Elaine Ambrose

Bestselling Author, Ventriloquist, & Humorist

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Once Upon a Time: The Stories that Surround Us

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elaine 2013 (117)

 

Recently I was playing with a gaggle of giggling granddaughters. We were telling stories, and they squealed with delight at each silly suggestion in our creative plot as “Once upon a time….” encouraged them to imagine without restriction.

“And then the princess turned into a beautiful butterfly.”

“She waved her magic wand and poof! There was a purple horse with wings!”

“The little girl fell down a long tunnel and landed in a big meadow. She could understand what the animals were saying.”

Of course, the pretend princesses always survived their adventures and the endings always were happy, except for the conclusion in the Fable of the Farting Princess, but by then it was time to take a break. Such is storytelling with children.

Every day, we are surrounded by potential stories. Those of us who can still remember the 1960s can’t forget the lyrics of Simon and Garfunkel’s song “America” as the couple turns ordinary situations into imaginary stories:

“Laughing on the bus, playing games with the faces.
She said the man in the gabardine suit was a spy.
I said, “Be careful his bowtie is really a camera.”

If you need inspiration to write, you should go sit in the park. Observe a happy family playing and laughing, and then allow your imagination to wander. Who is that dark stranger slowly driving around the park? Why is the woman yelling into her cell phone? Did you see the lonely custodian laughing as he went down the slide? Is the little boy really talking to a squirrel?

You can find story ideas while waiting at stop lights. The obnoxious guys in the noisy car next to you are certain to be smuggling something illegal. The old woman ahead of you must be on her way to her best friend’s funeral. That’s why she’s driving so slowly. Her friend’s name is Erma, and they used to process jars of pickles together in Erma’s farmhouse kitchen. The old woman craves a fresh tomato.

I also use newspaper headlines to create short stories. The Idahoan Who Speaks for U.S. Sheep Industry.” So, what do the sheep have her say? Do they have a meeting in the pasture and discuss issues over bowls of fresh grass and pitchers of water from the canal? N.Y. Pet Cemeteries Told to Stop Taking in Humans. Will Fifi really care? The old dog’s been dead for 20 years. And, what if those really aren’t Fifi’s ashes?

Every day presents an adventure waiting to be told. The real ending can’t be controlled, but with enough creativity and imagination, writers can add some festive, mysterious, tragic, inspirational, and amazing elements to make the journey less mundane. After all, it’s what we do. We are storytellers.

 

(Featured on NanaHood.com 10/1/2015)

Need a Cheap Laugh?

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drinking dead women writers cover

The world can be a horrible, nasty, rotten place. You can get away from it all and have some giggles with this e-book on sale for only $.99. Drinking with Dead Women Writers E-Book by fearless authors Elaine Ambrose and AK Turner is on sale on Amazon.com for one week beginning October 2. The original price was $2.99, so act fast because the deal ends next Friday. The book received three awards from the Idaho Book Awards: Top Author, Fiction, and Cover Design.

Follow this link to buy the e-book and share laughter and libations with literary ladies. The authors make you believe they shared drinks and stories with 16 authors, including  Dorothy Parker, Erma Bombeck, Louisa May Alcott, and Emily Dickinson. Discover fascinating facts, such as Jane Austen’s original title for Sense and Sensibility was Elinor and Marianne. The book was reviewed as “a fantastical romp through literature and drink.” Buy it now. Laugh soon. Erma Bombeck would approve.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B007VTRU06/ref=series_rw_dp_sw

 

Don’t Name the Shooter

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shooter

Eric Harris. Dylan Klebold, Adam Lanza. James Holmes. They’re famous. Google their names and instantly retrieve pages of references, links, and related articles. Their victims don’t have the same prominence. They’re dead and gone.

In my opinion, it’s time for the media and law enforcement officials to agree not to name the alleged or convicted shooters involved in mass killings. Deny them the notoriety they crave and maybe prevent future copycat killers. I suggest that any mass killer be identified as Asshole Murderer.

According to University of Alabama criminologist Adam Lankford, fame is revered as an end unto itself. “Some mass shooters succumb to terrible delusions of grandeur and seek fame and glory through killing,” he was quoted in an article in The Los Angeles Times.

He noted that Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold, the perpetrators of the April 1999 shootings at Columbine High School, both illustrate and feed such delusions. They both sought fame and gained infamy by their actions, and their example has been cited as inspiration by school shooters since, in Germany, Argentina, Finland and Canada.

Adam Lanza is famous for his horrific crime of murdering 20 children and six adults at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut. Can anyone beyond the town name even one of the victims?

During his trial, the media continued to show the distorted face of James Holmes. He was found guilty of killing 12 people and injuring 58 others in the Century 16 movie theater in Aurora, Colorado. Why do we need to see his face or hear his name? Lock him away and focus on the names and lives of those who were murdered.

Right now, we don’t know much about the young man who entered a classroom today at Umpqua Community College in Roseburg, Oregon, and systematically murdered at least 13 students and injured several others. Let’s keep it that way. Initial reports say that he posted a warning on social media. Only a sick, evil person would premeditate and publicize such a horrendous act. He is not worthy of having an identity. He is nothing.

I’ll leave it to the mental health professionals and other officials to assess and create programs to identify and treat mentally ill people. And, I refuse to engage in the no-win gun control debate. Thousands of shootings occur in gun-free zones.  Chicago, Illinois, for example, has tough gun-control laws yet there have been 2,326 shooting victims in Chicago so far this year. Murderers don’t obey the law.

For now, don’t read or repeat the names of the murderers. Remove their wicked memory from humanity. Instead, send condolences and prayers to the victims and families of today’s senseless tragedy.

Help Stop Wimpy Parent Syndrome

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adam elaine halloween scan

 

I’ve been embarrassing my children for more than 30 years. They now are happy young adults with loving spouses, adorable children and rewarding careers. Obviously, my strategy worked.

Throughout their childhood, I didn’t worry about harming their delicate self-esteem. Nor did I hover over their every action, schedule daily enrichment activities, make them eat kale, or ensure their socks matched. Instead, I created chaos and commotion just to motivate them to find peace and create order in their lives. I’m altruistic like that.

Children today are so pampered that some timid parents will become marooned in a horrifying, never-ending reality show if they don’t stop appeasing and indulging their tiny terrors. News flash to those afflicted with Wimpy Parent Syndrome: Your Kid Isn’t a Child Pharaoh. To toughen kids for real life, bewildered parents should halt most organized activities and throw in these handy tips to challenge their children’s self-confidence and encourage self-reliance.

1. Criticize their artwork. If your first-grader comes home with a hand-drawn picture, be sure to say that the tree looks like a spider and the sun should be more round. Then throw it away. Maybe she’ll try harder.

2. Show favoritism. Is the older child has an attractive project, be sure to tape it to the refrigerator for months and often mention the talent to the younger one. Give the older child extra dessert.

3. Exhibit lazy behavior. Stay in bed on Saturday morning and tell them to make their own damn pancakes. This is how children learn responsibility and cooking skills.

4. Take your own time-out. If the children are throwing a fit in the car, pull over to the side, turn off the engine, lean back, and close your eyes. Say, “Mommy is going away for a while.” Then chant in a foreign language for 10 minutes. They’ll be too traumatized to make noise.

5. Condemn their friends. Be sure to mock their friend’s silly habits. And when your teenager has a basement full of rowdy kids, walk in wearing a clown nose, belch loudly, and walk out. This instills a fear in your child that never goes away.

6. Cry when you meet your child’s first date. Sob into a towel, run into your room, and slam the door. This action will test their patience, strengthen their loyalty to each other, and promote tolerance.

7. Threaten them, if necessary. If your high school senior won’t write thank you notes for graduation presents, threaten to publish an announcement on social media that your child is too lazy and ungrateful to appreciate gifts now or in the future.

8. Bribery works. That hellhole of a bedroom won’t get clean on its own. Hide a $10 bill somewhere in the room and tell them to tidy and organize everything to find it. Substitute a $20 bill for particularly egregious cases that harbor toxic diseases. If they demand more money, tell them to move out and find an apartment.

Finally, remember that children can sense an easy target. If mommy and daddy are too weak and delicate to assume their strong but loving roles as parents, the kids will rule the house before the youngest is out of diapers and could stay in diapers for ten years. Parents can reverse this pending disaster by starting now to embarrass their children on a regular basis so the kids find the courage to grow up, move out, and prove themselves.

Help stop Wimpy Parent Syndrome. Go buy a clown nose. You can thank me later.

 

(Featured on The Huffington  Post Comedy page Sept. 29, 2015)

Elaine’s Idaho Potato Soup

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organic spuds

My cousin Ron Ambrose gave me some organic potatoes that he grew on land in southern Idaho that had never been farmed. They taste delicious, and I’m on the waiting list for more next fall. I grew up on a potato farm and worked on the harvesters in the fall. I love the tubers baked, mashed, boiled, fried, in casseroles, and in soups. My Idaho potato soup recipe that has been published in several cookbooks. Add corn bread, a salad, and apple crisp for a festive fall meal. Ignore the carbs. Be happy.

potato soup mug

It’s almost time for sweaters and jeans, a cozy fire in the fireplace, and a large pot of homemade potato soup. Here’s my favorite recipe. It serves a large family or two teenagers.

 

6-8 Idaho Russet potatoes, cubed, (peeling is optional)

(I can’t guarantee quality if other, lesser spuds are used from other states.)

1 pound spicy, bulk Italian sausage

1 pound regular, bulk Italian sausage

One onion, diced

6 stalks of celery, diced

2 Tablespoons mustard seed

4+ Cups Chicken Broth

2 Cups of Cream or Half-and-Half

Salt, Pepper

Optional: 2 cans of creamed soup, any kind

 

Cover spuds with chicken stock (add water, if necessary to cover spuds) and boil in a large soup pot with mustard seeds for 10-15 minutes. Do not drain. (The mustard seeds are for my mother who always believed the parable of having the faith of a mustard seed.)

In separate large skillet, brown sausage. Sauté onion and celery in sausage drippings or olive oil.

Combine all ingredients into the soup pot. Add salt and pepper to taste. My hubby adds red pepper flakes, but he’s not from Idaho. (For thicker soup, add 2 cans of creamed soup, any kind.)

Heat but don’t boil. Yummy. This soup is delicious to reheat for several days but doesn’t freeze well. If frozen, the spuds get mushy so pretend it’s cream of potato soup.

My favorite memory with this soup: My wee 2-year-old granddaughter and my 80-year-old mother competed for the last helping.

 

Midlife Creates the Right Time to Write

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Instead of moaning and groaning about empty nests, expanding waistlines, and lost libidos, midlife women should write something. Now is the time to release the passionate muse that has languished for years beneath responsibilities for raising children, establishing careers, maintaining homes, retaining happy marriages, and campaigning for political causes and charities. Middle-aged women have stories to tell, so they should convert the empty nest into a writing den, substitute the chocolate with a salad, and receive self-confidence from writing so they feel sexy enough to find that lost libido. This is a win-win situation.

typewriters

Here are some suggestions to inspire the writing process.

1. Write what you know. I couldn’t write well about a vegetarian, Socialist, nuclear physicist who sleeps with his/her dog and listens to rap music. Can’t do it. But, I thoroughly enjoyed writing Menopause Sucks because I’ve been there and it does! And, I laughed every time I wrote a sentence such as, “Let me tell you why you sneeze, fart, and wet your pants at the same time.” And, my fingers literally flew over the keyboard as I wrote about hairy toes, night sweats, and recommended sex toys. Yes, write what you know!

As always, there is a caveat. If you’re writing historical fiction or a detailed novel, research the facts about a certain era and write a story that fits. You weren’t a member of the Clan of the Cave Bear and you didn’t run away with a peasant boy from the 17th century, but with enough investigation, you can always imagine the scenarios and write a compelling story. Just don’t name an ancient heroine Mandy.

2. Take advantage of, no… exploit, the serendipity of your life. Develop fascinating characters modeled after your belching piano teacher, or your uncle who refuses to discuss his war wounds but smashes beer cans against his forehead, or the passenger in the airplane seat next to you who laughs in her sleep, or your child who cries when the Disneyland Nightlight Parade stops. You are surrounded by juicy writing prompts. Keep a notebook handy to write quotes and facts to use later. Start with a private journal and progress to a public blog. That byline could become a lifeline to revitalizing stagnant energy.

3. Read your work out loud. You will discover sentences, paragraphs, and complete pages that no one will understand or ever read again. You’ll find that preposition lounging at the end of a sentence that screams: I’M A HORRIBLE WRITER! READ NO FURTHER! Also, make note to delete exclamation points and unnecessary capital letters.

4. Believe that all the words tumbling around in your brain MUST get out or you will explode! Yes, you hear voices, but it’s your characters demanding that you set them free. If you’re fiddling with non-fiction, then quick, spew forth those creative ideas on napkins, notebooks, old envelopes, typewriters (I still have some), and even a computer. Write. Write. Write. You’ve read plenty of crap that others have written, which is proof that your work will be OK.

5. Continue to read and learn. Emulate your favorite authors. Janet Evanovich makes me howl with laughter and want to read more. On the other hand, E.L. James causes me to wish I were a vegetarian, Socialist, nuclear physicist who sleeps with my dog and listens to rap music. Her bestselling novel, Fifty Shades of Grey, is a hotbed of horrible writing featuring such provocative lines as, “Desire pools dark and deadly in my groin.” If I have anything pooling in my groin, I better run to the bathroom. Personally, I prefer two shades of grey during my romps in the hay: lights dim and lights off.

Writers should be honest enough to admit they need editors, smart enough to know their cousin shouldn’t design the book cover, and strong enough to read rejection letters and negative reviews without getting depressed. They can continue to hone their craft by attending writing workshops, joining literary groups, registering for writing retreats, mingling with other authors, and finding a space to write. And, they should say out loud every day, “I am a writer.” Then they must go write.

 

(Featured on The Huffington Post 50 page.)