If we’ve learned anything from the girl who was hired by the Kent Police commissioner’s office to advise on youth crime, it is to be careful what you say on social networks. Granted what she said was bang out of order but she would never have been caught if she hadn’t posted it.

What do you do if you’ve written something that has been misconstrued?

You are probably wondering what this is about. Well I signed a petition to say that I didn’t agree that the recently departed Baroness Margaret Thatcher should not have a no holds barred funeral similar to Princess Diana and the Queen Mother.

My reasons are:

• Most Prime Ministers have low-key funerals. I think this is more appropriate so the families can grieve in solitude.
• Baroness Thatcher is not and never has been a member of the royal family.
• In a time of austerity it is wrong to spend that much money on a funeral when there are soo many people suffering in this country because of government cuts. That money could go to better use.

So there you have it, my feelings on the subject. I should point out that I don’t really have any strong feelings for the ex-prime minister personally.  I don’t really remember her that well. I was in school during her reign and only saw her in person once. This was in the Houses of Parliament where I watched her being booed and jeered at during a speech. No idea what it was about but that was the only lasting impression I have of the visit.

Therefore I would never say anything nice or horrible about her as a person. In fact with my limited understanding of her achievements,  I approve of the Falklands war. Only because she was protecting the little guy from a big bully of a neighbour. Might not be how she viewed it but that’s how it looked to me.

You now know the background. So I signed the petition online and put it on Facebook. Next we know a relative has misread it and thinks I’ve said something awful about her. I mean c’mon, this is me. I once completely irritated a friend because I refused to slag anyone off. Sorry about the vulgarity there.

What can you do in this situation? Well I unfriended the relative in question. It is not worth the family arguments if my posts will be misread. I have freedom of speech and I don’t want to argue over it.

If you are anything like me, you never knew there were so many verses to Row, row, row your boat. Seriously, how many? For the benefit of new parents everywhere, I have collated a whole load of verses, thanks to Wikipedia and Mumsnet. To be honest most of them came from Mumsnet and the baby group I went to.

Scroll down for the a Youtube video of me singing them. I apologisr most profusely for the indignity your ears will be feeling!

Variations on Row, row, row your boat:

Row, row, row your boat,
Gently down the stream,
Merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily,
Life is but a dream.

Row, row, row your boat,
Gently down the stream,
If you see a crocodile,
Don’t forget to scream.

Row, row, row your boat,
Gently down the Nile,
If you see a camel,
Don’t forget to smile.

Row, row, row your boat,
Gently down the river,
If you see a polar bear,
Don’t forget to shiver.

Row, row, row your boat,
Gently to the shore,
If you see a lion there,
Don’t forget to roar!

Row, row, row your boat,
Gently down the creek,
If you see a little mouse,
Don’t forget to squeak.

Row, row, row your boat,
Gently over the waterfall,
If you see a telephone,
Don’t forget to call.

Row, row, row your boat,
Gently over the weir,
If you see a public house,
Don’t forget the beer.

Row, row, row your boat,
Gently across the lake,
If you see a jellyfish,
Don’t forget to shake.

Row, row, row your boat,
Gently under the bridges,
If you see an insect cloud,
Watch out for the midges!

Row, row, row your boat,
Gently down the brook,
If you see a skinny dipper,
Don’t forget to look.

Rock, rock, rock the boat,
Gently to and fro,
If you do it hard enough,
Into the water you go.

Row, row, row the boat,
Gently in the bath,
If you see a spider,
Don’t forget to laugh.

Row, row, row the boat,
Gently as can be,
‘Cause if you’re not careful,
You’ll fall into the sea!

Row, row, row the boat,
Gently down the stream,
Throw your teachers overboard,
And listen to them scream!

Propel, propel, propel your craft,
Softly down the liquid solution,
Happilly, Happilly, Happilly, Happilly,
Existence is but an illusion.

Rock, rock, rock the boat,
Gently down the shore,
If you see a dinosaur,
Don’t forget to roar.

Row, row, row your boat,
Away from all your troubles,
If you see them following you,
Better blow some bubbles!

Row row row the boat,
Gently under the stream,
Ha ha, fooled you,
I’m a submarine!

Row, row, row your boat,
Quickly out to sea,
When you’ve sailed the ocean long,
Just come home to me.

Row, row, row the boat,
Gently over the lagoon,
If you look up to the sky,
You will see the moon.

Row, row, row the boat,
Gently over the sea,
Can you see the pretty fish,
Swim from you to me?

Shunt, shunt, shunt the train,
Gently down the track,
Merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily,
Up the line and back.

Drive, drive, drive your car,
Quickly down the road,
Merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily,
With a heavy load.

Row, row, row the boat,
Gently on the tide,
Merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily,
To the other side.

Row, row, row your boat,
Gently in the bath,
If you see a tall giraffe,
Don’t forget to laugh.

Row, row, row your boat,
Gently out to sea,
If you see a big blue whale,
Invite him home to tea.

Row, row, row your ferry,
Gently ‘cross the Channel,
Up and down, over the bumps,
Like a giddy camel.

Row, row, row your boat,
Gently out to sea,
If you see a mermaid,
Give her a kiss from m.

Row, row, row your boat,
Gently to the cave,
If you see a friendly bear,
Don’t forget to wave.

Row, row, row your boat,
Gently to the cave,
We’re all getting tired now,
It’s been a long long day.

I never thought I was going to have a kid and I was never interested in the world of children. In fact I used to walk in the opposite direction when I used to hear the sounds of a baby when they were introduced  at my old workplace.

My pet ‘hate’ used to be profile pictures of babies. I
found it creepy talking to a thirty something who looked like a baby. …and the timelines, sooo many baby pictures, why did they take so many?

Well since December the shoe has been on the other foot. While I haven’t gone down the profile pic route,  I have *gulp* been updating my timeline with cute baby pictures. I can’t help myself. He does sonethibg cute and I am compelled to pick my phone up and take a photo.  Then my finger slips to the share button and somehow slides to the Facebook app. It’s like my fingers have a life of their own.

So I now get it. You can’t fight the cuteness. You just have to go with the flow and hope your single friends (and those who don’t want kids) forgive you eventually. Or at least until they have their own and face the same fate as well.

…and another thing, the really weird thing is I like looking at other people’s baby photos now!

It is my great pleasure to be part of Carlie Cullen’s blog tour. The first part of a paranormal romance trilogy, this debut novel will blow you away.

Giveaways to celebrate the launch will run from 8-31 October. It’s still not too late to enter! For further details, please visit http://carliemacullen.com

Excerpt of Heart Search

“Dayna, on the first charge, how do you plead?”

Dayna hesitated. She was tempted to plead ‘not guilty’, but it was obvious they knew everything so what was the point? She raised her eyes and looked directly at Sophia.

“Guilty,” she replied quietly but firmly, no remorse in her voice. Sophia made a note on a small pad lying in her lap. She looked at Dayna once again and soberly asked, “On the second charge, how do you plead?”

Dayna paused much longer. She hadn’t meant to create another vampire – it had been a complete accident so why should she plead ‘guilty’ to this charge?

“Not guilty,” she responded loudly.

Again, Sophia wrote it down, this time a frown marred her beautiful face. Plainly she was not happy at Dayna’s ‘not guilty’ response, and she wasn’t the only one. Emile, acting as prosecutor, took charge of the next part of the proceedings.

“Dayna, you have pleaded ‘not guilty’ to the charge of illegally creating an immortal, despite the evidence against you. Will you please explain your reasoning?”

Dayna looked Emile straight in the eyes, a little of her customary arrogance unwittingly resurfacing.

“I am not an expert when it comes to the law, but I believe the charge hints at some premeditation on my part. This is not the case. I can honestly say it was a complete accident, a lapse of concentration. I didn’t mean to do it. Was I careless – absolutely, but am I guilty – no, I don’t believe I am.” Whilst her diction was formal, Dayna’s tone was not as respectful as it should have been and as a result, did nothing to help her case. Emile, not impressed by her attitude, scowled at her. He wasn’t the only one – every one of the Commissioners faces was thunderous.

“Be that as it may, do you at least acknowledge your actions have endangered your coven, and all immortals?”  The timbre of Emile’s voice changed to one of absolute authority.

“Not really,” Dayna replied flippantly, “I don’t see how it could endanger anyone but me and I can take care of myself.”

About the Author

Carlie M A Cullen was born in London. She grew up in Hertfordshire where she first discovered her love of books and writing. She has been an administrator and marketer all her working life and is also a professional teacher of Ballroom and Latin American dancing.

Carlie has always written in some form or another, but Heart Search: Lost is her first novel. This is being launched 8^th October 2012 through Myrddin Publishing Group and work has started on book two: Heart Search: Found. She writes mainly in the Fantasy/Paranormal Romance genres for YA, New Adult and Adult.

Carlie is also a professional editor.

Carlie also holds the reins of a writing group called Writebulb. Their first anthology was published September 2012.

Carlie currently lives in Essex, UK with her daughter.

Have you ever wanted to know about hacking and cybercrime? Well I’ve been hooked since the eighties although I usually reserve my curiosity for for films and TV programmes with hacking in them.Last week I attended the HP Labs lecture in Bristol about cyber crime. Usually I go to HP Labs lectures for the free food and alcohol at the end (my husband goes for the techie lectures) but since I am up the duff the alcohol has been off limits so it takes a really good lecture to get me interested. This time I wasn’t disappointed.

The talk was presented by James Lyne, the Director of Technology Strategy at Sophos. You can see easily why he has risen so high. His talk was funny, engaging and kept me interested through the whole thing. It wasn’t too dumbed down either but I don’t think he needed to explain what a DDoS attack was – I mean everyone knows what one of those is right? Just please don’t organise one for my tiny insignificant website. You all have bigger fish to fry. He didn’t even plug the Sophos antivirus app which I already had installed on my Android phone. Respect!

It was fascinating to hear about the work they do at Sophos how sometimes they hack the hackers so they can find out from the bad guys what the vulnerabilities are so they can fix them, who then find new ones once they realise they have been fixed and then create new ones, which Sophos then find ‘cures’ for and so on. I could go on all night with that!

He showed us hacking tools he’d ‘stolen’ from the hackers and programmes which he used for his presumably white hat hacking jaunts.

The dangers of Smartphone security

There was a really funny part where he asked what smartphones people had. First he asked about iPhones and a few unsteady hands went up (James, is obviously an Apple fan) and he joked that the pride had gone and they needed to reclaim the coolness. Then he asked about Android users and a whole host of hands shot up, pride beaming out of every Android owning face in the room, including my own. How the world has changed!

The point about the smartphone part of the presentation is that many people think they are safe when using them. He was able to demonstrate just how unsafe they were by snooping using his equipment to find what wifi connections people had looked at even though they weren’t currently connected to any wifi. He said, had he been of the bad guy persuasion then he could have created a wifi connection with the same name as one which your phone had been connected to before, which would mean it would automatically connect without your knowledge and steal some private credential you would rather keep to yourself.

The last few minutes of the lecture were a question and answer session. One question I found fascinating. Which computer operating system would the speaker deem to be most secure? The answer was surprising. He was at pains to point put that if the system was properly configured then he would rank them, Linux, Windows then Mac. Kind of blows your mind away don’t it.

All in all, this was a brilliant lecture which I am so glad I went to. In fact for once the food and drink paled into comparison with the actual talk. Full markes to HP and SOPHOS. Although please HP, could you bring back the goats cheese parcels, those cylindrical dark green things were the worst thing I ever tasted. There is no sauce that could ever improve that! Oh and more variety of non-caffinated or alcohol drinks would be nice. I was stuck with Apple Juice again.

If you are interested in security then the there is a competition he was plugging. It was called Cyber Security Challenge UK. More information can be found at https://cybersecuritychallenge.org.uk/. It is worth doing, you could win training opportunities at Masters level as well as internship places. If I was cleverer I would go for it!

This is the third and final stop on our blog tour of Alison DeLuca’s fabulous Crown Phoenix Series. There are three books in the series, all available on Kindle and Nook.

The Lamplighter’s Special

The Manor where Squire Bisselthwaite lived was in the center of Grimstead Compound. The thirteen farms that made up the rest of the Compound fanned out from the large, old house. Most of the fields touched the edge of the Manor grounds at their narrowest points, although all the farms were separated from the Bisselthwaite property by a dark, crumbling wall.

As Lizzie and her family rode through the huge, rusted iron gates set into the stones, she glanced up at the rooftops of the Manor. Her hat slipped down her neck, and she clapped one hand to hold it on as she squinted up at the dark front of the house.

There was a rather grand entrance, but of course the carriage took the family to the back of the house to the kitchen gardens. As the cart jostled over the pebbly drive, Ninna murmured in Lizzie’s ear, “Did you see that?” She pointed up to one of the windows on the third or fourth floor.

“What?” Lizzie squinted again. It was all a gray blur to her.

“Oh, nothing. Just thought I saw a face in one of the windows upstairs.”

Books in the Crown Phoenix series:

1. The Night Watchman Express
2. Devil’s Kitchen
3. The Lamplighter’s Special

Abput Alison DeLuca

Alison DeLuca is the author of several steampunk and urban fantasy books. She was born in Arizona and has also lived in Pennsylvania, Illinois, Mexico, Ireland, and Spain.

Currently she wrestles words and laundry in New Jersey.

You can find Alison here:

Facebook – http://www.facebook.com/alison.deluca.author

OR http://on.fb.me/TNWEfb

Twitter – http://twitter.com/ – !/AlisonDeLuca

Google + http://bit.ly/ADGoogle

Author Central: http://amzn.to/ADeLucaAuthorCentral

Pinterest: http://pinterest.com/alisondeluca/

This is the second stop on our blog tour of Alison DeLuca’s fabulous Crown Phoenix Series. There are three books in the series, all available on Kindle and Nook.

Devil’s Kitchen

The Headmistress entered the cell and looked down at her. It seemed as though the woman never stood in full light. From that angle, her light eyes gleamed like ice in the center of two black puddles.

“Stand up when I address you,” she said after a long moment.

Miriam stood and looked up at the woman. “Why am I here?” she asked. “When can I go home?”

There was a pause, and the Headmistress responded, “You will not talk to me unless I ask you a direct question.”

Miriam felt a rush of anger. Once, at a dinner party that her father had given, she had been allowed to squirt some soda water from a large siphon into a glass and taste it. Some had gone up her nose in her haste to drink the unexpected treat, and the prickling, stinging sensation in her nostrils was just like the fury that she felt now.

“You will work for the factory here,” the Headmistress said. “Mrs. Siddons will show you your duties tomorrow. You will start at the very bottom of the task list and, if you do as you are bid, you might possibly work your way up to a better position. Do you understand?”

Miriam gritted her teeth. She’d be damned before she gave this woman the satisfaction of an answer.

Books in the Crown Phoenix series:

1. The Night Watchman Express
2. Devil’s Kitchen
3. The Lamplighter’s Special

Abput Alison DeLuca

Alison DeLuca is the author of several steampunk and urban fantasy books. She was born in Arizona and has also lived in Pennsylvania, Illinois, Mexico, Ireland, and Spain.

Currently she wrestles words and laundry in New Jersey.

You can find Alison here:

Facebook – http://www.facebook.com/alison.deluca.author

OR http://on.fb.me/TNWEfb

Twitter – http://twitter.com/ – !/AlisonDeLuca

Google + http://bit.ly/ADGoogle

Author Central: http://amzn.to/ADeLucaAuthorCentral

Pinterest: http://pinterest.com/alisondeluca/

We all know that the Internet is different, but is it? The common sense rules we learn in real life should still be in effect in our virtual lives and this includes morality.

This post is about guilt by association. Here is why it just doesn’t work.

Say you are in a bank and suddenly a horde of masked gunmen rush in. ‘Everybody on the floor, NOW!’ you hear.

So you cower on the ground and you hear the shuffling of notes as money is being taken from the teller. Then one of the gunmen splits from the group with a white canvas sack half-open in hand, he starts asking for valuables from the people nearest you. As his cold steely-blue eyes stare into yours, the priceless wedding ring you inherited from your great grandmother descends into darkness and you know that is the last you’ll see of it. You can feel your face getting hot as you hold back your tears.

Who do you blame? Logically it’s the gunmen who took the money but maybe you are blaming yourself for deciding to go into the bank on that particular day but whatever you do, you do not blame the other people in that room who were on that floor with you.

Another example of why guilt by association does not work is say your wife was killed by a one armed man. You are being taken to a maximum security prison but manage to escape. No one believes you but you saw that one armed man. Do you go around like some vigilante murdering all one armed men while evading the incredibly sexy Tommy Lee Jones, the US Marshall?

No, you find out who was really responsible and take them to book. Preferably in the courts where they can assess evidence.

So when you feel you have been wronged in the virtual world, just think before you act. Everything is documented somewhere so your behaviour has to be above reproach as well as your adversary. Let your wrath follow proper channels and fall on the right person or persons not innocent bystanders. Guilt by association is a fallacy. And if you don’t believe me there is a good article on Wikipedia which goes into more detail.

In case you are wondering what I would do if I felt wronged, I blame myself, rant awhile and then move on. Every mistake I make, makes me a stronger person and just a little wiser. My advice? Unless your partner was murdered or the world is about to end, learn from your mistakes and move on. You’ll know better next time. Just don’t believe in that little thing called collateral damage. Innocents are the ones that get hurt.

Alison DeLuca’s fabulous Crown Phoenix Series books have now launched with a bang. If you haven’t heard about them yet, where have you been? There are three books in the series, all available on Kindle and Nook.

Set in a Steampunk world , they are an original and riveting read. To get your appetite running I will be posting an excerpt for one book over the next few days.

The Night Watchman Express:

“Oh, come on,” he said, pushing past the heavy desk and large chair to where she stood. “What have you got there, behind your back? I won’t tell on you; I just want to see what you’ve got.” Miriam twisted away from him, but Simon managed to get an arm around her and grab the paper.

“Ha ha!” he said, releasing her and holding the paper above his head. “Success!” He put a hand out and grabbed her arm.  “No, hold on, don’t leave; I just want to see…”

His voice died out as he stared at the letter. For an instant, he was frozen in disbelief. Then he looked up at her, mouth hanging open. “What on earth?”

“Well, don’t think that I had anything to do with it!” Miriam cried out.

“Yes, but-”

At that moment, they heard Theodosia’s voice at the front door, demanding that a servant come to take her parcels. Simon held the paper out to Miriam, and she thrust it back it him as if it were a live snake. He looked around the study and pushed it under the corner of the blotter. They retreated from the desk, escaped from the room and, as if with mute accord, ran for the back door as quickly as they could.

Outside, Simon took a deep breath and blew it out. He laughed a bit, feeling a certain exultation at avoiding his mother.

Miriam, leaning against the house and feeling her own heart thud in her chest, laughed as well. The next moment she opened her eyes and realized where she was. She was standing there with Simon, alone.

“Um, just realized. I must be off. ’Bye,” she announced hastily.

Simon frowned and reached out a hand to grab her arm again, but she slipped away and disappeared back into the house. He dropped his hand and started after her.

Neil came up behind him and grabbed his collar. “Hey, you abandoned me! Where’ve you been?” he demanded. “Did you find the string we needed?”

“What?” Simon turned to him and blinked.

“What’s the matter with you? You look like you just saw Old Harry himself. Where’s that string, idiot?”

Simon appeared to recall where he was. “String, right. String.” He squared his shoulders and marched away. Neil was left behind, scratching his head.

 Abput Alison DeLuca

Alison DeLuca is the author of several steampunk and urban fantasy books.  She was born in Arizona and has also lived in Pennsylvania, Illinois, Mexico, Ireland, and Spain.

Currently she wrestles words and laundry in New Jersey.

You can find Alison here:

Facebook – http://www.facebook.com/alison.deluca.author

OR http://on.fb.me/TNWEfb

Twitter – http://twitter.com/ – !/AlisonDeLuca

Google + http://bit.ly/ADGoogle

Author Central: http://amzn.to/ADeLucaAuthorCentral

Pinterest: http://pinterest.com/alisondeluca/

After leaving my previous publisher, I joined a group of authors who decided to group together to create our own ‘true’ cooperative.
We were all very excited to do this. We would all be Indie authors but have the support and combined experience of the group. We all have talents we could share and with the enhanced marketing and bulk buying power of several people we thought we could try something different.

The beauty of the cooperative was that any author could stay in the group even if they were traditionally published or even if we started our own companies. For example I created my own label (Lycan Books) which is in association with the Myrddin Publishing Group.

After getting together with some of my fellow authors online, I went ahead and started on the website (http://www.myrddinpublishing.com/). I decided to go with WordPress because of the flexibility and ease of use.

The website is a showcase of all our best work and is growing – even though we are not accepting new authors. Readers can browse author bios and all our books in one place.

For those interested in the nitty-gritty, I used the Suffusion theme which has sliders incorporated in the theme.
An app I found really useful was the Amazon Affiliate Link Localizer plugin which allowed us to put any link on the site but any visitor would be sent to a customised link based on the country they are visiting from. This along with a YouTube plugin really makes the website ‘pop’.

I really hope you enjoy browsing the site as much as I enjoyed making it.