What I'm Thankful For....

In honor of Thanksgiving, I thought I'd list what I'm thankful for....

1. My P's in the Pod - the psychiatrist, psychologist and educational advocate who work tirelessly to ensure my son has the best future possible. Each of them has a last name that begins with P, hence P's in the pod. Our lives would be much different without them.

2. The authors who engage their audience through blogs and contests. My life is often chaotic and depressing, and these small things they do give me moments of happiness. Winning a signed book is like a little mini birthday.

3. My dog. He's a fine beast, a loving beast, a smart sneaky beast and he never fails to make me laugh. I swear he can sniff out an empty paper towel roll from 500 feet away. And he can say "out" perfectly.

4. My books. They're my escape. They're my comfort.

5. Big flat screen HDTV. Yes, its too big for my room, I know. Its like being in my own personal movie theater without all the assholes. And I love it.

6. My computer. It connects me to the world when I am often trapped in my house by circumstances, I can still have human contact.

7. The color black. It hides the fat.

8. My son. Who taught me perseverance (the ability to persevere under difficult circumstances) as well as perseverance (the ability to hyper-focus on something until you make everyone around you insane). My life would be empty without him.

9. My husband. He pisses me off. He makes me laugh. He buys me things like e-readers and new computers and big screen HDTVs just because....

10. My family. Because they say the damndest things and never let me forget where I came from or who I am. Which isn't always a good thing, but is sometimes exactly what I need.

Word Count Widgets | National Novel Writing Month

Word Count Widgets | National Novel Writing Month: "

- Sent using Google Toolbar"

Only because I type 125 words per minute & I've had a story stuck in my head for a month....
I've decided sleep is not nearly as important as writing & attempting to de-stress. So, damn it, I'm writing.

An Emo Post (ignore if you don't want to wallow in my misery)

Soooo.... *sigh*

My son is out of school. He hasn't been able to make it thru a day in 3 weeks. In fact, most of those days, he's suffered massive panic attacks & not even made it out the door. Why? Mix aspergers, anxiety, cruel teenagers & adults (some well-meaning, some not) who just don't get it into a big mixing bowl, stir & bake.

Here's the problem in a nutshell. Social interaction. Social rejection. The inability to fit in no matter how hard he tries. He's not a normal kid. No matter how well he learns to "fake normal" he will never be normal. Kids pick up on that. Kids are cruel.

Tomorrow we go back to home tutoring. Maybe home schooling. He has no friends. None. Because of this group of kids who invited him into their group & then rejected him, he doesn't even want to try anymore. Fifteen. The kid is fifteen. And friendless. Alone. Rejected. Ostracized.

As a mother, I don't see the point anymore. Why should I force him to go to school to be made fun of, to be teased, to be bullied? Why should he have to accept that because he's different, he needs to work harder to blend, to be less of himself, to be "normal" when normal is unkind and hateful? Why should he have to take medication to just get thru that school day so that he can tolerate that hatefulness?

And yet, he's a smart, funny, loving kid. He's kind. He's brilliant with computers. He could have such a bright future. How is he ever going to function in this world that's not user friendly for him? I don't know. If I don't see it, how can he?

I don't know how often I'll be able to post now. All else falls away when we go thru these times. This isn't the first time he's had to regroup & start over from scratch because the world failed him. Each time I worry he'll make sure it's the last. My world is upside down. Again.

Be nice to others. The next time an odd person who won't make eye contact approaches you in the store and tries to strike up a conversation about Star Wars figures or books or whatever, instead of treating them like a freak, take a minute and talk to them. That little piece of conversation may be the only social interaction that person (who likely has aspergers or autism) has in a year. For those minutes you talk to them, they feel connected - like they matter. They don't feel that often. Too many people make sure they believe that different is worthless.

Books read in October with ratings

Total books read - 12

I'd like to spend time writing reviews of these books & I'll try to edit at some point, but I'm having crazy days. I decided to participate in NaNoWriMo this year. I did it unofficially last year and have been writing like crazy ever since. (I seriously had forgotten how much I loved writing.) On top of that, my 15 yr. old has decided school is too stressful. He's throwing a huge pity party, the school is trying to just get him to his 16th birthday so that they can write him off & I'm scrambling like a madwoman. Fun days.

The Replacement by Brenna Yovanoff ****
Raphael by DB Reynolds ***
Jabril by DB Reynolds ***
Venom by Jennifer Estep *****
Double Cross by Carolyn Crane ****
The Iron Daughter by Julie Kagawa ***
Night Shift by Lilith Saintcrow ****
Hunter's Prayer by Lilith Saintcrow ****
Redemption Alley by Lilith Saintcrow *****
Flesh Circus by Lilith Saintcrow *****
Heaven's Spite by Lilith Saintcrow *****
Sweet Disgrace by Cherrie Lynn ****

I will say this - I highly recommend all the book I read this month. Even those with 3 stars had interesting stories that kept me reading. And Lilith Saintcrow's Jill Kismet series? Oh my God! Phenomenal.

Fun Fun Fun

So, there was one good thing that happened on my birthday. My husband and son got me a Cruz Reader. I will admit, I love paper books and I never thought I'd want one of these electronic devices. Read books on a stupid little screen? Not me.

Hah.

This thing runs android. I can get my emails. I can play Pandora radio. I can play games. Oh, and the books? What on eath was my husband thinking? At the touch of a click - A CLICK - I can purchase a book.

My wonderful computer savvy son downloaded the Kindle store to it and voila. Books for under $5?! Oh my God. Someone pinch me.

My husband (God bless him) actually said "We'll save a little money on all the books you buy." I didn't have the heart to tell him that he had just set me up with a library that I could go bat-shit crazy filling.

I'll never willingly give up paper books. I love them too much. If anything, I'm going to make sure that I purchase every hard copy of every book I love before they disappear. But oh man...

Happy Birthday to me?... :( An emo post

So how will I celebrate my birthday today? Hmmmm....

My 15 yr. old will refuse to go to school because yesterday his asshole health teacher decided it was a good day to embarrass, insult and generally bully a socially inept aspergers kid who's failing his class to make sure he KNEW that he completely fails at life & no one likes him.

I will attend a meeting with the head of guidance, the special ed teacher, the nurse, the counselor & probably as many people as the school can come up with to attempt to bully me into agreeing that this is my son's problem & not the teacher.

I will take my son to his psychologist for the 2nd time in 3 days (he went 2 days ago- and needed 2 hours with him - because he was so anxious about school & the fact that he has NO friends & feels isolated and alone and is treated "like a tool") so that the psychologist can try to undo the damage done by the teacher.

I will studiously avoid any and all phone calls from people who want to wish me a happy birthday because I might just burst into tears. (Most of them avoid us like we have the plague anyway because they don't want to lose their rose-colored glasses.)

I'll pretend that its okay that my husband didn't get me anything (my son has already informed me that they didnt) & read the stupid joke cards he buys & do my best not to cry.

I'll follow the ridiculously time-consuming, painful new method of caring for my crappy teeth (and gums (twice a day) after gum repair surgery & seriously contemplate the benefits of dentures.

Today is a seriously emo day....I wish it was over already.

Top 25 Urban Fantasy Men

In honor of my 48th birthday (which sucked and not in a vampire goodness way), I thought I'd list the 25 hottest men in urban fantasy. (This is, of course, based on the roughly 600 books I own.) Now, I know I've probably left off other people's favorites (and I'd love to hear who I missed on this list). Also, its in no particular order, tho the closer to the top of the list, the less I had to think about it. (And Dante is my favorite male character!)



1. Dante (Prejean) Baptiste from Adrian Phoenix's Maker series

2. Curran (The Beast Lord) from Ilona Andrew's Kate Daniels series

3. Niko Leandros from Rob Thurman's Cal Leandros series

4. Jericho Barrons from Karen Marie Moning's fever series

5. David from Rachel Caine's weather warden series

6. Carter from Richelle Mead's succubus series

7. Finn from Jennifer Estep's elemental assassin series

8. Kisten from Kim Harrison's Dead Witch Walking series

9. Terrible from Stacia Kane's Unholy Ghost series

10. Ethan from Chloe Neill's Chicagoland vampire series

11. Cal Leandros from Rob Thurman's Cal Leandros series

12. Mercer from Karen Chance's Cassie Palmer serie

13. Adrian from Richelle Mead's Vampire Academy series

14. Lucienne from Adrian Phoenix's maker series

15. Dorian from Richelle Mead's thorn queen series

16. Phineas from Kelly Medding's Dreg city series

17. Lex from Stacia Kane's Unholy Ghosts series

18. Zayvion Jones from Devon Monk's Allie Beckstrom series

19. Japhrimel from Lilith Saintcrow's Jill Kismet series

20. Cole from Maggie Stiefvater's Shiver series

21. Robin Goodfellow from Rob Thurman's Cal Leandros series

22. Al (yes, the demon Al) from Kim Harrison's Dead Witch Walking series

23. Jesse James Dawson from K.A. Stewart's A Devil in the Details

24. Capt. Michael Morrison from C.E. Murphy's walker paper series

25. Dmitri Kallinikos from Angie Fox's demonslayer series