Black-Out

My BFF's Aunt is a Monster

2010-04-10T07:10:00.000-07:00

I want to write scary again, soon.

I am in the thick of revising (nay, rewriting) my historical novel, and I keep wanting to put ghosts in. Alas, its plot won't have any in the way of ghosts unless I put in a nightmare scene.

Anyway, about this story itch.

I keep thinking back to this trip I made with my girlfriends between high school and college. What if my BFF's aunt was a monster?

Mmm.

Haunted?

2010-03-16T07:35:00.000-07:00

This past Friday, my family and I went to see a house built in 1907. (We are looking for horse property, and this house sits on nearly two acres in the old section of our small town.)

I held no high hopes for this light-yellow two-story house. The brick around the foundation looked like it was crumbling or sagging. A lone, overgrown pine tree was its only front yard accent. A black cat provided color and life in an otherwise bland facade. We walked around the grounds first as another realtor was showing the house, and peered into the crawl space towards the back of the house. (A perfect place for a child to hide and discover something terrifying.) There was a shed labeled "Danger: Chlorine Gas" with a metal container for "Gas Masks".

But inside was something else. It made me think of pioneer houses in the memorial parks in downtown Salt Lake City. Lovely and possibly - with the help of my overactive imagination -haunted.

***
There was a spacious entry with hardwood polished to a high sheen. There were french doors on both sides. To the right was a front room with a carved fireplace mantle in gorgeous wood and framed with painted tile. To the left was a dining room with a built in china hutch and another ornate fireplace. From the dining room, you go into the kitchen, which, for an older home, felt spacious, with modern-day amenities; no original wood stove.

To the back of the house, a more recent occupant added onto the building with a rectangular family/work room which is probably where they did laundry because there were water hook-ups. The room smelled of turpentine because of the various paints and stains being stored there. (Mmm, or maybe there was a former occupant who painted at the first light of dawn or late into the evening by candle night?)

There was one bedroom downstairs. I loved the bathroom, with its clawed bathtub and tall ceiling. It reminded me of a bathroom we had in the Philippines when we rented this old Spanish house.

As we went upstairs through this narrow stairway, a musty smell overpowered me and gave me goose bumps. There was a plant ledge at the turn of the stairs in front of a window. The three bedrooms upstairs all had interesting shapes that followed the sloping roof line. There was also an attic, where one could keep an insane relative under watch from a servant (a la Jane Eyre). One door led to the house addition's roof, which was spongy under our step and led to an unrailed edge which was a good drop to the lawn below.

Okay, so maybe it wasn't really a haunted house, but I already decided I want this house as a setting for a ghost story someday.

Scare The Dickens Out Of Us

2010-01-30T06:24:00.000-08:00

Have you heard of the "SCARE THE DICKENS OUT OF US" short story contest 2010? It is a contest sponsored by the Clark Library Friends

$20 ENTRY FEE First prize, $1,000 and a trophy.Second prize, $500 and a ribbon. Third prize, $250 and a ribbon.Junior contest prize $250 and a trophy.

The contest is a Friends of the Dr. Eugene Clark Library fundraiser and is privately funded. All entry fees go to the Friends and are used for library projects. The contest is open to published and unpublished writers alike. The ghost story must be 5,000 words or less, in English, and typed double-spaced. Deadline October 1, 2010.

From Hope Clark's Fund For Writers

Dead Dizzy Lizzy for Class Pet

2009-10-08T12:02:00.000-07:00

Here's a short story I wrote for and shared with my fourth grade daughter's class. There's a dead lizard in it, so I figured it could go in my horror blog.

(Dead) Dizzy Lizzy for Class Pet

Mrs. W’s fourth grade students wanted to keep a dead lizard for a class pet.

They had this lizard, see. Her name was Dizzy Lizzy and she lived in an aquarium on the shelf which the sun hits nicely in the afternoon. She had purple streaks along her cheeks, a yellow line on her back, and little teeth that seemed to smile when someone gave her a cricket. She got her name because whenever she got excited running after crickets, she twirled round and round until people watching got dizzy.

But she died.

Maybe she was lonely. Maybe she ate too many crickets one day. Maybe she got too cold the week it rained all day, every day and no one hardly saw the sun.

They were going to take her out of the aquarium to bury her in the school yard, but S. – who always says hi to stray cats and gives her dogs treats under the dinner table when she thinks her parents aren’t looking – said, “Please, can we still keep her as the class pet?”

At first, her classmates looked at her funny. Her best friend N. even giggled about it. But soon, everyone was nodding – what a great idea! – and turned to look expectantly at Mrs. Walker.

Mrs. W. said, “I don’t know. Let’s ask Mr. B.”

Mr. B was the school principal. Mr. B usually walked around doing important things with an important look on his face. And sometimes the kids didn’t want to bother him about questions like “Can we keep a dead lizard as a class pet?” because he seemed too busy to bother. Today was a hard day to bother him because it was photo day and he had spent all morning with the photographer after a student jammed a camera with a piece of chewed gum.

But they were already standing as a class in his doorway. Mr. B looked up from his desk and of course asked what he could do for them.

Someone pushed S. forward. She finally said, after three unsuccessful tries, “Please, can we keep Dizzy Lizzy in our classroom?”

Mr. B’s smile froze on his face. “Are we talking about a student?”

Fortunately, Mrs. W explained. But Mr. B still looked puzzled. “A dead lizard?” he asked.

Everyone nodded.

Mr. B leaned back and thought about it. Then thought about it some more. Finally, he plucked a book from his shelf and opened it up. He said, “I am sorry, but according to school rules, ‘Only live pets are allowed.’”

All the kids walked back so slowly and sadly that by the time they reached the classroom, they missed recess. They all crowded around the aquarium to say goodbye to their dear Dizzy Lizzy. But when they got there, the aquarium was empty. A nearby window was open, Mrs. W’s water bottle was tipped over on its side and there was a gum wrapper on the floor.

Whatever could have happened?!

The Next Time I Lie

2009-07-29T07:49:00.000-07:00

At a recent campout with girls from our church (I was one of the leaders), we gathered around the camp fire to exchange scary stories. Most of the others' stories had to do with intruders or sounds in the night.

I told them, "I have a story," and proceeded to tell them in essence, the first chapter of my novel "Ghost Moon Night". Everyone hung on to my every word, and then I revealed that I was fibbing. Someone asked, did you just make that up? I said, no.

It worked once, I don't know if it'll work again, the next time I say, "I have a scary story to tell..."

I feel obligated to reveal next time if I am making the story up, or if it's real. But what's the fun in that?

From the Dead

2009-05-04T13:02:00.000-07:00

I have resurrected my YA paranormal novel Ghost Moon Night. Taken it out of the crypt and sent it out again to haunt an editor whom I met recently at a writer's conference. I tweaked it some, but otherwise, let the first three chapters stand as is.

I had shown her my first chapter of a historical novel, and though she loved it, she doesn't represent that genre. And then it occurred to me, listening to her presentation, hey, she represents paranormal!

It took me two days to figure this out.

So I asked her if she would look at my ms. She said, sure, send me first three chapters. Normally, she doesn't even look at ms without an agent's blessing. So the conference has been a great foot in the door.

Now I wait.

Too Happy

2009-04-13T22:52:00.000-07:00

I have a little problem.

It's spring, I am eating pastel M&Ms, baby calves are running in farm fields around town...

...and I am not in the mood to write horror.

I'm too happy.

My latest novel is waiting for edits and then submission to agents, and I am thinking of tackling my "coconut" horror novel.

What I really would rather do is to run down to a beach somewhere and sip coconut under the shade of an umbrella.

Friday the 13th

2009-02-13T06:23:00.000-08:00

Are you superstitious about Friday the 13th?

I'm not. But when I was growing up in the Philippines, my family was superstitious about some other things.

For example:

Don't sweep uncooked rice or you will sweep good fortune out the door. (As a child, if I spilled uncooked rice, I had to pick up every grain.)

If you bite your tongue, someone is thinking of you. Name a letter and a person's name starting with that letter; they are thinking of you. (This is a fun game I do with my kids now.)

Jump at midnight on New Year's Eve and you will grow taller. (Didn't work too well for me.)

Serve round fruits and long food (like noodles) on New Year's Eve to ensure prosperity for the coming year.

***
Are YOU superstitious?

Out of the Darkness

2009-01-29T23:39:00.000-08:00

In my previous post, I wrote about a new horror story I am working on. At first I was really excited about it. But now, I am not so sure because of the horrid feeling the first chapter gave me.

Ghost Moon Night is scary but does not have a pervasive feeling of evil. Whereas this new chapter involving coconuts (I am trying to write this with a straight face) makes me feel dark and dismal and dread-y if there is such a word. Thank goodness for a goofball sort of hero, or I'd have stopped at page five.

I am not sure I want to channel this story to life.

***
So I took a break and wrote another first chapter to a YA novel and the feeling is like light and day. The characters still are flawed and there will be major conflicts, but for the first time in a long time, I felt - emotion! Sadness. Wistfulness. Happiness. As I closed the scene, I felt like I was writing something that could illuminate the human experience. I am usually unsentimental in my fiction and avoid Hallmarky stories, but I really enjoyed writing this. The words flow and I do not grit my teeth over the effort.

Truth is, unleashing emotion on the page scares me. It is powerful but makes me feel utterly vulnerable.

***
I cannot imagine not writing horror anymore. It's been such an integral part of my writing life, hence this blog.

But what goes in has to have a source, and I'm just not sure I want to be the receptacle of all that.

A New Story

2009-01-26T11:16:00.000-08:00

I've started a new story.

All I'm saying is it's scary and involves coconuts.

I showed the first chapter to my 13 year old daughter and she gave me this weird look when she was done.

I don't think she'll be my first reader.

***
I aspire to be a YA writer, but in reality, maybe my themes are too adult.

My husband keeps telling me that, but I'm still hoping to be considered YA. I don't know why, I guess because it sounds more "important".

Please Do Not Disturb

2009-01-09T07:06:00.000-08:00

Here's a short story to ring the new year with. I wrote this two years ago, my first stab at a short horror piece. Be warned, it is a little disturbing.

***
"Look," the girl said to Ruben, "a nuno sa punso." A gnome in a mound.

In the moonlight, Ruben saw a two-foot tall berm. He silently scoffed. It looked more like an ant hill to him.

"Where are you going?" he asked as she veered to the right.

"Don't you know, we're supposed to leave them undisturbed, or else..."

"Or else what?"

"Or else the nuno will get mad and cast a spell on you."

"You don't really believe that, do you? Anyway, we'll just walk by it." But the girl hung back.

The church bell tolled. "I guess," she said, "we can go this way or we'll be really late for mass." She pressed close to him as they made their way toward the mound.

This vacation was going better than Ruben expected. At first he had hated the idea of going to the Philippines for Christmas. He had rolled his eyes. Christmas among the provincials, in his mother's hometown. Not to mention New Year's Eve. No parties in Boston, no watching the ball drop at Time Square on TV, no kiss at midnight with some girl.

This girl's name was Diana, and she was from Manila. They met at someone's house earlier in the evening. She had invited him to attend mass to celebrate the arrival of the new year. He knew better than to pass up such an opportunity. She was a little taller than him, big deal. She was cute anyway.

They came to the mound and stared.

"When my uncle was young," she said in a hushed voice, "he stepped on one and he went blind for a while."

"No one really lives there," he said.

"Shh. He'll hear you." She walked a few steps, giving the mound wide berth, and glanced at him anxiously. "You coming?"

He took a step back and kicked at the mound. Diana screamed.

"What have you done?" She was all hysterical. It was kind of funny, really.

"It's just an ant hill, see? There's nothing in it." He laughed, but she was already stomping off.

They squeezed into a crowded bench at the back of the church.

The priest was droning on and on. Ruben looked at his watch. Twenty minutes to midnight. He remembered another Filipino superstition. He and his sisters had done it a million times on New Year's Eve.

Jump up exactly at midnight on New Year's Eve and you'll gain an inch or two.

If he gained another inch or two, he'd be as tall as Diana.

At midnight, the church bell tolled. Ruben jumped in place. Diana gave him a scathing glance. Goll, she sure was a nag. He yawned.

When he opened his eyes, his first thought was, where'd all the people go? In front of him was a wall of wood, and to his right was a dark blue curtain.

Then he looked up.

That blue curtain, it was Diana's leg in jeans. She towered over him like a giant. And he was like an ant.

He thought of the nuno sa punso, the one he stupidly demolished.

He screamed just as Diana's foot shifted and her shoe squished him.

Spook Alley

2008-12-15T07:21:00.000-08:00

I'm gonna check out this spook alley, but I won't be taking anyone along. Till the next scare...

Scary Christmas Story

2008-12-02T23:13:00.000-08:00

As I have done over the last few years, I am gearing up to enter a fictional piece in our local paper's holiday writing contest. I am planning to write a scary Christmas story.

My daughter heard me tell my plan to my husband and she asked, "Why do you like writing scary Christmas stories?"

I told her I do because it's more unique, unexpected. And I love turning the stereotype of the Hallmark Christmas story on its ear.

***
Do you like writing scary stories? Why? How did you get started?

A Grave Tradition

2008-10-31T06:59:00.000-07:00

No pumpkins, no trick-or-treating, no costumes.

Halloween in the Philippines, as our family celebrated it when I was a young girl, was called "All Soul's Day" or Todos Los Santos on October 31st.

The first scary thing about the holiday was...the traffic jam created by all these cars lined up to go into the cemetery, Loyola Cemetery, where my mom's parents were buried. I remember the smell of candles and garlands of this fragrant flower called Sampaguita which vendors hawked along the way.

Once we got in to the cemetery, it was time to settle in for the rosary (I was Catholic then, LDS now). Usually one of the elder aunts recited it for us to follow along. It was really hard to concentrate because...

...sometimes I would see a hand rise up from behind the grave markers.

(photo by yveslecoq on Flickr)

Well, I imagined one...

It was also hard to concentrate on prayers because all around us was a big party.

Music. Loud laughter. Food spread on top of people's graves. The whole place blazed with lights from candles.

I thought then how rude of these people to not be solemn this day commemorating the dead.

But now that I think back, perhaps it was good to be celebrating the living, too!

***
If you want to see how I celebrate Halloween today, come by my scary photo post (that needs a caption) on my blog "Pink Ink".

An Excited Reader

2008-10-08T14:23:00.000-07:00

Me: How was school today?

Youngest daughter: *shrugs* We had a sub today.

Me: *after a long pause, waiting for more* Anything else interesting?

Youngest daughter: *eyes light up* I got another Warriors book!

For a good ten, fifteen minutes, my youngest daughter proceeds to tell me all about Squirrelpaw, Leafpaw and Cinderpelt, cats who figure prominently in Erin Hunter's book Dawn from her Warriors series.

That I can write a book that would excite a reader like my youngest daughter!

Getting Un-Lost

2008-09-30T07:55:00.000-07:00

Just a couple of weeks ago, I was struggling with the revisions of my YA historical novel "Girl From Gurian". I kept hitting Chapter Three only to feel stumped as to how to continue. I felt extremely lost.

I felt like I was banging my head against the wall. Very unproductive. I needed to do something different.

***

Also just a couple of weeks ago,I took my kids to the State Fair. At one point, I felt extremely lost.

I am notorious with my family for getting lost. It is so bad that when we first moved into our house six years ago, I had to rely on my then 7 year old daughter for directions on which street to turn. And even now, I have to ask her if I turn right or left on Main Street to get to the stable where we board our horses.

So at the State Fair, I stood there lost, and asked Sierra to lead the way. She did, with little difficulty.

I realize now if I had just put in a little effort - determined where I wanted to go, studied the map and thought about it some - I don't think I'd have felt as lost as I did.

***

I learned something from that experience that I can apply to fiction writing.

1. Use a map. A synopsis functions like a map. It is there to guide me, but not set in stone. I don't have to go down a certain storyline if I don't want to, but I certainly can explore different routes. When I wrote a synopsis, my manuscript took off once again. I don't have to wonder if I am actually going somewhere with my story.

2. Think before you go. Just the mere act of thinking, sifting through the story, gets me out of paralysis. When I pause before barrelling down on a story, it shows.

3. Learn from someone who does it better. My daughter is better than me at figuring out where places are. There are many other story-tellers out there that I can learn from.

4. Look for familiar landmarks. As I have written more and more fiction, I feel like I am recognizing familiar places to really pack the punch. For instance, I spend a little more time in the opening chapters, I focus on making great first-fifty pages. It sets the tone for the rest of the story.

***

Have you ever felt stumped in your fiction? Felt lost? How did you break through it?

Ghost Moon Night - First Chapter

2008-09-16T07:12:00.000-07:00

Here's the first chapter of "Ghost Moon Night," my horror novel set in 1950s Philippines about a town haunted by evil creatures on ghost moon night.

Coastal town of Dasalin, Philippines

I was six when I first discovered the peculiar nature of ghost moon night.

For as long as I could remember, I was forbidden to go outside on ghost moon night, which is that one night in the month when the sky is completely empty of the moon.

It had been a rainy day, and I had to stay indoors. My mother hardly hung up the switch she used to swat me with, I was always getting in trouble. Late that night, the rain finally ceased. I didn’t care if it was ghost moon night, I was determined to go outside to the batalan and get a drink of water.

To get a drink now, you simply turn on the faucet inside the house. But when I was six, the kitchen was outside, and to get water, you had to pump it from the well.

My mother said I had to wait until sun-up, but I didn’t want to wait that long. When she wasn’t looking, I bolted out the back door and ran past the ditch where the labandera washed the clothes, to the outside kitchen where the pump was.

Someone had already beaten me to it. At first I thought it was Trining, the servant-girl, but then, I realized it wasn’t. For one thing, Trining had just cut her hair short with a pair of dull scissors, and this girl had long hair over a dark shawl.

The girl had her back turned towards me. I heard the handle of the pump creak as she lifted it up, the gush of water hitting the ground. And then I heard a horrible noise.

Even now, seventy years later, the hairs on my arm stand on end when I think about it.

It was the sound of an animal, slurping noisily, gulping in mouthfuls, with satisfied growls coming from the back of its throat.

I stood there frozen for a good minute, then I turned right around and ran to the back door as fast as I could.

I twisted the knob, but it would not budge. My clammy hands slipped as I tried to get the door open, and then I realized I must have accidentally locked it behind me. I pounded on the door and cried, “Mother! Mother!”

For what seemed like an awfully long time, no one came to the door. I looked over my shoulder and could make out the figure of a woman slowly approaching me, just beyond the low wall, against which the wash basin was leaned to dry for the night. What I thought was a shawl unfurled behind her, like wings.

Once again, I pounded on that door until finally, it opened and I collapsed in a heap at my mother’s feet. She slammed the door shut and locked it behind me.

“Susmaryosep, Antonio,” she said, looking frightened. “Didn’t I tell you to stay inside?”

“What is all this commotion about?” My father appeared in the doorway of the dining room.”

My voice was small and pinched. “I was getting a drink.”

“It’s ghost moon night,” Father said, frowning at Mother. “How could you send him outside?”

“I didn’t,” she said. “He went out on his own.”

I sat cross-legged on the floor, holding still for once that day, staring at my lap.

“Did you see anything?” Father asked. I knew he was talking to me, but I ignored him and continued to just stare. Mother bent down, grabbed my shoulder and repeated the question.

I hugged my knees and said, “I’m sleepy.”

***

All the lamps in the house were lit, like times when my parents expected visitors. My father accompanied me to my bedroom, tucked me under my mosquito net and sat on a chair beside my bed. Moths flit about my bedside lamp and cast dancing shadows on a wall adorned with a painting of the Sacred Heart of Jesus cut out from a calendar. A heart glowed on his chest.

“Son,” he said. “I was going to wait to tell you about ghost moon night until you were older, but I see that it cannot wait. Do you know why we stay inside and shut all the doors and windows?”

I mumbled something about multo, or ghosts.

“They are not just ordinary ghosts,” Father said. “They are called langbuan, for they come out that one day in the month when there is no moon, or walang buwan. They committed such terrible sins while alive that they are cursed to wander our town on ghost moon night.”

“Trining says they eat people, and that they especially like children who misbehave.”

Father smiled. “I don’t know about eating people, but they do steal people’s souls.”

I imagined my chest laid open, a clawed hand reaching for my soul. My eyes wandered over to the portrait of Jesus and his exposed heart. I looked away, burrowed deeper under my thin sheet and shuddered.

“Trining was lying anyway,” I said. “She also told me they looked like monkeys, when actually…”
My words died on my lips as Father’s gaze sharpened. Something in it scared me, and I could not go on.

“Promise me you will never go out on ghost moon night,” Father said, his voice trembling with strong emotion.

“Yes, Father,” I said.

“When I think of what could have happened to you tonight…”

“I was just thirsty,” I blubbered, trying to head off a tongue-lashing. “I didn’t mean to…”

Father reached in under the mosquito net and patted me awkwardly until my sobs subsided, and I felt a little better. As he usually did, he left the lamp which stood sentinel over my closed window burning. Later, I realized that he also left my bedside lamp lit well into dawn, for which I was grateful. I really needed it that night.

There were times, in later years, when I sensed my father wanted to speak to me about what happened that night, but I usually changed the topic. I learned my lesson, though. I never went out on ghost moon night.

Not until I was seventeen. Do you want to know what happened then?

You know, your mother will not appreciate my telling you this story. You might have nightmares.

Very well, don’t say I didn’t warn you.

The room down the hallway

2008-09-06T23:07:00.000-07:00

When I was eight years old, my family moved to an old two-story house in the San Beda area of Manila, Philippines. It was crafted in the Spanish style, with a tile roof and a stucco stairway that led from the driveway to the second floor. My father worked for the government and made a decent living, but apparently it was not enough because I remember moving from rental to rental until this house. It could also be that my father never got along with neighbors.

It was a huge house, the kind that a child could happily get lost in. Our widowed landlady lived on the ground floor and operated a store; we lived on the upper floor. There was a spacious living room with a hardwood floor and two large picture windows that looked out onto the other houses. Saturdays, the maids would polish the floor with coconut husk and floor wax until it gleamed. We didn't have any furniture in it, which suited us children just fine. I would lay on the floor next to the window and watch dust motes float in the sunlight. Next to the foyer, there was a room rented out to an Iranian student named Irwan whom my brother, sister and I would tease: "Irwan! Two! Three!"

We occupied the kitchen and the room next to it, both of which lay just past the living room. It was a very interesting sleeping arrangement. My family (my parents and three kids) slept on one mattress on the floor. I can't remember if the maids slept on it, too, but logic says otherwise. I mean, is there a mattress big enough for eight people? I don't know, but I remember all of us sleeping in that room, with a urinal to use in the middle of the night tucked in one corner.

Like I said, very interesting.

Past the kitchen was a hallway which had more bedrooms, most of which were unoccupied during the year or two we lived there. We set up the sewing machine in the first one on the left. Through that bedroom window, I could see the top of a tree and into the dirt, fenced compound of the neighbor whose dog chased and bit my brother. Across from this bedroom, there was the bathroom, with old-fashioned spigots and a tiny window that let in little light.

At the end of the hallway, there was a little room with a door that opened like an accordion.

Now this is where it gets even more interesting.

Someone told us, in that room, a nurse had committed suicide.

I didn't know if that rumor was true, or the product of someone's imagination. But as an eight year old, I believed that with all my heart. When I went down the dimly lit hallway, my eyes were riveted to that door, half-expecting it to be open and then:

A corpse in a nurse's dress would be swinging from a rope at the rafters.

Just thinking about that, these many years later, gives me goose bumps all over again.

How I Started Writing Horror Fiction

2008-08-21T13:38:00.000-07:00

It was Christmas of 2006 and I was thinking of a plot for a short story to submit to our local paper for their Holiday Contest. I didn't want the piece to be sappy. The year before, I submitted a piece called "Gift Exchange" which was about a girl who makes friends with the new boarder in her house and THAT bordered a little on sappy. This time, I wanted to turn the stereotype of the holiday story on its ear. I wanted a piece that would scare people.

I thought of holiday traditions I grew up with in the Philippines, where I spent the first 15 years of my life. My family put up a fake five-foot-tall Christmas tree in our living room which I liked to stare at while listening to the Carpenters' Christmas Portrait album. That's probably scary to some people, but to me that was a pleasant experience. We put up a Santa poster, had a Christmas party and went to mass on Christmas Eve. On New Year's Eve, we also went to mass. At the stroke of midnight, my siblings and I would jump (in the middle of mass) because there is a Philippine superstition that if you jump at midnight, you will get taller.

I decided the story would be set in a Philippine province on New Year's Eve, and the main character would be a Filipino-American boy who kicks a nuno sa punso (a mound with an elf) and gets cursed on New Year's Eve. When he jumps in mass, instead of getting taller, he shrinks to the size of an ant.The story came to me easily. When I was finished, I looked at it and went, "Whoa. Where'd that come from?" I submitted it and got surprised reactions from family and friends. "I didn't know you had that in you," was the general feedback.

I'm a pink-lover and a girly-girl (see my other blog Pink Ink), and I enjoyed shocking people.