There’s two of you, and I’ll be traveling, so I’m taking today to wish the best of birthdays to:

reginagiraffe

shayheyred

Two of the most fabulous women you could ever meet.

Love you both and wish I could be celebrating with you.

Today, I get an email from a fellow writer, a woman who once lived in an African country and speaks Swahili. She’s coordinating volunteers for the Dying to Write Conference later this month and heard I was a sucker, ahem, able to volunteer. Be that as it may, she tells me that my email addy (mlima) means “Mountain” in Swahili.

Oddly enough, my last name originated as a much longer Basque surname (shortened when my g’g'greats descended from the mountains into the cities of Spain. The original meaning of the name: the shepherd who walks amongst the mountains.

If that’s not enough of a coincidence, I spoke to my “twin” today, my soul sister, who is half-Japanese. It seems her last name means Mouth of the Mountain.

Dude.

Pretty damn cool.

In other news, I’m off to Boston this weekend, and not to the lovely NYC gathering (waves at the gals) due to a business trip. A silver lining – there’s a real good chance that I can sneak out Saturday night to meet up with my pal, Christopher Golden as he, Tom Sniegoski, Craig Shaw Gardner and Jeffrey Carver sign at Pandemonium Books in Cambridge.

Chris and I have *known* each other via email and such for a few years now. He’s co-authored a few things with my cousins, Jeff Mariotte and Maryelizabeth Hart. I had the great good luck to get to vet a galley of the 4th book in the Shadow Saga, The Gathering Dark, thanks to cousin allaboutm_e. We’ve never actually met in person, as our paths keep diverging. I’m keeping my fingers crossed that this outing will work out.

I’ll be taking my laptop, but have no idea how much time I’ll have to play, since the trade show begins on Sunday and I’m booked for events every night until my Wednesday return.

So, BLG, sorry babe, looks like we’ll have to hook up next time you’re here, or maybe I can come up there some weekend.

Still trying to catch up on the week’s season premieres. The EyeTV tuner is awesome – recorded everything. I just now need to have time to actually watch! (Did catch Lost, though.)

Had some progress on Blood Bargain, thanks to beledibabe‘s sympathetic ear. Fortunately, she didn’t let me throw out the baby with the bath water. I did, however, throw out the boring, gray water. Amazing how much you can stare at your opening chapters and until you talk it out, you don’t realize how intensely nothing they are. My fresh start is a hell of a lot better. I think I’m going to lose some characters, too. The whole thing was beginning to resemble a William Wyler epic. (No chariot races, though ::g::) No wonder I was getting bogged down. I swear, if it wasn’t for beledibabe, I’d be the idiot jibbering over there in the corner, staring at the screen. Thank the writing gods for my fabulous alpha/beta!!

September passed in a whirlwind of work, work and hey, look – more work!

Somewhere in there was the “yay, birthday” with pressies and good fun.

Somewhere else in there began a small seed of restlessness I attribute to the changing season, changing weather, something that started germinating and just wouldn’t let go.

This happens to me every so often. I need a change of some sort. I need to make a difference in myself. Do something that is the usual thing.

Nearly six and a half years ago, I moved here, to the DC area, from San Antonio, Texas. Since I’m a lazy cow and hate moving, I tend to take out my restlessness on other things. Like my hairstyle.

One thing you should know – I’m so not a girly girl. I prefer sensible shoes, comfortable clothes and no makeup. I don’t know why this restlessness manifests itself in hair cuts and color, but it does.

After I got to DC, I decided to color my hair auburn. I think it was a bit of a rebellion against my mom, who hated that color on me. 1600 miles later, I had to do it. Rather ridiculous rebellion for someone in her 40s. But hey.

Then, I got tired of cutting it and let it grow out, past my shoulders. Part of me still likes long hair, mostly because my parents never let it grow out when I was a kid – cropping it really short and, admittedly, a lot more manageable. I do have a lot of hair.

That lasted a couple of years, and then I just got tired of it, so I went to the Hair Cuttery (think SuperCuts) and chopped it all off and let it go its natural silver gray – much to the dismay of the hair stylist. She asked me three times if I was sure I wanted to cut it and sure I didn’t want to color it. I was.

This style remained the same for a while, about 2 years or so.

Then, a few months ago, I started to let it grow out again. Figured I’d see what it looked like long and gray. Well, that didn’t last.

I don’t know if it’s been the stress of work, the stress of trying to finish my 2nd book, or just the stress of turning 48, but I couldn’t take it anymore.

Yesterday, I got my hair dyed back to close to my original color – dark brown, got it cut (not as short as it’s been), and got my eyebrows waxed.

It’s a radical change for me.