First, I want to thank you, Susan, for your wonderful words of encouragement in your comment to me.  I got so excited and inspired that I immediately burned the breakfast toast.  And not just a little!  Huge stinking grey clouds were swirling around before I even noticed, and when I opened up the toaster oven, fire spurted out.  I had to open a window and turn on a fan.  But if this is what it takes to get me started on my writing, then it's a good thing.  I've gotten out my Writers' Market manual, a huge tome, and have begun to check off publishers that might be interested in my novels.  I guess the first step is to go to their websites and see what they require for submission. 

Then on to the doctor appointment that was set up for me...there to find out that all infection is gone from me, and I had my ears flushed out, too.  That produced a terrible headache later in the day, after the water finally cleared out, that I tried to soothe with a heating pad.  That only made the pain worse, so next I tried a bag of frozen peas, wrapped in a towel, placed against the worst of the pain, and that worked very well.  In five minutes, the pain was going, going, gone! 

It is supposed to be very cold for the rest of this week, with temps not bothering to get above the zero degree mark, and I plan to spend the rest of this week at home, just enjoying the beauty of the cold, and keeping things from freezing up.  I went to the library yesterday after the doctor visit and got another bunch of books to read.  My interests seem to be taking me into study of the forests of the world.  As if I don't have enough books to keep me occupied for years! 

Then on I went to St. Joe's Thrift Shop, where I donated a beer box full of personal care items, like baby powder, hydrogen peroxide, rubbing alcohol, unused new hair curlers, etc. that are extras here and not needed.  The old ladies in charge there, after first nearly tripping me as I carried the box to their table and guffawing loudly about it, went through the box immediately, making ribald comments on everything they took out to examine.  I keep forgetting, I am an old lady, too. 

But that reminds me, the doctor I saw, one of the nicest people I've met lately, looked at me and said that he could tell that I and my daughter were very close, and very supportive of each other.  I said, in fact, she is my best friend.  He said he could tell by looking at me that this was so.  That warmed my heart to hear it.  He talked about how his wife and daughter were like that, too.