Yes, another spotlight! [I know, it’s agony for those of us who won’t be there, isn’t it? At least it’s something to aspire to in the future? Who’s to say? Maybe AAD will be in one of your backyards one year!] Today we have BA Tortuga visiting with us! A very nice post – and I hope a new author to many of you. Because who doesn’t like discovering a new author, I ask you?

Traveling, Mountains, Yoga and Inspiration

It’s been a crazy winter here at the house. Julia and I are saying goodbye to our redhead, sending him off to China to live his dreams. We’re planning on downsizing from the big house into a little condo, so we can save some money to buy our dream house in the Rockies. We’re also participating in a huge yoga challenge, which has been tough, doing yoga 6 days a week, but also incredibly satisfying.

In the middle of all of it, we went to Colorado for a week – mainly to house hunt, but also to see what I thought of the cold, the snow.

I also got to snowmobile, get into a hot springs pool while it was snowing, and take my daddy to Vail. I had an amazing cup of coffee in Aspen, flirted with a hot little waitress in Carbondale, and ate a lot of oatmeal. 😀

It was amazing, and while I was there Julia and I spent a long time talking about inspiration.

You see, right before we left, we were chatting after yoga class with our fellow yogis (and let me tell you, there’s something a little hysterical about this inked, pink-haired Texas girl calling herself a yogi O.o) and someone asked me where I got my inspiration.

My answer was *very* The Thirteenth Warrior. “I listen.”

In Colorado, though, I realized that was the very simple answer.

I listen.

I travel.

I go to rodeos and goddess workshops and yoga classes. I take weird clay classes and snowmobiling trips and white water rafting trips. I make friends online and at cafes. I visit yarn shops and coffee shops and weird little antique stores. I spend time riding horses down at Daddy’s ranch, play with any one of the 33 nieces and nephews (and one grandnephew, OMG) I have. I drive to Galveston. I drive to East Texas and look at the trees.

How can I not write with so much amazing life out there to explore?

I think, if someone asks me again, I’d have to tell them, instead of “I listen.”

I live.

😀

BA Tortuga
Because Sometimes Fistfights Are Foreplay

Bio: I enjoy indulging in the shallow side of life, with hobbies that include collecting margarita recipes, hot tub dips, and ogling hot guys at the beach. A connoisseur of the perverse and esoteric, my days are spent among dusty tomes of ancient knowledge, or, conversely, surfing porn sites in the name of research. Mixing the natural born southern propensity for sarcasm and the environmental western straight-shooting sensibility, I do my damnedest to produce mainstream fiction, literary erotica, and fine works of pure, unadulterated smut.

With characters ranging from supernatural demons to modern-day cowboys, alternative illustrated men to Victorian dandies, the addiction to history and atmosphere is everpresent, and laced through with sensual pleasure. my latest projects include werewolves, rodeo cowboys, and fistfighting rednecks. Please sign up for my newsletter for monthly goodies at www.batortuga.com

Ms. Tortuga is also very generously offering a giveaway. What’s this prize, you ask? A $25 Torquere Press Gift Certificate. That’s right. Twenty-five smackeroos! That’s enough for books! So I’m curious. If you’re a writer, where do you get your inspiration? If you’re not a writer [like me!] – do you have any sort of life mantra?

Or – less “zen” – do you like to travel? Where was your most recent destination? Alternatively, do you have any travel stories to share with us?