Here’s the dog post you asked for. Regular posting resumes tomorrow, I swear. In the meantime here’s Wolfie helping with copy edits:
And Veronica pretending the camera isn’t there:
Veronica left the room shortly after that picture was taken and Lyle snagged the bed. Lyle loves having his picture taken:
The Lyle saw a squirrel on the deck and went for it, and Mona snagged the bed. This is Mona showing her spiritual side, possibly looking for Ceiling Cat:
Then Milton wandered in and posed, too:
And then Mona went to check out the squirrel situation and Milton grabbed the bed:
Just to be clear, there are other beds in the living room. They all wanted the one by the fire.
There, dog pictures. And tomorrow afternoon a real post. Nothing but good times ahead.
And congratulations to the winners!
THANK YOU. I mean it sincerely.
Well except for one they are ALL dachies. WHAT do you expect? Next time get yourself a smooth. They are a TOTALLY different personality. Very bright can be a little more aggressive than the long hair’s but still a Dachie! You need more dapples though! Thank you for all your wonderful books! Cheers!
Of course. I want the seat by the fire, also. Again, thank you, thank you, thank you! 🙂 I can’t wait!
Thank you for the dog post. They all are just adorable.
They’re all gorgeous. Veronica looks like Greta Garbo and Lyle appears to have a bit of Charlie Chaplin in him. Mona? maybe Shirley Temple. Milton – Cary Grant, and Wolfie – hmm, he seems wise and a little mature – Andy Griffith?
Love the photos and the musical bed (as in musical chairs) the dogs all look wonderful.
Missed my chance at the drawing today, had to drive a friend to the airport. Congrats to everyone who snagged a copy. It’s all over now, right?
One more day. We’re trying to see if SMP will spring for five more books for the last drawing, but I don’t know if we can get that worked out in time. At least four will be given away tomorrow.
wow. thanks for the effort, that’s warmer to our hearts than coco with teeny marshmallows 🙂
What a wonderful and wise looking boy. Give him a pet for me, and give his butt a sniff from my dogs.
Tawna
Sigh..I want a dog.
Quick question:
Was anybody here playing Go Fish (the card game) in 1992? I just assumed it was an old game but my copy editor is questioning it. Of course she also said there was no song called Achy Breaky Heart, but she’s so stellar at the rest of the edit, I’m forgiving her that one.
Go Fish in 1992. Anybody?
I’ve been playing Go Fish since I was a kid and that’s a good bit before ’92 and I learned it from my mom so I think it’s safe to safe before your time frame.
Yeppers. I was growing up at the time, and definitely played Go Fish.
My grandmother taught me in to play in 1973. She even bought a “kids” deck for me with drawings of colorful fish on them that you had to match up. I taught my daughter in 2001. A game for the ages. 🙂
Thank you, Lindsey and Jennifer.
I was pretty sure it was an older game, but it’s good to know for sure.
I thought it was a timeless game, no? People still play it.
P.S. Who hasn’t heard of achy breaky heart?
Yeah-that was my first thought: “Um, isn’t Go Fish TIMELESS?” I remember playing it with my younger sisters in the late 80’s and I taught it to my kid/s in the early 2000’s. I just saw several different versions being sold in the game section at Target the other day…
I was a kid in the 80’s and I played Go Fish – I had a cute deck of cards with cartoon fish on them. They came in a set with Old Maid cards.
Sorry for not thinking of this before I posted the last comment, but Go Fish was in a PG Wodehouse book I read recently, one of the ones from around the 30s, so who knows how long it’s been around, and it’s international, too!
Go Fish in the 70s at the very least.
I definitely played go fish in the 70s.
born in ’69 and I was playing go fish at age 5 so, you’re good to 1974 at least
Huh. Yes, go fish goes back that far. I played it in 1970. And thanks for the dog pictures. What is a ceiling cat??
Ceiling Cat is the feline incarnation of Good in the same way that Basement Cat is the feline incarnation of darkness.
It’s from Lolcats.
Yes I was. But then again, I was in elementary school in ’92.
I was playing go fish in the late 60s. I’m old! But it’s been around forever!
Oh thank God, I thought I was going to be the only one to cop to playing Go Fish in the 1960s.
I know I was playing with my grandmother in the 80s. I’m pretty sure it goes way back before that.
Not in 1992, but when I was a kid. Let’s just say well before 1992 and pull the veil of secrecy over the exact years.
Thank you for that delightful series of pictures! What a pleasure to look at!
🙂
Uh, yeah. I played Go Fish LONG before 1992. When I was a little kid, it was one of the first games I learned. And Achy Breaky Heart, by Billy Ray Cyrus, on the album “Some Gave All” released in 1992. (Thank you, Wikipedia.)
Go Fish in 1992? Of course! I turned 9 that year, and I LOVED card games. My family also played Old Maid, Crazy Eights, Skip-Bo, Uno, Kings in the Corner, Cribbage, and Pitch (for some other examples).
Awwww… doggies. My dogs (2 Rat Terriers and 1 street urchin who looks like a Chihuahua-Pug mix-all rescue dogs) now have a new fun game. We howl together. It starts with one of my dogs barking at me and me barking back. It gets louder from there. Makes me laugh so hard I almost fall out of my chair.
I have played Go Fish since I was a little girl (born in 1943). People still pay it today, especially people with small children who turn off the TV once in a while. Of course people played it in 1992 – at least those who turned off the TV and actually played with others…
Yeah, played Go Fish long before ’92. A staple card game for kids, especially at camp.
I read WHAT THE LADY WANTS on the plane last night. Loved it, too. I seem to remember a blog about it being one of or your first published novel. It is very “Jenny Crusie” style. Laughed at some really great lines. I see the evolution of your writing style, it just gets/got better and better.
HQN seems to have made a mistake on the back of the book. It says Mitch Peabody and in the book he is Mitch Peatwick. (No spoilers in case there are those who have not read it.) Lovely book for a long plane ride over the water and a broken entertainment system. I have read everything now, waiting for the new stuff. Cheers to the winners!
Love the dogs.
Thank you, Carol Anne. I don’t know why they put “Peabody” on the back of the book. Just one of those glitches. When they’re reissues like that, I can’t remember the details, so they may even have showed it to me and I said, “Uh, sure.” I have a memory like a sieve.
Played lots of “Go Fish” ~ and danced to Achy Breaky Heart many a night at the bar in college. Love the dog pics! Looks like my house with everyone wanting the same chair, even when there are plenty of others. Although in my house it usually ends in everyone being sent to their rooms.
I meant I played lots of Go Fish while growing up – not in college. Ugh!
Two games of cards isn’t so bad. At least she doesn’t have to play Pretty, Pretty Princess.
Hey, we play a lot of Go Fish here. Also Uno and Apples to Apples. After Family Dinner, we have Game Night. Two games of cards, then Lani’s head explodes.
Thank you all for fact-checking for me. This copy editor is really good except on the 1992 stuff, which I really did research, but the Go Fish info eluded me. You have all been a great help, since otherwise they’d have had to play Old Maid which let me tell you, stinks on ice.
I hate all board and card games with a fiery passion, but I ADORE Apples to Apples. That game is simple and brilliant.
It really is, and since you have to please the judge, it’s a really good way to pay attention to other people.
Huh. I meant to reply down here, but somehow my post ended up above yours. Too damned early in the morning.
All the dachshunds are so wonderful! Loved getting to see the beautiful Veronica again!! She is simply “Gorgeous!” (They all look so happy and healthy!)
Yes, we grew up playing Go Fish (we called it Fish) in Australia, in the 70s and 80s, so it’s documented and international. Also Uno, which we played at lunch time in my first workplace, too. The dog pictures are beautiful, and very refreshing on a gloomy, humid Friday. Is that a real fire?
Gas fire in a real fireplace. We love it.
Oscar and Bogart are jealous of the bed. And the fireplace, too. Okay, I’m a little jealous of the bed, too!
That picture of Lyle made me chuckle. Thanks for taking all the pictures and posting them. So cute and cosy. Love the hardwood floors and fireplace too.
Nothing but good times ahead. 🙂
OMG!! Are those Liz Danger collages on the mantelpiece?
You have good eyes, kid. The post tomorrow is about them.
I noticed the collages but was confused since I expected them to be the fairy tales but they didn’t match what you’d already shown us and the person was the same on all of them. So, Liz makes much more sense. (I should probably be sleeping…)
Are you kidding? That mantelpiece with the glowing fire below is gorgeous.
I didn’t play Go Fish in 1992, but I do remember playing it in 1954. Also Old Maids. And Hearts.
I love your dogs. Sigh, they have so much happiness in their eyes. Thanks for caring for our little friends.
Love dog pics, no matter who’s they are it makes me smile. Hmmm.. who’s. That looks and sounds odd to me now. I’m pretty tired and now wondering if I just made that up and it’s total nonesense. Quick prayer to the ceiling cat and then I’m off to bed…
I’m jealous of your dog naming ability. Veronica is spot on. thanks so much for sharing the dog lurv.
I see other people have stood up for go-fish. I thought it was old when I learned it as a kid in the 70s. Othello, Straego, Battleship… plus Uno, Go-Fish, Old Maid, Crazy 8’s, etc all around and common in the 70s and 80s. Can’t speak for whether or not people played them in 1992, but my assumption is “of course they did” as I wasn’t aware that there were kids who *didn’t* learn to play go-fish. It seems to be more ubiquitous than any other card game I know of.
I seem to remember that when Mona arrived she had some problem with her back legs – has that been resolved? I love Mona. I want Mona. Fortunately for you I live on the other side of the Atlantic or dognapping would be a real possibility.
Mona was born without knees in her back legs. Since Mona never had knees back there, she doesn’t miss them. She looks like a rabbit when she runs, which is unbearably cute, but she keeps up with everybody. The only real handicap she has is that she can’t climb higher than about five inches so stairs are out and jumping on the furniture is impossible. She can wiggle her way onto a bean bag chair though, and then makes her way from the beanbag to the LaZBoy where she naps very happily. She’s doing fine.
Here in NZ we didn’t call it “go fish”, just “fish”. And I learnt it as a preschooler in the early 70s. I reckon it’s been around forever.
A tip for the final draw for those of you who’re slow typists: type your details into a Word file earlier. Then all you have to do is copy and paste into the form.
I still wish this was open to us foreign lot! The dogs are great, but can I be greedy and second the request for consolation prize outtakes?
Yr copy editor has time to ask you about Achy Breaky Heart and Go Fish, but can’t take 5 seconds to google them and get the wiki entries? She *must* be stellar! (Also born in a bubble, or another country. What American kid hasn’t played Go Fish?) Is she a brit? I believe they know the game as “Happy Families.” Or perhaps that’s Old Maid.
I keep thinking she must be young. The music seems to be throwing her since I researched all of it, and if I couldn’t find the dates on the net, I didn’t use it. And as you said, the Wiki has most of it. She just queried Clapton’s “Man in Love” to see if it was a real song title, and that’s available on iTunes. She must have been using an incomplete database as a source.
But she’s stellar on the stuff that matters, catching inconsistencies that I hadn’t seen, lots of them because I moved the book from 2010 to 1992. And she’s very smart about most of the changes she wants to make, querying them in the margins instead of changing them in the text. There’s a ghost in the MTT who whispers “Who do you love?” and the copy editor keeps writing “Whom?” in the margin, which of course is grammatically correct and colloquially wrong. A bad copy editor would have changed it. She just keeps questioning it. She’s good. Probably frustrated as hell about that “whom,” but good.
Actually, probably she’s not. She just sounds excellent. We had the who/whom talk yesterday in my English class. One student couldn’t get over the fact that it’s corrrect to she “I am he/she” when answering the phone. Another summed up subject-verb agreement with a “So, if I think it’s right, it’s wrong?!?”
But, what _is_ a ceiling cat?
@JulieB Ceiling cat is from the LOL Cats website. Ceiling cat is angelic, Basement cat is demonic.
In my editing class (and as has been reiterated on several freelance listservs) you should always A–query those things, B–think about what the author is writing for, and C–try not to confuse your audience. We actually discussed your post on insure vs ensure as one of those examples where, what grammar crazies like us naturally are inclined toward, isn’t right for a novel because it would confuse people and throw them out of the story. We were told to pay a lot of attention to Who/Whom for that reason, too–just because it’s grammatically correct doesn’t mean it’s “right” for the situation.
Btw, I’m young (25) and totally played Go Fish growing up. I didn’t own the official cards, but some friends definitely had them and I’m fairly sure my preschool did.
Also, seriously seriously jealous of that editor. Can you imagine the cred that comes from “I edited a Crusie book”? I mean, seriously, just…jealous. Okay, going back to boring government health communications.
Thanks Nicole!
I agree Bethany! I also discuss this with my students; what they will see in fiction and dialogue, and what they hear in conversation, is different than what you say. Many of them have an “Ah ha” moment when they start to consider audience and purpose, rather than the mere size of their paper. 🙂
Sweet as cake!
Oooh, the ghost whispering “Who do you love?” gave me goosebumps.
Lucky copy editor.
I just finished Trust Me On This. So not like it’s harlequin cover. I loved it.
Yay gorgeous puppies! I, too, want to sit by that fire. Wish our fireplace worked. I’m with Lori on the goosebumps.
For the record, Go Fish was around in the 60s. Does she realize it’s a card game? I think there’s a Hazbro or something version and she might be thinking of that. I’m not sure I blame her for doubting Achy Breaky since its too silly to be believable. However, anyone around at the time would remember it. It was silly, but really catchy. Then again, no worse than a lot of modern songs.
I missed the contest but the dog pictures more than make up for it! I can buy the book–pics of your adorable dachshunds (and Mona) are much harder to come by.
Many thanks for posting them!
Oh. My. Gosh. I had no idea you had so many doxies!! I love dachshunds — they’re my fave. I go to the Weinerdog races every year. 🙂
The dogs are so, so beautiful! I am jealous, as my doxie HATES the camera-she spends 99% of her life in my lap or under my feet but the second she sees the camera (or the case, or something square) in my hand she takes off like a bat out of hell. I’ve tried to be sneaky about it, esp because I’m the sick sort that likes to dress her dog, but the brat can hear the second the camera is turned on, so the only pics that I have are of her blurry tail or her glowering at me from underneath something. Thanks for satisfying my need for puppy-cute!
I’d have more dogs if I hadn’t adopted one that is very, very bad about peeing in the house. He was 11 when he was left at the humane society and in awful shapee health-wise…very anxious dog (an Italian greyhound) and tries to be good but oh man, I’ve so had it with the peeing. Vet did tests on him and there’s no problem…I spend so much time letting him out and also, chasing after him when he suddenly jumps up and needs to go…ever chased a greyhound with a bad knee? Wish I could put a dog door in. Would be interesting to see if it helped. About to try a belly band…
You all make my brain bleed when you cite Wikipedia as a reputable source. Anybody can change any page. I’ve actually had to input reminders into my work calendar so that I regularly check our Wiki page and take down incorrect info that someone else has added.
The Wiki page could say that Billy Ray Cyrus released the song Go Fish in 1982. Just because it’s on the Internet . . . 🙂
I always double check if it’s something important. Two sources at least. But the Wiki has been very good to me . . .
OK–hopefully you check back in on this post because i want to know where you got the awesome doggy bed that all the pups are fighting over! I love the fact that it is up off the floor, more like a hassock? My little dogs would love something like that (and the cats too!) Is it something I will have to come to Ohio to find or can I get it out here on the West Coast?
Frontgate. I bought it online, but I just went to look at their dog beds and they don’t have that one any more. It’s round and it came with a cover with a skirt that the dogs got rid of about a year ago. But we’ve had it for ages, so I’m not surprised it’s not on their dog bed page any more.