Cystic fibrosis is a genetic disease often diagnosed in childhood, usually before a child's first birthday. It affects the respiratory and digestive systems and is caused by secretory glands that don't function properly. Thick, sticky mucus blocks airways, causing bacteria to multiply. This often leads to lung infections that worsen over time. Current treatment options enable sufferers to live longer than ever before while researchers continue looking for a cure.
There are numerous websites with more information, including http://cysticfibrosis.com/, http://mayoclinic.com/, and http://nhlbi.nih.gov/.
Collect your money in the Giftigami Box and donate it to the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation. Visit their website at http://cff.org/.
St. Patrick's Day is coming up and I'm going to make a Giftigami Box with a shamrock theme. I'm also going to introduce a charity to support!
The official release date of The Haunting was today, and what a day it was! We got a sprinkling of snow--something we're not used to seeing around here! It made the day feel special and marks a new beginning, for the time to send out press releases has arrived...
I finished Mazie a few weeks ago, but I'm just now getting around to posting her picture! Chuck said she needed a bow on top of her head... She's described in The Haunting as follows:
"The large oversized teddy bear, almost as tall as {Angela}, was a special gift that Lita had made for her out of white heavyweight yarn. It had jointed arms and legs and a friendly face with black bead eyes, a black pompon nose on its snout, and a smiling pink mouth. A huge pink heart, frilly, quilted, and buttoned, was attached to its round belly, and a silky pink ribbon was fastened under its head."
A few years ago, a New York Times article was written about my brother's "haunted" house. You can read it on this website: http://www.ghastlyghosthunter.com/28GHOST21.pdf. There are similarities to real events in his home in The Haunting. For example, the previous owner of Harry's house died there. In The Haunting, the previous owners of the Casas-Treski home had a young daughter who died (in the hospital). The newspaper article stated that "police cadaver dogs have detected human remains (in a section of the back yard), perhaps from an old cemetery that may go back to the property's plantation origins." In The Haunting, the subdivision where the main character lived had once been home to a children's orphanage and "rumors spread of curious sightings and sounds in the area, mostly of young children at play and distant church bells ringing."
I wanted to post another picture of a Giftigami Box decorated with Valentine's Day stickers before the end of the day. If you don't want to put money in it, you can write down things you did to help other people (for example, family members, neighbors, and friends) on strips of paper and slip them in the box.
In a blog posted last July, I wrote that The Haunting is a fictional story with parallels to real life experiences. The book is about the possibility of ghosts. Its original title was Ebram's Story to focus on the main character and not the haunting of his house.
Last night I received a phone call from my brother, a Houston police officer who lives with his wife and kids in what was once a real haunted house in Cypress, TX and partly inspired my book. My Catholic faith teaches that ghosts aren't real but Satan and his demons are, and I tried to avoid controversy over this in my book. More about this later...
