Sandra Rose Hughes

Sippy has started playing! The first few days he was in too much shock to be interested in playing, but last night and this morning, he has been pouncing at anything that moves! Also, when I gave him a bath the first day, he hung there limply, not resisting, but when I gave him one yesterday, he was a force to be reckoned with. These are sure signs that he is feeling much, much better. I can still feel his bones quite a bit, but not as much, and his belly is very round. He has also been pooping consistenly since yesterday. Unfortunately, he is nowhere near litter-box trained. We have shown him the litter box, helped him scratch in the litter, made sure he can come in and out of the box easily...and he still poops in the dark corner under the desk. We have put the litter box in the dark corner under the desk...he pooped behind it this morning. Our other two kittens understood the litter box concept almost immediately, but they were raised with big litters and humans caring for them. Who...

As I drove home from school on Friday, I thought to myself, "I am so relieved that all my pets have been fixed and vaccinated. We shouldn't have to pay another vet bill for a long time." My 5 month old kitten got fixed a few weeks ago, and she has healed beautifully. It's worth the minimal cost to know that she won't get pregnant, and can run around at night without adding to the pet over-population problem. Everyone should spay and neuter their animals unless you are a breeder, and then maybe you might need to re-think that. It's not like we have a lack of animals in the world- do you really need to contribute to it by adding more pure-bred, bug-eyed $200 chihuahua puppies that will someday sit in a shelter? Anyway- I'll get off my soapbox now. I felt very satified as I drove home. When I walked over to the construction site to greet my husband, he said, "Sandy...there is a tiny black kitten hiding in the SIPS panels. See if you can get it out. It...

Here is the link for the picture on the left. It advertises a book I should probably check out: Help For Writer's Block by Donna Kakonge. Here is the last section of chapter 2. I finished my rough draft about 3 years ago, and the book is now in its third stage of re-writes. It takes a lot of effort for me to work on it because I'm not sure the premise is even remotely marketable, however, as my first full-length endeavor, it's been really good for my writing ability. So far, my queries have been rejected 10 times,and I've recieved no response about 10 times- really not much in the grand scheme of things. Soon, I will post a few chapters from my new endeavor, a book called Marilyn Marlin . I feel better about this book, but it also has many, many rough edges, and my plot is currently stalled due to writer's block and a faulty computer. Without further ado...the end of chapter 2! Suddenly, there was a loud cracking noise coming from somewhere in the big house and a f...

Chapter 2 What the cavies did not know was that a terrible thing had happened. Donner, Macie, and their humans lived in a little town called Lake Isabella. Lake Isabella was in a valley called the Kern River Valley, which had a beautiful blue lake in the middle of it. Unfortunately, it wasn’t a natural lake. It used to be a river, and about fifty years before this story (which for cavies would be during their grand-grand-grand-grand-grand-grand-grandparent’s time) some people had decided it would be a good idea to dam up the river and turn it into a lake so the nearby city of Bakersfield could have drinking water and so that there would be lots of tourists who could come for boating and fishing on the lake. Pretty soon, the humans got so used to the river being dammed up, that they started building houses and shops and businesses where the river used to be. They even planted crops there, because the soil was so rich and fertile. They did all these things believing that the dam wo...

I will post more Guinea Pig adventures next time. I thought we needed a little break from all the treacle. My New Year's resolution this year was to write a page a day. Have I achieved that so far? Absolutely not. I did get a lot of writing done this year, but not as much as I had hoped. One of the things that happened was my grandfather's death. Since his illness and death, I have been pre-occupied with grief and feelings of loss. Anytime I try to write...that's all that will come out. I'd rather not look at it, so I just put the pen down instead. It's time to break out of this, but I'm just not sure how. I don't like writing dark things so often- it makes me feel morbid. It's just not my style or my personality. I haven't chosen to share very many of my sad writings on the blog because they are so dark, and also because my family supports me by checking on the blog regularly, and they are also dealing with so much grief that I don't want to fur...

Here is the end of chapter one. Can you guess how many agents/publishing houses rejected my query letter and first two chapters? I will tell you at the end of chapter 2. When the humans at the rescue found him in her cage that day, they were very surprised, but they figured it must mean that the two guinea pigs wanted to be bonded. So from that time on, they had lived together at the rescue until their new family had come to adopt them. Donner had often daydreamed about adventures, but had never really had any reason to try and get out of his cage in their new home, until now. Their home was roof-less, and the walls were not very tall. Slowly, cautiously, their hearts beating fast, and their tiny legs trembling, Donner and Macie peered up at the edge of the cage wall. Macie watched, as Donner finished pushing their purple-plastic house up against the wall, shoved his favorite log tunnel against the side of the house with his nose and began climbing up the tunnel to scramble to the to...