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What I'm writing in YEAR OF THE DOG

I just finished writing Year of the Dog ! It had a massive plot hole that I had to fix which turned out to be more work than I expected. Here’s a snippet: “Hey, Auntie Nell.” He wrapped his arms around her, bussing her on the cheek and breathing in pikake flowers and shortbread cookies. And suddenly he was nine years old again, and her solid presence had made his chaotic world stable once more. “What are you doing here?” He usually took her to dinner on Wednesday nights, but today was Tuesday. The edges of her smile faltered a little before brightening right back up again. “What, I can’t visit my nephew?” She angled around him to enter his home. “Is this your new house? Looks lovely.” Which was a blatant lie, because the fixer-upper was barely livable, much less acceptable to a neat-freak like his aunt. She also left four matching pink and purple floral suitcases on the stoop behind her. Only then did Ashwin notice the cab driver standing slightly to the side of the walkway. “Can ...
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Black Forest Cake @adagioteas #teaadventcalendar #adventcalendar2021

Today’s tea from my Tea Advent Calendar is Black Forest Cake. Sounds yummy!

The tea contains black tea, cocoa nibs, natural chocolate flavor, dark chocolate chips, cherries, natural wild cherry flavor, natural creme flavor. When I opened the packet, I could clearly smell both the chocolate and the cherry scents. It smelled really good!

I steeped it for 3 minutes in 8 ounces of 212ºF hot water.

(I forgot to take a photo of the cup before I finished it. Sorry!) Unsweetened, it tasted okay—I could taste the chocolate and cherry, but it seemed weird to me to taste them without sugar. So I added almond milk and sugar, and that really brought out both the chocolate and the cherry flavors. It had such a nice dark chocolate flavor, with just enough cherry to notice. Really good tea!
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