Dashing through the snow...

Yeah, right. Who dashes through the snow?

You slog, blog ... no not blog, ... but you moving through the snow isn't a dash, I don't care how many Clydesdales you have in front of you.

Sure, you can slide, glide, plummet, spin, tumble ... but don't give me no dashes. I ran enough track ... when I was young ... to know the difference between a dash and what I was doing on my way to my booksigning at Borders Books & Music yesterday.

When I woke up, there was a lovely white wintry wonderland outside, complete with eight inches of brand new snow, gusted up to over a foot here and there, twinkling merrily as the ice crystals laughed at me with tinkery little titters.

But I had a booksigning to do.

So I lashed up my bobsled, tethered up the huskies and ... no? .... no bobsled? ... no huskies?

Okay, fine, I grabbed my Budweiser horses and wrapped them up in leathers that would enrapture a masochist, cracked a whip over their heads and ... huh? ... no sleigh either?

So I got my cross country skies, put my signing pen in my pocket and .... what, you don't believe?

All right, all right.

The truth is, I went outside, huffed my way through the snow with my shovel, all the time muttering my yearly mantra - "next year I get a snowblower" - and cleared the way through to where the county had already plowed.

Then I leaped on my snowmobile ... hah, all right ... you got me again. No snowmobile.

I got in my car, strapped up really nice, and drove out to Matteson.

Last year the Matteson Borders had me out twice to sign my first book. First, in October, and back two months later. I sold a lot of books, including selling all of them the second time right before Christmas.

So I was hoping my visit this time would carry the same magic, but the snow had other ideas. Instead of lines snaking around the store, the store was quiet. Too many people hid in their houses rather than brave the ice and snow. But still, I had a great time and sold a lot of my books. Sold over twenty of my second book, and a dozen of my first.

But the store manager likes how I 'work' the crowds, so she asked me to do an encore performance this coming Friday. So I'm going right back.

The next day will be a signing at Centuries and Sleuths for our new anthology, Heat of the Moment. This will be a new experience for me, because it's a joint signing! I mean, I've gone to author fairs and signed 'with' people, but we are maybe a little bit competitors ... all vying for the readers' limited book allowances.

Not this time, though, this is purely a cooperative venture. We're all there for the same book, and the same great ideal, to help people!

I'm really looking forward to it and meeting my fellow authors. Come out and join us! Centuries and Sleuths, 7419 W. Madison in Forest Park, Il. We'll be out there from 2:00 until ?

And this time, I'm bringing my track shoes so I can do that dash thing.

Norm

www.normcowie.com
The Adventures of Guy ... written by a guy (probably)
The Next Adventures of Guy ... more wackiness
Heat of the Moment (anthology)