Weekly Cute Photo Cop Out Post

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Yeah yeah, like you don’t do it too… This is Taz and Bug Bear (we figure his adult name will be just ‘Bear’ ).  Taz recently lost her littermate, Haggis, with whom she was very close.  His death broke our hearts and left Taz bereft of her playmate.

We weren’t intending to get another kitten, but our friend Maureen rescued this little guy from a shelter when they were going to euthanize him because he had ringworm.  Mo took him in, got rid of the ringworm and we knew she’d get attached and keep him if we didn’t intervene.  Heh.  So our other friends Aldyth and Brad joined us in a new endeavor: It takes a village to raise a kitten.   We agreed to take the little guy (then Gomez) for a few days each so he wouldn’t bond with one particular person.  This way it would be easier for Maureen to find him a home.

Great plan, right?  Except we didn’t plan for him bonding with Taz.

First day he was here she hissed at him and smacked him.  Second day, she hissed, but followed him around like a shadow.  Where he went, so did she.  He was oblivious to hissing, smacking and stalking.  Third day, she was forcibly washing him.  Fourth…well, look at THIS picture.  The caption is simply “Mine!”

An Author By Any Other Name…

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I need a pseudonym.

I recently had a short story accepted for publication by Ravenous Romances and just received a contract to expand the story into a 200 page novel. The story is erotica (in my pretentious moments, of which I have a few, I refer to it as ‘literary erotica’) and while I’ve got no problems or shame attached with writing genre erotica (Laurel Hamilton does is all the time and she’s considered mainstream), ‘Dana Fredsti’ is not a name that conjures up the right image. At least not to me. And since I’ve already published MURDER FOR HIRE: The Peruvian Pigeon under my real name, I think it’s better to reserve it for further mysteries. That being said, Fredsti is a unique name and you don’t get a lot of options when you google it. On the other hand, my dad would flip if he found out. On the OTHER hand, my dad doesn’t use Google.com or much else on the computer. Oh, the quandary…

Trying to come up with a suitable nom de plume (there’s one of my pretentious moments for you!) is causing my brain to spit out all sorts of silly names, like: Kiki Dupont; Angelique DuVallon (I like the ‘Du’ prefix, for some reason. You could say I’m ‘du-prefixated.’… BWAHAHAHAH!); Constance Melons; Forest Hill (okay, my Muni train just pulled up into the Forest Hill station); Flame Winthrop (don’t ask). What my brain is NOT doing is giving me anything useful.

I asked a friend at work and she thought I should dig into my family history and use a family related name. Can’t use my mom’s maiden name – it’s already been snagged by another family member as THEIR pen name – and HER mom’s maiden name was Butte. Yeah, that’d make for a great erotica pen name. Dana Butte. Fanny Butte. Dana Fanny?

Sigh.

You can see my plight here.

So I’m soliciting opinions and suggestions here. How many of you think I should use a pen name for my new projects? And for those of you giving a resounding ‘yes’ to that question, what do YOU think a good pen name would be for me?

I have to send my contracts off in the mail tomorrow, so any expedited suggestions would be greatly appreciated. Even the silly ones!

Taking a short break from cozies

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I’ve been expanding my reading list over the last year. Up to the point I joined Sisters in Crime and started hanging out with fellow writers, I only read mysteries within my preferred genre: humorous cozies. Then, after meeting Simon Wood, then president of the Sisters in Crime NorCal chapter, I decided I really needed to give his book, PAY THE PIPER a try. I also picked up a copy of TUNNELS by Michelle Gagnon. Both are definitely NOT cozy (the books, that is. Simon and Michelle are both kinda cute and cozy); they are disturbing psychological and sometimes graphically horrific thrillers. But despite the lack of food and clothing description and amateur sleuths who date cops, I myself enthralled by both books. Rather like the day when I was 10 or so and my taste buds suddenly decided they LIKED lasagna and cheesecake, I found I suddenly had a newfound appreciation for this hard-edged style of mystery thriller. I picked up several of the Irene Kelly mysteries by Jan Burke, both of whom I’d met at Left Coast Crime (and yes, I KNOW I haven’t finished writing about my experiences there yet…picture me shuffling my feet and hanging my head in shame.) Both were extremely nice and personable, although Jan Burke seemed almost shyer than I was when I talked to her – as are Simon and Michelle.

All of these books have several things in common as well: tons of suspense, believably flawed and interesting heroes/heroines, twisted villains, and, as mentioned earlier, they are REALLY disturbing in parts. They also wouldn’t allow me to my usual juggling two or three books at a time (I tend to keep one in the bathroom, one on the bedside table, and one in my purse for travel) routine. OH no, these books wouldn’t allow competition. “Put that friggin’ cozy mystery down, you!” They wanted to be read all the way through without interruption (I just read Michelle’s second book, BONEYARD and carried it with me everywhere, including to the bathroom at work).

I really wanted each and everyone of these books to end well, without losing any of the main or subsidiary characters I’d become fond during the read, and I had to continually stop myself from flipping to the last chapter to make sure I wasn’t going to be VERY upset with the authors. I really hate getting attached to characters only to have them die horribly on me. As to whether or not this happens in any of the books mentioned, I’m not gonna say. I will just say that despite whatever fates these authors decided on for their characters, I found their books compelling enough to read more of them. Not that I’m forswearing my cozies! I’m just expanding my literary taste buds.

Wombathon Part III: The Ferry and Sausalito

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Once we were on the ferry, everything was pretty much perfect.  It wasn’t crowded, so we had an unobstructed view off the bow and both sides of the ferry.  We all had drinks: a Bud Light for Judi (don’t they call it the ‘champagne of beers?’); some sort of microbrew each for Dave and Lisa; and a glass of Chardonnay for me.  You know it’s good wine when you can taste and smell all the various flavors/aromas out of a plastic cup.

The wind picked up and I was glad I’d brought a warm woolen shawl, but I spent a lot of time holding shawl and dress skirt down to avoid flashing my neighbors.  Judi, Lisa, and Dave were wearing pants; this was not an issue for them.  Everyone’s hair was whipping all over the place: Lisa, Judi and I looked like three happy Medusas.

If you live in the Bay Area or are visiting, I strongly encourage you to take the ferry at least once because words really can’t describe how much fun it is or how gorgeous the scenery from the ferry deck.  I would also recommend a weekday to avoid the crowds of tourist and their rented bikes, unless you are very, very patient.  When we reached the Sausalito ferry landing, the crowd waiting to board and head back to the City was scary.  The line was longer and more convoluted than that for a popular ride at Disneyland during summer break.

John had told us the Sausalito Yacht Club was literally right next to the landing and he wasn’t exaggerating.  A quick right turn after disembarking and there was the club and there was John, standing at the front door to greet us.  He led us into the club to a private room at the back which overlooked the water.  Fellow Wombats Ken (and his lovely wife Judy) and Brenda were already there and so was a bottle of chilled champagne and another of Chardonnay.  Flutes were filled for a champagne toast.  The Sausalito Wombathon had officially begun!

The alcohol flowed freely (thank you, John!) and things got silly very fast.  To see HOW silly, go here to Judi’s webpage and blog for her impressions of the evening and incriminating video evidence!  Our Queen entertained us with a German drinking song, yours truly gave an impromptu rendition of Wombat Love, Dave coined the term ‘wombat fancier’ for himself and Ken’s wife Judy, a chorus of Junior Birdmen (complete with ‘goggles) was sung, and…well, it was just plain fun getting to know people in person whom I’d only met onine.  It was also amusing looking up now and again and see people STILL boarding our ferry an hour after we’d disembarked.

We stayed at the Yacht Club for an hour and a half befoe moving on to the Spinnaker restaurant, a five minute walk from the club.  Dave ran into a group of Gaelic speaking Irishmen whom he’d met on the ferry and we paused to let him indulge in one of his favorite pasttimes: speaking Gaelic.  It’s just what he does, y’see.

Our table at the Spinnaker was the best in the house.  The restaurant itself is on the waterfront and our table was in the far end of the restaurant which went out over the water itself.  The view was amazing and we waved at many a passing boat and its crew and passengers.  The food was outstanding and the wine (Flowers Pinot Noir for us red wine drinkers) was perfect.  There was also champagne, beer and Riesling for those not into the red.  We talked writing (no big surprise considering everyone at the table is a writer, with the exception of Wombat Fancier Judy, who is a artist), with a celebratory toast for Judi Fennel’s recent three book deal (Yay, Judi!).  We drank more wine, ordered dessert, and had more wine.  Lots of wine.  Too much wine for some of us who had gotten sunburned and not much sleep the night before.  I’d like to say I didn’t put my head down on the table (NOT in my plate) and take a brief snooze, but I’d be lying.  At least I didn’t snore.  Right, Wombats?  RIGHT?!!!!

I vaguely remember the walk out to the tax queue.   I also have a slight recollection of Judi taking a fall in her gorgeous pink heels and taking Brenda down with her.  But mostly I remember crawling into the back of the taxi, snuggling up against Dave and sleeping most of the drive from Sausalito to home.

I woke up feeling amazingly perky the next morning and with a very clear recollection of what a wonderful time I’d had with my fellow Wombats (and Fanciers) and what a superlative and considerate host John had been for our special night.

Thank you, John, and may this be the first of many Wombathons!

Wombathon Part II: Retrieving Judy or How Many Clowns can you Fit on a Ferry?

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Picking up Judi on Saturday was much less of a Three Stooges routine. For one thing, it was daytime and much easier to distinguish faces without the glare of headlines coming up behind and next to me. Second, Judi had checked baggage so she had to go out on the Arrivals level – no chance for misunderstanding or misdirection from SFO’s bad signage. She called as soon as her plane landed and Lisa and immediately took off to go retrieve the next Wombat ‘package.’

The Queen and I had already been for a nice long walk up to West Portal and it was an unusually warm and sunny day for summer in San Francisco. We were pretty much ready for the Wombathon and now just had to make sure we got Judi checked into her hotel and then all of us down to the ferry in time for the 4;45 departure.

We didn’t see Judi when we reached Frontier’s Arrivals, so Lisa went to go look for her in the baggage claim area and I cruised around the terminals a couple of times. Traffic was light and so was representation by law enforcement officials. My third loop around, Lisa and Judi were waiting curbside, Judi looking exactly like she does in her icon. She greeted me with a big smile and while these might not have been her VERY first words when she got in the car, they were close: “I am ready for that glass of champagne!” My kind of woman. Judi was remarkably fresh and bubbly in appearance and spirits for someone who’d been on a plane as long as she had. I meant to ask for her secret, but got distracted by the need to pay attention to traffic.

We stopped at the Ocean Park Motel, a cute little retro motel four blocks from my house and also the oldest hotel in San Francisco (according to Lisa, who’s stayed there before). If you’re ever vacationing in the City and want a cute, inexpensive place to stay that’s near the beach, the zoo and a Muni line that’ll connect you to any possible public transportation you might need to get around SF, this is a good one.

Okay, promo for neighborhood hotel over.

Judi checked in while Lisa and I waited, studying Judi’s shoes in fascination. Pink suede with what had to have been 4 inch brown heels and a rounded toe, they were the perfect Barbie shoes. I told Judi this and she said, “What do you think one of my nicknames is?” And yes, fellow Wombats, Judi walked in ‘em like a pro. None of the ungainly, weight tipped slightly forward stride for her. She had heels and knew how to use ‘em. Lisa and I both favor flats or lower heels (I’ll go as high as 3 inch heels on very special occasions) watching Judi’s ability to navigate the terrain was akin to a non-dancer watching professional choreography. This was, of course, before the champagne…

(insert ominous music)

We stopped at my house to retrieve Dave and made it to the Ferry Building with 40 minutes to spare, bought our tickets at the kiosk out back by the docks and roamed around the shops inside to kill time. Well, I waited in line for the bathroom for 10 minutes while Lisa, Judi and Dave went exploring. I tracked them down at Book Passage, a more or less ‘literary’ bookstore which did not have a romance section. Judi was understandably not impressed.

We went out to get in line for the ferry. A long line snaked around the grounds and we eyed it in dismay. I went up to the last person in line and asked if this was the line for Sausalito. Happily, it was the line for Larkspur. The line for our ferry was over to the left and had about 15 people in it. We wondered aloud why so many people were going to Larkspur and why not Sausalito. A cute girl with short blonde hair streaked in front with shocking pink explained Larkspur was the hub for most of the ferry lines and all the tourists tooling around the city on rented bikes were now headed back to their cars.

Our ferry, scheduled to leave at 4:45, was late. We weren’t exactly on a deadline, but we knew John and the rest of the ‘bats would be at the Sausalito Yacht Club drinking without us. We also knew we could get beer and wine on the ferry and we were anxious to catch up with the rest of the gang. Judi’s feet hurt, no surprise. Mine hurt too and I was wearing flats. We wanted to sit down and have a drink, dagnabbit!

The ferry finally pulled up around 5:00. People with bikes began dismembarking. Then more. And more…and more…

“I think there’s a black hole i there” said Lisa. “Bicycles are being sucked through from another dimension.”

I swear, it was like a clown car. How many bicycles can fit on a ferry? This went on for 20 minutes. In the meantime, our line grew louder and the crowd more unruly. A group of older Southern women, Sex in the City’d out for the day, were the most vocal. “They’d better give us all free beers after this bullshit,” growled the Kim Cattrell wannabe.

“I think they’re just cycling people around the back for another round,” said Lisa.

Our blonde friend turned out to be a regular fount of knowledge about all things ferry related and entertained us during our wait. Then the topic of tornadoes and their attraction to trailer parks came up; she said it was because they were flat and there wasn’t as much resistance and something else to do with wind and mathematics. I dubbed her ‘Wiki’ for her great store of trivia and facts.

More people with bikes came down the ramp. A young couple looked to be the last ones and everyone cheered as they cleared the walkway. Then another bicycle appeared from the back doorway and everyone groaned. But that was the last and finally we were allowed to board.

The four of us made straight for the bow and scored five prime seats (four for us, one for our new friend Wiki). Dave and Lisa took drink orders and headed to the bar while Judi and I relaxed and took in the gorgeous view of San Francisco Bay. Within five minutes the ferry left the dock and we were on our way to Sausalito and the Wombathon.

(I was going to make my Wombathon story a two-parter, but I’m being called by an outline that needs finishing, so…ONE more day!).

Wombathon Part I: Getting Queen Wombat

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I am taking part of an August blog challenge. The glove was thrown by Dani with Blogbooktours Silly me, I picked it up and now have to try and blog as often as possible and bring this blog together in a cohesive manner. So I’ve decided to focus on anything to do with writing, which makes sense as this is a writer’s website. I admit to forgetting that at times and use my blog as more of a personal journal.

I’m going to cheat a bit for my first August post and use something I wrote for my Gather group The Writing Wombats. We had a get-together last Saturday of those Wombats who could convene on the West Coast and it was just a blast. This is the first of my posts about the event, written for the edification of my fellow Wombats and fellow writers.

Friday night Lisa, Queen Wombat, was due in at SFO at 9:30. She was flying Southwest, no carry-on, so Dave and I figured on an easy swoop and grab retrieval around 9:35-9;40 from Terminal 1, arriving back at home by 10:00, easy. I arranged with Lisa to meet her outside at Arrivals, in front of the Southwest baggage claim. “Jerry Brown always wanted to be picked up at Departures,” said Lisa. “He said it was faster.” As I’d never had a problem picking someone up from Arrivals, I thought we should just stick to the original plan. Nothing against Jerry Brown, mind you. I voted for him.

Once we reached SFO, however, the wisdom of Jerry’s words became apparent. The traffic on the right side was flowing freely, not too many cars branching off towards Departures. The traffic to the left, Arrivals, however, was backed up nearly to the freeway off-ramp. “This is what we get for not listening to Jerry Brown,” I said glumly as we crawled along towards Terminal 1.

I looked out for cars trying to merge over into my lane while Dave kept an eye out for Lisa amongst the crowds lining the sidewalk in front of Southwest, Continental and the other Terminal 1 carriers. I pulled over to the curb and he called her cell. Message only. Maybe her plane was late. “Tell her to meet us at Departures! Tell her Jerry was right!”

Dave left the message and we pulled away from the curb before the traffic cops could chase us away. They were out in force for what I could only assume was typical Friday night madness at SFO. We’re talking the little ticket carts, black and whites, and motorcycle cops. I felt guilty just by proximity.

As we inched our way around the rest of the terminals, I worried Lisa wouldn’t get the message. “Maybe we should park and just go look with her. We all have cell phones.” Dave concurred with the wisdom of this new plan and I pulled into a parking lot. We called Lisa, who said she was in front of baggage claim at Continental. “It’s not crowded her at all,” she told us. Hmm, I thought. Maybe her jaded Los Angeles traffic sense had a different notion of crowded. Oh well. We told her we’d see her in five minutes and headed out.

What neither Dave nor I realized until we were riding up to the terminal in the elevator that I’d somehow parked us in International Garage A, which led (logically) to the International Terminal. I also realized I was wearing baggy flannel pajama bottoms, Ugg boots, a GAP Red shirt without a bra and had my hair clipped on top of my head, most of it flopping down on one side of my face. Hey, I wasn’t planning on getting out of the car. Dave looked at me. “Maybe if you take the clip out?” I did and ran a brush through my hair. It helped. A little.

We looked at an airport map and figured out where we were in conjunction with Terminal 1. But translating the points on the map with where we were in the three dimensional world was more difficult. This was another Spinal Tap in Cleveland situation as we rode an escalator down one long hallway and found ourselves surrounded by Japanese tourists. Dave and I were both getting grouchy, so we found an information desk and got what sounded like simple directions from a smiling woman: “Go down this hall, down the escalator, turn right, go out the doors.” Or something like that. We did just that, grousing at each other most of the way about writing collaborations (ours) and peeked out some doors to find nearly empty lanes of traffic. I asked a uniformed guy (I don’t know what kind of uniform, but it looked official so I went for it) where Continental Arrivals were. He pointed to another ‘down’ escalator. We found ourselves in the middle of the baggage claim section for Terminal 1 (Yay us!) and went back outside to scan for Lisa. No sign of her.

We called her again. She was still cheerfully waiting in a mysterious curb with no real traffic. “Could you be at Departures,” I asked.

“Could be! Signage here sucks. I followed the signs that said ‘baggage claim’ and walked straight outside. It’s a nice airport!”

Sigh.

We went back up the escalator and out the door where we’d spoken to Uniformed Dude. It took us all of a minute to spot Queen Wombat and then another five-10 minutes to hike back to International Garage A. Lisa is right. The signage DOES suck at SFO.

We pulled into our driveway in the Outer Sunset at 11:00, an hour later than planned, but not to late to feed the hungry Queen a bowl of gumbo and crack open a bottle of ’05 A. Rafanelli Zinfandel (‘ll spare you the horror of discovering I’d poured some into a glass with Castille soap suds at the bottom and had to toss it out) and then a bottle of nice (but not as spectacular) Pezzi King Zin. Didn’t get to bed till 12:30.

What is the lesson here? Listen to Jerry Brown!

Okay, part two tomorrow!

When Ebay Sellers Attack!

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My friend Maureen is addicted to vintage magazines, particularly Ladies Home Journals from the ’30s, ’40s and ’50s.  As she is somewhat computer illiterate (not as much so as she used to be, but still kind of behind the times here), she doesn’t bid on Ebay.  She is a wizard at finding stuff she wants, however, so she gets others to do the actual nuts and bolts of buying.  I am her winged monkey, sent to do her Ebay bidding.  I got an email from Mo the other day, asking if I’d please bid on a lot of LHJ’s for her, so I did and I won.  I’ve done this many times and have always had the seller ship the magazines directly to Maureen in La Jolla rather than send them to my San Francisco address where I’d then have to re-mail them down to her.  It’s never been an issue or a problem.  Until last night when I went on PayPal to pay for the magazines.  For the first time in my Ebay bidding history, it would not let me use one of the alternate shipping addresses I have on file (Maureen’s being one of them, my work address the other).  Confirmed address only, which was my home address.  Fine, I paid for them and then sent a quick email off to the seller.  What follows is my correspondence with Bruce, aka ‘Kardkidd.’ 

In a message dated 7/24/2008 9:51:58 P.M. Pacific Daylight Time, Zhadi writes:

Hi, can you please ship these to;
Maureen
address and last name withheld for privacy!)
These are a present for her!
Thanks!

Best,
Dana

His response: 
Paypal payments ship to confirmed addresses so that I am covered under the Paypal Seller Protection Policy.

In a message dated 7/24/2008 10:08:30 P.M. Pacific Daylight Time, Zhadi writes:
Is there any way around that?  I’m ending up paying for shipping twice.  I’ve had good feedback for about 10 years now… My billing address is the confirmed address.
best,
Dana

His response:

Confirmed addresses only as stated in the description and explained in depth on the linked FAQ page. It is absolutely not negotiable.

In a message dated 7/24/2008 10:15:55 P.M. Pacific Daylight Time, Zhadi writes
Okay.  But as someone who was a seller for five years, I find this policy very unreasonable given my ebay history. You’re the first seller I’ve run into who has had this policy and it’s not an incentive to buy from you again
Best,
Dana 

His response:
If you don’t like my policy then you shouldn’t have bid. Like I said, Paypal requires it for the protection of my business. My policy is the industry standard

In a message dated 7/25/2008 8:43:36 A.M. Pacific Daylight Time, Zhadi writes

I’ve never had a seller refuse to ship to an address requested before as long as they had my confirmed address for billing, so it never occurred to me there would be an issue.  I realize Paypal has that policy for the sellers’ protection, but it’s also discretionary.   It also wouldn’t hurt for your responses to be less abrupt – it’s very much like dealing with an outsourced help line based in India or thereabouts. A friendly personality goes a long way even when the response is not what the person wants to hear.

Regardless, yes, I bid on the magazines and will deal with the second shipping after I receive them.
Best,
Dana 

His response:

My policies are simple. If you don’t like them you should have moved on. You didn’t get your way and now you are whining. I don’t want your business and if you want to cancel the transaction I’d be happy too. I don’t want to do any kind of business with arrogant rude people like you. 

And my last response:

If these magazines were for myself, I would cancel the transaction, but they’re for a friend who would be very disappointed, so I’d rather you ship the magazines and continue the transaction.  I was not trying to be rude or arrogant by asking you for some flexibility in your policies, but I stand by the friendly personality observation.  I am, however, sorry this became contentious.  My whiny tone is much shriller, btw. 
Best,
Dana

Now I don’t blame Bruce for wanting to stick to his policy; Ebay instituted a new rule where sellers can’t leave negative feedback for buyers and he might have been burned in the past.  However, I meant what I said about inserting a little friendly personality into his emails.   Granted, my third email, written last night when I was tired, was not as polite as I normally try to be, but I was reacting to his unnecessarily brusque and borderline rude responses to my first two emails. Reading the second one was like a written slap in the face.  Would a little friendly courtesy have pained him that much?  Sadly, taking the extra minute to instill some personality into transactions seems to be becoming a lost art.  Like cell phone rudeness and the sheer nastiness exhibited in the comment sections of articles online, this indifference to social niceties seems to be an increasing part of our culture.  

Ah well, I’m whiny, arrogant and rude, so what the heck do I know?  

This is, btw, my first negative Ebay experience as a buyer and I’ve only had one bad experience as a seller (bounced check).  Guess that’s a pretty damn good record over a decade plus of buying and selling. 

I have not had a response to my last email, so I have no idea if he’s going to ship the magazines or not.  If he does and they’re in good condition, I don’t intend to flame him with lousy feedback.  I think in this case I’ll stick to the ‘if you can’t say anything nice’ policy.  And if he returns my payment and doesn’t ship them, he’ll be out a sale and I’ll look elsewhere for Maureen’s latest fix in her addiction. 

Gelato

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I actually have several book reviews in progress, but haven’t had the time to sit down and flesh them out (and make sure I have things right, like the characters’ names or the spelling of the author’s name, little details like that!) as I’ve been busily working on an outline/synopsis for a novel.  I’ve had a story accepted for publication and the editor wants me to expand said story into a novel, hence the outline.  I suck at outlining, so it was a bit of a trauma getting it written.  Outlines have always made me feel hemmed in creatively and I either have a huge block towards them or lack the ability to plot without starting at chapter one and laboriously following my characters through the story.  Either way, I did get a short and VERY basic outline finished and sent off.  Yay me!

 What, you ask, does this have to do with gelato?  I just finished a cup of dark chocolate and Tahitian vanilla bean goodness before writing this post.  It was on my mind, doncha know.   And OH so very very very decadent and yummy…  For those of you not in the know, I will quote from the Caffe Gelato website here: 

Gelato is Italy’s version of ice cream, with three major differences.

First, gelato has significantly less butterfat than ice cream’s typical 18 and 26 percent. Tests conducted by Delaware’s Department of Agriculture confirmed Caffé Gelato’s vanilla and chocolate gelato both have less than 10 percent butterfat.

However, less fat does not mean less taste. With the lower butterfat content, gelato is less solidly frozen than ice cream and melts in the mouth faster.Therefore, the customer will taste gelato’s full flavor immediately.

 
 

Second, gelato has a much higher density than ice cream. Ice cream is produced by mixing cream, milk and sugar, then adding air. Manufacturers add air to ice cream because it nearly doubles the quantity of their product. But, it cuts their quality in half. No air is added to gelato. The result is a higher quality dessert with a richer, creamier taste.

Third, gelato is served slightly warmer than ice cream. While both gelato and ice cream are served well below the freezing temperature of 32 degrees Fahrenheit, gelato is served 10 to 15 degrees warmer than ice cream. Because it is less solidly frozen, gelato’s taste is further enhanced as it melts in the mouth.

I will be reviewing a book this weekend,  as well as posting on Fatal Foodies.  Do check out that blog (there are five of us currently posting each week) if you’re into mysteries and food!  Or just food.  It’s a very droolable read! 

Murder in Miniature – Book Review

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Several days behind, but still determined to do my one review a week (or am I now a week behind?…never mind), here I am with my review of Margaret Grace’s new mystery, MURDER IN MINIATURE.  For those of you not in the know, Margaret Grace is the pen name of Camille Minichino, well known for her popular Periodic Table mysteries featuring witty physicist Gloria Lamerino.  I’ve been lucky to meet Camille/Margaret through Sisters in Crime and, like the other writers I’ve met recently, she’s as witty and fun in person as she is as a writer.

Murder in Miniature is the first entry in Margaret’s new Miniature Mystery series, featuring recently widowed Geraldine Porter,  retired and now able to devote her time to her favorite craft, building miniatures.  Gerry is juggling chairing the local Dollhouse and Miniature fair while babysitting her precocious granddaughter when a troubled friend and fellow miniaturist goes missing.  Murder quickly follows and Gerry is drawn into the thick of things against her own better judgment, not to mention that of her nephew Skip, who just happens to be on the local police force.

And that’s all the plot you’re getting from me ’cause I don’t want any spoilers here!

Gerry is a likable heroine.  Her grief at the loss of her husband, protectiveness towards her granddaughter, and desire to be a good friend, whether or not some of her friends deserve her loyalty, give her a core of believable vulnerability.  The character of the granddaughter is precocious without being irritating; she just happens to be smarter than most kids her age and yet still easily bribable with pizza and ice cream.  The cast of suspects gives the reader plenty of possible perps to choose from and you’re kept guessing through most of the book.

My favorite parts, though, were the loving and detailed description of the miniature construction, from how to make DVDs and books for a miniature library to using the little white ‘tables’ in delivery pizzas as the inspiration for an Italian restaurant miniature.  Grace gives the reader an insight into the mind of a miniaturist and how every day items (‘found’ items) are seen for their potential and given new life.  Absolutely fascinating stuff and guaranteed to make readers think twice before throwing anything away!

Plague & Pestilence

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That’s me!  In the last month I have had a two week long bladder infection; two bouts of food poisoning (or a 24 hour stomach flu that took a 2 day intermission before resuming the show); and now I have a cold.  This cold, not even a slight tickle in my throat this morning, manifested around 11:00 with a slight cough, then turned into full on faucet sinuses within the space of two hours.  What’s next, ebola?

Speaking of pestilence, is this not the cutest little kitten you’ve seen all week?  Okay, all kittens are cute, but little Goblin/Bugbear/Grizzly/The Piranha is MY kitten…so he’s especially cute.  Taz has adopted him as her personal chew toy and cuddle monkey.  I think he

helps fill the Haggis shaped whole in HER heart too. ..Goblin