PeterHogenkampWrites

It is three days to Christmas and time to think about Christmas's past (and greatly embellish them.) So, today, for your reading pleasure, here are some highlights (and lowlights) from the last forty years of Hogenkamp family Christmas celebrations. The year without a Santa Claus (circa 1978): I was ten or so, and I had a hankering for a BB gun you wouldn't believe--unless you are a ten year-old boy. I can still remember the make and model, a Crosman Model 760. I made sure to show my mother the exact gun I wanted at our local sporting goods store, and recollect that she said, 'We'll see,' a sure sign I wasn't getting it. And sure enough, when Christmas morning dawned there was no Crossman 760 under the tree--on the positive side, I did get a pair of Levi's corduroy pants in a mauve color. In protest, I refused to put clothes on, and spent the next three days in my long underwear. (Ok, ok, but I was ten--or twelve maybe, who can remember?) Christmas in ...

Welcome, #MINI fans. Due to the success (remember, success is a relative term) of my #november in #vermont post last month, I have decided to dedicate the 3rd #MINI of every month to a pictorial essay featuring #vermont scenes I have captured on my iPhone, so those of you who don't live in the #greenmountainstate can get a sense of what it is like the whole year round. (And, yes, there are lots of cows.) Just a quick plug before we get started: if you haven't read #theintern, the serialized novel I am writing on #wattpad, I am posting the links below. If you have, note that segment 3 is published and also posted below: The Intern; Chapter 1, The Boy in Room 12 The Intern, Chapter 1, segment 2 The Intern, Chapter 1, segment 3 The ubiquitous red barn   #burdock (also ubiquitous) #merrychristmasCharlieBrown Penguins are native to Vermont A fern in winter blackberries gone by

                                                                 Good evening Post fans. We have--yet another--treat for you; a guest blog written by my brother-in-law, Tim Sayles. But, before you read the post, be aware of three things about Tim. 1) If charisma were worth money, he would be in a higher tax bracket that Bill Gates. 2) He is the best natural born actor I know, which is the reason I always find myself in trouble whenever he's around. (Go ahead and click on the link I have provided to see his award-winning short film ) 3) He brings the thunder. (Don't ask--you are better off not knowing... plausible deniability and all that.) Ok, here's Tim. F...

                                                                      I have been getting a lot of questions lately about where I am in the publishing process right now (Ok, mostly from my mother, but still....) so I thought I would devote the #MINI to an update on my progress. Warning: I am feeling a strong desire for self-deprication, so if your stomach is a little queasy, you may want to skip to the end. (But please leave a comment anyway--good comments only, of course.) > First things first, I do not have a book contract yet, but my ueber-agent, Liz Kracht, and I are working on it. Publishing is a slow business, and patience is not a virtue--it is a necessity. So I am practicing patience and humility (##gggrrrrr!) and Lord knows I need the practice. >In the meantime, I am working on other projec...

Happy Thanksgiving all! I hope you are spending it with friends and family, and that you don't need to unbutton your pants before dessert--because that's bad form. For starters, (in our house, that would be the olive/pickle/cheeseball tray--my late mother-in-law's tradition--and we miss you Nanni!) let me say that I am #thankful for my family. I have been blessed, and there is nothing in this world more important to me. Having said that, let's get to the turkey of today's post: three things for which I never expected to be thankful. Number 1: the broccoli and cheese casserole (borrowed from my sister-in-law, with whom we used to spend Thanksgiving before our kids got too big to travel). I am thankful not to be working today. Who works on Turkey day, you say?  I remember a Thanksgiving about twenty years ago, staring out at the grey and bleak Syracuse skyline from my call room in the top floor of the hospital, thinking about my loved ones back at home as I cha...

Good afternoon #MINI fans. I recently finished Olen Steinhauer's An American Spy , and I'm in the mood to write a book review, but don't worry, this is Thursday and the rules of the #MINI are etched in stone: short and without an excess of verbiage. (Actually, it's more of a guideline than a rule.) The first spy I ever met was James Bond, and all the others I have met since have had to live in his shadow, because James Bond has no equal. That said, spying is a shadowy business and Bond is way too fond of the limelight to be a real spy. (But he has swag, mind you: #SWAG). So, the following generations of fictional spies went to the other extreme. John LeCarre's George Smiley was the perfect foil to Fleming's Bond: quiet and demure whereas Bond was brash; clever, not blunt; subduing his prey with intelligence and guile as opposed to gunplay. Countless other secret agents have been forged in the intervening decades, most splitting the gap between Smiley and Bond....

Fall, Interrupted Ten Shades of Grey #WishIhadmyskis #snowbeard #Rutvegasbaby That's the #MINI for this week, hope you enjoyed it. Make sure you tune in on Sunday, as the Saturday Evening blog Post features the fir st in a series of guest blo gs. Thanks for your support.