It Snowed Yesterday. Geez.

It didn't accumulate much, and it's certainly melted away by now, but I usually think of there being more time from the start of fall to the first snow . . .

Ah well. It isn't nearly so bad that I'm going to be singing this again (that I'm reserving for March. Or even April) and a little snow in the morning looks rather pretty.

(SOURCE)

Do you get snow, and if so, have you had any yet? Do you like winter at all?


(And yes, I'm trying to come up with topics for the last stretch of NaBloWriMo. Only one day left in October, which is a fairly scary thing. Got to go work some more on my NaNoWriMo novel.)




-----The Golden Eagle

Awards! And Tags! Hurray!

In the past couple of weeks, I've been awarded and tagged several times . . . and since today was a day when I didn't (miracle, I'm telling you) have a scheduled post, I figured it was time I posted them. :)

First, the 7x7 Link Award!

This one was awarded to me by Siv Maria at Been there, done that. and M Pax at Wistful Nebulae. Many thanks to both of them!

For this one, I have to list the Most Beautiful, Most Helpful, Most Popular, Most Controversial, Most Surprisingly Successful, Most Underrated, and the Most Pride worthy of my posts. Oh, this is going to be difficult . . .

Most Beautiful: A-Z Blogging Challenge: N Stands For: Nebulae
For the pictures. (None of them are mine, of course.)

Most Helpful: How To: Beaming Someone Up Into A Spaceship
All right, all right. So that wasn't what was meant. Maybe this one, then:
How To: Writing
What, you say? That's not really helpful either? Well fine. Here's a serious one:
Do You Have To Like The Setting To Enjoy A Book?

Most Popular: A-Z Blogging Challenge: W Stands For: Water
814 pageviews. The one with the most comments, though, was this one:
First Campaigner Challenge: 200 Word Flash Fiction
. . . with 87 Things People Wanted to Say.

Most Surprisingly Successful: Awards, Deck The Halls, Eclipse, Arctic Dinos, Congress, Christmas
33 comments, but it's my third most-viewed post of all-time. I haven't the slightest idea why.

Most Underrated: It Would Be A Stretch To Call Them Beautiful . . .
5 comments (2 of them mine), on a post about some fascinating birds (I might even go as far to say they're some of my . . . well, if not favorites, then I'm at least quite fond of them).

Most Controversial: In Which We Interrupt The Usual Posting Schedule To Rant About Politics
Just after Gabriel Giffords was shot. I was steamed. So I posted about it.

Most Pride Worthy: The Copenhagen Interpretation vs. The Many Worlds Interpretation
Two words: Quantum Physics.


Emily Rose at mist of the blossom rain awarded me the Lovely Blogger Award. Thank you, Emily!

. . . and technically, I'm supposed to list seven things about myself. But I was also tagged, so I'm going to combine the two into one.

Speaking of which, Susan Kane at thecontemplativecat and WB Terrien tagged me with the meme that's been floating about the blogosphere: listing 10 random things about yourself.

So, here I go:

1. I love fall. The smell in the air, the slight chill, the orange leaves, the start of a new school year. I'm looking forward to September 23. (And Michael Di Gesu's blogfest is another plus, of course.)

2. I have the urge to write a book with the title All the Shades of Gray. With a gray cover, of course.

3. I love cinnamon. Especially the smell, but it's wonderful on things like bread. Cinnamon raisin bagels are lovely.

4. I strongly dislike mint. Strongly. Which makes it difficult when in the dental aisle at the store, because most of the products are Mint. Or Peppermint. Or Cool Mint. Or Fresh Mint. Blech.

5. I'm finding a lot of discrepancies in my writing, for some reason. It's not something I usually do, but I keep coming across sections where I've said one thing at the beginning and wrote the rest like I said something else. For example, this morning, I'd mentioned the character had a breeze on their face as they were moving, but then continued with the character being in an enclosed truck. With all the windows up. (And no sunroof or anything, either . . . :P)

6. I plan to watch The Color of Magic for Terry Pratchett Month tonight and review it tomorrow for the scheduled post. It's rather long (I think it says 197 minutes on the back) but I've been reading some positive reviews of it . . .

7. I have never sent a text message in my life. And I don't intend on changing that anytime soon.

8. My website is coming along nicely. (You probably figured I'd forgotten about that, didn't you? I haven't mentioned it in over a month on my blog, I believe.)

9. I like cold much more than I do heat. For me, crunching through the snow is way more appealing than strolling down a hot, sunny beach.

10. I love my library.

Now, for who I am going to tag and award. I decided to try something a little different this time, just to see. (Don't panic yet.)

Here's the idea: for those commenters who land on a Fibonacci number (1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, 21, 34, 55, 89, 144, 233) consider yourself awarded. Or tagged. Whichever you please. (Basically, you can take any award, both awards, just the tag, a tag and an award, or all three. And can you tell I love the Fibonacci sequence?)

You can panic now.

Or not.

Hope you're all having a great weekend!


-----The Golden Eagle

Happy Halloween! (Plus: NaBloWriMo, NaNoWriMo, And Random)

HAPPY HALLOWEEN! Hallowe'en. All Hallows Eve. Whatever you'd like to call it, today's the day! Have fun trick-or-treating, partying, whatever. :)

*****

Today is also the last day of NaBloWriMo! I have posted at least once every day for the entire month of October! Even more reason to celebrate.

But, if you're like me and have participated in NaBloWriMo, don't do party too hard! Because tomorrow is *drumroll*dramatic display* NaNoWriMo!


I know that I've said several times that I wasn't planning on doing this event. For many reasons, I told myself. It wouldn't be good for my novel, I said. It would be better to edit, I thought. I don't think word-vomiting all over my document would be a really great idea, I consoled myself.

*sighs* EXCUSES. But you know what? I've decided to change that. Because of a lot of factors. So, basically, I am going to be doing NaNoWriMo!

(If you don't know what NaNoWriMo is by now, I'm seriously going to question where you've been for the past month.)

I'm kind of pushing the deadline to sign up here, but I did sign up to do it! This will be my first year. But hey, I wrote 40,000 words last month, so it's just 10,000 more than that. So, the thing on my mind right now is, I am going to kill this challenge with everything I've got.

Here's the link to My Profile. Buddy me, if you've got an account. (I can't find a lot of you, because there's no "search" for the profiles or anything like that.) At first I wasn't sure about linking to it, but I managed to disable the Home Region thing, which would basically tell you where I live. Boo. I didn't want to do that.

I'll update you guys over there and on this blog with one of those word count widget-y things. I think I'll use the potato man one:

Anywho. Just get geared up for the absolute writing frenzy--it's 50,000 words, after all!

*****

Interesting, because they don't come around here often, but I saw a bald eagle yesterday! Just perched. It was sort of far away, but I could see the characteristic white head and dark brown body. It would be nice if it stuck around . . . but I doubt that.

Ever seen one?


It was snowing a few days ago. SNOWING. It just wet the sidewalk a little, but it's c-c-c-o-o-l-d-e-r than usual now. Even for the beginning of November, people are not usually shivering in a winter coat. It's supposed to get colder and stay that way for a while, too.


Have a great Halloween, all!


-----The Golden Eagle