, award-winning author of Paint this town Red, Perfect World, and Bully.

http://www.amazon.com/The-Edger-ebook/product-reviews/B006Y3P12Y/ref=sr_1_1_cm_cr_acr_txt?ie=UTF8&showViewpoints=1

The Edger was also named Book of the Month on Kirby’s PAINTTHISTOWNRED blog site.

http://paintthistownred.wordpress.com/

You say, “Thongs don’t get in a wad.  They…er…shimmy deep into the Mariana Trench.”  I say, “Check out the thong I crushed to the size of a gumball and flung on the bedroom floor.” It’s in a wad. I dare say I’m not the first woman to get a thong in a wad.

Who invented the thong, anyway? They look good on three women. Three. If you’re one of the three, good for you. Wear your thong with gusto under those white shorts. For the rest of us, they’re just another reason to feel crappy about ourselves.

Top reasons thongs suck for 99.99% of women:

The side string ALWAYS burrows deep into the hip fat. It makes you look like a Big Mac.

The tiny front is like spreading a picnic blanket on the lawn.

Lawn maintenance. Unless you want the wax job to “look like a baby,” you’ll body-double a Sasquatch with a stray band-aid stuck on its nether parts.

The back string goes in a place strings shouldn’t go — the Mariana Trench. I don’t want to hear about the exploratory submarine that visited the trench.  I’m a total prude.

Now, on the other hand, men love their women in thongs — even when the woman looks like a hirsute Big Mac when wearing one. They’re totally “on” just over the idea of a thong. I think part of the male brain exists in a Platonic state. I don’t mean a sexless relationship. I mean they accept the notion that the idea of a thing is the real thing. All chairs exist in the pattern of the idea of a chair, the one real chair.  Their hirsute Big Mac Mama is in the pattern of the airbrushed Victoria’s Secret model. There’s no other way I can explain it.

Still, I can’t oblige.

So, has your thong ever been in a wad?

Grab a pencil and paper. We’re taking a test. It’ll be enlightening AND fun, I promise.

Instructions: Jot down answers.   Don’t read the text following the picture, or any of the  blog comments,  until you’ve finished writing your answers.  Ready?

1. Name a color. Write three adjectives that describe the color.

2. Name an animal. Write three adjectives that describe the animal.

3. Name a body of water. Write three adjectives that describe the body of water.

4. Imagine you’re in a white room without windows or doors. Write three adjectives describing how you feel about being in the room.

Be a nice blog-reader and enter your answers in the comment section.

Here’s what your answers “mean.”

1. How you view yourself.

2. How you think other people view you.

3. What sex is to you.

4. Your feelings about death.

Interesting, huh?

Now you writers who are reading this, can you answer these questions for your characters?  If you can, you’re staring into the glossy black eyes of the mother-of-all  literary devices — symbolism.  Do you use it? Consciously? Unconsciously? Care to share an example?

P.S. Thanks for commenting and letting me and your blog-friends  get to know the symbolic  you.

Which sentence is more true:

A. Everybody thinks thinks they can write a book because they’ve read books.

B. Everybody thinks they can build a car because they can drive cars.

I know you said A.  The only people who say B have grease stains on their church pants.

Everyone says A because books are made out of simple, familiar things: words. No catalytic converter required by government regulation.  Loads of would-be writers, because of the seeming simplicity of the building blocks involved,  jump in and start THE BOOK.  Once in a bazillion times, someone intuitively knows  how to fit 80,000 words together. No words left out. No words left over. Everything in its proper place. You have my leave to despise those freaks of talent with every chamber of your heart.

Everyone else cheerfully knocks out a crappy first book and enthusiastically sends it to every poor agent in the universe. At some point, usually 33.5 rejections later (one got so mangled by the mail-sorter there’s no telling what it actually said), the aspiring novelist faces the reality that crafting a book involves more than simple words. There’s plot, character, scene construction, showing not telling, arcs, tension, dialog, pacing, conflict, irony, and dozens of more things that have to work together. Every sentence must do more than one thing. Like a car, we usually don’t think about how it works until it breaks. So too, a book. We don’t think about the mechanics of writing until the writing doesn’t work. The struggling writer plunks down $125  for craft/repair manuals.

Second time around, writing the novel isn’t such a blissfully ignorant joy. Our writer knows to “show not tell,” but doesn’t quite get how to do it. If she’s smart, she joins a writer’s group sprinkled with near-published and published authors (blatant shout-out to Georgia Romance Writers).  A generous critique will demonstrate to our aspiring author HOW she could show what she’s now telling.

Third time around? Isn’t that supposed to be the charm? Maybe. But this is hard stuff. Consider how many people work on Hollywood movies. They have script consultants up the wazoo. Still, movies come out that just suck.  All the biggest brains in California couldn’t save them from crappiness.

So, when you get to the point where little old you, working alone on your little old laptop, craft something fine, award yourself an honorary PhD.  This isn’t rocket science, but it’s close.

But how do you maximize what you get out of the group? I’ve come up with some guidelines.

1. Monopolize

Face it, all those other manuscripts are crap, recycling bin fodder. You have the Great American Novel. It deserves the majority of the attention. Even when the group moves on to another story, artfully bring the discussion back to your work.

2. Defend the House

I can’t emphasize how important it is to defend your work. Any time someone questions your characters, plot, or scene construction, give a detailed explanation of why you did it that way. Be confrontational. Get in her face. Wear your team colors with a vengeance. After all, you’re going to be able to give that same, detailed explanation to your readers once the magnum opus is in print.

3. Prioritize

It takes a good chunk of time to do a thoughtful critique. Time is precious. Why waste it on those crappy other manuscripts? Remember, you have the Great American Novel. It’s  generous enough of you to skim the other work.

4. Troll for Compliments

Great talent demands recognition. Some people are stingy with compliments and need to be pressed. It’s fine to continually ask if your work is ready, good, or better than all that other published crap. When people hesitate to answer, it only means they don’t know how to sufficiently express their awe, or maybe they’re jealous (remember, their work is hovering over the recycle bin).

5. Submit Random Bits of Brilliance

The subtle changes you made to paragraph two on page 156 are so freaking genius that everybody wants to drool over them again…and again…in addition to having the pleasure of reading your current chapter. If they don’t sufficiently admire the Random Bit of Brilliance,  revisit tip #4.  If they stupidly liked a previous version, revisit tip #2.

Okay, we’ve all probably been guilty of  practicing one or more of the above rules. I’m the gal Defending the House. I really have to watch myself on that one. If you feel like fessing-up, I’ll hear your confession and as a fellow guilty writer, absolve you.

One of my favorite examples of machinima is Freeman’s Mind.“Freeman’s Mind is a [online] science-fiction comedy series that follows the thoughts of Dr. Gordon Freeman, a 27 year old physicist and protagonist of the [video] game Half-Life…In the game Half-Life, Freeman is entirely silent and has no actual personality. In Freeman’s Mind, he is a highly vocal and neurotic individual with paranoid and delusional tendencies.” — Ross Scott, creator of Freeman’s mind, www.accusedfarms.com

I was thinking how cool it would be to find a video game about a writer and add all the thoughts in voice-overs. Let’s imagine this scene – part of the series Anna’s Mind. The writer/heroine is jetting off to Puerto Rico for a thrilling week of writing, dodging bad-ass iguanas, and drinking staggering quantities of rum.

A tall, handsome dude sits next to the heroine on the airplane.

Heroine’s voice-over: “OMG, he looks just like the hero in my book. I can’t believe he’s sitting next to me. I can’t believe he exists in real life. Don’t turn red. Don’t turn red.”

She opens her laptop, mulls how to revise the sucky opening scene, and he asks, “Are you a writer?”

The adrenaline rush heats the heroine’s face.

In voice-over, she says with arm-pumping certainty, “YES! He talked to me and knows I’m a writer. He peered into my repressed little soul. He probably thinks I’m cool. I am cool. Well…I’ll pretend like I’m cool.”

Then Mr. Hero-lookalike asks the dreaded question, “What do you write.”

“About you,” she thinks aloud.

As the animator, I’m going to push button “A“ to move her laptop out of sight because she doesn’t want him to see that what she writes really is…crap.

Her voice-over says, “Jeesh, I hope he didn’t see what crap I write. I hate it when people try to read while I’m writing. It’s almost like having someone watch me go to the bathroom. I wonder if he’s a perv. He doesn’t look like a perv, but you never know. I hope he doesn’t put on those cheap-ass ear phones to listen to Kenny G. “

Hey, who invited that neurotic and paranoid Dr. Gordon Freeman into my machinima?

This isn’t going to work. No one will ever make a video game about the act of writing. It isn’t exotic or thrilling. It doesn’t involve guns or take place in underground tunnels full of aliens and radioactive goo. It involves lots of coffee and reward snacks and takes place in semi-daylight. For example, let’s look at where I wrote today. This morning at the coffee house, I sat facing an electrical outlet. The holes look like a sad face, like someone who’s disappointed that I ate the last piece of cheesecake. Voice-over: “Hey, you neither licked it nor put your name on it. It was so delicious.” Later, I plopped on the orange couch in the photo. It used to be a frou-frou, fugly country-blue plaid monstrosity, but I recovered into a mod masterpiece. Impressive, n’est pas? I wish someone would be that impressed by my writing. You put your soul into writing, but only your blood into upholstery (lots of blades, staples and big scary needles required, kind of brain surgery). By the way, that’s Pauline the Cat hanging on the window screen. Voice-over: “Get off the screen, you fat blob. I just let you out two seconds ago. You can’t want in already.” I stop everything I’m doing and let her in.

Alas, the act of writing will remain un-machinima-ed.

So, do you mind when people read your stuff while you’re writing?

PS – please leave a comment, but I might not be able to read it right away.

I’ll be in Puerto Rico on a wild writing adventure when this goes live.

Really.

So, let’s talk about…fads. They do tangentially tie-in to the writing remorse, but I’ll save that for last since the fads themselves are infinitely more diverting. And, to give a nod to the theme of the week, I’m thankful that I’ve never deeply engaged in any of the following fads (except I do wear flip-flops to the pool).

10 Random Fads – please post more of your own

10. Beanie Babies: Middle-aged women go berserk over bean bags. BEAN BAGS! In one way, it’s a sweet return to youth. In every other way, it’s disturbing.

9. Decoupage: You take a plaque, glue on a picture of Holly Hobby, and smother it in more glue. For a super-artsy effect, sprinkle it with glittery crystals. Warning — Even Goodwill won’t take these anymore.

8. Atkins Diet: Let’s eat even more of what makes us fat.

7. Feather King/Queen Hair: Think Charlie’s Angels vintage Farrah Faucett. Since I have curly/fuzzy hair, this style was my holy grail in middle school.

6. Mork and Mindy Suspenders: Now only worn by clowns and elementary school assistant principals who are going for friendly but creepy look that scares kids to death.

5. Rubik’s Cube: In a moment of Alexander the Great greatness, I sliced the Gordian knot by peeling off all the stickers and sticking them back on. They are super hard to peel off and look like crapola when you put them back on. I guess there’s a lesson about cheating in that, but I’m sticking with the Gordian knot brilliance because it’s all I have. I never solved the cube the legitimate way.

4. Tongue piercing: How does that work with Popsicles?

3. Flip Flops: These are especially odious when worn by men with fungus-infested hobbit feet. Invariably, I get behind Fungi Frodo in the airport security line.

2. Twitter: Go ahead and defend it in 150 characters or less.

1. High Concept: Transformers = machines turn into different machines = crapola.

The reason I was thinking about fads is that when you fall out of love, your head turns at every dude passing by. Especially at those two feather kings in the photo. Admit it, you were checking them out. You hope one of the feather kings is your next big-haired love. You’re down in the dumps and you just want someone to reaffirm that you’re worthwhile. There’s even a technical name for it – rebound dating. He’s a fad. A diversion. His hair is a diversion in its own right.

When you hit a rough patch with your writing, it’s tempting to look at whatever is hot in the market and chase it. You think you’ll have a better chance at getting a contract. Surely everyone will love you if you write what everyone wants to read. But you have to be careful. The hot trend of today is tomorrow’s decoupage. By the time you finish the manuscript, everyone’s on to the next big thing. Yesterday’s big thing looks as dated as a leisure suit with white piping trim.

I know the standard advice is to write what you love, but with an eye to the marketplace.

But what if you don’t know what you love anymore?

No, I’m not talking about hemorrhoids, vaginal dryness or anything else the doctor has a tri-fold color brochure for. You oh-so-clandestinely slip those puppies in your purse. Then, when you’re in Walmart, grubbing for your wallet to pay for that pallet-load of groceries, it flutters to the floor and lands at the feet of the one and only hell-fire hot Greek god who’ll ever be in line behind you. Being a gentleman, he bends to pick it up. Never mind that you’re diving after it like a hawk to the kill. He still gets to it first. You have to endure the moment when he reads “So, you have vaginal dryness.” He looks like he just picked up something that says, “Touching this brochure will make your wiener discolor and shrivel up like a really old banana.” When he gives it to you, a bizarre physiological transference takes place – kind of like shapeshifting. He sees you as the really old banana. You hang your head, stuff the brochure back in your purse, and know that you will never, ever have an intimate conversation over a glass of pinot with hell-fire hot Greek god guy. And, he won’t offer to do something about your “problem.”

I am talking about something equally as dreadful, though. You’re pitching your novel to an editor or agent, in person or in a query, and have to say which shelf your book goes on in Books-A-Bazillion. It’s a legitimate question. You want your book where its readers will be looking. Too, some agents only sell certain kinds of books. Editors definitely sell certain kinds of books. But your book is “bi.” It could sit on two shelves. “Well, ideally,” you evasively say to the agent,”it would have its own big shelf right where you walk into the bookstore, then another one by the coffee counter. I just know I could sell to the caffeine clan. They’re my people – legally indulging in a slightly mood-altering drug.”

The agent or editor looks at you like your manuscript title is “So, You Have Vaginal Dryness.” If the agent’s a woman, she raises an eyebrow. If it’s a man, you’re in the dead banana zone.

Seriously, I’m selling a book that certainly has a huge romance at its heart and a HEA, but it’s post-apocalyptic, has a supernatural creature as the villain, but no magic, trolls, elves or dwarfs like a fantasy (swords, but no sorcery). So, it’s kind of paranormal, with a level of world-building you’d want in a paranormal, but the setting isn’t your typical paranormal (castles and fortresses, but no vampires, werewolves or shapeshifters). To make matters more complicated, people who’ve read it said it feels like you’d find it over in literature. I take that as a compliment, but it doesn’t make it easier to sell. My name isn’t Margaret Atwood. Did I mention it’s 130,000 words? A disastrous length for romance. A delightful length for fantasy.

I’m making this too complicated. The book could go in either section depending on marketing. Maybe I’ll follow the tack of a published author whose query letter I found online. She was in a similar quandary. She just called her work a novel and let the query speak. It worked!

I’m curious how other people are handling this. I know some of you P4HTs have the same little problem, but in different permutations.

When we get this hashed out, I’ll make the brochure. “Oh Reader, Where Art Thou? – or — So, You Have Shelving Syndrome.”

Swine flu. Now there’s something I can write about. I should’ve been a doctor. My handwriting is sufficiently atrocious, and I possess a certain untoward curiosity. If you want to show me your boil, I’ll look at it and give you free, but potentially harmful, advice. In that spirit, I offer my experience with N1H1.

My son calls California the “State of Emergency” because they have a budget crisis, wildfire or earthquake every fifteen seconds. Georgia, where we live, used to be the Peach State. Now we’re the N1H1 state. You hear about a confirmed case here or there, but in reality, “The Flu” is all over Georgia like a fog of Aqua Net hairspray. Both my kids had it.

Our Experience:

1. A bit of a sore throat for a day or two before.

2. Headache and fever (101 or so) and a cough sets in.

3. Fever lasts or one or two days. Cough lasts a week longer.

4. You’re contagious 24 hours after the fever ends. This is on the authority of Dr. Swails, our most excellent pediatrician.

5. Incubation period is 1-3 days.

6. If you have another potentially serious condition, see the doctor. Otherwise, it’s not as bad as the regular flu. Don’t be one of the idiots jamming the ER just because you get a bit of a fever.

7. According to the kids, never admit you had swine flu unless you want to be treated like a leper. You were just ill, got it?

9. Call it N1H1. It sounds more cultured.

10. Mostly kids are getting it. For once, us mature heroines are getting a break.

11. Can you believe I tied swine flu to mature heroines? Those weird associations usually only work in Frank Zappa songs.

I love books and movies with mature heroines. By mature, I mean women of post-childbearing age, 45 and better. I’m throwing this out there for discussion — I don’t think mature heroines will be a staple of the romance genre as it’s currently being written. Why? Well, it isn’t because of the heroines. They’re interesting, sensual, just as eager to be in love. It’s because we savor alpha men in this genre.

Men get mellower with age, like good booze. It’s harder to craft a believable 50-year-old alpha hunk than a strapping young one unless he’s a multi-millennium-old paranormal guy. And I guarantee Mad Max Methuselah isn’t rocking the world of anyone who uses Oil of Olay.

Older alpha men seem relegated to the ranks of the Bad Dudes. Evilness must elevate testosterone levels. They’re power-lusting politicians, war-mongering generals and tyrannic tycoons. Come on, don’t we think they’re a bit silly for swaggering on?

What do you think?

Stay well.

Image from huhwhat.com/?tag=list

Unless you cut the mass media umbilical cord this week, you know writer/director John Hughes died. Raise your hand if the news brought a flood of images to your mind and quotes to your lips. Okay, slowly bring your hand down and pretend to brush your hair behind your ear. Otherwise, people are going to think you’re a freak smelling your armpit. I know, humor and death shouldn’t share a bunk-bed. But dang it, John Hughes was funny.And all about character. And honest at the core. His movies never descended into pure parody. RIP and thanks for the delight.

Who can forget in Planes Trains and Automobiles how a cash-strapped Del (John Candy) tries to score a room at the Braidwood Inn by doing the Vanna White with his Casio watch? And jeesh, I heard “Donger need food” from Sixteen Candles at least a bazillion times this weekend. They’re pretty small bits, but sticky bits. Burrs. By the time you walk out of Hughes movie, you’re covered in the things.

Okay, I need more burrs in my writing. I’ve overdosed on GMC. Plotted my pants into a wad. Fixed the POV shifts (oops, I almost typed a naughty word instead of shift). But I need more burrs. More really memorable moments. So, who better to study than Hughes. His movies seem to work mostly by flinging one after another of those prickly suckers at your socks.

I watched Sixteen Candles with an eye to how Hughes does it. To start, he uses a normal character to keep things grounded. Everybody identifies with Samantha, the nice but not va-va-voom looking girl, who wants the super-hot hunk (the premise of every romance). Her life is populated by the usual assortment of stereotypical characters — jocks, geeks, grandparents, the foreign exchange student. Not much of a story here. Every agent in the world would pinch her nose at this one. Ready. Aim. Recycle pile.

But Hughes plays up the absurdities of his supporting cast. The jocks all look alike. The geek not only dances like a spaz, but he’s so self-involved he doesn’t notice when Sam ditches him. The grandmother “feels up” Sam’s budding chest and the bathroom’s still unusable 30 minutes after grandpa was reading in it. The foreign exchange student, who seems merely blandly strange at first, turns out to be a sex machine.

How these people inflict their weirdness on Sam is what makes the movie and its point — a teen feels the whole world, except the guy she has a crush on, is just kind of stupid. We believe and enjoy it all because Sam is so real. Never once, even during the over-the-top party scene where the rich boy’s house gets trashed, did I grumble “yeah, right.”

My writing isn’t comedy, but I do think there’s a lesson here about not being afraid to use stereotype to advantage in building character. Heck, Jane Austen is the all-time mistress of it.

Release your inner Donger. Give him food.

So, do you have a favorite John Hughes memory?