No, seriously—you really should not have.

It seems to come in waves, but lately I’ve received a number of shoutouts/awards from lovely, wonderful, and (obviously!) perceptive readers. You shouldn’t have.  As I explained here, I’m not allowed to get blog awards. In addition to the reasons listed there, I’m absolute rubbish at responding, pathologically unable to come up with interesting things to put into the questions I’m supposed to answer, and (even if I could) criminally slow about doing so.

Take this fun blog idea that came my way via Terry Tyler and Shelley Wilson. [Check out their posts if you want to see how to properly respond to invites with grace and nonstop entertainment.]

See what I mean?

Whoa? You’re back already? Okay, well… I’ll give it a shot, but mostly for deeply selfish goals. You see, I want you to download a free book. Now, please. For reasons that completely escape me, my SciFi/Fantasy/Romance/Humor book Don’t Touch is ABSOLUTELY AND COMPLETELY FREE this weekend. It’s pushing to the top of those categories on Kindle, and I’d absolutely love you to pieces if you could help by popping over to your  Amazon-of-choice and downloading your FREE copy. Did I mention that it’s FREE? I have no idea why, so I can’t tell you how long this will last. But you should probably hurry.

And if you click on the book cover below, it will take you to Amazon where you can download your free book and NEVER have to read on to see all my stupid random answers to the questions for the blog tag. Win-win!

FREE! Don’t Touch – Book 2 in award-winning author and humorist Barb Taub’s acclaimed paranormal Null City series!

Hope flares each morning in the tiny flash of a second before Lette touches that first thing. And destroys it.

Her online journal spans a decade, beginning with the day a thirteen-year-old inherits an extreme form of the family “gift.” Every day whatever she touches converts into something new: bunnies, bubbles, bombs, and everything in between.

Lette’s search for a cure leads her to Stefan, whose fairy-tale looks hide a monstrous legacy, and to Rag, an arrogant, crabby ex-angel with boundary issues. The three face an army led by a monster who feeds on children’s fear. But it’s their own inner demons they must defeat first.

This just in! Millions of thanks to Geoff Le Pard for his fabulous new review of Don’t Touch. I’ve read it (okay, a LOT!) and just can’t stop grinning! Check out the other great books he reviews as well as his fabulous blog, TanGental.

“Barb Taub has a way with her words, her images, her sass. Her main characters are all flawed irritating people who you love because they know it, they irritate themselves and they find, if not answers, then some sort of life ointment that makes them bearable. The relationship with George the nearly frozen cat is a perfect metaphor for this book. They annoy each other but they need each other. Like so much in life too, we lean on those we have to, not because we want to but because they happen to give the best support. Enjoy the imagination of the author, the witty one liners but mostly enjoy the fact she writes a damn good story.” —Geoff Le Pard

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Really? You’re back AGAIN?

Well, you’re now stuck with reading completely random facts about me in the various steps of this Tag challenge. Don’t say I didn’t warn you.

1. Share your profile picture.

2. Who are you named after? Apparently, I was named after my younger sister. I did not discover this until I applied for my first passport and noticed that the middle name on my birth certificate was not the one I’d always used. It was, in fact, actually my younger sister’s name. When I asked my mother about this, she shrugged it off. They had ten kids, eight of whom were daughters. Each daughter required more than one name. She seemed surprised that name multiples hadn’t occurred more often.

3. Do you like your handwriting? I remember handwriting. I saw it in a museum on these things called “letters”. Frankly, I have no idea how it works. There’s no delete, no cut and paste, no spellcheck, no google fact check. I think you have to be some kind of genius to use that handwriting stuff.

4. What’s your favorite lunch meat? Whatever kind I can get them NOT to pollute my lunch salad with.

5. Longest relationship? Obviously, my siblings. Compared to the nine of them, the better part of four decades I’ve spent with the Hub barely count.

6. Do you still have your tonsils? Why, yes I do. Do you need to borrow some?

7. Would you bungee jump? Already did. Once is probably enough. Well, maybe twice…

8. Do you untie your shoes when you take them off? I think shoelaces belong with those museum letters…

9. Favorite ice-cream?

10. What’s the first thing you notice about people? Their handwriting. And whether their shoelaces are tied.

11. Football or baseball? No thanks, I just washed my hair.

12. What color pants are you wearing? Blue. Whether we’re talking American (in which case they are jeans), or British (in which case my knickers are probably blue as well, not that it’s any of your beeswax).

13. Last thing you ate? Coffee. (You could put money on that being the next thing too.)

14. If you were a crayon what color would you be? If I was a sentient crayon, you mean? One whose superpower of self-selecting color does not, apparently, free her from the everlasting horror of knowing that her entire existence involves being mashed onto coloring books, often with such force that she will be broken, her tip worn down, her paper skin peeled back bit by bit to expose her ravaged little wax body to further danger and—depending on the age and perversity of her user—possibly eaten? That kind of color choice? Obviously, I’d go for that puke-making brownish yellow that nobody ever wants to color with.

14. Favorite smell? Coffee. Or possibly mojitos. (Are there coffee mojitos?)

15. Who was the last person you spoke to on the phone? I used to have a rich full life that included friends and writing and walks along the beach with my dog. Now I have a broken oven and my days revolve around waiting on hold in a (usually vain) attempt to reach a human at the cooker repair company and humbly ask when they plan to visit my ailing cooker, as they promised (and were paid) to do back in August. August!

16. Hair color? Why yes, thank you. I’m seriously giving a lot thought to purple, usually as I’m sitting on hold with the oven won’t-repair guys. Or maybe that terrific blue green color that looks screaming cool on everybody except perhaps chubby elderly writers. . What do you think?

17. Eye color? No thanks. I’ll stick with brown.

18. Favorite food to eat? Yes, please.

19. Scary movies or happy endings? This is a very serious question, perhaps the most serious one on the list. My bias is for movies where there are characters, at least one, who are actually likeable. And not scary. Seriously. It took me the better part of a very long life (and glass wall panels) to even be able to take a shower without checking for Norman Bates.

20. Last movie you watched? My First Steps, starring The UMAG (Universe’s Most Adorable Grandbaby). I laughed, I cried. I watched it several [hundred] times. Oscar-worthy for sure.

21. Favorite holiday? I just got back from another trip to India with my besties. Well, we did run into a few glitches… Blog post coming soon: That time we were kidnapped in India. 

22. Beer or wine? Wine, although I do have a beer every summer. Whether I need it or not.

23. Favorite day of the week? Now that I’m retired, all days are Saturday.

24. Three or (four) favorite bloggers you want to learn more about? Here are some of my current must-clicks:

• When the Doctor is the mother: Victo Dolore’s Behind the White Coat
• A complete and perfect new story most every day (lately anyway!): the eponymously titled Andrew Joyce 
• A quip a day:Quiall’s Butterfly Sand
• Deeply funny, often moving, helpful, and infinitely varied: Sue Vincent’s Daily Echo

 

Who were the last three people to follow your blog?
There are a surprisingly large number of people who follow my blog but don’t have (or aren’t telling me about) blogs of their own. Here are some recent followers who are willing to fess up:

• Dave Chrisp Comedy —NSFW but hilarious
• The World According to Dina —gorgeous photos and magazine format commentary
• Blair the Shameful Sheep —this post is called “I wish I could fart cupcakes”. What more could you ask for?