Not Ready For Radio

 

I had a very interesting new experience this week. In my publicity endeavors, I was presented with a great opportunity: to do a podcast! Now, I'm terrible about listening to these things. The Nerdist tends to be the only one I can listen to for any amount of time (my ADHD is not audio-friendly). I still tend to check out after 15 minutes or so, even if it's, say, Jeri Ryan. 

However, when I was told this Larry Duane of Not Ready For Radio was interested in interviewing me on his podcast, I gave it a listen. This guy is hilarious. He held my attention, he was polite to his guests--it made me feel very confident that I could manage! 

For anyone who isn't aware, I have agoraphobia. To do this, I had to be dropped off and have my husband take the shorties off to go play so they wouldn't be noising up the studio. This presented the problem that not only is it hard for me to be around strangers, particularly men I don't know well, but I wouldn't even have a baby to help balance me. It ended up being a non-issue. 

Get me talking about my favorite subjects and I'm immediately comfortable! Throwing in some pumpkin cream liqueur does not hurt, apparently (I also very seldom drink). He was just as funny in person and his girlfriend is a friend from a local mama's group (how I got connected to him). 

I had a lot of fun and hopefully expanded my reach for Hotel of Lost Souls. Which, by the way, he read and really enjoyed!

If anyone has ever wondered what I sound like, you can check me out here (click the pic--audio is NSFW):

The Cage

Larry Duane continues talking terror in this episode of his show, and he's joined by author H.S. Kallinger. Her book, Hotel of Lost Souls, is an urban fantasy novel featuring the scary-story staple that are vampires; so the pair chat about that a bit, but not before daring to utter -- three terrible times -- HIS horrifying name! Who is HE? Tune in to witness HIS summoning!

Hi, everybody

Sorry about dropping off the face of the earth, but I've been a bit busy... creating life.

I'm 7 weeks, 5 days pregnant. Remarkably, I got pregnant on the first try. We didn't think that would ever happen. My first little girl took 18 months of trying before I gave up--right after getting pregnant ;) My second was 8 months with two losses in the meantime and required supplements. So, I'm going to be a nervous Nellie for who-knows-how-long while I go from pregnancy milestone to milestone.

I'm having a yucky first trimester, but since a friend has hypermesis gravardium (where you puke endlessly, end up having to go to the hospital to be hydrated, etc.), I don't really see it as that bad. I take morning sickness vitamins and have only puked once, even if I spend about 80% of my waking time feeling like I'm going to and being afraid of it, because I'm exhausted, weak and can barely tolerate much food.

On the night I ovulated, I had a dream. This dream was so interesting that I overslept and had to tell a friend all about it. I wrote it down as a micro-fiction and that friend told me I should make it into a book. I laughed, because that seemed so silly, but the worm was in my head and I decided to write a short story.

Exactly 3 weeks later, I had over 100,000 words--a full novel. I wrote an average of 5,000 words a day (my daily goal) and put in 8-14 hour days on it. I was driven and I enjoyed it. I felt so fulfilled and productive. I've never written like that in my whole life. All the while, this little bean in there grew, implanted and started the road to becoming a baby. My little muse. My muse has always taken maternity leave when I get pregnant, so having him go into overdrive was strange and welcome.

So I've neglected my blog, dramatically and I'm sorry. But I'm also not sorry, as I had quite legitimate reasons. I don't know how active I'll become, since not a lot has really come up, parenting-wise, lately, that isn't already super-blogged. I'll eventually cover car seats and the new recommendation, but that's for another day. Today, I want to go lie on the couch and veg out, trying to forget about the ever-present nausea and overwhelming cravings for potatoes.