The concept of recent sci-fi movie Transcendence– what if a human’s brain becomes an A.I.? – fascinated me, and I enjoyed the film. What bothers me is that despite one of the two main characters being a woman, Dr. Evelyn Caster, I can’t remember, in the entire movie, any woman speaking one-on-one with any other woman. About anything. I understand men outnumber women in the hard sciences, but Evelyn has not a single woman friend to support her in a crisis? I also understand that writers can’...
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Pete Spencer Held Prisoner – Excerpt from The Unbelievers (Book 2 in The Awakening series)
Reader Kerri Geiser attended a book release party for the paperback edition of The Awakening and won the right to have a character named after her in Book 2 in the series. Below is an excerpt that includes an interchange between her character and Tara's father, Pete Spencer, from The Unbelievers, set to be released in September, 2014. These scenes occur around the middle of The Unbelievers but contain no spoilers, so feel free to read away:***Pete lay on ...
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Work, Wine, Twitter & The Hop
I've met many fun, kind and talented people through Twitter. One of them is fantasy writer Kyle Newton, whose sense of humor I love, and who tagged me in a blog hop. His blog is required reading for me when I need inspiration or want to laugh or both. As for what I'm up to (required questions for hopping):1 – What am I working on (or struggling not to work on in my version of the hop) –Here's the crazy thing I discovered - when you work for yourself, it's hard to not work. In cont...
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From My Mother’s Bookshelves (Favorite Books Post No. 3)
My mom and dad had in their bedroom three large bookcases, which I thought of as my mom’s because nearly all the books were hardbacks she’d bought from book-of-the-month clubs she’d belonged to in the 1950s and 60s. The books had a slightly musty yet dry old paper and cloth smell I love to this day. Most of them had plain cloth bindings with titles that were barely visible on the sides, as the paper jackets had fallen apart and been discarded.My favorite book on those shelves was The Elegant Wit...
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5 Ways to Be More Productive — And More Relaxed — In The New Year
Relax -- unlike some articles on productivity, the suggestions below are not meant to help you do more than you’re doing now. Instead, I hope they will help you enjoy your work more, relax more, and open up a little extra free time in the new year.1. Know your best times of day for different tasksOur brains work differently at different times of the day. Figuring out the ideal time to perform a task can make it more enjoyable and lessen the amount of time you spend on it. Most people are m...
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Seven Reasons Reading Stephen King Novels Is Good For You (Favorite Books Post No. 2)
I love to read horror, suspense, mysteries, and thrillers, all books that fall within the category of genre or popular fiction. Probably because I write them as well, it disturbs me that even people who love those types of books at times refer to them as “trash” or feel embarrassed about reading them. I’m not sure where this idea came from. Shirley Jackson wrote horror, and I read her short story The Lottery in honors English class in high school. Perhaps a book needs to be a certain age to be c...
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Sin, Sex and the Art of Persuasive Writing
My parents used to subscribe to a Catholic magazine with a column for young adults. When I was in high school, I read one of the columns that advised teenagers that the Bible clearly showed pre-marital sex was wrong - just look at the Sixth and Ninth commandments. I didn't remember anything in the Ten Commandments about pre-marital sex. I checked my parents' Bible (no Internet at that time, so I used the index - remember those?). The Sixth Commandment prohibits adultery. The ...
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The Military, Make Up, and Rereading Katniss (Favorite Books Post No. 1)
Recently I reread the Hunger Games trilogy. It was great fun, and the themes seemed particularly timely. (I'll do my best not to spoil any of the plot for those who haven't read the whole trilogy.)(1) Women in Combat: In the Hunger Games, each combatant (known as a tribute) competes to become the sole survivor. The arena for the games changes from year to year and even within each game. A combatant might face mountains, drought, fire, floods, or all of the above. Author Suzanne Collins...
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In Which I Realize I Don’t Need To Use The Health Insurance Marketplace (Post No. 6 of Adventures in Health Insurance)
In my continued journey to obtain the private health insurance now available due to The Affordable Care Act/Obamacare, I've been checking the status of my application at https://www.healthcare.gov/. After two weeks, it's still "in progress." I called and easily reached a real person at 1-800-318-2596. Unfortunately, he said there was no way to provide potential plan information until the application finished processing. At the very least, I'd hoped for an overview of the differences between...
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In Which I Probably Applied For Health Insurance (Post No. 5 of Adventures in Health Insurance)
Since my first attempt, I've been periodically checking the Illinois insurance exchange to apply for health insurance coverage under Obamacare (The Affordable Care Act). I'm self-employed and have coverage now through an Illinois program that allowed me to purchase what is basically an extension of COBRA coverage. COBRA, for those not familiar with it, is a law allowing someone covered under a group employer health plan to extend that coverage for 18 months after leaving employmen...
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