A Few More Days

 Posted by at 1:20 am  Nick's Blog
Aug 242023
 

If the weatherman is to be believed, we should have a few more days of this blistering hot weather with triple-digit temperatures and high humidity before things start to break on Monday or Tuesday. He says that early next week we will see the 80s again, and possibly some rain. I can’t wait. I am […]

Crunching Words

 Posted by at 12:25 am  Nick's Blog
Aug 222023
 

We are still dealing with oppressive heat here in west central Alabama, and with temperatures predicted to be in the triple digits most of this week, it’s a good time to stay inside as much as possible, which is exactly what we are doing. There’s only so much goofing off I can do, especially when […]

Feb 262023
 

I spent most of yesterday working on my new Tinder Street book, A Changing World, and as always with this series, a lot of time was dedicated to research and checking facts to get the timeline correct for the events that were happening in the last half of the Great Depression. I’m about 8,500 words […]

The Big 50!

 Posted by at 12:43 am  Nick's Blog
Aug 162022
 

I have a birthday coming up in the next few weeks, but that’s not the reason for today’s blog title. That birthday happened almost 20 years ago. But I achieved another milestone yesterday when Pucker Factor, the 11th book in my John Lee Quarrels mystery series, went live on Amazon. This is my 50th book, […]

Close But No Cigar

 Posted by at 12:54 am  Nick's Blog
Jul 312022
 

I said in yesterday’s blog that I had written 9,000 words and if I could do the same thing for the next day or two, I would finish my new John Lee book. Well, I had another good writing day, but not quite that good. By the end of the day, I had knocked out […]

Cataracts And Kayaks

 Posted by at 1:11 am  Nick's Blog
Jul 292022
 

A week or so ago, I mentioned that Terry’s eye doctor said it’s about time to consider cataract surgery for her. We knew it was coming, and she’s been wanting to get it over with, but just needed to wait for the doctor to give the okay. She had an appointment at Kutryb Eye Institute in […]

Not Going To Do It

 Posted by at 12:43 am  Nick's Blog
Jul 282022
 

I had my RF nerve ablations done on June 13th and 20th. They were outpatient procedures, and a couple of weeks after the second one I had a follow-up appointment with the doctor’s office in Orlando. If traffic isn’t bad we can make the trip in about an hour and 15 minutes, but you never […]

Jul 242022
 

No, I’m not Santa Claus, although I am a jolly little fat man. And I used to dress up and play Santa for the kids at the women’s shelter I was involved with years ago. But I’m talking about a different kind of list. Quite a few readers have asked me how I keep track […]

Better Late Than Never

 Posted by at 12:38 am  Nick's Blog
Jun 292022
 

Well, it took longer than expected, but I woke up to a message yesterday morning that the printed edition of The Hard Years, the fourth book in my Tinder Street family saga, is now available on Amazon. Better late than never, right? Meanwhile, I sent four more chapters of Pucker Factor, my next John Lee Quarrels […]

Warming Up

 Posted by at 12:30 am  Nick's Blog
May 012022
 

It’s starting to warm up here on the central Florida coast, with the weatherman saying that it will be in the 90s every day next week. Combine that with the humidity, and I think summer is going to start early for us. I’m not looking forward to it. Just like some people who live in […]

Flying On Delta 8

 Posted by at 1:02 am  Nick's Blog
Apr 302022
 

For years the Veterans Administration prescribed pain pills for my back issues. Hydrocodone, oxycontin, morphine, you name it and at one time or another, I had it. The thing is, I really don’t like taking narcotic medicine. There are too many side effects and other issues that I did not want to deal with, so […]

I’m Sniveling

 Posted by at 12:48 am  Nick's Blog
Apr 292022
 

One of my least endearing character traits is my tendency to snivel, and I’ve been doing a lot of it the last couple of days due to my back pain. I have been relatively pain-free in that area for the last two years, except for the normal aches everyone with a bad back has now […]

Apr 272022
 

We were up early yesterday morning because we had an appointment for Wilkie’s Pest Control to come by and do their quarterly spraying. If you live in Florida, you have a “bug man” because if you don’t, all kinds of critters will find their way inside your house. Wilkie’s is a family-owned business that has […]

It’s A New World

 Posted by at 12:50 am  Nick's Blog
Mar 292022
 

I already know that I’m an old fart, but sometimes that message is driven home in ways that I don’t expect. I’ve shared stories with you before about my days in the car sales business, and while that only lasted a year or so, I learned an awful lot about not only the industry but […]

Words, Books, And Rain

 Posted by at 12:46 am  Nick's Blog
Oct 262021
 

I had such a good time knocking out 7,000 words in my new book, Big Lake Ranger, on Sunday that I did the same thing again yesterday! That puts me at over 34,000 words, and with a couple more days like that, I will be well past the halfway mark. I never know exactly what […]

Fred Flops

 Posted by at 12:44 am  Nick's Blog
Aug 142021
 

Living in Florida, every time there’s the possibility of a hurricane or bad tropical storm we hear from friends and family members all over the country asking if we are all right, if we have plans to evacuate, and if we don’t, do we have enough supplies to survive in case the power grid goes […]

Aug 092021
 

I am very pleased with the progress of my newest book, Big Lake Shootout. I released it Friday, and yesterday afternoon it was #3,602 of all of the millions of Kindle books on Amazon, #95 on Amazon’s top 100 Hot New Release list for mysteries, and #33 in the top 100 for police procedurals. Thank […]

Aug 062021
 

Yesterday I was formatting the e-book version of Big Lake Shootout, and when I was about halfway through, my darned computer froze up. I had to reboot it before I could work anymore, and since I broke one of my own rules and hadn’t saved very much as I went, I lost about half of […]

The Squeaky Wheel

 Posted by at 12:42 am  Nick's Blog
Jul 202021
 

Yes, the squeaky wheel does eventually get greased. But sometimes, it has to squeak loud and long before that happens. In a blog post a couple of weeks ago titled Stair Rails And Carpet Woes, I told you that we have been unhappy with the carpet we had installed in our house three years ago. […]

Potpourri

 Posted by at 12:29 am  Nick's Blog
May 232021
 

Definition of potpourri – 1: a mixture of flowers, herbs, and spices that is usually kept in a jar and used for scent. 2: a miscellaneous collection. The second definition above pretty much describes today’s blog, a collection of miscellaneous thoughts and info that I’m sharing because I don’t have anything else to talk about […]