That’s The Way The Cornbread Crumbles

One of the things about being married is that you are the automatic partner to any event that your spouse wants to go to. My husband found this out three years ago when he came to Belfast with me to Bjork. She is my favourite artist, but I know no one else in Ireland who liked her enough to accompany me.

So last Thursday it was time for me to pay the piper. I’ve spoken before about my husband’s love of country and bluegrass music, and how I shudder at the mere sight of a banjo or a harmonica. It’s the one area in which my husband and I are completely opposite. But Gillian Welch was coming to the Grand Canal Theatre in Dublin, and my husband hadn’t seen them perform for seven years.  I was kind of dreading it, but didn’t want to let on to him just how much I was dreading it. Nobody wants to go to an event with someone who has a face on them and isn’t even trying to enjoy themselves.

And actually, it wasn’t that bad. Yeah, I could have done without the harmonica. And I can’t say I’m going to load up all their songs to my iPhone. But Gillian Welch and David Rawlings are really talented musicians, and a couple of songs I really liked.

Sometimes it’s good to be pushed outside your comfort zone, even if it’s only to something like Appalachian/Bluegrass fusion. It’s a reminder to myself that I need to be more open, that even though something might not be my thing, it doesn’t mean that I can’t take something from it.  

And I even came up with a plot point at the concert! Score.

Followers, Fibro and Purple Hued Cocktails

No real bunnies were injured in the taking of this photo.

My weekend was fairly uneventful, because I was sick for most of it. My fibromyalgia hasn't been bothering me much lately, but it has come back this week and seems to want to make up for lost time. Great.

I had a good week though. I am now godmother to my beautiful brother Jack. There's almost twenty three years between us, but as I plan on sticking at 25 for at least a decade the gap will soon narrow.

I got my husband an Xbox for our anniversary, and he's been solving crime in 1940s LA ever since. We did manage to squeeze in a meal at a nice restaurant to celebrate two years of marriage and many cocktails were consumed. My new favourite is an Avation, a mix of gin, maraschino liqueur, lemon and crème de violette. It's a pre-1916 cocktail, which means it comes from my period of history so could conceivably be called research. Unfortunately, it doesn't come from the right continent, as it originated in New York instead of Europe, but there were a lot of Irish people in New York then, right? All I need to do now is link cocktail bars to the spread of smallpox and I can come at my historical research from a whole new angle.

 I also got a new iPhone, which I love. I had an iPhone before, but I lost it in the Big Snow of 2010 (for my North American friends, the 'big snow' was around five inches, and the country ground to a halt. Ireland doesn't usually get snow). It's handy because it means I can check my email on the go and I don't have to be at home to update my Facebook or Google+ status. I can also take pictures for my blog, like the one of my dog at the top of this post.

And hello to all my new followers! I've broken the 150 follower mark, so a contest of some description is called for. I'll try to come up with a suitable prize. And for those of you who want to take part in Rachael Harrie's Platform-Building Campaign there's still time to join in. You can sign up until August 31st.

Hope everyone had a great weekend! :)

Paper Hangover and Anniversaries

Every Friday the writers behind the YA website Paper Hangover give a blog prompt. This week they want to know about everyone's five favourite back to school books.

I don't actually have a 'top five', but I did enjoy reading books set in schools when I was a child. Going back to school when I was a child meant rereading books by Enid Blyton, primarily the Mallory Towers and the St. Clare's books. They are fantastic and I used to fervently wish that I could go to boarding school. As a complete homebody I would have been miserable as hell in a boarding school, no matter how many midnight feasts were consumed or the lashings of ginger beer.

I'm having a lovely day today, because it's my two-year wedding anniversary. It's hard to believe it's been that long. We're going out to a Thai restaurant and to my favourite cocktail bar after that, which should be lovely and romantic. The we're going to spend the rest of the weekend ignoring each other while my husband enjoys his anniversary present (LA Noire) and I enjoy mine (The Song of Ice and Fire series). Is it still anti-social if we do this is in the same room...?

Anyway, hope you all have a great weekend :)

Exciting Day!

Good times ahead, because today I'm getting my first foster placement! I'm lucky, because the three year old will be staying with us for a week, and this weekend is the August bank holiday. So my husband will be off for three days of it.

Things are still fairly chaotic, as is our way, and we discovered last night that the stair-gates that we bought because they were the only ones that fitted our super narrow staircase need a drill to put up. Do we have a drill? No. We're currently ringing our way around friends and family trying to find one before she arrives. This afternoon. Our disorganization will come as no surprise to those of you who remember us losing our keys the week we were moving house, and came close to having to move the contents of our three bedroom home, including furniture, via Dublin Bus. Dublin's bus service should not be confused with bus systems in other world cities, which usually arrive on time. The Dublin Bus schedule is more a hope of what could happen, rather than a prediction of what will happen. It is the New Year's resolution of transport timetables.

In other exciting news, my main journalism job is stopping for August. That means that while I may still have some random projects to work on, my Monday to Friday job is on hold for four weeks. Which means that my plan of finishing the first draft of Lemons in August may actually come to fruition (See what I did there?). Good times.

Right, I'm off to write my last business segment for the summer, and to locate a drill. Hope you all have a good weekend!

I'm on holiday!

People who don't read my blog often, may not be aware that I'm currently on holiday. I may have spent most of last week blogging about it, and boring you all senseless, but now I should finally be very close to the picture you see on your right. Yep, that's County Wexford.

I'm scheduling this blog post, because if I do so much as attempt to boot up my net book my husband may wrestle me to the ground (and not in the good way) and throw it over the cliff. And, you know, he may file for divorce on the grounds of unreasonable behaviour: i.e. not being able to take a holiday without writing.

Husband once wanted to buy an electric banjo.
Thankfully I persuaded  him otherwise.

 But, as it so happens, he may not be the only one pondering divorce. I was lucky enough to meet my soul mate at nineteen. He is a fabulous person, and we have a huge amount in common. However, when I daydreamed about finding the perfect man, I didn't imagine certain things that came as part of the package. I didn't see myself marrying someone who left cupboard doors open, and who likes to take random pieces of bric-a-brac out of his pockets at the end of the day and leave them on the kitchen table. And I certainly didn't see myself marrying someone who loved country music.

Yep. We have completely different musical tastes. I like musical scores, and pop, he likes a certain type of country music. While a proper holiday soundtrack for me would involve Rihanna, Beyonce, Michael Jackson and Fergie playing at full blast with me shrieking the lyrics tunelessly and flailing my limbs in wild, holiday-induced abandon, he will want to listen to depressing funeral dirge type music that bemoans the fate of humanity at length over the twang of a banjo. Our differing musical tastes only tend to come to a head on car journeys, when we're forced to share a stereo for a protracted amount of time. It will be interesting to see who prevails.

*I have no intention of divorcing my husband.*

*I'm sorry for any fans of depressing country music that may have been inadvertently offended by my post. On the bright side, at least y'all have more credibility than my pop-loving soul*

*Blog posts are scheduled, so I'll reply to any comments when I get back*

Episodic Television and Instant Gratification

So, my husband and I aren't exactly hip. You'll see that this is true by dint of the fact that I used the word 'hip'. We're usually not on the up with whatever is currently fashionable, we're always a season or five behind. Nowhere is this more evident than when it comes to our television watching.We watched The Wire after it had been cancelled, we started Mad Men series one during Mad Men series four, and we finished watching the last episode of Arrested Development on Sunday.

Ok, so watching television series later than everyone else has its downsides. You are at constant risk of spoilers. The jokes that your friends tell go right over your head. You feel out of the loop. But that's balanced by the fact that, when watching a show later, you can set the pace yourself. Cliffhanger at the end of an episode? Well, you can find out what happened right now. Sure, you may miss out on an hour or two of sleep/household chores/other important things, but it's still your choice.

Recently. my husband and I started watching Game of Thrones. Yes, it's current, but two historians tuning into  a fantasy show based loosely on the War of the Roses does not make us hip. Or whatever the cool kids are saying these days. But because of this, we're watching it at the same pace as everyone else. Almost every week there's a cliff-hanger and we're left, open-mouthed, staring at the credits in shock. 'What can we do? ' we ask each other. 'How can we find out what happens next?' But there's nothing we can do.

My husband cracked, and got the book a few weeks into the series. He finished earlier than the series, and is now on book two. He's dreading the moment when he reaches the end of book four...although book five is due to be released this summer.

Have we all become spoilt? There was something nice, albeit frustrating, to looking forward to something all week. It reminded me of the serialised stories that used to be released in parts during the Victorian age. What do you guys think? Is it better to get an entire story in one go? Or rationed out?

**After all the opinions I got in comments yesterday, I decided not to review the book. Thanks for the help guys!**

Tag, I'm it!

Thank you all so much for the kind messages yesterday. Today I'm feeling much the same, but my attitude is more upbeat. Which is good news, because self-centred pity gets old after more than a day.


The lovely Kate Larkindale tagged me, which means that I have to answer some questions and pass it on. So here we go...


Do you think you're hot?


Of course I don't, I'm Irish. We're generally a self-deprecating lot. If someone gives you a compliment, we consider it impolite to take it at face value. We have to argue with the person, repeatedly insulting ourselves and driving down our self-esteem. Here's an example:


Non-Irish person: 'You look really lovely in that dress.'
Irish person: 'This old thing? I have it ages. It's horrible, really.'
Non-Irish person: Yeah, well it sets off your skin tone.'
Irish person: Really? I think I look really pasty. Like I have some type of disease. A contagious disease.'


So no, I don't think I'm hot. If I did everyone here would think I had 'notions above my station', a term used for people who think too highly of themselves.


Upload a picture or wallpaper that you're using at the moment.

This is something I have everywhere at the moment, because I need all the motivation that I can get. In typical me style I have bitten off more than I can chew and am struggling to get one book out on submission, another edited and to write 50,000 words of my current WIP before I go on holiday on July 2. Sensible is not my middle name. As a matter of fact it's Nicole.


When was the last time you ate chicken meat?


I had a lovely chicken burrito from one of my favourite Mexican places yesterday. I like my food spicy, and they do frozen margaritas. What more could you ask for?


The songs you listened to lately


I'm a big fan of Florence and the Machine. My favourite songs are Howl and Drumming Song, so I played those today. I also love Bjork, especially her Vespertine album.


What were you thinking as you were doing this?


That I married a geek. My husband is currently painting more models for one of his Warhammer armies, and I just realised I know the names of a lot of them. I can tell a night goblin from an orc. I'm a normal 24 year old woman, I shouldn't be able to do this. Then again I write YA urban fantasy, so we're probably well matched.


Do you have nicknames? What are they?


The only person who has nicknames for me is my husband. He calls me 'C' or 'kitten'. Some people call me 'Chris' occasionally.


This is the part where you usually tag eight people, but I don't want to burden anyone by making them do this. I found it quite fun though, so feel free to take the questions and answer them on your blog.


Hope everyone is having a nice weekend. It's a bank holiday here, so I have no day job tomorrow. Woot!

Five Things I Can't Live Without...

Ok, the lovely people over at Paper Hangover have asked us to talk about the five things that we just can't live without when we're writing. So here are my top five:

1: Coffee. I used to be addicted to tea, but it proved to be a gateway drug. I now drink double shot espresso Americano whenever I write. And the number of them I drink daily is slowly increasing...

2: My lovely Ikea office chair. When my husband and I bought it, it cost us the same amount of money as two weeks worth of groceries. Money was super tight back then, so it really was a ridiculous extravagance. However, I spend so much time writing that if I sat in a normal chair I may have spent ten times as much in the physiotherapists. (If you think ten times is an exaggeration, you should see the cost of healthcare in Ireland. It's unbelievable. And not in the good way.)

3: Focus Booster. I think I've talked about it before. It's a free app that aims to make you more aware of your time so that you are more productive. And it really works. Anything that can stop me wandering into various internet fora is a good thing in my book. And a good thing for my book.

4: My dog. I have a chocolate Labrador, and she lies by my feet when I write. I sometimes read parts aloud to see if the rhythm of the language is right, so she knows what is going on in my stories. She sometimes makes suggestions, like maybe one of my characters might like to run like crazy after a frisbee, catch it in her mouth and slobber over it. I politely decline these suggestions.

5: My husband. I could get all emotional and talk about how supportive he is, and it would all be true. However, he is also practically helpful. He's my number one beta reader and he picks up all my grammatical errors. I also talk about plot with him. He's my sounding board.

What about you? What things can you not do without?

Plot Bunnies

I wish I had come up with this idea at Easter, that would have been cool and very in keeping with the season. Unfortunately, I didn't. My mind doesn't work that way. I only thought about writing about plot bunnies after I was attacked by one.

It was a normal evening, pretty much like any other. I was trawling through my final edit which, as I've mentioned here numerous times, I am finding increasingly tedious. My husband (he's my beta reader, he works as an editor which makes him more critical than the average husband) was reading over some chapters with his customary little frown on his face. He chuckled a couple of times, which I took as a good sign. Then he told me that it was very good, and I relaxed slightly. It's nerve wracking giving someone part of your work to read. My writing is entirely fictional, but deeply personal.

I felt upbeat then, and went back to my editing with renewed vigour. 'You're so close to the finish line,' I told myself excitedly. 'You can do this.' And then...the plot bunny attacked.

Plot bunnies are strange creatures. When you actually need one, catching one can seem almost impossible. But whenever I'm working on a story, a plot bunny pops up and waves it's little paw at me. Incessantly. This bunny is especially unwelcome, because I've put writing novel 2 on hod in order to edit novel 1. And this plot bunny told me firmly that he was destined for novel 3.

I have to try and ignore it while I finish the job at hand. But I don't want to completely ignore it, in case it wanders away and I can't find it when I come to write novel 3.

What about all of you? How do you deal with plot bunnies?

Frailty, thy name is...Christine.

Ok, the title is a bit melodramatic but there you go. I feel bad because I haven't written a blog post in a few days, but there has been a really good reason. I went into a fibromyalgia flare, which for those not in the know (you lucky, lucky, things) is when the symptoms step up in intensity and normal functioning is almost impossible. I've spent the last few days migrating from the bed to the couch and back again. I haven't written, blogged, or edited in days. I even had to use a sick day on my journalism work which I only do when I absolutely have to. I'll freely admit I sometimes cry off my fiction writing too easily, but journalism pays the bills. Some bills anyway. And short term bill paying can sometimes can often get in the way of long term dream building.

Husband was great. He made dinner, and went on valiant searches for dairy free chocolate. He didn't even give out to me when he found out I'd let my meds run low and therefore didn't have effective pain relief. This was especially good, because I do that all the time. Organisation and Christine do not go together. My fourteen year old sister despairs of me. I'm going to the doctor tonight anyway, and have vowed not to be so stupid again...

Back on track with editing now though. And I logged into my account this afternoon to find out that I have 50 followers! Hurrah! I thought the only way I would ever get 50 followers was if I started my own religious cult but, like I said, organisation and Christine do not go together. Thank you to everyone who reads my witterings. It means a lot.

Hope everyone is having a good week :)

My Writerly Routine/Once More With Feeling

My Writerly Routine

My working days tend to take a fairly regular pattern. I get up early, walk the dog, and aim to be sitting at my desk for eight am. Then I do my journalistic work which, on a good day with no procrastination, I can do in under two hours. Then I do some household chores and set myself up for an afternoon of writing. My husband works is out of the house for around twelve hours, and often times the only people I meet are dog walkers, the postman and the biweekly Tesco delivery man. In some ways it's a hermetic existence, well as hermetic as you can get when you live in a suburb of a capital city. My routine (and even the fact that I call it a 'routine') makes me sound all hard-working and diligent, but just because I'm at my desk in person does not mean that I'm working. I would not like to see a tot up of the hours that I waste fawning over fora.

I write in the kitchen, with my French doors open onto our lovely garden. We have an office in the front of the house, but it doesn't get the sun and can be dark and gloomy. In the kitchen I can see the sun filled garden and listen to birdsong which is all very inspirational. In short, I love my routine and didn't realise how much until I found out that my husband and I have an appointment tomorrow morning in our house. This will mess up my system. If I don't get a certain amount of work done in the morning, my day is practically a write-off. I find it hard to get into the groove again. I've been this way as far back as I can remember. This may make some of you worry that I have some form OCD, but trust me, fifteen seconds in my less than immaculate home would set you straight.

Once More, With Feeling


So, this is it for Storms in Teacups. I've set my submission date for Wednesday June 1, the day when I sent out my sample chapters, synopsis and cover letter out to agents across the British Isles. I have a month of hard editing to do, and then I'm done. Now, I love my book. I think it's good, and there's parts of it that still make me smile even though I've read it around a dozen times. The problem is, this edit is making me crazy. Maybe because it's the last one, maybe because I've edited it countless times before, but I'm starting to lose the will to live. Not to mention the fact that I have The Fear. On previous edits I haven't worried to much over whether or not my corrections are the best they can be, because if they don't work then I can always pick it up in subsequent edits can't I? Ah, no. Not any more.

My husband must know I'm under strain, as he bought me this Fry's Chocolate Cream (well, not this exact one) completely unprompted. Yummy and scrummy and completely dairy free. He's a man in a million.

W is for...Waiting, Wondering and Working

Hope everybody had a lovely Easter. I know I did. Well, I did until I had an incident.

I'd been thinking for a while that dairy wasn't agreeing with me. I was getting sick after I drank tea, was having a lot of nausea and other issues. At first it was mild, but over the past few weeks I noticed it had gotten worse. I tried a couple of days dairy free, and my symptoms stopped. So, I thought fine. I obviously have a food intolerance. That I can deal with. I can avoid milk products most of the time, and then occasionally I can indulge as long as I realise that there are consequences. Fine.

But yesterday was Easter Sunday. And I am a chocoholic. My husband had very nicely bought me a bar of Toblerone all for my very own self, and so I decided to do what any good chocolate lover would do. I ate three quarters of it. Only then did I discover I was not lactose intolerant, I have a full on allergy. My immune system went into full force trying to protect me, and the result was kind of scary. My body itched all over, I got bad nausea and headaches and my mouth swelled up. My husband wanted to bring me to the hospital, but we waited it out with antihistamines and water. Husband was very worried, I thought he was overreacting. He pointed out that I had rashes and tingling, I said that I'd had it for weeks. My husband, who has a severe allergy to paracetamol, said that they were symptoms of anaphylactic shock. Great. Every woman loves to discover she's allergic to milk on Easter Sunday!

But, on the bright side, I was vegan for a while, so I know how many great substitutes there are out there. And while I'm going to miss my Starbucks frappucinos, I'm sure I'll deal.

 Tomorrow I find out if I made it through to the ABNA semifinals. I don't expect to, competition is very strong and I'm delighted to have come so far. And I'm not going to lie, getting through would be amazing. But for now I just have to wait. And wonder. And work on my next novel.

U is for...Ugh.

It's a lovely bank holiday weekend. The sun is shining, my husband is off work, there is a ridiculous amount of chocolate in my house. But I have decided to disregard all these things in order to have a rant thread.

My fibromyalgia has been bad this week. My hips and knees are so bad that I had to bow out of a fun game of rounders that my husband and his friends had organised. I was never going to be playing, I wouldn't be able to, but I knew that I wouldn't be able to stand and watch or sit on the grass either. So my husband went off on his own. He didn't want to leave him, but I made him go. He misses too many things due to my ropey health. Even so, I know that he'll be worried about me while he's there, and I feel so guilty for taking the shine off the day for him. And I really wanted to go out, enjoy the sunshine and chat to some nice people. I'm a bit down about that.

I had four of my siblings over yesterday for dinner. They're 7, 10, 11 and 14 and I love them to bits. We had a good time, but I struggled to seem cheery and upbeat for them because of the pain I was in. I really hope that they didn't pick up on it. They're only kids, and the last thing I want is for them to think I don't enjoy their company. I do, so much.

And then, of course, there's my writing. Despite resting my hands and arms, they're in bad shape and it hurts to write. This is bad, because I've reached a seam of writing where it's all flowing, and I'm in the middle of some intensive edits too. I can't work right now. Writing is what got me through my illness, and now I worry that physically my body can't do it.

Living with a long term illness is hard. Not only the pain, the nausea and the lack of energy, but you sometimes feel like you are losing yourself, the person you'd like to be and the person that you want to become. I think to be honest that that's the worst part of all.

I'm just having a bad day. Tomorrow will hopefully be better, and I'll remember that in the scheme of things I'm a very lucky woman. I've a great husband, a lovely family, I get to write a lot and have a lovely house and supportive friends. But right now? I need to vent.

Anyone who has a chronic illness, or knows someone who has should check out The Spoon Theory by Christine Miserandino. It gives a great explanation on what being ill feels like on a day to day basis, and my husband said it really helped him realise what it's like to be me.

Hope this all finds you well, and that you have a great Easter. I'm going to go cuddle my dog, drink copious amounts of tea and read a book.

O is for...Organisation (or lack thereof)

So, I was a little ahead of this whole A-Z blog thing, and that turned out to be very good news. Because my new house does not have an internet connection. It started out as something liveable with, and anyway my husband and I had far too much work to do in the house to procrastinate on the internet. It was rustic, and old timey. And then I realised just how spoilt and technology dependent I have become. I couldn't write on my blog, or more importantly read other people's. My access to forums was gone, my access to news was gone (why not watch the television, you say? Or buy a newspaper? All good points, but the petulant child in me just wanted to whine). I'm currently writing this in my parents house, as I need the internet for my journalistic work. Oh interweb, how I've missed you...

We moved house on Friday. Our car (with keys), my parents car and even my Grandad helped move boxes, bags and furniture. The move wasn't helped by my husband and I's laid back approach to packing i.e. throw it all loose in the back of the car, it'll be fine. Chaos ensued, but I am pleased to report that all belongings plus Roxie the Labrador are now happily installed in our new house.

So, organisation. I'm starting to realise the importance of it in the abstract, though I'm not so good at it in practice. Fibromyalgia has actually helped in this regard. It affects my cognitive functions so on a bad day I forget everything. I forget what I was saying half way through sentences, I forget what I was going to do, I forget important things like closing doors, and turning the oven on, and ordering a broadband package for my new house in advance before I move in. So I have discovered lists, they are my saviour. All I have to do is remember that I have a list and everything is well.

Now that I'm getting nearer to that oh-so-scary activity -submitting to publishers- I have had to become more organised about my writing. When you first sit down to write a novel, it's all about Words on Page. This is the novel that you're going to finish, and you find an hour here, a half hour there to make it happen. Some days you write thousands of words, some weeks you don't even open the file. But that's alright, because you're writing regularly, your word count is going up, and everything is rosy in the garden. But then you realise that writing is addictive, and if you don't put some order on matters everything else in your life will suffer for your art. Which is noble, I suppose, but my muse doesn't make me tea, give me hugs and buy me a chocolate egg on Easter Sunday so I need to keep my marriage going.

I don't plan my novels, but I plan my work. And that is today's project (after I finish the work that pays the bills) to write up a time frame for completing manuscripts and edits for every project I have going on. Which, is fairly organised.

I should really be writing 'P' today, rather than 'O'. And I have to do 'Q' tomorrow as part of my query blog hop. If I run the letters together as a sample of a 'Pathetic Query', does that count?

K is for...Kindle

When I first heard of ereaders, I was disgusted. I was a bit of a purist, the idea of a machine didn't appeal to me.  I love the feel of the paper, the smell of a new book, the smell of an old book (I do have two history degrees after all) the whole sensation of reading a proper book. But slowly I'm beginning to change my mind. Partly, it's because my illness makes it difficult for me to hold a book for a long time. I spent a day reading a couple of weeks ago, and spent the next day in pain with heat pads on my wrists. The thought of not reading, or even of reading less horrified me. I'm addicted to books. I read every day, and get uneasy if I can't for some reason. I get antsy if I don't have another couple of books lined up for when I finish my current one. I like the fact that if I'm too sore to leave the house, I can still buy books.

So, still not enthusiastic, my husband and I went to PC World to look at various readers. I'm not mad on the iPad or the Sony reader, so we looked at the Kindle. It was really light, much lighter than a standard book. But I still wasn't sure. I decided to think about it. I mean, we're not exactly rolling in money right now, and we can't afford to pay that much for a machine I think I might use.

But then something happened that changed my mind. For we are moving house. My husband packed loads of boxes of books last week. I packed loads of boxes today. We gave some books away to charity. And you know what? We still have an entire bookcase left to go. It's not good for my back, my wrists or my hips and I'm sore now. I could store 3,500 books on my Kindle, I think that's a good investment. So I think if I get knocked out of ABNA on April 26 then I'm going to buy myself a Kindle to reward myself for getting so far.

Is it true that I can lend ebooks to other Kindle users if I have one myself? Or is that just a scurrilous rumour?

J is for... (The New York) Jets

Ok, I'm a little ahead of myself here, but I discovered if I blog the A-Z challenge straight then it will take me up to April 26 when the next round of ABNA come out and we find out who has made it to the semi-finals.

So, today I'm going to talk about my one sporting love, American football. Thankfully it's starting to become a bit more mainstream in Europe, so we can watch it on TV rather than on a series of dodgy streams that seem to get taken down every time something really exciting is going to happen.

I'm not a sport person. I don't watch soccer, Gaelic football, hurling, rugby or any of that. But my husband's family holidayed in Florida regularly, and they had once gone to a Miami Dolphins game while Dan Marino was still playing. They lost. But that didn't matter to my then-teenage husband. He was hooked, and a Dolphins fan forever more.

Fast forward to our honeymoon in New York ( '...concrete jungle where dreams are made of, there's nothing you can't doooo...' you get the idea). It had been over a decade since my husband had last seen a live game. With great generosity of spirit, I agreed to go out to Meadowlands and watch the Giants take on the Jets. My only stipulation was that I could have a hotdog and a plastic glass of beer while watching the game, like I had seen people do in the movies. (Yes, this is an American stereotype and I know not everyone in the US does this, but in my defence when people come to Ireland they want to go to a thatched-roof pub, listen to Irish rebel songs while drinking a pint of Guinness. I have never done this. I also have never sung rebel songs about eight hundred years of British occupation. Except when the United Kingdom score us low in The Eurovision Song Contest.)  Obviously, the Jets and the Dolphins are rivals, so we would be supporting the Giants.

When we got to Meadowlands, all of the merchandise was for the New York Giants. The jumbotrons urged us to cheer for the Giants, when they were in offence and in defence. The Giants were winning. Now, a little thing about my home country. We are a tiny island with a population of about four million people, and we don't invest a huge amount in sport. We don't have a huge pool of talent from which to choose from.We go in to every sporting occasion expecting to lose. When athletes from other countries qualify for something like the Olympics, they think it's the start of something. In Ireland, if our athletes qualify, then we've won. We'll send our athletes, wave our flag and cheer them on. If they don't win, that's ok. We're used to it. We qualified, anything else is a bonus. We are sporting underdogs.

I felt for the poor Jets. They were behind, their fans were outnumbered by Giants' fans. The jumbotrons couldn't care less about them. So, used to supporting the underdog, I switched allegiance, much to the chagrin of my Miami Dolphin supporting husband. The Jets then came from behind to win the game. There's a message in there somewhere I feel.

I love American football now. It's such a social game, the break between the downs gives you a chance to discuss the game, and I love the way the referee explains his decisions to the crowd. Only problem is, the Jets have turned into a great team, and have narrowly missed out on Superbowl two years running. I'm supporting a strong team, I don't know what to do with myself.

**Disclaimer**

I can actually spell, and I spell check every post. Any differences in spelling are down to the way we spell in the British Isles as opposed to in the USA. I've got a couple of comments about my spelling, just wanted to clear that up.

H is for...History

Hmmm. Now I know why I have such a bad back.

Other than writing, my other love is history. I've been interested in since I was a kid, and I think part of the appeal of the urban fantasy genre for me is that you get to create your own new histories and mythologies from scratch.

I studied for my BA in Trinity College Dublin. I met my husband there, also a history student and we met on a history society trip to Edinburgh.

After graduating I went to University College Dublin and got my MA in the Social and Cultural History of Medicine. When I told people I wanted to study history at BA level, they assumed I wanted to be a teacher, when they found out that I was doing an MA in the history of medicine they assumed I wanted to be a doctor. And the embarrassing thing is, at 24, I don't really know what I'm going to do with my life at all.

When I was younger, I was so definite. I was going to get my PhD, write in my spare time, and raise children. I was energetic and determined, but then I got ill. I just don't have the same amount of energy as I used to. I'm currently on a year out from college, and I don't know whether I should go back and start my research doctorate this autumn. My husband thinks I should focus on writing, but I worry if I do that I'll end up five years down the line no nearer to being published with all my dreams in the dust. I really don't know what to do.

If I do my PhD, I won't be writing as much. That's a fact. But other people seem to juggle lots of things in their lives. How do you all juggle everything?

The guys over at Paper Hangover are asking people what are five things they'd wish they'd known before becoming a writer. Here are mine:

1) No matter how great an idea sounds in your head, it always loses a slight something when it moves onto the page. This is normal, and not a sign that you are a failure.

2) When you're a writer, everything is material. Worried about going to a family occasion because you can't stand someone? That's ok. Save up the negativity and use it for a character. Stuck waiting in a queue at the grocery. Eavesdrop on other people's conversations. It helps you learn what makes people tick.

3) Coffee is fuel. It has magical qualities, the stronger the better.

4) Sometimes I will prefer my imaginary world to the real world. Though, I've been like this all my life, even before I started to write.

5) I wish I'd known how much writing can hurt. Your wrists, your back, your fingers (not to mention the whizzing of caffeine through your veins). I see physiotherapy in my future.

And that's it. Have a good Friday! ;)

C is for... Coffee

Coffee is a relatively new love of mine. Like every good stereotypical Irish person, my first love is tea. My husband on the other hand, is a coffee lover. He samples different types of gourmet beans in the same way that some people collect expensive cigars or fine wines.  My husband is a journalist who works from home and the coffee machine we got as a wedding present is starting to huff and puff under the strain of making so many cups of coffee. I expect she'll be taking early retirement.

Before this month, I would have the odd cup of coffee, maybe once every fortnight or so. No more than that. But all of a sudden tea started tasting slightly bland, and I've moved over to having two mugs of coffee a day. Not much for most people, but for me it was the equivalent of a teetotaller starting to drink a bottle of wine a night.

I'm a very good person. I have no choice, I'm terrible at being bad. The one time I tried to sneak out to a pub when I was sixteen I was caught. Coffee has become my way of being bad. This sounds strange, but people with fibromyalgia aren't meant to have caffeine. I can't sleep without taking special medication (NOT sleeping tablets) and having the equivalent of four espresso shots a day isn't exactly going to help, is it? But I don't smoke, I only drink occasionally, and I have to cut down on sugar to drop body weight to improve mobility. We all need a vice, and I'm deciding right here and now, that my vice is coffee.

How badass is that? ;)