Well, here I am again after a long absence. And I have to come up with something to blog about, lol. Oh my, you have no idea what you’re asking for here. First I thought about what I wanted to write about. Nothing, I mean nothing came to mind. I was drawing a complete blank. So a friend said ‘why not write about writer’s block?’  Nope, I couldn’t even think of what to write about writer’s block. How sad…  So then what? After kicking some ideas back and forth (and still coming up blank) I told my friend about a certain thing that was going on in my life and how I had to make a choice about how to tell my husband about this.  And suddenly, just like that I knew what I wanted to blog about. Choices.

So what kinds of choices? Well, the choice I’m trying to make is how to tell my hubby that I’m taking a part time job at my kids’ karate studio. How should I tell him? Should I wait and tell him with all the kids standing around and shrieking with excitement? Should I call him at work and tell him there so he can’t say anything without other people asking him embarrassing (to him) questions? Should I do it in private so he can rant and rave about how I don’t need to work? Ah, choices.

Oh and for those of you who don’t know me (is there anyone left out there?) I’ve been married for almost 18 years and have eight (yes, that’s right…8) kids. I’ve been a stay at home mom for almost all of my married life.

Back to my choice here. Once upon a time, the choice would have been an easy one. Back at the beginning of my marriage I would have talked it over with him and made a decision with him, most likely taking the job with the understanding that it would be part time and would help our family out. Or even two years ago, I would have let him make the decision for me as I was trying to hold our family together after the death of our youngest son and suffering from a deep depression.

But today I’m a different person. I had my blindfold removed shortly before Christmas and suddenly I could see again. I realized that things had become strained and difficult for everyone because I had not made choices for the last three years. It was time for me to make some.

Sometimes our choices are easy ones. Who’s going to get littlest one a drink while I’m trying to get a scene written down before I lose my train of thought? Easy…which child is closest that I can holler at to do it? Should I make tacos or chicken with stuffing for dinner? Again, easy…tacos, everyone in the family will eat them. Should my characters have sex now or later? (now…now…now)

And then there are those hard ones. Do I stay in a marriage to a man who has admitted he has some serious issues to work through but doesn’t seem to want to actually get help? Who makes promises but doesn’t follow through? If I’m not going to stay, when do I make the decision to leave? After the bankruptcy goes through?  After we have to move from our home? Before all this takes place? What if I want to stay in the marriage? Can I live with a man who acts like Dr Jekyll and Mr. Hyde? When do I draw the line and where is it?

Ah yes, choices. Our lives are full of them and even when we try to ignore them they come back and haunt us, practically begging us to decide on something. We can try to hide from them or run from them but sooner or later they come knocking at the door. Okay, in my case they broke the door down and stomped all over me so I would pay attention…lol. (um, not literally for those who are assuming the worst here)

In thinking about all this I realized there were some things that were almost non-choices, the choice to write, the choice to put my kids first, the choice to keep my family and friends close to me and the choice that I need to be happy too.  These are things that I didn’t even really have to think about.  The hard choices will be made and they will be my choices. Not anyone else’s because I have to live with them, good or bad. They will be made in my time and with a lot of thought. Why? Because like so many of you out there, my choices affect more than just me. They affect my kids, my family, my husband and his family.

Choices…

So what kinds of choices have you made lately?

“Oh, that’s um…nice.”

Yeah, that’s the usual response I get when I meet people in person and say I’m a writer.  Well, it’s actually the second response.  Conversations normally go as follows;

Random person:  “So, what do you do?”

Me:  “I’m a stay-at-home mom, but I also write.”

Random person:  “What do you write about?”

Me:  “Well, I write gay erotic romance.  I’ve had some short stories published and also a novel.  I’m working on the sequel to that right now.”

Random person:  Long pause as they figure out what the hell to say, then, “Oh, that’s um…nice.”

End of conversation.

Over the past couple years since I’ve had my first short story published, I think I’ve figured out a few reasons why I get this pretty standard reaction.  One being when I talk to someone face-to-face, they don’t get the chance to stare at an email while they think of response.  They feel they need to say something fairly quickly since I’m standing in front of them smiling.  But maybe it’s because I am standing in front of them that causes this reaction.  As a guy friend of mine once said to me years ago when I got huffy at him for drooling over a provocatively dressed woman, “Oh, you’re hot too, but you’re like, Marsha Brady hot.”  I never was quite sure how to take that comment, but I translated it into I look like a good girl.  But you know what they say?  It’s the good girls and boys you have to watch out for.

Combine that with the “erotic” part of my statement.  If when I meet people, they instantly get that same impression my friend told me regarding my outward appearance, me spitting out the word erotic just all out stuns them.  It’d be like if there was a very special Brady Bunch episode where Marsha confesses she’s an underage stripper.  You just didn’t see it coming.  And simply being associated with something erotic in any way tends to give the idea that I must be a wild woman swinging naked from a trapeze in my bedroom every night, which so isn’t true.  I’m really clumsy.  I’d be certain to fall off and cause some terrible injury to myself.

The final reason I think people don’t know what to say is by far the saddest, and that’s the bigotry directed toward homosexuality.  Occasionally I get someone who says, “Why do you write that?”  My response, “Because I believe in equal rights, and love is transcendent to gender and sexuality.”  After this declaration, I often see confusion on people’s faces, as if they’re trying to come to grips with this jolt to their minds and beliefs.  Marsha Brady writes hot man-on-man action!  How’d this happen? 

But despite this shock, as the conversation ends and we part ways, I always hold onto the hope that when that person crosses paths with someone deserving of acceptance, whether it’s for sexuality, race, religion, or any of the other so many sad reasons people are singled out, that they’ll show acceptance to them.  Maybe it’s a naïve hope, but I believe acceptance works like a chain reaction.  What a beautiful place the world would be if all preconceived notions could be dropped when we meet a person, and instead of deciding who they must by looking at their outward appearance, we wait until we truly know them as an individual.

Now, that’s not to say confusion is the only reaction I’ve ever gotten when I talk about my writing.  And it’s not to say that I haven’t politely turned down prayers to save my soul, or fought with every bit of my willpower to not burst out laughing at the suggestion I should write children’s books instead (if you’ve read my work, you know why that last suggestion is hysterical), but I’ve also come across people who offer full support.  Those encounters are what swell the hope I have and keep it strong.

So, if you read this and think, “Oh, that’s um…nice,” I’m okay with that.  If you read it and think I’m a total loony, well, you wouldn’t be the first.  Or even if you read this and then think of it the next time you see a Brady Bunch rerun, I’ll take that, too.  But if you read this and think that the next time you meet someone, you’d like to share in the hope I have, then I’ll be overjoyed.

Well, sort of. If the man I’m talking about saw me use that term, he’d probably whallop me one. Not physically; verbally. He’s mad good with words.

By the way, hello. I’m Karenna Colcroft, and this is my first post on FAB. I’m thrilled to be part of this group, especially with the company I’m in! I write romance and erotic romance under this name, and young adult paranormal under my secret identity. Or maybe this is my secret identity… I haven’t had enough coffee yet today to be sure.

Back to what I was saying. I have a male friend. Actually, several male friends, but this one… Let’s just call him Temptation, since that’s what he is to me. He and I had a little bit of a thing a couple years ago, but it didn’t go anywhere because at the time, he and I lived two hours apart and he’s not into the long-distance thing.

Last summer, I moved in with my fiance. I now live less than a mile from Temptation. Strangely, he vanished for about a year and a half, but about a month before I moved, Temptation showed up at a party at a mutual friend’s house, and we immediately reconnected.

This post, however, isn’t about how tempting he is. I won’t cheat on my fiance, as much fun as it would be to, er, spend some time with Temptation. But I respect my fiance more than that, and Temptation respects me more than that.

Hence the source of the warm fuzzies. Temptation is a very black-and-white kinda guy. He either likes you or he doesn’t. There aren’t a lot of people he likes, and even fewer whom he respects. His respect has to be earned, and it isn’t easy to do so. It’s kind of an honor to be respected by him. He lets even fewer people “in”, and being allowed past even part of his barriers is a huge mark of esteem from him.

I’m honored to be one of those whom he both respects and has allowed, however slightly, “in”. And that has benefits for me, too. When he considers someone a friend, he stands by them no matter what. He and I both belong to a certain chat room. It’s rare for anyone to give me a hard time in there; the regulars know me, and I’m considered one of the nicest people there. Once in a while, though, someone who doesn’t know me so well hassles me.

Which is what happened yesterday. Temptation and I were both in the chat room, bantering as we do sometimes (he’s told me I’m just about the only person he knows who can keep up with his banter) and half-jokingly plotting a new story for me to write, when someone started spouting off about me. I responded, sticking up for myself as much as I could.

Temptation jumped right in, confronting the person and refusing to let up until they apologized to me. And that… Okay, Temptation was angry. He always is when someone gives one of his friends a hard time. And I’ve seen him angry, and it can be a bit scary. But he was sticking up for me, and that gave me the warm fuzzies.

It’s an honor to be his friend and have his respect. And it’s a privilege to have his protection. That’s the warm feeling.

Love is paradise, I think.

Feeling alive, excited, desirable, safe, and oh so much still in danger… feeling like every inch of skin could tingle, that our breath could lift us up towards the loved one….

That’s paradise.

Writers are strange creatures sometimes.

To think that sweetness can be found etched into the formerly simple paper of a publishing contract… It doesn’t make sense, if you think about it. Paper is paper. Relationships of any kind are not usually unconditional love and great sex all the time.

Sometimes they are. I keep up my hopes.

The relationship dance often starts with a very small whisper.

A smile on the bus.

A 300 word pitch.

It ends because the other person already has a girl friend.

It ends just because my name wasn’t on the list.

That 300 word pitch.. that was from the Amazon Breakthrough Novel Awards.

I’ll confess that I’m broke enough that the promise of a coupon for a free proof copy enticed me. I’ll also confess that I had my moments of day dreaming about winning the contest. Then I’d be splendid and brilliant and everyone would know it!

The little slights I’ve felt recently would all be redressed! People would see how magnificent I am!

Now, I would like to point out that I’m not alone in either wanting the proof coupon nor in day dreaming about winning.

10,000 of us showed up.

It was a huge Bachelor, and the prize wasn’t even a hunk with a lot of money. Just a little scrap of paper and 15,000 dollars.

There can be such a hole in a person’s soul when a relationship is not accepted, either with a pretty person or with a publisher.

When I’ve come up to the edge of this hole in the past, many people have told me, with great self-righteous certitude I might add, that you have to love yourself first!

As I’ve stood there at this big gapping hole in the past, with those proud ‘wise’ words ringing in my ears, I’ve wondered… just how in the hell does one do that?

It’s not like I don’t want to believe in myself or love myself.

I didn’t wake up and decide that my art was pathetic or my stories lame, or that I, as a person, was just not really up to the standards of our species.

That hole can be filled up with the crazy promise that I will win this time! I’ll win next time! One of my personal favorites, I’ll win a Nobel Prize!  OR So-and-So loves me!

Of the 10,000 hopefuls that entered that contest, gave up their best 300 words, and waited, only 2,000 made it forward. Of those, only 500 will move forward again.

Here’s my pitch:

Don’t go in the cellar.

Cain’s problems didn’t get smaller in Iraq.

Whiskey doesn’t fix anything long enough.

His last chance gets him a job as a caretaker for an old mansion.

It comes with more ghosts than he had before.

Don’t go in the cellar.

A hundred years before a triple homicide made the house notorious.

Shelly Comstock-Gray is still the celebrated murder suspect.

Cain can’t believe the smiling, cheerful ghost hurt anyone.

Mistakes can be deadly.

Don’t go in the cellar.

I thought that was a decent smile… but with nervous fidgets.. looking back, things can always be made better, different, to the point that the pretty person gets off the bus before any smile has even happened.

I expected it to hurt.

Looking down that list, looking for my name… there was a  Winter, but it wasn’t me.

It didn’t hurt though.

Well, maybe just a little.

But it was completely balanced and overcome by kind words from friends, by the strength I have in my close friends.  (The people over at Ethan Day’s group are fantastic, I might add!)

I’ve been doing good things over the last year. Working on my art, writing novels, smiling at people, trying to build friendships… and now I stand at that hole, staring down, and it’s filled up with leaves.  I’m not really sure how it got that way. I wasn’t really doing anything differently than I have done all my life.

I’m pretty sure that those little leaves managed to fill up that hole in my soul because a few great people decided I was worth loving.

Some people like my art. Some people like my writing. I’m making both my art and my writing true to who I am. I like their writing and art.

I don’t feel alone.

So when I smile at some pretty girl on the bus, or boy on the bus, and they aren’t interested in me… it’s just not a good fit. I’ll smile at the next one that catches my eye.

Same thing with publishers. I know my work has good points, bad points. I’m a difficult person to work with sometimes. I’m way too skittish and independent.

I’m not nearly as submissive as I used to think I was. If I was polite and good with lots of rules I had no hand in creating.. then I’d be at a lot of publishers.

I think that relationships and publishers really have a lot in common, or at least our relationship to both does.

I’m not chasing. I’m inviting.

But I’ll go right to the source! No dating service. No agent.

Come here, my sweet reader, come here my darling! I have something wicked and sweet for you!

Come into the river of life with me, my love.

Do you remember your first love?

I think I was 13 when I first fell in love with Allen. He was my 15-year-old next-door neighbor and had the most soulful deep brown eyes and golden blond hair. He played all the sports, had tons of friends, and went to the ‘big’ school, lol. And for the longest time, I didn’t think he even knew I existed.
Way back then, I went to a catholic school in New Brunswick, New Jersey. I was in the middle school, and he was a FRESHMAN in the bigger building just next door. The students over there always looked like they were having so much fun . So, I loved him from afar for a year and a half, and he never knew.
Then came the summer before my freshman year.
Suddenly, he’d stop in front of my house if I was out there or say hello through the window if we happened to catch each other’s eye. Gradually, he began to walk ‘down-street’ with me or come up on the porch to sit and talk for a while at night.
I was beside myself. This Adonis I’d been lusting after for almost two years had finally noticed I was alive. Unfortunately, I became ‘one of the guys’ to him. We hung out all the time, went everywhere together, but he never gave me even the tiniest indication that I was more than a pal. *sigh* Still, you never heard me complain, lol.
August came, and I was really excited about finally going to the ‘big’ school, a freshman. YEAH!

Whoa!! Put on the brakes, missy. Not so fast.
My mother came into my room and dropped the bomb that was sure to decimate my life. “We are moving to Vermont.”
VERMONT?!? Are you effin kidding me? We’re leaving this great city, all my friends, and ALLEN for some hick town in some long forgotten state? Really?

Life was over as I knew it. I was heartbroken, crushed, destroyed, distraught, devastated and any other adjective you can think of. I may have even been a little MAD!
The day we left, I sat in the doorframe of my mother’s VW bus (his name was Willie, but that’s another story), waiting for her to finish up inside the house—okay fine, I may have been sulking—when across the back lawn saunters Allen in all his golden glory. I swear, he always had a golden aura surrounding him. Oh, why am I being punished so greatly?
“So, this is it, huh?” he states with all the esteemed knowledge of the older man he was.
“Yup. It sucks,” I reply. I so don’t want to talk about this with him because I know I’ll start bawling like a baby.
And here it comes folks…
Since I’m here writing this, I obviously didn’t die…but I damn near did. And as I’m remembering all this and jotting it down, the butterflies are swarming in my tummy and my chest is constricting. I shit you not; the memory still gets to me. Wow.
“It sure does suck, Debbie,” he replies. “But I’ll always love you, and I’m gonna miss you forever.”
Before his words even registered in my foggy little brain, he leaned in and planted a 90 second kiss on my lips, came up for air, and goes in again. At this point, I know I’ve transported to some other realm of reality, because when his lips touched mine this time, his hands cradled my head and his tongue begged for permission to enter.
PERMISSION GRANTED, HELLLOO.
The kiss must have lasted for hours—okay well, until we couldn’t breathe any more. Then he just turned and walked away. (Not the last time that happened to me, but alas that’s another story as well.)
WHAT??? I mean, come on! He loved me? Just kissed me like I’ve never been kissed before or since and now he’s gone and I’m leaving for some god forsaken cold-ass country backwoods state and I’ll never see him again? Did it even happen? I touch my hand to my mouth and the moistness remains. Hell yeah it happened.
NOT FAIR I TELL YOU!!
And so began the story of my life. Yes, I am happily married, and yes, I survived the heartbreak (that one and the others to follow) though I don’t know how. But I will never forget my golden boy neighbor and the irony that was our relationship.
As an aside, the following summer I went to the Jersey shore to visit a friend and her family for a couple of weeks. The day before I was to leave, I saw Allen’s sisters on the beach. (Oh, did I forget to mention he had sisters?) Anyway, I asked them if he was there and they said he was working and wouldn’t make it to the beach till the following night. UGGHH!!
I have so often wondered where he is now, what he’s doing, and who the lucky woman is that grabbed his heart. But I like to tell myself I was the first one who had it. Ah, well.
So, who was your first love?

What is the old adage?  Do girls make passes at—? No, that’s not it.  It’s Do guys make passes at girls who wear glasses? Ah, that age-old question. 

When Dorothy Parker’s famous quote hit print in 1937, Men seldom make passes at girls who wear glasses, it cemented the concern in spectacle-wearing dames from that day forward. Doomed them to a life void of passes from gents. The poor Janes! Cursed for having four eyes!

Did anyone ever stop to wonder if girls make passes at guys who wear glasses? Why did Parker single out girls to be the heirs of that blight?

I don’t suppose we’ll ever know. But thinking about it did make me realize something: I adore men who wear glasses!  I find them sexy, incredibly so. I’m not sure why, though. I study men who wear glasses.  I look close at photos in magazines of men who wear them. And I wonder. What is the allure? 

I’m not sure, but I can tell you this…

Anyone who knows me knows I’m a big fan of silent films, and, right up there with my beloved Rudolph Valentino, is Harold Lloyd, the comedic genius of the silent era. His talent is unparalleled. He didn’t need sound to be funny.  

But what really attracts me to him? His glasses! The horn-rimmed spectacles that stand between me and that hidden tiger. The optical paraphernalia that promises mystery just the other side of those two circles of glass.  A terribly handsome, sexy man lurks behind those frames. 

If you don’t count Timothy from my second grade classroom, then Harold Lloyd is the object of my first imaginary love affair with a spectacle-wearing fellow. I fell in love with the silent hunk with the manly charisma and boyish good looks the second I laid eyes on him. 

Oh, I know what you’re going to say. It’s the Clark Kent syndrome.  You’re going to tell me that I think there’s a Superman behind those specs. Nah.  It’s not that. Or is it?  

You just might be right. I stumbled across an interesting piece about my silent film hero, and this information would not only interest Superman lovers, but Harold Lloyd fans as well. Seems that the character, Clark Kent, was based partly on Harold Lloyd. Who knew? And I found it even more interesting that Kent’s name was derived from combining the names of two actors, Clark Gable and Kent Taylor. Go figure. 

So my darling Harold is a super man after all!

But still. I couldn’t have known that in second grade, when I daydreamed about Timothy, when I had the most agonizing crush on him. Later, in high school, there was Michael. And Alex. Ricky. And then later, Billy.  Bill. Tom, my husband.

To me, there is something so very sexy about a man stopping to take off his glasses before he begins to—well, make love. There. Oh, geez, I said it.  Yes. I admit it.  What a wildly wonderful experience, as a guy pauses to pull off his glasses and, with that careful deliberation (partly not to break them, of course), folds them shut and sets them on the table. Now he’s ready for business. Can you sit there and tell me that is not kind of sexy?  He’s undressing without undressing? 

Oh, calm down. I never made ‘whoopie’  with Timothy in second grade!  But maybe, just maybe, I sensed, even at that delicate age, the future allure those pieces of metal or plastic and glass would have on me. 

So, to my darling Harold. To Timothy, Michael, Alex, Bill, Billy, and Tom—wherever you are, I salute you! May the women you meet make passes at you! May the women who cross your path see your hidden Clark Kent!

You already know yours truly thinks you’re a hunk!

Yeah, I know Valentine’s Day is officially over but I’m still in a hearts and flowers state of mind here, so bear with me. Still feelin’ the Valentine spirit! Love is in the air on almost every channel on tv during February and over the past few days I’ve tried to watch as many gooey, mooshey, make-me-swoon movies as possible. Pure heaven for a romantic gal like me. Nothing does it for me quite like a three hanky movie that makes me laugh, makes me sigh, and gets me geared up to write my OWN romances. These days, since my daughter is off in college, I’m on my own in the romantic movie department. Mr. Regina doesn’t like anything that doesn’t feature exploding heads and lots of ick. That’s okay with me. I can go it solo. I’ll have my romance with popcorn please and a box of tissues on the side.

My favorites are historical romances, especially those based on books by Jane Austen. Who couldn’t love the scene at the end of Sense and Sensibilities where Edward (Hugh Grant) professes his love to Eleanor (Emma Thompson)? I swear, I have watched this one a million times and I cry each time…right along with Eleanor. And who couldn’t love the angst, the passion, the twists and turns of Mr. Darcy and Elizabeth Bennett with their complicated personalities and mutual craving for that most basic need of all-love? Even Emma, the darling matchmaker who is so busy putting others together that she doesn’t recognize a love that has been right in front of her all along! They are movies that take me to another place, in another time and I can’t get enough of them. I suppose I should mention Gone With the Wind. Yes, it’s a classic and features the best movie kiss of all time…kiss me, Scarlet, kiss me… but, damn it, I can’t. No happy ending and that is a must for me. Maybe that’s why I can’t get into Nicholas Sparks…his books or the movies based on them. They are too heart-wrenching. Yes, I know that real life isn’t hearts and roses. It’s often painful and hard but I sure as hell don’t want painful and hard in my entertainment.

Which brings me to funny.

I’ve decided I want to be Nora Ephron when I grown up. The woman writes and directs some of the funniest stuff ever and I can’t get enough of her, especially when her work features Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan, a modern-day version of Tracy and Hepburn. Give me Sleepless in Seattle and You’ve Got Mail and I’m a happy camper.
So Mr. Regina can keep his blood and guts, I’m fixing snacks and popping The Princess Bride into my dvd player.

I was talking to a reader the other day and the subject of pen names came up. Now anyone who knows me knows I have three pen names. I write three different kinds of stories and they are so different they cannot all be under one name. In explaining this my reader was aghast that Aeryn Traxx is not my real name and how can she trust anything I write.
Uhm…..yeah.
Well, to be honest the name Aeryn Traxx LOOKS fake so I’m not too sure why the fact it turns out to BE fake is important. As for trusting what I write, again I am a bit bemused why a pen name matters. The work is good and worth reading or it isn’t. Shouldn’t matter what name is on the cover other than that is why you bought it because you had read other works by Aeryn Traxx and liked them. But that loops back around to why I have three pen names. When you pick up a book with Aeryn’s name on it you will get a m/m romance that has hawt over the top sex scenes, love and a happily-ever-after. There will be other factors depending on the piece but these are the three things Aeryn builds into every story . It is a guarantee- sorta like McDonalds. No matter what McDonalds you go to you know a double cheeseburger is going to be good. Same with a story written by Aeryn. You know when you pick up a book with Aeryn Traxx on the cover it is going to be hawt, have characters with love on their minds and a happily-ever-after. To anyone who has had their world shattered to learn writers don’t always use their real names I apologize. I suppose I could have done like they do in radio and used a truly obvious fake name like Oliver Clotheshoff…then again maybe not.

TTFN
Aeryn

Part 3 of Dating in the New Millenium
Sorry folks for missing the blog last month but I was uhhh tied up. I have been trying to get a handle on this Dating in the New Millenium thing. I registered myself on several singles sites and found a fuck buddy within a few weeks. He has turned out to be my Mr Right. Then I had to get acquainted with the prospect of Nooners. Whew! It still blows me away how clueless I have been for the past few years. Now I am getting into the concept of adult toys.
Twenty five years ago I had a small stash but tossed them all when I met my first Mr Right. Heavens how things have changed over the years. Instead of ordering a vibrator from Adam and Eve and have it delivered in a plain brown box you can march down to the local adult toy store and pick from twenty or thirty different shapes, sizes and colors. Instead of just having KY jelly in multiple sizes to choose from you have at least fifteen different lubes. There are walls of adult DVD’s. There are racks and racks of lingere for both men and women. To say I love going shopping in this place is truly an understatement. Hell, I’m even planning a vacation around a tour of an adult toy supermarket. Wonder if I can write that off on my taxes as research? But I digress. There’s a lot more to dating these days than I ever expected but I think I’m up to the challenge. Might have to get a part time job to pay for the Nooners and all the toys I want. Hey! I think I saw a help wanted sign at the adult toy store……

TTFN

AERYN TRAXX

So on August 31st, we closed down for the last time this year.  The last week we were open was, as usual, pretty boring.  It has a lot to do with the fact that our last stop of the year is one of the slowest spots we do all season.  It was not all bad, I did get a chance to get to know one of the new workers, a guy that goes by the nic Ares.  On Sunday, I got the honor of driving one of the bunkhouses from Trumansburg, NY to Middletown, CT.  This trip was pretty boring, fairly standard trip.  I got into the yard and dropped the bunkhouse where it should go.  Then I had to wait for the others to get there so that I could have one of them ride back with me in the day-cab.  Got to nap on the way back to Trumansburg.  Once there, I was told to pick up the bus with all the employees on it and drive it back to Middletown.  Fun Fun Fun…  Did that…no problems.

So now I am sitting in Middletown, CT waiting for the other guys to get in so that I can go back and pick up a 3rd load.  By the time everyone was in and we could leave it was around 4pm EST.  Got into Trumansburg around 9:30 pm.  Checked out my load…everything looked good.  The load was our ticket box trailer.  Not a heavy load, in fact it is light enough that the trailer they sit on only has one rear axle.  Was on the road around 10:30.  Stopped for something to eat and got back on the road.  Right around 11:30 I blew out both tires on the drivers side rear trailer axle.  Not good.  Sparks flying…I manage to get the truck pulled over onto the curb.  So now the problem is, there are no tires on the trailer, in fact there are also no rims either.  It all blew off.  I actually had the privilege of watching them roll away from the truck.  Talk about scare the crap out of me.  I am actually surprised I did not mess my pants.  Called the boss to let him know there was a problem and for him to call someone to come and check out the damage.

Help does show.  Unfortunately it is not really helpful.  All he could do was sit behind me with flashing lights until a state trouper came by and set up some flairs for me.  I spent the night of September 1st in the cab of a rig with no bed in it.  Not fun.  It seems that every time I managed to fall asleep, someone came by.  Not good for keeping a tired girl from getting too grumpy.  Of course, by now my cell phone is just about dead.  It is dawn and no one is going to be out to move me until at least noon.  Yippie, 12 hours or more sitting on the side of the highway.  On the side of the New York Expressway to be more precise.

Several people who saw what the trailer looked like and the two guys that were following me when the incident happened all said that they are surprised that the trailer did not flip.  Everyone is also surprised that I did not end up in the ravene that was on the passenger side of the road.  It dropped down around 1o or 15 feet.  I stopped the truck just above where the drop off was.

I know how it stayed upright, my guardian angel picked up the rear end and held it until I got it off of the road.  When we tried to move the truck later, it would not move.  The wheel was buried in the ground.

I ended up on the side of the road for right around 14 1/2 hours.  When we finally got the truck and trailer to the shop it was around 3 pm or so.  I get told that the truck would not be ready until the next day.  So now I get to go to a motel.  At least it gave me a hot shower and a fairly comfortable bed.  The truck was finally done around 3 pm the following day.  I did not get to leave the mechanics shop until almost 5 pm.  Now I have to drive the rest of the way to Middletown.  By the time I get in there it is around 8pm.  This ended up being the longest trip in recorded history.  54 hours on a trip that should have taken no more than 14 hours to do round trip.

Now it is payday.  I am hoping to get paid off and bonus’d out so that I can leave in the morning to head south.  Unfortunately, my bonus is not ready.  I am told that I will get it in the morning.  I finish loading my pickup up with my stuff.  In the morning I go and pick up a uhaul pull-a-long trailer since the pickup is way overloaded.  By the time I get back I still have to wait until almost noon before I finally get my bonus.

I get home safe and sound.  All is suppose to be good now right?  NOT.  While Alex is happy to see me, things are not good here.  He is spending all of his time either watching tv or he is playing a game either by himself or with his nephew.  When I have tried to say something to him about it, he informs me that he is a gamer, and his nephew is his life.  And apparently he is spending time with me.  I am sorry but sleeping next to me is not spending time with me.  It is sleeping.

I get more attention from talking to Ares on the phone, which I have been doing for just over a week now.  I have been out job hunting.  It looks like I am going to try and get back out on the road driving 18 wheeler if I can find a company that will take me right now.  If not, I have a lead on a job.  A company that I use to work for is willing to take me back.  Ares is suppose to call them on or around November 1st.  He and I are, maybe going to go down there and work this winter.  In the spring, we will most likely go back to Coleman Brothers Shows.  As a couple.  Who knows what will happen in the future.  Time will only tell.