Susan M. Boyer

USA TODAY Bestselling Author
Agatha Award Winner

Susan M. Boyer

USA TODAY Bestselling Author
Agatha Award Winner

The Stingray Incident

I can’t believe I haven’t told y’all this story, but I’ve searched my blog high and low, and somehow, I have not.

Like many folks, I love the beach. Give me a beach umbrella, a chair, and a book, and I am one happy camper. I used to swim in the ocean, or perhaps more accurately, bob around in it, and ride the waves on anything that would float. That was before my close encounter with a stingray.

 The waters off the coast of South Carolina have a fair amount of sand and such stirring around in them courtesy of the rivers flowing into the Atlantic in the vicinity. Disclaimer: I’m not a scientist who studies such things. This is the reason I’ve been given since childhood when I ask why the water in South Carolina isn’t as clear as south Florida and the Caribbean. This could just as easily be something Mamma pulled out of thin air to keep me quite. I digress. The point is, you can’t see the bottom.

A few summers ago we rented a beach house in Garden City, South Carolina for a family vacation. It had a boat dock in the backyard and the Atlantic in the front. The first day—it was a beautiful day—Sugar, (my husband, aka Jim) my brother, and my brother-in-law took the pontoon boat out fishing. Daddy, my sister, and I were taking a late afternoon dip. Mamma was sitting in her beach chair watching us try to push each other down in the waves. We aggravate each other as a way of showing affection.

Suddenly, fish started jumping out of the water—lots of fish. They’d break the surface, hit the water and jump again. They flopped and splashed all around us. Now, I’ve always heard that when small fish do this, it’s because a bigger fish is trying to have them for supper. Naturally, I’m thinking, Shark! 

“Run!” I screamed and bolted for the beach. We were almost out of the water when something got ahold of my foot and I just knew I was going to have a stump where my foot used to be. I expected gallons of blood. I’d have to be helicopter-lifted to the hospital. Would I ever walk again? Would I die on the beach from blood loss? These were the things that ran through my mind because it felt like something had chewed my foot clean off.

Imagine my shock seconds later when I reached the beach and my foot looked nearly normal—still attached and everything. It still hurt like blazes. But aside from a little redness and a mark just below my ankle, it looked fine—still attached and everything. 

“A jellyfish must have gotten you,” my sister said. “I know those hurt.” 

She sounded real sympathetic, but I knew there was no way on God’s green earth she could possibly know how bad my foot hurt or she would be calling 911. I wanted Sugar.

“Find Jim,” I wailed.

“Let’s put some vinegar on it,” my sister said.

“This was not a jellyfish,” I growled. My foot was now a brighter shade of red, and it had puffed up.

I limped towards the house. Someone called Sugar on his cell phone, and by the time I made it to the house, he was there. He put me in the car and off to the ER we went.

I am telling y’all right now, this hurt worse than childbirth. The pain radiated up my leg and the swelling spread. It hurt so bad I howled all the way to the hospital, which took only about twenty minutes but felt like days. I was scared.

I kept right on howling in the ER. They were busy, and wanted to shut me up, so someone brought out some hot towels and wrapped my leg in them. “Does that feel better?”

I stopped my caterwauling. “Yes—that helps.”

“A stingray got you. Heat breaks down the venom.”

Every time the towels cooled off, I started howling again and they’d bring more. I didn’t have to wait long. The doctor had to cut open my foot to make sure the barb wasn’t in there. Thankfully it wasn’t. After several shots and prescriptions for antibiotics and painkillers, I left on crutches.

I spent the remainder of that vacation propped on pillows in the screened porch or hobbling around. I still love beaches, but I have one iron-clad rule: If I can’t see the bottom, I don’t get in the water.

Y’all stay safe.

Susan

Y’all Won’t Believe This, Either…

in Crazy Happens, Evidence of My Insanity, Family

I’ve been completely absent from social media for the last week or so because we’ve been in the middle of moving. Anyone who has ever moved knows what an all-consuming, body-and-soul-battering experience this is. I’ve been in over my head, is what I’m saying.

Because Sugar has been home for two and a half days of this move—his paycheck is a key component of this entire project—my parents have been in town to help me organize. Mamma is especially good at pantries and all things kitchen. Dad toted a thousand boxes of books upstairs to my office, then broke down the boxes after Mamma alphabetized and shelved my books. I don’t know what I would have done without my parents this last week.

But the crazy happened Sunday night after we’d dropped Sugar off at the airport to go back to work. Mamma and Daddy went to bed about ten thirty. We were all exhausted. I turned in about twelve thirty after a long hot shower. I slept pretty well until exactly five thirty when I woke to loud moaning and groaning. I hopped out of bed and ran upstairs to the door of the guest room, thinking something was bad wrong with one of my parents. But all was quiet on the other side of their door. I went back downstairs, checked the doors and windows, and went back to bed thinking maybe I’d been dreaming.

At six thirty, I awoke to an alarm. I hadn’t set an alarm. I checked the clock. It was silent, as was my phone. The beeping came from a box I hadn’t unpacked yet. I tore it open and dug through a mess of unrelated items until I found the weather station that has occupied the corner of my bedside table for years. It displays the temperature indoors and out. I never knew it also has an alarm clock feature. We’ve never used it, and it hadn’t gone off the previous three nights that unpacked box had sat in my new bedroom.

I finally got the dang thing to shut up and went to powder my nose before returning to bed. Y’all, when I sat down on that toilet, I nearly fell in—ladies, y’all have experienced this I’m sure. It happens every time a man you live with leaves the toilet seat up. Except Sugar had gotten on a plane at three that afternoon and my daddy has his own bathroom upstairs and a powder room downstairs and no reason whatsoever to wander into my bathroom. Also, I had used the bathroom in question myself before going to bed, and I assure you I did not raise the seat.

Let me tell you, I was spooked. I started wondering about the lady we’d bought this house from. She’s such a sweet lady. She and her husband built this house in 2008, but her poor husband passed away two years ago. I never asked her if he’d left this world for the next while in this house because I didn’t want to know.

I think we have a ghost.

Sugar has offered all manner of far-fetched explanations for all of the above, but I’m not buying any of them. I think we have a ghost who likes to play pranks. All things considered, this isn’t a bad thing. I can get all sorts of inspiration for Colleen from him.

 

Peace, out…

 

Susan   

The Christmas Trees Won’t Fit in the Bathroom

in Crazy Happens, Evidence of My Insanity, Family

I can write about this now, because it’s over. But, I’ve danced perilously close to the line between sane and crazy these last few months…

Sugar and I are blessed with a large family, and we are grateful for each and every loved one. We love it when they all come over to visit. We were not, so much, prepared for five of them to move in for an extended stay. But, the economy and other disasters made it necessary. This is what family does, right?

The guestroom became an extended-stay bedroom, which meant all my off-season clothes had to either fit into my closet or be stored in the basement. Both my office and Sugar’s also became extended-stay bedrooms, which meant that everything in those offices, including all the stuff stored in the closets, had to go downstairs. All of this had to happen quickly, which meant we ended up with what looked like the aftermath of a tornado in the basement.

When we first bought our current home, the partially finished basement served as an overflow area. It was eclectically furnished, and we could hang out there when all the family was around, or when we felt like rounding up a group of friends for Karaoke and didn’t want trouble with the HOA. (The sound doesn’t carry outside from the basement.) Also, there was a nice-sized storage room, the laundry room, and a pre-plumbed, but unfinished, bathroom.

We tried carving office space out of the storage room, but the Christmas trees wouldn’t fit in the bathroom, which was the new storage room. With all the stuff now in what used to be the unfinished-but-not-too-bad Karaoke/Family room we were low on space for everyone to hang out separately when we started getting on each other’s nerves. And, as I am slightly–okay, maybe much more than slightly–OCD, the chaos in my house was driving me to the brink of a breakdown.

Suddenly, the basement we might finish one day became the basement we needed finished lickety-split. All the stuff that had just been moved to the basement had to be moved to the garage. The cars had to be parked outside. Never one to pay someone else to do something he can conceivably do himself, Sugar drew up a construction plan, got a permit, and got to work–during the one day a week, some weeks, but not all, when he was home.

Progress was slow. Nerves frayed. Construction dust drifted upstairs and covered everything, no matter how often we cleaned. After about eight weeks, Sugar looked at me and said, “Call somebody.” I did, and the work is mostly finished now. We had a few bad moments when we were cleaning the aftermath and moving things back in from the garage. Several pieces of furniture are worse for the experience, and one didn’t make it.

But, we have a fully-functional family/Karaoke room now, with more than one bare bulb and a disco ball for lighting, and more than one electrical outlet to replace the two power strips and spaghetti bowl of extension cords. The Christmas trees have their own storage space. Sugar has his office back, and I have a killer new writing cave. And boy, does that extra bathroom come in handy.

Peace, out…

Susan

When Life Sends You a Fruit Basket

in Blather and Profound Notions, Evidence of My Insanity, Family

We all know what to do with lemons, right?  When life hands us lemons, we make lemonade and add our libation of choice. Common sense, that. When we have only one choice, we make the best of it.
But what to do when life hands you a basket filled with mangoes, kiwi, and all manner of luscious fruits? I’m ridiculously blessed, and perhaps, sometimes, have too many choices. If I fill up on figs and strawberries, I won’t have room for a peach, right? And I love peaches…

Saying yes to one thing always means saying no to something else. Saying no is hard for me. I spent years of my life so over-extended by commitments–okay, yes, I’m no longer talking fruit here, we’re on time management, please stay with the group–that I was in need of an intervention and regular doses of that spiked lemonade.

But the need to make hard choices, embrace them, and not look back applies to so many things. (Leaving time management, on to life choices…it’s all about the fruit…)

A few weeks ago, when I was explaining how Sugar and I are not cut out for subdivision living, I mentioned that we were working on a plot with our old neighbors–the ones we lived next door to for years in the house we loved, before I filled up on pears (decided we should live downtown, within walking distance to restaurants, etc)–to convince the interlopers who bought Barbie’s Dream House that it was in fact haunted, and they must move to satisfy the spirits and whatnot.

Well, I guess it worked. I got a phone call a few days ago from said dear friends next door, who we’ll call Wilson and Sandra, because those are their names. It seems the folks we sold our house to are interested in selling. Now, I have no evidence that Sandra or Wilson either one hid a tape player with a timer in the neighbors’ attic that played “GET OOUUTTT” at 3:15 a.m. every morning, so we’ll say no more about it.

Sugar and I have an appointment to see our old home and discuss details on Saturday morning. Right now, I so long to drive into OUR driveway when we get home from Indiana and be home again. Of course, there’s the detail of selling the subdivision house…

But saying yes to Barbie’s Dream House will mean saying no to some other things we really want to do. It will need new windows soon (two vacations we won’t be able to take). And Sugar wants to replace the paneling in the den with sheet-rock. The master bath needs updating… Already we have a list of projects we’re excitedly considering. The budget for all those projects would eat up a lot of travel.

And the time spent on all these projects could be spent enjoying family, volunteering, or taking up crop circle interpretation.

That house is special to us. We have so many wonderful memories there. It’s home. But saying yes to it will mean making choices. It will mean fewer date nights out, fewer vacations, and less time and money for a long list of things we enjoy.

But I suspect if we can come to an agreement with the very nice folks who bought it, we will buy our home back. We’ll eat the peaches with the juice dripping on our hands, having learned that pears are nice, but you simply can’t eat all the fruit in the basket. You must choose.

And there’s no place like home. (Clicking my heels together…)

Peace, out…

Susan

Some People are Just Not Subdivision Material

in Crazy Happens, Evidence of My Insanity

Up until three and a half years ago, we lived in a neighborhood. There was no overall theme–the homes were whatever style the owner chose, and the lots were anywhere from half an acre to four acres. We had two acres with a brick house built in the sixties that I absolutely adored. Sugar called it Barbie’s Dream House, and it was. It was Southern traditional–big front porch, screened porch in back, lots of big oak trees in the yard.

But… we travel a lot, and two acres of yard plus a large house with fifty-year-old parts that needed continuous maintenance made us think life would be less complicated if we had less to take care of. Small house, big scrapbook, we said to ourselves. Simplify.

I REALLY wanted to live in downtown Greenville, where we could walk to dinner, or to Falls Park, and could ride our bikes through the park trails without having to load them up on the bike rack. Sugar was not so keen on this idea, as ninety-five percent of the real estate in downtown Greenville is condos. “But our back yard would be Falls Park,” I said. Sugar gave in on the condition that we would rent for a year, and if we liked it, we’d buy.

We sold Barbie’s Dream House, and moved into a 1,200 square-foot condo half a block from Falls Park. Despite all the amenities of downtown living that we both loved, within six months we were both claustrophobic. No patio, no deck–no place for Sugar’s grill.

We started looking at new houses, ones that didn’t need anything done to them. The beautiful homes in neighborhoods that border downtown Greenville were older than the one we’d sold, so we looked further out. A subdivision, we thought, is the middle ground. Half acre yard, new house.

Covenants and restrictions? Oh, those are just to protect your property value–to make sure folks don’t put up outhouses and such in the backyard. This is the fiction we were sold. Don’t ever let anyone tell you this.

I believe there are three kinds of people on any given Architectural Review Committee:

Type One, the well-meaning sorts, who volunteer because they want to do the right thing, give back, etc. These are the minority, and they will be worn down to a nub by the rest of them, and likely take to strong drink.

Type Two are dragged in kicking and screaming, or perhaps convinced when they’ve had a few martinis, by their friends who are Type Ones. Type Twos will hide when trouble starts, and it will.

Type Three are the folks who want to be in charge. They have a driving need to decide what is best for all, and then shove it down their neighbors’ throats. They will rule the ARC in any homeowners association because they are the most invested. They crave POWER. Likely, they were bullied in high school.

Two and a half years later, we love the house, but have ascertained that we are not subdivision people. We’re rebels. If, on Saturday afternoon, we decide we want to put a trellis in front of the air conditioner compressor, we don’t want to have to draw a picture, fill out forms, and wait FORTY-FIVE DAYS for the Architectural Review Committee to approved it (or not).

And don’t get me started on the trees. The ARC has tried to dictate which trees we can plant and in what configuration. Thankfully, the attorney who drew up the covenants and restrictions assures me this is unenforceable, not covered in the covenants and restrictions, and ridiculous.

We’re currently working on a scheme with our old neighbors–the ones who live next to Barbie’s Dream House–to convince the folks we sold it to that the place is haunted so they’ll leave. In the meantime, I’m thinking of taking up sculpture and creating a heinous piece of orange and pink yard art with tassels and old shoes stuck on.

Peace, out…

Susan

I Need a Packing Intervention

in Conferences, Evidence of My Insanity

I’d planned to post more pictures from The Mother of All Road Trips, and write something about our time in every city. But, I’m leaving Tuesday for RWA Nationals, and I have to start packing.

You’d think, maybe, since I just got back from a three-week trip, that I’d have a clue how to pack for six days in Orlando. I thought that, anyway. Until I started reading all the blogs on how and what to pack for Nationals.

Many conference veterans advise things like, “Pack one skirt, one pair of pants, and four tops that you can wear with either.” Huh? My sister packs like this, but this is SO not me. I need choices. Who knows what mood I’ll be in on any given day? Besides, we’re going to be in ORLANDO, which is one big sauna in late July. I can’t see myself wearing anything twice, but that’s just me, and I have some well-documented neuroses.

Then there’s the perennial travel advice, “Bring things you can wear during the day, the slip into evening by changing shoes and accessories.” While this SOUNDS like common sense, my wardrobe simply does not lend itself to this strategy. You really can’t just slip on pearls and heels with khaki pants, a lacy tank, and a sweater and call it evening wear.

My favorite advice was from the woman who advised taking only nude underwear because it works with everything. Okay–this advice I needed months ago, because I don’t have time (or money) to shop for all new underwear between now and Tuesday. I guess I’ll just have to try not to show mine.

But I really do need a new laptop case. And a “little black dress.” Oh, and some Downy wrinkle release. Gotta go shopping. Maybe I should pick up that underwear while I’m out…

Peace, out…

Susan

The Number One Reason I’ve Had No Time to Blog

in Evidence of My Insanity, Family, Road Trip, Uncategorized

Things have been intense lately. I’ve been traveling almost non-stop. Here are a few highlights from the road:

  • Last visit to Indiana, while we were on a side trip to Amish country for pickles, the police raided our hotel. They brought the drug dogs and everything. Seems one of the locals had rented a hotel room to hang out at the pool and smoke some weed. Someone must have reported the smell. This was big news here, as we’re in a very wholesome, family-oriented part of Indiana .
  • Last trip to Jasper, AL, we NARROWLY missed an F-3 tornado, which formed virtually on top of us, then moved on to the next county where it did a lot of damage. I love Jasper, but I am SO not going back there in spring or summer. The Husband has strict instructions he can only work there in fall and winter.
  • On a happy note, the hotel in Jasper now has a Belgian waffle maker. The Queen of Pain now has a few waffles to work off of me when I get home.
  • I made a quick trip home to Faith, where I spent most of an entire day chauffeuring my dad (who is young and perfectly able to drive himself) to various doctor’s offices so he could talk to the poor receptionists and nurses about this curious coating on his tongue and throat. Now, most folks will call and make an appointment to see the doctor. Not my daddy. He doesn’t like dealing with the automated answering machines that require him to press one to make an appointment, et cetera. He just drops in. To his credit, this has proven to be effective in that these nurses will do ANYTHING to get him to stop showing them his tongue. I can relate, which explains why I was driving him on this fool’s errand.

As exciting as all of this is, the number one reason I’ve had no time to blog is that I’ve been busy lurking over at Do the Write Thing for Nashville where I’ve been busy plotting my strategy for scoring some of the goodies.

I had my heart set on the manuscript consultation by none other than Janet Reid. I’ve had a little ebay experience, so I strategized waiting until the very last minute and placing one bid–but WAY before midnight last night the bidding got too rich for my bank account.

Then, I set my sights on five days at Kari Lynn Dell’s ranch in Montana–only to be quickly left in the bidding dust. This one is still open, and a bargain for anyone who has ever wanted to go to Montana. I think the bidding closes at midnight tonight.

I hear that tomorrow Barbara Poelle and Holly Root have a combo meeting at RWA or BEA going on the block. I’m glued to my PC. but I have a sinking feeling this one will go for big bucks as well.

Y’all check it out–there’s a lot of great stuff being auctioned for a great cause!

Peace, out…

Susan

The Chick-Fila Cows Perform a Public Service

in Crazy Happens, Diets and Other Torture, Evidence of My Insanity, Evidence of Rampant Insanity

I love a cheeseburger as much as anybody–more than many folks, actually, if you take into account the vegetarian and vegan sectors. Grilled Angus beef on a sesame seed bun, with extra cheese, mayo, lettuce, tomato, pickle, and Heinz 57. Yum. My mouth is watering and it’s not nearly lunch time.

And don’t get me started on grilled stuffed filet mignon. The moaning might disturb other hotel guests.

I’m a fan of the cow, is what I’m saying–always have been.

But, I’m also something of a…ahem…hypochondriac. Yeah, I  know, you’re shocked and all.

So, when I read this article on page 2 of today’s USA Today, I immediately started inventorying my symptoms. The article states that “A program set up to test beef for chemical residues is not accomplishing its mission of monitoring the food supply for dangerous substances… The health affects on people who eat such meat are a ‘growing concern.'” The article goes on to say that in 2008, “Mexican authorities rejected a U.S. beef shipment because its copper levels exceeded Mexican standards.” The rejected meat was sold in the U.S.

Our beef wasn’t up to Mexican standards, so it had to be sold in the U.S.???

It’s not just copper. (I’m still not clear on how the copper gets into cows, but some of the bad stuff comes from pesticide residue in the cow’s drinking water.) Also, antibiotics are a problem, among them PENICILLIN, which I am allergic to. The article gave a chart with contaminants, some of which I can’t pronounce, and SYMPTOMS TO WATCH FOR. These include oxidative stress (wtf?), renal dysfunction, and death. And those are just the copper-related symptoms. Call me a quack, but death is a pretty serious SYMPTOM.

I had reconciled myself to living with the threat of Mad Cow, now this.

It’s enough to make a girl turn to tofu.

Peace, out…

Susan

I May Have Gypsy Blood

in Evidence of My Insanity, Passing Sweet Time

Last year I spent some time on Ancestry.com tracing my family tree and Jim’s. Okay, Jim is part Cherokee, and I really wanted to see if we could document this. No, I was not angling for a casino check to support my writing habit.

Anyway, I found no evidence of gypsy blood on my side of the family, but there was one branch I couldn’t trace past four generations, even though we ordered the DNA test that was supposed to put you in touch with your dead relatives.

I’m now thinking perhaps these folks were gypsies…nomads…vagabonds.

Because I am loving this mobile life style. We’re headed home tomorrow, and I DON’T WANT TO GO. The Hilton Garden Inn and/or a Hampton Inn now feels more like home to me than my own house. I have the system down here. And I don’t ever have to clean or cook…

(Sigh)

Maybe we’ll sell the house and just live in hotels. They even have a party room for Karaoke night…

I wish this didn’t appeal to me so much.

Once More, From the Top

in Crazy Happens, Evidence of My Insanity

Well, at least this year I got my first post in during the month of January. It takes me a while to recover from the holidays, and with seven family (and several friend) birthdays in January, it feels like the holidays last until February.

Anyway, I’m traveling with Jim, using the hotel room in whatever city he’s in as my personal writer’s retreat. We’re in Warsaw, IN right now, and today I worked in the swimming pool and spa room, which is all glass, and watched it snow. Yes, I do know how lucky I am. I really, really do.

Along with the usual New Year’s resolutions, I’ve vowed to update the blog a little more frequently. It’s really a waste of fodder not to, because so much material just falls right into my lap by virtue of my being a little nutty, and 98% of my family being certifiable. (Note: If you are reading this, and you are a member of my family, no, of course I did not mean you! YOU fall into the 2% of my normal blood relations.)

Things just happen to me… For instance, I always sleep with a glass of water by the bed in case I wake up thirsty. Lots of people do this, right? Well, when we’re traveling, it’s usually a bottle of water. (Yes, I know about the landfills and whatnot, but I just cannot drink warm tap water from the bathroom in the hotel room, out of a glass that has been gathering germs in the bathroom for who knows how long, no matter how clean it looks. I’m SO SORRY about the landfills, and will try to reduce my carbon footprint in other ways as much as possible.)

Anyway, night before last, I woke up, partially, and reached for my water bottle. When no water gurgled out of the bottle into my parched mouth, I tipped it up a little more.

No water.

I tipped it back further, and squeezed the bottle a little.

No water.

It took me a minute, in my groggy state to figure out that the cap must be on the bottle. I tried to unscrew it, but was having trouble. Then I noticed that the top of the water bottle didn’t feel right. And WHAT was that goopy stuff on the side of my mouth and on my hand??

Well, turns out it was Jergens Total Nourishment, and I had been trying to drink my lotion.

I ran to the bathroom, rinsed out my mouth, and downed a whole bottle of Dasani.

I am now careful to put the lotion on the far side of the nightstand.

But this stuff happens to everyone, right?

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