I grew up on the beach and never thought twice about getting into the water as a kid. I was East Coast Editor of SURFER Magazine, and never hesitated to catch some tasty waves, dude. Then I moved farther inland for about twenty years and rarely found myself near an ocean.

And apparently, I left my nerve somewhere back on that last beach.

Because here I am again, living by the ocean thinking --- I can go swimming! Commune with nature!

My own baby, Gordon Labradoodle, passed away Dec. 6, 2017, which I never mentioned because I'm still a disaster over losing him. So, for over a year now, I've been getting my dog-fix by smothering every random pooch I pass with kisses, my voice rising to squeaky levels I think maybe only dogs can hear.  (We're going to get a new baby, but at first, it was just too hard and now we've been in transition planning our move to Florida so we're holding off a bit.)

My realtor and now bestest-buddy here in Florida, Jill Geraci has helped me ease my dog-jonesing by letting me babysit her hamster, Harley. (She says it's a dog but I don't believe it.) Harley is about one full pound of adorable though. She's like a mini-Muppet came to life!

Okay, not really but it was kind of exciting there for a second, wasn't it?

I'm about to make you feel better about snow.

Pineapple Port, the 55+ community featured in my Pineapple Port Mysteries  is a real place with a different name and I spent Christmas there this year with my mother-in-law (aka Mariska). Yesterday we drove around the community to check out the decorations, because, what's more Christmassy than that?!  I thought I'd let you see what we saw, especially since I'm pretty sure I'll end up with a scene in a book where Charlotte is checking out Pineapple Port's decorations, and now you'll REALLY be able to picture them. :)

Mmm. Yum. I don't know if it will eat me before I eat it.

I've failed making bread two out of three times now. Seems you never really run out of ways to kill yeast. The first time I used too hot milk, and sent them screaming to their little yeasty deaths.

The second time I let the loaf prove too long thinking it would make it bigger. Instead, the yeasts didn't find the energy to do a second rise in the oven and I ended up with a loaf dense enough to use as a flak jacket. I hate wasting things, so I did my best to eat it as toast, cut thin enough to see through, but ultimately gave up and chucked it.

My husband and I were on our usual daily walk when Mike sensed a disturbance in the Force and whipped around. His expression was so odd I turned too, and we both spotted a cat with a tuft where a tail should be running at us full speed.  It's not like a lion stalking across the Serengeti at you, but in a suburban neighborhood it can be unsettling when a strange cat has eyes for nothing but you.

As she grew closer and we muttered things like "Uh oh" and "This isn't good,"  she started meowing, which made her seem either less threatening or so desperate to rip out our throats she could barely stand it. We still didn't know which.

We were still rooted to our spots, resigned to our fates, when she started running figure eights through our legs and rubbing her face on my shins.

This year I decided I would plant everything we like to eat during the summer by seed, so when I bought an avocado and found myself rolling that smooth marble of a pit around in my palm, I thought--I'll plant this too!

I'm not what you call a green thumb to start out with. I inherited that from my mother, who could kill a bouquet of plastic flowers. Of the twenty tomato seeds I planted, I ended up with two viable stalks after the seedlings died one after the next. They took one look at me and thought, "Eh, why bother."

I think my goofy husband Mike might fear you all have the wrong impression of him (or that you might have the right impression and he'd like to change it anyway...).  I think he's going for more of a suave Don Juan type now... though you should be the judge of how well he's doing...

I started my Kilty series because I tried to watch Outlander (which isn't my thing but my mother was insistent) and all I could think the whole time was..

• This guy is hot but you know he smells like B.O. There's no deodorant unless she thought to grab a hundred packages of it before she was whisked away.
• If they keep having sex like this she is definitely going to get a urinary tract infection and antibiotics haven't been invented yet
• I doubt she smells like Chanel no. 5 either.
• They just had sex for the first time and she's just lounging around in the bed like pregnancy isn't even a thing and maybe that's something she might want to consider with everything going on at the moment.

After hearing the story about the man whose Alexa sent his friend a recording of him and his wife talking about flooring, Mike decided to go online and check our account. Sure enough, there were a million recording of me saying rude things to Alexa, because it amuses me. For instance, we have her setup to turn the lights on and off with a command, so every night I walk into the bedroom and say  "Alexa -- Turn on the lights" and bing the lights come on. And then, because she's been so sweet, I say some variation of, "Thanks, ya pox-faced trollop!"  All of which are recorded for posterity. Fantastic. Luckily, I'm an author and not a political hopeful.

Last night I reheated a meatball to throw on the spaghetti squash I was making for dinner (in case you were wondering how to shoehorn a bunch of fat and meat into a healthy vegetarian meal... oh, and don't forget the metric ton of Parmesan cheese...butter soaked garlic bread...). My husband Mike was standing next to me as I reached into the microwave with my clunky oven gloves to grab the little glass bowl I'd sat the meatball in for reheating.

You know where this is going don't you.