I realize this past full moon was no blue moon. How could it be? It occurred on November the sixth. It’s mathematically impossible to be a blue moon. It’s astronomically impossible.

Most full moons–blue moons included–are cause for angst. For me anyway. I dread them. I really do, in a mild, casual sort of way. Experience has taught me that full moons, more often than not, bring with them more than night shadows and starless skies. They generally bring me higher blood pressure and sometimes a bruise or two from furniture jumping in my path at the most inopportune times. There are goblins and spooks in those shadows. Pranksters for sure. I’m telling you, there are. Full moons make things happen. Most of those happenings are of the unpleasant variety. I could go on and on about my bloodied, nerve-wracked bouts with full moons, but that’s not why I’m writing this post. Not this time anyway.

I’m writing about the fact that this past full moon was a blue moon of sorts. It was one of those rare occasions when the stars align themselves to my unexpected pleasure. This time, there was a distinct lack of furniture jumping in front of my shins, and the blood pressuring through my veins was surely a meander. For once, there was no struggle between imagination and actual occurrence. My focus was harnessed in fact. The coffee table sat perfectly still. Even my heartbeat was steady, harmonious and rhythmic. Pleasant things occurred. This time, they did.

First, out of the blue–pardon me for overusing that word, but I couldn’t help myself–I got a call from my marketing person with the publisher. She imparted no startling piece of news really. She just wanted to ask how I was doing and pass along the comment that she uses Wandering West as an example for would-be authors to follow. I’m not sure what the significance is to that, but you must admit, it’s a rather kind thing to say. Especially to an author who mopes around waiting for kindly spoken comments about his book. Then, not long after I set my smartphone on my desk–without its giving even one hint of leaping to the hard, unforgiving, tile floor–I got an email from Writer’s Digest. I had long since forgotten that I had sent the publication a copy of Wandering West for a review. It so happens that Wandering West was critiqued in glowing terms. I mean, they rated it a 5 in every writing category (5 being the best on a scale of 1 to 5). The only blemish received was the publisher’s cover design which measured in at a 4. Not too shabby. I thought about pasting those comments for you here, but in some ways, it explains too much of the story for those of you who have been dilatory in picking up a copy of my book. Incidentally, you can do that right here on my website, as soon as you finish reading this post. Oh and shipping is free for the next few days with code HSQ2. Talk about blue moons. I wonder if that’s the publisher’s way of apologizing for Writer’s Digest’s sticking my cover design with a 4. I need to see if I can leverage that somehow. And speaking of picking up copies of Wandering West, I moseyed on over to my account on the publisher’s website and, to my great pleasure, discovered that I had sold more books in the past few days than I had in the entire previous month.

So, all in all, November’s full moon was not so bad an occurrence. Once in a blue moon, the full ones are like that.