Your friend gets into voodoo. She says it's grey magic... but that doesn't do much for you when you visit and see chickens hanging from the rafters along with a lot of dried herbs. You really get suspicious when you catch her pulling stray hair from your brush and picking the garbage for your nail clippings. Suddenly her idea for a girl's night isn't just about hair styles and bra freezing.

Luckily... you've got a few tricks up your sleeves... Genie in a Can!

The Genie in a Bottle was too expensive but Genie in a Can promises to protect you from any murky magic of the un-white kind.

Unfortunately the Genie is both temperamental and bumbling. He turns your friend into a toad and considers that his job done. So now you've got a toad for a friend. What do you do with her?

Blog Talkers: My imaginary life.

I have several imaginary lives. I daydream about them often when I have time to just think about nothing much. Most often I'm attending some glamourous function with Keanu Reeves or some other tall, dark and interesting creature. I design my own gown for these events. That's even more fun than thinking about Keanu.

If I have time still after the gown is designed I make a whole scenario. Sometimes there are children and sometimes there are babysitters or no children at all. I'm not a crazy stalker but I have read and heard a few things about Keanu. Having it all based on some reality is more interesting than just a talking to myself kind of daydream, imaginary life.

Keanu is sweet, romantic, a great kisser (not one of those loose lipped slobbery types). He enjoys conversation as well as holding hands, stroking my back and brushing my hair. He also likes going places: the bookstore, the local festival/ event, spontaneous road trips, flea markets, the bedroom. Sometimes we travel on his motorbike. Sometimes we just walk around.

In all of these adventures I am slim and my hair is not at all frizzy. It's so nice to have imaginary great hair along with the imaginary great size 10 or whatever it is.

Not that Keanu is essential in all of my imaginary lives. He just seems to suit me, the version of him I have created: the romantic musician and hockey playing biker dude. A nice guy but not stupidly nice, a little bad boy makes it all more interesting. Just as I only seem nice, inside I am deviously taking over the world, all polite and unsuspected.

You've just been hired to write greeting cards. They expect you to come up with at least 10 good ideas and one great idea each day. Not easy. But, if you can come up with some unique or modern events and situations that might help.

What kind of greeting card could you come up with for a divorce? What about a third marriage? How about a greeting card for a couple who have just adopted a child, not a baby? There are a lot of situations not covered by the standard display of greeting cards. Write 10, and then one more. Pick your best, send it in to a greeting card company and get paid for your writing doodle.

For the Thursday Thirteen: 13 Things I Like

1. Reading science fiction and the odd paranormal romance. Also reading fiction about web publishing and related topics.

2. Taking photos of abandoned farm houses or old buildings in general, the more fancy stone, iron and wood work the more I like them.

3. The way my hair looks when I brush it after a shampoo. It doesn't look all that great if I get lazy and don't brush it. Sadly, I get hair lazy quite often.

4. Having someone (preferably male) even sort of ask me out. Even sort of being asked out is nicer than the usual day of not being noticed and feeling like a big nobody.

5. Finding something really interesting and new (to me) in an area of arts. Especially if it is something I can do myself or find a way to adapt and do myself. DIY is great.

6. Being a grrl. Even if I am not into all the fashion and beauty which is like a female law (look at all those guys who want to be grrls, they seem to OD on it or is that really just a stereotype?) I am still a woman and I wouldn't want to be a guy.

7. Rocks. I'm not sure what causes my fascination with stone, rocks, polished pebbles, etc but I can not see a photo of rocks and not stop and look. I have rocks collected which are somewhere around here in all the clutter.

8. I like not having a routine. Or, as little routine as I can get away with not having. I don't like words like duty. My Grandmother loved words like that. She thought I was crazy, literally, not as a joke in any way.

9. Coffee when it's lovely and smooth and not sweet. French vanilla and caramel lattes are really good. Gingerbread used to be good but was kind of yucky over the holidays this year. I think they tried to make it fit what they thought people wanted instead of just sticking with a good thing when they had it.

10. My eyes. Or would that be my eyeballs since you can't really have one without the other. But I like my eyelids too, they fit nicely around my eyeballs and keep them from falling out. My eyes are blue. But not literally, I'm not a space alien.

11. I like holidays when we get paid to not go to work. But I like them for the spirit of being something special we can look forward to each year. It is kind of weird to think that the holidays will still be there, every year, even long after I'm not still here. Not that I'm making plans to not be here. I just didn't get any guarantee otherwise.

12. I like blogging. Real personal blogging where it is just here for me to experiment with. I like that people read it and give opinions and feedback and ideas. Thank you to everyone who does read this and extra thanks for comments. I read them all and I do make some effort to visit in return and leave a comment so you know I was there. I'm not always successful at returning visits and I feel crushing (well not crushing entirely) guilt over it.

13. Dragons. I'm a wood dragon by Chinese astrology. It is the only "fantasy" (meaning fantastic and likely overly blown ego) creature in the zodiac. Kind of nice to be unique (among the masses of dragons) in some way. I don't let it go to my head. Sure I don't.

Blog Talkers: What book is on your nightstand now? Tell us about it, post a blurb. If you're reading it, do you like it? If you haven't started, what are your expectations? Would you recommend it to a good friend? What type of stories do you like to read the most often? Why?

I'm reading the last in the The Circle trilogy by Nora Roberts, her vampire paranormal fiction try. The writing is ok but I find her books kind of drag on and then have a few good spots, just enough to keep you going to the end. But, overall I wouldn't add her as one of my favourites.

I don't keep books on my nightstand. I always have the book I'm reading crammed into my purse for any moment I manage to get away for a coffee after work and before catching the bus for home/ work.

My favourite reading is something science fiction. I really like stories about the end of the world/ civilization and how people manage to regroup and survive a huge change to their lifestyle and the planet itself. I read one (which I can't remember the title or author now) about having a biochemical in the air which caused all oil based products, like plastic, gas, etc, to break down and dissolve. That made an interesting story, had a huge impact on everyday life and the planet too.

I also read paranormal fiction. Also known as the vampire stuff. I resisted all the vampire stuff for a few years as it become more and more popular. I finally started reading it cause the writers I like were writing it. I still am not a vampire groupie but I like the aspect of it being another culture, underground and yet existing with the everyday. I think the book I have most liked lately as just a story idea was Neil Gaiman's Neverwhere. It was also an underground culture, existing on the fringes of our own. Mainly I like anything written well, not violent and gross, which is about something really creative which show a change in the day to day existence, an option not considered in the everyday normal stuff.