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Wednesday, July 30, 2014

WHAT DO YOU SAY TO A CANCER PATIENT?




Life has proven challenging for many in my various circles of life. 

How many of your friends lately have been diagnosed with cancer?

I've had my own run-in's with cancer.
It's important to choose your words carefully when speaking to a cancer patient. 

Though you probably mean well, it's all too easy to accidentally hurt someone.


I was walking down the hospital hall with my mother when another cancer patient had a "friend" 

come up and rub her stubby head, saying, "Your hair looks great like this."

I had to restrain Mother from using her cane as a rectal thermometer on the patient's "friend."

 Any comment that calls attention to hair loss or a change in hair color or texture or a wig due to chemotherapy is wiser to avoid.  

Those things are usually a devastating outward sign of being different and sick to the patient.



BUT WHAT DO YOU SAY?




1. “How unfair. You must be so mad.”


                These words validate their feelings and hopefully makes them feel understood. 

Misery does love company. 

Misery does not always love the positive spin on tragic life events such as “You are strong. You will get through this.”   

When you are scared, you do not feel very strong at all.



2. Avoid asking “How are you feeling?”


                You want them to know that you care, but cancer patients get asked that all the time, and they get quickly tired of that question.   

And probably they are not feeling so great, and the question only reinforces that.



3. Be specific in your desire to help:


                “Is there anything I can do to help?" is too broad.   

Instead how about something like: 


"I'd like to bring you dinner. Would Tuesday or Wednesday night be better?" 

If you can't bring the person dinner, maybe you could buy groceries, 

take care of his or her kids one afternoon or give the person a ride to treatment. 

If there's a spouse or friend in charge of logistics, ask that person what you can do.



4. Before you speak ask yourself - 

"Is this a comment about me or is it a comment that would be helpful to the patient?"


                Don’t say something that would make you feel good, but something that might uplift the specific individual you are speaking to.


                "God doesn't give you more than you can handle."
   

This might be of comfort if the person is one of faith. 

But do you really know how the person is feeling spiritually at the moment?



5. Avoid saying “I know how you feel.”


                No, you don’t.   

Not even if you’ve survived a cancer experience.  Instead stay focused on the patient's needs and concerns.


                This includes telling the cancer patient about Aunt Maude’s cancer ordeal – especially if it had a fatal outcome.



6. According to Barbara L. Andersen, PhD, a researcher and professor of psychology, 

Two of the best things to say are easy: 

"I'm sorry you're ill" and "I'm thinking of you." 


                In fact, sometimes gestures speak louder than words.

 For instance, sending flowers or visiting with your friend’s favorite flowers or watching TV with them can offer comfort. 


If the friend has a garden they can no longer maintain, 

coming over periodically and pruning the garden as they sit in a chair and chat with you would be nice.


Every cancer patient has a different opinion and experience, of course, and many know that you do mean well.



7. If the person loves a specific style of music,

 bringing them the latest album of their favorite artist may say more than your words could.

Most of you are writers.  You are inventive.  

Just use some of that creativity in seeing the world as your ill friend is seeing it at the moment, 

and you will come up with what to say and do.  


My prayers and thoughts are with all of you out there struggling with crises that have enveloped you. 


May all of you find that peace in the center of your storm.

Tuesday, July 29, 2014

AS FAR AS YOUR IMAGINATION CAN TAKE YOU



Are you sick of the Publishing Machine that churns out sequels, remakes, and the same boring plot over and over?

Are you sick of the "heroic destiny" yet?

Well, VICTOR STANDISH has no heroic destiny to pry from the hands of a heartless Fate.

Destiny? 

He's too busy digging his next meal from a French Quarter alley dumpster

and his first love from the graveyard to have time to worry about destiny.

His adventures may start in modern New Orleans,

but they soon streak to the last day of Troy, to the French Quarter of 1834, and finally to the Off-Reality Betting Parlor at the End of All Things where literally anything goes ... and comes.

Along the way, Victor will meet the Angel of Death, Mesmer, the cats who owns a French Quarter Restaurant, vengeful demigods, warring Sidhe, living Egyptian mummies,

ride into battle with Valkyries, and even survive the hilarious Menage a Trois of Death

THE FIRST of his adventures

THE LEGEND OF VICTOR STANDISH is still FREE!
 http://www.amazon.com/LEGEND-VICTOR-STANDISH-Roland-Yeomans-ebook/dp/B005NCUTAG/

The rest of the series in order are:

2.) UNDER A VOODOO MOON

3.) THE RIVAL

4.) END OF DAYS ( told through the eyes of his ghoul friend, ALICE WENTWORTH)

5.) THE THREE SPIRIT KNIGHT

Remember when reading was fun and filled with wonder?  With VICTOR STANDISH, it still is.

 
And a movie that brings back the wonder and fun is:
 

Monday, July 28, 2014

THE STRAIN, THE LAST SHIP? Do you watch them?





THE LAST SHIP:


After a global pandemic kills or sickens over 80% of the world's population,

the crew (consisting of 217 men and women) of a lone unaffected U.S. Navy guided missile destroyer,

 the fictional USS Nathan James (DDG-151),

must try to find a cure and stop the virus in order to save humanity.


THE STRAIN:


The Strain is an American vampire horror–drama television series that premiered on FX on July 13, 2014.

It was created by Guillermo del Toro and Chuck Hogan,

based on their novel trilogy of the same name.

Del Toro and Hogan wrote the pilot episode, "Night Zero", which del Toro directed.


Both shows are well-done.  And the popularity of these shows and post-Apocalyptic books and films got to me wondering

 WHY?


The ghost of Carl Jung tells me the answer springs from Man's Collective Unconscious --

We know on some deeply unconscious (or maybe even conscious) level that we’re screwing things up.

We know that all our pollution and over-consumption is driving the planet to ruin.

We might not accept the science of climate change,

but we can’t ignore all the droughts, floods, super storms, forest fires, heat waves and other signs of a world spinning out of balance.

Nor can we ignore the many signs of social inequality and religious zealotry leading to civil unrest.

Teens are very conscious of this and of the gilding of the poltical speech from the world's leaders.

Teens usually have heard it all their lives from one or both parents.

Something is slowly going deeply wrong all around teens. 

Like the children they once were, they have little or no power to take control of the madness they see in the nightly news.

So of course. post-apocalyptic novels where teens save the day in a world gone mad become popular. 

It is wish-fulfilment and the refuting of adult denial at one and the same time.

Children in alcoholic families learn at a young age to pretend that there isn’t a problem

and act like everything is fine.

And the "easiest" way to do this is to deny your own experiences and emotions.

This takes a terrible emotional toll.

Post-apocalyptic books and films offer us a vision of the world gone wrong in a symbolic way

so that the problems that must not be mentioned in our real lives can finally be confronted ...

And the tension and angst of the pain can be sublimated in conscious form as Freud said our dreams did in our unconscious.

Teens can sense when adults and our society are being insincere. Post-apocalyptic books and films are a way of calling us out on this.

Or maybe not.
 

I’d love to hear other people’s thoughts on this.
 
If you enjoy post-apocalyptic books,
 why?
 
What is it about them that makes them
appealing to you?


 
 

Sunday, July 27, 2014

KINDLE UNLIMITED. WHAT IT MEANS TO YOU



WHAT'S IT ALL ABOUT, ALFIE?


Amazon launched KINDLE UNLIMITED last Friday ...

Where for a fixed fee of $9.99 a month

readers can read as many books as they want from a certain subset of the ebooks sold by Amazon.

It also includes a limited number of audio books from Audible.com.

Here is how the numbers break down:

– 2,769,500+ ebooks in Amazon
– 645,790 books in Kindle Unlimited (about 23%)
– 2,157 audio books (about 0.3% of the Kindle Unlimited Books
– 2,773 books in KU are free (even if the reader isn’t subscribed to Kindle Unlimited)


At $9.99 a month, Kindle Unlimited is the most expensive of the three services.

Scribd is $8.99 and Oyster is $9.95.

The Kindle Unlimited platform will feature such blockbuster titles as

The Harry Potter series, The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings trilogy, the Hunger Games trilogy, Diary of a Wimpy Kid books, and Flash Boys.

Several of these big titles aren’t available on Scribd or Oyster, which have around 400,000 and 500,000 ebooks to choose from, respectively.


BUT HOW DOES THIS AFFECT US AS AUTHORS?


The fee we will get is about $2 when 10% of our book is read.

If your book is in Kindle Direct Select, it is automatically entered into Kindle Unlimited. 

Amazon is allowing you a chance to withdraw your books now.

Amazon is also GIVING A FREE ONE MONTH TRIAL. 


Free.  I would suggest you see what Kindle Unlimited does for you in the next month before you withdraw any books.

Unless you are a best selling Indie author like Hugh Howey, your book must be EXCLUSIVE WITH AMAZON.

It's REAL LIFE folks:

If your books make lots of money for Amazon, you will be accorded special treatment.  Life is what it is.

But protests howled when Kindle Direct Select first came out ...

and then, the Indies discovered that those first who entered, got the best rewards.

I suggest trying Kindle Unlimited as an author.  You can always withdraw.

Check out my books.  Many of them are in KINDLE UNLIMITED.

And for those of you who do not want to spend $10 a month --

FOR A LIMITED TIME --

THE LEGEND OF VICTOR STANDISH
 http://www.amazon.com/LEGEND-VICTOR-STANDISH-Roland-Yeomans-ebook/dp/B005NCUTAG/

and

RITES OF PASSAGE
http://www.amazon.com/RITES-PASSAGE-Roland-Yeomans-ebook/dp/B004XQVPYM/

ARE FREE!

Saturday, July 26, 2014

NEVER RUN FROM WOLVES.

"Never run from wolves. You'll only taste better."
- Victor Standish.

 
Victor Standish here.  Even stories with no end have a beginning.  Mine is no different. 
 
But for a LIMITED TIME you can get MY BEGINNING FREE!
 
And once having gotten my Kindle book, you can get the AUDIO BOOK for $1.99!
 
How cool is that? 
 
And along the way you will meet fascinating characters like Mesmer, the only cat who owns a French Quarter restaurant.
 
You know what's missing from TODAY'S FANTASY and SCIENCE FICTION?
 
OPTIMISM .... and ... FUN.
 
 
I mean I sleep in libraries, and all you see these days on the shelves are Dystopian ...
 
Is it just me but does Dystopian sound like a sick stomach?
 
And these Apocalyptic novels? 
 
The girl who is fated to save the world.  Give me a break.  Hitler would've made short work of Katniss.
 
In a world gone mad ...
 
The best we kids can do is try and survive the madness of the adults around us and find a way to thumb our noses and laugh.
 
And what is it with all the zombies?  I mean my time in Detroit gave me all I want from them!
 
Ah, Alice, you're a ghoul, not some mindless zombie. 
 
Would you stop looking at my fingers like that?  Alice!
 
See?  Harry Potter never had this kind of trouble with Hermione!
 
 

Thursday, July 24, 2014

HAVE YOU EVER WONDERED?




Have you ever wondered?

Monday, I noticed a tattooed man talking animatedly in the parking lot of the Eye Clinic to which I was going to get my new glasses.

He was walking in circles, talking into a cell phone – his left arm waving wildly like a rabid windmill.

As I got out of my car, I heard him wail to the phone: 
“Baby!  You gotta believe me.  I wasn’t drunk.   I wasn’t!  I promised you I wouldn’t drink, and I haven’t.  If I sounded funny to you it was ‘cause I was on dope!”

He went silent, listening to the phone.  And I almost walked back to him to ask  what his “Baby” was saying in reply. 

But I wasn’t suicidal that day so I walked into the Eye Clinic.  Yet, I wondered how did he think what he said made things any better?

Yesterday, I read a Wall Street Journal article about Putin seeking a “Double-Tier” solution to his woes about the shot down airliner: 
to apologize yet still be right.

I could feel a nose-bleed coming on so I stopped reading.

I remember reading what Winston Churchill wrote after completing his volume on his early life {1874 to 1904} in 1920.

“I have drawn a picture of a vanished age.  
The character of society, the foundations of politics, the outlook of youth, the scales of values are all changed –

And changed to such an extent I should not have believed possible in so short a time without any violent domestic revolution.”

I reflected on how much further his world changed after 1920 until the time in 1953 when he won the Nobel Prize in Literature.  
Yes, LITERATURE not peace.  Politics was a dirty world in those days as well.  The “Lion in Winter” was a rival to be diminished in British politics back then.

Edward R. Murrow, the journalist who braced and shamed McCarthy, said of Churchill in 1940:

“He mobilized the English language and sent it into battle.”

I wonder:

Do words carry any weight anymore?
Like Gore Vidal wrote:  Has this age gone from the Guttenberg era to the Dark Ages of MTV?
Are we destined to devolve not evolve in our society?
How much has society changed around you since you were a teenager?
Was the world simpler only because you, yourself, was simpler?
Or have we edited our memories, as Churchill did who was emotionally abandoned by both parents
yet enshrined them in his memoirs?
 
Oh, by the way –

Congrats to Justin Bieber for FINALLY getting an advantage in life by cutting lines at Disneyland by being pushed in a borrowed wheelchair by handlers for a bad knee.

Disneyland allows its disabled guests to cut the lines at any rides that can accommodate them.

Of course, Disneyland has a fast line for the famous, but the wheelchair allowed him to get in front of his famous peers as well.

I wonder what Churchill would say?
 
(I love the dialogue in this movie)

Wednesday, July 23, 2014

GO BACK TO THE BEGINNING_for FREE!


Coming back to where you started is not the same as never leaving.”
 - Samuel McCord


In the French Quarter of the Roaring Twenties, there is a strange night club owner whom society shuns ...

unless their world has become nightmare.

Travel back to the FIRST and listen to Samuel McCord recount a tale of horror, love, sacrifice, and redemption to a young William Faulkner ...

A tale from the mists of America's beginnings in the year 1853.

Meet Meilori Shinseen, her vicious twin Maija, Elu, and the Turquoise Woman for the first time!

FOR FREE!  For a LIMITED TIME.  Want MORE?

Upon getting the FREE kindle book, you can download the AUDIO for a MERE $1.99!

Go back to McCord's beginning ... FOR FREE!