Criminal Minds at Work: #DeleteFacebook

Criminal Minds at Work: #DeleteFacebook: Yes, I'm still on Facebook despite the kerfuffle in the news about the role Facebook data may have played in Cambridge Analytica and Agg...

Spring promises

Spring is here with all its tease and impending promise.

Beyond the whistle of the late March blizzard, one can feel it. Hear it. Even the snow now falls slower, quieter, laden with the promise of a quick melt. The chickadees chirp louder, with more persistence, with a familiarity born of eight long months of winter feeding and...their newfound longing to mate. In the evenings, at times a grouse drums in the forest.

On sunny days, the sun rises earlier and travels higher and kisses warmer.  The robins and the geese are yet to arrive, but we imagine them. They will come—soon. Expectations.

Spring—that time of year when life opens. When the future is more imminent than ever. Spring, when graduations happen, careers are chosen, love is consummated and new life is conceived. When one is rejuvenated, inspired, preparing. Learning.

Except...

I’m old. My careers have ended. Love is listless. My children are now the restless parents and my bucket list is terrifyingly short. All that’s on the horizon is another summer, a bout of gout. Another realization that one more summer sport must be put aside.

Forever.

I foresee one more adventure becoming nothing but a virtual campfire dream.

Spring—what do you wish me to do? What new and amazing and intriguing things are you promising? Riding in on your warm breezes is a renewed passion for...what?  What new truths are streaming in your rays, hitting my face, filling an eager mind with wonder?

What spring looks like where I live

I feel the power of your  potential, but Spring, exactly what are you promising this old lady?

Spring Promises has been brought to you by the BackTracker Series. At 15 she ratted out The Traz biker gang. She'll be endangered forever. 

Criminal Minds at Work: DNA and Privacy

Criminal Minds at Work: DNA and Privacy: THE LEGAL ISSUES When my kids gifted my husband and I Ancestry.ca  DNA testing kits, we both got a tad nervous.   Not so much because we feared what might ...

Ancestry--from whence one came

I’m not really a nut over family trees; to me the significance of my ancestors has rested mostly in the stories told to me by my parents. Faces and names and branches on trees mean little to me without a story.

Some people are obsessed with their ancestry, believing perhaps that by remembering and honoring those who have gone before, they will find a measure of immortality in their descendants’ pursuit of the same passion.

I pursue my immortality by publishing novels.

But curiosity is what it is—as is Holiday advertising. So when my son and his family gifted hubby and myself ancestry.ca DNA testing kits for Christmas—after a month of research and contemplation I spit in the vial and mailed it off over the pond to be processed in the Ancestry DNA lab in Ireland.

One doesn’t get a lot of information back with the results. In fact, one gets about ten times as much information and email litter inviting one to cough up one’s Ancestry.ca membership dues and search out ones relatives and build one’s family tree on their website.

Be that as it is, I found the data I received interesting.

Here are my ancestry.ca DNA results for my Ethnicity Estimate:

Great Britain 51%
Ireland/Scotland/Wales 24%
Europe West 11%

Scandinavia 9%
Finland/Northwest Russia 4%
Africa North < 1%

Unlike those in the Ancestry TV ads, the results did not surprise me. They’re a close match to the oral family history passed down.

The only surprise is that smidgen of North African. It is, I’ve come to say, my token attempt at diversity, otherwise I'm kinda like almost pure WASP.

Using my imagination, I filled in a bit more of my history.

It appears my ancestors were not very adventurous. They did not travel far, did not mingle with outsiders—didn’t sow their wild oats around the world so to speak. I've inherited this homebody tendency, staying close to where I was born and traveling afar only for short stints. When my ancestors immigrated to North American, they did so en masse, (according to the Ancestry Immigration maps provided) to New York and then the Eastern US. Family to them, as it is to me, was obviously important.

The tiny bit of North African in my past is interesting. My maiden name is Fairbrother. Perhaps that is because there was dark skin and hair somewhere in my past, with me descending from the fairer of the brothers. Perhaps, too, the North African ancestry explains the kinky (albeit blond) hair that sprouts up once or twice in each generation.

So all in all it’s kind of cool to have had my DNA tested.  My children now wait with great anticipation for my husband’s results to come in. Maybe he will have bigger surprises.

Ancestry--from whence one came has been brought to you by DISPASSIONATE LIES, a tale of conspiracy--and  a powerful woman.

Eileen Schuh, Author 

FIREWALLS
FATAL ERROR
Schrödinger's Cat
THE TRAZ
Web site: http://www.eileenschuh.com
Blog: http://eileenschuh.blogspot.com

Top 10 Things to do When Bored with Ice Fishing....

10. annoy the fresh water shrimp swimming around in the hole by hitting your line against them

 9. walk  over to the other fishing people and find out if they’re catching anything
 8. change your hook
 7. change your bait
 6. if you're not too remote for cell service, step away from the hole and check your email (phones don’t float.)
 5. turn on your tunes
 4. drill another hole
 3. move everything to the other side of the lake and drill another hole
 2. have a snack. Take a whiz. Open a beverage.

And the number one thing to do if bored when ice fishing...

 1. Plot  a novel

These Top 10 Things to do when bored with ice fishing have been brought to you by:
The BackTracker Series

Criminal Minds at Work: Fire and Fury...

Criminal Minds at Work: Fire and Fury...: Lawsuits and Amendment Rights Trump threatens the publisher and author of Fire and Fury with a lawsuit and the publisher responds by movi...

Super Powers and grand kids

In the cauldron of a volcano...

I love my grandkids. I adore them. They fascinate me to no end. They remind me of the way I was, and the reasons why I am the person I've become.

They see things clearly, without prejudice. They are unique in word choice and language. They like it when I tease them.

They know how to fix my tablet and phone when things go wrong.

After our home burglary last spring, my husband and I decided to use the insurance money to buy something the thieves couldn't come back and steal.

I now have a brand new fancy hot tub on my deck, complete with a lounger chair, speakers, a smart-phone connection and an entire menu for lighting selection.

Being a crime writer, I was grossed out when the the red light flooded the tub and oozed out of the controls and speakers. I felt I was in a churning pool of blood.

"No, Nana!" the nine-year old said. "It's lava! Turn on the jets and it's a volcano.  See? Now, we must call on our super powers to survive the eruption!"

I now sometimes choose the red light setting when I'm out there alone under the stars. The lava churns about me as I contemplate my super powers.

"Super Powers..." is brought to you by The BackTracker series

At thirteen she falls in with The Traz bikers. At fifteen her testimony brings down the gang. Her genius, beauty and wealth eventually make her a very powerful woman--but Katrina will forever be in danger.

Eileen Schuh, Author 
FIREWALLS
FATAL ERROR
Schrödinger's Cat
THE TRAZ
Web site: http://www.eileenschuh.com
Blog: http://eileenschuh.blogspot.com