This photo makes me smile.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-2107370/Angelina-Jolie-Oscars-2012-right-leg-pose-goes-viral.html

My son thought he would help me out. So, whatdaya think? My new publicity photo?

Male librarians!

Zack is a librarian in New York. A calendar is available here: http://menofthestacks.com/

Have had a FANTASTIC day. Saw the British crown jewels and I’m totally inspired to wear a tiara whenever I work in the kitchen.

Also, I want one of these for the living room:

Extravagant feasts demonstrated the wealth and status of the host. The two large knives with elaborately decorated handles would have been used by a carver to slice meat to the bone. He would then offer this to his lord on the flat blades. Diners used the smaller knives with sharper points to spear food from a communal vessel. Even at grand feasts most guests came with their own dining utensils and these knives were carried in a leather sheath. In the bottom half of the sheath is the image of a toiling peasant with the French motto “J’endure” (“I keep on going”).

and Abbeys,

and Dungeons!

Oh, my!

CHAPTER ONE

Gripping the hilt of the dagger hidden in the folds of her velvet skirt, Lady Arabella mentally counted the steps it would take to reach Bishop Ramm’s fat neck.

Fifteen paces.
 
Just on the other side of the large stone cross that dominated the village square.  Just beyond the baker’s wife, the town bell ringer and the crowd of sweaty exhilarated peasants who had gathered to watch her father burn at the stake.

Her target, decked in red and gold finery, waddled to the front of the mob, stood beside the pyre and lifted beringed fingers into the air.  “I stand before you, a humble servant of our Holy Mother Church, extending a merciful arm to this traitor.” 

Merciful!  Red welts crisscrossed her father’s emaciated limbs as black-clad monks lead him in chains to the pole.  He wore the barest remnants of clothing, ripped and dirty rags that bore testimony to the treatment he had received by the bishop’s men.  Mottled bruises marred his hollowed out cheeks.  His hair had been shaved off.  All of it.  Even his eyebrows.  

Her windpipe tightened.  The ermine trim around her collar made it feel like a rat crawled down her throat. 

Ramm’s chest puffed as the monks bound her father’s thin hands to the sturdy pole.  “God’s law declares that the church must be cleansed to prevent the spread of heresy.”

“A pox on Bishop Ramm and his bloody ambition,” she muttered, her fingers tightening on the knife. 

“Meat pies!  Meat pies!  Get your meat pies here!”  A merchant pushed a rickety cart over the cobblestones.  The smell of rancid grease wafted into the air.

At the front of the crowd, three large mastiffs, powerful shoulders tensed, sat in an alert queue watching the meat pies in the cart bounce back and forth in front of them.  Their ears swayed from side to side and their heads swung like pendulums.  Noses twitched.

Three restless dogs?  An omen?  A gift from God?  Mayhap she could somehow get them stirred up and cause a distraction that would give her time to rescue her father and rid Christendom of Ramm’s devilry all in one well placed stroke.

The veins of their owner’s forearm strained against his skin as he gripped their leashes.  A thick leather glove graced his large hand.

Her gaze traced up the man’s sinewy arm, past a muscular chest and flitted over impossibly wide shoulders.  

She took in a breath and blinked.  Heavens, he was large.  At least a head taller than the rowdy peasants who surrounded him.  

He wore peasant garb–plain breeches and a faded black tunic–but three knives, two flails, a mace, a war axe and a short heavy sword hung at his waist.  Two more daggers stuck from the top of his boot and another was strapped around his thigh.
 
Never in her life had she seen a man carry so many weapons. 

She swallowed.   

The dagger in her own hand suddenly seemed very short and very puny.  Unlike her own knife, the hilts, pommels and handles of all of his weapons were plain and unadorned.  Not the decorative piece of a noblewoman but deadly instruments.  Serviceable.  Practical.

She raised her gaze higher.  

Shaggy dark hair and a short mustache with a goatee graced an angular face.  His eyes flashed bright sapphire as the sun’s sinking rays caught the irises.

Her body jolted as if lightning had crashed through it.  Unlike the titillated villagers, he was not focused on what was happening between the bishop and her father; he was watching her!

Her?

She stifled a gasp. 

Had he seen her scrutinizing the path to the bishop?  Had he seen the dagger? 

His mastiffs strained at their leashes.

Through force of habit, she touched her face to verify that the eyepatch she always wore in public was securely in place. She enfolded the knife further in the thick folds of her skirts and flipped it so the blade would be better concealed by her hand…  

(more coming soon)