Do Your Civic Duty — Get Out And Vote!

Folks, it’s Election Day. I’m proud to say that I voted over an hour ago.

And even though it’s nearly 5:30 PM in the Central Time Zone, there’s still time for you to get out and do your civic duty by voting if you haven’t done it already.

Now why should you do this? It’s simple. Since we live in a democratic republic, the best way we have to affect the outcome is by voting.

Now, you might be saying, “Hey, Barb. I know I should vote, but I haven’t a clue who to vote for. Can you help me out a little?”

Well, sure. Here’s a quick-and-dirty summation of how and why I vote.

If I like what’s going on in my state, I tend to vote for incumbents.

If I do not like what’s going on — and I think I’ve made it clear over the past four years that I do not — I vote against the incumbents.

(Or in plain language: Yes, I proudly voted against Scott Walker for the third time. Let’s hope the third time is the charm.)

In the other races, I used the same strategy unless there was someone I truly wanted to vote for. (In this case, as I like John Lehman and Rob Zerban, I voted in their favor for Lieutenant Governor and U.S. Representative accordingly.)

And in the referendums, I used my best judgment.

As Robert A. Heinlein once put it (this being my best paraphrase), it’s better to go vote against than not to vote at all. So please, do go out and vote.

Voting matters, you see. Even if you vote against what I think — or used what I just said as a primer in how not to vote (which is another thing RAH said, long ago) — it’s still important.

Thus concludes tonight’s public service announcement.

Want to Read A Free Excerpt From “An Elfy On The Loose?”

Folks, we’re coming up on the holiday gift-giving season. Because of this, Stephanie Osborn got together with a number of writers and asked them all to give her blogs and/or excerpts from their novels in an attempt to interest people who knew next to nothing about us.

Because what’s a better gift than a book?

Anyway, the upshot of all of this holiday gift-giving stuff is that she posted an authorized excerpt from my novel, AN ELFY ON THE LOOSE, on her blog Comet Tales. Here’s just a wee bit from that (a snippet from a snippet):

But he still had no idea where he was. He didn’t recognize anything, except green grass, yet he had the oddest feeling. He wasn’t sure, but he thought they somehow had made it back to the Elfy Realm after all, and the not-knowing made him dizzy.

Sarah had stopped and appeared to be weaving on her feet. Bruno jogged the equivalent of three city blocks to get to her, hoping she’d not fall before he made it.

“Bruno, I feel…sick,” she gasped when he was only a few steps away. He sprinted toward her and turned her around; her greenish-white face was alarming. He told her to let the packs fall, then gently helped Sarah lay down on the ground…

Lost on a sea of too-green grass, with no way out in sight.

Please go take a look at the excerpt from AN ELFY ON THE LOOSE, and then, if you wish to see more, you can do any or all of the following four things:

• Go read the longer free sample at Twilight Times Books
• Buy it from Amazon (US)
• Buy it from Barnes and Noble
• Or buy it from Amazon (UK)…

And thanks for being willing to read any — or all — of my work.