Never let ‘em See You Blush

My palms were clammy.  I was in a cold sweat.  My nerves were peaked like I was sitting inside the electricity room at the Museum of Science in Boston.  I had a dry mouth and could barely form a thought in my head due to the tornado of feelings running through it in warp speed.  It was seven o’clock in the morning yesterday when I woke up and I knew that in eleven short hours I was going to be standing in front of a room full of published and accomplished Authors telling them all about my book.  The clock ticked far too quickly yesterday.

Public speaking has always been something I dread doing.  Those who have known me all my life are generally surprised when I make this admission.  But despite my comfort level in a room full of my nearest and dearest, I trip up when I have to talk to a room full of random people.  I knew the SSWW ladies were going to be encouraging, I knew they would smile and congratulate me on the release of Ripple the Twine.  But I was freaking out anyway.

As the day went on yesterday I kept running over and over in my head exactly how I was going to approach my thirty seconds of “fame”.

“Hi everyone!  I’m Jenn Flynn-Shon and I’m an avid blogger.  I’ve been a writer since I was fourteen and as of last Friday I can finally add the title ‘Author’ to my resume as my very first fiction novel, Ripple the Twine, was just released to the public! [pause for clapping] The story is about a Tomboy from Boston, Sara, who loves hockey, writes for a living, and meets a great guy through a close friend.  The book addresses all manner of daily life struggles of Sara and her three closest friends and how their friendship could be the very thing that saves all of their lives from internal destruction.  But I’m a sucker for a happy ending and this Tomboy-meets-Townie love story will leave you feeling upbeat and happy. Thanks!”

Awesome right?  Well I should’ve brought cue cards.

I arrived and ran into another member as I was pushing the elevator button.  She’s a woman that I’d talked with at length at the Author event the SSWW held a few months back in Scottsdale’s Mustang Library.  A guest for the evening got in with us and the three of us started talking about getting up and speaking.  The long-time member said it is so important to just get up and do it.  I knew she was right but my heart started racing as soon as we walked into the room.

With over forty women expected that night I felt that my stomach-flip showed all over my face.  But I’d dressed up in my super adorable pink and black party dress and matching pink cardigan.  I had my book in my purse.  I wore my comfy and cute patent leather flats.  I got my name tag and chatted with Patricia, the President of the group, for a minute then took my usual seat at the “shy table”.  I extracted my book and placed it on the table, ready to go.

I was, after all, armed with the best pitch ever!  The introductions began and I listened as these wonderful women got up and unapologetically told all of us about their achievements.  I internally repeated to myself (over and over) ‘you can do this, you will not be embarrassed, you will do just fine.’

It was our table’s turn at the mic.  A new friend with a book I’m dying to dive into, Thomasina Burke Author of Magic Bridge, got up and spoke.  She segued into me getting up.  There was no hiding under the table as the entire room turned to look at me and smile.  With a quick swig of water to wash down my last bite of salad (and hopefully rid my teeth of stray bits of romaine) I took a deep breath, gathered up my book and walked toward the front of the room.

I turned around with a smile to survey the space and face the crowd.  Oh my goodness.  Forty women is an endless sea when you’re nervous.  But I was prepared damn it!

I opened my mouth, promptly swallowed the microphone, and in a neurotic blur, likely shrill enough to wake up sleeping dogs all over the neighborhood, I said…

“Hi I’m Jenn! skugykev vksjgoiaegv djaeklgae sdus8etrw fis90urtweg spiwstg Ripple the Twine sdghowhef, sertiuy, gljkropty, mvierg.  Self-published pyw4,ry93 06836m, perty-3t4. Oh my full name is Jenn Flynn-Shon and guess that’s it!”

Clapping ensued.  I have no idea why or how anyone understood the insanity that had just flowed out of my mouth.  I know I said my name, my book’s name, held up the novel in my hand and backed off from the microphone eventually but I felt like I’d just rambled the last names of about 20 hockey players; that’s how decipherable my rambling was in my head.

But a strange thing happened when I got back to my seat.  I realized that for the first time since seventh grade I’d stood in front of a room of people I hardly knew and spoke without the slightest hint of blushing from embarrassment.  In fact, I was glowing inside.

I was still rolling on nerves by the end of my spiel but I wasn’t breaking out into hives like usual.  The entire rest of the night I simply congratulated myself for conquering something that has plagued me most of my life – the inability to just own my shit.

Our presenter was an award winning, NY Times best-selling Author of seven mystery novels and someone I’ve heard speak before, Betty Webb.  She’s funny and pointed and had the best advice I’ve ever heard – ‘Always be true to yourself in what you write. Even if it’s hard (or embarrassing) to admit it.’

Done.

Where Are We At So Far?

Well I was definitely wrong about a few of my predictions in Round one of the NHL playoffs.  Some series haven’t come to a close yet, in fact only half have secured a spot and only 1 series in the east is wrapped, but I thought it would be worth taking a look at the stats compared to my predictions.  Let’s see where we’re at as round 1 will be coming to a close this week.

Western Conference

Vancouver vs. L.A. – I predicted the Canuckle heads, but the Kings took the series (in a major upset) in 5 games.  This was not, however, a major upset for me to watch the defending Stanley Cup Losers go out in the first round.  Suck it Vancouver.

St. Louis vs. San Jose – I guessed St. Louis and was right.  They took the series in 5 games.  A bit of a bummer that Joe Thornton is done now, but this one was pretty predictable with the Blues on such a streak this season.

Coyotes vs. Hawks – I put my money on Phoenix and they’re up one game on the series right now (3-2) (despite losing Raffi Torres to a 25 game suspension for a repeat offender head-to-head hit on Marian Hossa which sent Hossa off the ice on a stretcher).  If they win tonight they take it in 6, if not then Chicago ties and we go to a game 7 (exciting series!).

Predators vs. Red Wings – I was sure the Wings were going to hammer this out, so this one shocked me, but Detroit went down to Nashville in 5 games.  I have no strong feelings either way really but it would’ve been nice to see an Original 6 team beat an expansion team.

Eastern Conference

Rangers vs. Ottawa – Somewhere in the hockey-verse the gods are giggling at all of us (read: me) who picked NY to demolish the Sens.  And who would’ve thought it would be such a tough series with so many penalties on both sides?  This series has Ottawa up by a game (3-2) so they could actually win the round if they win tonight.  I’d love that because the Rangers, being the second evil empire from New York, must be stopped.  The earlier the better (read: so the Bruins don’t have to play them).

Bruins vs. Caps – I always vote Bruins, that’s no secret, but even I knew this was going to be a tough fought series when we got Washington instead of Ottawa (though I guess now I’m not sure the Senators would’ve been easier!).  Series is tied 3-3 and Wednesday night seals the deal.  Go B’s!  I think they can actually pull it out if they stay focused and maintain offensive strategy but Timmy needs a fish-slap back to his crease.  Again.

Devils vs. Panthers – Come on Jersey!  Don’t lose to a team from a state where outdoor hockey wouldn’t even be possible, I know you’re better than that! (No comments on my backing of Phoenix please)  Panthers are up one on the series (3-2) so it’s do or die time for the Devils on Tuesday night.

Flyers vs. Penguins – Another unpredicted upset.  Another recoculously over the top series for penalties, fighting majors and game misconduct ejections.  Seriously in one of the games (I think it was 3?) the combined total penalty minutes for both teams was 133.  Yes for those keeping track that is more penalty minutes (by 13) than if the guys played two full hockey games! Despite the fact that Neal and Asham seemed to be looking to take Giroux, Schenn and Couturier out of play forever, Philly managed to take the series 4-2.

On fun and funny news…

The Bruins have not only managed to get the party started again with their episodes of “The Bear and the Gang”, but Andrew Ference has once again proved he is a motivating genius (and stepping up as captain material if and when Chara ever retires).  Last year the guys had the jacket.  I’ve talked about this before but the thing was God awful and is now hanging in retired player (sob) Mark Recchi’s closet. 

They needed something fun again this year.  Well enter Jacket 2.0 – The Chain

The chain is even more God awful than the jacket (if that’s possible) and is constructed of 20 industrial weight silver links with a padlock attached to the bottom.  Andy carved a Bruin’s 8-spoked B into the lock and clicked the thing shut. 

The chain is given to the best player of the night (Kelly is wearing it above after his OT winning goal in Game 1) and the links represent the fact that among the 20 players on the ice/dressed for a game, there isn’t a single weak link in the bunch.

Plus its good for neck workouts because that thing must weigh about 600 pounds.

It sure is fun, motivating, and a nice way to thank each other for the hard work out there.  Now bring the series to a close with a win at home on Wednesday and let’s see who gets to be the hockey equivalent of Flavor-Flav for killing it in game 7 of the first round.

Picture of Chris Kelly wearing The Chain taken as a still from - http://video.bruins.nhl.com/videocenter/console?catid=659&id=172067

"Ripple the Twine" - A Novel - On sale today

Ripple the Twine
by Jenn Flynn-Shon
Paperback, 322 pages
Not yet rated

Price: $15.99
Ships in 3-5 business days

A Tomboy-meets-Townie love story and tale about how friendship can save your life. Sara Quinn is a Sportswriter from Boston and over the past year she has started to earn major respect in the local market. In the process, however, she abandoned her personal relationships and put her emotions in the box. Regardless of her self-imposed timeout, a friend introduces her to Ben. With blue eyes, black hair and a brogue, he's her ultimate triple threat. But they connect just as Sara learns that her friends are facing heavy emotional crises. She starts offering advice, becoming a rock for everyone else, and in the process Sara unearths her own long dormant insecurities. But a bag of peanut butter cups and a hockey game won't fix her issues. She's got to move past her emotional past without hiding behind her career for once. She needs her friend's support as much as they need hers and the four will quickly discover that, when they stick together, their offense is virtually unstoppable.

Please feel free to leave a review of this book on this post, at my Goodreads Author page, or directly on Lulu.  Thank you for supporting Indie Authors!

Feeding the Beast

Or, Marketing 101 and how a brand new Author can learn the best ways to get herself and her book out there when she is somewhat  shy, new to the area, and no-joke broke.

Yeah that should be someone’s book title on Amazon.  I’d buy that eBook if it gave detailed and specific information on exactly what to do at this stage of the game.  Sadly I haven’t found one yet but I’m still looking.  And no, before you ask, I don’t want to write it.  If I knew how to write it I wouldn’t be in this lack of knowledge mess over my own marketing plan right now, you dig?

Anyway, I’m basing my ideas of how to proceed with marketing myself and my book on stuff I’ve heard – go to conferences, blog, guest blog, do a virtual book tour, write a press release, join some writing groups, hire a PR Rep or Marketing Manager, get out and meet people, go on radio/talk shows, get interviewed for the local paper, talk about what you do whenever anyone asks, give out business cards, etc.

Anything and everything on that list of stuff that’s free, I’m on it like blue bonnet.  But here’s the thing, the ‘no-joke broke’ part is certainly me right now.  I write for a living, it’s just that I don’t really make any money doing it – YET – so attending conferences and paying PR/Marketing people is a little out of reach at the moment.

People say you have to spend money to make money.  Well I’ve spent some recently, and I think it’s even been in the right places.

I love being a part of the Scottsdale Society of Women Writers group!  They only meet once a month though so finding another similar group would really be ideal.  And it would be great to find a group just as supportive but who write similar to how I write.  I had no idea but finding fiction writers with a somewhat jagged edge to their wit is actually pretty tough.  Most of the ladies I’ve met write memoir or self-help style books.  They’re brilliant writers but I write Gen X humor love stories.  Yeah.

Fiction, especially genre fiction not about vampires/zombies/death and destruction, is much more difficult in today’s world.  But I’ve always written girl-meets-boy and just because I missed out on the “Sex and the City” wave doesn’t mean I’m going to stop writing what I’m good at!  Besides, interest in vampires/zombies/death and destruction stories will come and go but people will never stop falling in love, so, frankly, I feel I have the long term edge.

Getting my foot in the door at local radio and television stations (or even a local paper) would be great.  But I don’t begin to know what door to knock on so I can insert that foot, so I spend countless hours researching.  Which of course takes away from getting out there and selling my work.  Which in turn means I can’t afford to hire a PR Rep.  Which means I’m back to the vicious square one again.

For now I’ll just work with what I’ve got which is a semi decent social media presence, friends and family who are so supportive I can’t even BEGIN to thank them enough, and a brand new geographic region to explore.  And who knows, maybe I’ll happen across the right contacts in the process.

All of this selling stuff is exhausting!  But if nothing else at least it’s fun trying to learn.

Can't we just get to the rich & famous part?

Round One NHL Playoff Prediction Post

Say that five times fast…

Earlier this morning my friend Chris posted a nice NHL Playoff prediction post.  I started to reply to him and suddenly realized that my comment was encroaching on the length of his post to begin with so it seemed just as good a time as any to throw out a playoff prediction post of my own.

So I’ll start off by sharing what I was writing back to him.  If you didn’t get over to read his post first that’s probably a good idea so you know where I’m at.  See the link up there?  Yeah click that and I promise it will open in another window.  Don’t worry, I’ll wait.

Interesting choices right?  And by “interesting” I mean spot on (mostly).  In quotes is my reply to him because I’m too lazy to go through & fix all the pronouns…

“I agree with all but one of your predictions (have to disagree on Nashville).

I tried to avoid even reading the paragraph on the PA teams because frankly no matter who takes the series both teams scare the begeezus out of this Bruins fan. Of course to play either of them means one or the other has to get through the Panthers or NJD.  Lord willing its NJ because I have no love for FLA.  Then that of course also means the B's have to take the Caps (as you predicted, though I see it in 5 not 7 JMO) AND then take the Rangers (because seriously, sorry Ottawa but it was really nice of you to try).

Anyway, that's about all I can think about at this point and its all projections based on fandom where I try to imagine the B’s in the Cup Finals again more than anything else.  Here’s why…we just found out that Horton is shut down for the rest of the season (sadly that’s not a shock but still a morale blow to the guys). 

Quaider won't be playing game 1 (and I predict he's done too but I can hardly bring myself to even say it out loud) and its possible Boychuck won't be playing game 1 either.  That's 2 of our strongest D which means we have to make a choice on who to play instead - Mottau, Krug, or (oh god help us all) Corvo.  Two newbies (1 B's newbie, 1 NHL newbie) and an idiot who hasn’t learned over the course of an entire  season how to play our style of hockey.  Sigh.

And then there's the question of Rask.  Thomas can't play every game so we'd get Khudobin which would be great if we knew how the kid played but, as Yoda would likely say – one start does not a playoff goalie make. 

Not going to blame a shallow talent pool if we go down to NYR in the semi's but we'd have to work our freaking asses off to take that series.  Did it last year but the spirit was way different (as I've already said in a prior post).

So my thoughts on all the first round teams are as follows (no thoughts on number of games though, I don’t go that far):

Eastern predictions...

B's over Caps

Rangers (shudders) over Ottawa

Pens over Philly (though I don’t like saying it out loud because the name Malkin haunts me at night…)

Devils over Panthers

My predictions in the west...

Vancouver over Kings (the rioting will have to wait at least one series)

Blues over San Jose (if the Sharks took this I think it would be the biggest upset in hockey right now)

Red Wings over Predators

Coyotes over Chi-town (and though you know I'm a huge B's fan I'm also a hockey fan so to see these guys win it all this year is a secret wish of mine so the team would find it just a bit difficult to move...but don't tell anyone, gotta protect my street cred)”

Now, to expand on that whole last thought about the Coyotes.  Of course I’d love to see the Bruins in the Finals, of course I’d love to see them win it again as proof it wasn’t a 39 year broken curse fluke.  I mean hell I’m a huge fan, no question about that.  And some of those guys aren’t going to be playing maybe ever again so to get their name on another Cup would be like validation for the lack of penalties / punishment handed out in response to their injuries.

But (and it’s a big one) I live in Phoenix now.  This in no way, shape or form means I’m no longer loyal to my team though.  The reason I’d love to see the Coyotes win it all is truly because I just love hockey and I think there can be a place for the Coyotes here in the desert.  They need to stick around.

It isn’t like we don’t have talent out here, Smith is actually a pretty decent goalie.  Sadly their defense is somewhat lacking (other than Yandle who’s at 40 something points on the season…and it doesn’t hurt that he’s from Boston originally.  Not the team, the town.  And you all know how I feel about my Townies).  Offensively we have a decent number of good players too – Doan, Torres, Vrbata to name just a few.

I think they can certainly make a really good run for it this year and if the Bruins happen to make it all the way too you can bet your ass you’ll see me in the stands.  Secretly wishing for a Coyotes win but wearing my black and gold.

Pic courtesy http://www.cbc.ca/sports/hockeynightincanada/ but I edited for my semi finals predictions in my trusty Photoshop program.

Daffodils, Cherries, and Outdoor Seating at Happy Hour

This morning I was thinking about entering a contest to win a virtual crate full of spring & summer reads over on Jen Lancaster’s blog.  All I had to do to enter was leave a brief response as to my favorite thing about spring.  Sounds easy.  But this is me so of course I sat there staring at the comment submission box for like ten minutes.

I grappled with what I really love about spring.  I analyzed exactly what makes spring so great.  What do I really and truly love about the return of plants and all that stuff?  I wanted it to sound genuine whether that turned out to be a witty reply or not.  I wanted to sound like I understood the assignment deep in my soul but without rambling on and on.

There would be plenty of room to do that over here.

Why I did all of that analyzing, I have no idea.  It isn’t as if saying ‘brandy in a bathing suit’ or ‘flowers sprouting’ or ‘having sex without a comforter’ or ‘lemonade’ would generate any different of a response.  Not from her or any of the other people leaving comments.  Not like she’s going to give a hoot what I say.  At the contest deadline she’ll go to random.org and throw in the final count, click ‘generate’ then report the winning entry.

We don’t have to make her laugh to win.  We don’t have to be awesome to win.  We just have to say something.  I could’ve said ‘everything’ and it would have been just as valid as saying ‘rainbows that shoot out of a Leprechaun’s ass after a warm desert rain’.

What the heck is my problem?  Could I be more of a dork?  Haven’t I already gone through this recoculousness once before with this woman?

Anyway, I entered by answering with the exact words of my title.  It’s still a little fun but also it is exactly what I genuinely like about spring’s return.

So then that got me thinking.  (Gee, shocker huh?  Yeah, I know.)  It got me thinking about all the other stuff that’s cool about this season.  The end of hockey season, the return of baseball, Matt’s birthday, beginning to plan trips (this year it’s the Lake, former years included the Martha’s Vineyard annual adventure), windows down in the car, returning temperatures and sunshine, etc.

This year also has me looking forward to new stuff like getting my first tattoo, receiving the title to my car because its paid off (the first ever woo hoo!), a first spring in a new state, buying and moving into our new home, and of course releasing my first book Ripple the Twine. (Pre-order your copy today and save, just click on the book title here or go to the Buy Now button on the left sidebar! <-- I should add ‘shameless self-promotion’ to my list of spring favorites but that pretty much takes place all year long so…)

In Phoenix we’re lucky enough to have temperatures that don’t go much below 60 degrees at any time of year so we’ve been hanging out with the windows open for well over a month now.  Last night in fact, for the first time this year, we actually had to kick on the air conditioner for about an hour.  It had gone up into the mid-90’s yesterday so an hour of regulation didn’t seem all that odd.  The fact that it’s early April had me struggling to wrap my head around the concept though, I’ll admit.

But I’m not in the northeast anymore so I guess I should just go with it.

Kind of like when I got the hell over myself and posted as commenter 1345 over on Lancaster’s blog. 

Fingers crossed, I could use some good reading this season.

Tear Me in Two

Obsession has been my middle name since the day I learned that my parents didn’t bless me with a real middle name.  Things haven’t changed much these days.  I still latch onto my flavor of the moment and, with OCD-like stealth, learn as much as I can about whatever it is until all the learning is used up.  I bleed it dry and then I move on.  Kinda like a vampire.

As a little kid I was obsessed with learning – Sesame Street singlehandedly taught me how to count, and spell the word chloroform (Or was it photosynthesis? Mum, care to weigh in on this one?) at the age of like four.  As a tween I was obsessed with reading.  Particularly the Nancy Drew series of crime fighting and mystery solving books.  As a teenager my obsession turned to Hollywood celebs, teen brat packs, and cute boys.  Born of that, of course, was my propensity for scrapbooking and quoting.

Quoting is a delicate art, one that requires impeccable timing and attention to the situation at hand.  You can’t just pull out any old movie quote at any old time and expect it to go over.  Like right now I wouldn’t be tossing out something from, say, The Lion King because it has no relevance to the situation at hand.

Anyway, after the teen years of celebrity gossip mag buying, I moved on to stuff like clubbing every weekend, partying and all that crap.  Then, as most of you who’ve been around here long enough know, Jason Mraz took over for a while.  A really, really long while.  But, like most other things, I eventually bled it dry and moved on.

Which brings us up to date with my obsessive need to get my book done so I can move on from this part of the process.

I’m still working on finishing the book.  Duh, of course I am.  And of course I’m going to talk about it ad infinitum because as I’ve already explained – “What’s up obsession?”.  I’m literally on the last step.  My mom has worked quintuple time getting my graphics done for the cover, Matt read at the speed of light to make sure spelling errors were as nil as possible and I threw myself into learning this whole business of self-publishing.  To the point of nothing else to talk about.  Nothing else to think about.  My project showed me its neck and I bit right in.

I bought books, saved about 16 billion websites to my favorites that I read and re-read as many times as I could just to be sure I had it all down.  Documents were formatted to be all perfect and I even created myself a Publishing House to put the book out under.  Ta-da right?  Wrong.

Lulu doesn’t let you look ahead.  I had my graphics created separately – front, back, spine.  Lulu doesn’t let you insert your own spine.  That is unless you create one full sized cover.  But they don’t tell you that until you’re already in there uploading the graphics your mom spent way too many hours creating already.  As if she doesn’t already have her own shit going on.  Ugh.  Oh and I still can’t figure out how to get the barcode to look right even though I’ve allegedly followed all the right steps.  Ugh times two.

So I say to hell with Lulu, “I’m Audi”, and start looking into other self-publishing options.

I started with CreateSpace.  Yeah well they don’t tell you anything either.  So I started reading…

I think you can see where this would have been going if I hadn’t gotten on the phone with my mom this morning to just talk it all out.  And Lulu it is.  She is generously going to recreate the graphic as one document because she’s frinking awesome that way.

A side note here - Frinking is my new favorite curse word that my Aunt made up one night when we were Facebook chatting real-time during the Bruins game.  She didn’t intend for it to be a curse word.  She was trying to type drinking.  But that D and F are a little too close on the keyboard and FB doesn’t really have a spell check feature.  So now I’m borrowing it as my new favorite create-a-curse word.

And let me tell ya, I’m frinking freaking out right now.

But instead of getting all nuts and taking up my long time want of practicing rooftop archery, instead I revived an old and almost forgotten obsession with vampires to take the edge off reality.

This particular fixation began back in sixth grade when I won some kind of contest in my grammar school library.  It was probably for the kid who took out and returned the most books in a month or something.  With that Nancy Drew thing going on I was an easy target.  Anyway, after winning whatever it was I was offered a prize.  I could pick from a stack of different posters.

I was eleven years old.  A girl.  Shy.  Listened to Michael Jackson.  Wore pink.  So what the hell else would I pick but the dark and ominous poster of Dracula standing full-on tooth-faced in front of a gloomy fog, right?  That puppy went right on the inside of the bedroom door.  I shared the room with my sister and we slept in bunk beds.  I was older and I guess that meant I got to pick.  Of course I wanted top bunk.  Duh, who wouldn’t?

One night I guess the poster decided it wanted out of my room because I started getting chased by zombies in my dream.  This is long before I even knew what a zombie was but let me tell you, at eleven you sure know you don’t want them chasing you in your sleep.  The dream was one of those where it was so real that even 27 years later I can still picture the entire thing in my head.

Everything around me was varying shades of gray.  It was the middle of the night.  I was running down a dirt road with a looming gray fog rolling in behind me.  Something was chasing me and it was gaining.  I couldn’t tell if it was the fog but I didn’t want to find out.  I could feel a threatening presence at my back.  Right at my back.  Fingers were reaching out to grab me, to take me into the fog.  My lungs were aching from breathing so hard from all the running but I picked up the pace anyway.  Hundreds of forest trees whipped past my sightline but just past them it was pitch black forest.  I turned to look back, to make sure I was safe and had gotten away.  When I turned back to keep moving forward is when I plunged off the side of the cliff at full speed.

I woke up face down on my bedroom floor. 

The poster went in the trash the next day.  But it was too late, I was hooked on the darkness.  I wanted to figure out if there was a way I could have escaped without plunging to my doom.  I needed to know what it was that was really chasing me because the Dracula character on the poster wasn’t it.  Of that I was fully certain.

Of course The Lost Boys came out in 1987 and blended in quite nicely with my thing for Corey Haim.  But I was really sad when they killed David, it wasn’t his fault that Max turned him and he went all crazy.  He was just a vampire trapped in the body of a bad-ass motorcycling riding teenager.  Tragic.  “Yup, happens every day.”

Years went by while I got all pop princess on everyone’s ass.  I started working at a movie theater in town.  What came to our theater - Bram Stoker’s Dracula.  I was curious.  I had to know what it was really all about.  So I saw it and watched with trepidation because I was convinced the nightmares might come back.  But I literally fell in love with the movie.  I was in love with the entire theme that “He was just a guy who wanted to be loved.”

So much so that I tried to read the book.  But that was written in the late 1800’s sometime and I could not get into it at all.  So I just went out and bought the movie when it came out on VHS and watched it on loop.  Obsession.  Every time Dracula turns into fog and engulfs Mina I kind of wish they actually existed.  That would be so frinking cool.

And then I was introduced to Anne Rice’s books right before Interview with the Vampire was released in theaters.

Without revealing too awful much, during those club days I was what many would call, um, a big old slut.  In my early twenties I was probably going to sleep with you if you were cute enough.  So with that said pretty much anything sexually related was going to grab my interest.  Anne Rice wrote about Vampires with a slant on erotica as well as a deep seeded interest in showing that these creatures of the night actually had a soul.  Kind of.

Interview was amazingly well done as a movie, however, her other books were so much better than any movies released in their name.  But it was cool because who cared, vampires were cool.  I was a vamp groupie.

And then Quentin Tarantino had to go and fucking ruin it all by releasing From Dusk til Dawn.  Really dude?  What the hell were you thinking?  I was officially off vampires for a long time.

No matter how much my BFF tried to convince me that I’d love the Twilight series of books when they first came out, I resisted.  No matter how much my sister tried to convince me that the movies were amazing when they first came out, I scoffed.

And then there was Lost.  And there was Boone.  And then they went and killed Boone and I cried.  And then I found out that Ian Somerhalder had a new show.  “And they all rejoiced.  Yea.”.  I added it to my Netflix queue anticipating watching it when the series ended.

So we’re down at my sister’s house last weekend, all three of us including Matt were stressed about work – hello, book obsession – so when Wendy put on the first episode of The Vampire Diaries I was too weak to protest.

We watched the entire first two seasons over the course of the past week.  Holy crap that show is good.  The fact that one of the hottest men on television plays a lead role as the bad-boy-turned-good-turned-bad-turned-we’re-not-entirely-sure-anymore-if-he’s-the-good-or-bad-vampire-brother was all it took.  Obsession revived.  In spades.

So what does this whole post mean?  I don’t know, maybe I’m just obsessed with blogging or something.  I certainly didn’t give you much to latch on to.

*Title is courtesy of my favorite chorus from a Stroke 9 song:

Tear me in two

Bore a little hole that I can see right through

Your diversion’s my digression

Take me apart

Suck my blood until you stop my heart

You encumber my progression

And then you save me