Quote of the Week

"Adopt the pace of nature: her secret is patience."

Ralph Waldo Emerson

Random Stuff Friday

1) I'm still sick. Sorry if I've been MIA in blog commenting. I've been hacking up lungs and what not.

2) It's just recently occurred to me that it has been 10 1/2 years since I was in England (for a school trip). I still talk about it like it was just yesterday. I feel old. Thanks to the CP who had to ask all those Stonehenge questions. And I swear, I'm totally not that old.

3) Earlier this week, I *ahem* admitted to a bit of Bieber fever. I'd like to qualify that statement and remind everyone that I have been heavily medicated for the past 14 days or so due to illness and ... yeah. And seriously? It's not my fault that Glee decided they needed to sing Bieber. Besides, I have to say, the kid did an excellent job getting all sorts of shot up on CSI ... just saying.

4) I'm just throwing this out there today, but I'll be putting up a full-on blog post about this in the coming weeks, but if you're a local (to me), meaning that you live in Utah, I'm helping the ever-awesome Brodi Ashton with organizing a "locals" arc tour for her book, EVERNEATH (January 2012). If you're interested ... details are soon to come!

5) There's a hair appointment with my name on it tomorrow morning. I'm trying to decide how to also cram in a trip to Costco, getting new tires for the car, other grocery shopping and maybe a movie with the kidlets all into tomorrow. It's gonna be a busy weekend!

Happy Friday!

Quote of the Week

On this wintery Presidents' Day (which some of us do not get as a holiday - *gasp*) I hope all are staying warm and those of you who are off? Relax for me too, okay?

Courage and perseverance have a magical talisman, before which difficulties disappear and obstacles vanish into air.

John Quincy Adams

Random Stuff Friday

1) Being sick totally sucks.

2) It was starting to warm up and feel like spring around here and suddenly... BAM! Wednesday night into Thursday the wind picked up something fierce and the snow swirled around so much you could barely see. And now, it's all nice and sunny again. Ahh, to live in a place where Mother Nature is a bit schizophrenic. Always interesting.

3) I'm hoping this weekend's weather is nice, though. We've got an old overgrown plum tree we want to get cut down before the mama robin who uses it as her summer cabin returns and sets up her nest. I don't know where she'll take her summer vacations once the tree is gone, but honestly, I'll be happy to be rid of her. She is MEAN! Like, dive bomb you because you got too close to her tree even though your car is parked beneath it mean. It's scary.

4) Saturday is my grandma's birthday. We're not really sure how old she is. And we're not really sure what day in February her birthday actually is. This isn't because she's one of those old women who have fibbed about her age until no one remembers the number. This is because she was born in Laos a long long time ago. And in Laos a long long time ago they weren't so great at record keeping. According to our guess of her age, I think she's going to be 74. My mom just turned 50. And has 2 older sisters. So really, I'm not sure if that's an acc

urate age for my grandmother to be. But we'll just go with it. It's not like anyone can tell us we're wrong, right?

5) So remember two Fridays ago when I posted about 5yo's "accidental" drawing on her pants? I thought that was a little funny. Well, I do you one better today. When I went to pick her and her sister up from my parents' house (where they stay on my parents' days off), I saw this:

And no, I'm not laughing. That's right. That is 5yo's arm with what looks to either be the first part of a phone number (of possibly some super-hot 6yo?), or the entirety of some kind of inmate number. Apparently, when my child is bored, she's decided that giving herself something akin to prison tattoos - with a Sharpie, no less - is acceptable. Let's just say, there will be a great deal of long sleeve wearing for the new inmate at the Aphayrath Correctional Facility.

I'm off to figure out how to scrub permanent marker off her arm. Open to any suggestions! Hope everyone has a happy weekend!

Breathless Tweets

I've been trying to get to the bloggy world this week, but I've been sick. Really sick. Like, the flu coupled with a walking pneumonia, sick. So I'm sorry if I haven't commented recently.

And I'm sorry if I owe you pictures from last Saturday's awe

someness that was the Breathless Reads tour. I haven't even downloaded them from my camera yet. I've been so meaning to tell everyone about the awesome time

we had there. But alas, that will have to wait.

In the meantime, you can relive my fun at the Breathless Reads tour in a very abbreviated tweet version.

And in case you were wondering, @ElanaJ did eventually make her way back to me and the stash of 21 signed books which we then stealthily lugged all the way down to the P2 level of the Salt Lake City library parking garage. I think we also burned up all the calories from the pizza lunch we had that day too.

I think there's one stop left of the Breathless Reads tour - February 25 in Raleigh, I believe. If you get a chance to go, this is one event you don't want to miss and I'm just glad we were lucky enough to get to be one of the cities they stopped in!

You've Been MATCHED!

Happy Day After Valentine's and ...

Congrats to Marquita (KeeKee) Hockaday!

You're the lucky random winner of the fabulous Ally Condie's MATCHED!

And because I was lucky enough to get to see Ally again for the Breathless Tour, you ALSO get a signed bookmark!

Email me at windy.aphayrath (at) gmail (dot) com and we'll work out all your shipping details :)

Quote of the ... Day

Without Valentine's Day, February would be... well, January.

Jim Gaffigan

Just thought I'd try to keep things in perspective on this sort of holiday day! (It only really counts as a holiday if you get the day off from work.)

Oh! And don't forget! If you haven't entered to win a signed copy of (the ever-awesome) Ally Condie's MATCHED - with MATCHED-ing signed bookmark - go HERE and enter. RIGHT NOW!!

Random Stuff Friday

1) While it is pretty awesome that we've got 5 kick ass YA authors in town for a signing tomorrow, I'm not so sure this is gonna be good for my shoulders / back. Do you know how heavy that many books is?!?! Take into account the ones I'm getting signed for myself, a couple few for good friends who couldn't make it and then a few that may *ahem* show up on here for, yanno, one reason or a *cough* contest *cough* another.

What was that?!?? You haven't entered to win a signed copy of Ally Condie's MATCHED yet? Well what are you waiting for?!?! Run ... er ... CLICK HERE! I bet there will even be cupcakes in it for you!

2) So for the first time since I got it (back in June) Captain Nook's battery is about dead. And low and behold, what do I discover? I can't find the freakin' charger cord. Great. :( Good thing I have to go hit up B & N anyway.

3) I have self-imposed deadlines from now through the end of June for writerly stuff. We'll see how this pans out, seeing as it involves writing lots of "first three chapters" and, uh, I am not one of those people who actually writes chronologically. And also lots of outlining and I am so totally an organic writer. This should be interesting.

4) Oh look! While Captain Nook's charger cord has gone missing, I just found the charger cord for my bluetooth headset. The universe is totally toying with me.

5) When I was little my mom and I used to go to the little Asian store and she'd rent VHS tapes of Thai la khons aka soap operas. This was like, a weekly thing so she could watch her shows. This has been going on for years. Well, she recently discovered she can watch the la khons on YouTube. It's like a mini-Netflix for her, but without the $9.99 fee. Great, whatever. Except now my siblings are kickin' themselves for introducing her to this. Why? Here's my sister's tweet from last night:

Yes, she's gone psycho because my sister's laptop wouldn't turn on so she could use it to watch the la khons on YouTube. Forget that my sister was doing her homework at the time ... what's this world coming to?

I better go let my mom know her la khons aren't leaving YouTube any time soon and my sister probably should finish her homework. Have a nice weekend everyone!

It's Almost Friday

I meant to blog yesterday. But I got tied up with some other stuff and, well, it didn't happen. I meant to write today's blog post last night and, well, that didn't happen either. It's just been one of those weeks.

So instead, let me leave you with this:

Happy Almost-Friday!

Cupcakes and A Perfect Match(ed) Contest!

Do you know what day it is? Tuesday. That's right. And do you know what's in six days?

Husband would tell you that it would be Monday. And I actually agree a little bit, it will be Monday. But not just any Monday. It's Valentine's Day and in honor of that, I've decided that today is pre-Valentine's Treat Tuesday!

So to start off ... let's treat ourselves to some festive cupcakes. Go ahead, help yourself.

But that's not all!

From what I hear ;) ... Valentine's Day is a bit about that thing some people call love, right? So it's no wonder when people find their perfect match, they want to celebrate it with lots of treats and conversation hearts whispering sweet nothings to the taste buds.

Well, here's a perfect match for you for this upcoming Valentine's Day: your very own signed copy of Ally Condie's MATCHED!

As usual, the rules for entry are simple*: be a follower and comment on this post, telling me about how you found your perfect match - or who you think your perfect fictional match is.

And, of course there is always a little bit of fine print. I mean, this is a contest after all!

If you tweet, facebook or blog this contest and come back and let me know, I will totally give you extra entries for each. :)

Due to shipping charges, I'm limited to running this contest for the peeps in the U.S. and Canada only. Sorry if you live beyond those countries. As soon as that tree growing money sprouts up in the backyard, you guys are totally in!

The contest is open through . . . you guessed it! Valentine's

Day! (In case you live under a rock, or don't believe in Valentine's Day or something, that would be Monday, February 14.)

Good luck! Spread the word! Spread the love!

Quote of the Week

You must stay drunk* on writing so reality cannot destroy you.

Ray Bradbury

*throwing in some vodka, wine or a glass of whatever's on tap doesn't hurt either!

Random Stuff Friday

1) I don't drink much soda. A couple times a week if that. But the other day Husband bought me a 2-liter of Pepsi (the hard stuff - full-fat!) and a bottle of Rose's Grenadine. Put them together and you get the BEST cherry Pepsi EVER. Top it with a little maraschino cherry and wow. Deeeeeee-lish!

2) Going through the wash this is what I discovered in 5yo's hamper:

She said she "accidentally" drew on her leggings. I guess the marker also "accidentally" drew the arms and legs and heads on the square little bodies too.

3) I'm waiting waiting waiting. And I decided to give myself a bunch of self-imposed deadlines to distract me. Then I talked to one of my friends who showed me the error of my ways. Not that self-imposed deadlines were bad. Just that I was giving myself deadlines to things that maybe weren't what should be deadlined. *opens dayplanner* I must regroup now.

4) This week was our team meeting at the day job. Normally we're a pretty virtual team. About 20 of us work together, sprinkled across eight locations all over the world. It's nice to see everyone, but at the same time, it is freaking exhausting to manage all my regular day job stuff on TOP of the info-dump that comes with a week of all day meetings. My brain feels like mush.

5) On a completely separate note, I just needed to see this again.

*deep breath, crosses fingers and waits* (Because I TOTALLY believe in the power of the FB cookie. Don't you?)

Have a great weekend everyone!

A Pretty Possession

A few weeks ago I was lucky enough to get my hands on this:

Isn't it pretty? Yeah, I think so too. So anyway, thanks to Elana for giving me an opportunity to read this before it's June 7th release.

In case you've been living under a rock or something and need to know what POSSESSION is all about, here's the blurb straight from Elana's blog.

About POSSESSION: Vi knows the Rule: Girls don't walk with boys, and they never even think about kissing them. But no one makes Vi want to break the Rules more than Zenn...and since the Thinkers have chosen him as Vi's future match, how much trouble can one kiss cause? The Thinkers may have brainwashed the rest of the population, but Vi is determined to think for herself.

But the Thinkers are unusually persuasive, and they're set on convincing Vi to become one of them...starting by brainwashing Zenn. Vi can't leave Zenn in the Thinkers' hands, but she's wary of joining the rebellion, especially since that means teaming up with Jag. Jag is egotistical, charismatic, and dangerous--everything Zenn's not. Vi can't quite trust Jag and can't quite resist him, but she also can't give up on Zenn.

This is a game of control or be controlled. And Vi has no choice but to play.

Now, I haven't done many book reviews on here lately. Partially because I just haven't and the other part because, well, I haven't had a whole lot of time to read. But when the opportunity to read POSSESSION presented itself, I could not pass that up. I had to make time to read it!

Many who know me know that dystopian's not really my thing. I've read a couple here or there that I've really enjoyed, but like, I have yet to read HUNGER GAMES. *ducks flying tomatoes* It is in my TBR pile, but yeah. Anyway, so POSSESSION.

Add this to the ammo trying to convert me to be a dystopian reader! Elana does a great job with the world-building, the sci-fi was just enough without going over the top and making me lose interest (yanno, not being a sci-fi fan), and the storytelling sucked me in, making me feel so much of what Vi is going through. . And the characters, oh, the characters. Vi's just snarky enough to still be likable and when it comes down to it, she is such a girl :). Jag, he's a Bad boy - what's not to love? And Zenn, just trying to be Good. *sigh*

The entire premise really made me think about my own life and who's really in control. Me? Or is everyone around me really in control and just making me think I am.

Not on your to-reads yet? Go add it. Now.

Happy Reading!