A Day Out with Nancy Holzner: The Butterfly Conservatory

Author Nancy Holzner is one of my favorite people. I met Nancy online after reading the first of her Deadtown books and we eventually became friends. She lives in Ithaca, which is about two hours from me, so we manage to get together a few times a year. Yesterday was one of those rare days, and we had a LOVELY time.

Of course, we spent a lot of our time together talking writing--a real treat for me, since I don't have any writer friends here in town. She gave me some great advice on promoting the upcoming novels, and we also just talked about the writing process in general, and caught up on each others lives.

Naturally, we did some of this while eating.

Our waitress at The Farmhouse Restaurant was kind enough to snap this picture of us, post yummy lunch.

Then we headed down the road so I could show Nancy the very cool Butterfly Conservatory in nearby Emmons. We spent a couple of hours walking and talking and looking at all the amazing critters, which despite the name of the place, aren't limited to butterflies. There are also many exotic birds, a few lizards, and even a not all that exotic but very friendly giant white rabbit. (Seriously, I kept expecting him to say, "I'm late! I'm late! For a very important date!")

Here are a few of the highlights:

(Amusingly, one of the people working there--it is a very small operation, with no frills--told us this tortoise was a troublemaker, always eating plants he wasn't supposed to be nibbling on, as you can see in this picture. As soon as I'd snapped it, the worker swooped in and moved him away.)

And as promised, here is our pal the Very Friendly Rabbit.

I often have to remind myself that is is okay (necessary, even) to occasionally take a day off from working on writing, jewelry, running the shop, and all the rest. But fun days like this definitely leave me feeling good and recharge my mental and emotional batteries.

Next month Nancy is going to come back and we're going to the Glimmerglass Opera in Cooperstown to see Madame Butterfly. I detect a theme here...