Go to the Writers’ Federation of New Brunswick website for a complete list of winners in their recent contest. Scroll down to the non-fiction results where my name is listed - it’s official!

All the books that have made it into the second round of the Bookhabit Unpublished Novel Contest so far have been scored. Take a look at this page:

http://bookhabit.com/newsdetail.php?nid=32

If you haven’t downloaded the first chapter yet, rated that or the entire book, or made a comment on the site, please consider doing so soon by clicking on the widget at the right, and help me move my novel up the chart! The more complete books that are downloaded, the more points I receive. Thanks!

I received notice yesterday that I’ve won first place in a non-fiction contest I entered! I’ll post a link and the details of the contest here once everything is posted to the sponsors’ website.

This is the first time I’ve won anything for my writing!

Betsy was in Calgary over the weekend! Great to see her again. We go back a long way, to Queen’s days, when we met in residence and then shared an apartment. She moved to Alberta after we did and has lived here ever since. It was so good to catch up again in person. Here’s a picture she took of the two of us - a couple of grinning fools, but with no double chins showing in this photo. I believe her new-fangled camera has an anti-double chin setting.

Amazingly, we both look exactly as we did when we graduated from Queen’s. Well, almost exactly…

I hope so! I’ll find out on Monday afternoon when I have an appointment to see the doctor. It’s seemed like a very long six weeks, and having a broken ankle has restricted my movement somewhat during that time, has especially made things tricky starting this new job on the right foot, so to speak… But it could have been a lot worse and I thank my lucky stars that this was only a simple break that caused little to no pain. A good friend recently took a severe fall and is still in hospital while the doctors determine exactly what damage has been done to cause her to be in so much pain. My heart goes out to her! I hope you recover enough to get home very soon, and that the rehabilitaion after that does not take long at all.

During the next week there will continue to be many more changes for me. I’ll move into my niece’s apartment, temporarily, while she continues to search for a new house where we can both live comfortably together. So I’ll be getting to know my furry-great-niece-and-nephew, Piper and Jack, for the first time. Plus I will be contacting and introducing myself to all of the customers in my territory - by phone at first - and meeting an author, and others who I’ll be working with in the future. Lots to do, but it’s all good, and I’m totally optimistic that everything I have left to do will fall into place when it needs to.

And a good day it was… still getting organized, but I feel I’m on top of things. I had a great lunch with my good friends, and former Calgary publicists from days gone by, Marilyn and Donna. It was like old times with lots of laughter, reminiscing, and an exchange of information. (Not gossip; no, never that!) We had many years to catch up on.

Then I accompanied Niece Anne to join her knitting group at a coffee shop in Kensington - and I don’t even knit. Yes, Little Sister, eat your heart out! I crutched over there as it wasn’t too far and I’m getting around a lot better these days on this cast. Met some very nice knitting-women there, even one who has met and worked with many people I know in the book biz. So that was fun!

Tomorrow, another lunch, this time with a publisher. Yes, it certainly is rough being a working stiff once again…

It seems I’ll endure anything - cold, threat of snow, and crutching it more than three blocks - just to eat an East Indian dinner. Too bad the food didn’t live up to all the effort I expended in getting there.

But we did have a great evening visiting with Patty and Pat. And they offered us a ride after dinner was over so I wouldn’t freeze my toes off or kill myself on the ice and snow trying to crutch back to the hotel. Niece Anne was too busy taking pictures of me and laughing to be able to hang on to my coat, ensuring I didn’t do any further damage.

Since I left Bequia on Feb. 21st, Dennis has made some more progress with the pizza oven:

Hey! Is that an empty beer bottle I see in the back corner?? No wonder it’s taking so long to build this thing! Oh, no. It’s only a Bitter Lemon bottle…

The Bequia Community High School is still collecting books for its library and reading programme (see my original post, Books for Bequia for details as to what is most needed), but they are now much closer to filling those shelves with good books thanks to a very generous donation.

Over the Christmas holidays, Nancy and Tony Bertolotti held a party at their home on West Street in Bronte, ON, Canada, asking neighbours and friends to bring donations of books. Nancy was also able to collect more books from the Clarkson Branch of the Mississauga Library where she works. The result was over 500 books that will now be shipped to Bequia as soon as the shipping can be organized.

One couple of sailors attending the party had been to Bequia years before the airport was built, so contributing to this cause was special for them given the good memories they have of the island.

Thanks, to everyone, for their generous donations, but a special thanks goes to Nancy and Tony for organizing such a successful collection!

Just my newly improved ankle cast with reinforcing fibreglass - in blue! - and a nifty, and very fashionable, velcroed sandal that now gives me more stability, and makes it much easier to get around in Calgary.

I can live with this for another two weeks…