Tag: entertainment

Button Sunday

This is why it takes me so long. Some writers power through to get it all down and then go back and do their edits. Occasionally I want to try it that way, but it never works for me.

Maybe I’m too trained as an editor and proofreader. I edit, read, re-edit, and re-read constantly as I go. Maybe it’s also my experience as a teacher trained to correct errors and suggest how to polish writing.

I learned the hard way this is why beta readers don’t work for me. By the time I send pages, I’ve already started altering them.

ETA: Most recent writing playlist.


Bonnie Raitt, Bonnie Raitt


Red Hot Chili Peppers: Blood Sugar Sex Magik; One Hot Minute

Los Angeles is the major city featured in the Neverending Saga. It’s the home of my soul even if it’s never been a physical home to me. Tom and I have explored there. Jim has been my tour guide there. From Blood Sugar Sex Magik, “City of Angels.” I’ve been able to use so much of L.A. in the Neverending Saga.

Old Texas

I’ve tried in vain to find information online for this utility box mini mural on Bunker Hill Road. It’s an often-used image in Texas art: a longhorn in a field of bluebonnets.

I remember on long road trips when I was a kid that my sister used to sing this song as part of her car songs repertoire. Never dreamed back then we’d both one day live in the Lone Star State.

Hump Day

Wednesday, and the writing is slow, but it is happening. This has been the writing playlist.


Prince: Purple Rain; 1999; and The Very Best of Prince.

And one of my favorite songwriters of always.

John Prine: John Prine and The Missing Years. The third CD, Broken Hearts and Dirty Windows: Songs of John Prine, Vol. 2, is a tribute compilation with other artists singing his songs. Because he died at the very beginning of the pandemic in 2020, they couldn’t gather and reminisce and mourn him as they wanted. So they did this instead.

“I Remember Everything” – Brandi Carlile
“Pretty Good” – Nathaniel Rateliff
“Saddle in the Rain” – Amanda Shires
“Yes I Guess They Oughta Name A Drink After You” – Tyler Childers
“Sweet Revenge” – Margo Price
“Summer’s End” – Valerie June
“Souvenirs” – Jason Isbell
“Angel from Montgomery” – Bonnie Raitt
“Sam Stone” – John Paul White
“One Red Rose” – Iris DeMent
“Hello in There” – Emmylou Harris
“Paradise” – Sturgill Simpson

And looking at this, I realized it’s Vol 2, so now I’ve ordered Vol 1 to add to my collection. Overall, I just need more of John Prine’s music. It’s on my list.

I first heard that song on an 8-track tape belonging to my college roommate Debbie, though it came out before we were in college. The artist was Bette Midler; the album, The Divine Miss M. Made me sad the first time I heard it and still makes me sad.

Tiny Tuesday!

Tim cracks me up. I was in a text exchange with him and Jim this morning, and I shared this.

And Tim quickly replied:

Then he amended that isn’t always true of K-POP bands, which reminded me that I have Mattel’s Jimin doll from the K-POP band BTS (standing for the Korean phrase Bangtan Sonyeondan, which in English translates to “bullet-resistant boy scouts.”)

Jimin is another of the dolls that represents a character in the Neverending Saga. In 2021, Wardrobe was called in to redo his look to match his character.

The character is a private investigator.

Back to wardrobe! If the Jimin character gets a kilt, that’ll bring the number to seven, same as in BTS, and the shunned doll can rejoin his friends.

This is not faithful to canon, meaning Tim has inadvertently created the first fan fiction for the characters in the Neverending Saga. WITHOUT EVEN READING IT. It’s magic!

I should give props to the band in case you’ve never heard them.

Now I’ll keep thinking of this group of dolls as the Bangtan Scots, which kind of fits, though to my knowledge, only one of the characters is of Scottish descent.

all things must pass

George Harrison died on November 29, 2001. Today, I’ve chosen to listen to all of his songs from my CD version of his 1970 album All Things Must Pass. The three-disk album Riley gave me all those years ago when it was released was drowned in our Harvey flood; I replaced it quickly because not to have this collection from my “favorite” Beatle was unthinkable.

I got the 50th Anniversary vinyl when it was released in 2021, and I’ve never removed its shrink wrap. For some reason, I want it to remain intact. Maybe I’m sure that one day, a copy of the original will come back into my life. I don’t know. Whatever format it’s in, these remain some of the most meaningful, sometimes haunting, songs of my life.

I have the CD version of the 50th Anniversary recordings, too.

I miss George Harrison. I miss Riley.

Tiny Tuesday!

First up on the writing playlist. I’ve replaced two more drowned albums…


Tom Petty And The Heartbreakers, Hard Promises, 1981


Tom Petty And The Heartbreakers, Long After Dark, 1982

…with smaller (if not quite tiny) CDs.

Up next after those are the new offerings from…


John Mellencamp’s Orpheus Descending followed by Wolf Van Halen’s Mammoth II

I look forward to the inspiration. =)

Tiny Tuesday!

The kilt looks are finally completed, with some shirt exchanges once I sewed a new shirt. Now all the dolls are wearing belts I made, and I made and added their chains and sporrans (note the houndstooth), some embellished with their emblems. If you didn’t care about any of this to start with, I’ll put only one doll here and the rest behind a cut to save real estate on your monitor. If you do look at them all, thanks. I learned a lot of new things and spent my time on this project mentally plotting the rest of the Neverending Saga. That also gave me the opportunity to make good changes to the sixth book before diving into the seventh.


The Mogul

Continue reading “Tiny Tuesday!”

Button Sunday

For good or ill, below is a list of November 19 trivia.
Courtesy of The History Calendar.

Today in History – November 19th

1493 – Christopher Columbus discovered Puerto Rico, on his second voyage.
1805 – Lewis & Clark reached the Pacific Ocean –first European Americans to cross continent.
1850 – Alfred Tennyson became British Poet Laureate, succeeding William Wordsworth.
1861 – Julia Ward Howe wrote “Battle Hymn of the Republic.”
1863 – President Lincoln delivered his Gettysburg Address.
1893 – The first newspaper color supplement was published in the Sunday New York World.
1916 – Samuel Goldwyn and Edgar Selwyn establish Goldwyn, one of the most successful independent film makers of all time.
1928 – TIME magazine published its cover in color for the first time.
1969 – Apollo 12 made man’s second landing on the moon.
1977 – Egyptian President Anwar Sadat became the first Arab leader to set foot in Israel on an official visit.
1980 – CBS TV banned Calvin Klein’s jean ad featuring Brooke Shields.
1985 – President Ronald Reagan and Soviet leader Mikhail S. Gorbachev met for the first time.
1997 – Septuplets were born to Bobbi McCaughey. It was only the second known case where all seven were born alive.
1998 – The impeachment inquiry of President Bill Clinton began.
1998 – Vincent van Gogh’s “Portrait of the Artist without Beard” sold at auction for more than $71 million.
2001 – President George W. Bush signed the most comprehensive air security bill in the country’s history.
2002 – The U.S. government completed its takeover of security at 424 airports nationwide.
2003 – Eight competing designs for a memorial to the victims of the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks at the World Trade Center were unveiled.

SCIENCE, INVENTIONS, PATENTS
1895 – The “paper pencil” was patented by Frederick E. Blaisdell.
1954 – Two automatic toll collectors were placed in service on the Garden State Parkway in New Jersey.

MUSIC HISTORY
1968 – The Supremes performed at a Royal Variety Show with Queen Elizabeth in attendance.
1971 – B.B. King marked his 25th anniversary in music by opening a European tour in London.
1990 – Milli Vanilli were stripped of their Grammy Award because other singers had lent their voices to the “Girl You Know It’s True” album.
1995 – Bruce Springsteen’s thirteenth album, “The Ghost of Tom Joad,” was released.
1996 – Prince released the 3-CD set “Emancipation.” The release was on his record label NPG Records.
1997 – The American premiere of Paul McCartney’s “Standing Stone” was played in Carnegie Hall by St. Luke’s Orchestra.
1998 -Motley Crue’s retail store, S’Crue, opened in Los Angeles.

FAMOUS BIRTHDAYS
James Garfield 1831
Tommy Dorsey 1905
Indira Gandhi 1917
Larry King 1933
Dick Cavett 1936
Ted Turner 1938
Calvin Klein 1942
Meg Ryan 1961
Jodie Foster 1962