Home Articles posted by Erin Zarro (Page 7)

Revisiting House, M.D.

I have always loved this show, and I was devastated when it ended in 2012. For those of you who aren’t familiar with it, House was a medical show. What set it apart from other medical shows was the main character, Gregory House, who was a brilliant diagnostician who took on all of the medical mystery cases. Cases no one else could solve. While trying to diagnose his patients, he frequently used unorthodox means, which usually led to clashes between him and his team and also the Dean of Medicine. Apparently Sherlock Holmes was the inspiration for House. Also, he’s a jackass. He really is. He’s blunt, sometimes cruel, and likes to play mind games with people. He frequently refused to actually talk/treat his patients directly. He’d send one of his team to do it. He had a three-person team of doctors. But he always ended up solving the case and saving the patients’ lives. Part of the brilliance of the show was the interpersonal relationships—how the doctors related to one another and how House related to them. There were a few romances, too, which made things interesting. But man, those medical illnesses (beware! Wikipedia link!) were sometimes crazy. I believe they were all real, too. Here’s a link to the Wikipedia page on the show itself. Beware, you might lose hours there. You’ve been warned. The other thing is House’s addiction to Vicodin. He had some type of injury to his leg and uses a cane to walk and…

Continue reading

The Photograph

a free horror short story by Erin Zarro The strange picture hung in the hallway near my bedroom, cloaked in shadows. It was a picture of a woman who wore a black dress. A black veil covered her face completely, obscuring her facial features. I’d grown up in this house, and the picture had been there for as long as I could remember. Unfortunately, the only way to my bedroom was past that picture. Every time I passed by her, goosebumps raised on my arms, the hairs at the back of my neck stood up, and I’d get this painful twisting in my stomach. It lasted only seconds, but it was enough. My brother and I were walking home from school one day. The air was crisp with the feel of approaching autumn. Leaves had started to turn color. My heart was heavy, because at school I had friends. At home, not so much. “I’m gonna tell Mom and Dad that you broke Mom’s vase,” my little brother, Evan, said in a sing-song voice. “They’ll believe me. They always do.” It was freaking inevitable, so I didn’t bother arguing. “Whatever.” Evan stopped dead on the sidewalk, an expression of disbelief on his face. “Something’s wrong with you. You always argue with me. ‘Specially when I lie to Mom and Dad.” I shrugged. “I dunno. They’ll blame me anyway, so what’s the point?” Evan started walking again, and I followed. Yep, that was the ritual. Evan blamed me for something I…

Continue reading

The End of the Great Surgery Adventure of 2019

So I saw my foot doctor this morning. She asked me some questions, then told me I was “all set.” My mom jumped in before I could really process it. She asked if I still needed to wear my orthotic (my “cyborg leg,” lol) that I’ve been wearing for about a month to stabilize my Achilles’ tendon so it heals better/faster. She said yes, until I am one hundred percent pain free, then I need to wean out of it. I’m done, unless there’s anything that comes up. It feels a bit surreal to be done. I’ve been seeing her since Dec. 21st. I’ve been dealing with this foot issue since maybe last September, which puts us at just under a year. (That’s an estimation because I don’t actually remember the exact onset of the pain). I’ve been working upstairs in our kitchen at least since December. My plan is to get down there ASAP but it needs to be cleaned and organized badly. I might just start working there anyway—I miss my solitude. It’s been rough working in a different space long term. I am truly a creature of habit and need stability in my routine. It’s hard to believe that on March 1st —five months ago—I had surgery and wasn’t able to walk for a month. In that time, I’d been cleared to walk (March 29th—two days after my birthday…it was the best birthday present ever!), had physical therapy for almost three months, and have been in an…

Continue reading

Everything old is new again

Those of you who are very observant probably noticed that this blog wasn’t posted yesterday like it was supposed to be. My bad. I need to put this on my calendar or something because I apparently can’t remember crap. Grump. But in cheerier news, I finally, finally, finally started the rewrite of Survivor, my psychological horror novel from 2004. It started its life as a carelessly written idea in a file I tucked away somewhere on my hard drive. When I decided to take a class on novel writing, and one of the requirements was a completely new idea, I happened to find it by accident. I worked on it literally for years, sometimes setting it aside for another book, but always came back to it. It fascinated and haunted me. In 2009, I finished the first draft. It was 225,000 words, too damn long but that was okay because I was quickly becoming the queen of the machete. I told myself for TEN FREAKING YEARS that I’d get to it, I’d get to it, but something was always getting in the way—important stuff, but stuff nonetheless. So when I found myself with a bit of room in my schedule and a writing challenge for this month, I said, “I wonder if I could finally do this. I’ve waited long enough.” So I did. In the beginning, it felt so wrong, because I remembered what the original was like. Even though 2004!Erin sucked as a writer, it still felt firmly…

Continue reading

Face Everything and Rise

This is my new motto. The idea behind it is that F.E.A.R. can be an acronym — Forget Everything and Run or Face Everything and Rise. And I need that so much right now. Recently I started having these weird, head-in-a-vise kinds of headaches. They are mostly in the back of my head, but sometimes I’ll get pain on the sides just behind my ear. It is mostly on the left side (which is my TN side), but once in a great while the pain will migrate to the right. They also tend to flare up the TN which makes it a double whammy of pain. At first I thought it was the trigeminal neuralgia, but the trigeminal nerve doesn’t go to those places. The occipital nerves do, though. But according to my research, there would need to be some sort of damage, so I don’t think that’s it. These headaches can at times be worse than migraines. There’s the feeling of major pressure, and I find it difficult to concentrate. Maybe it’s from having migraines for years (since I was eighteen), but it’s difficult but not impossible to work with a migraine (I once worked with one that lasted six days. I actually wonder now if it was a TN attack and I just didn’t know it). So it’s affecting my work, my sleep…everything. And I’m in constant fear of the next onslaught. While at the neurologist on Wednesday, I told her about the headaches and she believes it…

Continue reading

Thank God for Physical Therapy

Well, of course it’s a Godsend after having foot surgery. I’m getting my mobility back, one step at time. But did you know that PT is really good for writerly brainstorming? We do mostly the same things every time—strength building, weight bearing, massage. At the end, I get “stim and cold pack” which just means using a TENS unit to give me electrical pulses and putting an ice pack on my foot. So there’s about fifteen minutes where I’m literally doing nothing but thinking. Or resting. Or zoning. Sleeping, no. Not yet, anyway. <grin> So I hit a wall in The Vanishing, my work in progress. Reaper Girl #3. Due in August. (No pressure.) I couldn’t figure out how to get from one place in the plot to another. Everything I thought about felt lame and too easy and contrived. I’d last left Leliel and Rick at their favorite diner, sharing breakfast and discussing the <something spoilery> they found. They needed to discover the next plotty bit. I was tired of not writing (Sunday doesn’t count because Game of Thrones finale) or writing just a few hundred words (deadline) so I started poking my muse and asking her questions. And while I am still a bit shaky on the what, I do have a bonus why. I figured out quite a lot in that short fifteen-minute period. I have literally had no other time to really dig into it. I was planning on doing a freewrite—which I still might do—but…

Continue reading

Sun Touched

a free serial set in the Fey Touched universeby Erin Zarro Part 5 Get caught up: Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 DAY 2 – Continued                 The hallway was strangely quiet as we walk-hobbled. I kept waiting for more rogues to materialize from the shadows, but none did.                 “How do we get out of here?” I asked Ry. There were several doors on both sides of the hallway, but nothing jumped out to me as the way out. It reminded me of an old, creepy castle.                 Ry took a deep, rattling breath. I remembered that tomorrow was day three. If I didn’t heal him…he would die.                 Tomorrow.                 It felt like a sucker punch. I wasn’t even sure I liked him. I wasn’t sure I was going to heal him. But the thought of him dying clearly did something to me. Something I didn’t understand.                 And I didn’t want to think on it too deeply.                 “There’s a door on the left that leads to another hallway. We take that all the way down, turn left, and we’re there.” Ry coughed.                 “Sounds pretty easy,” Tanya murmured.                 “Oh, but it might not be. Not if I have anything to do with it,” a voice said. It was male, and it was coming from in front of us, but no one was there.                 “That’s Andre.” Ry coughed again. “He’s mastered the art of hiding behind illusions. C’mon, Andre, show…

Continue reading

When I’m Not Writing…

I get twitchy. Out of sorts. Ideas feel like they are going to explode out of me if I don’t get them down on the screen. It’s just not pretty. There have been a few times when I stopped writing regularly. Once was after my first ankle surgery, where I didn’t touch the computer for a week. Another, which I’ve talked about at great length, was due to the trigeminal neuralgia attacks and not being able to concentrate. I could write around 100 words a day (and I did, resulting in this) but while it felt good, it also felt like not enough. I need to be able to immerse myself in the world and characters of a story. I need momentum. I depend on it, actually, to keep me moving. I can rack up quite a few words even at 500 words a day if I do it every single day. Let’s talk about the last time I wrote anything regularly. That was the Fireborn revision back in December, which required some rewrites, but not a whole lot. There was my antho story, Of Poison and Promises. The anthology released in March. I’ve also finished my online serial, Sun Touched, and I just need to revise the last installment before posting it on May 1st. I did write a bit on Oubliette, an older novel, but for only two days. And last week, I started book #3 of my Reaper Girl Chronicles, The Vanishing. The muse/right brain/writer brain is…

Continue reading

Still Mostly Brainless

So, the observant people will probably notice that this blog post is up on a Wednesday, not Tuesday like usual. There’s a story in that. So it was one task after another all day Tuesday and into the evening. Six clients’ work. I also posted my own blog post for A Round of Words in 80 Days (ROW80) which I always participate in because it keeps me accountable. I hadn’t posted check-ins except for two, and thought it would be good to at least post the final one for the round. Why this didn’t send up a flag in my head about this blog I’ll never know. It was around 10:30pm and because I need help to use the bathroom, my help wanted me to start so she could go to bed. Fair enough. As I am shutting down for the night, it finally freaking dawned on me. I’d forgotten this blog! But wait, there’s more. Between this and two other incidents, I am convinced that surgery can screw with your mind three weeks later. Please note that I feel fine with the exception of pain. I am also more tired because it’s physically wearing on me to haul this body around on essentially one foot on a scooter. And I have fibro fatigue added to that. I started working four days after my surgery. Say what? I had a lot to do. My clients were great about it, but I’m apparently insane. So I have a vivid memory of…

Continue reading

Surgery Prep Central and the Insanity of Trying to Do All The Things

Yep, so in case you haven’t heard, I’m having surgery on my screwed up right foot next Friday. When I was first notified by my foot doc’s boarding department of the date, it felt like forever. Now, it feels too soon. I have an impressive to-do list. I took on extra work for my VA clients because I wanted my first week of recovery to be easier. Which means…I have lots more work to do than usual. Like, I have two newsletters to put together before my surgery. One for a client, which I am totally okay with as I was the one to suggest it, and one for myself because I was an idiot and signed up to do a promo the day after my surgery. So that needs doing. My mom and sister have been AMAZING. I decided that I should have frozen meals to get me through that first week (and possibly beyond). The original plan was the three of us were to make the meals. Except…I got bogged down in work so sister and my mom took over. And did they ever! Holy crap, it the past I don’t know, five days or so, they’ve made 4 or 5 meals already! So that’s been happening. I also need to pick up my scooter once the medical supply place calls. I know the surgery is scheduled for 7:30am but I am assuming they will want me there earlier. I’ll have a pain ball, and as I’ve never…

Continue reading