Finally Over My Pneumonia and Working on Pioneer Book

Wow, it's been a long time. I was actually sick the whole month of December. This is the first time I can ever remember not sending Christmas cards, writing my annual Christmas letter and decorating my Christmas tree. I bought a tree, but it set in the family room for weeks without getting decorated. I finally put it in the yard for the birds to enjoy. At first I had a cold, then I was treated for bronchitis, but the Zithromax that usually takes care of it didn't do a thing. I finally went to the ER the Sunday before Christmas. They did X-rays and a blood test and decided it was pneumonia. When the doctor came back into my little cubicle, I was trying to figure out how to take a picture of myself with my cell phone! We scrapbookers will do anything to document our daily life so we can scrap it! She offered to take the picture. I said, "I didn't even get one of those little bracelets this time for my scrapbook." She said, "Just a minute." Soon she was back with one! She gave me four prescriptions, and they worked so well that I was feeling fairly well on Christmas, two days later.

I'm finding, though, that it takes awhile to get your strength back after pneumonia. For about three weeks, I was getting up and three hours later, lying down for a two-hour nap. This happened a couple of times a day. Guess I needed the sleep.

I signed the contract for the Pioneer book with Chicago Review Press and got the first half of my advance. By the time it came, I owed it all for Christmas and unexpected bills.

I wanted to get Adam an SLR digital camera like mine for Christmas, so looked for used ones. Found a reconditioned one on B&H, where I order most of my camera stuff. It was only $389 with an 18-55 lens. I bought it with part of my advance money and decided to keep it and give Adam mine. (I figured this one was more gently used than mine!) This one has a silver body, so we can tell them apart easily. I'll still share my 100-300 lens with him.

A group of us from the Photo Club met for breakfast on Jan. 13, then went to the Air Force Museum in Dayton to shoot. I'd never shot there, and Adam had never even been there. Actually, the last time I was there was when Adam's dad, Tim, was about 11 or 12 and I took him! It's changed a lot. We need to go back because we missed the rockets which are way back in the back. We did go to one of the I-Max shows, which was about Mars. Pretty cool!
It was Adam's first time using a tripod. His dad found the one I got him years ago. The exposures we took were anywhere from 20-50 seconds, so a tripod was absolutely essential. A few are posted above.

I've been subbing and working on the book. I need to have two chapters done before February 15, because I want to go to Florida for two weeks. I plan to finish the first chapter by the first of February. It's taking a lot of research, because it will cover the different westward movements, the most frequently-used trails, the different types of transportation used and the actual experience of the trip west.

There will also be activities in each chapter for kids to do. Lots of sidebars will profile different pioneers and also include excerpts from some diaries, journals and letters written either on the trail or afterwards. I was very pleasantly surprised to find that the full text of many of these diaries, journals and letters is available online. It's great to be able to get primary material without moving from my computer!

Monday afternoon, Suzanne Lieurance had me on her Book Bites for Kids radio show. She interviews a different children's author every afternoon. We had a good time talking for half an hour and I hope some of the listeners learned something about writing nonfiction for kids.

Last night I attended a gathering for writers from the Cincinnati area. I'm stretching it a little, being about 80 miles north of there, but heck, I was invited and it was a chance to schmooze with other children's writers. I went with Tonya Larson, another member of my children's writers' critique group. We enjoyed meeting and talking to all the other authors. I talked to Mary Kay Carson, who also does books for Chicago Review Press. Her husband gave me some ideas and tips for taking photos for the book. He took a large number of the ones in her Underground Railroad for Kids book. I hadn't thought of the Pioneer Village at Cesar's Creek or Cades Cove in the Smokies. I expect to be in the Smokies with the Photo Club in April, so that's a good idea. And I already have many photos from that area. Plus we have a log house right in our own Darke County Park district behind the nature center.

I got home about midnight last night and it was about 2:00 by the time I was in bed and asleep. Of course, they called me at 6:15 to sub! I was able to go back to sleep till 7:30, but then I got up and taught fourth grade all day. Had a good day and took a nap after school!

Now I'm going to bed (well after midnight) in case I get called again in the morning!

Pat

Camping and Photography at Hocking Hills State Park

Gee, it's been a long time since I've written. I guess I've been busy. I've been doing some subbing, mostly in sixth grade, which I like. Today was in fourth grade, and that's okay, too. I just don't want to go to the building that has 700+ kids from Kindergarten-2nd grades! I like the older ones, and those are the ones I like to write for, too.

The biggest thing I've done lately was the camping trip with six other members of the Photo Club. We went to Hocking Hills State Park on Wednesday, October 17. The weather was warm for this time of year, in the seventies in the daytime and fifties at night. We all slept in tents. I learned that I have no trouble with the new tents. The doors are about five feet high, so you barely need to bend over to get in and out. I have trouble with the old ones where the door is only three feet high. My knees won't let me crawl in, and I can't bend that far with my back problem. So these were great. My friend Tim rode down with me, and we met Ken, Terry, Lynn, Kathy and Tom there. The first night we had a weiner roast and sat around the campfire talking and taking pictures.

When we got up Thursday morning, it was pretty gray-looking, but we decided to take a chance and hike to Rose Lake. According to the sign, it's a half-mile hike. Most of the signs seem to say that. I think they don't want you to get discouraged and not go on the hikes! It started raining soon after we set out from the parking lot, but the way led through woods and a huge pine forest, which kept most of the rain off us for awhile. When we finally got to the lake, all we did was huddle under the trees and wait for it to stop raining, which it never did. So we decided to leave. I had on one of plastic ponchos that comes in the little bag you can never get it back into. My head was sweating, so I took off the hood. I figured if my hair was going to be soaked, I'd rather have it wet with nice clean rain than sweat! Water was streaming off my hair by the time we got back to the cars. We decided to go to the Lodge and eat lunch and get out of the rain. Lynn and I used the hand dryers in the rest room to dry our hair and cameras. By the time we finished with the buffet lunch, the sun was out. We hiked Conkle's Hollow, another half-mile hike, in the afternoon. It seemed further, but when you stop every couple of minutes to photograph a stump, a mushroom, or some colored leaves or rock formations, it takes awhile. The coolest thing of the day was a group of purple-rimmed mushrooms growing on a log. We had dinner at the campgrounds again. Tim and I made foil dinners in the campfire with hamburger, potatoes, onions and carrots. They were pretty good. We hadn't been in bed very long when it started to rain again. There were forecasts of severe thunderstorms. We got a little thunder and lightning, but I lay there and counted the seconds between the flash of lightning and the thunder and it was never less than twenty seconds. Didn't bother me, since I knew it was far away. I love lying in the tent, listening to the rain beating on the roof.

Friday morning we got up and the rain had stopped. Tim and I had thought of going up to Amish Country in Holmes County with Lynn and Terry, but Lynn decided it wasn't that nice a day and it was a long drive, so we stayed around the park. We went back to Rose Lake, but only Tim went all the way down to the lake. Lynn, Terry, Kathy and I shot around the pine forest. It's a beautiful place. Then Kathy, Tim and I went to shoot a little church across from the campgrounds. A man came over and asked if we'd like to see the inside, so he unlocked it and we took pictures in there. We were supposed to meet at the Lodge at 1:00 for lunch. As we finished shooting, I asked Tim what time it was, and it was already 1:00! So we were almost half an hour late, but nobody minded. They know what happens when you're out shooting! In the afternoon, Lynn and Terry started home, Ken and Tom went off on their own, and Tim, Kathy and I shot scenes of fall foliage from the road. Between Wednesday and Friday it had gone from sparse color to brilliant red and gold foliage. Had sandwiches at the Lodge and enjoyed another campfire.

Saturday we had to take down the tent and drive to the zoo in Columbus, where the Club had a shoot. The zoo photographer was to talk to us about zoo photography. Marilyn took Adam, so I wouldn't have to go back home and get him. His dad took him to Dayton. We were on the cell phone to people at the zoo and they told us if we went in with the photographer, we could get in free. On the third call, Vickie said, "We're going in right now!" We were still 15 minutes away, so figured we'd have to pay. We decided it was worth a try to tell the woman at the gate that we were with the group that went in with the photographer, and it worked. She let us in free. We did miss the photographer's talk, but we found Adam within a few minutes. He had a great time shooting with my camera. I really have to find a used digital SLR for him, so we can both shoot at once! I didn't get any fabulous shots there, but it was a fun day. We were all pretty exhausted by the time we left the zoo, after walking around for eight hours.

On the writing front, I'm still teaching the two courses for ICL, which gives me a number of lessons to do each week. I'm waiting to hear about the pioneer book. Last week I got an e-mail from a woman who wants people to write testing passages and questions betweeen November 1 and December 1. My friend, Suzanne Lieurance, recommended me to her. I wrote that I was interested, but haven't heard back. That would be a little extra money for Christmas.

Two Weeks of Company

I can't believe it's been a month since I wrote anything. I took my grand-nephew, who just turned 14, to my sister's. She's his grandmother. Grandpa took Adam to his son's in SE Ohio. Dave has 72 acres on the Hocking River, with woods, hills, etc. They gave Adam an old riding mower to ride around the place and he had the best time. I let him take my digital SLR camera, a Canon Rebel XT, my binoculars and my spotting scope. He took some good pictures, watched deer with the scope and birds with the binoculars. Meanwhile, Kay and I went scrapbook shopping, went out to eat, and just had a relaxing time.

Things weren't so relaxing when I got home. I spent a whole week cleaning and trying to get ready for company. On Aug. 15, Kay and our friend, Becky, from Pennsylvania, arrived, with all their scrapbooking stuff. Becky's little car was packed so full that when you opened a door, stuff fell out! We went to the country concert at the Darke County Fair on Sunday night. Josh Gracin opened for Terri Clark. It was good, but pretty loud. We had seats on the track, which means we got rained on for the first half! It didn't rain too hard, though.

I entered three photos in the professional division of the fair and got a second and a third. I'll post those pictures. I was disappointed Adam didn't win anything, but he had some nice pictures.

On Monday, our other friend, Karen, came with her scrapbooking stuff. We spent Tuesday at the home of a high school friend, chatting on the deck, eating, sitting in the hot tub, eating, etc. Wednesday we went to Dayton and went scrapbook shopping, which was NOT good for my budget. They keep coming out with all this awesome new stuff we think we need to have!

My family room is big (it used to be a garage), so I could get four big tables in it, arranged in a square so we could work on our albums and see each other at the same time. We got a lot of great pages done, although I spent most of my time cooking and trying to organize my stuff. I moved it all into a room next to the family room, so it's taking awhile to get it all organized.

Karen went home Friday and Kay and Becky stayed till Monday. Oz and I were tired out! We're used to being here by ourselves.

Now it's back to work on ICL lessons and finishing the proposal for the book I hope to do on pioneer life. I want to send that in tomorrow.

I'm also participating in the Lieurance-King Summer Article Challenge, which is to write 30 articles for article directories by September 30. I'm a month late starting, but if I do one a day, I'll make it. I post them on ezinearticles.com and people can pick them up free to use on blogs or in newsletters, as long as they include the box with my information. I found out today that someone changed the title of my article, Simple Composition Tips to Improve Your Photography to Simple Composition Tips to Improve Your Nudes. She also substituted that word a couple of places in the body of the article. Now I'm trying to find out how to get her to take it down. I can't see any way of contacting her. I guess that's one of the hazards of posting to the Internet.

Catching Up

I've spent the last couple of weeks catching up with things that I neglected while I was writing the Carver book. I also did a few things for fun. Last Sunday I went with three friends from the Photo Club on an all-day shoot. We went first to a balloon challenge in Middletown, Ohio at 7:00 am. Photographed lots of colorful hot-air balloons with a beautiful blue sky. About 10:00, we went to breakfast, then on to Cincinnati, where we went to River Downs to shoot the horses. (Sounds cruel, doesn't it?). I promise, we only used cameras! We got to sit on the rail along the track and shoot, mostly as the horses crossed the finish line. I'd never shot horse races before, so it was a new experience and lots of fun. Went back to Ken's house and ate pizza, then he put all our digital photos on the TV screen and we critiqued each other's. See, authors aren't the ONLY ones who critique each other's stuff! I'll post a couple of pictures.

I spent most of my time last week getting ready for a garage sale. I'm not sure $86 was enough compensation for all that work! I sold mostly scrapbook stuff that I had duplicates of.

Today a friend and I went to the Dayton airport and photographed the Thunderbirds practicing for the air show this weekend.

I really am starting to work on my proposal for the Pioneers for Kids book. I'd better, or he might decide to have someone else do it! It's not an assignment, but I think I have a good chance of doing it unless I mess up the proposal. It's something I'd really enjoy doing, with the activities and all.

I enjoyed Suzanne Lieurance's Coaching Club's conference call with Margot Finke. She critiqued the first pages of some of our mid-grade novels, which was helpful and interesting. I need to send my novel out to some more publishers. It's had three rejections so far.

I also wrote a short article on Daniel Boone for Fandangle, Nancy Cavanaugh's online children's magazine.

School's Out!

Well, school is out and I'm through subbing for the year. I've enjoyed it for the most part, but it will be nice to have more time.

I heard back from all three editors I e-mailed last week. Two wanted writing samples, which I sent, and the other wants me to submit a proposal and says he'll work with me on it. He's sending me another book in the series to pattern this book after. So that sounds quite promising!

I'm busy getting ready to go to my sister's on Wednesday night. I'll leave from Dayton after the Photo Club Board meeting, which will probably be over about 9. That will get me to her house about midnight. The next day we're going to Pennsylvania to spend a week scrapbooking with our friend, Becky. Our other friend, Karen, will join us there on Sunday and stay till Wednesday. So I'm sorting through all my stuff so there will be room in the van for my stuff and Kay's!

I'm also trying to go through the big plastic tubs where I put everything from the garage when I had it made into a family room. I'm trying to sort things and get them ready for a garage sale on June 23. Hopefully I can get rid of a lot of stuff and make some money for the Birders Virginia trip at the end of the month.

Thursday night was the Photo Club Banquet. I won a People's Choice Award for the Smokies photo of the sun rays streaming through the trees in the fog. They also gave me a funny award for being the person with the most colorful glasses! I got a huge pair of pink sunglasses, and a bag with four pair of Dollar Tree glasses (that's where I buy them!) Also got an award for amassing 750 Service Points to the club over the past 17 years. At the last board meeting, they made me go to the restroom while they decided what to get me. I was happily surprised to get a gift bag with two 2 gigabyte cards for my Canon digital Rebel XT! I can shoot forever without running out of cards!

Well, back to work on my sorting.

Too Busy to Post!

I've been busy and haven't blogged for awhile. I recently spent a week in the Smoky Mountains, photographing the national park. We only spent half a day in Gatlinburg. Some people think Gatlinburg is synonymous with the Smokies. I think it's too commercialized - a real tourist trap. I did have lunch at the Hard Rock Cafe there, which was an experience. I'm glad that the $10 hamburger really was the best one I've ever had! Also enjoyed looking at Ken Jenkins' photography at his Beneath the Smoke gallery.

No thanks to the nice young man there whom we asked about a drug store or grocery so we could buy Airborne (cold medicine.) He told us what road to take to find Food City. "You can't miss it. It's on the left. You'll think you've gone too far, but you haven't." Well, after 21 miles, we decided that we had, indeed, gone too far! I'd have turned around sooner, but my friend was driving and he kept thinking we couldn't have missed it. We got right back to the edge of Gatlinburg and there it was, FOOD CITY! The only problem is that the building faces away from Gatlinburg and the only sign is on the front of the building! So there is NO way we could have seen it without turning around and looking back. He COULD have said, "It's across from the municipal building."

Despite that mishap, we had a wonderful time and got some great pictures. We stayed in Townsend with 39 other people from several photo clubs, mostly from Dayton, Ohio. Spent most of our time in Cade's Cove, where we photographed bears, wild turkeys, pileated woodpeckers, deer, trees, mountains, fog, flowers, log cabins, and much much more. My photos are far superior to the ones I took the weekend before with the same camera. The difference? I used my tripod. I don't like using it and had gotten out of the habit, but I was shooting with Tim and he was using his all the time, so I decided to try it. It wasn't so bad, and the results were definitely worth the bother.

I took over 1000 pictures, but you can do that with digital and not waste film or money. Each evening, I put them on my laptop and cleared my card. I thought I might have lost all my photos, though. On Friday night, I found out that my laptop doesn't like Dr. Pepper as much as I do! I had a fourth of a bottle setting there and accidentally knocked it over. It landed on something and I saw a few drops that had squirted out the top. I wiped them off the table and went on downloading my pictures. Then I went through and turned them rightside up, then was deleting a few slightly blurry ones, when the monitor went off. I thought something was unplugged, so checked all the connections. All okay. So I turned it so the light shone on the keyboard and saw....several big drops of Dr. Pepper. I turned the laptop upside down and about two tablespoons of liquid came out.

I couldn't get it to come back on then, or Saturday or Sunday. I was hoping someone could take out the hard drive and get the photos off it. Got home Sunday night, and Monday I tried turning on the laptop. It came on and has worked fine ever since! Needless to say, I will NOT have any liquid near it again. And I put all the photos on CD's in case my reprieve is temporary!

Pat McCarthy