Okay, enough people nagged me (ever so lovingly) to get these pictures up, so here they are. The first few are when a group of us went out to dinner at Stagnaro Bros. restaurant in Santa Cruz. The next bunch are other people from the conference. I wish I had more but they all came out really blurry. I couldn't even recognize Randy Ingermanson or T. Davis Bunn . I also didn't get a good picture of me, Cherise and Lori, who all took Davis' Fiction track together. Cherise and I met last year, Lori was my roommate. Another picture that turned out all blurry was the one with me and Shelley Bates , who is in my San Jose ACFW writers group. :(

Me, Pamela Dowd ("All Jingled Out" Christian Fiction) and Cyndy Salzmann ("The Occasional Cook" cookbook and "Dying to Decorate" Christian Mystery Momlit)

Meredith Efken ("SAHM I Am" Christian Momlit) and Sharon Dunn ("The Ruby Taylor Mystery Series" Christian Mystery Chicklit) 

Kelly and Donita's picture came out fuzzy 

Donita Paul ("Dragonspell" Christian fantasy) and Meredith Efken ("SAHM I Am" Christian Momlit) 

Me and Brandilyn Collins ("Dead of Night" Christian suspense)

Me and Brandilyn being silly

Louise Gouge ("Ahab's Bride") and my good friend Sharon Hinck ("The Secret Life of Becky Miller," Christian Momlit) 

Me and Laura Jensen Walker ("Dreaming in Black and White," Christian Chicklit) 

Captain's Log, Stardate 05.21.2005 I was supposed to accompany my husband to a youth group outing tonight to see Star Wars III. My husband, the darling man, said I didn't have to go because almost all the kids will be accompanied by their parents tonight. So instead I get to stay home and write. I know I'm in the minority here, but I hate going to movie theaters. I have very definitive reasons why: 1) I always have to use the bathroom in the middle. No exceptions. For Lord of the Rings, I had to go twice. It doesn't matter if I go 3 times in the half hour before the movie starts, or if I don't drink anything the hour before and inside the theater. 2) Because I have to go to the bathroom, I have to make sure I get a seat at the end of a row, which stinks in terms of viewing the screen. When a theater is packed, like tonight will be, getting an end seat becomes ten times more difficult. Since I get motion sickness easily, I can't sit in...

Captain’s Log, Stardate 05.18.2005 I just saw the movie “Honey” with Jessica Alba. Loved the dancing. Except for a few cuss words and some sexually suggestive dance moves, it’s a lot like a feel-good Disney movie. A bit cheesy but cute. One of the people in the show compared it to a nu generation “Fame.” The dancing lifts it to a higher level of entertainment than “The Bad News Bears.” I especially enjoyed listening to the dialogue and the modern language used. It’s also one of the reasons I sometimes read Cosmo articles, to get a feel for the pomo terms and talk. I just can’t get that if I stay in my own corner of the US . I feel more in touch with the audience I’m writing for, the generation that includes my high school kids at church. Writing: Working on my suspense proposal, I need to finish my chapter-by-chapter synopsis. I might walk with the dog later to brainstorm more ideas for my Hawaii Chicklit. Diet: Did some weight training yesterday and today (...

Captain's Log, Stardate 05.14.2005 I've been struggling lately with work. I want to write full-time, but at the same time I want to obey God's will and wait for Him. I've been praying for contentment with my job until He sets me free. In wrestling with my yearning, I realized that it's like when I was single and yearning for a boyfriend. I wanted to wait for God's timing, even though I was tempted to go out and make things happen for myself. It was such a difficult time for me. Here again I'm going through something similar, yearning and waiting and wrestling and struggling and pouting. Will there always be something in my life I'm yearning for? Is this just a pattern that will repeat itself over and over again? I had convinced myself that once I could write full-time (meaning I would make enough so that we wouldn't be financially strapped), this yearning would stop. But maybe I'd just yearn for something else. So I...

Captain's Log, Stardate 05.13.2005 Well, I went back to work on Friday the thirteenth! It wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. My supervisor had apparently talked to my coworker about her hours this past week, and she got totally upset. But then our supervisor dropped the subject. So when I went in today, he was in a good mood and didn't mention it. She and I both feel rather abused about this issue. It shouldn't matter what time you get in and what time you leave, as long as all your work is done. It seems they don't notice when we stay late, complain when we leave early, and aren't appreciative when we come in on weekends. Writing: For some reason, I've got this pseudo-vampire short story idea in my head and I want to write this up. But I really need to edit my book and finish my proposal so my agent can send this puppy out to publishers. Maybe I'll work on the proposal tomorrow. I need to get more writing done, I've been sl...

Captain's Log, Stardate 05.11.2005 I am again at the airport at the end of my visit home to Hawaii . I am so sad to leave my parents and this relaxing time of vacation. I read almost all the books I brought with me and spent time around the island doing research for my Hawaii Chicklit. I wish I had more time to drive around more and do more research. But maybe it's better if I spend more time brainstorming so that my research will be more focused. I went to the Wahiawa Botanical Gardens for the first time since I was young, and it was neat to see the different native plants that my paternal grandpa had helped to cultivate. He worked in the Gardens in the late 50's. I also came up with some story ideas from the trip. I visited both the Mililani Cemetery and the Wahiawa Hongwanji temple to not only be a dutiful daughter and visit my relatives' graves, but also to take pictures for research. The Hongwanji visit was mostly to confirm how I'd desc...

Captain's Log, Stardate 05.09.2005 It's been a relaxing few days in Hawaii . My cousin flew in to visit from Colorado so I got to see him for the first time in years. We went to a party on Saturday night for him at my uncle's house, and we celebrated Mother's Day yesterday at my parents' house with huli-huli chicken (chicken slow-roasted on a rotating spit over low-heat mesquite wood so it has a smoky flavor and very juicy flesh) and musubi (rice balls). For breakfast on Sunday morning, we went to our local diner Dot's, which has been around longer than I've been alive. My parents, my aunty and my grandma go there every Sunday morning. The restaurant has an amazing Loco Moco (a hamburger patty made with ground beef, onions, egg and bread pieces, fried and served over steamed white rice, topped with an egg over-easy and savory brown gravy), but I had their homemade blueberry pancakes, loaded with blueberries in the pancake mix. Hawaii doesn...

Captain's Log, Stardate 05.06.2005 I'm in the airport waiting to board my plane to Hawaii . It'll be the first time I've gone back home in about two years. Mom is excited I'll be there for Mother's Day. I hate flying. I'm not a good traveler--I get antsy waiting around, I get motion sickness easily, and I get off the plane exhausted. Too bad my family lives in Hawaii , eh? My husband isn't coming with me, he can't take off of work. I'm borrowing vacation, too, but Mom has wanted me to come home for a while and 1) the summer airfares to Hawaii are preposterous, and 2) my parents are traveling to California in the autumn, so it would be a bit redundant for me to fly home then. Vent alert: Work today (in fact, this whole week) was hard, because I had to set up a study before I left. For some reason, my supervisor didn't like the fact I had to leave early to go to the airport, but I had stayed an extra hour at wor...

Captain's Log, Stardate 05.03.2005 Well, I didn't get called about the Daphne contest finals, so I must not have finaled. :( I guess that's okay, although I'm apprehensive about what the judges thought. I got really burned last year by a judge in the Noble Theme who judged my Chicklit/Women's Fiction like a straight Romance. She didn't like anything about my entry. But it's not as bad as my friend, whose judge said her storyline was impossible when the manuscript had been based on a true story. The judge gave her all "1" ratings no matter what the criteria was, whether character, plot, manuscript format, whatever. I'm sorry, I shouldn't be harsh, judges volunteer their time and energy for these contests. Most judges are professional and encouraging, it's only the occasional one who lands you a facer that gives the contest a bad name. I must also be terribly prideful to dread the criticisms from the judging. ...

Captain's Log, Stardate 05.02.2005 Angie Poole , the nut, tagged me today. "It's part of a new meme that is travelling through the blogosphere. The idea is if you're tagged, you need to choose 3 (or more if you like) occupations from the list below and then finish the sentence for each that you've chosen. "You then tag three more people who must do the same. You can add more occupations to the list when you pass it on but you must choose your 3 from the list provided by the person who tagged you. You're also asked to trackback to the blogger who tagged you if you know how." Here's the list: If I could be a scientist… If I could be a farmer… If I could be a musician… If I could be a doctor… If I could be a painter… If I could be a gardener… If I could be a missionary… If I could be a chef… If I could be an architect… If I could be a linguist… If I could be a psychologist… If I coul...