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Text of the page (random words):
writing ruminations comment link margin left 6em writing ruminations writing is such an internal process why not make those private ruminations public this is how stories take shape and grow about me name mary rosenblum location happy valley oregon united states i ve been supporting myself as a writer for many years and am watching the changes in the publishing world with fascination for me sharing the craft teaching is as creatively satisfying as the writing process itself view my complete profile the new year in writing oregon spring nice writing news slow spring winter lambing reality check spring arrival with lamb and skies puppy herding new new millenium new start beneficence and wings april 2005 may 2005 june 2005 july 2005 august 2005 october 2005 november 2005 march 2006 april 2006 may 2006 july 2006 august 2006 september 2006 october 2006 november 2006 december 2006 january 2007 february 2007 march 2007 april 2007 may 2007 july 2007 august 2007 october 2007 december 2007 january 2008 february 2008 march 2008 april 2008 june 2008 july 2008 december 2008 january 2009 february 2009 march 2009 january 2011 sunday january 02 2011 the new year in writing i greeted this new january with enthusiasm after a couple of tough years hey my indoor citrus trees have all blossomed today what can be bad about a day perfumed with the scent of orange blossoms in january and it s a new start for many writers as well i have quite a few students and the trend to self publishing is accelerating it s so much easier to simply self publish your book than to suffer through the tiring and discouraging process of querying agents and getting a lot of rejections and you have no editor nobody to tell you that the story or memoir you love so much isn t perfect but increasingly i m seeing sad results from students who blithely published that mystery romance or memoir they sell three copies or maybe ten in a year most go to family and friends one or two to strangers alas the really tough part is that many of these hopeful new writers have paid thousands of dollars to publishers with the profound belief usually supported by these publishers that they ll make all that money back and more that a new york editor will notice their book and probably buy it or at least buy the next one these publishers now tell novices that in today s publishing world it s now accepted that authors share some of the risk and pay for the production costs this rapidly growing cottage industry saddens me these publishers are preying on the dreams of novices and they know exactly what to say in order to make the novice believe that all will be well and lucrative now there are reasons to self publish and you can make decent sales in the self published market but it takes a lot of work on the part of the author the build it and they will come belief is a lovely hollywood myth but doesn t apply very well when your book is swimming in a sea of often very poorly written self published books where does today s reader look for their next read sadly most of the people i ask still mention a brick and mortar bookstore like barnes and noble or powell s here in oregon and they re looking on the shelves not in the data base that allows a publisher to tell that hopeful novice that his or her book will be available from barnes and noble self publishing does open up a world of possibilities but it requires hours and hours of self promotion on the author s part the internet is a great way to reach a lot of potential readers but you have to reach them aha therin lies the rub if you re considering a non new york publisher for your book by all means do yourself a huge favor and visit preditors and editors and the sfwa writers beware pages these sites both carry a list of publishers who have been flagged for charging fees for their services remember if it s a real publisher the money flows from the publisher to the writer it does not ever flow the other way if you are paying to publish your book you are self publishing since you re writing that check and buying that publisher s services no matter what that publisher claims then be a good shopper and see who will give you the most service for the best price posted by mary rosenblum 4 55 pm 1 comments monday march 23 2009 oregon spring this was one of those weekends where i remind myself that if i got the same workout at a gym i d have to pay a lot of money but then if i was getting that same workout at the gym it probably wouldn t be raining and hailing on me but hey that final shower finished with a rainbow while it was still raining on me so it was at least quite pretty and not very cold since i was doing chainsaw calisthenics i stayed pretty warm you know that old saying about firewood and warming you twice right i was dealing with one of those gifts that come with a bit of a price tag i have all these big branches you can have for firewood translates to i don t want to have to deal with all those twigs so you can have em so i trimmed off all the really fine twigs and i burn stuff down to a size smaller than a broomstick and my beloved chipper even started first time out after its winter sit so it was a good day rain hail and all and i don t even have a pile of branches blocking my driveway woohoo then today was a good flight we had the scappoose airpark to ourselves mostly because everything else was already getting weather and i got in one really nice crosswind landing they ve been giving me trouble before rapidly decreasing visibility and rain chased us back to troutdale where i got to perfect my crosswind style a bit more i ve been having to unlearn my winter s worth of landing in 30 mph headwinds the rain came in on our heels classic oregon spring but cold my calendar is what s growing and right now according to that calendar it s early march not late march ah well the seasons do what the seasons do we re the ones with the inflexible calendar posted by mary rosenblum 4 23 pm 1 comments wednesday february 25 2009 nice writing news i got a great call today was a classic oregon february day rain wind sun more wind so i was working on students and deborah ross called editor of the lace and blade anthologies very nice fantasy collections i ve written two stories for her night wind in the first anthology and dragon wind in the second not out yet she called to tell me that night wind a sort of historical fantasy well they both are was on the final nebula ballot i had to pry my jaw off my chest that s way cool i really enjoyed writing that story posted by mary rosenblum 9 32 pm 4 comments saturday february 14 2009 slow spring well my ewe delivered twin ram lambs and now all four of the lambs are out bounding about together in between snow showers violating at least a couple of laws of physics with their antics two more ewes to lamb yet they re keeping their legs crossed for the moment cricket has decided my chickens aren t enough of a herding challenge and is eyeing up on the sheep but when i took her out to walk steers around with trudy and her brother she wasn t quite so sure about those big critters dunno why she s quite ready to keep watch on george s horses and they re much larger than the yearling steers we ll try again next week and i ll bring annie along she loves to make steers move posted by mary rosenblum 7 35 pm 1 comments sunday february 08 2009 winter lambing reality check we ve had our lovely february break from winter sun mild temperatures i planted peas and fava beans two ewes lambed and i wondered if i even needed to put them in the lambing pen why not let them stay out in the new spring grass then my black ewe decided that today was the day she dwadled around in the mild temperatures not really sure it was time to lie down and do it yet and the clouds gathered and the light waned and it sprinkled and yes we re likely to again get snow tonight sigh with a wind and 30 degree temps lamb killing weather when you re wet and newborn and out in the field so it s crunch time she s pawing lying down not really pushing the lambs out yet but thinking that it s soon do i leave her out then i have to go out in the dark with a light which spooks the rest of the sheep and probably her as i pick up her new lambs and coax her to come with me to the warm dry lambing pen or do i get annie the enforcer out there and let her put the ewe in that s pretty stressful for the ewe i don t want to do that so i went out to feed the rest in the waning light fingers crossed if she s not really ready to push she ll come in i serve alfalfa at night they love that i put out the hay and hear her bleat wait for me closer than the far back of the paddock where i ve been keeping them penned major coyote pressure this year she s coming i wait until she s in everybody is nose deep in the manger slip through and close the barn gate then i have to get her into the lambing pen no thank you she weighs 200 lb she is wet and not at all interested never mind clean straw alfalfa in the feeder and fresh water bruce the ram watches me balefully but i snapped a lead to his collar while he was happily eating and tied him so he can t butt me like he really wants to a bit of wet sheep wrestling later she is in and i m panting she immediately starts munching on the alfalfa quite happy to be here i mutter a couple of not for family viewing comments under my breath as i latch the door now she s fine with being in there hay all to herself sheep that is not what i muttered i am quite soaked winter fleeces hold a lot of cold rain and the ram is letting me know that as soon as i unsnap the lead he s going to discuss my behavior with me i call annie in to ride shotgun as i unsnap him they face off he decides that really he d be better off eating annie and i depart cricket the puppy is really disappointed that she didn t get to help i tell her later annie tells her i ll handle the ram squirt i agree with annie so i ll sneak down there in another hour or two and see what s up or out should i say it can snow tonight that s fine lambing season is never dull posted by mary rosenblum 6 58 pm 0 comments friday february 06 2009 spring arrival with lamb and skies well i declare it officially spring two of my ewes have now lambed each with a single lamb i m blaming the nasty weather earlier they usually twin but both are nice large lambs one ewe one ram lamb this is the first born the official spring is here announcement he s a couple of hours old in this picture nice and dry and already has his belly full it has been quite the week crocuses blooming lambs george is doing great his surgeon calls him one tough guy and said he could go back to flying at the end of the month nice to see him looking good i miss my rides in the back seat of the twin comanche he flies the season has really changed the sheep always know so happy spring to you all even if you do have snow up to your backside posted by mary rosenblum 6 15 pm 1 comments sunday february 01 2009 puppy herding this has been a tough couple of weeks a lot of things converged and i didn t have enough hours but hey life is like that sometimes and today i had a date with trudy my aussie puppy cricket s breeder to put her on ducks and i went cricket s mom tick is a stunning herder with a lot of herding trial trophies and i wanted to see how she measured up so today on a foggy cold afternoon trudy sorted five ducks out into the small paddock and i with some trepidation took a very interested cricket out into the arena we re looking for natural behavior right now you can add a lot of training as a pup gets older but right now you get what that pup has unadulterated and it can be good or bad trying for duck cutlets is bad so is saying uh got other things to do it s a test of what ya got under the hood well the got other things to do was not an option miz cricket was fighting the lead ready to party i grabbed the plastic leaf rake for scooping puppies off stock took a deep breath and let her go the ideal in herding dogs is one who stays just on the fight flight zone so that the stock doesn t bolt but will give to that pressure especially if the dog uses eye and stares aggressively and will move off the dog in a calm and organized fashion rather than in a panicked route the ideal dog will find balance positioning the stock between it and the handler we gotcha mostly you get much less perfection than that the pup charges into the flock grips scatters the stock what have you you can fix it later but it s nice if you don t have to so miz cricket she took off and flanked around the ducks like a pro came to balance eyed up when a duck bit her twice she just backed up a step stared hard and pushed it back into the flock naughty duck now if that had been a rottie puppy i d be having you for dinner tonight even when a single duck took off screeching she flanked out and brought him back to the flock stopping on balance to me and simply holding them wow who trained this dog while i wasn t looking trudy was very happy she says she has never seen a pup work this well cricket was very happy until i finally got hold of her and made her stop working i think we d still be out there sheep are next she was all ready when we went down to feed tonight well i ll have a nice lamb crop for her shortly just her size labels australian shepherd herding puppy posted by mary rosenblum 6 51 pm 0 comments