Kait Nolan posted an article on Shadow & Fang - Feb 11, 2012, 10:07 am
First off, go read this post by Carrie Cuinn.  It is awesome. She brings up the issue of how so many people define themselves by what they have to do, by their responsibilities, by how they act around others based on what they want–whether they want to repel or attract.  And she talks about how...
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Kait Nolan posted an article on Pots and Plots - Feb 10, 2012, 8:31 am
I blame The Pioneer Woman for this.  It looked SO AWESOME on the show a couple weeks ago while I was working out (yes, I watch cooking shows while I exercise–I’m perverse that way) that I just HAD TO MAKE IT.  Of course I adapted it somewhat to make it gluten free and to cut down on the fat an...
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Kait Nolan posted an article on Shadow & Fang - Feb 10, 2012, 7:55 am
I don’t read a lot of contemporary romance–with the notable exception of Nora Roberts, who is just on my automatic buy list, period.   So excepting La Nora, who does such a marvelous job building friends and families and relationships with people I’d love to know in real life, I tend to find...
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Kait Nolan posted an article on Shadow & Fang - Feb 9, 2012, 8:35 am
The world has changed.  IS changing.  I suppose this is not a shock as, in fact, the once true constant IS change. I fell in love with writing when I was twelve years old.  It was one of those deep, gut level knowings.  This is what I am supposed to do.  My parents, while proud of my capabilit...
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Kait Nolan posted an article on Shadow & Fang - Feb 8, 2012, 11:36 am
My brain is all over the place today. I started my morning with tears when I heard the news about Piper Bayard‘s beloved Daisy, the love pooch, who interviewed me about Red for my tour.  On the heels of Jami Gold losing her precious cat, and Serena Lawless worrying about her furbaby Lucy who’s...
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Kait Nolan posted an article on Pots and Plots - Feb 8, 2012, 8:22 am
As we are fond of saying around here: Bacon makes everything better.  Hubby gave me a o.O when I said I was going to make scallops with bacon.  I told him to just go with it.  I see bacon wrapped sea scallops on fancy menus often.  Since we actually prefer bay scallops, it seemed to make more se...
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Kait Nolan posted an article on Shadow & Fang - Feb 7, 2012, 11:24 am
So over the weekend hubs and I watched the latest incarnation of The Three Musketeers.  We knew it had received poor reviews, but we admit we’re suckers for any adaptations (though the Disney version with Kiefer Sutherland, Oliver Platt, and crazy man Sheen wins every time–because there is no g...
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Kait Nolan posted an article on Shadow & Fang - Feb 6, 2012, 11:17 am
I am often called a Superwoman by my peeps on the interwebz.  This is largely due to my reputation for Doing All The Things and my freakish organizational capabilities.  Such declarations are AWESOME for my self-esteem, yo.  But lest anybody be mistaken otherwise, I am completely and totally huma...
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Kait Nolan posted an article on Pots and Plots - Feb 6, 2012, 8:13 am
Continuing the whole meatballs are a portable protein lunch thing, this week I opted to try Philly Cheesesteak Meatballs.  My inspiration for this is, of course, our Philly Cheesesteak Sloppy Joes, a la Rachel Ray.  Except I wanted to try to get all those ingredients IN the meatballs.  The end re...
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Kait Nolan posted an article on Shadow & Fang - Feb 5, 2012, 1:08 pm
I seem to be developing a habit of getting up on Saturday to get in my words before hubby wakes up and then never remembering to post…ah well. This week has been kind of a draw on the jogging.  I got up and did it Tuesday morning, barely getting more than 1.25 miles and feeling like I was going ...
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Kait Nolan posted an article on Shadow & Fang - Feb 3, 2012, 11:51 am
My eye is twitching after grading this week’s discussion questions.  I have decided that a higher percentage than usual of my students hit way too many branches on their fall out of the stupid tree this semester.  Because da-yum they cannot follow simple directions and as juniors and seniors man...
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Kait Nolan posted an article on Shadow & Fang - Feb 2, 2012, 10:02 am
So I got into a lengthy chat last night with dear pal Claire Legrand, who’s currently writing her first, first person book.  Her prior work has always been in third.  She was having some concerns over the fact that this MG was slated to be in the neighborhood of 60-65k and she’s at around 43k ...
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Kait Nolan posted an article on Shadow & Fang - Feb 1, 2012, 10:44 am
It’s raining today.  All gray and dark and the LAST thing I wanted to do was leave my cozy cocoon in bed to actually get up and work out.  But I managed to drag myself out in time to do my weights at least.  It’s one of those rare days I’m wearing my glasses instead of contacts, owing to th...
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Kait Nolan posted an article on Pots and Plots - Feb 1, 2012, 7:43 am
I rarely make my own chili from scratch.  This might be considered shameful by some foodies, but frankly, I really just love the Carroll Shelby mix from the grocery store.  But I decided that I just had to try making chili with BACON because bacon makes everything better.  This wound up being kin...
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Kait Nolan posted an article on Shadow & Fang - Jan 31, 2012, 8:27 am
I’ve been behind on grading.  Felt lousy.  Been busy.  Assorted reasons that I only just yesterday got to the second round of discussion questions for one of my classes.  I don’t often give writing assignments.  I can’t tolerate it much.  College students, for the most part, can’t writ...
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Kait Nolan posted an article on Shadow & Fang - Jan 30, 2012, 5:17 pm
I’m only just now getting around to blogging today.  It has been a serious MONDAY and I’ve got one of those My Blood Pressure Shot Up Too High, Too Fast Headaches.  Want chocolate or some other massive source of sugar. I had a long, detailed post about exactly why my blood pressure went throu...
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Kait Nolan posted an article on Pots and Plots - Jan 30, 2012, 7:35 am
One of my goals for the new year is to get hubs on a higher protein diet.  He has not had good luck with salads being portable and staying good and fresh and most of the ready made options are either expensive as all get out or not gluten free.  So I had the idea that I could make a variety of mea...
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Kait Nolan posted an article on Shadow & Fang - Jan 29, 2012, 1:32 pm
It was a good week, writing wise.  I wound up with a total of 4318 words with only one missed writing day, averaging 720 words a day (on the days I wrote).  I got through a really pivotal scene that’s finally getting my heroine into the headspace I understand. I joined #WIP500, which is a lovely...
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Kait Nolan posted an article on Shadow & Fang - Jan 28, 2012, 3:07 pm
Twitter is an ever flowing source of new and potentially interesting resources for writers.  Our habits of clustering hashtags at the end of our tweets means that eventually we get exposed to new stuff.   Friday I saw #WIP500 fly by in my #ROW80 stream, so I asked about it and got directed here f...
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Kait Nolan posted an article on Shadow & Fang - Jan 27, 2012, 9:59 am
There’s a troll on the internet!  I know, we’re all so shocked by this.  In response to Jami Gold’s post yesterday, I happened to go look up said troll because, hey, I admit that Author Behaving Badly stories are kind of like train wrecks.  You just can’t help but look.   This one was a...
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Kait Nolan posted an article on Pots and Plots - Jan 27, 2012, 8:31 am
This is not my mama’s chicken n’ dumplins.  Hers is made with Bisquick dumplins and no matter how many times I try, I can’t seem to make it the same.  And of course now with the gluten thing, hubby couldn’t eat it anyway.  Since I have been sick and am responsible for making my own comfor...
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Kait Nolan posted an article on Shadow & Fang - Jan 26, 2012, 8:25 am
So I was one of the lucky few to get ahold of an eARC of Vicki Keire’s latest novella, Worlds Burn Through.  First, the blurbage:  Chloe Burke dreams of creatures who walk through fire and a strange boy who saves them both. Her parents convinced her long ago that the dreams are the result of ...
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Kait Nolan posted an article on Shadow & Fang - Jan 25, 2012, 10:00 am
My feet hurt less this morning.  So do the rest of my muscles.  I have hope that jogging will feel more normal by next week.  Won’t get to jog tomorrow, as it’s supposed to be all wrath of God, Noah’s arc, flooding nasty.  And I get to drive in it for work.  Awesome. Things are moving ri...
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Kait Nolan posted an article on Pots and Plots - Jan 25, 2012, 8:22 am
I started out making another batch of stuffed shells then realized I had way more filling than shells, so I swapped over to lasagna.  Nice and simple.  Makes 6 servings at 385 calories and 12.1 grams of fat and freezes beautifully. Ingredients: 2 cups simply cottage cheese 2 cups simply ricotta ...
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Kait Nolan posted an article on Shadow & Fang - Jan 24, 2012, 10:50 am
I am, quite possibly, going insane.  My husband is ready to verify whether I’ve been body snatched.  I’m moving around like an arthritic old woman…  And I kinda like it. Lemme splain. While on vacation in Kansas, my buddy got a couple of guest passes to her gym for me.  On the second vis...
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Kait Nolan posted an article on Shadow & Fang - Jan 23, 2012, 9:24 am
Writing is, at once, the most fun and exciting job and the hardest (no doubt plenty of people would say the same about parenthood).  You start out and you don’t know anything, so you’re happily splashing in the pond that is your work in progress, just basking in the joy of creation–and probab...
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Kait Nolan posted an article on Pots and Plots - Jan 23, 2012, 8:04 am
I’ve been on vacation and am only just now caught up with everything enough to get back to blogging about what we’ve been eating.  Hubs is getting a cold or sinus infection or something, so soup was the name of the game.  Except of course we’re a gluten free household, so it’s chicken and ...
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Kait Nolan posted an article on Shadow & Fang - Jan 22, 2012, 5:21 pm
I have officially lost my mind.  I went running this morning.  On purpose.  2.25 miles, of which 1 was actually run.  Okay, jogged.  I haven’t really don’t this in a long time.  Still.  I’m contemplating doing this a few times a week on my non weight-lifting days, just to shake it up. I...
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Kait Nolan posted an article on Shadow & Fang - Jan 20, 2012, 10:43 am
Back in my pantsing days, it was not at all uncommon for me to jump from one project to another, following the trail of the elusive muse and working on whatever project I was jazzed about.  This led to a lot of good beginnings and not a single finished manuscript.  As I made my transition from pan...
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Kait Nolan posted an article on Shadow & Fang - Jan 19, 2012, 8:11 am
I’ve been at this indie publishing thing for 2 solid years now.  Longer if you count the platform building I did before I released my first title in March of 2010.  Each year I do analysis of productivity, sales, ROI for time and promotion method, etc.  And every year I learn stuff and adapt wh...
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Kait Nolan posted an article on Shadow & Fang - Jan 18, 2012, 8:42 am
Well I’m officially home after a lovely visit with one of my college BFFs.  Back in the land of grown ups.  I adore my unofficial niece and nephew but a little kid proofed house is totally dangerous to the short and klutzy.  Baby gates…kiddie stools in the bathroom…toys in the floor.  All ...
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Kait Nolan posted an article on Shadow & Fang - Jan 17, 2012, 8:07 am
I’m headed home today so one more rerun before we’re back to our regularly scheduled blogging. *** I’ve been reading several novels based around characters in the WITSEC program.  One of the ones I requested arrived this weekend through interlibrary loan, and I started reading through it la...
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Kait Nolan posted an article on Shadow & Fang - Jan 16, 2012, 7:04 am
Since I’m still out of town and short on time, I’m doing reruns the next couple of days, highlighting some of my older posts. *** I am fascinated with villains. It fits in neatly with my love of psychological profiling. Villains are far more interesting on that front. I won’t say that I love...
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Kait Nolan posted an article on Shadow & Fang - Jan 15, 2012, 8:48 am
So this is going to be pretty short and sweet since I’m on my phone. Not a lot to report since Wednesday’s check in. I haven’t written. Wednesday’s writing block was absorbed by a phone call. Thursday’s by prep for the trip I’m now on. I haven’t pulled out my laptop since I’ve been ...
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Kait Nolan posted an article on Shadow & Fang - Jan 12, 2012, 8:53 am
So my pal Jessica Corra has this thing where she picks one word to focus on for the year. You know, I think this is a marvelous idea.  It kind of reminds me of Madeleine L’Engle.  In Circle of Quiet she talks about having a word for the summer–for me the very memorable ontology, which led to a...
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Kait Nolan posted an article on Shadow & Fang - Jan 11, 2012, 11:44 am
I’m just gonna say it.  Life has been INSANE since work started back.  It’s just that season for us.  Assorted projects are ending, we’re working on grant applications for new funding, everybody’s remembering all the stuff that didn’t get taken care of before the holidays and is trying ...
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Kait Nolan posted an article on Pots and Plots - Jan 11, 2012, 7:51 am
I came across this recipe for spaghetti squash pizza on Pinterest and was immediately intrigued.  Spaghetti squash as a CRUST?  Really?  Well I tried it.  It wasn’t bad.  But I thought it was a bit to quichy to classify as pizza, so I did some adaptation.  The end result was a single serve p...
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Kait Nolan posted an article on Shadow & Fang - Jan 10, 2012, 5:24 pm
I’ve been thinking about stakes a lot lately, both as I work on plotting out some of my own projects, help brainstorm the plotting of other friends, and watching all the season finales of assorted TV shows.  There’s this sort of accepted bit of writing wisdom (of the same generic school as “w...
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Kait Nolan posted an article on Shadow & Fang - Jan 9, 2012, 5:03 pm
Wow, I am full of all kinds of fail getting blog posts up at a reasonable hour this year.  I hadn’t even thought about it until now.  But in my defense I am very muzzy headed today.  Hubby called and asked me to bring him something on my way to work.  So I did that, and realized about ten minu...
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Kait Nolan posted an article on Pots and Plots - Jan 9, 2012, 7:38 am
Nut crusted fish is something you often see on the menus of swanky restaurants.  I’ve never tried making it before but it’s just as easy as breading fish in anything else and it makes a gorgeous presentation.  This is definitely a company meal because they’ll think you slaved.  Given the pr...
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Kait Nolan posted an article on Shadow & Fang - Jan 8, 2012, 10:52 am
It’s official.  I have a sinus infection.  Joy.  But it’s not strep or something equally heinous, like the flu, so I’m continuing with the boatloads of water, vitamin C, zinc, ecchinecea, and chamomile tea, and I’ll go irrigate later to flush my sinuses out.  Not what you would call fun,...
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Kait Nolan posted an article on Pots and Plots - Jan 6, 2012, 7:12 am
One of our favorite foods in this house is sourdough bread.  I make it every year for holiday gifts as EVERYONE loves it and it’s easy to make in large quantities (I made 16 regular loaves this year).  Well, I got it into my head to try a gluten free version.  My google search didn’t bring up...
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Kait Nolan posted an article on Pots and Plots - Jan 4, 2012, 8:37 am
Hubby had a bit of a pout over the holidays because he didn’t get to partake in the sweets as pretty much none of them were gluten free.  Not that he didn’t eat (boy did we all eat) but I took pity and made up a batch of these flourless peanut butter cookies.  They’re gluten free and awesome...
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Kait Nolan posted an article on Pots and Plots - Jan 2, 2012, 7:18 am
Black-eyed peas are just not one of my favorite things.  I’m a Mississippi girl so I prefer purple hull peas.  But black-eyed peas are the thing for New Year’s fare, so I had to do something with them.  A few years ago at a New Year’s party I had some black-eyed pea chili.  I have no idea ...
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Kait Nolan posted an article on Pots and Plots - Dec 21, 2011, 7:56 am
I keep trying butternut squash.  I like it roasted and in soup.  Hubs has not yet found an incarnation he likes, but I am nothing if not persistent.  It’s a marvelous veggie because it’s low carb, low cal, and low fat.  It’s got about a third of the calories of potatoes.  Since we’ve be...
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Kait Nolan posted an article on Pots and Plots - Dec 19, 2011, 7:05 am
I’ve been on a crusade to try to be better about not wasting food.  I’m really really bad about it with the new fridge because all the extra space is in depth and stuff gets lost in the back.  So when I found half a container of ricotta, half a thing of cottage cheese, and some feta, I knew I ...
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Kait Nolan posted an article on Pots and Plots - Dec 16, 2011, 7:22 am
All around the country, a standard feature at any holiday table are Sister Schubert’s Parker House style rolls.  These are the best rolls to hit the freezer section since…well, ever.  Each tin contains these fabulous pillows of delicious, buttery bread that is impossible to put down.  But the...
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Kait Nolan posted an article on Shadow & Fang - Dec 15, 2011, 10:21 am
…Nora that is. I was reminded by this yesterday when I made a Twitter hail for people to tell me their favorite non-historical book that’s set on a ranch in Montana.  I know.  Very specific query, but my current WIP begins on a ranch in Montana, so I’m wanting to read more in that vein for ...
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Kait Nolan posted an article on Shadow & Fang - Dec 14, 2011, 11:44 am
Thing are going pretty well with DOTH.  I’m still managing an average of 500 words a day, despite a number of events that have interfered with my writing this past week.  I’m hoping to keep that up as the week progresses since I’ve got even more stuff sucking up my writing time.  I’ve spe...
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Kait Nolan posted an article on Pots and Plots - Dec 14, 2011, 7:17 am
This was one of those “my oven is full of bread, what can I cook on the stovetop?” inspired dinners.  It’s quick, easy, and a great use for leftover rice.  Hubby absolutely declared this one a keeper.  I served it with a side of Bush’s Grillin’ Beans, the Black Bean Fiesta flavor, which...
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