This picture is actually more of a test than a clip art image–though I bought it from a clip art site. If you immediately get twitchy over the mismatching pin colors and the lack of a brown pin…you might have OCD. This made my brain scream. I wanted to shake someone over the horror of it. But maybe that’s […]

    I’m not sure what the prevalence of OCD is in other families–though I know there’s a strong genetic component, but in my family…it runs mad. My grandmother has it–though we’ve never talked about it really. Her obsession with her health is her primary obsession that is outwardly visible. My grandfather is a hoarder, so my own mother was […]

  A hot guy counting coins…if that isn’t OCD eye candy, I don’t know what is. I don’t know about you guys, but I feel better. Oh, right, therapy. Let’s talk about therapy. If you’ve read some of my other OCD posts, you know I’m a therapy dropout. I’ve gone through therapy three times. The first time was in the […]

  While most people aren’t diagnosed officially with Obsessive Compulsive Disorder until, I believe, their late twenties (I once read the average age was 28, but can’t seem to document that claim,) its onset is usually seen at two distinct times. The first is early onset which would occur typically between ages 7-11. The second would be after puberty between […]

Pure-O is sexier-sounding than it is. Seriously. It is. It sounds like a street drug to me. By the way, I’ve been thinking of getting a shirt that says, “I have OCD. I do drugs not hugs,” but I’ve been worried people might not find it funny…   Anyway, Pure-O, or Primarily Obsessional OCD, or Purely Obsessional OCD, or OCD […]

  I love a good villain. There. I said it. And I hate bad villains. Oh, not villains that are very villainous–I mean I hate villains who miss the mark. Villains who, when you get to the end of a story, are easy to overcome. The villains who fail to be a foil to the hero. (A hero is only […]

    (The picture above is one of my nights via the Jawbone Up tracking bracelet I wear. Look! I was in bed for eight hours! How fantastic is that?) The term night-owl sounds so much better than raging insomniac, but I suspect the former implies we have a choice. I know I’ve brought up insomnia in previous posts, but […]

  “Where do you get your ideas? Easily the number one question authors are asked in my opinion. And also the most baffling to us. Why? Well, here’s a day in the life of an author:   For some inexplicable reason, I wanted cash to pay for my lunch today, so I stopped by an ATM. Locking my car, I […]

Likable vs. Unlikable Characters     This topic interests me from both sides. As a reader, I’ve noticed that nothing tanks my enjoyment/rating of a book as much as a character I’m supposed to like, but don’t. As a writer, this is something you have to straddle with flawed and realistic characters–have I made them empathetic or just pathetic? Do […]

  Dandelion seeds in the wind and the contest is over. I would get all philosophical about this, but the RA in my hands is killing me today. So, let me just say that the winner of the necklace was picked randomly by Rafflecopter but was also the person with the most entries. She tweeted nearly every day it seemed. […]