Escalator Riding For Beginners

The Next Big Thing is a series of blog posts where authors and other writers talk about their work by responding to ten uniform questions. At the end of the blog we tag other authors who will do the same thing a week (or so) later and so on it goes. So not only do you get to find out more about my book but you also will discover some other interesting writers. Soon to be published author and friend Mary-Lou Stephens  tagged me and here are my answers: 1. What is the working title of your next book? I got a feeling it will be my book of handy and helpful tips for young people titled either "Idiots Guide To Planet Earth" (since I'm pretty sure I won't be able to use "..... for Dummies")  or "How Stuff Really Works In The Bizarre World Of The Adults".  Something like that.  2. Where did the idea come from for the book? From talking to people ever since I could talk and watching their eyes glaze over every  time I started talking about a...

The Elderly: Once they get to a certain age, usually within plain sight of retirement from the job that has held them prisoner for their entire adult life, older people begin to do things differently. They take their time about things. Not because they are slow themselves but because they realise that no matter how fast you try to do things you will never beat time itself. Time marches on. The elderly, finally, know this. That is why they spend an inordinate amount of time in gardens and sipping tea. Gardens consistently provide proof that time is the boss of us all. That is also why the elderly drive their cars as if they were boats. When near elderly people who are driving always give them extra space and time to turn, to park, to do a u-turn, to respond to a signal, to brake. Give them an extra wide berth as you pass them by because who knows what sort of choppy current they are traversing, or whether the tides are coming in or going out. Nobody knows, but the elderl...

Mechanics A breed of mostly men trained to perpetually sabotage your automobile on a kind of falling dominoes system that starts when you first go in for an oil change only to find out, a month later, that you now need a new oil filter. After returning the car to have the oil filter changed you find out a month later that you need new spark plugs, and then another month later, new leads, then a fan belt, then clutch, then brake pads, then battery, water pump, transmission, head gasket and so on and so forth until you finally give up on your car and sell it to your mechanic who is only too happy to do you the favour and take it off your hands for, say, 100 bucks.   The next week you will recognise your old car standing out front of the mechanic shop looking brand new and sporting a big sign that says “One Owner! $17,000!” The trick is to check where the black fingerprints are located every time your car is returned to you after each bogus repair so you’ll know what they...