The Dynamic Trio - Blog

Yes, summer is truly here. It’s too damned hot to cook in the house, yet we need to eat. So what are my choices - hmmm, let’s see. Cold cereal? Umm, no. Fruit salad? That sounds good, no cooking required, however, I have a growing boy at home and fruit alone ain’t gonna do it for him.

So I guess it’s time to break out the grill!

For the vegetarians in the group (I eat nothing but grains and veggies all day, and have a single serving of meat with my dinner, so I have to be creative to keep it interesting), grilling can work for you in a major way. And if you’ve never tried indirect cooking, it’s something results in a tender cut of meat that falls apart in your mouth.

So whether you’re a veggie-gal or a rib-chicken-fish diva, here’s a couple of cool recipes for both of you:

Grilled Asparagus with Green Peppercorn Vinaigrette Recipe courtesy Bobby Flay, 2007

3 tablespoons white wine vinegar
2 teaspoons Dijon mustard
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1/4 cup plus 2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
2 tablespoons green peppercorns in brine, drained
1 pound fresh asparagus, trimmed
2 tablespoons canola oil

Whisk together the vinegar, mustard, salt and pepper in a small bowl until combined. Slowly whisk in the olive oil until emulsified and stir in the peppercorns. Let the vinaigrette sit at room temperature for 15 minutes before serving. Vinaigrette can be made up to 8 hours in advance and refrigerated.
Heat the grill to high.

Toss asparagus with the canola oil and season with salt and pepper. Grill until tender, about 5 to 7 minutes. Place grilled asparagus on a platter and drizzle the vinaigrette over the top.

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Grilled Yellowfin Tuna with Sweet Corn Salad, Herb Roasted Tomatoes and Eggplant Caviar Recipe
courtesy Emeril Lagasse, 2007
(Note, follow the link below for the Sweet Corn Salad, Herb Roasted Tomatoes and Eggplant Caviar)

6 (5-ounce) portions yellowfin tuna
1/8 teaspoon salt
1/8 teaspoon black pepper

Season each piece of the tuna with 1/8 teaspoon of the salt and 1/8 teaspoon of the pepper. Heat a grill to high and grill the tuna to the desired temperature. Place 1/2 cup of the Sweet Corn Salad on each of 6 plates, and place tuna on top. Garnish each portion of tuna with 2 tablespoons of the eggplant caviar and a 4 slices of the Herb Roasted Tomatoes.

Serve immediately.

Click HERE for the other recipes. Enjoy!

TJ

The weather here has been absolutely scorching. Now I’m SO not the girl who enjoys being baked alive, but I do enjoy getting outside. I don’t get to do it as often as I’d like anymore (somehow those danged responsibilities sometimes get in the way ;D) but I like to walk at lunch time with some of the ladies at the office. The other day when I took this pic it was cloudy out with a bit of a cool breeze as a storm blew in. And it was STILL 80 degrees outside! Just yesterday, it was 92. Ack!

Forget New Year’s resolutions (I don’t bother to make them), it’s all about taking care of yourself all year long. Last year was one of the most stressful years of my life, mostly due to my job. And I made a commitment to myself that I would SO not go there again, being worked up and worked out to the point of affecting my health.

I’ve always been a health goofball - I love the outdoors, I like going to the gym, and like taking walks. Not to the point of being a fanatic, but it is important to take care of yourself. Especially if you have kids. Your kids need you to be around for a good long time.

So what are you doing to keep yourself in good health? And if you’re not doing anything, maybe I can help you with that?

First, a good way to work off stress is to play! Do something fun. My game of choice right now is World of WarCraft. Another good way is to get physical. You don’t have to lift a ridiculous amount of weights, or do aerobics until you faint. Just a little walk about the neighborhood, enjoying the evening breeze is a good one, too. And it’s even better if you can grab the hand of someone you care about and drag them along ;D

TJ

Now this is a hot topic personally. But before I get started you can blame this all on my friend and fellow author, Marilyn Lee. If you don’t know Marilyn’s work, she’s a kick butt author who writes Shifters, Weres and Vamps with so much personality you expect them to jump off the page and bite you (oh baby!). Her contemporary books are off the chain, too.

Well, the other day on the Ladies of the Club blog (another cool group that Marilyn and I both belong to) she started the topic on asking whether we, as woman, think chivalry is dead. The discussion was being had on other blogs where it seemed that some women don’t mind if their men called them bitches, as if the word ‘bitch’ has become the new endearment rather than ‘baby’ or ‘honey’.

Now is that ri-goddamned-diculous or what? Like Marilyn, I have strong opinions about this. If chivalry is dead with a man, then he’s not the one for me. Do I need him to tie my shoes? Not. But I do expect to be treated with care. Now, I am so NOT a high maintenance woman. I don’t nag, whine or pout. But…well, anyway, this is what I wrote in response to her blog (click HERE for the original post at Ladies of the Club):

TJ SAID: “Mary, this is a subject that just frosts my cookies. Basically, makes me mad, pisses me off, etc. Is chivalry dead? It depends on the guy. I happen to like polite, courteous men. To me, that’s chivalrous. I’ve had men tell me that they like opening doors for women, but stopped doing it when the woman bit their heads off for being nice. Which, in my opinion, is simply stupid.
Read the rest of this entry »

Okay, I am officially a World of Warcraft nutball. I am totally hooked on this blasted game. It’s all my sons fault - he was always asking me to play Halo and Call of Duty and stuff like that, but they held no appeal for me. Then he started harping on me about WarCraft. Of course, I did what most moms do - I looked at him and said, ‘Not interested’ and went back to my writing. Then one day he pulled a whammy on me - “But mom, it’s something we can do together” then blinked those big brown eyes at me. So huffing and sighing I let him install it on my laptop, grumbling about manipulative children and the like.

Then we started playing together, he was on one computer and I was on mine. AND IT WAS A BLAST! Since he’d been playing longer he helped me through getting started, showing me where things were and which monsters to avoid. The Christmas rolled around and the son who was wrapped up in WarCraft moved on to the games that cam ewith his brand new Xbox 360. But good ole’ mom that I am, I kept WarCrafting.

And by the time the kid came back to the game I was ten levels ahead of him! And now…I’M TWENTY LEVELS AHEAD. Given I don’t do much but work and write, I’ve found myself surrounded by tons of other thirty- and forty-somethings who gather online to play this game and have a good time. It’s like our own little community ;D

This is one of my characters on the Bladefist server. Notice the name? Obviously, she’s got to be a genius to have a name like that! My good friend and author, Heather Holland, dropped in to see Carinian just last night. So if you’re ever online, come by and say hello!

Because I’ve gotten used to windows movie maker through doing video blogging, I thought I’d try to make a book video for a few of my upcoming books. The problem is, like video blogging, I look up and an hour has passed without my knowing it. It’s fun to think about how to present your book through visual media instead of through words. It’s a whole new way to think about your work and as long as you use the stock photo sites and the stock music sites (hey, I know what it’s like to be pirated!), you can make something fun for around the same price as you’d spend on some cover ads at a website (aside from what a huge time suck it is, but that’s just me loving to learn something new - blame Anya Bast, she started me on this road!)

To tell the truth, I’m not overly convinced book videos make a difference in book buying patterns. Shrug. Hell, lots of things I do I’m not sure if they make a difference. And having them done professionally is far more expense than I’m personally willing to go to (although certainly after having done one now, I know the time and energy it takes!).

However, I’m never opposed to learning how to do things for myself. It appeals to the control freak living inside me, making lists and using color coded 3×5 cards and stuff. I don’t think it can *hurt* to try book videos, most certainly. And I like doing the multi media stuff even if I’m not perfect at it. It’s fun even if it’s time porn in a major way.

I’ve got several books coming out in print the remainder of this year - Making Chase, Reading Between the Lines and Undercover (and Taking Care of Business in the UK) so why not give it a whirl? So without further ado - here’s my very first book video for my summer trade paper release, Reading Between the Lines. Go easy on me, it’s my first time…

Hi all ;D

I’m a bit late posting this and apologize for that. It’s been nuts at work. In fact, before I could get out the door this morning my phone was ringing because some of my customers were having major problems.

My customers are pharma and biotech manufacturers. While they add to our lives by producing everything from life saving medicines to good-ole-cracker-jack vitamins, sometimes they forget that the sun doesn’t rise when they wake up in the morning. Besides, the sun can’t rise when they wake up, ’cause it saves that honor for when I crack open my eyes and sit up in bed ;D LOL!

Anyway, as the day went along the problems kinda of piled up. I even found myself at odds with a co-worker. In fact, we ended up in an argument. Bottom line - my boss gave me instructions to do something a certain way, and the co-worker didn’t give a fig and was determined to do it her own way. The problem with that was that I’d still end up on the hook if the tasks weren’t completed on time or in a satisfactory manner. Can we all say, ‘Bump that mess’ boys and girls?

So, I backed up, backed off…and called my boss to let her handle it.

Now, if that had happened fifteen or twenty years ago I probably would have handled it all wrong by continuing to press my point with my co-worker, even if I knew it wasn’t going to get me anywhere. However, the years of experience in a thing called ‘life’ have given me some wisdom on when to just back up, call it a day, and leave it alone. I do the same thing in relationships (which I haven’t had in for-EVAH!). I think the biggest compliment my ex has ever given me was in front of a counselor when he said, “She doesn’t ask me for much, she doesn’t nag me about anything, she handles the big things like a champ…” Most men would be happy to have a woman like that, wouldn’t you think?

But I digress. My question to you is this - are there things you used to do a certain way at one time in your life that you do completely different now? You don’t have to get too personal, but I’m just curious.

10,500 / 90,000 (11.7%)

RELENTLESS!

Whoo! Hit 10K last night and the story and my characters are opening up for me. Originally I’d envisioned a certain kind of push and pull between H/H but as I write, that’s not how it’s working. Certainly they’re from two different worlds, but I can’t make them not like each other so I’m not going to force it. The meta story is the same, the conflicts are the same, but their chemistry is a bit different.

IMO, you can’t outline chemistry. It’s organic on the page and it develops as you write. At least for me. I know other folks write with very detailed, broken down by scene outlines. I wouldn’t outline at all if I didn’t have to to sell to NY and on proposal because I tend to like to let the story unfold on its own. However, an outline is helpful when you’re starting something you sold on a few pages of an idea in November, LOL.

Don’t get me wrong, selling on proposal and synopsis is awesome. It means editors trust me and my record enough to complete a book, a good book, to buy on spec. I appreciate having come this far. And I’m fortunate to have editors who haven’t complained when I veer a bit off from the original synopsis when I turn in the final. Now, if I was really veering off, like it had been proposed as a post apoc love story between one man and one woman and I turned in a contemporary menage romance, that’s gonna be a problem! But so far, *knocks wood* it’s been smallish things - almost always because as I write, my characters real motivations come to me and I write to reflect that.

Hi all! I don’t have alot to write about because I’m frantically working on three manuscripts all at the same time. One book is the story of Alaina Bixler, the daughter of Carin and Bix. I hadn’t planned to continue the series after the third book (Kenoe’s story, due out in July) but I got an idea in my head that I just couldn’t shake, so it’s in the works. And speaking of Kenoe’s story, the final book cover has been okay’d and it’s now up on the Samhain Publishing coming soon web page. I’ll have it up on my website soon, too.

I’m also working on books for the Pryde sisters from Spirit of the Pryde. They’ve been on hold for a while, but I’m now hot and heavy working on Niah’s story.

Memorial Day is upon us. Most year’s we barbeque or have people over, but in Colorado we don’t have any family or friends, so we just kind of do our own thing. This year, my son is in Wyoming camping with his dad, and my daughter and I are doing absolutely nothing - which is a fabulous. However if you’re a martini kind of gal, I recently got some new recipes that you just might like…

Check out the Fine Living take on Washington Apple Martinis, Blueberry Martinis, Flirt-inis, Passion-tinis, and more!