In Search Of…

…lowfat crock pot recipes.

Anyone out there have favorites to share? I really love being able to throw everything into the pot in the morning and have dinner waiting whenever we want it.

A few caveats:

1. Not a lot of prep work, please. Chopping veg is fine; pre-cooking is less so. The whole idea of this is it for not to be a lot of work!


2. Recipes that combine meat, veg, and brown rice or wheat pasta (or at least two out of the three) are the spiffiest! I’m all about the one-pot meal.


3. I can modify to lowfat if needed. For example, recently I used lowfat cream of chicken soup and fat-free cream cheese in a recipe, and it turned out smashingly well.
   


4. Any kind of meat is fine. We’ve cut back a lot on beef, but do eat it occasionally (or frequently substitute ground turkey for ground beef). Chicken (esp. boneless, skinless breasts), pork, lamb is all good. As much as we love it, game such as venison and ostrich is more expensive and harder to come by for us, though.
   


5. Seafood (e.g., shrimp, scallops, etc.) recipes are highly encouraged! I find I’m less and less fond of fish when it’s cooked (sushi is another matter entirely!), but I’m willing to try.
   


6. No mushrooms. If you have a fabulous recipe that contains mushrooms, please send it along; I’ll modify it on my end (I’ll substitute baby carrots or extra onions or something). Just no fabulous vegetarian dishes based on mushrooms. (Besides, we’re carnivores—our teeth and digestive systems say so!)
   


7. I’m not fond of savory and sweet in the same dish, so no recipes containing gobs of fruit. (Maybe a little fruit, if the dish is also spicy. Convince me!)
   


8. Hot-n-spicy is yummy. We’re not afraid of fire…
   


9. I already have good recipes for boeuf bourguignon, beef stroganoff, and Sloppy Joes.
   

Hit me!

Beautiful Trophy

I finally picked up my Beautiful Trophy for the first quarter of 2007, when Teresa and I finished Out of the Frying Pan. I still need to get a plaque made with the book title, but I couldn't resist posting a picture. Isn't it gorgeous? It's one of the glass fishing floats that the Oregon Coast is known for.

Nyquil hangover

Happy Birthday to my mom!

Four stories back in the mail Tuesday, plus a bunch of follow-up e-mails re: languishing ones. The responses are already coming back on those follow-ups. One editor, who has several of my stories for several projects, didn’t have any bad news, although most of the anthologies are still at some level of progress, so there’s no specific “yes” to anything yet. Another market cancelled their series, but those two stories were reprints anyway; not really “rejections,” either.

Yesterday was one of those days where you run around a lot and accomplish little. I went to the chiropractor, came home, and took Ken to TO. We had lunch together at Roma Deli, and I think I’m just not going there any more. Their once-fabulous mozzarella salad has, over the years, slowly become mediocre. I wanted to cry remembering how fantastic it once was.

After that we went to the bike dealer, but his bike wasn’t ready yet, so we went to the mall and wandered around a bit, but my hip starting hurting pretty badly. I dropped him off at the bike place and went home, and when the chiropractor’s office called to let me know my supplements were in (they hadn’t been unpacked when I was there in the morning), I asked for an afternoon appt as well.

I hung up, and the phone rang again: Ken. They found some things wrong with the bike that they’d have to order parts for, so his 50CC trip from coast to coast was now impossible (the plan was to hit FL in time for a long-distance riders’ banquet. He’ll do the ride probably later this month.). So I raced up to TO to get him, then straight to the chiropractor’s, where it was discovered that my hips were two inches off from each other. That would explain the pain, then!

We made quick runs to the library and PO (where I forgot to actually buy stamps, dammit) and then to the grocery store because Ken requested Sloppy Joe’s for supper (since mostly what we had in-house was simple meals for me while he was gone). By the time I’d caught up on computer stuff and made dinner, it was time to wander off to Morgana’s for sewing…

Meh.

Today I woke up late with a Nyquil hangover, and I’ve been draggy ever since. Bleah. I’m slowly getting stuff done, but too slowly for my own impatience…yet sometimes too fast for my easily tired self.

I got through about 2/3 of the edits on my swords story (“Dyrnwyn’s Fire”) tonight and should get it to Denise tomorrow, along with a fresh copy of the story she’s buying and an anthology idea proposal. Then, it’s on to a couple of other short stories as well as getting back into Ghosted with renewed vigor.

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Currently Reading: Agnes and the Hitman, Jennifer Crusie and Bob Mayer
Lately Listened To: Okay, so even though I had no voice, when I was driving yesterday and Great White’s “Once Bitten, Twice Shy” came on, I had to sing along at the top of my raspy, lurgy lungs. Tonight, it was Within Temptation’s Mother Earth and Evanescence’s The Open Door, because apparently I needed Gothic Rock to edit my paranormal/pagan Welsh WWII sword story. Who knew?
Recently Watched: Ghost Hunters, Cities of the Underworld (Vietnam), Lost, Graham Norton, If Walls Could Talk (That’s all spaced over several days, mind you. And I’ve been sick.)

More workshop photos

Taken by the awesome, gorgeous, and funny Janna Silverstein.

February stats

wrote 8400 words
wrote 9 out of 29 days

story submissions: 4
story acceptances: 0
story rejections: 5
stories written: 1 finished from previous start (“Drynwyn’s Fire,” for workshop); 1 written in full (“If the Shoe Fits,” for workshop)
stories edited: 1 (publisher edits on “Some Old Lover’s Ghost”)

novel submissions: 8 queries or partials for Out of the Frying Pan
novel acceptances: 0
novel rejections: 1 (for Out of the Frying Pan)

Lust Bites articles written: 2 (Mammoth Book of Erotica 7 promo, half each of “In the Future, All Men Will Be Hotter” and “In the Future, All Women Will be Hotter”)

Comments

Honestly, I don’t think the words written and days of writing stats are correct; I think by the end of the month I was so frazzled I was forgetting to list them. No clue what the correct stats are.

Goals for March

More words, more days. Period.

Finish Ghosted if it kills me. Then (or concurrently, more likely), start work on Caressing the Tiger once Teresa and I hammer out a schedule for that novel.

Write a story for the Cats Curious Press anthology. Edit “Dyrnwyn’s Fire” for Denise Little and “Animal Attractions” for Hips & Curves. If I have time, I have a couple of other stories to finish up, and several stories to expand so I can submit them to Spice Briefs. Plus I need to get the recently returned stories back in the mail ASAP. Oh, and I should check out the guidelines for the various best-of anthologies and send out appropriate reprints.

Lust Bites: I’m doing an interview with the amazing Mary Anne Mohanraj and contributing to the “lust.bites” hunky man in the upper righthand corner section. I need to brainstorm a new topic for my April post and beyond, though.

Oh. Ow.

When I decided (over the weekend) that I was officially taking today off to recover from the trip and my cold, I didn’t expect to be also flattened by another headache. Bleah. I was thinking I was taking the day off from writing, but that I’d take it slow and get through other stuff.

Hah.

Actually, I did do a little bit, but I’m still feeling annoyingly unprepared for tomorrow. Some e-mail answered, bills paid, mail sorted, book picked up at library, suitcase and computer bag unpacked. No phone calls, because I have almost no voice. Ken did the laundry and made dinner, because I was in no shape for that sort of thing. Of course, he spent the day in the garage working on the bike in preparation for his upcoming trip (a 50CC, which is coast to coast in two days, a crazy-long-distance-bike-people get-together in Florida, and then back home), so I didn’t even have him to lay on the couch with me and watch mindless TV until this evening. And we had little recorded that I would watch w/o him.

<>-<>-<>

Photos from the workshop have been uploaded here. Enjoy!

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Currently Reading: Agnes and the Hitman, Jennifer Crusie and Bob Mayer
Lately Listened To: hack, cough, throb
Recently Watched: Torchwood Season 1 extras, Clean Sweep

Workshopped hard and put away wet

Thursday, 28 February 2008

Nope, I’m not on the plane yet, but I’m comfortably early to the airport so there’s no stress. That said, I feel like five levels of crap because of lack of sleep, and possibly I’m coming down with a cold, but I don’t know. And I’m thirsty, but I’m also grumpy about the cost of a frakking bottle of water. It would not surprise me one whit to find out TSA is getting kickbacks from the bottled water industry and the cosmetics/toiletries industry for the ridiculous and useless liquids ban.

I have five stories left to read, so I guess I’ll have at them…

On the plane now. Less grumpy. Flying generally makes me happy. We arced out over the ocean, and as always, I looked for dolphins or whales. Should I go whale watching for my birthday? I can’t decide.

Friday, 29 February 2008

Happy Leap Day!

Yep, I have a cold. ::muttergrumble:: I mainlined Nyquil last night and slept pretty hard, and so far the symptoms aren’t major, so maybe I’ll get through this. I even figured out the next story we have to write.

Three rejections (short story, not novel) today. Sheez. Couldn’t they have waited ‘til I got home?

<>-<>-<>

The consensus from Dean and Denise Little is that the story I submitted for the swords anthology is the beginning of a novel. ::pound head on desk:: Allllrighty then, I’ll add that to the list. Because I need a paranormal British World War II novel on the list. (It’s all Doctor Who’s fault, I’m telling you.) Denise also said she’d consider the story again with some rewrites, although it’s one of three stories about the sword Dyrnwyn, so she may not be able to juggle all three into the book.

Better than a poke in the eye with a sharp stick, you betcha.

I’ve finished the next story, although it’s short. It is what it is. I have no perspective anymore. I do have, however, Nyquil, and I’m almost a zombie…

2 March 2008

Hangin’ out in PDX with fellow workshopper Dave. (This was his first workshop—he’s coming to the Master Class in the fall—and he came through with flying colors.) I board in about 45 minutes, so I’ll wander through security (which has no line) in half an hour, grab a sandwich and a water, and all will be well. Then Ken will pick me up, we’ll go home and watch Torchwood, and I’ll sleep for many hours. Nyquil will be involved. I’m in the process of losing my voice.

That story I had no perspective on? Denise says she’s buying it. Squee! (“Squee” is actually an important part of the story. Hee.)

I also received another one of those “we liked it, but decided against it, and please send us something else” rejections via e-mail.

Okay, I’m going to go ahead and upload this as one entry, because it’s not worth posting a bunch of little ones.

I’ll add that I’m very sad that nobody had any questions for me… :-(