New romance in the works

A tidbit of chapter one.

Charlie knew there was no such thing as a Prince Charming by the time she was ten years old.
After all, Charlie had just turned ten when her mother’s prince charming Rowland had thrown his glass of wine at her mom and in his anger at apparently missing he put his fist through the decorative glass pane of their front door, effectively slicing his wrist open from palm to elbow causing her mom to have to rush him to the hospital while Charlie and her brother and sister were left behind to clean up the broken glass and the spattering of blood. If this was a prince charming, Charlie knew she never wanted one.
As luck would have it Charlie’s mom brought Rowland back from the hospital that same day alive and well. For a few weeks it seemed as though her parents had taken a hiatus on quarreling, but before long the palpable tension that seemed to have existed in her home for as long as she could remember was back in full force. Laughter was only heard in the home if Rowland was laughing the rest of the time was spent tip toeing about the house so as not to disturb him while his game was on tv or he was doing something else as earth shatteringly important. Happy times were but a foggy distant memory.
It was only a matter of time before Rowland found something new that angered him and though Charlie spent hours practicing the art of invisibility, at times like that she could only hope she would not be the next target of his anger.

Welcome to the Country 2-23-10

Welcome to the Country
So you’ve decided to move to the country where the advice of old timers is almost always the best advice you can get.
We have all heard the good old advice of ‘don’t squat with your spurs on’ and ‘if it rattles don’t investigate’ but here’s an old timer’s advice that really needs to be heeded in the foothills…if it itches don’t scratch it.
Now that may seem to be extremely simple advice to most of you and should go without saying but wait… I’ve added a bit of mommy advice to that one…
‘If you really must scratch remember to wash your hands before you use the restroom.’
I’m sure you have figured out where this particular story is headed, but for those of you that just love a good chuckle please continue with this quick read.
Hiking Table Top Mountain is pretty much every kid’s dream when they first move to Copper or the surrounding area. As parents we are usually able to dissuade our youngsters from this somewhat treacherous trek until they become teens or pre teens with manly hormones a pumpin’ through their little systems.
My oldest son home for leave, being the adventurous sort, snagged his citified high heeled girlfriend my other two sons, his sister in law and my daughter and headed off for a romantic Valentine’s Day trek to the top of table top. At this point in my life you can safely assume that I have lost an awful lot of my powers of persuasion over my two older boys towering over me at a whopping 6’2” and 6’3” so I gave in and let them go on this adventure convincing myself that at least they were not attempting this hike at the peak of rattlesnake season, which as we all know seems to be most any day that the sun shines, but I digress.
Off they went equipped with water bottles, first aid kits, and smiles. 3 hours later home they came, muddy, wet and exhausted. The next morning was when we discovered that poison oak is a plant that gives all year long because all hiking participants were sporting a plethora of bumpy red splotches on various parts of their bodies. My older sons had poison oak on their arms and neck, my daughter in law on her face and my youngest son just on one arm…until he scratched...and went potty. Not good. Not good at all.
The moral of the story is…if it itches…don’t scratch and go potty.
Until next time…welcome to the country.
www.charitymaness.com

Waste is just that...waste

I realize that the 3 or so books I have started that are on the back burner will never grow up to contain the amount of words required to interest an agent, so they will simply have to stay young, or small.
So with my desire not to be wasteful with my words, thoughts or creations I have decided to go with the proverbial literary flow and allow these ideas to come to life through a collection of short stories.
The plan is to have these stories on paper and published in 2012. Seems like a long way away, but there are an awful lot of thoughts running about in this head of mine that need organizing.
With that said, happy reading:)

P.S. No worries, the murder mystery is still in full swing.