Last week, my girlfriend gave me a refrigerator magnet with the definition for Coffeegasm written on it. I had never heard the word before, nor the meaning. Still, I loved the gift. Without a doubt, it’s me.
The definition reads.
Coffeegasm {noun}: that little rush you feel after the first sip of good, strong coffee.
It’s not a real word but so what. It’s an accurate depiction of what I feel when I take that first sip of coffee.
If you have been reading my last few articles, you know that a lot has happened in my town, county, and my state. Last week, we suffered a wind storm of sustained 80+ mph winds that lasted for hours. It started at around 2 pm and was still raging after I went to bed that night. It’s no surprise that I didn’t sleep that well that night. By the weekend, local law enforcement reported 6 people died as a result of the wind storm.
Now, just as we are recovering from that storm, yesterday, once again, two massive weather patterns decided that the north-eastern US was ready for another clash. Guess who is stuck in the middle? You got it, I am. That is my part of the state. While the northeaster ravaged the coastal states with blizzard and blizzard-like conditions, I don’t live in that area. I’m about 500 miles west of the coast, right where the northeaster storm decided to interact with the arctic storm coming down over Canada.
My local international airport closed, shutting down all flights into and out of my area. Officially, as of this moment, the airport has so far recorded 22.2 inches of snowfall, and it’s still coming down. Wind is a problem. The snow that is falling, is falling almost sideways. While there is a patch of ground next to my house where I can see the grass, in other area, the drifting snow is the real problem. Roads are still snow covered, despite the highway department doing an awesome job in plowing the highways. Even some of the large massive plows have slipped off the roadways and ended up overturned in ditches. It’s scary, and I’m staying put.
My girlfriend’s daughter is stuck in Hamburg Germany waiting for a break in the weather and return home. The news tells us that things should break around midnight, and by tomorrow, we should be able to get back to what constitutes normal for my region of the country. Yes, you get that right, it’s still snowing and they are estimating another foot of snow before it ends tonight. What progress made to keep the roads and driveways cleared last night must be repeated all over again.
The replacement hot tub cover that I bought after the windstorm now has more than three feet of snow on it. Thankfully, I was able to get a cover as I doubt the plywood and tarp I used temporarily would have survived the snow.
But you know what? I’m healthy. I’m strong. I’m warm and safe. There is a lot to be said for that. I know that there are thousands of homeless, hanging out in shelters and abandoned underground subway tunnels trying to keep warm in temperatures approaching 0 degrees F. I feel for them. There was a time, almost two decades ago, that I might have been one of them. Providence, luck and perseverance helped prevent that from happening, though I believe luck was the most significant portion of that. Thank you Lercher for being in the right place and the right time to pull my ass out of the fire.
In the meantime, I am working on cleaning up before publishing my latest book, ‘The Trafficking Consortium’ and getting back to writing anew. I’ve got my cup of hot coffee to warm me as I stare out the window, and see mostly white snow. Cheers.
Have a great day and a better tomorrow.
Oh, and have a cup of your favorite beverage on me.
That’s right. I feel fortunate and incredibly lucky. Two days ago, my area of the country and specifically my county was hit with a disastrous sustained windstorm.
By sustained, I mean a storm raging, hour after hour, and lasting just over fifteen hours. It started slowly, teasing the people in its path, lulling us into thinking it wouldn’t be too bad. At its peak, lasting many hours, we registered eighty-plus miles per hour wind speeds. Speeds that were similar to those recorded by smaller hurricanes. Yet, this was no hurricane, just a clashing of two weather fronts. A clash of two weather fronts? I feel like it was a clash of the titans and we were insignificant casualties.
Now, don’t get me wrong. I don’t live in a hurricane region or in the tornado belt. I feel for those that do. When a tornado touches down, it reigns havoc for those in its path. However, it’s pretty localized to a rather narrow track, which can be only a couple hundred yards to a mile or more. Hurricanes are another story of course and are more akin to what our region experienced.
In my case, our windstorm encompassed dozens of counties, two or three by six to eight long. 
Meteorologists in the area report that our area hasn’t ever seen one of this magnitude in over a hundred years. The damage was incredible and extensive.
In the early stages, tractor trailer trucks were flipped over on their sides, like toys in a child’s hand. As the day progressed, roof shingles were ripped from the roofs of houses and tossed like confetti in a parade. Then, trees were uplifted out of the ground, root ball and all, toppling which way and that, often landing on houses, crushing them and their occupants.
The roof of one of the local middle schools in my town was ripped off and sailed in the wind for hundreds of feet before touching ground. States of emergency were declared in several towns in my county, including my own. Live electrical wires danced in the streets, begging for the occupants of cars they draped, to step out in a futile attempt to escape their deadly touch.
Thankfully, in all the turmoil and bad situations, no one was seriously hurt or killed. Wow!
I could go on and on. It’s bad, but I know, it could be worse. I feel fortunate that my house faired well. My roof is intact, and I didn’t lose power to my house. I have about $600 in damages in non-critical areas of my house. Not bad considering most of my neighbors have damage ranging in the thousands. Kudo’s to the builder of my development. He coordinating the immediate repair to the roofs of the quality homes he built, and within a day, all of the houses on my street had their roofs repaired. Today, as I write this, he is doing the same on the homes located the next street over.
Kudo’s Joe Sciortino of 
.
Over ten thousand homes and businesses in my county lost power. It is going to take a week or more to restore power to most of the region. Temperatures dropped overnight, and the thermometer outside my window informs me that we are currently at eight degrees F. It’s cold, and I pity those that do not have electricity to power their furnaces. Many of my friends lost power, and I offered them a warm bed for the night. Gratefully, their power came back on last evening. All due to the willing power workers that showed up in our region yesterday from all over the state to help out.
I feel fortunate, and I am grateful to all those that descended on my community to help out. It could have been worse. Thank you. Now, I need a cup of coffee.
Two whole days and I didn’t spill a drop of my coffee. Whoo hoo! Both days were splendid, and I got stuff done, now if I could only delete my chronic headache, but who cares. Coffee heaven!
Spilling your coffee on the way into work definitely makes for a very bad day. I don’t recommend it. Very bad day!
Last time I wrote about my short-term vs. long-term happiness. Another short-term happiness is coffee. I love coffee. Sixteen years ago when I rejoined the dating scene, I had my first cup of vanilla latte. 
While I liked coffee then, I fell in love with vanilla lattes. Today, exiting the dating scene with my long-term girlfriend, I drink several cups of coffee daily, laced with vanilla sugar-free creamer.
Which brings me to my second item in my long-term happiness list, alone time for painting, drawing, and writing. I drink coffee as I paint, draw, or write.
However, I am getting ahead of myself. Let’s back up, shall we?
As a child, I drew all sorts of spaceships and ground vehicles, making up stories as they developed. I also tended to write stories in my head that incorporated these doodles or were fresh and not related to them. I even wrote a couple down which were lost to the hands of time. As a young adult, I forgot about them and proceeded to be caught up in photography and girls. Girls turned out to be my main obsessive behaviors and I was awkward around them. It took a lot of trial and effort that lasted for decades, despite getting married and having a child in the meantime.
Sixteen years ago, I revisited my creative talents a couple of years after my marriage died and I lived alone. I loved it and I began drawing and painting in earnest. Living alone like that for all those years trained my adult mind to disappear into my creative world, feeling and living the lives of the characters I created. Later, branching out and revisiting my creative writing, I fell into the same pattern. In some ways, it was easier to disappear into my creative world as I could sit in a comfortable chair and write; all the while, my girlfriend watched her favorite shows on television.
I have to admit, I prefer my alone quiet time, apart from life and in my creative space (my office or my studio) in order to draw, write or paint. 
It’s important to me, no question about it, and being there makes me happy. I’m free to be myself, unbeholden to anyone or anything else. Feeling what my characters feel and experience, I can develop story lines that flow. I can feel the pain and joy, torment and pleasure that they feel. It hurts at times but I am able to leave a bit of me in my creations. As I have said before, my heart and soul is embedded in each work I create, be it visual or written. I wouldn’t have it any other way.
To be honest though, it is difficult at times to separate myself from the real world, where my girlfriend is such an important part, and spend time in my creative space where I immerse myself in my fictional realities. I can recall a numerous occasions when I had to stop and ask her to wait until I finished a particular section of the story. I didn’t want to lose track of the flow of the story, extricate myself from the pretend world in order so that I could interact with her on whatever she wanted to say. Sometimes she’d acquiesce and other times, she’d fume. I can’t say I blame her. I do the same to her.
Last November, consumed with writing my latest book, ‘The Trafficking Consortium’, she really became bothered at the time I spent writing the story and disappearing into this fictional world, even when I was sitting right next to her. I took every spare moment to write, moments that she had felt were hers. I agree. Most times they were but during November, nope. It was as if I had a barking dog scratching at the door to be let out and relieve itself. Just as you can’t tell a dog to wait, else it would piss on your carpet, I couldn’t tell the story to wait. Frankly, it hurt to keep it inside instead of being let out. So, every available moment was taken to write, and write, and write some more.
My girlfriend and I are still negotiating these rules of engagement, so that I can create undisturbed and uninterrupted with time I allocate to her. Since she is very important to me, I walk a delicate line between the two worlds. In the meantime, I keep at it. I thank the universe that lately, she is okay with me blocking out significant blocks of time to create. I wonder what she will think when she figures out that some of my best creative time is well after dark and can last into the wee hours of the morning. I don’t think it is a problem though as my body can’t take it anymore. For some reason, it insists upon a decent night’s sleep.
Thanks for reading. I hope you have a great day and a better tomorrow.
It’s Friday afternoon, and I am sitting in my home office for the first time in a week. I’m a bit surprised by that as I ordinarily come in here every day, whether I am working at my full-time job or not. The past several days have once again, been an eye-opener for me. I’ve learned a few things, and I’ve needed to deal with doctors, medication interactions, and my job. But what might I write about that will interest you, my fans and fellow readers out there?
I could write about how well sales of my books are going. I’m very pleased with that, especially with the ‘Her Client’ series of books. It seems they are taking off. I’m a bit surprised with that revelation but what do I know? I write what comes to me, whether it is a nice, vanilla topic or not. But do you honestly care what my sales figures are? No, I wouldn’t think so. However, thank you to everyone who has bought my books.
I do have a new book, ‘The Trafficking Consortium,’ on the cusp of being released. An Advance Reader Copy (ARC) available for purchase right now on my website right now. My beta readers, (those readers who I make the book available for free with the understanding that they will write an honest critique as well point out problems in the book) have suggested a couple of revisions. After chatting with them and thinking about it, I decided to implement the changes. They were right. The changes will help with the flow of the book, and rectify a timeline issue that I had not considered before. In the end, it will be a better book.
If you want to be one of my beta readers, send me a request and I will be happy to send you a link to the free copy of the ARC.
Over the next couple of weeks, I will be implementing the changes and once again offer the revised edition for free with the promise of an honest critique of the book. So, if you’re eagerly awaiting the delivery of the first edition of the book to the general market, please be patient. I promise you. It’s coming. I love this story too much to let it die.
Circling back to what to write about in this post. I finally decided that, despite the issues I’ve experienced and suppressed from most people, I learned a valuable lesson which I would like to share with you.
Keep plugging. Don’t try to analyze and problem-solve that which you have no control over. Instead, deal with the here and now, work out a way to do what you love, and ways of coping to allow you to do exactly that. You know who you are. Be who you are. Fuck the rest. That’s my message to you.
Until next time, this is Richard Verry, with a cup of coffee, writing to you from my home office with windows that look out on a snow covered landscape and glad to be indoors.
It’s Sunday morning, and for the first time in a very long time, I see blue sky above. They tell me that within the U.S.; my city has the second fewest blue skies throughout the year. Seattle being the first.
Speaking of Seattle, the Seahawks went down quickly to the Atlanta Falcons in the divisional round of the American Football playoffs yesterday. Damn, they were my girlfriends pick to appear in the Super Bowl. We also had hoped that the Houston Texans would topple the Patriots, but as expected, they didn’t. They did put up a great fight against the home team. I thought it was going to be a blow-out and it wasn’t, despite the final score. For once, though, officiating didn’t feel all that one-sided for a change. Others may have a different opinion, but that’s what I got out of the game.
I hate to say it, but I think that the teams that will play in the Super Bowl will be New England vs. Dallas. The two teams I hate the most. Hey, don’t kill me. That’s how I have always felt, and probably will for the rest of my life. And for you Boston fans, let me just say, I love your city, been there a few times. I just hate the team. Dallas, to me, the only good thing you got going are the cheerleaders. There, I said it. Just don’t shoot me. Green Bay Packers, can you do it today? Can you put down the Cowboys in this afternoon’s game? I’m rooting for you.
Of course, my home team hasn’t made the playoffs in seventeen years. What the f#$&? So, what does that tell you?
Enough about weather and sports. I’m sure that there are enough weather and sports outlets out there that can fill your hungry minds.
I’m pretty sure my book, ‘The Trafficking Consortium,’ is ready for publishing. I’m just waiting on a couple of responses from my beta readers who are reading an advance release copy (ARC) of the book. I’m excited and nervous to read their reviews. Damn, the wait is excruciating.
If you want your own ARC of ‘The Trafficking Consortium,’ click the free button where you can download it free. All I ask that you write a review and post it on my site. You can do that, right? 
Just click the envelope on my home page, RichardVerry.com. This is a limited time offer. The promotion will end once the book is published.
It does deal with a tough subject, although the story is not as horrific as the ‘Her Client’ trilogy. I wrote it intentionally that way. Sure, there’s sex and death in the book but so do most suspense dramas. It’s a first person view of someone caught up in the human trafficking trade and what happens throughout their captivity. While they hate their captivity, they grow as a person and start to see their life in a whole new way. Suitable for all readers 18+. I think you’ll like it.
Time to refill my coffee, so, thank you for reading this. Remember, if you want your free ARC copy of ‘The Trafficking Consortium,’ click the free button where you can download it free. 
All I ask that you write a review and post it on my site. This is a limited time offer. The promotion will end once the book is published. All I ask that you write a review and post it on my site. Just click the envelope on my home page, RichardVerry.com.
Due to lots of icy rain and the aftereffects of my head injury suffered last summer, I just had to cancel a coffee date with a dear friend of mine. Damn it all! This head crap is really affecting my lifestyle. Will I ever get past this? PT is helping, for sure. But enough already! Okay, enough venting. Back to your normally scheduled programing.
Good cold morning. When I woke up this morning, I discovered we had a light overnight snowfall, and it was a whopping 6 degrees F (-14C), Brrr…. Now, a couple of hours later it’s risen to 16F (-9C). No matter how you cut it, it is still cold.
After making a cup of coffee, I sat down at my desk to consider what I would do today. Struggle over Lucky Bitch or begin working on a new story. Of course, I could do a Word of the Day … Nah.
Since I still haven’t figured out whether to kill the Bloodline storyline or not, I guess that leaves me with a new story. Okay, day decided, what else is there to talk about? Well, there’s the Golden Globes from last night? Did your favorites win? Don’t ask me; I didn’t watch them, and I care little about them.
Oh, I am thinking about putting down the keyboard and picking up charcoal, pencil, and paper and do some sketching. I have some really good ideas on what to put to paper. I would like to finish setting up my studio, but I ran out of supplies to continue. I should go to the hardware store, but, baby, it’s cold outside. It’s supposed to warm up mid-week so that should be a good time.
It’s strange; I used to love winter. The cold and the snow. I’d be outside sledding, skating, and even doing a little skiing. I’ve camped on top of a mountain in a tent pitched right on the snow. It was a good time, but that night, I froze, despite a solar blanket, cold weather foam padding, a 20below sleeping bag, parka with hood, thermal gloves, and ski cap. I didn’t sleep much that night and seemed to need to pee every half-hour. When the next morning came around and I broke camp, I discovered that my body heat and transformed six inches of snow into ice. I was sleeping on a bed of ice! Damn. Come to think of it; I think that was my last time camping in winter and maybe the start of my disliking the cold. Of course, age may have something to do with it. Nonetheless, I got the garbage out to the curb this morning for my weekly pickup and shoveled the driveway.
Enough talk about the cold. I know others have it much worse than I do, so it’s stupid to talk about it. Man, I need to be in the tropics right now.
And with that, I’ll sign off, still undecided as to whether to write, draw, or for that matter, do nothing. Wouldn’t that be nice. Not in my nature but I can still fantasize. Oh, yeah! Lying on a black sand beach in Hawaii, with a drink in one hand and the love of my life at my side, holding my other hand. Heaven!