Hey all, just wanted to let you know that The Kidnapping of Kenzie Thorn (available July 14) is now available for preorder on even more websites. BarnesandNoble.com and GoHastings.com has my book available. Visit Liz’s Books page for direct links. The suggested price is only $5.50, so start saving your pennies and nickels now. 🙂

And just an heads up about cover art. I should be getting the final in a couple weeks, and I’ll be sure to post it here first.

Can’t believe people can actually buy my book! -LJ

Just wanted to offer a big birthday wish to Amy! Hope your day is great! In honor of the big 2…. never mind about the age. Let’s just focus on the honor:

Paula’s earrings ROCK! I tried to find a pair for Amy for her birthday, but they were not to be found. Sorry. She’s stuck with the other gift I got her.

Be sure to check out her blog about the gummy, green ice cream that she experienced earlier this week. 🙂

When I first moved to Colorado Springs in 2006, I was determined to take up a new activity, try something that the locals might do. I contemplated skiing for about 2 seconds. Nope! Too expensive and I’d like to stay alive. With my poor coordination I was sure to break at least one bone if not all of them if I tried skiing. Hiking? Well, I don’t mind a nice stroll, but I’m certainly not a interested in hiking a 14er. I prefer to get to the top of mountains the way that God intended me to. In a car or on the cog railway.

So what were my other options? I debated a number of things and finally decided ice skating was the sport for me! After all, we didn’t have ice–EVER–in southern Arizona, so I figured it’d be a new and exciting opportunity for me. I promptly signed up for lessons through the city of Colorado Springs and began a 10-week session at the Adult Basic 1. I was pretty sure I was going to be the worst person in my class. But it turned out, I at least wasn’t afraid to stand up on the ice, which could not be said of everyone else in the class.

Every Thursday night I’d make the trek down to the Sertich Ice Center. Most Saturday mornings I did the same, just for some extra practice. I needed it too. I was never very good. I could only marginally skate backward. I think I was too busy worrying about falling on my bum. But I certainly had a very healthy appreciation for the guys and gals who have mad skills. I loved going to the public skate times and seeing the kids sailing around the ice. Jumping and dancing and practicing their routines. I made me wish that I’d started skating before I was 25.

Anyway, in 2007, I was back in AZ visiting the family. One night I was flipping channels and stumbled on the men’s National Figure Skating Championships. I just happened to catch Evan Lysacek perform the routine below to the music from Carmen. It was thrilling and beautiful and the music so haunting. (The performance also prompted me to go see the opera Carmen when it came through the Springs about a year later. Bad move. It was terrible and had absolutely no redeeming characters. But the music was good.)

Anyway, about a month later I heard that Evan and Ryan Bradley (a skater, who trains here in the Springs) and others were performing at the Four Continents Championship at the World Arena. So I packed up after work and went to see the show. Two nights in a row I went by myself and I actually got to see Evan perform the same program that won him the gold medal at Nationals. His performance was so beautiful and I was so sucked in that halfway through I realized that I was crying. I’d never seen anything so beautiful before.

I’ve been thinking about that performance lately. Not sure why, exactly. I was just remembering how fun it was to feel so weightless on the ice, so free to fly. I had a vacation day to use last Friday, so I called Sertich to see if they had public skate times. Sure enough they had a matinee for $1.50, so I pulled out the skates that I haven’t worn in over 6 months and headed over there.

It was everything I remembered. So fun. Zig zag. So freeing. Swizzle, swizzle. So … uncoordinated. I’ve lost a step or two, for sure! But then in the mail that afternoon I got the brochure for the upcoming Learn to Skate sessions. I’m seriously thinking maybe it’s time to sign back up and get back into the fun of it! Remembering how much I love how cold the rink is and how rosy my cheeks are on the ice until next time. -LJ

All right. I confess. I totally read Encyclopedia Brown books when I was a kid. In fact I still have a dozen or so on my bookshelf. My dad used to read them to us when I was little. (I still can’t solve the cases most of the time.) 🙂

Well, I’ve stumbled upon a case for just such a young sleuth. I’ve lost a library book that’s due back! It had become my regular take-it-to-the-gym book, so I was sure it was just hanging out in my gym bag or in one of the piles on my floor. Yes, that’s the multiple of pile. I have a pile of books for Paperback Swap. One for dvds that I’ve been watching before bed lately. One of shoes hanging out that I kicked off when I got inside my actual room.

Anyway, you get the picture. So wearing my incredibly painful high heels that I’m still trying to break in and my pajamas, I tore my room apart. I shifted piles (even put some of them away), dug through my purse and gym bag, scoured all of my bookshelves. I checked my “borrowed from friends” pile and even ripped apart my bed covers, thinking it might have been lost in the mess. And my grand discovery?

I can’t find one of the books that I own. Not my biggest problem of the night.

To be honest, I had 8 books checked out of the library, and I’ve been able to locate 7 of them. But where is that last book? I wasn’t done reading it.

So here you go, young Encyclopedia Brown:

Will pay 25 cents for the safe return of Me and Mr. Darcy by Alexandra Potter.

Searching the trunk of my car until next time. -LJ

I’m currently rocking out to this song on my ipod and at work pretty much every day. I totally dig it. And the video is a hoot. Thought I’d share the jam of the moment: The Sound of Your Name by Above the Golden State. Jamming with the mustard yellow pants until next time. -LJ

Update: The embedding option for the video got pulled, so you’ll have to click here to see the video on youtube. Enjoy!

So I try not to bore my readers–both of you–with the mundane details of my life, but I just have to share about my crazy weekend! I can’t believe how fast it flew by. Moreover, I can’t believe that I actually had time to post a new blog or two this week. I’ll tell you a little secret. I usually write my posts on the weekend and then schedule them to post throughout the week. I almost never write a post on the actual post date. So imagine my worry that I wouldn’t get a single post completed this weekend with such a crazy schedule.

Friday after work: I stayed a little late, checking my personal e-mail and stuff at work, then headed home about 6. I grabbed a quick dinner in front of the TV and then promptly fell asleep. 🙂 Okay, so that part wasn’t so bad. But then I was so tired that I got up from the couch and hit the sack after reading for a few minutes.

Saturday morning: I woke up to the buzzing of my neighbor’s saw. He’s building a fence between our yards. Well and good, but I still had ten minutes until my alarm went off, so I was bummed. But I rolled out of bed anyway and got ready for the gym. 50 minutes on the bike with a book from the library, and I was starting to really feel it. Then I headed home–in the completely random snow. I got home and started preparing a couple things for dinner that night with friends. While my eggs were boiling, I worked on a freelance editing project. I managed to grab some lunch while I was making notes on the project.

Before I knew it, it was time to get cleaned up and head over to the bridal shower for my roommate Leslie. Quite fun times, but I couldn’t even stick around for the games and presents and stuff, because I had to get back home to keep working on the freelance project and finish getting dinner ready. On my drive home I finally connected with Hannah, who I hadn’t talked with in over a week. We chatted for about 30 minutes while I was driving, then I talked to Julia for about 45 minutes. I love that kid. And I felt bad that while we were talking, I was multi-tasking, trying to get more of the freelance thing done. My computer froze up, so I beat it back into submission and kept working away while listening to funny stories about cartoons and Julia’s little sister.

And suddenly it was time to go. I headed over to Jess B’s house where Jess Lacy met us for dinner. It was just like old times … so great to be back together. The food was great–I make a mean frozen pizza and spinach salad. Then we headed out to a show at the Pike’s Peak Center. Broadway Here and Now as a cool collection of popular tunes from Broadway musicals performed by the Colorado Springs Philharmonic and 3 Broadway performers. It included some of my favorites from Phantom of the Opera, Beauty and the Beast, Rent, and more. It was great to see something a little out of the normal entertainment realm.

I got home about 11, but then I set all of my clocks forward for daylight saving time, so it was really midnight. (Can I just mention that Arizona doesn’t recognize daylight savings time? So this whole clock changing thing is still kind of bizarre to me.) But I had a book due back to the library on Monday, so I decided to finish it. Except that it took me nearly 2 hours to do that. Oops!

Sunday morning started with more hammering and sawing from my neighbor, but fortunately I didn’t notice it until my alarm went off the first time. So I stumbled out of bed to get ready for church. I volunteered in the bookstore, so I had to be there 30 minutes before service started, and I was there until 1p.m. I hurried home to grab some lunch and then it was back to the gym for another 50 minutes on the bike and another book from the library. I stumbled out of the gym and had to get gas on my way home. I needed a car wash too. The snow on Saturday had seriously made a mess of my pretty little car.

When I finally got home at almost 4, I seriously needed to finish my freelance project but a shower was also compeletely necessary. Somehow I managed to get both taken care of, and I finally sat down for dinner at nearly 7:30. I flicked on my laptop at nearly 8 to start my first blog post of the week (yesterday’s post), and then Amy got home. She’d been gone for the week visiting her brand new niece. There was much to catch up on.

Now it’s Sunday at 10:00, and I’m just writing this–my second post for the week that you’ll get to read on Tuesday.

Oh, and somewhere in there, I managed to do 4 loads of laundry. It’d been more than a couple weeks and was high time I had some clean clothes.

Hmm. I’m tired. That may not seem like a busy weekend to you, but my weekends usually consist of:

Friday: Watch Friday Night Lights with Amy
Saturday: Sleep in, go to the gym, watch a movie at home, take a nap, snooze on the couch, watch another movie, go to bed early
Sunday: Sleep in and go to the late service at church, come home and take a nap after lunch, read in bed after said nap, catch up on my DVRed TV shows, read a little more before going to bed

Okay, that might not be the most realistic view of my normal weekend, but it does sound almost ideal. Regardless this was a pretty busy weekend, and I’m pooped. But I just wanted to share it with you. 🙂 Snagging a bit more sleep until next time. -LJ

I generally like driving. It’s not going to make a Friday Favorite or anything, but it’s not bad. But yesterday morning I thought driving was going to make me die!

I was wearing my brand new shoes. The ones that made an appearance in yesterday’s blog and looked quite unique with my work out clothes. But I was wearing my new shoes with appropriately professional attire yesterday morning, so that wasn’t the problem. Apparently my problem is that when I drive, I turn my foot slightly, just enough so that my new shoes tried to squish my pinky toe clean off. Seriously. All the way off.

I made it to Powers and Research–about half way to work and couldn’t take it any more. I reach down and ripped off my shoe, chucking it into the passenger seat.

But then the really strange thing happened. I looked over at it, and it was just sitting there all perfect and new and begging to never be worn again. It was like it was asking to always get to ride shotgun, like it was some sort of car mascot.

The really weird part is that I seriously considered leaving it there, perched on the seat. But then I would have had to go into work with only one shoe on. Hmmm. That was bound to look silly. So I put the shoe back on to walk into the office. No problem. Not overly painful. Maybe the early part of the day had been a fluke. When I headed to Subway for lunch, I thought I’d try driving with said shoe on again. Well, that didn’t work. I couldn’t even make it out of the parking lot without tossing it again in the seat next to me. Same thing when I left work for the day.

The truth is the shoes need to be broken in a little more, but I like them. They’re cute. So I’ll keep wearing them.

But I’m afraid as long as I’m wearing them the right shoe is always going to ride shotgun. Driving with a bare foot until next time. -LJ

Do you ever have one of those days where you feel so completely terrible that all you can manage to do is lay in bed curled up into the fetal position. I had one of those days on Monday. My tummy was tied in knots, and I just wanted to sleep, but I was in too much pain to actually fall asleep.

Needless to say, it wasn’t a great start to the day. But as the hours passed, I managed to make it to the couch with my pillow and snuggled under a blanket. By three o’clock I was uncurled enough to enjoy sipping a diet soda and watching a little tv on dvd. I still hadn’t managed a shower or even bothered to change out of my pajamas, so I was starting to notice that I was a little greasy and maybe not-so-daisy-fresh.

I was totally reminding myself of that scene in She’s the Man where Amanda Bynes can’t shower for days because she’s pretending to be her brother. She tells her friend on the phone, “I’m convulsing  people!” It’s a good thing the roommates were both out of the house at the time. 🙂

Before I get back into this story, I think I should explain a little something about my current state of mind. Several weeks ago I found out that my boss’s boss’s boss’s boss (or something like that) is coming in from New York next week. As such, my department was instructed that we need to ditch the business casual dress for the week and ramp it up to business professional. So I’ve been picking up a new jacket here, a new top there, fun new shoes everywhere (a pair of which I’m currently wearing with my work out clothes–Leslie questioned my fashion choice, but I stood behind it so I can get the new shoes broken in). I decided this was a good time to work on looking the part of a professional publicist more often–rather than, per se the college student that I haven’t been in 6 years.

As part of my personal mini-maker, I picked up some Crest White Strips to ramp up my smile. *insert cheesy grin here* I’ve been diligently using them for only about 5 days, but I think I’m alreayd seeing a whiter smile.

Okay, so back to Monday. There I was practically convulsing myself when I decided it was about time to put on my white strips. I couldn’t manage to get clean and put on fresh clothes, but my teeth were going to be whiter, dag nabbit!

Apparently I decided it would be the strips and nothing else on Monday.

Fortunately I’m feeling much better today and actually got clean today before putting on the white strips. 🙂 I know everyone appreciates that. Getting whiter until next time. -LJ