The new Book has just been released! THE GIRL WITH THE FARAWAY EYES Check out a free sample on Apple ibooks or in print or eBook at Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Girl-Faraway-Eyes-Ric-Wasley-ebook/dp/B00UY518MA Book Description: THE GIRL WITH THE FARAWAY EYES Publication Date: April 3, 2015 Chris Brennan is just your average guy. Smart, but no genius. Nice, but occasionally a jerk. He's basically coasting through life trying to figure out how to balance his passion for writing with his need to eat on a daily basis. So he trades in his journalism degree for one in computer programming and moves to Germany for a job by a large hi-tech firm... Let's face it, his life is boring. But, one rainy night, in a smoky, Munich Rathskeller, he meets a beautiful young woman. As Chris is drawn further into the mystery that surrounds her, he discovers that she may be older than she appears. On top of this, the enigmatic woman he is falling in love with is a dead ringer for Maria Orsic, a mysterious psychic who lived in Germany between the First and Second World Wars. If “Ria” is an intimate of the twisted group of fanatics that brought the Nazis to power and supposedly provided them with advanced rocketry, jet propulsion, and even—some contend —flying saucers, Chris wants nothing to do with her. He leaves Germany, returns to Boston, and finds a new love. Kat is an uncomplicated American girl with no mysterious past, sinister acquaintances, or confusing chronology. In short, perfect. But events have been set in motion, and it might be too late for Chris to escape the plans of an ancient consortium set on world domination.

The end of in-store retail?

Has this happened to you lately? I've always been a supporter of my local retail stores. The owners were always there to answer a question, show you how the latest gadget worked and generally support the products they sold. Apparently those have become quaint relics of a by-gone day... Kinda like the friendly neighborhood grocer before he devolved into the Quicky Mart or the local Hardware before they were replaced by cavernous warehouse filled with bins of stuff that no one knows anything about or even where they are! That was brought home to me today when I ventured out to the local Best Buy to pick up a sound bar for the big screenTV. I had done my homework and had settled on the unit that Best Buy customers had rated 4 1/2 stars so I really just went in to see it demoed and pick it up. A half hour at most I thought... Silly me. First I couldn't find anyone who worked in the department. No surprise there. But the real head-scratcher was when I did manage to find them and none of them could even demo it for me. Why... Out of 4 people in that department, No one could figure out how to make the sound bar work! After randomly trying plugs and TVs the only thing they could agree on was that the unit was defective. "Let's try another one." Was my contribution to the conundrum. Shocked looks all around. But once that novel idea had been batted around another new box was opened .. With the exact same result. Hummm... What are the odds, I wondered? But their keen intellect had the solution. Yup, you guessed it. "It's defective." The brain trust concluded. Hummmm... On to a third unit and as the hours of the day slowly ticked by guess what they found when me they opened the third brand new box...? Aww you peeked. Yep. About this time as I was mourning an afternoon of my life I'd never get back I boldly asked if maybe the problem was that none of the TVs they hooked them up to had any working sound!! ... "Nah," they explained as if to a small child.. They had just changed the displays around and now due to this improved set up.. none of the TVs sound could be turned on. "Wow!" Says I in increasing bewilderment..."that must make it hard to sell TVs?" Shrugs all around. "Well," says one, "If someone really wants to hear a TV I think there's a Sony in the stereo room that does have the sound working." And I know I shouldn't have throne gasoline on this 'bonfire of insanity' but I just had to ask. "But suppose I wanted to buy this Samsung right here?" An uncomfortable shuffling of feet. "Well," ventures one... We could take you in and let you listen to the Sony" People I am not making this up!!! So finally having run out of excuses and new boxes of sound bars to open and puzzle over they comforted me by telling me that the unit, which their customers had rated highly, was really "a piece of crap" anyway and offered to sell me another that was 6 times the price. Ah but I had them there ... "Sure," I said, "could you demo it for me?" And then I left.

Songs for lovers of lost causes...

Song of the week... Those of you who know me, know probably all too well of my obsession with music and some of you who go all the way back to my band days will recall how I fixated on a particular song and have to take take it apart and study it from all angles. I especially love old Irish and Celtic tunes and have collected hundreds over the many years playing and listening in pubs from Boston to San Francisco. So I was actually surprised when the other night I heard one down at O'Shea's that I'm sure I must have heard a hundred times before but this time I listened to the words which are all about rebellion and lost causes which must appeal to my Irish/Norwegian blood. So naturally I've been listening to all different versions .. 27 to be exact, for the past week and have finally found the one I like. And I especially like the words.. Which now that I think of it might make a good short story. Like the one I did based on the mountain song, "Long Black Veil"...which by the way you can read in the anthology, Weirdly 3, if you have a mind to. Anyway the song is an old Irish ballad from the 18th Century called The Minstrel Boy and here are the words ... Makes you want to go out and fight for a lost cause. Which as Rhett Butler said to Scarlet, are "the only ones worth fighting for." THE MINSTREL BOY by Thomas Moore The Minstrel Boy to the war is gone In the ranks of death you will find him; His father's sword he hath girded on, And his wild harp slung behind him;" Land of Song!" said the warrior bard, "Tho' all the world betrays thee, One sword, at least, thy rights shall guard, One faithful harp shall praise thee!" The Minstrel fell! But the foeman's chain Could not bring that proud soul under; The harp he lov'd ne'er spoke again, For he tore its chords asunder; And said "No chains shall sully thee, Thou soul of love and brav'ry! Thy songs were made for the pure and free, They shall never sound in slavery!"

A "night at the opera" ... Not really, but better!

We decided on going to see a band last night that a lot of people had been describing as, "must see," on the Cape... And they were right! The group is called Sarah Swain & The Oh Boys and they play a hard driving mix of country, blues and rock-a-billy. We saw them at a packed house at Harvest Wine Bar and the energy couldn't have been higher. In fact after a few pints of some very nice Cape Cod Oatmeal Stout even your humble narrator got onto the dance floor (also very packed!) And at the break I spent some time with Sarah and found her to be not only very genuine but very sweet... An unusual combination for one who delivers hard pounding music in a gritty rock style. She told me that almost everything they do are her original compositions and though I was told that they do an occasional cover, I didn't notice any last night .. (Although that could have also had something to do with the Oatmeal Stout) So if you have a chance to see to see them I urge you to do so... Even at their standing room only venues ... It will be worth it!

PARIS TRIP BLOG Paris Day 1 … Nous partons (just barely!) et nous arrivons … Finally Arrived at the airport in plenty of time. Got through security with no problem. Flight on time and begins boarding, when... A bored French accent requests our presence at the Air France desk where they tell us. "Quelle domage madam et Monsieur, we have overbooked and so even though you bought your tickets back in freakin' October... We've gotta bump someone and since you have no air miles with us.. Guess what?... You're it!" And so... After much "discussion" we did make it on to the flight.. (And at an upgrade no less... Long story..) and 6 hours later we were in 'La Belle' France. And shortly there after we were wandering the cobblestone streets of the City of Lights. And I'm pleased to report that despite my long absence, les femes Parisian' are still tres chic and very, very thin. They are also pale and wear a perpetual expression of anger, depression and despair. However they do have a reason... But that's a story for ...Day 2 'Till then... Au revoir mes ami... Paris -Day 2… So just why are the French so thin, attractive and so unhappy about it? Well me and B didn't take long to discover the thin part... They friggin' walk about a hundred times more than us fat-ass Americans do! For instance, me and 'ma chere femme' thought we were doing good at home with our 2-3 miles a day. Ha! Since we've been in La Belle France we've been averaging 10 miles per day! And that's small freaking change to the French. They also ride bikes everywhere and move tres vite all the frickin' time. And that's why they are rail thin even though their diet and habits would kill one of us Americans inside of a month. I mean not only do they pig out on cheese, fabulous French bread, every kind of heart stopping organ meat you can imagine, and enough chain smoking ciggy's to croak a whole herd of elephants, they all seem to survive just fine. And since we've been immersing ourselves in the Gallic way we've found that one of the immediate benefits is that you can stop every 3-4 miles or so for bread, cheese, wine and beer and walk that sucker off toot freakin' suite! The other thing that we find tres interesant is that we hot blooded New Englanders are walking around in short sleeved shirts while the French are bundled up in leather coats, fur boots and the ever-present scarfs. And here's one that Barb noticed... The men are all dressed in high fashion and "wearing the colors the woman don't". Although from this old Troglodyte's perspective the woman still look good ... damn good! And then there are "clueless Gendarmes, surly shopkeepers, fantastic food, incredible wine, lines at the Louve", a war historian's dream at Les Invalides and finally ... who the freak could get lost on the way to the Eiffel Tower! Well we did! More to come as L'adventure continues... Paris... Day 3 .. In search of Napoleon, Quasimodo and a cheap beer. Found Notre Dame just fine... It's smack dab in the middle of the Seine River so pretty hard to miss. The flying buttresses and stained glass were tres magnifique but alas, no trace of Quasimodo the fabled bell ringing hunchback ... C'est la Vie On the other hand we did locate Napoleon which again wasn't hard since he's been dead for close to 200 years and ain't going anywhere since he's being held down by several tons of red granite... Which by the way is very impressive despite the fact that it looks a lot like a giant red Lego. It was actually one of my favorites as the whole place (Les Invalides) is chock full of weapons from all eras. Starting with the Greeks and Romans and right down to WWll . In fact I liked it about a hundred times more than the Louvre... Which I think in French means "la tres hot, overcrowded, less than fragrant place of long lines and longer waits.. " Here's a tip.. Order tickets through your hotel and you can avoid at least half of the wait. Here's another tip. Spring for the translated headphones (which alas we did not) and don't ever expect to learn anything from the hundreds of civil servants sitting around in every room presumably to answer questions. Problem is ... They don't! I tried all three languages in which I have a smattering. English, French and German. Nothing. The best I got was in response to, "where is the bathroom and the exit?" which elicited a Gallic grunt and a vague wave to somewhere possibly across the Seine or perhaps he was telling me to ask Quasimodo.. Which in retrospect couldn't have been any worse. Still we and several thousand other tourists did get to see the Mona Lisa. (I held my camera over my head and then watched it later) The opposite of the "Le Louvre Zoo" was a delightful wine and cheese tour that our son Chris had set up for us. We and another couple from Kentucky (Go Big Blue! ) we're taken down the back alleys and side streets of St. Germaine by a charming, perky young woman where we feasted on wine, cheese and chocolate. Now that was worth waiting for! Still to come... Versailles, Marie Antoinette's pink marble palace (the cost of which probably gave the beleaguered French peasants the notion that all royalty and aristocrats would benefit from a visit to Madam Guillotine) and of course Bistro crawling in Paris Paris... Day 5 ... Open air busses on a beautiful sunny Paris spring day but with no hat or sunscreen .. equals 'la visage rouge'. Or one beet red American tourist! Took one of the Hop-On, Hop-Off open air busses out to the Arc de Triomphe on the Champs Élysées and it was gorgeous but ... I stupidly forgot my hat and sunscreen so was nicely baked by the end of the day, which meant ... Naturalement ... Lots of nice cold beer. So we stopped at one sidewalk cafe.. And then another, and another and .... Well you get the picture. We slowly worked our way up the Seine through the Latin Quarter and back to St. Germaine and thoughts of a fashionably late French dinner. Thus it was in a pleasant haze that we decided to flip the Euro as it were and try a place I spotted on line. We had been batting about .500 on restaurants, which in baseball is good but in the gastro-experience means that you've eaten a lot of bad 'soup d'onion'...And we had. But this little gem of a bistro opposite the Luxembourg Garden was a true find. The quintessential white washed brick, open beams and vaulted ceiling, shelves of wine racks with vintages just begging to be tasted and the smell of garlic and fresh bread. And we did the whole route .. from the escargot soaked in garlic butter to an amazing rack of lamb followed by white chocolate and lime. And of course all washed down by a fantastic 2003 Bordeaux. And then... Et finis... Quelle Domage And as all things must... We must return to our hum drum lives and leave behind the Parisian world of cares, bistros and brasseries. Quaint side streets and beckoning back ally's. And then of course there is the one thing that we will not miss... And let me tell you folks I am most definitely not a PC person who wants to run everyone's life, but Pleeeeze!... What is with the French and the constant chain smoking? Like most of my fellow boomers I did two packs a day in my teens, but in the 40 years since I quite I guess I've become unaccustomed to smoky cafes, 'cause let me tell you, these cafes aren't just smoky... You might wanna consider bringing you own gas mask! Seriously! And just in case you were thinking of asking... No, there is no such thing as a 'non-smoking' section. And if you can't find your waiter to order another glass of Ferme Blanc, it's 'cause he's out back having a smoke! And then there's the metro trip to the airport, where once again Air France had no seat for us! And the flight home with several hundred kids from high school French clubs. But as the French say, that mon amie is a story for une autre jour... And all in all, it was a great trip. Lots of adventures, and isn't that really what its all about? And so as Europe fades into the background... Au revoir La Belle France... jusqu'à ce que nous nous revoyions

From 2/8/13 Update from 'Storm Central'... AKA, 'Coyote Junction'. Well closing in on 18" gang but did that keep yours truly, 'the Worlds Oldest Teenager', from x-country ... Nah. When it got to about 6", just before dark, I strapped on the long back-country Track skis and went out to my ravine trail for some dopey blizzard fun. The wind was really starting to howl but it wasn't bad underneath the trees and just about the time I was thinking, "hey... This is nothing to worry about... " Yup, you got it. I was coming down a narrow trail and tried a very unwise telemark turn and caught the right outside back edge, went off the trail, over a log and into a thicket.. Winding up with my right downhill ski uphill and tangled in briers. So what happened, you may well ask (and you do, don't you?) Well I'm supposed to be a writer. So if this was a suspense tale, I'd tell how... 'As darkness slowly gathered a deep gloom fell turning the white blowing snow into a dirty grey blanket of cold, twisted cotton rags. The steady swish of the wind brushing the tree tops broken only by soft, muffled plops as clumps of snow bent pine limbs and fell from overloaded branches. I tried to free my right foot from the binding but it was no use. I'd fallen at an oblique angle and couldn't reach the release catch, not even with my pole. Too late I remembered my wife asking me to bring my cell phone. Just another in the long list of good advice I didn't take. It was then I noticed the first pair of yellow-red eyes watching me from the other side of the thicket. A raccoon? Some wandering pooch looking for a warm fire and a bowl of Puppy Chow? Not bloody likely. And now the eyes at the edge of the thicket had been joined by a second pair and as I watched, a third. And then another. A pack. Coyotes. At least I had my emergency Deer Derringer. A single shot heavy but compact pistol used by hunters to give a wounded quarry the coup de grace. It could be loaded with either a single .45 caliber slug or a .410 shotgun shell. I favored the .410. It had a nice spread and would give the pack something to think about. I heard a low growl followed by a rustling in the bushes. I felt the comforting weight of the pistol next to my chest and turned my head to the left where I could see the eyes moving, edging closer, getting ready for a rush. Time to brush 'em back. I unzipped the inside pocket and wrapped my cold fingers around the butt. I sensed rather than saw one approaching me from behind. I leaned around, cocked the hammer and fired. Click. The hammer fell on an empty shell. With a sick feeling I remembered that the last time I'd put the gun away I'd left an empty shell in the chamber, for safety sake. Safety - right. The eyes in the darkness moved closer...

Here's an article that I recently did for a magazine that focused on digital publishing and I'd like to hear your ideas on this topic... (Note, due to space constraints the article will be published in 3 parts. Here's Part 1) E-publishing and the Future of Books By Ric Wasley   (Reprinted from the March/April issue of the: IDEAlliance Bulletin)   If we were to take a snapshot of the publishing world and communications, it would reveal that the way in which we communicate ideas is exploding far beyond the ability of any single source to have a monopoly or even a handle on it. It is a classic case of what you know is out of date in the moment that you know it.   This is true in every form of communication, from casual to the most structured, and anyone who does not accept and understand this new reality ignores it at his own peril. Nowhere are those changes more profound than in the way we disseminate the written word.   The tide of change in written communications is sweeping away the old ways in a print media revolution the likes of which the world has not seen since Gutenberg invented his press more than 500 years ago. Despite all of the advances in printing, production, photography, distribution and sales over the last half-millennium, the fundamental base of the technology has remained the same: printing a word or image in ink on a piece of paper. All this has changed so quickly that many of those who have shaped the information we see and the way in which we access it still have not quite grasped how profound this change truly is.   Let’s take an example of how a typical citizen of the world has received his information over the past 572 years since Johannes Gutenberg made it possible for the average person to own books. (Before that time, books had to be hand-copied and thus far beyond the reach of the masses.) With the advent of printing, books became affordable and the ideas they contained went from being the sole province of the rich and powerful to anyone who had the price of a day’s wages. Newspapers and periodicals made news and ideas from other places available to the general population, which gradually transformed society and gave rise to the Industrial Revolution and the Age of Enlightenment.   Over the next 500 years, the dissemination of the printed word got faster, better and cheaper but didn’t fundamentally change until… Enter the Internet, World Wide Web, laptop computers, smart phones, tablets and e-readers—all within the past 10 years!   On the one hand, publishers and print media can’t be blamed for being tardy in recognizing this basic change and being slow to adapt. But as with many shifts in the past, the users of the technology have embraced it quicker than much of the media that purports to serve them. Yes, it is seldom easy or pleasant to give up the position of power and influence that those who have controlled what information the populace has had access to have enjoyed since the 15th century. And it is only within the past year or so that books, magazines and newspapers have begun to realize that they have lost their ability to remain the gatekeepers of information.   The genie is out of the bottle and it can never be put back in.   What has caused this amazing revolution?   Digital Publishing !   (... to be continued)   Check back next week for Part Two of this topic and by all means, please feel free to weigh in with you own thoughts and comments R.S.W.