General Update on Life and Writing

(Warning: if you dislike medical stuff, skip paragraphs 2 and 3).

Well, it's mid-February already. I have kept very busy since I retired at the end of October. No time to get bored or...breathe.

My granddaughter had her surgery last week. Thank you for the good thoughts and prayers! For the most part, Charolotte acted like nothing had really happened. Everything went well. They disconnected the fistula from where it was connected to her vagina and put it where it was supposed to go (rectum.) They made a new "booty hole," as my daughter calls it. And they even said there may be little to no need for dilations! I hope that turns out to be true.

They were not able to confirm that all her reproductive organs were normal because when they tried to do the scope, they found that her hymen is unusually thick. Evidently, this is not a rare thing. We just have to watch when she gets to menstruating age and make sure it allows it to pass at that time. It is a really good thing that the fistula that had been attached there, making her poop out of her vagina at birth and alertng everyone to the abnormalities, was connected below the hymen and not above it, or all her feces would have gone inside her with no one realizing it until they finally decided to look at her closely enough to see that she didn't have an anus. That would have been life-threatening.

The poor baby has had a stomach bug this past week. My son and his wife took her to the hospital because they weren't sure what was going on. So, I've been trying to help them out, as they both work from home. . Every illness is so scary. Throwing up could make her aspirate. Also, diarrhea in a colostomy bag is pretty difficult to deal with. Only three months old and she's had three surgeries, Covid, and a stomach virus. My sweet baby.

All that to update you and to say I haven't had as much time to write as I usually do. I am wrapping up book 3 of SOS. What I normally do at this stage is a revision, going through the book from the beginning and making whatever changes I need to, and then finish the book when I reach where I left off. I am almost to that last point now. Want more excuses? We've been having our carpet replaced with hardwood floors, and our furniture has been piled up in the hallway and family room.

This year, I'm going to put out a Halloween novella (or novel, if the story takes over). I have it all plotted out--something I never do. I am a total pantser. I've never written a Halloween book before, so this should be fun.

Did you check out the Out of Nowhere special scenes? The link to those and a couple of sales, along with MM and BL recs, are in my newsletter coming out on Sunday.

Have a wonderful rest of February!