1st RIP Review

Hubba-hubba! You just have to love this cover! In fact, this turned out to be a rather steamy read. Colleen Gleason's Rises The Night is the 2nd in The Gardella Vampire Chronicles. The 1st book in the series The Rest Falls Away was an OK read. It was good enough that when Rises The Night came out, I put it on my library list, but not good enough to buy the series.

Rises The Night has me pleasantly surprised. I still found it a slow read, but by the end, it really had my attention. The story-line had my attention, I just think that writing could have been a little more in-depth, a little more fleshed out. Gleason's sex scenes and her interactions between Victoria and Sebastian were the best in the book. It show cased her writing talents well. I just wish the rest of the book was as good.

R.I.P. II Autumn Reading Challenge!

Yay! Carl over at Stainless Steel Droppings has issued a new reading Challenge. In honor of the approaching Halloween season, Carl has open the flood gates to register for the R.I.P (Readers Imbibing Peril) Autumn Reading Challenge. I'm all kinds of excited, because my reading list has turned down a dark a spooking path (Mostly filled with Vampires) which is right in line with the challenge. Officially, the challenge starts September 1st and runs until October 31st. The rules of the game, per Carl: The Perils:

(Choose one, or more than one if you are feeling adventurous)

Peril the First:
Read Four books of any length, from any subgenre of scary stories that you choose.

Peril the Second
(Otherwise known as the Obese Book Peril):
As you may know, some books are scary not just because of their subject matter but because of their size. Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell by Susanna
Clarke is 737 pages of small type, for example, and Gordon Dahlquist’s Glass Books of the Dream Eaters is 637 pages long with type so minuscule it makes Strange’s look like large print!
For this peril simply read two weighty tomes during the challenge period.

Peril the Third:
If you think you have it in you, this third choice of perils is the Scary Sandwich Peril…choose two large books like those described in Peril the Second and read a
smaller qualifying tale in between.

Peril the Fourth
(Otherwise known as Just a Bit of Peril):
Some of you wonderful readers, or would-be readers, may have a tendency to shy way from this genre, thinking it is just not your cup of poisoned tea. However, it
wouldn’t be a challenge if I wasn’t challenging you. This peril is for those of you who want to take a chance. Simply choose one book that you feel meets the criteria for Readers Imbibing Peril II and, well, imbibe it!

This Challenge couldn't come at a better time for me. I had just finished ordering library books before reading Carl's post. Just about everything I ordered falls into the Gothic horror genre. So I'm going to do Peril the First x two. That gives me a little over a week per book. Easy peasy. As long as I don't scare myself too much!

My reading list, so far:

Poltergeist by Kat Richardson
Rises The Night: The Gardella Vampire Chronicles by Colleen Gleason
The Thirteenth Tale: A Novel by Diane Setterfield
Blood and Chocolate by Annette Curtis Klause
Coraline by Neil Gaiman
Storm Front (The Dresden Files, Book 1) by Jim Butcher (if I like this one, I'll read the whole series)
I need to add two more to my list, but I'm going to hold off until I see what the other people doing the challenge pick. I'm sure to find a new author that I've never heard of, with a book I'm dying to read.

Catch 22

The house that we are renting is set up for DSL not cable Internet. So when we moved in, we had to get phone service or Bellsouth wouldn't sell us Internet service. What a pain in the butt. Zalebaby and I both use cell phones. We haven't had landline phone since we first moved in together in 2004. We don't even own a plug-in-the-wall phone. However, since the house is a rental and the Landlord didn't want us to run the cables to put a cable outlet in the computer alcove, we were stuck, with a extra $30 (the cheapest phone service you can get) thrown down the drain.

Then, Joy of Joys! I met the At&t Southeast VP. He came into the Airplane Sales office where I am the admin asst and bought a plane. (it was only a little plane, but it still cost more that it would cost me to buy the house I'm renting) He's a really nice man, so I plucked up my courage and said to him, "I heard a rumor that you can now get high speed Internet without having to have phone service" He hem and hawed, tried to tell me I should have a phone line for 911 calls, then asked me for my phone number and told me that he would check to see if they were set up in my area. (I had to look up the phone number since I never use it....)

A week later, I get a phone call from At&t, and they set up my new account, for just Internet service. Yay! I bootie shaked all around the living room. Yay! $30 more a month to go on my Credit cards! Paying off the CC = time to make a Baby! Yay! (I don't know if I'm going to be able to hold out on baby making until all of them are paid-off)

Ok, here's the catch 22. I do paperless billing and I've always paid thru the Bellsouth website. So, I received my notice that the bill is ready and I went and logged in to pay my bill. I could log in, but it wanted me to verify the last 4 SSN to go with the phone number. Which since that number is no longer in service for me, my SSN is no longer attached to that phone number, which means I can not finshing logging in and pay my bill.

After an hour of talking and holding, I have gotten the paperless billing turned off, so next month I'll get a paper bill. When I get that, I'll set up to Pay my bill thru my bank. Now, I just need to find my check book and pay the current bill over the phone. Why they don't take debit cards over the phone is beyond me!

Bonus picture- Babe Ella (Since I've got a severe case of baby lust)

Pay it Forward

Yay! Now that I am home from my "Visit the Family up North" trip, it's my time to play "Pay it Forward" thanks to Denise at Mormar. The way it goes is this:

PAY IT FORWARD. The first three people who leave a comment and pledge to pay it forward to three others on their blogs will receive a handmade gift from me within one year (August 2, 2008) of this posting. I will read your blog and get the essence of who you are to come up with an idea.

So, Who would like a present from me?