Something Worth Watching?

Hey Everyone!! :-)

I'm back today with another video I wanted to share. With the primary elections fast approaching, this is the kind of policy-substantive story we should all be focusing on. So, please take a few minutes to watch this video, and hopefully it will help you choose between the candidates and cast your vote for the person who most represents your interests, come 2020. Peace!

Delicious Autumn Pasta #Recipe!

Hey Everyone!! :-)

This is one of my favorite Fall pasta dishes. Enjoy! :-)

Ingredients:
1 lb pasta (your favorite kind)
5 tbsp butter
1 large red onion thinly sliced
1 cup spinach chopped fine
1 small pumpkin seeded, roasted, and chunked
2 tbsp thyme leaves
2 cloves garlic minced fine
2 tbsp olive oil
1 cup grated pecorino romano
1/2 cup white wine (optional)
Salt and pepper to taste

Cook the pasta according to the package directions, and save 1 cup of the cooking water. Drain the pasta and set it aside. Melt 2 tablespoons of the butter with the olive oil in a deep-sided skillet. Add the onion, garlic, thyme and salt and pepper and cook until translucent. Add the wine and simmer until reduced (optional step). Add the pumpkin, spinach, cheese, and the remaining butter to the skillet, stirring to combine. Add the cooked pasta and saved water to the skillet and toss together. Garnish with more cheese and parsley, if desired. Serve hot.

Buon Appetito!

Ghoulishly Great #Reads #Halloween #Giveaway! $66 #Cash #Grand #Prize! #Free To #Enter!

Hey Everyone!! :-)

There's a new giveaway for Halloween!  Please take a moment to check out the Ghoulishly Great Reads Halloween Giveaway!!  There are lots of awesome books and prizes!! :-)  It's free to enter, there are over 44 prizes, and the grand prize is $66 cash payable through PayPal!! :-)  Now isn't that worth taking a few minutes to check out? ;-)   Here are all the details:

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Thank you so much for stopping by today!  And don't forget to check back tomorrow for the next installment of Mistral Dawn's Musings! :-)

#Animal #Rescuer's #Guide To #Staying ( #Relatively ) #Sane! #Free! :-)

Hey Everyone!! :-)

Just a reminder, for those who haven't checked it out yet, I've collected all my animal rescue/care posts together and published them as a small book.  If you'd like, you can download the book for free from Amazon, Smashwords, B&N, Kobo, and iTunes.

Amazon

Smashwords

iTunes

Barnes & Noble

Kobo

Thanks for stopping in today, and don't forget to check back tomorrow for the next installment of Mistral Dawn's Musings! :-)

#APC #Spotlight: Skinshifter (Sylvan Cycle Book 1) By Alycia Christine!

Hey Everyone!! :-)

I've got Alycia Christine in my APC spotlight, today! Alycia is an active and supportive member of the  Authors-Professional Co-op Facebook group and her young adult, sword and sorcery, shape-shifter, fantasy novel, Skinshifter, looks great! Here's the description:

The full moon revealed her humanity. Now the hunters know her secret.

Skinshifters are a curse. The Asheken deadwalkers proved that fact when they used skinshifters to spy against the Sylvan races during the Second War of Ages. Now, after three centuries of peace, the deadwalkers have found a secret way back onto the Sylvan Continent and this time they seek not just to conquer their enemies, but to enslave them body and soul.

When the Feliconas Clan suffers the deadwalkers’ first raid, one werecat—a skinshifter who has concealed her abilities—survives the massacre. Even as Katja struggles with her grief and guilt over her murdered kin, she must unite with other Sylvan refugees to defeat the deadwalkers before they can butcher and defile the other races. But can this skinshifter trust her newfound allies or will their secrets prove even more treacherous than her own?

If you think this sounds like something you might enjoy, go ahead and grab your copy here:

Thank you all so much for stopping by! Happy reading! :-)

#Agent Thoth's #Personal Log: Day 1015

Hey Everyone! :-)

Agent Thoth discusses more of the trials and tribulations associated with living with hominids. Incidentally, if you've missed Agent Thoth's earlier entries, you can find them here: Thoth's Journal

Department for the Preservation and Confirmation of Intelligent Life (DPCIL)

Agent Thoth's Personal Log

Day One-Thousand-Fifteen:

I’m uncertain, but I think my young companion may have alerted me to something of which I was previously unaware. He has been shadowing my hominid-servant whenever she enters the room where she attends to her sanitation needs. His determination to never allow her to enter the room alone is such that if she does happen to close the door before he joins her, he sits at the entrance and howls while digging at the side of the door in an attempt to cause it to open.

At first, I thought this was merely revenge for her preventing him from continuing to bully the canid, but it occurred to me that the extreme level of distress he experiences whenever she enters this room might have another, more concrete, basis. I have never observed any sign of matter transference technology among the hominids, but if the room my hominid uses for sanitation purpose also contains the means for her to relocate herself without having to first pass through the main door to my domicile, which inevitably makes us aware of her leaving, then the fear of abandonment might be what is driving my excitable protégé’s behavior.

To be honest, this room has long been a concern for all the members of my domicile save my hominid-servant. I had always thought this to be because it’s the room in which she insists on voluntarily submerging herself in liquid H₂O, which is clearly something only a deranged individual would do. But, perhaps, if my youthful compatriot has witnessed something, as I suspect he may have, then my unease has been due to my having picked up on a warning from my subconscious regarding the dangers present within the room. Matter transference technology is complicated and prone to error and, frankly, I’m not certain hominids are psychologically stable enough to handle dealing with the responsibilities associated with such a power as the ability to appear and disappear anywhere and whenever one wishes. I will carefully monitor this situation and report back on any further developments.

Those tricksy hominids! ;-) You may have noticed that Agent Thoth has a new look. I hope you like his new picture as much as I do, but I'd love to hear your thoughts, either way. Feel free to let me know what you think in the comments. ;-) Happy reading, everyone!

Playing The Long Game...

Hey Everyone!

Today's post might be overly philosophical considering the current cluster-fuck state of the nation, but I just wanted to talk about how I keep being reminded of the brilliance of the people who designed our government. They were far from perfect, especially when viewed through the lens of history, but they had fought a tyrant, shed blood to free themselves from him, and were canny enough to know that human nature doesn't change and tyrants will always rise.

We're currently dealing with one of those inevitable tyrants. But because of the foresight of the revolutionaries who came before us, his efforts to dismantle and co-opt control of our government have been repeatedly stymied. Undoubtedly, in time, he'll succeed. But the barriers to centralized power the leaders of a hard-won nation put in place are, at this moment, acting as a bulwark against the tides of fascism. It won't hold forever, but it's holding for now.

Unfortunately, those fortifications against a dictatorial regime aren't as strong as they should be. This is because in recent decades our elected representatives, on both sides of the aisle, have been systematically dismantling and creatively reinterpreting the checks that are supposed to protect us from tyrants. They've sought to consolidate and centralize our government in their short-sighted quest for personal power and glory and, frankly, we're to blame for putting such small-minded, petty people into power.

In short, we fucked up. We allowed ourselves to be distracted and lulled into complacency. And if we want to survive as a country, that has to end now. It's well past time for us to wake up and demand accountability from those who presume to rule us. We must insist, through our political action and speech, that the people we elect to our government abide by the rule of law and respect our Constitution. When we put people into public office, we need to make sure they know that it's not their own small agendas we expect them to prioritize, but the long-term prosperity and security of The People of the United States of America that they must serve. And then we need to maintain vigilance to ensure that they adhere to our expectations.

Our Founding Fathers bought us time to mount a resistance and fight back. If we act now -- if we exercise our right to vote, to assemble, and to petition our government for a redress of grievances -- we can turn back the flood of tyranny and restore the freedoms that have been taken from us without having to shed blood. The prescience of the freedom-fighters who enshrined those rights for us in the document they built the foundations of our nation upon has given us a chance to reclaim control of our government without the horror and destruction that come from war. Let's not squander it.

Peace!