Showing posts with label turkey. Show all posts
Showing posts with label turkey. Show all posts

Wednesday, December 19, 2018

The Poultry Conundrum by Stuart R. West

Visit mysterious, alluring, scenic, and dangerous Peculiar County! Just a click away...
I'm from Kansas and I'm apparently quite a dumb Kansan at that.

You'd think I'd know the distinction between a turkey and a chicken since I live in the Midwest. You'd be wrong. I mean, okay, everything I taste is formulated around the ground zero of chicken. It's like six degrees of Kevin Bacon, minus the actor, minus the bacon, add the chicken. Very complex equation (but if you add a side of bacon in again, you might have something. Hold the Kevin.).

So, over the holidays, my wife brings home a turkey, cooks it up. Tastes great. I like turkey "drumsticks." Anyway, I've eaten two of the drumsticks outta' the refrigerator and then I find another. And yet another. From the same turkey!  THE SAME TURKEY, YOU GUYS! Four drumsticks!

What?

Did this turkey grow up by a chemical waste plant or something?
I asked my wife why our turkey has four legs. After much eye-rolling, pantomiming and frustration from her, I sorta' intuited the answer.

I guess the turkey is the stronger of our fowl brethren with buffed-up, muscular upper arms that I mistook for bonus drumsticks. And it gets even stranger. The turkey apparently has many more bones in its legs than chickens do. New one on me! Why in the world would a turkey have more bones in its legs then a chicken? Do they bully the barnyard? Are they brutal fowls with thighs of thunder? Femurs of fury?

Edible nature sure can be kooky.

No matter what you celebrate or where you live, happy holidays everyone!
How about stuffing some Banana Hammock into your stocking?


Saturday, February 27, 2016

Evolution and morphing of a manuscript - by Vijaya Schartz

Getting to the end of writing DAMSEL OF THE HAWK (scheduled for release April 20, 2016), I cannot help but look back upon my first brainstorming sessions for the plot of this book. How it evolved since then amazes me. Then again, it happens with all the books we write. The semi-finished product as I near "the end" goes far beyond my expectations. It's a good thing.


I know many writers write from a rough draft. I never could. When I tried, I had to throw it away and start the novel again from the beginning without looking at the draft. Although I'm a plotter, my plot is never set and constantly evolves with the characters' reactions as the story unfolds. New villains appear out of the shadows, creating different conflicts and changing the backdrop and the course of the story. As I research minor details, better ideas come along and change everything again. Characters are forced to deal with unforeseen situations. The black moment is not what I predicted at all. Until the denouement, I do not know what the theme of the story is. That's what keeps me writing, what keeps me intrigued, what keeps me excited about my characters, what keeps the story alive in my mind, brimming with possibilities.


As I discover the heart of my story, that's usually when the final title comes to me. This book had several working titles in the six months it took to write it, none of them worthy of mention. Damsel of the Hawk appealed to me because of its medieval feel, and the tight connection to the heroine and her circumstances. This is also when I start looking for images to inspire the cover designer for the cover. I've been blessed for this Curse of the Lost Isle series:

 


The inability to write from a complete draft is what prevents me to participate in events like NANOWRIMO. That draft written in a month would be of no use to me. So I write my novels from a rough outline, ten pages or less, one paragraph per expected chapter, with the beginning, the main scenes, the major plot twists, and the expected ending. I leave plenty of room for change, to implement new ideas as they come, adding more chapters to the outline. Often, it means I have to go back to the beginning and add or rewrite several scenes to accommodate a new plot line, introduce a new character, give the reader clues, or foreshadow a future plot twist. It works for me. I don't mind rewriting as I write.


Then, when I have a complete story with all its intricacies and its nuances, comes the real work, the polishing, the fleshing out, the recasting of every scene to make it part of the whole. Emphasizing the theme, adding emotion, polishing the action scenes, the love scenes, making the reader part of the story by adding more setting and sensory details... That's usually the last month in my novel writing process.


Can you tell I love writing? Well, I do.


DAMSEL OF THE HAWK
Curse of the Lost Isle Book 7 (standalone)
Available for pre-order in early March:


1204 AD - Meliora, immortal Fae and legendary damsel of Hawk Castle, grants gold and wishes on Mount Ararat, but must forever remain chaste. When Spartak, a Kipchak warrior gravely wounded in Constantinople, requests sanctuary, she breaks the rule to save his life. The fierce, warrior prince stirs in her forbidden passions. Captivated, Spartak will not bow to superstition. Despite tribal opposition, he wants her as his queen. Should Meliora renounce true love, or  embrace it and trigger a sinister curse... and the wrath of the Goddess? Meanwhile, a thwarted knight and his greedy band of Crusaders have vowed to steal her Pagan gold and burn her at the stake...


In the meantime, catch up with the Curse of the Lost Isle series at:

 Vijaya Schartz
 Blasters, Swords, Romance with a Kick
 http://www.vijayaschartz.com

Sunday, November 29, 2015

TURKEY TALK, 1964





                                                   http://store.payloadz.com/go/?id=2357295



After 51 years of marriage, I still wouldn't dare claim all-knowledge. I have stuck with my own for a long time, and it continues to present enough twists, turns and drama to satisfy the need of any writer.   

This holiday season, I look back on small events now half a century distant. They were not as exciting as the life the young Hamilton's lived, with a revolution still to be fought and won. However, like the Paul McCartney song, these days I often feel like a "relic of a distant age." So here's my little newlywed's story:



The first turkey I ever cooked was in 1964. I was a young married, an ex-student, as was my husband. We were living in a dismal basement apartment in NYC, whose front window looked out upon the back of the building’s garbage cans. Needless to say, we kept the blinds closed. We shared a bathroom with some elder ladies who we never saw, but who, no matter how loudly I scrubbed the place after using it, would arrive soon after I'd left and vigorously wash the entire bathroom all over again. I suppose I can’t blame them, for lots of old people in the city lived in fear of their neighbors.

We’d managed to buy the turkey, a small one, although it took some financial planning to get the cash together, as I didn’t have a job. Only my husband, Chris, did.  As a nineteen year old with zero skills, it didn’t pay much and rent took the lion's share. As for me, I’d left the hospital I’d been working in back in Philadelphia and come to NYC in order to be with him. At the time, I was violently morning sick—to the 9th degree. I mean, Rosemary, in Rosemary’s Baby, had nothing on me! The only things I could reliably keep down were weird cravings: green pea soup, grapefruit, and sardines. Anything else—upchuck! Maybe that’s why the invisible ladies next door were so diligent about scrubbing our shared bathroom.

On the big day we cleaned up our turkey as I’d seen my parents do, slapped it in a big bakeware pan that we’d found in the kitchen, turned on the oven to 350 and then walked over to Broadway to see a little of the Thanksgiving Day parade. We were so far uptown that there wasn’t much to see, but there were bands and high school kids from out of town feeling really proud of themselves, and people wrestling with a couple of balloons—my favorite, Dino the dinosaur—being dragged about in the gusty wind. The other big event for me was seeing Fess Parker of Davy Crocket fame, waving and smiling from the back of an open car. Like a zillion children from my generation, he’d been my hero back in the fourth grade.  I’d wept while watching the Walt Disney show the night “Davy” died at the Alamo.

Image result for davy crockett coon skin hat
 

Now that little girl's life seemed incredibly distant. Chris and I looked at each other. We were married, pregnant and close to broke. Whether one or either of us would ever get back to college—and how the heck we would manage it--was still up in the air. Nobody’s parents were happy. With all this drama swirling, the parade, so very pointedly an event for kids, got boring fast. 

We turned and walked back through the wind and grimy uptown streets to our little pad. When we got there, the place was redolent with roast turkey and baked potatoes. The bird made snapping noises as the juice splattered about inside the oven, casting a smoky pall around the kitchen. We decided that this must mean it was cooked. Chris fetched it out, and lo and behold, it was done, all crispy, juices running clear. 

I was surprised because I was, for the first time in months and all of a sudden—genuinely hungry. It was quite a fine meal, our first Thanksgiving—meat, potatoes, squishy store bread and a freshly opened can of cranberry sauce. For a change, it went down and stayed there. 

Who knew I’d be remembering it fifty-one years later?


 

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