Top Ten Ways to Know You're Married to an 'Alley Cat'

This is certainly an oldie, but after a week away with my man, I am trying to get back into the writing groove so I thought I would share this fun perspective. I will also be guest posting on a couple of blogs this week so check it out at Seekerville Wednesday and Robin E. Mason's website Thursday!

Hope you have a great Memorial Day and remember all those real-life heroes who died so we might be free!


--Angie



First time ever...we are letting an Alley Cat Spouse post, I think....Hmmm...will it be the last? This is my husband, Cody. Enjoy! 

-Angie Dicken

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I don’t know much about Twitter, and even less about blogs. But one thing I do know, is that the number of ‘followers’ you have is a precious statistic in either of these virtual worlds. It’s the barometer of how solid your content it; how much impact you are making in near infinite battleground of the blogosphere.

One day this week my oldest son was telling me some things he learned about his Mom’s blog, “The Writer’s Alley”. He told me they had 650,000 followers. 650,000?!? No way. I’m proud of the 19 I’ve got on Twitter. And Garth Brooks only has 21,000 followers.  

So we were together in the pickup and I thought I’d ask how many she actually had. Now I don’t remember the answer, or if I even got one. But somehow I was dumb enough to open my mouth and suggest that I could come up with a post describing the husband’s perspective of an ‘Alley Cat’. So It is my privilege to put pen to paper for the purpose of sharing a fresh and daring perspective in these hallowed halls with my first, and almost certainly only, guest appearance on the “The Writer’s Alley”.

I don’t have very much experience writing blog posts, or really writing anything other than my name on the bottom of a speeding ticket. But I do have an eye for the posting format that hits the ‘sweet spot’. Where you maximize the reader’s interest, while at the same time minimizing the writers need to think and organize.  Yep, I’m going with the tried and true ‘Top Ten’ list.

So without further delay, I present to you the faithful Writer’s Alley followers, all 650,000 of you, the Top Ten Ways to Know You’re Married to an ‘Alley Cat’.

#10: For 45 minutes to an hour a day she clasps her iPhone tightly in her hand texting away with her ‘Crit Partner’, grinning from ear to ear, continuously giggling, and periodically snorting.

#9: It doesn’t matter where your favorite college football team is playing, how good the fishing report is, or if your job calls you on a business trip. The third weekend in September she will be out of town to the ACFW conference and you better just be ready to spend the weekend babysitting, buddy.

#8: At least once a year, and possibly twice, you will be asked to provide ‘tech support’ to ensure that the house’s WiFi is fully functional and that the latest version of Skype is installed to facilitate a 4-hour virtual laugh-fest that just really gets going around 10:30PM when the Australian girl is good and awake.

#7: Your favorite NFL team will most certainly be playing NBC’s Sunday Night Football each and every time it is her turn to post the Monday morning blog. You know this because you will miss the third quarter, and the most important play of the game, while you proofread her post for her.

#6: When you see her working away on her latest entry for the ‘Genesis Competition’, you know to keep your head down or else you will be summoned to read the chapter she is working on…for the fourth time.

#5: If you you’ve ever been to Kinko’s twice in one day to print the same 300 page manuscript…because the page numbers were 1/32nd of an inch too far to the right.

#4:  You have come to expect that when you are on a long car trip she will ask you if she can read just a few pages to you.

#3:  You have come to accept that when she asks you if she can read just a few pages to you, she really means just a few chapters.

#2: Your conversations at home include the characters in her stories so often that you start to think they are real people. And you actually start to miss them a little bit when she moves on to the next book.

#1: If she has been too busy and exhausted coordinating getting four kids through the first week of school, you will be asked to write her post for her on “The Writer’s Alley”.

Have a great day!