Tag: California

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in the time of serial killers

So, in case you haven’t heard, Stockton, CA has a serial killer currently out there shooting mostly Hispanic men. Six victims are dead (one in Oakland) and one, the only female victim so far, was wounded.

Now, if you know anything about me, I’m a true crime junkie and I am fascinated by the psychology of serial killers. But, this is something very different.

I don’t scare easily. I do my best to stay safe. However, I do like to walk in the early morning hours. The idea that someone is out there just ambushing people in the dark has strongly curtailed that.

I’m still fascinated by the minds of serial killers and I want to know the what/why/how of this guy’s head…he seems to be maybe on a mission…why?

Also, given the technology we have in this time and place, it seems weird that this kind of crime got this far without the person getting caught. Why did it take 6 deaths to tie these crimes together? How many more will it take to find this person?

There’s a task force in place and they released a surveillance video of a “person of interest” but considering that it’s only of the person from the back walking in what looks like an apartment complex, all it tells us is he’s tall and slender and was dressed in dark clothing.

The reward has been raised to $125K for info leading to arrest and conviction.

So, yeah. That’s the state of things where I live right now. I hope y’all are somewhere safe and sane and stay that way, Readers! Puppy picture above is your palette cleanser. Look at that face!

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the autumn of innocence

I was born in September. I don’t know if that has any bearing on my love for autumn, but I like to believe it does. In my Upstate New York childhood, autumn meant new school clothes and supplies (I still love new notebooks and pens and markers and folders and, and, and…), the smell of dry leaves and cider, and the excitement of Halloween. The highlight of October was the annual trip to Kelly’s Farm to pick out our pumpkins and get fresh brewed cider and old fashioned donuts.

While the innocence of that time has gone, and the world is a different place today than it was then, there is a certain wonder to the autumn months still. I sometimes miss the New York autumns, especially here in California where we basically get two seasons, Summer and Not-Summer. Sure we have leaves on the ground and the mornings and nights are cooler, and sometimes even cold, but the true fall colors don’t happen here, unless you travel up into the mountains.

We’re into the time of year here that means long pants and long sleeves in the morning, tank tops and shorts by noon and the air conditioner in the late afternoon. I go to bed with the fan blowing and not even the sheet pulled over me and wake up under blankets chilled.

Last night I refreshed my altar for my ancestors as sort of an invitation. The veil between worlds is thinning as we approach Samhain and I welcome them to visit.

Samhain, and Halloween for that matter, will be different this year, I imagine. For me it is usually a quiet holiday, being the my front door doesn’t face the street, but just the sheer number of newly dead this year…loved ones to be remembered and honored…changes the tenor of the day. This was true for me the Samhain after 9/11, and this is so much more, so many more dead, and many of them left this world bereft of human touch, without the ones they loved by their side.

On that somber note, I wish each of you a lovely week and the kindness and compassion that changes lives. I’m off for more coffee and to log into work. May this autumn be one of a better harvest.

Cover Photo by Dennis Buchner on Unsplash

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gonna have a star war!!

This has not been the best week for me mentally. Between the bad air quality and the ongoing public health crisis and all of the election hoopla, and the fact that I should have been at Disneyland last weekend, I was feeling pretty down for the better part of the week.

The air is marginally better yesterday and today, and a series of workplace wins has helped me feel a little bit more myself. We’re almost up to September, which is my birthday month, and that’s usually a pick me up.

Add to that some Star Wars related news in that the only video game I play with any regularity, the SIMS 4, is releasing a “Journey to Batuu” game pack in time for my birthday, and we’re planning a Star Wars related photoshoot with my family sometime soon, and that’s got me feeling a little more like me.

I’m hoping that the weather stays nice and the smoke stays away enough to get my house cleaner than it has been this weekend. It’s been hard to do physical work when I can’t breathe for the heat and smoke.

But now I can see that my software update is finished so I should get myself back to work. Stay safe, Readers! And happy almost weekend.

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into the fire

I’ve been struggling all day to come up with something to write about today that wasn’t just about my terror over money and work, or the impatience of not knowing when or if the unemployment information would come through, or how I’m going to manage healthcare costs if I’m not employed before the end of the month (or if I’m forced to take a contract job where benefits won’t start for 2 months).

I could tell you about my frustration with recruiters who can’t read a map and realize that a six hour drive is not a doable commute, or the ones who think that two hours one way is totally normal.  Or how it seems like all of the people with their hands out seem to come out of the woodwork when you’re unemployed.

It isn’t even that I don’t have work to do.  I currently have a number of freelance editing jobs that will feed me and keep my cats fed for a while, especially with how little I eat these days.  I also have wonderful friends who brought me a bunch of food yesterday, in an effort to help out.

So, if I’m not talking about any of that, what do I have left in me to say on this gorgeous Wednesday afternoon?  If my ankle is done being cranky with me, I was hoping to get out for a hike this afternoon, after a wonderful two mile hike on Sunday (which is probably the cause of my ankle pain).  There is something wonderful about hiking up big hills and over rocks, and through trees that helps settle my soul.

It makes me wish for long weekends in the mountains, and good food cooked over an open fire.

And I think I’ll leave you with that notion, Readers, and get back to my editing.

 

Photo by Justin Chavanelle on Unsplash

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in the morning fog

Winter in San Francisco generally means temperatures in the mid 40s to mid 50s and fog.  Sometimes really thick fog.  That does seem to be the case this year.  Even though I live a good 45 minute BART ride outside of the city, my little city can get pretty socked in too.

Fog means dangerous driving conditions, particularly when you don’t know the roads you’re driving on.  For me, I find fog mysterious and beautiful, especially when it hangs low over the mountains or the bridges.  I never do seem to get out into it with my camera however.  One of these days I’m going to get up to the Marin Headlands when the fog rolls in.

Just imagine what the world of horror movies would be like without fog!  It sets a mood, for sure.

where-shadows-fall

If you have been waiting for the paperback to get your copy of Where Shadows Fall, your wait is over.  As of this morning, the paperback is available.  Click HERE to get it.

We’re headed into the busiest time of year, with holiday parties and get togethers, shopping and cooking and chaos of all kinds.  My life is no exception.  I’ll be trying a new-to-me cookie recipe this coming weekend for a company pot luck, and I have my first holiday party tomorrow evening.

Then it’s all a landslide into Christmas for me.

What about you, Readers?  Do you have a special holiday tradition, no matter what holiday you celebrate?

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where birds fly free

It’s an early Saturday morning, early enough that it’s still dark outside.  I can hear the gutters still draining off the steady rain of the last few days and every now and then, a gust of wind. It’s a nice sound, especially because we have needed the rain so badly.

I’m waiting on cover options from our designer for Where Shadows Fall and working on the next project, but for today, I am taking a break to go watch some birds with my mother and a friend (who incidentally is the woman I modeled the character Victoria around in the Shades and Shadows books).

We have a number of ecological preserves and wildlife sanctuaries or refuges around us, and while I may not know the names of every bird we will see, I’ll enjoy watching them and spending time with two women I adore.  It is a chance for my camera to venture out and take some shots, like the one above, which I took at the Woodbridge Ecological Reserve a couple of weeks ago.

It’s nice to take a break from one creative endeavor for a different creative endeavor.

Right now though, I’m sipping my morning coffee and contemplating breakfast. I hope your Saturday is everything you need it to be, Readers.

And, if you’re shopping for the reader in your life this small business Saturday, consider any one (or more) of my books, found here.

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the chill of winter

It isn’t really winter here in Northern California, because it is, after all, California.  It is, however, colder here now than it was a few months ago.  Cold enough that my early morning writing is being done with my heavy bathrobe on over my pajamas.

I grew up where winters are a little more dramatic, where blizzards could mean days off of school, where I learned to ice skate, and ice fish, on the pond that emptied into Lake Ontario.

I have a lot of fond memories of winter in Upstate New York as a child.  I loved the winter then.  Sledding and skating and snow ball fights.  It would take you longer to get dressed to go out in it than you’d actually spend outside in the snow because it was so cold!  As I got older there was the fun addition of snow mobiles.

I left NY when I was 18, and I’ve been back to visit a time or two, but a blizzard that nearly kept us from getting home kind of soured my taste for it.  And, as I get older, the idea of all of that cold, wet snow and all of the work just to get around in it, makes me think that I’d rather stay here, where the snow doesn’t bury us to the second floor window and the cold rarely nips low enough to freeze.

It took some time to get used to the holidays without snow, but now that I have, I like not having to worry about driving on sheets of ice to get to see my family. As we head into the holiday season, that’s an important consideration.

Still, I’d take a bit of that snow about now if it would help combat the fires here in California.

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flames everywhere you look

I live in between two raging fires right now, albeit quite a bit closer to the northern one.  My home has been inundated with smoke for days, I don’t venture outside much to avoid any complications from weakened lungs or sinuses that don’t even need a reason to go bonkers.

I am fortunate that I can work from home and that I live where I do. Today I am reminded that many are not so fortunate.  Many are right now in emergency shelters after fleeing for their lives with whatever they could grab on their way out.  Some escaped with nothing more than the clothes on their back before a wall of flame came to take away their homes.

Still others never got out.  They died in those flames.

As an author, I do a lot of thinking about death, about ways to die and what those methods of death do to the body.  For me, there is nothing more horrific than burning to death while still alive. Nothing.

There are many stories coming out of the areas that are burning; stories of heroic rescues, of animals finding ways to survive and stories of people coming together to help one another.  I saw two stories in the last 12 hours about surviving by getting in a body of water.  The first was about a horse that managed to get into a pool  and was found shivering, but alive.  The second was about a group of people who, realizing that they were trapped by the fire, took to an icy cold lake.

There are other stories too.  On my way into the office this morning I read the words of a man who barely escaped in his car, watching in his rear view mirror as his neighbors fought, and failed, to escape the flames.

Towns have been decimated.  Thousands are homeless.  Many have lost kin, friends, and pets.  The entire concept is terrifying to me.

Firefighters are battling the blazes, working round the clock in an effort to contain the fire, and I pray that they are successful soon.

Imagine losing everything in your home; clothing, photos, mementos, family heirlooms, all gone in a flash.  My heart goes out to the victims, and once I get paid tomorrow, I’ll be donating what I can.  I’m thinking I can weed out my closet too.  I have way too many clothes.  I’ll see if I can find somewhere to donate some of them for the victims.

Please, if you can spare any amount of money, I ‘m sure that there are plenty of places you can give to support those who have lost so much.

Thank you, Readers.

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time to hit the road

By the time you are reading this, I will probably be somewhere on the road between Paris and Milan with my good friend and some good music at the start of our epic Italy road trip.

I figured since my normal Wednesday post would be pre-empted by a travel day, I’d pre-write it!

I’m such a nut for traveling.  I love to visit new places and meet new people, as long as I can control certain aspects of it, which is why we’re driving and not taking the train.  The agoraphobe in me balks at not having SOMETHING under my control.

Our first stop is Milan, but we likely won’t see much, as it’s mostly a stop for sleep before we head south.  Our first real touristy day will be when we get to Pompeii.  I’ve been wanting to visit Pompeii since I was about 9 years old.

Here in the states, or at least in California, it’s just starting to think about leaving summer behind for autumn.  The mornings and evenings are cooler and the wind is brisk.  I love autumn, it’s my favorite time of year.  I’m looking forward to being cold enough for sweatshirts!

But first, epic road trip through Italy, and a chance to see sites I’ve only dreamed of until now.  By the time I get home, it should be properly fall, and time to pull those sweatshirts out of the back of the closet.

I hope you are all having some fun too, Readers!  I’m off to finish my packing and have another cup of Death Wish.  I have a new book to read on the plane.  I hope to tell you about it once I’m done!

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the first harvest

It’s hard to fathom that we are here at the first of August.  For those who follow various Pagan religions, today is the First Harvest, known by various names in various traditions, with different ways of marking the holiday.

Despite their differences, most of them are ways of celebrating the first fruits of the planting done in the spring, and largely we are talking about grains; wheat, corn, etc.

In times past I might have baked bread on the first of August to share with friends, but this year it’s just plain too hot in my little kitchen!  Although, I have to admit, it’s been hotter where I live than it is right now.  I anticipate there are still some warm days ahead too.

There may be a little harvesting though, at least in the area of writing.  I have a weekend in which I don’t have to run out to Stockton to help my mother, so I am anticipating that some words will happen!

I am also starting to gear up for my trip in September!  This weekend I am doing a thorough cleaning and inventory of my camera equipment so I can decide what all I am taking with me.  When I travel, I try to post to my travel blog (when I can get internet anyway), which you can find here.

I will also be posting pics to my instagram account, and either of my Facebook Pages: My Author Page or my Photography Page.

On that note, I should get to the day job, and the cup of Death Wish Coffee sitting there seducing me.  May your harvest be plentiful, Readers!