my journey as a civil war novel writer

Another thing I am new at: banners. Oh dear I promised not to work today and I cleaned out part of my room making space for the new office supplies and now I am looking at banners, oops! This is my first try. Let me know what you think. Hmmm only half of it shows, bummer.

It is not a secret that I usually don't think too well on Dutch actors. I love a couple, often I think the British are way better. There are several exceptions, Henk Van Ulsen who died at the age of 82 yesterday was such an exception. He was one of the old generation who combined stagework with TV and movies. [And that breed seems to be dying out even in Britain.] The character actors who could tackle every role large or smart, and who really made their names on the stage n ight after night, instead of through movies. Van Ulse n came to my attention when I was a very small child, 7 in fact. He played one of the characters in a children's series called "de vloek of woestewolf." [the curse of dastardly wolf]. I remember only daring to watch it from behind a chair and the combination of his powerful voice and the penetrating eyes actually left me afraid of him for years to come. Not many shows have left that big an impact on me. When I began to go love theater about 10 y...

Wanted to write this a lot earlier but I hurt my hands a bit clapping at a concert. Shows you how often I go to pop concerts, not. I have been to a few in the past, but never many. And I hate the standingvenues as most of the Dutch ones are. So I wasn't looking forward to the Fish concert too much. I was doing this for my friend Mel. I loved his older work when he was the lea dsinger of Marillion, but me being a fan went back to the eighties and after that I really lost touch. I didn't know he more recent work very well and had not listening to too much beforehand. We stayed to the back in the concertvenue, Patronaat in haarlem. This was perfect for Mel who is not as tall as me and as we were standing on some steps she had a good view. It took me a while to get into the mood with the first couple of songs, didn't know many of them, yet the man is a great enternainere and pretty left wing, never a bad thing with me. But the dutch public!!!! There was a bar at the back of the...

Last weekend was very nice. I went to visit Marjon in Duiven. And as that is close to Arnhem , we went to Burger's Zoo on saturday. We both like taking pictures and taking pictures of animals. She gave me some great tips on how to use the camera. I am so lousy when it comes to reading manuals. I know stupid, but somehow I ju st don't have the patience for it. The animals here have some more room then in the more traditional city zoo's. For that reason I don't like to go to the traditional ones very much. I hate to see them in small cages and even a zoo like this is barely enough room in my opinion. They have create d some themed exibits showing animals from continents tog ether. This seems to be more a theme in zoo's these days. Big mammals are still my favorite, I liked the desert area very much as well. And on safari we were lucky enough to get there around feeding time, so we got a good view of all the animals feeding. I did manage to avoid the one spider they ha...

It's a dutch word it basically means getting the finances for your organisation in order. To know what costs you have and what comes in. Now this is not something I like or which comes naturally to me. It is a thing that I have been putting off. But I can't any longer.So this week is numbers crunching, sweating and nerves.Oh and getting the VAT out of the numbers. Argh. Luckily someone will be doing that for me. And then someone from the IRO bureau will check it for me for free. Now that is the plusside of the whole thing. After that I will have to come u with what I need to charge per hour. Arf. And then for later this month making folders is on the agenda. But that is something I like better. Writing is more my style. I am making sure not to work too hard, as I was doing before my holiday. And keep time to socialize. Doing fun stuff during the evenings, boardgame tonight! And during the weekends. So I am doing much better then before my break. Everything is under control and...

I am back from a lovely holiday in England. Nice and rested and with new energy to spend on the practice. I want to tell everyone about a great exhibition about Henry VIII at the British Library. It has been curated by David Starkey, an historian who has also w ritten books about Henry. The exhibit is full of original texts and many paintings and it was a joy to look at. Most of the information was not new to me, luckily as we had a nine year old a long. And I could now use my time to tell her the history in a way that was interesting for her. Of course she loved all the gory details of the six wives and especially the beheadings. It was a bit harder to get the whole complicated family across, the importance of Henry's mother, Elisabeth of York for peace after the wars of the roses. And the emergence of the Anglican church. I stayed out of protestantism in Europe at that time LOL. That is for when she is a lot older. She did give me the compliment that I was much better at telling ...

Sorry for the long absence. I promise to do better in the future. The last couple of months I hav e not been in the mood for blogging. I had to do so much writing for the counseling website that I did not feel much like writing here. And then there was the text f or the leaflet to make and the cards and..... At one time I was doing way too much again and had to cut back. My coach had to tell me twice. As a result I did nearly nothing for two weeks, just recuperating a bit and enjoying myself with watching the Tour de France. S ome people found it bo ring this year but I enjoyed the first and the third week very much. In the past I was never an Armstrong fan but I love rooting for the underdog so this year I did enjoy watching him and cheering for him. I think it is a great achievement to stop for 3 years and then come back at this high level and be third in this year's tour. Very good! Now that I am not so tired anymore I am doing a bit better physically. Had another nice chat wi...

My head is finally still again. This week was a huge learning proces. Afterwards you can look back at it and smile, but when you are in the middle.... I got sucked back into all the old traps I thought I had left behind me for good. Working too much the last two weeks. And because e-mails kept coming in, I kept answering and not relaxing even after I promised my coach I would do so. I did make little steps. Reviewed the scedule and to the dates and enddate off. Now every week I will look at it and select some tasks I think I can finish that week and if I don't finish them... tough! That took some getting used to. I am great at sticking to scedules, and fairly proud of it. But my body doesn't like it very much and I did make my body a promise, back to keeping it now. I also cleared some of the clutter in my room. Untill about two years ago I couldn't throw anything out even if I could sell it. I was attached to every book, cd, piece of junk I ever bought. When my rooms becam...

Sorry guys for not posting much at the moment. The setting up of the practice and especially the design of the website are taking a lot out of me and not leaving much time for other writing. I had to promise my job coach to take it easier yesterday as I am falling into my old stress trap again. But I am realising it earlier and this whole process is teaching me a lot about what I shouldn't do in the future. So viewing it positive and learning. The blog will pick back up in the furure, I promise!

Hi there, going to use this post to plug myself. :) I have entered a photo competition. WIth it I can win some nic e prices but I need more votes! I entered three photo's but this one has the best chance of a good spot. and it is my favori te as well. This is the link you can use to vote. Click here. On the page point your mouse over the symbols next to rating. the more you give the better the rating. and the click, the vote count should go up if you have done it right. You can vote only once. Thank yo in advance!!!!

I am having difficulty finishing a historical novel. Not even that it is badly written, the style is good and I have read books by this writer before and liked them. But I am not enjoying child of the phoenix by Barbara Erskine. The plot is sooooo ridiculous that I have to force myself to keep reading. It centers around Ellen, the daughter of Llewelyn the great. I have stated before that her parents are badly depicted and I disliked that already. But the plot!!!! Ellen married twice, first to the earl of Chester, a man she did not marry, second with Robert de Quincy, a poor knight, the second was a marriage of love that lasted untill her death. In this book they have de Quincy die before her, besides he is depicted as a monster and it is not a happy marriage. And then she has an affair with the kind of Scotland and is later abducted and forced to marry another scottish nobleman. It is absurd!!!! I mean if you want to write nonsense, just invent characters and then you can do what you w...

Sorry for being so slow at the moment. I have to warm you that this can continue for a while. April and May are not my best months. I always feel the ending of winter and haven't built enough new reserves with sun hours yet. It means I tire easier, have to cut down my out of the house activities and grind my teeth about it because in my head i want it all. :) At the moment I have an additional problem. After about 8 months on the laptop I switched back to using the computer. it has a lot of advantages, more space, more applications and I can concentrate better on my work for the practice as I can read my notes next to me and am not hampered with having the laptop on my lap all the time. But... strangely enough I am having way more pain in my arms and shoulders working on the laptop. They always say laptops are an ulhealthy way to work, yet the last 8 months I had less pain [not headaches but certainly arms and shoulders] how can this be. Everything is set up according to ergnomical...

It's been an up and down week healthwise. Loads of headaches, maybe that was to be expected after everything that happened last week. Workwise I have been busy with my coach on wednesday and ITC specialist today. Both meetings were very usefull and gave me a good feeling. Tomorrow I start going over the texts of my website again and my logo designer is working on the new logo for safe haven coaching. On the reading front I finished men of the otherworld, other books had to wait and that doesn't happen to me often. They don't get much better then this. Also started in another Anne Bishop novel. I really love that series, very strong characters, lots of brooding and romance but not so high on sex. Just what I like.

Settling down a bit and making time to write about books! I did read some in April, some good some not so good. Falling i n the not so good category. Kiss of a demon king - Kresley Cole. I don't know what it is is with this writer, the series is so uneven. Some of them I really enjoyed, about half of them. Those have a good story and interresting characters. But this one fal ls into the category of hardly any story and way to o much sex scenes. I like the romance with an occasional sex scenes [only a few writers are exceptions here like laurel hamilton] for the rest my imagination can do that trick itself, thank you very much. There was hardly any story in this one and it was pretty boring. Not sure I will go for the next one. Then I start in men of the otherworld, by Kelley Armstrong. Now I love her otherworld series, especially if the books are about the werewolves or Paige and Lucas. This one tells the backstory of Jeremy and Clayton. Now so far, half way through, no woman has ...

Now I was going to blog about books today, but... yesterday's events have put my mind on completely different matters. Doing something create now as I find it very hard to think and concentrate right now. Still not feeling well and... well let's start at the beginning. First there was a festive day yesterday, queensday in the netherlands. Always a festive day with whole families having fun. The queen always visits one or two cities with her whole family and joins in the fun. Yesterday she went to Apeldoorn, which has a long connection with the royal family. They would visit the town in the morning and then in the afternoon people would file past the royal family like they used to do in the times of her mother queen Juliana. I remember that from my youth and was looking forward to seeing it. Usually I don't want the festivities on tv but yesterday I was. And then 11.49 a huge crash and on tv we watch a car crash into a momunent along the route just missing the royal bus. I s...

Saturday 25th april Finally it was the elf weekend. Especially saturday started with glorious sunshine. I was going by public transport with the train letting me down a little by being late so it was already 9.50 when I came to Breukelen station to get the shuttlebus. Huge crowds there, in luck to get sitting room in one of the 3 busses, but it took forever for them to lea ve. Coming to the castle g ate was another shock, the queu even for people with tickets started on the public road and it was another half hour before I was through the gates and only at eleven was I o n the grounds! Glad I will be going by car the second day. First stop were booksignings. Robyn Young who writes about the templars and Adam Greenwood, who writes a bout Robin Hood and faeries. Him I had already 'met' on facebook and he is a really, really nice guy. Also Raven Dane, who writes novels about vampires. I decide d against buying her book already as they are really heavy Trade paperbacks, but we ch...

We are coming to the end of my holiday. Friday was the last day of sightseeing and we had selected Porthsmouth. Again not too far a drive from Winchester. Here you can see two great historic ships. The first is HMS Victory, Nelson's flagship at Trafalgar. Last time I was here you went in with a guided tour, now it was selfguided. And I remem bered correctly how hard it is on us who are a bit taller. With 1.84 it is not fun. And the poor captain of the boat was 1.93. While would anyone of that length want to enter the navy of that time is beyond me. We all enjoyed the tour very much and after this one we went to the Mary Rose museum. She is a Tudor royal ship, named after Henry VIII's favorite sister. There is about half of the ship left and it is still being sprayed with a solution to save her. Amazing that it sunk almost 500 years ago. This year in September she will be dry and then they will preserve her and build a new museum that will open in 2012. I do want to come bac...

Decided to write another one today so it won't take too long to finish this. On thursday we stayed in Winchester itself, this is a very old town, capital of the old saxon kingdom and very important still the first years of the norman rule. We started by walking past the guildhall to have a look at King Alfred's statue. The greatest king the saxons ever had, he brought them together and for his time he was a vey lear ned man. Next stop was the cathedral this one was st arted soon after the norman conquest and even before 10 66 there was a saxon church on this site. We were able to join a tour of 50 minutes. A very enthusiastic guide who kep t adding stories and making the tour longer then 50 minutes. We saw Jane Austen's grave, the many stages in build of the cathedral a very worthwhile tour. Next to the cathedral were the ruins of the old bishop's castle. Not much more then ruins remain now, yet it must have been a huge place, these priests certainly did not believe in...

Back to total sightseeing today. I wanted the boys to see some of the beautiful ancient monuments Britain has to offer today and we were not located too far away from them. First stop was not exactly my favorite but at least with my british heritage pass I could get in free. Stonehenge is a lot smaller in real life and they still haven't built the tunnel for the A303 which doesn't help. The last factor that detracts are the ropes that keep you well away from the stones. You just have to follow the rest of t he tourists and watch from a distance, it is nice to see but no more then that for me. Stop number two is more my cup of tea. In fact I love the stonecircle at Avebury. Some say it has a feminine feel were Stonehenge feels masculine. Could be, It is also a way bigger circle and you can move freely amongst the st ones and touch them feeling their energy. A lovely place! We had lunch in a local restaurant and then drove on to Silbury hill. This hill is manmade and they still ...

I had never been to Southampton before, but doing my research beforehand on the internet it seemed like the best option in the area to go shopping, the only town that had all the shops I was looking f or and a few days before I left Borders was kind enough to send me a coupon for 20% off in one of their shops, that offer lasted until tuesday. So that automati cally made tuesday the shopping day. It was only a short drive to Southampton from Winchester and we could park pretty close to the Borders. With three book addicts and a coupon we we re pretty sure we would have to return there after just one shop. And we were right. When the lady at the till saw us coming the first thing she did was ask for backup and open up another one for the customers behind us. It was also heavy and yeah we did need to go back to the car before resuming shopping. Second stop was for clothes. And again I was pretty succesful, came away with some nice tops, in this weather I can alre ady start wearing them! ...

Waking up on sunday morning was not a nice experience nor did I sleep well that night. The heavy drum obviously did not agree with me. And I did not feel up to going to the field today. So as I promised myself I would listen to my body I told the boys that I would stay at home and to go on without me. I relaxed that morning and around one I was feeling better. As I did want to see the battle but from the civilian side I decided to go to Basingstoke after all. I had already found out by walking the ground that walking to a busstop would be too dangerous. countryroads there are not made f or pedestrians or cyclists. We are so spoiled in the Nethe rlands. Because we had wireless internet I was able to find the phonenumber for a local taxi company and traintimes t o Basingstoke. Ordering the taxi was no problem and the trains ran frequently enough. As I expected it was no problem to find a taxi again at t he station in Basingstoke. So I made it to Basing House with over half an hour to spa...

The holiday started on Thursday the 9th of april in the evening. The first stage was Martin picking me up and driving to Belgium to spend the night with Koen. I still wasn't feeling that well and had an emergency fysio session in the afternoon to make sure I had do everything I could. In Belgium we spend the night on airbeds and that was not too uncomfortable. Up early the next day driving to Dunkirk. The sailing was smooth and so was the first part of the drive to Basingstoke. We learnt of a traffic jam on the M3 and decided to take detour on the A3. Of course we missed a few turns and ended up in Basingstoke itself and not the hotel as planned. So we decided to visit our friends at Basing House first. Dru unfortunately was ill, but Robert, Chris and Sarah were there. As they were organising the event they were pretty busy however and we didn't spend too long with them. We promised to be back at ten the next morning and drove to find the hotel. It was an amazing location. Some...

Still pretty tired after the trip, so not in a mood to blog. But I will try to do some later in the week. The trip was great, I had so much fun and did a lot.

Just a short scribble to let you all know that I will be on holiday starting tomorrow and getting back late on saturday the 18th. Going to England again, the easter weekend re-enacting at basing house and then a few days of siteseeing and shopping. The pound has lost so much to the euro that it is very interresting at the moment. And I will blog about the highlights when I get back. Just hope that I will feel a bit better then the last couple of days. One big headache since monday and very tired. This is not my best time of year. So hopefully the tension will drop from me when we leave tomorrow evening. It does help that I know my IRO is approved. And I am keeping my dissabilitymoney, they will just subscract my earnings from my disability money. That is great news for me, no pressure! So I had hoped that would help my headache when I heard yesterday but I think the stress was so big that it will take a little longer. :) I have some books with me as well, so expect little reviews when ...

Yes I really did it this weekend! Both days I went out on the bike and cycled for a bit. I did decide not to start too wild. Both days were 45 minute trips about 10 km. And I made sure I had the windy bit first, at least I did on saturday. After a couple of really nice days it was a lot colder again this weekend. Saturday I started on the dyke to Gouderak. Not as comfortable as I would have liked, no cyclepath and lots of cars. I wasn't sure how to get over the Go uwe here. If there would be a bridge. No pe no bridge but a small ferry. Wha t a nice experience. There was room enough for two cars and a couple of cyclists or pedestrians. The cars had to turn first on a small stretch of road and the go ba ckwards onto the small ferry. I was very glad I was not there by car. Luckily I did have some money on me. Not very expensive though. And then along the other side of the water over a cyclepa th this time back to Gouda. This was nicer as there was a cyclepath and I had the wind at...